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S. C. ▲mocUU Bdltor of TiM Ave MArte UNIVERSITY PRESS NOTRB DAMB, INDIANA PermlMu Supenorum 0ILBERTU8 PRAN9AIS, Bup. 09%. Congr. a a. Cruet. tUbd ObBUt J. B. SCHEIBR. C. 8. C, Cetuor Deputatua, fmptimatur .0,53 ® H. J. ALBRDINO, ^**^<*V 0/ Fort Waynt» OOPVRIOHT, It 14, ■Y A. B. O'NEILL HAMMOND PRCM W. ■ CONKCr COMMNV CHICAOO * TO FATHER ALFRED ROY, C. S. C, A FAITHFUL FRIEND FOB FOBTY YEABS, THIS BOOK IS AFFECTIONATELY Ocdlcattd CONTENTS ESSAT PAGE I. Young Preachers, Careful and Careless 9 II. The Priest as Book Censor 26 III. Sacerdotal Ennui 33 IV. The Methodical Priest and His Opposite 48 V. Daily Meditation 59 VI. A Cleric's Reading 70 VII. The Rubrics of the Mass 82 VIII. The Breviary: Gain and Loss 94 IX. Preaching and Rhetoric 105 X. The Week-Day Mass 116 XL The Priests' Communion League 128 XII. A Priest's Mnemonic Feat 140 XIII. Clerical Health and Exercise 155 XIV. Orthoepy in the Pulpit 170 XV. Health and Holiness in Convents 188 XVI. The Leisure of Clerics and Religious 201 XVII. Clerical Hobbies 211 Appendix Sonnet Sequence: A Priest's Way of the Cross 227 FOREWORD THE contents of this volume have appeared " from time to time during the past two decades in the pages of the Ecclesiastical Review, to the kindly editor of which standard periodical the author's thanks for pennission to reprint are herewith gratefully tendered. The reprinting has seen^ed to be warranted not less by the favorable reception accorded to the essays on their original appearance than by the comparative dearth of English books of just this kind— books written by, for, and about priests. It may be well to state that, in visualizing my prospective reader, I have had in mind, not the cleric of distinction, the exceptionally saintly or scholarly or zealous ecclesiastic, but rather one who, like myself, is merely an ordinary, every- day priest, a sort of clerical counterpart of that familiar lay character, the man in the street. Accordingly, both in the selection of topics and in their treatment, I have aimed at being helpfully interesting by telling such a reader some things which he himself has long known or felt, but which perhaps he has never found anyone to put in words for him, and by suggesting other things which, as soon as his attention is called to them, appeal to his good sense and compel his approval. It remains to be said that if, in such incidental portrait-painting or character-sketching as ap- 8 FOBEWORD pears in these pages, the imperfect cleric is more m evidence than is his exemplary brother, the adequate explanation is that I have followed the counsel of the old-time sage, "Look into thy heart and write." Such looking, it is hoped, has no been unprofitable. If. indeed, the perusal of the essays proves half as helpful to the reader as their composition has been beneficial to the writer the volume will abundanOy justify its publication! The Author. YOUNG PREACHERS, CAREFUL AND CARELESS My best sermon is the one I know the best. — MaasilJon. Manj a wandering discourse one hears in which the preacher aims at nothing and hits it. — Dr. Whately. I have always noticed that the best extemporaneous speeches are those which have been carefully written out beforehand, the manuscript being conveniently within reach in the orator's waist- coat pocket.— J. B. LowjU. HOW long should a young priest continue the practice of writing and memorizing his sermons? The question was recently put to a scholarly Catholic prelate and author, and his unhesitating reply was: "Ten years at least." Had the inquiry been as to the length of time during which the average young priest does con- tinue the practice, it is probable, and regrettable, that the true answer might have been widely different. As a matter of justice and propriety, no other form of public discourse is entitled to so elaborate a preparation as the sermon; as a matter of fact, one is often tempted to believe that for no other is the preparation so inadequate. No extended argument is necessary to convince even the youngest of those who have been elevated to the priestly rank that the ministry which they exercise in preaching the Word of God merits their most profound respect, and calls for the best efforts of their intellects and hearts. It is 10 PRIESTLY PRACTICE and preach thproL w ^ '"*° ***^ ^^ole world Baptiof prrpa?c"d"^ire. '^^Ut t f V^ austere penance and solitude that StlW*"* Charged with /„ rw/T ^t i'riS ':!re':7 Mderations well calculated to impreS „,^i,l perfoming ' "' <=™'™«'«d the obligation o^ in.blThe;U"cherwir''^"''r/"'"-«'^''> ministry, tliey wouM hf f j""'^'' "*« "' h" YOUNG PREACHERS 11 sponsibilities incurred by those who neglect to do what in them lies toward the achievement of those results. It has been well said that in practical importance, the sermon scarcely yields to the sacraments; for, although these latter are the divinely ordained channels of God's grace, it com- monly happens that preaching is the only means by which those who stand most in need of that grace can be brought to the tribunal of penance and to the Holy Table. There is nothing fanciful or exaggerated in the statement that, as often as the priest announces the Wrrd of God to his peo- ple, the interests inv Ived in his discourse, and the results dependent on its force or its feeble- ness, are incomparably greater than those which confront the advocate appealing to a jury on be- half of a fellow-creature's liberty or life. Theo- retically, indeed, it is almost impossible for the preacher to have too lofty a conception of the dignity and importance of his office; practically, however, it is quite possible that in his hands the dignity may be compromised and the importance disregarded,— quite possible that he may come to merit not only the epithets "traitor" and "wretch" with which Quintilian brands the lawyer who fails to do his best for his client, but the terrible an- athema of Holy Writ: Maledictus qui facit opus Dei negligenter.^ Admitting that the genius essential to the for- mation of a pulpit orator of the highest grade is nature' s dower to but very few, and that notable iJerem, xlviii. 10. 12 PRIESTL Y PRACTICE can be .UDDlied L „ "culUes. whose lack •UU .eem"T^„''^vTlid «."^' "' '"^f ">• «here of every man whom rnnT '^''^ *'"' """o™ effeeUve. and*rL''°^e:fr„te"°o; '^ "'''"}: abused term, eloquent ^eth!r^°J. *' "'"'='' «ny given preacher djeriVfM. ^h *»cour.e. of ito opposite w', h.^f J . eharaclerizaUon or on .h?de;^;e'^Ah':r:°urne« iTwhf f h'''"'">' S. Mn^Tu.r * r '" ^- '^Haf'S aon. eM^Ua, a, ,h,r"T "J" «"»*"" P«P«"- acquisilion of an abuLw"".'""'"'' '»• "<=^ »« the leading of an p„^ . ' "°" "^ knowledge, habit of Z^, ZS'7 '""' » '■"'y w«. « purity of intenUon, «d al° tCrV"""' "■"• Ihis proximate preparation nftkT ''Onceming be talcen for granted Oil? «./ f- """'"'• " ""V ough or inade^X^'dX rfl«?fe " " *°" the preacher's ministrv.„!fM ** y*»" of tinue to be thronahn^' 1° '"" '=«"n™onIy con- fulness inftiSeZ' h-' career. Initial care- found that Kniar^' Jf?' ^-^'^ '^J " be YOUNG PREACHERS 13 the young priest prepares his sermons; and the remainder of this essay will be giveu up to a brief discussion of the several methods of prepa- ration that are open to his choice. It may be well to premise that by a "young priest" is meant one whose ordination dates back not further than a decade: and that what follows is based on the supposition of his having, as in the majority of cases he undoubtedly has, ample time to devole to an adequate preparation. The least complex, and one of the least com- mendable, of all methods of making oneself ready for the pulpit is that which consists wholly and solely in an exercise of the memor}', the prepa- ration being restricted to th? simple process of getting by heart the discourse of another. Viewed as a manifestation of altruistic sentiment, such a course is perhapn not absolutely indefensible, and it must further be admitted that those who adopt it follow the letter of at least one portion of St. Paul's advice*— they assuredly do not preach themselves: but even at the risk of sacrificing altruism to egotism, the young preacher vill do well to eschew the practice. Apart from all higher considerations, it would seem that a proper self-respect should be sufficient to deter a clergy- nian from playing in the pulpit the rather ques- tionable rdle of another man's proxy. He be- comes at best o"v' a species of improved phono- graph: and, do what he will, his utterances, like » n Oor. It. 8. M PBIE8TLY PBACTICB ft'*B of the phonographic cylinder will h. mechanicl rather U,an vlvifed « vi^fyi*'" ** like charity in SiT^h^H -^ P"**^'*' speaker. .he pcii.ur^5%reVcrp':;:;,:: z^^i Sorr;„^I-t^ 'he wa7oPac1ur;.S^ fl^meftoST *'"' "'"^'•Sy™''" who adopt, "hi. sptSuv^iy""'"""'"""' '"" «"«'y hope to course- and in 1?? composing a fit dis- avail him^df of^h? '"**^^'^* "^^ **^«* *»e ^^Y quUe fa^e to assort thaTT "' '°°*'"'-' *»"' ^* ^« aie lo assert that, of every tweniy who do YOUNG PREACHERS 15 lo avail themselves, nineteen ai lacking, not in talent, but ict industry. In composition, as in every other art, facility comes with practice, and inability to write is due far more frequently to the non-exertion of mental powers than to their non-existence. That the young priest finds the composition of an original sermon a hard, tedious and irksome task may possibly be his fault, or perhaps only his misfortune; but in either case the difficulty of the work certainly does not ex- empt him from its perfonnance, especially as this difficulty will surely be found to decrease with each successive trial. Aversion to intellectual labor and sustained mental effort is quite intelli- gible to most men, but that it forms a valid reason for neglecting plain duties will hardly be urged by any. If we suppose the preacher to be actuated, in using the discourses of another, by a motive still more ignoble than laziness, if we conceive that he is the slave of vanity and follows this course simply to acquire the fraudulent reputation of being a great preacher, we place him at once be- yond the pale of every worthy man's sympathy or respect. Of all the ridiculous mortals that "play such fantastic tricks before high heaven as make the angels weep," none, we take it, is so thoroughly and contemptibly ludicrous as the clerical jack-daw, strutting about the altar or the pulpit in the borrowed plumage of another man's eloquence. The discourses o( such t jher cannot well be other than nugatory in t icielves 16 PRIESTLY PBACTICB !l and ultimately disaitrout to the speaker; for, while on the one hand it can scarcely be expected that the blessing of God will sanctify the ministry of a plagiarist from vanity, on t jtlier it is more than reasonably certain that soouer or later his plagiarism will be detecter* and his claims to genuine eloquence discredited. "What a grand St ion Father Blank preached to-day!" said an emotional lady to a companion, a few years ago, as they were leaving a city church after High Mass. "Yes," was the somewhat critical and quite unemotional reply, *'yes, I have always liked that sermon and I read it frequently: but I confess I prefer that other one of Father Baker's, on The Lessons of Autumn.*" Viewed from the stand- point of effectiveness in the preacher, or of utility to the congregation, a fifth-rate original sermon is worth at least five times as much as a first-rate borrowed one. The Second method of prep»« •'""bted cient premedSn are fo' h'^'"f. ^"'"»" ""»- nine-tenths of those ^..l.,f'"'"'"='l f^Hy without pith or pSnt. whth^'":^'^ "r""^-' learned to deplore as -Mnn." ""^"""g laity have discourses in J^hich, Ttro^nl tZ"Z'~''""''"'"' themes, the speakers ran»» i' u L^'^"' Particular over the whole field „fmoraU.'j:Ph?7 «s.mie the Stfuon' ''"«'°'" ""'=•"'"« -«><«" ««>uble He^nitri^SgrL^s-s-- mon, the younc Driest win k« i * therefor hv f hi / • '^^ ^'"P'y rewarded .helXX^acc^nSrof^t'^fX^"^? s:;^crrrcin^rc?-£H^"--7^ preparaUon, and is doi°n*g '^UTi^ ^^Z:'^. YOUNG PREACHERS 25 TruT aL^° „""^ '^"""^ ^' '^'^^^o-^ of "ouls. w^o fructTflef thl '''^ '"^^°"^' " " ^od alone oered that, if God gives the increase, the Dlantino and watering is the work nf fh« ^l *"« Planting tua. Deus sua faciet P^^^<^^^r. Fac ii n. THE PRIEST AS BOOK CENSOR childhood have grown insfpfd an^ the S„Jf ."T* P"^«" °'7«»' IS il a sin lo read novels, Father? Few nricsts * among those who have had even a lfm?t 'd n„„i ?f""? 'i"^'*'"" « one frequently pr<; pounded; and still fewer, it is to be hoped are f r^ ♦ fu off-hand answer: yes, or no In fact, to the question thus baldly put the resnnnl^ s'atr^"!" V°°°^^"^^^^ wX^bdnTatThe sanie time vastly imprudent. « "i me ♦K. *^" *^^ y°""« woman or girl (from whom of nreiri"s7ot^ """^ -erely^hat\h"S,'^ oi novels is not wrong, is constructively to son^ S.ou«h'sS'''H' "'?"^ ""'"'^ Whose Vndre;; tnough sk Ifully disguised or veiled, is in realitv not less vile and pernicious than tha of tSe woil^ i:tT2l' !'""" "" "■«' Churcht°prLhibT°„^* iMex. while to answer summarily that novel feadmg „ sinful, is to go to the olhe^eZm" a^d L^f7 " "^°'^™ «» indefensible as w^uW Se the condemnation of basking in the surUgh? or 26 ihlm":.^ t .'t'llillTu-.r • '" '"^ ■"--hue. one indicate Z'h^TJ!^"," ""' "» '"f"?"*"! the multifario^ «,n»? i clearness (hat one of regarded Z" en rt^H'.'' ^^'1 ""^ P""' » of book censor And ,.h .I" " "'""S"' " "'«« incompetent ,af/n, ^^iH '=''"'°'"- '«PaWe or measure „? hi, attaTnme!;^ ■"".•. f '=<"•'"»« '" *» conscientiou^est "^rrt nZ"^ '"' ''*''!,'" "' "is .e«ve mini,.^ „' „ i^neT; orTh^eelU^ with^vrl^p^tl*^;!"!- Of this otnee essential that the Driest n?l a '"J"^"' " »««"» an extensive Ihouoh „„? '""'' ''"""'' ""I"'" acquaintance WcS^n"'Tr'^!":i " ""'-hand, knowledge is hernmf r/"^- ""= domain of ™ost g,;ftfd mindsrus.'°er:e";1, J.lr'th'^^^" "■« ranee in many a ApIH «f »k ?. * *^^*^ ^«no- .here i, „o '^e/jJ^^Jn^^Xi^^rf'''' others- sake ftt uu ""-f? "<="""•• ^^t ^o-" attain such info™ aH„„™' .'. ''"'°°^^' "im to enable him to Zde riK"" ^^^ '"""J"' «» «^1 or approv" wit^^r.mL P'''"'"''"'''^ 'o condemn The world onida!! *'""."•"" *=<'"»«« tion. one hour devoted i.h '''"'''"« "'"■": ^ut for »cientiflc bWanhical 5""'?' "' "^'orical. Ieastflveari5veJun,„^K''T"™''' '">'^'- at papers and noveL The l%''r°''T8 "^ »'*»- private iihrarie, L !X^^^'^!^^^ ^^ PRIESTLY PRACTICE publishers, observation of the volumes one sees ' the hands of fellow-travelers on railway or steai. ship, a casual examination of the literature preva- lent in the ordinary homo circle— all emphasize the fact that, of three-fourths of those who read at all, the uade mecum is the fictitious narrative, the omnipresent novel. Pre-eminently the literary expression of this opening quarter of the twenUeth century, the novel is stamped with the characterisUcs of the Umes; and just as, with not a little that is noble, the age presents » uch that is commonplace and a great deal that base, so among novels there are to be found the positively good, the compara- tively harmless, and the superlatively vicious. To be able to discriminate among these various classes and the multiplied divisions of which each is sus- ceptible, to be so skilled in literary botany as to distinguish not only the healthful plant from the deadly herb, but the innocent odor of one beau- teous flower from the poisonous perfume of a blossom which, to unschooled gatherers, is equally fair and sweet, is to possess a knowledge of no little value to him who as father-confessor, director of the parish library, or friendly counsellor and guide, must often be consulted as to the selection of books. How is this knowledge to be acquired? As- suredly not by the priest's personally examining the monthly or weekly output of the various fac- tories of fiction. Such a course would be con- demnable, even in the hypothetical case of its THE PRIEST AS BOOK CENSOR 29 being practicable; and practicable it is not, save in a very limited degree. So mighty is the flood of light literature with wliich American and Eng- lish publishing houses are deluging the country that even were one to devote his time to nothing else, he could not give the most cursory examin- ation, the merest skimming, to one-tenth of the volumes that bid for public favor. Shall the pro- nouncements of the critical reviews be accepted as a 8t)?nd£\rd sufllciently safe? As to the artistic merits or defects of the novel discuised, the judg- ments of such reviews may be entitled to some consideration; but as to the practical question whethe.' the novel may be read by a Catholic, ond especially a young Catholic, with some profit or ct least without fear of injury, they are generally worthless, if not misleading. The briefer notices given in the ordinary secular magazines and in the more important among the secular papers are equally unsatisfactory. Some of the most dan- gerous books in recent fiction, books which sap the very foundations of the theological virtues, have been lauded by such censors as genuine addi- tions to the literature of all time, priceless gifts of genius-dowered mortals to a world which in jus- tice should hold their names in perpetual benedic- tion. Lists, like Sir John Lubbock's, of the best hundred books, however valuable as helps in de- termining a course of general reading, will mani- festly prove of very meagre usefulness in aiding us to separate the scanty wheat from the super- abundant chaff in the perennial harvest of novels. 30 PRIESTLY PRACTICE m Such prudent guides through the terrilorv ^fT hon are the book reviewers of our rfTh T "^ Jine^notably the lTe.tZa^T^:rZ Monll,. the ^.,. W„m, the Catholic WoZ7nd Z U.at one ?u?ct7on oflX l^jru^ "oV^tS^h' sTiS intrelts^ ^^^AST ^'^ iou™ai"'r'L',/",™!^x''ir'thr"'' *" '^-""'""^ exhaling f™„ theT^°td „e4irsecuT»;''''"" such a magazine or paner", milf.h . ,"' P""- .ity in eve?y CatholHrus' h^ wh" ftstaooT .ance a, an agent co^peraUng ;ith te pSn THE PBIE8T AS BOOK CENSOR 81 lioVnf"!""?" °' ""*'"" "•""> »"<« ">« promo- »„i*.'i.^''""''i!'' '"'»<">ook. Irealing of Ihe heallhv all .if '""^^t'""" '" ""•''"n flelion «e have in B^.h ']"" T"*.'^ "•""' '•"Pf"' will be found nB"^n,rM "■'"' if"'"" -" "fi""". «nd Read- Novclfat. •• Th"" /"•""' ^«""'' "Novel, and novclMU. The extensive reading, broad cullur* S 'd :,i!r; '\' ■""'rp'-"' ^-'p oftind Brother m.H^''''' "" "''"''"•'y ChritUan Brother made him an especially efllcicnt mentor- wkieris' ,ha.\;r?^' '"."""■'"« "" '^^^^^^^ DOOKtet IS that he did not give us a more cooiou. outpouring of his, intellectual wealth TX meanUme, since people will reud Action .1 i! «a,,ur,ng to have his authority for the Icemen that there i. no dearth of novels that have nassed the ordeal o lime and are pronounced cZfc" Ur. Egans volume, as its title indicate. I. more directly in line with the subject o?Si, paLer and can be unreservedly commended to those to whom we write, priests who would acou°re Jt second-hand, some notion of what is good Lnd otherwise among the novel, in our lanJLage H ^11 increase, rather than diminish. theTaMca hon of those who consult this interesting book of erihcism to learn that the hundred and odd re wntten for very young people"; that Dr Eoan was actuated by the belief "that the time ha, amved when Catholic American literature shouW 32 PRIESTLY PEACTICE which no clever you„,r«„ T^^Bo^^y "orie, and that "he Se, f/^ ''"^"" "' «ae Caxtons'" -The Las n''- "' T^ '^^ ''"veV" "Rien.i." To' mentL^"!?;^: «f Pompeii," and ""pores: Anthony Trollonll *" "^ 'he d,V volumes possess the necaL? """^^ ""** « •>«« of ■nnoxiousness, a merit nn.f """' "^ humdrum other prolific E„ghsh^^°'/^7^pV/red by that !!!:^'ack.s "A Dau«hte'rVHrih"-,'rf^ ^ i?°S'SS°'? ""«S"a»°' .?!,"■*■ '.. to iwi d,. . 34 £5I5^™Y PEACTICE is one of the few ° a"), g^e", S'=^ ' "»f » «"■•.•■ language. Wilkie CoHW "Lmi T ''?'■''' '» *' ter than „os. of hi, ^r o "i: ?'"''" 'j'"^'- and Walter Besant „?f i. . '^'''"'8'' Ebers books may ver? nr„n„ ■ ''"'"'"'"arians whose neglect whL .Kow'fo r J""'',^''' "'■"■ '"» dith, the Brownine of^. 1: '''^°''8« ^ere- writer whose ItyleVill ir T'u""' ''' « ^'^ng than his matter will beneflMh/''"^.'"''°'" '""^ Rider Haggard's stnsuo,?.!. ! ordinary reader, sionally info .eJuZyTT t«''"<»-ati„g occa- healthy food for any t'ind t^d '"' ""»,""=«» """ 3oung one. Howelfs Ts n'o,"ea«tT"' ■" "" claims to be, or at least surh 1 .• '''='''"" •■« 'erizes 'The Ministe^^ Charge"'' Tm'/''''™'^- stance." "The Rise of Sil^w u *'"''"" In- World of Chance" ?' .f''''^I;''P'•am" and "A altogether differe't from X^ "' ."" """""y painting of Emile Zo ' "nH^- ''."'■'="<'«d dirt- delightful humor of Frank stocl.""""!.""- "^^ of "Rudder Grange " i, ^„ Stockton, the author ness or irreveSe- and T '"'"' »' P-oss- Bret Harte. Thos H^rdv rTI ?' ""^ «""■" of and Thos. A. Jan" er^is"!"",' '"'"'? ^'evenson reading. ' " wholesomely pleasant withlr^t;:' s^r^le-te' """^ "^ '"'"''—'' Humphrey Ward iZ Vel ^^^ '"™"°n Mrs. lett. Hall Caint Mar,^ c^" L^e. Maurice Hew- Ouida, Rhoda B-^uZ"! Be^rk^cTa^A^-- Rives and the Ouchesi tk. j ~ «o the same caleson^ ,i;.,r m ^° ""' "" '"^'ong from anti-ChrS' Lhil^ T"^ P™''"'^' ''•■"'get ■nisUc cynicism InS s^etaZ»r ^""""^ P'^'' Mer insipidity dashed wVih" ™" "*"• «<> •>ess; but the besrof ihTi „ "h*"" "" '''' '^d" merit that compr„'sa,es't .'^s"fluHs ■""""" "" ••Car;nU--tet,^1^*^^^^^ synonymous phrases'th "r^ 'T S ""' '""'"^» security engendered by eve„ thTu """" °' designation; one feels tl..!. . '* assertive are in favir of Zl hf ," 'r' «ho chances agnostic vaporil,cc,,7„-^ '!"« "''''^ f™"" reverent in tone An "' '^'"'cncy, and lieve, are, with rare e> „,'' ^'^ ^S" ''"PPy '» be- o/ Catholics to the storf ofT' '^^•^''"'"'"■Hons enumerate them all TnL *'"'' «'=''<'"• To a partial list mryposb^vL"'"'.''."'^"'' ''"'^= """ reading has run'nther'lt: "'" '" '""^ -"o- iics, we'^ha'vt in"rdd;;i„rto' t°h^ ""'''' "^ ^««"'- of Dr. Bari^, Ca^on Sheeti mTr™" ™'''-' John Ayscough, Wisem»n'. "S' ^*, Benson, and "Calista," and "U^rj^^V ■Z"^"'^"- Newman's the Sybils" Marion r ," = '^'""'^ "Di"" and "Sanf Ilario' ""ZTn ^r^^-ford's "Saracinesca," "A Ci«are;?;.mat"r-s°r°;n ^"1°"' Pp-«^" and "A Roman Sincer" mI ^ r, ^"^ Patoff," Disappearance of John' ?^ '" ^^ ^««"'« "The Success of Patrick DesmonH"^r*^y" ^"^ "The House of York^and «? r?n ' ^T '^^"^^'"^ "The ' and Grapes and Thorns"; Lady f1 1 1 11 I 'c if ut \.i 36 PRIESTLY PRACTICE Georgiana FuIIerton's "Constance Sherwood." "A a^d "M:^ V"^'^:^ 'Tr ^*'^"«^ ^°* *° «- True" and Mra. Gerald's Niece"; Christian Reid's "A Heart of Steel," "Armine," "A Child of Mary^' tio° 'J'"v """^ rf "C-'"-*^'" "Philip's Restltu- •Th; n ff ^^f «"'" ""^^^^ L^8^* of the Vision," The Daughter of a Star," and "A Little Maid of O'MeX;^"^'^ f ^"^'^ "Moondyn^-; K^tn UMearas Narka"; Mrs Craven's "A Si^fpr'c Sto:y," Jliane," "Fleurange." anS-'Lucie- J c Heywood-, "Lady Morton- Rose Mulhoiand^' The Wicked Woods of Tobevervil," "The BVrds of K. leevy," and "Marcella Grace"; F. S D Ames' ••Marion Howard,- and "Wishes on Win«" Td no to be tedious, many other worthy volum'es by CalhoUcs as fervent as Mrs. Dorsey and Anna T Sadher and as artistic in touch as Richard Mai: colm Johnston, JusHn McCarthy, Frank SpeanZ Henry Harland, and Father John Talbot Sm™h With such works as these from which to ?o«nTin clthT^"'"""^ """ '"ere shouW be ir.v "^ households novels whose utter trashiness can serve no other purpose than to g.ve distorted views of life and hlan nata« becloud the spiritual sight, and Iethargi"e the Xl''T^ '1'' "*"" '° '*'" «"«= novel-reader into the channels of legiUmate fiction may easily be a rejd duty as well as a genuine kindness ft IS superfluous to add that even in these channels one may sail too constantly. Fiction should be the condiment of mental food: to use it as a prin! cipal article of diet is to produce mental ansmla- THE PRIEST AS BOOK CENSOR 37 and to partake of it alone, to the exclusion of more substantial aliment, is to court intellectual starva- tion. A mind fed solely with novels— even the best novels— can no more preserve its vigor and robustness than can a body fed solely with ice cream and bon-bons. As an occasional relaxa- tion from mental work, the reading of a good novel may have its rightful place in the best- ordered life; as a cor'^tant occupation during every hour of leisure that can be earned or stolen such reading is a real injury to the intellectual and spiritual faculties, and moreover an inex- cusable waste of time. Ill SACERDOTAL ENNUI s«ousn«,« that he has doners ^t^sl'dnTsmUk!''''' '''' '=°°- beyJnn. Mass and an houfand a ha?f ltT%""'""T "">« 'han recitation of the Divine om ^" *"""• '<"• ">« and a half for a vis ,1,^"%.'""' T"'^" •■<»"• the beads. »Piri.ua7re'aI*\^iS.iorT^"'- science, and niirh* «- examination of con- minimiii'g ,he t™ of « "'^ 7^ P™'"""^ "<" granting .hre: ro^^lrr'al "'aS!?'^' """• '" physical exercise, we concludl .„ .• "«''=«»»T liberal rather than niMardly TO,?"T, ' """ " at the disposition of ^ZT^' . " "^' ""ain hours of his day and on Ih"" "^ ''.'^'=" """»" »« employment of'^'thls lehureM T' "■• ""^'^^ his habitual sereX or Cu.fe » .''''r'''''"^ ness or ennui. ""qmetude, his cheerful- How may this free Ume be best utilized? As _?ACBRDOTALENNUI «o a considerable portion of it iu question. It should kTH *' ^^^'^^ can bo no not bebeve." says the Sn ^'T'^ »° «»"<^y. "I do :^h^i a greater" „*-u^'^^^^^^ Father Macl.: « render useless h^desL. fZ" '" ^'°^ »'^«" «o trample underfoot hT "'" Providence. ;"ands. to content L^ ?'?* P**^'^'^'""" ^^ni- His sovereign niajestv 1^°'* /.'""''^" ^'^''^a^^ of done by the pries wh„ h "^^ ""^ " i»«t what is «tudy.» Virtue shoT.?d br„r* "P'^^>' »"">-'f to guishing character^ of "u""'^' ^'^^^ d^«tin. to the service of God K^f """ ^'^^ '^ consecrated "cnt degree, is not th; si ' "^' .r'^^" ^'" «" -'"i" priest. ^"^^ ^°^c requisite of the model "" owledge and piety" snv« q, t> SuK., are the two eves of fh ^L ^*- ^''^"cis of because, according to the ^ ''''^'"* ecclesiastic; brated council. '«"*/! *'i"/'^P''e««on of a cele- facit, ita vita linTltta^^^^^^^ -^ta arrogantem have already assumed In Th" "^^ ''^^^'^' " We given of thepartiUon nf h- ^'^timate we have Priest possessera not inconsid'n^'^^' "^^» °- «o there need be no scrun?. • !i^ ' ^""^ ^^ P^cty; quire all the knowleda/1 '\«,^^»»°« him lo ac- Supposing him e^^^'fd 12 'l *h'" "''P-'*^- nion sense the danger of Til i '""^^^"n^ of com- so extraordinan- a" to enJ^l, ^''"'"^'^ becoming not sufficientl/ p'^xLTfe t '" P"?^ ^^ P^^bapf grave fears; a':ld^n Tp'y J^e ITt^ ^"^ ^^^ knowledge, even at the risk of in •^''' ^r'"'* "^ ;s preferable to stupid vegetaln " "*"^ '^"^^'*' that may well become ZZm '" ^^"'"""^^ 44 PRIESTLY PRACTICE j^l rJl r I I'u^^}^ ^"^ *"*** **^«* « ?»•*«•» ^ho has conceived the idea that his days of obligatory study terminated with his seminary life, and l!Zi [V"^-^"^^' «" "«'y Scripture, dogmatic and moral theology, canon law, etcIcHiastical history, he councils, and sacred eloquence have accord- Ingly been assigned to a condition of "innocuous desuetude" in a rarely disturbed bookcase, nos- sesses a sadly inadequate notion of what is de- manded by the dighity and sanctity of the profes- sion which he has embraced. Granting that his course of studies in college and seminary was even exceptionally brilliant, and that, when ordained, h.s knowledge of the foregoing subjects was as unifornily thorough as it is occasionally superfi- cial, the reviewing of them all from time to time, at least m his texl-books, if not in more compre- hensive reatises. would still be a peremptory duty rather than an optional task; for without such review he cannot competently discharge his func- tions m either the confessional or the pulpit Some portion of a priest's spare time, then, should be devoted to serious strdy. Prolonged apphcation of the mental faculties, however, is unquestionably fatiguing. Most of us yield a ready assent to the dictum of Ecclesiastes. "Much study IS an affliction of the flesh." and so the deliberate acquisition of knowledge need not monopolize the leisure of even the most consci- entious clergyman. Another occupation to which several hours a day may well be given, is one closely connected with study, and indeed often SACERDOTAL ENNUI 4S identical with it— solid rcadintf m« i dmac^na ? *"""■ ''"°* ""' '"•■•'^•'on' of .lowly ll'c Sacramento," .ay. Brother AzarL -'l [„ no greater .olacc to the ,ml th^n .1: 1 " word, of a good book" n„rt i. 'h" '"olh'ng an prie... eo^d trthW^'a.T h"" "'" " .00 miyj'rtr^tetuantafrr- "--■"•"• -« fnn um lu . quantity; but sonic read with rre''2;'ti: tl'T^ ° '•^''^"- ■" "ruS." de! hlw. I, ^^"^ """^ misehievou. by fosterino there'are In crn"^ ^' the matter read, just as mere are in Chicago, according to a recent mn«n zine writer, "circles in whiM, ♦ ? ^^®" (above the evel sav nf fK^n u"* ""^"^ "°^*^^« Mr R««V • ; 1: .^' °^ ^^^ Duchess,' or the late Mr. Roe) IS to be thought 'litemrv' o«^ '. the heights of culture "so ini^.f^ T*^ °" 46 PRIESTLY PRACTICE i It may be extravagant to assert that the reading of sonie pnests. apart from the Breviary, is re- stricted to "the papers" and novels S ^ft^n trashy as good), it is certainly within the limits of truth to say that far too much time is wasted on ^tr^^nrT* productions. Any man, not bent with mahce aforethought on killing time, can read his daily paper in from ten to twenty minutes; and the perusal of even a good novel should be looked upon as mferely the infrequent reward of exhausting mental work. There is, of course, one species of penodical literature which the priest not only may. but should read, of which indeed he cannot afford to deprive himself-the ecclesi- asbcal magazme-such a publication as the Irish Ecclesiastical Record or the Ecclesiastical Review. nr,I?i ?° '" «^*»*^«t^on to which a portion of priestly leisure may profitably be given up, is the producing of hterature-writing. No priest, we take 1 IS less liable to become the victim ^? ennui than he who, in his spare hours, becomes a 1 terary worker. Whether he be engaged in evo ving a book of his own or reviewing that of another, composing a sermon or a lecture, writing a magazine article or a sketch for the diocesan journal, or even scribbling verse that he would too swift, and welcomes abundant leisure as a blessing, not a burden. If half the time which some ecclesiastics spend in "indolent vacuity of tw^ ' ?u '^^'''^ **^"y ^"«^'- «^«y «n trifles that are the merest masks for idleness, were as beneficial to the 0>Th„i^' "'f,.™"'" would be the write« themtlves ° "•"""= "' """""^ '« poiiTz:z:t ^rbe° w-r *- there is no tenrf..n^„ . ■ "® enumerated, as them too slldom '^S?„!r°" '5."" °' "> ™P'oy have been !„sred «Z\''^^^'''« «"<' siting think, the atocaUons most^'nT'' ""=^ ''™- ''^ sacerdotal oharaZ "n": h '?°"y ^"' "-e greater portion of an ecclestttt- °. ""''='' ""^ best be devoted i„ '^<='='esiastic s leisure may tion of whatever k nd T/- ""'^ •""'"=™' «"=<='"?■•- soul and body than il,/"'^''"'"'''''^ better for lent man hasVh„„Jred temr?"'^' '^"^ '■"'°- man's one- and «n^ri? temptations to (he busy 'hut. eve„irtS:;ss: "°' """""« "> •"•°- "8.1.. tod. «,„ „i„M,, ,„„ ,„ ,^,^ ^^ ^ ^^ _ IV I '€■. THE METHODICAL PRIEST AND HIS OPPOSITE Ordo ducit ad Deum. — 8t. Augiutine. Method is like packing things in a box; a good packer wiU get in half as much again as a bad one. — Cecil. aJ^}3 ^^l.^^Pf pence of every man who has either combated difficulties himself or attempted to guide others through them, that the controlling law shall be systematic action.— Pr. Kane. IF a life spent worthily ought to be measured by 1 "deeds, not years," the orderly man of forty has practically lived as long as his unmethodical neighbor of three score and ten. A hundred- weight of energy applied with system is more effective than a ton discursively expended; and an essential requisite to success in any profession or calling is the habit of taking up one's various duties in regular order, of intelligently allotting a time for all things and then seeing to it that everything be done in its proper time. That a lack of method in the prosecution of any mer- cantile business will inevitably result in failure and ruin, is a truth which the revelations of in- solvency courts have made a truism; and it needs no special keenness of vision to perceive the significance of this truth in other pursuits than commerce or to note its verification in other dis- asters than bankruptcy. In no profession, perhaps, is this habit of 48 THE METHODICAL PRIEST 49 methodical, systemaUc perfomiance of duUes more indispensable than in the priesthood. The vaned occupations to which the pastor must neces! sanly give his attention, and the multrplied^n- stances in which his pre-arranged plans are un- avoidably upset by the emergencies incidentaUo his calling, render it all the more important tha° fixed t",' 7"'""^ " " P"«=«e«We. adhere to a f^xed way of procedure in the routine of his dMly life. Such action is no less essential to his per- sonal sanctification than to the effective discharge of his obligations toward those entrusted to his spiritual guidance; a contrary course canno? but The author of that excellent handbook for the Among the means proper to aid the priest in rapidly attaining the sancUty exacted by hfastate . t/t ",''"" ?k' «'•"" *'"<='"'»'=y' "commended by the saints as the easiest and safest road by which to reach that goal-the faithful and constat oIh senrance of a rule of Ufe drawn up ,^ft care One great advantage which, on the face of it. this scheme of life affords, is the certitude that in o^ .Tre.Il ''°*.°'" '""'•'^'y '" «>« "»"» fea- tures, the more prominent duties of life, but even m Its minor details and most indiiferent acti-ons To occupy one's time, not as the whim or caprice of the moment may suggest, but as the tenS^of 50 PRIESTLY PRACTICE I a specific rule prescribe, is to share the privilege of the faithful religious who can say with Christ: "I do always the things that please my Father." Apart, however, from this important question of attaining the degree of sanctity which his pro- fession demands of him, the priest will find that upon the systematic or haphazard arrangement of his work depends in no small measure the facility or difficulty with which it is accomplished, and the less or greater amount of worry which it occasions him. The methodical priest not only does far mus wotk than his desultory brother cleric, but h«: does it with far more ease and with a serene equanimity to which the latter is most frequently a stranger. Want of method means duties always accumulating, and sometimes neg- lected; and with the consciousness of such neglect, peace of mind is, or -t least ought to be, incom- patible. So necessary, indeed, is a well-ordered system to the thorough discharge of a pastor's manifold duties, that its absence can be supplied neither by exceptional cleverness and brilliancy of parts, nor by intermittent outbursts of genuine zeal Inconstant genius can never successfully cope with plodding mediocrity; and spasmodic energy, taking off its coat at irregular intervals to "pitch into" the piled up arrears of postponed work, is at best but a sorry and inadequate substitute for the methodical industry which takes up its tasks in their allotted seasons and quietly disposes of them from hour to hour and day to day. THE METHODICAL PRIEST 51 »^Zl ^^^°?« convinced of the fact that there are members of the clergy whose industry is spas- Zt'Z ?K •"■ ?"" systematic, few priests need extend their observation beyond their own im- ^^P«S .r*"*^: '° ^""^"^ *^°^^ °f their clerical whnJ'' **^^^^/f. Prob«Wy one individual at least whose way of life can be called methodical only 1 f ''^f *'^f «^°se that it is characterized by a systeniatic disregard of all method whatsoever On Sundays, it is true, services are held in his ''7^^»,"* '!**"** *^°""' *»»* o° week-days, pro! yided Mass be celebrated some Ume in the morn- ing, and the office recited within the twenty-four houre. he is apparently of the opinion that "the rest 18 all but leather or prunello"; and his man- part in that species of pedestrianism termed the go-as-you-please." unJ^^l T^ T^ ''^^*'"y *«*^'^y h^^seJf that such hn^ K°?r^ "^° ^'■^ *° he found in the clerical body, but the explanaUon of the fact is far from being as obvious as its existence. Speculatively considered, the unsystematic priest might well be regarded as a monstrosity, a striking instance of abnormal growth and development. In view of the training to which every aspirant to the ecclesi- hL^hU ^ '• ''*^''*'^ ^""°« *he years when ^H«n? J ♦ !k '* '"^ ^"'' *^«* P*«^*^^ c^'^dition best adapted to the process of moulding, it would seem natural that the priest, above all men. should b" ac«nn Tf "^°'"°"' .«**herence to systematic action. If ever one is justified in expecting the 52 PRIESTLY PRACTICE verification of the proverb, "A young man, accord- ing to his way, even when he is old, he will not depart from it," we may surely look for order and method in one who has passed his boyhood, youth, and dawning manhood in the habitual ob- servance of rules as comprehensive and minute as those of the college and the seminary. That such a training should occasionally produce the mere formalist who seems to imagine that he was made for his rule, ijot the rule for him, and whose cast-iron methods remain impliable under all circumstances— this is intelligible enough; but that a decr.de or a decade and a half of years spent in an atmosphere thoroughly impregnated with the spirit of regularity should yield for result a char- acter the very antipodes of the formalist, may well excite surprise. Whatever be the explanation of unmethodical habits in the priest— whether they are the out- come of revolt against long-continued restraint, or manifestations of natural tendencies too strong for education effectively to curb, or merely modes of procedure into which the ecclesiastic has care- lessly and almost unconsciously drifted— one thing is certain, he cannot exert himself too vig- orously in his endeaver to get rid of them as speedily as possible. Until he does so, intelligently systemaUzing not only his parochial work, but his personal devotions and even the pastimes of his leisure, he may rest assured that he has neither attained his greatest possible efficiency as a pastor, THE METHODICAL PRIEST 53 ine parish priests modeling his life upon that of the collegian, the seminarian, or the reliriom The very nature of the active ministry in whShh^ » engaged precludes the possibility of suciun^ form regularity as i, quite feasibre i„ fte »""-" inary or monastery; and a rule to be adantedTn his use must be drawn upon broader Unef m„.^ pre-suppose and take account of numerous o^. errdld'^li;: V^rt "^" nece^^r/beTsI noT ^a^ ieT HSrin ' The 'b^ '' r'^^^^ would probably be ma"det"hfs u eSrsiffl' Sh:rTnteL*r"r« *'* -"^ /™,ra": cX.S;m»:,rr :ues""^^ 'he ac. Th?^ '"•*"»'y day, and observe how poSv z srhr/ptcTreo":*"-^ '- "»-""' mind and ^•^n^rZ^t^^rT^^^r^^ ^J 64 PRIESTLY PRACTICE case of the priest it is very liable, in addition, to be more or less detrimental to health of soul. In every well-ordered parish daily Mass is celebrated at a fixed hour— six, half-past six or seven o'clock, according as the pastor mny decide. If we credit the pastor with a very moderate degree of zealous- ness for the welfare of his people, the particular hour will be determined, not so much by the priest's personal convenience as by that of the majority of his flock, supposing them to be desir- ous (as it is his du^ to see that they should be) of attending the holy sacrifice. Now, properly to acquit himself of his morning devotions, he should get up an hour, or at least three-quarters of an hour before Mass-time. Unless he makes it a point to do so, he will gradually fall into the habit of shortening his meditation, of postponing it to some indefinite later period in the day, or of omitting it entirely. To get out of bed only ten or fifteen minutes before vesting for Mass is very surely to begin the day badly; yet nothing is more certain than that many days will be just so begun by the priest who does not habitually rise at a given hour. To suppose that the priest makes small account of occasionally omitting his daily medita- tion, or, still worse, that it is his established cus- tom to disregard this means of sanctification, is to suppose a man in a condition of spiritual de- bility that urgently demands some such tonic as a serious retreat. There can scarcely be an apter instance of the "blind leading the blind" than a pastor to whom has been entrusted the guidance of «ml,. and who is himself neglectful of mental cntll l^^ t"'^.^'' difficulty of rising promptly is oer, tiie man of method will naturally obsprvp ~wel/r^r"°& J-* how m'ucL^tp'^e win do well to allow himself depends a good deal upon his age and temperament The fuSfor of 'Jll/^'^'f ,^^^^-^ook from which we have a° slee/ nTtts'; T' **?'* '^ P"^«* '^^^^^ commonly hnf '^^ i^ /^"° '" °'' '"O'-e than seven hours- bu m the rule of life which he proposes nm' nap of from half an hour to double that time The ordmary clergyman will perhaps find thTt ei^ht lessTh "lu'f'' '' '""y «» ™"^h as he requires • less than that amount, especially if he is a dfli' gent mental worker, is pretty su're to blinsul" of furnl^re^lr f"^^' I ^^^^ ^™P«'*«°t aHicle clock aT ^ P"^'* * bedroom is an alarm ciocK. As a good start is hnif ♦!,« i "*"*"» Offl!^! ^ ^ recurring obUgalion, the divine .Waited eTr'l r'l*^ '°" **•• -"^^rafng a "^ read the htUe hours at one appointed time, yes- S6 PRIESTLY PRACTICE pere and compline at another, and matins and lauds at yet another, certainly lightens the labor of their recitation; and he is obviously more apt to acquit himself of his task "digne, attente. de- vole" than is his procrastinating neighbor who, after repeated postponements, finally takes up his breviary an hour or two before midnight and reads from "Venite, adoremus" to "Nunc dimittis" at a sitting. Method should be applied to the reci- tation of the canonical hours to assure the avoid- ance, not only of the worry occasioned by the consciousness of a^ imperative duty's remaining unaccomplished, but of a precipitancy in its ac- comphshment that too often gives point to a re- mark df Father Neumayr: "We pray to God. Domme, ad adjuvandum me festinp ' not 'ad festinandum me adjuva.'" Concerning such devotional exercises as a visit to the Blessed Sacrament, spiritual reading, the beads, or the Way of the Cross, the difference be- tween assigning specified hours for their perform- ance and resolving in a vague, general manner to attend to them "some time in the course of the day, • IS very often the difference between the observance and the omission of thes** practices of piety. Unfortunately, too, with the man who sub- jects himself to no rule oth • than the caprice of a passing mood, the omission is far more liable than the observance to become habitual. So, also, with the preparation of sermons. Ihere IS ordinarily no real reason why the pastor should not begin on Morday the work of com- THE METHODICAL PHIE8T 57 jKxing hi. weekly in.trucUon, to the extent at Hne of thought to be pumued. If he i. an orderW tTa" "S i ", "' '''<^'" ™«'ho"»* "quired in the crucifix i^S'^Z'^L^t-TlXT'''''''''' *' ^"^ *'«»* ^' 'pjAT the life of a priest should, in its broader lines, be a reproduction of our Divine Master's career, is a truth too elementary for anv one to gainsay. If ordinary Christians are bound. In the measure of their ability, to be followers of Christ and imitators of His virtues, the priest is unqu " tionably held to the practice of these virtues ?„ To eminent a degree that he shall vindicate his daim to the glorious titles lavished upon him by Holy Scripture and the Fathers of the Church-«vicar of Christ, angel of the Lord, salt of the earth shepherd of the fold, mediator between God and men doorkeeper of Heaven, a terrestrial God. an other Christ." A cleric to whom the application of these titles would be incongruous, whose ff" not modeled on that of the Divine Exemplar, L 59 eo rnm PBIESTLT PBACTICB hymn of wo«Wp and If' 'L*'""''??'" »<"« '» «he singing to her Founder Tr^ "'"'='' "■" » «ver Son of the Uving God ''""'^ <^''*' »« and™^e?rrr:ofe":Vrrr»-'''«"'«''es, undeniable one. to'our davT " ""=*' "•" "» preceding centuries of fte '^?;!f. "«• "' '» "l' have been, not onlv 8om.f '^'•ristian era there live, are in la'menUranr ^'='"f»j«'«'=» whose to the model pSsed for 1' •""•'".'°"' «"•»"»» great many in S ftf TJ-^*'V""'"'°°' hut a Christ-traits pS vUiM ''."' '^««>nblance to ordination-have wffh he .' '* */ "«'« "' «heir hlurred and indSu'e? it, ^roflr"'^ ''^~'"« pronounced and striltino » °'.''^'=?™"'8 "or* causes which have jS £ ,u- "/.'"luire into the •he ideal peKec, o„ of fte c'hri, ■'°* "T^ ^«"» and which have subsJt,^.!, T™' «>• Priesthood, natural acUon a st"rile al!f /^^ ''"^"«* '"Per- baneful and nf^d^^;^J"'^^. «' «« " to the end of ]"fe -^ ll ^"^ '" P«"evere in to divine ministries." savs sT Tu° "^ ^PPo'n'ed a royal dignity, and o^h^ St Thomas, "attain to No man ought rashiylotffe, h' ""I.'"* '" '"^''^■ ' guide in the divine liah.Lj ""•''" '<• o""'" «» and habit, is „„t m'o"! /i^'to^God " "" "" "««' «°AyviS^rn\rs°.l.f„?™--*eoh,^ in« in himself thfe kt " » *• ?"" "' '''^V hy simply disclaiming anvl- ""["^"""ity to GoS. most heights of Tanftf^^ T *° ^«'^'" ">« top- Piratjons and exertton,Vtht^ "'"""'« "" «»■ «mple sanctifying grace T Pf^'^^aUon of liolines, as is impIiS j^' , J° '"f *> « degree of ot this sanctifyi"^ ^te o^'.^*"!'?*' Possession from mortal sin, flI*?hSsSan^' -.k*""* '"^Oom are calied. The oriesfT. .'"*°"' exception to a loftier plane rndh, ^''""arily asceSdeS »Wrk the higher cond.r """'• ^"^ impunitv «i».ent life thtrlortithTv TT"^ '° " <»- ^?i::?^'^--"=-rs^: 66 PRIESTLY PRACTICE I !: ■J i ii !! satisfied quiescence in a degree of holiness no higher than that demanded of the ordinary Chris- tian, will exempt him from the rigorous obliga- tions of striving earnestly and perseveringly to become "most Hke to God." To admit the exis- tence of such an obligation is obviously to ac- knowledge the indispensableness of daily medita- tion; for we can grow like to God only through knowing Him, and we know Him only in propor- tion to our study of His attributes and perfections in the steadfast light of mental prayer. That there are members of the clergy who, in theory, underrate the importance of this exercise can be accounted for only on the supposition that, in practice, they habitually neglect it. To the sane- minded priest who even occasionally devotes a little serious reflection to the obligations incum- bent on every man consecrated to the service of God and ordained to the ministry of His altar, it must appear utterly preposterous that he can render fit service or adequate ministration with- out daily recourse to this substantial aliment of all spiritual life. As well might the laborer think to do without the material food which sustains his bodily strength, or the student to dispense with the regular sleep which refreshes his weary brain. If the priest is pre-eminently the man of God, if his whole lifework consists in seeking God, himself, and leading others to Him, if it is his express business to be in the world but not of it, if his ordinary duties bring him into habitual contact with the supernatural, it is surely little less than DAILY MEDITATION from daily commun.'on 3hfA r"."' '"'"• As a mere »pccuJaUv?n„- "'' '"^ ■^«'"'"-- •ha. from (he ver^ natreTr" !' *"""" «™ fhe condiUons inTeDan.M ' ""'^ »"•• fro™ ^">'"'er. tbe most exemplary of Vhl ■ f ^ '•""'iction. The iaborintheworidreateTh!,"'""'^ "■"• '"« ""d fold grace, and the nM^ht^ even with the mani- acquired by fr^nenf ml„, . "='=«"'<>» of strength cult enough toToTd Se dl""^*'": " » »«" dim- are co„,«„„ -»;<' the ?™f " J.", which they "ght," and to aive to (h. .. ^ '"*• "o' by ponderance inTai,iiu!? ,h"'"J?"'""' "^ <>•"« Pr^ know full well ttt even * """ "="'"'• They of their morn ngt med«a.r °P'=«»'™'" "mission certain languor of t"etu,° " ""'*'' "'* « ing of the spiritual tone „ 1 V''?'^''"'''^ '°«er. complishment of dai " diue ' "^ '"^' '" *« "c ution in the energv wf,h „hV '""P^hle dimin- God and the thT^Tf G^d tndT ""' *"' »*'"' upon habitual neelJlntihL ^ V'ej' W"'"! look case as a wilf^, Sd„e« ff r '" ">«'' own of their eyes to thtuZ^'J ""^ 'i«™'c 'hutting a lower level of e4te„ce th ^u"^'"' '"^^ent to "' Wh°/t ^;r-"""^e Sr.'atl' """'• -'-'''' " whoomit:;rm'3;iS?^--:~He 68 PRIESTLY PRACTICE ii ^1 he makes it? or that of his still laxer brother who disregards the practice altogether? To ensure honesty and candor in the expression of the lat« ter's views, it will perhaps be advisable to **appea1 from Philip drunk to Philip sober,** from the priest affected with that species of lethargic stupor which is superinduced by spiritual indolence, self-indul- gence, and mere routinism, to the same priest with spiritual faculties thoroughly aroused by the exercises of his annual or biennial retreat. If, in that season of reawakened fervor, he has to deplore the remissness that has char«icterized his conduct; if he is conscious of having allowed the world and its happenings to engross far too much of his time and attention; if he realizes that his energy has often been wasted, and his labor ren- dered sterile, because unsanctified by purity of intention; if he has reason to fear that familiarity with the sacraments and even the Mass has bred in him, not perhaps contempt, but gross careless- ness and irreverence; if, in a word, he feels that he has been leading a natural rather than a super- natural life, he may justly attribute much of the evil to his neglect of daily meditation, and may well echo the plaint of the Psalmist : "I am smit- ten as grass and my heart is withered, because I forgot to eat my bread."^ Of the beneficial influence which the faithful practice of daily mental prayer exerts on the whole round of priestl> duties and labors, it is needless to speak at any length. It would argue *■ Pi. ei. 6. . DAILY MEDITATIO N e9 el^rdse D^L°f '""? *?/°"^* ♦*»«* '^'^ ««»"tary n?^h? / ?^°*o' *''*"'*^ ^^'^or in the celebration of the adorable Sacrifice, ensures the more worthy nmZ\Ta -I *'^ -r™^"t«. burnishes "eeded Jignt for the guidance of souls in the confesHinnni enhances the efficacy of God's word in the "S and aids as nothing else can do in the solution re'Son Tf " **""?. «^"* ^'^^^ ^^^^itua realization of unseen and heavenly things which be«e"r t^L°' l'''"1 ''"'-'^-^ assured ^s t better than all external rules to guard and SrwhVh"h"*' '*." «" -temafJi^ht a^nd strength, which he carries with him at all times ^ace'of'hrnri^'T' T'^'T^ '""^ sacramell Snno h i'^" *^°°'*- '^"^^ ^^'^ " « d»vine and unfaihng help in every peril or need." VI ■ I A CLERIC'S READING iDtolleetiuUlj man is ruminant, and be gets little pennanent benefit from Uterary browsing unless be uterwards cbews tbe cud.— Dr. Thomat Httt. Reading is useful only in proportion as it aids our intellectual development; it ai^^s our intellectual development only in pro- portion as it supplies food for reflection; and that portion of one's reading alone avails whicb tbe mind baa been enabled to assimilate to itself, and make its own by meditation.— Brolker Atariaa. A babit of readin{^ idly debilitates and corrupts the mind for all wholesome reading; tbe habit of reading wisely is one of tbe most difficult to acquire, needing strong resolution and infinite pains; and reading for mere reading's sake, inBtead of for the good we gain from reading, is one of the worst and commonest and most imwbolesome habits we have. — Frederic Harriaon. "'T'ELL me thy company and I'll tell thee what 1 thou art," says the proverb-pregnant San- cho Panza : and the adage will lose nothing of its wisdom if to the term "company" we give a more comprehensive meaning than Don Quixote's worthy squire probably had in mind. Intercourse with this or that class of one's fellow-beings is not the only kind of companionship that influences the character and serves as a generally truthful index thereof. Books are no less companions than are men and women; and where the choice of one's living company is necessarily restricted, these inanimate friends of our predilection often furnish a far truer estimate of our real character and tastes than does the social circle in which we 70 A CLERIC'S BEADING 71 especially to many a priest, constrained by force destitute of congenial society, an apter rendcrinfl bnol?'^° '^'"r • P""^''** ^°"»d b^= Tell me h? books you read and I'll tell you what youTre Books and reading have been the fruitful and ^oerj^^^^^^^^^^ I' ^«"""-« Englishtsayi^' ^nJ^M^ philosophers ever since Bacon wrote Reading maketh a full man/' and Pope scored With loadi of learned lumber in his head," I"ver^d^^^m•'^^^°^^^ ^^*^°^^«» Pr«««her de- ng ^savs the i^^^^^^ commentaiy: -A little learn- ing. says the poet, 'is a dangerous thina' Ah me uniity, or rather the necessity, of readinfl in ?Z"'=/;" "'««»»'v« generaOon. h.v?alwa™ continued to puWi.h book, about book. andT though the question is „o longer now if « ever was, to read or not to read— there iiill Ll^i . o*er quesuon. the answers'-trwlll Tar U™° pf ^'mcuu-ordis-rits-^s ""i how to read it7 Specie TnsJ^t ,o eith™ Uon would necessarily be as varied as are'he i„ tellectual requirements and caoabiliiu. 'f i .Tie "ir : Tr- ""' he'fflnu^e" V ,! lr«T^,t , n °°'" "'^ '""^ *« PU'Pose of gen- eral mental culture, and as to those in harmony II I 72 PRIESTLY PRACTICE with one's particular profession. Reading un- doubtedly occupies a considerable portion of the time at the disposal of most priests, and ought to occupy some part of the leisure of all of them; hence an essay dealing with tlic matter and method of a cleric's reading may reasonably be supposed to appeal to the attention of the younger clergy, even should it fail to command their ap- probation. And first, let it be said that the young eccle- siastic who has arrived at the epoch of his ordi- nation without having acquired a taste for good reading, is very sincerely to be pitied ; and that the absence of such a taste denotes something radi- cally wrong, either in himself or in the collegiate training to which he has been subjected. If the classics of his mother- tongue, whether in prose or poetiy, are to him mere bowing acquaintances, instead of valued friends; if he cannot appreciate their lofty sublimity, their multiform beauty, or their delicate humor, his mental development has not kept pace with his physical growth. He may have acquired a considerable store of fact-knowl- edge and a smattering of various sciences, but "so far as reading is concerned his mind is still the mind of the cliild who reads his book only till he finds out the meaning of the pictures it contains." Volumes that should be to him as pleasant flower gardens, bright with varied colors and redolent of a thousand grateful odors, he looks upon as arid deserts, progress through which would surely prove a wholly uninteresting and toilsome task. A CLERIC'S READING 78 If he reads, at all, anything higher than the iensational fiction which debauches the intellec- tual system just as opium docs the physical one. It is in a desultory fashion, at infrequent intervals, for bnef periods, and with scarci ly perceptible results. Even a good novel is beyond his mental grasp. Like the emotional young woman, he see» nothing but vapidity in th. masterpieces of ihackeray. and turns from tlum In revel in the puerile pages of Rhoda Broughton or the 'IHich- ess ; If indeed he is not more -d ho-ne on the still lower intellectual plane whereo,; ih unn rmed schoolboy takes to his heart the l»! >od curUli.io adventures of "Wild Nick of the Guich," or the absorbing inaniUes of "Old Sleuth the Detective '» Place such a young man in a city or large town and the chances are that he will give to the world and its pleasures an undue portion of his time and attention; place him in a remote country parish where during the greater part of the week he has Ave or six hours of daily leisure at his disposal, and It IS hardly too much to say that it will require a superabundance of God's grace to preserve him from moral shipwreck. No one will question the statement that, other things being equal, the priest who has the greatest fund of intellectual re- sources IS in the least danger from inferior temp- tations-if for no other reason, because he has fewer idle moments; and hence a taste for solid hp?n "5^1*** ^^^ *T^«^ "'^^ « ««°"^ne '"oral neip. When a man has neither work enough nor study enough to fill his mind." says Cardinal Man- II fl ■^■- , 74 PRIESTLY PRACTICE nin^ "he suffers from monotony, and is restless for change. He is weary of vacancy, and craves for an interest. He jBnds none at home, and he seeks it abroad. His mind wanders first, and he follows it. His life becomes wasted and dissi- pated—that is, scattered and squandered, full of weariness and a tediousness in all things, which at last invades even his acts and duties of religion. .... Weariness is the descending path that leads to sloth, and sloth is the seventh of the sins which kill the soul."* It need scarcely be remarked in this connec- tion that, while the possession of a good library is prima facie evidence of its possessor's taste for good reading, experience proves that such evi- dence is frequently unreliable. To have a few hundred select volumes is one thing; to make one- self familiar with their contents is quite anoi i. -. The taste for making a collection of really valua- ble books is decidedly more common, among the clergy as among other people, than is the zest for perusing them, once they are collected. A priest possessing any perceptible amount of self-respect must, in deference to the pubUc opinion which af- fects him personally, have at his disposal a cer- tain number of standard works — those at least that deal with the various branches of ecclesias- tical science. In self-defence, if for no better rea- son, he must own a few fairly well-stocked book shelves; because he is intimately concerned in keeping up the common— even should it happen 1 The Eternal Prieathoodj p. go. A CLERIC'S BEADING 75 to be the erroneous-impression that he is a man of leammg and a book-lover. That hundreds of volumes are purchased in accordance with this principle, r .'her than from any genume desire to extract the treasures of wit and wisdom that lie buried in their pages, is a fact as sad as it is incontrovertible. Many a ^oung pnest expends, in the first fervor of his ecclesias- ^cal career the bulk of his availabl^ funds" buying good y tomes which, for all the practical beneht he will ever derive from them, mfght jus as well be reposing on the bookseller'^ shflvei as P^K f.T"- ^ ^°^ "^""'^ i« unquestionably an embellishment to any residence; but when ^hey are to serve for ornamental purposes only, books are rather a costly acquisition. Not hy the books cZ^r- \"- ^^ **^"^^ *^^ '•^«^«' -^^ reads judi! ZS" i' "Jf"*"^ «''°^*** «ff^^*^« --«:! purse and some few of them, at least, should be admitted to the intellectual storehouse ;f him con! cerning whom it is written: "Labia sac^d^tis custodient sapientiam." The quality of the vol- umes, rather than their number, is the true cr- tenon by which to estimate the comparative ex- cellence or worthlessness of different book-collec- 1 br^^'^ril^ ^ k'k* ""^y P°''^^^ « ^^'-y admirable library although he owns no more than a hundred books As efficient aids to genuine mental growth and literary culture, indeed, the Bible and Shake! speare are alone worth any thousand other books taker^at random from the shelves of a great there are non» t^Kn -an sfforrt »n/t!. '^"i'"'' « P»pers and magnxines- and c»l Pttbilction. "^""^ "°* '^ Bubscnbe to at lea.* one .ccleViasti 78 PEIBSTLY PRACTICE library; and thoi^h a man had no other volumes than these two and a good quarto dicticmary, he would still possess, both ample material for the highest development of his intellectual powers, and Ihe best models for the formation of a liter- ary or an oratorical style. Apart from the incomparable value of the Sa- cred Scriptures, as the Word of God, the inspired volume possesses another merit to which a good many priests are apparently blind, or which in any case they do not sufficiently appreciate— that of literary excellence. The man who cannot en- joy reading its pages, considered merely as litera- ture, deriving therefrom a delight akin to that afforded by the poetry of Shakespeare, Milton, Wordsworth, and Tennyson, or the prose of Ba- con, Burke, Newman, and Ruskin, has a taste less cultured than might reasonably be looked for in one who has enjoyed the educational advanta|^s of the ordinary' cleric. 'There is no higher poetry on earth than Isaias, no higher prose than the parables ^ our Lord." The encomium pro- nounced a few years ago by a distinguished Amer- ican editor on the Bible as. of all the books essen- tial to the jouriMlist. "the most indispensable, the most useful, the one whose knowledge is most effective,'' merely attested the editor's scholarship, although it probably astonished his average audi- tor. "I am cwBsidering it now," said the lecturer, "not as a religious book, but as a manual of util- ity, of professional preparation, or professional use for the journalist. There is perhaps no book A CLERIC'S READING 79 fTom whlh ""''"" «"««-«tive, more instructive. simDhnt l^.V^^''' "^°^^ directly that sublime Zntl L''^''^ ""^''' ^^««««rates. which re- counts the greatest events with solemnity of rnrwhich "'*''"* -timentality or affectation dnwn *t ^°u °P'" ^^**^ «"^h confidence or lay the BiWe!-'" ^^^'---°ee: there is no book like The manner of one's reading is scarcely a less important consideration than is the matter It L quite possible to read even the best books for four or five hours daily without deriving from the ex' ercise any appreciable profit, or at least a profit readLrrs^r*^"""' *? **^^ ''"^^ ^^P^^^^d- I? our reading is to prove of real benefit, if it is to build up and strengthen the menial fabric and conduce t'must hf "^'"^ development of moral character! condition. ^T'^^^T^ ^y <^-rtain indispensable conditions. One such condition is that it should be methodical. Given a book worth reading ?^ any rational le^timate purpose, one's bes?1,Ian day until its perusal is finished. Habitual desul- toriness in reading is not merely unprofitable it IS positively deleterious. Inconstancy of purpose and discursiveness of thought are weeds wWcr „ the soil of most minds spring up all too rapidl" and their noxious growth needs repress^n ratfae; Uian encouragement. The preacher who is c^. tanually wandering away from his text, who c« i^flfTjceep to his subject, whose argiL^ »Ch«rlea A. Dana, in a lecture on " JonrnmliBn. • • 80 PRIESTLY PRACTICE I loose, disconnected. wanUng in logical sequence, w almost invariably a man whose reading has been desultory and aimless. It is obvious, in the second place, that to ren- der our reading profitable, we must give to the matter read our attenUve consideration. "Atten- tion,*; says Brother Azarias, "is the fundamental condition of all reading, of all study, of all work properly done;" yet it is a condition very often wanting in those who devote even a large part of their leisure to books. To concentrate one's men- tal faculties upon the author's train of thought, to the utter exclusion of other musings, conceits, and fancies, is a habit as necessary to acquire as it is difficult of acquisition. The perfect attention which the trained scholar readily gives to any subject, however dry and uninteresting, is possi- ble to the undisciplined thinker only when the theme is wholly congenial to his tastes, or when it strongly appe.i.: to his interest. Like all other habits, this (,f att. ntion is formed by the constant repetition of single acts. The reader who reso- lutely turns away from distractions as soon as he notices their presence, and repeatedly brings his mind back to the consideration of the full mean- ing of the lines which his eyes are traversing, will eventually acquire facility in concentrating the powers of his intellect on whatsoever subject he will. Not less necessary than either of the foregoing conditions is the leisurely meditation of what one has read or is reading. When Bacon wrote that good books; and the m».'^ Judiciously using of men derive so U«lereL^''r ^^y the mj what they read is ih.. •!'"*' ""'enance from •»ental tla, fhe^boult Ta°t °'.'='"'^»« '"e" us any utility at all it, „ ",k 5°°'' Powewes for appreciated until by iLTti™ h"' "°' ''«" "July deliberate judamenf 1 ?' '''' ^mparison. by aoroughlyLSTtedtoou"''''''""? '"«' •""=»"■* "ig. Reading thatT un^rn T" ""^"eetual be- Uvity may sefvelo kwZ u"^"^ °^ "•»««' ac- "•'"Prove it. On tie whol t''"' ''!''""'>' '^"^^ »<>« ruminant, the wise cleric i,hJ' ">teUectualIy rank and innutritious «»'„„ T°,- '""""'"8 »« •he most succulent meraTZ. °^'- '"<"" ""'y some hours daily bolh Z "^ ,!'"''°«^' ""d spends and in assiduous!^ 'Z^ .t^i^'y browsing. .:*L.--C'X^^ VII f ti:. ■1^ 1-1 I i THE RUBRICS OF THE MASS He that contemneth small things shall fall by little and little.— Ecclesiaaticua. A contenjptu nescio qiionotlo excusari possint istis (niissae) caeremomas omittentes saerius, imo immutantes, transferentes et confundentes. — Tvrrino. Inasmuch as the action which you are about to perform is one of no small peril, I advise you, my dear sons, before celebrating Mass, to learn carefully from well-instructed priests the order of the whole Mass and everything relating to the Consecration, Breaking and CommuMon of the Sacred Host.— Bite of Ordination. WHEN the elder clergy of X— get together and begin exchanging reminiscences, one name that is sure to figure prominently in the conversa- tion is that of Bishop M., the saintly and scholarly Ordinary' who ruled their diocese during the fifth and sixth decades of the last century. Ever zeal- ous for God's honor and glory, and somewhat punctilious as to the order and decency of all re- ligious functions, this prelate had especially at heart the exact observance by his clergy of the rites and ceremonies of the Holy Sacrifice. In pastoral letters and synodal conferences he fre- quently insisted upon the necessity of a priest's reviewing from time to time both the rubrics of the Missal and the decrees of tlie Sacred Congre- gation relating thereto; and, if local tradition does not belie him, he once enforced the same lesson in a manner as drastic as it was novel. _83 of a PopuIaT pastor, ir''''"^."'' '^^ "««"»" and about a do«l „f h^' ^'"'"*'- ^''^op M. and the „ext morning w Masse. 'r'*^''"°»= at Father B.'s three «li„I.f * ' «'""8 °" o'clock. That the Ri.i,„ k T '" """' «i«ht preparatory /„*,&, l"!"'" "^^ ""^ ««» way of thanksgivin'^ * , °„?,; '"^ ''"°"""' ''^ Ws remaininff h, .hf . ™"^'' °' «>«rae; but Mas, wasTmrnelV" """^ '"^''« ""' « «hird of hi. ::errrSg°pir " t'T-"" '""»»« whether by accident ^rdelL ?h.R- T^^r*""'- diea and chair were ,o m! *? • .! «'»hoP» P">- .o afford M™ an etX^ rw o/af, Z^'T ^' and a close observer mi»M h l- " """"^ prelate's attentio7 .eZd t. h """"" '"«' *« divided, hi. eyes folS L "''"^ "^"'"^ of one celebra'n, nowTfnotLrurrt' "''" elusion of the last low Ma« Th n- . ™"" played his usual afraMitTr'.h t ?.'/''°P *'" assisted at the .h,^„ 7 ■ """ breakfast-table; celebrated by the Tuhi?""°* ""* ^"""" ««»» 84 PRIESTLY PRACTICE it ■ j ' !i or so in pleasant converse before they were sum- moned to dinner. Once in the dining-room, Bishop M. suddenly appeared in an extraordinary rdle which fur- nished the guests with a series of surprises from the soup to the walnuts, and led not a few of them to suspect that their Ordinary was afflicted with an attack of temporary insanity. For the time be- ing, he seemed to have forgotten even the ele- mental rules of table etiquette, violating all the canons of polite living as recklessly and systemat- ically as the m6st vulgar of half-famished street Arabs at a Thanksgiving festival. Having adjusted his napkin around his neck after the manner of a baby's bib or a barber's towel, he drank his soup with audible gulps, smacking his lips as he swallowed the last drop of the liquid which he had tilted his plate to scoop up; took a leg of roast turkey in his fingers, and ate the dressing with his knife; reached over his neighbor's plate to help himself to dishes a little removed from him; drank his coffee from the saucer with both elbows resting on the table; and, having satisfied an apparently ravenous appetite before the other guests had nearly finished their meal, pushed back his chair, threw one leg over the other, and began ostentatiously to pick his teeth with his penknife. This astounding per- formance was not of course calculated to promote geniality, and although some of the priests, ignor- ing the eccentric behavior of the Bishop, endeav- ored to keep the conversational ball rolling, it was _IH1J!?^?WCS_0PTHE MASS 86 z«^t ''£"jtj'^ 'eve^r::;;;;;:,;::; Bishop M paW nl «.l, *""'".« "' ** «"■""='. other end oHh" ablT To Z'i/™" «,"'"• «' «>« B. whether he wntf!' .• " "1""^ '">"> Father ally 4lied -^p OD- « r K *'"' "' •««'"'''- .i.enoeL,iUhJ'e'„d''onhe"Lar The""!? '"'" somewhat sooner thnn { „ V^? . ^°*^ ^^"'"e ndtif r" ^^^^^^^^^^ '"a';: .* said. Just a moment. Fathpp n •• tu / ■ng to the expecan. gues'lT he ^^^Un JJ^" "'™- .in«u!aS',ror*;':!ordS''/-"''T"- '■'•''' '•■<' hourhasHHed vou »»h ^''"''« ""^ P"" h"''- .temation: andCwra .rZ'el'."-';" '"^ '™- ticularly to our hos? In nff ' '"^ ""''^ P"" of that'eonducT To^^ fo^ Z^ lT"f'"' endeavorinc to irivp v«» ^"'^°'/"^n» ^ nave been rics. or rather i? th * ?" o^Ject-Iesson in rub- . ui ramer, m the neclect of thpm v^.. nave noticed ihnt i mem. You may ing. as I have done durina fM-^* ^^"'•egard- of etimiPffo T . "*^ aurmg this dinner, all rules "J6*i5"W^' "*' .•«"■ " MtCROcory rboiution tbt chart (ANSI and ISO TEST CHART No. 2) A /1PPLIED IN/HGE he 1653 East Main StrMt Rochrics of surely iepl^e iTiSZ"" '"r"'^*' "»« ™«y without meriting the rl°". ''"^° ?«'<" '° «"=■". impiied in the :*iLVfSe flel''" ' A. .r"^"' least, even the mn«* «, '"""c neijd. At the very of .he Mi^ittSy^r 'wo';;?.!":.? H*"* ™'^ erent method nf «ffZ- worthiest and most rev- parabir/he tfate!t acti ' """''j.^'^ *^«* ^« '^-^^' -a sacrificeTs,^ i^than^^^^ °° ^«'*^ ate niinister can sc^ety t ^"tvrnf ''" tammg to it to be a matter nftJw ®"^*'*^°8 P^^- the Mass may he saW in » ! °* '"*'"*"°*- ^^ Emerson dreamt of!' '' ''°'' *«° «^^' To the Soul that knoweth all- " ^^tTei-aSs^ftt------- .ha."a« tolatdta^r,: "^^Sble"?'^- '""'^^'''• Priests who either have never LraedT^r "^ Mass properlv nr ho,r« , '^^"'^a now to say occas-lanr^ViewlnJ^hr^r "'* "• «"^'=*> bv rhieh the/ha^TS hel "yXtr^^li't "'" inadvertence, and routini.m r '^ '"rgefulness, P.en.en. .o his C^rZ^ZraJ^J^^^Z^^l 88 PRIESTLY PRACTICE of the faults ordinarily committed in the celebra- tion of Mass, and of the no fewer than fifty-three he instances, many arc transgressions against ru- brics which are very certainly preceptive. That some clerics profess to attribute no importance whatever to various details of the cerem nies of the Holy Sacrifice (details which they the selves habitually neglect) is explicable only on the pre- sumption that with them "the wish is father to the tliDught"; and they seem quite oblivious of the fact that their inconsistency is made glaringly manifest by the weight which they give to some other details not a particle more authoritatively prescribed. In this matter of rubrics, indeed, priests not infrequently "Compound with sins they are inclined to By damning those they have not mind to, ' ' as if their vigorous condemnation of the lapses made by others were a species of compensation for the faults of which they themselves are guilty. Like Bishop Warburton's witty distinction, "Or- thodoxy is my doxy; heterodoxy is another man's doxy," the difference, in the estimation of many nriest, between the two kinds of rubrics seems ..o be, "Preceptive rubrics are those I observe; di- rective ones are those I neglect." Of the genuine importance of all the rubrics of the Missal, it is easy to form a correct estimate by weighing well the terms of this extract from the bull prefixed to the Missal of Pius V: "Mandantes et districte omnibus et singulis ... in virtute m I5?_£E5?^^^ ^^ THE MASS ,) 89 sanctae obedienUae Kaedpientes. ut monks V.I ^'''^^ celebratione alias caere- TenZr Lh ' ■'*''^' ^"^"^ ^"«^ ^oc Missali con«- ™b„c .tsclf doe, „„, obviously^how atfreli^" bf p e uTd'^Tt" " t -'"""""'" -" - """y slance^rf .; ™"""8 of 'he hands, for m- 8?cnW hv ^- P'^.P""""" "f 'he MiMal in the sacnsty, by disposing the "siffnacnla" f., ,u" e™Kr«r *"* -''--^ under h"e ge^ ,o^ »„!i w^' ""' '"■•"""'"' in celebratione Mi.. psalm, Judica me, Deus Thi« ««/«« 4 xl of fhA oito« • ^ "*• ^ "Js going to the corner nroin ' ''P^"'"^ ^'^^ M^''^^^' and verifyin«™he proper arrangement of the "sicnar.i]«" uZ^ L S*"«^^«'» *e psata. •reTjty ,^ t'ot phshment of another and a separate rubric "^d .'bV^sstthf^rty- ""' --'"- «-- - probabty be more'ThaTsurpLed l^t^; IX' number of points in which'^'pr^eU:' mZ 90 PRIESTLY PRACTICE from the ordained "ritum, modum ac normam" of saying Mass, the positive faults of which he is habitually guilty, the distorted and mutilated cere- monies to which he has accustomed himself, but for which he can cite the authority of no rubricist great or little, ancient or modern. Fortunate for him if he has a brather priest candid enough to cal his attention to his numerous lapses— and skillful enough to do so without wounding his self- esteem. Better still if, seeing the necessity for re- form in his method of celebrating the adorable sacrifice he has the good sense to recommence the study of the Mass from De Praeparatione bacerdotis Celebraturi, thoroughly learning a lit- tle daily until he knows and observes the most minute rubric. The Ordinary of a diocese, according to a de- cree of the Sacred Congregation of Rites, cannot escape responsibility for the neglect or violation of rubrics among the clergy under his jurisdic- tion. Ordmarius stricte tenetur opportunis rem- ediis providere, ut Rubricae et S. R. C. Decreta rite serventur; siquid dubii occurat, recurrendum ad S. C. pro declaratione." Few Ordinaries, pre- sumably, would consider such a course of action as Bishop M.'s rubrical dinner an opportune rem- edy for abuses however great; but some have in- stituted practices more available and not less ef- fective. One such practice is the "rehearsal" or moot" Mass at the regular ecclesiastical retreat, or at one of the several conferences held in the' course of the year. In the presence of all the 4 ! -Hii^[:5E£!_2*' ™E MASS 91 clergy, assembled in Hie sacri.iv ^^, 'enl aparlnieni wlure the Blef ^ « ''°'"'*"- not kept, one of II , v ^'' Sacrament is goes through alUheeeLT*" "7'" ^*"»- «"■ one of scribe,, by he rubric:'':" ,h™"' '"' °"''' P'"" ni.ed a. a'utl,ori[:,tl°, J'^dVetr tr""? and nnaiif^eS "b; rrfe"rr„m^ ""'re- lies mentioned. The exer^fae if ^^ 1 °"" dueled, may oecunv „n h ' i """ously con- hours; but it rZe ev T I"** " """'f »■• 'WO few.if onv.of ,hep.'r,S;"«'y r" 'P""'' «"d 'hing new" from th'; prac'tict "" '" '™™ ^°™- an oLarasmMo menH " '"'° '^ ''°P^ "f ™<=h which rubridsts Lie n " "'"'"y °f ""^ ' '«"» •he celebratio" ;f"ri Masrbut™'^ °'™'?'''« '" attaches to the naHicMl!!. 'j "^ '"°'"' interest general and abstract ', "" T""'" """> "' *« specify iu,t a few „ • ; T'' ''^ permissible to .nay ^i^'^Z^tf^^]/^ 'he reader least, of some of his p]pW. i " °^"' o*"' a* first, the inchn^L "of ^borr bf^ .^"' ing the Confiteor, as also at fh.V 5 ""^"^^ *^"''- enough lo aii^'^'tre- Z^t tZll^^t; Z 92 PBIESTLY PRACTICE hands. Unless a good many priests have abnor- mally long arms, their inclinaHons are less pro- found than moderate. The custom of bending either the body or the head while making the genuflechon (unico genu) is not only ungraceful but mcorrect, even at or after the ConsecraUon. The minor reverence is included in the greater, the inclination in the genuflection, which, as Wa- pelhorst and other liturgists teach, "semper fit al>sque capitis vel corporis inclinatione." The de- votional sentiment which probably inspires the act may well give way to a desire exactly to con- form to the rubrics. The sign of the cross should be made in straight lines, not in arcs of circles or in parabohc curves; and to substitute for it a scooping of the air with the hand, or still worse a mere gyratory movement of the fingers, is to travesty one of the most venerable of ceremonies. The Ora/e fratres, the Sanctus and Benedictus. the Nobis quoque peccatoribrs and the Domine non sum dignus ought to be. but commonly are not, said ma lower tone of voice than the other por- tions of the Mass which are said aloud. The hands, when extended, should be not farther apart or nearer together than the width of the shoulders: when elevated, they should not be raised higher than the shoulders; and in both positions they should be so held that the palms shall face ea-\ other. Attentive consideration of the foregoing points, and of dozens of similar ones to be found in any good Ceremonial, can scarcely fail to benefit the even were the rubric, onH ."*''' consideration. -IT. It is «;;„'"" TZlnlZZ' °' ^^"P"*- l>eauty and harmonv nf n„ ^* ensures the priest can celeb^e L- w^fh 7''"^""'" ' ""^ "« «veness unless he accurate! '""«^"«"« ^'"Pres- things" of the rubric^ ^ °^'^'^^' "*»^*^ «*"e VIII !4 THE BI.EVIARY: GAIN AND LOSS ^^^ Divinum Ofc.cium imiuti-. eat caelcotiii concentun. -.°i'. a„.rhe makes iven >isits .1 the heavenly court day by day.-cW Manning IT is related of a zealous bishop of the seven- * teenth century that, having been appointed to the diocese of Potenza. in which the clergy were somewhat lax, he consulted St. Joseph of Coper- tino, as to the best measures to adopt in order to secure their amendment. "Let your Lordship," said the Saint, "see to it that your priests recite the divine Office with attention and celebrate the Holy Mass with devotion: the worthv perform- ««nce of these two exercises will effect an enUre reformatio- in your clergy." The soundness of the advice cannot be questioned, and trree hun- dred years have detracted so little from its per- tinency that these words of the Saint might per- haps be addressed to many a bishop of the twen- tieth centur. with fuiIy as much appositeness as characterized their original deliverance to the Or- dinary of Potenz? in the seventeenth. In any 94 iH^55I!^5lL2^VIN^ND LOSS 95 Ingi and it i, ^caKehZf" Z'"' """' "''°""- refor,,, would Wrtuallv h„ » '" ""^ "■"' "'<■'•• one lo Qcq,"rc .!„. hlu Z'^'"''"''' *"'^ "hey dotal day: the .'..,„ „„J „,,. ^^^^^ <" •••« -ccr- 'en lo vilialc th ! whole 1h "",,'" "'"''*'' '» "f" meant to honor 7n Iho *■?•■ «■^on. the Office i, circumstance of place "het,-'r. "' """• ">e v«Oing movement, rite, IT"' •■""• «"'' ">« »pire to impre„",t prfesl w^fhT'V"''"' ™"- »'«niflcance of the LdoraWe si i'" "•^'"endous oflering. while .he awf™" eairoMh?'"'' "^ " f»f Jesus Christ in »i,« rtaiiiy of the presence ene. ..e„„.„ aid tf Wm ^f thTa^Ur "th'''^"^^'- of such .emn i!i,.nM. • 1 • The absence of th,- " H-c^ '!^'" '""f P"™'e ■•' Station "'e red « „ lime n. '"".'""" "'■■""^d '» eoncenira,, rmTenir.n f^"; ""d Posture, make culfy. incr. «. he a" eri;f -^^' °' «'"'"" diffi. volion, ar.d ,, readT *"'^»Peel and inde- .apse into m. . ^r^f^S- '-^ "ep.orable "a^ coulracted the obligation 96 PRIESTLY PBACTICB III of reading ,t, the Breviary i. variouHly coiwidered a pi* dsure or u burden; and it accordingly provea eitljer an effective help r a genuine hindran^^ heir sanctiflcaUon. The truly exemplary priest the cleric who ha. become acclimated to the supernatural atmo -)here in which of right t^ mmister of God should habitually movef loi « upon the recitation bf the divine Office as an ho..- orable service which he is signally privileged in wh.Vh'h • ed to perform, and the performance o which brings to him a copious influx of spiritual p-ace and consolation, a notable accession of celesUal sweetness and light. A veritable man of 1. « .1 f ? ^^^ S^*-^^' °f »"« Lord and Master, L fP ''if '^ 'T^^^*' *° *^^» »^«»»* <'«" never assume the ignoble guise of a laborious task. With the characteristic delight of the ardent lover, he r^ joices in rehearsing the endless atalogue of his Beloved's perfections, and neve .earies c^ r" echoing in his heart the constantly recurring "trib- utes cf praise and worship and thanksgiving to which patnarchs. evangelists, and saints of every degree lend their voices in the magniflcent chorus of the canonical hours. V«I° *;"''*' ^P"l'* ^^^ Breviary is a genuine Vade Mecum in whose treasured pages he finds not only congruous expression for all his varied sentiments but balm-like words of healing for eveiy bruise of his soul; and the precious mo- ments which from time to time during the day he devotes to the Office are merely renewals o7the meffable communion that -lorifled the morning — ■'■' ot H.W.y the ecS.ll*%r' h" 'l""' «f «''«1- hend. Uie true .igniflcM^ „, '^^ ""'^ W"- dlvine Office, anSThn j!n '^'.«'««oii. to the W. ,heo^ of X^ J^° d^|y verier in p^cice one who -Vven tlniM ! T • • ' "* '• '"dwd ««lnU .„d before rf«eL"rJ:i.f''°'' *'"' ">« Holy M.M. he find. i„ ,he HoL^ " '"'' ""' '» help 'he most •i«««c^ the reci7aur„ of ?h° S' "?* " '«" ««'*- •n irk«,me labor, a dai Iv "'^'^ '» ""^'y which they perfo™ i„ "^ ««uiTing drudgery |;ecau,e JC^i\^Z ^^^''V^ f«»hio^ them, but which they wouM '^f?""" '"'" "Po" the omiMion involve norn^T''""*'^ °™i'. did •he Hou« to be declared ^ iZf^ "■* «»*ng of «hat many a Bievia'J J! "'^^hly »«fe fo ,ay sated to the top ,?etf oTX h"' ^""'*"'' «'«^ are stored volume. u.ed,n^*'"'°^«5e '■• which only. ™ "ed tot occasional reference Of ~el.eu^fiirtri„r';!," ""«"-- t " '"* inconsiderate remarks 98 PRIESTLY PRACTICE upon the Breviary so often heard in clerical cir- cles, or take it for granted that the irreverent tongue is always the faithful interpreter of its owner's real sentiments; but if any truth what- ever may be attributed to the maxim, "ex abund- antia cordis os loquitur," then a considerable number of priests clearly look upon the recitation of the divine Oflfice, not as an agreeable and a joy-giving service, but as an onerous and undesir- able burden. It goes without saying that such men pervert the purpose of the Office, and make it a stumbling-block in the way of their spiritual advancement rather than a stepping-stone to their sanctification. The priest who habitually regards the recitation of his Breviary as an uncongenial task is so little likely to turn it to his profit that he may be considered fortunate if the Office does not become for him the occasion of very serious spiritual loss. If the psalms, hymns, lessons, antiphons, ver- sicles, responses and prayers that constitute the Canonical Hours are to prove of any positive ben- efit to him who reads them, they must unques- tionably be recited "digne, attente ac devote," and it is difficult to understand how the cleric who views their recitation merely as so much unavoid- able drudgery can fulfill these conditions. Grant- ing that he pays such attention to the mere words as strictly suffices for the acquittance of the obli- gation, what prospect does his frame of mind offer for the presence of even incipient devotion? What likelihood is there that he will combine the 111 !5iJ?55Xil5lLfffli]^DLOSS 99 interior recoUecUon, the becoming posture anrt the decorous general demeanor wWch should ac company the worthy recital of vocal praye" it as to S; ^.7 '"mentably often he faiHot on y as to the digne ac devote," but even a, regards the mmnnum of attention requisite to tb^ vaHH discharge of his daily debtl "" wan" of tT^'^H'"'" °' •"""»" """'^ that a our tastes. No worl unleSa^L" fn 'aSTf'rl" well. Unless an ecclesiastic has learned to love ?ron,'» "•^'l-^'^™'^' ''« ^» ^carcdy derive fhf ^K t^ ^"""^ '" "^"y d^™"* members of danger"? h'i:"-"'""^ """"^ """ '"ere i, cerLl?y' faulfs imnJ^l r""""*.*" 8""' "f ""-nberless faults, imperfections, and venial sins, even though he does perform all that is rigorously invo°™d m the obligation of the Office. One of Ze s„r pnses that assuredly await the average cleric who IS happily destined to reach Purgato?v isXTm mense debt contracted, throughTbe^^evil ' W osaftherr ^fff^'^ "T*" T"" "'^^ -S^«''^ to say their Office-and rarely said it really well of so maT e'^'™' «P'.="'««on of the remLn ss ot so many ecclesiastics in the accomplishment of this du y IS their failure to understand, or at ?east L"1"?)' f^iuently, the excellence of fteCa nonical Hours, and the motives by which the Church was actuated in constraining W miiT 100 PRIESTLY PRACTICE i I' .1 !r* i'* f P®''"y *^"^ **^«* "^i«» desolation is all the land made desolate; because there is none that considereth in the heart." How many priests of the readers acquaintance read, even once a year, a treatise on the Divine Office, supposing that such a volume can be found among their nooks? How many are conversant with the beau- tiful symbohsm of the different Hours, or appre- ciate the significant collocation of the constituent parts of each? How many possess any further knowledge of the history of the Breviary than a hazy notion that it is a compilation made by the s othful monks of other days, who had nothing else to do than recite interminable prayers, an occupation palpably ill-suited to their overworked successors in modem times. This lack of information concerning Uic Of- fice partially accounts for the slight importance attached to it by many priests, and for their judging to its recitation anything beyond what is stnctly exacted by the law. Let the preacher of an ecclesiastical retreat venture to discuss the Breviarj' in one of his conferences, and suggest that the recitation of the Office should mean something more than the merely mechanical ut- terance of tfie words composing the psalms and lessons; and probably half his hearers will accuse hini of talking "high spirituality." while a consid- erable number of the other half will shake tiieir heads and regret the fact that, "The fellow is not practical." I51.??5Zi^5I= GAIN AND LOSS 101 Practical! What a colossal hunibuc this shih M^!! .K • "'" "^-^ntial celebration of Holv Mass. he importance of careful prepare Uon for preach,ng-and how glibly he disposes of "al Tp^aX^ar^rart-r^^^ .werable argument) : ••AFvrA weH in .hT"" my dear sir. but your discou,^7is n" ^racUeap: IatasTn;o"ar l" '"* """'""I "' •"» 1»« hetans. lates into actual pracUce much of what he nro fesses to disregard as "beauUful theoiyronly " ^ r.l^T'u"^'' *'«' " '""« impossibk to do the et^naTrvatr- '^' "^ " ^^^ <>"' ^^ S .J^.. ,. P."*" "' '" *e esteem in which he wh?h K °'u *f D^'-e Office, and the manner in which be should discharge the obligation of rTcH mg . , certainly do not deserve to be canedTm practicable theories. On the contra^, .h^y '^l easiy reducible to actual perfonna^'e by\ny cleric whose good-will is at all commensurate ^th ststlThe" wh"= """ V-f '™'y practical e«i* siasUc IS he who. recognizing the wisdom of such Sull;"!" ™"""-''?'" -ff-ts to follow , hem taithfully. No mimmizing of his responsibilities 102 PRIESTLY PRACTICE fho» 1? ^." **• * P"^'* ^^° ^° «^«y with the fact that he 18 primarily a man of God. dedicated in a special manner to the highest possible life, and tK)und by a thousand considerations to the wor- w? *u"° u P"""'"^ °^ **»^ ever-blessed Trinity. Whether he fully realizes and accepts all the T ! Xr » ^"^T^'»^"ts of his exalted position, or strives to underrate their numbe. and restrict heir power of binding, it is none the less incon- triable that when he entered the sanctuarv and amoT^H T''' ^°'""^^"'" ^' ^"^°"^d himself among the chosen band to whom, principallv is entrusted the Church Militant's function of Li! tating Jie incessant service of adoration and thanksgiving offered to the Triune God by the Church Glorious and Triumphant. Not merely, then, as an individual wavfarer on earth, does the cleric pray when he recites the Canonical Hours, but as the special representa- tive of the congregation of all the faithful, as their leader, spokesman and advocate-a consideration which may well a-^centuate the fervor of his peti- tions and his determination to make them potent. The Divme Office is the prayer of the Church, and the pnest. with Breviary in hand, is the Church's ambassador, dowered with her credentials and charged with the mission of proffering to God the homage of her worship and her gratitude. To him also, in this quality of ambassador, do all the members of the Church appeal, begging him to obtain for them from Heaven the graces of which they stand in need— perseverance for the -____I5L55?If^5^lGAIN AND LOSS 103 just, repentance for the sinner, forUtude for t'le fTr'n "'to" H '^'''T''' '^^*^ «°^ hope and love for al . To shut one's eyes to these truths and to their legitimate bearing on the manner of recit ing the Office, is to be the very revere of prac" tica . IS to Ignore the patent significance and im- port of the priestly calhng. and to outdo in foUy the veriest visionaries that ever mistook fantastic day-dreams for substantial realities. Again, no member of the clergy will presum- ably deny that prayer is a duty from which he canno safely dispense himself. The necelsity and importance of this exercise of the Christian iffe has been the theme of too many of his instructions to his people to admit any doubt as to the ordin- ary priest's thorough conviction that prayerTs n- dispensable to the common faithfu^and afZ tion to the clergy, from whom, since they have received much, "much will be required " This necessity once admitted, can any course of action be more genmnely practical than that of the cleric who makes of the obligatory recitation of the Breviary a real prayer, vivifying by the emobons of the heart and the elevation of the soul to God. words that would otherwise be mean- ingless formulas, mechanically uttered and prof- iting nought? No petitions of his own composing r ^^T^r^^^^ '" excellence with those scattered through the Canonical Hours. «A hundred pri- vate prayers," says St. Alphonsus Liguori, "are not of so much value as a single prayer of the Breviary. In truth, whether our object in pray- 104 PRIESTLY PRACTICE ing be to acknowledge God's supreme dominion over us as over all creatures, to appease His anger aroused by our sins, to return Him thanks for the benefits constantly showered upon us, or to solicit from His infinite goodness the assistance we need in order that we may walk in the foot- steps of our model Priest, Jesus, the divine Office accomplishes each of those ends more excellently and efficaciously than any other form of prayer that heart or lips can utter. It is evident, then, that the priest who persists in viewing the Breviary as a hardly tolerable bur- den, and who consequently recites it as the rest- less .chool-boy recites his reading lesson, is ob- livious of his true interests, and is willfully dam- ming up a copious stream of grace — a stream sadly needed, perhaps, for the irrigation of his drouth-stricken soul. Comparatively few, indeed, are the ecclesiastics whose method of saying their Office is not susceptible of judicious revision i the lines of becoming posture, distinct and i .- hurried utterance, attention to the meaning of psalms and lessons, frequent aspirations in uni- son with the passages recited, and habitual spir- itual union with the heavenly choir of whose never-ending anthem our Canonical Hours form earth's most faithful echo. All such revision would be a manifest blessing, tending, as it cer- tainly would, to the greater glory of God, the Church's benefit, and the personal sanctification of the clergy. (I . IX PREACHING AND RHETORIC of thr;rta%rai?o'ri?lr/*' ^r'^^l •*"»''** •^•^ t^en^wlve. l.nRu.ge, the pto«Si„,«^t^^^^^ ""«* "«^--t"' <><»'ect th« Id, of true eiotet?.^8ri^r,'o:y'^\r,;^^^ -t ^«Pi- i- the UL*?; "L^itZ^nl?^^^^^ «>' «'• P'J«^ ough a knowledire o^ Ti. *I ?*^"*- ^* "*'0"' ">« colmure effective meiKly inveigl w .h « < i T""" *'«' "«''«• B«lne that h, .. language, may im- pronounced bv . rv rl.i,.,^i ' !? ''" ''"" and which I,e-», „ Za^/LTJ^v Tn "" """"y- •core of rhetorwal ," ,; ,VX iL " ""'' ""l"' " and college.. '' " <""' whooU flcialiUe,. tCw tX TheTr^ir?""'""' '* catechi,, preparing „ claM i^^hiWrefforTr^I Communion or Conflrmation. *"' Rhetonc is concerned with everv di»rn„~. » nTanTacti^C'™";:- --«. - P-ua": good or bad, eifecti\p ni' f..#ii« i »y'a"veiy revPMP "TK^ '^"*"®' eloquent or the p^Xugh^" rarnxrif "u«hi^i rs law, inherent in the mind, which we are at libert^ 110 PIUESTLY PRACTICE r; --rnrwm S: to violate, but, if we violate them, tiic discourse will foil to realize its end." The knowledge and full mastery of these laws, with a ''ew to their practical observance in speaking or waiting, is the prime object of the study of rhetoric; and any dis- paragement of such study is, in its ultimate analy- sis, scarcely less puerile than would be the con- demnation of grammar or logic. Restricting the phrase- to its legitimate mean- ing, to "preach rhetorically" is to preach with propriety, elegance, and force; it is to present the matter of the sermon in the manner best calcu- lated to produce In the hearers the effect desired; and hence, properly speaking, the more rhetorical the preacher, the better will be the preaching. Paradoxical as it may sound to some, it is never- theless strictly true t.'iat every good discourse, whether religious or profanr is rhetorical: no orator, in or out of the pulpit, ever speaks to the purpose without consciously or unconsciously conforming to those laws which rhetoric enjoins as necessary to the adequate and forcible expres- sion of thought. Let it not be supposed that, in penning the foregoing paragraphs, the writer has been obliv- ious of the stock objections urged by a certain class of priests against the studious composition of sermons. He has not been unmindful of the formidable array of quotations from the Fathers of the Church, in which rhetoric seems to be de- spised as inconsistent with the dignity of the preacher's office; nor has he lost sight of St. Paul's JPBEACHINO AND RHBTOHIC m H„„. °" P'-™':''!"* Such .Icreotypcd auota ft.«.« .k "'*^/ *""*'" and Saints, heina detnrhed from the context which best explains their mean • o?;irtoT'"".^ interpreted in a sensTuTerlv" such^nh* """*'' °^ *»'^''- ""thors: and tha^ such phrases as are quoted above are expressive of far other qualities than those which manlaUh denouncers of the rhetorical sernTon woiw havP dUK'cond" *° ^'''- Th^ Vlthe'rs'rn! aouDtedly condemn aflTected elesanrp »».»„».. exprcion. .uperfluou, ornamTnf and tZ^Z cxce»,e, which characerized much oHhc rhetoric there be found the slightest censure of the pri"c pies inculcated by modem rhetoricians ni„f those qualities of style which are 7heT;»° ? resuit of the practical »pp.icaHoTof"'.hJ;eCn''cN II was not one of the Fathers, but a rhetorician who in h.s mtroduction to a courae of eet"re, which have proved the storehouse of most ™b^e! acciarod that his purpose was: "to explode fnlJ ornament, to direct attention more toward sub- 112 PEIBSTLY PRACTICE I* ii ll stance than show, to recommend good sense as the foundation of all good composition, and sim- plicity as essential to all true ornament" The same author. Dr. Blair, one of the most noted ex- pounders of those rhetorical principles against which the young preacher is so assiduously warned, has this to say of the sermon : "With re- spect to style, that which the pulpit requires must certainly, in the first place, be very perspicuous. As discourses spoken there are calculated for the instruction of all sorts of hearers, plainness and simplicity should reign in them. All unusual, swollen, high-sounding words should be avoided; especially all words that are merely poetical or merely philosophical. ... In a sermon, no points or conceits should appear, no affected quaintness or smartness of expression. These derogate much from the dignity of the pulpit, and give to the preacher the air of foppishness which he ought, above all things, to shun." Now, there is nothing, we take it, particularly obnoxious in such recommendations as these; and even St. Al- phonsus Liguori would hardly condemn the preacher whose sermons displayed conformity to such like rhetorical precepts. Perhaps the most egregious mistake commonly made by clerical talkers on this subject of preach- ing is the supposition that the simplicity of style so universally enjoined as the most suitable for pulpit oratory, is a negative quality, importing merely a lack of study or effort in the choice of words, the construction of sentences, and the dis- PREACHING AND RHETORIC 113 position of the various parts of the discourse The extemporaneous preacher who fancies Tat" be- cause he speaks right on, in a natural, ree and easy manner and sedulously shuns the bugbear of figurative anguage, his sermon possesses tWs quahty, mamfests simplicity, not of stvle but of understanding. If the Fathers, whosf authority s so often adduced in vindication of this unstud- ed manner of expression, were to listen to the impropneties and inaccuracies of dicUon, the iu! l^ZaV '^'?'*' ^°^ ambiguous phrases, the stragghng clauses and dislocated periods the 7iZ?2""". '"P'*^*'^° °' P^°"« platitudes and stereotyped commonplaces, the whole combination of undignified twaddle and forceless prosing that masquerades nowadays under the tiUe of a "sim- pie sermon, they would assuredly feel like ex- claimmg, m a paraphrase of Madame Roland: "O Simphcity! Simplicity! How many crimes are committed in thy name!" The genuine simplicity which, according to the rhetoricians not less than the Fathers, should dis! tingmsh the se^on. "stands opposed, not to oi^a- ment. but to affectation of ornament, or appear- ance of labor about our style- and it is a capl^l error to suppose that so excellent a quatity can be acquired without studied effort and constant pract ce No man is ordinarily so apt to speak in a style the very reverse of simple as the priest who preaches without adequate preparation And just here let it be said tiiat most of the adverae 114 PRIESTLY PRACTICE ii ' cnUcism of rhetoric in preaching comes from clencs whose preparation of their sermons is habitually madequate. The time and attention which conscientious preachers devote to the com- position of their discourses is a tacit condemna- tion of the culpable negligence or laziness of less exemplary ministers of the word of God; and very often these latter are merely throwing a sop to the Cerberus of their own conscience when they utter their loud-mouthed denunciations of the rhetorical, or what to their minds is practically the same thing, the carefully prepared, sermon. That much harm is done to youthful preachers by this ill-advised talk of their elders is incon- testable. Many a young curate is led to give up writing his sermons, or even preparing them with a care at all commensurate to tiieir importance, simply because of sarcastic references to "high- flown sentiments," "rounded periods," "the flow- ers of rhetoric," "the ambition to be eloquent," and similar platitudes, coming from a pastor who never grows animated unless when scolding, and is eloquent only )n the subject of his pew-rents. A fondness for figurative language is, after all. not an unpardonable off'ence in a very young preacher; and if at first his style is somewhat overioaded with ornament, it is a fault that gen- erally cures itself, his own taste, as he grows older, leading him to reject all figures that are merely showy, while retaining those which give to his speech additional effectiveness and vivacity. _£55££HJNO^AND_BHBTOK[C 115 THE WEEK-DAY MASS One Mass is worth more tban all the treasures of the world. — B. Leonard of Port Maurice. The Mass is the abridgment of divine love and the com- pendium of all the benefits conferred on men. — St. Bonaventure. Necessario fatemur, nullum aliud opus adeo sanctum ae divinum a Ghristi fidelibus tractari posse, quam hoc tremendum mysterium. — Cone. Trid. "IF I were a parish priest," recently exclaimed 1 a fervent convert, "it seems to .me that I would never rest until the gieat body of my pa- rishioners were habitual attendants at daily Mass.** "If you were a parish priest," replied a pastor who had overheard the remark, "you would in all probability be very well satisfied if your people habitually attended Mass even on Sundays and holidays." The pastor presumably looked upon the convert as a sort of visionary enthusiast, wrapped up in a longing for unattainable ideals, and impatient, as converts are ofttimes wont to be, of low standards of pie*/ among their breth- ren in the faith. The convert possibly regarded the pastor as a priest not overburdened with that zeal for the glory of God and the salvation of souls which his profession calls for, and his ordination presupposed him possessed of. The judicious reader will perhaps be of the opinion that the re- mark of the layman was as natural and intelligi- 116 THE WEEK-DAY MASS 117 ble as the reply of the cleric was flippant and in- adequate. It is assuredly not surprising that an intelligent observer should be struck by the glaring incon- sistency between the belief of all Catholics con- cerning the Mass. and the practice of a great many of them as regards attendance thereat. Thor- oughly convinced that the oblation of the adorable Sacrifice is the central fact of all Christian wor- ship how can Catholics nevertheless manifest, as to the matter of taking an actual part in the obla- tion, so lamentable an indifference? For, that thousands and thousands o' the faithful are in- diiferent in this respect, it would be futile to deny Even among the steriing Catholics who form per- haps the majority of every parish, men and women faithful in the performance of all essen- tial duties, "good, practical Catholics," as we are wont to call them, how many are there not who entirely neglect the daily performance of the grandest and most efficacious of all acts of piety? When the celebrant of the week-day Mass, in the average parish of the land, turns around to say "Orate, fratres," what proportion of those who without notable inconvenience could be present are really there to join their prayers to his? Yet all his people firmly believe that at the altar is being consummated the most sublime and most beneficial sacrifice possible on earth or in heaven. With a certainty precluding all shadow of doubt, they know that "when the beams of the morning sun come in at tiie windows of the church, and 118 PRIESTLY PRACTICE i fall for a moment into the uncovered chalice, and glance there as if among precious stones with a resUess. Umid gleaming, and the priest sees it, and the light seems to vibrate into his own heart, quickening his faith and love, it is the Blood of God which is there, the very living Blood whose first fountains were in the Immaculate Heart of Mary."* That the Mass is the holiest of acts and the most pleasing to God, that it is potential beyond all other acts in appeasing the divine anger and victoriously combating the forces of hell, and that of all conceivable sacrifices it is incompar- ably the most fruitful of graces and blessings to men on earth and of relief and solace to the souls m purgatory, these are truisms familiar as house- hold words to every adult Catholic, yet sadly in- operative as to their influence upon the conduct of many. Daily attendance at the oblation of the unbloody Sacrifice is certainly the best of all de- votions. Whose fault is it that it is so very gen- erally neglected? Primarily and principally, doubtless, the fault of the faithful themselves; but in a measure, also, and sometimes in a large measure, the fault of the pastors as well. It may be taken for granted that in every parish there is to be found a considerable number of fervent souls, genuinely religious men and women, who are so far consistent Catholics that they habitually consider salvation to be the para- mount affair in life, who daily acquit themselves *F»ber, "The Precious Blood." THE WEEK-DAY MASS 119 of the obligaUon of seeking God's assistance in prayer, and who approach, every few weeks at leaau the tribunal of penance and the Holy Table. Ihat such people do not in addition frequently, not to say habitually, attend the week-day Mass, IS probably due to one of two causes: Either the opportunity is wanting, or their pastors have not sufficiently impressed upon them the excellence of the practice and the incalculable advantages to b denved therefrom. While the latter cause is undoubtedly the more common, the former is not so rare as is desirable; and all too frequently one is made aware of the existence of both. The pastor who wishes to sec an appreciable number of his people present at the daily Mass must make up his mind to celebrate regularly every morning, and to celebrate at a fixed hour. Nothing will more speedily reduce his week-day congregation to a mere handful than their uncer- tainty as to the question whether, on a given morning, the Holy Sacrifice will be off-ered or not. If he omits celebrating once or twice one week and two or three times the next, if it is no uncom- mon experience for the assembled parishioners to wait half an hour or more and then be informed that "Father Edward is indisposed this morning," It is tolerably certain that the number of attend- ants will sooner or later dwindle to a few saintly women whose piety is proof against all disap- pointments, and whose charity possibJy attributes to Father Edward's indisposition a gravity that is non-existent. I IW !i PRIESTLY PRACTICE Apart from any strict obligation rcsUng upon a pastor to celebrate as frequently as he can, ob- ligahon incurred by the reception of stipends, by promises, etc., he can hardly be allowed, in the matter of omitUng to say Mass, the same latitude as might be given to a simple priest who is free from the burden of a pastoral charge. Yet even the simple priest is advised to celebrate as often as is possible. The advice is based on reasons wWch the Venerable Bede thus groups together: The pnest who, being prevented by no legitimate reason, does not celebrate, deprives, as far as in him lies, the most Holy Trinity of the greatest glory and most signal honor that can be rendered to it; the angels of a sovereign joy; sinners of their pardon; the just of the aids and graces which they need; the souls in purgatory of a consider- able relief; and the Church of the spiritual bene- fit of Jesus Christ Himself, of the supreme rem- edy." The truly zealous pastor will not only afford his parishioners the opportunity of hearing Mass as often as he reasonably can; he will, moreover, offer the Holy Sacrifice at the hour best suited to the convenience of the majority of those desirous of being present. His celebrating a half-hour or an hour earlier, or later, than the time which his personal preference would select, he will account a trivial sacrifice, amply compensated for by the additional worshippers thereby drawn to the house of God, for the glorification of His name and their own spiritual and bodily welfare. THE WEEK-DAY MASS 121 Once the hour is determined, however the pansh priest will best consult the interests of his people and best insure the attendance of an in- creasing congregation by observing the strictest punctuality in beginning Mass at ?he appointed n^f; "^^ « S^"^*-"* »•"»«. it » mistaken charity to postpone Mass. even on Sundays, for ten. fifteen or twenty minutes, because the church is not well filled, or the members of the choir are not all nnS'i.^"!*"? week-days the priest will lose nothmg by displaymg all the promptitude of the most exact business man. A daily Mass known to be celebrated mvariably at six o'clock is far Z'ctii f-^ *1^^ participated in by a numerous congrega ion than one understood to begin "about MX o clock, a phrase in which the qualifying term su^ests probable tardiness of unceriain duration and which m any case wants the deflniteness and precision that satisfies the orderly mind. Regularity ahd pur.ctualitj- on the part of the celebrant, then, are the primary requisites to the general practice, in any parish, of this devotion to the daily Mass. If these were the sole requisites there would be but little cause for complaint, since m the overwhelming majority of parishes these conditions actually exist. That something additic "1 IS needed to draw the people in appre- ciable nuxnbers to the morning Sacrifice is evi- dent from the pitifully empty churches in which day after day the tremendous Mystery of CaJvarv 18 renewed. This additional, and equally essen- tial, condition is the vivid realization, by the faith- m PRIESTLY PRACTICE fill, of the incompttrable excellence of the Holy Mass; a living, practical belief In the untold bless- ings of which its devout attendants are the recip- ients; a firmly settled conviction that to treat the Holy Sacrifice with indifi'ercnce, to abstain fr m taking part in it, when one can readily do so, is an act of genuine folly. To animate the faithful with such sentiments and to persuade them to act in conformity therewith, '» surely the duty of (heir spiritual father, of the pastor whose mission it is, not merely to seek out and bring back to the fold the lost sheep of his flock, but to lead all his sheep to rich and abundant pasturage. This is an age of special devotions, of sodalities, unions, apostleships, conlraternities, arch-con- fraternities, and pious associp.tions of all kinds. Excellent as the purpose of each may be, it is quite conceivable that a pastor may doubt the expediency of indiscriminately recommending to his people such a multiplicity of devotional exer- cises, and may hesitate about warmly endorsing the practice of any considerable number of them. Granting, however, that he is desirous of seeing his parishioners devotional at all, that he believes in the advisability of their performing any other acts of piety than those which are of strict obliga- tion, it is difficult to imagine him feeling hesitancy in recommending as frequent attendance as pos- sible at the oblation of the august Sacrifice of the altar. Here, surely, he is secure and need have no scruple as to the wisdom of his action. Here is a subject upon which he may insist, in season THE WEEKDAY MASS 123 and out of senson, with the certitude that he is not ovenitepping the bounds of due discretion. Here. If he desires a quasi-hobby, is one which is per- fectly safe and which he cannot pursue too as- siduously. If. in tiie zealous advocacy of certain other devotions, the warmth of one's feelings may give rise to occasional exaggerated statements con- cerning their excellence and advantages, here is no such danger,— on the sublimity of the Mass and on the benefits resulting to those who hear it devoutly, exaggeration is impossible. While it would be a work of supererogation, if not an act of impertinence to the reverend read- ers of this volume to insist at any length on the various considerations likely to prove effectual in winning the faithful to a more general practice of this salutary devotion, a brief reference to one or two topics may prove so far useful to the younger clergy as to suggest some lines of thought to be pursued and plans of arguments to be de- veloped. And first, through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, we most adequately accomplish the main purpose of our existeii To honor and glorify God is the principal destiny of all created beings, angelic and human, animate and inanimate. "Praise ye him, all his angels; praise ye him, all his hosts."^ "Every one that calleth upon my name, I have created him for my glory."* "Let all thy wor ks, O Lord, praise thee."» God's glory, in I Pi. exiTil. 2. *l8. xlii, 7. ' Ps. cxJjv, 10. IM PBIESTLT PBACTICB h ' i ! ^ a word, is the ultimate raiMon (THre of the uni- verse and all it contains — and, in greater degree or less, that glory has been given to Him ever since the morning stars praised Him together, **and all the sons of God made a Joyful melody.** Now, all the honor which the augcls have ever rendered to God by their homage, or men have ever given to Him by their virtues, penances, and martyr- doms, is as naught compared to the glory which God receives from the celebration of a single Mass: and this infinite honor may be paid to the Heavenly Father by the humblest mortal who de- voutly attends the Holy Sacrifice. Considered as a sacrifice of petition, the Mass is clearly the most efficacious means of securing the blessings of God, temporal as well as spiritual. "Amen, amen, I say to you: If you ask the Father anything in my name, he will give it to you."' If any one mav confidently expect the ful- fillment of this promise of Jesus Christ, it is surely he who, actually present at the oblation of the Lamb of God, not only asks in the name of Jesus, but has his petition presented to the Father by Jesus himself. As a sacrifice of propitiation, the Mass, being the unbloody renewal of the bloody Sacrifice of Calvory, has an equally salutary effect, "the remission of sins.** "Let us go, therefore, with confidence to the throne of grace, that we may obtain and find grace in seasonable aid.'** Reconciled by this "clean oblation," God grants the grace of penace to sinners guilty of Grievous * John ztI, 28. *H«b. W, 16. i; THE WEEKDAY MASS 125 offenses, and suffuses with the full light of par- don souls stained by only venial faults. Finally, as a sacrifice of satisfaction, the Mass. according to St. Thomas, has the power ex opere operato to remit the temporal punishment due to our sins because by it "the fruits of the bloody Sacrifice of the Cross are distributed and received in the same abundant measure." This atonement, still due to God, after the guilt of sin has been re- mitted, must be made either by voluntary penace and other satisfactory works here, or in tlir rl.-ans- ing fires of purgatory hereafter. Could liu.e be any stronger motive to induce the faithful to throng to the sacrificial altar as of tr- rs they may? •The tinklings of the Mass-K new-crea- tive words," says Father Faber, lip, he whole aspect of the unconscious work ; )wn and unsuspected temporal calamities ar Ay driven away, like clouds before the wind, by the obla- tions of the Precious Blood ... Let us leave off the calculation, and contemplnte in quietude the ocean of painstaking graces, of vast satisfac- tions, and of kindly expiations, into which the daily Masses of the Church outpour themselves, lighting the patient darkness under ground, flash- ing up to the skies as so much of litional light and song, and beautifying the poor, exiled earth in the eye of the all-holy heavens." While these graces, satisfactions, and expiations undoubtedly benefit all the children of the Church, they are just as undoubtedly applied in most copious super- abundance and with most plenary effect to those 126 PRIESTLY PRACTICE of the faithful who take actual part in the offer- ing of i]'.M Sacrifice. ^ tne convert whom we quoted in the opening par ^?.ph of '.As essay had the foregoing con- side -..ions in nind, then his remark was clearly neither irraiicaal nor extravagant. Many a pastor expends considerable energy on movements far less beneficial to his people than would be the promotion of a fuller attendance at daily Mass; and there are comparatively few parishes, perhaps, in which the pastors could not, by the exertion of a little enrnest, zealous effort, speedily bring about a notable increase in the numbers of their morn- ing congregations. It is, of course, purely a ques- tion, not of obligation, but of devotion, and of devotion that does not interfere with the per- formance of other duties of one's state in life. We readily grant that the devotion is imprac- ticable to very many Catholics whose time is not at their own disposal ; but we believe also that it is quite practicable to thousands of Catholics who habitually neglect it. Pretexts for absenting one- self are easily discoverable; but in sober earnest- ness, no Catholic really believes that the economy of any household ever suffered, or the prosperity of any business man ever waned, because the wife or husband gave one-half hour of the day's forty- eight to the worship of that God on whose Provi- dence our life and health and happiness depend. It is pertinent to add that one unfailing result of a priest's strenuous efforts to spread this best of all devotions among his people, is his own THE WEEK-DAY MASS 127 fuller realization of the sublime dignity of the Sacrifice whose unworthy minister he is, and his proportionately greater care that the effects of the Mass ea^ opere operantis may increase in fruitful- ness from day to day. Even were this the only result attainable, his zeal would be abundantly rewarded; for he cannot too sedulously shun the danger of celebrating with irreverence, inatten- tion, or a lack of actual devotion. Viewed from any standpoint the practice of attending daily Mass IS thus thoroughly commendable; to flock and pastor ahke. it will surely prove a source of innumerable benedictions. XI THE PRIESTS' COMMUNION LEAGUE AS the Priests' Communion League has for its object the extension among the faithful of the practice of frequent and daily communion, it will not be irrelevant to consider for a moment the bearing on that practice of the particular mode selected by our Lord for the bestowal upon mankind of His divine love's incomparable gift, Himself, His Body and Blood, Soul and Divinity. In view of His undoubted omnipotence, we know that, had He so desired. He could readily have accomplished the purpose of the Eucharistic sacri- fice and sacrament in any one of multifarious ways other than the precise and definite one which He adopted, the giving Himself to us under the ' of bread and wine. Now, on the face of it, lot His selection of this mode. His choice of tiiese elements, throw a white light on the fre- quency with which He desires the sacrament of love to be received by His followers? Is there anything forced or strained in the contention that, since H^. chose to give Himself to us under the form and appearance of substances that constitute the daily food of our bodies, it was presumably because He wished that we should make His sacra- mental self the daily food of our souls? Divesting our mind, in so far as is possible, of the notions, concepts, prejudices, opinions, and beliefs which 128 mi THE PHIESTS' COMMUNION LEAGUE 12 9 we have acquired, as to this matter of frequent commumon, from inherited traditions, from toe teaching of most theologians, a^rt espeda™y from aboutT, • ''"'='' "' '"'™ "» PrevaiUng round fn the^IacrofTn' 'hiWhood-putting ourselves n ine place of the AposUes and discinlts and faking account with them of the reiSe'd "n stances m *hich Jesus Christ declared Thaf Z flesh ;s meat indeed and His blood drink indeeJ- does ,t not seem entirely natural that they should ook upon the Eucharist, not as a specraFbanquel sDirif,^! ^ . . r""' '"' " y*^''- •»" =>' a regular spiritual meal to be partaken of as a matter of course every day? "wuer oi meJX!^?!.*'' '" '•"''' "P°" ">« »>«'«<• Sacra- pracuce in this respect was followed by the earlv Chnshans for some centuries, is matLr of his- toncal record Later on, attendance at I^e Holy to aid ft:??;;'"" '™'"'^»«- ""O " - PermisSbJe lo add that m consequence, that not only post hoc ^Lru^Mur n""' '"/^' '"^ Christian^eLme a less faithful reflex of the life of Christ. From Je^o/dnw"! i*"' ^f" "';'"<""'"' of EucharS _ ihl, •"*"" " "'"' ^'"' ^S"' "•«« was ome L. tnd^r'- f "7 "' "«^"' Saints, a dis- pute. not indeed as to the nature of the Blessed Sacrament in Itself, but as to our moral condud ■n regard thereto. Of the two opposing v"ews one and that with which the majority of us I^e probably most familiar, was that Jhile. the^ 130 PEIESTLY PRACTICE retically, the Church desires thai the faithful should communicate frequently, and even daily, as far as their duties permit, still in individual practice distinction is to be made between soul and soul, according to the greater or less degree of preparation and of holiness in daily life. In harmony with this view, or at the least in sub- stantial agreement with it, were St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure, St. Ignatius, Blessed John of Avila, St. Francis or Sales, and St. Alphon- sus Liguori. The opposite view was that no higher prepara- tion is essentially needed for daily reception of the Eucharist than is required for a single recep- tion, say at Easter; and that those holier condi- tions of the soul, beyond the mere state of grace and a right intention, are not so much prepara- tion for the Sacrament as its fruits and eifects. This second view was authoritatively endorsed by Pius X. in December, 1905, when he ratified and confirmed the decree Sacra Tridentina Sy nodus of the Sacred Congregation of the Coun- cil. As that decree supplies the raison d'itre of the Priests' Communion League, and as it is, more- over, in the words of Bishop Hedley, "a docu- ment of the first importance, forming a law by wjiich theologians and confessors will henceforth have to guide themselves in theory and practice," it becomes congruous, if not imperative, before going further, to quote textually a few at least of its provisions. It determines, then: 1. Frequent and daily Communion, as a thing THE PRIESTS' COMMUNION LEAGUE 131 bl the f?f?*i'y 5^l'^^"3 H Christ our Lord, and fi^^thf!,! nf °^lf P"''*^*'' 4°"^^ ^^ open to ail the so thn/'nn whatever rank and conaition of life- so that no one, who is in the state of grace and who approaches the Holy Table with a rfcht nnH devout intention, can lawfully be'hiSderef theTe^ „,u^' ^ "^h*. intention consists in this- that hp who approaches the Holy Table should do so nol 3 A Hhon JS1?T ^""^ *"'" weaknesses and defects* commnni!^2?f f * '^ ""Vf^ expedient that those who communicate frequently or daily should be free fctT^nH?"'' especfally sucH^as are fulfy de- liberate, and from any affection thereto, neverthe- in' with fhfn"'"* *^^V"^^y ^^ ^'^^ f?om mortal sm with the purpose of never sinning mortally in fu ure; and. if tfiey have this sincere purpose U Lr«?,f«T ^^'^ ^"*- *^^* i^'^y communicantsThould gradually emancipate themselves from even venial sms and from all affection thereto. Law 7hl!nl*'tr^^ **^^ Sacraments of the New «f ' ,u.^^^ ^^^Y *^^e effect ex opere operato Son'«?thf H-P'°^?-"" ^ F^u^*^'- ^ff^^t in proper: tion as the dispositions of the recipient are better- therefore care is to be taken that Holy S munion be preceded by serious preparation, and followed by a suitable thanksgiving according to each one's strength, circumstances, and dS 5. Ihat the practice of frequent and daily Com- munion may be carried out with greater priidence «hn„lTr « W^"^ "^.^"t- ^^^ cSnfessor^s adv°cl P«rpf,?i ^^ ?f ^^^- Confessors, however, are to be careful not to dissuade anyone (ne quemauam provided that he is m the state of grace and an^ proaches with a right intention. ^ ^ 132 PRIESTLY PRACTICE 1 m . ^ ■ jji i ^ 1 ? 1 "■' r ■*a j 9! ' ■i ■ ill 6. But since it is plain that, by the frequent or daily reception of the Holy Eucharist, union with Chnst is fostered, the spiritual life more abun- dantly sustained, the soul richly endowed with virtues, and an even surer pledge of everlasting happiness bestowed on the recipient, therefore parish priests, confessors and preachers — in ac- cordance with the approved teaching of the Ro- man Catechism (Part II, cap. 4, n. &S) — are fre- quently, and with great zeal, to exhort the faith- ful to this devout and salutary practice. • The passage in the Roman Catechism, to which reference is made, runs: "It will, therefore, be the part of the parish priest frequently to exhort the faithful that, as it is considered needful every day to feed the body, so also they should not neglect to feed and nourish the soul every day with this Sacrament; for the soul, it is evident, stands not less in need of spiritual, than the body of corporal, food." As will be seen from the foregoing, all parish priests, confessors,- and preachers, should in obe- dience to this "law by which they must henceforth guide themselves," encourage, foster, and zealously spread among the laity the practice of frequent and daily Communion. Those of them, therefore, who join the Priests' Communion League, are not in reality contracting any new obligation, but merely pledging themselves to the faithful acquit- tance of an obligation already existing. The Priests' Communion League, in fact, is an asso- ciation established seven years ago at Rome, in the Church of San Claudio, with the sole object of THE PRIESTS' COMMUNION LEAGUE 133 spreading the practice of frequent and daily Com- munion in conformity with the decree Sacra Tri- dentina Synodus. some provisions of which have just been quoted. All priests determined to labor for the accomplishment of this object are eligible for membership in the League and so far as priests of the Eucharistic Leagiie are concerned they may become members of this new associaUon by simply forwarding their name for enrollment to the Director General. The means proposed to its members for furthering the aims and attaining the end which the association has in view are- prayer, speaking, writing for the press, and the distribution of Hterature relating to the subject. These constitute the sole duties required of mem- bers, and, presumably, not all of them are de- manded of each. If the duties of membership are not onerous. Its privileges are notable. Members of the Priests' Communion League enjoy the right of a privileged altar three times a week. They may celebrate the Holy Sacrifice an hour before sunrise and an hour after midday. They may distribute Holy Communion at any hour of the day, from an hour before sunrise until sunset. They may gain a Plenary Indulgence on all the first-class feasts of the Mysteries of Faith, of the Blessed Virgin, and of the Apostles. They may gain, likewise, an In- dulgence of 300 days for every separate work which they perform for the advancement of the Leagues purposes. On Uie occasion of the Tri- duum recommended to be held in their parishes i i 134 PRIESTLY PRACTICE they may impart to the people, after the General Communion, the Papal Benediction with the Plenary Indulgence attached thereto. Finally, they may grant to such of their penitents as are in the habit of receiving Holy Communion daily, or almost daily (that is, etiamsi abstineant semel nut iferum in hebdomada) a Plenary Indulgence once a week, which Indulgence may be granted at one time for several weeks. It is superabundantly evident from all this that our beneficent Holy Father, whose energetic activity thus far in his pontificate has shown him consistently living up to his motto, "to restore all things in Christ," has especially at heart the great- est possible extension of the salutary practice of daily Communion. For it may be well to note here, with Father Zulueta, S. J., that the decree. Sacra Tridentina Synodus uses indifferently the expressions, "frequent," "frequent and daily," "fre- quent and even daily," showing that daily Com- munion is not a separate species of Eucharistic practice, governed by rules different from those regulating frequent Communion. It goes without saying that in this matter "most eamesUy desired by Christ our Lord and the Catholic Church," every priestly heart should throb in unison with that of Pius X, that every priestly mind should discard the more or less Jansenistic or near-Jansenistic principles hitherto acted upon, and that every priestly will should be an energizing force habitually exerted in entic- ing the faithful to more and more frequent recep- THE PRIESTS' COMMUNION LEAGUE 136 tion of their Eucharistic God. It would seem in- deed eminently fitting that the Priests' Communion League should speedily count on its roll at the vep least four or five times its present member- No pastor who gives to the matter ever so little senous reflection can fail to perceive that only the happiest possible results can flow from his efforts to introduce or increase the practice of daily Com- munion m his parish. Even now. modified fre- quentation of the Sacrament is the hall-mark of the good practical Catholic, and the source of the true priest s greatest consolation. What blessings XIZ *!^^^P.^i^t^d ♦« accompany the increased piety, the intensified fervor, that will surely spring ^^2 f f^'./'-eq^entation-five or six times a tonersf ^^'^^-^^ ^ven a handful of his parish- Apart from the benefit to his flock, what a genuine boon will not his zealous advocacy of daily Communion prove to the pastor himself! It IS a truism that one learns most effectively by teaching; and the priest who follows the advice or. rather, obeys the orders of the Pope, and often exhorts his people to approach the Holy Table with increasing frequency, will infallibly develop l°i'\l°'^" T\^ ^'^^^"^ appreciation of the Mass and the Eucharist, with a deeper piety in his cele- braUon of the one and his administering of the other. ** If it will not be considered an impertinence in these pages. I should like to suggest that perhaps 136 PRIESTLY PRACTICE not the least eloquent, or least necessary, exhorta- tion in behalf of the spread of daily Communion will find its scope among one's brother clerics. In the simplest form of what used to be called mind- reading, but what is in reality muscle-reading, the "subject" grasps the wrist of the "reader" and thinks intently of some material object to which the "reader" is supposed to lead him. The subject is cautioned to remain perfectly passive, and is quite ready to affirm on oath that he i$ so, while at the same time, all unconsciously to himself, his hand is unmistakably mov'ng the hand of the reader in the direction of the object on which his mind is concentrated. It is not improbable, I think, that not a few excellent priests— pious, de- voted men, who would deem themselves least of all likely to set themselves above the Pope— are nevertheless unconsciously swayed by the in- herited or acquired old-time Jansenistic b bear of exaggerated reverence due to the Blessea Sacra- ment, a reverence which they find it difficult to convince themselves will not be endangered in its daily reception by the faithful. At heart they really doubt the prudence of the practice. Without emphasizing the obvious by urging that in this matter it is the Pope's business to be prudent and the priest's to be obedient, one may suggest that such priests need to be told time and time again, in season and out of season, in the Emmanuel, the Ecclesiastical Review, and other Catholic periodicals, in clerical conferences, and in private conversations, that Rome has authorita- THE PRIESTS' COMMUNION LEA GCJK 13T Uvely asserted once for all that the primary pur- pose of the Eucharist is not the safeguarding of the honor and reverence due to our Lord, but the conferring upon its recipients of strength to resist sensual passions, to cleanse themselves from the stains of daily faults, and to avoid the graver sins to which human frailty is liable. They need remmding that Christ Himself forgot Himself in order to minister to our needs. "Qui propter nos homines et .>roptcr nostram salutem," says the Creed. "Sacramcnta propter homines," declare the theologians. And the Pope emphatically reiterates that the Eucharist is not a reward of virtue, but, as the Council of Trent declares, it is Dwinum pharmacum, "the antidote whereby we are delivered from daily faults and preserved from deadly sins." To the great mass of the faithful the parish priest is for all practical purposes, bishop, Roman Congregation, College of Cardinals, Pope— m a word, the Teaching Church. Now, if his teaching is to be thoroughly orthodox, the burden of his exhortation about frequenting the Sacra- ments must henceforth be, not so much "My dear people, be holy in order that you may become worthy to go to communion frequently and even daily," as "My dear people, go to Communion fre- quently, and even daily, in order that you may become holy." *^ Other priests there may be— though let us trust the number is small— whose lack of zeal, tepidity, indifference, fear of multiplied confessions, or what not. may lead them to treat Pius X.'s decree 138 PRIESTLY PRACTICB on Daily Communion with fulJy as much construc- tive disrespect as has been shown in too many in- stances to his Motu propria on Gregorian Chant To overcome the "vis inertiae," or the active op- position of one of this class, will require all the persevering fervor of the most devoted member of the Eucharistic League or the Priests* Com- munion League. It is conceivable, even, that such a member may be treated with ridicule, jeers, and scoffing, may be characterized as a faddist, a dreamer, a visionary, an unpractical enthusiast. (Ah! God grant there may be more of such en- thusiasts, that their tribe may increase!) One can readily, however, support a charge so radically untrue. Viewed in the light of the Sanctuary lamp, weighed in the balance of the Tabernacle, who is. in very deed and truth, the unpractical, visionary cleric? It is assuredly he who forgets that the Eu- charist is the very reason of his priesthood, and that his pre-eminent duty to his people is to draw them into closer and closer union with our Lord in His Sacrament of love; it is he who attempts the hope- less task of falsifying the words of the Holy Ghost, and proving that a man can serve two masters, God and the Mammon of wealth, pleasure, worldly reputation, social honor, or sensual ease; he who exaggerates the rights and privileges of his pas- toral office and minimizes its duties and obliga- tions; he who expends his most strenuous activities on the material, financial side of his priestly life, and brings to his spiritual functions a lifeless per- .il^W THE PRIESTS' COMMUNION LEAGUE 139 functoriness that is an insult to the God he has vowed to serve with love; he who fancies that spasmodic effort on special occasions can atone for the neglect of humdrum, hidden, even-day duties; lie who imagines that intellectual brlliancv can supply the lack of a humble and contrite nfon ; n Y*»« *?"«»•«« that in our day. not less than in that of Thomas Aquinas or Bernard, more true sacerdotal science is to be absorbed at the foot of tht crucifix or before the Tabernacle than can be gleaned from books, that the former method has transformed a quasi minus hahens clerical candidate into a faith-illumined and samtly Cure d'Ars. and the latter has deformed a maxima cum laude" seminary graduate into a pnde-blinded and excommunicated Abb^ Loisy he. in fine, who loses sight of the fact that the only genuine realities are the eternal ones, that, in the last analysis, the preponderating rule is, as a man—piiest or layman-lives, and lives habitu- o%, from day to day, so shall he die; that true life in this world and the next is union with God and that in no other character than as an eamesJ active, devoted member of the Priests' Communion League, consistently promoting habitual sacra- mental union with our loving Jesus by word and work, counsel and conduct, preaching and prac- tice can he so confidently re-echo tiic as«»nrance of the royal psalmist: "Credo vJdere bona Domini in terra viventium"-«I look to see the good things of the Lord m the land of the living," ^i)»Ec:i«>!^':r' XII A PRIEST'S MNEMONIC FEAT •yms paper recounts how a cleric in his fiftieth A year committed to memory, during the be- tween-whiies of ten days, the complete Office of the Dead. The true record of a bit of psycholog- ical experience, its frankly personal character is due to the writer's conviction that, their literary content being the same, an autobiographical nar- rative interests the average reader considerably more than does an impersonal essay. The ordinary child invariably prefers the "really truly" story to its "made-up" substitute; and, in this respect at least, there is justice in Dryden's dictum that "men are but children of a large- i rowth." Our attention is far more readily enchained by the concrete and determinate than by the abstract and indefinite. We more easily develop interest in the specific than in the general, and are, accordingly, more apt to be affected, sympathetically or otherwise, by the actual expe- rience of an individual man with "a locah habita- tion and a name" than by the possible explo' : they were known by heart as soon as fll 144 PRIESTLY PRACTICE To come at length to the Office of the Dead: the idea of committing it to memory arose in this way. The writer habitually spends an aggregate of three hours a day in taking what the New York Sun declares to be "tlie best of all exercises, the simple and old-fashioned one of walking briskly with head up and arms swinging." It is laid down in the books that, if full benefit is to be derived from such exercise, the walk should not be made the occasion for doing intellectual work, or labor- ing at mental problems. At the same time, the mind must occupy itself with something, and per- haps its least fatiguing operation is the reproduc- tion, voluntary or involuntary, of matter that one knows by heart. Acting on this Drinciple, the writer made it his practice to recite, while pedestrianizing, such selections in prose or poetry as cost him no effort to recall. Now, a few years ago, while looking through some old papers in search of a particular manuscript, he came across a writing-book containing a list of the specific memory feats accomplished during the months when his favorite hobby was the "School" of physiological memory already mentioned. The train of thought awakened by this me- morial of other days led to several conclusions, one of them being that it might be feasible, by employing a modification of the method used years ago, to learn by heart something more use- ful than the hundreds of figures in the ratio of the circumference to the diameter, or the hun- dreds of combined proper names and dates em- ji^J^iT^SjlNEMONlC PEAT 145 attempt the task w«?h k*. *^°^' decision to extent^Iso by anXr n r ""^ T*""*^^ *° ^^'"^ cover whether thr-* ^ "i*'^^' ^^^ ^^^'^-^ to dis- as excellent for the minw '^^*J"^°* oaths) is some years hfs proved Tt to'h/° 'l^'''^^^^ of the body. Not tL least reltae'conlrr* l""' success in the proposed task « « L ??°°* ^°'' tion to succeed washv n!. * "*°« determina- it {« « '."^^-^^ea, was by no means wantinc Ami of S>TZ or fltr "'^^'"••''''S'y- «" the intervals be ^pi"^-z:'':zx^:zt: t:;^^' 146 PRIESTLY PRACTICE necUon and sequence in its parts; and, finally, to link verse to verse and sentence to sentence by a supplementary word or words expressing an idea associated with both the end of one verse or sentence and the beginning of the next one. As a concrete demonstration of this method will be given at the close of this paper, further explana- tion, in detail, of the linking process need not be given now; but it may be useful to cite here the general laws of the association of ideas. To select the rendering of them given by Father Maher, d. J. t J The Law of Association by Similarity expresses the general condition that the mind in the presence of any mental state tends to reproduce the like of that state in past experience. . . . The Law of Contrast enunciates the general fact that the mind in the presence of any mental state tends to reproduce contrasted states previously expe- rienced. . . . The Law of Contiguity formu- lates the truth that the mind in the presence of an object or event, whether actual or ideal, tends to recall other objects and events formerly closely connected in space or time with that now present. One detail of the writer's method may prove inleresting even to clerics who have no intention of memorizing any portion of their Breviary — his use of the English version of the Bible as an aid to remembering the Latin of the Ofjftcium Defunctorum. Professor James remarks that "a curious peculiarity of our memory is that things are impressed better by active than by passive repetition. I mean that in learning by heart (for A PRIEST'S MNEMONIC PEAT 147 example), when we almost know the piece, it pays be ter to wait and recollect by an effort from withm han to look at the book again." I found It useful when at fault, or. as the old-time col- oquiahsm has it. when "stuck." to turn to the Eng- lish version of the Psalms, (or to the Book of Job, in the case of the Lessons), and recall the fl ?"*K /^u*V*' *''«"«»«tion- Young priests will fnfllcf r^K T'^"^ "^"^ *«^^ *»" «" addiUonal nterest If they thus compare the two versions of the Psalms found in the Common of the Saints. Perhaps as effective a way as can be chosen to Illustrate the whole process by which the writer accomphshed his mnemonic feat will be to apply that process to the Canticle of the three Hebrew DomJnn' 't\^r'^^^^*'' omnia opera Domini, 2v^« %* \*/''""' P^'"* ""^ ^^^ P'-^y^" o' thanks- giving after Mass. the great majority of priests can very probably recite any one of its verses v^ hen once they are started on that particular verse Owing, however, to the similarity, not to say the identity, of many of the verse-beginnings and verse-endings, a considerable number of pnests find it difficult or impracticable to recite the whole canticle by heart. The facilities for H?! !"J r^"^^ "P" ^'■^ °^^^°"«' y^t « half-hour devoted to a systematic study of the Canticle will probably suffice to impress it on even the poores memory-provided the main difficulty be in learn- ing the proper order of the verses. Let us see. ine LanUcle consists of twenty verses, each being an apostrophe calling on some one or some 148 PRIESTLY PRACTICE thing to bless the Lord. In six of the verses, the first, tenth, fifteenth, eighteenth, nineteenth and twentieth, there is the additional entreaty or com- mand to ''praise and exalt Him above all for ever." Roughly speaking, the first nine verses relate to heaven or the heavens— the angels, the elements, the seasons, etc.; the next five verses have to do with the earth, its physical features and the animal creation; and the last six verses deal with man, generaUy and specifically considered. For mem- orizing purposes, it is well to note that each of these divisions begins with a verse containing the admonition to "praise and exalt Him above all for ever"; and that, in the beginning of the second and of the third division, the grammatical form is the third person singular instead of the second person plural, laudet et superexaltet, not laudate et super- exaltate, as in verses one and eighteen. The change in verse nineteen, from the second to the first person plural, is another circumstance, notice of which will facilitate ojie's remembering it; and the change in verse twentieth, from the imperative to the indicative mood, ivill help to fix that con- cluding verse firmly in Ine mind. Now, to apply the laws of the association of ideas to the binding or linking of the verses one to another in the due order of their succession. A necessary preliminary observation is that one's own connecting words or ideas are far better than those suggested by other persons, the writer or any one else, for the simple reason that while a given word may have the same meaning, or denotation. A PBIBST'S ilNEMONIC PEAT 149 for the reader and me. its connotaUon. or the ideas closely associated with it in our respective mmds. may vary widely. "Home." "college life" Uie seminary." and "the bishop." for instance, plainly suggest different ideas to the various readers of this paper. It follows Uiat the linking words given herewith may be artificial, rather than natural, associations for the reader; yet, even so, they will, it is thought, serve the purpose. Pro- fessor Ladd. of Yale, says: "These 'laws' (of asso- ciation) are the 'natural' modes of the recurrence of the Ideas under the principles of contiguity, similarity, conti-ast, etc. Mnemonics, or 'artificial' memory then, furnishes safe maxims only so far as It follows these laws, that is. ceases to be arti- flcial and becomes natural. But relatively non- rational or accidental associations are natural in the earlier stages of the development of memory; and. indeed, for such subjects, in all stages, as do not lend tiiemselves readily to tiie higher forms of association.' ^ This much being premised, a prominent word m the last clause of verse one is superexaltate. rhere is nothing particularly artificial or strained in the association of "superexalted" with "highest," or, in view of the content of verse one, of "highest" with "highest of God's creations," by which phrase angels is ahnost spontaneously suggested; and so verse two is tinked to verse one. Coeli, toward V^^. t" . ''^"^. *^**' '"^y ^" « Scriptural and Old Tes tament piece readily enough suggest "the ^Pychologv. DeacripUve and Explanatory, p. 406. 150 PRIESTLY PRACTICE windows of heaven," their being opened at the time of the deluge, and hence "waters," the aquae which starts one on verse three. Virtutes, in final clause of verse three, may unforcedly suggest "strength," "strong power in nature," "the sun," tol, the starting word of verse four. In this verse the last two words are identical with the last two of verse two, identical in sound though not in sense; so that the associaion must be between stellae coeli and the imber of verse five. Perhaps this series may serve to connect them: stars of heaven, "falling stars," "falling rain." These in- stances will probably be sufficient to explain the plan of linking, without doing any more for the rest of the verses than merely indicating the link- ing words. Thus connected, the verses would be memorized in this fashion : Benedicite, omnia opera Domini, Domino: laudate et superexaltate eum in saecula . superexalted, highest of God's creations, angels. Benedicite, Angeli Domini, Domino: benedicite. coeh, Dommo . . . heaven, "windows of heaven," deluge, waters. ' Benedicite, aquae omnes quae super coelos sunt. Domino: benedicite, omnes virtutes Domini, Domino . . . virtue, strength, strong power in nature, sun. ^ ^ Benedicite sol et luna. Domino: benedicite, stellae coeh. Domino . . . stars, falling stars, falling rain, rain. Benedicite, cmnis imber et ros. Domino: bene- dicite, omnes spiritus Dei Domino . . . Holu Spirit, "tongues of fire." " Benedicite, ignis et aestus, Domino: benedicite. A PRIEST'S MNEMONIC PEAT m excetaiue heat. frigus et aestus, Domino . . refreshing dew, dews. a^t^^'Il^?'^'^''' ''.?*'^*.''* P"*"^"®' Domino: benedicitc. * Ln/jJSV"'^?'""" • • • great cold. ice. Benedicite, glacies et nives, Domino: bene- diate. noctes et die,. Domino '. . . daybrlal Hinw^"r**i'"*^' ^V* ?* tenebrae. Domino: bene- dicite, fnlgura et nubes. Domino . . . position of clouds, above the earth. p^'^uun Benedicat terra Dominum: laudet et super- "rt moTn/2r ^^"*" ' ' ' '^''^'^ ''-" ^f ^.owf"^'*-*''*^' '"**"*''^ ^* *=°"e»' Domino: bene- dicite universa germmantia in terra. Domino • •„ • germinating, springing, fountains. Pt fl„.!!f„l"i?- ^*^"*'^*' I^^'nino: benedicite. maria SJfta/LT *°° • • • '''''^ ''"d rivers, fish, o«.?^"??^*^**^' *^l*^ ®* **"^"^a *I"ae moventur in aquis. Domino: benediate. omnes volucres coeli. aZTs. beasts. '"^'' ^^'"^ «"'"«"' ^^'^^^ Benedicite, omnes bestiae et pecora. Domino- benedicite, filiihominum. Domino*^ . . Znso'f meih sons of God, chosen people, Israel. Benedicat Israel Dominum: laudet et super- Tri^sfs. '""' '" '""""^^ • • • ^'^''"' «/ '"««. Benedicite, sacerdotes Domini, Domino: bene- dicite, servi Domini. Domino . . . servant, slave, poor-spirited, spirits. Benedicite, spiritus et animae justorum. Domno: benedicite sancti et humills cord™ arn. the pari Alh'^T' ''''''''' ^^^^^"^ Benedicite, Anania, Azaria, Misael, Domino: m i6i PRIESTLY PRACTICE laudate et superexaltate eum in »ue^ ia foreuer, changelett, change in grammaiical form. Benedicanuw Patrem et FiTiiim cum Sancto Spiritu: laudemus ct supcrexaltemua eum in ■aecula . . iaecula taeculorum, the end in- dicated, indicative mood. I ?®u»^^*^*H* e»J>o»«ino in flrmamento coeli: et laudabihs, et gloriosus. et superexaltatiu in sae- cuia. It has already been said that while the reader's own linking words are the best for him, still the foregoing Aeries of correlaUons will probably serve his purpose in memorizing the Canticle. The statement was made in accordance with a psy- chological law which any one may test for himself, and which Coleridge thus formulates: 'The true practical general law of association is this: that whatever makes certain parts of a total impression more vivid or disUnct than the rest will deter- mine the mind to recall these in preference to others equally linked toR-ther hy the common condition of contemporaneity or of contiguity. But the will itself, by con/lniuy and intensifying the attention, may arbitrarily give vividness or distinctness to any object whatsoever." Accord- ingly, although the foregoing linking words are mme, and not the reader's, the latter can make them his own by the simple process of repeating them, say a dozen or score of times. As to repetition, Professor Ladd gives Uiis good advice: "Repeat with fixed attention until the object is 'fastened' in the memory; or, if tiiis can- A PRIEST'S MNEMONIC FEAT 153 not be done without excessive expenditure of the first attempt at memoriiing. For forgettina is rapid at flr.t and slower afterwards." The r pet^! tion for ,ns tance. of the foregoing verses with their connecting words or phrase, twenty-flve times at one sitUng will probably impress them Hon. J^r*"? *'"""" **^«" ^» » hundred repeti- Uons scattered over five or six days. aiZil ZT""' however, is becoming inimoder- his «lr ? I' ""^'^^^^ "' "' P'-°^««'^^ purpose has already been effected. The Office of the Dead "^"♦1 fu ™^^ ^^ ^^^ P''^*^^'' indicated in dealing with the Canticle of the three children. That it was memorized at all by one who had celebrated his Sliver Jubilee as a priest is perhaps a fact to be set against the Oslerian theory of man's in- cipient decay at the age of forty. That it was memorized m from twenty-five to thirty hours by one who, unlike the middle-aged actor or lawyer, Tlf ^ff^^^^ °^ ^^"«^ *»«• Sr^^te'- feats, had neglected for a quarter of a century to keep his memory m training, is due chiefly, in all prob- abihty, to two conditions: the writer's perfect phy«cal health and his fairiy strong power of will. « L. Z? ^''''^ **^ *h^ selections in prose and poetry which it used to be the custom to learn by heart, Ruskm said: "They may become fairy palaces of beautiful thoughts, bright fancies, sat- Sp^i!^!"'"""' T^^^ *^^^*°"^«' f«^*»^f"l savings, treasure-houses of precious and restful thoughts 154 PRIESTLY PRACTICE which care cannot disturb, nor pain make^gloomy, nor poverty take away from us,— houses built without hands, for our souls to dwell in." Where can more congruous material for such houses, built for priestly souls to dwell in, be found than in the liturgical prayers of the Divine Office! xin CLERICAL HEALTH AND EXERCISE inundates the neighSSdri^d cr^fa^/U^^^^^^^^ 'V°« «^«'.»°d —Emerson. creejts of other men's necessities. the dog8.--»F. Hall. ^^ *°^ P^y">« *o QIXTEEN or seventeen years ago, when the r ,P^^°* Sovereign PonUflf was known only as nn^"?? K^'*'^:/^*^^'"^ °^ V^°^^^' h« ™«de it a point to be assiduous in visiting his Semmary. It was his custom to drop in unexpectedly so as to «^!fr T.?°*^ ^^ ^""^P"°^ «f *he house, but also the studies, and even the food and the g^es. iSo? ;;"P°^* Z^'^* l>y Wm to Rome in DecLber. ^fff^n^^- T^^' °[ '"y y°""« ™^°' *>oth in piety and in learning, but I do not attach less im- portance to their health, on which depends in a ^eat measure the exercise of their ministry later eauallv?*?'?;^^'^^""^"^' Eminence of Mechlin. equaUy sohcitous for the symmetrical formation of his youttif ul aspirants to the priesthood, has more recentiy told them: 'The physical life of our 155 156 PRIESTLY PRACTICE organs and, as a consequence, the activity of our moral being are subject to the law of repose, and the health of the whole organism to the equili- brium of the functions of the different organs which constitute it. . . . Throw yourselves heart and soul into the recreations and outdoor exercises which your Seminary provides and or- ganizes for your benefit. In Uiese your souls are safe, and they will be the means of helping in- stead of hindering tiie higher efforts of your in- terior life." Excellent advice, this; but is it really as much needed by youthful seminarists as by priests who have been ordained for fifteen, or twenty, or twenty-five years? The average young man, in and out of the Seminary, is not given to physical mactivity. He may not expend much thought on the hygienic necessity of safeguarding his healtii by taking adequate exercise— but he takes it. The midde-aged priest, on tiie other hand, while he readily accepts, and may even eloquentiy advocate, the theory tiiat physical exercise is essential to health, all too commonly fails in practice to show that he has the courage of his convictions. Pius X.'s young clerics of 1897 probably need now, as Cardinal Mercier's probably will need fifteen or twenty years hence, far more serious admonitions concerning healtii and exercise tiian tiiey received in the formative period of tiieir ecclesiastical career. And tfie pity of it is tiiat ordinary treatises on tfie priesthood, in which suc^ admonitions might congruously find a place, pi ctically ignore CLERICAL HEALTH . I ND E2EBCI.4E 157 the subject. You will, for instance. looL :a vain ^ugh Manning's Eternal Priesthood, MoJer's two volumes on The Catholic Priesthood ^ Keat- o?Te ^rt't "^ ^I^ k"^^* «**^^"*^ - -edition F«thl/^ T .'^^''^' «*^cording to nar Holy Fatoer. depends in a great measure the exercise of the pnesUy ministry. exercise feJ^h^lui ''•''"?u^* ^ '"^'^ ^"^'"^ *« ««y *hat per- fect healUi, m th-. natural order. like sancUf^ng Wes uttennost blessing. Bodily well-beinaor physical soundness, is moreover a requisite condT F^.°i?:'"/.* '"^'*^°° «^ '''-'' other blessing. ruZ^,^*'°'5°°u ''^""^^'^y attainments, a cS^ tured taste and the means to gratify it. access to fte treasures of literature and%rt. fte\Teasures of domestic and foreign travel, congenial wo4 love Ts^^r^** *^ S"^^'^^P °^ --y -"^e love of som^none of these can be thoroughlv enjoyed by the chronic, the intermittent, or fven of Tn^r ' ° ?"^"'^ ^'^^^ P«^^- A consideration of more senous impr. -t to the priest is thus phraseS by that sturdy old moralist. Dr. Johason: "Health of WrZtTe '" •'" *^. ^"^'^'^ '^^ ^ ^" - P^^-^es tte follv " ?! ™'/ squandering it is equal to wWch h^; i, • ^° '°**^«Pen^abIe means to an end e ftp 5? «'° consc ence bound to accompUsh. i. e. the effective exercise of big ministry, health and Tj'^^u^r *"^*^ o° *he aspect of a p^iSve debt which the parish priest owes not merely to 158 PRIESTLY PRACTICE himself but to his people. It needs no elaborate argument to demonstrate that, as between the per- fectly healthy and the frequently ailing pastor, the former is likely to preach the better sermons, to be more punctual at the morning SacrijQce, to attend more regularly at the confessional (and be more patient when seated therein), to be more available for sick-calls, and to display more zeal and fervor and energy and perseverance in the hundred and one activities, spiritual and temporal, that demand his attention. Insistence on this point is obviously not equiva- lent to undervaluing the discipline of pain, or to denying that sickness may be, and frequently is, a means of sanctification. Ill-health directly willed by God, or contracted through holy impru- dence in the zealous discharge of duty, is doubt- less a blessing, though in disguise; but it is worth while remarking that in perhaps the overwhelm- ing majority of cases illness is an evil which God permits rather than positively wills. Some one has defined dyspepsia to be "the remorse of a guilty stomach"; and many a cleric's attack of in- digestion is as deliberately voluntary and as little "in conformity with the holy will of God," as is the intoxication of the drunkard. Nay, more; many a confirmed toper who is admonished by his pastor that he is surely "drinking himself to death" might truthfully retort that the pastor in question is just as srrely eating himself to death. This does not of course mean that any appreciable number of pastors are habitually, or even occa- CLEBICAL HEALTH AND F.XV.^r,^^^^ ?onv'h^:,?l'!i'^ "^ •'*"^""' ""d '""'"ou, glut- tony, but It does mean that the middle-aueH nlw UuI'r^T '" 'r '""''y'"* "n eteSfnt ^ppt r^.iKrrHet.''~'^^^^^^^ Ai»^ r: ^^ ^^^ Henry Thompson puts it Hp i« dig^ng his grave with his teeth. ^ * 11 taking three full meals a day, formed in vn„»i! ter as simple as it was unconscious, clings to us ;frndTc2j;ri,,-ir„Srt^ ftldy t Sled JS^ r^lf". *'"' ^'™«"'»- "" o«« ^ ° ^*" ® greater ouantitv of nni sonous matter than the organs of dimtaatiol can" And. by mipairing the Wood and lowS!^ ij^e 160 PRIESTLY PRACTICE vitality, this same condition prepares the system for infection — ^for colds, or pneumonia, or tuber- culosis, or any of the fevers. The necessity of exercise being admitted, the question narrows down to the form thereof most conducive to the preservation of health, most con- gruous to the dignity of the sacerdotal character, and at the same time most available to the great mass of priests. At the outset, it may be asserted on the authority of all writers on physical culture, that any form of exercise in the open air is im- measurably better than such calisthenic or gym- nastic practices as are performed within doors. In this twentieth century as never before, perhaps, mankind is coming to realize the beneficial eflfects of fresh air and sunshine, or, in the absence of sunshine, of rain, hail, snow, fog, or other atmos- pheric condition. Thus, sitting on an open ve- randa is better than lounging in even a well-aired study; and riding behind a "faithful Dobbin," or on a seat in an open trolley-car, or in a swiftly moving automobile, is better than indoor deep- breathing, swinging the Indian clubs, or practis- ing on the athletic rings and bars. To mention some specific methods of muscu- lar exertion : the old-fashioned occupation of saw- ing wood is advocated by many, physicians as well as laymen, as the best of all exercises; but, apart from its strenuousness, the conditions of modem life, particularly in cities, practically remove it from the list of physical activities to which a priest may well devote an hour or two of his day. CLERIC AL HEALTH AND BXEKCI8E 161 Merase— for the horse"; while another aua>i authonty on physical culture declare, that'"X al^o-"" '^' *' '""'^^ "' » ""■• *» *« ouWde o? S„ „^. £' *"'" '"''J°"'y »' «='eri«». however toe IW,^'" , K?'^ ""'' *' "" •" animals/rom the hvery .tables would encroach too much on «ncet" hf T"'^ •» P^™« of habiturindul" f^ e,l„.f P'r """' 'PO-* Bicycle-riding is Ih^. f^P™";*- •"» «n additional advantaae in lumself. and, on good roads in pleasant weather ..certainly exhilarating; but, waiving aU question of It. congrmty to the priesUy character, «cltog ^ke swimming, rowing, golf, temiis, an^S other form, of outdoor physical exerton carbe taken advantage of oaly during certain .eason^ and exerci,e i, needed in all seLn" ^ .V J T- u ?°^ ^'"™ °f ""wcular activity, how- ev„, which i. open to none of the foregSng „I jections and entail, none of Uie dl,a&««. menboned. It is Uie oldest of aU forms- vet no? r-S^v"^? / *? 7^' P"*-'. "™™ r maTn'; fi »L ?P'*"- ''"' "pensive, most health- °i And^^ * "" P'''^""' nature-walk- wSkint^l ,Z^^°V^"*?""'' ■•««"'"• daily waiKing— 1. the ideal exereise for Uie Driest In *^*"« P'o-^e. i' fa entirely compalSle'^^,^ a^ *^ly of even Uie most exalted cleric. "When ? walked. "yt^-H',""' '''"" "'"^ ""■ «ee„Uy!°. walked. I wish I were younger so Uiat I might 162 PRIESTLY PRACTICE 1 ljsBB It i m ^^^HBPr walk more than I do now. When people walked more than they do now, they were stronger and healthier." *'I am willing,** wrote Cardinal Gib- bons a few years ago to the present writer, **to endorse all that is said in praise of pedestrian- ism." And, as is well known, the practice of His Eminence of Baltimore in this respect, like that of the Holy Father, is quite in accord with his preaching. Their example may well settle any question as to the congruity of the exercise. Like other best things of life— air, light, and water, for instance — walking is, moreover, within the reach of all, constitutes no drain on even the scantiest incoiAe. A satiric pedestrian of our ac- quaintance inclines indeed to the belief that this very inexpensiveness is one reason why walking is not far more popular. '*If a number of my friends," he declares, "had to pay five or ten cents for every mile they walked, they would spend sev- eral hours a day on the road." Be this as it may, not even the poorest priest can oppose to walking the objection so potent in the case of some other forms of exercise, "I can't afford it** To set down here a tithe of the available tes- timony as to the healthfulness of walking would be taxing the capacity of the remaining pages of this volume, so let it be summarized in this state- ment of Dickens: "The sum of the whole is this: walk and be happy; walk and be healthy. . . . The best way to lengthen out our days is to walk steadily and with a purpose." Apropos of this last point, the lengthening of our days. Dr. Pearce CLERICAL HEALTH AND EXER CISE 163 Kintzing assures us that "there exists no better gauge of our youthf ulness, our physical balance— of the distance that separates us from senility — than our ability to walk and to run." The readers of this book, whatever may be their personal practice, very probably accept the theory that walking is beneficial; but they may be interested in an authoritative pronouncement as to the amount or measure of walking that prudent regard for their health prescribes. The writer just quoted, Dr. Kintzing, in a volume with the attractive title. Long Life and How to Attain It, tells us: "Walking furnishes the best basis of computation for the amount of exercise needed in our daily lives. Omitting details, making a straight cut to conclusions, energy, human and mechanical, is measured in foot-pounds. A stan- dard day's labor (Parkes) equals the lifting of 300 tons to the height of one foot. Estimating that a sedentary man should take exercise equivalent to one-half of this amount, and placing his weight at 145 pounds, we find that he ought to walk about nine miles daily; since, in walking on the level, we raise one-twentieth of the weight of the body at each step. Naturally, we must deduct the amount which he walks in the conduct of his busi- ness and home life. Perhaps a fair estimate of the latter would be three miles; leaving six miles owing to the average strong man of forty years. After fifty, the distance may be reduced ten per cent each decade.** The clause, "placing the weight at 145 pounds." 164 PRIESTLY PRACTICE in the foregoing extract, suggests the reflection that the average weight of priests forty years old —at least among those of the writer's acquaint- ance — ^is considerably more than 145 pounds. In fact, a goodly number of middle-aged clerics are unmistakably obese; and they, even more than others, need to become systematic walkers. What constitutes obesity may be gleaned from the fol- lowing table of heights and weights, drawn up by D. H. Wells, Actuary, and utilized by medical ex- aminers for life insurance companies: NO. 1 — FOR AGE FORTY-SEVEN AND UPWARD Height Nomua weight -20 per cent +20 per eeot +80 per eent 5 ft. 134 107 161 174 5 ft. 1 in. 136 109 163 177 5 ft. a in. 138 110 166 179 5 ft. Sin. 141 113 169 183 5 ft. 4 in. 144 115 173 187 5 ft. 5 in. 148 118 178 192 5 ft. 6 in. 152 122 182 198 5ft. Tin. 157 126 188 204 5 ft. 8 in. 162 130 194 211 5 ft. 9 in. 167 134 200 317 6 ft. 10 in. 172 138 2i06 224 5 ft. 11 in. 178 143 214 331 6 ft. 183 146 220 338 6 ft. 1 in. 188 150 226 244 6 ft. 2 in. 194 155 233 "32 6 ft. 3 in. 300 160 240 260 For younger ages subtract one-half pound for each year under forty-seren, and the result will be the normal weifht for the given age. CLERICAL HEALTH AND EXERCISE 166 In connection with this table it may be ex- plained that the applicant for life insurance is considered, other things being equal, a poorer or safer risk, according as he varies more or less from the normal weight of persons of his height; and that when his weight is 30, or more, per cent above that normal figure, conservative companies, believing that his longevity will be less than the average among people of his age, will issue him a policy only at special ratings. Just why it is that "overweights" are considered poor risks, that is, are thought unlikely to live the average length of days, is thus stated by Dr. O. H. Rogerb: *They are abnormal. They are prone to develop heart disease, apoplexy, and premature arterio-sclero- sis. They are peculiarly liable lo diabetes, rheu- matism, and lithemia. They succumb easily to accidents and surgical operations." Further statistics likely to interest clerics with a tendency to become unduly corpulent are fur- nished in table No. 2, prepared in connection with the "specialized mortality investigation" of the Actuarial Society of America. Persons of weights D and B are considered bad insurance risks; those of weight A are looked upon as very bad risks, while those of weight C are classed as persons of ordinary weight. To take a concrete example : When Father John, six feet in height and aged forty-five years, weighs only one hundred and forty-two pounds, his chances of enjoying a long life are poor; when he weighs anything from one hundred and fifty-five 166 PRIESTLY PRACTICE MO. f— TABLES ; OF WE10HT8— AGE FORTY AND OV!Jl Htight D C B A 5ft Under 114 114-161 162-174 Over 174 5 ft. 1 in. (« 115 iir im 164-176 " 176 Rft. 2 in. t< 117 117-165 166-179 " 179 5ft. Sin. « IIP iir'~i69 170-183 " 183 5 ft. 4 in. « 123 123-173 174-188 " 188 5 ft. 5 in. II 126 126-177 178-192 " 192 5 ft. 6 in. 11 129 120-182 183-197 " 197 5ft. Tin. II 13M| 1.53 1%8 189- an4 " 204 5 ft. 8 in. II 1^7 i37-i';4 .v'i -aio " aio 6 ft. 9 in. II 142 142 20U 20i-2U. " 216 5 ft. 10 in. i< 146 liG-20- that we are like other persons. When I meet wiA any fm^ts in my own mental experience, I feel al- most sure that I shall find them repeated or an- ticipated in the writings or conversation of oth- ers." Applying this theory to the matter in hand : at any time during the past two or three decades a discussion of clerical orthoepy by a writer with my present experience would very surely have interested me; consequently there are prob- ably several hundred prospective readers of this book who will not consider it a waste of time to peruse the following paragraphs. Of the desirability of correct pronunciation in the pulpit there can scarcely be any question. If Scripture warrant be called for to emphasize its importance, such wanant can without undue straining be found in St. Paul's oft-quoted coun- sel, or precept: "Let all things be done decently and according to order." Now, faulty pronun- ciation is emphatically not decent, in the primary, etymological sense of that word — is not beccwfting^ not befitting either the dignity of the pulpit, the character of the preacher, or the nature of the preacher's utterances. Mispronouncing is clearly not "according to," but against, that order and har- mony which should characterize any deliverance of the Word of God. Our spoken langus^ is the dress of our thoughts, and it would be d^icult to prove that slovenly utterance in a preacher is 'not fully as reprehensible as is slovenly attire; that the priest who is guilty of a carele», slipshod, vicious method of expresaicm is aay more excus- ORTHOEPY IN THE PULPIT 173 able than he would be for appearing in the pulpit with dishevelled hair, unshaven face, a soiled col- lar, and a ragged surplice. At the very least, in- correct pronunciation is quite as incongruous in the pulpit as the violation of grammar or the use of slang. There is at bottom just as much impro- priety in a preacher's discoursing to his congre- gation on the "reel diffrince between grievyus and veenyil sins" as in his assuring them that "them there Saints simply knowed God's will and done it," or in his tolling them (as, alas! once upon a time a pastor of our acquaintance actually did tell his astounded flock) : "That's the kind of a hairpin I am, and don't you forget it." It is possible of course that carefulness as to one's pronunciation may degenerate into pre- ciosity, or the extreme of being overnice; but such undue fastidiousness is certainly not so common among public speakers in general or pulpit ora- tors in particular as to constitute anything like a prevalent abuse. Gross blunders, wide deviations from accepted usage, are a good deal more in evi- dence in both the private and the public discourse of even professional persons than is purism, scru- pulous accuracy, or affected daintiness. Excessive refinement in orthoepy is indeed about the last fault with which the average preacher can be charged, save in patent irony; and many a cleric who flatters himself that his pronunciation is un- exceptionable is in reality habitually guilty, not merely of neghgible imperfections and venial , ■.jrt'y*',' ,-«::; J*fl*4M5«4='!^.'= »&»--.*>: K « : t i iS 174 PRIESTLY PRACTICE transgressions, but of veritable mortal sins against propriety of speech. If the foregoing statement impresses the reader as being a piece of rhetorical exaggeration, let him reflect for a moment on the way in which one or another of his clerical friends, if not he himself, would be liable to deliver such a sentence as : "My dear brethren, it is ordinarily a good plan for those who are conversant with the Douay ver- sion of the Bible to read therein the vernacular rendering of the introit, the epistle, and the gos- pel of each Sunday's Mass." The sentence con- tains no uncommon words, no terms likely to be foreign to an average preacher's vocabulary; yet the writer has in his time heard seven or eight of its words habitually mispronounced by clerics who would have indignantly resented the imputation that their pronunciation was in some respects il- literate rather than scholarly. "Brethren" is a word of two syllables, with the accent on the first, and with the vowel-sound of short e (as in met) in both; yet who has not heard it pronounced "bruthem," "bruthi-en," or "bretheren"? "Ordi- narily" has the primary accent on the first, not the third syllable; "conversant" is also accented on the first; and "with" is not a rhyme for "pith" or "myth," its th being sonant or vocal, as in "breathe." "Douay" has the accent on the second syllable; the third vowel in "vernacular" is the modified long u, not short u, or short i; "introit" . ^ miHi ORTHOEPY IN THE PULPIT 176 is a word of three syllablei with the accent on the second;^ and, finally, the t in "epistle" is silent. The primary impulse of a reader who, on con- sulUng his dictionary, finds that he has all his life been mispronouncing any one or several of these common words, is perhaps to comment: "Oh, well; what's the odds? My people understand me; that's the main thing." The comment is natural enough; we are all prone to excuse ourselves for violations of any code, moral or social; but, as an argument, it is a patent fallacy, hardly worth while exposing. The "main thing" is assuredly not the only thing that merits attention, either in speech or action, else rubrics and ceremonies in- numerable might be disregarded with impuaity. Equally fallacious is the probable comment of some downright old pastor of the rough-and-ready type: "Twould suit you far better to be trying to get the grace of God in your heart, and put some piety into your sermons, than to be so mightily concerned about all this Miss-Nancyism in pro- nouncing." If there were any incompatibitity be- tween orthoepic proficiency and the deepest ^ety, if carefulness in pronouncing a sermon meant carelessness as to its substance and form, or if correctness of delivery could be secured only at the cost of earnestness and unction, the supposi- titious old pastor would be right; as it is, he is simply begging the question. It is a perfectly gratuitous assumption that a scholarly, correct » Though p*rehaiice you don't know it, Still, the word ii introit. ,a»..^ i 176 PRIESTLY PRACTICE '4 ii speaker is necessarily an ineffective one, or that the force of the best-constructed and m<»t feel- ingly delivered sermon will be increased by the preacher's disregard of good usage in the pronun- ciation of its words. Before going farther, however, something should perhaps be said of this phrase, '*good usage," which denotes the court of last resort in determining whether or not a word is correctly prononrced. Use is admittedly the law of living language, both as to the meaning and spelling of words, and as to their sound as well. The usage of En^ish-speaking people ultimately decides not only whether a given word is good English or not, but, in case it is a legitimate word, how it should be spelled and how pronounced. Naturally, the use that thus becomes law must possess several essen- tial qualities. It must be reputable, the use of the educated, not the illiterate; it must be national, not merely local or provincial; and it must be contemporary or present. To ascertain what good use, as thus defined, decrees concerning tl-e pro- nunciation of particular words is the professed business of lexicographers, and the results of their labors we find recorded in our standard diction- aries. Provided our manner of pronouncing an individual word is authorized by such a diction- ary we need not take account of any adverse crit- icism; if we cannot quote in our .supp>ately con- cerning the general welfare of these Sisters pos- sesses an element of genu'ne interest to the readers of this volume may accordingly be taken for granted. Archbishops and bishops, as the jurisdictional superiors of these religious women, and ordinary priests as their chaplains, spiritual directors, confessors, pastors, or school superin- tendents, have indeed so many and such respon- sible relations with them that any apology for the 188 HEALTH AND HOLINESS 180 appearance of the present essay in ic pogcs of this book would seem to be superfluous. Lest the title of the essay should suggtst to the reader any erroneous ideas, let the writer dis- claim at once any intention whatever of insinuat- ing that the inmates of our convents have grown at all lax in the observance of their rule, or that their piety, zeal, fervor, or spirit of mortification needs any stimulating. On the co itrary, the mem- bers of all the half-score or dozen sisterhoods of which he has any fii-st-hund knowledge practice the Christian virtues, observe their vows, and fol- low the prescriptions of their rule with an exemplary fidelity which has frequently com- pelled his admiration and made him blush for his own shortcomings. Th: advice which, he thinks, may not inappositely be tendered to many, it not most, \merican convents, is a purely hygienic one : as a rule, our Sisters unduly neglect the care of their bodily health; more specifically, they do not take adequate exercise in the open air. An examination of the mortaiity statistics of our religious communities of women will prob- ably show that the longevity of Sisters is by no means so notable as one might reasonably expect to find it. A distinguished English physiciar. Sir James Crichton-Browne, has said that "every man is entitled to his century"; and, if we p ice any reliance on the United States Census Reports, we are justified in adding, "a fortiori, every woman." According to these reports, for every man in this country who has reached the age of ninety, there 190 PRIESTLY PRACTICE ! ! i ! i- : are two women equally old; and female outnum- ber male centenarians in a still higher ratio. Now, given the conditions that are universally conceded to make for longevity: the simple life or **plain living and high thinking," regularity as to meals ."•nd sleep, sensible dress, temperance, cheerful- ness, contentcdness of spirit, congenial compan- ionship, etc., it would seem that Sisters should be exceptionally likely candidates for the attainment of extreme old age. As a matter of statistical fact, relatively few of them reach four-score years, or even the tradi- tional Biblical limit of three score and ten. In view of their numbers in this country — some fifty thousand — it is both surprising and lamentable that the occurrence of a Sister's Golden Jubilee, the fiftieth anniversary of her religious profession, should be a comparative rarity, and a Diamond Jubilee, the seventy-fifth anniversary of profession day, a veritable phenomenon. It may sound some- what extravagant in the statement, but it is prob- ably verifiable in fact, that from thirty to forty per cent of American Sisters die before "their time comes," their death being of course, subjectively, entirely in conformity with God's will; but being, objectively, merely in accordance with God's per- mission, which is quite another matter. Now, long life is a blessing. As Spirago says : **It is a great boon, for the longer one lives, the more merits one can amass for eternity." So precious a boon is it that God promised it as a reward for keeping the fourth commandment, a fact of which St Paul ' 11 HEALTH AND HOI»NESS 191 reminds the Ephcsians (6:2, 3) : "Honor thy father and thy mother . . . that it may be well with thee, and thou mayest be long-lived upon earth." Accordingly, any procedure, any scheme of ule, which contributes even indirectly to the shorten- ing of one's days assuredly needs unusually strong reasons to justify it; and, with all <' - deference be it said, such procedure, negative il »iot positive, is not uncommon in our convents. Neglecting to take daily exercise out of doors may appear a small thing in youth or in early middle life, but there is nothing surer than that such neglect is seriously detrimental to health; and, exceptional cases apart, poor health is the correlative of a truncated career rather than of normal length of days. Underlying this disregard of the open-air exei^ cise which all physicians declare to be essential to bodily well-being, there is probably in the minds of many Sisters an inchoate, if not a fully de- veloped, conviction that vigorous, robust health is more or less incompatible with genuine spiritu- ality, that an occasional illness of a serious nature and a quasi-chronic indisposition at the best of times are after all quite congruous in professed seekers after religious perfection, incipient fol- lowers of the saints. That is a pernicious fallacy of which their spiritual directors and confessors should strenuously endeavor to rid them. Ill- health directly willed by God is doubtless a bless- ing; but it is also an exception. In the ordinary course of God's Providence, men and women, in 192 PRIESTLY PRACTICE ^ii M the cloister as in the world, are in duty bound to take such care of their bodies as will result in the greater efficiency of their minds and souls, and in an increasingly acceptable service of their whole being to their Heavenly Father. Health is to be sought for, not as an end, but as an excellent means, most frequently indeed an indispensable means, of attaining the true end of both religious and laity, holiness or sanctity. The saints themselves thoroughly understood this truth, and their preaching frequently empha- sizes it, even though the practice of some of them, in the matter of austerities and penances, did not apparently conform thereto. Apparently, for in many a case it was precisely the superb health of the saintly body that rendered the austerities and penances possible. Like the trained pugilists of the present day, those old-time spiritual athletes could "stand punishment" to an extent that would permanently disable physical weaklings. It is to be remembered, also, that some of these unmerciful castigators of their bodies — St. Ignatius and St. Francis of Assisi, for instance — frankly avowed in their later years that they had overdone the busi- ness of chastising the flesh. St. Ignatius took good care to offset the influence of his Manresa example in this matter by making due provision, in his rule and his counsels to his religious, for proper heed to bodily health. Time and time again he gave, in varied phrase and amplified form, the advice stated in this, his general precept: "Let all those things be put away and carefully avoided that may 1 I ( il HEALTH AND HOLINESS 193 injure, in any way whatsoever, the strength of the body and its powers." Since sanctity is, after all, only sublimated common sense, it is not surprising to find other saintly founders, reformers, and spiritual direc- tors of religious orders giving the same judicious counsel. "If the health is ruined, how is the rule to be observed?" pertinently asks St. Teresa. Writing to some of her nuns who were inclined to follow their own ideas in the matter of prayer and penance, tiie same great Carmelite advises: "Never forget that mortification should serve for spiritual advancement only. Sleep well, eat well. It is inlinitely more pleasing to God to see a con- vent of quiet and healthy Sisters who do what they are told than a mob of hysterical young women who fancy themselves privileged. ..." "Gov- ern the body by fasts and abstinence as far as health permits" says the Dominican rule. "I have seen," writes St Catherine of Siena, "many peni- tential devotees who lacked patience and obedi- ence because tiiey studied to kill their bodies and not their self-will." To e^ ery religious order and its members may well be applied the words of a Jesuit General, Father Piccolomini, to his own sub- jects: "It may be said Uiat an unhealthy religious bears much the same relation to the order of which he is a member as a badly knit or dislocated bone does to the physical body. For just as a bodily member, when thus affected, not only can- not perform its own proper functions, but even in- terferes with the full efficiency of the other parts, IS i i It" f ■ ir. 194 PRIESTLY PRACTICE so when a religious has not the requisite health, his own usefulness is lost and he seriously inter- feres with the usefulness of others." Were further testimony needed to expose the fallacy that health is something to be slighted, rather than cultivated, by a fervent nun, it could be furnished in supera' undance. "Health," says Cardinal Newman, "is a good in itself, though nothing came of it, and is especially worth seek- ing and cherishing." In, 1897, Pope Pius X, then Cardinal Sarto, reported to Rome concerning his seminary in Venice, as has been stated on a former page: "It is my wish, in a word, to watch the progress of my young men both in piety and in learning; but I do not attach less importance to theii; health, on which depends in a great measure the exercise of their ministry later on." A dis- tinguished director of souls in our own times, the late Archbishop Porter, favored one of his spiritual children, a nun, with the following sane advice: "As for evil thoughts, I have so uniformly re- marked in your case that they are dependent upon your state of health, that I say without hesitation: begin a course of Vichy and Carlsbad . . . Better far to eat meat on Friday than to be at war with every one about us. I fear much you do not take enough food and rest. You stand in need of both, and it is not wise to starve yourself into misery. Jep lousy and all similar passions become intensified when the body is weak. . . . Your account of your spiritual condition is not very bril- liant; still you must not lose courage. Much of HEALTH AND HOLINESS 195 your present suffering comes, I fear, from past recklessness in the matter of health." This is merely repeating in other words what St. Francis of Sales, three centuries before Archbishop Porter, wrote to a nun of his Ume : "Preserve your physical strength to serve God with in spiritual exercises, which we are often obliged to give up when we have mdiscreetly overworked ourselves." Enough of theory; what about practice? In the present writer's opinion, the practice in all convents should be that every Sister not incapaci- tated by illness or infirmity should take outdoor exercise of some kind for an hour or two daily Sisters who are "on their feet all day" in the kitchen, the laundry, the clothes-room, the hos- pital ward, the infirmary, or "all over the house" as portresses, ought to have at least a half-hour m the morning and another half -hour in the after- noon or evening out in the open, where they can breathe unvitiated air and promote the oxygena- tion of their blood. As for teachers and others engaged in sedentary occupations, whether in the sewing-room, the library, or the office, a full hour m the forenoon and another in the afternoon can hardly be considered extravagant concessions to ..«Tu JJ,^*^^^«»'7 energizing and recuperation. WhaV. exclaims some scandalized Superioress, lose two hours a day, or even one, when there is so much work to be done? The idea of wasting so much time!" Pardon, Reverend Mother; the time, so far from being wasted, would be most profitably employed— yes, and could easilv be m 196 PRIESTLY PRACTICE spent fully as meritoriously as the period given to meditation, spiritual reading, or even a visit to the Blessed Sacrament. The individual S:^*er who pleads lack of time for even an hour a day of outdoor exercise is speaking either absolutely or relatively. If ab- solutely, if her "obedience," the aggregate of her assigned duties, is so onerous that she really has no time left after its accomplishment and the per- formance of her spiritual exercis'."^, then the mis- fortune is hers and the fault is her Superior's. And fault there undoubtedly is. There can scarcely be found a more graphic instance of the "penny wise, pound foolish" policy, a more irrep- arable kind of false economy than to lessen the efficiency, undermine the health, and ultimately shorten the life of a religious subject by over- loading her with work, mental or manual. The inevitable result is periodical illness, prostration, collapse; and an all too common consequence is a sojourn in the hospital for a surgical operation, or several operations, a protracted invalidism, and finally the death at thirty-five, forty, or fifty, of a woman who should be rendering effective service to her community for a quarter or a third of a century longer. Apart from any consideration of economy, such supposititious action on the part of a Superior might readily involve a question of justice. The parents who send their daughters to a convent boarding-school, and the pastors who engage Sisters for their parish schools, have a quasi-right to the full efficiency of the teachers. HEALTH AND HOLINESS 197 and if the laUer are overtaxed, such efficiency is normally impossible. In all probability, however, the case supposed rarely if ever occurs, unless in an emergency and for a brief period. Our individual Sister is very likely speaking only in a relative sense. Her state- ment that she lacks time for exercise may well be slighUy hyperbolical. The average nun, like the average religious or secular priest, can usually find, or make, time for what she believes to be genuinely worth while. Hence her failure to safe- guard her health by taking judicious outdoor exer- cise is doubtless not her Superior's fault, but her own. That she does not recognize the existence of any fault in the matter is probable enough; as likely as not she considers that her abstention from physical exercise in order to give additional time to supererogatory work or prayer is merely a manifestation of laudable zeal. Of Sisters of this stamp let the writer say with St. Paul: "I bear them witness that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge." As to the kind of outdoor recreation that will best subserve the preservation or the restoration of Sisters' health, comparatively little need be said. The mere breathing of the fresh air after being cooped up for hours in class-room or office is a blessing, even if the lungs are the only organs exercised; but exertion of the limbs and the va- rious sets of muscles is of course strongly advis- able. Gardening is a species of manual labor gen- erally considered not unfit for even the daintiest 198 PRIESTLY PRACTICE 1 -!l!i' ; , il:r! 1 . ir 3 ! M'lJj and most cultured ladies, so the cultivation of flowers at least (supposing vegetables to be eschewed) might, wherever possible, congruously occupy some porUon of a Sister's leisure. The community cemetery, to which among all grave- yards may surely be given with most propriety the beautiful German name, "God's Acre," sup- plies another field for health-giving physical activities. In looking after the orderly trimness of walks and alleys, in planting and pruning young trees and shrubs, and in embellishing the graves themselves witii living blooms, our Sisters would be boUi improving their ^wn health and accom- plishing a loving duty toward their departed com- panions and fnunds. Of outdoor games in which religious women might indulge with no suggestion of impropriety, croquet yields a certain amount of genUe exertion and may be safely commended to even the most fragile and delicate. The best exercise, however, for Sisters (as for all other people) is Uie simple, easy, inexpensive, natural one— walking. Says an English physician: "Walking as an exercise is without question the least injurious and can be made the most uni- versally beneficial of all outdoor sports. It is suitable for all ages. It is within the reach of the poor as well as the rich, and it can be graded to the physical ability of the most delicate or pre- scribed so as to tax the utmost capacity of endur- ance in the strongest." An American medical author. Dr. Kintzing, whom we have already quoted in a previous essay, is more specific. He HEALTH AND HOLINESS 199 states that women of medfum stature and ordi- nary strength need to walk daily from four to SIX miles. And he adds: "I can not too strongly urge upon women the value of a daily promenade m the open air. The returns in retained vigor, youthfulness. brilliancy of complexion (sic), and robust health repay the exertion a hundred-fold, spasmodic essays do not suffice. One day over- domg, omitting several, housed up in bad weather discouraged by inconveniences, are ineffectual! When one is properly dressed and properly shod, the tramp soon becomes a pleasure anticipated rather than a task." That last phrase, "rather than a task," suggests a reflection which it may be worth while to ex- press Should there chance to be any middle- aged Sisters afflicted, as are a good many middle- aged pnests, with undue obesity, about as profit- able and meritorious a form of mortification as they can take up is the reduction of their weight to the normal figure by means of judicious walk- ing and dieting. As it is generally admitted that we all eat about a third too much, a degree of abstinence that will sensibly mortify the appetite may be practiced without the slightest injury, nay with positive benefit to health and strengUi As' IS well said in the preface to Francis Thompson's Health and Holiness: "The laws of perfect hy- giene, the culture of the 'sound bodv,' not for its own sake, but as the pliant, durable instrument of the soul, are found more and more to demand such a degree of persevering self-restraint and '• a r I II t ; I 200 PRIESTLY PRACTICE self-resistance as constitutes an ascesis, a morti- fication, no less severe than that enjoined by the most rigorous masters of the spiritual life." Su- pematuralizcd as it surely would be by the purity of intention so characteristic of Sisters, such mortification would be not less a spiritual asset than a physical boo.i. May it not be hoped that such of the clergy as come into contact with these self-sacrificing daughters of religion, and more particularly those clerics who preach their annual retreats, will exert their influence in the direction indicated in this paper? It wi" be entirely safe to assure the Sisters that they cannot do better for the Church, their community, and themselves than follow the advice of St. Teresa to her nuns: "Take care of the body for the love of God.'* XVI THE LEISURE OF CLERICS AND RELIGIOUS Everjthingr hits its time.--Eeeleaier C. who weighs fifty or sixty pounds more uian is normal for a man of his age and height, knows that he ought to take a goodly amount of physical exercise every day, but then he has to be at the constant beck and call of his parishioners, and so is debarred therefrom. Sister D is fully aware that her efficiency in the class- room will suffer from her infrequent enjoyment of fresh air, but tliere is so much to be done that •Us really impossible to go out for a walk. And so on. - Now, making .iue allowa ce for excepUonal cases, if is safe to affirm that, nine times out of ten, or, more Ukely, ninety-nine out of a hundred, such statemente as these arc merely inept excuses. Active pretexts designed to lull an uneasy con- science or to forestall the censure one feels to be deserved. In all probability Father A habitually expends more time in gratifying from day to day the haphazard and unprofitable whims and caprices of the moment than would suffice for the due preparation of several sermons. Father 3's parish work does not prevent his devoting several half-hours, not to say whole ones, daily, to tLe assiduous perusal of sundry papers, magazines, and "best-sellers." Father C. despite the alleged LEISURE OF CLERICS AND RELIGIOUS 206 incessant demands of his pnrishioners, manages to attend without fail all the ball games played in his city or town. And it is even conceivable that Sister D may spend in superfluous correspon- dence, in unnecessarily frequent or prolonged visits to the parlor, in protracted chats with her house-mates, or in reading books not really essen- tial to her spiritual advancement or intellectual growth, a period amply sufilcicnt for the outdoor exercise, which is scarcely less necessary to her than is food or sleep. The perspicacious reader will have noticed the less pc/'Jve and categorical form of that last sentence, as compared with the several preceding ones, and will doubtless readily apprehend the reason therefor. The writer has first-hand knowl- edge of dozens of Fathers A, B, and C; his ac- quaintance with the counterparts of Sister D is both too limited and too superficial to warrant any reliable generalizations as to their normal mode of action. Just here, oy the way, is perhaps the most fitting place for the insertion of a human docu- ment which should possess no little interest for many a reader of this volume, and which in reality constitutes the main raison d'itre of the present essay. It is an extract from a letter recently received from the Mother Superior of a religious community devoted to educational work: . . . M»7 I suggest, aa a subject for some future article of yours in the Ecclesiagtical Review, the injustice done to Sisters in the parochial schools f The Sisters are engaged to teach the school, not to clean the church, to be the sacristans (with all that 1 206 PRIESTLY PRACTICE that entaUs), to play the organ, and conduct aU the sodalities of the parish. In many places they are expected to do all this and more, and at the same time to teach from nine to twelve, and from half -past twelve or one to half-past three or four, to correct all their papers, to prepare their lessons, to attend to their reUgious duties, and to keep pace with the furious gallop of modern educa- tion. It is absolutely impossible— something will have to suffer. Accepting this statement at its face value, one is at a loss to determine which of the two is the more to be admired (in the strictly etymological sense of the word), the pastor who seeks to im- pose such unconscionable burdens, or the Mother Superior who allows het- Sisters to accept them. That the conditions stated are purely and simply intolerable goes without saying. Any one who knows from personal experience (as does the present writer) what it is to teach for six hours a day, who understands the nervous wear and tear inseparable from attendance in the class- room and the subsequent fatiguing drudgery of correcting multiplied "papers," "duties," or "exer- cises," does not need telling that, in the matter of work, sufficient for the day is the teaching thereof. To expect that, over and above such work, a Sister should fill the supplemental role of sacristan, organist, janitress, or quasi-curate, is to display such a lack of consideration, not to say of intelligence, as is difficult to reconcile with one's habitual notion of a judicious cleric. The sweat- ing system is bad enough in the tailor's trade or the tobacconist's; in common decency it should be tabooed in the case of our teaching Sisters. LEISURE OF CLERICS AND RE LIGIOUS 207 Evidently there is scant leisure for religious subjected to such conditions as the foregoing; but the deprivation of what is rightfully theirs does not invalidate their title thereto, nor does their case, which, for the honor of our cloth, one hopes is altogether exceptional, affect the general rule that religious as well as seculars have a rea- sonable amount of daily free time. If, as has al- ready been said, representatives of both classes do not always admit or even recognize the fact, it is very probably because they are wanting in meUiod and have not learned the important secret of sys- tematizing ttieir work and prayer and recreation. There are few," says Archbishop Spalding, whom routine work keeps busy more than ten hours in twenty-four. Allow eight hours for sleep and two for meals, and there remain four hours for self-improvement" Profitable expeuditure, raUier than useless frittering away of these hours' depends very largely on a person's having or not havmg an individual rule of life. All treatises on the priesthood emphasize the expediency, or rather tiie necessity, of such a rule as a means to that systematic action of which St. Augustine says, "Order leads to God." "Among the means proper to aid the priest in rapidly attaining the sanctity exacted by his state " says Le Tresor du Pretre. "there is one of great efficiency, recommended by the saints as the easiest and safest road by which to reach that goal— the faitiiful and constant observance of a rule of life drawn up with care and prudence and 208 PRIESTLY PRACTICE I 111 M 1 1 1 iii approved by a wise director." "In order to spend his time for the glory of God, for the sanctifica- tion of his own soul, and the salvation of his neigh- bor, every good priest," declares Father MuUer, "draws up for himself a good rule of life and strives to live up to it" "If you never acted from caprice, but observed a fixed order in your every- day life, appointing a suitable time for everything, you ^ould never have to complain of want of time," protests Rules for the Pastor of Souls; and it adds : "Having first fulfilled all your duties in the best way possible, you would still find time for all necessary recreation." And Canon Keat- inge tells his brother priests : "The need of method and rule in our life comes home to us in a strik- ing way when we reflect that there is no profes- sion or calling in life in which the work can be got through in a slovenly and negligent manner more easily than in ours. ... I know of no walk in life where a man can do less if he chooses than in the priesthood, and yet be sure of the necessaries." The basic truth underlying these several quota- tions would seem to be that priests and religious lack most frequently, not ti ne, but orderly sys- tem in utilizing time; not real leisure, but real method in the performance of their various duties. Hazlitt's assertion, "the more busy we are, the more leisure we have," is absurd only at first blush; many a man has often experienced its prac- tical truth. Not less judicious is Lord Chester- field's statement: "It is an undoubted truth that 11 LEISURE OF CLERICS AND RELIGIOUS 209 the less one has to do the less time one has to do It m One yawns, one procrastinates, one can do It when one will, and, therefore, one seldom does li at all; whereas those who have a good deal of busmess must (to use a vulgar expression) buckle to It, and then they always find time to do it in " A review of his personal activities at two different penods— an extra busy week, for instance, and an unusually slack one-will demonstrate to the average man the j itness of this reflection, and should convince him tiiat if, conformably to the old-time /-ounsel, he "works while he works," he will lack either time nor zest to "play while he plays." It would be superfluous, if not impertinent, to dilate m such a volume as this on tiie distorted view of Christian perfection and the spiritual life taken by those who would identify legitimate leisure with wasted opportunity or time lost. It is elementary that the very best thing one can do at any given time is to accomplish God's will. The most lucid and unmistakable expression of that holy will as to the details of daily routine is nor- maUy found in "a rule of life drawn up with care and prudence and approved by a wise director," and the leisure permitted or enjoined by such a rule IS no more inimical to one's eternal interests one's personal sanctification, than is the most in- tense and exhausting labor of brain or brawn More than most other people, presumably, clerics and religious resemble tiie just man. in that they hve by faith," and tiieir consequent purity of in- 14 210 PRIESTLY PRACTICE tention gives supernatural merit to acts in them- selves indifferent, unmoral. There is sound theol- ogy as well as common sense in the advice : Enjoy your daily leisure; but, whether you rest or read, pay visits or receive them, ride, row, wheel, or walk, "or whatever else you do, do all to the glory of God." :lliJ! n I ■■^% \ XVII CLERICAL HOBBIES Blessed is the man that hath a hohhj.—Brougham. are^amoi^'^h^p" w" *'" '°*!y««t»«l <>»«« Such recreations i"rldlTnS.-*S«,iS! P'^^^"^***-- "^-"t -Ifi'hness and vulgar ♦-, ^7"^°? *? P*** '"^ ''''»* yo« a'-e- A good farthine is bet- riahf^ *',?*'* sovereign Aflfect no oddnL; but dare to be nght, th.a -h you have to be singular.— 5. Coley. LJAPPY the priest with several harmless hobbies, * * and woe worth the cleric too lisUess or too la^ to enjdy the riding of even one. Innocent hobbies may not in themselves be virtues- but they often serve as virtue's safeguards, and' they are sovereign remedies against sloth, which, as many a pnest has learned by experience, is not the least msidious of the seven deadly sins. Does this impress the reader as surprising doctrine, utterly opposed to prevalent opinion and his own habitual judgment? Does not the phrase "a man with a hobby" connote an insufferable bore, a pereon who, however estimable be may be in the mam, is on some subject or subjects eccentric and cranky, an individual whom normally sane people regard with a certain measure of kindly tolerance, not to say good-humored contempt? Let us see Our word, hobby, is the modem equivalent of the old-time hobby-horse, which term, in its literal sense, meant either a wooden figure of a 212 PRIESTLY PRACTICE horse, usually provided with rockers, for children to nde on, or one of the principal performers in a morns-dance, having a figure of a horse made of wickerwork supported about his waist, and his feet concealed by a housing. The identity of mean- ing m the older and the more recent word is clear from the idea of equestrianism common to both In our day we ride hobbies, whereas in Tristram Shandy shme "my Uncle Toby rode a hobby- horse In present-day literary usage, a hobby, according to the Century dictionary, is any favorite objec^ pursuit, or topic; that which a person per- sistenUy pursues or dwells upon with zeal or de- light, as If riding a horse. Webster defines it as a subject upon which one is constantly setting off • favonte theme of disconrse, thought, or effort! Ihe Standard declares it to be a subject or pursuit in which a person takes extravagant or persistent irterest A more satisfactory, because more ade- quate definition tiian any of tfie foregoing is tiiis. from the Oxford dictionary: "Favorite subject o^ occupation that is not one's main business." The restrictive clause, "that is not one's main business. IS not merely supplemental; it conveys an Idea that is of the very essence of the word's ti-ue meaning. A hobby bears the same relation to one s regular business or occupation as an avoca- tion (in the proper etymological sense) does to ones vocation; it is a subordinate or occasional occupation, a diversion or disti-action. This pre- cisionizing the meaning of the term is so far use- nu that It at once excludes from tiie purview of CLERICAL HOBBIES 213 ^L''llZ:r^r^7:''P''''''y employments,^ SruJio' The^rr C^Sr "' """^ jn« diffleui. texts in Ho,y Vri ^^/eaSeral the •Wh, , K °" °- i' '"■■«^™"- on the '"okout for Dean T ;^i;''Ch'^'"''°"'' °f ^is city parish. And speaking. Ceriea, hXlX The ?;v:;SercC Hon or topic of each is. not a diversion fr^^Tl personal sanctification. "'t^rewitn. his A clerical hobby, then, may be defined as a fa vonte occupation or pursuit which has no di'rec^ bearing on one's priestly duties; or a subject of predilection, non-sacerdotal in charac er ' upon .W tl^at"!r'"*' ^^':^*«-««" one loves to' dHa" l^ow that the possession of hobbies, thus under- ila 214 PRIESTLY PRACTICE stood, or one's addiction thereto, is something to be deprecated or apologized for, is a contention that can scarcely be made good. Any orderly dis- cussion of the matter is apt to resolve itself into the centuried distinction between the use of a thing and its abuse. A hobby may be ridden too furiously, too frequently, and too long, just as may the horse from which the word first derived its significance; but the mere mounting of a hobby and leisurely putting it through its paces is no more incongruous or blameworthy than is mod- erate, exercise in real equestrianism. It is pertinent to add that the very critics who are most severe in their strictures on "the man with a hobby" not infrequently have very pronounced hobbies of their own, and ride them as mercilessly as the most inveterate gallopers whom they condemn. Some men are hobbyists, as others are egoists, without ever suspecting the fact. Given the positive utility, or even the negative harmlessness, of a particular clerical hobby, it needs no special training in psychologj*^ to under- stand that the riding thereof may be an excellent thing for the priest. Theoretically, of course, it would be a still more excellent thing if all his waking-hours were spent in occupations directly and immediately affecting some duty of his many- sided vocation, and possibly the number and variety of those duties may be urged as a reason why he need not go outside their circle to seek relief from sameness and monotony; but in down- right practice some of those hours in most priestly CLERICAL HOBBIES 215 lives are given to matters or pursuits other than purely sacerdotal ones and the actual alternative to riding a hobby is ver^ often doing worse, or still more frequently, doing nothing. Now idle- ness, even the "busy" idleness" that consists in frittering away half-hours or hours in fussing about unimportant things and trifling events, is an evil, which in priests as in other people may easily lead to disastrous results both in thought and action; and if a hobby does no more than keep a cleric innocently occupied during his hours of legitimate leisure, it is still a genuine blessing. It is easy enough to moralize on the utter needlessness of a parish priest's looking beyond the round of his regular priestly duties for such relaxation as is necessary for mind and body. One knows by heart the lengthy list of occupa- tions, peremptory or congruous, that solicit every moment of his time — his personal religious exer- cises, his confessions, his household manage- ment, his necessary correspondence, his regular supervision of the school, his visiting the sick and the afflicted of his flock, his receiving the innumerable calls of parishioners and non-parish- ioners to consult him on a hundred diff'erent topics, his instructing prospective converts, etc., etc., and the variety of these occupations may be pleaded as the equivalent of rest; but it is an undeniable fact that, this formidable list of activ- ities to the contrary notwithstanding, the parish priest who has not several hours of leisure a day is the exception, not the rule. In so far as the 216 PRIESTLY PRACTICE III subject of this essay concerns the reader, the main point is, not what he might do or should do. but what he actually does. As for those priests, a goodly number in our day, who are occupied in other than pastoral duties---missioners, professon*, chaplains, editors, chancellors, secretaries, etc., they too, as a rule, have a reasonable amount of daily leisure, and may well culUvate a hobby or two that will help to make such leisure profitable, or at least keep It from becoming detrimental. Most clerics who have arrived at middle age have learned either from their own experience, or from their observa- tion of their brethr^ • , that The bow that 'a always bent will quickly break, But if unstrung 'twill serve you at your need; and hence recognize the wisdom of Phadrus's advice. So let the mind some relaxation take, To come back to its task with fresher heed. There is exaggeration, no doubt, but u sub- stratum of truth withal, in this recent pronounce- ment of a metropolitan journal's paragraphist : Of course we cannot do without hobbies. They have become u necessity and are the salvation of many of those who might otherwise be driven to face a dull, empty, and aimless existence." Assuming that the case for the advisability or justification of clerical hobbies has been made out, there remains a very wide question to be con- i,.* CLERICAL H0BBIE8 217 eidered-the kind of hobbies most congruous and cxpcd cnt for priests to cherish. It is a quesUon altogether too wide to receive more than the merest summary treatment in so necessarily brief a paper ns the present one; but at least a few sug- gestions may be made, a few principles laid down, and a few hints proffered, sufficient to awaken the nterest, enlist the sympathy, or haply provoke the opposition of some of our clerical readers At the outset it may be well to take issue xidth that statement of Smiles which Is quoted as one of the forewords of this paper, 'The best hobbies are intellectual ones." That intellectual hobbies are best for persons whose main business is not intellectual, is probably true; that they are most expedient fcr persons habitually engaged in the exertion of their mental powers is more than doubtiul. A sounder principle than this of the English essayist is: the best hobbies are those which differ most from one's regular, wonted occupaUon. The man who is engaged in brain- work for eight or ten hours a day will surely de- rive more benefit from a hobby that exercises his muscles than from one that still further taxes his mmd; just as the laborer whose physical powers are wearied by prolonged muscular activity will profit most from a distraction that calls for mental, rather than bodily, exertion. Gladstone s hobby of walking two full hours after every parliamentary sitting was a much wiser one han would have been his devoting those hours to the rebgious controversy which was another of his 218 PRIESTLY PRACTICE III ii 1 !i I hobble.; and Newman's varying hii literary labors with the playing of his violin was much better for him. and his books, than would have been the reading of his favorite authors. RelaUvely few clerics, presumably, belong to that class of hobbyists generically known as "col- lectors,** those who make it a pursuit or an amuse, ment to accumulate such objects of interest as painUngs. ceramics, bric-i-brac. plants, minerals, shells, coins, postage and revenue-stamps, etc. One excellent reason why few priests are given to col- IccUng any of the first three of these enumerated objects is that the hobby is a more expensive one than the average cleric can afford. A North- western prelate of our acquaintance has, it is true, developed a pronounced taste for the acquisition oi religious paintings, and, a year or two ago, had m his possession a very respectable art- gallery; but the nucleus of his collection had come to him by inheritance, not purchase, and in tiie field of more strenuous labor to which he has re- cently been promoted, his artistic tastes, or at least the gratification thereof, will probably have to be kept m abeyance. Such collectors as are found in the ranks of the clergy are for the most part bibliophiles, and we have known two or tfiree whom there would be httle exaggeration in calling bibliolaters. The love of books and the consequent desire to possess them is a scholarly hobby which can scarcely be considered unbecoming or discordant in one of whom it has been said. "The lips of tiie priest CLERICAL HOBBIES 219 ■hall keep knowledge"; and. accordingly, in one or another of iU ramincations, it is fairly common among clerics. Some priests delight in securing a heterogeneous collection; others in getting hold of rare copies of volumes that are out of print; Bishop B. and Father Z. are constantly making additions to their Dante libraries; Fathers A. and T. pounce upon every new edition of Newman and on all books about Newman; Father H. has several shelves of volumes dealing with Spiritism; the present writer owns to a fondness for Scott and Thackeray; his next-door neighbor is an en- thusiastic admirer of Francis Thompson; Monsig- nor G. stints himself occasionally in creature com- forts, to indulge in the purchase of an edition de luxe of a favorite author; and Dr. B. is crowding his book-cases with tomes and brochures and pamphlets on Socialism. in general, it may be said that few clerical hobbies need less apology or justification than a decided fondness for reading. Those priests in- deed whose main work has comparatively little to do with other books than their professional ones are very sincerely to be pitied if they lack this fondness. To be unable joyously to lose one's self for an hour or two of spare time in a volume of history, biography, science, poetry, or even classic fiction, is to be lacking in a habit emi- nently in keeping with the sacerdotal character and of no little assistance in routing the ennui that is a curse to soul and body. "Such a habit," says Canon Keatinge, "will keep up your interest in nmii it I 220 PRIESTLY PRACTICE things intellectual and will not suffer your pro- of date. It will bring balm to your soul when fail- ure may have damped your courage; when age is creeping on and throwing you n?o;e and more de^T:L ^°""uf • '' ^" ''''^'' y«" indepen- dent of others, able to live without the young and active who so often have no time for usf and It will carry you over many pitfalls and will en- Of cognate character and similar utility is the hobby of writing, which might well be a good deal more common than it is. Even though a priest's hterary output never finds its way into prinlits production may easily prove a veritable blessing to himself. ,f not to others. Whether his preference be for some one of the many forms of prose or for JZTu ^'"'*^ °^ ^"'^^^ *^^ j^y ^^ find« in its composition IS a good thing in itself, and a notable aid as well to the forcible writing, or at least the studied meditation, of his sermons if is per- haps worth while mentioning that the favorite hobby of one of the greatest priest-scientists in Ifrfk,''?" "^ 'IJ^^ composing of limericks-a striking exemplification of the old truth that A little nonsense now and then — _. Is relished by the wisest men.' the Vv"e.I?„r."Li'''orion*8en?e t^rJV"Z^ '^'ll".!'' unfaniiliar with cUssic example: "onsenge ver.e known as the limerick, here is • There was a young lady of Niger Who rode, with • o^iil -*r/. Who rode: wfthrsmiironTtTger; And the smile on the face of the tiger. ,1. 'jl CLERICAL HOBBIES 221 An admirable hobby of many priests on the other side of the Atlantic, and possibly of some clerics on this side also, is the teaching <. Latin ic c e or two of their altar-boys in whom fh v dis( era the germ of a sacerdotal vocation. Music is another hobby not uncommon among priests and assuredly not incongruous in the most dignified of their number. The cleric who pos- sesses a taste for the harmony of sweet sounds and some skill in the production thereof, is to be con- gratulated on having at his disposal an excellent means of distraction and necessary recreation Whether he be a proficient performer on the piano, hke St. Alphonsus Liguori; on the violin, like Cardinal Newman; or on flute, clarinet, guitar or mandolin, he has at hand a ready egress from the tedium of daily routinism, a refreshing bath after his dust-laden and occasionally soot-permeated labors. Fortunately for some of us, it is quite feasible to cherish a musical hobby even though one be entirely lacking in skill as a performer on any instrument. Phonographs, gramophones, and the like mechanical appliances, have in our day been brought to such a pitch of perfection that at a comparatively trifling cost for cylinders or discs, one may enjoy a whole series of exquisite musical selections, vocal and instrumental, as varied in character as are the multitudinous tastes of mankind. Of indoor games that lend themselves to the III I j i. A 222 , H n E ! [ I -li PRIESTLY PRACTICE discriminating choice of a clerical hobbyist, chess is perhaps the most interesting, although many amateurs find it to partake more of the nature of intellectual work than brain relaxation. Billiard tables have of late years made their appearance in a good many parish-houses and community recreation-rooms, and the movements necessitated by playing the game are a strong point in its favor. Of games of cards, whist, euchre, and the old-time "forty-fives" afford occasional wholesome distrac- tion, while the "great American game"— poker, to wit, is a pastime which clerics in general, and young priests in particular, may congruously — and profitably — eschew. ' All the hobbies thus far treated are especially helpful to such priests as, in the prosecution of their main business, habitually spend several hours at least of their day out in the open, drinking in a goodly amount of fresh air and sunshine. As for clerics whose work is of a sedentary character, keeping them confined to the desk, or writing- table, or class-room, or lecture-hall for the major portion of their waking-hours, it stands to reason that distractions of a different nature are most expedient. The best hobbies for them are those that entail outdoor exercise, muscular activity, physical exertion. There is a wide field, a great variety of such helpful occupations from which to choose, and the country priest or the pastor in a small town or village may easily do worse than employ many of his all too numerous hours of CLERICAL HOBBIES 223 leisure from Sunday to Sunday in good, healthy manual labor. Gardening is a hobby which in our northern clime is not likely to be overridden, and which yields tangible and toothsome rewards, as well as necessary exercise. A carpenter-shop is by no means a ridiculous adjunct to a presbytery's oi'thouses, nor need a cleric blush for either his skill or his assiduity in building modest structures, from a chicken-coop or summer-house to a vestry or a barr. Laying out the church grounds or the cemetery provides an opportunity for landscape gardening, and the care of an orchard, a vineyard, or a field of berries will pleasantly vary one's in- terests, and superinduce the healthy muscular fatigue which is less common perhaps in the clerical physique than is muscular flabbiness or quasi-atrophy. Where such expedients for -r'ngling profit and pleasure, remunerative work • ; salutary hy- gienic exertion, are wanUng- . of course they are wanUng to very many of the clergy— the pat- ent alternative is to make a hobby of some game or pursuit that affords exercise pure and simple. Hand-ball, golf, tennis, horseback-riding, motor- ing, cycling, sailing, rowing, swimming, skating, the old-fashioned driving, and the older-fashioned walking— these proffer a choice varied enough to suit the most diverse tastes of clerics young and old; and the priest who gives to some one of these recreations an hour or two a day is considerably wiser in his generation than is his bihous or splen- etic critic who piously deplores such waste of I 224 PRIESTLY PRACTICE time — and then has idiotic recourse to his private pharmacy of patent medicines for relief from ills mainly due to his habitual inactivity. The present writer may perhaps be cod sidered too much of a special pleader on the bei eflts of pedestrianism to make his appeal thereioi of any particular weight; so let him quote in favor of his own hobby, walking, an opinion that may win more favorable consideration. In Bodily Health and Spiritual Vigor, Father Lockington, S. J., has this to say: A man comes out of the classroom or confes- sional, dull and weary, his head aching and his whole being tired. It is easier far for him to drag himself to his room and lie on his bed, than to go out, and by a swinging four or five mile walk work out of his system the blood-clogging poison placed there by the vitiated air that he has been breath- ing for hours. Yet, if he follows the former course, he will remain heavy and tired as before, and probably have a sleepless night; while in the second case he will rejuvenate the whole body, coming home with oxygenated food, feeling fresh and vigorous and ready for more work. Verily, blessed is the priest that has several hobbies, and thrice blessed if one of them be walking! APPENDIX I 16 r 1 1 A PRIEST'S WAY OF THE CROSS BEFORE THE TABERNACLE O Man of Sorrows, Sufferer Supreme ^id all the anguished whom the ages know. Thou chiefest Martyr whose abyss of woe Was sounded to the utmost depth extreme *J»o"»:crowned Jesas. who wouldst fain redeem Mankmd with surplusage of pain, to show Sms mahce and Thy n-ercy's overflow — Too rarely have I made Thy Cross my theme. Yet see me prostrate at Thy feet to-day, I who, alas! "another Christ" should be: Ahu Lord, vouchsafe Thy grace whilst I essay Thine only function that befitteth me,— To bear Thy Cross along this doleful way, And weep my sins that built Thy Calvary. 227 .■■wT":«u-w-'- PRIESTLY PRACTICE STATION I— CONDEMNED Was ever justice in a world unjust So foully outraged as on Pilate's seat! Did ever sentence so flagitious greet A blameless culprit, or so basely thrust Amid a rabble hot with murder's lust Such Victim, robed with innocence complete? Poor Christ, foredoomed at bar of men to meet This dastard judge's breach supreme of trust! And yet, wherein was Pilate worse than I Whose sins, sweet Jesus, to my lasting shame, Have oft betrayed Thee to satanic foe ! O Lord! in mercy deign to fortify My coward soul that Thou mayst yet reclaim Its service true, and spare me endless woe. i; f ' ! 1^ tfiW: A PRIEST'S WAY OF THE CROSS 229 STATION II— CROS:i-LADEN Upon His sacred shoulders, bruised and torn In livid stripes where cruel scourges flayed, The crushing burden of the Cross is laid. O Tree transformed! Once malefactor-borne In shame and vile disgrace; henceforward shorn Of infamy, no more canst thou degrade: Earth's noblest heroes clasp thee undismayed. And joy to wear the badge that Christ hath worn. Full meekly, O my Jesus, dost Thou bear This heavy load, thrice- weighted by my sin; And I, ignoble ingrate, shall I dare By shirking burdens light renounce Thy kin? Ah! no, dear Lord; though trials press me sore. Thy Cross shall teach me patience evermore. 230 PRIESTLY PRACTICE i 11 STATION III— THE FIRST FALL •Mid jeers and insults of the mocking throng Begins the weary march to Calvary; The brutal guard urge on with fiendish glee The drooping Christ, and smite with lance and thong. The while i*e drags His bleeding feet along. Each step an added pang of agony: At length, quite spent, relaxed each yielding knee. He prostrate falls, than helpl s babe less strong. Exhausted Lord, my sins have laid Thee prone; More potent they than ruthless lash or blow To pierce with poignant grief Thy Sacred Heart Ah, help me. Lord, for errors past atone. And teach my darkened mind at length to know How bitter 'tis to walk from Thee apart! A PRIEST'S WAY OF THE CROSS 231 STATION IV-SON AND MOTHER Upraised by savage force with oaths applied, He reels and staggers slowly on until. Where turns the way to seek the distant hill. His care-worn, stricken Mother is descried. One glance exchanged.— then on; He may not bide; But oh ! the keen and agonizing thrill That pierces both, the memories that fill Their souls, and swell compassion's surging tide! By all the pity, Lord, Thy look conveyed To Mary's heart, my trespasses forget; And thou, s--* Oueen of Martyrs, be mine aid When tirt. . foes my daily path beset: One loving glance, deign, Mother, to bestow. And peace, 'neath every cross, my soul shall know. ill t ^i ' # PRIESTLY PRACTICE STATION V— THE CYRENIAN Resolved on glutUng to the full their hate. But fearful lest forthwith the Man-God die And foil their purpose set, to crucify. His crafty foes their cruelty abate : Constrained to bear in part the Gross's weight Reluctant Simon serves as Christ's ally. Then, grace-touched, feels the contact vivify His parched soul, and glories in his fate. What Simon, Lord, in this our later day Shall help to bear the burden of Thy Cross, If not e'en such as I, Thy priest for aye. Who erstwhile spumed the world's delights as dross? Ah, let my heart still own that spirit's sway. And count all joy unshared by Thee a loss ! i! A PRIEST'S WAY OP THE CROSS 233 STATION VI— VERONICA If sympathy, so dear to hearts oppressed. Be doubly sweet at moments when most rare. Then never act of kindness shone more fair Than hers whose loving offices arrest This toilsome march, her pity to attest For Jesus fainting 'neath o'erwhelniing care. Her guerdon prompt— He bids the napkin bear For aye the imprint of His visage blest. HencefoHh, O Christ, the daily task be mine To emulate Veronica's brave deed. By seeking oft Thy Eucharistic shrine To pay in tender love Thy Passion's meed : Unworthy I to cleanse Thy Holy Face, Still let me. Lord, Thy bleeding feet embrace. 234 PRIESTLY PRACTICE STATION VII— THE SECOND FALL So lavishly His Precious Blood has flowed Since, hours ago, it oozed in crimson sweat Wherewith the Garden's olive-roots were wet. So prodigal it gushed *neath scourge and goad And thorn-spikes fierce, that e'en the help be- stowed By Simon fails fresh vigor to beget: Again doth nature outraged claim her debt, — He sinks and falls upon the stone-strewn road. f f Reviewed by light of this. Thy second fall, O prostrate Son of God, how vile appear My frequent weak relapses into sin ! Erase, dear Lord, my past transgressions all. That I, forgiven, may the better cheer Yet other souls whom Thou hast died to win. A PRIEST'S WAY OP THE CROSS 235 STATION VIII— JERUSALEM'S DAUGHTERS Though from thy sons, Jerusalem, had fled Mild Pity, forced to give blind hatred place. Still did compassion's mood thy daughters grace: Foreboding gloom its shadow o'er them spread. And plaints were wailed, and tears distressful shed 0*er His, the Nazarene's most woeful case: Uplifting then His pain-worn, blood-stained face, "Weep not for Me, but for yourselves," He said. So may'st Thou say, dear Lord, to all who weep Emotion's swift-dried streams o'er Thy sad plight. Yet hug the sins Thy cruel doom that wrought: My soul, let sorrow fast-abiding, deep. Be ours for years sin-burdened in His sight. Till contrite tears our evil records blot! 236 PBIBSTLY PRACTICE STATION IX— THE THIRD FALL His weary journey drawing to its close. The summit of the fatal Mount at hand. Fresh fury seizes on the bestial band Of torturers. Redoubled now their blows, While faint and fainter with each moment grows Their Victim 'neath riharp stroke and harsh command; Though striving sore His weakness to withstand. Once more He sinks, borne down by countless woes. Unlike to Him, for my repeated falls Adown the frightful steeps of sin's abyss. None other than myself may I accuse. Thy grace, dear Lord, sustains whoever calls On Thee for aid: henceforth, no more remiss. Thy strength I'll crave, nor further grace abuse. A PRIEST'S WAY OF THE CROSS 237 STATION X— STRIPPED Revolting climax of extremest shame. The garments from His sacred flesh they tear; Nay, tear the flesh itself, all quivering where The tunic's fibres grasped His aching frame. Each previous pang, renewed, like ardent flame Shoots through His body, still divinely fair Though bruised and mangled now its beauty rare, — Such dread atonement carnal pleasures claim. O Lord, my God, who each recurring morn Thy Body to my keeping dost confide. Of cravings sensual increase my scorn; Be my rebellious flesh so mortified That oft as in my heart Thou art reborn. Its purity may win Thee there to bide! 238 PRIESTLY PRACTICE STATION XI— CRUCIFIED Fell consummation of earth's blackest crime. Whereat the soul all terror-stricken quails — See Jesus fastened to the Cross with nails: The huate-plied hammers ring a horrid chime. And Precious Blood commingles with the slime As each torn v* in its ruddy drops exhales. Behold, my soui, the cost that sin entails. And gauge herein thy Saviour's love sublime! O blest Redeemer, crucified for me. What base returns with auntless grievous sins Thy sacred hands and feet to pierce anew! O erwhehned with bitter shame, I turn to Thee With contrite heart that still Thy pardon wins. And vow forevermore allegiance true. A PRIEST'S WAY OP THE CROSS 239 STATION XII— DEAD The holy Rood upreared 'neath sombre skies. His long, long agony wears slowly on; ChiU death-sweat .nckles o'er His features wan And pains keen throes have dimmed the mourn- ful eyes. Tis come, the hour supreme of sacrifice: Sin's full atonement He hath undergone. And, direst sight mankind e'er looked upon. The Word Incarnate bows His head and dies. O loving Christ, who even on the Cross, While life's exhausted tide was ebbing fast, For those who slaughtered Thee didst deign to pray, '*^ Of misspent years help me repair the loss. And grant that love and penitence at last Prevail to lead me to eternal day. 240 PRIESTLY PRACTICE STATION XIII— IN MARY'S ARM5 Beside the Cross stands Mary, living still, By miracle upborne on that vast sea Of woe submerging her on Calvary. Disconsolate, she views flie spear-thrust spill Of saving Blood His heart's last tiny rill; Then clasps the Body loosened from the Tree, Caresses It in tearless misery, — And learns the while all sin's unmeasured ill. Sweet Mother, dolorous like unto none 'Mid other martyrs, I would share thy grief: My sins, alas! have robbed thee of thy Son; Mine, then, to bring thy stricken heart relief. Since each true priest another Christ should be. Oh, let me prove another son to thee! A PRIEST'S WAY OF THE CROSS 241 STATION XIV— BURIED At length the awful tragedy is o'er, Complete the God-Man's voluntary doom; Within the sepulchre— a borrowed tomb— His Body, cleansed by Mary's hands from gore. Rests peacefully. The faithful few adore. Then leave Him lying in its silent gloom, That grave which three days hence will prove the womb Whence springs the Christ, Triumphant evermore. Close by Thy sepulchre, my buried Lord, Remorseful, yet despairing not, I kneel; Though death eternal be the just award For all my sins, Thy mercy still I feel; And, contrite, dare to pray Thy death may save E'en me for endless life beyond the grave. ]« 242 PBIESTLY PRACTICE EPn^OGUE **Another Christ!** Lord, pity my distress Who heard of old Thy counsel, *Tollow Me,** Yet, in this mirror of 'thy Passion, see How with the years my soul has grown e*en less Like Thine, yrhile ever my unworthiness Has taken deeper hues. Oh, let my plea For loving pardon once more granted be. And all my future shall the past redress! And thou, sweet Mother, thine assistance lend That, firm and faithful to my latest breath. Thy Jesus I may serve, His cause defend. His Cross support, and by His mystic death. Renewed as oft as Holy Mass I say. Win union blest with Him and thee f
«teur« of CUirica and !!•• UttoM Ml d«flnod, Mt Loonard of Port Maurloo, Bl lit Llbru7 M onuHmrit. A Tl Ucuoii, Bt AlphonauB n. w, loa Llmarieiui tn Unklns words. 14t Litorary ermiy-qulitt 17 Locklncton. 8. J., Rev. W. J., on walking, tZi Utlwy, Abb*, and tho CurC d'Ara in XiOnsevlty of Bist^is. ..... 18* Lone Ufa a blaaalr^.. 110 Lone aarmona il Lowall on eztemporanaoua apeecbea 9 Lubbock. Sir Jcrtin M Lukawann (^«rlc. tha tt M Maeaulajr'a mamonr 141 ICacb. 8. J., Father, on ona'a motber-tongue. lOS on meditation, t* on atudy 4a Maher, 8. J., Rev. If., quoted, 146 Manna, aaeerdotal 59 Manner of one'a reading, The 79 Manning, Cardinal, on per- fection, IS on divine office, 94 on wearlneaa, 74 Maaa, The Rubrics of the,.. 99 The week-day, 116 Inconalatency concerning,. 117 boUeat of acts Ill why not attended, 119 Pag* Mass. and aaalous pastor. .. 110 bast ot davotlona HI Patbar Fabar on HI. IM 8t. Thomas on IM Van. Bade on 190 MasslUon's best sermon t Mathews, Prof. Wn., on memory 141 Meditation, of (•enmxi, . . . . . It Dally 19 Memories, 8