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 CHEISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
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CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS 
 
 A DEFENSE OF THE CATHOLIC FAITH 
 
 BY 
 
 Rev. W. DEVIYIER, S.J. 
 
 EDITED BY 
 
 The Rt. Rev. S. G. MESSMER, D.D., D.C.L., 
 
 Bishop of Green Bay^ Wis, 
 
 'S 
 
 New York, Cincin-n-att, Chicago: 
 Senziger Brothers, 
 
 Printers to the Eoly Apostolic See. 
 
ITniprimatur^ 
 
 •f. JOHN M. FARLEY, 
 
 Archbishop of New York. 
 
 LOAN STACK 
 
 New York. April 15, 1903. 
 
 Copyright, 1903, by Benziger Brothers. 
 
Dh-6 
 
 TO THE 
 
 CATHOLIC READING CIRCLES 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 
 
 BY 
 
 THE EDITOR. 
 
 f 935 
 
EDITOR'S PREFACE. 
 
 If it be true that a book well recommended by competent 
 critics is sure of a hearty welcome from thoughtful readers, the 
 present volume will find favor with the Catholic pubhc. Dur- 
 ing the fifteen years of its existence the French original has 
 passed through twelve editions. It has been praised by the 
 CathoUc press and has received a flattering recognition on the 
 part of cardinals and prelates. Thus Cardinal Mazzella wrote 
 to the author : ' ' You unite with soundness of doctrine the clear- 
 ness of exposition which the intelligence of the pupil requires, 
 and you treat your subjects with the reserve necessary to permit 
 the professor to add his own developments. I hope that your 
 work will become a classic jtext-bopk to the great advantage 
 of students. People of^tEe" world will also read it with profit 
 and pleasure." 
 
 Cardinal Deprez, Archbishop of Toulouse, writes: "You 
 have given us in a very clear and concise form an excellent 
 summary of fundamental theology. Not only the pupils for 
 whom your work is more specially intended, but all educated 
 men, desirous to complete their religious studies, will read it 
 with profit. They will learn from its substantial pages to 
 recognize the basis upon which all Christian dogma rests; they 
 will see that if faith is frequently represented as blindfolded, 
 yet she is not wholly blind, and that before giving her full assent 
 to revealed truth, she makes sure that she is not the victim of 
 a pious illusion. I commend you for having added to your 
 dogmatic proofs a few of the objections against religion and 
 the Church by which, unfortunately, many unthinking minds 
 are influenced. Your very clear and always accurate explana- 
 tions will destroy fatal misunderstandings in men of good faith." 
 
 Cardinal Mermillod, Bishop of Lausanne and Geneva, writes: 
 "It is a _. compendium, so to speak, in which the proofs of the 
 divinity of the Christian religion and the Catholic Church are 
 compactly grouped and forcibly presented. But if, like the 
 Jews rebuilding Jerusalem, you keep the trowel in one hand, 
 the sword is in the other; you refute victoriously in the name 
 of science the objections against the books of Moses, and in the 
 
4 EDITOR S PREFACE. 
 
 name of history the accusations frequently launched against 
 the Catholic Church. In defence of the books of Moses and to 
 show the harmony which exists between the Pentateuch and 
 geology or profane history, you have summed up long works, 
 among others the learned folios of the Abbe Vigouroux. Your 
 manner of stating questions enables you to refute in advance 
 objections not yet stated, but which may arise later. You 
 have facilitated the task of apologist for yourself in your authori- 
 tative work by ever bearing in mind St. Augustine's principle: 
 In necessaris unitas, in duhiis lihertas, in omnibus caritas. Your 
 book is characterized by method, lucidity, accurateness, and 
 conciseness; and one recognizes in its pages the work of an 
 eloquent professor." 
 
 Cardinal Place, Archbishop of Rennes, writes: " It is a most 
 opportune work to enable young men and men of the world to 
 justify their faith to themselves and to others, and to be con- 
 vinced that it is not the believer but the sceptic who is con- 
 demned by sound reason. The more science, deviating from 
 its proper sphere, seems to encroach upon the domain of re- 
 ligion, the more important it is that faith be equipped with 
 learning. Your excellent work will efficaciously contribute to 
 this end." 
 
 Mgr. Fontenau, Archbishop of Albi, writes : " Under a modest 
 title and in a simple and unpretentious form you have united 
 in a single volume all the arguments which Catholic controversy 
 opposes to contemporary irreUgion. Exegesis, philosophy, 
 theology, history, physical sciences, political economy, all 
 branches of knowledge, human and divine, concur in your work 
 to demonstrate incontestably the perfect agreement of reason 
 and faith. The proofs are abundant, well chosen, and well 
 presented, the arguments nervous and powerful, the style clear, 
 sober, and precise. . . . Your Course of Christian Apologetics, 
 therefore, is not only an instructive book, it is also a finished 
 model of methodical exposition and learned discussion. For 
 these reasons it is truly a most valuable work. Therefore I 
 should like to see it in the library of my seminarians and priests ; 
 they will find in it all the elements of CathoUc controversy and 
 learn from it how to use them." 
 
 Mgr. Vigne, Archbishop of Avignon, writes: "I shall recom- 
 mend it the more wilhngly that, in my opinion, it meets the 
 needs of our time, and that, in addition to its being incontestably 
 opportune, it has the essential merit of clearness, soHdity of 
 doctrine, and brevity. Ignorance of the truths of rehgion is the 
 great evil of our day, and undoubtedly one of the chief causes 
 of the weakening of the faith among us. Therefore, Rev. 
 Father, I should like to see your book in the hands of all young 
 people." 
 
EDITOR S PREFACE. 5 
 
 Mgr. Sebaux, Bishop of Angouleme, writes: "I am happy to 
 unite my suffrage with that of my venerable colleagues. The 
 book is so clear, so well arranged, and so suited to the condition 
 of minds of the present day that it will render most valuable 
 service. I shall gladly recommend it, and I earnestly desire to 
 see it not only in the hands of the most advanced pupils of our 
 institutions, but also of men of letters, whom a defective religious 
 training has left in ignorance of the decisive reasons of our faith, 
 or who are in a state of doubt created by objections which they 
 know not how to answer." 
 
 Mgr. Isoard, Bishop of Annecy, writes: ''The author has 
 written for the pupils of the higher classes, and his book will 
 certainly furnish the clearest and most complete text for the 
 lessons of the catechist and the conferences of the preacher. 
 But many others of the faithful will derive notable profit from 
 an assiduous and careful reading of this manual. The students 
 of philosophy and theology in our large seminaries will owe to 
 this study the power of being able later to translate into language 
 corresponding to the needs of the faithful the teaching which 
 they have received in the dry, severe formulas of the language 
 of the Church. I would urge the fathers and mothers of the 
 pupils in our educational houses or in our seminaries to procure 
 first for themselves this book, which they should desire to see 
 in the hands of their children, to acquire a thorough knowledge 
 of it, to study it profoundly: the study of reUgion is one of their 
 first duties." 
 
 The gist of these and numerous other recommendations may 
 be given in the words of Mgr. Rosset, Bishop of Maurienne, who 
 writes : "I consider that the work has all the merits required 
 for a classic. Pupils in our houses of secondary education will 
 study it with fruit; the clergy cannot read it without deriving 
 great advantage; the educated will find in it weapons of defence 
 if they are true Catholics, or reasons for abandoning their errors if 
 they are the victims of prejudice. To guide souls toward the 
 Catholic faith, to confirm in the mind the reasons of our belief, 
 to do good to those who believe and to those who do not believe — 
 such are the results to which P. Devivier's Course of Christian 
 Apologetics will largely contribute." 
 
 Modem infidelity, armed with the sophisms of rationalism, 
 scepticism, naturalism, and materialism, attempts to undermine 
 the very foundations of Christianity. The battle is no longer 
 confined to the campus of academic and scientific schools; it 
 spreads over the wide field of popular education and literature. 
 The same may be said of those strange aberrations of Spiritism, 
 Christian Science, Theosophy, and a lot of similar religious fads 
 which, like so many mental plagues, begin to attack the masses 
 of the people. " The need of defending the integrity of Chris- 
 
6 editor's preface. 
 
 tian faith and morality was never greater than it is to-day, 
 when nearly every doctrine which the Saviour of man, Jesus 
 Christ, entrusted to the Church for the welfare of mankind, 
 is assailed in deadly strife by an unbridled license of mind 
 and heart. Various, indeed, and unlimited is the cunning and 
 artfulness of the enemy in this battle; but first and full of 
 danger is the immoderate mania of writing and of spreading 
 wicked literature among the people. We cannot think of 
 anything more perniciously calculated to effect the ruin of 
 souls by instilling into them a contempt of religion and 
 deluding them with the false charms of sin.'' (Leo XIII., Const. 
 on forbidden books, Jan. 25, 1897.) Under such conditions 
 it becomes a positive duty of intelligent Catholics to get more 
 fully acquainted with the solid grounds of their faith in the 
 divine character of the Catholic Church, the concrete realiza- 
 tion of Christianity, and to apprehend more clearly the worth- 
 lessness of infidel and sectarian opposition. In this connec- 
 tion we may call attention to some other weighty words of our 
 Holy Father. In his encyclical ^'On the Means of Preserving 
 the Faith among the People" (Feb. 15, 1882), Leo XIII. 
 mentions books written in defence of the Catholic rehgion: 
 " Books must be fought by books; the skill and art from which 
 the greatest harm may come must be turned to work the 
 salvation and welfare of man; the source from whence evil 
 poison is sought must be made to yield the remedy." The 
 Pope then calls upon Catholic writers to make pubhcly known 
 the claims of the Church upon every Christian, to display the 
 splendid works accomplished by her among all nations, to set 
 forth the blessings she brings upon individuals as well as upon 
 society, and finally to demonstrate the importance of giving 
 the Church that position in society which her divinely-given 
 dignity and the pubhc welfare of the State demand. But the 
 Pope also admonishes the Catholic people to encourage CathoHc 
 writers by its hearty co-operation in spreading their books: 
 '' For all those who truly and sincerely desire progress in 
 Church and State, whose interests must be defended by the 
 writings of bright minds, it becomes a duty to insure by their 
 liberality the success of these writers." 
 
 Observe that in the above words the Pope evidently appHes 
 to the defence of the Church the words of Christ: '' By their 
 fruits you shall know them." For, as Father Tyrrell, S.J., 
 beautifully explains (Introd. to "The Faith of MiUions"), 
 " the mere reasonableness of believing cannot stir the will " 
 to actual belief. Rehgion must draw the heart unto itself 
 not by its truth alone, but stiU more by its goodness and 
 beauty. Only when man perceives that faith is able to bring 
 happiness, peace, and dehght to his soul will he accept it with 
 
EDITOR S PREFACE. 7 
 
 a willing mind. This power of religion for good and its 
 spiritual beauty must be shown principally by its fruits. In 
 this regard what Father Tyrrell says (1. c.) of England applies 
 equally to America. '' Nowhere more than in businessUke 
 England, where the distrust of dialectic is so profound and the 
 appeal to palpable results so decisive, have we need to strengthen 
 this argument ex fructihus, if we are to draw others or keep 
 those we have. If believers are, as a rule, notably more 
 just, truthful, charitable, beneficent, and temperate than un- 
 believers; if invisible, supernatural virtue is thus proved to 
 include, presuppose, strengthen, and refine that which is natural 
 and visible, to be a light shining before men, and not merely before 
 God, then the apologist may enter hopefully upon his labors." 
 
 Devivier's Manual sets forth both the truth and the goodness 
 of the Catholic religion. Although very compendious in size 
 and treatment, it is sufficiently complete for popular use. It is 
 especially suitable for our Catholic Reading Circles. We are 
 under the impression (if wrongly, so much the better) that in 
 many Reading Circles and other Catholic literary clubs too 
 much time is spent upon secular literature and history; time 
 and labor that would be applied with far greater profit, intel- 
 lectual, moral, and religious, to the study of the Catholic religion, 
 its dogmas and laws, its liturgy and pious practices, its history 
 and literature. In our opinion a systematic course of short 
 essays in the form of plain exposition or of apologetic discussion 
 upon the fundamental doctrines of Christianity and the special 
 claims of the Catholic Church, her achievements on every field 
 of civilization (universal charity, individual and social morality, 
 education and science, etc.), will of itself furnish an almost end- 
 less programme at once thoroughly instructive and truly delight- 
 ful. There is no reason why societies of intelligent and loyal 
 Catholic men and women should be afraid to take up in their 
 meetings the study and discussion of the Catholic Faith, provided 
 it is done under proper guidance. This does not mply the con- 
 tinual presence of an official censor in the person of an ecclesiastic. 
 The CathoHc Enghsh Uterature of to-day, whether in works of a 
 general character or in special treatises, tracts, and articles, 
 offers many excellent helps to earnest seekers after a fuller 
 knowledge of heavenly truth. Where these Catholic " Guide- 
 books in Religion" are conscientiously and properly followed 
 there will be no danger of going astray on the byways of religious 
 error. Moreover, some clear and intelligent reading, properly 
 selected, of a paragraph or an article from a sound CathoHc 
 book or magazine will often aiford more instruction and pleas- 
 ure than a dozen " original essays by club members." 
 
 For the purpose of pointing out some of those safe guides to 
 Catholic Reading Circles and others interested in the apologetics 
 
8 editor's preface. 
 
 of their faith, we have dropped the author's references to French 
 writers (unless translated into EngUsh) and have, in their place, 
 inserted references to Cathohc English Hterature. CathoUc 
 periodical literature in particular has received more considera- 
 tion than usual. It is no exaggeration to say that some Catholic 
 magazines are rich mines of Catholic information; treasures of 
 Cathohc truth and sound philosophy, of Cathohc virtue and 
 culture, of sacred and profane history, are hidden there; nothing 
 else is needed than " to work the mine." Sets, more or less 
 complete, of such magazines are found in Cathohc colleges and 
 convents, the libraries of Cathohc clubs, and sometimes in " the 
 study", of the priest and the educated layman. The same 
 may be said of Cathohc books in defence of rehgion. The 
 following list of Catholic apologetic literature to which reference 
 is frequently made in this volume, may appear overcrowded. 
 Our excuse is in the desire of helping all, the high and the 
 lowly, the city and the country reader. What does not suit 
 one may help another, and for the book vainly sought another 
 may be at hand. A few books are mentioned which are no 
 longer in the market. But then " out of print " is not always 
 '' out of the shelf "; look for it, by good luck you may find it. 
 Simply as a matter of literary curiosity it may be observed that 
 an English translation in three stout volumes of Rev. Anthony 
 Valsecchi's (O.Pr.; f 1791) "The Foundations of Religion and 
 the Sources of Unbelief" (a work famous in its time and prob- 
 ably the first specimen of a complete Catholic ''Apology" in 
 the modem sense) was published in Dublin at the beginning of 
 the last century. Of course it is O.P. The English translation 
 of Bishop Frayssinous' (f 1841) celebrated " Defence of Chris- 
 tianity" (a work translated in all European languages) shares a 
 similar fate. American Catholics, we hope, will not allow the 
 beautiful '' Conferences of Pere Lacordaire " to be forgotten. 
 The uniform edition pubhshed by O'Shea, N. Y., some thirty 
 years ago (some conferences were also issued by Protestant 
 publishers) presents a splendid course of Catholic Apologetics, 
 grand in thought as well as expression, and worthy to find a 
 place in every Catholic and public library. 
 
 True, many of the arguments given in the earlier apologies 
 for the existence of God and the supernatural order, of revelation, 
 mysteries and miracles, of free-will, conscience and moral law, 
 will not serve effectively to overturn the arguments of modern 
 infidels. As Rev. Dr. Fox (in Cath. World, Jan. 1903, p. 490 ff.) 
 very neatly observes: '' Truth does not change; but, as you say, 
 error does. And it is not from the enduring character of truth, 
 but through the Protean character of error, that there arises a 
 variation in the efficacy of certain demonstrations or reasons for 
 behef. ... If, however, we are to make Cathohc truth pre- 
 
editor's preface. 9 
 
 vail, we must present it under that aspect through which it 
 will appeal most strongly to those whom we seek to convince. 
 Not merely the objective value of an argument is to be con- 
 sidered, but also the force with which it appeals to a particular 
 mental attitude. ... In a day when fundamentals are attacked 
 the student who takes utility for his guide will wisely devote 
 himself to those parts of theology — using the term broadly — 
 which bear upon the living issues." The ample attention given 
 by Father Devivier to these '' Uving issues" and to the argu- 
 ments of modern unbelief is one of the special attractions and 
 advantages of his work. 
 
 Persons inquiring after some special point of CathoUc doc- 
 trine or history often do not have the books at hand which 
 treat in particular of the subject concerned, and they are at a 
 loss where to find an answer to their question. In such a case 
 it will be best to look up some book of a general character corre- 
 sponding with their subject, where they may hope to find at 
 least a plain, if brief, statement of the Catholic side. Thus, for 
 example, for statements of Doctrine they may consult the works 
 of Bishop Hay, Gaume, Card. Gibbons, Bagshawe, Hunter, 
 Schanz, Hettinger, Scheeben, Wilmers; Exposition of Catholic 
 Doctrine (3 vol.); Spirago's Catechism Explained; Mueller's 
 God our Teacher; Power's Catechism. For statements regard- 
 ing events or facts in Church History see the works by Alzog, 
 Briick, Birkhauser, Parsons, Gilmartin; Butler (Lives of the 
 Saints); Pastor and Mann on the Popes; Balmes, Young, De 
 Haulleville, and Brownlow on Catholic Civilization; Jansen, 
 Gasquet, Cobbett, and Archbp. Spalding on the Reformation. 
 On points of Controversy see the Chfton Tracts, the Paulist 
 Tracts, the tracts of the Catholic Truth Societies, especially that 
 of England; Ryder, Milner, De Trevem, Searle, besides the 
 general expositions of the Catholic Creed; Arnold's Catholic 
 Dictionary and Theui's Ecclesiastical Dictionary may also be 
 of good service. 
 
 In justice to the translator of this volume, Miss Ella McMahon, 
 it must be stated that several additions inserted from the latest 
 French edition have been translated by the editor. With the 
 exception of some slight changes in the arrangement and of a 
 few additional sentences to render the author's meaning clearer, 
 the original text has been preserved. 
 
 May Devivier's Christian Apologetics help to set more fully 
 aglow the CathoUc Faith in many minds, and to fan in the hearts 
 of the faithful the fire of holy love for Mother Church! 
 
 4"S. G. Messmer. 
 Easter, 1903. 
 
LIST or EEFERENCES. 
 
 The asterisk (*) indicates a Protestant writer. 
 
 A. C. Q. The American Catholic Quarterly Review. 
 
 A. E. R. American Ecclesiastical Review. (A monthly for the 
 
 Clergy.) 
 
 Aiken. The Dhamma of Gotama, or the Buddha and the Gospel 
 of Christ. 
 
 Allies. Formation of Christendom. 3 vol. — Church and State. — 
 The Throne of the Fisherman. — Peter's Rock in Moham- 
 med's Flood. — ^The Holy vSee and the Wandering of the 
 Nations. — The Monastic Life. — The See of Peter. — St. 
 Peter, his Name and Ofhce. 
 
 Alnatt. Cathedra Petri. — The Church and the Sects. — Church 
 and Bible. — Bible and the Reformation. 
 
 Anderdon. Luther. 
 
 Audin. Lives of Luther, Calvin, Henry VIII. 3 vol. (Not 
 always reliable.) 
 
 Azarias. Essay on the Philosophy of Literature. 
 
 Bagshawe. Credentials of the Catholic Church. 
 
 Balmes. European Civilization, or Catholicity and Protestant- 
 ism Compared. — Letters to a Sceptic. 
 
 Baluffi. The Charity of the Church Proof of her Divinity. 
 
 Barry, Wm. The Papal Monarchy from Gregory the Great to 
 Boniface VIII. 
 
 Barton. Angels of the Battlefield. 
 
 Bayaert. The Workman. 
 
 * Beal. Bioplasm. — Life Theories. 
 Beane. Cardinal Lavigerie. 
 
 Begin. The Bible and the Rule of Faith. 
 Belloc. Historic Nuns. 
 Best The Victories of Rome. 
 Bellord. Relics of the True Cross. 
 
 B. N. History of the Jesuits. 
 
 * Bissell. The Pentateuch, its Origin and Structure. 
 Boedder, S.J. Natural Theology. 
 
 Bossuet. The Variations of Protestantism. 2 vol. 
 
 Botalla, S.J. Papacy and Schism. — Authority of the Pope. — 
 
 Infalhbility of the Pope. (These two vols, also under the 
 
 title: The Church and the Pope.) 
 
 11 
 
12 LIST OF REFERENCES. 
 
 Bougaud. The Divinity of Christ. 
 
 Bowden. The Witness of the Saints. 
 
 Brann. The Great Schism of the West. — ^Truth and Error. — 
 
 The Popes the Protectors of Popular Liberty. 
 Bree. Fallacies of Darwinism. 
 
 Breen, A. E. Introduction to the Study of the Sacred Scriptures. 
 Breen, J. D. Sacerdotalism. — ^Anglican Orders. 
 Brennan. Science and the Bible. — What Catholics have done 
 
 for Science. 
 Bridgett. Ritual of the New Testament, 
 Broeckardt,S.J. The Fact Divine. (A short Christian Apology.) 
 
 * Brown. Assyriology, its Use and Abuse. 
 Brownlow. Slavery and Serfdom in Europe. 
 Bronmson, H. Faith and Science. 
 
 Br. W. Works of Orestes Brownson. — Liberalism and the 
 
 Church. — Brownson's Views (by H. B.). 
 "^ Buckingham. The Bible in the Middle Ages. 
 Burnet. Path which Led a Protestant Lawyer to the Catholic 
 
 Church. — Reasons why we should believe in God, etc. 
 Butler. Lives of the Saints. 12 vol. 
 Capel. Catholic. 
 
 Casey, S.J. The Bible and its Interpreter. 
 Catholic Church (the) from Within. 
 C. S.S. L. Catholic Summer School Library. 6 vol. 
 C. T. S. CathoHc Truth Society of England. (Its publications 
 
 contain a large amount of apologetic literature.) 
 C. W. The CathoHc World. (Monthly magazine.) 
 Chatard. Christian Truths. — Occasional Essays. 
 Chateaubriand. Genius of Christianity. 
 Clarke, S.J. Theosophy. — Divinity of Christ. — Existence of 
 
 God. — The Pope and the Bible. — Lourdes. — Card. Lavigerie 
 
 and the Slave-trade. 
 Cobb, S. H. The Rise of Religious Liberty in America. 
 Cobbett. History of the Prot. Reformation in England. (Ed. by 
 
 Dom Gasquet.) 
 
 * Cook. Religion and Chemistry. — Credentials of Science and 
 
 Warfare of Faith. 
 Coppens, S.J. The Living Church. — Moral Principles and 
 
 Medical Practice. — Moral Philosophy. 
 Corvo, Fred. Chronicles of the House of Borgia. 
 Cox, Th. The Pillar and the Ground of Truth. 
 
 * Craig. Christian Persecutions. 
 
 * Creighton. History of the Papacy during the Reformation. 
 Dangers (the) of Spiritualism. 
 
 * Deadly Error (the) of Christian Science. (Philadelphia.) 
 De Concilia. Harmony between Science and Religion. 
 
 De Trevem. An Amicable Discussion. 
 
LIST OF REFERENCES. 13 
 
 Devas. Studies in Family Life.— Political Economy. 
 
 Didon, O.Pr. Jesus Christ. 2 vol. — Belief in the Divinity of 
 
 Jesus Christ — Science without God. 
 Dighy, Mores CathoHci, or the Ages of Faith. 4 vol. 
 
 * Diman. The Theistic Argument. 
 
 Doellinger, Luther: a biographic sketch. — Heathenism and 
 Judaism. — Judaism and Christianity. — ^The First Ages of 
 Christianity. — Fables concerning the Popes. — Church and 
 Churches. (Most of these books are O.P.) 
 
 Dot. The Dolphin. (A monthly.) 
 
 D. R. The DubUn Review. 
 
 Drane. Christian Schools and Scholars. 
 
 Driscoll. God — The Human Soul. (Both under the title : 
 Christian Philosophy.) 
 
 Dupanloup. Papal Sovereignty. 
 
 Dwenger. The Spanish Inquisition. 
 
 Earnshaw. The Catholic Church and Civil Governments. 
 
 * Einstein, Lewis. The Italian Renaissance in England. 
 England, Bishop. His Works. 5 vol. 
 
 * Evans. Christian Doctrine of Marriage. 
 
 Faber. Essay on Beatification and Canonization. (Vol. I. of 
 
 Oratorian Lives of the Saints.) 
 Faith (the) of Catholics. 3 vol. (Testimonies of the Primitive 
 
 Church.) 
 Fastre. Acts of the Early Martyrs. 5 vol. 
 Feasey. Monasticism: What is it? 
 
 * Fiske, John. New France and New England. 
 Fitz-Arthur. The Worth of Human Testimony. 
 
 Fouard. Jesus Christ. — St. Peter and the First Years of Chris- 
 tianity. — St. Paul and his Missionary Labors. 
 
 Fox. Religion and Morality. 
 
 Frayssinous. Defence of Christianity. 
 
 Freppel. Discourse on the Divinity of Christ. 
 
 Gagarin. The Russian Clergy. 
 
 Galway, S.J. Thoughts on ApostoHc Succession. — Is Ritualism 
 Honest? 2 vol. 
 
 Ganss. Mariolatry. 
 
 Garratt Loretto, the New Nazareth. 
 
 Garside. The Sacrifice of the Eucharist and other Doctrines. 
 
 Gasquet. Eve of the English Reformation.— The Old Enghsh 
 Bible. — Henry VIII. and the English Monasteries. 
 
 Gaume. Catechism of Perseverance. 4 vol. (A mine of doc- 
 trinal and apologetic information. ) 
 
 * Gaynor. The New Materialism. 
 
 Gerard, S.J. The Gunpowder Plot.— Science and Scientists.— 
 
 Science or Romance. — ^The Antidote. 
 Gibbons. Faith of our Fathers.— Our Christian Heritage. 
 
14 LIST OF REFERENCES. 
 
 Gigot. Biblical Lectures. — ^A General Introduction to the Study 
 
 of the Holy Scriptures. 
 Gleason. Trials of the Church. 
 Gmeiner. Scientific Views and Christian Doctrines. — Spirits of 
 
 D arkness . — Emmanuel . 
 Gordon. Seven Lectures, or Some Doctrines of the Church. 
 
 * Graham, R. B. C. A Lost Arcadia, or the Jesuits in Paraguay. 
 Green. Indulgences and Tax Tables. 
 
 Guibert. In the Beginning 
 
 * Gurnhill. The Morals of Suicide. 
 Hammer stein, S.J. Foundations of the Faith. 
 
 Haulleville, de. The Future of Catholic Peoples (against Lave- 
 
 laye's Protestantism and Catholicism.) 
 Hawarden. Truth and Charity. 
 
 Hay, Bishop. His Works. 5 vol. — On Miracles. 2 vol. 
 Hedley. Who is Jesus Christ? — ^The Spirit of Faith. — Christian 
 
 Inheritance. 
 Hecker. Aspirations of Nature. 
 Henry, L. E. — ^The Cloister, or the Apostolic Monks and Nuns 
 
 who Live there. 
 Hergenroether. The Catholic Church and the Christian State. 
 
 2 vol. — Anti- Janus. 
 Hettinger. Natural Religion. — ^Revealed Religion. — Supremacy 
 
 of the Apostolic See. 
 Hewit. The King's Highway. — Problems of the Age. 
 Hope. Conversion of the Teutonic Race. — ^The First Divorce 
 
 of Henry VIII. 
 Hughes, Archbp. Works. 2 vol. — Debate with Breckenridge. 
 
 — Brooksiana. 
 Hughes, S.J. Principles of Anthropology and Biology. 
 Humphrey, S.J. The Sacred Scriptures. (Formerly under the 
 
 title: The Written Word.)— The Bible and Behef.— The 
 
 Vicar of Christ. — Urbs et Orbis. — Christian Marriage. 
 Hunter. Outlines of Dogmatic Theology. 3 vol. 
 /. E. R. Irish Ecclesiastical Record. (A monthly for the clergy.) 
 Ives. Two Lectures on the Inquisition. 
 Jansen. History of the German people. 6 vol. 
 Johnson, L. Religious Liberty in Maryland and Rhode Island. 
 Joly. Psychology of the Saints. 
 Jouin, S.J. Evidences of Christianity. 
 Kenrick, P. The Primacy of the Apostolic See vindicated. — 
 
 Vindication of Catholics. 
 Knox. When does the Church Speak Infallibly? 
 Lacordaire Conferences. 6 vol. — ^The Order of St. Dominic. 
 Laforet. Why Men do Not Believe. 
 Lambert. Answers to Ingersoll. — ^Tactics of Infidels. 
 
LIST OE REFEEEN"CES. 15 
 
 Lenormant. The Beginnings of History. 
 
 Leo. XIII. — The Great EncycHcals of Leo XIII. Translations 
 collected from Approved Sources. 
 
 Lilly, W. S. Ancient Religion and Modern Thought. — Chapters 
 in European History. — A Century of Revolution. — Shib- 
 boleths.— Claims of Christianity. — Essays and Speeches. 
 
 Lindsay, Collins. De Ecclesia et Cathedra, or The Empire 
 Church of Christ. — Evidences for the Papacy. 
 
 Livius. St. Peter, Bishop of Rome. 
 
 Lucas, Dr. G. J. Agnosticism and Religion. 
 
 Lucas, S.J. Era Girolamo Savonarola. 
 
 Lyons. Christianity and Infallibility : Both or Neither. 
 
 Madden. The Reaction from Agnostic Science. 
 
 Maglione. The Vatican and the Kingdom of Italy. 
 
 Maker, S.J. Psychology. 
 
 Maguire. Pontificate of Pius IX. (Formerly " Rome, its Ruler 
 and Institutions.") 
 
 Maistre, de. Of the Pope. — Letters of a Gentleman on the 
 Inquisition. 
 
 * Maitland. The Dark Ages. 
 
 Malachy. Has the Reformation Reformed Anything? 
 
 * Mallock. Doctrine and Doctrinal Disruption. 
 Manahan. Triumph of Religion. 
 
 Mann. Lives of the Popes in the Early Middle Ages. 2 vol. 
 
 Manning, Card. Miscellanies. 2 vol. — ^The Vatican Decrees. — 
 Story of the Vatican Council. — Independence of the Holy 
 See. — ^Why I became a CathoHc (formerly under the title: 
 Religio Viatoris). — Characteristics from M.'s writings (by 
 Lilly). — Essays on Religion and Literature. 3 vol. (By 
 different writers, edited by Mgr. M.) 
 
 Marcy. Christianity and its Conflicts. 
 
 Martinet. Religion in Society. 2 vol. — Philosophy of the 
 Catechism. (Excellent, but O.P.) 
 
 Maurel, S.J. The Church and the Sovereign Pontiff. 
 
 McErlane. The Church of Christ the Same Forever. 
 
 McLaughlin. Indifferentism. — The Divine Plan of the Church. 
 
 Melia. Origin, Persecution, etc., of the Waldenses. 
 
 Mercier. Relation of Experimental Psychology to Philosophy. 
 
 Merry del Val. The Truth of Papal Claims. 
 
 M. S. H. Messenger of the Sacred Heart. (Monthly magazine, 
 now: The Messenger.) 
 
 Michaud. History of the Crusades. 3 vol. 
 
 Miley. History of the Papal States. 3 vol. 
 
 Milner, Bishop. The End of Controversy. (Ed. by L. Rivington.) 
 
 Ming, S.J. The Holy See.— Data of Modern Ethics. 
 
16 LIST OF REFERENCES. 
 
 Mivart. Genesis of Species. — Evolution — Lessons from Nature. 
 
 — Man and Ape. — Origin of Human Reason. — Nature and 
 
 Thought. 
 Molitor. Burning Questions (on Church and State). 
 Molloy. Geology and Revelation. 
 Monsabre. Marriage, Conferences on. 
 Montagu. Some Popular Errors in Politics, etc. 
 Montalembert. The Monks of the West. 6 vol. 
 Montault, de. Lives of the Roman Pontiffs. 2 vol. 
 M. The Month. (Monthly magazine.) 
 Moran, Card. Occasional Papers. 
 Moriarty. Stumbhng Blocks made Stepping Stones. — ^The 
 
 Keys of the Kingdom. — The Catholic Church in its Relation 
 
 to Human Progress. 
 Mulhane, C. W. Leprosy and the Charity of the Church. 
 Mullen. The Canon of the Old Testament. 
 Murphy, J N. — ^The Chair of Peter. 
 Newman, Card. Difficulties felt by Anghcans. — Historical 
 
 Sketches, 3 vols. Development of Christian Doctrine. — 
 
 The Idea of a University. 
 Nicolas. Divinity of Christ. 
 
 Northcote. Roma Sotteranea, or The Roman Catacombs. 
 Northgraves. Mistakes of Modern Infidels. 
 O'Brien, Archhp. The Philosophy of the Bible. 
 
 * Occultism, The Danger of Spiritual. (Philadelphia.) 
 O'Connor, S.J. Luther's Own Statements. 
 
 * O'Neil, Warren. Refutation of Darwinism. 
 O'Neil, 0. Pr. Savonarola. 
 
 O'Reilly^ S.J. Relations between Church and Society. 
 
 Ozanam. Civilization in the Fifth Century. 
 
 Fallen. What is Liberalism? 
 
 Palmer. A Visit to the Russian Church. 
 
 Parsons. Lies and Errors of History. — Studies in Church 
 
 History. 6 vol. 
 Pascal. Or the Divinity of Christ. (Edited by Rev. Morris.) 
 Pastor. History of the Popes of the Renaissance. 6 vol. 
 Picard. Christianity and Agnosticism. 
 Points of History. (Boston.) 
 Poland, S.J. The Kingdom of Italy and the Sovereignty of 
 
 Rome.— The Truth of Thought. 
 Pollen, John H., S.J. Acts of the Enghsh Martyrs. 
 Preston. The Vicar of Christ. — Christian Unity — God and 
 
 Reason. — Reason and Revelation. — Protestantism and the 
 
 Bible. — Protestantism and the Church. 
 Quatrefages. The Human Species. 
 
 * Rashdall. The Universities in the Middle Ages. 2 vol. 
 Reusch. Nature and the Bible. 2 vol. 
 
 Rhodes. Visible Unity of the Church. 
 
LIST OF REFERENCES. 17 
 
 Ricards. Catholic Christianity and Modern UnbeUef. — ^Aletheia. 
 
 (On the CathoUc Rule of Faith.) 
 Rickaby, John, S.J. First Principles of Knowledge. 
 Rickahy, Jos., S.J. Moral Philosophy. — Oxford and Cambridge 
 
 Conferences. — Positivism. — Political and Moral Essays. 
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 from A.D. 430 to 451. — ^The Primitive Church. 
 * Rogers, Dr. W. R. History of Babylonia and Assyria. 2 vol. 
 Ronayne, S. J. God Knowable and Known. — Religion and 
 
 Science. 
 Ryan, Bishop. Apostolical Succession. 
 Ryder. Catholic Controversy. 
 
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 Schanz. A Christian Apology. 3 vol. 
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 the Church in the Nineteenth Century. 
 Schroeder. American Catholics and the Roman Question. 
 Searle. Plain Facts for Fair Minds. 
 Shanahan. The Idea of God. 
 Shea. History of the Catholic Church in the United States. 
 
 4 vol. — History of the Catholic Missions. 
 Sheahan. Batta, or Vain Repetitions. (Defence of Catholic 
 
 Prayers.) 
 Shield. The Bible against Protestantism. 
 Smyth. Genesis and Science. 
 
 "^ Smith. Acadia: a Lost Chapter in American History. 
 Soderini. Socialism and Catholicism. 
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 Spalding, J. L., Bishop. Lectures and Discourses. — Essays 
 
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 Spalding, J. M. , Archhp. Miscellanies. — Evidences of CathoUcity. 
 
 — History of the Protestant Reformation. 
 
 * St. Clair. Darwinism and Design. 
 
 Slang. Luther. — On the Eve of the Reformation.-- ^ore about 
 
 the Huguenots. 
 Starr ^ E. A. Christian Art. 
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 Sweeney. Pope and Emperor. — Lectures on the Council. 
 
 * Taylor. The Classical Heritage of the Middle Ages. 
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 2 vol. — The Church and the Moral World. 
 Thompson. — Sufferings of the Church in England. 
 Thein. Christian Anthropology. — Difficulties of the Bible, — 
 
 The Bible and Rationalism. 4 vol. 
 Thorold. CathoHc Mysticism, 
 
18 LIST OF REFERENCES. 
 
 Tondini. The Pope of Rome and the Popes of the Oriental 
 Orthodox Church. 
 
 * Tout. The Empire and the Papacy, a.d. 918-1273. 
 
 * Townsend. Great Schoolmen of the Middle Ages. 
 
 Treacy. Tributes of Protestant Writers to the Truth and Beauty 
 
 of the Catholic Church. 
 Tyrrell, SJ. External Rehgion.— The Faith of the Millions. 
 
 2 vol. 
 U.B. University Bulletin. (Quarterly review of the CathoUc 
 
 University.) 
 Ullathorne. The Endowments of Man. 
 Van der Doncht. Mrs. Eddy and Bob Ingersoll. 
 Van der Hagen. Where is the Church of Christ? 
 Vaughan, Archbp. of Sidney. Science and Religion. — ^Reason- 
 ableness of Christianity. 
 Vaughan, J., Mgr. National Decay and Romanism. — Life after 
 
 Death (Immortality). 
 Verres. — Luther: a Historical Portrait. 
 Veuillot. Life of Christ. (Against Renan.) 
 Villemain. — Life of Gregory VII. 
 Walworth. The Gentle Skeptic. (On the Bible.) 
 Waterworth. The Fathers on St. Peter. 
 Ward, W. Geo. Philosophy of Theism. 2 vol. — Essays on the 
 
 Church's Doctrinal Authority. — Devotional and Scriptural 
 
 Essays. 
 Ward, Wilfrid. The Wish to Believe. — Clothes of Religion. 
 
 (Both together with other essays in ^'Witnesses to the 
 
 IJnseen.") 
 Wegg-Prosser. Galileo and his Judges. 
 
 Wilher force, O.Pr. Dominican Missions and Martyrs in Japan. 
 Wilberforce, Rob. I. Church Authority. 
 Willington. Dark Pages of EngHsh History. (Prot. Intol.) 
 Wiseman, Card. His Works. 9 vol. 
 
 * Woolsey. Divorce and Divorce Legislation in the United 
 
 States. 
 Young. Catholic and Protestant Countries Compared. 
 Zohm. Catholic Science and Scientists. — Bible, Science, and 
 
 Faith. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Editor's Preface 3 
 
 List of References 11 
 
 PART FIRST. 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 Chap. I. General Explanations 25 
 
 Art. I. General Notions 25 
 
 I. Religion 25 
 
 II. Revelation 29 
 
 III. Object and Division of this Course 33 
 
 IV. The Three Historical Phases of Revealed Religion 34 
 
 First Phase : Primitive or Patriarchal Religion. ... 34 
 
 Second Phase : Mosaic Religion 35 
 
 Third Phase : The Christian Religion 36 
 
 Art. 11. Examination of Three Preliminary Questions 38 
 
 I. The Role of Reason in Matters of Faith 38 
 
 11. The Mysteries of Religion 42 
 
 III. The Criterion of Certainty in Matters of Faith 46 
 
 Chap. II. Historic Value of the Bible 52 
 
 Art. I. Authority of the Pentateuch 56 
 
 I. Authenticity of the Pentateuch 57 
 
 Thesis : The Pentateuch is the Work of Moses, 
 
 the Lawgiver of the Hebrews 57 
 
 II. Integrity of the Pentateuch 60 
 
 III. Veracity of the Pentateuch 61 
 
 Art. II. The Pentateuch and the Sciences 63 
 
 I. The Bible and Geology 72 
 
 Thesis : Geology Does Not Contradict the Biblical 
 Account of the Origin and Formation of the 
 
 Universe of the Earth 72 
 
 II. The Bible and Astronomy 86 
 
 HI. The Bible and Biology 93 
 
 IV. The Bible and Paleontology 97 
 
 1. Order of Creation of Organisms 97 
 
 2. The Origin of Man. Transformism 99 
 
 19 
 
20 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 3. The Difference between Man and Animals. . . 102 
 Thesis: Man Differs Essentially from Animals.. 104 
 
 4. The Unity of the Human Species and its 
 Descent from Adam 110 
 
 5. Antiquity of the Human Race 117 
 
 V. The Bible and Modern Discoveries in Egypt and 
 
 Assyria 130 
 
 Art. III. Authority of the Gospels 141 
 
 I. Authenticity 141 
 
 Thesis: The Gospels were Written, in the First 
 Century of the Christian Era, by the Authors 
 whose Names they Bear; that is, by the 
 
 Apostles or their Immediate Disciples 142 
 
 II. Integrity of the Gospels 146 
 
 III. Truthfulness of the Gospels 148 
 
 IV. Answers to Objections 152 
 
 Chap. III. Demonstration of the Divinity op the Christian 
 
 Religion 161 
 
 Art. I. Remarks on the Method to Follow in this Demon- 
 stration 161 
 
 Art. II. Miracle and Prophecy 163 
 
 I. Miracle 163 
 
 Thesis: Miracles are Possible 166 
 
 Thesis: There are Miracles of the Existence of 
 which we may (I) have Certain Knowledge, 
 (II) the Miraculous Nature of which we may 
 
 Discern Scientifically or Philosophically 172 
 
 II. Prophecy 182 
 
 Art. III. Ten Proofs of the Divinity of the Mission of Jesus 
 
 Christ, and of His Work, the Christian Religion.. 183 
 I. First Proof. 
 The Miracles Performed by Our Lord 183 
 
 II. Second Proof. 
 
 The Resurrection of Jesus Christ 187 
 
 III. Third Proof. 
 
 The Fulfilment of the Prophecies Concerning the 
 Person and Mission of Jesus Christ 200 
 
 IV. Fourth Proof. 
 
 The Miracles of the Apostles and of the Disciples 
 of Jesus 208 
 
 V. Fifth Proof. 
 
 Fulfilment of the Prophecies Made by Jesus 
 Himself 212 
 
 VI. Sixth Proof. 
 
 The Miraculous Establishment of the Religion 
 of Jesus, and its Perpetual Duration Through 
 all Ages 217 
 
 VII. Seventh Proof. 
 
 The Testimonv of the Martyrs 229 
 
 VIII. Eighth Proof. 
 
 The Marvellous Fruits of Christianity, or the 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 21 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Wonderful Revolution which it Effected in the 
 World 236 
 
 IX. Ninth Proof. 
 
 The Doctrinal Teaching of Christ 243 
 
 The Dogmatic Teaching of Christ 244 
 
 The Moral Teaching of Christ 252 
 
 The Teaching of Christ Concerning Worship . . . 255 
 
 X. Tenth Proof. 
 
 The Incomparable Holiness of Christ 278 
 
 Chap. IV. The Divinity of Jesus Christ 285 
 
 Summarv of the Ten Proofs. Conclusion of the 
 First Part 292 
 
 PART SECOND. 
 
 THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. 
 
 Chap. I. General Notions 299 
 
 I. Our Object 299 
 
 II. The Church 301 
 
 Thesis : Jesus Christ Truly and Personally- 
 Founded His Religion under the Form of a 
 
 Real Society, of a Church 303 
 
 Chap. II. The Church op Rome is the True Church of 
 
 Jesus Christ 310 
 
 Art. I. Notes of the True Church of Jesus Christ 311 
 
 I. Of the Notes in General 311 
 
 II. Division of the Notes 313 
 
 III. Positive Notes 313 
 
 A. Unity 313 
 
 I. Unity of Doctrine and Belief 314 
 
 Thesis: Jesus Christ Willed that His Church 
 
 should be One in Doctrine and Belief; that is, 
 He made it an Obligation for Pastors to Teach, 
 and consequently for the Faithful to Believe, 
 Unreservedly, all the Truths Revealed by Him 314 
 
 II. Unity of Ministry or Government 317 
 
 Thesis: Jesus Christ has Established in the 
 
 Church an Authority which He confided to the 
 Apostles and to which all the Faithful must 
 Submit ; consequently Whosoever Separates 
 Himself from their Ministry is Guilty of 
 Schism and thereby Excluded from the Church 318 
 
 B. Sanctity 321 
 
 I. The Sanctity of the Church in General 321 
 
 Thesis: The Church of Christ is not Composed 
 
 Exclusively of Men Just in the Sight of God . . 323 
 
 II. The Sanctity of the Church Considered as 
 
 a Note 323 
 
22 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE! 
 
 C. Catholicity 324 
 
 Thesis: Catholicity is an Indispensable Attribute 
 of the True Church 325 
 
 D. Apostolicity 327 
 
 Thesis: Jesus Christ willed that the Powers 
 
 Given to His Apostles should be Transmitted 
 
 to all their Successors 327 
 
 Art. II. The Church of Rome Possesses the Four Positive 
 
 Notes of the True Church 331 
 
 I. The Church of Rome Possesses Unity 331 
 
 II. The Church of Rome Possesses Sanctity 335 
 
 III. The Church of Rome Possesses Catholicity 338 
 
 IV. The Church of Rome Possesses Apostolicity 339 
 
 Conclusion of Article II 342 
 
 Art. III. Protestantism Does Not Possess the Notes of the 
 
 True Church of Christ 343 
 
 I. Protestantism is Absolutely Devoid of Unity 345 
 
 II. Protestantism Does Not Possess Holiness 348 
 
 III. Protestantism Does Not Possess Catholici y 352 
 
 IV. Protestantism Does Not Possess Apostoliciiy 352 
 
 V. The Protestant Rule of Faith Differs from that of 
 
 Christ 355 
 
 Thesis: The Protestant Rule of Faith is Untenable.. 355 
 Art. IV. The Schismatic Greek Church Does No Possess 
 
 the Marks of the True Church 360 
 
 I. The Greek Church has Neither Un y of Belief 
 
 nor of Ministry . 366 
 
 . II. The Greek Church Does Not Possess Sanc'ity 368 
 
 III. The Greek Church Does Not Possess Catholicity. . . 369 
 
 IV. The Greek Church Does Not Possess Apo tolicity . . 370 
 Conclusion 371 
 
 Art. V. The Primacy of th: See of Peter, or the Papacy. . . 373 
 First Thesis: Christ Conferred upon St. Peter the 
 
 Primacy of Jurisdiction over the Whole Church. . 373 
 Second Thesis : Jesus Christ Desired that this 
 Primacy should Descend to the Lawful Successors 
 
 of Peter 381 
 
 Third Thesis: The Church o:' Rome Possesses the 
 
 Primacy of the See of Peter 383 
 
 Chap. III. Certain Prerogatives Conferred by Jesus Christ 
 
 UPON His Church 391 
 
 Art. I. Indefectibility of the Church 391 
 
 Thesis : Jesus Christ Wished His Church to Endure 
 without any Essential Change until the End of 
 
 Time 392 
 
 Art. II. Authority or Powers of the Church 393 
 
 I. The Power to Teach 394 
 
 II. The Power to Confer the Sacraments 397 
 
 III. Power to Govern 397 
 
 Art. III. Infallibility of the Church 399 
 
 I. Its Nature and Necessity 399 
 
CONTENTS. 23 
 
 PAGE 
 
 First Thesis: The Authority Divinely Estaoushed 
 to Teach Men the Doctrine of Jesus Christ must 
 be Infallible in its Teaching 400 
 
 Second Thesis : Jesus Christ Established in His 
 Church an Authority Infallible in its Dogmatic 
 
 and Moral Teaching 401 
 
 II. Object of Infallibility 403 
 
 III. Subject of Infallibility 404 
 
 Thesis: When He speaks as Head of the Church, 
 
 with Plenary Doctrinal Authority, the Sovereign 
 Pontiff is Invested with Infallibility 405 
 
 IV. Conditions of Infallibility 409 
 
 Art. IV. Relations between Church and State 410 
 
 First Thesis: The Ecclesiastical Power and the 
 Civil Power, Church and State, are Independent 
 or Sovereign, each Within the Limits of its 
 
 Proper Sphere of Action 411 
 
 I. Independence of the Spiritual Power 411 
 
 II. Independence of the Civil Power 415 
 
 III. Rights of the Church 416 
 
 Second Thesis: In Cases of Conflict, that is, when 
 
 in Mixed Matters the Two Authorities Prescribe 
 Contradictory Obligations for Members Owing 
 Allegiance to Both Powers, the Authority of the 
 Church must Prevail over that of Civil Society. . 417 
 Third Thesis: The Church and the State should 
 Mutually Help Each Other 419 
 
 IV. The Church should Aid and Protect the State 420 
 
 V. The Temporal Power Owes Assistance to the 
 
 Church 420 
 
 Art. V. On Liberalism and Liberty 424 
 
 I. Notions Concerning Liberalism 424 
 
 II. Modern Liberties 435 
 
 III. Tolerance 442 
 
 IV. Notions Concerning Liberty 449 
 
 Chap. IV. Certain Accusations against the Church 457 
 
 Art. I. Intolerance of the Church 458 
 
 I. In What Sense the Catholic Church is Intolerant. . 458 
 II. Protestant Intolerance 460 
 
 III. Intolerance of Other Enemies of the Church 464 
 
 IV. On the Maxim: Outside the Church There is No 
 
 Salvation 466 
 
 Art. II. The Inquisition : 473 
 
 I. Lawfulness of the Inquisition in Principle 476 
 
 II. The Proceedings of the Inquisition 480 
 
 Art. III. The Trial of Galileo 488 
 
 I. The Decree of 1616 and the InfallibHity of the 
 
 Church 489 
 
 II. Was Galileo a Martyr to Science? 493 
 
 Art. IV. The Massacre of St. Bartholomew and the Revo- 
 cation of the Edict of Nantes 496 
 
24 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Art. V. Crusades and So-called Religious Wars 503 
 
 Art. VI. The Papal Power over Temporal Rulers in the 
 
 Middle Ages 507 
 
 I. The Power Exercised by the Popes in the Middle 
 Ages over Temporal Princes was Perfectly 
 
 Lawful 508 
 
 II. The Popes Exercised their Rights in a Manner Very 
 
 Salutary to Society 512 
 
 Art. VII. The Temporal Sovereignty of the Popes 514 
 
 Art. VIII. Bad Popes 517 
 
 Chap. V. The Church and Civilization 521 
 
 Art. I. The State of the World before Christ, or Pagan 
 
 Civilization 523 
 
 I. A General Glance 523 
 
 II. The Lot of Individuals 526 
 
 I. Slaves 526 
 
 11. Gladiators 528 
 
 III. The Poor and the Unfortunate 530 
 
 IV. Workmen 531 
 
 III. The Family 531 
 
 IV. Public Society and the Relations between Nations . 533 
 Art. II. The State of the World after Christ, or Christian 
 
 Civilization 535 
 
 I. A General Glance 535 
 
 II. The Lot of Individuals 536 
 
 I. Slaves and Gladiators 536 
 
 II. The Poor and the Unfortunate 539 
 
 III. The Working Classes 540 
 
 III. Family Life 541 
 
 IV. Public Society and the Relations between Nations. 542 
 V. Transformation of Barbarous Nations 543 
 
 VI. Catholic and Pr testant Nations 546 
 
 Art. III. The Church and Intellectual Culture 550 
 
 I. The Influ nee of the Church on Letters and 
 
 Science o50 
 
 II. Th- Church and the Fine Arts 557 
 
 III. The Church and Education 558 
 
 I. Popular Education 558 
 
 II. University and College Education 567 
 
 General Conclusion 571 
 
 Alphabetical Index ^^^ 
 
CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS, 
 
 PART FIRST. 
 THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 
 
 ART. I.— GENERAL NOTIONS. 
 
 I. Religion. 
 
 Religion. — According to the etymological meaning of the 
 word, religion may be defined as the sum of the ties or rela- 
 tions which bind man to God.^ Between God and man there 
 exist two kinds of relations: one results immediately and 
 of necessity from the very nature of man; the other has 
 been added by the free and sovereign will of God. The 
 first kind, with the duties which flow therefrom, constitutes 
 natural religion; the second forms supernatural religion. 
 It is important to have a clear and accurate idea of this 
 distinction. 
 
 * On the Existence of God see Chatard (Ch. Tr.), Garke, Driscoll, 
 Gibbons (Ch. H.), Lambert, Manning (R. V., a. 1), Northgraves, 
 Archbp. O'Brien, Rickaby, Ricards, Ronayne, Br. W. ii. (Refut. of 
 Atheism), A. C. Q. vi., vii., xi., and in general works against Atheism, 
 Agnosticism, and Positivism, especially Picard, Lucas, Madden, T.E.R., 
 Oct., Nov. 1901 ; also references on next page. On Religion see 
 Schanz, I., ch. 3, 4. 
 
 36 
 
26 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Natural Religion.^ — Man, created by God out of nothing, 
 holds from his Creator all that he is and all that he has: 
 his body with all its senses; his soul with all its faculties. 
 He is indebted to God every moment for the preservation and 
 development of this body and this soul, and the divine 
 concurrence is necessary for every one of his acts. From 
 God come also all the creatures with whom we are in per- 
 petual relation by reasons of necessity, pleasure, or profit. 
 
 If this be our position, and it undoubtedly is, if man 
 holds everything so absolutely from God that without Him 
 he would have nothing, would not even exist and act, it is 
 undeniably evident that man belongs to God ; that he is His 
 property and possession; that he must live in absolute de- 
 pendence upon his Creator and Benefactor; that he can 
 think, that he can say, that he can do only what God wills; 
 that he must conduct himself everywhere and always as a 
 subject toward his sovereign master. These relations and 
 these duties are as immutable as they are necessary, for the 
 nature of man does not change, and God cannot cease to 
 be his Creator and sovereign Master. 
 
 These relations, or, if you will, this absolute dependence on 
 God, and these duties constitute natural religion. It may be 
 defined as the sum of the relations which exist, in virtue of 
 the creation itself, between God and man, together with the 
 duties which these relations impose on man. 
 
 We shall not insist any further on these natural relations 
 between God and man. This belongs to the province of 
 philosophic inquiry. No rational being can doubt the ex- 
 istence and obligation of natural religion without denying 
 God and the creation of man, and without destroying the 
 moral order upon which human society is based. ^ 
 
 Supernatural or Positive Religion. — Besides these 
 
 ' Hettinger, N. R.; Boedder, S.J., N. Th.; Preston, G. and R. 
 
 2 Fox, Rel. and Mor.; A. C. Q. xxv. 41; I. E. R., Apr. 1902; 
 also Catholic writers on Ethics or Moral Philosophy, f. i. Rickaby, 
 Conway, Ming, etc. 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 27 
 
 first ties, God, in His supreme authority and infinite goodness, 
 could have estabhshed between Him and His creature higher 
 relations and more intimate communication. 
 
 Nothing, in truth, obhged God to do more for man than 
 the needs of the nature He had given him required, nor 
 could anything prevent Him from lavishing new benefits 
 upon him. He was free to raise man, who was only His 
 subject, to the dignity of His son by adoption; to communi- 
 cate to him, by means of sanctifying grace, a principle of life 
 higher than that which he held from his nature, preparing 
 for him at the end of his life the incomparable happiness 
 of contemplating in heaven his Creator and Father face to 
 face. Such an act of ineffable goodness, performed in virtue 
 of the plenitude of His dominion over man, in no way 
 destroys the first work of God; in fact, the relations and 
 the duties which constitute natural religion continue to exist, 
 and these new relations only elevate, perfect, and embellish 
 the nature of man. Thus the graft does not destroy the 
 nature of the tree; it only changes and improves it. 
 
 New duties for man necessarily spring from these new 
 relations. Let us beware, however, of regarding them as an 
 onerous burden. These obligations, which are, moreover, 
 light, are most abundantly compensated by the multiplied 
 advantages which result from our elevation to the super- 
 natural order. God, at the same time that He assigned us 
 an end, a destiny incomparably more sublime than the end 
 we should have had in the purely natural order, promised 
 us a happiness incomparably greater, and He has given us, 
 in supernatural grace, most powerful and abundant means 
 of attaining this end and of meriting this happiness. Let 
 us observe, in passing, that this grace gives us much greater 
 facility for observing the decalogue, that is, for accomplishing 
 the duties which flow from our nature itself. 
 
 This supernatural religion is also called positive, because it 
 is imposed upon man by a positive and formal act of the free 
 will of God. 
 
28 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Supernatural religion may be defined as the sum of the new 
 relations which elevate man to the dignity of a child of God, 
 and assign him as final end the beatific vision, the sight of 
 God face to face in heaven, as well as the duties which result 
 from these supereminent relations. 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. By the last end of man we mean the 
 supreme term of his existence, the end he is obliged to attain 
 and the possession of which will cause him to obtain his 
 perfection and eternal happiness. 
 
 2d. God only is the last end of every intelligent creature. 
 But God may be known directly, i.e. in Himself, or indirectly, 
 i.e. by means of His works. If man had been created only 
 for a natural end, his fidelity in accomplishing, during the 
 time of his probation, the precepts of the natural law would 
 have merited for him, at the end of his probation, a natural 
 happiness. Then, contemplating in creatures the traces of 
 the divine perfections, he would have had a very perfect 
 knowledge of God. He would have loved Him with a love 
 proportionate to this knowledge, and in this knowledge and 
 this love he would have found the complete satisfaction of 
 his desires. Very superior, however, is the supernatural end 
 or happiness for which he is destined. It consists in seeing 
 God as He is in Himself, consequently in loving Him, and 
 in possessing Him in an immediate and ineffable manner. 
 To this end the intelligence must necessarily be raised above 
 its own strength by an aid essentially supernatural, which 
 theologians call the light of glory. This aid or this grace 
 communicates to the soul a sort of participation of the divine 
 nature, as St. Peter says (2 Pet. i. 4), and renders it capable 
 of enjoying the same good which constitutes the infinite 
 happiness of God. 
 
 3d. It would be an error to think that Adam was raised to 
 the supernatural order only after he had lived a longer or 
 shorter period under the rule alone of natural law or religion: 
 the privilege of child of God was granted and imposed upon 
 Adam, for himself and his posterity, simultaneously with 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 29 
 
 that of existence. Hence man never had a purely natural 
 end. 
 
 II. Revelation.^ 
 
 Nature of Revelation. — ^Natural religion being a neces- 
 sary consequence of the relations existing between God and 
 man in virtue of their very nature, it follows that in order 
 to prove the necessity ^ and existence of this religion it 
 suffices to have a proper knowledge of the two beings 
 between whom these relations exist. Thus man may, 
 without other assistance, discover the truths and precepts 
 of natural religion. He finds them engraven, so to speak, 
 by the hand of God, in the depth of his mind and heart. 
 
 With supernatural religion it is very different: as there is 
 question here of relations which arise solely from the free 
 will of God, natural reason is powerless to discover them. 
 The truths and precepts of the supernatural order can be 
 known to us only by a manifestation on the part of God, 
 by a revelation. Revelation, therefore, is the means by 
 which God makes supernatural religion known to man. 
 For this reason the terms supernatural religion and revealed 
 religion are usually confounded. 
 
 Revelation may be defined as a supernatural act by which 
 God makes known certain truths to man. We say in a 
 general way certain truths, because God may, if He pleases, 
 reveal not only supernatural truths, but also truths which 
 are not in themselves above reason. In fact, a good number 
 of truths of this kind have been revealed to us. For example, 
 the precepts of the decalogue, with the exception of those 
 relating to the observance of the Sabbath, belong to the 
 natural law; God, however, has not deemed it useless to 
 strengthen our conscience by a solemn revelation of these 
 precepts. He has thus added to the light of reason the 
 
 ^ Schanz, II.; Hunter, I.; Hettinger, R. R.; Manning, I.e. 
 ^On Indifferentism see McLaughlin; Bp. Spalding, 1. 1; C. T. S. 
 37; Hettinger, N.R., ch. 1. 
 
30 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 authority of His infallible word in order to make the knowl- 
 edge of these fundamental truths which are necessary to all 
 men easier, more certain, purer, and more universal. 
 
 Possibility of Revelation. — In order to ruin the very 
 foundation of all supernatural religion, the enemies of Chris- 
 tianity have accumulated a number of sophisms tending to 
 establish the impossibility of all revelation. We need not stop 
 to refute them at any length. We shall do better. We shall 
 prove most positively that revelation really exists, and it 
 must follow of itself that it is possible. A simple observation 
 suggested by common sense is sufficient, moreover, to over- 
 throw the whole scaffolding of rationalism. Man, an intelli- 
 gence finite and limited in so many respects, has received 
 from God the power to communicate his thoughts to a 
 fellow being, yet God could be powerless to enter into com- 
 munication with man! A scholar may impart to the ignorant 
 the secrets which his genius has penetrated, yet God could 
 lack means to communicate to us truths which concern our 
 highest interests, our elevation to the supernatural order! 
 
 Such revelation is the more possible in that it responds 
 to the divine goodness and is of incontestable advantage 
 to man: by enlightening the mind, it communicates greater 
 energy to the will and thus aids man to attain his end. It 
 is evident, moreover, that revelation, so far from crushing 
 and annihilating our reason, tends to perfect it, by causing 
 it to know sublime and important truths that it never, of 
 itself, could have discovered. Does the telescope destroy 
 the sight because it gives it greater range, and causes it 
 to see stars hitherto hidden in the depth of the firmament? 
 Are the physical powers of man destroyed because the 
 lever, steam, and electricity help him to do a tenfold work? 
 
 Necessity of Revelation.^ — If revelation is possible, if 
 it is of incontestable advantage, and if, as we shall show, 
 it really exists, we may dispense with proving its necessity. 
 
 ^Br. W. V. 280 ff., 302 ff.; Hecker, Aspirations; Humphrey, 
 Written W., ch. 13 ; Archbp. O'Brien, p. iii., ch. 5. 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 31 
 
 Something, however, should be said upon this question, 
 particularly at a time when we hear so much of the independ- 
 ence and sovereignty of reason, and when so many absolutely 
 deny supernatural revelation, regarding it as useless and 
 superfluous. 
 
 Let us distinguish, first of all, between moral necessity and 
 physical or absolute necessity. The latter supposes a com- 
 plete impossibility to attain, without revelation, religious 
 truth; the former, great but not insurmountable difficulty. 
 
 It is evident that a revelation is absolutely necessary to 
 make known to us the existence and the duties of the super- 
 natural order. Here, in fact, all depends, as we have seen, 
 on the free will of God. The same necessity exists for attain- 
 ing a knowledge of the mysteries w^hich it pleases God to 
 teach us: we shall make this sufficiently evident later. 
 
 But it is not the same with the theoretical and practical 
 truths which form the basis of natural religion; reason is 
 capable, even in its present state of decadence, of acquiring 
 of itself a knowledge of these. Thus reason may by its 
 own light reach a knowledge of the existence and unity 
 of God, of His providential action upon man and the world, 
 of the immortality of the soul, the obligation of a moral 
 law with a sanction in the future life — in a word, a knowledge 
 of the foundations of the moral life. Nevertheless, if man- 
 kind had been abandoned to itself, if God had not come to 
 its aid by the light of a positive revelation, an immense 
 majority of men, owing to want of time, facility, or courage, 
 would not have attained a clear and certain knowledge of 
 these essential truths, or would have attained them late 
 in life and in an imperfect degree. And yet religion is 
 indispensable not only to certain privileged minds but to all 
 men and at all periods of life. It would have been still more 
 impossible to acquire a knowledge of truths in detail, and of 
 all the natural duties of man toward God, toward his neigh- 
 bor, and toward himself. To be convinced of the weakness 
 and inadequacy of reason left to itself, we need only recall the 
 
32 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 monstrous errors which, with the exception of the Jewish 
 people, abounded among the nations of the world before the 
 coming of Christ. What absurdities were taught in the schools 
 of philosophy itself on the most important and vital ques- 
 tions, questions, moreover, which appear so simple to minds 
 enlightened by Christian faith! What monstrous errors in 
 Plato's famous treatise on *' The Republic '' ! One of his most 
 enthusiastic admirers, Mr. Aime Martin, rightly charges 
 him with cruelty as well as the most flagrant immorality. 
 The greatest philosophers of antiquity earnestly desired to 
 be enlightened upon these capital questions, but they ac- 
 knowledged that the light must come to them from heaven. 
 ''The truths necessary to man," says Plato, ''are easily 
 learned if we are taught them, but no one can learn them 
 unless God shows him the way." "We must wait," he says 
 elsewhere, "until some one comes to teach us how we must 
 bear ourselves toward God and toward men." They recog- 
 nized in a still higher degree their inability to raise the masses 
 from their moral and intellectual degradation, and, what is 
 more, it gave them but Uttle concern. How, indeed, could 
 they have succeeded in such an attempt, being themselves 
 unable to agree on the most important truths and their lives 
 being too often in open conflict with their teaching ? 
 
 Modern philosophers who, after so many centuries of 
 Christianity, endeavor to answer by their own light the 
 great problems which unceasingly perplex souls, fall only too 
 frequently into the most extravagant errors of antiquity; 
 in the words of St. Paul, "They became vain in their thoughts, 
 and their foolish heart was darkened: for professing them- 
 selves to be wise they became fools." (Rom. i. 21, 22.) 
 The history of contemporaneous philosophy proves with 
 irresistible eloquence that there is not a single truth of the 
 natural order which found acceptance among them. 
 
 Therefore, it is a moral necessity for mankind, in its present 
 condition, to learn by divine revelation— a means as safe as 
 it is easy— even the truths which, strictly speaking, may be 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 33 
 
 discovered by the unaided reason, and the knowledge of 
 which is indispensable for the guidance of human Hfe. See 
 also Part I., Ch. III., A. 3, Sect. 8, and Part II., Ch. V. 
 
 To convince ourselves that this is the doctrine of the 
 Church on the necessity of revelation, let us read what the 
 Vatican Council (Const. I. ch. 2.) teaches on the subject: 
 ''Holy Mother Church holds and teaches that God, the 
 principle and end of all things, may be known with certainty 
 through the natural light of reason, by means of created 
 things; for the invisible perfections of God have become 
 visible since the creation of the world, by the knowledge 
 which His works give us of Him. Nevertheless, it has 
 pleased the wisdom and goodness of God to reveal Himself 
 to us and to reveal the decrees of His will by another way 
 which is supernatural." This is what the Apostle says: ''God, 
 who at sundry times and in divers manners spoke in times 
 past to the fathers by the prophets : last of all, in these days 
 hath spoken to us by His Son." (Heb. i. 1, 2.) To this 
 divine revelation all men, even in the present state of the 
 human race, owe the power of knowing promptly, unerringly, 
 and vrith absolute certainty those divine things which are not 
 accessible to human reason. Nevertheless, it is not for this 
 reason that revelation is absolutely necessary, but because 
 God, in His infinite goodness, has destined man for a super- 
 natural end, that is, to participate in divine blessings which 
 completely surpass human intelligence; for "eye has not 
 seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart 
 of man, what things God hath prepared for them that love 
 Him." (ICor. ii.9.) 
 
 III. Object and Division of this Course. 
 
 We have given a brief summary of the teaching of the 
 Catholic Church on the subject of religion and revelation. 
 But is this teaching founded on truth, is it supported by 
 irrefutable and absolute facts? Has that which God in 
 His wisdom and mercy could do in favor of humanity been 
 
34 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 really done? In a word, is there a supernatural religion 
 revealed and imposed upon man under pain of failing to 
 attain his last end? What is this religion, and where is it 
 taught in all its purity and integrity? 
 
 The answer to these questions will form the subject of 
 this Course of Apologetics. In the first part we shall prove 
 that God has really revealed Himself to man, and that the 
 Christian religion is, since the coming of Christ, the super- 
 natural religion and obligatory for all men. In the second 
 part we shall prove that only the Catholic Church preserves 
 this Christian religion in its integrity, and that she alone is 
 charged to teach it to the world. 
 
 IV. The Three Historical Phases of Revealed 
 Religion. 
 
 In order to establish that the Christian religion is revealed 
 by God and imposed upon man, we shall start with a fact 
 absolutely undeniable, attested as it is by all historic records. 
 This fact is that there has always existed on earth a religion 
 calling itself supernatural and revealed by God. We see it 
 in the very cradle of the human race and throughout the 
 centuries in its various phases of development. These phases 
 bear respectively the name of primitive or patriarchal 
 religion, Mosaic religion. Christian religion. 
 
 Let us begin by giving an adequate idea of these three 
 great historic phases, refraining meanwhile from prejudging 
 the divinity of any of them. 
 
 First Phase: Primitive or Patriarchal Religion. 
 
 Primitive or patriarchal religion is the supernatural religion 
 which God imposed upon our first parents at the beginning 
 of their existence. It contained dogmas revealed and 
 supernatural — for example, the existence of good and bad 
 angels, and, after the fall, the hope of a liberator ; it included 
 also certain positive precepts, such as the observance of the 
 Sabbath, the manner of offering sacrifices. 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 35 
 
 This religion was binding upon all men; until the coming 
 of Christ it sufficed the human race to attain its end. There 
 was, however, one exception: from the time of Moses, the 
 Jewish people were obliged to practise the Mosaic religion. 
 
 Primitive religion was to be preserved in the human race, 
 on the one hand by conscience, which dictated the precepts 
 of the natural law; on the other, by means of tradition or 
 teaching passing from man to man and transmitting the 
 knowledge of truths and of positive precepts added and 
 revealed by God. Unfortunately, men by sin obscured the 
 ideas of the natural law: they no longer read its precepts so 
 clearly in their conscience; they ceased to distinguish so 
 readily the good they should do and the evil they should 
 avoid. The tradition of truths and revealed precepts became 
 altered and corrupted in the course of time.^ 
 
 Then it was that God, in order to preserve the primitive 
 religion in the midst of the erring human race, chose Abra- 
 ham and his posterity. Through these patriarchs He con- 
 firmed and determined the previous revelation; He taught 
 new truths and imposed new precepts, for example the ob- 
 servance of circumcision. Primitive religion received its first 
 development under the patriarchs: hence its double name of 
 primitive and patriarchal. 
 
 Second Phase: Mosaic Religion.^ 
 Later, as man continued to turn from the path of righteous- 
 ness, God in His infinite mercy willed to bring him back by 
 new means which would make salvation easier for him, and 
 prepare the way more efficaciously for the Messias, for the 
 Redeemer promised after the fall. He chose Moses and the 
 prophets who followed him to revive the knowledge of the 
 natural law and of previous revelations, and to impose new 
 precepts. This new revelation was made, as we know, on 
 
 ^Thebaud, Gentilism; Ch. and M. W., I., ch. 1; Schanz, H., ch. 1 
 ff.; Lacordaire, 5th conf. on the Church; Alzog, Ch. Hist., I., hist, 
 in trod. 
 
 ' DolUnger, on Judaism; Schanz, II., ch. 5; also Thebaud and 
 Alzog, 11. cc. 
 
36 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Mt. Sinai under circumstances fitted to make a deep and 
 lasting impression on the mind and the heart of the Hebrew 
 people. 
 
 The Mosaic religion or law, therefore, is a collection of 
 dogmas and precepts revealed principally to the Hebrew 
 people through Moses and the other prophets who came 
 after him. This law, which was, moreover, only the primitive 
 religion raised to a degree of perfection which it hitherto had 
 not possessed, was not addressed to the whole world like the 
 first, but only to the Jewish people; nor was it destined to 
 embrace all times: its special mission being to prepare the 
 coming of the Messias, it was to last only till this coming. 
 Hence God did not will to perfect it. This perfection, ac- 
 cording to the degree determined by the wisdom of the Most 
 High, was reserved for the religion which the Messias was to 
 announce to men. 
 
 Third Phase: The Christian Religion. 
 
 When the time marked by the eternal decrees was accom- 
 plished, the Redeemer promised from the beginning of the 
 world came to redeem men and establish a religion which 
 was called by His name, that is. Christian.^ 
 
 The Christian religion or evangelic law, then, is that which 
 Christ Himself came to give to the world. It contains 
 necessarily, like the others, the truths and precepts of the 
 natural law, but it teaches them in an eminently clear, 
 certain, and perfect manner; it presents, besides, a complete 
 collection of truths, of precepts, and of supernatural aids. 
 
 The Christian religion abrogated the Mosaic law in all that 
 was special to the Jewish people, and became the only re- 
 ligion necessary to all men until the end of the world. It 
 will not receive, like those which preceded it, any ulterior 
 development, Christ having given it as perfect as God willed 
 it to be for the salvation of the human race. 
 
 Remark. — It follows from what we have said that these 
 'Schanz, II., ch. 7. 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 37 
 
 three religions, the Primitive, the Mosaic, and the Christian, 
 though different exteriorly, are one and the same religion, 
 developed by God in the coarse of centuries. In fact, they 
 all three have the same author, God; the same supernatural 
 end, the beatific vision; the same fundamental means, super- 
 natural grace for the intelligence and the will ; all three rest 
 on a Redeemer who is to come or has come ; the decalogue is 
 common to them; the dogmas, though revealed progressively, 
 are found, at least in germ, and frequently entire, in the three 
 religions. Hence it is undoubtedly the same religion which 
 has passed through two preparatory phases in order to receive 
 finally in the Christian revelation its crown and its definite 
 perfection. 
 
 Conclusion. — Such are the facts attested by history and 
 the traditions of the nations. It remains now to learn 
 whether, in each of these three phases, this religion, venerable 
 certainly in its antiquity, is legitimately entitled to claim, 
 to the exclusion of all others, a supernatural and divine 
 origin. Is it really God who, by Himself or by means of 
 His representatives, revealed and imposed it on man? This, 
 let us repeat, is what we propose to examine in the first part 
 of this course. 
 
 It will not be necessary, however, to establish the proof 
 of this divine origin for each of these three phases. It follows 
 from the preceding exposition that the religion which Jesus 
 Christ brought into the world is, and will be until the end of 
 time, the religion which all men must embrace in order to be 
 saved: the essential point, then, is to prove the divinity of the 
 Christian religion. This is what we are about to do. 
 
 Later we could, by following an analogous method, estab- 
 lish the divinity of these two anterior religious phases. But 
 we refrain in order not to overburden our work with proofs, 
 particularly as, the divinity of Christ's mission being once 
 established, it will be easy, if necessary, to prove the divin- 
 ity of these two preceding revelations: the solemn affirma- 
 tion of Christ on the subject would be amply sufficient. 
 
38 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ART. II.— EXAMINATION OF THREE PRELIMINARY 
 QUESTIONS. 
 
 Before attempting to demonstrate the divinity of the 
 Christian Rehgion, it will be well to elucidate three questions, 
 or, if you will, to reply to three objections which are stumbling- 
 blocks to many minds in search of religious truth. The 
 first concerns the role which reason plays in the matters of 
 faith, or supernatural religion; the second, the mysteries 
 which this religion contains; the third, finally, the means by 
 which reason establishes with certainty the existence of a 
 divine revelation. 
 
 I. The Role of Reason in Matters of Faith.* 
 
 Rationalism claims that revelation, or faith in a divine 
 authority, annihilates reason or renders it absolutely useless. 
 Nothing is more utterly false than this assertion, as we 
 have alread}^ shown above, p. 29f. 
 
 1st. The Vatican Council, 1. c, ch. 4th, speaking of the 
 relations between faith and reason, uses these words: ''The 
 Catholic Church has always held, and holds by perpetual 
 consent, that there exist two orders of knowledge, distinct 
 in their principle and in their object. In their principle, 
 because in one we know by natural reason, and in the other 
 by divine faith. In their object, because outside of things to 
 which natural reason may attain, there are mysteries hidden 
 in God, which are proposed to our belief, and which could 
 not be known to us, if they were not divinely revealed." 
 Later on it says further: ''Though faith is above reason 
 there can never be any real disagreement between faith and 
 reason, for the same God, who revealed the mysteries and 
 communicated faith, has given to the human mind the light 
 of reason, and God cannot contradict Himself, nor can 
 truth ever deny truth. . . . 
 
 ^ Lacordaire's Conf., 11-13, on the Doctrine of the Church; 14-20, 
 on Catholic Doctrine and the Mind; Ronayne; Archbp. Vaughan; 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 39 
 
 "Not only can faith and reason never disagree, but they 
 afford each other a mutual assistance; right reason demon- 
 strates the foundations of faith, and, enlightened by the 
 light of this faith, develops the knowledge of divine things; 
 faith, on her part, delivers and guards the reason from error 
 and enriches it with divers kinds of knowledge. Hence the 
 Church, so far from being opposed to the study of the arts 
 and human sciences commends such study and furthers it in a 
 thousand ways." Certainly nothing could be more clearly 
 and formally expressed. The same doctrine is fully stated 
 in the Encyclical of Leo XIII., on Thomistic philosophy. 
 
 2d. This doctrine of the Church is in conformity with 
 Scripture. So far from exacting blind faith of us, God even 
 forbids us to give premature or unjustifiable credence to any 
 word claimed to have come from heaven. ^'Qui credit cito, 
 levis est corde : He that is hasty to give credit, is light of 
 heart," says Ecclesiasticus xix. 4. The Apostle St. John in 
 his turn also warns us against unreflecting impulse which 
 leads direct to error: "Believe not every spirit, but try the 
 spirits if they be of God: because many false prophets are 
 gone out into the world." (1 John iv. 1.) St. Paul gives the 
 same recommendation to the Thessalonians : "Despise not 
 prophecies. But prove all things: hold fast that which is 
 good." (1 Thess. v. 20, 21.) By means of this wise discern- 
 ment we shall be always ready, as St. Peter tells us, " to 
 satisfy every one that asketh you a reason of that hope 
 which is in you." (1 Pet. iii. 15.) 
 
 3d. Catholic Theology teaches the same. It is many years 
 since St. Thomas, the Angel of the schools, formulated the 
 doctrine of the Church in these terms: "Reason would not 
 believe, if it did not see that it must believe." He only 
 repeated, moreover, what St. Augustine wrote on the subject 
 
 Preston, Reason and Revel.; Gibbons, Ch.H.; Hunter, I.; D. R., III. 
 Ser. xiv. 243, xxi. 87, xxii. 72, Oct. 1900; Br. W. iii. (passim), viii. 
 574, ix. 235, 268; C. W., xxi. 178, xxxiii. 289, xxxviii. 577, Ixxii.; 
 A. C. Q., vi. 300, xiii. 1, xvi. 1; M., June, Sept. 1899; I. E. R., Feb. 
 1900; U. B., Jan. 1895. 
 
40 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 in his letter to Consentius: ''The Church exacts faith; and 
 because we have so many reasons to beheve, strong and urgent 
 reasons, she requires faith and humble submission to all her 
 divine teachings. Let her not be accused, then, of requiring 
 an absolute, blind, unreasoning faith, or of insisting that 
 those who, in order to believe, have used their reason in the 
 salutary manner we have indicated, may not continue to 
 use their reason to render their faith ever more humble, 
 but also ever more enlightened. God forbid that our sub- 
 mission to all that is of faith, should prevent us from search- 
 ing and asking the reason of what we believe, since we could 
 not even believe if we were not capable of reasoning ! " Evidently 
 any revelation made by God to mankind supposes in man 
 the corresponding capacity of knowing. In this very course 
 of apologetics, to what power of the mind do we appeal if 
 not to reason? ''Christian faith," says Bourdaloue, " is not 
 any acquiescence to believe or any submission of the mind 
 whatever; it is a rational assent, otherwise it were no longer 
 a virtue. But how can this submission be rational, if reason 
 has no part in it? What are the proofs that will show me 
 the religion I profess and the mysteries it teaches to be 
 evidently credible? This is the important question which I 
 must endeavor to grasp, and by careful study to understand; 
 here I must bring my reason into active play, for in this 
 matter I am not allowed to say: I shall not reason. 
 Without this strict examination and discussion my faith 
 will be uncertain, wavering, and vague, without principle 
 and without consistency." ^ 
 
 Conclusion. — Hence it is incontestable, not only that 
 Catholic teaching accords reason a special object, distinct 
 from that of faith, but that even in the things of faith, this 
 reason fills an important and serious role. One part of this 
 role is to establish harmony between the various revealed 
 truths, to show the link which unites them, to prove each 
 one by fitting arguments, and to deduce the consequences 
 
 ' Rickaby, Oxf . Conf., I. S., ch. 9. 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 41 
 
 which follow from them ; in a word, to make these truths a 
 scientific whole; this is what the Council calls developing the 
 science of divine things. This is certainly a very beautiful 
 role, but there is another much more important, viz., demon- 
 strating the truth of the Gospel, that is, establishing with 
 certainty the foundations of faith by demonstrating that 
 it is perfectly rational, legitimate, and indispensable to 
 believe. According to the Vatican Council and the Encyclical 
 of Leo XIII. already quoted, it belongs to reason to give 
 this demonstration, and we are not permitted, under pain 
 of erring against faith, to deny it this right and power. Let 
 us add finally, that it also devolves upon reason to defend 
 revealed truths against the attacks of their enemies. "Phi- 
 losophy," says the same Pope, ''bears a noble and honorable 
 title as the bulwark of faith and the firm rampart of religion.'' 
 
 What more could they who proclaim themselves the 
 champions of human reason ask? No; it is no longer pos- 
 sible to claim with any appearance of truth that the Catholic 
 Church does not recognize the rights of reason, that she 
 endeavors to crush reason under the weight of authority. It 
 belongs to reason to prove that God has spoken to men to 
 instruct them in religion and their duties; but, once this is 
 established, it is undeniably the duty of reason to bow 
 before the sovereign authority of God, to admit His revealed 
 word, in short, to believe according to His infallible testi- 
 mony. 
 
 Remark. — It by no means follows from what we have said 
 that reason directly produces faith. Faith is a supernatural 
 gift ; a virtue by which we firmly believe the truths revealed 
 by God, because He has revealed them. Now, evidently the 
 natural cannot produce the supernatural; hence reason only 
 prepares the way for faith by examining the motives of belief. 
 Thus, an unbeliever or a heretic who, by examining these 
 motives, is convinced of their soundness, and, consequently, 
 of the necessity of giving his assent to revealed truths, has 
 only a wholly human belief; in order that his belief become 
 
42 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 a divine faith he requires that a supernatural principle, 
 that grace lead him to believe these truths as revealed, that 
 is, on the infallible authority of God.^ Let us hasten to 
 add that, according to the theological axiom, facienti quod 
 est in se Deus non denegat gratiam, this divine assistance, 
 enlightenment of the mind, and impulse of the will, is never 
 refused to a man of good will, that is, to one who is perfectly 
 sincere in seeking religious truth. Such a man, moreover, 
 would never fail to implore the divine assistance by humble, 
 confident prayer. 
 
 II. The Mysteries of Religion. 
 
 Among the truths which God has revealed there are 
 mysteries, that is, points of doctrine which reason, of itself, 
 could never have discovered, nor can it penetrate their 
 essence or intimate nature, but it admits their existence on 
 the supreme and infallible authority of God. These truths, 
 moreover, are far from being unintelligible to us; we under- 
 stand them sufficiently to speak of them intelligently, to 
 avoid confounding them with others, and to derive from 
 them salutary and persuasive lessons of conduct. 
 
 Is it true, as rationalists claim, that the existence of these 
 mysteries is a sufficient reason for rejecting a priori, that is, 
 without further examination, as false, a religion which pro- 
 poses them for our belief? Is it necessary to understand 
 a truth in itself in its essence, in other words, to know perfectly 
 the why and wherefore of its existence, in order that one 
 may believe it without sinning against reason? By no 
 means, nor does it redound to the credit of human in- 
 telligence that we need to refute anything so absurd and 
 yet so general. 
 
 Thesis. — It is in no way contrary to reason, rather it is 
 wholly in accordance with reason, to believe the mysteries of 
 
 religion, once we are certain that they are revealed by God, 
 
 ^ On the Grace of Faith, see Rickaby, Oxf. C, I. S., ch. 8, 10; 
 Manning, Int. Miss., ch. 3; Lacordaire, conf. 13 on Doctr. of the Gh. 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 43 
 
 First Argument. — If we were to reject the mysteries of 
 religion because we have not a perfect, an adequate knowledge 
 of them, because we do not know or clearly understand the 
 why and wherefore of their existence, we should be obliged 
 for the same reason to reject all the mysteries of nature. 
 *'We have no complete knowledge of any thing," Pascal has 
 truly said; and this profound thinker goes so far as to define 
 science: '' Learning which recognizes its ignorance.'^ Is there a 
 scholar who completely understands even the simplest natural 
 phenomena? Who has ever thoroughly grasped the intimate 
 nature of heat and cold, of light, of attraction, of electricity? 
 Who understands time, space, the infinite, eternity? Who 
 understands the nature of a simple grain of sand, the germi- 
 nation of plants, life, sleep, fatigue, pleasure, death? Who 
 understands the substantial union in us of spirit and matter, 
 the intercourse of souls, the reciprocal communication of 
 their thoughts, their sentiments, their desires by a vehicle 
 wholly material, speech or writing? Who understands what 
 takes place in each of our senses, and innumerable other 
 things? Yet these are truths which all the world admits, 
 though the essence of these things escape us and we have 
 of the truths themselves only very imperfect ideas mingled 
 with impenetrable obscurities. 
 
 Now, if it is not contrary to reason to believe these mys- 
 teries of nature because their existence is confirmed by the 
 senses and experience, how can it be contrary to reason to 
 admit mysterious truths of a religious nature when a witness 
 whose authority is irrecusable, God Himself, attests them? 
 No doubt reason must, as we have said, prove the reality of 
 this testimony; but, once this is established, reason itself 
 makes it a duty for us to assent without hesitation. The 
 most noble use man can make of his reason is to submit it to 
 God, the Infinite Wisdom. 
 
 Second Argument. — If it were contrary to reason to 
 believe on reliable testimony truths, the essence of which 
 is impenetrable to reason, we should be obliged to say that 
 
44 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 it was repugnant to the reason of an unlettered man to 
 admit, on the testimony of a scholar, the majority of things 
 which the latter teaches him. In fact scientists undoubtedly 
 possess certain knowledge of many things which are beyond 
 the intelligence of ordinary minds, and which not only seem 
 to them inadmissible, but contrary to what they believe 
 they daily witness; for example, that the earth turns round 
 the sun, that a certain star is a million times larger than the 
 earth, that it takes thousands of years for its light to reach 
 us, that it contains certain constituent elements. Would 
 this unlettered man be acting contrary to reason in accepting 
 the testimony of a scientist worthy of belief? Would it be 
 unreasonable or imprudent for a son, blind from his birth, 
 to believe with entire faith and perfect confidence whatsoever 
 his father, whose wisdom and affection he had a thousand 
 times experienced, tells him of the wonders his eyes discover 
 by means of the telescope? Yet does he comprehend any- 
 thing whatever of the manner in which these distant objects 
 are presented to his father's vision? How, then, can it be 
 unreasonable for a Christian to believe mysteries on the 
 testimony of Him who is Truth itself? 
 
 Third Argument. — God, infinite Intelligence, must evi- 
 dently know the truths which are beyond the natural 
 power of man's limited intelligence. On the other hand, 
 it may be most profitable for us to be instructed concerning 
 the existence of these truths in order to know God's designs, 
 His acts of goodness, of mercy, of justice in behalf of human- 
 ity; in order to have an adequate idea of these things, with- 
 out, however, comprehending them, or penetrating the inti- 
 mate nature of them. Finally, He who has given man ears to 
 hear, intelligence to understand, and speech to communicate 
 his thoughts to his fellow-men, surely does not lack means of 
 imparting to His creature these elevating and salutary truths. 
 
 Remarks. — We would add to these arguments a few 
 remarks which will confirm what we have advanced by 
 removing all misapprehension. 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 45 
 
 1st. The difficulty we experience in believing the mysteries 
 of religion is frequently due to the fact that we form an 
 erroneous idea of them. If, for example, in regard to the 
 mystery of the Trinity, we were asked to believe that 
 three distinct natures are but one and the same nature, or 
 that three distinct persons are but one person, this dogma 
 would be evidently contrary to reason and consequently 
 inadmissible. In fact, reason shows us clearly that one can- 
 not be the same as three. But such is not the mystery 
 revealed. If it is above reason, it is in no way contrary to it ; 
 nor does it contradict the immutable principles which reason 
 reveals to us. Religion, in fact, says only that the three 
 Persons in God are but one nature. The unity and trinity 
 are not affirmed under the same relations but under different 
 relations: the unity concerns the nature, while the trinity is 
 affirmed of the persons. No doubt our limited intelligence 
 could not of itself discover this mysterious truth, the object 
 of which is the intimate nature of an infinite being; but there 
 is nothing opposed to our believing it on the authentic testi- 
 mony of God Himself. 
 
 What we have just said of the mystery of the Holy Trinity 
 applies to that of the Incarnation and to all other mysteries. 
 All are, it is true, beyond reason in the sense indicated above, 
 but none are contrary to reason.^ 
 
 2d. Mysteries, to a reasoning man, are far from being an 
 obstacle to admitting a religion which contains them; their 
 very existence is a presumption in its favor. The absence of 
 all mystery should, on the contrary, make its authenticity 
 doubtful. In fact, reason, as we have just seen, finds im- 
 penetrable obscurities even in the sphere of natural truths; 
 everywhere it finds itself forced to recognize, and accept as 
 certain, things which are obscure and incomprehensible. 
 Why, then, should we not encounter obscurities and incom- 
 prehensibilities in religion, that is, in the relations between 
 
 * Newman, Discourses to Mixed Congregat., xiii., xiv., xv.; Br. W., 
 viii. 28; M. 1902, Nov., Dec. 
 
46 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 God and man? How can our finite intelligence fathom the 
 unsearchable depth of an infinite being? Should we not justly 
 regard as insensate a man who would dare to say: "1 am 
 capable of knowing God as far as He can be known, as far 
 as He knows Himself; I can penetrate His nature and His 
 perfections, His will and His acts in regard to man; there is 
 nothing in their infinity, in their eternity, in their supreme 
 elevation, which is beyond or impenetrable to my reason"? * 
 The reply which we shall give to the following question 
 will further confirm what we have said on the subject of 
 belief in mysteries. We shall see that there are innumerable 
 facts and truths to which we accord reasonable belief without 
 any direct knowledge of them and without understanding 
 their intimate nature. 
 
 III. The Criterion of Certainty in Matters of Faith. 
 We have seen but a short time since that it belongs to 
 reason to prove not only that it is not absurd to believe 
 revealed truths, but that it is insensate and impious not to 
 believe all that God, infinite Intelligence and infallible Truth, 
 has deigned to reveal to man, even mysteries. But we 
 may ask ourselves how reason succeeds in establishing these 
 grounds of faith, how it proves to itself that God has re- 
 vealed to man certain truths and certain precepts, with the 
 obligation to believe them and conform his life thereto? 
 
 Philosophy mentions different means or sources of attain- 
 ing certain knowledge which rests in every case upon 
 evidence.^ These sources are experience, reason, and 
 testimony. 
 
 1st. Experience may be either internal or external. The 
 first, by the help of the internal sense, or consciousness, per- 
 ceives immediately our subjective modifications, our inter- 
 nal and personal acts and facts, whether of the mind or 
 the will or the whole human compound. The latter, by 
 
 * Lacordaire, 5th conf. on God and Man. 
 
 ^ Rickaby, First Principles of Knowledge; Mivart, Nature and 
 Thought, ch. 2; Poland, The Truth of Thought. 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 47 
 
 means of the external senses and the impressions made upon 
 them by external objects, makes us know these objects, the 
 existence of bodies, their quahties and properties, and in 
 this way reveals to us the material world and its wonderful 
 changes and motions. 
 
 2d. Reason works upon the material supplied by experience; 
 it penetrates the nature of things and discovers the relations 
 which exist between the various beings. The acts we thus 
 perform are of two kinds: (a) acts of intelligence, by which 
 we perceive at a glance universal, necessary, immutable truths, 
 the denial of which would imply contradiction — for example, 
 that the whole is greater than one of its parts; that that 
 which exists is possible; that a thing cannot at the same 
 time exist and not exist ; (b) acts of reasoning, by which we 
 deduce certain ideas from other ideas, conclusions from their 
 principles. Reason enables us to infer from the existence of a 
 finite, contingent world the existence of God, a necessary 
 being and first cause of all things. 
 
 3d. Testimony or authority gives us a knowledge of beings 
 and events of which, being separated from them by time or 
 space, we can have no experience; thus by means of testi- 
 mony we attain the certain knowledge of historical and 
 geographical facts, such as the exploits of Alexander, the 
 existence of San Francisco, Thibet.^ 
 
 It is important to observe here that each of these three 
 means enables us to attain perfect certainty. I am abso- 
 lutely certain of the existence of my body, of the reality of 
 the things I see or touch, of the existence of the universe, in 
 a word, of all the things coming under my own experience. 
 I am absolutely certain that everj^ effect has a cause, that 
 God exists, etc., though these truths are beyond the reach 
 of experience. I am equally certain of the conquests of 
 Caesar, the victories of Napoleon, the existence of Rome, 
 and an infinite number of facts in history, geography, 
 and natural science. Under pain of being unreasonable I 
 * Fitz-Arthur; Rick^b;^, 1. c, p. 377 ff.; Poland, 1. c, ch. 14. 
 
48 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 must admit these facts on the strength of testimony worthy 
 of behef. 
 
 It is true that truths proved by testimony do not induce 
 the assent of the intelhgence as irresistibly as truths of 
 immediate intuition, such as axioms ; but, on the other hand, 
 it would be absurd to exact this immediate and irresistible 
 evidence when there is question of historical and geographi- 
 cal truths, and in general of remote objects or exterior facts 
 which the senses cannot attain; at the same time it is evident 
 that these truths are no less certain. 
 
 Evidence is what determines the assent of our intelligence 
 to a tenet or truth. Now this evidence may be intrinsic 
 (internal), that is, inherent in the tenet or doctrine itself; 
 or it may be extrinsic (external), in which case it may be 
 called the evidence of the credibility of the doctrine proposed. 
 Let us explain. Certain doctrines or propositions brought 
 before our intelligence are themselves endowed with such a 
 clear light that the mind without denying, in a measure, 
 its own nature cannot refuse to admit their truth. Such 
 is, for instance, that first principle: A thing cannot at the 
 same time be and not be. With other propositions there 
 may be need of a long process of reasoning (argument) 
 before we perceive their truth. Of this kind are many 
 propositions in algebra and geometry. However, by the 
 very fact that our mind clearly sees the intimate connec- 
 tion of these theorems with evident principles the conclu- 
 sion itself becomes evident. Finally, there are other prop- 
 ositions or tenets for which our assent is asked, although 
 they do not show forth that light of evidence. Do what we 
 may, they remain for us enshrouded in obscurity and mys- 
 tery. But suppose men of irreproachable probity assure me 
 that they have heard these propositions from the mouth 
 of God, suppose I am certain that they speak without any 
 personal interest whatever; nay, more, for the truth which 
 they proclaim they suffer insults, persecution and death 
 itself, while, on the other hand, their teaching is confirmed 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 49 
 
 by striking and incontestable miracles. Would it not be 
 unreasonable, under these circumstances, to refuse my assent 
 to their doctrines? 
 
 Another important remark. If the internal evidence 
 shining forth in certain metaphysical and mathematical 
 truths were always required to justify our intelligence in 
 giving a firm assent, there would be no longer any historical, 
 geographical, and natural sciences, for the simple reason 
 that the facts or results of these sciences consist mostly of 
 knowledge acquired by means of testimony (extrinsic evi- 
 dence). What scientist has ever by his own personal 
 experience verified all the facts related in scientific works and 
 accepted by him as undoubtedly true. If he honestly analyzes 
 the reasons of his convictions, will he dare to affirm that all 
 of them rest upon evidence free from the slightest cloud? 
 
 Conclusion. — Let us now apply what we have just said 
 to the question of revelation or supernatural religion. Reve- 
 lation is a fact, an exterior act dependent on the will of God; 
 furthermore, it is a fact removed from us by many cen- 
 turies. Hence it is authority or testimony which enables us 
 to attain certain knowledge of revelation and, consequently, 
 to demonstrate the foundations of faith.^ 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. According to the definition of the Vatican 
 Council, faith is a supernatural virtue whereby, inspired and 
 assisted by God's grace, we believe as true the things which 
 He has revealed, not because we perceive their intrinsic 
 truth by the natural light of reason, but because of the 
 authority of God Himself who has revealed them, and who 
 can neither be deceived nor deceive (C. I. ch. 3). Faith, 
 like every virtue, is a principle of free acts which are meri- 
 torious before God. Yet faith is an act of the intellect, 
 and the intellect is not a free power: its assent is neces- 
 
 ^ Hettinger, Nat. Rel. (Introduct.) ; Brann, Truth and Error; 
 Ward, Theism, I. pp. 1, 120, II. pp. 107, 244; C. W. xxix. 11; D. R., 
 Oct. '92, p. 365; Chatard, Essay 19; Newman, Discourses to Mixed 
 Congr., X., xi.; Manning, The Grounds of Faith, lect. 1, 
 
50 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 sarily determined by evidence. The explanation of this 
 apparent difficulty is that free-will enters largely into 
 the birth and development of a supernatural act of faith: 
 this is what makes the act the homage of human reason 
 to the Divine Wisdom. 
 
 It may be well to explain one of the ways by which 
 man's free-will intervenes in an act of faith. We have only 
 to observe our own mental activity, however briefly, to 
 see that few truths are privileged to produce certainty by 
 means of absolute evidence which convinces the reason. 
 There is much knowledge rightly called certain in which, 
 however, this character of certainty is not evident. Facts, 
 sometimes, present luminous sides, while other parts are 
 obscured by shadows. This obscurity wearies and dis- 
 concerts our intelligence, and our first impulse, yielding to a 
 movement of pride, is simply to reject a truth which is not 
 clearly and completely revealed to us. Here is where the 
 will intervenes to oblige our intelligence, despite its repug- 
 nance, to accept truths, which though not completely evi- 
 dent, are presented with sufficient clearness to leave no room 
 for pncdent doubt. In very many cases this intervention 
 of the will in the act of cognition takes place spontaneously. 
 There are many special facts in regard to which no one 
 would venture to claim that he is guided only by complete 
 and infallible evidence. The affirmation of our senses and 
 the testimony of our fellow men constantly form for us the 
 starting point or basis of the most important resolutions. To 
 reject whatsoever is not sustained by absolute evidence would 
 be to condemn one's self to the most desolate scepticism. 
 
 The application of the foregoing explanation to the truths 
 of revelation follows of itself. As many of these truths are 
 not self-evident, and yet the assent of our intelligence thereto 
 is required by God, it is the duty of the will to intervene in 
 order to oblige our reason to accept the truths on testimony 
 recognized to be from God.^ 
 
 * Ward, The Wish to Believe; Hedley, The Spirit of Faith; Manning, 
 
GENERAL EXPLANATIONS. 51 
 
 The necessity of this intervention of the free-will appears 
 more clearly still when we consider the difficulties in the 
 way of the firm and persevering assent demanded by divine 
 revelation. In order to believe man must often conquer three 
 enemies at the same time: pride, which revolts against the 
 acceptance of truths which reason cannot understand; the 
 terror of sensual passions, which tremble in view of the chains 
 to be imposed on them by the practical truths of faith; the 
 tyranny of human respect, and the fear of the dangers and 
 sacrifices to which the pubHc profession of the CathoUc faith 
 often exposes its followers. We can easily understand that 
 under such conditions the intellect as well as the will stand in 
 need of supernatural help, of that spiritual power which in 
 the Christian language is called the grace, the Hght, or the 
 gift of faith. 
 
 2d. From what has been said, it follows that when arguing 
 with unbelievers we must never promise to satisfy their loud 
 demand for absolute evidence of revealed truths. This would 
 be to forget the essential character of Catholic faith. What 
 we may stoutly maintain is, first, the perfect satisfaction 
 that our dogmas, even the most mysterious, offer to the de- 
 mands of the highest and most exacting intellect; secondly, 
 the authenticity, integrity, and truthfulness of our sacred 
 books, particularly of the Gospels, as perfect as that of the 
 most rehable historical documents; finally, the divine char- 
 acter of the Christian religion and the Catholic Church shown 
 in each motive of credibility and shining forth in real splendor 
 from the full cluster of all these motives. Moreover, it can 
 be shown most clearly — with a clearness approaching abso- 
 lute evidence — that the unbelief of the rationalist is contrary 
 to sound reason, that it brings misery to its followers, and 
 that it constitutes one of the most serious dangers threaten- 
 ing the individual as well as society. What more can a 
 rational mind demand? 
 
 Internal Mission; Lacordaire, 6th conf. on God and Man, 13th conf. 
 on the Church; Br. W. v. 496 ff. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 
 
 Supernatural religion supposes a divine revelation, which 
 in turn establishes the truth of that supernatural religion. 
 But revelation, being an historical fact, must be proved by 
 testimony carrying with it certainty. Where shall we find 
 these unimpeachable testimonies of God's successive com- 
 munications with man? They are contained in the holy books 
 written under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost and for this 
 reason enjoying for long centuries an exceptional and well- 
 deserved veneration.^ Collectively they are called ''The 
 Holy Scriptures" or ''The Bible," and are divided into the 
 Old and New Testaments.^ 
 
 The Old Testament. — The name Old Testament is given 
 to the inspired books written before the coming of Christ. 
 They are forty-five in number, and may be divided into four 
 classes. 
 
 1st. The historical books, which relate the history of religion 
 from the creation to the time of Christ. The principal one 
 of these is the Pentateuch of Moses, containing five parts or 
 books: Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuter- 
 onomy. It includes the period which elapsed between the 
 
 ^ Tradition is another source from which the Church draws her 
 knowledge of revealed truths. We shall speak of it shortly in the 2d 
 part, ch. 2, art. 2, IV. 
 
 ^ See the beautiful 10th conf. by Lacordaire (on the Church), about 
 the Bible and pagan sacred books. On the inspiration, canonicity, 
 authenticity, and integrity of the Bible and its separate books consult 
 the so-called " Introductions to the Sacred Scriptures " by Gigot, 
 Breen, Dixon, and MacDevitt. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 53 
 
 creation and the death of Moses. Then come the other his- 
 torical books which resume this history at the period of the 
 entrance to the promised land and carry it on to the coining 
 of the Redeemer. These are the book of Josue; that of 
 Judges; the four books of Kings; the two books of Paralipo- 
 menon; the two books of Esdras, the second of which is 
 also called Nehemias, and the two books of Maccabees. Be- 
 sides this general history, there are five books which contain 
 only special histories: such are the books of Job, Ruth, 
 Esther, Tobias, and Judith. 
 
 2d. The books of praise, or chants addressed to the Di- 
 vinity : these are the Psalms and the Canticle of Canticles. 
 
 3d. The books of morals, which give rules for the conduct 
 of hf e : these are Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Wisdom, and Eccle- 
 siasticus. 
 
 4th. The books of the Prophets, which reprove the people 
 for their vices, predict the chastisements which threaten 
 them, and above all, announce the coming of the Messias. 
 The Prophets are sixteen in number: Isaias, Jeremias, with 
 Baruch, Ezechiel and Daniel, the four principal ones, are 
 called the great Prophets because of the importance of their 
 works. The others, who because of their lesser works are 
 called the minor Prophets, are twelve in number: Osee, Joel, 
 Amos, Abdias, Jonas, Micheas, Nahum, Habacuc, Sophonias, 
 Aggeus, Zacharias, and Malachias. 
 
 The New Testament. — The New Testament is com- 
 posed of inspired books written after the coming of Christ and 
 at the time of the Apostles. They include twenty-seven 
 books which we divide into four categories. 
 
 1st. The Gospels, which contain the history of the life and 
 of the ministry of Jesus Christ, His doctrine. His death and 
 His resurrection. These Gospels, which are four in number, 
 have respectively, as authors, St. Matthew, St. Mark, St. Luke, 
 St. John. 
 
 2d. The Acts of the Apostles, that is, the relation of the acts 
 of the Apostles, of what they did to establish and promulgate 
 
54 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the Gospel. This narration, the author of which is the Evan- 
 gehst St. Luke, the disciple of St. Paul, goes as far as the 
 first captivity of St. Paul at Rome. 
 
 3d. The Epistles, or letters of the Apostles written to the 
 different churches, and even to individuals, to give them 
 counsel and to instruct them. We count fourteen of St. 
 Paul, three of St. John, two of St. Peter, one of St. James and 
 one of St. Jude. 
 
 4th. The Apocalypse or revelation made to St. John in the 
 Island of Patmos. 
 
 Inspiration of the Bible. Our Present Point of 
 View. — It is extremely important to determine very accu- 
 rately the point of view from which we here regard the Holy 
 Scriptures, particularly the Pentateuch and the Gospels. In 
 the eyes of a Catholic all the books just mentioned have a 
 sacred character. They are given him by the Church as 
 divinely inspired, that is, dictated by the Holy Ghost to the 
 biblical writers. Therefore, God Himself is their author. To 
 avoid any errors on this subject let us state briefly what the 
 Catholic Church means by this inspiration} God by an 
 efficacious influence, either exterior or interior, impels a man 
 to write; He makes known, with more or less detail, the 
 things He wishes written by the hand of this man, and, while 
 the writer is laboring to execute the divine idea, the Holy 
 Spirit assists and guides him that there may be nothing in 
 his writing contrary to the designs of Him whose instrument 
 he is. At the same time this man is, under God's hand, a 
 living instrument endowed with intelligence and will; and 
 God, in employing him, does not prohibit him the exercise 
 of this double faculty. That is to say. He permits man to 
 conceive after his own manner the divine thought which He 
 communicates to him, and to choose the manner which suits 
 
 ^Manning, Essays, II. Ser.; Humphrey, Written Word, ch. 1, 2; 
 U.B., Apr. '97; D. R. III. Ser. xx. 144, July '93, p. 532; C. W. xxxiii. 
 523, Ivi. 742, Ivii. 206, 396; Br. W. vi. 427; I. E. R., Jan., Mch. '95; 
 Walworth, ch. 17; Schanz, II., ch. 13; Hunter, I.; Gigot, lect. 10. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OP THE BIBLE 56 
 
 him to express it; one thing is guaranteed by the divine 
 Author: that His thought shall be faithfully rendered by 
 the hagiographer. At times, it is true, God dictates to man 
 the very words by which the divine thought must be ex- 
 pressed; but usually these words and the arrangement of the 
 details of the inspired writing are left to the choice of the 
 writer under the direction and with the assistance of the 
 Holy Spirit. At times God's thought is manifested to the 
 writer without any effort on his part; at other times He 
 wishes that the author contribute personally by preliminary 
 or concomitant labor to the conception of the divine idea. 
 He in no way prohibits the author, for example, from making 
 use, while engaged in his historic labor, of preexisting records, 
 from having recourse to his memory, from making researches, 
 from questioning witnesses of events. Every proposition 
 thus written under divine inspiration, is the word of God, 
 the truth of which is infalHble. Hence the Bible as a whole 
 as well as in all its parts is invested with divine authority. — 
 Leo XIII., Encyclical on the Holy Scriptures. 
 
 It is not to this divine authority, however, that we shall 
 appeal in the studies which follow. The apologist, propos- 
 ing to establish the premises of faith, cannot appeal to in- 
 spiration, the existence of which is affirmed only by faith 
 and the infallible teaching of the Church. Therefore, we 
 must completely set aside, for the moment, the divine inspira- 
 tion of the sacred books and consider only their historic value; 
 the same as if we were considering the Commentaries of 
 Caesar or the Annals of Tacitus. Do those sacred books, 
 simply as historic documents, deserve our full and entire 
 confidence? We insist that, thus regarded, the books of both 
 the Old and the New Testament possess an authority so cer- 
 tain, so well established that we cannot doubt it without 
 absolutely denying all historic certainty. This is what we 
 shaU first demonstrate.^ 
 
 ' Gigot, lect. 2. 
 
56 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ART. I.— AUTHORITY OF THE PENTATEUCH.* 
 
 Preliminary Observation. — If an historical book is to 
 be an unimpeachable authority and command our confi- 
 dence, three conditions are necessary. It must be : 
 
 1st. Authentic, that is, written by the author to whom it is 
 attributed, or, if the author is unknown or doubtful, at the 
 period assigned to it. 
 
 2d. Intact, that is, it must have come to us just as it left 
 the pen of the author, without having undergone any sub- 
 stantial alteration bearing on the main subject of the history. 
 
 3d. Truthful: the moral qualities of the author and the 
 circumstances under which it was written should protect it 
 against all suspicion of error or falsehood. When an his- 
 torical work fills these three conditions, no reasonable man 
 can refuse to admit the facts contained therein. Now such 
 are the books which compose the Holy Scripture. We are 
 about to establish this specially, in regard to the Pentateuch,^ 
 
 ^ If we had only simplicity of method in view, there would be 
 reason to ask if it were opportune to treat here the questions contained 
 in the two articles which follow, particularly in article 2d. Un- 
 doubtedly, if our only object were to make the divinity of the Christian 
 religion very clear, we should not hesitate to omit this discussion, 
 for the New Testament would be amply sufficient for our purpose. 
 But we deem these pages useful in other respects. If, however, a 
 reader lacks time to study seriously the whole Course, he may, with- 
 out detriment to the soundness of the general demonstration, pass 
 over article 3d of the present chapter. It is true that among the 
 proofs which we give of the divinity of Christianity there is one 
 very important which rests on the fulfilment in Jesus Christ of 
 the Messianic prophecies; but in order that this proof preserve all 
 its apologetic value, it is enough that we be perfectly certain that 
 these prophecies existed and were known long before they were ful- 
 filled. Now, of this there can be no doubt; every one knows that 
 the Greek version of the Septuagint had spread the knowledge of them 
 everywhere, more than 250 years before Christ. 
 
 ^Bissell; Thein, The Bible and Rationalism, p. L; Schanz, II., ch. 
 12; Walworth, ch. 3 ff.; Burnett, Why, etc., ch. 9, 10; D. R., Apr. 
 '92, p. 264, Oct. '92, p. 245, Jan. '93, p. 40; M. S. H, 1900. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 57 
 
 the most important of the historical books of the Old Testa- 
 ment, containing as it does the account of the creation, the 
 fall, etc. We shall do the same afterward for the Gospels, 
 the principal historic basis of the Christian Revelation. As 
 for the other books of the Old as well as the New Testament, 
 which will be less useful to us in this treatise, analogous proofs 
 may be found in special works.* 
 
 I. Authenticity of the Pentateuch. 
 Thesis. The Pentateuch is the work of Moses, the 
 Lawgiver of the Hebrews. 
 
 First Argument. — The authenticity of the Pentateuch is 
 superabundantly proved : 
 
 1st. By the traditional testimony, as unanimous as con- 
 stant, of ancient and modern Jews. After their departure 
 from Egypt, these books were always in the hands of the 
 whole nation, and they always insisted that they were the 
 work of Moses, who had delivered them from the bondage of 
 Egypt. Moreover, all the sacred writers, from Moses to Jesus 
 Christ, cite or pre-suppose the Pentateuch of Moses to have 
 come from him. It is the same with the profane writers of 
 the nation, such as Philo and Josephus, and all the Talmudists 
 and Rabbins. Finally, in our own day also, the Jews, who, 
 by a phenomenon unique in history, continue to exist though 
 scattered throughout all the nations of the world, certify the 
 same thing to us, though these books condemn them. 
 
 2d. By the testimony of the Samaritans, who, despite their 
 profound hatred of the Jews, preserved the Pentateuch and 
 never ceased to attribute it to Moses; whence we must con- 
 clude that at the time of the separation of the ten tribes, about 
 a thousand years before Christ, its authenticity must have 
 been incontestably and universally acknowledged. 
 
 3d. By the testimony of a multitude of other writers 
 
 Wn Biblical Criticism see A. C. Q. xix. 412, 562; I. E. R., 1892, 
 '93/94,1901,1902; M. S. H., 1900; Wiseman, Science andRev. Rel., 
 1.10. 
 
58 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 among the nations of antiquity, Pagan, Egyptian, Greek, 
 Roman, etc., who admitted the Pentateuch as the work of 
 Moses and as containing his legislation. Even Celsus, 
 Porphyrins, and Julian the Apostate, though it was their 
 capital interest to deny the authenticity of this book, never 
 accused the Jews or the Christians of supporting their doc- 
 trines with apocryphal documents. 
 
 4th. By the testimony of Jesus Christ and the Apostles: 
 whenever they name the Pentateuch or the Law they attrib- 
 ute it to Moses.^ Let us add further the testimony of all 
 Christians whether Catholics or heretics. 
 
 These extrinsic proofs based on testimony are amply suffi- 
 cient. If we admit the authenticity of Virgil 's ^neid, of the 
 Philippics of Demosthenes, etc., on the faith of testimony, 
 we cannot reasonably deny the authenticity of the Penta- 
 teuch, attested by just as great a number of unassailable 
 witnesses. Let us add, however, other arguments which are 
 equally significant, and, first of all, an intrinsic proof, drawn 
 from a careful study of the text itself. 
 
 Second Argument. — All that the Pentateuch contains in 
 point of religion, of history, of politics, of geography, of morals, 
 of customs, reveals the great antiquity of the book, and is 
 in perfect harmony with the time of Moses; this minute 
 accuracy in the very circumstantial narrations, abound- 
 ing with a multitude of details fully verified by the 
 study of the Egyptian monuments, could not be explained 
 at a less ancient period. Thus what he tells of Egypt when 
 speaking of the sojourn of the Hebrews there and their flight 
 agrees perfectly with the condition of the country under 
 Ramses, a condition quite different from what it was at a 
 later period, e. g. of Solomon or the prophets. What we shall 
 say later on (p. 130) of modern discoveries in Egypt and 
 Assyria goes to show that such exactness in the smallest 
 details points necessarily to an author who lived at the time 
 and the places of which he speaks. Let us observe, however, 
 
 ^ See, e.g., Luke xxiv. 27; John v. 46. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 59 
 
 that there is a small number of supplementary details which 
 were added after the death of Moses, the chief of which is the 
 story of the death of the Lawgiver himself (Deuter. xxxiv.) . 
 The study of language leads to the same conclusion. With- 
 out entering into particulars, which space does not permit, 
 we would merely observe that the books of Moses possess 
 an inimitable character of poetry, originality, and simphcity, 
 which give a special impression of antiquity. The antiquity 
 of the language is apparent in several archaisms, such as 
 the absence of any distinction between the masculine and 
 feminine genders in the third person of the personal pronoun. 
 The masculine inflection takes the place of the feminine in 
 195 passages of the Pentateuch, while in the book of Josue 
 the distinction between the genders appears to be fully estab- 
 Ushed. Another characteristic : the only strange words found 
 in the Pentateuch are Egyptian. Finally, it is important to 
 observe that the general unity which characterizes the five 
 books of the Pentateuch indicates one and the same author. 
 The style of Moses is moreover very personal and very 
 succinct.^ 
 
 It would be ridiculous to-day to object that writing was 
 not invented at that time, particularly in the face of recent 
 discoveries which show us that the art of writing was known 
 in Egypt at least two centuries before the time of Moses. 
 
 Third Argument. — There is question here of a book that 
 is both national and religious, of a book which contains the 
 
 ^ Certain rationalists of the present day, headed by Wellhausen; 
 Kuenen, and Reuss, acknowledge Moses as the author of the decalogue, 
 but refuse to see in the Pentateuch anything but fragments, docu- 
 ments of various authors and epochs, compiled by an awkward hand, 
 perhaps by Esdras. They display much erudition in defence of their 
 system; but, on close examination, the want of logic in their demon- 
 strations is very evident; arbitrary decision and prejudice are evident 
 at every step. See Vigouroux, Les livres saints et la critique ration- 
 aliste, tome 3. It is admitted, however, that Moses inserted in 
 Genesis, with little or no alteration, certain oral traditions and even 
 certain written fragments, the authenticity of which was known to 
 him. This is not the place to give the reasons for this supposition. 
 
60 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 legislation itself of the Jewish people, the sum of their laws, 
 religious, political, civil, and military; of a book by which 
 the religion, the police, the morals of this people were regu- 
 lated with much precision and detail. It is absolutely im- 
 probable that a book of this kind could be apocryphal. We 
 might just as well say that the Code Napoleon is falsely 
 assigned to the emperor whose name it bears, or that the 
 American constitution was not framed by the delegates of 
 the United States. 
 
 II. Integrity of the Pentateuch. 
 
 First Argument. — Let us observe, first, that the greater 
 part of the arguments which go to prove the authenticity 
 of the Pentateuch makes the integrity of the work equally 
 clear, at least in the sense that nothing substantial has been 
 added. Yet there is no want of special proofs. Studies 
 made of this subject, particularly those of Kennicot, which 
 embraced 581 manuscripts, and those of J. B. Rossi, which in 
 eluded 825 others, demonstrate that we possess in its integrity 
 the Hebrew text of the Old Testament. Nor has it, more- 
 over, been possible to produce any evidence capable of weak- 
 ening the constant and public tradition of the Jews relative 
 to integrity of the Holy Scriptures. 
 
 Second Argument. — Any essential alteration would have 
 been impossible. In fact, 
 
 a. According to the testimony of Flavins Josephus, the 
 Pentateuch was so famihar to the Jews that they even knew 
 how many times each letter was repeated in the volume. 
 ''No one," he says, ''would have dared to add or take from 
 it, or to make the slightest change in the work. We hold 
 them to be divine, we so call them, we promise to observe 
 them faithfully, and gladly to die, if necessary, in their 
 defence." 
 
 h. This book being the foundation of the life of the Jews, 
 any change in it would necessarily have entailed change in 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 61 
 
 their beliefs, their moral code, their laws and their customs 
 which could not fail to excite earnest protest.^ 
 
 c. It is evident that any alteration was still more impos- 
 sible after the separation of the ten tribes. 
 
 d. Finally, we have a still stronger guarantee in the Greek 
 translation of the Septuagint which was made, according 
 to the most probable opinion, by order of the king of Egypt, 
 Ptolemy Philadelphus, and which was known throughout the 
 entire world from the year 277 before Christ, that is, long 
 before the fulfilment of the prophecies relating to the Messias. 
 
 III. Veracity of the Pentateuch. 
 
 Moses is veracious if he was not deceived, or if he did not 
 wish to deceive. This will be still more evident if we prove 
 that he could not deceive. 
 
 1st. Moses was not deceived. 
 
 a. In regard to the events of his time, that is to say, in re- 
 gard to those related in the last four books of the Pentateuch, 
 Moses was in a position to know them, since they were tan- 
 gible events and of extreme importance, events also in which 
 he himself was actor or witness, and which he prepared, 
 directed, or accomphshed. 
 
 b. He derived authentic knowledge of anterior events from 
 living tradition, the preservation of which was favored by 
 the longevity of the first men. Though we may, with reason, 
 attribute to providential intervention the perfect preserva- 
 tion of these patriarchal traditions, yet we have no need, in 
 order to explain it, to have recourse to miracles properly so 
 called. In fact the events related by Moses were well known 
 and of the greatest importance ; there are several the mem- 
 ory of which is perpetuated, according to the custom of the 
 times, by canticles, by inscriptions, and by monuments 
 raised to commemorate them. 
 
 2d. Moses did not wish to deceive. 
 
 a. History and tradition agree in representing Moses as a 
 * Bossuet, Discourses on Universal History, Part 2, ch. 3. 
 
62 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 man of great virtue, perfect integrity, and irreproachably 
 impartial. His integrity always inspired the most absolute 
 confidence, so much so that his book became the rule of life 
 for the Jewish people. 
 
 h. His writings bear the imprint of the most perfect sin- 
 cerity and integrity ; his style itself shows the tranquil loyalty 
 of a writer who has no reason to fear contradiction : it is sim- 
 ple, unpretentious, free from exaggeration, enthusiasm, and 
 flattery. Nowhere does the author disguise the faults of 
 his ancestors or the evil incHnations of his people, his own 
 weakness, and the chastisements which followed both. It 
 is everywhere apparent that his object is only to record and 
 preserve the memory of events known to his contemporaries 
 as well as to him. 
 
 3d. Moses could not deceive. 
 
 a. The events which Moses relates, and of which he was the 
 author or witness, are striking public events of the highest 
 importance ; upon them are founded the pohtical and relig- 
 ious legislation of his nation, and the authority which he 
 claimed for himself. He records the events, not in a vague, 
 general way, but with every detail of circumstance, place, and 
 person. " Forget not, " he tells them, 'Hhe words that thy 
 eyes have seen. " " Thy eyes have seen the great things which 
 thy God has done for thee. " (Deut. iv., viii., xi.) If these 
 alleged facts were false, would the Jews, always so ready to 
 murmur against their liberator, have made no protest, par- 
 ticularly when the writer imposed upon them, in the name 
 of God, duties very painful to their carnal nature? The very 
 feasts of the Jews, religious and civil, such as the Passover, 
 Pentecost, Tabernacles; the ceremonies in use among them, 
 like those of redeeming the first-born ; their sacred canticles, 
 which go back to the time of Moses, attest the continuance 
 of the marvels which m.arked the departure from Egypt, the 
 publication of the Law on Mt. Sinai, the sojourn in the desert, 
 and all the great miracles worked in their favor through the 
 ministry of Moses himself. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 63 
 
 b. The events of which he was neither the author nor wit- 
 ness must have been fresh in the minds of the entire people. 
 There is nothing comparable to the care and fidehty with 
 which the Orientals preserve and transmit the reports of 
 important events connected with their ancestors. It would 
 have been impossible for Moses to add to or take from these 
 popular traditions without offending the most cherished 
 sentiments of the people and exciting the most violent 
 protests. 
 
 ART. II.— THE PENTATEUCH AND THE SCIENCES.^ 
 
 '^ Science, " says Joseph de Maistre, ^^is a species of acid 
 which dissolves all metals but gold." Only that which is 
 divine resists the attacks of modern criticism. Christianity 
 certainly has not lacked assailants, and if it has stood un- 
 daunted, without losing one of the dogmas it professes or one 
 of the facts it guarantees, it is because it is of Heaven, as it 
 claims and proves. The sciences, in our century particularly, 
 have been brought under contribution to overthrow the rock 
 upon which it rests, but so far from suffering injury thereby, 
 the profound studies to which scholars have devoted them- 
 selves with noble ardor only confirm the authenticity of the 
 Mosaic relation. Not infrequently, it is true, scientific dis- 
 coveries have seemed, at first, to contradict the veracity of 
 the sacred text ; but when the arduous labors of the pioneers 
 of science have led them deeper, and finally revealed unde- 
 niable truths, these alleged contradictions have vanished, 
 and the truth of the sacred writings shines with greater 
 brilliancy than ever. 
 
 To us who are Catholics this result is not astonishing. We 
 know with absolute certainty that no conflict is possible be- 
 tween faith and science. The reason of this is simple : it is the 
 
 * On the various subjects of this article see Reusch, Schanz, I., Mol- 
 loy, Thein, Vahey; also Wiseman, Science and Rev. Religion; Zahm, 
 Science, Bible, and Faith; Gmeiner, Scientific Views. 
 
64 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 same God, it is the Creator of all things who is at the same 
 time the Lord of science and the Author of revelation. What- 
 ever the means by which He communicates to us a portion 
 of the truth, whether He reveals it directly to man, or dis- 
 covers it gradually to the laborious investigations of scholars, 
 God cannot contradict Himself, hence true science can never 
 contradict revelation.^ 
 
 But we cannot be satisfied with this summary affirmation. 
 Particularly as alleged objections furnished by geology, 
 paleontology, and other sciences ^ of which we hear so much, 
 have not only proved a stumbling-block to many in their 
 search for religious truth, but have wrecked the faith and 
 caused the spiritual ruin of souls. The religious convictions 
 of many have been overthrown by the oft-repeated asser- 
 tions that science is incompatible with revelation ; that mod- 
 ern discoveries evince the impossibility of miracles, and prove 
 the absurdity of Christian dogmas. It is important that 
 Catholic youth be able to show the inanity of these lying 
 affirmations; they must be able to refute specious objections, 
 and thus take from many of their brethren obstacles to the 
 attainment of that truth which was revealed for the salva- 
 tion of souls. For this reason we shall review the principal 
 objections raised in the name of science against the Mosaic 
 narration, on the subject of the age of the world, of the 
 work of the six days, of the antiquity of man, etc. But a 
 few general remarks are necessary first; they will serve to 
 fix the reciprocal position of Holy Scripture and science. 
 
 First Remark. — Holy Scripture is in no way a scientific 
 
 * Cf. references on p. 38. 
 
 ^ Among the sciences usually called modern because of the great 
 progress they have made in our centuries, we refer particularly to 
 geology, or the science of the earth; astronomy, or the science of the 
 heavens; biology, or the science of life; paleontology, or the science 
 of fossils; anthropology, the object of which is the origin of man, his 
 constitution, the unity of his species, and his antiquity; ethnology, 
 or the science of peoples, that is, their antiquity, their tongues or 
 idioms, their morals, customs, writings and monuments, 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 65 
 
 hook} — Even when it touches upon phenomena, the proper 
 subject of science, its end is not to solve problems of geology 
 or astronomy, but to teach us the truths of faith and to set 
 forth the facts of religion. Thus when Moses relates the 
 creation, he proposes to reveal and affirm the dogma and the 
 fact of divine creation in regard to all categories of beings; 
 to establish in this way the foundations of natural religion 
 and the obligation of observing the Sabbath. His object is 
 by no means to teach natural history, to formulate a theo- 
 retic and complete geogony, to describe scientifically the suc- 
 cessive formations of the globe which we inhabit. Hence 
 when we interpret Scripture it must be in this doctrinal and 
 religious sense, and not for the purpose of seeking formulas 
 to solve the disputed questions of scientists. 
 
 Second Remark. — Nevertheless, though the intention of 
 the Spirit of truth was not to teach profane science, yet He 
 could not have inspired what is false even upon a subject 
 foreign to dogma and morality, nor have permitted the Sacred 
 Scripture to set forth anything of the kind. Scripture, 
 therefore, cannot present as true things which science proves 
 to be false. 
 
 But if the sacred writer is never deceived in regard to the 
 precise object of his statement, there is nothing to prevent 
 his using expressions, metaphors, figures scientifically inac- 
 curate, strictly speaking, but conformable to the genius of 
 the language in which he expresses himself, or to the habit 
 of mind of the people whom he addresses. A few examples 
 will explain our thought. 
 
 When Josue wrote that, owing to the miraculous length- 
 ening of the day (due perhaps to a local and atmospheric 
 modification), he was able to achieve the battle of Gabaon, 
 he related a certain fact. But to state this fact, and to be 
 imderstood by the people, he used a popular term which 
 expressed very clearly what he wished understood: he said 
 that the sun stood still. This is the language of appearances. 
 
 * Reusch, ch. 3. 
 
66 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 In this respect, moreover, the example of Josue is still followed 
 by the greatest scholars and even by the Bureau of Longitudes. 
 Notwithstanding the progress of astronomy, we still say that 
 the sun rises and sets; and we should make ourselves ridic- 
 ulous if, adopting strictly astronomical language, we were 
 to say, the earth sets, the earth will rise to-morrow. It mat- 
 ters Httle, moreover, whether Josue was or was not ignorant 
 of the scientific truth of this fact. The illustrious astronomer 
 Kepler, referring to these words of Josue, says: ''The Scrip- 
 ture in teaching sublime truths makes use of ordinary locu- 
 tions in order to be understood. It speaks of natural phenom- 
 ena only incidentally, and in terms common and familiar to 
 men. We astronomers, ourselves, while perfecting astro- 
 nomical science do not perfect language; we say with the 
 people, the planets stop, the planets return; the sun rises, 
 the sun sets, it rises in the heavens; hke tlie people we ex- 
 press what appears to pass before our eyes, though in reality 
 it is not true. We have less reason to require that Holy Scrip- 
 ture abandon, in this respect, ordinary for scientific language 
 which would perplex the simple faithful and fail to attain the 
 sublime end it proposes." Another famous astronomer, 
 Arago, speaks in the same terms. 
 
 Another example. Moses speaks of the sun and moon as 
 two great luminaries destined to light the earth, and he insists 
 less upon the innumerable multitude of stars. The reason 
 of this is that he does not pretend to give an astronomical 
 classification; he expresses himself according to popular 
 ideas; he speaks of nature as the people apprehended it and 
 according to the relative importance of the stars to inhabit- 
 ants of the earth. Again, when he enumerates the various 
 animals he is not anxious to give a complete scientific enu- 
 meration, he is satisfied to make it understood that all were 
 created by God.^ 
 
 ^ It will be well to say a few words here in regard to a biblical 
 fact, the history of Jonas, which has excited the ridicule of certain 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 67 
 
 Third Remark. — Scientists have no reason to complain 
 of being hampered by CathoUc theology in their scientific 
 studies, and particularly in their researches in regard to the 
 formation of the globe. So far from barring the path of 
 science, the Church leaves it full Hberty to move and progress 
 in the vast domain which God has abandoned to it. She 
 applauds its efforts, certain in advance that its discoveries will 
 only confirm revealed truths. Thus, the scholar possessed 
 of faith finds himself as much at ease in his geological studies, 
 for example, as the scholar who has not the happiness to 
 believe. 
 
 Only recently has Leo XIII. proclaimed that ''the Church 
 does not forbid scientific labors, each science in its own 
 sphere making use of the principles and methods proper 
 to it, " and he affirms that there is no conflict to fear, provided 
 they remain within their own limits without invading the 
 province of philosophy and of faith.^ ''Religion," said 
 Bishop Freppel at the last session of the Scientific Congress 
 
 men of the present day as it did that of the pagans of Africa who 
 were answered by St. Augustine. The fact is evidently miraculous, 
 for the prophet could not naturally live three days in this dark prison 
 and be cast forth whole and sound on the shore ; but are we to regard 
 the swallowing of Jonas by the whale as still another miracle? Yes, if 
 the monster which devoured him was really a whale; as a matter of fact 
 the oesophagus or gullet of this mammifer is too narrow to permit a man 
 to pass. But the Hebrew, which is the original text, does not define 
 the monster in question. It merely says it was a great fish — a term 
 which, in its vulgar acceptation, includes all sea-monsters without 
 exception, the cetacea as well as the fish properly so called. The 
 word employed by the Septuagint version is not more precise. This 
 is the opinion of the best commentators, Jews, Protestants, and 
 Catholics. It seems preferable to suppose it a fish of the genus Pristis, 
 as represented in the frescoes of the catacombs and the monuments of 
 the first ages, or, better still, of the genus Squalus, like the shark or 
 lamia. These fish have always inhabited the Mediterranean, and 
 there are some of them so enormous that they could easily swallow 
 a man without crushing him, as, in fact, they have been known to do. 
 ^ C. W. xlvii. 225, xlviii. 145; Month, liv. 474; also references on 
 pp. 38, 56, and 63. 
 
68 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 in Paris, 1891, '^does not mean in any manner whatever to 
 restrain the normal and regular growth of human science 
 any more than she claims to issue a doctrinal judgment upon 
 the merit of an oratorical or literary work. It is hardly 
 necessary to say that the Church has received no revelation 
 from her divine Founder, whether on the properties of material 
 bodies or upon the relations of distance and space existing 
 between the stars. In other words, and I use them in their 
 precise meaning, there is no revealed astronomy, nor medi- 
 cine, nor chemistry, nor physics. These are all natural sci- 
 ences, which by their proper and specific subject build up their 
 own temples and to whom theology can lend neither the laws 
 of their operations nor the method of their development.'' 
 And in fact these confhcts can only arise on the side of false 
 science, that quasi-science which, going beyond its province 
 and abandoning the method proper to it, endeavors to over- 
 throw the truths of religion in the name of arbitrary hypoth- 
 eses unverified by facts and experience. But this alleged 
 science becomes anti-religious only when it ceases to be serious 
 and positive and consequently of authority. Certainly we 
 do not forbid scholars to formulate imaginary hypotheses in 
 order to attain, eventually, positive conclusions; we only 
 forbid them to present such things as obstacles to revealed 
 truth as long as they are only gratuitous hypotheses. 
 
 What, then, is the method proper to these sciences and 
 from which they must not depart? 
 
 Here is the answer given to this question by M. Berthelot, 
 whose efficiency is well known: ''Positive science proceeds 
 by establishing facts and by uniting them one to another by 
 immediate relations. . . . The human mind verifies the facts 
 by observation and by experience; it compares them and 
 draws relations therefrom ; that is, more general facts, which 
 are in their turn (and this is their only guarantee of reafity) 
 verified by observation and by experience. It is the chain 
 of relations which constitutes positive science." This is the 
 language of the most reliable scholars. They are equally 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 69 
 
 unanimous in regard to the object of these sciences, and to 
 the province to which they must confine themselves. The 
 same M. Berthelot proclaims that they have not to occupy 
 themselves '^ either ^vith first causes or the end of things. '' 
 ''Experimental science/' says M. Pasteur in his turn/ 'is 
 essentially positive in this sense, that in its conceptions the 
 consideration of the essence of things, of the origin of the 
 world and its destinies, never enters." The illustrious Claude 
 Bernard also declares that the essence of things must remain 
 unknown in positive science. Certainly this spiritual-minded 
 savant did not repudiate metaphysics; he only protested 
 against mixing methods. There is no one, not even Littre 
 himself, who does not recognize that " experience has no value 
 in questions of essence and of origin." Such is the language 
 held by all in pursuit of science that is true and serious and 
 not a matter of fancy and imagination. As long as the nat- 
 ural sciences are faithful to this method of observation, of 
 experience, of induction, the only method by which they can 
 attain certainty, as long as they keep within their proper 
 province, they may boldly pursue their investigations and 
 redouble their efforts: never will they encounter hindrance 
 of any kind from theology. 
 
 Fourth Remark. — Moreover, the bibUcal affirmations in 
 regard to facts concerning science, and for which the Church 
 exacts respect, are very jew in number. The reason is simple 
 and follows from what we have just said: the Bible being a 
 religious and not a scientific book, whenever it touches upon 
 the phenomena of nature it is only to teach men whatever 
 relates, in this matter, to their faith and conduct. By taking 
 successively the principal objections formulated against the 
 Mosaic narration, it would be an easy matter to show that 
 these rare truths are in no way contradicted by the certain 
 conclusions of modem sciences. 
 
 Fifth Remark. — Let us add another very important 
 remark. In order that there be, on a point touching nature, 
 any opposition between the Bible and science, the union of 
 
70 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 three conditions is necessary. 1st. The exact and natural 
 meaning of the Scripture must be absolutely certain, either 
 because this meaning is completely self-evident or because it 
 is fixed by the infallible authority of the Church. 2d. The 
 affirmation of science must be incontestable and admitted by 
 all judges of undisputed authority. 3d. There must be, 
 finally, absolute incompatibility between the certain sense of 
 the Bible and the result obtained and perfectly demonstrated 
 by science. Now, these three conditions have never been 
 encountered together and never can be. 
 
 First Condition. — Apart from the small number of truths 
 clearly affirmed by the authority of the Church, it is difficult 
 to fix in a certain manner the literal sense of the Bible in these 
 kinds of passages. We speak particularly of the narration 
 of the creation made by Moses in the first chapters of Genesis, 
 for it is here particularly that objections arise. It is well 
 known that this exposition of the work of creation, of the 
 formation of our earth, has received on the part of the Fathers 
 of the Church and of exegetes, the most varied, not to say 
 the most opposite interpretations. Now it is a fundamental 
 principle in hermeneutics that, in things left by God and by 
 the Church to free discussion, each one must guard against 
 giving his private interpretation as the absolute word of the 
 Bible. 
 
 It is beyond all doubt that full certainty accompanies 
 the interpretations of Scripture texts sustained by the 
 unanimity — at least moral unanimity — of the Fathers and 
 Doctors of the Church; provided, however, it is a doctrinal 
 text, that is, contains doctrinal or moral teaching, and that 
 the Fathers give their interpretation as being that of the 
 Church and imposing, consequently, faith upon the faithful: 
 ^' In matters of faith and morals belonging to the edification 
 of Christian Doctrine," say the Councils of Trent and the 
 Vatican. Then, and then only, are the Fathers and Doctors 
 of the Church invested with higher authority, because in 
 cases of this kind their teaching represents or manifests the 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 71 
 
 authentic teaching of the universal Church, which in virtue of 
 the promise of her divine Founder is infalhble. Outside such 
 cases we are in no way bound by the scientific ideas of the 
 ancient Fathers. In their exegetical labors they accepted the 
 sciences as they were apprehended in their time; we are as 
 free as they to avail ourselves, in explaining the Scripture, 
 of the progress which these sciences have made in our day. 
 The condition which we have just specified cannot be verified 
 relative to the Mosaic account of the creation. 
 
 Second Condition. — For a conflict to be possible it is also 
 necessary that the scientific affirmation be absolutely incon- 
 testable. Now in the majority of sciences pitted against 
 the Bible this certainty can rarely be claimed.^ To convince 
 ourselves of this we have only to consider the number and 
 variety of systems which have successively claimed pre- 
 eminence, pronouncing all others absurd. 
 
 Geology and paleontology, particularly, should beware of 
 establishing as axioms deductions still doubtful, of pro- 
 claiming as certain theories simply possible, hypotheses 
 still unverified and unsupported by absolutely certain proofs. 
 No doubt these sciences have made remarkable progress in 
 modem times, and we are agreed, for example, in regard to 
 the grand divisions of the strata of the earth, of the chrono- 
 logical classification of certain groups of fossils. But, again, 
 the apologist, upon these capital and well-estabhshed points, 
 has no difficulty in showing that the Bible in no way con- 
 tradicts scientific data. In regard to certain details of 
 science, concerning which we are far from certain, we may 
 and should, before taking the trouble to examine them from 
 a theological point of view, wait until scientists cease to 
 contradict one another. This prudent delay is all the more 
 necessary that it is well known that in geology, particularly, 
 theories change with a rapidity which has become proverbial. 
 Hypotheses only succeed hypotheses. And yet in virtue of 
 each one of them it is claimed that the Bible errs! The Abb6 
 
 * Gerard, Science or Romance; J. L. Spalding, lect. 2. 
 
72 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Moigno, in his second volume of Splendeurs de la Foi, has 
 inserted five large pages of assertions, all alleged to be scientific, 
 giving concisely the objection and answer, the yea and the 
 nay of a multitude of points. 
 
 Third Condition. — After what we have just said it is 
 useless to insist upon the third condition required to make 
 conflict possible. It is too evident. If the sense of the 
 biblical text is certain, if the scientific fact is incontestable, 
 there must be further, to prove the existence of any contradic- 
 tion, absolute incompatibility between one and the other. 
 This, as we have already said, never happens. Now to prove 
 it. 
 
 I. The Bible and Geology.^ 
 
 Thesis. Geology does not Contradict the Biblical Account of the 
 Origin and Formation of the Universe of the Earth. 
 
 Geology is a science which explains the primitive forma- 
 tion of the earth and the successive changes which it has 
 undergone up to the present day. It describes the structure 
 of our globe, the different strata and mineral veins which 
 form its crust, in a word, gives the anatomy of its immense 
 frame. 
 
 Observation. — It is necessary to distinguish carefully 
 the question of the origin of the world from that of its forma- 
 tion. The first is concerned only with the moment when the 
 universe sprang out of nothing, the act by which it passed 
 from non-existence into being; the second relates to the 
 primitive transformations or evolutions of this primary 
 matter, of the atomic elements, from the moment when the 
 physical and chemical causes began to act. 
 
 A. Origin of the Universe. — Relative to the question of 
 origin there is no reason to fear opposition between faith 
 and science. And yet the Scripture speaks in the most 
 categoric manner on the subject. ''In the beginning God 
 
 *Schanz, I.; Reusch; MoUoy; Vahey; Vuibert; Thein, Anthrop. 
 ch. 9, Bible and Rat., p. IV. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 73 
 
 created heaven and earth." It is God, it tells us, who 
 created all things, primary matter and the laws which govern 
 its successive transformations. But true science, that which 
 keeps within its proper sphere, relying, as it should, solely 
 on observation and experience, declares, as we have just 
 seen, that it can teach us nothing in regard to primary causes, 
 to the origin of the world. 
 
 B. Primary Formation of the Universe. — Though the 
 question of the origin of the world is absolutely beyond the 
 sphere of the natural sciences, yet that of the primary trans- 
 formations which it has undergone rightly belongs to them. 
 Nor is there any fear that in this, their legitimate province, 
 they will be hampered by theology, which is in no way con- 
 cerned with the question. Moses in fact presents no cosmog- 
 ony, properly speaking; he gives no theory as to the forma- 
 tion of the world. But whether the universe was created in 
 its perfection or whether it gradually developed under the 
 action of forces created by God; whether it began in a solid 
 or a gaseous state; whether it underwent great cataclysms 
 before reaching the state in which it was found at the appear- 
 ance of man; whether it possessed in this primitive period a 
 primary creation of organized beings, the necessity of a 
 Creator is no less certain. Primary matter, the forces which 
 animate it, the laws which govern its transformation, evidently 
 claim a powerful and intelligent cause, the action of God. 
 Faith in creation, therefore, is safe amid all these theories, 
 and since Scripture is silent upon the other points, a vast 
 field is opened to the investigations of science where it can 
 proceed untrammelled. 
 
 It will be well to give here a sketch of the two most popular 
 systems explaining the primary formation of the earth. 
 
 First System. — The theory in regard to the formation 
 of the imiverse generally received among scholars is that 
 imagined, it is said, by Kant, adopted by Herschel, and 
 finally clearly formulated by Laplace. Several modern dis- 
 coveries have added a new degree of probability to this 
 
74 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 magnificent hypothesis. We know that the spectroscope, 
 for example, made it possible to prove that the chemical 
 composition of all the heavenly bodies is fundamentally the 
 same as that of our globe. This system considers the earth 
 as a nebula changed from the state of gas to that of a sohd, 
 that is, as a gaseous mass of enormous volume, which, grad- 
 ually condensing, became a fluid incandescent mass. Sub- 
 stances in a state of gas being much larger in volume than 
 when in a solid form, our planet had, at first, immense dimen- 
 sions.^ But, cooling continually during innumerable cen- 
 turies, the planet, at first vaporous, reached a fluid and 
 incandescent state, diminished in volume, and assumed, like 
 all bodies in rotation about an axis, a spherical form flattened 
 toward the poles. The cooling, continuing, produced a 
 solid crust which gradually thickened until it reached a 
 depth of about twelve thousand leagues, which is the depth 
 attributed to the earth's crust at the present day. Minerals 
 were formed at the same time in the mass. The earth's 
 radius being 1584 leagues, its crust can be only a sort of 
 bark ; its interior is still, as in the beginning, in a state of 
 fusion. 
 
 While this gradual cooling was going on, materials in a 
 state of ebullition, striking violently against the thin crust of 
 the earth, dislocated it in various parts, swelled it, pierced 
 through it, and thus produced the mountains. At other 
 times, in filling the fissures and crevices already produced, 
 they formed the mineral veins which we are now exploring. 
 
 At the same time there reigned about the earth an atmos- 
 phere charged with vapors, and with mineral and earthy 
 materials, constantly kept at a high temperature by the 
 heat of the mass in fusion. The temperature of this mass 
 lowering according as the solidity of the crust increased, 
 there were produced, by condensation, immense quantities 
 
 ^ What is here said of our globe must also be applied to the sun 
 and to our whole planetary system, which was originally one confused, 
 gaseous mass. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 75 
 
 of water which fell upon the surface of the earth. Mean- 
 while the heat of the superficial crust reduced them anew 
 to the state of vapors falling back into a liquid state. The 
 waters, however, coming into repeated contact with the sur- 
 face of the earth, decomposed it and formed insensibly 
 materials which they carried to the valleys and deposited 
 in successive strata. Finally, after a long struggle between 
 the liquid and the solid element, the waters ended by localiz- 
 ing and formed what we call the seas. The present volcanic 
 eruptions appear to be only feeble remnants of these in- 
 terior convulsions, which in the first ages must have been 
 much more violent and more general. This theory gives 
 heat, as we see, a preponderating influence in the formation 
 of the rocks. 
 
 Second System. — According to this system, a sort of 
 watery liquid must have primitively contained in solution the 
 elements of mineral substances. By pressure and chemical 
 combinations, all these materials passed into a solid state, 
 settling into crystalline forms and the various kinds of 
 rocks. This theory also contains a very specious explana- 
 tion of earthquakes, thermal waters, volcanic phenomena, 
 and other mysteries of nature. It has been called the chem- 
 ical theory in opposition to the first, which is called the phys- 
 ical. Though it is less accredited by scholars than its rival, 
 it does not lack illustrious defenders. 
 
 These two scientific systems are divided into several others, 
 and there are scholars who combine them both. What are 
 we to think of these systems? We are free, as we have 
 already said, to adopt whichever seems to us most probable. 
 Moses, it is true, says that there was a time when what is 
 now called the earth ''was void and empty" (in the Septua- 
 ginf unsightly and shapeless "), and that '' darkness was upon 
 the face of the deep '^; but this fact is acknowledged, without 
 exception, by all geologists. They are agreed as to an azoic 
 period destitute of all animate substance. 
 
 Remark upon the Age of the World. — We do not speak 
 
76 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 here of the age of man, that is, of the period which has elapsed 
 since mankind appeared upon the earth. We shall take up 
 this question later on. The age of the world is the period 
 comprised between the moment when God began to create be- 
 ings out of nothing and the present moment. It is composed 
 consequently, 1st, of an interval which may have existed 
 between the first moment of creation and the work of the six 
 days, properly so called; 2d, of the time which this work itself 
 lasted; 3d, of the years which have elapsed since that period 
 and the present time. We see at once that it is impossible 
 to deduce the age of the universe from the sacred text, since 
 between the first creation of the elements of matter and the 
 organization of these elements there may have elapsed an 
 absolutely unknown period of time. The question seems 
 more insolvable still when we study that of the six days, or 
 the Hexahemeron. 
 
 C. The Work of the Six Days, or the Hexahemeron.* — 
 After speaking, in the first verse of Genesis, of the general 
 creation of primitive matter, and specifying the chaotic state 
 of the earth in particular, the sacred historian relates the 
 ulterior organization of the earth, destined to be the abode of 
 an intelligent and free creature. He divides this organiza- 
 tion into six acts or periods which he calls days, with evening 
 and morning. Here is a summary of the Mosaic Hexaheme- 
 ron : The first day God caused light to spring from the bosom 
 of the darkness which enveloped the earth. The second day 
 He established the firmament in the midst of the waters by 
 separating the waters above from the waters below the firma- 
 ment, and He called the firmament heaven. The third day 
 He gathered into one place the waters under the firmament, 
 which He called seas, and caused the dry land to appear, 
 which He called the earth; the same day He conmianded the 
 earth to bring forth the green herbs which bear seed, and 
 fruit-trees which yield fruit, each according to its kind, each 
 
 ' C. W. xxiv. 490, xl. 145, xliv. 317, 351, 445; D. R. III. Ser. 
 V. 311, vi. 49; M. xli. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 77 
 
 having seed according to its kind. The fourth day He caused 
 the sun to shine in the firmament, to rule the day; and the 
 moon, to rule the night; and the stars. The fifth day He com- 
 manded the waters to bring forth creeping creatures having 
 life, and fowl that fly over the earth under the firmament of 
 heaven. The sixth day He commanded the earth to bring 
 forth the living creatures in its kind, cattle and creeping 
 things, and beasts of the earth according to their kinds. Fi- 
 nally, the same day He made man to His image and likeness, 
 and the seventh day He rested, that is. He ceased to create.^ 
 If we confine ourselves simply to reading the beginning of 
 Genesis, it would seem as though Moses had clearly indicated 
 a chronological order in the formation of our globe and of what 
 it contains. Yet how variously the Fathers and theologians 
 interpret this work of the six days! While a great number of 
 them admit the successive order of creation, the Alexandrian 
 school, particularly Clement and Origen, think that the his- 
 torian had no intention whatever of estabhshing this succes- 
 sion of days or epochs. They believe, on the contrary, that 
 God created everything at once; only Scripture, they say, 
 in order to accommodate itself to human intelligence, dis- 
 tinguishes and states separately the various works really 
 accomplished in one indivisible instant. Hence they find in 
 the Mosaic relation no chronologic-historic exposition, but 
 simply a logical interpretation of the creative activity. St. 
 Augustine also admits that everything was created at once. 
 In his opinion the days of creation are only the various logical 
 
 ^ Must this rest of the seventh day or the cessation of the creating 
 act be considered as extending universally to all beings or only to our 
 earth? In the first place, this repose even in regard to our earth is 
 not absolute : each day God creates a great number of souls to unite 
 them to bodies. And there is no reason why other worlds may not 
 spring again out of nothing at the creating word; and our planet even 
 give place one day to another when the destiny of man will be accom- 
 plished. It was for our moral and religious instruction that Moses 
 wrote, and not to satisfy our curiosity relative to points foreign to the 
 end he had in view. 
 
78 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 moments of knowledge which the angels had of the works of 
 God. As to St. Thomas Aquinas, he first remarks in his 
 general principles that when a text is susceptible of two 
 meanings, both conformable to CathoUc doctrine, we should 
 not arbitrarily exclude one, and claim that the other is the only 
 meaning of the Holy Spirit. Afterward applying this rule to 
 the present question, he carefully distinguishes the creation 
 itself from the order of the works of creation. Though he 
 proclaims with all the Fathers that the creation is a dogma of 
 faith, yet he ranges the question of order in the class of free 
 opinions. The opinion which affirms the chronologic order 
 seems to him, it is true, more simple and, at first sight, more 
 conformable to the letter of the text ; yet he finds the explana- 
 tion of St. Augustine more rational, more ingenious, more efji- 
 cacious in defending the Holy Scriptures against scoffers: 
 and he adds that he prefers the first. 
 
 Such authorities give us great freedom in interpreting the 
 work of the six days. Nothing obliges us to seek concord- 
 ance between the inspired text and scientific discoveries. 
 Hence but few of the objections raised in the name of 
 profane science against the Hexahemeron can be sus- 
 tained.* 
 
 Does this mean that the partisans of the chronologic-his- 
 toric interpretation are wrong when they endeavor to estab- 
 lish a positive concordance between the biblical narrative and 
 the results acquired by science? By no means. They also 
 are free to maintain their opinion, which has numerous and 
 illustrious supporters. They can do so all the more that they 
 believe it possible to show that the narrative of the creation 
 is, in its great outlines, in perfect harmony with the discov- 
 eries of contemporaneous science; that this narrative con- 
 tains the culminating facts of cosmogony, and, what is more 
 remarkable still, that it presents them in the very order 
 indicated by scholars. 
 
 Here is how a learned contemporary, M. Pfaff, expresses 
 
 ^Zahm, Bil)le, Science, etc., p. I. ch. 4; Schanz, I., ch. 15. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 79 
 
 himself on the subject of this concordance in his Histoire de 
 la creation : 
 
 " If we compare scientific data with the bibhcal history of 
 creation, we find that the latter agrees with these data as far 
 as we have any right to expect. We discover, in fact, the 
 same reigns, equally distinct in themselves : allowing for the 
 historic variations which they may have undergone, the 
 chronological sequence of their appearance is exactly given 
 by Moses. The primitive chaos ; the earth covered first by 
 the waters, then emerging from them; the formation of the 
 inorganic reign, followed by the vegetable reign; then of the 
 animal reign, of which the first representatives were the ani- 
 mals hving in the waters, and after them the animals of the 
 land; man appearing, finally, the last of all: this is indeed the 
 true succession of creatures; such, in fact, are the various 
 periods of the history of creation, periods designated under 
 the names of days." 
 
 This word day used by Moses, in the first verses of Genesis, 
 claims a special explanation in the system of those who hold 
 to the chronologic-historic sense. What are we to under- 
 stand by these days in which God organized primitive matter 
 and drew from it the creatures which constitute the entire 
 creation? We have great freedom in this interpretation. 
 In fact : 
 
 1st. The Hebrew word which we translate day is used in 
 that language, as in our own, metaphorically, in the sense of 
 time, period; the Scripture itself in several places, and in 
 the very chapter of which we are speaking, employs this 
 word to designate periods, and not days properly speaking. 
 There is nothing in this interpretation surprising to us who 
 constantly say, in the day of adversity, in the happy days 
 of my youth, etc. 
 
 2d. The Fathers of the Church and theologians give various 
 explanations of this word, as well as of the terms evening and 
 morning, and the Church, on her part, has defined nothing 
 ooncerning them, 
 
80 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 3d. St. Augustine even causes us to observe that the first 
 three days cannot be astronomical days, since there was 
 neither rising nor setting of sun : it is only on the fourth day 
 that the sun and moon appear and rule the day and the 
 night. 
 
 It is evident that we are perfectly justified in under- 
 standing by the word days undetermined periods of time of 
 greater or less duration, of thousands or of millions of years, 
 but finite, having a beginning and an end. 
 
 ''As to the words evening and morning which Moses em- 
 ploys, they have, even in Scripture, " says P.OUivier/' a double 
 literal sense which agrees perfectly with the system of day- 
 periods. They signify, first, end and beginning, or accom- 
 phshment and inception ; and thus the Mosaic formula means 
 that the accomplishment of each of the works of the six days, 
 developed gradually from its inception, marked a distinct 
 period of geogony. They signify afterward confusion and 
 arrangement; and in this sense, which is perhaps the more 
 acceptable, the same formula may be translated thus: From 
 the first state of confusion and of its arrangement was formed 
 the first period, . . . the second period, etc. This interpre- 
 tation seems to find support in the omission of the word ereb, 
 evening, before the description of the yom, or seventh day, 
 which is the day of rest. This day is certainly not a day of 
 twenty-four hours : it is a period which still endures and which 
 was not begun in a state of confusion." 
 
 What we have said may serve to solve several other special 
 difficulties. It will be well, however, to continue to mention, 
 in going over the sciences, the principal objections which may 
 be alleged against the Mosaic narration, and to demonstrate 
 briefly how little faith has to fear from them. 
 
 D. The Mosaic Deluge.^ — Here are the terms in which 
 Moses relates this great event. In the six hundredth year of 
 the life of Noe, in the second month, in the seventeenth 
 day of the month, all the fountains of the great deep were 
 
 ' Cf . also M. Ixii. 335 ff. ; C. W. xl. 635, xliv. 741, xlix. 17. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 81 
 
 broken up, and the floodgates of heaven were opened: and 
 the rain fell upon the earth forty days and forty nights. . . . 
 And the waters prevailed beyond measure upon the earth: 
 and all the high mountains under the whole heaven were 
 covered. The water was fifteen cubits higher than the 
 mountains which it covered. And all flesh was destroyed 
 that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of 
 beasts, and of all creeping things that creep upon the earth : 
 and all men, and all things wherein there is the breath of 
 hfe on the earth, died. And He destroyed all the substance 
 that was upon the earth, from man even to beast, and the 
 creeping things and fowls of the air: and they were destroyed 
 from the earth: and Noe only remained, and they that were 
 with him in the ark. And the waters prevailed upon the 
 earth a hundred and fifty days. (Gen. ch. vii.) 
 
 Let us remark, first, that geology, in its present state, pre- 
 sents no proof either for or against the deluge. This is not 
 astonishing; the inundation, being only a passing event, left 
 the surface of the earth almost intact: the vegetable reign 
 was not disturbed, the olive-tree reappeared in all its freshness 
 as soon as the waters subsided, and the animals on coming 
 out of the ark foimd their usual food. The deposits called 
 diluvium, as well as the erratic boulders or rocks formerly at^ 
 tributed to the Mosaic deluge, are of another source. 
 
 But if geology is silent, history speaks clearly. The fact of 
 the Mosaic deluge is so undeniable that to doubt it is to reject 
 all historic certainty. 
 
 1st. The account which Moses gives of this great catastrophe 
 in which the whole human race, with the exception of Noe 
 and his family, perished, is clear, accurate, and methodical. 
 The details are given in such a circumstantial, united, co- 
 ordinate manner as to form a sort of journal, or historic rec- 
 ord, properly speaking. Now all are agreed, and we have 
 demonstrated, that Moses (aside from being inspired, a fact 
 which we do not consider in all this part of our labor) is a 
 profoundly learned and eminently reliable author; there is 
 
82 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 nothing in his writings to justify the least suspicion of levity 
 or fraud. 
 
 2d. His account of the deluge, moreover, was admitted with- 
 out a shadow of reluctance by the Hebrews, his compatriots, 
 who would undoubtedly have protested if this marvellous 
 event had not been recognized as incontestable. A great 
 number of the bibhcal writers who followed were faithful 
 echoes of Moses, and Jesus Christ Himself, as well as the 
 apostles, confirmed his testimony in formal terms. Profane 
 historians, those of the Jewish nation, like Josephus and 
 Philo, as well as those of other nations, are no less 
 exphcit. 
 
 3d. We find the same unanimity in the traditions or chron- 
 icles of all the white races: always a mass of water in which 
 everything is swallowed up, a single couple saved by taking 
 refuge in a ship, a mountain upon which this ship rested, a bird 
 sent out at the end of the catastrophe, and even a rainbow. 
 And, what is no less striking, all or nearly all these traditions 
 locate this event about the same period. * 
 
 4th. Let us add that the event is so well established that 
 even unbeUevers, like Bailly, Freret, Boulanger, are forced 
 to yield to the truth of conviction. Hear what the latter 
 says : '' Let us take, in the traditions of men, a fact the 
 truth of which is universally recognized. What is this 
 fact? I know of no event whose monuments are attested 
 more generally than the monuments which have been 
 transmitted to us by that famous physical revolution 
 which, it is said, formerly changed the face of our globe, 
 and occasioned a renewal of human society. In a word, 
 the deluge seems to me the real epoch in the history of 
 nations. Not only is the tradition which transmits it the 
 most ancient, but it is also clear and intelligent, it 
 presents to us a fact which can be justified and confirmed 
 by universal suffrage, since the tradition of it is found in all 
 languages and in all countries of the world." " Not only the 
 * Lord Arundel, Tradition, ch. 10 £F. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 83 
 
 Aryan and the Semitic races," says Renan, '' but nearly all 
 peoples head their annals with a struggle against a humid 
 element, represented by a great cataclysm." The fact of the 
 deluge, therefore, is incontestable. Hence none of the objec- 
 tions formulated against it have any real value. Moreover, 
 we must bear in mind that it is an event miraculous in its 
 cause, in its announcement, and in its agent : it was God who 
 used the deluge to punish a guilty human race ; it was He who, 
 a hundred years in advance, uttered His prophetic menaces; 
 it was He who at the same time opened the abyss of the earth 
 and the floodgates of heaven. Now nothing is impossible to 
 the Almighty. Hence, though science may be unable to an- 
 swer the questions which arise concerning the manner of this 
 great catastrophe, it argues nothing against the reality of the 
 catastrophe itself. 
 
 But is it true that science casts no light upon this subject? 
 Far from it. First it is necessary to remark that the prin- 
 cipal objections raised by Carl Vogt and other scholars 
 against this cataclysm vanish of themselves the moment we 
 assmne that the Mosaic deluge did not cover all the habitahle 
 earth. Now nothing obhges us to believe that the entire 
 globe was submerged by the diluvian waters. It is true that 
 Moses, to mark the extent of the disaster, uses at one time 
 the expression " all the earth," and at another an expression 
 equivalent to it, '' under the whole heaven," universa terra, 
 sub universa caelo; but these expressions do not imply abso- 
 lute universahty; in fact, in many parts of the Scriptures 
 they evidently apply to only a part of the earth. Thus a 
 number of theologians, following the opinion already pro- 
 claimed at the end of the seventeenth century by the scientist 
 Isaac Vossius, interpret the words of Moses in the sense of a 
 deluge which covered only all the then inhabited portion of 
 the globe, destroying the human race, with the exception of 
 eight persons shut up in the ark. We know, moreover, that 
 not all the countries of the universe were inhabited by men. 
 Moses, adopting the current language of his time, and wishing 
 
84 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 to be understood by those to whom he spoke, naturally 
 meant to convey by the expression " under the whole 
 heaven " the celestial space which covered the countries in- 
 habited by Noe and his compatriots, that is, a part of Asia. 
 
 This explanation of the sacred text, largely accepted by 
 exegetists, is in no way condemned by the Church ; never has 
 it been defined a dogma of faith that the diluvian waters sub- 
 merged even the uninhabited parts of the globe. In adopt- 
 ing this interpretation we destroy the very foundation of 
 the objections current relative to the deluge. '^ Discussions 
 concerning the history of the deluge," says M. Pfaff, "are 
 now without object for the naturalist, since theologians recog- 
 nize that we may receive the account of Genesis as signifying, 
 not that all the mountains on the globe were simultaneously 
 inundated, but that all humanity was destroyed by a power- 
 ful volume of water. This is granting that the deluge was a 
 partial submersion of the globe. The scientist has no oppo- 
 sition to offer to the fact of the deluge thus explained: it is 
 impossible for him to prove that a partial deluge, the existence 
 of which is, moreover, affirmed by the traditions of nearly 
 all nations, may not have taken place or has not really taken 
 place." 
 
 There is an opinion more recent still according to which the 
 deluge may not have extended universally to all men. This 
 opinion has been defended and attacked in various learned 
 pubhcations. Let us content ourselves with reporting the 
 judgment of a competent authority Hke the Abbe Vigouroux. 
 " We reject, " he says, " this interpretation because it is con- 
 trary to the general tradition of the Church, and nothing 
 demonstrates that this tradition is an erroneous interpreta- 
 tion of the sacred text." 
 
 Let us add a few subsidiary remarks. 
 
 1st. There is nothing in regard to the construction of the ark 
 which need greatly surprise us. Why could not Noe, who was 
 rich enough to engage a sufficient number of strong, intelH- 
 gent workmen, and who had a hundred years in which to 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 85 
 
 accomplish his work, execute the order of God at a time when 
 the arts and sciences were well advanced, when they built 
 great cities, when they raised those monuments of Baalbak, 
 the ancient Hehopohs of Syria, the great ruins of which still 
 tax the imagination of modern times? We refer to the most 
 ancient part of these ruins, for there is another part which 
 does not go farther back than the Antonines. " While the 
 great stones of the pyramids," says Lamartine in his Voyage 
 en Orient, ^'do not exceed 18 feet in length, the hewn blocks 
 of granite of Baalbak, which form the basis of the temples, 
 are 156 feet long, from 15 to 16 feet wide, and of unknown 
 thickness; and these enormous masses were taken from dis- 
 tant quarries, then hoisted one above another at a distaDce 
 of 20 or 30 feet above the ground. Hence it is beheved," 
 adds the same author, " that these gigantic stones were 
 moved either b}^ men whom all primitive histories call giants, 
 or by antediluvian men." Burckhard, who measured a few 
 of these blocks, found the largest was 55.50 metres in length 
 3.65 metres in width and of equal thickness. 
 
 Let us conclude that it was not more difficult to construct 
 the ark than to raise the stones of Baalbak : according to this 
 evidence of strength and intelhgence, the construction of the 
 ark must have been mere play. 
 
 2d. In regard to the capacity of the ark, it has been proved 
 by estimates made repeatedly by M. Le Pelletier, by the 
 learned Abbe Maupied, by Silberschlag, the skilful architect 
 of Berhn, and by the French Vice-Admiral Thevenard, that 
 the ark could contain many more kinds of animals, mammals, 
 birds, and reptiles than exist at present, as well as the food 
 necessary for them. 
 
 Tiele has calculated that the capacity of the ark was 
 3,600,000 cubic feet, and that thus there was, reserving nine 
 tenths for provisions, sufficient space to lodge very conven- 
 iently nearly 7000 kinds of animals, at the rate of one couple 
 of each kind. This was evidently a larger number of species 
 than was necessary, for, according to our supposition of a 
 
86 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETIOS. 
 
 partial deluge, Noe did not need to take more than a rela- 
 tively limited number of animal species. 
 
 Men competent to judge have also shown that the ark, in a 
 nautical point of view, was of the best possible proportions, 
 so much so that it may be regarded as a veritable master- 
 piece. 
 
 3d. Other objections quite as untenable have been raised in 
 the name of ethnology and philology. To explain how the 
 descendants of Noe had time to form the various races of 
 which we shall speak later, and which are stated to have ex- 
 isted as far back as we can go, and to explain also how human 
 language can be as varied as it is at the present day, we need 
 only observe that the date of the deluge is unknown to us. 
 We shall prove, in speaking of the antiquity of peoples, that 
 for the first ages of humanity there is, properly speaking, no 
 biblical chronology, and that we do not know at what period 
 the Mosaic deluge took place. We can maintain that this 
 terrible chastisement was inflicted by God on the human race 
 at a time much nearer that of Adam than is generally sup- 
 posed. There is nothing to prevent its dating as far back as 
 historic and archseologic sciences require.^ 
 
 II. The Bible and Astronomy. 
 
 We shall confine ourselves to answering a few objections 
 formulated in the name of astronomical science; they are 
 directed specially against the work of the first and of the 
 fourth day.^ 
 
 First Objection. — Why are heavenly bodies, incom- 
 parably greater than the earth, represented as simple acces- 
 sories of the latter, as luminaries in its service? 
 
 Answer. — 1st. We have only to remember that Moses 
 was not writing an astronomy and had no need to treat his 
 work from the point of view of modern mechanism. Writing 
 
 ^Thein, The Bible and Rat., p. iv. ch. 15; Anthropol., ch. 16. 
 ^ Schanz, L, ch. 16. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 87 
 
 to instruct the inhabitants of the earth in their religious 
 duties, he speaks of the heavens according as they appear to 
 our senses and according to the relative influence of each star 
 upon our planet. Do not all writers, with the exception of 
 those whose object it is to give a precise exposition of 
 science, speak, even at the present day, in absolutely similar 
 terms? It is unimportant for us to know whether Moses 
 received or did not receive from God precise ideas concern- 
 ing the sun and the stars; what is certain is that, consider- 
 ing his object, he should not have spoken otherwise than he 
 did. 
 
 2d. Our planet, moreover, while filling a very modest r61e 
 in the astronomical system, has, because of its connection wdth 
 the divine plan of the redemption, a much more striking one 
 in the religious order. If it pleased God to choose the grain 
 of sand which we call the earth upon which to place the king 
 of creation, and above all to make it the theatre of revelation 
 and of the Incarnation of the Word, why should not Moses 
 speak of the earth in a very special manner? Jerusalem was 
 very insignificant in comparison with the illustrious cities of 
 antiquity, and yet Holy Scripture does not speak of the latter, 
 or mentions them only in connection with the history of Jeru- 
 salem and of the Jemsh people. Who could take offence at 
 this? 
 
 And let us not say it is strange that God should specially 
 choose a little globe like ours to make it the habitation of 
 man and the theatre of the Incarnation. There is much which 
 could be said in reply to this, but we shall content ourselves 
 with a few beautiful reflections from a conference of P. 
 Olivier, S.J. ''The grotto of Bethlehem," he says, ''was a 
 very humble and obscure place for the birth of the Redeemer 
 of the world; why then did God prefer it to a magnificent 
 palace in some illustrious city? Let us not search into the 
 secret designs of God: unless God Himself reveal them to us, 
 our search will be vain. We may ask man the reason of his 
 conduct, but with God we ask what is His good pleasure. His 
 
88 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 will is the reason of all things, for it is ever just and holy, 
 blending with His infinite wisdom. After all, immensity, in 
 His sight, is no more than a grain of sand; and if He has 
 chosen the grain of sand which we call the earth to place 
 upon it the king of creation, it is because He has made this 
 earth suitable to bear Him. Moreover, even though God in 
 creating the worlds had no other object than to offer the mind 
 of man an inexhaustible subject of study, and to the heart of 
 man a touching motive of gratitude and love, who would dare 
 to declare this end imworthy of Him whose power has no 
 limits, and whose magnificence equals His power? 
 
 ''After that, each one is free to prefer that there exist in 
 other worlds free and intelligent creatures, composed hke man 
 of body and soul, of matter and spirit, and endowed hke 
 him, by the goodness of their author, with all the means of 
 existence suitable to their nature and their end. 
 
 ''At the same time we are not ill pleased to see in man 
 alone the final cause of the visible creation, and, conse- 
 quently, in the earth which bears him the most august place 
 and, before God, the true centre of the universe. Has not 
 God so loved man as to give him His only Son ? And what are 
 all the worlds compared to this divine gift? Has He not even 
 made man divine, by associating his poor human nature with 
 the divine nature in the person of the incarnate Word, and is 
 not man, thus transfigured, greater than all the worlds that 
 roll in space? If the Christ, first announced and prefigured, 
 afterward appearing on the earth, and finally perpetuating 
 Himself there m His work, which is His Church, and in His 
 sacrament of love, which is the Eucharist, is truly the centre 
 of the history of humanity, why should he not also be the 
 centre of the history of worlds? And if this conclusion should 
 not seem rash, do you think the starry firmament a dome too 
 great and too magnificent for this earth destined to bear the 
 Man-God? Certanily it is very beautiful to think of the 
 heavens as peopled by beings who recognize and adore the 
 Creator; is it less so to see in them satellites — may astronomy 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 89 
 
 pardon us the term! — stationed, like the Magi at Bethlehem, 
 about the humble dwelling of their sovereign Master, bowing 
 with respect before this earth so small and yet so great, hon- 
 ored by His presence and sanctified by His divine blood? 
 Does not one drop of the blood of Jesus weighed in the balance 
 of truth outweigh all the worlds ever created ; and the sacri- 
 fice of the cross, and the sacrifice of our altars which renews 
 and perpetuates it throughout the world, do they not suffice, 
 were man the only intelligent creature after the angels, to 
 justify all the magnificence of the universe? " * 
 
 Remark. — 1st. Apropos of this objection, it is well to ob- 
 serve that never has either the Holy Scripture or the Catholic 
 Church taught that the earth is the central point of the 
 material world, or that it dwells motionless in space, while 
 the sun and the stars revolve about it as about their centre of 
 motion. As the earth was believed immovable by the Greek 
 and Roman world, it was natural that this opinion should 
 reappear among a large number of the Fathers of the Church. 
 In this, as in many other things outside their immediate 
 province, they followed the ideas universally received; but 
 their error on this point has nothing common with faith. 
 Hence it did not prevent Copernicus, a sincere believer and 
 priest, from breaking down this false system. In any case. 
 Scripture has nothing whatever to do with the geocentric 
 error. It is content to affirm that the sun, moon, and stars 
 serve to light and vivify the earth. Who can deny this fact 
 as evident as the day? 
 
 2d. Let us add still another word on the hypothesis of the 
 
 ^ According to M. Faye, the earth is far from being of minimum 
 importance in an astronomical point of view. This learned scholar 
 says that, of the myriads of stars discovered by the telescope, not 
 one is inhabited, and the reason that he gives for this, is that they are 
 all in full incandescence; and he adds that none of them ever will 
 be inhabited, because at the period of their extinction, when a living 
 being could set foot on their cooled and solidified crust, there would be, 
 owing to their immense distance one from another, no neighboring 
 sun to impart to them light and heat. 
 
90 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 plurality of inhabited worlds.^ This hypothesis has been 
 sustained with talent by several Catholic writers, particularly 
 by Father Secchi, S. J. ; but though there is nothing condem- 
 natory in their opinion, it affords, according to our mind, no 
 convincing proof. It is in no way repugnant to us to think 
 that these innumerable stars which people the universe con- 
 tain intelligent creatures capable of knowing God; we have 
 no difficulty in admitting that, if these creatures really exist, 
 they had no need of redemption, or that God manifested His 
 mercy to them in a manner unkno^^^I to us, or that they 
 shared in the effects of the blood of infinite price shed on 
 Calvary. But we do not see why man may not be the final 
 cause of all the visible creation, why God, to whom nothing 
 is impossible, may not have created these great planets in 
 innumerable multitudes to give man a greater idea of His 
 almighty power, and also to detach him more easily from the 
 contemptible things of earth. 
 
 Second Objection. — How was the earth produced before 
 the sun, which is the centre of its orbit, the regulator of its 
 movement, the principle of its fecundity, and, perhaps, its 
 regenerating focus? 
 
 Answer. — This objection is absolutely without founda- 
 tion, for it does not necessarily follow from the words of 
 Genesis that the earth was created before the sun and stars. 
 Commentators admit that these words: ''God created heaven 
 and earth,'' imply that the stars were created at the same time 
 as the earth in its chaotic state; but that various causes — 
 for example, the heavy vapors which primitively enveloped 
 the earth — may have rendered the stars invisible to it ; it would 
 be only on the fourth day, in the fourth period, when these 
 vapors disappeared, that the sun and moon would have 
 begun, in their definite and complete form, to shine upon 
 our globe. According to these exegetists, this is the sense in 
 which we must understand the words of Genesis regarding 
 
 ^Schanz, I., ch. 17; C. Q. R. ix. 193, 452; C. W. xxxvii. 49, 
 Iv. 860, Ivi. 18. 
 
HiSTOmC VALUE OF TfiE BIBLE. 91 
 
 the fourth day. There is no doubt that this sense is suffi- 
 ciently justified by the estabUshment of visible and normal 
 relations between these stars and our globe. We must 
 observe, however, that Moses does not say, God then created 
 the sun, moon, and stars, but, God made, that is, caused to 
 appear. Whatever the truth of this explanation, the Church 
 has not condenaned it, consequently the most rigid exegetists 
 may freely use it. 
 
 Third Objection. — Does it seem probable that God took 
 five days to organize our Httle globe when He needed but one 
 to create all the w^orlds of sidereal space? 
 
 Answer. — Where do w^e read that God employed but one 
 day for this last work? Moses, it is true, tells us in detail 
 the manner in which God prepared the earth, the cradle of 
 the human race ; that is, he tells us what it most concerns us 
 to know: he informs us at what moment the stars became 
 useful luminaries to the earth; but he had not to make 
 known to us how these stars were formed, or the time that 
 this formation may have required. Moreover, this fourth 
 day or fourth period may, hke the others, include milHons of 
 years. Hence astronomers have a free field for their 
 hypotheses; they have no need to fear contradiction from 
 Scripture, which is silent on this point. 
 
 Fourth Objection. — We cannot admit, when the sun 
 did not exist, (a) the existence of hght; (6) of vegetation. 
 
 a. We can hardly understand how one could venture to 
 propose such an objection. If it had any real value, we 
 should have to conclude that it is impossible ever to have 
 light at night. It is daily evident to the most ignorant that 
 there exist sources of light other than the sun. The very 
 light of the lamp by which Voltaire, perhaps, wrote this 
 ridiculous objection ought to have shown him its absurdity. 
 Who does not know that to render dark bodies luminous noth- 
 ing more is required than a high temperature or an intense 
 and rapid chemical combination? Will not electricity send 
 forth brilUant sparks of light in the midst of int'erse darkTies'B? 
 
92 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Certainly the combination of cosmic elements at the beginning 
 of the world had sufficient power to produce a Hght in no way 
 inferior to that of the sun. Let us observe that the mass of 
 matter which we now call the sun has passed through two 
 different states : it existed first in a nebulous state, endowed 
 with a certain power of giving light, like other nebulae still 
 observed by astronomers; later, under the influence of 
 numerous attractions, its constitution underwent an intimate 
 change, and became that of the planet which we to-day behold. 
 In both of these states this mass may have been the hght of 
 day to our globe; thus it is manifestly evident that Hght 
 could have reached us before the sun had its definite form. 
 
 h. We are still less embarrassed by the objection concerning 
 the existence of vegetation before the appearance of the sun 
 under its present form, for this existence is completely 
 established by geology. Hear the testimony of Hugh Miller 
 on this subject: ''At no other period [the coal period, before 
 the influence of the sun, at least under the form which we 
 now see] was there so magnificent a flora. For example, 
 there were 2500 kinds of ferns (there are now only sixty in 
 Europe), and they were of gigantic size. The trunk of the 
 Calamus, a kind of reed, grew, probably in a few months, to 
 30 feet in diameter." This is the fact; we are not called 
 upon to explain it. Let us remark, however, that electric 
 light possesses all the qualities necessary for the accomplish- 
 ment of phenomena essential to vegetation. It is the same 
 with all kinds of light, natural and artificial. It is well known 
 that the same gigantic vegetation has been found at the poles 
 and at the equator: a high temperature united with uniforai 
 and constant humidity prevailed then over the whole earth. To 
 explain this primitive condition we may have recourse to the 
 scientific hypothesis we have mentioned. The sun under its 
 nebulous form could send its light and diffuse its heat to the 
 earth through the thick vaporous covering which enveloped it.^ 
 
 ^ We shall examine the question of Galileo in the second part of 
 this course, Ch. IV. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 93 
 
 III. The Bible and Biology.* 
 
 We have just seen that faith has nothing to fear from 
 geology, or the science of the earth, nor from astronomy, or 
 the science of the heavens. Let us prove that it is still 
 more secure on the side of biology, or the science of Hfe. 
 
 According to Scripture, God, by an act of His almighty 
 power, created different kinds of plants and animals and gave 
 them the faculty of reproduction. Impious naturalists 
 attack this teaching in the name of what they call spontaneous 
 generation. Spontaneous generation, according to them, 
 consists in the formation of certain hving creatures not 
 only from preexisting germs, but solely from the influence 
 of chemical and physical forces inherent in matter. Thus, 
 according to their theory, a hving being, whether plant or 
 animal, can be brought into hfe without preexisting germs 
 furnished by antecedent hfe, by the simple effect of physico- 
 chemical reaction, ^'hke sugar or vitriol." And they argue 
 that if this can be done now, it could always be done, and that 
 the hypothesis of creation from hving organisms is at least 
 superfluous. Such is the objection presented by the heter- 
 ogenist materiahsts. 
 
 Answer. — Not only is the alleged fact of purely spon- 
 taneous generation, that is, without preexisting germs, 
 unproved, but it is a hypothesis that is no longer even tenable, 
 and it is rejected by the most competent authorities. '' No 
 one since Redi," says M. Flourens, ''beheves any longer in 
 the spontaneous generation of insects; that of intestinal 
 worms finds no defenders since Balbiani, and since the experi- 
 ments of Pasteur, it has been generally abandoned in regard 
 to every kind of animalculse." "We consider the doctrine 
 of spontaneous generation definitely condemned," says M. 
 Quatrefages. " Not a single positive fact," says Virchow, '' is 
 
 ' SeeMivart; Beale; Th. Hughes, S.J. ; O'Neill; Quatrefages; Gerard; 
 Thein, The Bible, etc., p. IV.; D. R., III. Ser. xiii. 332; A. C. Q. xix. 
 673, vi. 193, 542, xvii. 449; C. W. xliv. 654; Br. W. ix. 365,485, 495, 
 xix. 673. 
 
94 
 
 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 known to prove that there has ever been such a thing as 
 spontaneous generation, or that inorganic matter has ever 
 been spontaneously transformed into an organic being." No 
 one, not even Darwin, despite his theories of transformation, 
 accepts it; Littre himself, even before his conversion, though 
 the hypothesis accorded then so well with his atheism, 
 rejected it. But it is particularly important to hear the 
 opinion of the best authority in the matter. Here is how 
 M. Pasteur, one of the glories of the Academy of Sciences of 
 Paris, terminated a lesson given at the Sorbonne, in the 
 presence of the most eminent scientists: ''There has never 
 been a single known instance of beings coming into the 
 world without parents. Those who affirm the contrary are 
 victims of illusions or of causes which they could not appre- 
 ciate or which they did not remove." ^ On another occasion 
 he said: "I am convinced that, in the present state of 
 science, spontaneous generation is a chimera. It is impos- 
 sible to contradict me, for my experiments are all unrefuted, 
 and all prove my assertion." After his memorable works, 
 confirmed by the experiments of Schultze, Schwann, Milne- 
 Edwards, and the obsen^ations of Payen, Quatrefages, and 
 Dumas, the Academy of Sciences announced this fundamental 
 law of biological science: ''All organized beings, in the 
 actual state of our globe, receive life from bodies already 
 Hving; large and small are born of ancestry." 
 
 ^ Air apparently the most pure contains an infinite amount of 
 vegetable and animal germs which easily pass through any filter or 
 by any stopple. These germs, when placed in the proper medium, 
 begin to develop and then cause the fermentation or decomposition 
 of diverse substances. By shutting off, under the most minute pre- 
 cautions, all contact with such germs, Dr. Pasteur has been able 
 to establish the fact that life never appears spontaneously in organic 
 matter; that the most changeable liquids may be preserved intact 
 for an indefinite time, provided that the ferments supplied by the 
 air are kept out. It is well known that these discoveries of Pasteur 
 have enabled modern surgery to make such wonderful progress by 
 means of antiseptic treatment that it can confidently undertake sur- 
 gical operations which untU recently were cowsidered impossible. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 95 
 
 Remarks.— 1st. The hypothesis of spontaneous generation, 
 even if proved true, would not accomplish the end desired by 
 a certain number of its partisans. With it they would dis- 
 prove the fact of creation and thereby the existence of God. 
 But were we to admit that now and at the beginning of the 
 world hfe sprang of itself from matter, there would still re- 
 main to be explained the first appearance of this matter and 
 the properties we assign to it. It must have existed, it 
 has not the power to produce itself; hence it must owe its 
 existence to a being anterior and superior to it. We always 
 have to return, whether we will or not, to a creating act, to 
 the intervention of the divine almighty power. 
 
 2d. Science demonstrates, moreover, that hfe has not always 
 existed upon the earth : that it had a beginning. It is equally 
 certain that, up to the present day, no living creature was 
 ever found that did not spring from another being endowed 
 with life. This fact and this law, the existence of which is 
 absolutely established, is a singular embarrassment to ma- 
 terialists: to sustain their absurd system of the eternity of 
 matter they must not only repudiate a metaphysical proof 
 accepted as irrefutable by the best authorities, but they must 
 set aside the conclusions of science itself, that is, the testimony 
 of observation and experiment. This is hard for men who 
 affect to accept only such means of certainty and to place 
 faith in nothing but science. 
 
 3d. Another remarkable thing is that the more science 
 progresses, the nearer it approaches the Christian dogma. 
 Virchow himself, to whom virtue and vice appeared only as 
 chemical products like sugar and vitriol, and thought was 
 nothing but a secretion of the brain, has at last been forced 
 to write these significant words: ^'To attribute the produc- 
 tion of life and of mind to a simple evolution of the organic 
 world is to admit a pure hypothesis and to leave the grounds 
 of science." He goes further still: ''Inasmuch as the action 
 of matter can no longer be considered as the last cause of the 
 production of beings, ample room is left for a higher causality 
 
96 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 which we have not the right to declare impossible. The 
 question of theism stands out in all its greatness and power 
 before us." Haeckel, one of the high-priests of the material- 
 istic and godless science, has not the courage frankly to 
 acknowledge the triumph of truth. Yet he confesses that 
 ''if we reject spontaneous generation, we must admit mir- 
 acles." 
 
 4th. Scientists have not only proved that there was a time 
 when no living being existed on earth, but they also tell us 
 now that the day will come when all hfe shall disappear from 
 our globe. Some venture even to indicate approximately the 
 epoch of this extinction. It is a well-established fact that 
 some of the stars which people the heavens are gradually 
 losing their hght and heat; that even our sun has considerably 
 cooled, and that the time will come when it will no longer 
 send enough heat upon this earth to sustain life. But this 
 cooling process is not the only cause that, sooner or later, is 
 to bring about the cessation of life here below. Scientific 
 research has led to the discovery of several other causes of 
 inevitable ruin. In discussing these causes scientists, very 
 properly, simply move within the sphere assigned to them ; 
 they foresee and foretell what may or must happen accord- 
 ing to the data of science. As Christians we know that, if 
 the words of revelation are taken in their literal sense, our 
 globe will be destroyed by fire. 
 
 We see, then, that in regard to the question of the end of the 
 world, there is also no antagonism between the teaching of 
 faith and that of science. Rather, science has demonstrated 
 with equal clearness that, however constant the sum of the 
 energies of the universe, the quantity of vibratory energy or 
 heat increases unceasingly with the loss of visible energy; 
 hence it follows that the whole universe tends to a Hmited 
 state or existence: it must die. ''We find," says Claudius, 
 "a natural law which allows us to infer with certainty that 
 in this universe all things have not an invariable circular 
 course; but that well- determined modifications take place 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 97 
 
 which will bring about a limit to existence. '^ From this the 
 same scientist infers that the world must have had a begin- 
 ning. "If the world," he says paradoxically, "were from 
 eternity, it would be dead to-day." 
 
 IV. The Bible and Paleontology. 
 
 1. Order of Creation of Organisms. 
 
 Paleontology is a science relating to animals and vegetables 
 which no longer exist, but of which the ruins or fossil remains 
 are found in the depths of the earth's crust. The name fossil 
 is given to those organic bodies, or recognizable traces of 
 them, which are found in the interior strata of the globe. 
 Such fossils are found from granite to the soil of the quaternary 
 period, where unmistakable traces of man appear. Only 
 the general lines of paleontology are yet definitely deter- 
 mined. Its numerous discoveries are nothing compared 
 to those which remain to be made, and its conclusions con- 
 tradict one another in various points. If the strata which 
 we have mentioned were laid regularly one upon another 
 like the leaves of a book, we should only have to lift them, 
 just as we turn the pages of a book, to read with certainty 
 the relative age of fossil formation. But this is by no means 
 the case; the leaves are scattered, mutilated, or misplaced 
 like the contents of an ill-paged volume. This explains the 
 want of agreement between scholars seeking to reconstruct 
 this book of nature. The discussions wax warmest when 
 there is question of determining the time necessary for the 
 formation of the different strata: some say innumerable 
 centuries; others, a much shorter time; othei'S again explain 
 everything by certain great upheavals of nature. We have 
 no need to range ourselves with any side, and We do not 
 pretend to make paleontology, particularly as it is known at 
 the present day, a confirmation of the Bible. " The twentieth 
 century," says Quinstet, "will probably laugh at our science, 
 just as we laugh at that of our predecessors"; and Lyell 
 
98 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 insists that the second half of this century does little but 
 correct the scientific opinions of the first half. 
 
 Are the organic remains of animals and plants which we 
 discover in the bosom of the earth buried in the order indi- 
 cated by the biblical account, and do the periods, as paleon- 
 tology now presents them, confirm or contradict the six 
 periods of creation rigidly interpreted? 
 
 Two theories sum up the hypotheses of scientists in this 
 matter; for it is useless to mention to-day the absolutely 
 untenable notions of those who attribute fossils to earth- 
 quakes which have taken place since the fall of the first man. 
 Now, neither of these theories presents anything which 
 could embarrass the Cathohc scientist. We must always 
 bear in mind, moreover, that we are in no way obHged to con- 
 sider the Mosaic relation of the creation and of the formation 
 of the world and the earth as a chronologic-historic account. 
 
 First Theory. — This includes the systems which, with a 
 great variety of shades and detail, agree in referring the forma- 
 tion of all fossils to the intermediate period between the first 
 creating act and the work of the six days. Before this Gene- 
 sitic week the earth was covered, the theory assumes, with 
 organic beings, and this animal and vegetable world was de- 
 stroyed by certain catastrophes the effects of which are 
 indicated by these words of the second verse of Genesis: 
 "The earth was void and empty, and darkness was upon the 
 face of the deep." 
 
 This hypothesis cannot contradict the sacred text, since 
 it is absolutely silent upon this point. Let us remark, how- 
 ever, that the theory seems to us to have but Httle foundation. 
 
 Second Theory. — This places the phenomena of fossihza- 
 tion in the Genesitic week by interpreting the days as unde- 
 termined periods of time. It assumes that during these 
 periods occurred the great earthquakes which swallowed up 
 whole generations of plants and animals. 
 
 This theory also is far from contradicting the Mosaic 
 account. First, it does not prevent us from regarding the 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 99 
 
 vegetables and animals created during the six days as the 
 ancestors of the present fauna and flora. The sacred text per- 
 mits the assumption that, during these earthquakes, certain 
 species were definitely destroyed; that others were preserved; 
 finally, that others, after their destruction, were reproduced 
 in the interval of the six periods. This suffices for our end. 
 
 It might be asked whether the organic debris of animals 
 and vegetables discovered in the crust of the earth have 
 been buried there in the order followed by the biblical narra- 
 tive, and, consequently, whether the epochs established 
 at the present day by paleontology confirm or deny the six 
 bibhcal periods of creation. In answer to this it is enough to 
 repeat that nothing binds us to see a chronologic-historic 
 order in the Mosaic story regarding the formation of the 
 world and of our earth; that there are, however, many 
 Catholic scientists who admit that order of succession and 
 point out a surprising conformity between the Mosaic report 
 and the results of science. 
 
 2. The Origin of Man. Transformism} 
 
 Man was created after the plants, fishes, birds, reptiles, and 
 all the mammalia; he is the last and the highest work of 
 creation, and he owes his existence to an immediate and 
 special act on the part of God. Such is the teaching of the 
 Bible: ''God created man to His own image." The doctrine 
 of the Church on this point is no less clear. Hence a Christian 
 cannot consider man as simply evolved from a monkey or 
 from any animal whatever. Contrary to this doctrine, 
 Darwin, Carl Vogt with others, and as early as the beginning 
 of this century Lamarck, assigned man a different origin. 
 
 ^ See references on page 93; also Gaynor, New Materialism ; Burnet, 
 Why, etc., ch. 4, 5; Rickaby in C. T. S. i.; articles in A. C. Q. i. 
 126, ii. 598, 644, viii. 193, xvi. 280; C. W. x. 252, 332, 656, xxv. 
 90, xxvi. 490, 774, xxxix. 194, 289; M. Ixxiv. 14, 203, 491, xciv. 113, 
 249; D. R., New Ser. xvii. 1, III. Ser. xxi. 51, xxiii. 33. 
 
100 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 According to them, he is the result of an incalculable series 
 of successive transformations: a first organism, to which 
 they give the name of monad or protoplasm, etc., underwent 
 progressive development during innumerable centuries, and 
 ended by producing successively all kinds of plants and 
 animals, terminating finally with man. This theory, which 
 includes man himself in the series of evolutions, is absolutely 
 false and inadmissible. 
 
 We must beware, however, of confounding special systems, 
 pursued too often for an impious and materialistic end, with 
 the general conception of transformism. The falseness of 
 preconceived anti-religious systems does not necessarily 
 involve the condemnation of the transformist theory itself. 
 
 The transformist theory is that which assumes the general 
 transformation of species by the forces of nature only. It is 
 well known to-day that, by careful culture and intelligent 
 crossing, plants and animals are easily transformed and 
 improved, and new varieties and races obtained. Nature 
 itself, aided by climate, environment, and food, continues 
 to produce before our eyes similar transformations. We 
 naturally ask whether this nature, more powerful than man, 
 and no doubt more efficacious in the beginning of its plastic 
 forms, when the influence of heredity was absent, did not 
 formerly produce not only varieties of race, but new and 
 more perfect species. If this be the case, all the species of 
 plants and animals known at the present day may have 
 developed, in the course of innumerable ages, from a small 
 number of primordial types, or even from one initial type. 
 We have not to examine this question scientifically. Our 
 duty is only to examine whether this theory of transformism, 
 which assumes that more perfect living beings are derived 
 from less perfect living beings, is or is not contrary to Catholic 
 teaching. 
 
 We should unhesitatingly answer No if it were a question 
 of vegetables and animals, to the exclusion of man. The 
 Bible affirmS; it is true; that God created all the animals, 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 101 
 
 each according to its kind; but these words could still be 
 verified even if these species were not fixed and unchangeable. 
 Let us remark, however, that the primordial determination 
 of species by the creating act seems rather to indicate a law 
 in virtue of which each species was henceforth to be fixed 
 and immutable. 
 
 The question is more grave and complicated in regard to 
 man. Man, by reason of his soul, is so distinct from all 
 organisms that we cannot conceive as possible a natural 
 transition from an animal, even the most perfect animal, to 
 the human nature. Thus the Bible, describing the origin of 
 man, mentions a special act of the Creator in the production 
 of his body as well as his soul. But does the sacred text 
 formally indicate the manner in which God created the body 
 of Adam out of dust? Was it by an immediate act of His 
 almighty power, as the words seem to indicate (Gen. ii. 7), 
 or was it through the medium of secondary causes? The 
 philosophic reflections we have just made lead us to accept 
 the biblical account in its most natural sense, that is, in the 
 sense of an immediate act. It has always been so accepted 
 by the Fathers and Catholic interpreters, and so far the 
 partisans of transformism have not produced a single argu- 
 ment casting any real doubt upon this explanation.^ 
 
 ^ Moreover, even if theology permitted us to include in the theory 
 of transformism the body destined to form with the soul a human 
 being, the production of this spiritual soul being absolutely excepted, 
 the opinion would be regarded as illogical by real transformists ; for, 
 if plants and brutes are evolved one from another according to their 
 complete nature, the law of evolution requires that it should be the 
 same with man: according to the philosophic teaching received 
 among Catholics there is but one soul in man, the spiritual soul, 
 which is the substantial form of the body. It is not easy to evade the 
 force of this objection. Hence genuine transformists, consistent in 
 the application of their system, make no exception in regard to the 
 human soul, and thus fall into the fatal abyss of materialism. 
 
 This is where the real danger of the doctrine of transformism lies; 
 it justifies the extreme distrust it inspires in Catholics: Finding that 
 the evident object of many of its advocates is to make this hypothesis 
 
102 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Remark. — Those who, with preconceived bias, try to 
 explain the origin of plants and animals without the in- 
 tervention of God, will always find it impossible to explain 
 the origin of the elements of matter and of the forces 
 with which it is endowed, as well as the origin of life. It 
 is of no avail for them to proclaim the eternity of matter ; 
 they must assign a sufficient reason or cause of its existence ; 
 they must say how life came from lifeless matter, intelUgence 
 from non-intelligence, the simple from the complex. To 
 these questions they can give no answer; rather, to escape 
 from a truth which hampers them, they are forced to admit 
 absurdities.^ 
 
 3. The Difference between Man and Animals. 
 
 The false systems of transformists who endeavor to class 
 us with the monkey naturally lead to the conclusion that 
 man does not differ essentially from an animal. This in 
 fact is the last word of materialism. Is it not sad to see 
 intelligent men expend so much mind in proving that they 
 are nothing but beasts? Truly these words of Scripture are 
 verified: ''Man when he was in honor did not understand; 
 he hath been compared to senseless beasts, and is become like 
 them." 
 
 These systems, we hasten to add, are far from attracting 
 the majority of true scientists. Nevertheless it may not 
 be amiss to show how ill-founded and absurd they are. It 
 will enable us at least to help unfortunate minds misled by 
 them. 
 
 Let us first take note of the declarations made by a goodly 
 number of rationalistic scientists. In proof of the common 
 parentage of man and the monkey, they allege certain 
 human skulls of great age which belonged, they say, to an 
 
 the basis of a system of atheistical philosophy, and to establish, 
 under cover of science, the fundamental dogma of materialism, they 
 reject the hypothesis itself as false and impious. 
 
 * A. C. Q. xi. 58 (Animals and Plants) ; Mivart, Lessons, etc. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE 01" THE BlBLll l03 
 
 inferior type of populations called anthropomorphic, who 
 hold a middle place between the hmnan form and the monkeys 
 most closely resembling man, such as the chimpanzee, gibbon, 
 gorilla, orang-outang. Unfortunately for those who aspire 
 to this parentage, scientists, who cannot, moreover, be re- 
 proached with great orthodoxy, acknowledge that this 
 argument is of little value. Let us be satisfied to quote 
 Virchow. ''If we study," says he, ''the human fossil of the 
 quaternary period, which is, moreover, the nearest approach 
 to our most remote ancestors, we always find man such as he 
 is at the present day. . . . The ancient troglodytes, the in- 
 habitants of coal-pits and lake dwellings, present the ap- 
 pearance of a perfectly respectable society of human beings: 
 they have heads of a dimension which many men of the 
 present day might think themselves fortunate to possess. 
 In short, we are obliged to acknowledge that we have not the 
 smallest fossil type indicating an inferior state of human 
 development. What is more, when we estimate the total 
 number of human fossils known at the present day, and 
 compare them with what the present period presents, we 
 can boldly affirm that a much larger number of individuals 
 of relative inferiority is found among living men than among 
 the fossils so far discovered. . . . There has not yet been 
 found a single fossil skull of monkey or man-monkey which 
 could have belonged to a human being." Huxley, another 
 rationahst, speaks no less clearly or categorically. "The 
 structural differences existing between man and the monkey 
 are not," he says, "either small or insignificant, and the 
 human fossils so far discovered indicate no approach what- 
 ever toward the pithecoid form" (that is, the man-monkey). 
 Zoologists most in favor of our simian origin acknowledge 
 that the researches of paleontology have never succeeded in 
 finding the slightest trace of a species from which developed, 
 on the one hand, man and, on the other, the anthropoid 
 species, which, according to their transformist theories, served 
 as common ancestor to the monkey of the present day and to 
 
104 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 US. This is not all: as the transformations according to 
 Darwinism were effected only by imperceptible transitions, 
 by the fortuitous acquisition of an advantage at first very 
 slight, it follows that there must have been between man and 
 the monkey most closely resembling him a long series of 
 intermediaries. Now, notwithstanding the most diligent 
 researches, not one of these intermediary fossils has ever been 
 found. To afhrm gratuitously that they are to be found in 
 the submerged lands is to leave the domain of science for 
 that of pure hypothesis. 
 
 Finally, whatever resemblance may be established as ex- 
 isting between man and the monkey, it does not authorize 
 us in concluding a common ancestor: that a thing is pos- 
 sible does not argue its existence. Moreover, we shall 
 demonstrate that there are great and radical differences 
 between these two zoological types, and we shall give a few 
 direct proofs which attest the nobility and excellence of 
 human nature. 
 
 Thesis. — Man Differs Essentially from Animals.^ 
 First Proof. — Anatomical and Physiological Differ- 
 ences BETWEEN Man and the Monkey. Is it astonishing 
 that there are certain osteologic resemblances (structure of the 
 bones) between man and the monkey? Is not man defined 
 a reasoning animal? Is it not clear, therefore, that there 
 must be some resemblance between him and an unreasoning 
 animal? But if that is sufficient to make us monkeys, we 
 might claim, with just as much appearance of truth, that 
 we are perfected lions or tigers, for the anatomical structure 
 of our digestive organs, for example, is exactly like that of 
 these carnivorous animals. But if there are points of resem- 
 blance between man and animals, there are notable and very 
 characteristic points of difference. First, man walks erect, 
 the monkey is a quadruped and cHmbs; the gorilla itself, 
 
 * Mivart, Man and Ape; Lessons, ch. 6 ff.; Maher, p. 546 ff.; Thein, 
 AnthropoL, ch. 4 ff. 
 
HISTORIC. VALUE OP THE BIBLE. 105 
 
 which is cited as the nearest approach to man among existing 
 monkeys, can preserve a vertical attitude only for a very short 
 time ; the soles of the feet, the hands, the vertical attitude, 
 the development and conformation of the brain, the laugh, 
 the organs of mastication, etc., are so different in man and the 
 monkey most closely resembling him that a naturalist must 
 needs be inspired with hatred of his own. excellence to con- 
 clude that he and these creatures form anatomically the 
 same class. The single circumstance of the almost complete 
 absence of hair on the body of man, particularly on the back, 
 is so significant that Wallace declares that it creates a diffi- 
 culty impossible for Darwinism to solve, and he adds that 
 Darwin and Haeckel are much annoyed with him for having 
 had the imprudence to point it out. There is nothing more 
 frivolous, or rather more ridiculous, than the explanations 
 they attempt to give of this partial nakedness of the human 
 skin. 
 
 Let us hear, moreover, what serious scientists say, and 
 particularly M. de Quatrefages, whose word has long been 
 an authority in this matter. He concludes a report on the 
 progress of anthropology with the following words: ''There 
 exists no possible passage between man and the monkey, 
 unless we introvert the laws of development "; that is, unless 
 materialists overthrow at one blow the system which the}^ 
 have elaborated with great difficulty. Carl Vogt himself, 
 atheist and cynic as he is, is most scathing in his raillery of 
 those among his friends who rank man in the same class with 
 animals. 
 
 Second Proof. Intellectual, Moral, and Religious 
 Differences. — Though the physical resemblance between 
 man and the monkey were still greater, it would prove ab- 
 solutely nothing, for what constitutes man and his real 
 superiority is not his skeleton, but his rational and free soul, 
 his moral and religious nature. This is not a simple differ- 
 ence of degree, but a difference of nature, of essence. Let us 
 develop this capital truth. 
 
106 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 A. Man alone has intelligence, for he alone reasons; he 
 alone speaks; he alone invents and is indefinitely perfecti- 
 ble.i 
 
 a. Man Alone Reasons. — Animals are endowed with 
 instinct, that is, with a blind, spontaneous impulse which 
 is not the result of reflection, but of organization, and which 
 is consequently irresistible, uniform, invariable. The ani- 
 mal, impelled by this interior principle, does not act freely 
 or with any consciousness of itself. It perceives only the 
 phenomena which impress the senses (Potius agitur quam 
 agit). Man, on the contrary, endowed with intelligence, 
 with reason, possesses the consciousness of himself and 
 the reflected consciousness of his acts. He alone is capable 
 of forming abstract, universal, absolute ideas; he alone is 
 capable of generalizing and of grasping the substantial causes 
 of the phenomena which strike his senses, and not the 
 phenomena only; he alone has knowledge of purely spiritual 
 beings; he alone comprehends the beautiful, the true, the 
 good ; armed \vith the laws of logic, he reasons, he learns, he 
 daily acquires new knowledge. Animals are wholly devoid 
 of these things. It is true that with persuasion and threats 
 they may be made to do many things ; but who ever thinks, 
 for exam.ple, of reasoning even with the cleverest animal? 
 Who could seriously beheve it possessed of intelligence, that 
 is, of the power of forming abstract, intellectual, universal 
 ideas from material images furnished by the senses? ^ 
 
 h. Man Alone Speaks. — We hear animals emit cries 
 by which they express what they feel, pleasure or pain ; but 
 they have no language properly speaking, for they cannot 
 express thoughts, which they have not. The animal which 
 manifests its impressions does not do so freely and is not aware 
 of this manifestation. Their cries are simply an intermediary 
 of which they are unconscious, and the cleverest parrot is only 
 a sort of repeating machine, a living phonograph. We may 
 
 ^ Mivart, Origin of Human Reason; A. C. Q. ix. 
 ^Lacordaire, 5th conf. on God. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 107 
 
 theorize over the alleged language of animals, but it is incon- 
 testable that only man speaks with the expHcit and formal 
 intention of communicating his thoughts; besides, when he 
 speaks, when he converses, when he teaches, when he argues 
 it is most frequently for the sole purpose of expressing his 
 thoughts, of communicating knowledge to his interlocutor.^ 
 
 c. Only Man is Perfectible, and He Alone Invents. — 
 The animal never goes beyond the limits of his instinct. No 
 doubt, as we have just said, by making use of the senses, of 
 the memory, of the sensible imagination of the animal, we may 
 succeed in correcting in him certain faults, in teaching him 
 certain habits, in a word, by utilizing the instincts of the 
 animal as we utilize the forces of nature; but we can say, 
 nevertheless, that the animal at birth is completely formed, 
 and that of itself it is unperfectible. I^eft to its instinct, it 
 would always remain what its species was at the beginning 
 of the world. The bees build their hives to-day as they did 
 in the time of Solomon, and the habits of animals are still 
 what Aristotle describes them: progress supposes reflection, 
 reason, general ideas, and rational abstraction. 
 
 B. Only man has a moral sense, sl sense of duties imposed 
 upon his conscience. He not only distinguishes between vir- 
 tue and vice, but he has the faculty of enjoying the good he 
 does and of suffering by the evil he commits ; he alone also 
 possesses the idea of future life bringing to him the merited 
 reward or punishment. No doubt we see animals abstain 
 from certain things, but it is only through instinct, and 
 through fear of physical chastisement which their sensible 
 memory recalls; it certainly is not to avoid a moral evil, a 
 remorse of conscience. If man feels the responsibility of his 
 actions, if he is capable of merit or demerit, it is in consequence 
 of his liberty or the faculty of choosing between means which 
 lead to an end ; now this faculty also belongs only to man ; 
 
 ^A. C. Q. xi. 226; D. R., N. Ser. xxx. 139; Mivart, on Truth, ch. 
 16; Lessons, ch. 4; Maher, Psychol., p. 432 ff., 552; also Lacor- 
 daire's beautiful remarks in his 4th conf. on God and Man. 
 
108 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the animal has only instinct which does not permit it to 
 deliberate and to make a reasonable choice: Potius agitur 
 QUAM AGiT. Therefore, it is not responsible for its acts; if 
 we punish, if we kill an injurious animal, it is not because we 
 regard it as guilty, but to prevent it from doing further harm 
 by following the same instinct. It is quite otherwise with 
 man; whatever the impressions made upon him by sensible 
 objects, he can always act independently of his feeling of 
 attraction or repulsion. '^Man," says Bossuet, ''is so com- 
 pletely master of his body that he can even sacrifice it to a 
 greater good. " ^ 
 
 C. Man alone has a religious sense. Religion, that tendency 
 which impels us to seek God, to aspire to Him, which makes 
 us feel our need to place ourselves in union with Him, is so 
 exclusively possessed by man that pagans long since proposed 
 to define man a religious animal. 
 
 This is the teaching of philosophy and plain common 
 sense, confirmed by the testimony of the most eminent 
 scholars. '^ Man alone," says M. Quatrefages, " possesses the 
 idea of good and of moral evil, independently of all welfare 
 or of all physical suffering; he believes in superior beings 
 capable of influencing his destiny; he beUeves in the pro- 
 longation of his existence after this life. . . . Never in any 
 animal whatever has anything similar or even analogous 
 been found." 
 
 As to the alleged existence of peoples without religion, let 
 us be satisfied to refute it by quoting a few eminent authori- 
 ties. ''I declare," says the same scholar, ''that I do not 
 know of a single people that can, with any appearance of 
 truth, be called atheists." He also says elsewhere: " Obliged 
 by my teaching itself to examine all the human races, I 
 have searched for atheism in the lowest as well as in the 
 most civilized peoples; I have never found it except individ- 
 ually, or in more or less restricted schools such as were seen 
 in Europe in the last century, and are still to be seen at the 
 
 ^ Lacordaire, 6th conf. on God. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 109 
 
 present day. . . . Nowhere has atheism anything but an 
 erratic existence. . . . This is the result of a search which I 
 may be permitted to call conscientious. . . . '' The cele- 
 brated Livingston also says: ''However degraded the African 
 people, they have no need to be taught the existence of God 
 or to be told of a future hfe : these two truths are universally 
 recognized in Africa.'' 
 
 Conclusion. — From the foregoing we may rightly con- 
 clude that, aside from the very marked differences between 
 the organisms of man and beast, there is, from an intellectual, 
 moral, and religious point of view, an impassable gulf between 
 them. This threefold difference is less striking, perhaps, 
 than the organic differences, as it does not fall under the 
 senses and cannot be touched with the scalpel. But in real- 
 ity it is far greater than that which separates the animal 
 from the vegetable kingdom. 
 
 In concluding our remarks on this question we should like 
 to quote, with a few modifications, a page from the Abbe 
 Caussette: ''How did it ever enter the mind of a rational 
 man to place himself on a level with the ape? What progress 
 has the ape achieved during the ages that he has been gam- 
 bolling in the forests? We behold man, on the contrary, 
 moving proudly through the treasures of his mind which fill 
 the libraries and museums of Rome, of Paris, of Munich, of 
 London, or amid the marvels of a world's exposition, the 
 fruit of his intelligence and skill. ' Behold,' he exclaims, ' I 
 am the author of the immortal Iliad of Homer, of the 
 Summa Theologica of St. Thomas; I bear the name of 
 Plato, of Augustine, of Bossuet ; I have composed the glo- 
 rious strains of a Rossini, of a Gluck ; I have thrilled the old 
 world and the new with the accents of a Pindar, a Euripi- 
 des, a Racine, a Comeille; I built the Parthenon, I flung 
 into the clouds the lordly dome of St. Peter's; I have 
 weighed the stars, analyzed their elements, and followed the 
 path of suns in the depths of the heavens ; I have dis- 
 covered unknown continents and ruled the vast seas; I have 
 
110 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 brought to light and learned the nature of a whole world of 
 animalcules, and I have added a decade to the life of my 
 fellow men ; bending the forces of nature to my will, I speak 
 with the rapidity of lightning to my brothers at the extreme 
 ends of the earth; I have made steam my chariot; my work 
 is the civilization of Babylon, Athens, Rome, and Christian 
 Europe. Show me the cities built, the books produced, the 
 masterpieces achieved, the discoveries accomplished by the 
 ape from whom, you dare to affirm, I am descended, and I 
 may think that you speak seriously.' " 
 
 4. The Unity of the Human Species and its Descent from Adam} 
 
 ''God," says St. Paul (Acts xvii. 26), "hath made of one, 
 all mankind, to dwell upon the whole face of the earth." It 
 is an article of faith that all men who now people the earth 
 are descended from Adam; this dogma, is moreover, iati- 
 mately connected with that of original sin, of redemption, etc. 
 It is rejected, nevertheless, by the polygenists, who contend 
 that there are several different species among men. The 
 monogenists, on the contrary, acknowledge that all men 
 form but one species, though in this species there are several 
 different races. 
 
 Before proving that Scripture is in no way at variance with 
 true science, let us make a few prehminary observations. 
 
 First Observation. — The Bible does not clearly affirm 
 the specific unity of mankind, but only the imity of origin, 
 that is, the Adamic unity of all the human races. It follows 
 that the Christian dogma would not be overturned by ad- 
 mitting that the many varieties or races of the descendants 
 of Adam, brought about in the long course of time, constitute 
 so many new species. However, we affirm and shall presently 
 prove that mankind has not only a common origin, but forms 
 only one single species. 
 
 Second Observation. — The most ardent defenders of the 
 polygenist doctrine acknowledge that, scientifically speaking, 
 ^ See p. 63; also Lenormant, Quatrefages, Guibert. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. Ill 
 
 it is of very recent date. Its partisans, moreover, are few in 
 number, while a very large majority of scientists hold to 
 imity of species, and even to imity of stock, Adamic unity. 
 Among them are Blumenbach, Pritchard, Linnee, Buffon, 
 Cuvier, Van Baer, Van Meyer, Burdach, Etienne and Isidore 
 Geoffroy, Saint-Hilaire, de Blainville, Hugh Miller, de Serres, 
 Flourens, de Quatrefages, Milne-Edwards, Lyell, Huxley. 
 Hence science and revelation are by no means at variance 
 on this capital point. Let us remark further that the tradi- 
 tions of all nations, whether oral or recorded in the most 
 ancient books, are strikingly unanimous in representing the 
 human race as descended from one single couple. 
 
 Third Observation. — a. Is it not remarkable that certain 
 scholars hesitate to believe in human races, unwilling to 
 admit an3rthing but species in humanity, yet readily ac- 
 knowledge the existence of these varieties and these races in 
 vegetables and animals, where the diversity is even greater 
 than among men? Think, for example, of the different 
 varieties of radishes, of cabbages, of wheat, of pears, of apples, 
 that we have before our eyes; the vine alone has at least a 
 thousand varieties which grow like the parent stock. And 
 in the animal kingdom we know that there are 300 kinds 
 of pigeons. In the exposition of 1858 Europe alone fur- 
 nished 28 races of dogs, presenting from one to five variations 
 in shape; in hair, from the thickest to the perfectly smooth 
 or hairless; in color, from black to white, with every inter- 
 mediate shade and color; in voice, from the dumb to the 
 loud-baying hound; in the number of caudal vertebrae from 
 none to 21 ; in the shape of the head, from the greyhound to 
 the bulldog. Observe that all these races continuously and 
 indefinitely reproduce themselves. 
 
 b. It is still more remarkable that the men who proclaim 
 the impossibility of a common descent for the negro and the 
 white man are the ones who admit the simian origin of man 
 as a reasonable hypothesis or as a fact. What is the explana- 
 tion of this inconsistency? Here is the explanation given 
 
112 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 by Van Baer, the most celebrated naturalist of Russia: 
 ''This opinion [of the plurality of species in the human race, 
 so contrary to all the principles of natural history, is it not a 
 thing invented by the Anglo-Americans to quiet their con- 
 sciences? When they inhumanly and barbarously drove 
 out the oldest inhabitants of America and imported negroes 
 to make them slaves, was it not natural to argue : ' we owe 
 no duty to these men, they are of a race inferior to us^?" 
 
 What we have just said may suffice to destroy the value 
 of the objections against the Bible raised by the polygenists. 
 But let us establish our thesis more directly. 
 
 First Argument. — We may consider it an axiom in zoology 
 that all individuals capable of reproducing and indefinitely 
 perpetuating themselves are of one and the same species. 
 Species, M. Flourens says, consists essentially in two ideas: 
 that of resemblance and that of fihation. We may define it as 
 a collection of individuals possessed of common characteristics, 
 which they transmit, by means of reproduction, to other 
 individuals capable of preserving these fundamental charac- 
 teristics, and susceptible at the same time of secondary 
 variations. In fact each species is capable of great modifi- 
 cations, but these modifications, which affect only the acci- 
 dental and not the essential properties, do not change the 
 typical resemblances or the faculty of reproduction; they 
 simply constitute what we call varieties, which take in their 
 turn, when they become permanent, the names of races. 
 Thus the bulldog, the poodle, the hound, the terrier, belong, 
 notwithstanding the great difference in their exterior form, 
 to the same species. 
 
 Continual reproduction, therefore, is the positive mark of 
 species : it is this characteristic which enables us in doubtful 
 cases to decide whether plants or animals belong to the 
 same species. This was the opinion of Aristotle, and it is 
 still that of a large majority of scientists. If, therefore, it is 
 proved that all the human races, from the most civihzed 
 European to the lowest negro, are capable of continual 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 113 
 
 reproduction, there exists but one human species. Now 
 this is undeniable: experience shows that human races, 
 even the most barbarous, united with the most perfect 
 produce individuals indefinitely fruitful. This fact is so 
 incontestably estabhshed that we do not think it necessary to 
 support it with authorities. Hence our thesis is demonstrated. 
 
 This is a fundamental and decisive proof, but let us add, 
 nevertheless, a few subsidiary arguments. 
 
 Second Argument. — Not only do we find all the human 
 races capable of continual reproduction, but resemblance 
 between individuals, though it is a much less important char- 
 acteristic, is also proved. In fact, 
 
 a. The physical organization, in its essential parts, is the 
 same in all men; the points of dissimilarity are trifling com- 
 pared to those of the spaniel and the bulldog or the terrier, 
 which all agree, nevertheless, in ranking in the same species. 
 In all the human races we find the same shaped skull, the 
 same cerebral layers, the same number of teeth, arranged in 
 the same order and of the same length, the same shape of 
 the hands, as well as the opposable thumb and index-finger, 
 the same vertical position, the same vocal organs greatly 
 perfected. Nowhere else do we find as great conformity, even 
 between different species. Let us not lose sight of an im- 
 portant remark of Herder 's. ' ' We usually, ' ' he says, * ' reckon 
 only four principal himian races; but the varieties are in 
 reahty inestimable, we find every intermedium; colors are 
 blended in some, and, in the same race, the aspect of individ- 
 uals differs in regard to color as well as structure. '' 
 
 b. From an intellectual, religious, and moral point of view 
 the resemblance is no less great. All men are endowed with 
 reason and the faculty of speaking an articulate language, of 
 expressing their thoughts for the sole purpose of communicat- 
 ing them; even the negro is capable of a remarkable intellec- 
 tual and moral development ; the most uncivilized races are 
 susceptible of a progressive civilization ; all are endowed with 
 moral and religious sentiment, though in different degrees. 
 
114 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Third Argument. — They who advance a new doctrine 
 must prove it. Now the polygenists have no positive proofs 
 to oppose to ours. First, they cannot demonstrate the im- 
 possibihty of several human races springing from one species; 
 still less can they prove the impossibihty of the descent of all 
 men from one couple. We, on the contrary, can give suffi- 
 cient explanation of the differences we observe in the various 
 races. It has been proved that climate, the general habit 
 of life, and heredity produce this diversity. At the same 
 time, if we were unable to assign the causes of these differ- 
 ences, there would be nothing astonishing in our perplexity, 
 for it is a question of origin, and we know that questions of the 
 kind are usually impenetrable or wrapt in mystery. 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. The differences observed among various 
 human races are not as important as many naturalists make 
 them out to be. 
 
 One of the most striking things when men of different 
 races are brought together is the color of the skin. This 
 coloration, which ranges from the pale white of the albino to 
 the dusky brown of the negro, is due to the pigment, the color- 
 ing matter contained in the cells of the skin. Now we know 
 that this coloration depends principally upon locality or 
 environment, that is, upon climate, air, water, heat, or cold, 
 as well as social and religious conditions. Thus the skin of 
 the European becomes brown in the tropics and almost copper 
 color after a long sojourn in Guinea, and in the Marquesas 
 Islands it assumes a shade as dark as that of the natives. 
 Labor in the field is sufficient to produce the bronze hue. The 
 negro in his turn becomes lighter in temperate climates. No 
 doubt the distance is great between the white Swede and the 
 negro of Congo or the Caribbean Islands, but there is a mul- 
 titude of imperceptible shades between these two latitudes, 
 white, yellow, copper-color, brown, and black. These effects 
 of environment are no less evident in animals than in man. 
 In Guinea, birds and dogs are all black; at the poles, on the 
 contrary, the animals soon become white in ^vinter unless 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 115 
 
 they are housed. In short, color is a thing so accessory that 
 a skilful breeder, for example, can in three years give pigeons 
 any plumage he chooses. 
 
 Nor is the hair, specialists say, a more distinctive charac- 
 teristic. It is woolly, crinkly, long and glossy, black or red, 
 according to the hygienic regime, country, and the mixture of 
 races. Under the microscope the hair called woolly is found 
 to be of the same composition as the other kinds. Here also 
 the grades are so gradual as to be almost imperceptible. 
 
 As to the shape, weight, and capacity of the cranium, there 
 is no more variety among the various races of men than among 
 the various races of animals. Why then should these differ- 
 ences, which are never considered as indicating several species 
 when there is question of animals, be considered as an argu- 
 ment against unity of species when there is question of man? 
 Moreover, the American Morton, whose opinion on this point is 
 shared by several other polygenists, has proved, by measuring 
 1200 craniums, that the objection founded on the capacity 
 of the cranium is of no real importance. In a series of 964 
 craniums examined by Wagner for size and capacity of 
 holding an amount of brain matter, the skull of Dr. Depuy- 
 tren the celebrated physician, ranked only as the 170th, 
 while that of the mineralogist Hausman ranked 640th in the 
 whole scale of the 964. Though it is true that the brain is, 
 generally, developed in proportion to the degree of intelli- 
 gence, yet facts prove that we cannot derive any certain 
 conclusion from the weight of the brain. "We must accept 
 the fact," says M. Flourens, ''that the size of the brain does 
 not indicate the amount of intelligence. ' ' 
 
 It is the same in regard to the shape of the skull and the 
 facial angle. This facial angle averages, according to Camper, 
 70 degrees in the negro and 85 in the pure Greek type: this 
 variation of 15 degrees cannot evidently constitute a specific 
 difference, particularly as every intermediate degree is found 
 between the negro and the scale of the Greek statues. Very 
 different is the variation between the facial angle of the negro 
 
116 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 and that of a full-grown chimpanzee : the latter hardly meas- 
 ures 35 degrees. Haeckel himself acknowledges that the shape 
 of the skull affords no basis for classifying the human species. 
 
 There are long and short heads and all intermediaries in the 
 same people. A remarkable thing is that in the prognathic 
 type the protruding maxillaries, resembhng the snout of an 
 animal, are not that shape at birth, but become so with age; 
 we find them, moreover, in all peoples, even the most civiUzed. 
 
 2d. To understand the possibility of reaching the most dis- 
 tant islands in order to people them, we need only remark 
 that nowhere is communication between one country and 
 another more difficult than in the South Sea Islands; yet we 
 have evidence which proves that these difficulties are not 
 only surmountable, but that they have been really overcome : 
 the marked resemblance in the idiom, customs, traditions, 
 and rehgion of the various peoples of the Pacific will not per- 
 mit us to doubt the reality of migrations to these latitudes. 
 
 As to the peopling of America, in particular, there is no cer- 
 tainty that the American continent was always separated 
 from Asia as it is now; besides, it requires only 36 hours to 
 go from Asia to America. In addition to this, the cold cur- 
 rent from the Arctic Ocean flowing through Behring Strait 
 brings to the American continent all the vessels wrecked in the 
 Pacific Ocean. Thus since 1852, that is, since California was 
 settled by the whites, there have reached the country some 
 thirty ships from Asia, sixteen of which contained passengers. 
 Finally, there are proofs of various kinds which estabhsh the 
 fact that several nations of the Old World, particularly the 
 Phenicians, the Norman-Scandinavians, the Indians, the 
 Chinese, the Japanese, contributed to people America. The 
 yellow race is still represented in Brazil by the Botocondos. 
 
 3d. The objection against unity of species founded on the 
 question of language is of no value whatever.^ What rela- 
 tion can there be between the different species of men 
 and the conventional meaning attached to certain sounds, 
 
 ^Schanz, I., ch. 17; Walworth, ch. 27; Thein, Anthrop., ch. 9 ff.: 
 The Bible, etc., p. iv. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 117 
 
 when among the same people, as it sometimes happens, the 
 same sounds convey different meanings ? We know what per- 
 petual changes im written language is subject to, and in how 
 short a time savage nations can change their language. The 
 case is very different with languages spoken by partially civil- 
 ized people and languages fixed by writing and enriched by 
 Hterary monuments. Men of the same region by no means 
 follow the same grammar and the same dictionary. It is 
 estimated that the Enghsh peasantry use only about three 
 hundred words, though the Enghsh language contains about 
 one hundred thousand. Hence philologists, Renan among 
 others, while denying the primitive unity of language, acknowl- 
 edge that it affords no proof against the primitive unity of 
 species. ''Whatever the diversity existing,'^ says Max 
 Miiller, "in the forms and in the roots of languages, it affords 
 no conclusive argument against the possibihty of a common 
 origin of these languages." The Scripture, moreover, attest- 
 ing the confusion of languages, it is not necessary that we 
 should find a common derivation or origin for languages. 
 Let us add that philology itself tends more and more to 
 prove the unity of origin of all men; it is this science which 
 has afforded us positive proof of the common origin of peoples 
 inhabiting the opposite extremities of the earth. 
 
 5. Antiquity of the Human Race} 
 
 Life has not always existed upon the earth, and among the 
 beings endowed with life man is the most recent; he came 
 after the plants and animals. Here are points upon which 
 natural science agrees with the Bible. But while Genesis 
 seems to indicate that it is only a few thousand years since 
 man appeared upon the earth, there are naturalists and his- 
 torians who unhesitatingly affirm that the human race is at 
 
 * See p. 63; especially Zahm, Bible, Science, etc., p. iii; also Lenor- 
 rnant; Thein, Anthrop., ch. 8 ff.; The Bible, etc., p. iv; Schanz, L, ch. 
 18; A. C. Q. xix. 260; C. W. xl. 318, 444. 
 
118 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 least one hundred thousand years old; others say even a hun- 
 dred thousand centuries. We can readily understand that 
 they who hold that we are descended from anthropoid mon- 
 keys must needs insist ujjon great antiquity, for no doubt it 
 took a good portion of time for man to rise from the state of 
 the beast to the moral, intellectual, and religious condition 
 found among the oldest races.^ Let us consider what the 
 Bible and science teach on the subject of the age of man. 
 We shall see that, here again, there is no opposition between 
 these two legitimate means of knowledge. 
 
 1. The Uncertainty of Biblical Chronology. — The 
 Scripture makes no formal statement in regard to the age of 
 man, and the Church, which is not obliged to regulate ques- 
 tions of chronology, has given no decision upon the subject. 
 There is, it is true, a chronology called biblical, because based 
 upon the elements of Scripture. But what is the value of a 
 chronology of this kind, the work of man? To appreciate its 
 weight as an authority we have only to remember that there 
 are almost as many chronologic systems of the Bible as there 
 are exegetes. Des Vignolles, in 1738, counted more than two 
 hundred, varying to the extent of thirty-five centuries, yet 
 notwithstanding all these efforts we have never succeeded in 
 bringing order out of this chaos. Therefore, the learned Abbe 
 Hir declares that " bibhcal chronology is fluctuating and unde- 
 cided, and that it is for human sciences to find the date of the 
 creation of our species.'^ 
 
 What is the reason of this uncertainty? It arises from 
 various causes, the chief of which are these : 
 
 a. We do not always know the true figures originally written 
 by the sacred writers either in the Pentateuch or the other 
 inspired books; all the ancient texts we possess disagree in 
 
 i 
 
 ^ On Primeval Man not a Savage cf., besides the authors already 
 quoted in this chapter, Thebaud, GentiUsm, ch. 3; Br. W. ix. (often); 
 A. C. Q. xi. 226; C. W. ix. 766, xiii. 492, xxix. 602; B. C. Y., The 
 Remote Antiquity of Man not Proven; Primeval Man not a Savage 
 (London, 1877). 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 119 
 
 this matter. According to the Hebrew and that of the Vulgate, 
 for example, only 1656 years elapsed from the fall of Adam 
 to the deluge; and from the time of Noe to Abraham, 292. 
 According to the text of the Septuagint these figures are 
 respectively 2262 and 1172; finally, according to the Sa- 
 maritan Pentateuch they are 1307 and 942. This disagree- 
 ment is not remarkable; for we know that in successive tran- 
 scriptions, nothing is more easily altered than figures, par- 
 ticularly when every people has its special divisions of time, 
 and the majority of nations a method of computation entirely 
 different from ours. Errors, therefore, would naturally be 
 made either in the copies or the versions. God evidently 
 is not obliged to work miracles to preserve scriptural dates 
 unaltered, for they have nothing whatever to do with morals 
 or dogma, or with the substance of the sacred text; our sal- 
 vation and the fulfilment of our duty are in no way compro- 
 mised because we are relatively ignorant of the number of 
 years which elapsed from the fall of Adam to the coming of 
 the Redeemer. 
 
 b. We have no assurance that we possess complete genea- 
 iogic fists. All that we have in the shape of historic records 
 concerning this period is the fists of the antediluvian and 
 postdiluvian patriarchs contained in Genesis. Now there 
 is no doubt that in these fists there is at least one hiatus, or 
 perhaps an interpolation. May there not in fact be a great 
 many? This is very probable, particularly as the only object 
 of the Oriental nations, in their genealogies, is to fofiow the 
 direct line regardless of intermediate branches ; hence whole 
 generations, that is, centuries, may have dropped out of the 
 calculation. This remark of M. WaUon is further confirmed 
 by a large number of analogous omissions, proved to exist 
 in other books of the Scriptures. These systematic omis- 
 sions ought, it would seem, to be assigned to a mnemonic 
 cause. Thus, it is evident that St. Matthew expressly ex- 
 cludes the names of three well-known kings in order to make 
 the dry fist of names fomung the genealogical tree of the 
 
120 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Messias more easily retained. These omissions, the extent 
 of which we do not know, make it impossible to determine 
 the period of man's appearance on earth. 
 
 The variations which we find in the figures of the three 
 sources have still another no less important cause. The 
 Septuagint and the Samaritan Pentateuch regularly add one 
 hundred years to several Hebrew dates. Why? We are 
 obliged to answer with St. Augustine, who had already 
 observed this fact, ''We give no explanation where the ex- 
 planation would be unsatisfactory." However this may be, 
 as the chronology of the Septuagint has been adopted by 
 all the Fathers of the Greek Church and by the majority of 
 the Latin Fathers, there is nothing to prevent our accepting 
 it. Following it, we estimate the age of man to be 8065 years. 
 At the same time there is no reason why this figure may not 
 be subject to any modifications necessary to meet the just 
 claims of history and paleontology. 
 
 But may not profane science now remove the doubts still 
 imsolved by the study of the sacred text? This is what we 
 are about to examine by consulting successively paleontology 
 and the history of ancient peoples. 
 
 II. Data of Science. — A. Geology and Paleontology. 
 — Despite the figures hazarded without proof by a certain 
 number of geologists and paleontologists, science, so far, 
 offers nothing absolutely certain on the subject. The exist- 
 ence of man in the tertiary period is still unproved. We 
 know that in 1884 the Association for the Advancement of 
 Science held at Blois one of its most important sessions, and 
 that forty members of the congress were deputed to study 
 the layers of Thenay belonging to the tertiary period, and 
 which contained, it was said, a quantity of flints cut by the 
 hand of man. Now the result of their careful investigation 
 was to convince them that man did not exist at that period, 
 and that the marks on the flints were due simply to physical 
 causes. Nor is there any more authority for the flints con- 
 cerning which there has been much discussion ; for example, 
 
HISTORIC VALtTE OF THE BIBLE. 121 
 
 those found in the neighborhood of Aurillac and the vicinity 
 of Lisbon. In regard to the quaternary period, which con- 
 tains a quantity of human fossils the age and authenticity 
 of which are incontestable, let us hear the opinion of a master 
 of geological science, M. Lapparrent: ''That part of the 
 modern era called the quaternary epoch is characterized by 
 the appearance of man on the earth. . . . This period, not- 
 withstanding its proximity to our own time, is still enveloped 
 in mystery. The succession of the deposits is sometimes very 
 obscure. The absence or the rarity of organic remains ren- 
 ders it particularly difficult to determine the relative age. 
 . . . Science has not yet achieved a chronometer enabling it 
 to measure past time, even the period immediately preceding 
 our own. It is wise to expect this achievement only of the 
 future, and, for our part, we are satisfied with having shown 
 how baseless are aU these calculations generously distributing 
 himdreds and thousands of centuries between the various 
 phases of the quaternary period. '^ 
 
 This is the last word of science up to the present time. 
 Moreover, Lyell himself, so given to exaggeration on this 
 point, acknowledges that, '' In the present state of our knowl- 
 edge, the attempts to compare the chronologic relations of 
 the periods of upheavals . . . and of the retirement of the 
 glaciers . . . must be considered as simple conjectures.'' 
 Other serious paleontologists hold the same language, and 
 Carl Vogt does not hesitate to declare that, " So far, all efforts 
 to establish a means of chronologically estimating the time 
 that has elapsed since man appeared upon the earth, have 
 been ineffectual." Though, in truth, this declaration has 
 not prevented him from heaping hypotheses upon hypotheses, 
 and from attributing 57,600 years of existence to a human 
 skeleton found at New Orleans. 
 
 Chronometers} — The authorities cited excuse us from speak- 
 
 * The author speaks of Geological Chronometers, a term used to 
 designate such articles and objects found in the various strata of the 
 earth which may serve as time-measures to indicate the age of man's 
 
122 CHRISTIAN' APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ing in detail of the various chronometers, the subject of so 
 much discussion and which, it is said, afford conclusive proof 
 of the great age of man. A word, however, of some of them: 
 it will give us some idea of the precaution necessary in re- 
 searches of this kind in order to arrive at even a probable 
 conclusion. 
 
 It was believed that proofs of the antiquity of man were 
 to be found in human fossils discovered in caves, where they 
 were mixed with the bones of animals of extinct races; in 
 splinters of flints which had served as arms or utensils to our 
 ancestors; in the formation of the deltas, particularly those 
 of the Nile and the Mississippi; in the peat-moors; in the 
 diluvium of valleys and plains; in the downs of Denmark 
 and Norway; in the lake dwellings of Smtzerland; in the 
 stalactites and stalagmites ; and in the kitchen utensils of the 
 Scandinavians. 
 
 1st. In order to draw a scientific conclusion from, for ex- 
 ample, the bones of human fossils, we must at least be very 
 certain, 1st, that these fossils have been found in strata 
 older than the quaternary period ; 2d, that their appearance 
 in virgin soil is not due to the hand of man, or caused by some 
 upheaval of nature; 3d, that their origin has not been 
 altered either by the falsification of a museum, or by a sys- 
 tematic interpretation. Now none of these things are 
 estabhshed with any certainty. Moreover, we repeat that 
 it is not easy to distinguish the superior strata of the tertiary 
 period from the primary strata of the quaternary; that we 
 have no means of appreciating the duration of the geological 
 formations, of estimating how much older one is than 
 another, or of determining how far back each of these for- 
 mations dates. 
 
 2d. The same remarks apply to cut, pohshed, or other kinds 
 of flinte foimd in large numbers in the bosom of the earth, 
 and which may have served as arms or utensils to our an- 
 
 presence upon earth and the duration of the different phases in the 
 development of the race. — Editor. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 123 
 
 cestors; we must also be sure that the object found is truly 
 a product of human mdustry; that the strata in which it lay 
 was free from the action of man and the violence of the 
 elements; then we must be able to determine with certainty 
 the age of the strata itself. Now let us hear the opinion of a 
 competent authority like M. Dumoulins: ''I declare in my 
 own name and in that of M. Gourges that, in the thirty-five 
 years that we have been studying these implements, we have 
 never found any in strata undisturbed by the hand of 
 man." As to the cut flints, particularly, we know that 
 the marks upon them which are presumed to indicate 
 that they are the result of human industry, are frequently 
 only the effect of lightning, of the sun's heat, of sudden 
 changes of temperature, of pressure, of shocks, etc. At the 
 congress of Lisbon the following opinion was given by its 
 president. Dr. Virchow: ''Ten years ago I put," he says, 
 ''this question to myself: Can we recognize in a few spHnters 
 of flint whether their form is or is not the result of intention? 
 ... It is a question likely to excite much discussion at several 
 congresses. . . . Here we disagree, and there are many natu- 
 ralists who deny that these flints are the work of man. ... At 
 the next congress I will submit samples, bearing all the 
 characters claimed, which I have collected under conditions 
 which make it impossible that man could have had anything 
 to do with them." 
 
 3d. The formation of deltas and alluvia generally was also 
 supposed, for a time, to furnish useful results. The term 
 alluvia is applied to formations produced by the denudation 
 of the soil, great rains, inundations, or the deposits of rivers. 
 It is now well established that nothing is more irregular than 
 such formations, for these deposits and inundations vary 
 considerably according to circumstances. They must also 
 have been much more rapid before the mountains were de- 
 nuded of vegetation. As to the objects found there, it is 
 clear from the nature of the soil itself that they do not belong 
 to it. Now the force of currents, Lyell himself acknowledges, 
 
124 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 may bring together in a very short time objects which perhaps 
 have been separated for centuries. Mr. J. Ferguson, an 
 English geologist living in India, gives an instance of an 
 inundation during which bricks from the foundation of a 
 house which he had built, were carried away by the waters 
 and buried in the bed of the river at a depth of from thirty 
 to forty feet. ''The river," he says, ''has passed on, and a 
 new village now stands on the spot where my bungalow 
 stood, but forty feet above the ruins; and any one who 
 chooses to dig on the spot may find my reliquia there, and 
 form what theory he likes as to their antiquity or my age." 
 Let us further remark that Carl Vogt claims 158,400 year.^ 
 for the formation of the delta of the Mississippi, while Si'j 
 John Lubbock thinks it required only 3000 years, and M.' 
 Schmidt only 1700. 
 
 4th. Nor do the peat moors or bogs afford anything more 
 conclusive. These bogs consist of accumulations of detrite 
 vegetable matter from which a combustible is formed. It 
 is impossible to find in these accumulations any means of 
 estimating their vertical increase. According to experiments 
 made in East Friesland it would require only two hundred 
 years for the formation of a stratum of peat thirty feet in 
 depth, while according to the theory of M. Boucher de Perthes 
 it would take no less than three thousand years! Burmeister 
 affirms, on his part, that he has seen completely exhausted 
 peat-bogs grow again to the depth of five feet in thirty years. 
 
 The depths at which objects are found buried in the peat- 
 moors give us no reliable information ; for, on the one hand, 
 we know that the more recent and liquid the formation the 
 more easily objects sink in it; and that, on the other hand, if 
 we were to accept the theoretical estimates of some geologists 
 in regard to the alleged slowness of peat formations, the 
 objects contained in them must be antediluvian productions ; 
 while, as a matter of fact, the coins, axes, and kitchen utensils 
 found in them are nearly all of Roman origin. What con- 
 fidence can be placed in such calculations? 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 125 
 
 5th. We know that lake dwellings, dwellings built upon piles, 
 have been discovered in large numbers recently, particularly 
 in the lakes of Switzerland. It was hoped that the study of 
 the horn and stone implements, the household effects, and 
 the skulls of the inhabitants, which were also found there, 
 would throw some Ught upon science. But no results were 
 obtained: the oldest skulls discovered are in every respect 
 like those of the Swiss of the present day; the plants and 
 animals are also the same as ours. Hence eminent geologists 
 think that these dwellings possess, relatively, but Httle 
 antiquity. Hochstetter thinks it very probable that the 
 lake cities date no farther back than the tenth century before 
 the Christian era. Franz Maurer thinks them still nearer 
 our time, and Hastier dates the most recent from the third 
 century before Christ. As to the accumulation of gravel 
 imder which they are buried, Wagner declares that it may 
 have been formed in as many moments as Morlot assigns 
 years for it. 
 
 Conclusion. — Science, notwithstanding all its efforts, is 
 far from furnishing us any certain information in regard to 
 the antiquity of the human species. BibUcal chronology, on 
 the other hand, leaves us in uncertainty. Therefore there is 
 no possibility of contradiction between the sacred text and 
 natural sciences. 
 
 B. History. — We know that all nations, particularly 
 the Egyptians, Chaldeans, Hindoos, and Chinese, have the 
 vanity to attribute to themselves a fabulous antiquity which 
 is lost in the night of time.^ Cicero has already remarked 
 this fact. Let us see if history verifies their claim. 
 
 1. Egypt. — The accounts of Greek travellers who visited 
 Egypt in ancient times give us information in regard to its 
 chronology. But the data furnished by Solon, Herodotus, 
 Varro, and Diodorus of Sicily are so vague and, above all, so 
 contradictory that no reliance can be placed upon their 
 
 ^ D. R. AprU 77. On the religious systems of these peoples see 
 Schanz, II., ch. 2, 3. 
 
126 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 figures. This, however, is not astonishing: these writers did 
 not know the language of Egypt, hence immediate sources of 
 information were closed to them. They ma}^ also have 
 misunderstood the information furnished by interpreters; 
 and what guarantee, moreover, have we of the accuracy or 
 truthfulness of the latter? As to Manetho, who Hved in 
 Egypt, but only about the year 300 before Christ, we must 
 remember that his history, written in Greek, is no longer in 
 existence ; all that remains of it is a summary of its chronology, 
 which was preserved to us by Eusebius ; but how may such 
 a document help us to reach a satisfactory result? First of 
 all, the extreme insignificance of the facts which he relates 
 shows us that he was a man very imperfectly acquainted with 
 the early history of Egypt. Then, though the monuments 
 prove that several kings reigned together during a certain 
 time, Manetho enumerates all the dynasties as if the reigns 
 had been successive. Finally, in thirty-seven cases in which 
 we can check the figures of this historian by those of the 
 papyrus of Turin, which contains a list of the kings of Egypt, 
 we find that he increases the duration of twenty-two reigns 
 and diminishes that of six. 
 
 Let us consider the third source of information. This 
 consists of the lists containing the names of the kings of 
 Egypt, particularly the papyrus of Turin, unfortunately 
 incomplete, and the tablets of Abydos, Saqqarah, and Karnak. 
 We have also the hieroglyphic inscriptions relating, on the 
 walls of the temples, the exploits of the Egyptian monarchs, 
 the stelse of the court officers and of various other personages, 
 the Apis stelse and figured monuments of all kinds. 
 
 But in none of these do we find any complete information. 
 Moreover, as Fr. Lenormant says, ''the greatest obstacle 
 to the establishment of a regular Egyptian chronology is the 
 fact that the Egyptians themselves never had a chronology." 
 And how could they have a chronologic system when they 
 had no era? Thus Marie tte insists that modern science will 
 fail in every attempt to restore what the Egyptians never 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 127 
 
 possessed. Brugsch is of the same opinion: ''In the present 
 state of things no man living," he says, ''is capable of re- 
 moving the obstacles which hinder the re-estabhshment of 
 the original Hst of kings contained in the fragments of the 
 papyrus of Turin." The greatest obstacle is probably the 
 fact that the Egyptian historians confine themselves to 
 stating the duration of each reign without mentioning whether 
 the sovereign reigned alone or jointly with another; and that 
 they represent dynasties as consecutive which were contem- 
 poraneous. 
 
 The historic documents of Egypt, therefore, furnish no 
 certain chronology, nor can they demonstrate that the 
 chronology derived from the Septuagint is too short. This 
 is the well-grounded conclusion of the Abbe Vigouroux. 
 Scholars, he adds, who claim more time, base their demand 
 upon a personal opinion which nothing obliges us to 
 accept. 
 
 If we want a striking proof of the truth of these assertions, 
 it is to be found in the very disagreement of the various 
 modern historians who have dealt with the history of Egypt. 
 While Bockh places the accession of Menes, the first known 
 king, in the year 5702 before our era, Mariette and Lenor- 
 mant assign it to the year 5004, Brugsch to 4455, Bunsen 
 to 3623 or 3059, Wilkinson to 2691. As Mr. George Raw- 
 linson wisely remarks: "It is as if the best authorities on 
 Roman history were to tell us, the one that the Republic 
 was founded in 508, the others in 3508, before Christ." Let 
 us conclude our remarks upon the antiquity of the Egyptians 
 with an observation of the Abbe Vigouroux: "We must 
 acknowledge that Egypt existed before the time of Menes, 
 and that it is notably more ancient. Go back as far as we 
 will in its history, we find it in a state of advanced civiliza- 
 tion, in possession of the arts, of inscriptive monuments, and 
 of religion. . . . But here, as in questions of prehistoric paleon- 
 tology and archaeology, we lack chronometers, we can arrive 
 at no certain conclusions, and we must only repeat that 
 
128 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Genesis, correctly understood, leaves the Egyptologist per- 
 fectly free to claim for Egypt the antiquity which a careful 
 study of its monuments indicates." 
 
 2. India. — ^''The Hindoos," says Kruse, ''have no histori- 
 cal works. They have wrapped ancient events in a poeti- 
 cal cloak of myths, without any attempt at chronology." 
 Duncker assures us that we can have no certain knowledge 
 of them prior to the year 800 before the Christian era.^ In 
 the country itself no historical monument dating farther 
 back than the third century before the Christian era has been 
 found. Xavier Raymond tells us in his history of India that 
 '' the fragments which remain of the annals of the people of 
 India are so mingled with fable and disfigured by the most 
 extravagant chronology that it is impossible for the most 
 patient investigator to find a thread to guide him in the 
 perplexing labyrinth. We find no certain date in the history 
 of the country before the invasion of Alexander (327-325 
 B.c.).^' Finally, Bournouf assures us that ''it requires an 
 act of faith to believe that the literature of India is ancient ; 
 for among their numerous works no historical books have yet 
 been found." If Sanscrit Hterature permits us to go farther 
 back than history proper, it furnishes no satisfactory data in 
 regard to the antiquity of man. According to Max Miiller, the 
 most ancient hymns of the Vedas date no farther back than 
 the year 1200 before Christ. Hence Barthelemy St. Hilaire 
 concludes that, "despite all the efforts of our profound and 
 careful study, we must despair of resurrecting a past annihi- 
 lated by the very actors in this past. India has not willed to 
 come forth from her dreams; we cannot evoke her historically 
 from the tomb." 
 
 3. China. — Notwithstanding the earnest efforts not only 
 of the present but of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries 
 to unravel the chronology of China, we have almost as little 
 knowledge of its early history as of India. Nor is this re- 
 markable: in fact the inhabitants of the Celestial Empire 
 
 ^ See Chatard, essay 24. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 129 
 
 in primitive ages had no era, properly speaking, and pre- 
 served no historic records; later, about the year 213 before 
 Christ, Chihouang-ti, the founder of the Tsin dynasty, ordered 
 all the historical books of the kingdom to be destroyed under 
 penalty of death. In addition to this, ancient monuments, 
 with which we might verify or modify dates, are totally 
 wanting. Those that have been brought forward do not 
 bear critical examination. Thus Balfour justly reniarks: 
 ''The primitive history of the Middle Kingdom is a sealed 
 book." The knowledge we have of it indicates that the 
 chronology derived from the Septuagint is sufficient for the 
 development of its history. 
 
 4. Chaldea. — The ancient monuments recently discovered 
 in Chaldea give us a better knowledge of its chronology. 
 The historic records of the country throw but Httle light 
 upon it; all that relates to chronology in the fragments of 
 Berosus, priest of Bel at Babylon, was regarded as fabulous 
 even by the Greeks. It is quite otherwise with the cunei- 
 form inscriptions: they furnish us with more precise dates 
 in regard to Chaldea and Babylon, starting from the era of 
 Nabonassar, 747 before Christ. If, however, these dates 
 are correct, the chronology derived from the Septuagint is 
 insufficient, and we must admit that there are gaps and 
 omissions in biblical chronology. But what means have we of 
 verifying the accuracy of these dates? 
 
 Conclusion. — ''The history of India, and even that of 
 China in its authentic parts, '/ concludes the Abb^ Vigouroux, 
 "may easily be included in the series of centuries admitted 
 by the Greek and Latin Fathers. As to Egypt, the extreme 
 antiquity of Menes is by no means proved, and there is much 
 evidence tending to diminish it. It may be argued, it is 
 true, that the state of civifization in Egypt during the reign 
 of the most ancient kings known to us indicates, as do also 
 geological and paleontological discoveries, a longer period of 
 time than that furnished by the Septuagint. But no fixed 
 or absolute calculation is possible here, hence we can only 
 
130 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 repeat to scholars: Establish the antiquity of man with sohd 
 proofs, and the Bible will not contradict you.'! 
 
 V. The Bible and Modern Discoveries in Egypt and 
 
 Assyria.^ 
 
 We cannot terminate these notes upon the relations 
 between the Bible and science without speaking of the 
 unexpected testimony borne to the truth of the Holy Scrip- 
 tures by the modern discoveries made in Egypt, Chaldea, 
 and Assyria. The inhabitants of these countries are the 
 people who had most intercourse with the Hebrews. The 
 Hebrews, the Assyrians, and the Chaldeans had a common 
 origin; for centuries they trod the same soil, lived the same 
 hfe, followed the same customs. They were brought again 
 into immediate relations when the Israelites were led into 
 exile by Nabuchodonosor. 
 
 As to Egypt, it is well known that the Jews dwelt there for 
 several centuries. Hence it was not possible to exhume 
 these people from the tomb, so to speak, without casting 
 hght upon the facts consigned to Scripture. It was truly 
 providential that at the very moment when rationalism 
 was inventing new weapons mth which to sap the foundations 
 of the divine work, God caused the Chaldeans and the Egyp- 
 tians to live again to attest and proclaim the veracity of 
 Moses and the sacred writers. 
 
 1. Discoveries in Egypt. — We know that Napoleon I. took 
 with him in his expedition to Egypt a galaxy of scholars to 
 gather all that was possible in the interest of science. He 
 made important discoveries; they became innumerable from 
 the time that the indefatigable ChampoUion succeeded in 
 deciphering the hieroglyphics. As we cannot dwell upon 
 these important discoveries which followed without interrup- 
 tion, let us content ourselves with giving an idea of the real 
 service they rendered Holy Scripture. 
 
 * Thebaud, Gentilism; Brown; Thein, ch. 10; A. C. Q. iii. 73, xvi. 
 703; M. Ixxiv. 528; C. W. xiii. 804, xiv. 63. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 131 
 
 We all know, for example, the history of Abraham and that 
 of Joseph, and that they contain innumerable details relating 
 to the morals, customs, geography, etc., of the time. It was 
 these details which formed the subject of the attacks of Ger- 
 man rationalists, which were afterwards translated or copied 
 by the free-thinkers of France. They alleged that the biblical 
 accounts contained numerous inaccuracies and errors, denot- 
 ing a writer very imperfectly acquainted with the country he 
 described, and, above all, possessing no claim to the divine 
 inspiration that we attribute to him. 
 
 First. The manner of Abraham's reception at the court of 
 Pharao seemed very improbable. They also claimed that 
 the sheep, asses, and particularly camels offered by the king 
 of Egypt to the patriarch were animals w^hich had never been 
 acclimated in this country ; that horses, on the contrary, which 
 were not enumerated among the presents of Pharao, were 
 numerous there. Objections of a like nature were raised 
 against the history of Joseph. The incident of the cup pre- 
 sented to the king by the cupbearer was absurd; wine, 
 they insisted, was almost unknown in Egypt; the ceremony 
 of clothing Joseph in a robe of silk, as well as the chain of 
 gold and the graven stone bestowed upon him when he was 
 raised to the dignity of prime minister, were unknown at 
 that period. 
 
 Now, in the midst of this general assault upon the Bible, 
 the modem discoveries of Egyptologists gave the most 
 positive denial to these arrogant claims of an impious 
 science, and completely destroyed this scientific scaffolding 
 so laboriously erected. The numerous paintings in the 
 hypogea of Beni-Hussan, contemporaneous with Abraham, 
 represented scenes from the reception of strangers recalling, 
 incident for incident, the visit of Abraham to Pharao. 
 According to the inscriptions on the paintings, the strangers, 
 like the members of the family of the patriarch, were amu, 
 that is, wandering shepherds of Arabia and Palestine; the 
 name of their chief, Abschah (father of the sand), bears 
 
132 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 some analogy to that of Abraham (father of the multitude) ; 
 the physiognomy and the costumes are purely Semitic. 
 Though the amu offer presents as a mark of submission and 
 respect, they are treated as persons of distinction; the recep- 
 tion tendered them is accompanied with all the pomp of 
 the Egyptian ceremonial. Finally, everything, even to the 
 motive of the visit, seems to be identical: it was a famine, 
 says the hieroglyphic legend, which attracted these strangers 
 to the land of Misraim. 
 
 The sculptures and the paintings of Thebes, explained by 
 the most accurate authentic texts, show that asses (aa), 
 sheep (sau), and oxen (aua) formed the greater part of the 
 riches of kings and princes; some of the monuments also 
 represent camels; horses, on the contrary, do not figure 
 among the animals, and the inscriptions tell us that they 
 were acclimated in Egypt only under the reign of the shep- 
 herd-kings, under the last of whom Joseph was prime 
 minister. Hence it is natural that they should not be men- 
 tioned in the twelfth dynasty, the period when Abraham 
 went to Egypt. 
 
 As to the history of Joseph, indirect proofs of its authen- 
 ticity are no less numerous or less conclusive. Wine was 
 perfectly well kno^vn among the ancient Egyptians. Ar- 
 tists of Thebes represent the ancient inhabitants of the 
 Nile cultivating the vine, using and abusing wine, and 
 receiving at their repasts the wine-cup from the hands of 
 the first cup-bearer. 
 
 Several centuries before the arrival of Joseph the Egyp- 
 tians were already the best goldsmiths and engravers in the 
 world. Jewels and engraved stones, veritable masterpieces 
 in every respect, wrought in Egyptian manufactories more 
 than three thousand years ago, may be counted by hun- 
 dreds. All the museums of Europe have a large number 
 of magnificent specimens. Moreover, the description given 
 by Moses of the ceremony of Joseph's elevation to the rank 
 of prime minister, the putting a robe of silk upon him, 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 133 
 
 a chain of gold upon his neck, a ring upon his finger, the offi- 
 cial title which the king gave him, and the place assigned 
 him in the second chariot in the royal processions — all this 
 is a faithful copy of the numerous sculptures and paintings 
 representing the same facts. 
 
 And so it is with the account of the dreams of the cup- 
 bearer and the baker, of the interview of the sons of Jacob 
 with Joseph, of the special etiquette observed at the feast 
 which was served them. But without entering into details, 
 which we could multiply indefinitely, and all of which prove 
 the accuracy of Moses even in the smallest particulars, let 
 us consider only a recent discovery connected with the last 
 years of the Hebrews' sojourn in Egypt, which furnishes 
 the bibUcal exegete authentic and unexpected information. 
 
 A mummy recently discovered in a state of preservation 
 proved to be Ramses II., the Greek Sesostris, who inaugu- 
 rated the persecution of the Hebrews. To satisfy his mania 
 for building as well as his hatred of the sons of Israel he 
 forced them to build the two cities in the land of Gessen, 
 Rameses and Pithom. The Bible gives us a picture of the 
 sufferings of Israel; under the rod of the Egyptian overseers 
 the Hebrews were forced to labor without respite, making 
 bricks and baking them in the sun. The pictures of the 
 eighteenth dynasty confirm the accuracy of the biblical 
 account in every point; even the mode of manufacturing 
 the brick described in the papyrus containing the reports 
 of the overseers is identical with that given in the Bible. 
 
 But the location of the two cities built by the Hebrews 
 was unknown; the texts gave only a vague description 
 of Rameses; Pithom was commemorated in no monu- 
 ment so far discovered. Behold, this last village has risen 
 out of the sand which so long covered its vast ruins. 
 
 In the month of February, 1883, Naville discovered 
 near Maskhuta, east of the Delta, an immense block of 
 granite representing a Pharao seated between the god Ra 
 and the god Tum. This Pharao was no other than the 
 
134 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Ramses II. whose name occurs six times in the inscription 
 of the monument. The ruins in which the Swiss Egypt- 
 ologist found the sculpture were composed of a mass of 
 sun-baked brick mixed with straw and reeds, and stamped 
 with the cartouche of Ramses. They were surrounded by a 
 good-sized wall, also of brick, enclosing an area of a hundred 
 acres. Other sculptures soon came to light, all bearing, with 
 the bibUcal name of Pithom, the cartouche of Pharao the 
 persecutor. No fragment anterior to this reign was found. 
 
 This important discovery, while confirming the truth of 
 the Mosaic text, enables us also to determine with suffi- 
 cient satisfaction the limits of the land of Gessen^ and to 
 trace with greater precision the route of the Exodus. 
 
 This accuracy of local coloring has become so manifest 
 that the most hostile savants, finding themselves every- 
 where contradicted by new discoveries, are forced to ac- 
 knowledge themselves defeated.^ Thus when, in 1868, 
 Ebers, the most celebrated Egyptologist of Germany, pub- 
 lished, despite the protestations of fellow rationalists, his first 
 volume on Egypt and the books of Moses, the evidence of 
 facts forced from him this significant avowal: ^'It is with 
 reluctance that I pubhsh this laborious work. I hope no 
 doubt to win with it the good-will of a certain number of 
 biblical adherents, but, on the other hand, I am well aware 
 that I shall subject myself to severe criticism. I offer 
 despite myself, so to speak, and yet willingly, to those who 
 would close the Scriptures to open criticism, much which 
 will gratify them, for I demonstrate that the history of Joseph 
 particularly, even in the smallest details, portrays with great 
 exactness the state of ancient Egypt.'' 
 
 2. Discoveries in Assyria and Chaldea. — Notwith- 
 standing the amount and variety of information furnished 
 by ancient Egyptian monuments, Egyptology has not ful- 
 filled all that it promised at the beginning. It has hardly 
 given us more than merely indirect confirmation of the 
 
 ^ A. E. R., Nov. 1902. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 135 
 
 truth of the Sacred Scriptures. With Assyrian archaeology 
 the results are quite otherwise: here direct proofs are most 
 numerous. The texts and sculptures of the ruins of Ninive 
 and Babylon not only confirm the inspired writings, but 
 in many places explain them and supply omissions.^ 
 
 About the time that the key to the hieroglyphic writing 
 was discovered scholars began to decipher cuneiform writ- 
 ing, that is, the wedge- or nail-shaped inscriptions: the tri- 
 angular steel used in forming the characters produced a 
 mark resembling a wedge or nail. The monuments of 
 Assyria were covered with this writing; the Assyrian mon- 
 archs were in the habit of engraving their exploits on tab- 
 lets, prisms, or cylinders, which were placed in the founda- 
 tions of large edifices, on the marbles which adorned the 
 large halls of the temples and palaces, or behind the bas- 
 reliefs which ornamented the porticos. The richest source 
 of it, however, consists of the numerous libraries discov- 
 ered in Chaldea, Assyria, and particularly at Ninive. In 
 this city was discovered, besides the library of the palace 
 of Sennacherib, that of the palace of Assurbanipal, contain- 
 ing about ten thousand cuneiform tablets, that is, an almost 
 complete treasury of the literature of the period: theology, 
 astronomy or astrology, history political and natural, geog- 
 raphy, and grammar. The books of the hbraries consisted 
 of flat, square tablets of clay, covered on both sides with 
 fine, closely written cuneiform characters, which were set 
 by a process of baking or firing. Some of the books con- 
 sisted of more than a hundred tablets, labelled and num- 
 bered in the most perfect order. It is true that the library, 
 particularly of Assurbanipal, was seriously injured in the 
 palace fire and, later, by the inclemency of the seasons 
 and the rapacity of the Arabs; but a good portion of it 
 still remains and forms one of the chief possessions of the 
 British Museum in London. 
 
 We are indebted for these treasures to the efforts of Mr. 
 
 ^ See Rogers, History of Babylonia. 
 
136 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Layard in 1850, and to those of Mr. George Smith in 1873 
 and 1875. In the beginning of April, 1882, Hormuzd Rassam 
 enriched the British Museum with five thousand new tablets 
 which he found at Abou-Habba, the Sipharnaim of the 
 Bible. The Louvre also acquired in 1882 a large collec- 
 tion of cuneiform inscriptions. At the same time M. de 
 Sarzec, French consul at Bassorah, discovered at a four 
 days' journey from this locality ruins covering a space of 
 from six to seven kilometres, and containing a large num- 
 ber of cylinders and tablets as well as the remains of a 
 temple formerly ornamented with greenstone statues of 
 great antiquity. These figures are the first specimens of 
 real Chaldean statuary. 
 
 Here are a few of the remarkable results of Chaldean- 
 Assyrian discoveries relating to biblical exegesis. 
 
 The Assyrian bas-rehefs frequently reproduce the tree of 
 life; an ancient Babylonian cylinder represents the tempta- 
 tion of Adam and Eve; the serpent, which is seen behind 
 the woman, does not crawl, but stands erect. Mr. George 
 Smith found a cuneiform tablet anterior to Moses, on which 
 were inscribed all the principal events of the deluge: 
 the corruption of the world; the divine command to build 
 the ark; the judgment of God against sinners; the dimen- 
 sions of the ark, the calking, the command to preserve 
 certain living creatures; the entrance into the ark; the 
 description of the deluge; the opening of the window; the 
 sending forth of the bird; the oblation of sacrifice; the 
 blessing of God and the covenant with Him. Another 
 account of the same event has just been discovered by M. 
 Hormuzd Rassam. This version is not of Assyrian origin 
 hke the first, but Chaldean, yet it is exactly the same and 
 supplies several omissions. 
 
 Shapeless ruins, 170 metres in circumference and 46 in 
 height, were found recently twelve miles from Hillah, an 
 ancient town of Babylon; they consisted of bricks partially 
 vitrified by fire, and have proved to be the remains of 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 137 
 
 Birs-Nimmd. The labors of Mr. Oppert establish be- 
 yond doubt that they are the ruins of the Tower of Babel. 
 The inscriptions of Sargon, on the other hand, tell us the 
 material employed in its construction: bricks baked in 
 the fire, and slime for mortar. Is not this precisely what 
 the Bible says? '^When they removed from the East, they 
 found a plain in the land of Sennaar, and dwelt in it. And 
 each one said to his neighbor: Come, let us make bricks, 
 and bake them with fire. And they had bricks instead of 
 stones, and slime instead of mortar." (Gen. xi. 3.) 
 
 The Babylonian traditions of the Tower of Babel and the 
 confusion of tongues are so strikingly like the biblical report 
 that certain modern rationalists have thought that the legend 
 ''could not be very old." But in his inscriptions Nabucho- 
 donosor, who rebuilt the monument, speaks of the first tower 
 "as of great antiquity." 
 
 By reading, with the light of Assyrian discoveries, the 
 books of the Old Testament where the people of God come 
 before us in their relations with the kings of Ninive and 
 Babylon, we shall also find numerous and incontestable 
 proofs of biblical truth; but we can give only a few in- 
 stances. The enemies of the Bible question the Babylonian 
 captivity of Manasses, king of Juda, mentioned in the 
 Book of Chronicles, and the historic existence of Sargon, 
 king of Assyria, mentioned by Isaias. Thanks to recent 
 discoveries made by Assyriologists, such doubts can no 
 longer be entertained. As regards Sargon, for instance, they 
 have produced inscriptions sufficiently developed to be called 
 by Assyriologists ''The Fasti of Sargon." Moreover, an 
 effigy of the great monarch himself is now to be seen at the 
 Louvre in Paris. 
 
 The Book of Daniel, says the Assyrian scholar Menant, 
 records the features of the Chaldean civihzation under King 
 Nabuchodonosor with an exactness which an apocryphal 
 or fraudulent writer could never have attained. 
 
 It was also stated that the Book of Esther was written 
 
138 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 in the year 160 B.C., after the victories of Judas Machabeus, 
 by a writer absolutely ignorant of Persia. Now the exca- 
 vations made by Dieulafoy give the lie to all such state- 
 ments. In a conference which he gave in 1888, a resume of 
 which was given by M. Darmesteter in the Journal asiatique, 
 he showed that ^' the objections accumulated by a rational- 
 istic exegesis against the authenticity of the Bible are based 
 chiefly on an imperfect conception of Persian life. The 
 details which were condemned as unreasonable and improb- 
 able now prove, on the contrary, that the writer possessed 
 an excellent knowledge of the customs of the court of Susa.'' 
 It is only necessary to examine the plan of the royal palace 
 brought to light by the excavations of M. Dieulafoy to see 
 how accurate are certain details of the edifice given by the 
 author of the Book of Esther. The writer's description is 
 evidently based upon an actual view of this monument, de- 
 stroyed at the end of the third century B.C. 
 
 The study of the Egyptian and Assyrian languages, com- 
 pared with the text of the Bible, also affords proofs in favor 
 of Scripture quite as conclusive as those of archaeological 
 discoveries. We find in the Pentateuch, and there only, a 
 large number of Egyptian words, which prove how familiar 
 its author was with the Egyptian language. The tradition 
 which attributes the work to Moses is all that satisfactorily 
 explains this phenomenon. Let us give a few examples. 
 
 Pentateuch. Egyptian. 
 Tebah (the basket in which Moses was exposed on 
 
 the Nile) Tba. 
 
 Ses (the linen robe of Joseph, the prime minister) / . Ses. 
 
 Hartum (Pharao's interpreters) Hartum. 
 
 Qas (straw used in the bricks) Qas. 
 
 Seneh (the burning bush) Sent. 
 
 Even the accuracy of the proper names in the Bible is 
 confirmed by the contemporary monuments of Assyria and 
 
HISTORIC VALtTE OF THE BIBLE. 139 
 
 Egypt. This is the more remarkable that the Bible is the only 
 book which transmits the original orthography of these proper 
 names; in all other books extra-biblical, even the most 
 ancient, it is frequently impossible to identify them. 
 
 ^ ^^ Cuneiform or Hieroglyphic 
 
 Biblical JNames. Texts. 
 
 Madai (Media) Madai 
 
 Javan (Ionia) Javanu. 
 
 Kus (Ethiopia) < 
 
 Put (Syria) Put. 
 
 Nemrod Nemerad. 
 
 Babel (Confusion) Babel. 
 
 Jerusalem Oursalimmi. 
 
 Sennacherib Sin-Akhi-irib. 
 
 Manasses Minasi. 
 
 Pharao Per-aa. 
 
 Putiphar Petiphra. 
 
 . , f Abram or Abu-Rama (As- 
 
 Abram < . . , . r .^ 
 
 I Syrian form), great latner. 
 
 Chanaan Kanana. 
 
 Accad (city of Sennaar) Akkad. 
 
 Assur ^ Assur. 
 
 Elam V Children of Sem Ham. 
 
 Aram J Aramu. 
 
 The lists of the names of countries in the inscriptions of 
 Thothmes III. at Karnak contain a large number of cities 
 and localities mentioned in the Bible. 
 
 We should never conclude if we were to mention all the 
 testimony which modern discoveries in Egypt, Assyria, and 
 Palestine bear to the absolute truth of the Scriptures. 
 
 Conclusion. — We cannot better conclude this part of our 
 work relating to the authority of the Pentateuch than by 
 quoting a beautiful page from the Abbe Darras' " History of the 
 Church/' vol. III.: ^'Will these frequent discomfitures of in- 
 
140 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS, 
 
 credulous exegetes make future rationalists more cautious? 
 Would we might hope so! But as we glance at the past and 
 count all the adversaries of the Scriptures who have succes- 
 sively come forward to hurl their grain of sand against the 
 immutable rock of the divine word, we have told ourselves that 
 these revolts of the human mind will never cease. Hence, des- 
 pite so many impotent efforts other arms will be raised again; 
 despite so many failures, other assailants will rise in their 
 turn; the struggle will last until the end of time. But God, 
 who reserved for our day witnesses buried in oblivion for 
 more than three thousand years, will raise up others in ages 
 to come. What rich harvests, still unknown, are to be 
 reaped in the domain of the past! What treasures, now 
 buried under the ruins of extinct civilizations, the future 
 will see exhumed at the hour marked for the triumph of truth 
 and biblical faith! 
 
 ''Even in our own day have w^e not found that every 
 discovery so laboriously accomplished in all the branches of 
 human science is a most striking and unexpected confirma- 
 tion of the most widely controverted texts of Sacred Scripture? 
 And so it has been from the time of Porphyrins to the present 
 day. Now let the most perfect work of genius be sub- 
 mitted to the investigation, to the severe and partial criticism 
 which the Bible has endured, and that for centuries; where 
 is the Plato, the Aristotle, the Tacitus, the Bossuet of whom 
 one single work would remain entire? And yet the Bible 
 stands triumphant and immortal. According as devastating 
 hands dig about the foundations of the edifice to destroy it, 
 they find new and ever-indestructible masonry support- 
 ing it. 
 
 "Rationalists, you do not believe in miracles; for twenty 
 centuries you have followed one another in legions to destroy 
 a book written long ago by a few Hebrews in a small province 
 of Asia. All human passions have been allied with you in 
 this war. So many books have been destroyed, and yet you 
 could not destroy this one: in truth it is a miracle/^ 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 141 
 
 ART. III.— AUTHORITY OF THE GOSPELS.* 
 
 Universal credence would be willingly given to our 
 inspired books if, instead of the life of the Saviour and the 
 establishment of Christianity, they told us of the deeds and 
 exploits of a great conqueror or of one of those political 
 revolutions upsetting whole nations. But they acquaint us 
 with the origin of a religion which demands the sacrifice of 
 many prejudices and passions and the constant practice of 
 precepts opposed to the worst instincts of nature. Hence it 
 is not surprising that every effort has been made to de- 
 stroy this religion. Now the very foundation of Christian- 
 ity will be shattered if the quality of historical certainty can 
 be removed from those documents which record the life, 
 miracles, death, and resurrection of Christ and the founding 
 of the Church. It is, therefore, of capital importance to 
 establish upon solid grounds the historical authority of these 
 documents already so venerable by their age. 
 
 Let us recall w^hat we have already said in regard to the 
 point of view from which we are considering the Holy Scrip- 
 tures, and the qualities required to render the authority of 
 a historical document full and complete. 
 
 I. Authenticity. 
 
 The authenticity of the writings of the New Testament, 
 upon which the full light of criticism has been concentrated, 
 is now hardly disputed. Reus, Holzman, Schenkel, Reville, 
 Michel Nicolas recognize the historical authority of the 
 gospels and admit that they were written in the first century 
 of the Christian era. "We consider ourselves justified,'' 
 saysTischendorf, ''in placing at the end of the first century 
 not the birth or composition of the gospels, but their union 
 into a canonical body of books/' In regard to the epistles 
 
 * Introductions by Breen, Dixon, McDevitt, Gigot, Bumet, Why, 
 etc., ch. 15-19; D. R., Apr. '93, p. 420, New Ser. xxiv. 357; C. W. 
 xlviii. 376, Ivii. 593; M., Sept., Oct. '84, Jan. '85. 
 
142 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 of St. Paul Renan affirms that the full light of history 
 shines upon the time of St. Paul's preaching, which, without 
 doubt, was between the fifteenth and the thirty-second year 
 after the Passion of Jesus. He says: "The epistles of this 
 apostle have an absolute authenticity." Again: "It is 
 beyond all doubt that the Acts were written by the author of 
 the third gospel, of which they are a continuation. . . . The 
 author is a companion of St. Paul." 
 
 Thesis. — The Gospels were Written in the First Century of 
 
 the Christian Era, by the Authors whose Names they Bear, 
 
 that is, by the Apostles or their Immediate Disciples. 
 
 First Argument, — It is prescription. Possession is equal 
 to a title until the claim is disproved. Now all Christians, 
 Catholic or heretical, have always regarded, and still regard, 
 the gospels as authentic, and on this point they are in 
 peaceful and perpetual possession. To dispossess them it is 
 necessary to prove that the possession is illegal, and to say 
 when and by whom the assumption was made. "We 
 Christians," says M. de Broglie, "are in the position of a 
 proprietor who knows from whom he holds his possessions, 
 who is sure of the validity of his title, and who is obliged 
 to examine the claims of contestants only as far as it is 
 necessary to defend his own." Now, despite all the efforts 
 of infidelity, we find no opposition on this capital point, 
 except a few weak objections, the futility of which we shall 
 see later on. The authenticity of the gospels, therefore, 
 remains established until its adversaries prove the contrary. 
 But this they cannot do, for the proofs which we are about 
 to demonstrate are irrefutable. 
 
 Second Argument. — ^The positive proofs in favor of this 
 authenticity are so numerous and so uniform that they 
 defy contradiction. We have, in fact, on this point : 
 
 a. The unanimous accord of all Christian authors, not 
 only of our day, but even of the first centuries. Among 
 the Apostolic Fathers, that is, the immediate disciples of the 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 143 
 
 apostles, we find quotations from the gospels.^ St. Ignatius of 
 Antioch, the disciple of St. John, says in one of his letters 
 (ad Philad. 2, 5): ''I have recourse to the Gospel as to 
 Christ corporally present, and to the apostles [that is, to 
 the epistles] as to the teaching of the present Church." St. 
 Papias, another disciple of St. John, gives precise informa- 
 tion in regard to the writings of St. Matthew and St. Mark, 
 whom he designates by name. In the second century St. 
 Justin testifies that in his time the memoirs of the apostles, 
 which we call gospels, were read in the assemblies of the 
 Christians; he knows that these memoirs were written by 
 the apostles and apostolic men (that is, by the apostles 
 Matthew and John, and by apostolic men, Mark and Luke) . 
 The first to cite the names of the four evangelists is 
 St. Irenseus, the disciple of St. Polycarp, St. John's disciple; 
 he came from Asia Minor to Gaul and was raised to the 
 episcopal see of Lyons, where he died a martyr in 202. In 
 his works he refers so frequently to the gospels that we 
 could almost reconstruct the entire gospel narrative with 
 the texts he quotes. He has left an analysis of the Gospel 
 of St. Luke corresponding point for point with the book 
 we possess bearing this name. Origen, in Egypt, and Ter- 
 tullian, in Africa, afford us formal and almost equally ancient 
 testimony in favor of the authenticity of the gospels. ^ 
 
 h. The accord of the heretics of the early centuries. The 
 Gnostics knew our gospels and made frequent use of them. 
 Marcion falsified the Gospel of St. Luke to adapt it to his 
 
 ^ We have a certain number of writings of the Apostolic Fathers 
 which are absolutely and incontestably authentic. Such are the 
 celebrated letter to the Corinthians by St. Clement, a contemporary of 
 St. Peter; the Epistle of Barnabas, the faithful companion and friend 
 of St. Paul; The Pastor by Hermas; seven letters of St. Ignatius of 
 Antioch; the letter of St. Polycarp to the Philippians; the letter to 
 Diognetes; and the Fragments of Papias. 
 
 2 1. E. R., Apr., May, July 1900. In Pere Didon's beautiful work, 
 Jesus Christ, another proof is taken from the different versions of the 
 gospels put forth in the very earliest days of Christianity (pp. xii., 
 xxvii., Engl. ed.). 
 
144 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 erroneous doctrines. In fact the authenticity of the gospels 
 was so incontestable that none of these heretics dreamed 
 of disputing it. 
 
 c. The agreement of pagans themselves, such as Celsus 
 in the second century, Porphyrins in the third, Julian the 
 Apostate in the fourth. These inveterate and astute ene- 
 mies of the Christian religion tried, it is true, to find in the 
 gospels objections to their divinity, but they never at- 
 tempted to assail the authenticity of the books. Yet if it 
 had been possible they certainly would have had recourse 
 to this means, for it was evidently the shortest and most 
 efficacious way of combating the Church of Christ. 
 
 Third Argument. — The gospels bear all the intrinsic 
 marks of authenticity. So far from finding in them any- 
 thing contrary to the laws, usages, institutions, language, 
 customs, characters, tastes, prejudices, in a word, to the 
 social and religious state of Judea at that time, it is 
 portrayed with such scrupulous accuracy and precise detail 
 that only ocular witnesses could have known and written 
 the events described. The same may be said of all that 
 relates to the history, the geography, the topography, the 
 numismatics of the period. The English writers Lardner and 
 Paley, particularly, have demonstrated that the conformity 
 of the gospels to the state of Roman society as we know it 
 in the time of Augustus is, even in the smallest details, most 
 remarkable. Now it would have been absolutely impossible 
 for a later writer not to err, particularly upon certain 
 very complicated and obscure points of the first century. 
 It is evident from a number of passages that the Jews to 
 whom St. Matthew addresses his gospel lived in Jerusalem 
 before its ruin. The Jerusalem of Agrippa is so vividly 
 portrayed in the same gospel that rationalists do not venture 
 to date its composition beyond the years immediately fol- 
 lowing the destruction of the holy city; otherwise how 
 could the vanished city have left so fresh a memory? When 
 these critics, obstinate enemies of the Holy Scriptures, place 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 145 
 
 the composition of the first gospel after the year 70, it is only 
 because it contains the prophecy of the ruin of Jerusalem and 
 of the Temple: from their standpoint prophecy being impos- 
 sible, they must declare it to have been written after the event. 
 
 Fourth Argument. — ^The preceding proofs more than 
 suffice to establish decisively the authenticity of the gospels. 
 We may go still further, however, and demonstrate that it is 
 even impossible for these books to be other than authentic. 
 In fact the proofs cited above show that they were imiver- 
 sally recognized as authentic at the beginning of the second 
 and even in the first century. If, therefore, there was any 
 imposture, it must necessarily have been perpetrated in 
 the lifetime of the apostles, or a short time after their death. 
 These two hypotheses are equally inadmissible, for any- 
 thing of the kind would have encountered violent opposition 
 from the apostles, so careful to preserve the faith in all its 
 purity, or at least from their immediate disciples, as well as 
 from pagans and heretics interested in revealing the im- 
 posture. Now nothing of the kind was produced. The 
 faithful never hesitated to receive these writings as coming 
 from the apostles; on the contrary, when the apocryphal 
 gospels appeared they were immediately repudiated by 
 the most eminent Christian doctors. 
 
 Conclusion. — These arguments, as convincing and de- 
 cisive as history can possibly furnish, render the authenticity 
 of the gospels incontestable. Renan himself is finally 
 forced by German science to acknowledge as much. "On 
 the whole," he says, "I admit that the four canonical gos- 
 pels are authentic. In my opinion they all date from the 
 first century and they are nearly all written by the authors 
 to whom they are attributed." Nearly all — rather a strange 
 expression in a question requiring a simple yes or no. But 
 some allowance must be made for the awkward constraint 
 of such an acknowledgment.^ 
 
 ^ See the Abbe Fouard's work, " St. Peter and the First Years of 
 Christianity/' ch. 12; also Didon, 1. c. 
 
146 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 II. Integrity of the Gospels. 
 
 First Argument. — To prove this integrity we may be 
 satisfied with quoting the following from the learned polyglot 
 Card. Wiseman: ''Although every attainable source has been 
 exhausted; although the Fathers of every age have gleaned 
 for their readings; although the versions of every nation, 
 Arabic, Syriac, Coptic, Armenian, and Ethiopian, have 
 been ransacked for their renderings; although manuscripts 
 of every age from the sixteenth upwards to the third, and of 
 every country, have been again and again visited by indus- 
 trious swarms to rifle them of their treasures; although, 
 having exhausted the stores of the West, critics have 
 travelled like naturalists into distant lands to discover new 
 specimens — have visited, like Scholz or Sebastiani, the 
 recesses of Momit Athos, or the unexplored libraries of the 
 Egyptian and Syrian deserts — yet nothing has been dis- 
 covered, no, not one single various reading, which can throw 
 doubt upon any passage before considered certain or de- 
 cisive in favor of any important doctrine." ^ 
 
 We have about five hundred ancient MSS. of the gospels, 
 dating from the time of Constantine to the sixteenth century; 
 the principal ?je the Codex Vaticanus, the Alexandrine, the 
 palimpsest of St. Ephrem in the National Library of Paris, 
 and the Codex Sinaiticus. Now all these MSS., even the 
 most ancient, substantially agree. They agree also with the 
 numerous quotations made by the Fathers and the Doctors 
 of the Church. Therefore they have remained as they were 
 originally written. 
 
 We have seen that the result of the studies made con- 
 cerning the MSS. of the Old Testament is absolutely the 
 same; hence the enemies of Christianity are forced to ac- 
 knowledge their defeat. 
 
 Second Argument. — Such alteration, moreover, would 
 have been impossible in books so widely known and re- 
 
 * Science and Rev. Rel., 1. 10. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 147 
 
 spected from the beginning. In fact, when could it have 
 taken place? In the time of the apostles? They would 
 not have permitted it. After their death? Their disciples 
 would have perceived it and would have protested against it. 
 A little later? The copies of these writings were so numerous 
 and such a great check one upon the other that any alteration 
 would have excited violent protest on the part of the Chris- 
 tians, on the part of heretics, or, finally, on the part of Jews 
 and pagans. Now nothing of the kind took place. "At 
 the present day,'^ says August Nicolas, "it would be im- 
 possible to alter the Holy Scriptures, for they are in the hands 
 of all Catholics, of the pope, bishops, priests and laity; they 
 are in the hands of heretics and Jews; they are in the hands 
 of unbelievers : and one or other of these would be sure to 
 brand the imposture as soon as it appeared. Now what 
 is impossible to-day, because of this triple rank of incorrup- 
 tible surveillants, has always been impossible for the same 
 reason.'' 
 
 Observation. — No doubt numerous variants are found 
 in the different MSS. of the New Testament, but they prove 
 absolutely nothing against the integrity of the book. We 
 know that the same thing occurs and must occur in all the 
 works which have come down to us from antiquity. The 
 variants in the works of Horace alone have furnished matter 
 for three volumes. There could not but be variants in the 
 gospels, for no work has been, at all times and in all places, 
 more copied, read, translated, and commentated. God 
 was not obliged to work a perpetual and striking miracle to 
 preserve the gospels from slight changes in the text which 
 in no way affected the doctrine. We may even say that 
 these numerous variants, far from proving anything against 
 the integrity of the Holy Scriptures, only confirm it the more. 
 As they leave the essential parts of each phrase intact, it is 
 clear that they are only the mistakes of copyists and trans- 
 lators, and that the idea of a substantial alteration never, 
 occurred to any one. 
 
148 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Conclusion. — The evangelical books have never been 
 altered; it was not even possible to alter them. The fact of 
 their integrity, therefore, is incontestable. 
 
 III. Truthfulness of the Gospels. 
 
 Let us prove now that the authors of the gospels (a) could 
 not be deceived in regard to the events which they relate; 
 (b) that they did not wish to deceive; (c) that even had they 
 wished to deceive they could not do so; and we shall thus 
 establish the incontestable accuracy of their narrations. 
 
 A. These Writers could not be Deceived, for they 
 relate only what they saw or learned from eye-witnesses 
 worthy of belief. They wrote, moreover, of sensible, material, 
 recent facts accomplished in the full light of day, frequently 
 in the presence of a large multitude, and even of the enemies 
 of Jesus, who, without contesting what He did, endeavored 
 only to explain it by means of the intervention of the Evil 
 One. They were facts of capital importance to the institu- 
 tions and the religion of the Jewish people, and consequently 
 of vital interest to them; finally, they were frequently ex- 
 traordinary and marvellous, and therefore fitted to excite 
 attention. We certainly cannot say that the authors of 
 the gospels were, all four at the same time, blind and deaf or 
 the victims of illusion. If we did, we should have to say 
 the same of innumerable others, even among the enemies of 
 Jesus, for they also admitted, without protest, the evangelical 
 narratives. It is certain, therefore, that these writers could 
 not have been deceived in regard to what they have written. 
 
 B. Did They Wish to Deceive? — This is impossible, 
 for they had no object in playing so base a role; now a man 
 must have some reason for making himself an impostor. 
 Far from hoping to derive any advantage from a fraud which 
 would have been attacked by Jews as well as by pagans, 
 they could only expect what they actually reaped : contempt, 
 outrages, persecution, and, finally, to be put to death. It is 
 well known that they sealed their testimony with their blood. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 149 
 
 Pascal had reason to say: ''I readily believe the histories of 
 witnesses who sealed their testimony with their death/' 
 Moreover, we have only to read the gospels without prejudice 
 to be convinced that these historians could not be impostors: 
 the sincere, simple, candid tone of the narratives is a guarantee 
 of their veracity. 
 
 C. They could Not Deceive. — 1st. They wrote the gos- 
 pels while numerous witnesses of the events related in them 
 still lived who would not have failed to brand any falsifi- 
 cation. The Jews, particularly, had the greatest interest 
 in doing so. The chiefs of the synagogue, unable to deny 
 the facts, endeavored to suppress the new religion by silenc- 
 ing the apostles, but they found it impossible to dispute 
 the truth of the gospel narratives. There was question of 
 public events of the greatest importance; they were related 
 as occurring throughout Judea and in the very city of Jeru- 
 salem, in the presence of numerous witnesses mentioned 
 by name. Many who figured in the events were men of high 
 positions, inimical to Jesus, and interested in revealing the 
 existence of fraud; hence, if protestations had been possible, 
 they would have been loud and violent. Yet not a voice 
 was raised to confound these impostors! Such an hypothe- 
 sis is manifestly absurd. 
 
 2d. One who claims that the writings of the New Testament 
 are inventions must admit the following absurdities : 
 
 a. A few unlettered, uneducated fishermen imagined a 
 hero of so grand a character and so pure a life that he forces 
 from J. J. Rousseau this spontaneous tribute of admiration: 
 ''Yes, if the life and death of Socrates are those of a wise 
 man, the life and death of Jesus are those of a God.'' These 
 same ignorant men invented and attributed to their hero 
 a doctrine holier, more sublime, more profound than all 
 that the most celebrated pagan philosophers have ever 
 conceived. *'To invent a Newton," says Parker, ''one 
 would have to be a Newton himself. What man could 
 invent a person like Jesus? Jesus alone could do it." 
 
150 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 h. These writers, contrary to the manner of impostors, 
 enter into the smallest details of time, of place, of persons, 
 and yet there is throughout a perfect resemblance, an abso- 
 lute conformity to all that we know of that period exposed 
 to the full light of history. 
 
 c. These men, as ignorant as they were corrupt, wrote 
 these fables of their imagination in a style of truly inimitable 
 candor and sim^plicity. The accent of truth in all these 
 pages from various pens is so striking that it carries con- 
 viction to every unbiassed mind, and forces the same Rous- 
 seau to exclaim: ''Shall we say that the history of the 
 Gospel is invented at will? My friend, this is not the way 
 inventions are made; and the facts in the life of Socrates 
 are not as well attested as those in the life of Jesus Christ. 
 This, in reality, is abandoning the difficulty instead of 
 solving it; it would be easier to conceive that four men 
 agreed to manufacture this book than that one alone fur- 
 nished the subject of it. Never could Jewish authors have 
 found either this tone or this morality; the Gospel bears 
 characters of truth so great, so striking, so inimitable, that 
 its inventor would be more marvellous than its hero." 
 
 d. The various writers of the gospels, the Acts, and the 
 epistles, though separated by distance and years, agree so 
 perfectly in their imaginary narratives, presented in very 
 different forms, that no real contradiction can be proved 
 among them. As to the discrepancies and apparent con- 
 tradictions in the narrations of the four evangelists, they 
 are a proof that they did not concert to invent what they 
 relate. 
 
 e. All these writers, uninfluenced by any interest tem- 
 poral or eternal, sealed with their blood what they knew 
 to be an invention on their part, and after them millions of 
 martyrs died to attest the same lie. 
 
 /. These same men, who could have been only base im- 
 postors, succeeded, without any human assistance, in estab- 
 lishing their fraud so perfectly as to overthrow not only 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 151 
 
 Judaism, so ancient and so deeply rooted, but also paganism, 
 bulwarked by wealth, science, power, and a moral code 
 favoring human passions; they succeeded in making the 
 repentant world kneel at the feet of a crucified criminal; 
 succeeded in leading an immense number of men to renounce 
 all they had till then believed and practised, and to adopt 
 a religion offering to the mind unfathomable mysteries, and 
 to the will a moral law contrary to all the instincts of sensual 
 nature. 
 
 g. A religion which has regenerated humanity, created 
 the modern world on the ruins of the old, inspired its 
 morality, its institutions, its laws; which has been every- 
 where an inexhaustible source of truth, of virtues, and of 
 blessings; which counts among its disciples in all ages 
 innumerable scholars and saints, could not have been founded 
 upon a lie invented by a few fishermen. 
 
 h. Finally, God must have confirmed the fraud of these 
 impostors by fulfilling the prophecies which they invented 
 and attributed to Jesus, and by working innumerable mira- 
 cles in the course of ages in favor of their disciples; hence 
 He contributed to lead us into error. 
 
 In truth, if this is the case, we have reason to say with 
 Richard of St. Victor: ''Lord, if I am in error it is Thou 
 who hast deceived me, for the Christian religion is con- 
 firmed by signs Su striking and so numerous that Thou 
 alone canst be its author/' 
 
 Resume and Conclusion. — Let us quote here, by way 
 of resume, a beautiful page from M. de Broglie's UEglise et 
 r Empire Romain au IV^ Sitcle: ''The events related in the 
 Bible do not belong, like the records of ancient religions, 
 to a remote, semi-heroic, and semi-barbaric age, nor are 
 they confined to some unknown, deserted land. It was in 
 the bosom of advanced civilization, in the principal city of 
 a Roman province, visited by Pompey and described by 
 Tacitus, that Jesus Christ lived, preached, established His 
 Church, and sacrificed His life. His biography has not 
 
152 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 come down to us from mouth to mouth in rhapsodies height- 
 ened by popular enthusiasm and creduhty. Four simple, 
 precise narratives, agreeing in their assertions, taken down 
 by ocular or contemporaneous witnesses in a perfectly intel- 
 ligible language, are the documents upon which the history 
 of Jesus Christ is established. A concert of ancient testi- 
 mony, a prompt diffusion, the similarity of the texts spread 
 throughout the entire world, the conformity of the narra- 
 tives to contemporaneous chronology, constitute characters 
 which in their turn entitle the evangelic writings to rank 
 among the authentic monuments of the past. The authen- 
 ticity of the facts rests upon no other foundation; criticism 
 can exact nothing more. We know Jesus Christ through 
 His disciples John and Matthew, St. Paul through Luke, 
 the companion of his travels. Have we any other knowl- 
 edge of Alexander or Augustus than that furnished us by 
 their companions in arms or their courtiers? Because 
 facts belong to the domain of faith and astonish reason, 
 because they carry with them a certain order of moral 
 consequences, is this any reason for rejecting, in regard to 
 them, all the ordinary rules of human judgment? We ask no 
 other favor for the Gospel than that of being judged by the 
 usual tests applied by science and erudition." M. de Wallon 
 remarks in his turn, at the conclusion of his beautiful work, 
 La Croyance due a VEvangile: ''If we were as exacting 
 and as critical in regard to ancient or modern books as we 
 are in regard to the New Testament, history would still be 
 unwritten, for want of duly authenticated records; we 
 should be still in the mythological age." ^ 
 
 IV. Answers to Objections. 
 
 A. General Reply. — We cannot enter into detail here in 
 regard to all the objections which adversaries have been 
 pleased to collect against the veracity of the gospels. More- 
 
 * Lacordaire, 6th conf . on Jesus Christ. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 153 
 
 over, the solid character of our thesis does not require this 
 special refutation, particularly as we are treating the question 
 of the veracity of the Scriptures only from an historical 
 point of view. Therefore we shall confine ourselves to the 
 following reflections, which we have borrowed also from 
 M. de Broglie. 
 
 All the objections usually alleged, either against the 
 authenticity of the gospels or the truth of the facts related 
 in them, come necessarily under one or other of the following 
 principal heads: 
 
 1st. The miraculous character of the facts stated. 
 
 2d. The want of harmony in the various gospel narratives. 
 
 3d. The contradiction between certain facts related by 
 the evangelists and the facts of chronology or contempo- 
 raneous history as given us by profane writers. 
 
 Let us see what we are to think of each of these chief 
 accusations. 
 
 1st. The miraculous character of the facts of the Gospel 
 proves absolutely nothing against the authenticity and truth 
 of them, unless we claim to reject a 'priori, without any 
 proof, all miracles as impossible. If, as logic and common 
 sense require, we admit the possibiUty of miracles, the mirac- 
 ulous events related in the gospels cannot be urged against 
 the veracity of the evangelists: these facts are capable of 
 proof like any other, first by the senses, and afterward by 
 testimony when they have ceased to exist. Later on we 
 shall speak ex professo of the possibihty of miracles and 
 their verification (ch. III. art. 2). 
 
 2d. As to the variations in the gospels, they may be 
 ranged into two classes: variations through omission, when 
 one evangehst omits what another includes, is silent when 
 another speaks; variations through contradiction, when sev- 
 eral evangehsts give apparently irreconcilable versions of the 
 same fact. 
 
 The first are of no importance whatever, and this is the 
 case with the majority of the variations found in the gospels. 
 
154 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 We know, moreover, that the apostles, whose teaching, hke 
 that of the Jewish rabbins and according to the command 
 of Jesus Himself, was essentially oral, wrote only occasionally, 
 with no intention to form a complete body of doctrine, nor 
 to relate all the acts of Jesus. The evangelists expressly 
 declare that they are far from having written all that they 
 knew upon this subject. 
 
 The variations through contradiction constitute a more 
 serious difficulty. But let us remark that the contradictions 
 between two versions of the same fact, even if duly proved, 
 impugn the accuracy only of certain details of the fact; they 
 do not authorize us to reject either the substance of the fact, 
 or other facts concerning which the narrations agree. Now 
 the apparent contradictions between the evangelists all relate 
 to insignificant points, unimportant details.^ As to the 
 whole history, and the precious and touching truths con- 
 tained in the simple gospel narrative, the agreement is 
 complete. Never have writers better described the same 
 person; never have they more strikingly exhibited that 
 perfect unity which is the appanage only of truth. 
 
 3d. In regard to the disagreement of the Gospel with the 
 facts of the history of that time, by making the same dis- 
 tinctions we shall attain the same result. These variations, 
 which are, moreover, very few, may also be ranged as omis- 
 sions and contradictions. 
 
 The first class prove nothing, particularly as the Gospel 
 does not deal with facts which at that period would certainly 
 have come within the province of the historians of Rome 
 and have figured in contemporaneous annals; it relates the 
 history of a carpenter, living in a city of the province, and 
 whose influence was at first sufficiently restricted to have 
 escaped the attention of Suetonius and Tacitus. When the 
 
 ^ A few slight errors in unimportant details in no way weaken the 
 authority of an historian. When there is question of an inspired 
 historian, we can attribute no error to him; but in our present study 
 we are considering the gospels only as historical documents. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 155 
 
 Christians became numerous enough in Rome itself to awaken 
 the attention of philosophers and of the Roman officials, 
 that is, about thirty years after the death of Christ, then, 
 and then only, would the great annalists have to mention 
 them. It is precisely at this period that Tacitus speaks of the 
 Christians (followers of Christ) as persecuted in Rome by Nero. 
 
 There remain the contradictions which may be found 
 between the very small number of dates mentioned in evan- 
 gelical history and the general chronology of contempora- 
 neous history. As we have already said, even though we 
 could not explain them, or do away with them by any plausi- 
 ble supposition, the only result would be to make doubtful 
 the dates of certain events in the Gospel, the name of some 
 governor of Judea at that period, and similar absolutely 
 secondary points. But the essential facts would remain no 
 less firmly established ; it would be no less incontestable that 
 Jesus Christ came into the world, that He spoke in prophecy, 
 that He wrought miracles, that He died on the cross, that 
 He rose from the dead. Now these are not points of second- 
 ary but of primary importance which cannot be disputed, 
 and which serve to prove the di\dnity of the mission of 
 Christ and of His work, the Christian religion. 
 
 In regard to the difficulties concerning details, they are to 
 be found stated and explained in the commentaries on the 
 Holy Scriptures. 
 
 B. Reply to Special Objections. — Let us remark, first, 
 that it is not at all astonishing that we should sometimes 
 be perplexed concerning the interpretation of a text when 
 there is question of peoples whose customs, habits, and 
 language are so different from our own. Many things which 
 are obscure to us, and seem at times to imply contradiction, 
 must have been very clear, very comprehensible to contem- 
 poraries, and consequently required no explanation. Thus, 
 according as linguistics, numismatics, history, and geography 
 advance, the obscurities disappear and the texts become 
 clearer. 
 
166 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS 
 
 First Objection. — There have been false gospels, hence 
 ours may be false. 
 
 Reply. — 1st. It would be just as reasonable to say there 
 is false coin, hence there is no genuine. It is the contrary 
 of the proposition which is true, and we may say with Pascal: 
 ''Instead of concluding that because there are apocryphal 
 gospels there are none that are genuine, we have to admit, 
 on the contrary, that there must be genuine gospels since 
 there are apocryphal, and that it is the genuine which have 
 given rise to the apocryphal.'' The latter could have been 
 only counterfeits of the real gospels, to which this very 
 attempt at imitation renders homage. In fact, if the 
 authors of the apocryphal gospels presumed to relate such 
 things, and succeeded in obtaining credence for them, it was 
 only because they were more or less in harmony with the 
 authentic gospels, of which they assumed the character and 
 authority, and because one and the other were in accord 
 with recent events, with tradition, with all the monuments, 
 with all the contemporaneous memories of Judea. 
 
 2d. We have positive proof of the false character of the 
 gospels called apocryphal, while, on the contrary, the authen- 
 ticity and truth of our four gospels are established, as we 
 have seen, by incontestable proofs. In proportion as these 
 bear all the marks of absolute authenticity the others bear 
 evidence of improbability or bad faith. "These composi- 
 tions,'' says Renan, ''should not by any means be placed on 
 a footing with the canonical gospels." 
 
 3d. These apocryphal gospels were never accepted by the 
 Church and they soon disappeared, while our four gospels 
 have always been distinguished as the only authentic ones, 
 not only by the Church, but by heretics and pagans them- 
 selves. "The Church," says Origen, "has four gospels; 
 heresy has many." 
 
 Second Objection. — ^We are told by Strauss that all 
 religion among the Greeks, the Romans, the Germans, and 
 the Indians began with myths, that is, with fables, in which 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 157 
 
 a moral idea, a physical event, etc., was represented under 
 the figure of a man who never existed.^ He also claims that 
 it is the same with the Christian religion, where all that 
 belongs to humanity is attributed to a unique hero, to Jesus 
 Christ. 
 
 Reply. — 1st. What we have just said in regard to the absurd 
 consequences of any fraud on the part of the apostles is 
 equally applicable to the hypothesis of a myth. We should 
 have to admit that a myth, a lying fabrication, founded an 
 institution as real, as efficacious, as indestructible as the 
 Church; that a myth wrought the conversion of the world; 
 that the very authors of the fraud and millions of their 
 followers laid down their lives to witness to its truth. 
 
 2d. That other religions should be based upon fables is 
 perfectly natural, since they are false. For this reason their 
 origin is carefully assigned to prehistoric times, that is, to an 
 obscure period where the imagination of the poets is un- 
 trammelled by historical facts. It is quite otherwise with 
 Christianity : it belongs to a period subjected to the full light 
 of history, to a period of intellectual activity, where even 
 scepticism was rife, to a period, consequently, where fabulous 
 relations would be received with even greater incredulity 
 than at the present day. How can the mythical characters 
 of other religions compare with that of Jesus, so lifelike, so 
 imbued with sweet and simple majesty? The most super- 
 ficial observer, to recognize the incontestable character of 
 historic truth in the Gospel, has only to compare the mythical 
 legends, always so obscure, so vague, confounding times, 
 places, and persons, with the detailed, explicit narration of 
 the acts of the gospel hero. 
 
 3d. Moreover, to apply the system of myths to Jesus Christ 
 is to destroy all history. Certainly no one doubts the ex- 
 istence of Napoleon I. and the reality of his renowned deeds. 
 Yet by having recourse to myths we could demonstrate very 
 
 •M.; June and July 77; Lord Arundel, Nature-myth Untenable] 
 C. W. xvii. 209. 
 
158 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 plausibly that the great conqueror of modern times never 
 existed/ If we are told that the works of Napoleon survive 
 him and powerfully protest against the hypothesis of a mytii, 
 we do not deny it; but the Church also and the whole Chris- 
 tian world, the works of Jesus Christ, have shone before the 
 eyes of the whole universe for more than eighteen centuries; 
 their very existence proves most clearly that Christ, as He 
 is represented in the Gospel, was the grandest and most 
 powerful reality that ever appeared in this world. ^ 
 
 Third Objection. — Renan in his ''Life of Jesus," not 
 daring to reproduce the too absurd theory of Strauss, modifies 
 it in a way to attain the same end, that is to deny the divin- 
 ity of Christ. As he has no belief in the supernatural, and 
 alleges that no miracle has yet been proved, he denies all 
 that is miraculous in the life of Our Saviour. It must neces- 
 sarily be attributed to the excited imagination of His dis- 
 ciples; all that they relate of miraculous events are only 
 legends with no historic value. 
 
 Reply. — We shall not reproduce here the magnificent 
 and annihilating arguments with which Renan's sad and 
 impious romance has been refuted, but content ourselves 
 with a few reflections. 
 
 1st. Renan 's whole theory rests solely on the affirmation 
 of the non-existence of the supernatural and of miracles. 
 But whatever the vigor of this affirmation, it does not 
 cease to be purely gratuitous, unproven, and contrary to 
 the legitimate and universal belief. Let us remark, first, 
 that if we prove the existence of one miracle since the begin- 
 ning of the world, Renan's entire structure crumbles to its 
 base. Now we shall prove, very decisively, the reality of 
 numerous miracles. 
 
 2d. All that we have said of Strauss' myths is equally 
 
 ^ This has been done by the Protestant Archbishop Whately in a 
 brilliant jeu d' esprit against Strauss entitled "Historic Doubts con- 
 cerning Napoleon Buonaparte." D. R., Oct. '77, p. 559. 
 
 ^ See Lacordaire, 7th conf . on Jesus Christ. 
 
HISTORIC VALUE OF THE BIBLE. 159 
 
 applicable to Kenan's legends. The arguments which de- 
 stroy one are equally fatal to the other. 
 
 3d. Renan is in contradiction with his own theory when 
 he affects to respect Jesus. According to him this Jesus was 
 nothing raore than a base impostor, who, knowing that he 
 was a mere man like his fellows, allowed himself to be honored 
 as a worker of miracles and adored as a God. 
 
 4th. Let us add that this same writer gives in his book 
 numerous and absolutely manifest proofs of bad faith; he 
 goes so far as to falsify t^xts with the greatest effrontery, 
 to cite them in a sense contrary to their natural and certain 
 signification; he refers the reader to passages saying the very 
 opposite of what he claims. Abundant proofs of this want 
 of honesty are to be found in Henri Lasserre's interesting 
 work entitled Le 13 e Apotre. 
 
 Conclusion and Transition. — The inevitable conclusion 
 of the preceding pages is that the Pentateuch and the gospels 
 possess, in an historical point of view, incontestable authority, 
 and merit unreserved belief. They afford an invulnerable 
 basis for the proofs in favor of supernatural religion, which 
 we shall presently give. Supported by these documents we 
 can establish successively the divinity of the primitive reve- 
 lation, then that of the Mosaic religion, finally that of the 
 Christian religion. This historic method will have the ad- 
 vantage of being very complete, and it has been employed to 
 advantage, particularly in the last century, by the defenders 
 of the faith. 
 
 Contemporaneous infidels, Voltaire particularly, had in fact 
 accumulated against the teachings and the relations of the 
 Old Testament a quantity of sophisms which it was necessary 
 to destroy. But these objections, devoid of all foundation, 
 and bolstered, for the most part, by scoffs and jests, have lost 
 their force ; we have no need to occupy ourselves with them. 
 
 To-day the discussion has reached the very heart of the 
 question. The rationalist school pretend to find in Jesus 
 sometimes a wise man who by the power of his genius has 
 
160 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 done much to promote the progress of the human race, 
 sometimes an arrant impostor by whom men have been too 
 long deceived. We shall boldly attack these impious state- 
 ments and furnish direct proof of the divinity of the Chris- 
 tian religion, the crown and completion of the other two 
 with which it is intimately united. When we shall have 
 established that Jesus Christ was truly sent by God, His 
 testimony alone, henceforth incontestable, will abundantly 
 suffice to establish the divinity of the two religious phases 
 which prepared man for His coming. 
 
 We shall demonstrate that Jesus Christ has been truly 
 sent by God to impose upon men a new rehgion, more per- 
 fect than those which preceded it. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 DEMONSTRATION OF THE DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN 
 
 RELIGION. 
 
 ART. I.— REMARKS ON THE METHOD TO FOLLOW IN 
 THIS DEMONSTRATION. 
 
 1st. Among the distinctive signs of true revelation the 
 Fathers and apologists, interpreters of Christian tradition, 
 have always placed in the first rank miracle and prophecy, 
 which is also a miracle of the intellectual order. They have 
 always seen here the incontestable testimony of God, the 
 seal, as it were, of Heaven's communications with earth. 
 For a long time ancient and modern adversaries of Chris- 
 tianity agreed with its defenders on this point; though 
 they denied the reaUty of miracles attested by Christians, 
 they never questioned the irrefragable value of a miracle 
 fully demonstrated. 
 
 2d. That rationahsts should object to this method we can 
 readily conceive. Rejecting revelation completely, all that 
 remains to them is a purely natural rehgion which has 
 sprung in a perfect state from the human intelligence and 
 conscience. This religion, they tell us, is only a code of 
 morals; its precepts escape the inquisition of science; they 
 must be observed, however, for man is made to live in 
 society. If this is the case, the principal character of the 
 true religion is the morality of the doctrine: it furnishes 
 the supreme criterion which each one's own reason should 
 enable him to appreciate. As to miracles, it goes without 
 saying that they reject them completely, or admit them 
 only in name. All that is represented in the Scriptures 
 as supernatural events, miracles, prophecies, should be 
 
 161 
 
162 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 regarded as figurative expressions, as representative laws 
 and duties; these events must be brought into the category 
 either of rational concepts or of natural facts. In this does 
 the office of interpreter consist; here is what Kant, the 
 first author of this theory, calls moral accommodation. 
 
 3d. Even Catholics have sometimes been perplexed as to the 
 proper method for an apology of faith. In answering the 
 difficulties and sarcasms which the infidels of the last century 
 had accumulated, in the name of science and philosophy, 
 against miracles, the defenders of the faith felt that they 
 could not be too wary, and deemed it wiser tactics to de- 
 monstrate the moral beauty of the Christian religion and 
 the wonderful changes it had wrought in the world. Such 
 considerations are of undoubted value, and we ourselves 
 will have recourse to them later; we do so the more will- 
 ingly that we find in them proofs of a direct intervention 
 on the part of God. 
 
 4th. The true method, however, is that which the Church 
 has always used : it consists in stating, first, the proofs directly 
 furnished by God, and consequently most proper to estab- 
 lish the divinity of the fact of Revelation, that is, miracles 
 and prophecies. Let us hear, on this subject, the opinion 
 of Cardinal Pie, bishop of Poitiers. ''Mira-cle," the illus- 
 trious prelate writes, "is the veritable pivot of the Christian 
 religion. Neither through His prophets nor through His 
 Son did God endeavor to demonstrate by any process of 
 reasoning the possibiHty of the truths which He taught, 
 or the fitness of the precepts which He imposed upon the 
 world. He spoke. He commanded; and as a guarantee of 
 His doctrine, as a justification of His authority. He worked 
 miracles. Hence we are in no way permitted to abandon 
 or weaken, by placing in a subordinate rank, an order of 
 proofs which occupies the first place in the economy and in 
 the history of the establishment of Christianity. Miracle, 
 which belongs to the order of facts, is inestimably more con- 
 vincing to the multitude than all other kinds of arguments; 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 163 
 
 it is a means by which a rehgion is imposed and made pop- 
 ular." (Instr. Synod.) 
 
 But we have a still higher and more decisive authority. 
 Here is the exphcit declaration of the Vatican Council: 
 ''In order that the homage of our faith may be in harmony 
 with reason God has willed to add to the interior aids of 
 the Holy Spirit exterior proofs of EQs revelation, that is, 
 divine facts, particularly miracles and prophecies, which, 
 demonstrating with e^ddence the almighty power and infi- 
 nite knowledge of God, afford in behalf of divine revela- 
 tion very certain signs suitable to the intelligence of all." 
 (Const, on the CathoHc Faith, ch. 2.) 
 
 We see now why prophecy and, particularly, miracles 
 have been so fiercely attacked by rationalists. It is for 
 us, consequently, to put in the clearest hght their convincing 
 power. To this end we shall give a few philosophic no- 
 tions concerning miracle and prophecy, refute the principal 
 objections, and thus prepare the ground upon which our 
 demonstration of the truth of Christianity is to be erected. 
 
 ART. II.— MIRACLE AND PROPHECY. 
 
 Four questions present themselves for our examination: 
 I. The nature of miracle and prophecy. II. The possi- 
 bihty of miracle and prophecy. III. The means of recog- 
 nizing and distinguishing them from natural facts. IV. 
 Their demonstrative value or conclusive evidence. 
 
 I. Miracle.^ 
 
 Nature or Notion of Miracle. — The word miracle comes 
 from the Latin word mirari, to be astonished. The strictly 
 
 * Bp. Hay; Card. Newman; Kegan Paul in C. T. S. xvi.; Schanz, 
 II., ch. 10; Walworth, ch. 15; Hettinger, R. R., ch. 3; Chatard, 
 essay 16; Boedder, B. III., ch. 3; 'Hunter, L, treat. I., ch. 2 ff.; 
 I. E. R., Aug. '97; P. Murray, Essay on Miracles; Archbp. O'Brien, 
 pt. iii., ch. 6; Spalding, Evidences, lect. 5. 
 
164 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 etymological meaning is something which causes astonish- 
 ment. Now nothing causes more astonishment than an effect 
 the cause of which is unknown or which seems to be beyond 
 the causes operating to produce it. 
 
 It is true that among these marvellous effects there are 
 some the cause of which is unknown to certain minds, but 
 very clear to others. Thus the cause of eclipses is a mystery 
 to the unlettered, but no secret to the astronomer. Evi- 
 dently this is not the kind of miracle of which there is ques- 
 tion here. 
 
 There are other effects which no created force could pro- 
 duce and which claim divine operation, the intervention 
 of God Himself. Such are veritable miracles, and it is in 
 this class that we find characteristic proof of revelation. 
 Yet any intervention on the part of God does not suffice to 
 constitute a miracle, for God intervenes in all the acts of 
 His creatures. There must be a special intervention by 
 which God suspends in a particular case the general laws 
 which He has imposed upon all things. 
 
 A miracle thus understood may be defined as an effect 
 which exceeds all the forces of nature and can be produced 
 only by the special intervention of God Himself. There 
 are also miracles which are absolutely beyond the senses, 
 as, for example, the eucharistic transubstantiation and the 
 extraordinary operations of supernatural grace. Miracles 
 of this kind, though very real, evidently cannot serve to 
 prove the truth of a religion; we must have palpable, mani- 
 fest facts. We can understand, therefore, why apologetic 
 authors generally prefer the following definition, which we, 
 in our turn, have adopted. A miracle is a sensible effect 
 which surpasses the natural energies of the universe, and 
 which, in the general conditions under which it is produced, 
 manifestly reveals an immediate and extraordinary inter- 
 vention of divine almighty power. We may also say that 
 a miracle is an extraordinary manifestation of God through 
 a sensible work which no human agent can produce. 
 
DIVINITY OP THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 165 
 
 Possibility of Miracles. — A reasonable man who 
 admits the existence of God cannot doubt the possi- 
 biUty of miracles. This was so apparent even to the 
 impious Rousseau that he says: ''Can God perform 
 miracles, that is, can He derogate the laws which He 
 has established? To treat this question seriously w^ould 
 be impious if it were not absurd. To punish one who 
 answered it negatively would be doing him too much 
 honor; he ought to be sent to a madhouse. But who has 
 ever denied that God can work miracles?" The convic- 
 tion of the possibility of miracles is, moreover, so natural to 
 man that belief in miracles has existed at all times among 
 all peoples. Neither the Jews nor the pagans, nor even the 
 bitterest and cleverest enemies of Christianity, such as 
 Celsus and Julian the Apostate, ever thought of combating 
 Christianity by objecting that the miracles upon which it 
 rests are impossible. Yet it would have been a summary 
 and very easy means of stifling the new religion in its cradle. 
 
 The modern enemies of the supernatural and of all positive 
 religion have shown themselves wiser in their generation. 
 As the impossibility of miracles is a vital point in their sys- 
 tem and cannot, moreover, be proved, they have been care- 
 ful to establish it as an incontestable axiom. This manner 
 of proceeding, though no doubt convenient, is not very 
 scientific or convincing: the absence of argument is too 
 apparent. There are those, however, who claim to support 
 the axiom with apparent proofs furnished by philosophy 
 and science. We shall have occasion to show" how little 
 foundation they have. 
 
 Remark. — The same motive which makes miracles the 
 chief aim of the attacks of modern rationalism, explains its 
 fierce warfare against the dogma of divine Providence, that 
 is, the special intervention of God in the government of the 
 world, and the efficacy of prayer, an inevitable corollary.^ 
 
 ^ With rationalists nothing is easier than to make assertions of this 
 kind: "Absolute, inflexible necessity governs matter; the law of 
 
166 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Thesis. — Miracles are Possible, 
 
 First Argument. — ^We might confine ourselves to this 
 simple statement: Miracles exist, hence miracles are possi- 
 ble. Yes; we shall prove that history witnesses to sensible 
 facts which no human agent can produce, and which require 
 extraordinary and immediate intervention on the part 
 of God. Thenceforth all that can be alleged against the 
 possibility of miracles is absolutely null: ah esse ad posse 
 valet illatio; the existence of a fact demonstrates its possi- 
 bility. And let us remark that the fact of one well-estab- 
 lished miracle, at any period of the world, is sufficient to 
 refute the capital objection of unbelievers, and thus destroy 
 the entire foundation of their impious arguments. 
 
 Second Argument. — Miracle is possible if there is nothing 
 to prevent it either on the part of creatures or on the part 
 of God. Now there is nothing to prevent it: 
 
 a. On the part of creatures, who in their being and their 
 manner of existence are and remain essentially dependent 
 
 nature is a mechanical, eternal, immutable law, which is confounded 
 with the laws of reason itself; it is the most rigid expression of neces- 
 sity; no power can escape this necessity, which knows no exception 
 or restriction." But let them prove these assertions, denied by 
 the intimate conviction of the human race, and the universal and 
 perpetual custom of prayer and sacrifice. We can readily see, more- 
 over, how they lead to the most wretched fatalism and to the de- 
 struction of all morality. It is certain, on the contrary, that the 
 constancy (absolute constancy) of force in the universe cannot be 
 scientifically demonstrated; it is certain that the animal world is 
 not devoid of all creative faculty, that the movements of the will 
 alter the constancy of the total energy of the universe; it is certain 
 that above the law of the conservation of matter and of force reigns an 
 enlightening and completing principle, a sovereign idea which domi- 
 nates all: the idea of order and of finality, without which the world 
 would be no more than a mass of facts; it is equally certain that in the 
 system of the world the laws could have been other than they are. 
 (Duhamel.) 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 167 
 
 on their Creator, and absolutely submissive to His sovereign 
 will. If they are subject to the general physical laws which 
 God has established, why should they be less so to a special 
 order of this same God? 
 
 h. On the part of God, whose almighty and independent 
 power created the world and freely gave it the laws by which 
 it is governed. Why should God be subject to these laws? 
 Why should He be so bound by His own work as to be no 
 longer its master, but its slave? Why cannot He, like a 
 human legislator, determine in advance the exceptions to 
 the laws He makes? Because, for example, God has willed 
 that, as a general rule, moisture and heat should be the con- 
 ditions for the germination and development of plants, has He 
 deprived Himself of the power of causing grain to germinate 
 and ripen without heat and without moisture? Such a 
 statement is simply absurd; it reduces the Creator, the 
 sovereign Master of the world, to a sort of purely passive 
 being, ruled by a supreme necessity; in a word, it denies 
 the very existence of God. In fact one must be an atheist 
 to affirm the impossibility of miracles. 
 
 Objection. — What is the great objection raised against 
 these arguments so conclusive for every upright intelligence? 
 That a miracle is contrary to the immutabihty and to the 
 wisdom of God; in other words, that any change in the 
 general laws established by God would indicate ignorance or 
 fickleness of purpose on His part. 
 
 Reply. — 1st. The immutability of God is in no way com- 
 promised by a miracle, since a miracle argues no change in 
 the divine decrees. Deus opera mutat, says St. Augustine, non 
 consilium. God decrees, by the same indivisible and eternal 
 act of His will, the laws themselves and the exceptions to 
 these laws in special cases. Miracles, therefore, form a part 
 of the divine plan. The will of God, as well as His thought, 
 embraces in one single act the past, the present, and the 
 future, the whole universe and each of the beings who com- 
 pose it. In determining that the usual action of these laws 
 
168 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 shall be suspended in a special case, God does not change His 
 decrees; He fulfils them.^ 
 
 2d. The wisdom of God is no more compromised than His 
 immutability. 
 
 a. A miracle is performed for a determined and reasonable 
 end: in view of some moral good. It behooves us to re- 
 member that the entire order of the universe includes both 
 the moral and physical order; but the physical world is 
 destined to serve the moral. Hence it is evidently worthy 
 of God to refer everything to the salvation of souls and the 
 preservation of His Church; it is worthy of His wisdom to 
 confirm the truth of a doctrine coming from Him, or the 
 
 ^ The objection in regard to the immutability of God has no more 
 weight against the efficacy of prayer than against miracles. In 
 hearing our prayers, God, who has foreseen and willed all things in 
 one simple act, does not change; He is not like us limited by time, 
 which is His creature as much as any atom in the universe; He does 
 not interrupt the course of general laws. He fulfils them ; He does not 
 modify His resolutions. He executes them. We do not pray, St. 
 Thomas tells us, in order to change the divine plan, but to obtain 
 the accomplishment of that which, in this plan, was left dependent 
 on our prayers. "When a soul," says Euler, "offers a prayer worthy 
 to be heard by God, we must not imagine that it is only then that 
 it reaches the knowledge of God. He has heard it from all eter- 
 nity, and He has ordained the world expressly in favor of this prayer; 
 so that its fulfilment is a consequence of the natural course of events." 
 This last thought meets all the vain difficulties raised on this subject. 
 Ward, Theism, II., p. 158. Gilbert, Miracles and Prayer. 
 
 It is well to remark here that we do not regard as miracles extraor- 
 dinary graces obtained by prayer, but which are the effect of physical 
 forces which God has prepared from the beginning with the intention 
 of answering the prayers which should be addressed to Him. When, 
 in answer to public prayers, a plentiful rain puts an end to a long 
 drought, it may be a striking favor and a visible protection of Provi- 
 dence, but as it is the effect of natural agents, and not a derogation' 
 of the laws of nature, it does not manifest direct and immediate 
 action on the part of God, and is not a miracle. Rickaby, Cambr. 
 Conf. I. Ser., n. 21. On Christian Science, the unchristian theory of 
 "favors by prayer," see Dr. Hart in S. S. L., vol. I., essay 2; M. S. 
 H., Aug. 1901; The Deadly Error of Ch. Science (Philad.). 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 169 
 
 authority of one of His ambassadors, or the sanctity of one 
 of His servants, or His own divinity. Now nothing can do 
 this more effectually than a miracle. Man is too famihar 
 with the ordinary marvels of nature to think of them in 
 connection with their Author; to make him recognize the 
 presence and action of the Creator, his attention must be 
 awakened and impressed by a derogation of the laws of 
 nature. ''Miracles," St. Augustine tells us, speaking of the 
 multiplication of the loaves, ''are divine works which are 
 performed to raise the human mind to the knowledge of 
 God by means of sensible acts. There are few who deign to 
 observe the truly admirable and astonishing works of Provi- 
 dence in the smallest grain of wheat, hence God, in His 
 infinite mercy, has reserved certain things outside the ordinary 
 course and order of nature to be produced at opportune times, 
 in order that the marvellousness of a spectacle, not greater 
 but unusual, shall awaken the astonishment of men upon 
 whom daily marvels make no impression. And in fact 
 it is a greater miracle to govern the entire world than to feed 
 five thousand men with five loaves of bread; the first, how- 
 ever, excites no astonishment, while we are filled with ad- 
 miration of the second, not because it is greater, but because 
 it is more rare." ^ 
 
 6. God is no way Hke a workman who, after he has con- 
 ceived and fashioned a complicated instrument, may touch 
 sometimes a wheel, sometimes a spring, sometimes a lever, 
 either at his pleasure or caprice, or to remedy an unforeseen 
 defect. God never alters His designs and has no need to 
 revise His work ; but He has need to show that He is absolute 
 Master of His work, and for this purpose He makes special 
 use of miracles: it is in every way worthy of the sovereign 
 Master of all things to confirm His word by extraordinary 
 effects of His infinite power. 
 
 c. Let us add that miracles, necessarily rare, and exceptions 
 
 ^ On the moral end of miracles, read Bossuet's admirable Discourses 
 on Universal History, pt. ii., ch. 1. 
 
170 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 to general laws, can in no way disturb the harmony of creation 
 or interfere with the study of science : though at the word of a 
 thaumaturgus a man born blind is restored to sight, or a dead 
 man comes forth from the tomb, it will not prevent nature 
 from following its habitual course and mankind will remain 
 subject to sickness and death. The following from Bergier 
 may serve as a summary of this whole matter: 
 
 ''No one can doubt the possibility of a miracle, once he 
 admits that it is God who created the world, that He did 
 it of His own free will and in virtue of His infinite power. 
 In fact, according to this, the only true hypothesis, God 
 regulates the order and march of the universe; He has 
 established the connection which we perceive between 
 physical causes and their effects — a connection for which we 
 can assign no other reason than the will of God; He has 
 given to the different agents, according to His good pleasure, 
 the various degrees of force and activity which it pleased Him 
 to bestow; all that happens is an effect of this supreme will, 
 and the order of the universe would be different had He 
 willed it other than it is. In decreeing from all eternity 
 that a dead man should remain without life, that wood 
 should be consumed by fire, God has not deprived Himself 
 of the power of derogating these two laws, of restoring fife 
 to a dead man, of preserving a bush in the midst of flames, 
 when He wills thus to awaken the attention of men, to in- 
 struct them, or to convey His positive precepts. 
 
 "If He has done this at certain periods, it is clear that the 
 exception to the general law was as undoubtedly foreseen and 
 determined by God from all eternity as the law itself; and 
 that thus the law and the exception in such a case are the 
 effect of the w^isdom and the will of God, since, before creating 
 the world, God knew what He willed to do and what He 
 would do throughout future ages. ... It was with fullest 
 liberty and unconstrained by necessity that God established 
 a certain order in nature; He was free to regulate it otherwise. 
 He had only to decree that from the dust of the human body 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 171 
 
 buried in the earth another man should spring, after the 
 manner of the oak from the acorn. The resurrection of the 
 dead, therefore, is not a phenomenon which transcends the 
 divine power. When God raises a man from the dead it 
 argues no change in the divine will, which has resolved from 
 all eternity to restore him to life and thus derogate a general 
 law. Nor can this exception be said to destroy the law 
 since it follows its wonted course in the case of all other 
 men. A resurrection, finally, interferes in no way with the 
 established order, or impugns the eternal wisdom which 
 created this order.'' ' 
 
 Possibility of Verifying a Miracle. — There are ad- 
 versaries of Christianity who, unable to deny the pos- 
 sibility of miracles, endeavor to accomplish the same end 
 by another means, and claim with Rousseau that it is at 
 least impossible to verify a miracle; but this new attempt 
 is, as we shall demonstrate, as fruitless as the first. 
 
 For the perfect establishment of a miracle it is only neces- 
 sary to prove two points: 1st, the existence of the fact itself; 
 2d, the miraculous nature of the fact. Now we affirm that 
 in certain cases this double verification is possible and easy.^ 
 
 We say in certain cases, for we by no means claim that all 
 miracles may be verified in themselves: have we not already 
 said that certain miracles, like the eucharistic transubstantia- 
 tion, are, because of their suprasensible nature, incapable 
 of palpable proof? As to miraculous facts which come under 
 the senses, it is clear that there may be cases which it is 
 difficult for the unlettered, or even for scholars themselves, to 
 verify. But let us remark that the affirmation of our adver- 
 saries is general; if a fact is miraculous, they maintain that 
 it is necessarily beyond our power of investigation. 
 
 * Consult on this subject the conference of Frayssinous on miracles. 
 ' Bumet, Path which Led a Protestant Lawyer to the Catholic 
 Church, ch. 6. 
 
172 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Thesis. — There are Miracles of the Existence of Which we may 
 (I) Have Certain Knowledge; {II the Miraculous Nature of 
 Which loe may Discern Scientifically or Philosophically. 
 
 1st. Since a miracle is a sensible fact, it may be known, like 
 all facts of this kind, either by the testimony of the senses 
 or by ordinary human testimony. To be certain, for ex- 
 ample, that a man walks upon the waters of the sea, that a 
 leper is instantly healed, that a dead man is raised to life, do 
 we need anything more than sound organs? To be sure that 
 the body of Lazarus, first, was in a state of decay, and that it 
 was afterward restored to perfect life, did the witnesses need 
 any better organs than would suffice to convince them of 
 life and of death in the case of any man? We must remark 
 that what we verify by means of the senses is the act itself 
 as it falls under the senses, and not the supernatural char- 
 acter or miraculous origin of the act; the latter is a matter 
 of reasoning, it is a rational conclusion. 
 
 2d. There are also cases where it is very evident that a 
 phenomenon is beyond all the natural forces operating at the 
 time it is produced. In such instances one does not need to be 
 an academician to recognize that the miracle is of divine 
 origin. Is there any one, for example, who is not absolutely 
 certain that it is not natural for the dead to come back to 
 life? If you were told that the day will come when a man 
 may by natural power, by a simple word, give life to a de- 
 caying corpse, would there not arise in you a protest stronger 
 than all scientific systems, the protest of nature and common 
 sense? Is it necessary to be a physicist, a physiologist, or a 
 chemist to be certain that it is impossible to feed five thousand 
 men with five loaves and two fishes? that a deep-seated 
 ulcer is not cured by a verbal command? If, at the voice of 
 one speaking in the name of God, I see a man who has been 
 dead four days come forth from the tomb in perfect life, it 
 would be impossible for me to attribute this effect to any 
 natural cause, known or unknown, for it is an effect diametri- 
 cally opposed to the most certain and imiversally acknowl- 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 173 
 
 edged laws. Yes, as long as it cannot be proved that a 
 physician by a simple act of his will is capable of restoring 
 a dead man to life, or that the imagination is sufficient to 
 knit a fractm-ed limb immediately, to restore sight to a man 
 born blind, to still a tempest instantly, I am sure of being 
 able to prove the miraculous character of a fact which I 
 witness or which is verified by unimpeachable testimony. 
 
 To claim, as Renan dares to do, that a miracle, to 
 merit belief, must take place in an amphitheatre under the 
 eyes of the best physicians, physiologists, physicists, and 
 chemists, before a commission of specialists allowed to 
 choose, for example, the body that is to be restored to life, 
 and to regulate the programme of the experiment; to claim, 
 in a word, that God, if He wishes to be believed, must place 
 Himself entirely at their disposition, and repeatedly, like a 
 hired magician, produce the phenomenon before their eyes, 
 is as impious as it is absurd. With such a claim no death 
 certificate could be issued without a previous verdict of a 
 commission in which all the academies must be represented. 
 
 Objection. — Since a miracle is an effect for which we 
 can assign no natural cause, to be able to pronounce an event 
 miraculous we must know all the laws of nature without 
 exception; for one law of which we are ignorant may in 
 certain cases, unknown to the spectators, change the effect of 
 all the others. Now no one can flatter himself that he knows 
 all the forces of nature and the various combinations of 
 which they are susceptible. Hence it is always impossible 
 to pronounce with certainty in regard to a miracle. 
 
 Answer. — 1st. a. This objection, formulated by J. J. Rous- 
 seau, is no doubt specious; hence certain rationalists present 
 it as irrefutable. As a matter of fact, however, it has no 
 value whatever with soimd reason. It only proves that one 
 must not affirm the supernatural character of an event 
 before having thoroughly examined all the circumstances 
 under which it happened. But it could not prove the 
 impossibility of ascertainmg the supernatural character of a 
 
174 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 miracle unless the laws of nature worked capriciously. But 
 there is nothing less capricious than these laws. It is the 
 very character of a natural law to produce the same effects 
 under the same circumstances. Consequently from the 
 moment we know that the circumstances are identical, a 
 matter most easily proved in hundreds of cases, we are 
 absolutely certain that a determinate phenomenon will natu- 
 rally follow. 
 
 h. The universe, which is the work of infinite wisdom, 
 forms a harmonious whole, ruled by laws which cannot oppose 
 or destroy one another: this would be disorder. Hence, if 
 a determined event manifestly contradicts a single known 
 law of nature, it is superfluous, nay, absurd, to seek an ex- 
 planation of it in another law. The whole and sole explana- 
 tion of it must be sought in the free will and almighty 
 power of God, who proclaims by a miracle His sovereignty 
 over nature. 
 
 2d. The object of this objection is to frustrate the con- 
 clusive evidence of the miracles performed by Our Lord, 
 and thus destroy His authority, that is, cast doubts upon 
 the divinity of His mission. It is an easy matter to demon- 
 strate that it fails of its end. In effect it supposes that a 
 fact reputed miraculous may be caused by a force so com- 
 pletely concealed in nature as to escape the observation 
 of scientists themselves. It would follow, then, that this 
 same force, hidden as it is, was so well known to Our Saviour 
 that He clearly foresaw and confidently announced the 
 precise effect it would produce at a given time. Hence 
 this objection supposes that a quantity of forces unknown 
 to all, even to scientists, have constantly produced, as 
 Jesus foresaw, effects contrary to those which they as con- 
 stantly produce on all other occasions. Whence could 
 Jesus, the carpenter of Nazareth, hold exclusive knowledge 
 of a science so vast, so absolutely certain, if not from the 
 inexhaustible source of all knowledge, from God? It is 
 evident, therefore, that such an objection only changes the 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 175 
 
 character of the Saviour's miracles, and that if we deny 
 this man miraculous power we are forced to grant Him 
 miraculous knowledge. 
 
 3d. If, in order to be certain that a sensible effect has no 
 possible cause in the forces of nature, it is necessary to know 
 all these forces, then the conduct of man on all occasions 
 and in the gravest circumstances of life is truly inexplicable. 
 For example, he inters his dead with no certainty that they 
 will not come back to life. And this has been the universal 
 custom of humanity in all ages. For who would dare to 
 claim that he knows all the forces of nature and their possi- 
 ble combinations? Who knows, consequently, whether a 
 hidden, unknown force may not at any moment instantly 
 restore life to a dead body? When this learned academician, 
 who had the misfortune to lose his only son, was following 
 the body to its last resting-place, was there any doubt in 
 his mind as to the possibility of its naturally returning 
 to life? Certainly not; and yet would he venture to assert 
 that he knows all the forces of nature and all their imag- 
 inable combinations? In confiding these dear remains 
 to the earth he is, alas, only too certain that all hope is 
 over for him, and that no human effort can restore to him 
 the son whom he mourns. We see that to claim that it is 
 impossible to verify a miracle without knowing all the 
 laws of nature is to mock mankind, for the example we 
 have just given may be multiplied indefinitely. Hence 
 we may have a perfect knowledge of certain forces in nature 
 and their undoubted effects, though we do not know all 
 the natural forces and their various combinations.^ 
 
 * No doubt we often hesitate to pronounce a verdict in regard to 
 certain facts of a marvellous nature; so we say we must be cautious 
 when there is question of a miracle, and accept it only with good 
 evidence. But what does this prove against miracles? Absolutely 
 nothing. Prudence is necessary in a great many other things. There 
 are moments when, if we were asked to say whether it is night or day, 
 we could not always answer categorically, and in certain circumstances 
 opinions on the subject would be divided. Yet no one would claim 
 
176 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 4th. If we can never pronounce in regard to a miracle 
 without full knowledge of all the forces in nature, neither 
 can we affirm of any phenomenon that it is the result of a 
 certain law we have formulated, since it may be produced 
 by some natural force of which we are ignorant. In this case 
 all natural science becomes impossible. In fact the very 
 object of the natural sciences is to establish and formulate 
 the certain and constant laws of natural phenomena. If 
 the objection were serious, who would dare to affirm the 
 existence of any law, when the phenomena announced 
 as its invariable result might be coimteracted by another 
 force concealed in nature? Yet we see physicists, chemists, 
 and astronomers formulate such laws with every assurance, 
 although they do not know all the forces in nature. With 
 the same legitimate assurance we claim a resurrection from 
 the dead to be a miracle, for, without knowing all the laws 
 of nature, we are sure that a lifeless body cannot naturally 
 return to life. To declare that a certain article of the code 
 has been violated one need not know the whole collection 
 of laws. We see that the objection urged against miracles 
 impugns the very science in the name of which it is pre- 
 sented. We have reason to be proud of our faith when it 
 is so clearly evident that the attacks directed against it are 
 equally subversive of moral and social laws, of all science, 
 and of reason itself. 
 
 5th. This objection rests mainly on an error in regard to 
 the requisite degree of certainty; it was in anticipation of 
 this error that we spoke, on page 46 ff., of the criterion of cer- 
 tainty and of the various means by which certainty may be 
 obtained. There is an absolute certainty which commands 
 the assent of the mind and excludes even the possibility of 
 doubt. Thus it is absolutely impossible, for one who under- 
 stands the terms, to doubt the truth of these propositions: 
 A triangle has three sides; twice three is equal to three 
 
 that it is always impossible to make this distinction between the 
 full light of day and the darkness of night. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 177 
 
 times two; the whole is greater than one of its parts. The 
 same certainty exists in regard to my own existence, and 
 even in regard to the existence of other men, and of the 
 universe, and of a number of phenomena which fall directly 
 under my senses. 
 
 But when there is question of certain exterior facts, of 
 the existence of Caesar, for example, of the conquests of 
 Charlemagne or of Napoleon, I am also certain; but this 
 certainty, however great, does not exclude the possibility 
 of doubt, it only makes doubt unreasonable. It is the 
 same wdth innumerable practical truths upon which our 
 daily actions and our whole social life depend. Is it abso- 
 lutely certain that the sun will rise to-morrow? that I 
 belong to a certain nationality? that I am of sound mind? 
 that those whom I call my parents or my brothers are really 
 such? that such a possession is really mine? Is the contrary 
 absolutely impossible or does it imply contradiction? Cer- 
 tainly not; yet I very properly act without any doubt in 
 this respect. The reason of this is that in the majority 
 of cases truths of this kind present themselves so clearly 
 to the mind that we cannot refuse our assent without 
 contradicting nature and subverting the intellectual, moral, 
 and social constitution of man. Certainty, again, may 
 exist where doubt is rigidly possible; but if doubt here is 
 not a formal contradiction, as in the case of absolute cer- 
 tainty, it is great folly, for it is resisting the spontaneous 
 conviction of the common sense natural to all men. Thus 
 it implies no absolute contradiction to doubt the conquests 
 of Alexander or the existence of New York, but in doing 
 so we despise the dictates of reason. If this certainty, which 
 suffices in all the natural sciences, and which guides men 
 generally in all the acts of social and rational life, is per- 
 sistently claimed by some to be only a great probability, it 
 is merely a question of words with which we have no need 
 to concern ourselves, for this kind of probability, Buffier 
 says, is regarded by mankind as certainty, and to refuse to 
 
178 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 accept it as such is to be wanting in common sense. Now, 
 a miracle being a sensible fact, it cannot be proved with 
 absolute certainty, excluding even the possibility of doubt; 
 but, like all exterior facts, it may be established by the 
 evidence of which we have just spoken — the evidence with 
 which men are necessarily satisfied even in the gravest 
 events of life, and upon which scientists themselves formu- 
 late the laws of science.^ 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. The following reflections will convince us 
 that it is possible to distinguish true miracles from the 
 illusions or marvels which may be the work of the Evil One. 
 
 a. Whatever the natural faculties of the prince of dark- 
 ness, or the quahties of which his fall has not robbed him, 
 it is certain that this enemy of God can do nothing without 
 the permission of the sovereign Master of all creatures. 
 Now the truth, the goodness, the sanctity of God cannot 
 permit this fallen angel to imitate the divine works in such 
 a way as to lead man invincibly into error, and thus drive 
 him to eternal ruin. We say invincibly; for God, having 
 endowed man with reason, does not dispense him from the 
 obligation of exercising that faculty in order to guard against 
 illusions. 
 
 b. There are certain marks, both positive and negative, 
 which enable us to distinguish true miracles, or those wrought 
 by divine power, from the marvels produced by the Evil 
 One. If, for example, the miracle is accompHshed in the 
 name of God, or if it has been foretold by genuine proph- 
 ecy, or if it is performed in confirmation of a doctrine fitted 
 in every way to lead men to serve God better, etc., it can- 
 not come from the Evil One. One thing particularly incon- 
 testable is that the Evil One cannot be the author of the 
 miracles performed by Our Lord and His disciples, for they 
 
 ^ Cf. references pp. 39, 49. " I maintain that many a man has been 
 hung in England, and justly hung, on the evidence of illiterate per- 
 sons, in no way better educated or better apt to observe the things 
 that passed before their eyes, than were Peter and Matthew and 
 John." Rickaby, 1. c. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 179 
 
 were wrought against him, and he would not fight against 
 himself. Now these miracles suffice for our purpose. If, 
 on the contrary, the effect of miracles is to violate the pre- 
 cepts of modesty or to accredit an immoral doctrine, they 
 cannot be attributed to God. The doubtful character of 
 the agents employed by the spirit of darkness in miracles, 
 the undignified, grotesque methods to which they habitually 
 resort, usually make it easy to divine the origin of their 
 marvels. 
 
 c. There are, moreover, miracles, called of the first order, 
 which transcend the power of all created beings, visible or 
 invisible, and which absolutely require the immediate inter- 
 vention of God Himself, as, for example, the resurrection 
 of the dead. Now such facts are not lacking in the 
 Gospel. 
 
 d. Let us say further that we have no certain knowledge 
 even of the existence of evil spirits, except through Reve- 
 lation, which is in itself a great miracle. 
 
 2d. Outside of Christianity extraordinary facts are related 
 which would seem to require divine intervention.^ Such are, 
 in paganism, the feats ascribed to Vespasian and to Appo- 
 lonius of Thyoneus, and, in later times, the marvels related 
 of the Catholic missionaries in the extreme East, and of 
 the convulsionaries who flocked to the tomb of the Jansenist 
 deacon Paris. But in these remarkable events, which are 
 a mixture of illusion and imposture, and frequently of 
 questionable morahty, the superhuman element, if it enters 
 at all, is so weak that it requires only the intervention of 
 any spiritual being. In any case there is no analogy be- 
 tween equivocal marvels of this kind and the numerous 
 and striking miracles related in the Gospel. What can be 
 compared, for example, to the multiplication of the loaves, 
 to the resurrection of Lazarus, to the cure of the man born 
 blind, to the walking upon the waters, to the stilling of the 
 tempest? The works of Christ have all the same character 
 
 * Newman on Miracles, pt. ii. ; Historic Sketches, I. 
 
180 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 of divine power, simplicity, and goodness. There is in them 
 nothing bizarre, no ostentation or vain show, no design to 
 astonish the crowd or strike it with terror. Let us observe 
 also that the miracles of the Gospel bear, directly or in- 
 directly, upon the admirable dogmatic and moral teaching 
 of Our Saviour, while the other events mentioned rarely 
 have any laudable end. 
 
 3d. We have no need to dwell here upon spirit-rapping 
 and the general manifestations of the SpirituaHsm of the 
 present day, which is a renewal of paganism.^ Let us only 
 observe, with authors versed in the subject, that though 
 much of it is fraud and prestidigitation, yet many marvels 
 connected with it are so well established by historical truth 
 that we cannot reasonably doubt them. It is no less certain, 
 however, that spiritualism is a shameful and very danger- 
 ous superstition. Let us content ourselves with quoting a 
 few words of Mgr. d'Annibale, who sums up the history of 
 table-moving and American Spiritualism. After stating 
 the principal facts of SpirituaHsm he adds: '^They who take 
 it up as an amusement flatter themselves that these spirits 
 are no other than the souls of the dead. They are mis- 
 taken: they are devils; St. Augustine and St. Chrysostom 
 affirm it, and pagans themselves. Porphyrins for example, 
 have recognized and acknowledged it; one must have lost 
 his reason to doubt it." We shall also find many excellent 
 things on this question of Spirituafism and the others of 
 which we have just spoken in Bonniot's work, " Le miracle 
 et ses contrefagonsJ^ 
 
 4th. This might be the place to speak of the wonders of 
 hypnotism,^ particularly of the cures effected by sugges- 
 
 ^ Gmeiner, Spirits, etc.; Tyrrell, Faith of Millions, II. Ser., n. 21 ; The 
 Danger of Spiritualism (St. Louis); Br. W. ix. 332, 352; C. W. xviii. 
 145, 318, 606; M. Ixvi. 1, 200} Ixxxi. 34; A. C. Q. vi., vii. 208, viii. 
 153; D. R.; Old Ser. xxiv. 408, New Ser. iv. 525, ix. 253, Jan. '99. 
 
 ^ D. R., III. Ser. xxv. 241. On the Moral Aspect of Hypnotism 
 see Dolphin and A. E. R., Sept. 1902; L E. R., Apr. '99. On Theos- 
 ophy see Clarke; also D, R., Apr. '92, p. 337. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 181 
 
 tion or otherwise; but the scientific character of the ques- 
 tion is not sufficiently advanced to occupy our attention 
 here. Let us be satisfied to observe that we may apply to 
 these wonders many things mentioned in the preceding re- 
 marks, particularly what was said in refutation of the ob- 
 jection founded on the hidden forces of nature. Moreover, 
 we can find no trace of hypnotic methods in the innumerable 
 maladies other than nervous which Jesus cured. In any 
 case, in a large number of His miracles, notably the multi- 
 pHcation of the loaves, the stilling of the tempest, and the 
 resurrection of the dead, there is no possible place for hyp- 
 notism. Now these miracles abimdantly suffice to prove 
 the divinity of Our Saviour's mission. 
 
 Value of Miracles Regarded as Proof. — A miracle is 
 an authentic confirmation of the doctrine in favor of which 
 it is produced. 
 
 a. A miracle is a derogation of the laws of nature; hence 
 it can have no other author than God, the author and master 
 of nature. Now God cannot lend His almighty power to 
 further imposture or error. Hence when a man proposes 
 a doctrine as coining from God and supports it with a miracle, 
 it is God Himself who marks this doctrine with the seal of 
 His authority. This man, therefore, cannot be an impostor, 
 and the doctrine which he teaches is necessarily true. It 
 is in this sense that St. Augustine says: ''Miracle renders 
 authority sensible, and authority commands faith." 
 
 h. It is, moreover, the conviction and the belief of all 
 peoples that miracles prove the divinity of a mission or a 
 religious doctrine. Once it is confirmed by positive miracle, 
 man, unless bhnded by prejudice or passion, no longer hesi- 
 tates to accept it as true; he feels instinctively, and he is 
 fully convinced, that the miracle comes from God and is the 
 divine seal of Revelation. 
 
182 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 II. Prophecy.* 
 
 Its Nature. — Prophecy consists in announcing in ad- 
 vance, accurately and positively, actions which depend on 
 the free determination of God or man. It may be defined 
 as the certain prediction of a future event which cannot be 
 known, through its natural causes, to any created intelli- 
 gence. It is clear that the predictions of astronomers 
 announcing eclipses, of a statesman who foresees pohtical 
 changes, are not prophecy, for they are deduced from nat- 
 ural causes which may be known to man. The definition 
 alone of prophecy shows that it is a species of miracle; 
 thus God has given it as one of the chief signs of the 
 authenticity of divine revelation. It is a form of miracle 
 specially fitted for this end, for it is suited, like revelation 
 itself, to the capacity of every intelligence. 
 
 Possibility of Prophecy. — Prophecy is possible, but to 
 God only. It is evident that no creature can, by his un- 
 aided intelligence, know certain events which form the sub- 
 ject of prophecy; but God, on the contrary, infinite Intel- 
 ligence and Knowledge, necessarily knows all that will ever 
 be; He knows the future determinations of free causes, such 
 as the will of man, as well as the future results of all nat- 
 ural causes, even of those which are not yet in existence. 
 Now what He knows He can manifest to man. He can, 
 therefore, prophesy. 
 
 Value of Prophecy as Proof. — A fulfilled prophecy is 
 a certain proof of the divinity of the revelation in favor of 
 which it was made. In effect: 
 
 1st. It constitutes a true miracle, and it has, conse- 
 quently, the convincing power of a miracle. 
 
 2d. Prophecy is possible only to God, hence it is a sort of 
 divine revelation; and as God cannot confirm error, it follows 
 
 ^ Maas, S.J., Christ in Type and Prophecy, introd.; Schanz, II., ch. 
 11; Hettinger, Rev. R.; ch. 3. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 183 
 
 that the whole doctrine of which this prophecy forms an 
 integral part must come from God. 
 
 3d. Thus all peoples have given this meaning to real 
 prophecy. For men recognized without difficulty that if a 
 prophecy could confirm a He, God Himself would be ac- 
 countable for leading men into error. 
 
 With the assistance of the notions which we have just 
 developed, and supported by the Old Testament and par- 
 ticularly by the gospels, the historical authority of which 
 has been placed beyond controversy, let us come now to the 
 essential object of the first part of this Course, the demon- 
 stration of the divinity of the mission of Jesus Christ, and 
 consequently of the rehgion which He came to reveal to the 
 world. 
 
 ART. III.— TEN PROOFS OF THE DIVINITY OF THE 
 
 MISSION OF JESUS CHRIST, AND OF HIS WORK, THE 
 
 CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 
 
 I. First Proof. 
 
 THE MIRACLES PERFORMED BY OUR LORD.^ 
 
 1. Number of these Miracles. — There are few pages in 
 the Gospel which do not tell us of one or several miracles 
 performed by Our Lord. He truly appears as the sovereign 
 Master of nature. The infirm and the sick of all kinds were 
 brought to him in large numbers, not only from various parts 
 of Judea, but from Syria and other neighboring countries; 
 and Jesus cured them by a simple word, or by the imposition 
 of His hand, or by the contact of His garments, or even 
 by a secret virtue which went out from Him (Matth. iv.; 
 Luke viii.). He changed water into wine, filled the nets of 
 His apostles with a miraculous draught of fishes, appeased 
 the fury of the wind and the tide, dehvered demoniacs from 
 the possession of the devil, raised the dead to life. And 
 
 * Wiseman, Essays^ vol. i. 
 
184 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 yet the evangelists mention only the marvels most striking 
 in themselves or because of the circumstances which ac- 
 companied them ; they are content to refer only in a general 
 way to the others. (John xxi.) 
 
 Among the numerous miracles given in detail and which 
 suffice to make the life of Jesus the most marvellous that 
 ever appeared on earth, let us quote in particular: 
 
 A. The cure of the 'paralytic (Matth. ix.; Luke v.), wit- 
 nessed and watched by the unfriendly Pharisees and Scribes. 
 The concourse of people, moreover, was so great that the 
 friends of the sufferer, in order to bring him to Jesus, were 
 obhged to lower him through the roof. (We know that the 
 roofs of the houses in the East were clay terraces.) 
 
 B. The two multiplications of the loaves, which borrow a 
 great force from the testimony of the multitude whom Jesus 
 fed in the desert with a few loaves and a few fishes; the 
 fragments gathered each time after the repast filled several 
 baskets (Matth. xiv. and xv.; John vi.). 
 
 C. The cure of the man horn blind so admirably told by 
 St. John, ch. ix. The strenuous efforts of the Pharisees to 
 disprove this miracle, and the official investigation to which 
 they subjected the witnesses, confirmed it the more. 
 
 D. Many resurrections from the dead. Miracles of this 
 kind must have been numerous, to judge by Our Saviour's 
 answer to the disciples (Matth. xi. 5). Here the resurrec- 
 tions from the dead are placed in the same category as the 
 heahng of the sick: the bhnd see, the dead rise again. The 
 Gospel relates specially the resurrection of the daughter of 
 Jairus, for whom the mourners had already assembled 
 (Matth. ix. ; Mark v. ; Luke viii.) ; that of the son of the widow 
 of Naim, whom they were bearing to the tomb and whom 
 Jesus restored to fife with this sovereign command: ''Young 
 man, I say to thee, arise '' ; and finally that of Lazarus, the 
 most remarkable of all. Jesus was some distance from Be- 
 thania, the home of Lazarus; He arrived there four days after 
 the death of His friend, who had been placed in the tomb 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 185 
 
 after unequi vocal signs that decomposition had begun: ''he 
 stinketh.'' In the presence of a large concourse of witnesses 
 belonging to the more enhghtened and educated classes, and 
 for the most part hostile to Our Saviour, Jesus utters a 
 command and Lazarus comes forth instantly from the tomb, 
 notwithstanding his hands and feet were bound with winding- 
 bands and his head was enveloped in a winding-sheet. The 
 witnesses saw that the bands had to be loosed before he 
 could walk. Hence Christ told them : " Loose him and let 
 him go" (John xi.). 
 
 2. Circumstances Connected with these Miracles. — 
 1st. The reahty of these miracles and of a number of others 
 could be perfectly estabhshed, for they were performed in 
 open day in the presence of great multitudes, who flocked 
 not only from all parts of Judea, but from the neighboring 
 countries, to witness the marvels of which they had heard, or 
 to experience the effect of Our Saviour's power; in the pres- 
 ence, also, of His most implacable enemies, the Scribes and 
 Pharisees, astute men interested in branding an imposture. 
 
 2d. They were so palpable and so striking that their 
 miraculous character could be appreciated as readily by the 
 simple and ignorant as by the scholars. To do this one 
 only required the testimony of the senses and an unbiassed 
 mind. Some of them were miraculous in themselves, as the 
 cure of the man born blind, the resurrection of the dead; 
 others in the circumstances which accompanied them, as 
 the cures instantly effected by a word, by simple contact, or 
 even at a distance. 
 
 3d. Moreover, if these miracles, performed in the full light 
 of day and so frequently repeated, were not real, how can 
 we explain the ever-increasing confidence which the people 
 manifested in Jesus? Why did they continue during several 
 years to bring Him the lepers, the blind, the deaf, paralytics, 
 demoniacs, if He had not cured other sufferers? 
 
 4th. For eighteen centuries these mysteries have been 
 sifted by the most minute criticism on the part of Christians; 
 
186 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Jews, and pagans; their truth is triumphantly established by 
 every trial, and they have obtained a greater and more 
 constant assent than ever has been accorded in the world. 
 The explanations which rationalists have given of these 
 miracles in order to set aside their miraculous character, 
 are generally so ridiculous and miserable that they amount to 
 an open confession of their utter inability to banish the 
 supernatural.^ If all this is not sufficient to estabUsh a fact 
 beyond dispute, then, to be consistent, we must confess to 
 absolute scepticism of historic truth. 
 
 Conclusion. — Miracles, as we have seen, are the letters 
 patent of one purporting to be God's ambassador to men. 
 
 Now, 1st, Our Lord never ceased to perform miracles and 
 to proclaim that He was sent to teach men the way of sal- 
 vation. Even the miracles performed for the relief of 
 human misery, miracles which abounded in Our Saviour's 
 life, prove that one who could thus dispose of divine, almighty 
 power, who could subject all nature to His will, must be 
 accredited by God. It is evident that the doctrine which 
 He announces in the name of God cannot but be divine, 
 otherwise God would authorize what is false; He would 
 confirm the imposture and the impostor. He would sanction 
 a teaching contrary to truth. ^ 
 
 Moreover, 2d, Jesus performed a large number of His 
 miracles for the special and formal purpose of proving the 
 mission with which He proclaimed Himself charged. Let 
 us quote a few of these miracles: 
 
 a. When asked by the disciples of John the Baptist 
 whether He was the Messias expected for the salvation of 
 the world, Jesus replied by citing the evidence of the mira- 
 cles which He performed before them: ''The blind see . . ."; 
 thereby manifestly declaring His divine mission in con- 
 firmation of which He gave the most striking miracles. 
 
 ^ For a splendid refutation of the theories of Strauss and Renan see 
 Picard, pt. ii., ch. 3. 
 2 Lacordaire, 2d conf . on Jesus Christ; Gigot, Biblical Lect., 1. 8, n. 3. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 187 
 
 6. When the Pharisees, who, it would seem, appreciated 
 the conclusive evidence of miracles, ask one of Him as a 
 special proof of His mission, Jesus, who had unceasingly 
 multiplied such proofs before them, cites, this time, the 
 future miracle of the Resurrection (Matth. xii.). 
 
 c. Another time He tells them that if they find it diffi- 
 cult to believe His teaching, to believe for the very work's 
 sake (John xiv.). 
 
 d. On another occasion the wily Pharisees, disturbed by 
 His words, said to Him: ''How long dost Thou hold our 
 souls in suspense? If Thou be Christ, tell us plainly." 
 Jesus answered them: "I speak to you and you believe 
 not: the works that I do in the name of My Father, they 
 give testimony of Me. . . . The works themselves that I 
 do, give testimony of Me, that the Father hath sent Me.'' 
 He added, affirming more formally not only His divine 
 mission, but the divinity of His person: ''If I do not the 
 works of My Father, believe Me not. But if I do, though 
 you will not believe Me, believe the works: that you may 
 know and believe that the Father is in Me and I in the Father. " 
 (John X.) 
 
 e. At the resurrection of Lazarus, Jesus formally declares 
 that He performs the miracle that the people may recog- 
 nize His divine mission (John xi.). 
 
 II. Second Proof. 
 
 THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS CHRIST. 
 
 1. The Special Importance of this Miracle. — Among 
 all the miracles of Our Saviour there is one more important 
 than all the others, that of the Resurrection. Yes; Our 
 Lord's Resurrection is of itself a summary and peremptory 
 
 *Ward, Devotional Essays, n. 9; Schanz, II., ch. 16; Hettinger, 
 Rev. R., ch. 5; Gibbons, Ch. H., ch. 16; Wiseman Science, etc., 1. 6. 
 But see especially Picard, pt. ii., ch. 4; M. Ixvi. 195. 
 
188 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 demonstration of the divinity of His mission and of His 
 religion. It is a proof, moreover, which has the advantage 
 of being eminently suited to every intelligence: to imder- 
 stand it nothing more is needed than an upright heart 
 which seeks the truth in good faith. In fact it is incon- 
 testable that if Our Saviour returned to life by His own power, 
 He i^ God; and if it was by the power of God, His mission 
 is divine; for it is impossible to suppose that God, whose 
 sanctity, goodness, and wisdom are infinite, would fulfil the 
 prediction of an impostor, and mark his doctrine with the 
 incontestable seal of truth. 
 
 Our Lord Himself, in predicting His Resurrection, pre- 
 sented it as the most striking mark of His divine mission. 
 The apostles did the same in their preaching; and when 
 there was question of choosing a disciple to replace the 
 traitor Judas, they required that it should be one who had 
 witnessed the life, the death, and the Resurrection of their 
 Master (Acts i. 22). St. Paul does not hesitate to declare 
 that the faith of the Christian is vain if Christ did not rise 
 from the dead (1 Cor. xv.). Finally, the enemies of Jesus, 
 the Jews themselves, so fully appreciated the conclusive 
 testimony of His Resurrection that they placed a guard 
 at the sepulchre to render any deception impossible; and, 
 in later times, the opponents of Revelation left nothing 
 undone to destroy faith in this most important miracle. 
 
 Let us demonstrate that the fact of the Resurrection of 
 Jesus Christ, the divine Founder of Christianity, is as real, 
 as certain as it is important; let us prove that God has 
 surrounded it with so many guarantees that to deny it we 
 must obstinately close our eyes to the light. 
 
 2. Historical Statement. — Let us begin by stating 
 briefly the principal details of this great event as we find 
 them in the gospels.* 
 
 Friday, the eve of the Sabbath, about three in the after- 
 
 * See Coleridge, The Works and Words of Our Saviour, ch. 19 (same 
 in Life of Our Life, II., ch. 12). 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 189 
 
 noon, the soldiers came, according to custom, to break the 
 legs of those who had been executed. After breaking the 
 legs of the two thieves, seeing that Jesus was dead, they did 
 not break His legs, but one of the soldiers opened His side 
 with a lance and immediately there issued blood and water 
 (St. John, an ocular witness of the death of Jesus, chap. xix.). 
 Toward evening, Joseph of Arimathea, a noble councillor, 
 asked Pilate for the body of Jesus. Pilate inquired of the 
 centurion who had presided at the execution whether Jesus 
 were really dead; upon being assured that He was, he allowed 
 Joseph to have the body. It was then taken down from 
 the cross; Joseph and another of Jesus' disciples, named 
 Nicodemus, bound it in linen cloths, and placed it with 
 spices in a new sepulchre, which Joseph had had hewn for 
 himself in a rock. Then, after rolling a large stone against 
 the entrance to the sepulchre, they went away. 
 
 The next day, which was the Sabbath, the chief priests and 
 Pharisees begged Pilate to place a guard at the sepulchre. 
 '^We have remembered,'' they said, 'Hhat that seducer 
 said, while He was yet alive: 'After three days I will rise 
 again/ His disciples may come and steal Him away, and 
 say to the people, He is risen from the dead, and the 
 last error shall be worse than the first." Pilate bade them 
 guard the sepulchre themselves, which they did by sealing 
 the stone and placing a guard about it. 
 
 Now the next morning, at dawn, there was a great earth- 
 quake ; an angel in human form, whose countenance was as 
 lightning and whose raiment was as snow, rolled the stone 
 from the sepulchre and sat upon it. The sepulchre was 
 empty: all that remained were the linen cloths and the 
 napkin which had bound His head, carefully folded. The 
 guards fled in terror to the chief priests and related what 
 had happened. Upon learning it they gave the soldiers 
 money to induce them to say that, while they were asleep, 
 the disciples of Jesus came and carried away His body. 
 
 The same day and the days which followed, up to the time 
 
190 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 of His Ascension, Jesus appeared, at intervals, to Mary 
 Magdalen, to the hoh^ women, and to the disciples, sometimes 
 individually, sometimes collectively. He talked with His 
 disciples of the kingdom of God, and gave them sensible 
 proofs of the truth of His Resurrection, eating with them, 
 showing them and even letting them touch the wounds 
 which still remained in His hands, His feet, and His side. 
 Finally He appeared, a last time, on a mountain of Galilee 
 to more than five hundred of His disciples, and ascended 
 before them into heaven (Matth. xvii.; Mark xvi.; Luke 
 xxiv.; John xx.; Acts i.; 1 Cor. xv.). 
 
 This is a brief statement of the evangehc narration upon 
 which we shall found our demonstration. If it is accurate, 
 the fact which it relates can be accounted for only by divine 
 intervention. This is so true that infidels themselves do not 
 think of explaining it by natural causes, but they try to 
 contest the reality of the fact. 
 
 3. Certainty of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ. — 
 The truth of the gospels has been fully estabhshed. Hence 
 we cannot question the reality of the Resurrection of Jesus, 
 which is given with so much detail by the sacred writers. 
 It is well nevertheless, considering the exceptional importance 
 of this miracle, to make it the object of a special discussion. 
 To prove the reality of this resurrection, it is sufficient to 
 establish: A. That Our Saviour was really dead when He 
 was taken down from the cross; B. That He was afterwards 
 seen fully restored to hfe. We shall add nevertheless a 
 third proof no less decisive: C. The impossibility of any 
 deception. 
 
 A. Jesus was truly dead when He was taken down from the 
 cross. 
 
 a. St. John, an eye-witness, and the other evangelists 
 affirm that He expired on the cross. 
 
 6. Nor can we doubt it, if we consider the inhuman tor- 
 ments which He endured before He was placed on the cross ; 
 it is even marvellous that He lived during the three hours; 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 191 
 
 the crucifixion alone, according to the historian Josephus, was 
 sufficient to cause His death. 
 
 c. The soldiers did not break His legs, only because it was 
 so evident that He was dead. 
 
 d. The thrust of the lance would have extinguished any 
 remaining breath of fife. 
 
 e. Pilate allowed Joseph of Arimathea to take the body 
 only after the centurion had officially testified that Jesus 
 was really dead. 
 
 /. The Jews themselves were fully convinced of His death; 
 had they had the least doubt they would have taken pains 
 to verify it before placing the guard at the sepulchre, and 
 if necessary they would have despatched their victim. Thus 
 neither Roman nor Greek sophists, nor the Sanhedrim, nor the 
 Rabbins ever ventured to say that Jesus was not dead. And 
 even in our own day this miserable hypothesis is rarely used 
 against the reality of the resurrection. 
 
 B. Jesus Christ truly rose from the dead. 
 
 a. This was attested by numerous eye-witnesses, who, 
 after they had seen their divine Master expire upon the cross, 
 beheld Him again in life, not in a dream, nor during sleep, but 
 in open day and when they were in full possession of all 
 their faculties ; they heard His words, received His commands, 
 touched and felt His members and His wounds, and even ate 
 with Him. 
 
 h. During forty days they met Jesus under the most varied 
 circumstances, near the tomb, on the way to Emmaus, in the 
 cenacle, on the seashore, on Mount Olivet, etc. At one time 
 He appeared to the holy women, at another to Peter, at 
 another to the disciples on the way to Emmaus; on one 
 occasion He was seen by the whole apostolic college, with 
 the exception of Thomas, who refused to believe the testi- 
 mony of his brethren, and again by the whole college, includ- 
 ing Thomas, who was convinced by the evidence of his senses ; 
 at another time he appeared to seven of His apostles on the 
 shore of the sea of Tiberias, and again also to an assembly of 
 
192 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 more than five hundred apostles and disciples, most of whom 
 were still alive when St. Paul appealed to their testimony 
 (1 Cor. XV. 6). 
 
 c. Finally, these men laid down their lives in testimony 
 of the Resurrection of Jesus. And yet, so far from being the 
 victims of a too ready creduhty, they at first accepted the 
 news of the miracle only with great difficulty: it " seemed 
 to them as idle tales" (Luke xxiv. 11), and one of them, 
 Thomas, even refused to accept it on the unanimous testi- 
 mony of the other apostles, and protested that he would 
 not beheve until he could put his hand into the wounds of 
 Jesus. 
 
 Thus the nature, the number, and the various circumstances 
 connected with these apparitions, as well as the number and 
 variety of the witnesses, make it evident that the fact of the 
 resurrection of Our Saviour is no less certain than that of His 
 death. This miracle, therefore, is absolutely incontestable. 
 
 C. We might be satisfied with this decisive demonstration. 
 Nevertheless, in further confirmation of the truth of this great 
 miracle, and at the same time to refute the usual objection 
 of those who deny it, we shall show that the hypothesis that 
 the apostles carried away the body of their Master is abso- 
 lutely untenable. To this end let us prove : 1st. That they 
 could have had no intention to carry away the body. 2d. 
 That if they had, they never could have succeeded in carrying 
 it out. 3d. Let us add that had they resorted to fraud, 
 they never could have induced the whole world to believe 
 that Jesus had risen. 
 
 1. The Disciples could have had no Desire to Carry 
 AWAY the Body of Jesus. — No man engages in a perilous 
 enterprise without some determining motive ; still less would 
 a number of men unite to carry out an execrable plot, in 
 which they not only had no interest, but which was against all 
 their best interests. This, however, is what we have to 
 admit if the apostles conceived the design which infidelity 
 attributes to them. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 193 
 
 1st. They would have acted without motive of any kind. 
 In fact the apostles beheved in the proximate resurrection 
 of their Master, or they did not beheve it, or they were 
 doubtful. 
 
 In the first case it would be absolutely useless to carry 
 away the body. In the second case all that remained for 
 them was to abandon the cause and the memory of a man 
 in whom they no longer had the shghtest faith. In the third 
 case (which is true, as we learn from the desponding words 
 of the disciples of Emmaus, and the unwillingness of the 
 apostles to believe the Resurrection when it was announced 
 to them) the simplest common sense would have made them 
 wait the event, and be guided by its consequences. Therefore 
 the thought of carrying away the body of their Master could 
 never have occurred to the apostles unless— and there is 
 nothing to justify the supposition — they were the most irra- 
 tional of men, unless they were all equally foohsh and in- 
 consequent, for they must have concerted the plan together. 
 
 2d. They had, on the contrary, the most powerful reasons 
 for not engaging in such an enterprise: 
 
 a. They saw themselves surrounded by the enemies of 
 Jesus, implacable enemies who had treated Him most cruelly 
 and had put Him to death. They could expect from these 
 men only opprobrium, tortures, and death. 
 
 h. And they had to fear from God, the avenger of crime, 
 the punishment due to falsehood, blasphemy, and impiety. 
 
 c. They were, moreover, certain to fail most shamefully 
 and ignominiously in their enterprise. How could men, 
 without education, without influence, without fortune, flatter 
 themselves that they could succeed in the most insensate 
 design that could possibly be imagined, viz., induce the whole 
 world to adore as God an impostor who had been crucified in 
 Judea? 
 
 d. Finally, if Jesus did not rise from the dead He was 
 henceforth, in the eyes of His disciples, an impostor, the 
 criminal author of their shame and their misery. Would 
 
194 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 they have been willing to brave everything for such a man 
 and to expose themselves to condign punishment in this 
 world and in the next? 
 
 2. Had the Apostles Desired to Carry Away the 
 Body of Jesus They could not have Carried out their 
 Desire. — To be convinced of this we need only consider 
 briefly the nature and difficulties of such an enterprise. 
 
 The tomb was hewn in the rock, closed with a large stone, 
 sealed and guarded by soldiers. Now what means had the 
 apostles of executing such a design? We can imagine only 
 three: violence, or bribery, or deception. All three were 
 equally impracticable. 
 
 a. Violence. The apostles, who, we know, were shamefully 
 timid, who fled in the most cowardly manner and abandoned 
 Jesus during His Passion, were not men to force their way 
 through a guard of soldiers and break public seals. Had 
 they done so, their action would not have remained either 
 unknown or unpunished. 
 
 h. Bribery. How could they bribe the guards? They were 
 poor, and they would have had to win over the soldiers on 
 the very spot where they were posted; they would have had 
 to win them all without exception, for if only one refused 
 the bribe it would be sufficient to betray them. And these 
 soldiers, would they dare to count upon one another? 
 
 c. Deception. How much there was to make this means 
 impossible! How could they reach the sepulchre? By a 
 subterraneous passage? They must cut it in the rock in a 
 single night, without waking any of the guard, and then must 
 have filled it up again on leaving so that no trace of their 
 work remained. They must, moreover, have amused them- 
 selves, while removing the body, with stripping it of the 
 graveclothes, and carefully folding the napkin which bound 
 the head, and finally they must have rolled back the stone 
 which closed the sepulchre, apparently to avoid giving any 
 alarm. What a tissue of absurdities! 
 
 Did they go by the ordinary road to the sepulchre? Then 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 195 
 
 they must have passed through the guard, broken the seals, 
 rolled back the stone, and, after divesting the body of the 
 graveclothes, apparently with much deliberation, and folding 
 the napkin which bound the head, returned with their prize 
 by the way they came; and they accomplished all this so 
 silently that they were completely unobserved! Perhaps 
 the guards were asleep! Were they all asleep? Was there 
 no one left to warn the others of the attempt they were told 
 to expect? Was their sleep so profound that all this move- 
 ment about them in the silence of the night did not waken 
 one of them? But let us admit that they were all buried in 
 profound slumber, who was there, then, that could proclaim 
 and bear witness to the apostles' theft? Of what value is 
 the testimony of sleeping witnesses? And then how was it 
 that no search was made for the body thus stolen notwith- 
 standing all the precautions taken by the authorities? Why 
 were not the delinquent guards severely punished? Why 
 did the Jews feel obliged to give them money to induce them 
 to accuse themselves of having failed in their duty, and to 
 divulge their own shame? How was it that these same 
 Jews, who afterwards frequently reproached the apostles 
 with preaching in the name of Jesus of Nazareth, did not 
 simply accuse them of having stolen the body of their Master? 
 Hardly two months had elapsed after the Resurrection before 
 the apostles were preaching the great miracle, yet the Jews 
 never attempted to explain it away, but contented themselves 
 with having the apostles scourged and commanding them to 
 be silent. 
 
 Therefore we see that unbelief, do what it will, is invariably 
 contradicted by its own false arguments. The most wretched 
 of all sophistry is that by which the human conscience seeks 
 to evade divine certainty ; for it is impossible to contest the 
 truth of the Resurrection without rejecting the evidence of 
 reason and common sense. 
 
 3. Fraud could not have Converted the World. — 
 Even admitting the impossible hypothesis that the apostles 
 
196 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 wished to steal the body of Jesus, and that they succeeded 
 in their insensate enterprise, there remained a still greater 
 difficulty which they could not have overcome: they could 
 never have convinced the whole world that Jesus had risen 
 and that He is God, when in reality He was only a male- 
 factor condemned by human justice to die an ignominious 
 death on the cross. How numerous, in fact, were the 
 obstacles to the success of such a project! 
 
 1st. All the accomplices, authors, or abettors of this 
 criminal intrigue must have agreed among themselves 
 as to how they were to present their deception, and they 
 nmst have pledged themselves to endure the greatest tor- 
 tures solely to insure the impossible success of an infamous 
 fraud. 
 
 2d. It was necessary, moreover, to deceive the numerous 
 disciples who had taken no part in the plot, and to persuade 
 them to believe in the apparitions, purely imaginary, of 
 Jesus, and to believe with a faith strong enough to brave the 
 most horrible torments and death itself rather than admit 
 the least doubt of the reality of the Resurrection. 
 
 3d. It was necessary also to deceive the Gentiles, who 
 feared His severe morality, despised His poverty, and in- 
 sulted the folly of His death on the cross. It was necessary 
 to deceive the Jews who hated Jesus, who had put Him to 
 death on the cross, and who had every interest in branding 
 the imposture. We know that three thousand Jews were 
 converted at the first preaching of St. Peter, and five thousand 
 at the second. 
 
 4th. Finally, all these wonderful effects would have to 
 be produced without the aid of miracles, by the simple 
 affirmation of these men; miracles could not be looked for, 
 for God would not lend His power in behalf of miserable 
 impostors. 
 
 Conclusion. — What could be more conclusive e\'idence 
 than the proofs, particularly when taken together, which we 
 have just given? What shall we beheve if we refuse to 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 197 
 
 admit a fact so solidly established that it admits of no 
 reasonable doubt? ^ 
 
 Objections. — We must mention, nevertheless, a few of 
 the efforts of the enemies of Christianity to suppress this 
 capital miracle. The futihty of their attempts only renders 
 the truth more striking. 
 
 1st. Strauss has taken much pains to explain how the body 
 of Jesus disappeared from the tomb, for he acknowledges 
 that it is a burning question. He has finally adopted the 
 most unreasonable solution: he asserts that the body re- 
 mained in the sepulchre. After what we have said, it is 
 evident that this is an explanation contrary to all the gospels 
 and even to all probability; the Jews, moreover, would not 
 have failed to seize it in order to destroy from the first all 
 faith in the Resurrection. 
 
 Renan's method of overcoming the difficulty, though more 
 convenient, is hardly less ingenious: he declares that it is 
 useless to try to solve the question, for we shall never know 
 all the details. This declaration, however, does not prevent 
 him from attempting a dozen solutions: that the apostles 
 carried away the body; that the disciples took it with them 
 into Galilee ; that it was taken away by the Jews, or perhaps 
 the owner of the garden; that the folded napkin indicates 
 that a woman had part in the work. Finally, he rejects all 
 these explanations, and concludes that the body of Jesus 
 Christ disappeared by chance! 
 
 2d. It is equally embarrassing to these sceptics to explain 
 the apostles' unalterable faith in the Resurrection. Strauss 
 acknowledges that it is necessary to explain it. ''If we do 
 not find," he says, '* a means of explaining, without a miracle, 
 the origin of faith in the Resurrection of Jesus, we are obliged 
 to deny all that we have said, and to renounce our enter- 
 prise." He rejects, moreover, the hypothesis of imposture 
 on the part of the apostles, and justly concludes that a 
 faith for which they were willing to die could not be founded 
 
 ^ See Bourdaloue's sermon on the Resurrection. 
 
19S CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 on a falsehood. But when there is question of finding an 
 acceptable explanation, he goes so far as to say that the 
 apostles were deceived by their imagination. The Resurrec- 
 tion, therefore, of Jesus was, according to him and Renan, 
 who finds the invention to his taste, merely an hallucination 
 on the part of the disciples, the result of their excited 
 imagination. ''They were in a state of great excitement," 
 he says, ' ' and took for reality what was merely a trick of 
 their imagination." 
 
 After the proofs we have given of the special guarantees 
 of truth which the witnesses of the Resurrection afford us, is 
 it further necessary to reply to an assertion so purely gratu- 
 itous? If we cannot beheve such witnesses, whom can we 
 believe ? If the Resurrection of Jesus has no other foundation 
 than an hallucination, the apostles must have believed that 
 they saw what they did not see, that they heard what they 
 did not hear, that they touched what they did not touch! 
 Is not this diametrically contrary to the gospel narrative? 
 So far from being ready to believe in the Resurrection, we 
 know that they were very slow to accept the testimony of 
 the holy women, or that of their brethren, or even of their 
 own senses. The words of Jesus seemed to have made more 
 impression on the hatred of His enemies than upon the love 
 of His disciples. The first remembered perfectly that He 
 had announced that He would rise again, therefore they took 
 every means to prevent a fraudulent fulfilment of the pre- 
 diction ; the apostles, on the contrary, seem to have lost sight 
 of these words of their Master. When Jesus appeared to 
 them, they took Him for a spirit, and Our Saviour, to un- 
 deceive them, had to make them touch His wounds and had 
 to eat with them. Are the victims of hallucination so in- 
 credulous and so difficult to convince ? 
 
 And, mark you, according to this hypothesis all of the 
 disciples, without exception, must have been the victims of 
 hallucination, even the desponding disciples of Emmaus, 
 even the incredulous Thomas, even the five hundred witnesses 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 199 
 
 of the Ascension of Jesus. And this impossible illusion 
 must have lasted forty days and appeared in various and 
 very numerous circumstances ; and what is no less remarkable, 
 it must have suddenly and completely disappeared after the 
 Ascension ! 
 
 Nor is this all. We have to admit that the removal of the 
 stone from the sepulchre and the terror of the guards were 
 only an illusion; that the guards also were victims of an 
 hallucination; that the earthquake, the empty sepulchre, 
 existed only in the imagination of the disciples. In truth 
 we are tempted to ask whether writers who advance such 
 things are not testing the creduhty of their readers. 
 
 If all this were possible, we should still have to explain 
 how, if Christianity is founded upon illusion, the apostles 
 succeeded in establishing it, how it has regenerated the 
 world, how, despite all obstacles, it has been perpetuated 
 through all ages down to our own time. This would have been 
 a much greater miracle than all the others. 
 
 Read in Le 13e Apotre, by Henri Lasserre, a clever refuta- 
 tion of Kenan's system. The author does justice to it by 
 explaining in the same way the alleged return of Napoleon I. 
 from Elba. He applies to the Hundred Days not only the 
 system of Renan, but his very phrases, and thus he proves 
 peremptorily that Napoleon never returned, that the alleged 
 proofs of this return exist only in the deluded imagination of 
 the admirers of the great conqueror of modern times. 
 
 Conclusion. — It is, therefore, absolutely certain that the 
 evangelists were not deceived in regard to the Resurrection 
 of Jesus, that they did not wish to deceive, that had they 
 wished to deceive others they could not do so. Jesus, after 
 His incontestable death on the cross, came forth alive from 
 the tomb, as He announced, in proof of His divine mission ; 
 it follows, therefore, that He is sent by God, and that His 
 work, the Christian religion, is a divine work. 
 
200 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 III. Third Proof. 
 
 THE FULFILMENT OF THE PROPHECIES CONCERNING THE 
 
 person and mission of jesus christ.^ 
 
 1. An Enumeration of Some of these Prophecies. — 
 Since the fall of our first parents, God had never ceased to 
 send successively numerous prophets to announce and 
 describe, with more and more detail, the Messias, who was to 
 replace the Mosaic religion with one more perfect, destined 
 for all peoples and all ages. These divine ambassadors 
 specify the time when the Messias will appear on earth, 
 the family to which He will belong, the city where He will 
 be born. They give, centuries in advance, minute details of 
 His birth, His life. His death. His triumph over death and 
 the world. Let us mention specially the celebrated prophe- 
 cies of Jacob, Daniel, Aggeus, and Malachias, who appeared 
 one after another, specifying more and more clearly the 
 time of the Messias' coming. 
 
 Let us show, in a few special points, how minute are these 
 prophetic details of the future Redeemer. 
 
 1st. The Coming and the Qualities of the Messias. — 
 Son of Abraham (Gen. xii.), issue of the tribe of Juda 
 (Gen. xlix.), through David (Ps. Ixxxviii., Is. xi., Jer. xxiii., 
 etc.), the Messias expected by all nations (Gen. xlix., Agg. ii.), 
 who was to be born of a virgin (Is. vii., Jer. xxxi., Ezech. 
 xliv.), in the city of Bethlehem (Mich, v.), before the subju- 
 gation of the nation (Gen. xlix.), in the seventieth week of 
 years after the issue of the edict for the reconstruction of the 
 Temple of Jerusalem (Dan. ix.), and before the destruction of 
 this second Temple by a strange nation (Agg. ii., Mai. iii.). 
 
 His coming will be preceded by universal peace (Dan. ii., 
 Ps. Ixxi., Is. ii., Zach. iii.) ; His way shall be announced and 
 
 * Maas, S.J., Christ in Type and Prophecy; Veuillot, Life of Christ, 
 Introd. iii.; Didon, Jesus Christ, Introd., n. 8; Gaume, Catech. of 
 Persev., L, ch. 21 ff.; Hettinger, Rev. R., ch. 6. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 201 
 
 prepared by a special envoy (Mai. iii.), whose voice shall 
 resound in the desert (Is. xL). 
 
 The Messias will be, in character and name, Jesus or 
 Saviour (Habac. iii., Is. li., etc.), Emmanuel or God with us 
 (Is. vii.), Christ or the anointed of the Lord (Ps. ii., xliv.. 
 Is. Ixi., Lam. iv.), the Son of God (Ps. ii., Os. xi.), God (Is. ix., 
 XXV., XXXV., xL, Ps. xliv., cix., Bar. iii., Mai. iii.), and hidden 
 God (Is. xlv.), priest according to the order of Melchisedech 
 (Ps. cix.), the Just (Jer. xxiii.. Wis. ii., Is. xlv., Ixii., etc.), 
 the holy One and the Saint of saints (Ps. iv., xv.. Is. xii., 
 Dan. ix.). His name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, 
 God, the Mighty, the Father of the w^orld to come, the 
 Prince of peace (Is. ix.). 
 
 2d. His Birth and His Youth. — Kings from the East 
 will adore Him and offer Him frankincense and gold (Ps. 
 Ixxi., Is. Ix.); Rachel (whose tomb is near Jerusalem) shall 
 weep in vain for her children (Jer. xxxi.) ; the Saviour will 
 dwell in Egypt (Os. xi.), and in Nazareth of Galilee (Is. ix.); 
 He will converse with the inhabitants of Sion (Is. xii., etc.), 
 and He will honor the Temple wdth His presence (Agg. ii., 
 Mai. iii.). 
 
 He will be poor and in labors from His youth (Ps. ixxxvii.), 
 and yet He will be king and eternal possessor of a kingdom 
 which will extend to the utmost parts of the earth (Ps. ii.) ; He 
 will be obedient (Ps. xxxix.), gentle and peaceful (Ps. cxix.). 
 
 3d. His Apostolic Career. — He will not cry nor have 
 respect to persons; He will not break the bruised reed nor 
 extinguish the smoking flax (Is. xlii.); He will seek that 
 which was lost, the sheep which were lost; and that which 
 was driven away He will bring again; He will bind up that 
 which was broken, and that which was weak He will 
 strengthen, and that which was strong He will preserve, and 
 He will lead them in the way of justice (Ezech. xxxiv.) ; He 
 will comfort all that mourn (Is. Ixi.), and by His miracles He 
 will open the eyes of the blind, unstop the ears of the deaf, 
 and loosen the tongue of the dumb (Is. xxxv., xlii.). Yet 
 
202 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 notwithstanding the intrinsic efficacy of His divine word 
 (Is. xi., xUx.), notwithstanding the splendor of this heavenly 
 light (Is. ix., xlii., Ix.), the Messias will be a stone of 
 stumbling, a rock of offence, a snare and a ruin to many of 
 Israel (Is. i., vi., viii., xlii.). 
 
 4th. His Passion and His Death. — Surely He hath borne 
 our iniquities and carried our sorrows, and we have thought 
 Him as it were a leper, and as one struck by God and af- 
 fficted. But He was wounded for our iniquities, He was 
 bruised for our sins: the chastisement of our peace was upon 
 Him, and by His bruises we are healed. All we hke sheep 
 have gone astray, every one hath turned aside into his own 
 way : and the Lord hath laid on Him the iniquity of us all. 
 There is no beauty in Him nor comeliness: we have seen 
 Him, and there was no sighthness, that we should be desirous 
 of Him: despised and the most abject of men, a man of sor- 
 rows and acquainted with infirmity. His look was as it were 
 hidden and despised, whereupon we esteemed Him not (Is. 
 liii.); a worm and no man: the reproach of men, and the 
 outcast of the people (Ps. xxi.). What are these wounds in 
 the midst of Thy hands? With these I was wounded in the 
 house of them that loved Me (Zach. xiii.). They have dug 
 My hands and feet, they have numbered all My bones. And 
 they have looked and stared upon Me; they parted My 
 garments among them, and upon My vesture they cast lots 
 (Ps. xxi.). All they that saw Me have laughed Me to scorn; 
 they have spoken with the Hps and wagged with the head: 
 He hoped in the Lord, let Him deliver Him; if He be the true 
 Son of God, He will defend Him and dehver Him out of the 
 hands of His enemies (Ps. xxi., Wis. ii.). Many calves have 
 surrounded Me, fat bulls have besieged Me. They have 
 opened their mouths against Me as a Hon ravening and 
 roaring (Ps. xxi.). They gave Me gall for My food, and in My 
 thirst they gave Me vinegar to drink (Ps. lx\dii.). I am 
 made a derision to all My people, their song all the day 
 long (Lam. iii.). 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 203 
 
 5th. The Establishment of His Church. — God will pom- 
 out His spirit upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem ; He will give 
 them a new heart, and put a new spirit into them (Is. xlvi., 
 Ezech. xxxvi., Joel ii.). The word of God preached first 
 in Sion (Is. ii.) will be brought by faithful witnesses (Is. 
 xliii., xliv.) to Lydia, Africa, Italy, Greece, to distant 
 islands, to people plunged in darkness who will be won to the 
 truth (Is. Ix., lii.). They will be brought through fire, they 
 will be tried as gold is tried (Zach. xiii.). A new covenant 
 will bring together all the peoples (Is. xlix., Jer. xxxi., 
 Os. ii., etc.) : the wolf shall dwell with the lamb, the leopard 
 shall he down with the kid, the calf and the hon and the 
 sheep shall abide together (Is. xi.. Soph, iii., Jer. xxxii.). 
 
 6th. The Sacrifice of the New Law. — Malachias termi- 
 nates the series of prophets. He crowns the magnificent chain 
 of revelations concerning the Messias with the announcement 
 that the sacrifices of the Old Law, hitherto offered only in the 
 Temple of Jerusalem, will be replaced by a pure oblation 
 which will be offered in all places and among all nations (Mai. 
 i., X., xi.). Isaias and David add tliat the ministers of this 
 sacrifice of the New Covenant will be priests chosen from 
 among all nations (Is. Ixvi.), under a supreme pontiff ac- 
 cording to the order of Melchisedech (Ps. cix.). 
 
 7th. Prophetic Figures of the Messias. — God wished 
 that the future Redeemer should be continually kept before 
 the mind and the imagination of His people. Thus He was 
 not content to announce Him by the ministry of His prophets, 
 but, in conformity with the genius of the Jewish people and 
 of Eastern nations in general. He prefigured the Messias by 
 Hving types and symboHc events. Let us cite among the 
 first Isaac, Joseph, Moses, David, Jonas; among the second 
 the paschal lamb, the manna, the brazen serpent. In fact 
 the entire worship and all the institutions of the Jews may 
 be said to have been typical. *'AU the administration of 
 this people," says St. Augustine, ''was only a continual 
 prophecy of the king they expected. " We must mention 
 
204 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 this kind of prophecy; though it does not serve as the basis 
 of our present proof, it will complete the demonstration we 
 shall derive later from prophecy properly so called. 
 
 Five hundred years elapsed between the end of the Mes- 
 sianic prophecies and the beginning of their fulfilment. We 
 know, moreover, that to render any doubt of the anteriority 
 of the prophecies impossible, Providence had caused the Old 
 Testament to be translated into Greek three hundred years 
 before Christ, and that this translation, called the Septuagint, 
 was spread throughout the entire world long before the 
 coming of the promised Messias. But were they reahzed, these 
 numerous prophecies uttered by a serie^. of men during four 
 thousand years, and predicting with more and more detail 
 the same marvellous, extraordinary event which could not 
 possibly be foreseen? This is the question which it is par- 
 ticularly important for us to examine. 
 
 2. Fulfilment of the Messianic Prophecies. — We 
 have only to read the Gospel to be fully convinced that these 
 prophecies were realized perfectly in Jesus Christ and only in 
 Jesus Christ. The agreement of the Old and the New Testa- 
 ment is so striking that if we had not incontestable pioof 
 that the prophetic books existed centuries before Christ, we 
 should be tempted to beheve that these numerous and very 
 precise details were written after the events, not by prophets, 
 but by historians. 
 
 1st. The period of the coming of the Messias was so clearly 
 determined and so well known throughout the world that, as 
 soon as the Roman Empire and a general peace were pro- 
 claimed, not only the Jews but all nations looked for the great 
 event. The event itself was predicted, as we have seen, and 
 attested by all contemporary historians. ''The people," 
 says Tacitus, ''relying on the ancient prophecies, were gener- 
 ally persuaded that the East would prevail and that from 
 Judea would come the masters of the world." Suetonius 
 and Josephus express themselves in almost the same terms. 
 This hope of the promised Liberator was so general and so 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 205 
 
 strong among the Jews that they were ready to follow blindly 
 any insurgent who proclaimed himself the Messias or His 
 precursor. Hence the numerous revolts which preceded the 
 ruin of Jerusalem. 
 
 It was very remarkable that while Europe expected a 
 Saviour from the East, the people of India and China ex- 
 pected him from the West. Voltaire attests this in his 
 additions to general history. From all parts the attention 
 of mankind was centred upon a small point of the globe 
 which Boulanger, another sceptic, calls ''the polar star of the 
 hope of all nations.'' 
 
 2d. The other prophecies are no less fully realized. We may 
 say that the prophecies of the Old Testament are a portrayal 
 of the life and the death of Jesus Christ, an abridged history 
 of His works and of the marvellous establishment of His 
 Church. The relation is evident and the application is not 
 only easy, but it follows of itself. The prophets are the 
 witnesses who unanimously testify in favor of Jesus, says 
 St. Peter to the Jews (Acts x.). All their predictions, all the 
 prophetic types, all the figurative institutions of the Old Law 
 relate to Jesus of Nazareth, and prove that He is the true 
 Messias designated by divine inspiration, the Saviour of the 
 human race. 
 
 3d. Need we be astonished, then, to find the apostles, in 
 order to convince the Jews of the divine mission of Christ, con- 
 stantly appealing to the testimony of the prophets? To other 
 auditors they presented arguments of another kind, but to 
 their compatriots they could offer no more convincing testi- 
 mony. Thus St. Peter made it the basis of the exhortations 
 which converted thousands. And after testifying himself 
 to the voice heard on Thabor he quotes the prophecies as 
 still more incontestable proof (2 Pet. i. 19). And St. Paul, 
 on his part, devoted entire days, from morning till evening, 
 to convincing them that Jesus was prefigured in the law 
 of Moses and the prophets (Acts xxviii. 23). 
 
 4th. Our Saviour Himself revived the courage of the disci- 
 
206 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 pies by showing them that the things about which they were 
 troubled were only the fulfilment of the Scriptures (Luke 
 xxiv.). Thus He said to the Jews: ''Search the Scriptures, 
 for you think in them to have life everlasting, and the same 
 are they that give testimony of Me " (John v. 39). 
 
 Conclusion. — ^The fulfilment of so many prophecies, 
 uttered so many centuries before the events foretold — events 
 which could not possibly be conjectured, proves incontestably 
 that Jesus is truly the Messias, the Saviour sent by God, 
 announced and expected during four thousand years; that, 
 consequently, the religion founded by Him and predicted for so 
 many years is truly divine. In fact only He to whom all 
 ages are as the present moment, only He whose wisdom 
 and almighty power can prepare and direct events, could 
 make such revelations. ''The fulfilment of all the prophe- 
 cies," Pascal truly observes, "is a perpetual miracle, and we 
 need no other proof to recognize the divinity of the Christian 
 religion." 
 
 We cannot resist citing here a magnificent page from 
 Lacordaire on the subject of the Messianic prophecies (5th 
 conf. on Jesus Christ): 
 
 "And now, gentlemen, what think you of this? Here are 
 two parallel and corresponding facts, both certain, both of 
 colossal proportion, one which lasted two thousand years 
 before Christ, the other which lasted eighteen hundred years 
 since Jesus Christ; one which announces a great revolution, 
 a revolution impossible to foresee, the other which is its 
 accomplishment, both having Jesus Christ for principle, for 
 end, and for bond of union. Yet once more what think you 
 of it? Are you bold enough to deny it? But what will you 
 deny? The existence of the Messianic idea? But it is in the 
 Jewish people who still live, in all the continuous monuments 
 of their history, in the universal traditions of the human 
 race, in the most positive avowals of the most profound 
 unbelief. Would you deny the anteriority of the prophetic 
 details? The Jews, who crucified Jesus Christ and who 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 207 
 
 have a national and political interest in depriving Him of the 
 proofs of His divinity, declare to you that their Scriptures 
 were formerly what they are now; and for additional cer- 
 tainty, two himdred and fifty years before Jesus Christ, 
 under Ptolemy Philadelphus, king of Egypt, all the Old 
 Testament, by order of this monarch, was translated into 
 Greek and fell into the possession of the Greek, the Roman, 
 the whole civilized world. Would you turn to the other pole 
 of the question, and deny the accompUshment of the Messianic 
 idea? The Catholic Church, the offspring of that idea, is 
 before your eyes — she has baptized you. Would you stand 
 upon the point of junction of those two formidable events? 
 Would you deny that Jesus Christ has verified the Messianic 
 idea in His person, that He was a Jew of the tribe of Juda, 
 of the house of David, and the Founder of the Catholic Church 
 upon the double ruin of the synagogue and idolatry? But 
 the two interested parties — and they are irreconcilable 
 enemies — confess all this. The Jew affirms it and the 
 Christian affirms it. Would you say that this juncture of 
 colossal events at the precise point of Jesus Christ is the 
 result of chance? Were it even so, chance is but a brief and 
 fortuitous accident, its definition excludes the idea of con- 
 tinuity; there is no chance of two thousand years' duration 
 and of eighteen centuries added thereto. 
 
 '^Gentlemen, when God works there is nothing to be done 
 against Him. Jesus Christ appears before us as the moving 
 principle of the past as well as of the future, the soul of the 
 times which precede Him as well as of the t'mes which follow 
 Him. He appears before us in H s ancestry, upheld by the 
 Jewish people, the most important social and religious monu- 
 ment of ancient times; and in His posterity, upheld by the 
 Catholic Church, the greatest social and religious work of 
 modern times. He appears before us holding in His left 
 hand the Old Testament, the greatest book of the times 
 which precede Him, and in His right hand the Gospel, the 
 greatest book of the times which come after Him. And yet, 
 
208 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 SO preceded and so followed, He is still greater in Himself 
 than His ancestors and His posterity, than the patriarchs and 
 the prophets, than the apostles and the martyrs. Supported 
 by all that is most illustrious before and after Him, His per- 
 sonal physiognomy still stands out from this subhme scene, 
 and, by outshining that which seemed above all reveals to 
 us the God who has neither model nor equal.'' 
 
 IV. Fourth Proof. 
 
 THE MIRACLES OF THE APOSTLES AND OF THE DISCIPLES OF 
 
 JESUS. 
 
 1. The Prediction of these Miracles. — The religion which 
 the disciples of Jesus were to estabhsh was to encounter innu- 
 merable obstacles. Providence must needs lend the assist- 
 ance of miracles to those charged with this ministry. Jesus, 
 who desired that the divine power should shine forth in human 
 weakness, guaranteed in advance this salutary assistance: 
 ^'Amen, amen, I say to you, he that believeth in Me, the 
 works that I do, he also shall do, and greater than these shall 
 he do " (John xiv. 12. See also Mark xvi. 17, 18). 
 
 The disciples published this solemn promise of the Master 
 in the Gospel, and thus in a manner pledged themselves to 
 work miracles. It was a sort of challenge to the Jews and 
 pagans to disprove the divine teaching: if they had not 
 given striking proof of their miraculous power, the propaga- 
 tion of the Gospel would have been arrested at the very outset. 
 
 2. The Fulfilment of this Prediction. — To be convinced 
 that the divine oracle was Hterally fulfilled we have only to 
 look through the Gospels (Mark xvi. 20), the Acts of the 
 Apostles, and ecclesiastical history. We find from these 
 writings that nothing was more frequent than miracles at 
 the beginning of the Church. Nor is this astonishing, for 
 St. Paul tells us that miracles "are for a sign, not to be- 
 lievers, but to unbelievers." According to St. Gregory the 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 209 
 
 budding tree of the Christian rehgion needed, in order to 
 grow and thrive, the divine dew of grace. 
 
 1st. Among the numerous miracles of St. Peter related in the 
 Acts let us mention particularly the cure of the lame man at 
 the gate of the Temple (ch. iii.), that of the man ill of palsy 
 (ch. ix.), and other cures effected simply by his shadow (ch. 
 v.); the resurrection of Tabitha (ch. ix.); the miraculous 
 deliverance of several of the apostles from prison (ch. vi.) ; 
 that of Peter himself (ch. xii.). We find also numerous 
 miracles performed by St. Paul at Ephesus and elsewhere 
 by the mere touch of his garments (ch. xix.) ; the resurrec- 
 tion of a young man at Troas (ch. xx.), etc. 
 
 Two other miracles accomplished in connection with the 
 apostles merit special attention: we wish to speak of the 
 descent of the Holy Ghost and of the conversion of St. Paul. 
 
 2d. The miracle of Pentecost was both physical and moral : 
 physical, in the descent of the Holy Ghost under the form of 
 tongues of fire, and in the gift of tongues granted to the 
 apostles; moral, in the complete transformation of the 
 apostles (Acts ii.). One hundred persons were present in 
 the cenacle when this great event took place, which was 
 immediately carried through the world by the vast con- 
 course of strangers who were then at Jerusalem. If the 
 miracle had not been real and incontestable, the mere denial 
 of these strangers, on their return to their various countries, 
 would have sufficed to prevent the propagation of the Gospel. 
 
 3d. The miracle of St. Paul's conversion is sufficient of 
 itself to convert a man of good faith. ^ 
 
 Here, in a few words, is the history of this marvellous event. 
 Saul, a zealous persecutor of the Christians, was on his way 
 to Damascus to arrest the disciples of Christ and bring them 
 bound to Jerusalem; but at midday, as he nears Damascus, 
 he is suddenly blinded by a great light and falls to the ground. 
 
 * Picard, pt. ii., ch. 4. Also the old but interesting pamphlet by 
 Lord Lyttleton, " The Christian Religion demonstrated by the Con- 
 YQFsion a,nd the Apostleship of St. Paul." 
 
210 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 He hears the voice of Jesus and immediately a complete 
 moral transformation takes place in him. At the same mo- 
 ment Our Lord appears to Ananias and instructs him con- 
 cerning the new convert. Saul is cured of his bhndness by- 
 Ananias and receives baptism. After he has become Paul 
 he is distinguished by his great love for Jesus and by his gen- 
 erous, persevering zeal for the conversion of the Gentiles.^ 
 
 There can be no reasonable doubt as to the reality of the 
 facts; they are related three times in the Acts: in ch. ix. by 
 St. Luke; in chs. xxii. and xxvi. by St. Paul, who speaks of 
 them again in the Epistle to the Galatians, ch. i. 15. When 
 a man of the character of St. Paul relates a fact of this kind 
 with the most minute details, and when we have also as 
 guarantee his extraordinary conversion and the marvels 
 which followed it, we cannot believe that he was the victim 
 of an hallucination. 
 
 It is no less evident that such facts cannot be explained by 
 natural causes. Renan, who declares all miracle impossible, 
 must endeavor to find a natural explanation, but what an 
 explanation it is! St. Paul was in a state of great excite- 
 ment: he had a malignant fever and an inflammation of the 
 eyes; then a storm broke out, during which he imagined he 
 heard Our Saviour's voice; after the storm he had a sun- 
 stroke which made him blind! . . . Where are the proofs of 
 all this? He takes good care not to give them. And yet this 
 same Renan presumes to say, ''It belongs to the rationalistic 
 school to explain the events of history by adequate causes!" 
 
 4th. The gift of miracles, which marked the beginning of 
 the Church, continued, for the same reasons, in a very special 
 manner during the first ages. The Fathers of this period 
 speak very positively of the wonders which were performed 
 publicly and frequently before their eyes; they invite the 
 pagans to witness them; they defy them, for example, to 
 cite a demoniac who has not been delivered. The miracles, 
 moreover, were so patent that the enemies of Christianity 
 
 » " St. Peter and the First Years of Christianity," by P Abb^ Fouard. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 211 
 
 never dreamed of contesting them; hence the holy Fathers 
 made no effort to prove the reahty of them; all that they 
 endeavored to prove to the pagans was that these super- 
 natural works were wrought by the intervention of God, and 
 not by that of evil spirits or magic. 
 
 5th. Ecclesiastical history records so many incontestable 
 miracles of each of the centuries which followed, that the 
 ''Acts of the Saints" may be said to be a worthy continuation 
 of the ''Acts of the Apostles." To be convinced of this we 
 have only to read the Bollandists' Acta Sanctorum. Read, 
 for example, what Sulpicius-Severus, the biographer and 
 companion of St. Martin of Tours, relates of the miracles 
 which he witnessed and which won for the holy bishop the 
 surname of Thaumaturgus. No less astonishing and authentic 
 are the wonderful works of St. Simeon Stylites, related by 
 Theodoret, who witnessed them and wrote an account of 
 them for the people who daily flocked to the column of the 
 holy anchorite. We also find in St. Augustine's admirable 
 treatise, "The. City of God," a series of striking miracles, 
 performed in his day and sometimes before his eyes, par- 
 ticularly by the recently discovered relics of St. Stephen, 
 the first martyr. There is no doubt that these three historians 
 are absolutely unimpeachable.^ 
 
 6th. AVho can in good faith deny that, even in our own day, 
 God still renders to the divinity of His Son and of the Church, 
 which is His work, the solemn and incontrovertible testi- 
 mony of miracles? 
 
 Read, for example, in the fifth volume of the learned 
 Abbe Moigno's Splendeurs de la Foi, the chapter entitled Le 
 miracle au tribunal de la science, where, as he justly says, he 
 "demonstrates completely by means of the most advanced 
 science that five miracles performed in our day in the full 
 light of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and similar 
 in every respect to those of the Gospel, have been brilliantly 
 
 ^ An account of these facts is found in Butler's " Lives of the 
 Saints," Jan. 5, Aug. 3, and Nov. 11. 
 
212 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 attested by the most august and enlightened tribunal of the 
 universe.'^ ^ 
 
 Remark. — It is well to observe that one true miracle is 
 sufficient to prove the divinity of a religion in favor of which 
 it is manifested. Now, as miracles in favor of the religion of 
 Christ have been produced in every century, in order to 
 destroy this present proof we should have to reject all the 
 testimony of history, that is, the history of all past ages. 
 
 V. Fifth Proof. 
 
 FULFILMENT OF THE PROPHECIES MADE BY JESUS 
 HIMSELF. 
 
 We have seen that Jesus faithfully fulfilled in His person 
 the Messianic prophecies, thus showing that He is truly the 
 Messias foretold by the prophets. Now we shall find still 
 further proof of His divine mission in the prophecies which 
 He Himself uttered. If prophecy is as great a proof as 
 miracle of the divinity of a mission and of a doctrine, what 
 is it when the event foretold is miraculous? If to prophesy 
 is to perform a miracle, what is it to prophesy miracles? 
 Now the prophecies of Jesus usually foretold miraculous 
 events. 
 
 1. The Passion, the Death, the Resurrection of 
 Jesus. — ^We shall not dwell upon Jesus' prophecies concerning 
 His Passion, His death, and His Resurrection. For example, 
 when He said to His disciples: " Behold we go up to Jerusalem, 
 and the Son of man shall be betrayed to the chief priests, and 
 to the scribes and ancients, and they shall condemn Him to 
 death, and deliver Him to the Gentiles : and they shall mock 
 Him, and spit on Him, and scourge Him, and kill Him: and 
 the third day He shall rise again" (Mark x.; Matt. xvii.). 
 It is unnecessary to say how accurately, even in the smallest 
 
 » See Newman; Hay; A. C. Q. i. 337; D. R. New Ser. xxvi. 1, lU. Ser. 
 iv. 386, C. W. xxxii. 433. See also references, P. II., ch. 2, art. 2, ii. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 213 
 
 details, all these things were fulfilled. Jesus also foretold 
 the treason of Judas, the flight of His disciples at the time 
 of His apprehension, the triple denial of Peter, the descent 
 of the Holy Ghost, etc. 
 
 We have just seen that He also predicted the miracles per- 
 formed by His disciples and apostles. Let us insist a little 
 upon the miracles which were to be realized at a later period, 
 or even to embrace, so to speak, all centuries. 
 
 2. The Destruction of Jerusalem and the Disper- 
 sion OF the Jewish People. — A. Jesus declared, at differ- 
 ent times and in the most explicit manner, the misfortunes 
 with which Jerusalem was threatened in the near future, the 
 siege of the city, the entire destruction of the Temple. Speak- 
 ing of the Temple to the disciples He said ''there shall not be 
 left here a stone upon a stone." They asked Him when this 
 destruction would take place. ''Amen," He said to them, 
 ^'this generation shall not pass until all these things be done. 
 . . . But before all these things they will lay their hands on 
 you, and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues, 
 and into prisons, dragging you before kings and governors 
 for My name's sake. . . . When you shall see Jerusalem com- 
 passed about with an army, then know that the desolation 
 thereof is at hand. " And again as He approached the 
 unhappy city He exclaimed: "The days shall come upon 
 thee, and thy enemies shall cast a trench about thee, and 
 compass thee round, and straiten thee on every side, and 
 beat thee flat to the ground, and thy children who are in 
 thee ; and they shall not leave in thee a stone upon a stone, 
 because thou hast not known the time of thy visitation. . . . 
 Thy children shall fall by the edge of the sword, and shall be 
 led away captives into all nations; and Jerusalem shall be 
 trodden down by the Gentiles, till the times of the nations 
 shall be fulfilled. . . . Amen I say to you, this generation shall 
 not pass away till all things be fulfilled." (Matth. xxiv.; 
 Mark xiii. ; Luke xix. ; xxi.) 
 
 Josephus, the contemporary Jewish historian, has trans- 
 
214 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 mitted to us terrible details of the destruction of this city. 
 If his accounts are to be received with entire faith, about a 
 milHon men perished by fire, or by the sword, or by famine. 
 He declares that no city since the beginning of the world ever 
 suffered as did Jerusalem. We know that, after the taking 
 of the city, the last combatants defended themselves in the 
 Temple with unheard-of fierceness, and that Titus prohibited 
 its destruction imder the severest penalties, but in vain: a 
 soldier, moved, Josephus says, by a divine inspiration, threw 
 a flaming torch into one of the buildings, and tKe fire spread 
 so rapidly that in a brief period the whole edifice was reduced 
 to ashes. The catastrophe was so unforeseen and so com- 
 plete that the conqueror could not but recognize and pro- 
 claim the divine intervention of which he was only the 
 instrument. 
 
 When the Jews remaining in Judea made an attempt to 
 rise under Adrian, he quelled the revolt by slajdng six hundred 
 thousand and dispersing the rest. They were afterwards 
 forbidden under pain of death to enter Jerusalem, which 
 was thenceforth called iEHa CapitoHna. 
 
 In addition to this, Our Saviour's words concerning this 
 event were still more solemnly confirmed. Julian the 
 Apostate, in order to falsify the divine oracle, left nothing 
 undone to rebuild the Temple. But the most extraordinary 
 phenomena prevented the execution of his impious design. 
 This is attested by the historian Socrates, by St. Ambrose, 
 St. John Chrysostom, St. Gregory Nazianzen, and even by the 
 rationalist Gibbon, who acknowledges it with reluctance, 
 and by the irrefutable testimony of the pagan historian 
 Ammianus Marcellinus, friend of the emperor and officer 
 of the royal army. ''When Alypius, assisted by the gov- 
 ernor of the province, strenuously urged on the work, there 
 issued," says Ammianus, ''great balls of fire from the earth 
 near the foundations, scorching and blasting the laborers and 
 rendering the ground at times inaccessible; finally, the ^dc- 
 torious element continuing to break forth upon the work- 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 215 
 
 men, as if obstinately and resolutely bent upon driving them 
 away, Alypius was obliged to give over the enterprise.'^ The 
 result of this attempt was that in digging for the foundation 
 of the new Temple that of the old was completely destroyed, 
 thus fulfilling to the letter. the words of the prophecy an- 
 nouncing that not a stone would be left upon a stone.* 
 
 B. We know how the prediction in regard to the dispersion 
 of the Jews was verified. When a people is scattered among 
 other nations, usually in a short time there is a complete 
 fusion of the two races. Contrary to this law of history, the 
 people of Israel, though dispersed throughout the world, con- 
 tinue to form a race apart, thus remaining, despite them- 
 selves, a perpetual witness of the fulfilment of the proph- 
 ecies and of the curse which was laid upon this deicide people. 
 ''God," says Bossuet, ''by a means of which there is but 
 this one instance, has preserved the Jews, though out of their 
 country and in a state of ruin, longer than the very nations 
 who conquered them. We no longer find any trace of the 
 ancient Medes, Persians, Greeks, nor even of the Romans. 
 They are lost and swallowed up in other races. The Jews, 
 though the prey of these ancient nations so celebrated in 
 history, have survived them, and God, in preserving them, 
 holds us in expectation of what He will still do for the rem- 
 nant of this unhappy people formerly so favored. Yet their 
 obduracy serves as a means of salvation to the Gentiles, and 
 gives them the advantage of finding where least expected, 
 in the hands of the Jews, the Scriptures which have foretold 
 Jesus Christ and His mysteries.'' (Disc, on Univ. Hist. P. II., 
 ch. XX.) 
 
 3. Persecutions. — "You shall be witnesses unto Me in 
 Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to the 
 uttermost parts of the earth" (Acts i. 8). When Jesus fore- 
 told to the disciples their success in the apostleship He an- 
 nounced to them at the same time that they would be hated 
 and persecuted because of His name. " If the world hate you, 
 
 * Card. Moran, Occasional Papers, p. 38; Parsons, Studies, L 
 
216 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 know ye that it hath hated Me before you; if they have 
 persecuted Me, they will also persecute you" (John xv. 18, 
 20). '^Behold, I send you as sheep in the midst of wolves; 
 . . . men will deliver you up in councils, and they will 
 scourge you in their synagogues. . . . You shall be hated by 
 all men for My name's sake." (Matth. x.) ''Blessed shall 
 you be when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate 
 you, and shall reproach you and cast out your name as evil 
 for the Son of man's sake. Be glad in that day and rejoice; 
 for behold, your reward is great in heaven." (Luke vi.) 
 " The hour cometh, that whosoever killeth you, will think 
 that he doth a service to God " (John xvi.). 
 
 Such was the oracle. The simple reading of the Acts shows 
 how perfectly it was fulfilled. We find the apostles reviled, 
 dragged before tribunals, cast into prison, scourged, yet re- 
 joicing in this ignominious and cruel treatment, ''because 
 they were counted worthy to suffer reproach for the name 
 of Jesus." The persecution of the just is reahzed even in 
 our own day. 
 
 4. Charity among Christians. — "By this shall all men 
 know that you are My disciples, if you have love one for 
 another. . . . That they all may be one, as Thou, Father, in 
 Me and I in Thee : that they may also be one in us : that the 
 world may beheve that Thou hast sent Me." (John xiii. 35; 
 xvii. 21, 23.) 
 
 Jesus predicted that His Church would be distinguished 
 by a boundless charity, by an admirable union of hearts and 
 souls. Now what does history tell us? In the very begin- 
 ning of the new religion the distinguishing mark of Christians 
 was a love which made them one heart and one soul. Later 
 centuries furnished innumerable heroes of Christian charity, 
 who practised all the spiritual and corporal works of mercy, 
 devoting themselves to reheving the miseries and comforting 
 the sorrows of poor humanity. We shall demonstrate this 
 more fully in another part of our work (P. IL, ch. 5). 
 
 5. This might be the place to mention the prophecies re- 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 217 
 
 lating to the establishment of the Church and its perpetual 
 duration; but we shall have to speak of them in the exposi- 
 tion of our sixth proof .^ 
 
 Conclusion. — The fulfilment of these various prophecies 
 authorize us to conclude that the divinity of Jesus and of His 
 supreme work, the Church, is incontestable. This conclusion 
 is the more firmly impressed upon us that several of these 
 prophecies were made in direct confirmation of Our Saviour's 
 mission; as, for example, that announcing the Resurrection. 
 ''An evil and adulterous nation," says Jesus, speaking of the 
 Pharisees and the unbeHeving Jews who sought to ensnare 
 Him in His speech, '^seeketh a sign, and a sign shall not be 
 given it, but the sign of Jonas the prophet. For as Jonas 
 was in the whale's belly three days and three nights, so shall 
 the Son of man be in the heart of the earth three days and 
 three nights." Also the prophecies relating to the treason 
 of Judas and the persecution the Church was to endure. ''I 
 tell you before it come to pass," says Our Saviour, ''that 
 when it shall come to pass you may believe that I am He'' 
 (John xiii. 19). 
 
 VI. Sixth Proof. 
 
 THE MIRACULOUS ESTABLISHMENT OF THE RELIGION OF JESUS, 
 AND ITS PERPETUAL DURATION THROUGH ALL AGES. 
 
 This also is a miracle, but of the moral order. Let us ex- 
 plain the meaning of these words: a miracle of the moral 
 order. 
 
 The moral world is governed by laws even as the physical. 
 For example, it is a law of the moral world that a vast 
 multitude of men will not change their convictions, habits, and 
 customs in a short time, particularly when their passions, 
 interests, and inclinations unite in opposing such a change.^ 
 
 ^ A. C. Q. xvii. 225. 
 
 ' The laws of the moral order, taken as a whole, constitute what is 
 frequently called the law of history. This law enables us to determine 
 
218 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 God intervenes in the moral order as well as in the physical 
 in two ways: one is ordinary and simply providential, the 
 other extraordinary and truly miraculous. To constitute, 
 strictly speaking, a miracle of the moral order there must be a 
 real derogation of a certain law of the moral order; a simply 
 providential ordering of events is not sufficient, even though 
 it may be more or less marvellous. 
 
 A miracle of the moral order may be defined as an effect 
 produced by human liberty, and derogating a law of man's 
 nature to a degree that requires the immediate and extraor- 
 dinary intervention of God. 
 
 It goes without saying that a miracle of the moral order 
 is usually much more difficult to discern than one of the 
 physical order. Hence, treating with an adversary of bad 
 faith, we should dwell most on miracles of the physical order. 
 It is no less true, however, that, to an unbiassed mind, the 
 establishment and propagation of Christianity, as well as its 
 preservation to the present day, are very real and striking 
 miracles. 
 
 1. The Establishment and Propagation of Chris- 
 tianity.^ — A. We must first establish the fact itself of this 
 rapid propagation. But it is so incontestable, supported as it 
 is by so many ancient monuments, profane as well as sacred, 
 that unbelievers themselves do not attempt to deny it; they 
 try only to weaken the effect of it by endeavoring to explain it 
 
 in advance, usually with great probability, sometimes with certainty, 
 what, in given circumstances, will be the conduct of individuals or 
 nations left to themselves. It is clear that this idea must not be 
 confounded with that of the moral law, properly so called, which 
 establishes an obligation of conscience : it is a moral law, for example, 
 that we shall not do to another what, if done to ourselves, we should 
 consider an injustice. 
 
 ^ See works on Church History; Allies (Formation, etc.); Manahan, 
 B. II.; Hope; Th^baud, S.J., Church and Gentile World, I., ch. 3, 4; 
 II., ch. 9; Broeckart, The Fact Divine; DoUinger, First Age of Chris- 
 tianity and the Church; Parsons, Studies, I., ch. 4; Spalding, J. M., 
 MiscelL, vol. i.,p. I.; A. C. Q. xix. 57. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 219 
 
 by natural causes. Let us quote, however, a few historical 
 texts. 
 
 The apostles had not completed their career before St. Paul 
 could write to the Romans: ''Your faith is spoken of in 
 the whole world ;" and to the Colossians: '' The Gospel which 
 is come unto you, as also it is in the whole world, bringeth 
 forth fruit and groweth, even as it doth in you." St. Justin, 
 a hundred years after Christ, counted several savage nations 
 among the faithful. ''We are but of yesterday," said Ter- 
 tullian, in his turn, in his Apology to the magistrates of the 
 empire, "and we fill your cities, your islands, your camps, 
 the palace, the senate, the forum: we have left you only your 
 temples. If we were to withdraw from you, the empire 
 would be a desert. . . . Among the Parthians, the Medes, the 
 Elamites, among the inhabitants of Mesopotamia, of Armenia, 
 of Phrygia, of Cappadocia, of Pontus, of Asia Minor, of 
 Egypt, of Cyrenaica, among the various races of the Gsetuli, 
 of the Moors, of the populations of Spain, of Gaul, of Brittany, 
 of Germany, everywhere we find the faithful." In the year 
 112, Pliny the Younger, alarmed at the immense number of 
 Christians in his province, wrote the Emperor Trajan, who 
 had appointed him governor of Bithynia: "The contagion 
 of Christian superstition is not confined to the cities, it has 
 invaded the villages and the country and has taken possession 
 of persons of every age, rank, and sex. Our temples are 
 almost entirely abandoned and the religious ceremonies neg- 
 lected." "This race of Christians is everywhere," Seneca 
 wrote. Renan himself says, speaking of the rapid spread 
 of Christianity: "In one hundred and fifty years the 
 prophecy of Jesus was accomplished. The grain of mus- 
 tard-seed which had become a tree began to cover the 
 world." ' 
 
 B. A propagation so rapid, so universal throughout the 
 known world in the space of three centuries could not be 
 
 » D. R., Oct. 1880 (Truth and Falsehood of Kenan's Lectures;) 
 Broeckart, 1. c. 
 
220 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 a natural event. We shall be convinced of this if we con- 
 sider the circumstances which accompanied it. Considered 
 from a human point of view, the new religion en- 
 countered little more than insurmountable obstacles. It 
 had against it: 
 
 1st. The Very Men who Preached it. — ^They were not 
 orators or philosophers, or men familiar with the secrets of 
 science and diplomacy, but Jews, despised by other nations; 
 Galileans, despised by other Jews; with the exception of St. 
 Paul they were men from the humblest walks in life, poor, 
 uneducated, with nothing to credit them in the eyes of the 
 world, wholly without natural advantages fitted to impress 
 the minds of their hearers. In a word, they had nothing 
 which could accredit their mission to the people, to the 
 priests, to philosophers, to magistrates, to emperors; on the 
 contrary, everything connected with them was of a character 
 to discredit their doctrine and to prejudice the success of 
 their enterprise.^* 
 
 2d. The Doctrine it Taught. — If this doctrine had but 
 favored the passions, its propagation would be more com- 
 prehensible; but it was no less opposed to the depraved 
 inclinations of the heart than to the prejudices of the 
 mind. Its mysteries offended man's intellectual pride, and 
 its severe and inflexible morality boldly warred against his 
 corrupt inclinations. What a contrast between the life 
 which the pagans led without remorse and that which the 
 new doctrine imposed upon them! Their modesty must be 
 carried to humility, their meekness and charity to loving their 
 enemies as themselves, to forgiving the greatest injuries, 
 their patience to bearing insults without murmur, their 
 detachment from earthly things even to choosing poverty 
 rather than injustice, their chastity to repelling the very 
 thought of evil, their fidehty to the faith even to martyrdom. 
 Here is what was asked of men who in paganism could 
 satisfy their passions and give themselves up to the most 
 
 » Thebaud, Church and G. W., I., ch. 3. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 221 
 
 shameful disorders, after the example and under the pat- 
 ronage of their gods. 
 
 3d. The End it Claimed to Attain. — This was nothing 
 less than to replace the ancient and venerated law of Moses 
 by a new law promulgated by a man whom the synagogue 
 had just condemned to an ignominious death; to destroy 
 throughout the world an idolatry which had reigned for so 
 many ages, an idolatry which had a national character, 
 which was considered as an indispensable social necessity, 
 as forming an essential part of the laws; an idolatry which 
 was connected with every act of public and of private life; 
 an idolatry, finally, which was supported by all human 
 powers, by the strongest and most absolute power which ever 
 existed. And all this was to be replaced by a detested wor- 
 ship, which the grave Tacitus accused of hating mankind, a 
 worship which carried its extravagance so far as to require 
 its followers to adore not only an invisible God, but a Jew 
 condemned, at the demand of the priests and magistrates of 
 His own nation, to an ignominious death.* 
 
 4th. The Time When it Appeared. — It was the age of 
 Augustus and of Tiberius, that is, one of the most polished 
 and enlightened, but at the same time the proudest and 
 most corrupt; an age when the Roman empire was filled 
 with philosophers, orators, poets, and historians; when 
 Rome had become the mistress of nations, and ruled the 
 world by laws and customs all based upon pagan ideas. 
 The ignorance of the apostles, therefore, had to contend with 
 the learning of the greatest geniuses inflated with the pride 
 of their attainments. 
 
 5th. The Violent Persecutions to which it was Sub- 
 jected FROM ITS Birth. — Far from receiving any support 
 from public authority, the new religion was the object of the 
 hatred of the synagogue, of the tyranny of emperors and of 
 kings, of the cruelty of governors and of magistrates, of the 
 
 * See in Lacordaire's Conferences on the Church the reasons why 
 statesmen and scholars were opposed to the young Christianity. 
 
222 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 rage of the priests, the philosophers and the people. From the 
 year 64, when the persecution of Nero broke out, to the edict 
 of Constantine in 313, that is, for two centuries and a half, 
 there were ten general persecutions ordered by emperors, 
 and a large number of local persecutions which took place 
 either in consequence of the edicts remaining unrevoked, 
 or which were excited by the hatred of the governors, the 
 magistrates, and the priests of the idols. And let us not 
 forget that among the crowned persecutors were vaunted 
 philosophers, such as Adrian, Trajan, Marcus Aurelius; and 
 there were some who, like Decius and Diocletian, were so 
 prodigal of human blood that they beheved they had exter- 
 minated the very name of Christian. 
 
 Conclusion. — The argument we have just presented is as 
 simple as it is conclusive; it rests upon a striking, unde- 
 niable historical truth, which does not need to be proved. 
 It is a well-known fact that before the fifteenth year of the 
 reign of Tiberius the name of Christian was unknown; pa- 
 ganism reigned as master in a society corrupt in the ex- 
 treme; the cross, an instrument of punishment reserved for 
 slaves, was a sign of extreme infamy. And yet from the 
 time of Constantine, despite a formidable opposition, despite 
 long and cruel persecutions, the Christianity announced by 
 Jews, obscure disciples of a crucified criminal, triumphed 
 even in Athens and Rome; the cross, transformed into an 
 object of adoration and love, adorned the diadems of mon- 
 archs, and became the emblem of honor and o' glory among 
 regenerated nations. The miracle is palpable, and we can 
 say with fullest confidence, the finger of God is here. ''He," 
 says Chateaubriand, '' who could cause a cross to be adored, he, 
 we swear it, can be no other than a God." We are famihar 
 with the celebrated dilemma of St. Augustine: either the 
 rehgion of Jesus Christ triumphed over all obstacles by force 
 of miracles, in which case we must acknowledge that it is 
 divine; or it was estabhshed without miracles, in which case 
 this conversion of the world is the greatest of all miracles. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 223 
 
 Our conclusion is further justified by the fact that here 
 again we find in the miracle of this rapid propagation 
 the fulfilment of a miracle of prophecy.^ In fact Jesus had 
 clearly announced the rapid estabhshment of His rehgion. 
 ''All power," He said to His disciples, ''is given to Me in 
 heaven and on earth; going therefore, teach ye all nations: 
 baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, 
 and of the Holy Ghost : teaching them to observe all things 
 whatsoever I have commanded you: and behold I am with 
 you all days, even to the consummation of the world. This 
 gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world, 
 for a testimony to all nations." (Matth. xxviii. 18, 19, 20; 
 xxiv. 14.) "If I be Hfted up from the earth (that is, after 
 My death on the cross), I will draw all things to Myself" 
 (Johnxii. 32). "You shall receive the power of the Holy 
 Ghost coining upon you, and you shall be witnesses unto 
 Me in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and even to 
 the uttermost parts of the earth " (Acts i. 8). 
 
 Objections. — Great have been the efforts of obstinate 
 imbehef to weaken the result of this irrefutable fact. 
 
 1st. According to Gibbon and those who have followed 
 him, the spread of the Gospel is naturally explained by the 
 unity of the Roman empire, the universal peace, the building 
 of the mihtary roads, the enthusiasm of the masses for the 
 novel and the marvellous, the need that was felt of a purer 
 morahty, the charity of the first Christians, the very perse- 
 cutions which served to spread rather than to stifle the 
 Christian doctrine. 
 
 Answer. — We do not think it our duty to refute one by 
 one these perhaps specious but really inconclusive arguments. 
 Let us only remark generally that there is no explanation 
 imagined by unbelief which is not in manifest contradiction 
 with history, or which does not contradict itself, or take the 
 effect for the cause, attributing the propagation of the Gospel 
 
 * On the prophecies of the Old Testament concerning the univer- 
 sality of the Church see Thebaud, i., ch. 2. 
 
224 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 to results which its doctrine had already produced, or at 
 least which are not radically insufficient to explain the 
 effect produced. 
 
 We are far from claiming that everything in the path of 
 Christianity was an absolute obstacle. We acknowledge 
 that divine Providence, ''which reacheth from end to end 
 mightily and ordereth all things sweetly," made the Roman 
 people the unconscious precursor destined to prepare the 
 way for the new religion. The unity and peace of the Roman 
 empire may have contributed to the diffusion of the faith. 
 But this same unity, this peace, and this facility of communi- 
 cation were incomparably more advantageous to the crowned 
 persecutors than to their defenceless victims. It is evident, 
 moreover, that these things, while they smoothed the path 
 of the Gospel, could not be considered the efficacious cause of 
 its success. As to the alleged attraction, not of a few choice 
 souls, but of multitudes in every part of the globe, who can 
 seriously admit it, particularly when there is question of a 
 rehgious doctrine preached under the conditions stated 
 above, and imposing upon proud minds, upon men given up 
 to their passions, incomprehensible dogmas and the most 
 rigid morality? Were the masses at that time so powerfully 
 attracted by the loss of worldly goods, of Hberty, of life itself? 
 If minds, as it is falsely claimed, were predisposed in favor 
 of Christianity, how was it that the pagans for nearly three 
 centuries pursued and persecuted Christians with inhuman 
 barbarity? 
 
 In brief, if there were circumstances which may have 
 favored the propagation of the Gospel, it is very evident that 
 the result obtained bears no proportion to the human means 
 employed. For we must not forget that, according to the 
 hypothesis of naturalism, Jesus was only an ordinary man, 
 a poor unlettered artisan, wholly without human resources; 
 that the disciples whom He gathered about Him were also 
 poor, despised, ignorant men, having no divine mission or 
 supernatural power. Such were the envoys whom this Jew 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 225 
 
 of Galilee sent throughout the world to substitute for the 
 revered law of Moses a powerful idolatry, a doctrine of his 
 own invention, a doctrine contradicting every incUnation of 
 the human heart and opposed to every received social 
 tradition. Imagine such an enterprise imdertaken in our 
 own day, when the means of communication are so numerous 
 and so easy; even granting the new apostles all the advan- 
 tages of eloquence, riches, power — who would venture to 
 predict any success, any lasting success for their mission? 
 Admitting that their doctrine, wholly human and curbing 
 the passions, excited by its novelty the enthusiasm of 
 one or several nations, how long would this enthusiasm 
 last? The study of the human heart and of history proves 
 that such reformations are very short-Hved; they last as 
 long as passions and interests can profit by the doctrinal 
 novelty.^ 
 
 2d. Islamism and Protestantism were also very rapidly 
 propagated. 
 
 Answer. — No comparison is possible here. Every one 
 knows that Islamism, a sensual religion authorizing the 
 gratification of the most brutal passions, was propagated by 
 the sword, while Christianity, proscribing all vices, and par- 
 doning nothing to human weakness, was propagated despite 
 the violence and persecution to which it was subjected. 
 Hence Pascal says: ''If Mahomet adopted a human means 
 of success, that adopted by Jesus was a human means of 
 perishing; and instead of concluding that, since Mahomet 
 succeeded, Jesus could succeed, we must recognize, on the 
 contrary, that if Mahomet succeeded, Christianity could not 
 but fail unless sustained by divine aid."^ 
 
 ' Thebaud, Ch. and Moral W., ch. 4; D. R., Oct. 1880, Kenan's 
 lectures. 
 
 ^ On Islamism see Newman, Hist. Sketches, I.; Schanz, II., ch. 6; 
 Parsons, Studies, I., ch. 37; Alzog, Ch. Hist., II.; Allies, Peter's Rock 
 in Mohammed's Flood, ch. 6; Lilly, Ancient Religion, ch. 3; The 
 Qaims of Christianity, ch. 3; D. R. Old Ser. vii. 78, April 78, Oct. 
 '93. On Buddhism see below, p. 276. 
 
226 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 As to Protestantism, we have only to consult history to 
 find : 1st. That it was not a new religion, but, under pretext of 
 reform, an open revolt against Catholicism, which had existed 
 for fifteen centuries; further, that it was as much a political 
 as a religious movement; 2d. That its votaries were attracted 
 by riches, and by the laxity it introduced in morals and 
 discipline; 3d. That many human elements favored its de- 
 velopment ; 4th. That to retain what it had acquired it was 
 obliged to have recourse to the most odious and implacable 
 measures of proscription against the Catholic Church.^ Read 
 in connection with this subject what we say in the second 
 part of this work in the chapters relating to Protestantism 
 and intolerance.^ 
 
 2. The Miracle of the Continual Preservation of 
 Christianity. — The religion founded by Jesus Christ and 
 preached by the apostles under the most unfavorable cir- 
 cumstances, not only could not be implanted in the world 
 without the assistance of God, but it could not be preserved 
 to us without a manifestly divine intervention. 
 
 History in hand, we have frequently traced the various 
 causes of decadence and ruin which would have completely 
 effaced Christianity had it been other than a divine work. 
 We cannot do more than briefly enumerate here the un- 
 ceasing and terrible combats recorded in the annals of the 
 world. 
 
 The Church of Jesus Christ, as P. Ollivier says in his beautiful 
 conference on the establishment of Christianity, had hardly 
 risen, before paganism unsheathed its sword against her — a 
 double-edged sword which it wielded for three centuries; 
 only at the end of the third century did it fall dulled and 
 powerless. Persecution was followed by the still more 
 formidable trial of heresies and schisms, further complicated 
 
 ^Spalding, J. L., lect. 11, 12; Lilly, Qaims, etc., ch. 6; Parsons, 
 Studies, III., p. 326 ff.; Alzog, Ch. Hist., III., §334; Spalding, Prot. 
 Reform., I., p. II.. ch. 4; Balmes, ch. 10; Br. W. x. 
 
 ' Lacordaire, conf . 4 on Jesus Christ. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 227 
 
 by the dismemberment of the empire under the assaults of 
 barbarians, and by the struggle with barbarism for Uberty 
 and civihzation. Then rose Mahometism, which, encirchng 
 Europe with an iron girdle, sought to crush her in its powerful 
 grasp. Peace itself did not free the Church from trials: 
 the rulers of the age, abusing the influence which the pro- 
 tection of the Church accorded them, created in her bosom 
 simony and corruption; they went so far as to subjugate the 
 Papacy, forcing it to transfer its see from Rome to Avignon. 
 There came finally the last trial, the most formidable of all 
 and which has lasted to the present day: the insurrection 
 and apostasy of Christian nations. Long prepared by the 
 Cathari, the Waldenses, and the Albigenses, resisted by a 
 crusade and by the efforts of the sons of St. Francis and 
 St. Dominic, the insurrection gathered new strength from 
 the rash ambition of Philip le Bel, from the great schism 
 of the East, and the attempts of Wickliff and Huss. Later, 
 under the powerful impetus of Luther, it broke like a tempest 
 over the Church of Jesus Christ. To accomplish its work, it 
 assumes, at need, all forms, it takes all names, it exhausts all 
 means. As Protestantism it combats with pen and sword; 
 as the Revolution it organizes noyades and erects scaffolds; 
 as Philosophy it is lavish of sarcasm and calumny; as an 
 armed and brutal power it invades the pontifical domains and 
 lays its sacrilegious hands on the Vicar of Jesus Christ. 
 ''The dream of Philosophy," wrote a modern pubUcist, ''was 
 to overthrow the Papacy, for it appreciated that there was 
 the head, there was the heart of Catholicism. If it could die, 
 this head, this heart must be the point of attack. The 
 Papacy destroyed, Philosophy gained its cause. The Revo- 
 lution came ; it knew the word of command ; it aimed at the 
 heart; it dragged the Pope into exile; he died there!'' These 
 are the facts as history presents them. Yet what happened! 
 While schools of philosophy, religious sects, kingdoms, em- 
 pires, in a word, all human institutions have successively fallen 
 and disappeared, even when everything seemed to favor 
 
228 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 them, the Church has stood steadfast in the midst of the 
 ruins accumulated about her; she has even come forth 
 purer and stronger from the trials which Providence per- 
 mitted her to meet in her passage through the centuries. 
 Thus the words of St. Augustine are truly verified: "The 
 Church may suffer, but it is not given any himaan power 
 to prevail against her: impugnari potest, expugnari non 
 potest J' 
 
 Remarks. — ^To these facts, so conclusive of themselves, 
 let us add two remarks which will make their value more 
 appreciated. 
 
 1st. Not only has the Catholic Church existed for nineteen 
 centuries, but it has always remained the same: it has pre- 
 served the same doctrine, the same constitution, the same 
 form of government, the same discipline, the same worship. 
 This is a unique and incomparable fact. It is the more 
 marvellous that if governments, even those which seem most 
 stable, succeed in preserving an existence of a few centuries, 
 it is only by means of concessions and compromises, only by 
 making the constitutions and the laws yield to the demands 
 of the times. It is quite otherwise with the Church: she 
 has always been inflexible and has remained immutable in 
 all that is essential to her. 
 
 This perpetuity of the work of Christ was predicted several 
 times in the most formal manner. "Behold I am with you 
 all days, even to the consummation of the world," said 
 Jesus to His disciples when He sent them to preach the 
 Gospel. And what was to be the result of this assistance? 
 "Thou art Peter," He said to him whom He made the chief 
 of His apostles, "and upon tliis rock I will build My Church, 
 and the gates of hell," that is, the powers of darkness, 
 persecution, snares, " shall not prevail against it " (Matth. xvi. 
 18). "In the world you shall have distress," He tells all 
 His apostles; "but have confidence, I have overcome the 
 world " (John xvi. 33). Here again we meet a double miracle, 
 that of prophecy and that of its fulfilment. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 229 
 
 Conclusion. — From all that we have stated in this para- 
 graph flows an evident conclusion. If the Church had been 
 a human work, it would long since have ceased to exist 
 except in the minds of men. Time alone would have de- 
 stroyed it; for time, a celebrated diplomat has said, is the 
 great enemy. Since the Catholic Church (we shall prove in 
 the second part of our work that the rehgion of Jesus is 
 identical with her) has vanquished time, which destroys all 
 things, if she still stands, ever deriving new vigor from 
 combat itself, it is the arm of God which has sustained her 
 through all ages. To draw this consequence we have only 
 to place side by side the two palpable, incontestable facts 
 mentioned: on the one hand, the fact of the rapid propaga- 
 tion of Christianity and of its preservation to the present 
 day ; on the other, that of the absolute impotence of the human 
 means at the disposition of the new religion in its struggle 
 with such powerful and numerous enemies. Nothing more 
 than common sense is required in order to recognize that 
 such effects are not the result of the wisdom or power of 
 man, but require the all-powerful intervention of God. 
 
 VII. Seventh Proof. 
 
 THE TESTIMONY OF THE MARTYRS.* 
 
 To appreciate the force of the argument in favor of the 
 divinity of our faith afforded by the testimony of the martyrs 
 it is important to consider: 
 
 1. The Very Large Number of these Martyrs. — From 
 Nero to Constantine, that is, during two and a half centuries, 
 Christianity was the object of the most terrible persecutions. 
 
 * On the early persecutions of the Church read Church History; 
 also Acts of the Early Martyrs, byFastre, S.J.; Gleason, I.; Manahan; 
 Allies (Formation, II.); Sweeney; Marcy; Craig; Parsons, Studies, I., 
 ch. 3; Burnet (Why, etc., ch. 13); D. R. New Ser. x. 362, xvi. 85; 
 C. W. xxii. 104; A. C. Q. v. 468. On modern persecutions see 
 references below, P. II., ch. 4, art. 1. 
 
230 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 A very large number of men courageously shed their blood 
 either during the ten general persecutions or during the 
 unceasing local persecutions. The Emperor Diocletian, 
 following in the footsteps of his predecessor, employed such 
 severe measures against the Christians that he flattered him- 
 self that he had exterminated them; witness the inscription 
 on the medal which he had struck: Nomine Christianorum 
 deleto (the Christian name has vanished). 
 
 2. The Diversity in their Condition. — Masters and 
 servants, rich and poor, men and women, children and old 
 men, soldiers, nobles, philosophers, all vied with one another 
 in their generous ardor to confess the faith of Jesus Christ. 
 
 3. The Barbarity of their Torments. — They were so 
 numerous that entire works have been written upon the 
 various kinds, and the simple enumeration of the tortures 
 inflicted upon the Christians fills us with horror; they caused 
 the most exquisite pains, says Tacitus. • Seneca, after 
 enumerating some of the terrible tortures, adds that the 
 martyrs endured all that human barbarity could invent. 
 
 4. The Manner in which they Bore these Torments. 
 — They were gentle and calm in the midst of the most ex- 
 cruciating suffering. Nothing in their bearing suggested 
 fanaticism or frenzy or a spirit of vengeance; on the very 
 scaffold and at the stake they prayed for their execu- 
 tioners. 
 
 5. The Striking Miracles which took place at the 
 execution of these men who were put to death out of hatred 
 of Jesus Christ, whose divinity they proclaimed. 
 
 6. The Happy Fruits of the Martyrdom of the 
 Christians. — The number of conversions wrought by these 
 triumphant deaths must have been very numerous to enable 
 TertulHan to write: ''The more they slay us the more 
 we multiply: the blood of the martyrs is the seed of new 
 Christians. ' ' The unalterable peace and joyful serenity which 
 shone on the brow of the martyr in the midst of the most 
 appalHng tortures frequently caused the executioners and 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 231 
 
 the tyrants themselves to embrace the faith of their victims. 
 Upon all these facts we shall consult with profit a general 
 history of the Church. 
 
 Conclusion. — It follows from this testimony of the mar- 
 tyrs that the reHgion for which they laid down their lives 
 is truly divine. In fact, 
 
 1st. So many martyrs of all ages, sexes, and classes of soci- 
 ety, in every part of the world and all at the same period, 
 could not have endured with heroic patience, not a speedy 
 and comparatively painless death, but the most prolonged and 
 refined tortures, if God had not manifestly sustained them, 
 and consequently if their faith had not been divine. Moral 
 strength of this kind does not belong to human nature. 
 Let us not forget that their sufferings were purely voluntary; 
 to escape them they had only to apostatize. 
 
 2d. Before every tribunal in the world, when there is 
 question of facts, proof by testimony is admitted, for facts 
 can be proved only by testimony. Now the martyrs died, 
 not to defend speculative opinions, but to attest the fact of 
 Christian revelation, that is, of the divine mission of Jesus 
 Christ, supported by the Messianic prophecies, by the miracles 
 He wrought, by His life, His superhuman death, His Resurrec- 
 tion, His Ascension, the descent of the Holy Ghost, the mir- 
 acles of the apostles, etc. : all this forms an essential part of 
 our religion. Men have been known to die for false opinions, 
 believing them true, but never for tenets which they doubted 
 or which they knew to be false. Therefore the Christian mar- 
 tyrs must have had very strong proof of the divinity of their 
 religion; they must have been profoundly convinced of the 
 facts upon which it is based, since they sacrificed everything, 
 even life itself, to obtain the blessings which this religion 
 promised them. When we find the apostles laying down their 
 lives to attest the facts of which they had been ocular wit- 
 nesses; when we find innumerable Christians of the first cen- 
 tury shedding their blood for the faith which they had freely 
 embraced, we have reason to say with Pascal, "I can readily 
 
^32 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 believe the histories, that is, the historical facts which wit- 
 nesses attested with their lives." 
 
 Objections. — In order to weaken the force of the argument 
 derived from the testimony of the martyrs, it has been said: 
 1st. That the number of the martyrs was not as great as it is 
 claimed; 2d. That the motive of the persecutions was politi- 
 cal rather than religious ; 3d. That the victims suffered more 
 through fanaticism than conviction. 
 
 Reply to the First Objection. — 1st. The objection 
 relative to the number of the martyrs originated in the 
 seventeenth century with Dodwell, an English Protestant, 
 a grave historian too; Bayle and other unbelievers have 
 merely reproduced his arguments, prudently refraining, 
 however, from mentioning the refutations of Macknight and 
 Burnet, and particularly that of the learned Benedictine 
 Dom Ruinart. Moreover, Dodwell himself recognizes that 
 the number of the martyrs is great enough to afford a striking 
 proof of the divinity of Christianity. This simple acknowledg- 
 ment may suffice us, as it leaves our argument untouched. 
 
 2d. Let us observe, however, that all the arguments of 
 Dodwell are only negativej that is, drawn from the silence of 
 other authors, and consequently prove nothing against ours, 
 which are positive^ that is, supported by authentic testimony. 
 Let us indicate a few of our proofs. 
 
 a. Christian tradition has always represented the number 
 of the martyrs as very large. It is the unanimous opinion of 
 the ecclesiastical writers of the first five centuries; in their 
 histories, their homilies, their apologies, their various treat- 
 ises, they always suppose that the persecutions created 
 martyrs without number, b. Tacitus affirms that, under 
 Nero, an immense number of Christians perished. c. The 
 historian Eusebius (fourth century) tells us that under 
 Marcus Aurelius the hatred and rage of the people created 
 an almost infinite number of martyrs. Among the ten 
 books of the History written by Eusebius there is not one 
 which does not speak of the persecutions enkindled under 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 233 
 
 the various emperors. In his work entitled ''The Deaths of 
 the Persecutors/^ Lactantius, who hved during the persecu- 
 tions of Diocletian, Maximus, and Galerius, recalls six em- 
 perors whose tragic end seemed to be the effect of divine 
 vengeance. ''All the earth," says this same writer, "was 
 cruelly tormented; the East and West, with the exception of 
 the Gauls, were ravaged and devoured by three monsters. '^ 
 d. According to tradition, the number of martyrs under 
 Diocletian and Maximus amounted to two millions. This 
 persecution was so terrible that these emperors boasted of 
 having exterminated Christianity: Nomine Christianorum 
 deleto; superstitione Christi uhique deleta, ran the inscription 
 on their medals. Now, when they ascended the throne, 
 Christianity flourished throughout the empire, hence they 
 must have shed torrents of Christian blood, e. It is true 
 that from the year 64 to 313 the Church had frequently 
 years of reprieve, God not wishing, says Origen, the race of 
 Christians to be wholly destroyed; but we know also that in 
 the intervals between the great persecutions the edicts of the 
 emperors were never revoked; their execution depended upon 
 the will of the governors of the province, who were not by 
 any means always merciful. 
 
 What does the silence of writers who were not obliged to 
 speak of our martyrs prove against such arguments? 
 
 Reply to the Second Objection. — 1st. If there is any 
 foundation for this accusation, why is it that neither its authors 
 nor writers in the ranks of unbelievers, offer any serious argu- 
 ment in support of the statement? If it be true, pagan 
 authors of the period, the edicts of the emperors, the replies 
 of the apologists ought to furnish many clear and decisive 
 proofs. No doubt the heads of the empire, who were both 
 rulers and pontiffs, had reason to fear that a change of religion 
 would diminish their power; and history shows that the 
 persecutions were intended solely to prevent the introduc- 
 tion of a new religion, and not the alleged crimes of the Chris- 
 tians. "The Emperor Decius," says St. Cyprian, "would 
 
234 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 have been less alarmed at a competitor for his throne than 
 at a rival in his 'priesthood.''^ If the Christians were regarded 
 as enemies to the State, it was exclusively because of their 
 religion, and not because of offences against the govern- 
 ment. 
 
 2d. St. Justin, Athenagoras, Minutius Felix, St. Clement 
 of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, and St. Cyprian, in their 
 apologies addressed to the emperors, the magistrates, to all 
 the people, boldly affirm that no crime, no sedition, no viola- 
 tion of civil law or public order can be imputed to the Chris- 
 tians; they challenge their enemies to prove the contrary; 
 they reproach the pagans with their severity against the 
 innocent, with putting to death peaceful, law-abiding citizens, 
 enemies of tumult and sedition, who can be accused of no 
 crime but refusing to offer incense to false gods. Now 
 their statement was never denied, their challenge was never 
 accepted. 
 
 3d. In addition to this we have the declarations of pagan 
 writers themselves. Tacitus' only charge against the Chris- 
 tians is pernicious superstition: exitiahilis super stitio; 
 Suetonius relates that, in the Christians, Nero punished a 
 sect given over to a perverse and hurtful superstition: super- 
 stitionis pravae et maleficae. Thus the pagans taxed the 
 Christians with impiety toward the gods, which they re- 
 garded as the cause of the scourges and public calamities 
 which visited the empire. Celsus, Julian, Libianus, make 
 no other charge against them; Pliny also speaks only of their 
 perverse and excessive superstition: pravam et immodicarrij 
 he says in his famous letter to Trajan. He declares that he 
 does not know what they punish in the Christians; he is 
 even flattering in his commendation of them, and his praise 
 of their irreproachable conduct is confirmed in the em- 
 peror's reply to his letter. We do not speak of vague accusa- 
 tions formulated by one or two pagan authors, in which no 
 crime is mentioned, unless that of infanticide, which accusa- 
 tion we know was based upon a misapprehension of the 
 
DIVINITY OP THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 235 
 
 Eucharist; but never, despite the challenge of the apologists, 
 was it possible to verify the accusation with a single fact. 
 
 4th. The persecuting emperors themselves acknowledged 
 the innocence of the Christians, since the cause of religion was 
 the only motive they alleged in justification of their severe 
 edicts. Diocletian and Maximus, particularly, make no 
 other accusation against the Christians than that of having 
 renounced the worship of the gods. We know that Trajan, 
 in his answer to Pliny, desires that the Christians be punished, 
 but only those who shall be denoimced to the tribunals; 
 he forbids the others to be pursued or sought after: this is 
 a tacit declaration of their innocence. 
 
 5th. There is, moreover, a very simple means of getting 
 at the truth on this subject. We have only to read the au- 
 thentic ''Acts of the Martyrs." Neither in the questions 
 of the examiners nor in the sentence of the judges do we find 
 any trace of proven crime; when they are brought before 
 the tribimals, when they are condemned to death, it is because 
 they refuse to adore the gods, that is, because they are Chris- 
 tians. Finally, here is a proof which may dispense with all 
 the others: in all the persecutions, the accused, to be 
 pardoned, to be laden with honors and rewards, had only 
 to make one act of idolatry. "The Christians," says Origen, 
 "are the only culprits whom the magistrates will dismiss, 
 if they will abjure their religion, offer sacrifice, and take the 
 usual oaths." ^ 
 
 Reply to the Third Objection. — ^We have already 
 replied to it in the preceding remarks. It is truly lamentable 
 
 ^ P. Houze, after stating and examining the different causes alleged 
 to have produced the persecutions, concludes that "none of these 
 causes suffices to explain the persecution, and that the true, decisive, 
 and fundamental reason is that given in the forcible language of Bos- 
 suet : * All the senses, all the passions, all worldly interests fought for 
 idolatry. It is the eternal history of the struggle of evil against 
 good. Perverse man would slay, would annihilate all that restrains 
 his passions. Cain slew Abel; the Pharisees slew Christ; the wicked 
 of all ages would slay the Church which is the body of Christ.' " 
 
236 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 to find modern unbelief more unjust toward the heroes of 
 Christianity than their very persecutors. It does not hesi- 
 tate to tax with madness men whose intrepid constancy 
 wrested admiration from the pagans themselves. Fanaticism 
 is a favorite expression of unbelievers when they speak of 
 Catholics. It does not dispense them, however, from being 
 logical. In truth, simple common sense tells us clearly 
 enough that there can be no question here of fanaticism, 
 that is, of that conviction unsupported by proof, that blind 
 devotion inspired by passion, limited to time and place. 
 Contemplate this multitude of men and women, youths and 
 maidens, old men and children, as well as converted soldiers, 
 magistrates, philosophers, who, in numerous countries, and 
 for nearly three centuries, endured with the utmost calmness, 
 midst the jeers of the multitude, excruciating, frequently 
 prolonged torments: what indication of passion, of pride, of 
 ambition, of hatred, of vengeance do we find in them? ^ Who 
 can seriously believe that they sacrificed everything, life 
 itself, except for well-grounded convictions? Certainly it 
 was no present, palpable end for which they died, hence they 
 could look for the reward of their sacrifice only beyond the 
 tomb. But the hope of such a reward necessarily supposes 
 supernatural faith supported by the most convincing proofs. 
 
 VIII. Eighth Proof. 
 
 THE MARVELLOUS FRUITS OF CHRISTIANITY, OR THE WONDER- 
 FUL REVOLUTION WHICH IT EFFECTED IN THE WORLD. ^ 
 
 This proof founded upon the benefits which the world 
 reaped from Christianity requires much development. We 
 
 ^ On the contrast between Christian martyrs and pagan heroes see 
 A. Butler, Lives of the Saints, Dec. 12. 
 
 ^ Allies (Formation) ; Thebaud (Church and Moral World) ; Balmes' 
 ch. 14; Chateaubriand; Baluffi; Delacroix, Benefits of Religion; 
 Spalding, J. L., lect. 9; Lacordaire, Conf. 21-28, Effects of Cath. 
 Doctrine upon the Soul; Archbp. Hughes, vol. i.; A. C. Q. iv. 389, 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 237 
 
 shall reserve it for Chapter V. in the second part of our 
 work, where we shall speak of the civilization effected by the 
 Church, and where we shall show that the Catholic Church, 
 that is, true Christianity, has completely transformed the 
 family, the individual, civil society, international relations, 
 the Roman world, and the world of barbarism. Let us 
 confine ourselves for the moment to a few facts, which amply 
 suffice for our purpose. 
 
 1. State of the World before Christ. — Let us observe, 
 first, that it is almost impossible for us who five in the light 
 of the Gospel, in the bosom of a society reformed and purified 
 by so many centuries of the Church, to form an accurate 
 idea of the state of the pagan world before the coming of 
 Christ. The grossness of its customs is almost incredible in 
 the present age. 
 
 Everywhere, except among the Jewish people, uncertainty 
 and the grossest errors prevailed in regard to the truths most 
 important to man, and which form the basis of intellectual and 
 moral life. Only one nation adored the true God; in every 
 other part of the world men bowed in adoration before the 
 stars, plants, imclean animals, before gods of wood or stone 
 fashioned by their own hands. The world was one vast 
 temple of idols, and, according to the forcible expression of 
 Bossuet, everything was worshipped as God except God 
 Himself. And let us not imagine that the most pohshed and 
 learned nations were less degraded than the imcivilized 
 world. Persia adored the sun; Egypt its ox. Apis; Ephesus 
 had its great Diana, Delos its Apollo, and Rome, even in its 
 golden age of Hterature and art, raised to earthly gods, to 
 the most cruel as well as the most infamous, the famous 
 temple (Pantheon: to all gods) which still stands and wit- 
 nesses with its cross-crowned summit to the victory of Christ 
 over the idols of the world. 
 
 We know that public and private morals were in keeping 
 
 ix. 358, X. 478, 696, xiii. 405; D. R. New Ser. viii. 456, III. Ser. i. 26; 
 C. W. V. 363. Cf. also references below, F. II., ch. 5. 
 
238 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 with such a worship. Man, forgetful of his origin and his 
 sublime destiny, lowered himself to the level of the brute, or, 
 in the delirium of his pride, raised himself to the rank of the 
 gods. Morality having no basis, men lived shameless lives 
 in imitation of the gods themselves. Every passion had its 
 altar. Human dignity, justice, modesty, the most sacred 
 laws were everywhere despised and trodden under foot. 
 Oppression and tyranny ruled in high places, enslaving and 
 degrading the people. 
 
 Let us quote a page from Mgr. Gaume, who sums up the 
 painful picture everywhere presented by pagan society 
 (Histoire de la famille) : 
 
 ''The bonds of religious society which unite man to God 
 had been broken. Separated from God, man and woman 
 had lost the appreciation of their natural dignity, and had 
 fallen under the despotic empire of sensuahty. They had 
 made themselves, after the image of the gods created by 
 their passions, cruel and voluptuous. From their brow had 
 fallen the crown of glory which the hand of the Creator had 
 placed there ; bhnded by the mist of passions, they had seated 
 themselves in the dust; forgetting what they were, what 
 they should be, they ceased to appreciate their true worth. 
 Hence arose in pagan antiquity man's universal contempt 
 for his fellow being and for himself. 
 
 "Contempt for humanity prevailed everywhere: for the 
 infant, who was pitilessly strangled, exposed to death, 
 immolated; for the prisoner, who was reduced to slavery, 
 forced to die on the tomb of his conqueror or in the amphi- 
 theatre; for the poor, who were driven forth like unclean 
 animals; for the slave, who was laden with chains, over- 
 whelmed with painful labors, thrown as food to the lions 
 and to the tigers, or killed at the caprice of his master; 
 for woman, who was bought, rejected, sold, and dishonored 
 in every way. 
 
 "Man's contem,pt for himself was shown by his abuse 
 of his intelhgence, which he fed with the most shameful, 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 239 
 
 the grossest, the most cruel errors, or with vain knowledge, 
 sterile as regarded his true good; of his heart, which he de- 
 graded by the most brutal, the most humihating affections; 
 of his senses, which he prostituted without pity, making 
 them minister to every form of iniquity ; of his life, which he 
 did not hesitate to end by the sword or poison, or to sell to 
 whomsoever would possess it, whether to abuse or destroy it. 
 
 "As to society, it had become, like its members, filled 
 with crime and misery, the strong ever preying on the weak. 
 The State everything, the individual nothing; the citizen, so 
 far from being really free, existed only for the mighty god, 
 the State, whose commands were to be held as just and 
 wise, even though they were the expression of the most 
 flagrant injustice and odious tyranny." 
 
 Such was the state of degradation and corruption in which 
 the world was plunged before the coming of Christ. And 
 observe well, the legislators, the poets, the orators, the 
 philosophers never dreamed of doing aught to lift it from 
 the gulf into which it was sinking deeper and deeper. Not 
 unfrequently they were the first to give the example of 
 every vice. Men were so accustomed to the cruel and de- 
 praved morality of the age that neither philosophy nor 
 history uttered a protest against these unparalleled dis- 
 orders, a tenth part of which would revolt any Christian of 
 the present day. 
 
 A few philosophers, aided by the light of natural reason, 
 had given utterance to true and elevating conceptions of 
 God, the soul, the true, the good; but their doctrine contained 
 also gross errors upon the essence of the divine nature and 
 the destiny of the human soul. At the same time there 
 existed, even in the best minds, cold and enervating doubt 
 of the most fundamental notions, which necessarily stifled any 
 spirit of propagandism. What could be expected, for ex- 
 ample, from a thinker Hke Cicero, who, after arguing at some 
 length, in his Tusculanae Disputationes upon the proofs of 
 the immortality of the soul, lets his pen fall with this dis- 
 
240 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS 
 
 heartening avowal: ^'How is this accomphshed? I know 
 not; but when I read these arguments I am convinced; then 
 when I lay down the book and set myself to reflect, all my 
 conviction vanishes.'' 
 
 At all events, the doctrine of the philosophers, the ex- 
 clusive possession of a few sages, never reached the masses. 
 While Epicurism hastened the progress of moral corruption, 
 Stoicism, notwithstanding its relative merit, did nothing to 
 arrest it. ''Devoid of that proselyting spirit which makes 
 apostles and martyrs, it was incapable of descending to the 
 masses, to revive among them the expiring flame of virtue. 
 Moreover, in preaching the apathy of the sage, and in re- 
 ducing life to a sad and silent contemplation of events, it 
 destroyed man's interest in the duties of social life and 
 enveloped him in an egotism filled with pride. It produced 
 a few solitary and sterile virtues ; it could do nothing for the 
 happiness of humanity, and despotism made the most of 
 this philosophy of despair which abandoned the world to its 
 power. " 
 
 2. The World after the Coming of Christ. — No one 
 can ignore the marvellous change which was wrought in the 
 world after the cross had been planted on the summit of 
 Calvary. Let us be content to sum up in a few words the 
 principal benefits we owe to Him who proclaimed Himself, 
 with justice, ''the Way, the Truth, and the Life." 
 
 1st. By means of the new religion which was brought to 
 the world not only the Romans and the Greeks, but even 
 the most barbarous nations, received the light of the Gospel; 
 the grossest classes, those whom ancient philosophy judged 
 unfit for instruction, were enlightened by the torch of 
 truth, and the people acquired, concerning a large number 
 of essential truths, a certainty which the most celebrated 
 philosophers never possessed. These capital truths, which 
 are the solid foundation of all morality, of all virtue, of 
 society itself, were spread throughout the world, and became, 
 so to speak, an integral part of modern society, so that it is 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHKISTIAN RELIGION. 241 
 
 difficult to imagine how it ever existed without them. This, 
 moreover, is one of the characters by which Christ wished 
 us to recognize the divinity of His mission: " the poor have 
 the gospel preached to them " (Matth. xi. 5). 
 
 2d. Truth begets virtue. In substituting the worship and 
 adoration of the true God in spirit and in truth for the intel- 
 lectual darkness and secular errors which prevailed in the old 
 world, Christianity gave birth to the virtues which sanctify 
 and honor humanity. We have seen them developed in 
 every age, every clime, and even in the most depraved sur- 
 roundings; there is no age, no condition, no class of society 
 which, under the all-powerful breath of grace, has not pro- 
 duced marvels of moral greatness and superhuman sanctity. 
 3d. The influence of Christianity was not confined to the 
 individual sanctification of its members ; it purified, moralized 
 the pubhc conscience itself. The heart of the pagan world 
 was vowed to the worship of brute force, and closed by a hard 
 and pitiless egotism to every good and noble sentiment, yet 
 under the softening influence of Christianity it not only ac- 
 quired respect for law and justice, but the gentle virtues of 
 mercy and charity ; the poor, the weak, the suffering, formerly 
 objects of contempt, were respected and cared for. There 
 arose for the solace of every kind of human misery noble 
 institutions, supported by the most subHme devotion. 
 
 4th. At the same time, and as it were necessarily, the 
 rehgion of Christ replaced the pagan legislation, marked by 
 despotism and nameless iniquities, with a new legislation, 
 wholly impregnated with the spirit of its Founder.^ By its 
 principle of the divine origin of authority it restored the 
 personal nobility of man. Without anarchy it rescued 
 man from the despotic and brutahzing yoke of man, to 
 subject him to Him from whom all power comes. Thus 
 it healed the bleeding and humanly incurable woimds of 
 paganism: slavery, the despotism of the father and husband, 
 
 » C. W. xiii. 342. 
 
242 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the tyranny of the State, which absorbed the individual, the 
 barbarity of international relations. 
 
 Remarks. — To these incontestable facts let us add a few 
 remarks which will make their bearing still more obvious : 
 
 a. This marvellous transformation, impossible by merely 
 natural causes, was accompHshed in all places where Chris- 
 tianity could be estabUshed. Nations, whether pagan or 
 barbarous, savage or polished, old or young, all felt the 
 salutary influence of the evangelical doctrine and of the 
 heavenly grace which accompanies it. 
 
 b. Wherever Christianity did not reach, the same state 
 of ancient superstition, of gross idolatry, of profound im- 
 morality, continued unmodified. Outside of nations where 
 the cross of Christ is adored we do not find a single people 
 distinguished by its civilization, its laws, its institutions, its 
 customs, by a wisely regulated Hberty, by the culture of the 
 arts, the sciences, and letters — ^in a word, by its moral and 
 intellectual worth. 
 
 c. Regions regenerated by Christianity, for example in 
 Africa and Asia, have fallen back into their primitive degra- 
 dation when they closed their eyes to the fight, and for 
 centuries have remained stationary in the darkness to which 
 they voluntarily returned. How great was the former 
 renown of the churches where echoed the voice of Athanasius, 
 of Cyril, of Chrysostom, of Cyprian, of Augustine! Do we 
 not find, moreover, in the very bosom of nations enfightened 
 by revelation that minds fall back into the errors of paganism 
 as soon as they reject the teachings of Christianity? 
 
 Conclusion. — Such are the certain facts; here are the 
 necessary consequences. A refigion which has effected mar- 
 vels so completely beyond human power cannot be the 
 work of man; it must come from God.* Divine fruits reveal 
 a divine tree, a divine principle. ''If we knew nothing of 
 Christianity," says August Nicolas, "neither its doctrine nor 
 its history, if the tree and its roots were completely con- 
 
 * Picard, p. II., ch. 1. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 243 
 
 cealed, and only the fruits apparent to us, we should have 
 been obliged to acknowledge that these fruits are not those 
 which the earth bears, that they are nourished by a super- 
 natural source." 
 
 IX. Ninth Proof. 
 
 THE DOCTRINAL TEACHING OF CHRIST. 
 
 Observation. — All the proofs heretofore stated suffice of 
 themselves to estabhsh the divinity of Christianity, for the 
 reason that they are supported by incontestable miracles, 
 and consequently by the irrefutable testimony of God. 
 
 It is otherwise with the two proofs which we are about to 
 state. The great virtue of an apostle and the elevation and 
 purity of his teaching, considered by themselves, do not 
 constitute a completely convincing proof of a (fivine mission. 
 In truth, hypocrisy and fraud may assume the appearance 
 of true sanctity. Any doctrine whatever, to be accepted 
 by mankind, must be supported by divine works; these 
 works were the more necessary here that the teacher not only 
 proclaimed Himself God's ambassador, but claimed divine 
 honors. Thus Jesus Himself announced this to be necessary 
 when He said: ''If I had not done among them the works 
 that no other man hath done, they would not have sin " 
 (John XV. 24). 
 
 At the same time we cannot pass over in silence arguments 
 which, considered in themselves, are very conclusive. If 
 they do not constitute a complete demonstration, they are 
 none the less a distinctive mark of divine revelation. More- 
 over, by the very fact that they are supported by the pre- 
 ceding proofs they become in their turn incontestable. 
 Furthermore, being very clear and easily apprehended they 
 make a deep and legitimate impression on the majority of 
 minds and prepare them to hear favorably and to study 
 attentively more solid, but perhaps less attractive, reasons. 
 
 Here is the reason upon which the ninth proof is based: 
 
244 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 It is manifestly evident that the doctrine of Christ in dogma, 
 in moral teaching, and in worship, is of superhurnan perfec- 
 tion. This is still more apparent when we consider the 
 circumstances under which it was announced to the world. 
 The doctrine therefore comes from God, and consequently 
 Jesus is God's ambassador. 
 
 The doctrine of Our Saviour is almost wholly contained in 
 the gospels. A large part of the teaching given His disciples, 
 either during His life or after His Resurrection, was con- 
 signed to the other books of the New Testament or books of 
 tradition. We cannot do more than sketch here the principal 
 points of this doctrine ; the development of it belongs to that 
 part of theology called Special Dogma and Moral Theology. 
 
 THE DOGMATIC TEACHING OF CHRIST. 
 
 A Doctrine of Jesus concerning God. — God is a Being 
 by Himself, without beginning or end, existing from all eter- 
 nity through the necessity of His nature, and possessing 
 all perfections in an infinite degree ; by His almighty power 
 to which nothing is impossible. He has created out of 
 nothing all that exists, and thus He is the principle, the 
 centre, and the end of all things; by His immensity He 
 is completely present in every place, yet cannot be con- 
 tained in space; He is in us and we are in Him; in Him 
 and through Him we live and move and have our 
 being; nothing can escape His omniscience: the past, the 
 present, the future, the beings purely possible, the future 
 determinations of beings endowed with free will, all are 
 present to the divine thought in an eternal and immutable 
 present. By His providence, as full of wisdom as of love, 
 He watches over all beings, causing them to serve His glory 
 and leading them to the end He has assigned them, unless 
 they voluntarily place an obstacle to His designs. Nothing 
 happens in this world without His order or permission. 
 Not a hair falls from our head without the consent of our 
 heavenly Father. His sanctity regards the smallest iniquity 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHKISTIAN RELIGION. 245 
 
 with the greatest horror. His justice punishes and re- 
 wards each one according to his merit: He does not 
 permit a glass of water given in His name to go unre- 
 warded. 
 
 What is particularly remarkable here in the teaching of 
 Jesus is the manner in which He dwells upon the mercy and 
 goodness of God. These divine attributes, of which the 
 pagans had not the sHghtest knowledge, were not, it is true, 
 imknown to the Jews. To them, however, God was par- 
 ticularly the sovereign Master, the all-powerful Lord, to be 
 adored and feared; but to the disciples of Jesus He is, above 
 all. Goodness by essence, "God is charity" (1 John iv. 8); He 
 is a tender, compassionate Father, who asks our love, who 
 knows the weakness of His children and has pity on their 
 misery. By His grace, which He has promised never to refuse 
 to their prayers, and by the sacraments which He has in- 
 stituted in His Church and which are admirably adapted to 
 their needs, He never ceases to strengthen them, and, if 
 they fall, to help them to rise again, and to renew their 
 strength in the path of heaven. God is the Good Shepherd 
 who goes in search of the lost sheep; and when He finds it, 
 tenderly bears it upon His shoulders, sparing it the fatigue 
 of the way. Again, He is the Father of the prodigal son, 
 whom He receives after long years of weary waiting, with 
 unheard-of tenderness, for "there shall be joy in heaven 
 upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon ninety- 
 nine just who need not penance" (Luke xv. 7). ^ 
 
 * We cannot resist the desire to make a remark here; it is somewhat 
 long, perhaps, but we regard it as very important. The thought of 
 this love of God for man, a thought which is the sweetest joy to the 
 heart and the greatest consolation in the trials of life, is of great 
 importance in determining our faith in the mysteries of revelation; 
 for the supreme reason of these mysteries is that which Christ Him- 
 self has given us: "God so loved the world as to give His only- 
 begotten Son" (John iii. 16). To believe in such a love is to 
 believe in Christianity, which is its result, or rather which is this 
 love itself. Thus the beloved disciple presents us no other motive 
 
246 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 To the dogma of the unity of God so clearly taught in the 
 Old Testament, and verified, moreover, by simple reason, 
 Jesus adds others of which the Jews themselves had only a 
 confused and incomplete knowledge. He it was who revealed 
 in an explicit manner the ineffable dogmas of the Holy Trinity, 
 of the Incarnation of the Word, of the Redemption of the 
 world. 
 
 Adam had sinned and infinite justice claimed a satisfaction 
 worthy of God's offended majesty. This satisfaction was 
 
 of faith: "We have known and have believed the charity which 
 God hath to us; God is charity" (1 John iv. 16); for in order to 
 believe we must will to believe.* The will is a necessary part in an 
 act of faith, which is an act of virtue, consequently a free act. The 
 motives of belief which we are stating at present do not, despite 
 their direct and convincing character, render doubt impossible; 
 they make it only unreasonable. Now that which most powerfully 
 determines the will is love excited by love. It was the consideration 
 of the love of God for His creature which decided the conversion of 
 the great and beautiful soul worthy to be praised by Bossuet. The 
 Palatine princess to whom he refers in his funeral oration of Anne 
 de Gonzague was so wholly without faith that to convince her of the 
 truth of Christianity would be, as she declared, the greatest of mira- 
 cles. Yet this miracle took place. How did faith enter a soul so 
 firmly closed against it? "When it pleased God," she says, "to put 
 in my heart the thought that His love is the cause of all we believe, 
 it convinced me more than all the books I had read. One can, in 
 fact, readily believe that a God who loves infinitely gives proofs 
 proportioned to the infinity of His love and proportioned to the 
 infinity of His power, which far exceeds the capacity of our weak 
 reason." This explains the Incarnation, the Redemption, and the 
 cross of Our Saviour; it explains the sacraments, and particularly the 
 adorable Eucharist, where Christ, great as He is, carries His love 
 for us so far as to become the Companion of our exile, our Food, and 
 our Victim (John xiii. 1; Gal. ii. 20). This explains the touching in- 
 troduction of the prayer which Our Saviour taught His apostles: 
 "Our Father, who art in heaven." The Lord's Prayer, properly 
 understood, suffices of itself to show the superiority of Christianity 
 over all religions of human origin. 
 
 Let us add a remark which will make what we have said still better 
 
 * Ward, W., The Wish to Believe. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 247 
 
 given, but where ''sin abounded grace did more abound." 
 God created all things by His Word ; and by this same Word 
 He restored all things. God imprinted His Ukeness in man 
 at the moment of his creation. He went so far as to assume 
 our likeness to raise us more efficaciously from our degrada- 
 tion. Thus God not only did not abandon humanity after 
 the fall of the first man, but He drew good from evil, and by 
 a miracle of love, greater than that of the creation, and than 
 that of our elevation to the supernatural order. He con- 
 tracted with humanity an ineffable imion, the highest and 
 most intimate union possible. The Second Person of the 
 Holy Trinity, the Son, in all things equal to the Father and 
 
 understood. Faith consists in cleaving to God and to His word; 
 it is a joyful and trustful abandonment of our judgment to the divine 
 intelligence. Convinced of the infallible wisdom of God, imbued, 
 above all, with His ineffable tenderness for us, we have no desire to 
 analyze the motives of our faith. We are like a child who relies 
 with absolute confidence on the words of his father, not only because 
 his father possesses knowledge which he is without, but because he 
 knows that his father loves him and finds his happiness in teaching 
 him the truth. The devils have unalterable faith; they believe 
 revealed truths with absolute certainty, but their faith is a cold, 
 rational deduction. Very different is the faith of the children of 
 God. It is not the result of cold, metaphysical infallibility; it is, if it 
 may be so expressed, a loving and beloved infallibility to which they 
 cleave. They know that if, by any possibility, God could be de- 
 ceived. He would not deceive His children, because they are His 
 children and He is their Father, and He wishes to give them Truth 
 as the first of all blessings, and the foundation of all others. The 
 knowledge of this disposition on the part of God excites confidence 
 in the faithful, and confidence begets faith, a loving allegiance of the 
 children of God to the word of their Father, who speaks to them in 
 love in order to put them in possession of the truth. What we 
 have just said serves also to explain why sincere study is not sufficient 
 to lead heretics or unbelievers to the faith; prayer must be added to 
 study, because, in addition to supernatural light, it obtains the grace 
 which makes them love truth and its Author, and cleave joyfully to 
 the word of Our Father in heaven.* 
 
 * Ward, 1. c; Manning, Internal Mission of H. Gh., ch. 3; Newman, Discourses to 
 Mixed Congr., 9. 10. 
 
248 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the Holy Spirit, was united hypostatically, that is, in unity 
 of person, to a human nature Hke our own in all respects 
 save sin. Through His human nature Jesus could suffer and 
 die; through His divine nature He imparted infinite value 
 to His expiatory sufferings. Thus there was offered to the 
 offended majesty of God a reparation worthy of His supreme 
 greatness. Thus justice and mercy were reconciled. 
 
 B. Doctrine of Jesus Christ concerning Man. — This 
 doctrine is neither less admirable nor less touching than 
 that concerning God. Created to the image of the Most 
 High, and adorned at once with sanctifying grace which 
 imparts to him supernatural life and a sort of participation 
 in the life of God Himself, man's sublime mission was to 
 know, to love, and to serve in this world his Creator and 
 Father. In fulfilling this duty so necessary, so glorious for 
 man, so perfectly conformable to reason, he was sure of 
 attaining his supreme destiny, that of enjojdng in heaven 
 the full possession of God, of sharing his infinite happiness 
 for all eternity. 
 
 God^s will was that this original justice, this sanctifying 
 grace which made the first man most pleasing to Him, should 
 pass to his posterity; but Adam could transmit it only on 
 condition of preserving it himself by his fidelity to his Creator. 
 On the other hand, the inheritance of heaven being assigned 
 him as a glorious reward of his free obedience, it was need- 
 ful that this obedience be put to the test. God therefore 
 addressed a prohibition to Adam with a formal command to 
 respect it. The observance of this command, which, more- 
 over, was light, was to be an acknowledgment of God's 
 sovereign dominion, an authentic proof of the creature ^s free 
 submission to his Creator, of the child to his father. Our 
 first parents disobeyed, and in punishment of this voluntary 
 abuse of their liberty they were deprived of the grace which 
 constituted the supernatural fife of their souls and rendered 
 them pleasing to God. 
 
 Adam, in losing through his own fault the state of justice 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 249 
 
 and original innocence, found it impossible to communicate 
 it to his posterity, who, by the free disposition of God, had 
 been made dependent on the head of humanity for super- 
 natural as well as natural life. Thus a father ruined by 
 play, or outlawed by an act of treason, cannot transmit his 
 title and fortune to his children. And as, according to the 
 beneficent will of God, each man was to be born with the 
 dignity of son by adoption, adorned with sanctifying 
 grace, the privation of these special relations of friendship 
 is a veritable forfeiture which, resulting from a culpable 
 act, makes unregenerated man an object of aversion to 
 God.i 
 
 This prevarication of our first parents has been the cause 
 of all the evils from which humanity suffers. It explains the 
 mystery of sorrow and of death, which has been and always 
 will be the despair of the philosophy which rejects faith. ^ 
 The loss of sanctifying grace entails the loss of other super- 
 natural gifts, as well as of preternatural or extranatural 
 prerogatives which God had generously attached to this 
 grace. These magnificent privileges, which are not required 
 by our nature, but which constitute its integrity, were, 
 especially, immortality, exemption from suffering, infused 
 knowledge, and the subjection of the body to the soul, of the 
 
 * According to the teaching of theology that which is transmitted 
 to us by generation is evidently not the personal or actual sin of 
 Adam, that is, the act by which he transgressed the precept of the 
 Lord ; but it is the state resulting from the severance of the relations 
 of supernatural friendship for which God had gratuitously predestined 
 Adam and, through him, all his posterity. This privation of the 
 sanctifying grace which was to make us the children of God being 
 the consequence, not of personal sin, but of the infidelity of the head 
 of the human race, those who die in original sin only will not, it is 
 true, enjoy the beatific vision, but they will be in no way subject to 
 the pains of sense. This is the opinion of St. Thomas, St. Bonaven- 
 ture, Innocent III., and many other theologians. See also below, 
 P. II., ch. 4, art. 1, iv. 
 
 2 On the Existence of Evil see Boedder, Nat. Th., B. III., ch. 2; 
 Hunter, II., n. 388 ff.; I. E. R. Oct.-Nov. '99. 
 
250 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 appetites to reason. Sin entailed the loss of these advan- 
 tages. Man found himself thenceforth condemned to know 
 death, to be subject to ignorance, to infirmity, to disease, and 
 to miseries of all kinds. The harmony which existed in the 
 beginning between the superior and inferior faculties gave 
 place to a warfare which every one feels within his breast; 
 man, having criminally withdrawn from the obedience which 
 he owed to God, beheld, by a just return, his passions rebel 
 against reason, the flesh unceasingly revolt against the spirit 
 instead of following its light ; thus virtue, which was formerly 
 sweet and easy, became for us an object of noble but laborious 
 strife. We see that the evils with which we are overwhelmed 
 are not the work of God, but the work of man, who did not 
 preserve the prerogatives with which he was endowed. 
 
 But human nature has not been deprived of anything 
 essential to it ; this is the teaching of the Church in contradic- 
 tion to Protestants and Jansenists. Let us further bear in 
 mind that God could, without injury to His justice or His 
 goodness, have created man as he is to-day, for his state meets 
 all the needs of his nature, his condition and character as a 
 reasonable being. 
 
 Appeased by the blood of His Son, God, as we have said, 
 gave man the right to recover the sanctifying grace which 
 permits him to call God his Father, and gives him a claim 
 to the inheritance of heaven. This grace, the principle of 
 supernatural life, is offered to man not only in its original 
 fulness, but in greatest abundance (John x. 10). At the 
 same time man preserves the power of refusing this signal 
 benefit, for he preserves free-will, a condition of merit. If he 
 is guilty of this insensate and criminal ingratitude, if he 
 obstinately repels the advances of divine mercy which 
 unceasingly invite him to repentance and offer him pardon, 
 he can attribute his eternal loss only to himself. If he 
 accepts with gratitude this gift, bought at an infinite price, 
 it is through the grace of God that he will merit the prom- 
 ised reward, participation in the infinite happiness of the 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 251 
 
 divinity itself. ''By the grace of God I am what I am'^ 
 (1 Cor. XV. 10). 
 
 C. Doctrine of Jesus Christ concerning the World. — 
 In creating out of nothing the universe which surrounds us, 
 God, the infinitely Wise, the only Being existing from all 
 eternity, must necessarily have had in view an end worthy of 
 Himself, His own glory. Now glory is an honorable name, 
 accompanied with praise. The material world is evidently 
 incapable of itself of glorifying God. It is for man, a 
 reasonable creature, to procure Him this glory by con- 
 templating and praising the power, the wisdom, the good- 
 ness, in a word, all the divine perfections which shine 
 forth in the entire creation. Again, this praise would, like 
 man himself, be Hmited if the Son of God had not 
 carried His love so far as to clothe Himself with our 
 nature and dwell among us (John i.). Through Jesus 
 Christ the Divinity received from man perfect homage 
 truly worthy of God. Thus through the intermediary of 
 man, who is, as it were, an abridgment of the world, material 
 beings glorify their divine Author, and through the organ of 
 the incarnate Word this glory is truly infinite : one act of 
 adoration of the Word made flesh glorifies the Creator much 
 more than could milhons of worlds peopled by the most 
 subhme creatures. Man, in return for the praise which he 
 renders God, will receive a hundredfold of happiness, for the 
 glory of God is intimately connected with the happiness of 
 His privileged creature. AU that is contained in created 
 nature, the triple reign of the mineral, vegetable, and animal 
 kingdoms, is designed by Providence as a means of helping us 
 to accomplish our present mission and to attain our eternal 
 destiny. It is the same with the events of each day, whether 
 propitious or unpropitious, public or private, ordained or 
 permitted by God. All miseries, whether physical or moral, 
 the consequence of sin, have ceased, in virtue of the Re- 
 demption, to be sterile or without hope; they remain a 
 chastisement, but it depends only on man to make them a 
 
252 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 means of expiation, a source of merit, a claim to the con- 
 quest of the most brilhant crown, of a high place in heaven. 
 '' To them that love God, all things work together unto 
 good'' (Rom. viii. 28). '^The sufferings of this life are not 
 worthy to be compared with the glory to come " (lb. 18). 
 
 THE MORAL TEACHING OF CHRIST. 
 
 It is impossible to imagine anjrthing more perfect than 
 the moral law imposed by Christ. Even the most impious 
 are forced to acknowledge this. After Strauss, who unhesi- 
 tatingly affirms that 'Hhe moral teaching of Christ is the 
 foundation of human civilization," and that 'Hhe Jesus of 
 history is a type of moral perfection," Renan declares that 
 'Hhe teaching of Jesus is the most beautiful moral teach- 
 ing which humanity has received. ..." ''Each one of us,", 
 he further says, ''owes to it all that is best in him. . . . The 
 Sermon on the Mount will never be surpassed." At the same 
 time that this law traces, with marvellous clearness, all the 
 obhgations of man toward God, toward himself, toward the 
 family, and toward society, it proscribes not only every crime 
 and every fault, but even the desire and the voluntary thought 
 of evil. Not content with confirming the practice of all that 
 is commanded by the natural law, it invites us to the practice 
 of the highest and most perfect virtues, of the evangelical 
 counsels of chastity, poverty, and voluntary obedience, sub- 
 lime virtues unknown to the world, of which the name alone 
 must fill it with amazement. 
 
 The ideal, the model of the pe-rfection which Christ pro- 
 poses to each one of us is no other than the perfection of 
 God Himself: "Be you therefore perfect, as also your heav- 
 enly Father is perfect" (Matth. v. 48). 
 
 To help us to imitate this perfection the Son of God 
 appeared to us under a human form, thus offering us a divine 
 model in Himself. Hence we have only to reproduce in our 
 souls the virtues which Christ has taught us by example 
 and by precept: "For I have given you an example, that 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 253 
 
 as I have done to you, so you do also" (John xiii. 15). 
 Every Christian, according to the forcible expression of Ter- 
 tulHan, must be another Christ: Christianus alter Christus; 
 he must be able to say with St. Paul: ^'I live, now not I, but 
 Christ liveth in me." 
 
 To us who are Christians, brothers of Christ, God is in a 
 special manner a Father full of love, of goodness, and of 
 mercy; hence it is not astonishing that He requires His 
 children to be specially distinguished by the practice of 
 these virtues. ^^Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy 
 whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole 
 mind; this is the greatest and the first commandment. And 
 the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbor as 
 thyself. On these two commandments dependeth the law 
 and the prophets. " (Matth. xxii. 37-41.) In declaring to 
 us that He came to enkindle the fire of His love, and that 
 there is nothing that He desires so much as to see hearts 
 more and more inflamed with this divine fire, Jesus refers 
 constantly, and in the most persuasive terms, to the neces- 
 sity of this compassionate charity for our neighbor, that is, 
 for all men without exception; for before God, as St. Paul 
 tells us, there is neither bond nor free; there is neither male 
 nor female: all are one in Christ Jesus. This, He tells us, is 
 His favorite commandment, the mark by which we shall 
 recognize His disciples, as well as an infalHble means of 
 pleasing Him and of acquiring innumerable merits: ''All 
 that you do to the least of these My brethren I shall regard 
 as done to Myself." 
 
 Jesus knows that many of these lessons are difficult to our 
 fallen nature. Far from concealing this. He declares openly 
 that the kingdom of heaven suffers violence, and that he 
 who would follow Him must renounce himseK and daily 
 carry his cross. But at the same time, to stimulate our 
 courage. He assures us that His yoke is sweet and His burden 
 light to those who bear it generously; that the observance of 
 the commandments here below is the only true and sohd good, 
 
254 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the only means of procuring peace of soul (Matth. xi. 29) ; 
 and He unceasingly holds before us the eternal and infinite 
 rewards which God has prepared for those who love Him. And 
 as the fear of punishment is needful to keep us from the abyss 
 whither our passions constantly lead us, Jesus, who desires 
 to save us at any price, speaks fourteen times in appalhng 
 terms of an eternal hell, and He places before us this un- 
 answerable argument: ''What shall it profit a man, if he 
 gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul?" 
 Finally, to these motives, which of themselves so powerfully 
 persuade us to persevere in the path of virtue and happiness, 
 Jesus adds another, purer, and more worthy of great souls: 
 the love of God, which enkindles and ennobles all virtues. 
 
 Moreover, in this painful warfare against the world, the 
 flesh, and the devil we are not alone and dependent upon 
 our own strength. He who unceasingly watches over each 
 one of His children has prepared for them supernatural, 
 most efficacious, and superabundant means by which they 
 may be ever victorious over their enemies ; the very power of 
 God has been placed at the disposition of their weakness. 
 Among the means of obtaining divine grace, prayer and the 
 sacraments hold the first place. Prayer, a means as honor- 
 able as it is easy, not only places us, as often as we will, in 
 intimate communication with " Our Father, who is in heaven," 
 but is, as Our Lord has promised, infalliUy efficacious.^ As 
 to the sacraments, which are adapted to all conditions and 
 all circumstances of life, they confer grace of themselves upon 
 souls in whom they meet no obstacle. This is particularly 
 true of the Sacrament of Penance, which, by means of sincere 
 repentance and a humble confession made under the seal of 
 the most inviolable secrecy, remits all sins whatever their 
 number and enormity.^ It is still more true of the adorable 
 Eucharist, marvellous invention of the love of Him who, 
 
 ^Ward (Theism), II.; A. C. Q. viii. 577, xi. 491; C. W. xii. 816. 
 
 ^ De Goesbriand, History of Confession; Melia, Auricular Con- 
 fession; Wiseman, Lectures on the Doctrines of the Church; Hunter, 
 TIL, tr. 19; D. R. New. Ser. xxxi. 122, 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 255 
 
 unwilling to leave us orphans, found means of returning to 
 His Father without ceasing to dwell among us. Under the 
 species or appearances of bread and wine, Jesus Himself 
 dwells in all tabernacles as truly as He was present in the 
 manger and on the cross. In this humble abode He urges 
 us to come to Him for strength and consolation; He un- 
 ceasingly renews, in an unbloody manner, the sacrifice of 
 Calvary, perpetually offering Himself as victim to His 
 Father for the sins of the world; finally, by an admirable 
 extension of His Incarnation, He deigns to unite Himself 
 in the most real and intimate maimer to all who receive 
 Him in holy communion, clothing them with His divine 
 strength, and imparting even to their bodies the germ of a 
 happy immortality.^ 
 
 He, therefore, who fails to realize the end of his creation 
 and of his elevation to the supernatural order can attribute 
 his loss only to himself. He is like a poor man who volun- 
 tarily dies in want and misery with an inexhaustible treasure 
 at hand completely at his disposition. 
 
 THE TEACJHING OF CHRIST CONCERNING WORSHIP. 
 
 Christ's doctrine of worship is in perfect harmony with His 
 teaching concerning God and man.^ God being spirit wills 
 to be adored in spirit and in truth; man being also spirit, 
 as regards his soul, owes God a spiritual homage, that is, 
 the homage of his intelligence and his will: this worship, 
 then, must, above all things, be interior. But as man is also 
 matter, and his body no less than his soul is God's, creature, 
 he must add to the interior homage of his will the exterior 
 worship of his body. Finally, being a social being and in- 
 debted to God for all the advantages he derives from inter- 
 course with his fellow beings, he is boimd to honor God not 
 only as an individual, but as a social being; hence he owes 
 
 ^ Humphrey, Sacrifice and Sacraments; Hunter, 1. c, tr. 18. 
 2 On Catholic Worship see references below, P. II.; eh. 2, 
 art. 2, II. 
 
256 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 God a public worship. This triple homage, freed from all 
 the cruel, superstitious practices of pagan worsliip, as well as 
 the minute, local details of the worship prescribed to the 
 Jews by Moses for a special end, is the most sublime, the 
 purest, the most worthy of God, as well as the most fitting 
 for man.^ 
 
 General Remarks. — The following considerations will 
 manifest still more clearly the marvellous character of 
 Christ's teaching concerning God, the world, man, morality, 
 and worship. 
 
 1. We have seen that the greatest unbelievers themselves 
 are forced to recognize the intrinsic perfection of Christ's 
 moral teaching and its incomparable superiority to all the 
 philosophic or religious teaching which the world has ever 
 received. Minds never cease to be impressed with its fulness, 
 its purity, its subHmity, and its efficacy. See in Part II., 
 ch. 5, art. 3., Jouffroy's opinion of the Catechism, which is only 
 an abridgment of the evangelical truths. Read also on p. 150 
 what we have quoted from Rousseau and where he speaks in 
 truly admirable terms of the Gospel. A fragment from this 
 same author has recently been found, in which his admira- 
 tion is still more expHcitly expressed ; all it lacks is a sincere 
 acknowledgment of Christ's divinity. Similar tributes or 
 acknowledgments have come from Strauss, Renan, and 
 others. 
 
 2. At the time when Our Saviour appeared polytheism 
 was almost universal ; the grossest errors, the most ridiculous 
 or the most cruel superstitions prevailed everywhere; the 
 grand ideas of one eternal God, of a spiritual soul endowed 
 with immortality, of a fatherly and merciful providence, of a 
 life to come, of the fall and the restoration of man, almost 
 unknown to the masses, were frequently, even to the greatest 
 minds, dark, and disheartening mysteries. At the same 
 time, and as a necessary consequence, all virtues, even the 
 
 » Br. W. V. 270, viii. 324. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 257 
 
 most indispensable, were banished from the world, and in 
 their place reigned every vice, personified in the deities whom 
 men worshipped. Such was the condition of the world when, 
 suddenly and unexpectedly, the evangeUcal doctrine, a doc- 
 trine which has been the admiration of all ages, appeared in 
 an obscure corner of Judea. No doubt all that is true and 
 just in the teaching of philosophy is clearly and forcibly con- 
 firmed in the teaching of Jesus; but the doctrines of the 
 philosophies frequently so erroneous, so varied, so opposite, 
 so barren, are much more frequently contradicted than 
 approved in the Gospel. No doubt again, the Gospel is the 
 crown and perfection of the Mosaic law. Moreover, the 
 Jews so little expected and were so Httle prepared for this 
 perfection that the whole nation protested that they did 
 not acknowledge it; they did more, they crucified its 
 Author. 
 
 3. And this teaching, so wonderful in itself, but still more 
 wonderful when we consider the period in which it appeared, 
 fell from the lips of an obscure artisan of Gahlee, who had 
 lived hitherto by the labor of His hands, ignorant of letters 
 and philosophy, and who belonged to none of the sects to 
 which Judea was then a prey. These circumstances were 
 fully known to the Jews whom Jesus taught. ''How," they 
 said, ''can this man know letters, having never learned?'' 
 (John vii. 15.) 
 
 4. Jesus' manner of teaching was no less remarkable. He 
 does not argue or discuss with His hearers; He does not 
 speak like the Scribes or Pharisees, " but as one having 
 power" (Matth. vii. 29). They felt as they listened to 
 His words that the profound mysteries which filled them 
 with awe and wonder were familiar and simple matters 
 to Him. Thus the astonished multitude exclaim: "Never 
 did man speak hke this man." And yet nothing equals 
 the touching simplicity of this teaching. The language 
 of the Sage par excellence is most natural and simple; 
 there is no attempt at eloquence, no extravagant flights 
 
258 Christian apologetics. 
 
 of fancy, and His words are adapted to the simple intel- 
 ligence of His hearers, for it is particularly to the poor and 
 the humble, to simple upright souls that He is pleased to 
 reveal the secrets of His wisdom. His dogmatic teaching, 
 sublime in itself and rigidly exact in its brevity, is usually 
 expressed in the form of sentences or proverbs easily remem- 
 bered; or in charming parables which engrave it deeply 
 upon the mind and memory; or more frequently still in 
 admirable similes borrowed from objects familiar to His 
 hearers, or from the events of the moment, or the customs 
 of daily life. Thus we behold the multitude hanging upon 
 His words and following Him for days, insensible of the 
 claims of hunger, even into the desert.^ 
 
 5. Jesus is no less admirable in His intercourse with His 
 adversaries. How frequently the Scribes and the Pharisees 
 endeavored to ensnare Him with artful questions, to make 
 Him contradict Himself or the Law of Moses and thus render 
 Him ridiculous or odious to the people! But the clear, 
 decisive answers of Jesus not only baffle their evil designs, 
 but put them to such confusion that they dare not question 
 Him further. 
 
 6. Let us recall what we have said of the marvellous 
 efficacy of this teaching which has transformed the individual, 
 the family, and society. Despite the united resistance of 
 the passions, it founded among men true fraternity, true 
 equality, and true liberty; it softened the morals of the age, 
 it established the unity and indissolubihty of marriage, and 
 with it the stability of family life. In a word, it created 
 modern civilization. While the doctrine of Plato, Socrates 
 and others remained almost barren, the teaching of Jesus 
 produced everywhere and in all ages the most admirable 
 virtues, marvels of abnegation, of devotion, and of holiness. 
 Even at the present day we find civihzation advancing or 
 retrograding according as it receives or rejects the teachings 
 of Christianity. 
 
 ^ Cardinal Wiseman on the Parables of the New Testament. 
 
divinity of the christian religion. 259 
 
 First Objection, Drawn from the Points of Resem- 
 blance BETWEEN Christianity and Other Religions. — ^^\ 
 primary and more general objection is stated now with great 
 display of erudition in works or public lectures treating of the 
 History of Religions. Under this title the enemies of the 
 Church, with equal contempt or indifference, affect to con- 
 found the one true religion with the multiplied rehgious 
 errors with which men have disfigured the divine work. 
 This objection is drawn from the points of resemblance 
 stated to exist between Christianity and the false rehgions 
 of antiquity. They argue that such resemblance proves 
 that the Christian religion is a simple evolution of earher 
 creeds, and, Hke them, of human origin. Though the objec- 
 tion is groundless, we consider it necessary to refute it here 
 because of its existence itself and of the injurious impressions 
 it has produced in many souls. We are obliged to be brief, 
 but to those who care for a fuller development of the subject 
 we would recommend the Abbe de Broglie's Prohlemes et 
 conclusions de Vhistoire des religions, a work from which we 
 have frequently quoted. 
 
 Reply. — 1st. It is important, first of all, to observe that 
 this objection, like all others from other sources, leaves 
 intact the ten proofs which we have given of the divinity of 
 Christianity. When a truth is solidly established by fitting 
 proofs, no objection is available against it. We are far from 
 denying that there are points of resemblance between the 
 religion of Jesus Christ and false religions; the contrary 
 would be most astonishing, nay, impossible, as we shall prove. 
 But it is no less true that the Christian religion alone offers 
 convincing and numerous proofs of its divinity. Thus, so 
 far from fearing the light, it provokes and solicits conscientious 
 examination; it fears only ignorance and bad faith. The 
 false religions, on the contrary, in whatever form they present 
 themselves, Brahminism, Buddhism, Zoroastrianism or Maz- 
 deism, Confucianism, etc., cannot endure for a moment the 
 searching fight of reason and the test of knowledge. As 
 
260 CHKISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Augustin Thierry said: ''In point of religion, it is only 
 Christianity which counts." What matter then the alleged 
 points of resemblance if it remains certain that Christianity 
 alone is divine and binding upon all men? 
 
 The justice of our conclusion is strengthened by the fact 
 that among the characteristics of Christianity which clearly 
 manifest its divinity, there are many exclusively its own 
 which bear no analogy whatever to anything in pagan 
 creeds. Where, for example, shall we find anything Hke the 
 numerous and exact prophecies which for so many centuries 
 prepared the coming of Jesus Christ and were so fully veri- 
 fied in Him? Where shall we find the innumerable, striking, 
 incontestable miracles wrought by Jesus, and by His disciples 
 in His name? What other religion presents such a com- 
 plete and perfect doctrine concerning God, man, and the 
 relations existing between both? Where is the founder of a 
 religion whose real life, not a legendary life Uke Buddha's, 
 can be compared to the historical and absolutely perfect Hfe 
 of the Author of Christianity? These striking facts, insep- 
 arable from the religion of Christ, clearly manifest that the 
 finger of God is here. 
 
 2d. We know that God has never left the world without 
 supernatural light ; that there has been a revelation from the 
 beginning. The successive communications of God with 
 mankind, the memory of which must have been perpetuated 
 through the ages, even among pagan nations, suffice to ex- 
 plain many analogies : all religions have necessarily borrowed, 
 more or less, from that common source. 
 
 3d. So far from its being difficult to explain the points of 
 resemblance between Christianity and the religions of the 
 East, particularly Buddliism, it can easily be shown that this 
 resemblance must necessarily exist to a certain degree. 
 Human nature, everywhere the same, is essentially rehgious; 
 in fact man has been defined as a religious animal. Rehgion 
 is destined to satisfy this instinctive aspiration of the human 
 heart; therefore the different creeds, whatever their origin, 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 261 
 
 divine or human, must have many points of resemblance. 
 Let us explain our idea by a comparison. Royal palaces 
 of capital cities are for the most part similarly arranged or 
 constructed. In each one we find a throne-room, reception- 
 rooms, private apartments for the sovereign, others for his 
 family and his suite ; in all of them we find stairways, ante- 
 chambers, doors, and windows. Can we conclude from this 
 that these palaces were all built by the same architect and 
 on the same plan? By no means. These resemblances come 
 from the fact that the structures are intended for one and 
 the same purpose : to serve as a dwelling for the head of the 
 state. For a similar reason one railway station resembles 
 another, one theatre another. It is the same with social 
 institutions: in all countries dehberative bodies, tribunals, 
 armies have certain points of resemblance, for the reason that 
 they tend to the same end and respond to the same needs. 
 
 To apply these comparisons we have only to bear in mind 
 that false rehgions as well as the true, which alone is endowed 
 with heavenly virtue, are intended to satisfy the religious 
 aspirations of the human heart. Among pagans, as well as 
 among Christians, we find the need of adoration and of 
 prayer, of expiation and of sacrifice, terrors of conscience, 
 a tendency toward the supernatural, fear of invisible beings, 
 aspirations toward a future life. Now, as all religions are 
 intended to respond to these aspirations of the human soul, 
 they must necessarily contain many points of resemblance. 
 
 Let us suppose men deprived of the benefit of revelation 
 and a divine religion, what happens? They naturally seek 
 what they lack, and fashion it according to their own ideas. 
 Feeling the need of a revelation, they are naturally disposed 
 to listen to any prophet without even verifying his claims; 
 feeling the need of a redeemer, they give credence to him who 
 declares that he can and will save them; eager for religious 
 emotions, they institute rites, ceremonies, feasts, canticles, 
 calculated to awaken and nourish these emotions; with 
 aspirations toward the supernatural, they address themselves 
 
262 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 to invisible beings to obtain for them health and earthly 
 blessings. This explains the existence in all ages of prophets, 
 messiahs, thaumaturges, founders of creeds, inventors of 
 touching ceremonies. 
 
 If such, in brief, is the history of the formation of human 
 religions, is it not evident that the divine religion, though 
 very different in essential points, must resemble the others 
 in man}^ respects? Consider the subject more in detail and 
 you will better understand the reason of these analogies. 
 
 The dogmas taught by Christianity are, in part at least, 
 truths which reason of itself can attain. If revelation has 
 added to the treasure of natural truths, it has first enlarged 
 and perfected the knowledge of these truths of the natural 
 order; it has made them more accessible to the mass of 
 mankind, and imparted to them a clearness and certainty 
 which the unaided reason too frequently is powerless to 
 give. Is it astonishing to find in the teaching of reason 
 certain dogmas which recall points of evangelical doctrine? 
 
 It must needs be the same with Christian morahty, since, 
 at bottom, it is only the natural law developed and super- 
 naturalized, illumined with a new light, and enlarged with 
 the addition of certain prescriptions imposed by God. 
 Why, therefore, should we not find in false religions certain 
 moral precepts analogous to those of the true religion? 
 
 The man who feels in himself appetites condemned by con- 
 science, readily understands that to secure the triumph of 
 the spirit over the flesh he must wage war against the pleasures 
 of the body, accustom this body to suffer. He sees also in 
 this suffering a means of appeasing the Divinity, which his 
 guilty weakness has offended. Then there follows naturally 
 a moral tendency to mortification of the passions, to fasting, 
 to voluntar>% self-inflicted, bodily suffering. We must find, 
 then, in the purer rehgions a tendency to lead a fife of austerity 
 fitted to conquer the evil inchnations of nature, and to 
 employ for this end the means indicated by nature. Why 
 should not the Buddhist monks, for example, in order to 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 263 
 
 become more perfect, employ means analogous to those in 
 use among the ascetics and religious of Catholicism? 
 
 As to exterior worship, which is only the outward ex- 
 pression of the hidden sentiments of the soul in regard to the 
 divinity, it is quite natural that it should bear great analogy 
 among the different rehgions. Man's object in this worship is 
 to express to God his respect, his adoration, his submission, 
 his gratitude, and obtain from Him blessings and the pardon 
 of his offences. What will he do, then, but have recourse in 
 his worship to the means which his reason, his imagination, 
 his sentiments, and the nature which surrounds Mm suggest 
 and afford? Why should not the true rehgion employ the 
 same means? Why, for example, should the Christian 
 religion have abstained from the use of incense, from the 
 burning wax, from religious canticles, from music, from 
 genuflections, from prostrations, from sacrifice — in a word, 
 from all that is fitted to express the acknowledgment of 
 God's sovereign dominion over His creatures, to implore His 
 help or His pardon, to maintain the fervor of religious 
 sentiments in the human heart? Is not this restoring crea- 
 tures to their true and highest destiny, and re-establishing 
 the rights of God? 
 
 The justice of tills conclusion is more evident when we 
 consider that God, in prescribing by means of revelation an 
 exterior worship, must, in His msdom and goodness, make 
 it in harmony with the tendencies and the necessities of the 
 nature with which He has endowed us. Nay, it was part of 
 His wisdom and goodness to take into account what man 
 had found of himself, what made the deepest and most lasting 
 impression upon him, and even, in a certain measure, religious 
 customs hallowed by time, and thus facilitate the accom- 
 plishment of the duties He prescribed. In prescribing to 
 Moses the rites, the ceremonies, and the feasts of the law 
 without obliging the Hebrews to renounce completely their 
 rehgious customs, God acted as a tender and provident 
 Father. In her turn, the Catholic Church, charged by her 
 
264 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 divine Founder to determine the religious practices other 
 than the sacraments, and to regulate the details of worship, 
 was not obliged to set aside the lawful custom of converts 
 that came to her either from Judaism or paganism. Heir 
 of the Old Law, it was just that she should borrow a part of 
 its rites and ceremonies. As to customs, good or indifferent 
 in themselves, of human religions, would she not have pre- 
 served them, only purifying and sanctifying them by re- 
 ferring thenceforth to the Creator what had served in the 
 worship of creatures? Why should she have suppressed all 
 pagan festivals? Was it not sufficient to replace them 
 with Christian feasts bearing exterior analogies to the first? 
 It was evidently easier in this way to abofish idolatrous or 
 corrupt customs. 
 
 4th. I^et us call attention here to a marvel suggested by 
 what we have said of the teaching of Jesus. This doctrine, 
 this moral teaching, this worship so absolutely perfect, 
 answering so perfectly all the postulates of reason and satis- 
 fying so completely all the aspirations of the human heart — 
 in a word, this teaching which nothing presaged or foretold, 
 — how, without divine intervention, could it suddenly have 
 fallen from the lips of an obscure artisan of GaHlee, who had 
 fived by the labor of his hands, knowing nothing of the 
 disputes of the schools and sects into which Judea was 
 divided? How was this man capable of the arduous study 
 necessary to master the eclecticism alleged to be the origin of 
 Christianity? He was a workman and the reputed son of a 
 workman ; all his youth had been spent in Judea, in the midst 
 of his own people, and he died at a comparatively immature 
 age. When, then, could he have travelled throughout the 
 entire East to study its diverse and contrary doctrines? 
 How could he have read the books of India, Persia, and 
 China, of which no translation existed in his own tongue? 
 And how could he have made a choice so absolutely perfect 
 among so many conflicting doctrines replete with errors? 
 Nor had he, it is certain, any knowledge of contemporaneous 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 265 
 
 philosophy. We have the testimony of Renan in this 
 respect. ''Jesus Christ," he says, ''had no knowledge of 
 Greek culture, either directly or indirectly, . . . nor was He 
 any more conversant with the extravagant scholasticism 
 which was taught at Jerusalem." 
 
 Conclusion. — We have said sufficient to show the inanity 
 of this objection, alleged to be overwhelming, against the true 
 religion. If Christianity has necessarily certain points of 
 resemblance to other religions, it differs from each of them 
 in a multitude of wholly essential points. No doubt it 
 contains all that is good and holy to be found elsewhere, 
 but without any admixture of error or imperfection. It 
 alone, moreover, presents among the various elements of 
 which it is composed a perfect harmony; it alone satisfies 
 everywhere the religious instincts of the human heart; 
 it alone remains perpetually young and promises to endure 
 to the end of mankind. The exterior resemblances which 
 exist between the divine religion and works of human origin 
 do not destroy, then, the originality of the divine work; they 
 only prove how perfectly this work is adapted to all the 
 needs of the human soul. In short, while the false religions 
 present no certain character of a divine word addressed to 
 mankind, and while they contain maxims and precepts 
 contrary to truth and probity, Christianity alone offers us, 
 together with the purest and most elevating moral teaching, 
 the most evident proofs of a truly divine work.^ 
 
 Second Objection, Drawn from a Comparison of Chris- 
 tianity AND Buddhism. — Certain rationahsts of the present 
 day have thought to depreciate Christianity and rob it of its 
 dogmatic and moral pre-eminence by contrasting it especially 
 with Buddhism. 
 
 We are loath to treat of a form of religion so unworthy 
 the attention of a serious mind; but the present circum- 
 stances oblige us to say a word sufficient to warn those 
 who might be deceived by a false appearance of learning 
 
 ^Lacordaire, Conf. 2, on God and Man. 
 
266 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 and statements as audacious as they are devoid of 
 truth. ^ 
 
 ^ In order to prove that Christianity is only a copy of the doctrines 
 of ancient India, Jacolliot, an ex-magistrate of French India, has 
 written several books, the principal of which bear the titles La Bible 
 dans rinde and La vie de Jezeus-Christna. If we mention these works, 
 it is certainly not because of their scientific value, for they have none, 
 but because the inconceivable audacity of the author's lying state- 
 nients is calculated to impose on the good faith of many readers. 
 When you read the crushing refutation of Mgr. Harlez you can under- 
 stand what must have been the feeling of this learned Orientalist 
 when he confronted JacoUiot's quotations with the original texts. 
 "A most painful task," he says, "is that of the critic obliged to review 
 a book where ignorance and bad faith meet him at every step : he has 
 to force himself to read to the end; there are moments when the pen 
 falls from his hand. . . . This book, written by a man with no knowl- 
 edge of science, is a mere tissue of lying statements, anti-scientific 
 hypotheses, and errors unpardonable in a student of the lowest class. 
 It is permeated with a dishonest spirit and inconceivable disingenous- 
 ness. Jacolliot indulges chiefly in two styles of argument: one is 
 to substitute for history the most improbable hypotheses, the other 
 is to affirm, with the most imperturbable assurance, falsifications, 
 contradictions the most evident, the most inexcusable, the most 
 unworthy of a man with any self-respect; he even goes so far as to 
 invent, completely, long texts, attributing them to authors who never 
 wrote a line." See proofs of this appreciation in Mgr. Harlez' La 
 Bible dans VInde. This judgment, given by a learned Catholic, is 
 confirmed by other equally competent scholars unbiassed by any 
 religious ideas. Let us cite, for example, Julien Vinson, an author 
 who belongs to the militant materialist school, and well known 
 by his labors in the Indian tongues called Dravidian. "I could have 
 mentioned," he says, "in the preceding enumeration publications 
 bearing the name of Jacolliot, an ex-magistrate of French India, 
 but I am speaking only of serious, genuine, or at least conscientious 
 works " {Revue de linguistique, t. XIII, 15 Janvier 1880, pp. 56 
 and 57). The celebrated Indianist, Angelo de Gubernatis, of the 
 mythic school of Strauss, does not deign to accord him any more 
 notice than the following: "Such is the case, Signor Jacolliot, credu- 
 lous dreamer to the contrary notwithstanding". (Ch. II., p. 265). 
 
 The manner in which writers have branded Mr. Jacolliot makes us 
 readily divine that his Jezeus-Christna is a creation of the author's 
 inventive genius. Never in ancient India did there exist either a 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 267 
 
 Let us hasten to say that all rationahsts are by no means 
 so deplorably blind. There are those, on the contrary, who 
 publicly proclaim Christianity to be superior to Buddhism. 
 To quote a few significant witnesses: Kuenen declares 
 that Christianity is as superior to Buddhism as Hfe is to death, 
 as heaven with its beatific vision is to Nirvana, as a living 
 body is to a phantom. Reveille, in his lecture at the 
 College of France, expressed himself in almost the same 
 terms. J. J. Ampere, after enumerating the greater number 
 of analogies upon which certain writers insist, does not hesi- 
 tate to state publicly that ''between the two rehgions, that 
 of Christ and that of Buddha, there is a profound and radical 
 difference: the difference between theism and pantheism." 
 Ad. Franck, in his studies of the laws of Oriental nations, 
 cannot help showing that the virtues taught by Buddhism are 
 sterile for want of a sohd basis, of a true imderstanding of 
 man's relations with nature and with God. 
 
 Again, Barthelemy Saint-Hilaire, who studied Buddhism 
 for thirty years. ''Reared in the bosom of an admirable 
 philosophy and reUgion, we take httle pains," he says, "to 
 learn their value and the immense services they render us. 
 We enjoy them, while we are completely indifferent and even 
 ungrateful to them. The marvels of ci\ilization multiply 
 about us. We profit by them, but we rarely ask to what 
 our races owe their great welfare, their stability, their com- 
 parative enlightenment, while at our door are other races 
 
 Jezeus or a Christna, still less a Jezeus-Christna; the very name is 
 impossible in Sanscrit. But it had to be proved that it was the Vedas, 
 the sacred books of India, which gave the idea of the Christ of the 
 Gospel. We find, it is true, but in books posterior to the Vedas, a 
 certain Krishna (a word which signifies black), who bears no resem- 
 blance to our divine Saviour. It is only in the Puranas, books written 
 in the middle of the Middle Ages, that they inserted in the legend of 
 this personage traits bearing a certain analogy to facts of the Gospel. 
 We know that Christianity was brought at an early age to India, and 
 that the Christian colonies continued in existence there until the 
 arrival of the Portuguese. See La Bible dans I'Inde, by Mgr. de Harlez. 
 
268 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 who are still in a semi-barbarous state and who have never, 
 since the beginning of time, been able to form either societies 
 or governments that would be bearable to us. I think that 
 the study of Buddhism, even in its most general characteristics, 
 will help us to solve this enigma. We shall see why a religion 
 which to-day counts more adherents than any other, has done 
 so little for the happiness of mankind, and we shall find the 
 explanation of its impotence in the strange and deplorable 
 doctrines which it has professed. '^ Farther on he adds: 
 ^'Despite appearances, sometimes very specious, Buddhism 
 is simply one long series of contradictions; it is not calumni- 
 ating it to say that it is a spirituahty without a soul, virtue 
 without duty, morahty without freedom, a world without 
 God. What can we derive from such teachings? What 
 things one must forget to become the bhnd disciples of 
 Buddhism! How low one must descend in the scale of 
 nations and of civilizations! The only but immense service 
 which Buddhism can render us is to make us, by means of 
 the sad contrast it offers, better appreciate the inestimable 
 value of our beliefs by showing us what it has cost a portion 
 of mankind to be without them.'' 
 
 This testimony from writers not of the faith may suffice 
 for the irrevocable condemnation of Buddhism. Present 
 circumstances, however, constrain us to offer a few reflections 
 on the dogmatic and moral teaching of Buddhism. We 
 shall speak first of primitive, theoretical Buddhism, then of 
 Buddhism as it is popularly known and practised. 
 
 Historical Details. — The founder of Buddhism was 
 Sakya-Mimi (the sage, the ascetic of Sakya), better known 
 under the name of Buddha.^ We know his life only through 
 biographies which appeared several centuries after his exist- 
 ence. The Buddhists themselves do not agree as to the 
 
 * Buddha is only a qualifying term meaning one who has attained 
 to true knowledge and moral perfection by his own efforts. Sakya- 
 Muni is the Buddha illumined by excellence, a mere man, but in- 
 finitely superior to ordinary men. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 269 
 
 period in which he hved. Max Miiller gives the date of his 
 death as 477 before Christ; other Indianists vary between 
 343 and 370.^ 
 
 As to the legends, of no historic value whatever, which 
 embelHsh the history of Buddha, they were probably created, 
 part of them at least, five or six centuries after his death, 
 a period when the Gospel had already spread into India. 
 This would readily explain certain traits in the legend which 
 bear a strange resemblance to facts related in the Gospel. 
 The legend itself, however, is by no means the same in all the 
 Buddhist schools.^ 
 
 The doctrine of the founder of Buddhism was written, not 
 by him, but by his disciples, and the canon of the books 
 which contain it was drawn up only 88 years before Christ. 
 Buddhism, which is nothing more than a sort of rebellion of 
 the individual reason against the old Brahmin despotism, 
 and notably against the anti-fraternal and anti-social dogma 
 of caste, spread over the vast plateaux of upper Asia and 
 invaded China and Japan. It prevails also in Thibet, Bur- 
 mah, Siam, Ceylon, etc. 
 
 Let it not be supposed, moreover, that Buddhism is every- 
 where one and the same. It is true, it is customary to 
 
 ^ What would unbelievers say if there were similar uncertainty in 
 regard to the authenticity of the Sacred Scriptures and the hero 
 of the Gospel? According to Senart, all that can be stated with 
 certainty in regard to Buddha is reduced to two points : 1st. Buddhism 
 had a founder; 2d. This founder was an anchorite, an ascetic, whom 
 the teaching of Brahminism could not satisfy. "Have we not met with 
 Orientalists who maintain that Sakya-Muni, the Buddha, was probably 
 only a solar myth? And if they were to succeed some day in prov- 
 ing this contention, what would become of the resemblance which 
 they have so often sought to establish between Jesus and Buddha ? " 
 Picard. 266. 
 
 2 P. Bonniot, in his Le Miracle et ses contrefagons, gives a few of 
 the marvels attributed to Buddha: it would be difficult to conceive 
 of anything more absurd, more incoherent, and more grotesque. A 
 biography of Buddha is to be found in Mgr. Harlez' Manuel du Baud/- 
 
270 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 estimate the disciples of Buddha as 350,000,000. There 
 are those, Rhys-David for example, who say 500,000,000; 
 but these are not all real Buddhists by any means. This 
 number includes more than 400,000,000 Chinese. Now, 
 though the Chinese include Buddha at times among the 
 objects of their worship, they care little for his doctrine, and 
 in no wise do they call themselves Buddhists. 
 
 It is an undisputed fact, moreover, that Buddhism is 
 divided into two piincipal branches which have taken directly 
 opposite characters. The Buddhism of the North has been 
 moulded, more or less, by the ideas of the people among 
 whom it was introduced — ^in fact it has become idolatry. In 
 China it consists in ranking Buddha and the personages of 
 the Buddliist Olympus among the spirits from whom favors 
 are petitioned and in making gifts to the bonzes. In 
 reality it is no longer Buddhism. On the other hand, the 
 South (Ceylon and the East Indies) has remained generally 
 faithful to the system of the founder: the disciples still 
 seek to attain Nirvana by the practice of renunciation 
 and penance, and the Buddhist monasteries offer examples 
 of genuine virtue, admirable discipline, and profoimd faith 
 in their doctrines. 
 
 dhism, tVaprh le catechisme du Suhhddra bhikshou et la Vajratcchedika. 
 This catechism is the work of a monk and doctor of Buddhism who 
 wished to give his coreligionists and Europeans an exact and perfect 
 knowledge of the doctrine they were invited to practise and propa- 
 gate. The learned professor of Louvain has merely translated it. 
 
 The zealous Buddhist is careful to pass over in silence certain traits 
 not altogether creditable to his hero. He does not mention, for 
 example, that he died of a fit of indigestion with which gluttony 
 had something to do. He is equally reticent in regard to a multitude 
 of marvellous events which make Buddha out to be the most super- 
 natural being that ever existed. The reason of this reticence is that 
 Buddhism absolutely rejects miracles: everything is done according to 
 the universal laws of nature which bind all beings, whatever their 
 perfection or their elevation. Here again we are confronted with 
 one of the contradictions with which this strange religion abounds. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 271 
 
 1. Theoretical Buddhism. — Sakya-Muni's end or object 
 was exclusively moral: he cared little for the solution of 
 questions relating to the origin of man, to the nature of 
 God and of other beings ; he gave his attention almost en- 
 tirely to moral precepts. His sole end was to procure for 
 himself and for others deliverance from temporal evils, and 
 above all to escape the necessity of being born again, for all 
 life, he believed, was fatally miserable. AVe see at once that 
 Buddhism does not merit the name of religion, and that it 
 responds in no way to the postulates of reason and of the 
 human heart. Moreover, its dogmatic character, upon 
 which morahty is necessarily based, abounds in errors and 
 contradictions. We need only point out a few of these and 
 we have a superabundant refutation of the whole system. 
 
 A. Dogmatic Character.^ — The doctrine of Buddha 
 includes : 
 
 ^ For a fuller knowledge of the metaphysical speculations which form 
 the basis of Buddhist morahty see the work of Mgr. Harlez already 
 quoted. This dogmatic teaching is borrowed from Vajratcchedika 
 (The Cleaver of the Diamond), the most famous of all the books, 
 written by one of the most fervent and best instructed adepts of 
 Buddhism. In reading this faithful summary of the doctrine of 
 Buddha one asks one's self whether the author of such a doctrine was 
 in his right mind or whether he spoke seriously. Here are a few of 
 the chief features of these fundamental lessons. The rest are exactly 
 like these specimens. 
 
 1. There is no law nor doctrine revealed by Buddha, for the reason 
 that this doctrine is incomprehensible, has no exterior sign to distin- 
 guish it; it is neither doctrine nor non-doctrine. 
 
 2. If a virtuous man or woman were to fill the world with seven 
 precious jewels and gave them to illuminated Buddhas, their merits 
 would be immense, incommensurable. And why? Because this 
 mass of merits has been declared a non-mass by Buddha, and that is 
 why Buddha has said it is a mass, a true mass of merits. 
 
 3. If there were found a man as large as Himalaya, his individuality 
 would no doubt be very great. And why? Because what is called 
 individuality is declared by Buddha a non-individuality, and that is 
 why it is called individuality. It is a man with an extraordinarily 
 
272 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 1st. Pantheism, or rather Positivism and Atheism. In 
 reality Buddhism does not formally deny or affirm the exist- 
 ence of a supreme being. On this capital point Buddha and 
 his disciples, at least, refrain from pronouncing judgment. 
 Therefore the system is justly called atheistic. Yet, strange 
 as it may seem, prayer and adoration are prescribed. An 
 attentive study of peojies reput^ ta be Buddhists shows 
 that they have divinities to whom' they offer adoration: in 
 one place it is the serpent or the dragon, in another and 
 almost everywhere it is tlie devil; in the kingdoms of the ex- 
 treme East the worship ^of the spirits of ancestors seems to 
 predominate; elsewhere, again, it is Sabya-Muni who has 
 become the god of his disciples. Moreover, this diversity 
 was inevitable : when the Buddhist teachers systematically 
 refused to pronounce upon the existence and the nature of 
 God they left their adherents free to form whatever idea they 
 would of Him, and to choose their god or gods according as 
 it suited them.^ 
 
 large body. For he is declared by Buddha to have no body, and that 
 is why it can be said that he has a large body. 
 
 4. The dust of the whole world is no doubt an immense mass. And 
 why? Because this dust has been declared non-dust by Buddha, 
 and that is why it is called dust. And this world has been declared a 
 non-world; that is why it is called a world. 
 
 5. It is said that Buddha should be recognized by exterior marks. 
 Not at all. For these marks have been declared non-marks by 
 Buddha, and for this reason they are called marks. 
 
 6. There is no doctrine which may have been learned by Buddha 
 in a perfect illumination. All doctrine taught by Buddha is neither 
 truth nor error. Because all doctrines are non-doctrines, declared 
 such by Buddha. That is why it is said: All these doctrines are 
 the doctrines of Buddha. 
 
 7. In the last age there will be beings who will believe in these 
 doctrines, and these beings will not be beings or non-beings. For 
 these beings have been declared non-beings by Buddha, and that is 
 why they are called beings. 
 
 ^ For the Buddhist there is no personal God, no creation. As to 
 the manner in which the world was produced Buddha gives no opinion, 
 for the reason that he judged that this knowledge was of no value for 
 
DIVINITY OP THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 273 
 
 2d. Metempsychosis, or the rebirth of souls in other bodies. 
 A fatal law, inherent in tilings, connects suffering with wrong- 
 doing, and happiness with good deeds. Men live to expiate 
 their evil deeds: those who have led a good life are born 
 again to a new life in happier conditions, and go thus from 
 transmigration to transmigration until they reach the final 
 term, Nirvana. 
 
 3d. What is Nirvana ? There is nothing more obscure in 
 the doctrine of Buddhism. The most probable opinion is 
 that which makes Nirvana the absolute suppression of ex- 
 istence. Various Buddhist books give the following defini- 
 tion: ''Nirvana cannot be a place of sensible fehcity, or 
 intellectual happiness, or incorporeality, or consciousness, or 
 unconsciousness of self." What then can it be, if not the 
 negation of existence — nothingness? Moreover, the com- 
 parisons employed to explain it certainly convey an analogous 
 idea ; for example, it is said to be the absorption of the creature 
 in the Great Being, the universal Being — an unconscious and 
 motionless mass; again, it is a state of passive and negative 
 repose, void of all thought and all sentiment; in a word, 
 it is at least the equivalent of annihilation. 
 
 4th. The principle upon which Buddhism bases this 
 metempsychosis and this strange beatitude is pessimism. 
 To the Buddhist, life is an evil, and true happiness consists 
 in being delivered from it; by the practice of virtue he escapes 
 after death the law which would obhge him to be born again 
 to expiate his faults. He who is without stain will be bom 
 no more. 
 
 Appreciation. — All that can be said of atheism, positivism, 
 metempsychosis, nihilism, applies equally to Buddhist dogma. 
 
 the end he had in view, i.e., deliverance from the evils of life, or rather 
 from life itself — for the complete annihilation of personality. "The 
 religions of the far East, Buddhism, Brahminism, Confucianism 
 and the rest, have no conception of God as a Creator. Metaphysical 
 scepticism is their bond of unity. They aspire to found a moral law 
 of love and charity precisely on the invincible ignorance of man as 
 to his origin and destiny." Picard, p. 230, 
 
274 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Is this a doctrine fitted to elevate or benefit souls? Is it not 
 rather a metaphysical theory fashioned by dreamers and for 
 dreamers? Annihilation! what an incentive to the practice 
 of virtue, what a reward for a good life! Yet let us not for- 
 get, Buddhism aims to be practical ; it is a moral end which 
 it pursues. 
 
 B. Moral Character. — Strange and full of error is the 
 dogma upon which the moral teaching of Buddhism is based. 
 Yet this teaching in itself is elevating and pure in every 
 respect: it prescribes renunciation and repression of the 
 passions. At the same time the renunciation is carried to 
 excess: not only must all irregular affection be eradicated 
 from the heart, but every desire, every affection. The duty 
 of the Buddhist monks — and they are the real Buddhists; 
 laymen are incapable of attaining Nirvana — is to attain a 
 complete inertia, a perfect state of moral quietude. These 
 Cramanas (ascetics) or Bhikshus (beggars), besides the 
 obligation of fasts, prayers, corrections, the confession of 
 their faults, are compelled to live upon alms, to practise 
 celibacy, and to bury themselves in profound meditation on 
 the nothingness to which they aspire: this constitutes their 
 sole occupation. Those who are not monks are commanded 
 above all to love men and to desire to lead them to Nirvana, 
 that is, to deliverance from the inevitable evils of existence. 
 Appreciation. — 1st. The morahty of Buddhism cannot, as 
 we have already said, be called moral teaching, since it is 
 without foundation; it does not emanate from God, hence 
 it suggests no lawgiver, no judge, no pardon, and it is de- 
 prived of effectual sanction, for annihilation is no real reward, 
 and existence is not in itself a punishment fitted to deter the 
 evil-doer. Moreover, a law which exists of itself and which 
 fatally produces its own sanction is something most irrational 
 and hopeless. For the Buddhist, life, in whatever form it 
 presents itself, is one long chain of miseries — a real evil of 
 which he must rid himself as soon as possible. And to 
 accomplish this end he must pass through an existence not 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 275 
 
 only deprived of every enjoyment and earthly pleasure, but 
 filled with continual renunciation, mortification, and penance. 
 After being thus tormented during one or several existences, 
 w^at may the Buddhist hope for? The destruction of his 
 individuality, his annihilation, or at most his re-entrance as 
 an atom into the unconscious mass of the universe! 
 
 2d. Though at first sight the moral teaching of Buddhism 
 presents much that seems elevating, yet in reality it is a sort 
 of stoic perfection— an inertia of indifference productive of 
 egotism and pride. The charity of Buddhism is in contradic- 
 tion to one of its chief precepts which proscribes all affection, 
 all desire even for fife itself. We need hardly call attention 
 to the abyss between this charity and the charity inculcated 
 by Christianity. This is evident even to unbehevers. ''We 
 must recognize," says the rationalist Oldenberg, ''an in- 
 trinsic difference between these two principles of morality, 
 the sentiment of Buddhist benevolence and Christian charity. 
 . . . The love of benevolence manifest in Buddhist morality — 
 a sentiment half negative and half positive — may be said to 
 approach Christian charity, but does not come up to it; just 
 as the beatitude of Nirvana, though radically different 
 from the Christian's conception of beatitude, presents, never- 
 theless, an uncertain and vacillating image of it. The 
 Buddhist is commanded, not so much to love his neighbor, 
 as to refrain from hating him; he is taught to excite and 
 foster a spirit of kindness toward all creatures, but this 
 spirit is not the effect of love, but rather the result of the 
 deliberate opinion and persuasion that everything will be 
 better in the world under the influence of the law of benevo- 
 lence, and that he who practises this virtue will find a reward 
 in the law of nature." 
 
 Remark. — We who enjoy the benefit of Catholic teaching 
 are in no way astonished at the relative moral perfection 
 found in primitive or theoretic Buddhism, a human and 
 philosophic work. We know that after the fall man pre- 
 served his intellectual and moral powers: if they were 
 
276 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 weakened, they were by no means destroyed. To practise 
 supernatural virtues we need the help of divine grace; but 
 this grace is not necessary to lead, within certain limits, a 
 good hfe in conformity with the natural law. 
 
 2. Practical and Popular Buddhism. — ^What we have 
 said so far applies only to primitive and theoretic Bud- 
 dhism, to that found in books. Buddhism is quite different 
 in its popular and practical reality. Here we find profound 
 differences between it and Christianity. By one of those 
 contradictions unaccounted for by scholars, but which is 
 an incontestable fact. Buddhism, while posing before the 
 elite of the so-called sages with the prestige of free thought, 
 posed at the same time before the people with the attraction 
 of rehgious formalism, multipHed idolatrous rites and obser- 
 vances, and became at an early stage a sort of polytheism 
 and superstitious magic. " The instincts of the human heart,'' 
 M. de Broglie justly observes, ''were stronger than theory: 
 the ideas of God and of a future life reappeared, but under the 
 form of superstition, in a religion of which the proper doc- 
 trine is atheism and nihilism." 
 
 A Word in Regard to the Propagation of Buddhism. — 
 It is easy to explain the astonishing success of a religious 
 system which overthrew Brahminism and threatened even 
 to replace it completely. The rapid propagation of Bud- 
 dhism is due to various causes; among others, the religious 
 and social protest against the secular tyranny of the old 
 Brahminism, the proclamation of fraternity, and the aboli- 
 tion of castes, which powerfully attracted the people. Con- 
 trary to the Brahmins, who reserved to themselves the 
 privilege of studying and teaching the science of religion and 
 the means of attaining final beatitude, Buddha and his 
 disciples preached publicly to all the world; they declared 
 all men equal before the universal Law, and called women as 
 well as men to the religious life : the impure Dasyu as well as 
 the Brahmin, the criminal as well as the ju'^t man, the widow, 
 the forsaken wife, — all were free to seek an honorable and 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 277 
 
 peaceful refuge in the monastic state. Moreover, the poverty- 
 taught by Buddhism, and its wholly natural moraUty, so 
 tolerant for laymen, could not excite against it the passions of 
 individuals and peoples. Far from proscribing superstition, 
 it encouraged and increased every kind. Besides, it had 
 long enjoyed the protection of rulers; it was only after having 
 reigned in India more than a thousand years, in competi- 
 tion with Brahminism, that it spread to the neighboring 
 countries.^ 
 
 Conclusion. — Let us conclude this sketch of Buddhism 
 with the appreciation of it given by the learned Orientalist, 
 Mgr. Harlez: ''There is little foundation for the comparison 
 which writers seek to establish between Christianity and 
 Buddhism. Buddhism possesses a few rather elevating 
 moral precepts, and that is all that can be said for it. Its 
 metaphysics (or dogmas) are absurd, and differ in no way 
 from materialism. It is the same in regard to its anthro- 
 pologic and cosmogonic conceptions. Its moral teaching 
 is based upon the irrational idea of metempsychosis, and the 
 only prospect offered disciples is a hfe spent in privations 
 and penance, to end in what? Nothingness, or what comes 
 to the same thing — ^the destruction of personahty. Men of 
 letters among modern Buddhists deny the charge of atheism: 
 they claim to honor God and to contemplate Him as the 
 universal Law. But this is a mere evasion. This law is a 
 pure abstraction and can never be a personal and active 
 being. Compare the Our Father with the canonical books 
 of Buddhism and we shall see at a glance the infinite distance 
 which separates them." 
 
 ^See Aiken; Schanz, II., ch. 2; Lilly, Claims, ch. 2; Anc. Rel. 
 ch. 3; A. C. Q. xiii.; Harlez inC. S. S. L. i. I. E. R. Dec. 1901; 
 Bering, E. H., Esoteric Buddhism; C. W. Aug. Sept., '95; Picard, 
 p. 293. 
 
278 CHEISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 X. Tenth Proof. 
 
 THE INCOMPARABLE HOLINESS OF CHRIST.^ 
 
 We have seen the eminent holiness of the dogmatic and 
 moral teaching of Jesus. His whole life was no less admir- 
 able : it was this doctrine put in practice ; He never imposed 
 a precept which He had not fulfilled to the letter; He never 
 preached a virtue of which He had not given in Himself the 
 most perfect example. Contrary to the general practice of 
 legislators, and particularly of impostors, He taught first by 
 example and then by precept (Acts i. 1). Thus in teach- 
 ing us our duties toward God, toward man, toward our- 
 selves, He could truly say: "I have given you an example, 
 that as I have done, so do you also" (John xiii. 15). 
 
 1st. We have only to read the Gospel to be convinced that 
 all virtues were united in Jesus in such a divine degree and 
 in so just a measure as to make Him the type, the ideal of 
 all perfection. From His infancy and during His whole life 
 the sole end of all His words, of all His actions was to glorify 
 God by causing Him to be known, loved, and served, and 
 by saving mankind; He Himself declares that He cares not 
 for His own glory, that He does only what is pleasing to the 
 Father. During His whole life He was meek and gentle, 
 grave and laborious, submissive and patient. 
 
 In all men, even the most perfect, natural infirmity reveals 
 itself in something; the ideal perfection found in biographies 
 is a mixture of fiction and history; but in Jesus, and in Him 
 only, we find absolute perfection and pure historic truth. 
 This unfathomable perfection never faltered in the various 
 events of His earthly career, in the intimate familiarity of 
 friendship, in the midst of the multitude when harassed by 
 its rudeness and importunity, in the joyous festivity of the 
 marriage-feast of Cana, in the agony of Gethsemane, in the 
 
 ^ See Lives of Christ by Didon, Fouard, Maas, Veuillot, Elliott, and 
 Costello. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 279 
 
 ignominy of His Passion, in the anguish of Calvary, where 
 He expired in inexpressible suffering, abandoned by His 
 own, insulted by His triumphant enemies, and apparently 
 abandoned by His Father. ''Never will it be possible to 
 rise above Christ," says Strauss, ''or to conceive of a being 
 equal to Him.'' "Jesus Christ," says Renan, "will never 
 be surpassed." 
 
 2d. His virtue was so pure, so incontestable, that He could 
 defy His bitterest enemies, who watched His actions and 
 examined His words in order to ensnare Him. He could defy 
 them to convince Him of sin: "Which of you shall convince 
 Me of sin?" And during His Passion, notwithstanding the 
 witnesses bribed to testify against Him, the pagan judge 
 was forced to proclaim His innocence no less than five times. 
 Moreover, modern impiety itself, after seeking in all His 
 words and in all His life to find matter of condemnation, 
 is obliged to bow before Him and render homage to His 
 virtues. If it refuses to bow the knee before His divinity, it 
 readily acknowledges Him as the wisest of men. J. J. Rous- 
 seau goes so far as to confess that "if the hfe and death of 
 Socrates are those of a sage, the hfe and death of Christ are 
 those of a God." 
 
 3d. Yet among all the virtues so brilliantly manifested in 
 Jesus there is none which shines with greater lustre, which 
 so powerfully won the hearts of His followers, as His en- 
 chanting goodness. It would be necessary to quote here 
 the whole Gospel, for there is not a page of it which does not 
 record the most touching proofs of this virtue. 
 
 "Jesus," says Lacordaire, "carried the power of loving 
 even to tenderness, and to a kind of tenderness so new that it 
 was needful to create a name for it, and that it should form a 
 distinct species in the analysis of human feelings — I mean 
 the evangelic unction. Jesus Christ was tender toward all 
 men; it was He who said: 'Whatsoever you shall do to the 
 least of these My brethren, you will have done it unto Me ' 
 (Matth. XXV. 40), an expression which introduced Christian 
 
280 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 fraternity into the world, and which still daily engenders 
 love. He was tender toward sinners; He sat at meat with 
 them, and when doctrinal pride reproached Him for it, He 
 replied : ' I am not come for those that are in health, but for 
 those that are sick' (Matth. ix. 12). Perceiving a pubhcan 
 who cHmbed up into a tree to see Him pass by, He says to 
 him, ' Zaccheus, make haste and come down, for this day I 
 must abide in thy house '(Luke xix. 5). A sinful woman 
 approaches Him and even ventures to anoint His feet with 
 ointment, to the great scandal of a large assembly; He 
 reassures her by that immortal allocution : ' Many sins are 
 forgiven her because she has loved much' (Luke vii. 47). 
 They bring before Him a woman taken in adultery, in order 
 to force a judgment from Him which by its very leniency 
 may compromise Him; He answers: 'He that is without sin 
 among you, let him first cast a stone at her' (John viii. 7). 
 He was tender toward His migratef ul and parricidal country ; 
 and, beholding its walls from afar. He wept, saying : ' Jeru- 
 salem! Jerusalem! thou that killest the prophets, and 
 stonest them that are sent unto thee, how often would I 
 have gathered together thy children, as the hen doth gather 
 her chickens under her wings, and thou wouldst not!' 
 (Matth. xxiii. 37). He was so tender toward His fiiends as to 
 wash their feet, and to permit a very yoimg man to lean upon 
 His breast on one of the most solemn occasions of His life. 
 Even at His crucifixion He was tender toward His execu- 
 tioners, and, Hfting up His soul to His Father for them. He 
 said: 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they 
 do' (Luke xxiii. 34). No earthly fife shows such a blend- 
 ing of hght and love." 
 
 We must confine ourselves here to a general glance at the 
 life of Him who offered Himself as model to all men without 
 exception, and who uttered these equally astonishing and 
 true words : '' I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life ; He that 
 folio weth Me walketh not in darkness."^ 
 
 ^ Lacordaire, conf . 1 on Jesus Christ, 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 281 
 
 Remarks.— 1st. The character of Jesus, despite its incom- 
 parable perfection, is natural and true; it offers nothing false, 
 nothing affected, nothing constrained. If the divine nature 
 is shown by the absence of the least imperfection, humanity 
 is equally evident in the truth of its natural emotions. As 
 Jesus desired to teach all men. His brethren, the way to 
 heaven, first by example and then by precept. He deigned to 
 experience all the legitimate sentiments of our nature and to 
 pass through all our trials. ''We have not," says St. Paul, 
 ''a high priest who cannot have compassion on our infirmi- 
 ties, but one tempted in all things hke as we are, without sin." 
 Like us Jesus labored, prayed, wept, and suffered. Like us 
 He loved His Mother, His disciples. His friends. His country, 
 the imfortunate, the abandoned; like us He experienced 
 sadness, compassion, trouble, fear, weariness; like us, and 
 more keenly than we. He felt physical and moral suffering. 
 From the manger to the cross, in every action, in every 
 sentiment, He could offer Himself as a model to be imitated. 
 
 2d. The perfection of the character and of the fife of Jesus 
 was the more striking because of the contrast it offered to all 
 that was about Him. With the exception of His blessed 
 Mother, and a few chosen souls inspired by Him, Jesus met 
 on every hand a vile and carnal people, hypocritical Scribes, 
 proud Pharisees, and pure formahsts, disciples full of them- 
 selves and of gross faults. What a contrast between the 
 weakness, the vice, the violence by which He was surrounded, 
 and His hohness. His dehcacy, His meekness, His patience! 
 ''Where among His own people did Jesus," says Rousseau, 
 "acquire that elevating and pure morality which He alone 
 has taught by example and by precept? From the bosom 
 of the most violent fanaticism issues the highest wisdom, 
 and the simplicity of the most heroic virtues honors the 
 vilest of people." 
 
 3d. The holiness of Jesus alone is a creative hohness : despite 
 the incomparable superiority of its teachings, none are 
 more easily followed; hence it has begotten in all ages in- 
 
282 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 numerable disciples. ''No sage/' says Voltaire, ''ever had 
 the slightest influence on the morahty of even his immediate 
 surroundings, but Christ has influenced the whole world.'' 
 The example of Jesus, no less than His teaching, has un- 
 ceasingly produced everywhere, during nineteen centuries, 
 miracles of obedience, of purity, of humility, of zeal, of 
 devotion, and of hoHness. True, the saints also have had 
 their sanctifying influence, but it was only by reproducing 
 in themselves traits of the perfection they contemplated in 
 Jesus. 
 
 4th. Still another thing which sets forth the marvellousness 
 of the teaching and the example of Jesus is that He is imitated 
 in that which is most repugnant to nature: He is a thorn- 
 crowned Leader, and His disciples must f oUow Him in His life 
 of humility, obedience, abnegation, and sacrifice. Whether 
 we study Him in the manger, in His hidden, in His public 
 life; whether we contemplate Him in His Passion and His 
 death, we shall find Him giving us everywhere the example 
 of virtues most opposed to our evil incHnations. And this 
 example is followed: "They that are Christ's have crucified 
 their flesh with the vices and concupiscences" (Gal. v. 24). 
 Christians, in order to advance in perfection, seek only to 
 triumph over themselves in imitation of Him whom St. Paul 
 calls "the image of the invisible God" (Coloss. i. 15). 
 
 5th. If Jesus succeeded by His word, and still more by His 
 example, in reforming the world, it was because He made 
 Himself loved. This very love is a marvel in itself. Great 
 men succeed in winning admiration, in exciting enthusiasm; 
 but who among the rarest geniuses has ever won and retained 
 the love of posterity during long ages? " One man alone, " 
 says Lacordaire, " has won from all ages the tribute of undying 
 love; He alone has been loved with a strong and tender, a 
 deep and efficacious love by countless souls, and at the present 
 day millions are ready to die for Him." Read in the 3d 
 conf . on Jesus Christ the eloquent page in which this same 
 orator speaks of the love which Jesus Christ excites in souls. 
 
DIVINITY OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION. 283 
 
 It is impossible to find a saint who has not loved Jesus 
 with fervent ardor. " Lord, Thou knowest that I love Thee, " 
 St. Peter answers with sad tenderness. St. Paul declares 
 that nothing can separate him from the love of this Jesus, 
 whose adorable name he repeats in his epistles no less than 
 two hundred and forty-three times. St. Augustine cannot 
 find words to express the sweetness contained in this divine 
 name. St. Bernard declares that everything is insipid to 
 him without the name of Jesus ; he says it is as honey to the 
 taste, music to the ear, joy to the heart. And all the heroes 
 of Christianity have spoken in hke manner. 
 
 It is this love which still impels so many souls to imitate 
 Jesus when they have learned His divine charms and inef- 
 fable goodness; and their imitation of Him is perfect in 
 proportion to the purity and fervor of their love. What is 
 a Christian worthy of the name but a man who bears in 
 his soul, in his body, in his whole being, the deep imprint of 
 Jesus, a man who strives to make his thoughts, his desires, 
 his words, and his actions conformable to those of his divine 
 Exemplar? A saint is only a grand Christian imitating 
 Jesus in a more complete, more perfect, more heroic manner. 
 
 Conclusion. — The mind absolutely refuses to believe that 
 Jesus, this type of the highest perfection, desired to teach us 
 anything but truth. Reason will never admit that a man 
 could unite the most revolting hypocrisy with the purest 
 and most subhme doctrine, with the most admirable, the most 
 perfect, the holiest fife recorded in the annals of mankind.^ 
 
 An impostor, moreover, never would have employed 
 means tending to defeat his enterprise; far from flattering 
 the passions and caprices of His fellow beings. He did not 
 
 * Infidels, in order to explain the rdle of Jesus, are obliged to have 
 recourse to one of two hypotheses, that He was either a fool or an 
 impostor. Renan, however, manages to make Him an impostor 
 deceiving in good faith, that is, a hypocrite and fool combined: an 
 explanation more inconceivable than the others, for it only adds an 
 odious to an absurd hypothesis. 
 
284 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ignore their faults, He did not seek the protection of the 
 great or powerful of this world, He did not seek worldly- 
 possessions. On the contrary, He waged war against vice, 
 He preached the forgiveness of injuries, the practice of 
 humility, abnegation, and self-denial; His chosen associates 
 were among the poor and the disinherited; He carried His 
 disinterestedness so far as to be without even a stone upon 
 which to rest His head. Far from avoiding the suffering 
 and death prepared for Him by His enemies, whose designs 
 He knew and foretold. He went to meet the soldiers charged 
 to seize Him, and dehvered Himself into their hands. And 
 in the midst of the most terrible outrages and the most cruel 
 torments, His calmness and gentleness never faltered for a 
 moment; His last act was an act of mercy, and His last word 
 a prayer for His enemies. Is this the death, is this the life 
 of an impostor? Yet Jesus must be an impostor if He was 
 not sent from heaven, for He pubhcly proclaimed that He 
 was sent by God. To the Samaritan woman, for example, 
 who was expecting the Messias, He solemnly said: This 
 Messias whom you await, '^I am He who am speaking with 
 thee." Would God permit the most sacrilegious imposture 
 to be confirmed by a life so holy that human reason is 
 forced to accept its testimony? It is absolutely impossible. 
 Therefore the mission of Jesus is divine, and divine also is 
 the rehgion He came to establish. 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 
 
 The divinity of Christ's mission means the divinity of His 
 work. This is the question of which we have been treating in 
 the preceding pages. The divinity of His person is a question 
 apart. Moses also was sent by God; he was also charged 
 to estabhsh among the Jews a new religion superior to the 
 one which preceded it; yet it never entered into the minds 
 of his followers to adore him as God. Jesus, on the contrary, 
 has been adored as God for nineteen centuries by followers 
 who glory in bearing His name and in following His doc- 
 trine. This fact is indisputable ; but is Jesus entitled to this 
 adoration, is He really God? ^ 
 
 This is the important question which now presents itself. 
 It belongs, it is true, to a course of Special Dogmatics, and 
 not to Apologetics, yet we do not feel that we can pass it 
 over in complete silence. As we have been occupied up to 
 the present with Our Lord, as we have stated the prophecies 
 which announced Him and those which He Himself uttered; 
 as we have spoken of His life. His miracles. His Resurrection, 
 of His influence on mankind, etc., we feel it incumbent to 
 say a few words of that which crowns and explains all — His 
 divinity; particularly, as this central and fundamental truth 
 of our holy religion admits of the most brilliant and striking 
 verification. Relying on the incontestable proofs which we 
 have just stated, we believe in the divinity of the mission of 
 
 * Bougaud; Didon, Belief, etc.; Freppel; Gratry; Hedley; Maas 
 (Ch. in Type, etc.); Hunter, II., tr. 11; Morris, The Son of Man; 
 Schanz, 11., ch. 16 ff.; A. C. Q. i. 100, 475; M. S. H., Dec. 1901, 
 
 385 
 
286 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Jesus, because He announced Himself as sent by God ; on the 
 authority of the same proofs we must beheve in the divinity 
 of His person, if He positively proclaimed Himself God. 
 
 Now if there is one thing that has been incontestably 
 proved by innumerable and clear texts, it is that Jesus 
 afhrmed that He is God. He declared on numerous occa- 
 sions, in the most absolute and unequivocal manner, that He 
 is God, the Son of God, equal in all things to His Father 
 who sent Him. Let us prove this briefly.^ 
 
 1. A very simple but peremptory argument is that every 
 unprejudiced mind is completely convinced, by the mere 
 reading of the Gospel, that Jesus proclaimed Himself God, 
 equal in all things to the Father. Thjs conviction is not 
 merely the effect of this or that text taken out of the context, 
 but of the whole book. The special object of St. John's 
 gospel, as ecclesiastical writers, St. Jerome, TertulHan, and 
 others, affirm, is to estabhsh the divinity of Christ; and this 
 is just the charge rationalists make against him. This is 
 sufficiently evident in the beginning and the conclusion of 
 the work. Here is the beginning: 
 
 ''In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with 
 God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning 
 mth God. All things were made by Him : and without Him 
 was made nothing that was made. In Him was hfe, and the 
 life was the light of men. . . . And the Word was made flesh, 
 and dwelt among us." The end is no less explicit: ''These 
 things are written that you may believe that Jesus is the 
 Christ, Son of God." Now when a Christian is convinced 
 that such is the inevitable result of reading a book which he 
 
 ^ We must content ourselves here with the decisive proof furnished 
 by the words of Christ Himself. See Lacordaire, conf. 1 on Jesus 
 Christ. Dogmatic theology gives other equally conclusive proofs, 
 drawn from the prophecies announcing that the Messias would be 
 God: Isaias xxxv., xxv., ix., xl.; Bar. iii.; Ps. xliv., cix., etc.; or 
 from the teaching of the apostles : Acts iii. ; Rom. ix. ; Phil. ii. • Colo=^s. 
 i., ii.; Heb i., etc.; or from apostolic traditions, or from ecclesiasti- 
 cal history^ etc 
 
THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 287 
 
 justly regards as inspired by the Holy Spirit, it becomes 
 equally clear to him that this result was intended by God. 
 
 Infidels themselves, if in good faith, must admit this 
 conclusion, since they all, with few exceptions, admire Jesus 
 as the wisest of men, the most beautiful character that the 
 world has ever seen, the ideal of perfection. 
 
 2. Let us now review the gospels, and select among many 
 texts sufficient to make it evident that they estabfish the 
 divinity of Jesus. 
 
 1st. Jesus attributes to Himself that which men have 
 always, with reason, considered as belonging to God alone. 
 '' I am the Way, and the Truth, and the Life " (John xiv. 6). 
 '' I am the Light of the world: he that followeth Me, walketh 
 not in darkness, but shall have the light of life " (ib. viii. 12). 
 '' I am the hving bread, which came down from heaven '^ 
 (ib. vi. 51). " He that eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, 
 hath everlasting life: and I will raise him up in the last day " 
 (ib. vi. 55). ^'I am the resurrection and the fife: he that 
 befieveth in Me although he be dead, shall five " (ib. xi. 25). 
 " The Son of man shafi send His angels, and they shall gather 
 together His elect" (Mark xiu. 27). " The Son of man shafi 
 send His angels, and they shafi gather out of His kingdom 
 afi scandals, and them that work iniquity" (Matth. xiu. 41). 
 " For as the Father raiseth up the dead, and giveth fife, so 
 the Son also giveth fife to whom He wifi '' (John v. 21). '' For 
 where there are two or three gathered together in My name, 
 there am I in the midst of them " (Matth. xvifi. 20). '' What- 
 soever you ask the Father in My name He wifi give it to you. 
 Whatsoever you shall ask the Father in My name, that will I 
 do" (John XV. 16; xiv. 13). ''And every one that hath left 
 house, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or 
 children, or lands for My name's sake, shall receive an hun- 
 dred fold, and shafi possess life everlasting " (Matth. xix. 29). 
 " For what things soever the Father doth, these the Son also 
 doth in like manner " (John v. 19). " If any one love Me, he 
 wifi keep My word, and My Father wifi love him, and We 
 
288 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 mil come to him, and will make our abode with him" 
 (ib. xiv. 23). ''All things whatsoever the Father hath are 
 Mine" (ib. xvi. 15). 
 
 Our Saviour attests His divinity no less clearly when He 
 forgives sin (Luke v. 21-24) ; when He declares that He will 
 send the Holy Spirit, as the Father hath sent Him (John 
 xiv. 26 ; XV. 26) ; when He announces that He will come at 
 the end of the world, to judge the hving and the dead, and to 
 render to each one according to his works (Matth. xxv. 
 31-46). 
 
 If we would appreciate the conclusive evidence of these 
 texts, let us suppose for a moment that they are uttered by 
 a simple mortal ! 
 
 Jesus proclaims Himself eternal: ''Before Abraham was 
 made I am" (John viii. 58). Observe the analogy between 
 this expression and that which David uses in speaking of 
 God: "Before the mountains were made, . . . Thou art 
 God" (Ps. Ixxxix. 2). It recalls also the subHme definition 
 which God gives of Himself, "I am who am." "And now 
 glorify Thou Me, Father, with Thyself, with the glory 
 which I had, before the world was, with Thee " (John xvii. 5). 
 He shows that He knows all things, even the most secret 
 recesses of the human heart (Matth. ix. 4). He is omnipo- 
 tent, for it is by His own power that He will return to life 
 (John X. 18). The miracles which He works and which 
 suppose a divine power are performed in His own name and 
 by His own merits. Other thaumaturges work miracles in 
 the name of God, in virtue of a delegated power; it was as 
 sovereign Master that Jesus commanded nature, men, angels, 
 and demons: "Young man, I say to thee, arise" (Luke vii. 
 14). "I will, be thou made clean " (Matth. viii. 3). " Lazarus, 
 come forth from the tomb" (John xi. 43), etc. The source 
 of this power is so truly within Him that a miraculous virtue 
 escapes, so to speak, from His divine person, without His 
 knowledge, as we see in the healing of the issue of blood. 
 Moreover, not only does He exercise at will this power 
 
THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 289 
 
 which belongs to Him by right, but He delegates it to whom 
 He pleases; He promises His apostles that they shall work 
 in His name miracles more marvellous than His own. 
 
 2d. Jesus clearly affirms His identity with the nature of 
 His Father, as well as the distinction of persons, and con- 
 sequently claims the worship and honors due to God alone. 
 ''I and the Father are one" (John x. 30). You believe in 
 God, said He to His apostles, beheve also in Me (ib. xiv. 1). 
 ^'God so loved the world as to give His only-begotten Son.'' 
 ''He that belie veth in Him is not judged; but he that 
 doth not beheve in Him is already judged: because he 
 beheveth not in the name of the only-begotten Son of God " 
 (ib. iii. 16, 18). He wishes us to pray to Him even as we 
 would to the Father (ib. xiv. 13; xvi. 23, 24). While He 
 proclaims the divine precept: The Lord thy God shalt 
 thou adore, and Him only shalt thou serve. He permits 
 Himself to be adored by the man bom bhnd, by the holy 
 women, and by His disciples (ib. ix. 38; Matth. xxviii. 9-17). 
 He declares that all men should honor the Son as they 
 honor the Father (John v. 23). When St. Thomas, finally 
 convinced of the Resurrection of his Master, said to Him, 
 ''My Lord and my God," far from censuring these words 
 as blasphemous, Jesus publicly approved the faith of His 
 disciple, and blessed those who in future ages would imitate 
 his example (ib. xx. 28, 29). 
 
 3d. Let us mention particularly a few solemn occasions 
 when, in presence of His disciples, of His enemies, or of His 
 very judges, or the great council of His nation, Jesus pro- 
 claimed His divinity in the most positive and formal manner. 
 We shall see that even those who pursued Him with implacable 
 hatred never misapprehended the meaning of His words. 
 
 He questioned His disciples one day about Himself: 
 "Whom do you say that I am?" Simon Peter answered 
 and said: "Thou art Christ the Son of the living God." 
 Far from rejecting this clear and positive profession of faith, 
 Jesus praises His disciple for it, and declares it to be inspired 
 
290 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 by His Father in heaven, since He alone could make known 
 the mystery of the eternal generation (Matth. xvi. 13-18). 
 
 On another occasion, Jesus being in the midst of the people, 
 they said to Him: ''How long dost Thou hold our souls in 
 suspense? If Thou be the Christ, tell us plainly." Jesus 
 answered: ''I speak to you and you believe not: the works 
 that I do in the name of My Father, they give testimony of 
 Me. ... I and the Father are one." On hearing these words 
 the Jews took up stones to stone Him as a blasphemer. 
 Jesus, midisturbed by their threats, and far from retracting, 
 said to them: ''Many good works I have showed you from 
 My Father; for which of those works do you stone Me?" 
 The Jews answered Him: "For a good work we stone Thee 
 not, but for blasphemy; and because that, being a man. 
 Thou makest Thyself God." (John x.) 
 
 Behold Him now before the Sanhedrin, the supreme re- 
 hgious tribunal of His nation. The high priest puts the 
 ciuestion formally in the most unequivocal terms: "I adjure 
 Thee by the livhig God that Thou tell us if Thou be the Christ 
 the Son of God." " Thou hast said it," Jesus calmly replies. 
 And to confirm this categorical affirmation He adds: " Never- 
 theless, I say to you, hereafter you shall see the Son of 
 man sitting on the right hand of the power of God, and coming 
 in the clouds of heaven." On hearing these words, the high 
 priest rent his garments, saying: "What further need have 
 we of witnesses? Behold, now you have heard the blasphemy ; 
 what think you? But they answering said: He is guilty 
 of death." (Matth. xxvi. 63, 64, 65, 66.) 
 
 From this tribunal Jesus is led to the Roman governor, 
 who, convinced of His innocence, is about to release Him, but 
 the princes of the people cry: "We have a law; and accord- 
 ing to the law He ought to die, because He made Himself 
 the Son of God" (John xix.). On Calvary we hear this sig- 
 nificant insult: "If Thou be the Son of God, come down from 
 the cross." Then they who were converted by the spectacle 
 of this divine death strike their breasts and exclaim: "In- 
 
THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 291 
 
 deed this was the Son of God" (Matth. xxvii.). Because He 
 affirmed His divinity Christ was condemned and suffered 
 death. 
 
 3. Jesus, not satisfied with pubhcly proclaiming His 
 divinity, cites in support of His affirmation the testimony 
 of His works: miracles, the infalhble signs of truth, create 
 faith in His words. When, for example, the Scribes and 
 Pharisees, scandaUzed that He forgVes sins, accuse Him 
 of blasphemy. He contents Himself with replying: '^ That you 
 may know that the Son of man has power on earth to for- 
 give sins, I say to thee" (addressing the man sick of the 
 palsy), ''Arise, take up thy bed, and go into thy house" 
 (Luke V. 24). A^ain, ^'BeUeve you not," He says else- 
 where, "that I am in the Father and the Father in Me? 
 Otherwise believe for the very work's sake" (John xiv. 11). 
 ''The works that I do in the name of My Father, they give 
 testimony of Me " (ib. x. 25). '' If I do not the works of My 
 Father, believe Me not; but if I do, though you will not be- 
 lieve Me, believe the works : that you may know and believe 
 that the Father is in Me, and I in the Father " (ib. x. 37, 38). 
 
 Remakk. — Jesus Christ is at the same time perfect God 
 and perfect man. Equal to the Father according to the 
 divinity. He is less than the Father according to the humanity. 
 The divine nature and the human are closely imited in the 
 person of the Word. "For as the rational soul and the 
 flesh is one man, so God and man is one Christ," says the 
 Athanasian Creed. Consequently we can and we should 
 attribute to Jesus Christ, God-man, all the properties and 
 all the actions of both natures. Hence it is true to say 
 of Jesus that He is eternal, and at the same time that He 
 was bom and that He died. These propositions do not 
 contradict each other, they refer to the qualities of these 
 two different natures: if Jesus is eternal as God, as man 
 He is mortal. Therefore, the same person being both God 
 and man, Jesus, though the Son of God, could call Himself 
 the Sou of man, could declare His Father greater than He, 
 
292 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 could say that there were things that only His Father knew, 
 that Ilis Father had abandoned Him, etc. 
 
 It gives us pleasure to add that it is in virtue of this same 
 law, called in theology communicatio idiomatum,^ that Mary, 
 though only a creature, is justly styled the Mother of God. 
 No doubt this holy and spotless virgin did not give birth to 
 the divine nature, but she bore a Son who is God. This will 
 be her eternal honor; it also justifies the special homage and 
 hyperduHa worship offered her throughout all Christian ages. 
 How could a disciple, a brother of Jesus Christ, not place 
 all confidence in her whom God chose to be the Mother of His 
 well-beloved Son in whom He is well pleased; in her whom 
 the Doctors and saints of the Church have been pleased to 
 call the all-powerful advocate; in her, finally, whom Jesus, 
 dying on the cross, bequeathed to us as mother, and whom 
 He made so kind, so tender, so merciful that she might help 
 us to bear with patience the trials of this fife and attain a 
 happy eternity with Him? ^ 
 
 Conclusion. — It is as evident that Jesus is truly God as 
 that He was sent by God.^ Hence we have only to cast our- 
 selves at His feet, and, with hearts burning with gratitude 
 and love, exclaim with Thomas, ^' My Lord and my God! " 
 
 ^ On this communication of properties or attributes see Hunter, 
 II., n. 537. 
 
 2 Newman, Difficulties of Angl., II., letter to Pusey; Br. W. vii 
 416, viii. 59, 186; Concilio, Knowledge of Mary; Ward, Devotional 
 Essays, 1-4; Ryder, Cath. Controversy, p. II., charge 1, §3; Petita- 
 lot, The Virgin Mother; Jeanjacquot, Simple Expjlanations concerning 
 the Most Holy Virgin; J. L. Spalding, lect. 1. 8; Gans, Mariolatry; M., 
 Oct. 1902; Card. Gibbon, Faith of 0. F., ch. 14, and in A. C. Q. iii.; 
 Hunter, II., tr. 12. 
 
 ^ To the objection: If Christ were God, the whole world would have 
 acknowledged him as God, Picard replies: ''Such an assertion takes 
 for granted that God cannot reveal Himself except in an irresistible 
 manner, repressing along with liberty of faith the possibility of 
 merit" (p. 273). 
 
THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 293 
 
 Summary of the Ten Proofs. Conclusion of the 
 
 First Part. 
 
 1. We have stated some of the fundamental proofs of the 
 Christian religion. The greater number of these proofs, even 
 if taken separately, are irresistibly convincing; one alone, 
 duly considered, suffices to carry conviction to every honest 
 and unprejudiced mind. To estabhsh any truth whatever, 
 all that is required, in fact, is one good argument; when this 
 argument exists all the objections are necessarily of no real 
 value; they cannot but be specious. Now here we have a 
 host of proofs from various sources in favor of the divinity 
 of the Christian religion, and when each one of them is so 
 conclusive in itself, what must they be if we take them, as we 
 should, as a magnificent whole? 
 
 How can we reasonably doubt the divinity of a rehgion in 
 favor of which can be cited the universal expectation of ages 
 anterior to the Christian era ; the entire history of the Jewish 
 people; the accomphshment of promises, prophecies, and 
 figures; the superior character of the evangelical doctrine; 
 the hohness of the life of its Author, the authority and great 
 number of His miracles and His prophecies; the no less 
 wonderful works of His apostles and disciples to whom He 
 promised the power of working miracles; the estabhshment, 
 propagation, and preservation, humanly unaccountable, of 
 the religion which He founded; the conversion of the world 
 to this religion, which thwarted all its passions and con- 
 tradicted all the reigning ideas ; the transformation of society, 
 of laws, and of morals; the unceasing testimony of martyrs; 
 the assent of the greatest geniuses the world ever produced; 
 the adoration and love of noblest hearts ; the beautiful fruits 
 produced in souls by the vivifying breath of the Gospel; 
 marvels without number of humility, of charity, of purity, and 
 abnegation of which the world never dreamed ; the successive 
 defeat of men and systems hostile to it; the faith and piety 
 
294 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 which sprung with new hfe in the midst of assaults and 
 denials; the unexpected return of minds to the faith just 
 when her cause seemed lost? All this, in fact, constitutes 
 the most briUiant proof of our faith, and superabundantly 
 justifies the belief of the innumerable generations who have 
 chosen to follow the standard of the cross. If arguments 
 of such a character establish only a colossal error, prostrating 
 the greater part of the civihzed world, including the greatest 
 geniuses of mankind, at the feet of an infamous impostor, 
 what must we think of the wisdom and goodness of God? 
 Yes; God is wise and good, hence He has prepared numer- 
 ous and convincing proofs in order that we may accept 
 revelation, not bhndly, but with an eminently reasonable 
 assent truly worthy of Him. 
 
 2. This holy religion which Christ taught the world is 
 binding upon all men until the end of time. The same facts 
 which estabhsh that God placed Himself, by means of His 
 incarnate Son, in direct and immediate relation with man, 
 force us to recognize the strict obligation on our part to 
 enter into this order of grace and glory founded by Him 
 for our benefit. No doubt in calling us to Christianity and 
 making us His children by adoption, and heirs of heaven, 
 God performed an act of love, but it was also an act of au- 
 thority. Our sovereign Master wdlled that we should accept 
 the gifts which His goodness offered us. His infinite majesty 
 cannot but claim the glory which He expects from His 
 chosen creature. 
 
 Moreover, our supernatural regeneration cost the Son of 
 God, Our Saviour, so dear, that religion, which assures us the 
 benefits of it by applying to us the merits of His blood, cannot 
 be an institution which we are free to reject or accept. 
 ''Jesus Christ has left a creed to enlighten the world; com- 
 mandments to guide it ; sacraments, a sacrifice, and priesthood 
 to sanctify it; His own representatives to rule it till the end 
 of time. Thirty years He consecrated to His work, which was 
 only terminated on the sorrowful tree of the cross. How 
 
THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 295 
 
 could it ever be possible to preserve our claims to heaven 
 and yet refuse to see a dogma in this creed, a law in this 
 decalogue, a sacrifice on this cross, and a divine institution 
 in this Church? It would be the most groundless preten- 
 sion that could be imagined." (Mgr. Bresson.) The will 
 of the divine Legislator is manifested on this point with a 
 clearness which leaves no room for doubt. When leaving 
 the world He said to His apostles: '^Go ye into the whole 
 world, and preach the Gospel to every creature. He that 
 beheveth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that be- 
 lieveth not shall be condemned." (Mark xvi. 15, 16.) 
 "God," says St. Paul, "hath exalted His Son, and hath 
 given Him a name which is above every name; that in the 
 name of Jesus every knee should bow of those that are in 
 heaven, on earth, and under the earth" (Phil. ii. 9, 10). 
 "There is one God and one Mediator between God and men, 
 the man Christ Jesus, who gave Himself a redemption for all " 
 (1 Tim. ii. 5, 6) ; and again he says that God hath chosen " to 
 re-estabhsh all things in Christ, . . . and hath subjected all 
 things under His feet" (Eph. i. 10, 22). And in the Acts we 
 read that Jesus "is the stone which was rejected by the 
 builders, which is become the head of the corner: ... for 
 there is no other name under heaven given to men whereby 
 we must be saved " (iv. 11, 12).^ 
 
 3. The best of civilized mankind has believed in the divinity 
 of the Christian religion. And yet we find, even, among 
 scholars, men who reject all revealed religion or who go so 
 far as to profess a degrading and hopeless materialism. The 
 various causes of this deplorable blindness are set forth in 
 many works. ^ 
 
 No doubt ignorance in matters of religion is, particularly 
 in the present day, one of the chief causes of unbelief. But 
 
 ^MacCarthy, Sermon on Unbelief: fragment of a sermon on in- 
 difference in matters of religion. 
 
 ' Laforet, Why Men do Not Believe; Lacordaire, conf. 15, 16, on 
 Cath. Doctrine and the Mind; M. xlvi. 531. 
 
296 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the most usual cause among young men who have received 
 a religious education is, unquestionably, immorality. For, 
 as Mgr. Freppel recently said: ''That which prevents our 
 seeing clearly the things of God is the great predominance 
 of the senses over the mind. The passions are like dense 
 vapors which, rising from the depths of the conscience, place 
 themselves between the eye of the soul and the sun of truth 
 and intercept the rays of eternal justice. Remove this veil 
 and light will appear, and religion will shine forth in all 
 the splendor of its incomparable certainty."^ 
 
 Religion curbs the passions, it commands man to rule his 
 senses, instead of letting them rule him; it commands him, 
 according to the beautiful expression of Descartes, to keep 
 his heart so high that matter cannot reach him. This is 
 what we dread in religion, this is what constrains and vexes 
 us, and we affect not to believe it in order to be dispensed 
 from doing what it prescribes. Nothing is more true than 
 this celebrated saying of Euler: ''If the theorems of Euclid 
 were moral precepts, they would have been denied long ago." 
 
 But great minds are most frequently united to noble 
 hearts. Therefore in all ages the greatest men have been men 
 of strong faith, sincere Christians. No one certainly would 
 class as feeble-minded men Athenagoras, Arnobius, Epipha- 
 nius, Justin, Clement of Alexandria, Origen, Mintius Felix, 
 Cyprian, Gregory, Cyril, Ambrose, Augustine, and many 
 others, who in the first ages of the Church believed with 
 fervent faith and displayed rare eloquence in the defence of 
 their belief. Who would venture to tax with weak credulity 
 Alfred the Great, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bonaventure, 
 St. Anselm, Bossuet, Fenelon, Malebranche, Bacon, Des- 
 cartes, Newton, Leibnitz, Euler, and innumerable others 
 who have never ceased to appreciate and admire the truths of 
 Christianity? 
 
 And even the last century, so justly proud of its 
 admirable discoveries, includes a multitude of scholars of 
 ^ Lacordaire, ib., conf. 14, 17, 18, 19. 
 
THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST. 297 
 
 every kind who have never faltered in their complete and 
 entire allegiance to the truths of revelation. And to men- 
 tion only representatives of sciences which are frequently 
 made to contradict revelation, there is no doubt that the 
 testimony of men like Volta, A. M. Ampere, Elie de Beaumont, 
 Cauchy, Biot, Hermite, Puiseux, Le Verrier, de Blainville, 
 Gratiolet, Secchi, Thenard, J. B. Dumas, Andre Dumont, 
 d'Omalius, d'Halloy, Van Beneden, and many others, is 
 quite equal to that of men like Moleschott, Vogt, Buchner, 
 and their companions in unbelief. It would be easy to make 
 this list of learned Catholics of the present day much longer, 
 but this enumeration may serve as a subsidiary proof of the 
 truth of our holy faith. ^ 
 
 Supported by such a vast and noble company we have no 
 reason to fear that we shall be accused of blindly or impru- 
 dently accepting revealed truth. ^ We can say in the words 
 
 ^ See references to P. II., ch. 5, art. 3. 
 
 ^ " The Pharisees of modern as of ancient times would fain persuade 
 us that the common people are credulous, whereas only those of re- 
 fined and cultivated minds can be free from error. But even if we 
 admit this distinction, does it follow that no Christians are highly 
 cultured men? . . . Has not every country possessed its men of sound 
 logic, strong, good sense, of clear discernment and prudence, and of 
 practical knowledge of life, who have not the less been good Catho- 
 lics? If such men as these, placed in circumstances which enabled 
 them ... to form a right judgment after weighing well the argu- 
 ments on both sides, have been able to arrive at a definite conclusion 
 and to become ardent believers, surely our opponents must admit 
 that there remains something to be said in behalf of the faith which 
 they consider so utterly contemptible. 
 
 "Moreover, several of the boldest and most daring Protestants 
 in Germany, France, and England have arrived at the conviction, 
 after free inquiry and in the unconstrained exercise of their private 
 judgment, that the Christian facts are true and that the foundations 
 of Christianity are impregnable. The belief of thinkers and critics 
 of this class proves very well that, though the proofs of Christianity 
 may be assailed, they cannot be demolished. Hence the fact that 
 some learned men do not believe in it is by no means a conclusive 
 argument against Christianity." Picard, p. 615 f. 
 
298 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 of the illustrious mathematician Cauchy: ^'I am a Christian, 
 that is, I believe in the divinity of Jesus Christ, with Tycho 
 Brahe, Copernicus, Descartes, Newton, Fermal, Leibnitz, 
 Pascal, Grimaldi, Euler, Gudlin, Boscowich, Gerdil; with all 
 the great astronomers, physicians, geometricians of past 
 ages. I am a Catholic with the majority of them, and I am 
 ready to give a reason for my faith. My convictions are not 
 the result of inherited prejudices, but of a profound exam- 
 ination. I am a sincere Catholic with Corneille, Racine, la 
 Bruyere, Bossuet, Bourdaloue, Fenelon; with the most dis- 
 tinguished men of our age, with those who have done most 
 for science, philosophy, and literature; with those who have 
 been the most illustrious members of our institutions. I 
 share the profound convictions expressed in the words, the 
 actions, and the writings of our greatest scholars, Ruffini, 
 Haiiy, Laennec, Ampere, Pelletier, Freycinet, Coriolis; and 
 if I refrain, out of regard for their modesty, from mentioning 
 others, I can say at least that it gave me great pleasure 
 to find all the nobility and generosity of the Christian faith 
 in my illustrious friends, in the inventor of crystallography 
 (Canon Haiiy), in the celebrated navigator of the Uranie 
 (Claude Marie de Freycinet), and in the immortal author 
 of electro-dynamics (Andre-Marie Ampere)/' 
 
PART SECOND. 
 THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 GENERAL NOTIONS. 
 
 I. Our Object. 
 
 Relying on the testimony of the Old and the New Testa- 
 ment, historic docimients of incontestable authority, we have 
 conclusively proved the divinity of the Christian religion. But 
 where is the true Christianity, preached and imposed upon 
 mankind by Jesus Christ, to be found? This is the important 
 question we have now to solve. 
 
 The Christian religion, instituted to be practised by all 
 men, does not and cannot exist in an abstract state. It is 
 presented to us by a concrete society called the Church, a 
 visible society, which professes the doctrines of Christ and 
 observes His laws. 
 
 There are many religious societies, each one of which 
 claims to be charged with the divine mission of preserving 
 in all its integrity the teaching of Christ and transmitting 
 it from age to age to the end of the world. Nevertheless 
 it is evident, as we shall soon show, that, among these 
 churches, differing so widely in dogmas, in precepts, and 
 in worship, one only is the true Church; the others can be 
 only sects, condemned by Jesus Christ, whose name they 
 falsely bear. 
 
 299 
 
300 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 The proper object of this second part of our work is to 
 enable us to discern with certainty the Church founded by 
 Christ, to show that only the Church of Rome, which has 
 the Pope as its supreme head, has a right to our belief, our 
 respect, our obedience, and our love. 
 
 The order of this demonstration is as follows : 
 
 Having given some general notions of the Church founded 
 by Jesus Christ, of her nature, end, constitution, etc., we 
 shall show that this Church is the Roman Catholic Church, 
 to the exclusion of all other Christian communions. 
 
 We shall then speak of some of her prerogatives, of her 
 supreme head, and of her relations with the State. Finally, 
 we must defend the Church against certain false accusations 
 made particularly by historians, and show what she has done, 
 and never ceases to do, for the civilization and happiness 
 of nations. 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. We have no need to dwell here upon Chris- 
 tian communions which have disappeared many centuries 
 ago, leaving hardly a trace in history. St. Augustine enu- 
 merated in his time more than eighty-four heresies almost 
 completely extinct; and in the sixteenth century Bellarmin, 
 after mentioning two himdred heresies previous to Luther, 
 added: '^ All these sects have perished; in the East there are 
 a few Nestorians and Eutychians, and in Bohemia a few 
 belated followers of John Huss.'' It is very evident that 
 we have no need to revive these errors long buried in merited 
 oblivion. It will be sufficient to compare with Catholicity 
 the churches which have preserved some vitality, that is, 
 certain Protestant sects, and the schismatic Greek churches. 
 The triumphant conclusion of this parallel applies more 
 forcibly still to other anti-Catholic sects. 
 
 2d. In this treatise the discussion takes, as we see, an en- 
 tirely different ground from that of the first part of the 
 work. There we assumed that we were dealing with infidels, 
 unbelievers, and rationalists, who refuse to acknowledge the 
 divinity of Christ's mission and the obligation to embrace 
 
GENERAL NOTIONS ABOUT THE CHURCH. 301 
 
 the religion established by Him. For that reason the only 
 proofs we cited were historic documents and the truths of 
 reason. Now the discussion is particularly with schismatic 
 Greeks and those of our separated brethren, who, like us, 
 believe in the divinity of Christ and admit that the Holy 
 Scripture is inspired. Therefore we may quote as decisive 
 arguments texts of the Old and the New Testament which 
 we both regard as the words of infallible truth. Even those 
 who, unfortunately, reject the authority of the Scriptures 
 can receive them nevertheless, as well as the writings and 
 documents of the Fathers of the Church, as historic records 
 of incontestable value. 
 
 II. The Church. 
 
 1. Definition of the Church. — Writers assign to this 
 word ^' church '' (eKKXifGia^ assembly) sometimes a broader 
 and sometimes a more restricted meaning. In the broader 
 sense of the term the Church is an assembly which embraces 
 all the faithful servants of God, whether they are still com- 
 bating on earth, or expiating their faults in the fires of pur- 
 gatory, or triumphing in heaven, including at times even the 
 angels. In the more restricted sense the Church is only an 
 assembly of the faithful who are combating upon earth (the 
 Church mihtant). Taken in this second acceptation the 
 Church may include all the true adorers of God from the 
 beginning of the world until the end of time; all, in fact, who 
 have beheved or will beheve in the revealed religion, essen- 
 tially the same in its three different phases. Nevertheless 
 the word church generally designates the Christian Church 
 as it exists in the world since Christ came to give the final 
 perfection to supernatural rehgion. 
 
 In the present treatise we are considering the Church in 
 this last or more restricted sense. Thus understood it may 
 be defined as the society of the faithful instituted by Christ 
 to preserve His doctrine, observe His laws, and thus attain 
 the final end of man, or eternal fife. 
 
302 christian apologetics. 
 
 2. The Christian Religion Constitutes a Real 
 Society, a Church. — Rationalists, we have seen, do not 
 refuse to recognize in Jesus Christ the ideal type of human 
 perfection; but however pure and striking His virtue. He is, 
 they allege, only a simple mortal and the Christian rehgion 
 is not His work; it has nothing in common with Him but the 
 doctrine which it professes. But if this be true, how was it 
 possible for the followers of Christ to form a society and 
 constitute a Church? Here is the explanation which they 
 hazard on the subject. Christians accustomed to study 
 unceasingly the doctrine of this Wise Man, whose hfe and 
 teachings they admired, and being accustomed, moreover, 
 to indulge in philosophic speculations, and having become 
 very numerous, they were naturally led to form a body, or 
 society. For the idea of Christ and His doctrine they grad- 
 ually substituted that of a society founded by Him, and as 
 they recalled the ancient glory of the synagogue they took 
 refuge under its shadow until they felt sufficiently strong to 
 separate from it. Thus certain rationalists insist that it 
 was only in the second century that the Christian Church 
 dared to proclaim its existence and appear in public, and 
 that it was also at this period that the gospels were written. 
 
 This was the theory introduced by Strauss in Germany, 
 and adopted in France by Littre, under the name of mythic 
 rationalism. Of course in the eyes of such men the super- 
 natural facts, the miracles attributed to Christ by Holy 
 Scripture, are only myths, figurative impressions, purely 
 intellectual conceptions. 
 
 In the first part of the present work we have answered 
 these last assertions as well as the assertions relative to the 
 composition of the gospels. It now remains for us to con- 
 fute the false assertions in regard to the establishment of the 
 Church by demonstrating the following thesis. But let us 
 first explain some of the terms. 
 
 We understand by the word society a collection of men 
 uniting their individual forces for the attainment of a common 
 
GENERAL NOTIONS ABOUT THE CHURCH. 303 
 
 end by the employment of conimon means. Hence we 
 find in every society four necessary elements: the mem- 
 bers, their united efforts, common means, and a common end. 
 
 The special nature of the society is determined by the end 
 it has in view. The end of domestic society is different 
 from that of civil society or that of religious society. This 
 end is what imites men into societies and determines the 
 means they use in pursuit of their purpose. 
 
 One of the most indispensable elements of any society in- 
 tended to last is authority; besides being the moral bond 
 wtiich holds the members together it presides over them all, 
 incites, moderates, directs, and reforms, according as it is 
 necessary for the good of all or the individual. Thus in 
 every society authority is invested with certain prerogatives 
 proportioned to the end to be attauied by its subjects. 
 
 Now we shall briefly prove that Jesus f oimded the Christian 
 society; in other words, that He Himself gathered His 
 disciples into one body in order to pursue a common end 
 (their salvation) by common means (preaching, worship, 
 sacraments), and under authority divinely established (the 
 heads appointed by Him). 
 
 Thesis. — Jesus Christ Truly and Personally Founded His 
 Religion under the Form of a real Society, of a Church. 
 
 We shall be satisfied here with merely mentioning the 
 arguments ; the development which they allow belongs rightly 
 to the following theses.* 
 
 First Argument. — ^We learn from the Gospel, 1st. That 
 Jesus Christ solemnly promised to institute a Church when 
 choosing among His twelve apostles one to whom He gave 
 the symbolic name of Peter. He said to him: ''Thou art 
 Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church; and the 
 gates of hell shall not prevail against it." This promise 
 
 * Manning, Religio Viatoris, ch. iv.; Grounds of Faith, 1. 2; Schanz, 
 HT., ch. 2, 3; Hunter, I., tr. 4, ch. 1-3; C. W. xxvi. 434, 653; Lock- 
 hart, Old Rel., ch. ^ ff.; Pi-Q^rd, p. II., ch. 5. 
 
304 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 already furnishes an incontestable proof, for Jesus Christ 
 could not fail in His word. 
 
 2d. That He executed His promise and founded this Church. 
 We read, in fact, that He gave to His apostles the power and 
 mission to preach the Gospel to every creature ; to administer 
 the sacraments; to govern the faithful; and that He prom- 
 ised to be with them until the end of time. At the head of 
 the apostles He placed Simon, to whom He gave universal 
 jurisdiction over the whole Church. This certainly was 
 founding a religious society, a Church. 
 
 3d. We learn from the same Gospel and the Book of Acts 
 that the apostles, after the Ascension, fulfilled the mission 
 that they had received: they preached the doctrine of 
 Christ, they observed His laws, they increased from day to 
 day the number of the disciples and governed them under 
 the guidance of Peter, who had been appointed their su- 
 preme head. 
 
 Second Argument. (Of Prescription.) — ^The existence 
 itself of the Church proves its Christian origin. Just as the 
 secular existence of a nation, a civil society, proves the 
 reality of its foundation, so the existence of the Church, that 
 is, of that society distinct from all others, and which from 
 all time has been called the Church of Christ — an existence 
 uninterrupted through all the Christian ages — proves the 
 reality of its Christian institution. By her name, her wor- 
 ship, her temples, her sacraments, her ministers, her organi- 
 zations, her general and special councils, the uninterrupted 
 succession of her first pastors, her marvellous institutions, 
 her moral and civilizing influence, the Church has never 
 ceased for nineteen centuries to attest that she was originally 
 foimded by Jesus Christ.^ 
 
 Remarks. — We shall find the preceding argument still 
 more convincing if we weigh the following reflections. 
 
 1st. Christianity is not a purely abstract conception like 
 
 ^ C. W. xxxi., xxxii. (Genesis of Cath. Ch.), xxxiii., xxxiv. (Chris- 
 tian Jerusalem). 
 
GENERAL NOTIONS ABOUT THE CHURCH. 305 
 
 Platens ideal republic; it is not simply a collection of docu- 
 ments and moral principles offered to the admiration of the 
 curious, but a living, concrete reality. The word religion 
 means a society professing religion, consequently a Church. 
 Therefore, the Christian religion and the Christian Church 
 are one and the same thing; one is only the visible mani- 
 festation of the other; therefore if Jesus founded His relig- 
 ion He founded His Church, that is, the visible society of 
 those who profess His doctrine.^ 
 
 2d. The proofs by which we have established the divinity 
 of the Christian religion apply, the greater part of them, 
 directly to the Church. Thus it was Christianity, not in the 
 abstract, but as forming a society, a Church, which was pre- 
 dicted and prescribed by the oracles and the prophets; it 
 was the establishment of the Church which was marked by 
 the seal of miracles; it was her divine origin which was 
 attested by the blood of martyrs, which was miraculously 
 established and preserved, and which produced the most 
 marvellous fruits of virtue in souls and the richest blessings 
 to mankind. 
 
 Corollary. The obligation of being a member of the 
 Church in order to be saved. ^ — This obligation readily follows 
 from the preceding thesis. There are societies which are 
 voluntary and optional; except in special circumstances no 
 one is obliged to enter them; if we assume their obligations, 
 it is to enjoy the advantages which they afford. Such are 
 financial societies, such also are religious orders. If after 
 we have entered societies of this kind we are obliged to 
 remain, it is because we cannot leave them without violating 
 the vows which we have voluntarily taken. 
 
 It is quite otherwise with the religious society, the Church. 
 
 * Br. W. xii. 59; J. L. Spalding, Lectures, I. 10. 
 
 ^ Dr. Edw. Hawarden, Charity and Truth; Hay, Sincere Christian, 
 vol. ii., append.; Schanz, IH., ch. 9; Ryder (C. T. S. vol. v.); Balmes, 
 Letters to a Sceptic, 1. 16; Br. W. v. 571; C. W. xxxi. 481, xlvii. 
 145, xlviii. 509; M. Ivii. 363, Ixxiii. 236, 344, 
 
306 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 It is a strict obligation for every man to enter it, for, as we 
 have already seen, every man is obliged to enter the super- 
 natural order, and this order is attained through the Church of 
 Christ. We have, moreover, the formal command of Jesus 
 Christ, the Founder of the Church: "Go preach the Gospel 
 to all nations, baptizing them. ... He that will not be- 
 lieve shall be condemned." This was always Catholic belief, 
 the doctrine of the Fathers and of the Councils. ''Faith 
 teaches us," says Pius IX., "that outside the Roman Cath- 
 olic Apostolic Church there is no salvation ; it is the only ark 
 of salvation, and whosoever will not enter it will be the 
 victim of the deluge." Let us add here a remark which we 
 shall develop more fully later: they who, through no fault 
 of their own, are ignorant of the existence of the true Church 
 and the obligation to form a part thereof, are not punished 
 for not entering it. We shall state in its proper place the 
 conditions under which such persons may form part of 
 the soul of the Church and enter heaven (ch. 4, art. 1, iv.). 
 
 3. The End of the Church. — The proper and direct end 
 of the Church founded by Jesus Christ, or the end which He 
 proposed in instituting the Church, was to save souls and 
 to lead men to eternal salvation. Nothing is more evident 
 than this in the gospels and throughout the New Testament. 
 Moreover, the Church, as history proves, has never, either 
 in theory or practice, claimed any other end. She has, 
 indeed, contributed to the welfare of individuals and of 
 governments; but this was an indirect though natural effect 
 of her teachings. 
 
 Considering this supernatural end, the Church may be 
 said to be a supernatural society, a society of souls, though 
 it is no less true that she is a visible and corporal society. 
 In fact when she speaks to the soul it is through the organs 
 of the body; the means she employs, preaching and sacra- 
 ments, are corporal and sensible means; the authority 
 which governs her is a physical and tangible authority. 
 
GENERAL NOTIONS ABOUT THE CHURCH. 307 
 
 This shows the absurdity of the following sophism of certain 
 Protestants. The Church, they argue, is a society of souls; 
 hence she is wholly spiritual; therefore they must reject 
 the Church of Rome, because she has a Pope, bishops, sacra- 
 ments, and religious ceremonies. 
 
 4. Constitution of the Church, or Ecclesiastical 
 Hierarchy. — In every State or civil society there are two 
 orders of citizens, those who command and those who obey. 
 Similarly, in the Church or society founded by Jesus Christ 
 there are two constituent elements, those who teach and 
 command, those who hear and obey. The first constitute 
 the teaching Church — they are called the pastors, the ministry, 
 the hierarchy; the second constitute that portion of the 
 Church who are taught — they are called the faithful or laity, 
 the fold or flock. 
 
 We distinguish, generally, three forms of government: 
 monarchical, aristocratic, and republican. The form of gov- 
 ernment imposed upon the Church by her divine Founder 
 is monarchical. In fact Peter, as we shall prove later, was 
 invested with the primacy, that is, with supreme power, 
 which he was to transmit to his successors. But just as in 
 civil monarchy there must be heads of provinces, chiefs 
 or governors subordinate to the ruling power or sovereign, 
 so in the ecclesiastical monarchy there is one supreme head 
 who is the Pope, the Vicar of Jesus Christ, and in the various 
 dioceses subordinate heads who are bishops. The Church 
 therefore is, by divine right, a monarchy, wisely seconded by 
 a sort of subordinate aristocracy.^ 
 
 Hence the folly of our separated brethren, the majority of 
 whom claim that the Church is a society where all are equal ; 
 that the ecclesiastical power is vested in the multitude of 
 the faithful; that as the faithful, en masse, cannot profit- 
 ably exercise this power, deputies or delegates must be chosen 
 to act for them; but the people, they claim, have always 
 the right to choose these deputies, to limit their power, and 
 
 * Br. W. viii. 527, xii. 79 ; Lacordaire; conf. 2 on the Church, 
 
308 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 to depose them when they think proper. It is clearly evi- 
 dent from simply reading the Gospel that such a system is 
 absolutely contrary to the will of the divine Founder of 
 the Church. This will be clearly demonstrated farther on. 
 
 5. The Church is a Perfect Society.^ — A society to be 
 complete or perfect must possess in itself all the means 
 necessary for attaining its end. Such, for example, is civil 
 society. A society to be perfect, 1st, must be independent 
 and form no part of any other society. Thus a financial 
 society which forms a part of the state or government is an 
 incomplete society. 2d. It must have no end directly sub- 
 ordinate to that of any other society: the end of military 
 societies, or armies, is evidently subordinate to the good of 
 civil society. 3d. It must possess in itself all the means 
 necessary for its subsistence, its preservation, and the ac- 
 complishment of its end. 
 
 Now it is God's will that the Church possess all these 
 conditions. 1st. She forms no constituent part of any other 
 society. 2d. Her end, so far from being subordinate, is 
 incomparably superior to that of all other societies; more- 
 over, every well-ordered society must ultimately be sub- 
 servient to the end of the Church, which is the supreme end 
 of man, eternal salvation. 3d. Finally, in virtue of her 
 constitution and the assistance of divine grace, which she 
 never lacks, the Church has every means of attaining her 
 end. Hence she is, as we shall prove later on, a perfect 
 society. 
 
 ^ See references below to ch. 3, art. 4. "The Church was founded 
 by her divine Author as a true and perfect society, not confined 
 within any territorial limits, nor subject to any civil government, 
 but free in the exercise of her power and rights all over the world." 
 Pius IX., Allocut. Dec. 17, 1860. The Church "is distinguished, and 
 differs, from civil society; and what is of highest moment, it is a 
 society chartered as of right divine, perfect in its nature and in its 
 title, to possess in itself and by itself, through the will and loving 
 kindness of its Founder, all needful provision for its maintenance and 
 action." Leo XHL, Encycl. on Christian Const, of States. 
 
GENEKAL NOTIONS ABOUT THE CHURCH. 309 
 
 For the rest, a short glance at history may convince us 
 of the fact. During the first three centuries the Church 
 never ceased to pursue her end, the sanctification of souls. 
 She spread and asserted herself among the nations not only 
 without any help or assistance from the civil power, but 
 in spite of the most cruel persecutions on the part of this 
 same power. ^ Besides, how could the Church, being a society 
 of a supernatural order, receive from any purely natural 
 society the means required to attain her end? Supernatural 
 means alone bear the right proportion to the attainment of 
 an end which is eminently supernatural, namely, the eternal 
 salvation of souls. 
 
 ^ "The Catholic Church has its charter directly from God, it came 
 immediately out of the hands of God, not through princes nor through 
 people. It was first established when all princes and, we may say, 
 all nations were against it. This circumstance was providential, 
 not only inasmuch as it served to show the power of God, . . . but 
 also because the Church in its origin neither required, nor received, 
 nor waited for any consent from existing political states." O'Reilly, 
 S.J., p. 24. See also his excellent remarks p. 154 ff. '. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE CHURCH OF ROME IS THE TRUE CHURCH OF JESUS 
 
 CHRIST.' 
 
 In the preceding chapter we have seen that Jesus Christ 
 founded a Church of which every one is obhged to be a 
 member under pain of faihng to reaUze his last end. We 
 must now enter upon the capital question of this second 
 part, that is, determine which among the Christian societies 
 we have before us was truly founded by Jesus Christ, pre- 
 serves His doctrine in all its purity, and represents Him upon 
 earth. In a matter where any mistake involves such de- 
 plorable consequences to our souls we cannot take too much 
 precaution to discern the false from the true. 
 
 Outside of the Catholic Church we find in the bosom of 
 Christianity two great reUgious divisions claiming to be 
 the true' religion of Christ: heresy and schism. Heresy is a 
 Christian sect which rejects one part of the Christian dogma 
 formerly universally admitted, and retains another part. 
 Schism is the separating of a religious body from the central 
 government formerly universally acknowledged, and the con- 
 stituting itself a special centre and separate government. 
 
 We shall first set forth the distinct marks or notes by 
 which the true Church of Christ may be recognized among 
 
 * Spalding, J. M., Evidences, etc.; Allnat, The Church and the Sects; 
 Schanz, III.; Gibbons, Faith of our Fathers; Lindsay, De Ecclesia, 
 etc.; Gildea, in C. T. S. xvi.; Preston, Protestantism and the Church; 
 Moriarty, The Keys of Heaven; Ricards, Cath. Christianity; Bag- 
 shawe, Credentials of the Church; Br. W. viii. 552; Hunter, I., tr. 4; 
 McLauglilin, Divine Plan; Van den Hagen, Where is the True Church?; 
 Cox, The Pillar and Ground of Truth. 
 
 310 
 
THE CHURCH OP ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 311 
 
 the various Christian communions, and show that the Catho- 
 Uc or Roman Church, who has as head the Roman Pontiff, 
 possesses all these notes. We shall then prove that all other 
 Christian commimions (Protestant or schismatic) lack these 
 marks, although this last proof is not indispensable. The 
 divinity of the Roman Catholic Church involves of itself 
 the illegitimacy of all sects. Lastly, in the Primacy of St. 
 Peter we shall discover a new mark by which the exclusive 
 truth of the Church of Rome may be readily recognized. 
 
 ART. I.— NOTES OF THE TRUE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST. 
 
 The true religion, binding upon all men, exists only in the 
 Church founded by Jesus Christ. God wills the salvation of 
 all, hence it is absolutely necessary that all be able to discern 
 the true Church of Christ among the various religious societies 
 claiming Him as founder.* The notes of which we are about 
 to treat will enable us to make this indispensable discovery. 
 
 I, Of the Notes in General. 
 
 Definition. — We call notes of the Church sensible and 
 permanent characters proper to her, by means of which the 
 true Church may be readily and unerringly recognized by all 
 men. Let us explain this definition in detail. 
 
 1st. Sensible characters^ that is, characters exteriorly per- 
 ceptible (visible). It is evident that qualities which, though 
 real, are not patent to our eyes cannot help us to discern 
 the true Church.^ 
 
 2d. Special characters proper to the Church. As the cele- 
 brated Bellarmin says: ''If I wish to describe a man whom 
 
 ' Spalding, Evid., 1. 6; Hunter, 1. c, ch. 9; Br. W. v. 476. A rich 
 collection of testimonies from the Fathers on the Marks of the Church 
 is found in the excellent work "The Faith of Catholics," vol. i. 
 
 2 " Though the Church possesses many properties, not all of these 
 are marks in the technical sense of the word." Scheeben, II., p. 341. 
 
812 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 you have never seen, and enable you to recognize him 
 immediately at sight, I should not say he has two hands, 
 two ears, for these things are common to all men." 
 
 3d. Permanent characters, that is, those which continue 
 throughout all ages in the Church. This is an immediate 
 consequence of what we have just said. If it never ceases 
 to be a strict obligation for all men to enter the Church, the 
 only way of salvation, it is sovereignly important to be able 
 always and at all times to recognize this way of salvation; 
 hence the characters which guide us must be constant and 
 permanent. 
 
 4th. Means by which the true Church may he readily and 
 unerringly recognized by all men. In fact it was for this end 
 that God willed that His Church should be invested with 
 these characters. Now as all, the ignorant as well as the 
 learned, are obliged to enter this ark of salvation, and as the 
 greater part of mankind is incapable of laborious examination 
 or profound study, God mercifully provides in these notes 
 an easy guide for all in search of truth. ^ At the same time 
 the conviction which the notes afford varies according to the 
 penetration of each mind. But the conviction of the scholar, 
 though more enlightened and the result of deeper reflection, 
 is essentially of the same nature as that of ordinary minds. 
 
 Remark. — It follows from what we have just said that 
 among the characters necessary to the Church there are 
 some which can in no way serve as notes ; such are indef ecti- 
 
 ^ " It is plain that if the Church is to be an available guide to poor 
 as well as rich, unlearned as well as learned, its notes and tokens must 
 be very simple, obvious, and intelligible. They must not depend on 
 education or be brought out by abstruse reasoning, but must at once 
 affect the imagination and interest the feelings. They must bear 
 with them a sort of internal evidence which supersedes further dis- 
 cussion and makes the truth self-evident." These evidences of the 
 Church need not be "such as cannot possibly be explained away 
 or put out of sight, but such as, if allowed room to display themselves, 
 will persuade the many that she is what she professes to be, God's 
 ordained teacher in attaining heaven." (Newman, Essays, I., n. 4.) 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 313 
 
 bility and infallibility, for the reason that they are not 
 exterior, palpable characters more easily recognized than 
 the Church itself. On the contrary, it is only after we have 
 discerned the true Church that we recognize its indispensable 
 quaUties of infallibility and indefectibility. 
 
 II. Division of the Notes. 
 
 All the notes of the Church are real properties and positive 
 characters; yet we divide them according to their demonstra- 
 tive value into positive and negative notes. The negative 
 notes (if they can be called notes) are those the absence of 
 which proves efficaciously that a society is not the Church 
 of Christ, but the presence of which does not of itself prove 
 the true Church. Let us cite for example certain notes 
 generally mentioned by Protestants: perfect integrity of 
 doctrine, loyalty of preachers, legitimate use of the sacra- 
 ments, just and peaceful means of propagation. These 
 characters are doubtless indispensable to the true Church; 
 but while they may exist, at least in theory, for a time in a 
 dissenting sect, they are as difficult to recognize as the Church 
 itself. The positive notes have quite a different value ; they 
 belong exclusively to the true Church of Christ. Once we 
 prove their existence in a religious society we are authorized 
 to conclude that this society is the true Church. 
 
 Apologists differ in their enumeration of negative as well 
 as positive notes. We shall speak only of the four positive 
 notes generally admitted, and enumerated in the Creed of 
 Nica^a or Constantinople inserted in the liturgy of the Mass: 
 Unity, Sanctity, Catholicity, and Apostolicity. 
 
 III. Positive Notes. 
 
 A. Unity, 
 
 This unity is twofold: it includes, 1st, unity of doctrine 
 and of faith, which consists in the universal assent of the faith- 
 ful to all that the Church teaches as revealed by Jesus Christ. 
 
314 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 2d. Unity of ministry and of communion ; that is, the union 
 of all the faithful by participation in the same sacraments and 
 in the celebration of the same worship under the guidance of 
 their bishops, and particularly of the Roman Pontiff. 
 
 To disturb the unity of faith by rejecting a point of doc- 
 trine is heresy ; to disturb the unity of communion by re- 
 jecting the authority of lawful heads is schism} 
 
 I. UNITY OF DOCTRINE AND BELIEF. 
 
 Thesis. — Jesus Christ willed that His Church should he one 
 
 in Doctrine and Belief ; that is, He made it an Obligation for 
 
 Pastors to Teach, and consequently for the Faithful to Believe, 
 
 Unreservedly, all the Truths revealed by Him. 
 
 First Argument, derived from Holy Scripture. — 
 a. ''Go," Jesus said to His apostles, ''and teach ye all nations, 
 baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son 
 and of the Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all things 
 whatsoever I have commanded you." Christ, we see, makes 
 no exception; His very words make exception impossible: 
 " You will teach them to observe omnia quaecumque mandavi, 
 all things whatsoever I have commanded you;" He imposed, 
 consequently, faith in all His doctrines no less than in all His 
 precepts. Again He says: "Preach the Gospel to every crea- 
 ture: he that belie veth and is baptized, shall be saved; but 
 he that believeth not shall be condemned" (Markxvi. 15, 16). 
 If it were sufficient to believe only certain truths, and we were 
 free to believe or not to believe others, Jesus certainly would 
 have declared those that were of obligation, since we are 
 obliged to accept them under pain of eternal loss. Nor does 
 Jesus make any exception when He says; "He that heareth 
 you heareth Me, and he that despiseth you despiseth Me." 
 And again: "He that will not hear the Church, let him be 
 
 ^ On Schism consult Harper, I., essay 2, §6; Hunter, I., n. 216; 
 M. Ixxxii. 1; Br. W. iv. 573; Botalla, Papacy and Schism; Lockhart, 
 Old Rel., ch. 15, 30, 31. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH, 315 
 
 to thee as a heathen and as a pubUcan^' (Luke x. 16; Matt, 
 xviii. 17). 
 
 b. The language of the apostles is the same as that of 
 their Master. We do not find in the Epistles of St. Paul any- 
 thing intimating the slightest distinction between dogma 
 and dogma, between truth and truth; he announces the 
 doctrine of Christ, nothing less, nothing more. He pro- 
 nounces anathema upon any one who would preach anything 
 else, were it even he himself, or an angel from heaven. He 
 conjures the Romans to avoid those who cause dissensions 
 and offences contrary to the doctrine they have learned. 
 He beseeches the Galatians to do the same, and to avoid 
 schisms and heresies without distinction, under pain of 
 damnation. St. John speaks in the same manner; according 
 to him, whoever remains not in the doctrine of Christ, but 
 rejects it, does not possess God: ''If any man come to you 
 and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into the house, 
 nor say to him, God speed you" (2 John i. 10). 
 
 Second Argument, derived from the Teaching of the 
 Early Fathers and Councils of the Church. — a. Pressed 
 by the irresistible arguments of Catholic theologians, the 
 French Calvinist Jurieu, in the seventeenth century, intro- 
 duced into the doctrine of Jesus Christ a distinction hitherto 
 absolutely unknown, viz., fimdamental articles which we are 
 obliged to believe, and non-fundamental articles which we 
 are free to reject. He claimed that this distinction was 
 generally admitted during the first four centuries of the 
 Church, and that it was only in the fifth century that it 
 was rejected and the faithful thenceforth obliged to believe 
 all the dogmas revealed by Jesus Christ. ^ It is very evi- 
 
 *We do not think it necessary to refute at great length this dis- 
 tinction invented for the needs of a desperate cause and eagerly 
 adopted by the Protestants of that day. It can be easily demon- 
 strated that this system, which has, moreover, been generally aban- 
 doned, is contrary to the Holy Scriptures upon which Protestants 
 claim to rely exclusively; that it destroys the authority of Jesus 
 Christ; that it is contrary to the belief of all Christians prior to the 
 
316 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 dent that if such a change had taken place then, it would 
 have drawn forth innumerable protests from the bishops 
 and Fathers of the Church, as well as from the faithful and 
 from heretics. The innumerable Councils, general or special, 
 convened to decide questions of dogma attest the vigilance 
 employed at that time to preserve the doctrine in all its 
 purity and integrity. Moreover, contemporaneous history, 
 which relates in minutest detail the smallest heresies, makes 
 no mention of any protest or charge of this nature. And 
 what is more, no Catholic or heretic, or even Protestant, 
 before Jurieu, was aware of such an innovation, nor did 
 any one ever think of reproaching the Church with such a 
 departure. As a matter of fact the Church has never varied 
 on this point, and consequently all tradition condemns the 
 theory. 
 
 h. Moreover, it is absolutely false that the Fathers and 
 Popes of the first four centuries taught the distinction, which 
 was the tardy invention of Jurieu's imagination. On the 
 contrary, when they treated of the doctrine of the Church 
 and the obligation of accepting it, they employed universal 
 terms which imply no restriction. They insist that what 
 is to be taught and to be believed is the doctrine of Christ; 
 that he who teaches anything else is a heretic; that he who 
 believes otherwise shares in his heresy; and that they are 
 
 seventeenth century: finally, that it is arbitrary and impracticable. 
 How will Protestants determine which are fundamental articles, 
 recognizing, as they do, no other rule of interpreting the word of 
 God than private judgment and individual reason? If, according to 
 Jurieu, the safest rule is to admit as fundamental and necessary 
 for salvation only what all Christians have believed unanimously 
 and still believe all over the world, there are absolutely no more 
 fundamental doctrines left in matters of religion. Is there any one 
 dogma which has not been rejected by heretics? Moreover, this sys- 
 tem tells against Protestants themselves, and condemns their separa- 
 tion from the Catholic Church. In fact, since this Church has always 
 held and still holds articles which they declare fundamental, what 
 reason have they for separating from her ? * 
 
 ♦Br. W. vi. 269; Hunter, I., n. 219. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 317 
 
 both excluded from the Church and from salvation. The 
 Fathers and bishops, even outside the Councils, who have 
 taught this, are very numerous. Cardinal Gousset in his 
 Dogmatic Theology reproduces the testimony of twenty-one, 
 from St. Ignatius of Antioch and St. Polycarp of Smyrna, 
 disciples of the apostles, to St. Basil, St. Gregory Nazianzen, 
 and St. Ambrose, all of whom lived before the fifth century. 
 Third Argument, derived from Reason. — Common sense 
 itself enables us to recognize that it cannot be a matter of 
 equal indifference whether we believe that there are seven 
 sacraments or that there are less ; that confession is necessary 
 for the remission of sin or that it is optional; that Jesus 
 Christ is really or only figuratively present in the Eucharist. 
 No one would venture to affirm that he who adores the 
 consecrated Host and he who tramples it under foot are 
 equally pleasing to God and true disciples of Jesus Christ; 
 that it is equally allowable to believe that faith without 
 works is sufficient for salvation, and that faith without works 
 is dead and of no avail for salvation. Religions professing 
 doctrines so opposite cannot be one and the same religion, 
 teaching the one and indivisible doctrine of Christ. Yet 
 this, notwithstanding it is so manifestly contrary to good 
 sense, is what our opponents advance. 
 
 II. UNITY OF ministry OR GOVERNMENT. 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. We have here a question of fact: Did 
 Jesus Christ confide to the Pope and the bishops, and to 
 no others, not only the ministry of the word which preserves 
 the unity of faith, but also the ministry of the sacraments, 
 the regulation of worship and of all the details of religious 
 government, from which arises the unity of communion? 
 
 2d. Protestants recognize, it is true, the existence of a 
 certain ministry in the Church of Christ; but with them 
 this ministry has no authority to bind the conscience of the 
 faithful. In fact they claim for every individual Christian 
 the right to pronounce final judgment in religious questions, 
 
318 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 and to decide what he must beheve and what he may reject. 
 Nor is this ministry, they claim, hmited only to bishops 
 united with, and subordinate to the Roman Pontiff, but it is 
 legitimately exercised by every pastor whom the people are 
 pleased to recognize, on condition, however, that the pastor 
 in preaching, and in the administration of the sacraments, 
 does not reject any of their fundamental articles. 
 
 3d. As to the Greek schismatics, they deny the primacy of 
 jurisdiction of the Pope of Rome in the exercise of the minis- 
 try and, consequently, the obligation on the part of the 
 bishops and their flocks to form part of the Roman com- 
 munion. 
 
 Thesis. — Jesus Christ has Established in the Church an Au- 
 thority which He Confided to the Apostles and to which all the 
 Faithful must Submit; consequently whosoever Separates 
 Himself from their Ministry is Guilty of Schism and thereby 
 Excluded from the Church. 
 
 FiHST Argument, from the Scriptures. — a. Jesus declares 
 that He sends His apostles as His Father hath sent Him. 
 He orders them to preach the Gospel, to administer baptism, 
 and to teach all that He taught them, promising to be mth 
 them until the consummation of the world. He makes 
 Peter the supreme head and the foundation of His Church; 
 He gives him the keys of the kingdom of heaven and de- 
 clares that all that Peter shall decide in the exercise of his 
 ministry shall be ratified in heaven ; He orders him to feed 
 His lambs and His sheep, that is, the whole flock, which is 
 the Church. 
 
 Again, Jesus, speaking one day to His apostles and the 
 disciples whom He associated with them, gave them practi- 
 cal lessons of great importance, among which is one which 
 has immediate reference to the present question. ''If thy 
 brother shall offend against thee, go and rebuke him between 
 thee and him alone; if he shall hear thee, thou shalt gain 
 thy brother; and if he mil not hear thee, take with thee 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 319 
 
 one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses 
 every word may stand. And if he will not hear them, tell the 
 Church ; and if he will not hear the Church, let him be to 
 thee as the heathen and publican." (Matth. xviii. 15, 16, 17.) 
 The witnesses of whom Jesus speaks here are not to be 
 called to pronounce sentence, but simply to sustain by their 
 presence the protest of the one demanding redress. And 
 though He adds, " tell the Church," Jesus does not mean a 
 union of the faithful, but of the heads established in the 
 Church to settle such questions. Thus nowhere do we 
 find, either in the Scriptures or in the ecclesiastical history of 
 the first ages, that the faithful were ever convened in coun- 
 cil to decide questions of this nature. Moreover, the words 
 of the Master which immediately follow those we have just 
 cited exclude all doubt in this matter: ''Amen I say to you, 
 whatsoever you shall bind upon earth shall be bound also in 
 heaven ; and whatsoever you shall loose upon earth shall be 
 loosed also in heaven." It is evident that these words, 
 which He had already addressed to Peter alone, referred, 
 not to the congregation of the faithful, but to those in whom 
 He had vested His authority, and associated with Peter in 
 the government of His Church. Now the question here 
 is not a question of faith, but simply of spiritual direction, 
 the reparation of an injury committed by one brother against 
 another. Jesus nevertheless says very clearly that if the 
 guilty one refuse to submit, he must be considered as a heathen 
 and a publican, that is, as no longer forming a part of His 
 Church. 
 
 Hence there exists in the Church a ministry not only for 
 preaching, but for government; and this ministry is con- 
 fided only to the heads estabhshed by Jesus Christ, whom 
 the faithful are obUged to obey under pain of being cut off 
 from the body of the faithful. 
 
 h. The same ministry is affirmed by the Apostle St. Paul 
 in several of his epistles. He tells the Ephesians that God 
 has appointed ''some apostles, and some prophets, and other 
 
320 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 some evangelists, and other some pastors and doctors, for 
 the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, 
 for the edifying of the body of Christ until we all meet into 
 the unity of faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God; 
 . . . that henceforth we be no more children tossed to and 
 fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine. '^ He 
 preaches to the Galatians union, concord, and obedience, 
 ranking schisms, which he calls sects, with the works of the 
 flesh which exclude men from the kingdom of heaven. Else- 
 where he orders the bishops, whom the Holy Spirit, he says, 
 hath appointed to govern the Church of Christ, to take heed 
 to themselves and their flocks; for he knows that after his 
 departure ravening wolves will steal among them and will 
 not spare the flock, and men will arise among them who will 
 pervert doctrine, and draw disciples after them. (Eph. iv. ; 
 Gal. \d. 20; Acts xx. 28.) 
 
 Here, certainly, is a ministry clearly defined as to its 
 origin, which is the will of God; as to its depositaries, who 
 are the heads of the Church; as to its object, which is the 
 government of the faithful. Now if the faithful were not 
 bound to submit to this ministry, why does it exist, and why 
 should refusal to recognize and submit to it exclude us from 
 the kingdom of heaven? 
 
 Second Argument, derived from the Teaching of the 
 Fathers in the First Ages. — Pope St. Clement, who was 
 the disciple and companion of the great Apostle, wrote the 
 Corintliians an admirable letter to suppress a schism which 
 had broken out at Corinth. The letter was of such excep- 
 tional authority that for a long time in the Churches of 
 the East it was read with the Holy Scriptures. It ought 
 to be quoted entire, but we cannot do more than give a 
 summary of it. He calls the dissension which was di\dding 
 the Corinthians an impious and detestable schism unworthy 
 of God's elect. You will walk faithfully in the ways of 
 the Lord, he tells them, by being submissive to your pas- 
 tors, loving to obey rather than to command. It is just 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 321 
 
 and reasonable that we submit to God instead of imitating 
 those who, moved by a detestable jealousy, have given an 
 example of pride and revolt. He adds that we must obey 
 our pastors according to the position, the rank, and the 
 measure of the gift which God has imparted to each one 
 in the spiritual edifice of the Church; that God sent Jesus 
 Christ, and that Jesus Christ sent the apostles. These 
 faithful ministers, having received orders from the lips of 
 their Master, preached in the cities and in the villages; 
 they chose men among the first-fruits of the infant Church, 
 and after having tried them by the Ught of the Holy Spirit 
 with which they were filled, they estabUshed them priests 
 and deacons over those who were to accept the Gospel, and 
 ordained that after their death other men tried in like manner 
 should succeed them in the ministry. He says finally that 
 the words pronounced against Judas by Jesus must be applied 
 to the authors of the schism: Woe to these men! it were 
 better that they had not been bom. 
 
 Let us remark that the doctrine so clearly formulated in 
 this chapter goes back to the time of the apostles of whom 
 St. Clement was a disciple, and consequently to Jesus Christ. 
 Though presented by the Bishop of Rome, it was received 
 without protest by the Churches of the East. Therefore it 
 was universally known and admitted in the first centuries, 
 and was regarded, not as a new doctrine, but as coming 
 from Jesus Christ. 
 
 We could cite much more testimony quite as conclusive 
 from St. Ignatius, St. Irenseus, St. Cyprian, and others. (See 
 Faith of CathoHcs, vol. i.) 
 
 B. Sanctity. 
 
 I. THE SANCTITY OF THE CHURCH IN GENERAL. 
 
 If we are satisfied with vague and general terms we may 
 say that Protestants as well as Catholics recognize sanctity 
 
322 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 as a necessary character of the Church. They hold with us 
 that Jesus wished His Church to be holy, and that He estab- 
 Hshed it only to make men holy. This is a point, moreover, 
 which they could hardly dispute in face of St. Paul's formal 
 declaration to the Ephesians: ''Christ loved the Church and 
 deUvered Himself up for it that He might sanctify it; . . . 
 that He might present it to Himself a glorious Church, not 
 having spot or wrinkle, or any such thing, but that it should 
 be holy and without blemish" (Eph. v. 25, 26, 27). And 
 again, that God estabUshed a ministry ''for the perfecting 
 of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of 
 the body of Christ," which He elsewhere calls the Church 
 (Eph.iv. 12; Col. i. 24). 
 
 But when there is a question of explaining in what this 
 sanctity consists, Protestants either exaggerate or minimize 
 it, and thus fall into two opposite errors. The first class 
 confound the sanctity of the Church with the sanctity of 
 each of its members, and claim that only just souls, who, 
 moreover, are known only to God, form a part of the Church 
 of Christ. Others are content with the ordinary and medi- 
 ocre sanctity common to all the members of the Church, and 
 reject as foreign to the spirit of the Gospel all that breathes 
 of heroism and perfection, particularly the vows and Hfe of 
 rehgious orders. They deny particularly all miracles in 
 favor of eminent sanctity. 
 
 The Church's teaching on this point, of wliich the follow- 
 ing is a summary, hes between the two extremes. We main- 
 tain that the Church is holy because her Author is holy and 
 the source itself of all holiness; because her end is to make 
 men holy; because the means she employs, her dogmas^ her 
 ethics, and her sacraments,' are holy in themselves and lead 
 to holiness; because, finally, she has produced in all ages 
 members distinguished by sanctity, some of them — those who 
 faithfully followed her guidance — ^by eminent sanctity. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 323 
 
 Thesis. — The Church of Christ is not Composed Exclusively 
 of Men Just in the Sight of God. 
 
 First Argument, derived from the Teaching of Jesus 
 Christ. — The figures under which Jesus represents His 
 Church invariably present it to us as composed of just and 
 of sinners, as including the wheat and the chaff, the faithful 
 and the unfaithful servant, the wise and the prudent virgins; 
 as the field where the tares are mingled with the good grain 
 until the days of the harvest; as a net cast into the sea and 
 gathering all kinds of fish, good and bad, while only the good 
 are retained and the bad rejected; as a vineyard where the 
 barren fig-tree is allowed to remain with the fruit- bearing 
 trees, in the hope that it will one day bear fruit. 
 
 Second Argument, derived from the Conduct of the 
 Apostles. — Thus did the apostles, instructed by Jesus, inter- 
 pret hoHness. We see them in the exercise of their ministry 
 recaUing to their duty Christians whose conduct did not 
 correspond to their faith; they are far from treating the 
 erring as strangers to the Church. St. Paul, when he ex- 
 communicates the scandalous sinner of Corinth and the 
 heretics Hymeneus and Alexander, does not regard the other 
 sinners, whom he has not cut off, as banished from the 
 Church (1 Cor. v.; 1 Tim. i. 20). 
 
 II. THE SANCTITY OF THE CHURCH CONSIDERED AS A NOTE. 
 
 We have just seen that the Church is holy in various 
 respects. At the same time these different kinds of sanctity 
 are not all equally palpable and appreciable; many of them 
 serve only as negative notes. 
 
 The holiness specially regarded as a positive note of the 
 Church is the holiness of its members, and particularly the 
 heroic sanctity of many among them. This character is 
 easily proved, for it is confirmed by striking miracles which 
 are not accidental, transitory facts, but the fulfilment of 
 
324 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 promises frequently uttered by Jesus Christ and limited to 
 no time. ''He that believeth in Me/' said Our Saviour, 
 *Hhe works that I do he also shall do, and greater than these 
 shall he do.'' And again: ''These signs shall follow them 
 that believe: in My name they shall cast out devils; they 
 shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; 
 and if they shall drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt 
 them; they shall lay their hands upon the sick, and they shall 
 recover" (John xiv. 12; Mark xvi. 17, 18). 
 
 C. Catholicity. 
 
 Catholic means universal. The application of this word 
 to the Church means that at every period of her existence, 
 after the adequate diffusion of the Gospel, she must extend 
 morally throughout the whole world, and be everywhere the 
 same. 
 
 Everywhere the same; for true Catholicity supposes 
 unity of doctrine and of communion, otherwise the Church 
 in China, for example, would not he the same as the Church 
 existing in Brazil; and it would be false to say that it is one 
 and the same Church in Brazil and in China. Hence it is 
 evident that a collection of sects having nothing in common 
 but a name (it is well known that this is the present condition 
 of Protestantism), even though its various elements are 
 spread throughout the entire world, cannot merit the name 
 of Catholic or universal religion. 
 
 Catholicity may be considered absolutely, in itself; or 
 relatively, that is, in comparison with the diffusion of dissent- 
 ing sects. 
 
 a. Taken in an absolute sense it does not require that the 
 Church exist in all parts of the world without exception, still 
 less that it include in its bosom the entire human race. St. 
 Matthew says clearly that when the Gospel shall be preached 
 to all nations the end of the world will be at hand. Hence 
 there is no question of a physical, but a moral universality. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 325 
 
 To justify its name of Catholic it suffices that the Church 
 include a great part of mankind, and that it exist in the 
 greater part of the world in a manner to be recognized in 
 all the other parts. ''It is necessary/' says the illustrious 
 theologian Suarez, ''that the Church shed throughout the 
 world a certain imiversal splendor, so that her light may 
 shine everywhere, and she may be distinguished from all 
 heretical sects." A proper understanding of the Scriptures, 
 and tradition from the earliest ages, show that this moral 
 universality is all that is required. 
 
 b. Nor is it required that the Church exceed in numbers 
 all the other Christian communities taken collectively, but 
 that it outnumber each one of them taken singly. 
 
 Thesis. — Catholicity is an Indispensable Attribute of the 
 True Church. 
 
 Proof Drawn from Holy Scriptures. — a. It is certain 
 that the ancient prophecies concerning the Messias and His 
 work, which we have cited elsewhere, represent the Church 
 as destined to spread throughout the world. It will be the 
 light of nations; the light destined to shine in the utmost 
 parts of the earth; the house into w^hich God will gather all 
 the nations; a high mountain which shall fill all the earth. 
 The Messias is to have nations for His inheritance, and His 
 kingdom will extend to the utmost parts of the earth. The 
 kings of the earth are to adore Him, all the nations are to 
 obey Him. From the rising to the setting of the sun His 
 name will be glorified by all nations, and in every place there 
 will be offered to His name a pure oblation. All these pas- 
 sages, and many others too long to quote, are inexplicable 
 if they do not signify the moral diffusion of the Church 
 throughout the world. 
 
 b. The words of Jesus Himself are no less clear. He tells 
 us that when He is raised upon the cross He will draw all 
 things to Himself. He commands His apostles to preach 
 the Gospel to every creature, to instruct all nations, baptizing 
 
326 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the 
 Holy Ghost, teaching them to observe all whatsoever He 
 had commanded them. He sends them as His witnesses to 
 Jerusalem, throughout Judea, Samaria, and to the extremi- 
 ties of the earth. 
 
 c. The apostles perfectly understood the design of their 
 Master. Faithful to His command they preached the 
 Gospel, first in Judea and Samaria, then they dispersed 
 through the pagan nations; and St. Paul was soon able to 
 write to the Romans that their faith had been announced 
 throughout the universe. The apostles knew then that Jesus 
 wished the Church to be Catholic, and that Catholicity was 
 one of its essential characters, hence they inserted in their 
 creed this article of their faith: '' I believe in the holy Cath- 
 olic Church." 
 
 The testimony of the Fathers on this point may be found 
 in ''Faith of Catholics," vol. i. 
 
 This Catholicity is a note. In fact it offers us a 
 ready means of recognizing the true Church. It is not 
 difficult to demonstrate which among the various Christian 
 communions is the Church that can be said to be morally 
 diffused throughout the world since the adequate promul- 
 gation of the Gospel, and to include in her bosom the greatest 
 number of members professing the same faith by participation 
 in the same sacraments and the same worship under the 
 guidance of one and the same apostolic and pastoral ministry. 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. Strictly speaking, another Christian com- 
 munion might at a given period exist simultaneously in 
 different parts of the earth, and yet we must be able at every 
 period to distinguish the legitimate communion from the 
 illegitimate. CathoHcity, therefore, to be a distinctive mark 
 must have still another character or note; that is, the true 
 Church must always outnumber every other Christian com- 
 munion. At the same time, as Catholicity is essential to the 
 Church, it is sufficient to prove that at a given period, at the 
 present day, for example, such a Christian society is the 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 327 
 
 most widely spread and the most numerous: we are then 
 authorized to conclude that it is this society which has been 
 universally diffused and the most numerous at all times 
 since the promulgation of the Gospel. 
 
 2d. We must not forget that by the notes of the Church, 
 especially its CathoHcity, we must distinguish the true 
 Christian Church from other Christian societies. The divinity 
 of the Christian religion has been shown in the first part of 
 the book (Ch. III.) by other characteristic marks. 
 
 D. Apostolicity. 
 
 In saying that the true Church is necessarily apostolic, 
 we mean that she must profess the doctrine taught by the 
 apostles: this is apostohcity of doctrine; then, that she 
 must be able to trace her descent from the apostles through 
 the succession of her lawful heads: this is apostohcity of 
 ministry or government. Apostolicity of doctrine is the 
 logical and indispensable consequence of the unity required 
 in the true Church. The necessity of this characteristic is 
 rarely disputed, but it is of little service as a note, as a positive 
 means of discerning the true Church. Hence we shall dwell 
 more particularly on the apostolicity of ministry. We have 
 shown above, pp. 303 f ., 318 f ., that all authority in the Church 
 has been really bestowed upon the apostles. This authority 
 must, as we shall prove, pass to their successors. 
 
 Thesis. — Jesus Christ Willed that the Powers Given to His 
 Apostles should he Transmitted to all their Successors. 
 
 First Argument. — a. Jesus imposed upon Peter, and then 
 upon all the apostles, the exercise of the ministry which His 
 Father had confided to Him for the purpose of saving all men 
 till the end of time. Hence this ministry is essential to the 
 Church, and must be indefectible and perpetual. There must 
 always, until the end of the world, be men who exercise it 
 in the name of Jesus Christ ; there must also always be a f oun- 
 
S28 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 dation which supports the edifice, always one in whom is 
 deposited the power of the keys, always a supreme pastor to 
 feed the entire flock, always heads associated with him for 
 preaching the word and for governing the Church. This 
 foundation, this depositary, this supreme pastor, these sub- 
 ordinate heads cannot be Peter and the apostles in their 
 individual persons alone, since they are mortal; they must 
 be also Peter and the apostles in the persons of their suc- 
 cessors. Now, because they only, and no others, have re- 
 ceived their character and their power from Jesus Christ, 
 they, and they only, can and must transmit this character 
 and this power to whomsoever they choose ; and those chosen 
 can and must, in turn, transmit these prerogatives to others 
 until the end of the world. 
 
 b. Christ assures us that His Church will last to the end 
 of the world. But no society can exist for any length of 
 time without an authority which is its very foundation. 
 Such an authority must, therefore, be forever perpetual 
 in the Church. Hence Christ willed that the ministry or 
 authority given to the apostles should forever pass to their 
 lawful successors in office, being with them but one moral 
 person. He made no other provision for the continuance 
 of the ministry in the Church. 
 
 c. The true Church of Christ must ever, imtil the end of 
 time, be distinguishable from heterodox churches; she must 
 ever, until the end of time, be able to prove her descent from 
 the apostles by the uninterrupted succession of her pastors. 
 
 Second Argument. — We see from the history of the 
 apostles that they did indeed transmit to others the powers 
 which they had received from Jesus Christ, by appointing 
 bishops everywhere to replace and succeed them. Thus St. 
 Paul made Timothy bishop of Ephesus, and Titus bishop of 
 Crete, charging them to perpetuate their ministry by ap- 
 pointing other pastors (Tit. i. 5). 
 
 Third Argument. — Tradition furnishes a most decisive 
 proof for our thesis. But we must refer the reader to special 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 329 
 
 treatises on the subject. (See ''Faith of Catholics," vol. i.) 
 Remarks. — 1st. The ministry confided by Jesus Christ to 
 the apostles, and by the apostles to the bishops, their suc- 
 cessors, includes a twofold power, the power of order and 
 the power of jurisdiction. 
 
 a. Power of order regards the administration of the sacra- 
 ments. Bishops alone possess it in all its fulness. Hence 
 there is no priestly office which they cannot exercise; and 
 they alone can confer upon others the sacred character which 
 they have received. This character is conferred by sacra- 
 mental ordination according to the fixed rite, which dates 
 from the time of the apostles. Every vahdly consecrated 
 bishop has the power of ordaining other bishops. Even should 
 he fall into heresy or schism, the consecration or ordination 
 performed by him would still be valid though not lawful, 
 provided he observed the prescribed rite. The power of order 
 is inamissihUj i.e., once obtained it can never be lost. 
 
 h. The 'power of jurisdiction includes at the same time the 
 faculty of lawfully exercising the power of order and the 
 right of taking part in the government of the Church. This 
 faculty and this right are conferred by canonical institution^ 
 and depend on the will of the supreme head of the Church. 
 No bishop who has not received jurisdiction from the head 
 of the Church can lawfully ordain a priest or consecrate a 
 bishop, even though he do it validly; nor can he take part, even 
 validly, in the administration and government of the Church. 
 To be in the legitimate and full line of succession of the 
 pastors of the Church, that is, in the hierarchy of jurisdic- 
 tion, it does not suffice that a bishop have received the power 
 of order; he must also have the power of jurisdiction. In 
 other words, it is not sufficient that he be consecrated bishop ; 
 he must also have received with his consecration the right 
 of administering a diocese, which in virtue of the apostolic 
 succession becomes thus attached to one of the primitive 
 apostolic sees. This is a self-evident proposition which may 
 be proved by the words of all the Fathers, who condenm 
 
330 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 as schismatics, bishops in possession of usurped sees. The 
 episcopacy is estabhshed for the administration of the 
 Church, and a bishop is a chief or ruler in the Church. 
 Hence he must have subjects. But one cannot give himself 
 subjects; Jesus alone, who has received from His Father the 
 nations as a heritage, could confide to whom He pleased the 
 power to govern the faithful, that is, the power of jurisdiction. 
 He confided it, as we have seen, to the apostles, and chiefly 
 to Peter, their head, with power to transmit it. Hence a 
 Christian society whose bishops go back to the apostles only 
 through the power of order, and not also through the power 
 of jurisdiction, cannot claim to be apostoUc, and consequently 
 cannot be the Church of Christ. 
 
 c. It belongs to the heads of the Church to transmit this 
 power of jurisdiction and to determine the mode of trans- 
 mission left undetermined by Christ. This mode may have 
 varied in the course of time, particularly in regard to the 
 selection of subjects who are to receive this jurisdiction. 
 Without prejudice, however, to the vicar of Christ's essential 
 right of free nomination in regard to all dignities and offices 
 outside his own, subjects have been chosen, sometimes by 
 election, sometimes by presentation, sometimes by the will 
 alone of the successors of St. Peter. 
 
 As the canonical rules observed in this transmission were 
 established by the Church, and not by Jesus Christ, the 
 Church has a right to modify them according to circum- 
 stances. But the jurisdiction itself always resides in the 
 heads of the Church, and is always transmitted by canonical 
 laws in force at the time. Consequently whosoever has 
 not received jurisdiction according to these rules does not 
 possess it, and though he may have received episcopal con- 
 secration he does not belong to the ecclesiastical hierarchy. 
 Having neither see nor subjects, it is evident that he cannot 
 be one of the heads of the Church, and has no claim to apos- 
 tolic succession.^ 
 
 * A. C. Q. XX. 225 (Order and Jurisdiction). 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 331 
 
 2d. Bishops have the same functions and the same powers 
 as the apostles. There are, however, certain personal privi- 
 leges which the apostles as founders, after Christ, of the 
 Chiu-ch alone enjoyed, and which they did not transmit to 
 their successors; such are: infalhbility in teaching the doc- 
 trine of Jesus Christ, the right to preach the Gospel through- 
 out the world and to govern the faithful, and the right to 
 erect bishoprics by their own authority. 
 
 These two powers of order and jurisdiction are commu- 
 nicated to priests, but in a hmited degree and in view of 
 certain acts only; for example, the administration of sacra- 
 mental absolution. 
 
 ART. II.— THE CHURCH OF ROME POSSESSES THE FOUR 
 POSITIVE NOTES OF THE TRUE CHURCH. 
 
 I. The Church of Rome Possesses Unity.* 
 
 A. The Church is One in Doctrine. — Throughout the 
 whole world we find the children of the Church chanting and 
 professing the same creed, accepting the same precepts, the 
 same sacrifice, the same sacraments. And if we go back to 
 apostolic times we find the same identity of doctrine. 
 
 The Church, moreover, possesses a principle which neces- 
 sarily sustains unity of belief: she professes as an essential 
 dogma that all must accept every doctrine which she pro- 
 claims to be of faith, under pain, if they persist in error, of 
 being ejected from her bosom.^ 
 
 Remark. — It can never be proved that the Church of 
 Rome has ever ceased to teach a single dogma contained 
 in the apostohc writings, or that she has ever admitted a 
 point of doctrine contrary to these writings. Never has she 
 defined a truth without previously demonstrating that the 
 
 ^Rhodes; Preston; Harper, I., essay 1; Newman, Difficulty of 
 Anglicans, 1. 10, 11 ; D. R. New Ser. xv. 458; C. W. lix. 152. 
 * Lacordaire, conf . 29, 30, Cath. Doctr. and Society. 
 
332 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 apostles taught it either in writing or by word of mouth. The 
 Council of Nice, for example, did not create the dogma of 
 the divinity of Jesus Christ when, in refutation of the Arian 
 heresy, it defined the consubstantiality of the Word, any 
 more than the Council of Trent created the dogma of transub- 
 stantiation when it defined the Eucharist, in refutation of 
 the Protestant doctrine of the Eucharist. On the contrary, 
 it was only because these dogmas were always believed in 
 the Church that the Councils could define them. Thus in 
 our own day the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Vir- 
 gin and the infalHbility of the Roman Pontiff have been 
 declared articles of the Cathohc faith. But they are not new 
 articles added to its doctrine, they are simply ulterior devel- 
 opments of the doctrine revealed by Jesus Christ, and taught 
 from the beginning of the Church ; they are truths impHcitly 
 contained in the deposit of revelation, which were brought 
 forward more prominently to confound the adversaries of 
 the ancient faith and preserve the people from a pernicious 
 error. ^ 
 
 ^ If dogma is immutable, like truth tself, this immutability does 
 not exclude progress. Progress in the Church is only the develop- 
 ment of principles laid down by Jesus Christ. Thus, for example, 
 the Church has declared or defined in three successive Councils that 
 there are in Jesus Christ one person, two natures, and two wills. These 
 three definitions are only logical developments of one and the same 
 truth, which, under its primitive, its revealed form, was known and 
 taught at all times : Jesus Christ is at the same time true God and 
 true man. 
 
 The following remarks will illustrate still more clearly the manner 
 in which doctrine is developed in the Church. 
 
 1st. There are in revelation a certain number of points which, in 
 the first days of Christianity, were formally and explicitly presented 
 to the belief of the faithful. 
 
 2d. There are others which in the beginning were not explicitly 
 given, and were destined, in the plan of divine Providence, to be 
 developed gradually in the course of time and under the direction 
 of authority. 
 
 3d. The history of the latter contains three different periods or 
 epochs. In the first period they are not immediately obvious, either 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 333 
 
 B. The Church of Rome is One in her Ministry. — There 
 is nothing more palpable or more readil}^ recognized. Unity 
 of faith, which we have just demonstrated, is maintained in 
 the Church by a unique, invariable, and perfectly known 
 ministry. The gentle but firm action of this ministry has 
 its source at Rome, the centre of government, whence it is 
 conveyed by means of bishops and subordinate pastors to 
 all parts of the world until it reaches the humblest members 
 of the Church. The simple faithful are united to their imme- 
 diate pastors, the latter are united to their bishops, the 
 bishops are united with the Pope, from wliich they hold 
 their faculties. Thus is the most comphcated multiplicity 
 reduced to the most marvellous unity. Here again is a 
 principle which sustains this unity : he who refuses to submit 
 to the authority of the lawful pastors of the Church is excluded 
 from her bosom. 
 
 History testifies that this unity, which we admire at the 
 present day, has remained unbroken through all the Christian 
 centuries. Disciplinary laws may vary with circumstances, 
 for they are not a divine but an ecclesiastical institution: 
 
 because of their deep metaphysical character, which caused their 
 connection with the principles revealed to remain unobserved, or 
 because of circumstances which do not permit institutions to manifest 
 themselves completely in the first days of their existence, or simply 
 because of the actual impossibility of the human mind to think of 
 everything at the same tiine. 
 
 In the second period these truths, which lay dormant in the Chris- 
 tian conscience, began to be agitated; they made more impression 
 than heretofore; they were preached and were presented as new food 
 of piety to the faithful. Then it happened that certain persons con- 
 tested them, alleged the obscurity of the tradition upon which they 
 rested, and protested against their being considered as part of 
 revelation. 
 
 In the third period authority established them as articles of faith, 
 and decided that they were originally contained in revelation. 
 (Card. Franzelin.) * 
 
 * Newman on Development; D. R. New Ser. xii. 28, Apr. 1901 ; Humphrey, Written 
 Word, ch. 11; Br. W. xiv. 1; Garside, p. 153 ff.; Schanz, III., ch. 1; C. W. Ixxii.; 
 I. E. R., July 1901. 
 
334 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the authority which has estabhshed them has a right to 
 abohsh or modify them; in fact it must needs vary them 
 according to the exigencies of the times. But the hierarchy, 
 the ministry for the governing and the teaching of the faithful, 
 is a divine institution. It comes from Jesus Christ, and 
 consequently never varies. Let us observe in passing that 
 the worship and ceremonial also may, for analogous reasons, 
 undergo certain modifications in rites or accessory ceremonies, 
 but it remains in all places and at all times the same in every- 
 thing essential established by Christ. 
 
 Objection.— At the period of the great schism of the West, 
 from 1378 to 1417, there were two Popes reigning at the 
 same time. Urban VI. at Rome, Clement VII. at Avignon. 
 Among Christian nations some gave their allegiance to 
 Urban, others to Clement. Did not this destroy for nearly 
 half a century the Church's unity of ministry or government? * 
 
 Reply. — It is true that during this time the material union 
 of government was disturbed in the Church, but formal or 
 essential unity never ceased to exist. There were not two 
 legitimate popes any more than there are at the present day; 
 but various circumstances made it difficult to discern clearly 
 the veritable supreme head of the Church and caused a 
 deplorable division. The situation, which Catholics ac- 
 knowledged was contrary to the will of God, was a source of 
 great grief to them. Both sides sought the truth and never 
 desisted until every doubt was dissipated, and the entire 
 Church acknowledged Martin V., elected in 1417 by the 
 Council of Constance. 
 
 Hence this schism, which is easily explained by an error in a 
 question of facts, in no way weakens our thesis ; it proves, on 
 the contrary, the profound spirit of unity which animated the 
 members of the entire Church. No one admitted the simul- 
 taneous existence of two lawful heads; all were convinced 
 
 ^ Dr. Brann; Rhodes; Preston (Ch. Unity); Spalding, J. M., Mis- 
 cellanies, ch. 9; A. C. Q. xvi. 67; M. Ixxviii. 77, 194; Br. W. yii. 
 320; Murphy, ch. 20; Parsons, Studies, II., ch. 36, 39. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH 335 
 
 that there was, and that there could be, but one ; but who 
 this one head was remained for a time doubtful. Evidently 
 one part of Christianity erred in their choice; but they 
 erred in good faith, and the obedience of both sides was 
 conscientiously given. 
 
 II. The Church of Rome Possesses Sanctity.* 
 
 The Church of Rome is holy in her final end, which is 
 the sanctification and the salvation of the faithful. She is 
 holy in the means she employs; in her dogmas which are 
 attacked only because of their sublimity and because many 
 of them transcend, as to their essence, the limit of human 
 reason; in her moral teaching, to which even her adversaries 
 pay homage, which proscribes all vices, inculcates all virtues, 
 and culminates in the perfection of the evangelical coimsels ; ^ 
 in her sacraments, fruitful sources of grace and holiness; in 
 her worship, the most spiritual which ever existed, the purest 
 and freest from immoral or superstitious practices.^ She 
 is holy, finally, in the members who faithfully follow her 
 precepts; only those who refuse to conform to her teaching, 
 and thus incur her condemnation, fail to witness to her 
 sanctity.^ 
 
 ^ Thebaud, The Church and the Moral World; Digby, Mores Catho- 
 lici; Ricards, Catholic Christianity, ch. 3 ff.; Lacordaire, conf. 21, 29, 
 on Cath. Doctr and the Soul, A. C. Q. v. 385, ix. 166, xix. 813; 
 C. W. vii., ix. 529; Br. W. vi. 409. 
 
 ^ On charges of immoral doctrines and practices see below, ch. 4, 
 art. 10. The Church is holy in her legislation; because its whole 
 object is to insure and facilitate (a) the success of her apostolic mis- 
 sion; (6) the faithful observance of the divine law; (c) the attainment 
 of higher Christian perfection. — Editor. 
 
 ^Bridgett; Chateaubriand, G nius, etc.; Wiseman, Essays, vol. ii.; 
 Ricards, 1. c, ch. 7; J. L. Spalding, Lectures, 1. 7; Chatard, Christian 
 Truths, 1. 8; Lockhart, 1. c, ch. 17 ff.; Shadier, Beauties of the 
 Catholic Church: Br. W. vi. 380, viii. 117; A. C. Q. xi. 462; D. R. 
 Old Ser. ix. 2, xxxv. 362, xliii. 391; C. W. iv. 721, xv. 605, xix. 322, 
 xliii. 250. 
 
 *Bowden, The Witness of the Saints; Burnet, Path, ch. 10; Allies, 
 
336 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 It would be difficult to enumerate the legions of holy 
 children which the Church of Rome has borne. Without 
 mentioning Christian heroes of the first ages, where shall we 
 find outside the Church any that can be compared to men 
 Hke St. Benedict, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Francis of Assisi, 
 St. Dominic, St. Francis de Sales, St. Ignatius Loyola, St. 
 Francis Xavier, St Vincent of Paul, St. Elizabeth of Hungary, 
 St. Teresa, and innumerable others? In addition to these 
 saints of all ages placed upon her altars, who professed no 
 other faith than that of the Church of Rome and whom she 
 alone can claim, she has nourished in her bosom innumerable 
 souls of no less solid virtue, whose sanctity, though hidden 
 from the eyes of the world, equalled that of the canonized 
 saints. And in our own day, in the midst of the corruption 
 of the world, as many good works and deeds of virtue are 
 performed under the influence of the same quickening spirit 
 as in the preceding centuries.* God has been pleased to 
 proclaim at all times the eminent sanctity of the heroes of 
 the Church by the most striking miracles — miracles which 
 can be attributed only to divine intervention, and which are 
 confirmed by such irrefutable testimony that to question 
 them is to annihilate history and refuse the testimony of 
 reason. 
 
 For many centuries the examination of miracles has been 
 reserved to the Pope. We find in the capitularies of Charle- 
 magne a prohibition against publishing any miracle before 
 the sovereign Pontiff has pronounced upon it. It is well 
 known how carefully and severely miracles in cases of canoni- 
 zation are tested by the Congregation of Rites under the 
 guidance of the supreme Pontiff.^ And yet how many 
 The Monastic Life; Br. W. viii. 219; Scheeben, Sanctity of the Ch. 
 in the XIX. Cent'y. 
 
 * C. W. li. 533; also Oratorian Lives of Modern Saints. 
 
 ' Faber, W., Essay on Beatificat on and Canonization; D. R. New 
 Ser. xxvi 1 ; Benedict XIV. on Heroic Virtue (first vol. of Oratorian 
 Lives); Burnet Path, ch. 6; J. M. Spalding, Evid., 1.5; Baart, The 
 Roman Court, ch. 5. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 337 
 
 miracles have been authentically proved in the last centuries ! 
 For example, those of St. Francis Xavier, St. John de Cuper- 
 tino, St. Philip Neri, St. Francis de Sales. The severe and 
 learned Pope Benedict XIV., in the appendix to his great 
 work on the canonization of the saints, relates the most 
 striking miracles, among others those of St. Elizabeth of 
 Portugal, St. Pius V., St. Andrew of Avellino, St. Felix of 
 Cantalicio, St. Catharine of Bologna, etc. The work of the 
 Bollandists, that gigantic monument to the glory of the 
 saints, gives abundant proof of the continuity of this divine 
 testimony in favor of the Catholic Church. We have 
 already stated above the reason why miracles are not as 
 numerous at the present day as in the first ages of the Church. 
 We must bear in mind, moreover, that the miracles of the 
 early ages, being supported by incontestable testimony, are 
 quite as conclusive for us. They proclaim to-day, as they 
 did then, the holiness of the Church in favor of which they 
 were wrought; they demonstrate that God gives the most 
 manifest approval to the virtues practised in her bosom. 
 Finally, the Church's remarkable preservation and the 
 marvellous results which she continually produces in the 
 world are true miracles and become more and more striking 
 as her age increases. 
 
 Our own century has not lacked the testimony of divine 
 miracles. The most exacting critic has only to read the 
 life of the venerable Cure of Ars and writers on Lourdes^ 
 to recognize that the power of God still abides with His true 
 children. 
 
 * Dr. Lasserre and Clarke, S.J., on Lourdes; Dr. Lefevre and Card. 
 Walsh on Louise Lateau; the articles in C. W. xiii. 1, xxxix. 835, on 
 the liquefaction of the blood of St. Januarius, liv. 897, on Lourdes, xiv. 
 171, on Louise Lateau; also D. R. New Ser. xvii. 170; Irish Eccl. 
 Record, Aug. 1900, "Modern Miracles"; Searle, Plain Facts, ch. 21; 
 Parsons, Studies, VI., n. 22, 
 
338 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 III. The Church of Rome Possesses Catholicity. 
 
 The Church of Rome is CathoUc at all times and in all 
 places:^ this is so manifest that she alone has always been 
 designated by this glorious title, and no dissenting com- 
 munion has ever dared to assume it.^ As early as the time 
 of St. Augustine, the name Catholic designated exclusively 
 the members of the Church of Rome, and at all times we 
 have proclaimed Christian our name, Catholic our surname.^ 
 
 After she took possession of the world through the eight 
 thousand men of every tongue and every nation converted 
 by St. Peter, the Church never ceased to spread and to wm 
 new subjects.* This we have already seen from our reflec- 
 tions on the rapid propagation of the Gospel throughout the 
 world. At the end of the first century the Church had gone 
 beyond the limits of the Roman empire, and since that time 
 her ascendency over barbarism continually increased, re- 
 covering in one country what she lost in another, and ever 
 finding reproduced in some part of the world the marvellous 
 fruitfulness of her youth. 
 
 This marvellous universality is as strikingly manifested 
 at the present day. Let us pass in review the most distant 
 countries, the most obscure islands of the ocean, and we shall 
 find Catholics everywhere, and we shall find not only that 
 
 ^ Lacordaire, conf. 31, Cath Doctr. and Society. 
 
 ^ It is only of late years that Protestants have endeavored to claim 
 this title by establishing the fallacious distinction of Catholic and 
 Roman Catholic. But, as the author of "Catholic Belief" observes, 
 "the word Roman does not limit the word Catholic, but completes 
 it, declaring more expressly that which is already supposed in the 
 word Catholic, viz., that the Catholic Church has its centre in Rome." 
 — Translator. 
 
 ^ Capel, Catholic, etc.; Austin, Notes on the Catholic Name; C. W. 
 i. 96, 669, 741; Spalding, Evid., 1. 4; A. E. R., Sept. 1902, Febr. 1903. 
 
 * Marshall, Cath. Missions; Wiseman, Lectures on Doctrines of the 
 Church, 11. 6, 7; D. R. III. Ser. xii., xiii., xvii, xxi.; Spalding, Evi- 
 dences, 1. 4. See also above, p. 217 ff. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 339 
 
 the Catholic Church is spread throughout all countries of the 
 earth, but that she far exceeds in numbers each of the other 
 Christian societies.^ 
 
 IV. The Church of Rome Possesses Apostolicity. 
 
 A. The Doctrine of the Church of Rome Goes back to 
 THE Time of the Apostles. — Her doctrine of to-day is the 
 same as that of the apostles. In speaking of the unity of 
 doctrine in the Church we demonstrated a complete identity 
 between the oldest creeds or professions of faith, the writings 
 and decisions of the first ages and those of our time. 
 
 Protestants claim, it is true, that after the first centuries 
 the Church of Rome created new dogmas ; for example, that 
 of the real presence, purgatory, and the invocation of the 
 saints. We have replied to this objection (p. 332). More- 
 over, such a statement is worthless unless proved. It 
 is necessary to show when and how these dogmas were intro- 
 duced into the Church ; this our opponents have never done, 
 and for a good reason. Meanwhile what is stated without 
 proof the Church has a right to deny without proof, for she is 
 in possession. She does not, however, lack proof: she has 
 history to testify how zealously in the first ages popes and 
 bishops opposed all doctrinal innovations. Hence they 
 would have offered the same opposition to the introduction 
 of the important dogmas contested by Protestants. They 
 did not do so, for ecclesiastical history, so watchful in matters 
 of this kind, is silent on this point. Perhaps it will be said 
 that all the members of the Church, pastors and flocks in all 
 parts of the world, agreed to admit without protest such 
 numerous and grave innovations. In the first place, this 
 hypothesis is absurd; in the second, the heretics of that 
 period would not have failed to make themselves heard : con- 
 demned as innovators by the Church, they would have seized 
 the opportunity to reproach her with her own innovations. 
 
 * Lacordaire, conf. 1 and 31 on the Church. 
 
340 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Remark on Tradition. — In the language of theology 
 tradition is the attestation of a fact, a dogma, a custom, not 
 formally contained in the Holy Scriptures If the attesta- 
 tion, made first by word of mouth, has been afterward con- 
 signed to the works of the Fathers or other historic documents 
 which witness to their existence, it is called written tradition; 
 otherwise it is oral tradition. Tradition of which we treat 
 here, and which has its very source in the apostles them- 
 selves, is properly called apostolic tradition. But inasmuch 
 as in matters of faith and morals they can have taught only 
 what they received from the very mouth of Jesus Christ 
 or by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, it is also called with 
 reason divine tradition.^ 
 
 Taken in this last sense the name tradition is applied by 
 theologians sometimes to a collection of truths and precepts 
 communicated first verbally by the apostles: thus we say 
 the deposit of apostolic tradition; sometimes to the fact 
 itself of the uninterrupted transmission of these truths or 
 precepts: thus we say such a point of dogma or morals 
 is established by tradition; sometimes, finally, in a complex 
 manner, to these same truths and precepts as transmitted 
 from age to age, from the apostles to us: this is the sense 
 in which we employ it here.^ 
 
 * Humphrey, Written Word, ch. 7, 8; Card. Manning Grounds of 
 Faith; A. C. Q. xii. 409; Walworth, ch. 11 ; Wiseman, lect. 1-7; Hunter, 
 I.,tr. 2, ch. 1. 
 
 2 " If there is a book," says the learned Le Hir, " to which the key is 
 found in tradition alone, it is the Bible. But here philological tradi- 
 tion is not enough if it be not intimately allied with dogmatic tradi- 
 tion. I would like you to understand how very imperfect, defective, 
 erroneous, and often bizarre is a science of the past that is cut loose 
 from the great tree of tradition The last Phoenician workman, 
 if he came back to us, could teach our greatest experts in the deci- 
 phering and interpretation of the texts of his country. In the midst 
 of life, where he once moved, and in the daily exchange of ideas and 
 reports forming a living tradition, he would find advantages and 
 resources which the most profound researches could only imperfectly 
 supply." See also Didon, J. Ch., introd. pp. xxxiv. and xliv. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 341 
 
 Among the truths attested by tradition alone, and which 
 are not expUcitly taught in Holy Scripture, let us cite as 
 examples the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin and the va- 
 lidity of baptism administered by heretics with the requisite 
 form and matter. 
 
 There are three principal organs of tradition, that is, three 
 means by which we may go back without fear of error to 
 the apostolic source; they are the universal and constant 
 belief of the Church, the sacred liturgy, and the ancient his- 
 toric monuments, particularly the writings of the Fathers.^ 
 
 We shall not dwell any further on tradition, though it is 
 of very great importance for the knowledge of revealed truth; 
 here we have to establish the foundations of faith and to 
 furnish proofs of the divine origin of the Church. Now to 
 attain this end tradition, from a theological point of view 
 as an infallible source of doctrine, does not offer many ad- 
 vantages. When we have recourse to it, it will be as to a 
 historic testimony of incontestable value. ^ 
 
 B. The Ministry of the Church Goes Back to the 
 Time of the Apostles through the Uninterrupted Suc- 
 cession OF her Chief Pastors. — All history testifies to the 
 fact that the sovereign pontiffs have come down in unin- 
 terrupted succession from Peter to Leo XIII. The popes 
 have always proclaimed themselves before the world the suc- 
 cessors of the chief of the apostles and the inheritors of his 
 supreme authority. The churches in subjection to the Church 
 
 ^ We call Fathers of the Chur h distinguished pastors and Doctors 
 who, particularly in the first centuries after the time of the apostles, 
 adorned the Church by their learning, their doctrine, and their virtue. 
 The name of Doctor is specially given those among them possessed 
 of greater learning and authority. Such, in the Greek Church, were 
 St. Basil, St. Athanasius, St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. John Chrysos- 
 tom; in the Latin Church, St. Gregory, St. Ambrose, St. Augustine, 
 St. Jerome, St. Leo, St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bernard, and in later 
 times St. Francis de Sales and St. Alphonsus Liguori.* 
 
 ' Lacordaire, conf. 9 on the Church. 
 
 ♦Harper, L, p. 250 ff.; Hunter, I., n. 98. 
 
342 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 at Rome and forming one with her show a hke series of lawful 
 pastors who hold their mission from the ApostoHc See. 
 
 Objection. — The legitimate succession of Roman Pontiffs 
 was interrupted several times by schisms and by the long 
 sojourn of the popes at Avignon.^ 
 
 Reply. — These facts in no way interrupt the legitimate 
 succession of the supreme heads of the Cathohc Church. 
 
 1st. During the schisms there was always but one legitimate 
 pope, even though his authority may have been contested 
 in good or bad faith by a part of the Church. If a province 
 revolts against a prince, does he cease to be the lawful sov- 
 ereign of this province which rightly or mistakenly disputes 
 his authority? As to the great schism of the West which pre- 
 sents the greatest difficulties, we have dwelt sufficiently 
 upon it (p. 334). 
 
 2d. The sojourn of the popes at Avignon did not prevent 
 their being bishops of Rome and, as such, heads of the entire 
 Church: a prince who fives outside the capital of his gov- 
 ernment does not forfeit the sovereignty of his country. 
 
 Conclusion of Article II. 
 
 The Catholic Church possesses, then, all the notes of the 
 true Church; and as only one Church was founded by Christ, 
 this Church must be the Church of Rome, whose mission 
 is to lead man to eternal salvation. After the preceding 
 demonstration the two articles following may seem useless. 
 We would add them, however, as superabundant proofs so 
 that they may facifitate the return of erring brethren to 
 the fold of Him who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, 
 and who earnestly desires that there be but one Fold and 
 one Shepherd. 
 
 ^ On the fable of Popess Joan see Dollinger, Fables, etc.; Parsons, 
 II., ch. 3; Alzog, II., §185. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 343 
 
 ART. III.— PROTESTANTISM DOES NOT POSSESS THE 
 NOTES OF THE TRUE CHURCH OF CHRIST.* 
 
 There is really but one serious heresy at the present day, 
 Protestantism. Under this generic name we include all who, 
 accepting revelation, protest against the authority of the 
 Catholic Church and claim that Scripture is the only source of 
 revealed truth. Protestantism, in fact, is not a definite 
 religion. The innumerable sects which it includes have no 
 other bond of communion than the same negative name 
 which belongs alike to all heresy, no other principle of life 
 than the dogmas and precepts which they have preserved 
 from the Catholic Church from which they separated. 
 
 Historical Notice. — Let us say a few words of the first 
 authors of Protestantism.^ Martin Luther was born at 
 Eisleben in Saxony in 1483. He embraced the religious 
 life in the Augustinian convent of Erfurt and was sent by 
 his superiors to the University of Wittenberg, where he 
 taught theology. He was particularly remarkable here for 
 his love of novelties and his indomitable pride. In 1517 
 Leo X. intrusted the preaching of certain indulgences to 
 the Dominicans. The preference shown another order prob- 
 ably offended Luther, who was of a lively imagination 
 and passionate nature. He began by violently attacking 
 what he called the preachers^ abuses and exaggeration in 
 language, and was soon led into attacking the doctrine 
 
 * In this and the following article consult the corresponding ref- 
 erences given in the preceding articles of this chapter. 
 
 ^ On Luther see Anderdon ; Audin; Dollinger ; Stang ; Verres ; 
 Murphy, ch. 22; Parsons, Studies, HI., ch. 18; A C. Q. viii. 689, ix. 
 551 ; D. R. Old Ser. xxxix. 1 ; M. xlix. 305-457. On Calvin see Parsons, 
 1. c, ch. 21; C. W. xxxvii. 769; D. R. Old Ser. xxix. 30; De Trevem, 
 1. 2, app. 2. On Wyclif see Stevenson, S.J.; Parsons, Studies, II., ch. 
 41 ; D. R. Old Ser. xxxv. 382. On Wesley see D. R. New Ser. xxiii. 87. 
 On Henry VIII. see Gasquet, O.S.B. (also M., July '82 ff.), and Ken- 
 rick, Vindication. On Knox see Spalding, Hist, of Ref., II., pp. 228 
 and 489. On Huss see Spalding, Miscell., I., essay 10; Parsons, 1. c.J 
 III., ch. 1. In general see Works on Church History. 
 
344 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS 
 
 of indulgences itself and the right to grant them. Then, 
 carried on by the consequences of a first false principle, he 
 went from one error to another. From this time forward we 
 find in his writings addressed to the people the principle 
 which was to play so important a role in his doctrinal system: 
 faith alone obtains the remission of sin. After long and 
 patient efforts on the part of Leo X. to win him back to 
 truth and obedience, a bull of excommunication was issued 
 against the rebellious monk. Far from submitting, the 
 heresiarch consummated his rebellion by causing the bull 
 to be burned publicly at Wittenberg, and Protestantism 
 found its first apostle. Eight years later he married an 
 ex-nun called Catherine Bora. He died in 1546. 
 
 Unbridled love of false liberty, covetous desire for ecclesi- 
 astical spoils, a moral teaching which gave free rein to the 
 passions, the abolition of ecclesiastical celibacy, the unheard- 
 of violence exercised toward those who desired to remain 
 faithful to the faith of their fathers, together with other 
 causes, secured him a large number of followers. 
 
 Shortly after Luther, Zwinglius began to dogmatize in 
 Switzerland, and Calvin in Geneva. Their doctrines are 
 far from being in accord with those of Luther, but they all 
 agree in contradicting the teaching of the Catholic Church, 
 and according great freedom to the passions. As to Henry 
 VIIL, King of England, we know how, after writing against 
 Luther and obtaining the title of ''Defender of the Faith," 
 he led his people into schism. He sought from the Pope 
 authority to gratify his uncontrolled passions. As the Pope 
 refused to second his criminal desires by sanctioning his 
 divorce from Catherine of Aragon, his faithful wife, he 
 abandoned the Church of Rome and had himself proclaimed 
 head of the Anglican Church (1534). Heresy was soon 
 grafted upon schism. 
 
 We have no need to insist further on these well-known 
 facts, but let us demonstrate that Protestantism has none 
 of the positive notes of the true Church of Christ. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 345 
 
 I. Protestantism is Absolutely Devoid of Unity. 
 
 A. It Lacks Unity of Doctrine. — a. There was no 
 agreement whatever in matters of doctrine among the first 
 founders of Protestantism, and their doctrinal divergences 
 became more and more marked. In fact they have in- 
 creased to such a degree that it is almost true to say that 
 the diversity of principles in the Church equals that of 
 individuals. Luther himself acknowledged this in 1525. 
 ''There are," he wrote, ''almost as many sects and behefs 
 as there are individuals. One will not admit baptism; 
 another rejects the Sacrament of the Altar; this one places 
 another world between this present world and the day of 
 judgment; that one teaches that Christ is not God. There 
 is no one, however ignorant, who may not claim to be inspired 
 by the Holy Spirit and give forth his imaginings and his 
 dreams as prophecies. " With time the diversity has become 
 only more wide-spread. The number of sects existing in com- 
 plete independence one of another can no longer be esti- 
 mated. According to the official reports there are at present 
 in the United States fifty-six principal sects, which with the 
 secondary sects make two hundred and twenty-eight. In 
 the city and suburbs of London alone there are more than 
 one hundred different sects, and in each sect the various 
 professions of faith succeed one another Hke leaves on the 
 trees. Thus a Protestant minister of Kiel, Harms, did not 
 hesitate to say that he could imdertake to write on his 
 thumb-nail all the doctrines uniformly accepted by his 
 brethren. 
 
 h. Not only were the leaders of the Reformation far from 
 agreeing in their rehgious tenets, but each one changed his 
 religious opinions without the slightest difficulty, alternately 
 accepting and rejecting points of doctrine according to the 
 needs of the moment. Luther went so far as more than once 
 to threaten his followers to retract all his innovations if 
 they persisted in annoying him and creating difficulties. 
 
346 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 According to Melanchthon himself, the most moderate of all 
 the apostles of the Reformation, ''the articles of faith should 
 be frequently changed and should be based upon the character 
 of the times and circumstances." 
 
 c. This variation in the behef of the early reformers and 
 of their followers of the present day need not astonish us; 
 it is a necessary consequence of the Protestant rule of faith. 
 In fact Protestants reject the Cathohc principle of the 
 authority of the Church divinely charged to interpret in- 
 falhbly Holy Scripture and tradition. They claim that 
 the Bible alone, interpreted according to the reason of the 
 individual, teaches each one what he is to beheve. It is not 
 difficult to see whither this dissolvent principle may lead.^ 
 Thus it furnished Bossuet in the century immediately follow- 
 ing the Reformation matter for his masterpiece, the " History 
 of the Variations of the Protestant Church." 
 
 Remark. — Despite this so-called rule of faith, the majority 
 of Protestants obey in reality any minister who has the 
 address to make himself heard and to secure the suffrage 
 of a certain number. But such authority, besides being 
 purely human, as well as contrary to the fundamental principle 
 of their rule of faith, can hardly fail to produce diversity of 
 beliefs. Why should there be more conformity among the 
 teachers than among their flocks? 
 
 d. Worship being only an expression of faith, and diversity 
 of belief entailing necessarily diversity of rites and rehgious 
 ceremonies, it must introduce in Protestantism great variety 
 of practices in regard to sacraments, sacrifices, and prayers. 
 Thus some admit and others reject the same sacrament; 
 and among those who admit it some accept it in one sense, 
 others in another. Luther, for example, reduced the number 
 of sacraments from seven to two. Again, according to the 
 Lutheran doctrine, baptism is not regenerating, it does not 
 produce interior sanctification ; again, justification does not 
 mean that sin is really effaced; it means that it is not imputed 
 
 See Lacordaire, conf . 27, Cath. Doct. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 347 
 
 to man, that it is covered by faith in the merits of Jesus 
 Christ. As to the Eucharist, some acknowledge the real 
 presence of Jesus in the sacred Eost, others regard it only as a 
 figure. Luther, though forced by the clearness of the sacred 
 text to admit this presence, nevertheless modified the Catholic 
 dogma concerning it. He claimed that the body and blood 
 of Jesus Christ are not present by the conversion of the 
 elements of bread and wine, or by transubstantiation, but 
 that they are present under and with the bread and the mne ; 
 that Christ is present only at the moment we receive the 
 Eucharist; that the sacrament was instituted only to be 
 received in communion, but not to be offered as a true ex- 
 terior sacrifice. Nor do our opponents differ any less in 
 the administration of the sacrament. Finally, some adore 
 Christ as God, others refuse Him the homage of their wor- 
 ship ; some pray for the dead, others condemn the practices. 
 
 e. Many Protestant churches, in order to preserve a shadow 
 of unity, have had recourse to formulas of faith, creeds, or 
 synodal decrees. Luther himself, in direct contradiction of 
 his fundamental rule of faith, wrote a catechism; he even 
 went farther and declared: ''There is not an angel in heaven, 
 still less a man upon earth, who may and who dares to judge 
 my doctrine: whosoever will not adopt it cannot be saved; 
 and whosoever believes not as I believe is destined for hell." 
 There could hardly be a more formal contradiction of private 
 interpretation. Many of his followers refused to accept 
 either the formulas or decisions, justly observing that under 
 such conditions they had better have remained in submission 
 to the great and ancient authority of the Church of Rome. 
 We see that this want of unity is an absolutely incurable 
 evil among Protestants. There are Protestant sects, but 
 there is not, there cannot be a Protestant Church, since 
 they have no common faith, no unity of doctrine, nor any 
 principle of such unity. 
 
 B. It Lacks Unity of Ministry or Government. — 
 Each sect, by the fact that it possesses a belief of its own, 
 
348 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 is independent of all the others, and the ministers of one 
 have not the right to interfere in the ministry and govern- 
 ment of another. What is more, in each determined com- 
 munion the ministers are in reality independent of one 
 another. It is, in fact, a Protestant principle that each one 
 lawfully exercises his ministry if he does not diverge from the 
 doctrine of the fundamental articles. But, again, who has 
 the requisite authority to define these articles? 
 
 II. Protestantism does Not Possess Holiness.* 
 
 A. It is Not Holy in its Founders. — 1st. History 
 represents Luther as a man of violent temper, addicted to 
 excesses of the table, and trampling under foot the most 
 solemn engagements; Calvin as an impure, vindictive 
 character; Zwinglius as a debauchee, as he himself acknowl- 
 edges; Henry VIII. as an adulterer and a debauchee. The 
 morals and private sentiments of Luther as revealed in his 
 own writings will not bear publication. 
 
 2d. The reformers authorized the most revolting crimes 
 in their followers. Luther, in servile deference to a crowned 
 head, did not dare to preach against polygamy, and even 
 went so far as to permit bigamy in the Landgrave Philip of 
 Hesse; the permission was confirmed by seven other re- 
 formers, and Melanchthon assisted at the marriage. 
 
 3d. In their writings and conversation they show them- 
 selves men of ungoverned temper, corrupt heart, and in- 
 domitable pride. At the least resistance they broke forth 
 into abusive and profane language. Luther's language, 
 particularly, is at times most gross and revolting.^ 
 
 ^ On the Fruits of Protestantism see Spalding, History of the Ref- 
 ormation, p. in., IV.; Evidences, 1. 7; Spalding J. L., lect. 1; Marcy, 
 ch. 23 ff.; A. C. Q. ix. 70 (Puritans), 127, xiv. 243; Br. W. v. 244, 
 xiv. 447; C. W. xxxviii. 194 (in England); D. R. Old Ser. xiv. 379; 
 III. Ser. xiv. (in Prussia). 
 
 ' See Jansen, Verres, O'Connor, and Audin, also our remarks upon 
 Protestant intolerance below in Ch. IV. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 349 
 
 B. It is Not Holy in its Doctrine. — Protestantism has 
 no common moral teaching binding upon all, an> more than 
 a common belief which all are obliged to accept. Its ad- 
 herents claim that the Bible is the only rule of morals as 
 well as belief, and as each one is allowed to interpret it 
 according to the light of his reason there is nothing to prevent 
 any one from fashioning his own moral teaching: he may 
 even change his ethics according to the ever-varying dis- 
 position of his mind. That which his prejudice of to-day 
 makes him read in the Scriptures may appear to him to- 
 morrow in an entirely different light, and he is free to change 
 his conduct according to his convictions. 
 
 Finally (it is hardly credible), a Protestant is not obliged to 
 practise what he reads in the Scriptures, however clear it 
 may be. For the founders of the Reformation teach that 
 works are useless and even injurious to salvation; that 
 faith suffices to make us the friends of God; that man once 
 justified before God is sure of being saved, whatever crimes 
 he may afterward commit. What is more, that it is even 
 impossible for man to sin since he is not free. Luther and 
 Calvin go so far as to deny the existence of free-will in man. 
 Luther wrote a book called ''Slave Will," which may be 
 summed up thus: ''God is the author of the evil as well as 
 the good in us, and as He saves us without any merit on our 
 part. He also damns us through no fault of ours. ... All that 
 we do is done, not freely, but through pure necessity." (Works 
 of Luther, vol. ii., p. 435.) Calvin holds the same language. 
 "God," he says, ''for incomprehensible reasons excites men 
 to violate His laws. His inspirations move the hearts of 
 sinners to evil. Man falls because God has so ordered it." 
 (Instit. Christ., bk. vii., ch. 23.) Again, "God," says Zwing- 
 lius, "is the first principle of sin. It is through a divine 
 necessity that man commits all crimes." (De Provid. Ep., 
 vol. i., p. 355.) 
 
 Let us give a few other texts from Luther, for they are 
 more conclusive than argument. "How rich is the Christian ! 
 
350 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Even if he would he could not be disinherited by sin: not to 
 believe in the Son of God is the only sin in this world. Be- 
 lieve, therefore, and you are sure of your salvation.'' (Luther, 
 '^ Captivity of Babylon.") ''There is no more dangerous, 
 more pernicious scandal than a good life exteriorly manifested 
 by good works. Pious souls who do good to gain the kingdom 
 of heaven not only will never reach it, but will be counted 
 among the damned." (Works of Luther, vol. vi.) ''The 
 Gospel does not ask our works for our justification; on the 
 contrary, it condemns these works." "Murder, theft are not 
 sins so great as to wish to reach heaven through good works, 
 which are the things most prejudicial to salvation." (Ser- 
 mons inedits publics par Mack.) 
 
 This same inefp^acy and uselessness of good works is taught 
 by Calvin in more than fifteen different parts of his ''Insti- 
 tutes of the Christian Religion." Such a doctrine flows 
 naturally from the idea those innovators had of justification 
 or righteousness. Man is made just and righteous, they said, 
 without any internal change in him; it all consists in the 
 gratuitous and merely external imputation of the righteous- 
 ness of Jesus Christ to the Christian. A sinner becomes a 
 just man by the mere fact that God deigns to consider him 
 covered as with a mantle by the holiness of His Son. The 
 moral character of man's conduct does not enter at all into 
 the conditions required for the friendship of God; sin amounts 
 to nothing, provided faith remains firm and strong. "Be a 
 sinner and sin stoutly," Luther wrote to his friend Melanch- 
 thon. ..." We must needs sin as long as we are in this 
 world; ... sin cannot deprive us of God, even were we to 
 commit in the same day a thousand adulteries and murders." * 
 Such doctrine is evidently the destruction of the very principle 
 
 ^ Here is the Latin text : " Esto peccator et pecca fortiter, sed 
 fortius fide et gaude in Christo qui victor est peocat', mortis et 
 mundi. Peccandum est quamdiu hie sumus. Sufficit quod agnovi- 
 mus per divitias Dei Agnum qui tollit peccata mundi: ab hoc non 
 avellet nos peccatum, etiamsi miUies et millies uno die fornicemur et 
 occidamus." (Works, Jena, 1556, vol. i., p. 545.) 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 351 
 
 of morality. If it were true, Jesus Christ, instead of coming 
 into the world to deliver us from sin and to teach us, by- 
 word and example, to practise all, even the most heroic 
 virtues, would have died to leave us free to live with im- 
 punity in crime. 
 
 C. It is Not Holy in its Influence upon Morals. — 
 We can readily divine whither a doctrine must lead which 
 places Robespierre and St. Vincent of Paul on the same 
 level. Why should man trouble himself to restrain his 
 evil inclinations; why may he not give free rein to his pas- 
 sions? It is not astonishing, therefore, to find Calvin pro- 
 testing only a few years after the inauguration of the quasi- 
 reformation that ^' among the hundred evangelists hardly 
 one could be found who had adopted the ministry from any 
 other motive than to be able to abandon himself with greater 
 liberty to all kinds of voluptuousness and incontinency.'^ 
 Luther himself was soon alarmed at the fruit of his teaching. 
 ''Our Germany," he says, ''since she has seen the Hght of 
 the Gospel almost seems to be possessed by the devil. . . . 
 The fear of God has disappeared; it is a deluge of vice of all 
 kinds. . . . They take the Gospel for a gastronomic doctrine 
 which teaches one to get drunk and to eat to bursting. This 
 is the actual opinion of all without distinction. . . . Wlio 
 among us would have entered upon this ministry could 
 we have foreseen the numerous calamities and scandals it 
 would breed? Now that we have begun we must abide by 
 the consequences." (Luther's Works, ed. Walch, vol. viii.) 
 And again he says: "I admit that my doctrine has indeed 
 given rise to scandals. I shall not deny that the new state 
 of things frequently makes me tremble, particularly when 
 my conscience reproaches me with having disturbed the 
 ancient order of the Church, which was so tranqml, so peaceful 
 under the papacy, and with having, by my doctrine, created 
 discord and trouble." ^ (Works, vol. ii.) Such avowals, which 
 we could multiply, and which are to be found in Janssen's 
 ^ See Lacordaire, conf . 23. 
 
352 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 History of the German People, demonstrate whether God is 
 with those who claimed to reform the Church of Rome. 
 While the sects of the Reformation incurred from the first the 
 severest censures and bitterest reproaches, the Fathers of 
 the Council of Trent, assisted by the Holy Spirit, efficaciously 
 remedied by wise and prudent rules the abuses which had 
 gradually crept into ecclesiastical discipline. 
 
 III. Protestantism does Not Possess Catholicity. 
 
 It is only too evident that Protestantism is not universal 
 either as regards time or place. It began only in the six- 
 teenth century; and even in the countries where it has 
 penetrated, though it bears a generic name, it is in reality 
 divided into a multitude of sects completely independent 
 of one another, separated even by specific names, and fre- 
 quently bitter enemies, having no other bond than their 
 common hatred of the Catholic Church. How can they 
 form but one rehgion when they have not and cannot have a 
 body of truths uniformly taught everywhere? Uniformity 
 of belief, binding upon all, would, moreover, be a contradic- 
 tion of their fundamental principle, private interpretation 
 of the Bible. Not only does no fraction of Protestantism 
 approximate in numbers to the Catholic Church, but the 
 sum of all its adherents does not equal the number of the 
 Catholic faithful. 
 
 IV. Protestantism does Not Possess Apostolicity. 
 
 A. It IS Not Apostolic in its Doctrine. — This we have 
 superabundantly proved. Where is the apostolic doctrine 
 imposed as of faith upon all? The apostles evidently did not 
 receive from Christ and transmit to their successors the 
 varied and frequently contradictory opinions which divide 
 Protestant sects. 
 
 B. Nor is it Apostolic in its Ministry. — How can the 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 353 
 
 founders of Protestantism hold their authority from the 
 apostles, they who revolted against the successors of the 
 apostles, and preached a doctrine opposed to that which had 
 been believed for centuries? In truth, Luther, Calvin, and 
 the other leaders of Protestantism, reahzing the necessity of 
 justifying their revolt, claimed to have received what they 
 called their mission of reformation from the apostles. But 
 the authority to alter or perfect a divine work must rest upon 
 something more than an affirmation. Christ Himself felt 
 obliged to give abundant proofs of His mission. The re- 
 formers should have furnished at least a few miracles to 
 credit their mission to the people. Luther was deeply 
 sensitive to the need of such proof, and sorely perplexed how 
 to furnish it. Sometimes he said he held his mission from 
 the magistrate of Wittenberg, sometimes from his dignity 
 of doctor. In the space of twenty-four years he changed 
 his opinion on this point fourteen times. 
 
 The truth is, no one has received or ever will receive such 
 a mission. We have seen that the apostles received the 
 mission to teach all men, to preserve all that Jesus Christ had 
 confided to them ; and St. Paul pronounced anathema against 
 any one, were he an angel from heaven, who wo aid teach 
 any other doctrine than that of the apostles. Hence 
 it is proved that it was on their own authority that those 
 so-called reformers arrogated to themselves their alleged 
 mission. And the Church has the right to say to them: 
 *'You are of yesterday; I know you not." 
 
 As to Anglicans, though their bishops possessed the power 
 of order, which they do not, it is manifestly evident that they 
 have not the power of jurisdiction.^ We have seen (p. 329 f.) 
 that jurisdiction is transmitted by the authority in whom 
 
 ^On Anglican Orders see Leo XIII. on Anglican Orders; Estcourt; 
 Breen; M., Sept. '94 ff.; Sydney Smith, S.J., Reasons for Rejecting 
 Angl. Orders; Brandi, S.J., Last Word on Anglican Orders; Ryan; Gal- 
 way, S.J.; Wiseman, Essays, v. iii. See also works on Continuity; 
 also the interesting collection, The Church of Old England, 4 vols., 
 C. T. S. 
 
354 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 it is vested, and according to the canonical law in force 
 at the time of the transmission. Now whom do Protestant 
 pastors succeed? From whom and how have they received 
 jurisdiction? Certainly not from Luther, or Calvin, or 
 Henry VIII. Nor from their first bishops, who abandoned 
 the Church of Rome to embrace the tenets of the Reforma- 
 tion. The latter, it is true, received jurisdiction from the 
 Church of Rome; but Rome, after their defection, took away 
 the subjects she had confided to them, having as much right 
 to withdraw them as she had to give them.^ 
 
 Conclusion. — Protestantism, therefore, possesses none of 
 the characteristic notes with which Our Saviour marked 
 His Church; the work of the innovators of the sixteenth 
 century is not the work of Christ; it is not the edifice built 
 by the divine Hand to shelter the elect during their passage 
 through this world. 
 
 There is still an easier means of setting forth most clearly 
 the falseness of Protestantism, namely, by showing that its 
 rule of faith is absolutely untenable and contrary to the will 
 of Christ. When this basis is overthrown the whole edifice 
 of the Reformation crumbles of itself. 
 
 Another peremptory and at the same time easy argument 
 showing the illegitimate birth and existence o.^ Protestantism 
 we shall find in the primacy bestowed by Christ on St. Peter 
 (see below, Art. V.). 
 
 V. The Protestant Rule of Faith Differs from that 
 
 OF Christ. 
 
 The Bible, nothing hut the Bible, freely interpreted by every 
 one, such has been from the beginning and still is the Protes- 
 tant rule of faith. 
 
 * It is well known that a few years ago certain Anglicans sought 
 ordination and consecration at the hands of the Jansenist bishop of 
 Utrecht in order to be able legitimately to ordain and consecrate 
 others. C. W. xviii. 686, 838; D. R. Old Ser. xlv. 468; A C. Q. On 
 the schismatic Church of Utrecht see Parsons, IV., ch. 14. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 355 
 
 We Catholics profess also the greatest respect for the 
 Holy Scriptures, but we receive it from the hands of the 
 Church, which, in virtue of her infallibility, guarantees its 
 inspiration. Moreover, with the Scriptures we receive from 
 the same hand with equal veneration Tradition, that is, the 
 word of God not contained in the Sacred Scriptures. Finally, 
 far from claiming, like Protestants, that every one has the 
 right to determine the meaning of Scripture, far from de- 
 claring every man the judge and arbiter of his belief, we 
 say that it belongs to the Church, assisted by the Holy 
 Spirit, to fix the catalogue or canon of the Holy Scriptures, 
 to determine the meaning of the sacred text and unerringly 
 interpret tradition. In a word, the Catholic Rule of Faith 
 is the teaching authority of the Church, her living and in- 
 fallible voice and doctrine. 
 
 Thesis. — The Protestant Rule of Faith is Untenable.^ 
 
 First Argument. — This rule of faith is contrary to the 
 will of Christ, and condemned by Scripture itself. 
 
 a. Protestants, if faithful to their rule of faith, must prove 
 to us by clear texts from Scripture that the apostles received 
 from their divine Master the command to write the teachings 
 which fell from His lips. Far from being able to do this, 
 they find as we do, when they read the Bible, that Christ, 
 after founding His Church upon Peter and the twelve apostles, 
 did not say to them. Go distribute Bibles, but, '^Go teach all 
 nations, jyreach the kingdom of God to them; teach them 
 to observe whatsoever I have commanded you; he that 
 heareth you heareth Me.^^ 
 
 h. Christ giving example in His own person preached, but 
 
 ^ On the Bible as the rule of faith see Wiseman, Lectures, vol. i.; 
 Lockhart, 1. c, ch. 4 ff.; Bp. Shield, The Bible against Prot.; Preston, 
 Protestantism and the Bible; Humphrey, S.J., Bible and Belief; 
 Written Word, ch. 3 ff.; Alnatt in C. T. S. v., xiii.; Kenrick, Vindi 
 cation, 1. 3, 4; Hunter, I., tr. 2, ch. 2; The Bible Question fairly tested 
 (Baltimore); Br. W. v. 352, vi. 122, 165, 203, 275, vii., viii. 373, 
 418; D. R., Oct. '94, 313. 
 
356 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 He wrote nothing. Nowhere do we find that He founded 
 a religion to be taught by writing, still less that it was to 
 be done exclusively by writing. ''Christ/' says St. John 
 Chrysostom, ''left no written instructions to His apostles; 
 but instead of books He promised them the Holy Spirit, 
 who would inspire them what they should say." 
 
 c. The apostles, to whom Christ promised that the Holy 
 Spirit would recall all that He had taught them, did as their 
 Master commanded them. It was by preaching that faith 
 was propagated in the world. It was only occasionally that 
 a few of the apostles committed their teachings to writing. 
 The other apostles wrote nothing, and yet they converted 
 whole nations. It was only at the end of the first century, 
 about sixty-seven years after the death of Christ, that the 
 books of the New Testament were completed ; yet the faithful 
 could not have been without a rule of faith during all these 
 years. Moreover, the sacred writers constantly refer to a 
 parallel oral teaching; they formally declare that they wrote 
 only a very small portion of Our Saviour's teachings; and 
 they exact the same respect for what they taught by word 
 of mouth as for what they had written. (2 John v. 12.) 
 "Stand fast, brethren," says St. Paul to the Thessalonians, 
 who were already Christians, "and hold the traditions which 
 you have learned, whether by word or by our epistle" 
 (2 Thess. ii. 14). And to Timothy (2 Tim. ii. 2) : "The things 
 which thou hast heard of me by many witnesses, the same 
 commend to faithful men, who shall be fit to teach others." 
 
 d. It is well known that we have no biblical authority, 
 no authority but tradition, for example, for the substitution 
 of Sunday for the Sabbath, for the validity of baptism ad- 
 ministered by heretics. If there be in the Church a certain 
 and unchangeable rule, followed by all the Fathers, pro- 
 claimed by all Councils, and observed by all her Doctors, 
 it is assuredly this: To follow most faithfully the command 
 so often repeated by St. Paul: " Timothy, that keep which 
 is committed to thy trust" (1 Tim. vi. 20). Keep, as St. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 357 
 
 Vincent of Lerins explains, not what you have discovered 
 yourself, but what has been entrusted to you; not what you 
 have yourself invented, but what has been handed to you by 
 others; not what your own mind has told you, but what you 
 have learned from your predecessors; not what you have 
 established by your individual efforts, but what you have 
 received from hand to hand, by a public and official tradition, 
 whereof you are not the author, but a simple guardian. 
 
 Second Argument. — ^This rule of faith is condemned by 
 the teaching of the history of the Church. According to 
 the testimony of St. Irenseus, there were, even in his time, 
 many barbarous nations who believed in Christ, though 
 paper and ink were imknown among them. These countries 
 did not have the Holy Scriptures, and yet the same saint 
 attests that they preserved the faith pure and intact by 
 means of tradition. Do we find anywhere in the history of 
 later times that the baggage of the ministers of the Church 
 consisted of books which they distributed before they 
 preached? How, moreover, would this have been possible 
 before the invention of printing, that is, during the fourteen 
 centuries when copies of the Bible were few and very expen- 
 sive? During this period the majority of the faithful had 
 little means of instruction save the oral teaching of the 
 ministers of the Church, and yet they were Christians. 
 
 From all that we have said it is evident that the Church 
 was founded without the Bible, and that it existed before the 
 Bible. The gospels, the Acts of the Apostles, the epistles, 
 and the Apocalypse did not form the Christian communions 
 or the Church, but they were addressed to these communions 
 already formed. Thus St. Augustine had good reason to 
 declare that he would not believe the Gospel except on the 
 authority of the Catholic Church.^ 
 
 Third Argument. — In any case, if the Bible freely in- 
 terpreted by all were the only rule of faith, very large classes 
 
 ^ Alnatt, The Church and the Sects, I. Ser., 1. 5. 
 
368 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 even of the present day would be deprived of the means of 
 salvation, for there is a large majority that cannot read, or 
 whose laborious life leaves them no time to read. And yet, 
 according to Protestant teaching, every one must verify for 
 himself the inspiration of Holy Scripture, the true meaning 
 of each verse, as well as the authenticity, integrity, and 
 fidelity of the version in his hands. If God had given the 
 Bible as a rule of faith, if He had, as Protestantism insists, 
 made it a law for all Christians to read the Bible for them- 
 selves, He would have made the entrance to the Church, to 
 eternal salvation, impossible for nearly all men, particularly 
 for the poor. Now one of the special marks which Christ 
 has given of His divine mission is that the poor shall have 
 the Gospel preached to them, and He declares them His 
 favorite children (Luke iv. 18; vii. 22). 
 
 Fourth Argument. — Without the authority of the Church 
 it is impossible to establish the full canon of Scripture and 
 to offer to the faith of believers a clearly and positively 
 defined body of doctrine. In fact Protestants, even the 
 most learned among them, cannot be certain that the Bible 
 is inspired, that is, that it contains the word of God, not 
 simply that of man. Nor can they be certain what books 
 form part of the Bible. The testimony of history, the 
 agreement of manuscripts, criticism, furnish only a human 
 authority, upon which it would be impossible to make an act 
 of divine faith. Criticism, moreover, has led Protestants 
 to cut off successively from the list of the sacred books 
 nearly all the books of the Old and the New Testament; 
 and many of them even deny that any part of the Scrip- 
 ture is inspired.^ 
 
 ^ Protestants reproach the Catholic Church with not allowing all 
 the %ithful to read the Bible. But it was precisely because of the 
 abuse which the Waldenses, Albigenses, and particularly Protestants 
 made of the sacred text, more especially since the world has been 
 flooded with false versions, that the Church was obliged, for the 
 protection of her children, to make wise restrictions concerning the 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 359 
 
 Conclusion. — The following simple dilemma suffices to 
 prove the falseness of Protestantism: During the first period 
 of its existence either the Church of Christ was buried in 
 error or it had preserved the integrity and purity of its 
 doctrine. In the first case, the promises which guaranteed 
 the stability and perpetuity of the Church were not fulfilled, 
 consequently the Author of these promises was not God nor 
 was He sent by God. Hence we have no need to concern 
 ourselves with His work, still less with the work of Luther 
 or Calvin. If, on the contrary, the Church of Christ re- 
 mained pure in its doctrine, this Church was the Church of 
 Rome or it was another. If it was another church. Protes- 
 tantism ought to have allied itself with that other Christian 
 society, which was the true Church. Now this it did not 
 do. If this true Church was the Church of Rome, then 
 Protestantism had no right or reason to separate from 
 her, and in rebelling against her it proclaimed its own ille- 
 gitimacy. 
 
 May our separated brethren remember that their ancestors 
 were Catholics, and that in adopting the Catholic faith they 
 are not changing to a new religion; they are only returning 
 to the bosom of the Church which their fathers unfortunately 
 abandoned three centuries ago. 
 
 reading of the Scriptures. These restrictions, it must be borne in 
 mind, refer only to the Bible translated into the vernacular; even 
 then it is not prohibited when the version is approved by the Apos- 
 tolic See, or when it is published with notes from the Fathers or 
 learned Catholic authors.* 
 
 ♦Besides the authors mentioned in note p. 355, see also Clarke, S.J., The Pope and 
 the Bible; Br. W. vi. 212. 232, vii.237; D.R.OldSer. xxiii. 145; M. Ixiv. 480, Ixv. 1; 
 
 C. W. Ivii. 20, Iviii. 587. On the Bible before the Reformation see Alnatt, Which is 
 the True Church?, p. 38; * Buckingham, The Bible in the Middle Ages; * Maitland, 
 Dark Ages; C. W. xxvii. 359; Murphy, ch. 30. On English Catholic versions see 
 Gasquet, Pre- Reformation Bible; Card. Newman, Tracts, etc., n. 6; C. W. xii. 149; 
 
 D. R. i. 367, ii. 475, iii. 428, July '94, p. 122. On Protestant versions see A. C. Q. iv. 
 123, 344, 521, V. 701. 
 
360 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ART. IV.— THE SCHISMATIC GREEK CHURCH DOES NOT 
 POSSESS THE MARKS OF THE TRUE CHURCH. 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. We have not to concern ourselves here 
 with the various heretical sects — Nestorians, Jacobites, or 
 Eutychians — which arose in the East, and which existed 
 long before the Greek schism. It is too evident that these 
 religious factions, the origin and authors of which are known 
 to us ; which were formally condemned in Ecumenical Coun- 
 cils; which, far from possessing unity of faith and communion, 
 are enemies one of another; which are limited to certain 
 countries and have no power of expansion, cannot be the 
 true Church of Christ. 
 
 2d. We must beware of confounding the Schismatic Greek 
 Church with the United Greek Church, which, though it has 
 a special liturgy of its own and differs from us in matters of 
 discipline, forms part of the Catholic Church. It is im- 
 portant to remark here that the Church has at all times 
 authorized customs proper to certain nations for the celebra- 
 tion of the divine office and the administration of the sacra- 
 ments, when these customs were not contrary to the dogmas 
 of faith. Thus the General Council of Florence, in the 
 memorable act publishing the solemn reunion of the two 
 Churches, decreed that the customs of each one should be 
 preserved unchanged. And Benedict XIV., following the 
 example of several of his predecessors, severely prohibited 
 changing from one rite to the other, and he demonstrated 
 in his encyclical that Rome had always endeavored to pre- 
 serve the Oriental rite intact and had forbidden the mingling 
 of customs and the changing from one rite to the other. 
 This was also the line of conduct pursued by Pius IX., and 
 such also has been that of Leo XIII. Therefore we see 
 how vain is the fear entertained on this point by Greek 
 schismatics, jealous of preserving their ancient customs. 
 
 Historical Notice. — Under the generic name of Schismatic 
 Greek Church are included the various religious factions, 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 361 
 
 issues of the great schism of the East begun in the ninth 
 century by Photius, patriarch of Constantinople, but which 
 was not really consummated until the eleventh century, 
 thanks to the ambition of Michael Cerularius, one of his 
 successors (1054).^ 
 
 Before Constantine chose Byzantium for his new capital 
 the episcopal see of that city was dependent upon the 
 Metropolitan of Heraclea. But hardly had this city re- 
 ceived from the great emperor the title of second Rome, 
 eldest and cherished daughter of old Rome, than ambition 
 awoke in the hearts of its bishops. Proud of the favor which 
 they enjoyed at court, and abusing the Third Canon of the 
 Council of Constantinople (381), which conferred upon the 
 Bishop of Byzantium "the primacy of honor after the Bishop 
 of Rome," they hastened to claim primacy of jurisdiction 
 which had always belonged to the sovereign Pontiff, claiming 
 that Constantinople ought to be as exalted and glorious in 
 ecclesiastical affairs as in political. John the Faster (583) 
 first assumed the title of ecumenical or universal patriarch, and 
 preserved it despite the vigorous protestations and adjura- 
 tions of Pelagius II. and St. Gregory the Great. 
 
 Let us remark here with Pope St. Leo, who as early as 
 the fifth century had to protest against the usurpation by 
 Byzantine prelates of the rights of the Church of Rome, that 
 "the presence of the emperor may constitute a royal resi- 
 dence, but it does not create an apostolic see ; divine things 
 not being regulated after the manner of human affairs." ^ 
 
 ^ See Church Histories. On the Greek schism see also Murphy, 
 eh. 8; Tondini, The Pope of Rome; Preston (Ch. Unity); Spalding, 
 J. M., Miscell. xxxi.; Parsons, Studies, II., ch. 4, 9; Allies, Per Crucem, 
 I., p. 46; C. W. iii. 1, X. 758; D. R. Old Ser. xvii. 447, xxiii. 406, III. Ser. 
 iv. 22; A. C. Q. xxvii. 675 ff. On Nestorians see D. R. Old Ser. xiv. 122. 
 On the Copts, ib. xxviii. 314, New Ser. i. 33. On Armenians, D R. 
 Old Ser. vii. 333; C. W. Ix. 212. On Maronites, D. R. Old Ser. xviii. 
 43. On the Abyssinians, D. R. New Ser. i. 30. On the Portuguese 
 Schism in India, D. R. Old Ser. xxvi. 179, Jan. '93, p. 27. 
 
 ^ The principle invoked by St. Leo is so obvious that even the 
 
362 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 It is evident that if the contrary principle were ever ad- 
 mitted, if we were obUged whenever a poUtical change 
 occurred in a country to make corresponding changes in 
 the order of the Church's hierarchy, we should be logically 
 forced to say that Christ built His Church upon shifting 
 sands, and not, as He affirms, upon a foundation against 
 which even the gates of hell cannot prevail. In fact a 
 handful of soldiers or the caprice of a sovereign would 
 suffice to raze the divine edifice to the ground. 
 
 Notwithstanding the increasing ambition of the bishops of 
 Constantinople the Pope's confirmation of every new pa- 
 triarch continued, before as well as after Photius, to be 
 regarded as indispensable, or at least of great importance 
 as establishing the orthodoxy of the newly elected bishop. 
 Thus Photius himself, though he usurped the see of Con- 
 stantinople, did not fail to send an embassy to Rome to 
 ask Pope Nicholas I. to confirm him. Photius's letter to the 
 sovereign Pontiff contained a profession of orthodox faith 
 for which he was commended by the head of the Church, but 
 the confirmation was refused, and the usurper excommuni- 
 
 clergy of Constantinople still follow Catholic traditions on this point. 
 We know, in fact, that the metropolitans of Chalcedon, Ephesus, 
 Nicomedia, Heraclea, Cyziciis are members of the supreme council 
 of the Patriarch of Constantinople and have enjoyed numerous and 
 important privileges. The reason of this is that these cities now 
 only unimportant towns or villages were formerly celebrated places 
 or capitals of great provinces. If the vicissitudes of human politics 
 involve corresponding changes in the ecclesiastical hierarchy, these 
 metropolitans should long smce have resigned their privileges to the 
 bishops of Candia, Smyrna, Thessalonica, Rhodes, and of many other 
 cities. Moreover, if the Greek schismatics were consistent, if the 
 motive alleged by John the Faster had a reasonable foundation, the 
 Bishop of Constantinople should long since have resigned the title 
 of Universal Patriarch, for Byzantium has ceased for centuries to 
 be the capital of the Byzantine empire. The ostentatious title 
 is all the more ridiculous that at the present day this patriarch's 
 jurisdiction does not include even a sixth of the Christians of the 
 Eastern Church. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 363 
 
 cated in a Roman Council. It was only after a reconciliation, 
 followed by a new excommunication uttered by Pope John 
 VIII., that Photius removed his mask and threw off what 
 he called the yoke of Rome. Then, to give his revolt a sem- 
 blance of reason, he claimed that the popes, by tolerating 
 the addition of the w^ord Filioque to the Nicene-Constanti- 
 nopolitan creed, had become heretical. It is worthy of 
 remark, however, that this protest was never made imtil 
 four hundred years after the addition of the word. Also 
 that it was only later, after the separation, that the dispute 
 concerning the opportuneness of the addition of the word 
 Filioque degenerated into a dogmatic question relative to the 
 procession of the Holy Spirit, the clergy of Constantinople 
 claiming that the Holy Spirit proceeded only from the 
 Father.! 
 
 After Photius the two churches remained united until the 
 time of Michael Cerularius (1054-1059), who renewed the 
 charges formulated by Photius against the Church of Rome, 
 and completed the separation from the universal Church. 
 Later a reconciliation was effected and solemnly proclaimed 
 in the Council of Florence held in 1439 under the pontificate 
 of Eugene IV.; but the bad will of the clergy of Constanti- 
 nople rendered this reconciliation, which would have been 
 so salutary, almost null.^ 
 
 ^ It would be easy to prove that this procession of the Holy Ghost, 
 as the Catholic Church teaches it, has always been universally be- 
 lieved; it was, moreover, authentically recognized by the Greeks 
 in the Ecumenical Council of Florence, in which the perfect agreement 
 of the Greek and Latin Fathers on the subject of this dogma has 
 been attested by both parties. In the Council ' a at Toledo in 448 
 the word Filioque itself was added only to cu^ ^nort the heresy of the 
 Sabellians and Priscillians, who used the ]y ;ene Creed to deny that 
 the Holy Spirit was consubstantial with/ le Father. Hunter, 11. , 
 n. 415. . J 
 
 ^ It is unnecessary to observe th' ' x^is union of the two churches 
 established by an Ecumenical Council still exists legally. In fact, no 
 later Council having abrogated or modified this solemn act, signed 
 
364 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 The Greek schism has spread through Turkey, Greece, 
 Austria, and Russia; but the importance of the Russian 
 nation requires that we give a few special details of the 
 introduction of schism into this country.^ 
 
 It would be a great mistake to suppose that this vast 
 country was won over to schism at the period of its conver- 
 sion to Christianity. It was only at the end of the tenth 
 century, when the Eastern and Western churches were 
 united in faith and government, that Russia received in a 
 stable and definite manner the benefit of the Catholic faith. 
 It owed this benefit to the Princess Olga, regent of the king- 
 dom from 945 to 955. Her sincere conversion accelerated 
 the movement toward Christianity; but the movement was 
 not definite and complete until the reign of her grandson 
 Wladimir the Great, or the Apostolic. The zealous prince 
 brought Greek priests to teach the Russian people the 
 principles of the Christian religion. This fact explains the 
 great influence which the Byzantine clergy exercised from 
 the beginning over this neophyte people — an influence which 
 led later to the introduction of schism into the powerful 
 nation. 
 
 As a matter of fact the present religion of Russia is not 
 more Greek than Prussian or Anglican. Though at the 
 period when it embraced the schism it had a metropolitan 
 immediately dependent on the Patriarch of Constantinople, 
 it has long since broken the bond which united it to this 
 great centre of the schism of the East. 
 
 by spontaneous and universal consent, it preserves to-day its legal 
 and canonical force; consequently in the eyes of every enlightened 
 Greek of good faith the sovereign Pontiff, the successor of Peter, is 
 the supreme and lawful head of the Eastern as well as the Western 
 Church. 
 
 ^ On the Russian Schism see Palmer, W., Visit to the Russian Church; 
 Wallace, Russia; Gagarin, The Russian Clergy; A. C. Q. xi. 505; 
 D. R. Old Ser. xxiii. 406, New Ser. xxviii. 277, III. Ser. v. 422, x. K 
 120, Jan. '93, p. 1; Tondini, Future of the Russian Church; Parsons, 
 Lies and Errors, p. 304; C. W. Apr. 1900. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 365 
 
 In 1589 the Metropolitan of Moscow was raised to the 
 patriarchal dignity; but Peter the Great suppressed the 
 patriarchate, and from that time the Russian Church has 
 been governed by the so-called Holy Synod, which acts in the 
 name and by the authority of the emperor, and is usually 
 presided over by an officer of the court. Thus, separated not 
 only from Rome and Constantinople, but from any patriarch 
 whatever, united most intimately with the autocratic govern- 
 ment which rules all the Russias, it is simply the national 
 religion of Russia, and should be called Muscovitism.^ 
 
 It is not surprising that the Church of Russia should of 
 late years assume the title of '^Orthodox." Has there ever 
 been a heretical or schismatic sect which did not claim to 
 possess the true doctrine? Moreover, we readily acknowledge 
 that the entire Greek Church, very different in this respect 
 from Protestant sects, has always preserved, and still pre- 
 serves unaltered, almost all the dogmas of faith as it held 
 them before the separation, and as the Church of Rome 
 teaches them. This is very evident from the institutions of 
 the Greek Church, from the writings of the Fathers most 
 revered by it, from the prayers, the canticles, daily chanted 
 in the offices and ceremonies of its worship, from the relig- 
 
 * Peter I., by the institution of the Holy Synod and by the promul- 
 gation of ecclesiastical rule, destroyed even the appearance of inde- 
 pendence in the Russian clergy. His successors have aggravated the 
 evil. It is well known that the composition of this synod depends 
 entirely on the good pleasure of the emperor, and that all its acts 
 are subject to the approbation of a minister of the czar bearing the 
 ftle of Procurator of the Synod. Moreover, in the ecclesiastical semi- 
 naries and academies the nomination and the deposition of the pro- 
 fessors, the choice of classic works, the methods of teaching are all 
 regulated bj^ the government. Thus Protestants and notorious in- 
 fidels have held professorships in the institutions; the text-books 
 adopted were for a long time, and probably still are, Protestant. 
 One can readily divine what must be the fate of the faith of clergy 
 and people under such a system. There is no reason to be astonished 
 at the great progress which Protestantism has made among the 
 Russian clergy. 
 
366 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ious practices and traditions of the people belonging to the 
 Eastern rite/ 
 
 I. The Greek Church has Neither Unity of Belief nor 
 OF Ministry. 
 
 A. Unity of belief, to be possible, necessarily requires an 
 authority, a tribunal capable of giving infallible decisions 
 in matters of faith. Now the Greek Church is deprived of 
 such a tribunal. Perhaps it will be said that the Patriarch 
 of Constantinople constitutes such a tribunal. But, first of 
 all, whence does the patriarch derive his authority? Christ 
 gave but one head to His Church, and this head, as we shall 
 presently show, is St. Peter, and after him his successors, 
 the bishops of Rome. What could deprive the successor of 
 St. Peter of his divine authority, recognized for more than 
 eight centuries, and cause it to be transferred to the Patriarch 
 of Constantinople? Certainly not, as we have just proved, 
 Constantine's choice of Byzantium as the capital of his new 
 empire. The authority which the Church of Rome has 
 received immediately from Christ resides so intrinsically 
 in her that no Council can modify or alter it. 
 
 On the other hand, the third decree of the first Council of 
 Constantinople (381) which raised the patriarch of this city 
 above those of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, ranked 
 him second to the Bishop of Rome. Now it is important to 
 
 * Protestants are frequently heard to refer triumphantly to the 
 obstinacy with which the Greeks have persisted in their schism and 
 in their hatred of the Church of Rome, totally unconscious that 
 these schismatics witness against them. In fact the dogmas which 
 we believe, are, with but little difference, publicly taught by the 
 Greek Church. Now these obstinate enemies evidently did not 
 borrow these dogmas from the Church of Rome after their separation 
 from her. Therefore we must admit that they have always been 
 believed in the East as well as in the West. But what becomes, then, 
 of the accusation of inventing new dogmas made by Protestants 
 against the Church? And why did not they themselves join the 
 Eastern Church when they revolted against Rome? 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 367 
 
 bear in mind that the Schismatic Greek Church acknowledges 
 the authority of the first seven Councils. The Greek Schis- 
 matics have been logically forced to adopt a conciliary 
 system. They admit in principle that in doubtful questions 
 of faith the patriarchs united in council have the right to 
 give doctrinal decisions. But no such assembly of patriarchs 
 has ever been convened since Michael Cerularius. In doubt- 
 ful points of dogma recourse is had to the first seven General 
 Councils. But who would venture to affirm that all points 
 of dogma and morals were fixed in these early Councils, or 
 that they could possibly settle all controversies which may 
 arise to the end of time? Moreover, there is an evident 
 contradiction in the system of the Greeks: if, as they allege, 
 the General Councils can decide doubtful questions in matters 
 of faith, on what ground do they reject the authority of the 
 Ecumenical Councils which were held after the first seven? 
 Finally, this is decisive : if it is true that the first seven General 
 Councils furnish the reply to all controverted questions, let 
 them cite the Ecumenical Council which defines that the 
 Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father alone. 
 
 B. As to unity of government, there is no trace of it in the 
 Greek Church. The dependence of the patriarchs of Jerusa- 
 lem, Alexandria, and Antioch upon the Church of Constanti- 
 nople is merely nominal; that of the Russian Church is null. 
 In one the patriarchs and bishops are subject to the head 
 of the Turkish empire, in the other the Russian Synod is 
 completely controlled by the czar. Such is the deplorable 
 state of the Eastern Church. It would be difficult to recog- 
 nize it as the one free Church which Christ founded upon 
 Peter, the one fold under the care of the one and the same 
 shepherd; or to believe that it was to these temporal rulers 
 that Christ addressed the divine command: "Feed My 
 sheep, feed My lambs." 
 
 It is evident from the historic sketch that the only bond 
 which unites the various factions forming the Schismatic 
 Greek Church and entitles them to a generic name is their 
 
368 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 common refusal of obedience to the successors of St. Peter 
 in the see of Rome: it is their common and persistent revolt 
 against the religious authority established by Christ Yet 
 this authority of Rome was recognized by the Greeks them- 
 selves until the ninth century, or, to be more exact, until 
 the middle of the eleventh, and again formally accepted by 
 them at the Council of Florence in 1439. 
 
 II. The Greek Church does Not Possess Sanctity. 
 
 Who would venture to say that the authors of the Greek 
 schism have signalized themselves by sanctity, and that 
 their revolt against the lawful and ancient authority of the 
 see of Peter was founded upon virtuous motives, and not 
 upon ambition or still less avowable passions? Undoubtedly 
 among the million schismatics born and reared in good faith 
 in the Greek Church, who have with Catholics the grace of 
 the sacraments, the benefits of the holy sacrifice, and of 
 devotion to the Blessed Virgin, there are many souls pleasing 
 to God and worthy of His favors. But where, we ask, are 
 the saints produced by this Church since its separation; 
 where the men of constant and heroic virtue worthy to be 
 compared with the saints of the Church of Rome? By what 
 striking and incontestable miracles has God manifested 
 the heroic virtue of persons held up in Russia to the venera- 
 tion of the masses? We refrain from speaking of the moral 
 degradation and the vices with which large numbers of the 
 Russian clergy are charged. If such things are the result 
 of human frailty in the ministers of the altar, we have a right 
 to expect, at least on the part of the ecclesiastical author- 
 ities, earnest and constant efforts to raise the priesthood from 
 this state of ignorance and abasement and render it less 
 unworthy of the respect of the people. 
 
TPIE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 369 
 
 III. The Greek Church does Not Possess Catholicity. 
 
 Since it ceased, by its revolt, to form part of the Catholic 
 Church, it is not only confined to a few countries of the East 
 and to Russia, but it is far from being everywhere the same. 
 As to the Russian Church in particular, its very name clearly 
 demonstrates that it is not the Church of Christ, for Our 
 Saviour did not establish national Churches; He decreed, 
 on the contrary, that there should be but one fold under one 
 shepherd. If the Russians claim that their Church forms 
 part of the Greek Church, it is contrary to all evidence, since 
 no hierarchal tie unites the two Churches, the Patriarch of 
 Constantinople being no less a stranger to the Russian Church 
 than to the Bishop of Rome. We are aware that epistolary 
 relations are now established between the Synod of St. 
 Petersburg and the schismatic Greek patriarchs. But we 
 fail to see in what way these recent relations essentially 
 modify the present situation, and particularly in what way 
 they change the situation which existed during the previous 
 centuries. Nor is this schismatic Church, despite the immense 
 territory of the empire which protects it. Catholic in numbers. 
 According to a recent census the schismatic Slavs number 
 little more than eighty million. Though closely united by 
 the strongest national spirit, they are far from possessing 
 religious unity. Notwithstanding the iron hand of the 
 autocracy which endeavors to prevent the irruption of 
 schisms, the country swarms with sects of every kind, known 
 as Raskolniks, chief of which are the Starowierzi, or "Men of 
 the Old Faith." These dissenters, who have broken with the 
 Holy Synod, just as the Synod broke with the Patriarch of 
 Constantinople and as the latter broke with Rome, may be 
 counted by millions. How long would this religious body 
 stand if the temporal power which holds it together were to 
 withdraw its support and abandon it to its fate? 
 
 The spirit of proselytism established by the words of the 
 divine Master: "Go teach all nations," hardly exists in the 
 
370 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Russian Chu/ch. True, every year the Procurator of the 
 Synod submits to the emperor and pubhshes a report in 
 which a special chapter is devoted to propagandism. There 
 is no denying that the number of recruits increases in pro- 
 portion as the empire increases its frontiers; but this is not 
 due to the apostolic devotion of its missionaries, or to the 
 blood of its martyrs. The first page of its martyrology is 
 still unwritten; but to make amends it counts by millions 
 the unhappy children of Catholic Poland, from whom it 
 endeavors to wrest their faith by violent and persistent 
 persecution. 
 
 IV. The Greek Church does Not Possess Apostolicity. 
 
 Her doctrine varies, hence it is not that of the apostles. 
 During the first nine, or rather eleven, centuries of the Catholic 
 Church, the East as well as the West believed in the primacy 
 of the Pope of Rome and in the procession of the Holy Spirit 
 as we ourselves believe and teach it. Numerous and most 
 convincing proofs of this are to be found in Pitzipious' 
 L'Eglise Orientale, and in the Bibliotheca grceca orthodoxa of 
 Assemani. The Greek Church now no longer admits these 
 two dogmas, hence it has varied. It teaches that the Holy 
 Spirit proceeds from the Father alone and that He rests in 
 the Son; it makes the personal distinction between the Son 
 and the Holy Spirit consist in the mode of receiving exist- 
 ence, one by generation, the other by procession, while 
 denying at the same time that this difference comes from 
 any relation in their origin.^ 
 
 Nor have they preserved apostolicity of ministry, for 
 
 *We shall not speak of other points of difference, for example 
 purgatory. In reality the difference between the two churches 
 here consists in the word used to designate this place of expiation. 
 The schismatics reject absolutely the word purgatory, but that they 
 admit the reality of a place of temporary expiation, as well as the 
 efficacy of prayers for the dead, -s manifestly evident from their 
 liturgy, their canticles, and their religious customs and institutions. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 371 
 
 their revolt against the authority to which they had been 
 submissive for so many centuries broke the chain which 
 united them to the apostles by the legitimate transmission of 
 pastoral jurisdiction. 
 
 Conclusion. 
 
 In concluding our remarks upon the Greek schism we are 
 happy to call our readers' attention to the movement in- 
 dicating a return toward the centre of Catholic unity which 
 begins to be manifested in the Greek Church. This is so 
 marked that the historian Pogodine and several other Russian 
 writers frankly acknowledge that if religious liberty were 
 tolerated in Russia half the orthodox peasants would become 
 Raskolniks, who are very powerful despite all the persecutions 
 they have endured, and half the higher classes would embrace 
 Catholicism. Quite recently a learned Russian, who is not a 
 Catholic, M Soloviev, son of the celebrated historian of the 
 same name, addressed to an archpriest and through him to 
 all the prelates of the separated Eastern Church, a series of 
 nine questions which not only show the perplexities and 
 doubts of a number of distinguished minds in regard to the 
 alleged orthodoxy of the schismatic Church, but seem to 
 indicate a serious step toward Catholic unity. It is curious 
 also to read in Uidee nisse, a work of this same Soloviev, the 
 very significant judgment pronounced upon his own Church 
 by I. S. Aksakov, one of the heads of the Russian party and 
 a declared enemy of the Church of Rome. After justifying 
 his statements by a long series of incontestable facts he 
 concludes his examination of the Russian Church thus: 
 ''The spirit of truth, the spirit of charity, the spirit of life, 
 the spirit of liberty, these are what the Russian Church is 
 deficient in" (CEuvres completes dTvan Aksakov, t. iv.). 
 
 Let us redouble our prayers that this Russian people, so 
 remarkable for its vigor, its religious spirit, and its patriotism, 
 may finally understand that its salvation, from a social as well 
 
372 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 as religious point of view, lies in the Catholic Church; and 
 that it may be convinced that no sacrifice is asked of its 
 national pride; that the popes desire less than ever to impose 
 upon it the rites and disciplinary customs of the Latin 
 Church. Only recently has Leo XIIL, far from attempting 
 to Latinize the Catholics of Roumania, constituted himself a 
 sincere and earnest defender of the rites and customs of the 
 ancient Churches of the East. If he earnestly desires to 
 bring back his separated children to the faith, it is with no 
 idea of injuring or weakening their national and religious 
 traditions. 
 
 After all, the Russian Church has only to unite again the 
 broken chain of its ancient traditions, to return to the doctrine 
 taught it by the first apostles of the Slavs, St. Cyril and 
 St. Methodius, consecrated bishops by Pope Adrian II.; 
 to return to the doctrine of the most illustrious Doctors of 
 the East, of Athanasius, of Gregory, of Chrysostom, of 
 Theodorus the Studite, of Cyril, of Ignatius, all of whom 
 remained faithfully united with the see of Rome, and re- 
 ceived its teaching and decrees with filial submission. The 
 Russian Church's claim to be the daughter of the schismatic 
 Church of Constantinople rests on a false historical basis. 
 Her true mother is the Catholic Church, formerly acknowl- 
 edged by the patriarchs of Constantinople, as well as by the 
 missionaries who brought her the faith. 
 
 We may fitly end this article by giving the consoling words 
 of Leo XIII. 's admirable encyclical to the Princes and 
 Peoples of the Universe, June 20, 1894: ''We cannot give 
 up the consoling hope that the time is not far distant when 
 the Churches of the Orient, so illustrious by the faith of their 
 ancestors and their ancient glories, will return to the doctrine 
 upon which they parted from us.'' ''You have no reason," 
 he further tells them, "to fear, as a consequence of your 
 return to Catholic unity, any curtailment of your rights, of 
 the privileges of your patriarchs, or of the rites and customs 
 of your respective churches. For it has always been and 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 373 
 
 will ever be the intention of the Holy See, as it has been 
 her most constant tradition, to treat all nations with a noble 
 spirit of condescension and to show the greatest considera- 
 tion for their origin and customs." 
 
 ART. v.— THE PRIMACY OF THE SEE OF PETER, OR 
 THE PAPACY.^ 
 
 This question belongs naturally to the chapter which 
 follows, but we treat it here because the primacy of the 
 Roman Pontiff affords a new, distinctive mark, easily recog- 
 nized and sufficient of itself to distinguish the true Church 
 of Christ from heretical and schismatic sects. 
 
 We must carefully distinguish, first of all, the primacy 
 of jurisdiction from primacy of honor, or primacy of directive 
 authority. 
 
 Primacy of honor is only a simple right of precedence 
 which in no way confers the right to govern or even to direct. 
 The primacy of directive authority is that of the president 
 of our legislative assemblies, the right to direct the discussion 
 of affairs. The primacy of jurisdiction is quite another 
 thing; it is the real right to govern, and includes the triple 
 power, legislative, judiciary, and coercive. Such is the pri- 
 macy which Christ bestowed, in all its fulness, upon Peter, 
 and which Protestants deny him. 
 
 First Thesis. — Christ Conferred upon St. Peter the Primacy of 
 Jurisdiction over the Whole Church. 
 
 First Argument, drawn from the Words of Christ. — 
 Among the words addressed by Our Lord to St. Peter there 
 are some which contain the promise to confer upon him the 
 primacy and others which are the fulfilment of this promise. 
 
 * Allies; Alnatt; Botalla; De Maistre; Hettinger; Humphrey; Ken- 
 rick; Lindsay; Murphy; Preston; Rivington; Spald-ng, J. M , Evi» 
 dences, 1. 11, 12; Lockhart, Old Rel., ch. 8 ff.; Hunter, vol. i., Schanz, 
 III., ch. 12, 13; A. C. Q. xix. 691; C. W. xxxv. 105. 
 
374 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 a. The Promise. — Jesus having asked His disciples as- 
 sembled about Him whom they thought He was, Peter 
 answered in his own name, and publicly proclaimed the 
 divinity of his Master, ''Thou art Christ, the Son of the 
 living God,'' and Jesus, delighted with this profession of 
 faith, immediately answered, ''Blessed art thou, Simon Bar- 
 Jona: because flesh and blood hath not revealed it to thee, 
 but My Father who is in heaven. And I say to thee: that 
 thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church, 
 and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." (Matth. 
 xvi. 15 ff.) 
 
 It is very evident that these words, than which nothing 
 could be clearer, were addressed, not to the apostolic college, 
 but to Peter. There could be no ambiguity in the words 
 of incarnate Wisdom, particularly when there was question 
 of so important a promise. The Master spoke to be under- 
 stood, and He wished that there should be no misapprehension 
 of His meaning. That Protestants should explain these 
 words of Our Saviour quite otherwise is not astonishing; it 
 is a case where the letter killeth and the spirit quickeneth.^ 
 
 The importance of the question itself requires that we 
 should develop it somewhat. Let us observe, first, that the 
 two expressions, "Thou art Peter" (Petrus) and "upon this 
 rock " (petra), both apply to Peter. The Greek, like the 
 Latin, changes from the masculine to the feminine, but this 
 
 ^ It is well to remark in passing that Protestants, following their 
 system of free interpretation, have succeeded in discovering in this 
 very clea- text at least ten not only different but contradictory mean- 
 ings. Some say that Our Lord addressed, not Peter individually, 
 but the apostolic college represented in Peter. In truth this would 
 have been a very extraordina y and unexpected reward granted to 
 the faith of Peter and announced in such solemn terms. Others claim 
 that by " this rock " He meant His oion person; but why then did 
 Our Saviour use the future tense, " I will build " and not * I buld "? 
 Is it not evident, moreover, that cedificabo (I will build) and dabo (I 
 will give) are intimately united by the sense of the whole context; 
 that if one of these two verV»s designate Peter, the othe^ also d'^es ? 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 375 
 
 is not the case with the Syro-Chaldaic, the tongue in which 
 Our Saviour spoke, or with the majority of the Eastern 
 versions, or even with the Hebrew text, which is considered 
 to be the original text of St. Matthew; it is absolutely the 
 same word (Cephas) which is repeated: " Thou art rock, and 
 upon this rock." As to the Greek, the best authors use 
 TteTpa or Tterpos to signify a stone, a rock. 
 
 Moreover, the demonstrative this, upon this rock, found in 
 all texts, leaves no room for doubt. As to the pronoun it 
 at the end of the phrase, whether it refers to rock or to church 
 does not alter the general sense; for if, according to the 
 promise of Christ, the power of hell is never to prevail against 
 the Church, it is because the Church is built upon Peter, 
 established as the foundation of this spiritual edifice, the 
 basis of which is authority. 
 
 Let us now show that Our Saviour gave Peter the fulness 
 of power. In fact the foundation upon which a perfect society 
 rests can be only the supreme authority which governs it. 
 Just as the solidity of an edifice and the adherence of all its 
 parts, nay, its very existence, depends upon its foundation, so 
 the stability, the unity, the very existence of the Church 
 rests upon Peter. The Church, therefore, would not exist 
 without Peter; where he is, there is the Church : Ubi 
 Petrus, ihi Ecclesia (St. Ambrose). Buo to produce the 
 result intended by Our Saviour this authority must be full 
 and entire; it must include the triple powers — legislative, 
 judiciary, and coercive; in other words, Peter must be in- 
 vested with the primacy not only of honor, but of power, 
 of jurisdiction. His authority must extend over the entire 
 Church, over the apostles as well as over the faithful: it was 
 not a portion of His Church which Jesus gave him to govern, 
 that of Rome, for example, or Antioch ; it was His Church, 
 the entire religious society which He founded. 
 
 The words which follow in the text of St. Matthew, and 
 which were also addressed only to Peter, bear no less con- 
 clusive testimony in favor of the primacy of Peter: ''And I 
 
376 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And 
 whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound 
 also in heaven : and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, it 
 shall be loosed also in heaven.'^ ^ 
 
 It is well known that in the language of the Scriptures, 
 in all Eastern languages, and in others as well, the 
 keys of the kingdom incUcate supreme power, sovereignty. 
 Jesus wished that this power should be exercised over 
 all the members of His Church without exception, over all 
 the spiritual rulers as well as over the simple faithful; for 
 
 ^ Apropos of this text Ruskin, Sesame and Lilies, p. 41, quotes 
 these lines from Milton: 
 
 " Last came, and last did go. 
 The pilot of the Galilean Lake; 
 Two massy keys he bore of metals twain 
 (The golden opes, the iron shuts amain). 
 He shook his mitred locks, and stern bespake," etc., 
 
 and then says: "Let us think over this passage and examine its 
 words. First, is it not singular to find Milton assigning to St. Peter 
 not only his full episcopal function, but the very types of it which 
 Protestants usually refuse most passionately? His 'mitred' locks! 
 Milton was no bishop-lover; how comes St. Peter to be 'mitred'? 
 'Two massy keys he bore.' Is this, then, the power of the keys 
 claimed by the Bishops of Rome, and is it acknow^ledged here by 
 Milton only in a poetical license, for the sake of its picturesqueness, 
 that he may get the gleam of the golden keys to help his effect? Do 
 not think it. Great men do not play stage-tricks with doctrines of 
 life and death : only little men do that. Milton means what he says, 
 and means it with his might too — is going to put the whole strength 
 of his spirit presently into the saying of it. For though not a lover 
 of false bishops, he was sl lover of true ones; and the Lake-pilot is 
 here in his thoughts, the type and head of true episcopal power. For 
 Milton reads that text, ' I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom 
 of heaven,' quite honestly. Puritan though he be, he would not 
 blot it out of the book because there have been bad bishops; nay, 
 in order to understand him, we must understand that verse first; 
 it will not do to eye it askance, or whisper it under our breath, as if 
 it were the weapon of an adverse sect. It is a solemn universal asser- 
 tion, deeply to be kept in mind by all sects." — Translator. 
 
THE CHITRCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 377 
 
 the kingdom of heaven represents here undoubtedly, as in 
 numerous other passages, the Church. 
 
 Objection. — It is alleged against this decisive argument 
 in favor of the primacy of Peter that this power to bind and 
 to loose was given later to all the apostles (Matth. xviii. 18). 
 Hence it would seem that the promise made only to Peter 
 did not convey any greater power than was afterward 
 accorded to all the apostles. 
 
 Answer. — To appreciate the falseness of this conclusion 
 it is sufficient to remark that Christ in addressing only Peter, 
 and in this very solemn manner, promises him not only the 
 power to bind and to loose, but moreover, and first of all, 
 to make him the foundation of His Church and to give him 
 the keys of the kingdom of heaven. Evidently this promise, 
 given in reward of his personal profession of faith and in 
 such emphatic terms, has some special significance: it must 
 contain something more than the simple promise of the power 
 to bind and to loose. If, therefore, the power to bind and 
 to loose signifies the fulness of power, this something addi- 
 tional must be the primacy of the same power. The power 
 to loose and to bind was given to all, and by the same au- 
 thority, but not in the same manner. Peter, to whom alone 
 the power was first given, received it in all its fulness without 
 any restriction, he was to exercise it over the other apostles; 
 they also received it, but only after Peter, secondarily, and 
 not over him. ''Upon one alone,'' says St. Cyprian, the 
 illustrious bishop of Carthage, ''did Christ build His Church, 
 and him He commanded to feed His sheep. And though 
 after His Resurrection He gave to all His apostles the same 
 power to remit sin, yet, in order to manifest unity. He has 
 by His own authority so placed the source of the same 
 unity as to begin from one. . . . The primacy was given to 
 Peter for the government of one Church and one apostolic 
 chair.'' The other Fathers hold the same language (see 
 Third Argument). Bossuet, therefore, gives us only the 
 teaching of tradition when he says in his celebrated Discours 
 
378 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 sur V unite de Veglise: " It was manifestly the intention of 
 Jesus Christ to place first in one alone what He afterwards 
 willed to place in many; but the sequence does not reverse 
 the beginning, and the first does not lose his place. . . . 
 The promises of Christ as well as His gifts are without repent- 
 ance, and that which He has once given indefinitely and uni- 
 versally is irrevocable ; moreover, the power given to several 
 is necessarily restricted by being divided, while power given 
 to one alone, and over all, carries plenitude." If the 
 slightest doubt as to the meaning of Jesus could remain in 
 our minds. He Himself dispels it when He fulfils His promise. 
 h. The Fulfilment of the Promise. — Our Lord after 
 His Resurrection appeared to seven of His disciples on the 
 shore of the Sea of Tiberias, and addressing the apostle who 
 had denied Him thrice. He asked him three times: ''Simon 
 son of John, lovest thou Me? (Lovest thou Me more than 
 these?) " Peter answered with a triple and touching protesta- 
 tion of love. Jesus addressed him these solemn and decisive 
 words: ''Feed My lambs," " Feed My sheep" (John xxi. 16, 
 17). We know that the word to feed means, in the Greek text, 
 to rule, to govern. Behold, then, Peter, and Peter alone, 
 established shepherd of the flock of Christ with an authority 
 which is in no way limited. Moreover, in designating the 
 entire Church under the figure of a flock, Jesus explicitly 
 distinguishes in this flock the lambs from the sheep, indicating 
 by the first the simple faithful, and by the second those by 
 whom they are spiritually begotten and who must feed 
 and guide them, that is, the bishops and priests. And in 
 placing Peter over all the fold, Christ Himself, the sovereign 
 Pastor, bestowed upon him the most extended power, the 
 plenitude of power, the primacy of jurisdiction. "All," 
 says Bossuet, "are submitted to the keys given to Peter, 
 kings and peoples, shepherds and sheep. It is Peter who is 
 first commanded to love more than all the other apostles, 
 and then to feed and govern all, the lambs and the sheep, 
 the little ones and the mothers, the shepherds themselves: 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 379 
 
 shepherds in regard to the people, sheep in regard to St. 
 Peter." Thus did Christ fulfil the promise of conferring 
 upon Peter the supreme authority of His whole Church, 
 of making him the foimdation-stone of this edifice. 
 
 Second Argument, drawn from the Facts related in 
 Scripture. — Peter, in the gospels and in the Acts, is repre- 
 sented as the first and the chief of the apostles, yet there is 
 never any protest on the part of the others, though we know 
 that they were jealous and sensitive in regard to precedence. 
 Thus St. Matthew in enumerating the apostles is not content 
 with naming Peter first, though he was not the first in the order 
 of vocation, but he expressly states that he is the first. ''The 
 names of the twelve apostles,'' says he, are these: "the first, 
 Simon who is called Peter." After the Ascension of Our Sav- 
 iour it is Peter who presides and directs the assembly where 
 St. Matthew is chosen; again, he is the first to preach the 
 Gospel to the Jews, to receive the order to baptize Cornelius 
 and open the Church to the Gentiles. He punishes Ananias 
 and Sapphira for their untruth, and confounds Simon the 
 magician ; it is he, again, who proclaims before the tribunal 
 his right and his mission to preach, who works the first miracle 
 in confirmation of the new religion; he is the first, again, to 
 speak in the Council of Jerusalem when "all the multitude 
 held their peace.'' Cast into prison, he is an object of sohci- 
 tude to the entire Church, which never ceases to pray for him 
 until he is miraculously dehvered; it is he, again, who founds 
 in Asia the see of Antioch, which became for this reason 
 the patriarchal see. Finally, it was he who founded the 
 see of Rome, and because he died bishop of that city, his 
 lawful successors have always had, and will always preserve, 
 the primacy of the universal Church. 
 
 Hence we see that St. Peter is, by the will of Christ Him- 
 self, the sole founder of the Church, made or appointed the 
 bearer of the keys of the kingdom of heaven, the depositary 
 of the sovereign power, the supreme pastor of the entire 
 flock; and that it is with reason that all Cathohc tradition, 
 
380 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 after naming Peter the prince of the apostles, proclaims the 
 pope the prince of bishops, the Father and Doctor of all 
 Christians, the head of all churches, the supreme pastor of 
 the universal Church, etc.^ 
 
 Third Argument, drawn from Tradition. — The Fathers 
 of the Church agree in interpreting the above texts in the 
 sense of a veritable primacy of jurisdiction granted to St. 
 Peter. The Hmits of our work do not permit us to develop 
 this important proof at any length, but we cannot refrain 
 from giving a few texts, particularly from the first centuries, 
 during which time, according to Protestants themselves, the 
 Church of Christ preserved the doctrine of Christ in all its 
 purity. The texts are so clear and exphcit that they dispense 
 with all commentary. Let us hear Tertullian first: ''Noth- 
 ing could have been hidden from Peter, who received the 
 keys of the kingdom of heaven with the power of binding and 
 loosing upon earth and in heaven, and who was called Peter 
 because upon him as upon a foundation-stone the Church 
 was built." In another place he says: ''Our Saviour gave 
 the keys to Peter, and, through Peter, to the Church. ' ' Origen 
 declares that though the Church is founded upon all the 
 apostles, Peter nevertheless is "the grand foundation of the 
 Church, the solid rock upon which Christ built it." Peter 
 has received "supreme power to feed the sheep." "Though 
 Our Lord gave all the apostles the power to bind and to loose, 
 nevertheless, in the interest of unity, He spoke only to Peter 
 when He said, 'Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will 
 build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail 
 against it.'" This is also the opinion of St. Pacian, whose 
 language is identical with that of St. Optatus of Milevum: 
 "In the interest of unity, Peter merited the place at the 
 head of all the apostles, and he was the only one to receive 
 the power of the keys of the kingdom in order to communi- 
 
 *Livius, St. Peter, Bishop of Rome; Waterworth, The Fathers on 
 St. Peter; also, Faith of Catholics, vol, i. ; Hunter, tr. V., ch. 2, 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 381 
 
 cate it to the others." ''Through Peter, Christ confided to 
 the bishops the keys of the kingdom of heaven." 
 
 The testimony of Eusebius of Cesarea, St. Hilary of Poi- 
 tiers, St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. Ephrem, St. Epiphanius, 
 St. Basil, St. Ambrose, St. John Chrysostom, St. Jerome, 
 St. Augustine, St. Eucharius, Bishop of Lyons, and many 
 other Fathers and writers of the fourth and fifth centuries, 
 is no less conclusive in favor of the primacy of jurisdiction 
 than that of the Fathers immediately following the time of 
 the apostles. But we shall be content with mentioning the 
 clear text of St. Teo the Great: '' Out of the whole world Peter 
 alone is chosen to preside over the calUng of all the Gentiles, 
 and over all the apostles, and the collected Fathers of the 
 Church; so that though there be among the people of God 
 many priests and many shepherds, yet Peter rules all by per- 
 sonal commission, whom Christ also rules by sovereign power. 
 Beloved, it is a great and wonderful participation of His own 
 power which the divine Condescendence gave to this man; 
 and if He willed that other rulers of the Church should 
 enjoy aught together with him, yet never did He give, save 
 through him, what He denied not to others." 
 
 In addition to the authority of the Fathers of the Church, 
 whose unanimity can be explained only by the faithful 
 preservation of apostolic tradition, we have that of the 
 General Councils, which are also the authentic voice of the 
 universal Church (see below, p. 387 ff.)- 
 
 Second Thesis. — Jesus Christ Desired that this Primacy should 
 Descend to the Lawful Successors of Peter. 
 
 This thesis has already been proved apropos of the apos- 
 tolicity of the ministry. Let us mention, however, a few 
 decisive reasons which relate especially to the primacy. 
 
 The form which Jesus Christ gave His Church can be 
 modified only by Him. Now Christ in constituting His 
 Church established a primacy which no one can touch, 
 
382 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 much less suppress; hence it must always exist not personally 
 in St. Peter, but in his lawful successors. 
 
 Moreover, the text of St. Matthew presents the primacy 
 of St. Peter as the foundation of the Church, without which 
 it cannot exist. It is in fact this primacy which must sus- 
 tain in the Church unity of government, purity of doctrine, 
 hohness of morals; on it, in a word, depend the stability and 
 the efficacy of the divine work. The foundation of an edifice, 
 and particularly a foundation of this nature, must necessarily 
 endure as long as the edifice itself, that is, according to the 
 divine promises, until the end of time. Now Jesus knew that 
 Peter would not live forever ; hence He evidently desired that 
 his ministry and his primacy should be perpetuated until 
 the end of time in his lawful successors.^ 
 
 Remark. — It results from the two preceding theses that 
 the jurisdiction or power of the Pope is ordinary, and not 
 restricted to exceptional cases. Jesus Christ in fact made 
 no restrictions when He established Peter the founder of His 
 Church and the pastor of His flock. He desired that this 
 Church should always find its stabihty in its foundation, 
 and that the flock should never cease to obey its pastor. 
 No doubt the popes, in the interest of good government, 
 usually exercise their jurisdiction in the form of direction 
 and surveillance, leaving to the bishops the initiative, and 
 the freedom of action necessary in the details of an effectual 
 administration; but they do not for this reason lose the 
 rights conferred upon them by the supreme pastor of souls. ^ 
 
 ^ The perpetuity of St. Peter's primacy, by the divine ordinance of 
 Christ, is easily proved from the constant tradition of the Church, 
 where it is laid down as the very foundation upon which the Fathers 
 and Councils base their belief in the Roman Primacy. — Editor. 
 
 Hergenroether, Cath. Church and Chr. State, I., essay 4; Br. W. 
 xiii. 480. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 383 
 
 Third Thesis. — The Church of Rome Possesses the Primary of 
 the See of Peter. 
 
 This is a point concerning which no dispute seems possible. 
 It is very evident that the CathoHc Church, and it alone, 
 obeys the successors of St. Peter, the first supreme pastor 
 given to the Church by Christ Himself.^ 
 
 A. Tradition and history afford us such abundant and clear 
 testimony in regard to St. Peter's sojourn in Rome that for 
 thirteen centuries no one thought of questioning it.^ After 
 the Waldenses, Protestants would naturally try to deny this 
 fact, which was of extreme importance in their controversies 
 with Catholics. Hence they, together with modern un- 
 believers, left nothing undone to destroy this truth, solidly 
 established by incontrovertible documents, and made still 
 more certain by the labors to which their attacks gave rise. 
 It may be well to give a brief summary of the proofs fur- 
 nished us by the most authentic records. 
 
 1st. The prince of the apostles himself may serve as wit- 
 ness here. In his first epistle addressed to the Christians of 
 Asia Minor he concludes thus : '' The Church that is in Babylon 
 saluteth you, so doth my son Mark" (1 Peter v. 13). The 
 word Babylon evidently means here, as well as in various 
 parts of the Apocalypse, the city of Rome, regarded then 
 
 ^ "The Primacy of the Bishop of Rome, that is of the Pope, is the 
 complex result of doctrine and fact. It supposes the truth of the 
 perpetuity of the Primacy, and the twofold historical fact that Peter 
 was Bishop of Rome and that he made the Roman Episcopate the 
 sole title of succession. The question whether Peter was ever in 
 Rome, though not necessarily identical with the fact of his Roman 
 Episcopate, is practically bound up very closely therewith." — Schanz, 
 III., ch. 13, n. 6. See also I. E. R., Oct. 1901; Spalding, Evidences, 
 1. 12, n. 3; Livius, 1. c, pt. iii, 
 
 ^Livius, St. Peter; Fouard, St. Peter; Thebaud Church and 
 Gentile World, II., ch. 11; Parsons, Studies, I.; Chatard, Occasional 
 Essays, n. 1; Barnes, St. Peter m Rome; Schanz, III., p. 470 ff.; 
 Murphy, ch. 4; Bishop England's Works, II., p. 370) C. W. ix. 374, 
 xvi. 55, 345; D. R., April, Oct. 1897. 
 
384 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 by the Jews as the centre of impiety, as was the Babylon 
 of the East by the Jew:? of the Captivity. It has always been 
 interpreted in this sense by the Fathers of the Church, with 
 whom even M. Renan fully agrees, as well as the Protestant 
 Grotius. Moreover, the arguments used by unbeheving 
 scholars to overthrow this ancient tradition and prove that 
 the Babylon mentioned in the epistle of St. Peter is a city 
 of the East will not bear serious examination. 
 
 2d. At the end of the first century, St. Clement of Rome, 
 disciple of the chief of the apostles, speaking of the faithful 
 sacrificed by Nero after the burning of Rome, mentions 
 among them St. Peter and St. Paul, and he adds these signifi- 
 cant words: ''They were a great example among us; it was 
 here that they bore the outrages of men and endured all 
 kinds of tortures." It is well known that this saint's epistle 
 is the first Christian writing, outside of the Scriptures, which 
 has come down to us. 
 
 Forty years after the death of St. Peter, St. Ignatius, 
 dragged from Antioch to Rome, where he became the prey 
 of the beasts of the amphitheater, addressed to the Romans 
 this touching prayer: ''I conjure you, show me not un- 
 seasonable kindness, let me become food for the beasts. . . . 
 I do not command you like Peter and Paul ; they were apostles, 
 and I am only a condemned man." These words are signifi- 
 cant only in as far as they admit that the two apostles 
 governed the Church of Rome. 
 
 Though the early ages of Christianity afford httle explicit 
 testimony in regard to Peter's sojourn at Rome, it is not a 
 matter of astonishment. For, in addition to the fact that 
 but few of the writings of that period have come down to us, no 
 one thought of expressing any doubt upon this subject, nor, 
 consequently, of attesting it; but little attention is given 
 by writers to idle questions during times of persecution. 
 Hence St. Peter's sojourn in the Eternal City is mentioned 
 only incidentally here and there. 
 
 3d. A century after the death of St. Peter, the tradition 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 385 
 
 of his sojourn and of his martyrdom at Rome was universal. 
 Renan himself says: ''No one denies that from the end 
 of the second century the general belief of the Christian 
 Churches was that the apostle Peter was martyred at Rome.'^ 
 And TertulHan, who lived in Rome at the end of the second 
 century, says: ''Go through the apostoUc churches and you 
 will still find the very chairs that were occupied by the 
 apostles, each in its place. If you are near Italy you have 
 Rome. happy Church, to which the apostles gave 
 their doctrine and their blood; where Peter endured the 
 same suffering as his Master!" "If you go to the Vatican, 
 or to the Ostian Way," wrote Caius under the pontificate of 
 Zephyrinus (202-219), "you will find the trophies (tombs) 
 of those who founded this Church." He says elsewhere 
 that Eleutherius was "the thirteenth bishop of Rome after 
 St. Peter." 
 
 St. Irenseus, bishop of Lyons, disciple of St. Polycarp, who 
 was taught by St. John, mentions twice in his treatise against 
 heresies that Peter and Paul founded the Church of Rome. 
 The same testimony is borne by St. Denis of Corinth, St. 
 Clement of Alexandria, Origen. St. Cyprian, martyred in the 
 year 258, calls the Church of Rome the see of Peter. It is 
 useless to quote the Fathers of later times; they are unani- 
 mous in their testimony. 
 
 4th. The most ancient catalogues, in enumerating the 
 series of Roman pontiffs, always place St. Peter at the head 
 of the hst. Such are those of St. Irenseus, Tertulhan, and 
 Optatus of Milevum. Eusebius, who borrowed his hst from 
 the memoirs of Hegesippus (175 to 189), writes in his history: 
 "After Peter, the first bishop of Rome was Linus, and Clement 
 was the third." ' 
 
 5th. The same testimony is borne by the monuments, 
 medals, and paintings of the first ages. According to 
 de Rossi, it is the veritable episcopal chair of St. Peter, 
 
 ^ D. R., Oct. '98; Apr. '99, on the Succession of the first Roman 
 bishops; Birkhauser, p. 105; Briick, I., p. 77. 
 
386 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the chair which he used in religious ceremonies, which is 
 venerated as a sacred rehc at Rome. The author of the 
 poem against Marcion speaks, in the beginning of the third 
 century, of the real chair in which Peter sat, and in which 
 he commanded that Linus should follow him. Tertulhan 
 bears similar testimony in favor of the episcopal throne of 
 St. Peter. 
 
 6th. There is no contrary tradition that can be cited 
 against this constant tradition of the first ages of the Church. 
 No city except Antioch boasts of ever having had St. Peter 
 as its first pastor; no one ever thought of locating the tomb 
 of the prince of the apostles anywhere but at Rome. The 
 Ebionitic and Gnostic apocrypha themselves, though they 
 tell us a thousand fables concerning St. Peter, never placed 
 the seat of his episcopacy anywhere but at Rome; finally, 
 among so many heretics and so many schismatics of all 
 times, no one, until the appearance of the Waldenses, or 
 we might say until the Reformers of the sixteenth century, 
 questioned the general behef in this historical fact. Let 
 us add that among Protestants themselves there is a large 
 number of scholars who admit with us St. Peter's sojourn 
 in the Eternal City. We may cite among others Cave, 
 Grotius, Usserius, Basnage, ScaHger, Neander; even Renan 
 finally says: ^'I think the tradition in regard to Peter's 
 sojourn at Rome probable, but I believe that this sojourn 
 was of brief duration, and that Peter suffered mart3Tdom 
 shortly after his arrival in the Eternal City." 
 
 Hence it is incontestable that St. Peter, martyred in the 
 year 67, came to Rome and died bishop of that city. We may 
 even fix the period of the apostle's arrival, in the year 42, 
 on the authority of the first part of the ''Catalogue of Libe- 
 rius," of the historian Paul Orosius, a writer of the fourth 
 century, of the historian Eusebius, whose chronicles were 
 written about the year 310, and of St. Jerome, born in 246. 
 The latter says: ''Simon Peter came to Rome to combat 
 Simon the magician, the second year of the reign of Claudius, 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 387 
 
 and he occupied the episcopal chair there during twenty-five 
 years, until the last year, that is, until the fourteenth of 
 the reign of Nero." According to the illustrious archaeolo- 
 gist J. B. de Rossi the ancient monuments confirm this date 
 completely. 
 
 It is to be remarked, moreover, that no ancient author, 
 no monument, either directly or indirectly, contradicts the 
 twenty-five years of the episcopacy of St. Peter, and the 
 learned P. Ch. De Smedt, Bollandist, in his Dissertationes 
 selectee unhesitatingly concludes that the opinion attributing 
 to St. Peter twenty-five years of episcopacy at Rome is ''by 
 far the most probable." We must not conclude, however, 
 that St. Peter remained at Rome without ever leaving it 
 during all this period. The contrary is very probable. In 
 fact there is clear mention, notably in Lactantius and in the 
 catalogue of Fehx IV., of a second voyage of St. Peter to 
 Rome imder the Emperor Nero.^ 
 
 The series of St. Peter's successors is known to us down 
 to Leo XIII. Hence Rome, and consequently the Roman 
 Catholic Church, possesses the See of St. Peter. ^ No sect, 
 moreover, has ever claimed this inheritance. 
 
 B. In further proof of our thesis we shall content ourselves 
 with mentioning the first four Councils, which have always 
 been regarded by the Church with special veneration, and 
 considered as almost equal to the four gospels. 
 
 The Council of Nice, held in 325, attests in formal terms 
 
 * Fouard, St. Peter and the First Years of Christianity. 
 
 ' " It is, making allowance for the greater lapse of time between 
 the two extremes, as easy to prove that Pius IX. is the successor of 
 St. Peter in the government of the Church, as that James K. Polk 
 is the successor of George Washington in the presidency of the United 
 States; and the fact of the succession in the former case as much 
 proves that the Church of which Pius IX. is Pope, is the Church of 
 St. Peter, that is, of the apostles, as the succession in the latter case 
 proves that the United States of which Mr. Polk is President is the 
 same political body over which George Washington presided." — Br. 
 W. vi, 479, 
 
388 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 that the Roman Church has always possessed the primacy} 
 This was so evidently the primacy of jurisdiction that the 
 Council of Sardica, an appendix to that of Nice, acknowledged 
 that a bishop deposed by the Council of the province had a 
 right to appeal from it to the Pope. The second General 
 Council, which was held at Constantinople in 381, also places 
 the Bishop of Rome before the Bishop of Constantinople, the 
 imperial city. In 431 the bishops, assembled for the third 
 time in Ecumenical Council at Ephesus, declared that they 
 deposed the heresiarch Nestorius because they were obliged 
 so to do by the holy canons and by the letter of Pope Celestin, 
 Bishop of the Church of Rome. In the same Council one of 
 the legates of the Pope makes the following declaration, 
 which was received without the shghtest protest: "No one 
 is ignorant of that which has been known at all times, namely, 
 that the holy and blessed Peter, . . . who received the keys of 
 the kingdom of heaven with the power to bind and to loose, 
 has continued to live up to the present time and still lives in 
 his successors, exercising through them the right to judge.'' 
 Then in 451 comes that of Chalcedon, the testimony of which, 
 too long to quote, is still more exphcit. Let it suffice to 
 say this is the Council in which, when the letter of St. Leo 
 to Flavian, Bishop of Constantinople, was read, all the mem- 
 bers exclaimed: " This is the true faith of our fathers, the faith 
 of the apostles; this is our belief; thus do all the orthodox 
 believe. Anathema to him who does not believe the same ! Peter 
 has spoken to us thus through Leo.'' In the synodal letter to 
 the Pope his confirmation of the acts of the Council is re- 
 
 ^ This is strongly contested by excellent Catholic historians, who 
 deny that the famous Canon VI. of this Council deals at all with 
 the Primacy. See Hefele, History of the Councils, I., p. 397 ff. On 
 the other hand, the above canon does not prove anything against 
 the Roman Primacy. See Parsons, Studies, I., p. 205 ff. On the 
 above Councils and the canons referred to see Hefele, I.e. On the 
 Councils of Ephesus and Chalcedon in particular see Rivington, The 
 Roman Primacy. — Editor. 
 
THE CHURCH OF ROME THE TRUE CHURCH. 389 
 
 quired in order that " thy loftiness may accomplish that 
 which is meet towards thy sons. " 
 
 It is useless to speak of the Councils which followed, the 
 doctrine of which is incontestable. Let us mention only the 
 Council assembled at Florence in 1439, in which the Greeks 
 as well as the Latins signed the following decree of Pope 
 Eugenius IV.: ''We define that the holy apostolic see and 
 the Roman Pontiff possess primacy over the whole world; 
 that this same Roman Pontiff is the successor of blessed 
 Peter, prince of the apostles; that he is the true Vicar of 
 Christ, and the head of the entire Church, the Father and 
 Doctor of all Christians ; that to him was given by Our Lord 
 Jesus Christ, in blessed Peter, full power to feed, rule, and 
 govern the universal Church, as is also declared in the acts of 
 the Ecumenical Councils and in the holy canons. ^^ 
 
 Let us hear, finally, the words of the Vatican Council, in 
 chapter iii. of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church. 
 After renewing and developing the definition of the Council at 
 Florence it adds: ''If any one say that the Roman Pontiff is 
 charged only with the surveillance or direction and not 
 with plenary and supreme power of jurisdiction over the 
 entire Church, not only in that which relates to faith and 
 morals, but also in matters relating to the discipline and 
 government of the Church throughout the world; or, again, 
 that he possesses only the chief share of this power, and not 
 all its fulness ; or, finally, that this power which he possesses 
 is not ordinary and immediate, over all the churches as well 
 as over each individually, over all the pastors and the faith- 
 ful and over each one of them, let him be anathema!" ^ 
 
 ^ See the numerous testimonies of the Fathers collected in Faith 
 of Cath., I., p. 59 ff. ; Allies, The Throne of the Fisherman; Waterworth, 
 pt. ii. 
 
 To prove the primacy of St. Peter and that of his successors, 
 the Roman Pontiffs, we may also appeal to all ecclesiastical history. 
 We shall see that from the beginning of the Church, and throughout all 
 the ages, the most positive facts and the most undeniable testimony 
 witness to the faith of pastors and of the faithful in the primacy of 
 
390 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 The logical and indisputable result of our thesis is that 
 the Roman Catholic Church is the true Church, since she 
 alone possesses the centre and foundation of the Church, 
 and she alone has preserved her first organization in all its 
 integrity. 
 
 the See of Rome. But we do not think it necessary to dwell upon 
 these historical facts, which may, moreover, be found in numerous 
 works. We may quote particularly the 69th conference of P. 
 Ollivier. "We should never finish," he says at the conclusion of 
 one of his conferences, " if we were to quote all the instances in which 
 the Churches of the East and of the West appeal to Rome, either to 
 ask support of the Pope in their struggle with error, or to obtain 
 from him the re-establishment of their episcopal sees, of which they 
 had been unjustly deprived, or to consult h^m upon doubtful ques- 
 tions relating to faith or discipline. ... A fact which of itself demon- 
 strates the primacy of the Pope is that never in the East or in the 
 West was a single Council, even among the most important, recognized 
 as ecumenical, that is, as representing the universal Church, unless it 
 was convened, at least implicitly, by the Pope, and presided over or 
 confirmed by him. . . . Since the concurrence of the popes was con- 
 sidered as essential by the entire Church, the entire Church, by this 
 fact, recognized their primacy of power and of jurisdiction." — See 
 Kenrick, Primacy, ch. 13; Allies, See of Peter, ch. 5, n. 5, 6. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 CERTAIN PREROGATIVES CONFERRED BY JESUS CHRIST 
 UPON HIS CHURCH. 
 
 The Church, in order to carry out effectually her mission 
 of saving souls to the end of time, must needs have certain 
 privileges or prerogatives which are quite indispensable 
 to accomphsh her purpose. Among these the principal are 
 indefectibility, or perpetual, uninterrupted, and unchangeable 
 existence through all the changes, evolutions, and revolu- 
 tions of the centuries; authority, that is, spiritual rights and 
 powers over the souls of men as well as over the means of 
 salvation; infallibility, which is the divine guaranty of the 
 unfailing exercise of the Church's authority; sovereignty j 
 or absolute freedom and independence of any and all earthly 
 power. 
 
 In the next four articles we shall prove that the all-wise 
 and all-powerful Founder of the Church did endow her with 
 these supernatural attributes. Lastly, we shall treat of 
 Liberalism, the great heresy of the nineteenth century, which 
 denies to the Catholic Church most of the above-mentioned 
 prerogatives. 
 
 ART. I.— INDEFECTIBILITY OF THE CHURCH.» 
 
 Taken in its broadest acceptation the indefectibility of 
 the Church is the duration that Jesus Christ promised her 
 until the end of the world, with the maintenance of her 
 interior constitution and her exterior form, with the preser- 
 
 ^ Spalding, J. M., Evidences, 10; Manahan, Triumph, etc.; Br. W. 
 xiii. 384; C. W. xlix. 761; Hunter, I., n. 166 ff. 
 
 391 
 
392 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 vation of all her properties and her prerogatives. The Church 
 can, of course, admit, in the series of centuries, disciplinary 
 changes required for the good of souls, but she will never 
 be deprived of one of her constituent elements (her members, 
 her chiefs, her organization), nor of any of her essential 
 properties (unity, sanctity, cathohcity), nor of her divine 
 prerogatives (authority, infalhbility). 
 
 Let us observe at the same time that this promise of 
 indefectibihty is made to the universal Church, and not to 
 each of her parts, or to particular churches. The latter may 
 fall away or disappear; but despite these shipwrecks the 
 true Church of Christ will always remain, ever the same; 
 these defections, moreover, will be compensated by the con- 
 quest or the foundation of new churches. Protestants, some- 
 times openly, sometimes covertly, reject this indefectibihty. 
 No doubt the invisible Church, many of them say, cannot 
 fail, but it is quite otherwise with the visible Church, which 
 may disappear from the world for a greater or shorter time; 
 and this they allege is what has taken place.^ 
 
 Thesis. — Jesus Christ Wished His Church to Endure without 
 any Essential Change until the End of Time. 
 
 First Argument. — A great number of texts in the Old 
 Testament clearly defines the perpetuity of the reign of 
 Christ. Let us hmit ourselves to quoting a verse from 
 Daniel, ii. 44: "But in the days of those kingdoms the 
 God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never 
 be destroyed, and His kingdom shall not be delivered up to 
 another people, and it shall break in pieces and shall consume 
 all these kingdoms, and itself shall stand forever. '^ The 
 synagogue, which was to change its form and receive an 
 essential perfection, is frequently contrasted with the king- 
 
 ^ The modern fiction, defended by Lasaulx, Dollinger and others, 
 of a triple successive development of the Church, called respectively 
 the Petrine, the Pauline, and the Johannine Churches, is clearly con- 
 demned by the Vatican Schema on the Church, ch. 8 and can. 8. — 
 Editor. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 393 
 
 dom of the Messias, the New Covenant, the Christian Church, 
 which was to exist forever, and remain always the same. 
 This is an argument frequently used by St. Paul, particularly 
 in his Epistle to the Hebrews (viii. 6 ff.; xii. 27, 28). 
 
 Second Argument. — The New Testament is no less 
 expHcit (Matth. xiii. 24, coll. 30, 39; 1 Cor. xv. 24 f.). 
 
 a. In a text already quoted, which has become classic and 
 dispenses with commentary, Jesus, with His supreme au- 
 thority, confirms this indef ectibility : ''And I say to thee 
 that thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My 
 Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it'^ 
 (Matth. xvi. 18). 
 
 b. Christ, sole mediator between God and man, has con- 
 fided the fruits of His Redemption and the means of salvation 
 to the Church. Now there will always be souls to be saved 
 by these means; hence Christ, in sending the apostles to 
 teach and to baptize, promises to be with them all days, 
 even to the consummation of the world (Matth. xxviii. 20). 
 But this perpetual indefectibility of the apostoHc ministry, 
 on which everything depends in the Church, evidently entails 
 that of the Church itself. (Cfr. 1 Tim. ii. 4.) 
 
 Third Argument, drawn from Theological Reasons. — 
 If the Church could ever fail, she would, by this very fact, lose 
 irrevocably all efficacious authority. In fact all who chose 
 to rebel against the Church could justly claim that she had 
 failed in her mission, that she had become corrupt, that 
 she no longer merited either their confidence or obedience. 
 Was it not on this ground that the innovators of the sixteenth 
 century sought to justify their rebellion? 
 
 ART II,— AUTHORITY OR POWERS OF THE CHURCH.* 
 
 We have seen that, by the will of Jesus Christ, the Church is 
 a real society. We shall now prove that Christ in founding 
 
 * Spalding, J. L., lecture 4; Lacordaire, conf. 2 on the Church; 
 Hunter, I., tr. 4, ch. 4; Br. W. viii. 359, 574; C. W. xlii. 158, 324. 
 
394 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 His Church conferred upon her all the power necessary to 
 continue the work of redemption till the end of the world. 
 This power is threefold, representing the threefold office of 
 Christ as teacher, priest, and king : first, the power to teach 
 revealed truths and to impose her teaching {Magisterium); 
 second, the power of exercising the sacred priesthood and 
 of dispensing the divine mysteries (Ministerium) ; third, the 
 power of government and administration over all her mem- 
 bers (Imperium). Although we have already proved the 
 existence of these three powers in the Church, it will not be 
 useless to put here briefly whatever refers to them. 
 
 Speaking of the apostoficity of the Church, we mentioned 
 (p. 329) only two powers given to the chiefs of the Church, 
 that of order and that of jurisdiction.^ But there we con- 
 sidered these powers in regard to the sources from which 
 they flow (ordination and institution), while here we shall 
 view them in regard to the objects to which they relate. 
 
 I. The Power to Teach. 
 
 The Church has received from her divine Founder the 
 power to teach, or doctrinal authority, that is, the right and 
 duty to preach the moral and dogmatic doctrine of Jesus 
 Christ, and to impose this, doctrine upon all men.^ This 
 truth is so evident that we shall content ourselves with 
 merely mentioning the following brief arguments : 
 
 First Argument. — As the doctrine of Jesus Christ can 
 be made known only by teaching, the Church, in receiving 
 the mission to make this doctrine known everywhere, must 
 necessarily have received also the power to teach afl men. 
 (See Rom. x. 14 ff.) 
 
 Second Argument. — The words of Jesus Christ on this 
 
 * Magisterium, being the authoritative teaching and thus impljang 
 the right to preach and to demand both the " obedience unto faith " 
 as well as the public profession of that faith, is quite appropriately 
 referred to the power of jurisdiction. — Editor. 
 
 ^ Ward Essays on the Doctrinal Authority of the Church. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OP THE CHURCH. 395 
 
 subject are sufficiently clear and well known: '^All power 
 is given to Me in heaven and on earth; going therefore, 
 teach ye all nations " (Matth. xxviii. 18, 19). " He that hear- 
 eth you, heareth Me: and he that despiseth you, despiseth 
 Me. And he that despiseth Me, despiseth Him that sent 
 Me." (Luke x. 16.) 
 
 Third Argument. — The apostles, strengthened by these 
 words of their Master, devoted themselves immediately 
 after the descent of the Holy Spirit to the ministry of preach- 
 ing. ''Going forth, they preached everywhere," says St. 
 Mark, ''the Lord working withal, and confirming the word 
 with signs that followed." To those who would forbid 
 them the exercise of this teaching they answered with the 
 celebrated words which have become the motto of every 
 true Christian brought face to face with tyrannical power: 
 "We must obey God rather than men." Or again: "We 
 cannot but speak" (Mark xvi. 20; Acts v. 29; iv. 20). 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. The Church's manner of teaching is always 
 twofold. The ordinary teaching is that which is adminis- 
 tered daily through the bishops or their delegates and under 
 their surveillance, by the aid of preaching, or catechising, 
 or theological lectures, etc. The extraordinary teaching is 
 that which is given by the Pope, or the Councils when they 
 proclaim a dogma or condemn an error. It is evident that 
 the extraordinary form of teaching is in no way required 
 to make a doctrine an article of faith to Christians, otherwise 
 the dogma of the Eucharist, for example, would not have 
 been of faith before the tenth century, and in our own day 
 the visibility of the Church, her indefectibility, etc., would not 
 be articles of faith, since they have never been solemnly 
 defined. The Church cannot err in her constant and uni- 
 versal teaching any more than in her definitions of dogma. 
 The promises made by Christ admit of no exception. Heresy 
 may consist, therefore, in denying wittingly a dogma pro- 
 claimed by the ordinary and uniform teaching of the entire 
 Church. 
 
396 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 2d. In consequence of this mission and this power the 
 Church is obhged to maintain the purity of faith, to guard the 
 faithful against erroneous, impious, and immoral doctrines, 
 to forbid the reading of books and papers that might corrupt 
 faith and morals, to supervise all dogmatic and moral teach- 
 ing given in society by any teachers whether private or 
 official, that is, appointed by the state. No one will dispute 
 this point when there is question of a Christian society. But 
 even though the constitution be based upon liberty of wor- 
 ship, the state, if it truly respect liberty, cannot refuse the 
 Church this surveillance, which is an integral part of the Cath- 
 olic apostolate. The state should, moreover, at least for its 
 Catholic subjects, allow ecclesiastical superiors power to exer- 
 cise an efficacious control over the various branches of human 
 knowledge usually taught by lay professors. Otherwise 
 the liberty awarded the Church would be a fallacy, since 
 official pedagogues could, in teaching science, for example, 
 astronomy, or history, or literature, attack, contradict, or neu- 
 tralize the lessons, the dogmas, and the moral teaching of 
 the Church. Finally, with still greater reason may the 
 Church claim the right to brand and condemn the anti- 
 religious, atheistical, and so-called neutral (unsectarian) 
 teaching organized under the patronage of the state. In 
 cases of this kind she must have recourse to every means 
 in her power, to every spiritual arm in her possession, to 
 preserve her children from the baneful influence of such 
 teaching. 
 
 These reflections suffice to make us understand and, at the 
 same time, to justify the Church's attitude toward govern- 
 ments which have promulgated similar legislation. It ex- 
 plains the conduct of the Belgian Episcopacy, who in 1869, 
 with admirable energy, saved their country from the corrup- 
 tion of irreligious schools.^ 
 
 * It explains in particular the wonderful system of parochial schools 
 in the United States of America, established and maintained by the 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 397 
 
 II. Power to Confer the Sacraments. 
 
 The Church has received the power of regulating all that 
 concerns the administration of the sacraments, the celebra- 
 tion of the holy sacrifice, of deciding, in a word, all that 
 belongs to public worship. 
 
 First Argument. — How could the Church fulfil her mis- 
 sion of saving souls if, while enlightening minds with the hght 
 of revelation, she did not at the same time impart the strength 
 absolutely indispensable for the observance of the precepts 
 imposed by revelation? Now it is through the sacraments, 
 through the sacrifice of the Mass particularly, and through 
 the exercises of her worship, that the faithful obtain the 
 graces necessary for the maintenance of the spiritual fife. 
 
 Second Argument. — Our Saviour's will in this respect is 
 very clear. Thus we see that when He gave His apostles 
 the command and the power to teach He also imposed upon 
 them the obhgation to baptize all men; at the Last Supper, 
 after distributing His body and blood to them, He bade 
 them do the same in remembrance of Him; on another 
 occasion He gave them the power to forgive sms, so that 
 they alone had the power to loose and to bind. 
 
 Third Argument. — The apostles themselves affirm this 
 power implicitly by exercising it, and exphcitly by their 
 words. In fact we see them baptizing, confirming, ordain- 
 ing, celebrating Mass, ministering to the sick, etc., and 
 St. Paul writes: '' Let a man so account of us as of the minis- 
 ters of Christ and the dispensers of the mysteries of God" 
 (1 Cor. iv. 1). 
 
 III. Power to Govern.* 
 
 The right of self-government given to the Church com- 
 prises three distinct powers similar to those possessed by 
 
 strenuous efforts of the Catholic priests and bishops and the enor- 
 mous but voluntary contributions of the faithful. — Editor. 
 ^ Burnet, Path, etc.; ch. 3. 
 
398 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 civil society : legislative power, or the right to make laws and 
 rules binding upon all the subjects of the Church; judiciary- 
 power, to define the sense and reach of her laws, to decide 
 disputed cases, to pronounce judgment upon guilt, etc. ; and, 
 finally, executive or coercive power, that is, the right to 
 procure, by the necessary means, particularly by the use 
 of penalties either spiritual or temporal, the observance of 
 the laws which she imposes on her members. The present 
 adversaries of the Church rarely deny her the first two 
 powers, that of teaching and of administering the sacra- 
 ments; they are, in fact, of little importance to them. But 
 they make fierce war against this power of governing, as 
 to do away with it would create great disorder in the economy 
 of the Church, and she would no longer be able to repress the 
 revolts of her members and to resist the violent attacks 
 or silent intrigues of her enemies. 
 
 They allege that the Church has no right to make laws, 
 to judge crimes, to punish the guilty; or if she has any 
 right in these matters, it is not an inherent right of her 
 constitution, but a right which she receives through partici- 
 pation or communication with the civil power, through the 
 courteous concession of rulers, or perhaps through usurpation 
 made possible by the neghgence or the connivance of govern- 
 ments. Let us prove, therefore, that the Church has really 
 received this power from Christ. 
 
 First Argument. — A society cannot really exist and 
 attain its end without the power to govern. A multitude 
 of wills seeking to attain the same end necessarily requires 
 common and efficacious guidance. Hence, when it pleased 
 Our Saviour to unite in a perfect society all who believed 
 in Him, He could not but endow this society with the au- 
 thority necessary to accompHsh its mission. In other words. 
 He had to establish heads and rulers invested with a triple 
 power, legislative, judiciary, and coercive; a law supposes 
 the right to judge the guilty and to inflict punishment. 
 
 Second Argument, drawn from the Words of Scrip- 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 399 
 
 TURE already quoted and explained in speaking of the 
 ministry of the apostles and the primacy of St. Peter. 
 
 Third Argument, dra\vn from the Conduct of the 
 Apostles and the History of the Church. — The apostles 
 from the beginning exercised all these powers, making laws, 
 pronouncing judgment, hurhng anathemas at the guilty and 
 the rebelhous without consulting the civil power or even 
 despite its opposition (Acts xv. 28; 1 Tim. i. 20; 1 Cor. xi. 
 33, 34; vii. 12, 13; v. 3, 4, 5; iv. 21; xi. 2; 1 Thess. iv. 2.) 
 The Church in the centuries which followed continued to 
 exercise the same powers in virtue of the authority properly 
 belonging to her; nor has belief in the legislative authority 
 of lawful heads ever varied in the Church.^ 
 
 ART. III.— INFALLIBILITY OF THE CHURCH.^ 
 
 1. Its Nature and Necessity. 
 
 Nature. — To be infallible, generally speaking, is to possess 
 the privilege of never deceiving or being deceived ; this privi- 
 lege in regard to the Church means that she can neither 
 alter the doctrine of Jesus Christ, nor misunderstand the 
 true meaning of what our divine Saviour taught, com- 
 manded, or prohibited. No doubt God only is infallible 
 hy nature; but He may by a special providence protect 
 those from error whom He has charged to teach in His 
 name, so that their teaching will never deviate in any- 
 thing from the truth. Now God has granted this infalli- 
 bility to His Church; and we shall even prove that He had 
 needs grant her this privilege. In speaking thus we evidently 
 have in view the ordinary course of things, for God could 
 have employed another means, as He did in the Old Law, by 
 sending prophets. 
 
 * Lacordaire, conf. 6 on the Church (her coercive power). 
 
 ^ See references p. 310; also Lyons; Knox; R^'vington, Authority; 
 Br. W. V. 280, 389, vi. 324, 429 ff., 453 ff.; and generally works writ- 
 ten by converts in defence of their return. 
 
400 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 First Thesis. — The Authority Divinely Established to Teach Men 
 the Doctrine of Jesus Christ must he Infallible in its Teaching. 
 
 First Argument, drawn from the Mission of the 
 Church and the Necessity of Divine Faith. — This may 
 be stated in various ways. 
 
 a. All men, to be saved, are obliged to believe the doctrine 
 taught by Jesus Christ. Now Christ has given His Church 
 the mission and power to teach His doctrine and transmit 
 it from age to age pure and intact; therefore, unless Christ 
 intervenes with continual miracles to insure the purity of 
 this teaching. He must necessarily guard the teaching Church 
 from all error; in other words, endow her with doctrinal 
 infallibility. 
 
 b. The Church, in the name of God, rigorously commands 
 us to believe, with a faith resting upon divine authority and 
 excluding all doubt, whatever she offers for our belief, even 
 mysteries most impenetrable to reason. Now the Church 
 has no right to require of men divine faith in her teachings 
 if she is not infallible. No one, in fact, can force reason to 
 admit without reserve a proposition which is not certain. 
 What is only probable evidently cannot command complete 
 and absolute faith; hence as long as error is possible doubt 
 is reasonable. Without the infallibility of the Church divine 
 faith, firm, unwavering faith, is therefore impossible; and 
 without it the Christian religion itself must disappear. 
 
 c. Let us state this argument in more general terms. 
 When there is question of religious truth necessary to salva- 
 tion, human reason imperiously claims absolutely certain 
 teaching. Not only do the unlettered feel the need of such 
 teaching, but scholars as well, despite their profound re- 
 searches and sincere efforts in search of truth. Now if 
 there were no infallible teachers of religion, mankind would 
 find itself abandoned to all the chances of error; it would 
 fluctuate in uncertainty in regard to all that is most essential 
 to its peace and happiness. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 401 
 
 d. The same conclusion follows if we apply this reasoning to 
 the preaching of the Gospel among infidel nations. Without 
 infallibility the propagation of the Gospel would have been 
 impossible, and consequently Catholicity would not have 
 been a property or distinctive mark of the true Church. The 
 Church sends missionaries everywhere with the mission to 
 convert nations to the true faith. Now if such missionaries 
 do not teach in the name of an infalhble authority, these 
 nations would have a right to say that their doctrine had 
 probably been altered in its passage through the ages. How 
 could they reasonably be required to accept with full and 
 entire faith that which might prove to be only error? What 
 difference would there be between such preaching and that 
 of Protestant ministers who cannot command behef in their 
 doctrine in the name of God? ^ 
 
 Second Argument, drawn from the Necessity of 
 Unity of Doctrine or Belief. — Controversy concerning 
 questions of faith and morals will necessarily arise in the 
 Church. The history of heresy shows us that such con- 
 troversies have sprung up at every period. How could they 
 be settled if there were no infalhble authority to pronounce 
 upon them? Without this inf alhbility the Church's decision 
 could not end the controversy, and unity of doctrine or 
 behef would be impossible. 
 
 Second Thesis. — Jesus Christ Established in His Church an 
 Authority Infallible in its Dogmatic and Moral Teaching, 
 
 When Jesus Christ sent His apostles into the whole world 
 to call immortal souls to the truth and to salvation, He said 
 to them: "All power is given to Me in heaven and in earth; 
 going therefore, teach ye all nations: baptizing them in the 
 name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; 
 teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have com- 
 manded you: and behold, I am with you all days, even to 
 
 * Lacordaire, conf . 3 on the Church, 
 
402 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the consummation of the world " (Matth. xxviii. 18 ff.)- '' As 
 the Father hath sent Me, I also send you" (John xx. 21). 
 "Go ye into the whole world and preach the gospel to every 
 creature. He that beheveth and is baptized, shall be saved; 
 but he that belie veth not shall be condemned. " (Mark xvi. 
 15 f.) ''And I will ask the Father, and He shall give you 
 another Paraclete, that He may abide with you forever, the 
 Spirit of truth : ... He shall abide with you, and shall be in 
 you" (John xiv. 16 f.). ''But when He, the Spirit of 
 truth, is come, He will teach you all truth" (John xvi. 13). 
 " But when the Paraclete cometh whom I will send you 
 from the Father, the Spirit of truth, who proceedeth from 
 the Father, He shall give testimony of Me: and you shall 
 give testimony, because you are with Me from the begin- 
 ning " (John XV. 26 f.). '' You are the salt of the earth; . . . 
 you are the light of the world" (Matth. v. 13, 14). "He 
 that heareth you, heareth Me; and he that despiseth you, 
 despiseth Me " (Luke x. 16). " If he will not hear the Church, 
 let him be to thee as the heathen and publican. Amen, I 
 say to you, whatsoever you shall bind upon earth, shall be 
 bound also in heaven : and whatsoever you shall loose upon 
 earth, shall be loosed also in heaven. " (Matth. xviii. 17 f.) 
 
 Evidently Jesus Christ has estabhshed a perfect solidarity 
 between Himself and those whom He charged to teach the 
 world the truths of salvation. In the most solemn manner 
 He promises them His special assistance in the office of 
 teaching imposed upon them, and He tells them that this 
 assistance shall last to the end of time, assuring it thus in equal 
 manner to their legitimate successors. For the preaching of 
 religion, absolutely proof against all error, is as necessary for 
 the coming generations as it has been for those of the past. 
 
 It seems unnecessary to appeal to tradition. Protestants, 
 our adversaries in the present question, are forced to ac- 
 knowledge that from the fifth to the sixteenth century the 
 Fathers and theologians have constantly professed the Cath- 
 olic dogma of infallibility. From which fact we may con- 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 403 
 
 elude that it was also the doctrine of the first four centuries; 
 for so important a change could never have taken place 
 without exciting formidable opposition from the bishops 
 and the faithful, and particularly from heretics.^ Moreover, 
 what has always been the tradition of the Church on this 
 subject is clearly seen from the whole history of the Church, 
 especially from the great veneration in which the decisions of 
 the Ecumenical Councils have always been held, a veneration 
 that extends to the very text of the first four General Councils. 
 
 II. Object of Infallibility. 
 
 The doctrinal authority of the Church is not unlimited; 
 it is, on the contrary, clearly limited to the domain of divine 
 revelation. It relates only to the deposit of revealed doc- 
 trine and that which is necessary for the preservation of this 
 deposit. These same boundaries hmit infallibihty. 
 
 Its object includes, then : 
 
 1st. The teaching of dogma, or the truths of faith which 
 are to be beheved. 
 
 2d. Moral teaching, or truths to be practised. 
 
 3d. Matters relating to general discipline, in as far as they 
 pertain to faith and morals. 
 
 4th. Dogmatic facts, that is to say, facts so intimately 
 connected with dogma, that they cannot be questioned 
 without weakening the dogma itself. Such, for example, 
 are the declarations and verifications of errors contained 
 in the writings judged by the Church, since otherwise she 
 could not, as she is bound to do, preserve from the poison of 
 error the flock confided to her care. 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. Infallibihty comes neither from inspira- 
 tion properly speaking (p. 54) nor from a new revelation, 
 but from a special, divine assistance granted either to the 
 
 * Such opposition and controversy would be undoubtedly recorded 
 on the pages of the history of those times. Yet that history is 
 absolutely silent. — Editor. 
 
404 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 bishops united with the Pope, or to the supreme pastor, to 
 enable them to understand and proclaim the revelation 
 made by Jesus Christ.^ This assistance by no means dis- 
 penses with useful researches and discussions; in a word, 
 with the labor of man. Only after taking every indispensable 
 means to avoid acting precipitately, only after studying 
 with extreme care the two sources of revelation. Scripture 
 and tradition, does the Church or the Pope declare as re- 
 vealed a belief hitherto imphcitly contained in the deposit 
 of revelation. 
 
 2d. Infallibility differs essentially from impeccabihty, which 
 consists in the inability to sin ; this signal privilege, which was 
 awarded to the Mother of God, has never been attributed 
 to the sovereign Pontiff. 
 
 III. Subject of Infallibility. 
 
 A. Infallibility of the Teaching Church. — To say 
 that the teaching Church is infaUible is to say that her 
 body of pastors, united with the Pope, the supreme head 
 of the Church, is infallible, whether assembled in solemn 
 session of an Ecumenical Council or dispersed throughout the 
 world. 
 
 To be ecumenical or general, a Council must be convened 
 or approved as such by the Pope, to whom belongs the right 
 to preside over it either personally or by his delegates. 
 Though convened by the Pope or with his approbation, if 
 the head of the Church separate from it, the Council becomes 
 a headless assembly and can do nothing ; if it persists in its 
 work, it is then only a conventicle or meeting of dissenters. 
 
 B. Infallibility of the Pope.^ — When he speaks as 
 head of the Church with the fulness of his doctrinal 
 
 ' Br. W. vi. 465 f. 
 
 ^ See references p. 373; also Knox; Fessler; Botalla; Manning, Petri 
 Privilegium; Story of the Vatican Council; M. Ixviii. 338; Br. W. 
 xiii. 412, and, in general, works on the Vatican Council. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 405 
 
 authority the sovereign Pontiff possesses in himself alone 
 the same infalhbihty as the whole teaching Church or the 
 entire episcopal body. Such is the certain behef of the 
 Church at all times, and which has become an article of 
 Catholic faith since the definition of the Vatican Council. 
 Here are the terms of this definition: 
 
 ''We teach and define that it is a divinely revealed 
 dogma : that the Roman Pontiff, when he speaks ex cathedra 
 — that is, when in the discharge of his office as pastor and 
 teacher of all Christians, by virtue of his supreme apostolic 
 authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals 
 to be held by the universal Church — is, by the divine assist- 
 ance promised to him in blessed Peter, possessed of that 
 infallibihty with which the Divine Redeemer willed that 
 His Church should be endowed for defining a doctrine re- 
 garding faith or morals ; and that therefore such definitions 
 are irreformable of themselves and not from the consent of 
 the Church. 
 
 *'If any one should have the rashness to contradict our 
 definition, which God forbid, let him be anathema.'' 
 
 Thesis. — When He Speaks as Head of the Church, with Plenary 
 Doctrinal Authority, the Sovereign Pontiff is Invested with 
 
 Infallibility. 
 
 First Argument, draw^n from the Holy Scripture. — 
 a. ''I say to thee that thou art Peter, and upon this rock 
 I will build My Church, and the gates of hell shall not pre- 
 vail against it " (Matth. xvi. 18). It results from these words 
 that the Pope, one of whose essential functions is to teach 
 the truths revealed by Jesus Christ, is necessarily infallible. 
 On him, in fact, does the Church rest as upon her visible 
 foundation; from him does she derive her stability. Now 
 the stability of a religious society depends above all things 
 on unity of faith. How could this constant and perpetual 
 
406 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 unity be possible if Peter, the foundation of the spiritual 
 edifice, could be mistaken in the truths which he requires 
 the faithful to believe? If the Pope by his teaching could 
 lead the faithful into error, the Evil One, the father of lies 
 and of error, would prevail against the Church and against 
 its head. 
 
 6. ''Simon, Simon, behold Satan hath desired to have you 
 that he may sift you as wheat: but I have prayed for thee 
 that thy faith shall not fail, and thou being once con- 
 verted, confirm thy brethren " (Luke xxii. 31, 32). Through 
 this prayer, offered for Peter, the future head of the 
 Church and its perpetual foundation, and consequently for 
 his successors, Jesus Christ promises that their faith shall 
 remain invulnerable, and that through them the other 
 members of the Church shall be preserved firm in the faith, 
 despite the trials to which they may be subjected. Now 
 this is not possible except on condition that the Pope be 
 infaUible in matters of faith. In fact, if Peter and his suc- 
 cessors are not infallible, it must be said either that the 
 prayer of Jesus Christ was not heard, which would be blas- 
 phemous, or that Christ, in charging Peter to confirm his 
 brethren in the faith, did not give him the means of fulfilhng 
 this essential office, which would be equally insulting to the 
 divine Wisdom. 
 
 c. ''Feed My lambs, feed My sheep'' (John xxi. 15). 
 These words, addressed to Peter alone, confer upon him the 
 mission of feeding the lambs and the sheep, that is, the 
 faithful and those who are their spiritual fathers, hence all 
 the members of the Church in general. Now the food of 
 souls is truth; if Peter is not infallible, if he cannot discern 
 with certainty between the true and the false in matters of 
 faith, he would corrupt with the poison of error the flock 
 confided to him, he would lead them to perdition. 
 
 Let us remark that if the decisions of the Pope could be 
 reformed, as the Galileans desired, it would be the flock who 
 would lead and feed the pastor, who would confirm their 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 407 
 
 guide in, the faith, which is diametrically contrary to the 
 will of the divine Master. 
 
 Second Argument, drawn from Tradition. — If Scripture 
 is clear on the present question, tradition is no less exphcit. 
 A great number of texts from the holy Fathers and from 
 the Councils may be found in the books referred to above, 
 p. 373, especially in Manning, Privil. Petri, pt. ii., Botalla, 
 and Alnatt, Cathedra Petri. 
 
 Let us note only this fact, decisive in itself, that at all 
 times the sovereign Pontiffs have used their prerogative in 
 condemning heresies throughout the world by the authority 
 proper to them, and without convoking General Councils, and 
 that their decisions have been received as infallible by the 
 entire Church. It is well known that the significant and oft- 
 repeated "Roma locuta, causa finita" — Rome has spoken, 
 the cause is decided — dates from St. Augustine. Before 
 him St. Ambrose uttered these words, which have passed 
 into an axiom: ''Where Peter is, there is the Church'' — Uhi 
 Petrus, ibi Ecclesia. 
 
 Remark. — This definition put a stop to the errors of 
 Gallicanism. Let us say a word of the circumstances which 
 gave rise to that system. Louis XIV. having quarrelled 
 with Rome, and desiring to humble Pope Innocent XI., 
 convoked an assembly of prelates and deputies of the 
 French clergy, in which Bossuet drew up the famous 
 "Declaration of the Galilean Clergy," together with the 
 four Galilean Articles, the last of which was as follows: 
 "Though the Pope has the principal part in questions of 
 faith, and his decrees relate to all churches, and to each 
 one in particular, his judgment is not irreformable, unless 
 by the consent (express or tacit) of the Church." This 
 article had never any doctrinal value. In fact only thirty- 
 four of the one hundred and thirty-five prelates signed the 
 declaration. The others either refused their assent or 
 resisted it with vigorous and irresistible logic. That same 
 year, 1682, it was solemnly disapproved by Pope Innocent 
 
408 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 XI., who abolished and annulled all the acts of that assembly. 
 In 1690 it was again and more expressly condemned by 
 Alexander VIII., and in 1794 by Pius VI. Moreover, the 
 bishops who signed the declaration disavowed it, and Bossuet 
 ceased to defend it. Louis XIV. submitted in his turn by 
 suspending the execution of the new ecclesiastical laws. 
 This, however, did not stifle Galilean error; it rose again with 
 a certain violence at the time of the Vatican Council, in which, 
 however, it received its death-blow.^ After the definition 
 all, anti-infaHibihsts and inopportunists, with a few rare 
 exceptions, accepted the decree with complete submission, 
 giving to the world again, as often before, a grand sight of 
 the wonderful strength and indestructible unity of the 
 Cathohc Church. 
 
 If it be asked how GalHcanism could avail against a truth 
 so solidly founded and imiversally admitted, we answer, 
 political motives may bhnd the finest minds; moreover, the 
 Galileans unconsciously adopted a false and absolutely 
 impossible hypothesis.^ They supposed the Pope speaking 
 on his side, and the entire Church holding a contrary opinion ; 
 and they could not understand that the decision of the 
 Pope alone should prevail against the opinion of all. But 
 this was an untenable supposition, for the definition of the 
 supreme head of the Church can be only the expression of 
 the unbroken belief of the Church. We know, for example, 
 that when there was question of defining the dogma of the 
 Immaculate Conception, the universal Church, consulted 
 
 ^ On GalHcanism see Hergenrother Catholic Church and Christian 
 State; Anti-Janus; Manning, Petri Privilegium, pt. i., p. 40 ff.; pt. ii., 
 p. 107 ff.; Chatard, Essay 1; Botalla, Supremacy, p. 159; Infallibility, 
 p. 342; Parsons, IV., ch. 10; Br. W. x. 471, xi. 62, 252, xiii. 462; 
 D. R, New Ser. xiii., xxii. 
 
 ^ The same impossible hypothesis dictated the famous decrees of the 
 Synod of Constance (1416-1418), placing the general council (repre- 
 senting the whole Church) above the Pope, as if the mystic body 
 of Christ, the Church, could be whole while separated, divided, or 
 standing apart from its divinely appointed head, the Pope. — Editor. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 409 
 
 in reference to its belief on this subject, answered by the 
 voice of all its pastors that it beheved the Mother of God 
 to be immaculate. One bishop alone dissented, but as 
 soon as the dogma was proclaimed he hastened to proclaim 
 his acceptance of it. 
 
 IV. Conditions of Infallibility. 
 
 We have seen, in speaking on the subject of infallibility, 
 what is required to make a Council ecumenical and conse- 
 quently infallible. It now remains for us to say under what 
 circumstances the Pope is infalhble, that is, when we can be 
 certain that his teaching is free from error. To know this 
 we have only to examine the terms of the decision of the 
 CouncH of 1870. 
 
 According to the Council the Pope, to speak ex cathedra, 
 must first act in virtue of his supreme authority and as head 
 of the Church. Second, he must have the intention of defin- 
 ing a doctrine, an intention which must be evident either 
 from the terms he employs (for example, if he uses the words 
 we define, if he pronounces anathema against contrary doc- 
 trine) or from the circumstances under which he speaks. 
 
 In a word, the Pope speaks ex cathedra when he makes 
 known his intention to oblige the faithful to believe interiorly 
 and to profess exteriorly that which he teaches concerning 
 faith and morals. 
 
 Hence it follows that this character of infalUbihty extends 
 in no way to the writings and acts of the Pope as a private 
 man. Such are, at least generally speaking, the sovereign 
 Pontiff's allocutions and addresses to the deputations which 
 he receives, as well as briefs which he addresses to indi- 
 viduals; though always worthy of profound respect, these 
 documents do not constitute a definition. 
 
 Let us remark further that infalhbility embraces only the 
 definition, and not the considerations, or the biblical, philo- 
 sophical, and historical arguments which usually precede 
 doctrinal definitions. 
 
410 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ART. IV.— RELATIONS BETWEEN CHURCH AND STATE.i 
 
 The Church has received from Jesus Christ all the powers 
 necessary to attain her end, and all men who desire to be 
 saved must obey her laws. On the other hand, man, a 
 social being, naturally forms part of a civil society, which 
 has also received from God the powers necessary to attain 
 its proper end, and justly requires obedience to its laws. 
 It is important to know what relations God wills should 
 exist between these two societies composed of the same 
 members; in other words, to know the reciprocal rights and 
 duties of the Church and the State. 
 
 Leo XIII. in his admirable encychcal on Christian States 
 presents these relations very clearly. Let us quote a few 
 passages from it, and then sum up this doctrine in a few 
 theses, which will help to fix in our minds the ideas relative to 
 this important question. It is particularly necessary to do 
 so at the present day, when efforts are made to hamper 
 the Church in the exercise of her authority and make her 
 subordinate to temporal powers. 
 
 ''God has divided the government of mankind between 
 two powers, ecclesiastical and civil ; one presides over divine 
 things, the other over human. Each in -its sphere is sov- 
 ereign; each is marked with Hmits perfectly defined, and 
 traced in conformity with its nature and its special end. 
 Hence there is, as it were, a circumscribed sphere, in which 
 each exercises its action jure proprio. At the same time, 
 their authority being exercised on the same subjects, it may 
 
 ^Allies, Church and State; Earnshaw, Molitor, Sweeney, O'Reilly; 
 Manning, Newman, and others against Gladstone; Manning, Miscell., 
 vol. ii., n. 4, 5, 6; Vat. Deer., ch. 2, 3; Hergenrother, Church and 
 State, vol. i., Essay 1; vol. ii.. Essays 13, 14, 15; Manning, Essays, 
 in I. and II. Ser. (Lucas); A C. Q. ii. 430, xvi. 20; C. W. xxvii. 
 lll,liv.389; M. xliv. 457; D. R. New Ser. xxiv. 170, 454, xxvi. 351, 
 xxix. 308, XXX. 174; Br. W. vii. 554, x., xi., xiii. often; Lacordaire, 
 conf. 5 on the Church; The Yorke-Wendke Controversy, p. ii. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 411 
 
 happen that one and the same thing, though for different 
 reasons, may come mider the jurisdiction and judgment of 
 both powers; . . . hence the necessity of having between 
 the two powers a system of well-ordered relations, analogous 
 to that which in man constitutes the union of soul and 
 body. We can form a just idea of the nature and power of 
 these relations only by considering the nature of each of 
 these two powers and by bearing in mind the excellence and 
 nobihty of their ends, since the special and immediate end of 
 one is the promotion of temporal interests, and of the other, 
 spiritual and eternal interests. Thus all that is sacred in 
 human things in any respect whatever, all that relates to 
 the salvation of souls and the worship of God, either through 
 its nature or through the relation of its end, comes under 
 the authority of the Church. As to other things which 
 relate to the civil and political order, it is just that they 
 be subject to civil authority, for Christ has commanded us 
 to 'render to Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and to God 
 the thmgs that are God's.' " 
 
 Leo XIII. in his encychcal on Civil Government has also 
 said: The Church '^ recognizes and declares that all be- 
 longing to the civil order are under their {i.e. temporal rulers) 
 power and supreme authority. In things the judgment of 
 which, for various reasons, belongs to the rehgious and to 
 the civil power, she wishes that there be mutual accord, by 
 which blessed means both powers will be preserved from fatal 
 dissensions." 
 
 First Thesis. — The Ecclesiastical Power and the Civil Power, 
 
 Church and State, are Independent or Sovereign, each Within 
 
 the Limits of its Proper Sphere of Action. 
 
 I. Independence of the Spiritual Power. 
 
 First Argument. — ^This is clearly evident from the 
 divine will. To Peter and his successors Christ confided 
 the government of His Church. "To her, and not to the 
 
412 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 State/' says Leo XIII. in the encyclical on Christian States, 
 " belongs the right to guide men in heavenly things. To her 
 has God given the command to make known and to decide 
 all things relating to religion, to teach all nations, to 
 extend as far as possible the frontiers of Christianity, in a 
 word, to administer freely, and according to her own judg- 
 ment, Christian interests.'' It is evident that to subject 
 the Church to a power other than that which God has es- 
 tabhshed would be to overthrow the personal work of God. 
 
 Second Argument, from the Superior End of the 
 Church. — The direct end of civil society is to promote the 
 welfare and safety of man here below, to further the pres- 
 ervation and development of his nature in the physical 
 and intellectual order. The special end of rehgious society 
 or of the Church is to help him to attain perfect and eternal 
 happiness, to establish and extend the reign of God upon 
 earth, to labor for the moral and supernatural perfection of 
 man, to lead him to his supreme destiny, to insure him 
 boundless happiness, which consists in the eternal possession 
 of God. This evidently is a mission superior to that which 
 is proper to the civil power. ''As the end of the Church 
 is by far the noblest of all," says Leo XIIL, ''her power 
 should rank above all others, and cannot in any way be 
 inferior or subject to any civil power." 
 
 Third Argument, drawn from the Nature, the Ob- 
 jects, AND THE Extent of the Church's Authority. — 
 a. A power directly divine, universal, perpetual, and immu- 
 table in its origin is infinitely superior to that which is only 
 indirectly divine, which is variable, and Hmited by time 
 and space. Now spiritual power was established directly and 
 immediately hy God Himself ; moreover, it is universal and 
 perpetual, and is founded upon divine and immutable laws. 
 The authority of civil rulers, it is true, also comes from God: 
 ^' There is no power but from God" (Rom. xiii. 1). But in 
 religious society, everything depends directly upon Him; not 
 only spiritual authority itself, but also its form, its limits, 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 413 
 
 and the manner of exercising it, rest upon a positive divine 
 right; the community possesses and transmits no power. 
 In civil society, on the contrary, the form of government 
 and the conditions of sovereignty are of positive human 
 right; they depend on the free choice of men, and con- 
 sequently are subject to change, h. The objects and means 
 of this spiritual power are all of a sacred and supernatural 
 character : the word of God, sacrifice, sacraments and worship, 
 Christian virtue and sanctification. On the other hand, 
 the civil power is confined exclusively to objects and means 
 of the natural order, c. Finally, in regard to the extent 
 of their jurisdiction, the Church is essentially universal 
 and perpetual; it must carry its mission to all nations, to the 
 end of time. The civil power, on the contrary, is essentially 
 national, circumscribed by geographical limits, natural or 
 conventional, and has, moreover, only a limited and un- 
 certain duration. 
 
 Fourth Argument, from the Conduct of Christ and 
 His Apostles. — Nowhere do we find Jesus asking permission 
 of earthly rulers to preach, to assemble His apostles, to estab- 
 lish His Church. Nor do we find that He commanded His 
 apostles to take counsel with civil governments in order 
 to propagate the Gospel and exercise their ministry. He 
 predicted, on the contrary, that they would be cruelly treated 
 and persecuted by earthly rulers and magistrates because of 
 their mission. If He commanded them to render to Caesar 
 the things that are Caesar's, that is, to submit to him in 
 matters purely temporal, if He Himself gave an example 
 of this submission by paying the tribute, they have not to 
 consult civil authorities in matters belonging to spiritual 
 government. Thus we find the apostles announcing the 
 good tidings everywhere, founding churches, consecrating 
 bishops, ordaining priests and deacons, making disciplinary 
 laws and precepts, regardless of the temporal powers; when 
 driven from one place they go to another; if they are over- 
 whelmed with outrages and insults, they glory to suffer for 
 
414 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the name of Jesus. They cannot, they say, be silent con- 
 cerning that which they have seen and heard, and they must 
 ''obey God rather than men.'' 
 
 The Acts of the Apostles offer us a remarkable example 
 of this independence of the spiritual power. The Jewish 
 magistrates forbade the apostles to teach the doctrine of 
 Jesus, alleging that they disturbed the public peace. What 
 do the apostles reply? ''We must obey God rather than 
 men." Here we have on the one hand the Church command- 
 ing the preaching of the Gospel in order to fulfil its end, 
 the salvation of souls, a thing of spiritual interest; on the 
 other, the magistrates forbidding this same preaching, in 
 view of the public peace, a matter of temporal interest. 
 Now the Holy Spirit, by the mouth of Peter, commanded 
 them to disregard this prohibition. The apostle does not 
 say that public order shall not be disturbed; he only alleges 
 the will of God (iv. 19; v. 29). 
 
 Fifth Argument, from Ecclesiastical History. — The 
 example of the apostles has been faithfully imitated by 
 their successors, not only through long periods of persecu- 
 tion, but throughout all history. "This authority, perfect 
 in itself and absolutely independent, the Church has never 
 ceased to claim or to exercise pubhcly. . . . Moreover, it has, 
 in principle and in fact, been acknowledged by princes and 
 heads of government, who in their negotiations and trans- 
 actions, by sending and receiving ambassadors, and by the 
 exchange of other good offices, have constantly acted with the 
 Church as with a sovereign and legitimate power. Thus it 
 was by a special providence of God that this authority was 
 furnished with a civil principality as the best safeguard of its 
 independence. " (Leo XIII. on Christian States.) 
 
 Remark. — There is nothing in common between the 
 superiority of the Church's jurisdiction, of which we have just 
 spoken, and theocracy, with which writers sometimes affect 
 to confound it. Theocracy, which is the government of a 
 temforal society by a political law divinely revealed, and by 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 415 
 
 an authority supernaturally constituted, has never existed 
 except among the Jewish people, and only during a period 
 of their history. It is true that by theocracy is sometimes 
 meant the domination which many attribute to the clergy 
 in purely temporal matters. But the Catholic doctrine, in 
 proclaiming, as we shall see, the independence of civil power 
 in these matters, renders such domination impossible. 
 
 II. Independence of the Civil Power. 
 
 As long as it does not violate the laws of God and the 
 rights of the Church, as long as the spiritual interests and 
 the supreme end of man are not endangered, the State is 
 free to take whatever measures it pleases in regard to cus- 
 toms, imposts, finances, armies, public works, etc. The 
 Church has nothing to do with these purely human details, 
 relating only to the temporal happiness of nations. In 
 other words, the Church has not and does not claim, in 
 virtue of its institution, any power over civil society in 
 purely temporal matters relating to a temporal end or an 
 exclusively temporal interest. ''The civil order," says the 
 present Pope, speaking of temporal rulers, ''is entirely subject 
 to their power and to their sovereign authority."^ 
 
 Corollaries. — 1st. It follows from the preceding thesis 
 that there exists between Church and State a real dis- 
 tinction decreed by Jesus Christ. Let us observe, however, 
 that this distinction is not rigidly essential. In fact God could 
 have confided to the same authority the office of promoting at 
 the same time the spiritual and the temporal end of man. 
 He could have made the kings of the earth the ministers 
 of the head of the Church, receiving their power from him 
 and governing in his name. But He has not willed to do this. 
 Christ in reahty has ordained that each of these two ends 
 
 * See Rickaby, Essay I.; Moral Philosophy ch. 8; BalmesJ Civiliza- 
 tion, ch. 49 ff. 
 
416 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 should be promoted by a special authority, each, in its 
 proper sphere of action, independent of the other. 
 
 2d. From what we have stated of the powers conferred 
 by Christ upon His Church, and the independence in regard 
 to civil authority which He has guaranteed to her, it results, 
 in virtue of the definition itself previously given, that the 
 Church is truly a perfect society. It also follows that pagan 
 Csesarism and all encroachments of the civil power upon the 
 religious related in the history of the Church must be 
 condemned. 
 
 III. Rights of the Church. 
 
 It will not be beside our purpose to enumerate here a few 
 of the rights which the Church justly claims. To rob her 
 of these rights is to violate the independence which belongs 
 to her as a perfect society, possessing in herself, according 
 to the sovereign order of Jesus Christ, her Founder, all the 
 means necessary to attain her end. 
 
 A. The Church has the right to fulfil the mission and 
 exercise the power she has received from her divine Founder 
 without having to ask the authority of the civil power, 
 and without being subject to its control or its interference. 
 Thus she is absolutely independent in everything relating 
 to the teaching of dogma and of morals, the administration 
 of the sacraments, the election of her pontiffs, the erection 
 and direction of her seminaries and rehgious commimities, 
 the distribution of ecclesiastical offices. No one has the 
 right to prevent the sovereign Pontiff from communicating 
 with the clergy and the faithful, or to prevent the promulga- 
 tion of his briefs or the execution of his decrees; the royal 
 placet and exequatur with which civil authority sometimes 
 claims to control the acts of the spiritual power are ilhcit 
 and of no value unless they are the result of a concordat,^ 
 that is, of a concession of ecclesiastical authority. 
 
 * Hunter, vol. i., n. 303; Hergenrother, Church and State, I., p. 71. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 417 
 
 B. As each member of the Church is composed of a double 
 nature, of a soul and of a body, he must be led to his final 
 end by means appropriate to this double nature. Hence: 
 
 a. The Church has a right to impose upon its members 
 not only purely spiritual but also material things, such as 
 fasting, almsgiving, assistance at divine worship. 
 
 6. The Church has the right and the duty to carry on 
 divine worship exteriorly and publicly, and consequently to 
 prescribe pubhc, exterior ceremonies, such as processions, 
 pilgrimages; to require the material means necessary for 
 the exercise of her worship, for the support of her ministers, 
 for the construction and preservation of sacred edifices, and, 
 since material means are necessary for this purpose, to 
 acquire temporal goods, to hold and possess them. 
 
 c. The Church has the right to command the obedience 
 of her members, to impose upon the rebelHous spiritual or 
 material penalties, either for their amendment or as an 
 example to others. 
 
 None of these rights can be taken from the Church without 
 violating the independence which she justly claims as a 
 perfect society, that is, as a society possessing in itself, by 
 the sovereign will of Christ, her Founder, all the means of 
 preservation and of action necessary to attain her end. 
 
 Second Thesis. — In Cases of Conflict, that is, when in Mixed 
 Matters the Two Authorities Prescribe Contradictory Obliga- 
 tions for Members Owing Allegiance to Both Powers, the Au- 
 thority of the Church must Prevail over that of Civil Society. 
 
 In temporal matters there arises, sometimes in the ordinary 
 course of things, sometimes through exceptional circum- 
 stances, a spiritual interest which the Church must safe- 
 guard; at the same time the purpose or object of such interests 
 may not be of a sufficiently supernatural character to place 
 them altogether in the spiritual or supernatural sphere; 
 
418 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 hence these are called mixed matters; a case in point is 
 the question of the temporal possessions of the Church. 
 
 ''All/' says Leo XIII., ''which in human things is sacred 
 for any reason whatever, all that pertains to the salvation 
 of souls and the worship of God, either in its nature or its 
 end, comes under the authority of the Church." This is 
 the proper domain of the Church, and consequently she has 
 a right to exercise her authority in regard to governments as 
 well as in regard to the individual faithful. Nevertheless 
 history attests that in questions of this nature the Church 
 always tries to act in concert with the State, in order that 
 such matters may be regulated by a common agreement, 
 rather than by a summary and supreme decision on her part. 
 Let us add further the following words of the encyclical 
 already quoted: "At times it may happen that another 
 means of securing harmony and guaranteeing peace and 
 liberty avails; this is when the heads of governments and 
 the sovereign pontiffs have a special agreement upon some 
 special point. Under such circumstances the Church gives 
 striking proof of her motherly charity in carrying indulgence 
 and condescension as far as possible." 
 
 The thesis announced is only a logical deduction of what 
 has gone before; nevertheless, because of its importance at 
 the present time, it is well to insist a little further on some 
 of the arguments upon which it rests. 
 
 First Argument, drawn from the End itself of the 
 Church. — ^This end is infinitely superior to that of the State. 
 What, in fact, are temporal goods compared to eternal? 
 What, says Our Saviour, will it profit a man to gain the 
 whole world if he lose his own soul? All earthly possessions, 
 and civil society itself, are only means given by God to man to 
 lead him to his final end, the possession of eternal happiness. 
 The proper and immediate end of the State is to promote 
 the temporal happiness of man; therefore in everything 
 relating to the final end of man it must be subordinate to 
 the Church. "The art of the pilot," says St. Thomas, 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 419 
 
 ''regulates that of the sailor, the art of the architect that of 
 the mason, and the arts of peace those of war." 
 
 Second Argument, drawn from the Superiority of the 
 Church's Authority over any Civil Power. — See Third 
 Argument, p. 412. 
 
 Third Argument, drawn from Catholic Tradition and 
 Pontifical Decisions. — ''AH the Fathers of the Church," 
 says Tarquini, in his excellent and sound work, Les principes 
 du droit public de VEglise, ''have constantly taught that the 
 end of civil society, and its government, must be subordinate 
 to the Church, as the body is to the soul." The same thing 
 is affirmed by the decisions of the Holy See. Not only did 
 Pius IX. condemn the 42d Proposition of the Syllabus 
 thus formulated: "In cases of conflict between the two 
 powers the civil power prevails," but in his Encyclical 
 Quanta Cura Pius IX., basing his decision upon the words 
 of several of his predecessors, expressed himself in these 
 terms: " It is certain that it is the interest of rulers, whenever 
 there is question of the affairs of God, carefully to follow 
 the order which He has prescribed, and to yield, and not to 
 prefer the royal will to that of the priests of Christ." 
 
 Third Thesis. — The Church and the State should Mutually 
 Help Each Other. 
 
 The conflicts of which we have just spoken are extremely 
 to be regretted; they are injurious to the good of the Church, 
 as well as to that of the State. Hence there should be 
 between the two powers, as Leo XIII. says, "well-ordered 
 relations, analogous to those which constitute in man the 
 union of body and soul." The wise providence of God, 
 which has established both powers, has provided for their 
 needs by tracing the relations that should exist between 
 them. These relations will form the subject of the present 
 thesis. 
 
420 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 IV. The Church Should Aid and Protect the State. 
 
 This duty, which does not need to be demonstrated, the 
 Church does not dispute; she fulfils it by her teaching 
 concerning the divine origin of temporal power, and the 
 necessity of obedience to all lawful authority ; by her prayers, 
 her sacraments, and her worship, which help subjects to 
 fulfil their civil obUgations. The Church is even obliged, 
 when necessary, to resort to spiritual penalties to induce her 
 subjects to perform their duty toward the State. There 
 may be even circumstances when it will be her duty to help 
 the State by pecuniary sacrifices, by relinquishing some of 
 her possessions, etc. 
 
 V. The Temporal Power Owes Assistance to 
 THE Church. 
 
 1st. Indirectly, a. By causing justice, order, and 
 tranquilhty to reign in the State, in order that the Church 
 may be able to exercise efficaciously her salutary influence. 
 
 h. By refraining from violating the rights of the Church, 
 and never permitting her to be hampered in any way in the 
 fulfilment of her divine mission, in the preaching of the 
 Gospel, in the exercise of her worship, in the administration 
 of the sacraments and in her government. 
 
 2d. Directly. The State owes the Church positive and 
 direct assistance, without, however, going outside its proper 
 sphere. Its duty, for example, is to make laws in harmony 
 with the divine and ecclesiastical laws ; to sanction, as far as 
 circumstances require and permit, the laws of the Church, 
 by temporal penalties; to provide, if necessary, for the 
 maintenance of the ministers of religion, and rehgious worship 
 itself. Let us give a few proofs of this direct duty, which 
 is usually contested. 
 
 First Argument, drawn from the Designs of God Him- 
 self. — God's special design, together with His glory, is the eter- 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 421 
 
 not happiness of man. If He delegates a part of His authority, 
 it is in the interest of this supreme end. It was to procure 
 man this happiness that He sent His Son upon earth, that 
 He estabhshed His Church, that He wills its extension and 
 its freedom. If the heads of government receive a portion 
 of this divine authority, if they can exact obedience in the 
 name of God, it is, no doubt, that they may secure peace and 
 temporal prosperity, but they must make these blessings 
 all contribute to the final end of their subjects. The latter, 
 moreover, cannot seek and desire the things of this world, 
 except in as far as they serve to realize their eternal destiny. 
 Hence depositaries of civil power use it lawfully only when 
 it serves to promote this same end. They also must labor 
 as far as circumstances permit, and in the limits of their 
 sphere, for the progress of the true religion, the only religion 
 which leads souls to salvation. 
 
 Second Argument, drawn from the Social Royalty op 
 Jesus Christ. — Jesus Christ is God, and as His absolute 
 sovereignty over all that exists is a necessary attribute of 
 His divinity. He is King of civil societies, as well as of families 
 and individuals. This royalty is clearly proclaimed in the 
 Old as well as in the New Testament. "Let peoples serve 
 Thee and tribes worship Thee,'' said Isaac, prophetically 
 addressing the Messias (Gen. xxvii.). "All the kings of the 
 earth shall adore Him," says David, "all nations shall serve 
 Him" (Psalms Ixxi.). "Kings shall be His ministers" 
 (Isaias Ix.). "God has given to the Son of man power, and 
 glory, and a kingdom : and all peoples, tribes, and tongues shall 
 serve Him" (Daniel vii.). "God," says St. Paul, "hath 
 exalted Him, and hath given Him a name which is above 
 every name: that in the name of Jesus every knee should 
 bow of those that are in heaven, on earth, and under the 
 earth" (Philip, ii. 9). "God has subjected all things under 
 His feet; ... He hath left nothing not subject to Him" 
 (Hebrews ii. 8). He is "King of kings and Lord of lords" 
 (Apoc. xix. 16). We know, moreover, the categorical 
 
422 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 affirmation of Our Saviour Himself: ''All power is given to 
 Me in heaven and in earth. " ''All things have been given to 
 Me by the Father. ' ' In virtue of the authority which essen- 
 tially belongs to Him as God, Jesus Christ could have as- 
 sumed the temporal as well as the spiritual sceptre of the 
 entire world. He has not done so; it has pleased Him 
 to leave to earthly rulers power over purely human things. 
 But if His kingdom is not of this world, if He commands us 
 to render to C£esar the things which are Caesar's, He can- 
 not permit that we render not to God what is God's. He 
 has made His religion binding not only upon man individ- 
 ually, but upon societies ; nations as well as individuals must 
 obey the law of the Gospel, and the depositaries of civil 
 power are bound to see, as far as it is in their power, that 
 His sovereign will is carried out. 
 
 Third Argument, drawn from the Welfare of the 
 State itself. — The prosperity of the State, the realization of 
 its proper and immediate end, that is, the temporal happiness 
 that it must procure its members, require that it contribute, 
 as far as it may, to the prosperity of the Church. In fact 
 without religion, no pubHc, stable, and prosperous society 
 is possible. Religion is the basis of society, for it explains 
 the origin of society, the lawfulness of social power, gives a 
 solid foundation to obedience, and causes harmony, justice, 
 and charity to reign among citizens. Evidently the true 
 religion, that which contains all truth unmixed with error, 
 which renders to God the worship due Him, and gives man 
 supernatural strength to fulfil his duties, is, by this fact 
 itself, the strongest support of the State, and a powerful aid 
 in the attainment of its proper end. 
 
 Fourth Argument, drawn from the Formal and Ex- 
 plicit Declaration of the Church. — See, for example, the 
 Encyclical of Gregory XVI. in 1832, of Pius IX. in 1846, and 
 the Propositions 55, 77, and 78 of the Syllabus. But let us 
 hear particularly what is said upon this subject by the Pontiff 
 gloriously reigning : " Political societies cannot, without crime, 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 423 
 
 conduct themselves as though God existed not at all, or 
 dispense with religion as something foreign and useless, or 
 indifferently admit any religion according to their good 
 pleasure. In honoring the Divinity they must follow 
 strictly the rules and the mode of worship by which God 
 declared that He wished to be honored. The heads of the 
 State must, therefore, hold the name of God as holy, and 
 rank among their principal obhgations the duty of protecting 
 and favoring religion, of supporting it with the tutelary 
 authority of the laws, and of avoiding any statutes or de- 
 cisions contrary to its safety and integrity. . . . Civil society 
 should, in favoring public prosperity, provide for the welfare 
 of the citizens in such a way as not only to place no obstacle 
 to religion, but to afford every possible- facility for the pur- 
 suit and attainment of that supreme and unchangeable good 
 to which they aspire. . . . For public power was established 
 for the benefit of the governed, and though its immediate 
 end is to promote the temporal prosperity of citizens, it is 
 the duty of rulers not to diminish but, on the contrary, to 
 increase man's facihties for attaining that supreme and sov- 
 ereign good in which eternal happiness consists and which 
 is impossible without religion." (Encycl. already quoted.) 
 Remark. — ^We have just stated, taking as guide the encyc- 
 lical Immortale Dei (on Christian States), the Catholic doctrine 
 in regard to the relations which should exist between Church 
 and State. In this statement we have reasoned from an abso- 
 lute thesis, without taking into consideration circumstances 
 which, at the present day particularly, modify these relations in 
 the interest itself of both societies. We shall speak later (p. 
 442 ff.) of these modifications, and we shall explain when and 
 why a Catholic may accept a constitution which deviates 
 from these general principles, swear allegiance to it, and 
 even defend it at need. 
 
424 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ART. v.— ON LIBERALISM AND LIBERTY. 
 
 I. Notions concerning Liberalism.^ 
 
 There is a doctrine diametrically opposed to that of the 
 Catholic Church regarding her powers and rights and her re- 
 lations to the State. It bears falsely the name of Liberalism.^ 
 
 ^Pius IX., Syllabus of 1864; Leo XIIL, Encyclicals on Socialism, 
 etc., 1878, Matrimony, 1880, Civil Government, 1881, Freemasonry, 
 1884, 1892, Christian States, 1885, Human Liberty, 1888, Christian 
 Citizenship, 1890; Apostolic Letters to the Emperor of Brazil, 1889, 
 to the Bishops of Italy, 1890, of France, 1892, of Hungary, 1893; Fallen, 
 What is Liberalism?; Brownson, L bera ism and the Church; Br. 
 W.vii. 305; D. R. New Ser. xviii. 1,285, xxv. 202, xxvi. 204, 487, 
 III. Ser. XV. 58. 
 
 ^ It is important, above all things not to confound Liberalism 
 as it existed for a certain period with the Liberalism of the present 
 day, for one differs essentially from the other. Only the name has 
 been retained, the more easily to deceive unthinking minds. 
 
 Formerly Liberalism meant a system, or rather a political tendency, 
 opposed to Centralism or Absolutism, favoring in a great measure 
 the participation of the citizens in the government of the State, and 
 procuring, particularly, a large autonomy of individuals and families, 
 of private associations communities, and provinces in the adminis- 
 tration of their own interests. It was, in other terms, a tendency 
 favorable to politica and to social liberty. In this acceptation of 
 the term it is evident that Catholics would be excellent Liberals, or 
 rather that they alone, at the present day, would have the right to bear 
 the name. Catholics are in fact wholly favorable to political and 
 civil liberty as we shall describe it elsewhere. They particularly' 
 claim for each one, in the reasonable limits of natual law, freedom 
 to dispose of his person, of his acts, to embrace the life or the pro- 
 fession he pleases, to form associations for an honest purpose, to 
 dispose of his fortune during his life and decree by will the 
 disposition to be made of it after his death according to the in- 
 spiration of his conscience, and without interference on the part 
 of the civil power. Catholics desire no less the independence of their 
 country, and freedom to govern according to its own laws. If they 
 live under a government which admits modern liberties, they respect 
 the government constituted to meet the present needs of society, 
 and if they complain, it is only when unjust restrictions violate the 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 425 
 
 We say falsely, because it is far from teaching and upholding 
 true hberty. It is not easy to give a precise and full defini- 
 tion of liberalism, for the simple reason that it is really 
 a purely negative system, something like Protestantism, 
 and, Uke this, susceptible of numerous shades. We shall 
 distinguish three classes of hberals, to which others can 
 easily be assigned. 
 
 A. Radicals, or Radical Liberals. — They are rightly so 
 called, because by removing every religious restraint they 
 strike at the very roots and foundations of the social order. 
 Of these Pope Leo XIIL says, in his famous encyclical on 
 Human Liberty: "The partisans of naturalism and of 
 rationalism are in philosophy what the abettors of Hberal- 
 ism are in the moral and civil order, since they introduce 
 into morals and practical hfe the principles laid down by 
 the partisans of naturalism. According to them, in practical 
 life there is no divine power which they are bound to obey, 
 but each one is a law unto himself. This gives rise to that 
 morality called independent and which, under an appearance 
 of liberty, turns the will from the observance of the divine 
 precepts and leads man to unhmited hcense."^ 
 
 Critique. — 1st. Between the Cathohc Church and radi- 
 cal hberalism, which is really identical with naturalism 
 and free thought, there is evidently positive and complete 
 opposition. We do not need to refute it; we have already 
 done so in demonstrating the existence of a rehgion 
 revealed by God, and how all men are obhged to embrace 
 
 liberty of citizens and the rights made sacred by the Constitution of 
 their country. — Author. 
 
 Besides this Political Liberalism there is a system of political econ- 
 omy sometimes called Economic Liberalism (see Devas, Polit. Econ- 
 0"^y> P- 552). Both systems are to a certain extent represented by 
 the famous Liberal Party of England. Our treatise has nothing: to 
 do Avith either system, being concerned exclusively with Liberalism 
 in Religion. — Editor. 
 
 ^ Ming, Data of Modern Ethics, ch. 10, 11 ; Lilly, Right and Wrong. 
 
426 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the Catholic faith under pain of failing to attain the end for 
 which they were created. 
 
 2d. It is not difficult to see the inevitable and disastrous 
 effects of such a doctrine. It is of the greatest possible in jury- 
 to the individual as well as to society. The Holy Father 
 demonstrates this with great clearness and convincing logic: 
 * ^ To desire that there be no tie between man or civil society 
 and God, the Creator and, consequently, the supreme Legis- 
 lator of all things, is contrary to nature ; ... to make good 
 and evil dependent upon the judgment of human reason alone, 
 is to suppress the proper distinction between good and evil; 
 there will be no longer any real difference between what is 
 wrong and what is right, save in the opinion and judgment of 
 the individual ; whatsoever pleases him becomes lawful. Once 
 we admit such moral doctrine, which is powerless to subdue 
 or appease the disorderly movements of the soul, we open the 
 way to all the corruptions of life. . . . Once we repudiate the 
 power of God over man and over human society, it is natural 
 that society should no longer have any religion, and that 
 everything relating to religion should become to it a matter 
 of complete indifference. Armed with the idea of its sover- 
 eignty, the multitude will be easily led into sedition and 
 revolt, and, the curb of duty and of conscience no longer 
 existing, force will be the only resource — force, which is of 
 little avail by itself to restrain the passions of the populace. 
 We have a proof of this in the almost daily warfare waged 
 against sociahstic and other seditious sects which have been 
 trying so long to destroy the State to its very foundation. 
 Let, then, impartial minds judge and decide whether such 
 doctrines are conducive to true liberty and are worthy of 
 man, or whether they are not rather the ruin and complete 
 destruction of society." (Encycl. cit.) 
 
 B. There is another kind of Liberals, called by Leo XIII. 
 Social or State Liberals. They do not formally deny all 
 dependence of man upon God; they are satisfied to affirm 
 the absolute independence of civil society as a society. Ac- 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 427 
 
 cording to them, the divine laws must regulate the life and 
 conduct of individuals, but not that of governments or states. 
 They would have it lawful in public things to deviate from 
 the commands of God, and to legislate without any regard 
 to them; the pernicious consequence of this is the Separation 
 of Church and State and the axiom of No Religion in 
 Politics.^ 
 
 This milder Liberalism may be defined as the doctrine which 
 claims for civil society an absolute independence in regard 
 to rehgion. Or, again, the pohtical school which admits 
 but one sovereign authority, the State, and denies the neces- 
 sary coexistence, distinction, and harmony of the two 
 powers, temporal and spiritual. It may also be called 
 social rationalism. It declares the people as a nation, and 
 civil powers of all degrees, exempt from every obligation, and 
 every duty toward any rehgious authority whatever. To 
 them Christian revelation, Jesus Christ its Author, the 
 Church which He established and which represents Him 
 on earth, are as if they did not exist; they do not even know 
 if Jesus Christ is God. They have not to concern themselves 
 mth this question, which belongs, they say, to individuals; 
 the existence of Jesus Christ and of His Church in no way 
 affects the action of the State and its various powers. Thus, 
 for example, when the legislature makes laws, the executive 
 power, and the courts in applying them, have no need to 
 consider whether these laws are or are not conformable to 
 the law of God, to the express will of Jesus Christ, to the 
 rights which He conferred upon His Church. Such liberals 
 allege that though a man as an individual is free to live in 
 private life as a Christian, he is forbidden to act as such in 
 his public life and in the exercise of his functions. 
 
 Another consequence of these liberal principles is that 
 where the State undertakes the work of instruction or public 
 education its teaching, called neutral or unsectarian, must 
 
 > I. E. R., Sep. '94; M. S. H., June 1901; U. B., Jan. '97. 
 
428 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 be atheistic, godless, without any religion; for all opinions, 
 they say, must be respected. As to ethics or moral teaching, 
 they are wary, it is true, of committing themselves, and to 
 deceive simple minds they talk of independent, lay morality, 
 etc. As if there could be a binding rule of morality without 
 a supreme legislator and adequate sanction. How could it 
 be imposed upon the conscience, deprived as it is of the 
 truths on which it must necessarily rest? 
 
 Critique. — 1st. State liberahsm, though less impious, no 
 doubt, than radical liberalism, is nevertheless the antithesis 
 of the doctrine which we stated in regard to the relations 
 which should, in principle, exist between the two powers. 
 We have refuted it by establishing our thesis with solid 
 proofs. Hence a faithful child of the Church cannot hesi- 
 tate upon this point. For it is to be noted that these 
 liberals present their doctrines as absolute truth; according 
 to them it flows from principles of reason, and is conse- 
 quently apphcable to all times and to all places. Here 
 is the judgment formulated by Leo XIII. on this subject: 
 'Tor such a state of things to exist a civil community must 
 needs have no duty toward God, or be able to disregard it 
 with impunity, which is equally and manifestly false. It is 
 a matter beyond doubt that the union of men in society is 
 the work of the will of God, whether we consider the society 
 in its members, in its form which is authority, in its cause, or 
 in the number and importance of the advantages which it 
 affords man. God made man for society, and to unite him 
 with his fellow beings, in order that the needs of his nature, 
 which his individual efforts could not supply, might find 
 satisfaction in the association. For this reason civil society, 
 as a society, must necessarily recognize God as its Principle 
 and as its Author, and consequently render to His power and 
 to His authority the homage of its worship. Neither in 
 the name of reason nor of justice can the State be atheistic, 
 or adopt a system which would result in atheism, that is, 
 treat all religions alike, and grant them equal rights. Hence, 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 429 
 
 as it is necessary to profess a religion in society, it must be the 
 one true religion, readily recognized, at least in Catholic 
 countries, by the striking marks of truth which it bears. 
 This religion the heads of the State, therefore, are bound to 
 preserve and protect if they would fulfil their obligation to 
 provide prudently and profitably for the interest of the 
 community. For public power was established for the 
 benefit of the governed; and though its immediate end is to 
 promote the temporal prosperity of citizens, it is the duty 
 of rulers not to diminish but, on the contrary, to increase 
 man's facility for attaining the supreme and sovereign good 
 in which eternal happiness consists, and which is impossible 
 without religion." (Encycl. cit.) 
 
 2d. If these State liberals were logical, there would be 
 a fatal outbreak of radicalism, as in fact there has been 
 among those who consistently followed their principles. 
 
 In reality radical liberals alone are logical. If God has 
 no authority over man as a social being, i.e., when associated 
 with his fellows in earthly pursuits, why should He have any 
 authority over man in his private life? Has He, perhaps, 
 created man for society in order that he may thus withdraw 
 in part from the sovereign dominion of his Creator? Has 
 He communicated a part of His power to civil authorities in 
 order that they may turn their subjects from the fulfilment 
 of certain duties toward the Divinity? God is either Master 
 of man, everywhere and always, or He is not Master at all. 
 The nihihsts of Russia and the anarchists of all countries 
 are only carrying out the logical consequences of these Hberal 
 principles. It is true, as the Pope causes us to remark, that 
 the partisans of liberahsm do not give complete assent to 
 such doctrines. Alarmed by the enormity of their claims, 
 and appreciating perhaps that they are in opposition with 
 truth, they would have reason remain subject to the natural 
 law and to the divine, eternal law; but they do not admit 
 that a man should submit to laws which it might please God 
 to impose upon him in some other way than by means of 
 
430 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 natural reason. The Pope has no difficulty in demonstrating 
 that on this point hberals contradict themselves. 
 
 3d. Of the disastrous effects of this liberahsm we shall soon 
 see more in the paragraph on '' Modern Liberties." Suffice 
 it to say that the work of this system usually goes much 
 farther than its professions. It is not satisfied with affecting 
 indifference toward religion; it is frequently its avowed and 
 positive enemy, as its words and actions prove. Look at 
 what has taken place recently and what is still taking place 
 in countries where liberahsm rules. It is not difficult to 
 recognize that the famous separation of Church and State 
 is in reality only the absorption of the Church by the State, 
 or the persecution of the Church by the State. The ideal 
 of liberalism is the old pagan Csesarism. It means the 
 head of the government, whether one or many, wielding both 
 the material and the spiritual sword, and thus monopolizing 
 the control of education, constituting itself the sole teacher 
 of society. Where the laws and the pubhc conscience do not 
 permit it to realize this ideal it approximates as closely as 
 possible to it by administrative measures as perfidious as 
 they are numerous. There is, however, a difference between 
 the present persecution and that of former times: to-day 
 it is universal and the selfsame everywhere, its purpose 
 being the complete destruction of the one true Church of 
 Jesus Christ. The reason of this is that the real source of 
 the persecution is none other than Freemasonry, of which 
 liberalism is the willing servant. 
 
 C. We must here mention a third kind of liberahsm which, 
 under many various forms, has appeared at different periods 
 of the Church's history. It took a more definite and tangible 
 form during the last century and has been called ''CathoHc 
 Liberahsm" or "Liberal Catholicism."^ 
 
 ^ This latter term is used in the celebrated joint Pastoral Letter 
 upon this subject addressed to their flock by the Catholic hierarchy 
 of England, Dec. 29, 1900. It was submitted to the judgment of 
 the Holy Father, who, in turn, sent a most flattering letter to the 
 
CEKTAIN PKEROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 431 
 
 It is hardly to be expected that among Catholics living 
 in an atmosphere saturated with the fatal germs of Uberalism 
 there will not be a few here and there contaminated by its 
 teaching. It is not unusual, therefore, to find men who, 
 heartily attached to the Church, and with a laudable desire 
 to further what they consider her true interests, will try to 
 effect an impossible compromise or reconciliation between 
 the doctrines of HberaHsm and those of the Church; they 
 will indulge in baseless dreams of a future when the spiritual 
 and temporal power will be absolutely independent one of 
 the other. They will deem it a prudent policy on the part of 
 the Church to pass over in silence Catholic truths opposed to 
 current errors; to refrain from asserting certain rights which 
 conflict with what are called modern ideas. Hence, without 
 denying the teaching and unerring authority of the Church, 
 they would, nevertheless, that the body of doctrines imposed 
 as of faith upon aU men be confined within the smallest 
 possible limits, minimized, while free speculation and discus- 
 sion of rehgious as well as philosophic questions must be given 
 the widest range; dogmas already proclaimed must be al- 
 lowed a wider and more liberal interpretation in accordance 
 with the advance and development of modern ideas and 
 science; the decrees of the Roman Congregations, especially 
 the Holy Office and the Index, ought to be few and far 
 between, lest they become so many stumbling-blocks to 
 CathoHc philosophers and scientists. Doctrines offensive and 
 distasteful to non-Cathohcs should not be too loudly preached 
 from the pulpit, lest these people, instead of joining the fold, 
 turn against the Church. Again, admitting the power of 
 the Church "to bind and to loose," liberal Cathohcs find 
 much to criticise in the present legislation and discipHne 
 
 English bishops, praising them for their "timely and prudent exhorta- 
 tion." For, he says, "too well known is the actual and threatening 
 mischief of that body of fallacious opinions which is commonly des- 
 ignated as ' Liberal Catholicism.' " The Pastoral is found in the 
 M. S. H., Feb. 1901. 
 
432 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 of the Church restricting individual liberty (religious orders, 
 marriage, rights of the laity, relations with the State, secret 
 societies, communion with the sects, etc.); there is too 
 much *' mediae valism " and " ultramontanism '' in the Church, 
 which, hke a dead weight, keeps her ''behind the times.'' ^ 
 
 ''The principles on which the new opinions we have men- 
 tioned are based may be reduced to this: that in order the 
 more easily to bring over to Catholic doctrine those who dissent 
 from it, the Church ought to adapt herself somewhat to our 
 advanced civilization, and, relaxing her ancient rigor, show 
 some indulgence to modern popular theories and methods. 
 Many think that this is to be understood not only with 
 regard to the rule of hfe, but also to the doctrines in which 
 the deposit of faith is contained. For they contend that it is 
 opportune, in order to work in a more attractive way upon 
 the wills of those who are not in accord with us, to pass over 
 certain heads of doctrine, as if of lesser moment, or to so 
 soften them that they may not have the same meaning which 
 the Church has invariably held. . . . The followers of these 
 novelties judge that a certain liberty ought to be introduced 
 into the Church, so that, limiting the exercise and vigilance 
 of its powers, each one of the faithful may act more freely 
 in pursuance of his own natural bent and capacity. They 
 affirm, namely, that this is called for in order to imitate that 
 liberty which, though quite recently introduced, is now the 
 law and the foundation of almost every civil community." 
 
 To the above demands of liberal CathoHcism the Pope 
 answers in the same letter as follows: "Few words are 
 needed to show how reprehensible is the plan that is thus 
 conceived, if we but consider the character and origin of the 
 doctrine which the Church hands down to us. On that 
 
 * This paragraph has been slightly modified by the editor, who has 
 also added the following extracts from the letter of Leo XIII. to 
 Cardinal Gibbons, Jan. 22, 1899. See also Rickaby, Oxf. Conf., s. ii.; 
 Tyrrell, Faith of Mill., I., p. 68; Ward, Geo., Doctr. Auth., Essays 1-4; 
 M. S. H., Feb. 1901; I. E. R., March 1903; M., May 1898. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 433 
 
 point the Vatican Council says : ' The doctrine of faith which 
 God has revealed is not proposed like a theory of philosophy 
 which is to be elaborated by the human understanding, but 
 as a divine deposit delivered to the Spouse of Christ to be 
 faithfully guarded and infalhbly declared. . . . That sense of 
 the sacred dogmas is to be faithfully kept which Holy Mother 
 Church has once declared, and is not to be departed from under 
 the specious pretext of a more profound understanding. ' 
 
 ''Nor is the suppression to be considered altogether free 
 from blame which designedly omits certain principles of 
 Catholic doctrine and buries them, as it were, in oblivion. 
 For there is the one and the same Author and Master of 
 all the truths that Christian teaching comprises, the only- 
 begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father. That they 
 are adapted to all ages and nations is plainly deduced from 
 the words which Christ addressed to His apostles: Going 
 therefore, teach ye all nations: teaching them to observe all 
 things whatsoever I have commanded you: and behold I am 
 with you all days, even to the consummation of the world. 
 Wherefore the same Vatican Council says: 'By the divine 
 and Cathohc faith those things are to be beUeved which are 
 contained in the word of God, either written or handed down, 
 and are proposed by the Church, whether in solemn decision 
 or by the ordinary universal magisterium, to be beheved as 
 having been divinely revealed. ' Far be it, then, from any one 
 to diminish or for any reason whatever to pass over anything 
 of this divinely delivered doctrine; whosoever would do so 
 would rather wish to alienate Cathohcs from the Church 
 than to bring over to the Church those who dissent from it. 
 ... If anything is suggested by the infallible teaching of the 
 Church, it is certainly that no one should wish to withdraw 
 from it, nay, that all should strive to be thoroughly imbued 
 with and be guided by its spirit, in order to be the more easily 
 preserved from any private error whatsoever. To this we 
 may add that those who argue in that wise quite set aside the 
 wisdom and providence of God; who, when He desired in 
 
434 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 that very solemn decision to affirm the authority and teaching 
 office of the Apostohc See, desired it especially in order the 
 more efficaciously to guard the minds of Catholics from the 
 dangers of the present times. The license which is commonly 
 confounded with liberty; the passion for saying and reviling 
 everything; the habit of thinking and of expressing every- 
 thing in print, have cast such deep shadows on men's minds 
 that there is now greater utility and necessity for this office 
 of teaching than ever before, lest men should be drawn away 
 from conscience and duty. It is far indeed from our inten- 
 tion to repudiate all that the genius of the time begets; nay, 
 rather, whatever the search for truth attains, or the effort 
 after good achieves, will always be welcome by us, for it 
 increases the patrimony of doctrine and enlarges the limits 
 of public prosperity. But all this, to possess real utiUty, 
 should thrive without setting aside the authority and wisdom 
 of the Church.'' 
 
 In regard to the laws and discipline of the Church the 
 Pope says: ''The rule of hfe which is laid down for CathoUcs 
 is not of such a nature as not to admit modifications, according 
 to the diversity of time and place. The Church indeed 
 possesses what her Author has bestowed on her, a kind and 
 merciful disposition ; for which reason from the very beginning 
 she willingly showed herself to be what Paul proclaimed in his 
 own regard : / became all things to all men, that I might save all. 
 The history of all past ages is witness that the Apostolic 
 See, to which not only the office of teaching, but also the 
 supreme government of the whole Church, was committed, 
 has constantly adhered to the same doctrine, in the same 
 sense and in the same mind; but it has always been accustomed 
 to so modify the rule of life that, while keeping the divine 
 right inviolate, it has never disregarded the manners and 
 customs of the various nations which it embraces. If re- 
 quired for the salvation of souls, who will doubt that it is 
 ready to do so at the present time? But this is not to be 
 determined by the will of private individuals, who are mostly 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 435 
 
 deceived by the appearance of right, but ought to be left to 
 the judgment of the Church. He who would have Christian 
 virtues to be adapted, some to one age and others to another, 
 has forgotten the words of the Apostle: Whom He foreknew 
 He also predestinated to be made conformable to the image of His 
 Son. The Master and exemplar of all sanctity is Christ, to 
 whose rule all must conform who wish to attain to the throne 
 of the blessed. Now, Christ does not change with the 
 progress of the ages, but is yesterday and to-day, and the 
 same forever. To the men of all time is addressed the 
 lesson: Learn of Me because I am meek and humble of heart; 
 and at all times Christ shows Himself to us as becoming 
 obedient unto death, and in every age also the word of the 
 Apostle holds: And they that are Christ^ s have crucified their 
 flesh with the vices and concupiscences. Would that more 
 would cultivate those virtues in our day, after the example 
 of the holy men of the past! Those who by humbleness of 
 spirit, by obedience and abstinence, were powerful in word 
 and work, were powerful aids not only to religion but to the 
 State and society." 
 
 II. Modern Liberties.* 
 
 A. Their Nature. — Liberalism is in its very nature the 
 father and the abettor of what are called modem liberties. 
 It boasts, moreover, of having given rise to them, and pro- 
 claims them the great and immortal conquests of our times. 
 Thus liberalism may also be defined as the doctrine which 
 recognizes the same rights in evil as in good, in error as in 
 
 * Leo XIII., Encycl. on Human Liberty; Lilly, W. S., chapters on 
 European History, Shibboleths, A Century of Revolution; Manning, 
 Essays, HI. Ser. (Liberty of the Press) ; Hergenrother, Catholic Church 
 and State, I., Essay 5; Br. W., vi. 520, xv.; A. C. Q. viii.; C. W. xxix. 
 852, xxxvii. 289, 741; M. xlviii. 200; D. R. New Ser. iv. 517, xxvii. 
 1, 555; xxviii. 1, 503, xxix. 193, III. Ser. xx. 118. Confer Commenta- 
 ries on the Syllabus of Pius IX. On the Roman Index see Baart, 
 Roman Court, etc.; C. W. xiv. 55; Br. W. vi. 520. 
 
436 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 truth, and consequently professes that all opinions must be 
 respected. It is the system which preaches and favors 
 everywhere those modern liberties. Let us, then, consider 
 them in themselves and in their effects, and estabhsh in the 
 next paragraph a rule of action in regard to political constitu- 
 tions based upon these liberties. 
 
 Leo XIII. in enumerating modem liberties names succes- 
 sively liberty of conscience and of worship, liberty of the press, 
 liberty of education or instruction, to which we shall add 
 liberty of association. Let us briefly explain them, following 
 the same guide, and learn how we are to regard them. Liberty 
 of worship, which is also frequently called liberty of con- 
 science,^ grants to every man the right to profess whatever 
 religion he pleases, or even to profess none at all. This same 
 liberty, considered from the social point of view, would 
 forbid the State to render worship to God, or authorize any 
 public worship; no religion or church must be preferred 
 to another; all religions have equal claims, regardless of the 
 faith of the people, even though it were all Catholic. Liberty 
 of the press means the right of each one to express by the pen, 
 to propagate by writings, any doctrines whatsoever on moral, 
 political, social, philosophic, and religious matters, falsehood 
 even as truth, however much they may savor of impiety 
 and immorality. Liberty of education proclaims the natu- 
 ral right of every one to propagate these same doctrines 
 by private and public instruction. Liberty of association 
 asserts the right of forming any societies or imions whatever, 
 though they be secret and dangerous to religion and society. 
 Let us not forget that it is not a question here of simple 
 tolerance, but of the acknowledgment of what is declared 
 to be a natural, sacred, and imprescriptible right. Then 
 remember that a right is a moral power, and that the right 
 of one man always implies in other men and in rulers the 
 
 1 See O'Reilly, ch. 22; Holaind, Nat. Law, 1. 4; I. E. R., July '96. 
 Later on, speaking of the Edict of Nantes, we shall explain a very im- 
 portant distinction between liberty of conscience and that of worship. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 437 
 
 duty of respecting it and making it respected. It is true 
 certain restrictions have been formulated in regard to the 
 use of these hberties, but these restrictions, while in them- 
 selves quite illogical, remain usually a mere matter of theory, 
 to be forgotten in practice. In the eyes of the modem State 
 it is no longer an impious crime to proclaim in public the 
 non-existence of a God/ 
 
 B. Their Falsity. — They are false in principle. We 
 have shown that the Catholic reUgion alone is true and 
 binding upon all men, and that this rehgion is identified with 
 the Roman Catholic Church. This Church alone, by the 
 will of God, has the right to exist and to spread throughout 
 the world, to demand faith and obedience from all men, as 
 every man is boimd to seek his salvation and thus to attain 
 his last end. Every doctrine opposed to her teaching, 
 and all morals contrary to her moral law, are condemned 
 without further proof or appeal. Neither rehgious error 
 nor moral evil, the two deadly poisons for the intellect and 
 the will, can ever have any right of existence or propagation. 
 
 It follows, moreover, that no individual or government may 
 lawfully place any obstacle to the exercise of this exclusive 
 right of the Catholic Church. In fact right and duty are 
 correlative terms; the right of one person necessarily implies 
 the duty of others to respect that right. Again, therefore, it 
 follows that neither individual nor government can lawfully 
 claim for error or evil, heresy, godlessness, and immorality a 
 natural right to exist or expand. Error and evil have no 
 such right; on the contrary, it belongs exclusively to truth 
 and goodness. Herein we find in principle the inevitable 
 condemnation of these modern liberties. Indeed what else 
 are they but the proclamation of the rights of error and 
 evil, and the open refusal to respect and protect rights be- 
 
 * Needless to say that we treat of the liberties of the press, speech, 
 and association only from the religious standpoint. As long as 
 dogma and morality are not touched, the religious authority will not 
 interfere, else it would go beyond its power. 
 
438 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 longing exclusively to the Catholic Church? This is clearly 
 implied in the description given above of these liberties. 
 
 C. Their Fatal Consequences. — The illustrious Pontiff 
 has no difficulty in demonstrating that these alleged liberties, 
 understood in this way, are contrary not only to faith but 
 to reason itself. He makes it clearly evident how disastrous 
 their application must be, and in reality is, to individuals, 
 to famihes, and to society. '^The evils of the present time, 
 the number and gravity of which we cannot ignore, have 
 arisen in great part,'' he says, ''from these much-vaunted 
 liberties, which it was beheved contained the germs of salva- 
 tion and of glory. Facts have destroyed this hope. Instead 
 of sweet and salutary fruit, bitter and poisonous fruits have 
 been the result." Let us indicate briefly a few of the fatal 
 effects produced by the apphcation of liberal doctrines. 
 
 First effect: The gradual weakening and extinction of 
 faith and religion. It is almost impossible for even intel- 
 hgent men wholly to escape the influence of their social 
 environment. If it present the spectacle of religious indif- 
 ference, how will they remain attached in heart and soul 
 to rehgion? How will they have the courage to practise 
 all their duties faithfully? When the masses, particularly 
 children and the uneducated, see the agents of the govern- 
 ment indifferent to the Catholic religion, affecting to make 
 no distinction between rehgious truth and error, their moral 
 and Christian sense will necessarily be weakened, and they, 
 in their turn, will regard religion as a thing of secondary 
 or no importance. 
 
 Moreover, an evil press and neutral, that is to say, godless 
 teaching will insensibly but surely stifle the faith in the 
 hearts of the people. For this reason Hberahsm, trusting to 
 these inevitable results of modern hberties, is willing at times, 
 to restrain the impatience of those who would openly resort 
 to violence to do away with the Church. 
 
 Second effect: There is but one step from perversion of 
 mind and contempt of rehgion to perversion of heart. Why 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 439 
 
 should not one who has ceased to love God, to fear His 
 justice, and who has no hope of eternal happiness, abandon 
 himself to the violence of his passions? Man thirsts for 
 happiness ; if he no longer seeks it where it is to be found, in 
 noble submission to God, in peace of conscience, and the 
 firm hope of eternal reward, he is forced to seek it here below 
 in the satisfaction of his passions, even of the most brutal. 
 This is so constantly verified by experience that we do not 
 need to insist upon it. 
 
 Third effect: The perils which threaten modem society. 
 When freed from the salutary restraint of religion why 
 will not the poor look with envy upon the possessions of 
 the rich, and why, when they find themselves the stronger, 
 will they not take forcible possession of that which they 
 covet? ''Need we be astonished," says Leo XIIL, ''that 
 men of inferior conditions try to raise palaces and emulate 
 the fortimes of the rich? Is it astonishing that there is no 
 longer any peace in public or private hfe, and that the human 
 race has almost reached the extremes of hfe?" Behold to 
 what the doctrine of liberalism inevitably leads. No doubt 
 many who profess and advocate it do not see its disastrous 
 consequences, but their short-sightedness does not destroy 
 the incontrovertible logic of facts; sooner or later the doc- 
 trine will bear its natural fruit, anarchy and revolution.^ 
 
 Objection. — There is a specious objection which it is 
 important to answer. God, the supreme Legislator, it is 
 argued, granted liberty to man, therefore civil society or 
 power may do hkewise. 
 
 ^ "If we take away belief in the next world, the man of the people 
 must necessarily and lawfully claim equality in this, and he will 
 claim it with forcible logic, with gnashing of teeth, and rage in his 
 heart, and firearms in hand. 'My soul,' he exclaims, 'is only a 
 growth, and God is only an hjrpothesis. You take from me the 
 restraining fear of hell, you rob me of the blessed hope of paradise; 
 then, fear and hope taken from me, all that remains are the tem- 
 poral possessions of this world. We desire them and we will have 
 them.' " (Mgr. Mermillod.) 
 
440 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Reply. — 1st. To solve this difficulty it suffices to make the 
 essential distinction between physical liberty, or simple power, 
 and moral liberty, or right. God, you say, gave man hberty. 
 True; but which kind of hberty? He gave him physical 
 liberty, that is, the possibility of choosing between good and 
 evil, but, so far from permitting him to use his liberty to do 
 evil. He imposed on him the moral obhgation to make use 
 of it to attain his last end by doing good. So true is this that 
 He threatens with hell those who choose to do evil and 
 reserves to Himself the right to punish them eternally. 
 Society cannot, even if it would, rob man of this physical 
 Hberty; but it does not imitate the action of God if it grant 
 man the right to do evil with impunity. 
 
 2d. Moreover, to set one's actions by those of another, one 
 must be in an analogous position. Now, in regard to liberty 
 there are several important differences between the divine 
 and the human government. 
 
 a. "God is Judge," says St. Thomas, "because He is 
 Creator," and in Him the judicial and the creative act reach 
 beyond the insignificant duration of time. When one's 
 field of action is eternity, why hasten the course of justice? 
 Are these the conditions of human government? 
 
 6. While waiting the supreme and inevitable reparation, 
 God has placed side by side with liberty in this life all the 
 correctives, conmiandments, exhortations, promises, threats, 
 interior grace, etc., necessary to "protect it in its power for 
 good and thwart it in its power for evil. Moreover, He has 
 created domestic society and civil society and invested them 
 with punitive power. He commands parents even to chastise 
 their children and not to spare the rod (Prov. xiii. and xxii.) ; 
 and St. Paul reminds rulers that they bear not the sword 
 in vain, that they are God's ministers, avengers to execute 
 wrath upon him that doth evil (Rom. xiii.). Is it in this 
 sense that human government seeks to imitate God's govern- 
 ment? 
 
 Remark. — It is clearly evident from what has been said 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 441 
 
 above that neither the Church nor the State can be taxed with 
 intolerance and tyranny when they seek, as they did in the 
 Middle Ages, to regulate the exercise of the human will, and 
 to diminish for men the facihties for evil and thus prevent 
 them from risking their happiness and welfare. Such 
 restrictions, so far from being an act of violence, are, on the 
 contrary, a great benefit to society, f acihtating for its members 
 the accompUshment of duty and rendering neglect or viola- 
 tion of duty more difficult. Now such are the benefits which 
 result from the intimate union of Church and State when 
 circumstances render it possible. By protecting the Church 
 of Christ and prohibiting opposing creeds the State does not 
 violate man's hberty, but comes to the aid of his weakness by 
 shielding him from error. It would clearly be absurd to 
 maintain that it was violating the rights of the human 
 intelfigence to teach and enhghten it that it may be able to 
 distinguish truth from falsehood; why should it be less 
 absurd to claim that it was tyrannical — that it was doing 
 violence to man's will to remove from about him incentives 
 to evil and help him to attain the good for which he was 
 created? It might just as well be said that the parapet wall 
 which guards a bridge is an attempt to interfere with the 
 free circulation of the crowd, or that the father of a family 
 violates the rights of his children when he will not suffer 
 immoral or impious doctrines to infect their frank, innocent 
 souls and forbids them all that is of a nature to corrupt them. 
 Moreover, as we have already said, the right to be impious, 
 blasphemous, or vicious does not, cannot exist for man, and 
 the State violates no right when it prevents its subjects from 
 destroying befiefs necessary for their eternal happiness, or 
 from weakening all that serves as the basis of civil as well as 
 religious society. 
 
 It is remarkable how readily these sophists admit on the 
 one hand that it is not violating human liberty to forbid 
 and punish certain crimes, such as assassination, theft, in- 
 cendiarism, which militate against the temporal welfare of 
 
442 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 subjects, and, on the other hand, denounce as tyranny all 
 attempt to remove causes productive of evils still more 
 serious, since they compromise the eternal welfare of these 
 same subjects. 
 
 III. Tolerance. 
 
 We cannot transcribe here the luminous pages in which 
 Leo XIII. indicates the remedy for this evil of liberalism. 
 But guided by his teaching, we would explain why the 
 Church, ''while condemning in principle these false and in- 
 jurious hberties, recognizes that there are circumstances when 
 they may be hcitly tolerated.'' Toleration always supposes 
 something evil which is endured and permitted for grave 
 reasons.^ 
 
 A. Let us hear, first of all, what the sovereign Pontiff says 
 on this subject: ''The Church, in her motherly appreciation, 
 takes into consideration the weight of human infirmity, 
 and she is aware of the movement by which minds and 
 affairs are swayed at the present time. For these motives, 
 while granting rights only to what is true and just, she is not 
 opposed to the tolerance which public powers think necessary 
 to use in regard to certain things contrary to truth and justice, 
 in view of avoiding greater evil or of attaining or preserving 
 a greater good." 
 
 We see, therefore, that there is an important distinction to 
 be made in regard to modern liberties. These hberties, which 
 consist in conceding to every man a natural right to profess 
 
 * Balmes, European Civilization, ch. 34, 35, 67; Letters to a Scep- 
 tic, 1. 7; Hergenrother, Church and State, II., Essays 16, 17; Rev. 
 W. C. Robinson, Liberty of Conscience; Spalding, J. M., MiscelL, 
 Introd. I.; Gibbons, Faith of Our Fathers, ch. 18; Bishop England's 
 Works, vol. ii., 1. 10 to Wm. Hawley; Br. W. vii. 320, 479, x., xi., 
 xii., xiii.; A. C. Q. XV. 301, xix. 508; C. W. iv., v., xxiii. 243, xU. 
 363 (freedom of worship) ; D. R. Old Ser. ix. 396, xxxix. 462, New 
 Ser. viii. 347, xxvii. 215. On Mary Tudor see D. R. New Ser. xxv. 
 435, xxii. 363, xxiii. 324, xxiv. 110. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 443 
 
 any religion he chooses, to propagate through the press error 
 and evil as much as truth and righteousness, are evil and of 
 themselves condenmable: this is what is ordinarily called 
 the thesis (theory). Nevertheless there are circumstances of 
 time or place when these liberties may be conscientiously 
 tolerated, sustained, defended, in order to avoid greater evils : 
 this is what we call the hypothesis (practice).^ 
 
 B. Let us give now a few proofs to establish the lawfulness 
 of this tolerance under certain circumstances. 
 
 1st. The interest of the Church itself and of its divine mission 
 may require this tolerance. It is an undisputed principle 
 that of two evils we must choose the lesser, and that one 
 evil may be lawfully tolerated in order to avoid a greater. 
 Now, in a given country and at a given time (when, for 
 example, these modern liberties already incorporated in the 
 constitution and laws of the country have passed into fact 
 and practice), the interest of truth and religion may re- 
 quire that this state of affairs be allowed to remain, at least 
 for a time, in order to avoid a greater evil or not to render 
 
 ^ This distinction between thesis and hypothesis is to be found in 
 a host of questions in every-day life, and common sense enforces it 
 frequently, though we are not always aware of it. Hypothesis is the 
 application of the principles of the thesis according to the circum- 
 stances of the case; thus to correct a child who does wrong is a 
 father's duty — this is the thesis; to correct him at a certain time and 
 in a certain way might be imprudent — this is the hypothesis. Food is 
 necessary to animal life — this is the thesis; but it maybe poison for 
 a sick man — this is the hypothesis. It is the same with religious 
 truth. It possesses of itself imprescriptible and exclusive rights; 
 but there may be circumstances when it is not well rigidly to enforce 
 these rights, and when error or evil may be tolerated. It is in this 
 sense that Leo XIII. , after declaring that neither society nor indi- 
 viduals are permitted to treat all religions alike (the thesis), adds 
 farther on: "If the Church judges that it is not permitted to place 
 the various worships on the same legal footing as the true religion, 
 she does not for this reason condemn the heads of government who, 
 in view of some good to be obtained or of some evil to be avoided, 
 tolerate these various worships, permitting them to have their place 
 in the State" (the hypothesis). 
 
444 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 all good impossible. To attempt in such a conjunction 
 of circumstances to abolish these liberties already estabhshed 
 would not serve the interest of the Church, but would excite 
 against her hatred and reprisals by exposing the State to 
 deplorable trouble and discord. 
 
 2d. This, moreover, is the teaching of theology. Interpreted 
 by St. Thomas, it declares it lawful in certain cases to tolerate 
 even pagan worship. With how much greater reason may 
 the tolerance of modern liberties be justified, since their 
 most extreme abuses never, like paganism, go so far as to 
 deify creatures and vices! 
 
 3d. The conduct of the Church proves the lawfulness of 
 this tolerance. If modern liberties could never be tolerated, 
 she would have had to oblige Constantine on the very day 
 of his conversion to banish absolutely the worship of false 
 gods from his kingdom. In the case of the return of a 
 Protestant prince to the faith, she would have to require of 
 him the immediate abohtion of the liberty hitherto allowed 
 his subjects to profess the Protestant rehgion. Now the 
 Church has never acted in this way, and it is not in this sense 
 that Gregory XVI. (Encycl. Mirari vos, 1832) and Pius IX. 
 (Encycl. Quanta Cura, 1864) condemned these liberties. 
 
 We find in the Roman review La Civilta Cattolica the fol- 
 lowing written in 1868, which seems to be a summary of the 
 doctrine we have just been stating: 
 
 '^With the exception of a very small number all sincere 
 Catholics agree in believing that hberty of worship is an 
 absurd principle. To place truth in the same rank with error 
 — is it not as monstrous from a social as from an individual 
 point of view? Cathohcs profess, therefore, that such a prin- 
 ciple appHed to the political order must in its very nature 
 be injurious. At the same time they admit that in certain 
 cases e^dl must be tolerated because there are circumstances 
 when, in consequence of the lack of good dispositions in a 
 subject, unity of rehgion cannot be imposed ^vithout resort- 
 ing to violence, which CathoHc principles condemn. The 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 445 
 
 regimen suited to one in health would be fatal to a sick man, 
 yet no one would be so foolish as to insist that the regimen 
 for the sick man is the ideal of hygiene, and that all must 
 submit to it. Without the principle of hberty of worsliip 
 properly understood, it is impossible to govern a people where 
 unity of religion no longer exists, and which is socially divided 
 by various beliefs. But to represent this state of things 
 as a state of social perfection, to claim that it must be in- 
 troduced where its introduction is not commanded by posi- 
 tive necessity, would be as absurd as to say that medicine is 
 the true food of man, or that there is no better means of 
 preserving the purity of morals in a household than to throw 
 the doors open to all kinds of corrupt and evil men." 
 
 Corollaries. — The preceding principles solve several 
 apparent difficulties. 
 
 1st. They make us understand how one can be at the same 
 time an excellent Christian and an excellent citizen in a country 
 where modem liberties are proclaimed by the constitution. 
 
 2d. They explain, also, the different action of the Church 
 in different countries in regard to the liberty accorded to 
 dissenters. In a State where the Church enjoys all her 
 rights she would injure the success of her divine mission if 
 she were to yield a place to error or to evil. Hence she 
 cannot, without failing in her duty, permit such an innova- 
 tion. On the contrary, in a country where the true religion 
 is oppressed, where liberty hardly exists at all except for 
 those who attack and hinder religion, we can understand 
 that the Church accepts civil tolerance, that is, the introduc- 
 tion of a new state of things enabling her to recover at 
 least a portion of her rights. 
 
 3d. They make us understand, finally, why, under the rule 
 of a constitution securing liberty of worship to all, the Church 
 may and should stoutly claim her share of the liberty due her 
 in virtue of this constitution. It would be ridiculous to say 
 that in acting thus she abandons her own principles, or that 
 she abdicates her rights; she simply acts like a proprietor 
 
446 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 who, deprived of his possessions by the triumph of com- 
 munism, afterwards claims, in virtue of the very principles 
 of communism, his proper share of the common hoard. 
 In acting thus the proprietor does not deny his own principles 
 or abdicate his rights as a proprietor, but he endeavors, by 
 resorting to an argument ad hominem, to recover at least 
 a portion of the possessions of which he has been imjustly 
 deprived. 
 
 Summary and Conclusions. — A. From all that precedes 
 we must conclude that in the relations between Church and 
 State four different conditions may exist. 
 
 1st. An intimate union or alhance; the State recognizing 
 only the true religion, exclusively protecting it and banish- 
 ing all other worships. 
 
 2d. Civil tolerance, properly so called; the Catholic 
 religion remaining the religion of the State, and as such 
 protected; but at the same time the civil power tolerating, 
 more or less, the pubhc exercise of one or several dissenting 
 worships. Such was the French Charter under Louis XVIII. 
 
 3d. Absolute tolerance or practical indifference; this is 
 what is to-day called liberty of worship. It consists in the 
 State placing itself outside of all religions, and recognizing 
 none as its own, or as being entitled to its protection. This 
 separation may be more or less marked ; thus in France the 
 Charter of 1830 made all recognized religions equal before 
 the law. In America the separation is almost absolute; 
 in Belgium the separation was less complete, particularly 
 immediately after 1830. 
 
 4th. Dogmatic tolerance or theoretic indifference. Here 
 also the State is indifferent to all worships, but on the ground 
 that it believes and professes that man has a natural right 
 to practise whatever religion he pleases or to practise none 
 at all, or that one can be saved in all reUgions or ^\dthout any 
 religion ; that it is a matter of indifference whether we adore 
 Jesus Christ or blaspheme Him. 
 
 From these four possible situations we have proved that 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 447 
 
 an intimate alliance ought to exist between Church and 
 State when societies are in their normal and perfect state. 
 As to dogmatic tolerance, as it is essentially evil, flowing 
 from principles as false as they are subversive of good, it can 
 never be permitted. Hence it is formally condemned by the 
 Church. But as governments are not always so happily 
 constituted that the two powers lend each other mutual aid, 
 and as, in the troubled times in which we Hve, this much- 
 to-be-desired agreement has become impossible, recourse 
 must necessarily be had to civil tolerance, properly so called, 
 and even to absolute tolerance. 
 
 B. Two things, however, are to be observed in the exercise 
 of this tolerance : 
 
 1st. Though civil tolerance, and even practical indiffer- 
 ence, may be licit under the circumstances indicated, the 
 things thus tolerated by modern constitutions do not cease 
 to be in themselves reprehensible before God and in the 
 consciences of individuals. If, in virtue of the liberty of the 
 press, the ci\dl power permits the utterance of the most 
 terrible blasphemies, these outrages upon the Divinity are 
 no less, from the point of view of conscience, horrible crimes. 
 It is the same with all acts intrinsically evil which civil 
 legislatures tolerate for grave reasons. Those who perpetrate 
 them will be no less condemned by the divine Legislator, 
 who will punish them in His own time. 
 
 2d. The Church cannot admit as a general and absolute 
 thesis that the liberty granted to heterodox worships, to 
 the propagation of error and of evil, is what is best and most 
 conformable to the nature of man and to true civilization. 
 She cannot find good or right in itself the freedom awarded 
 to that which ruins souls, or hail it as a manifestation of a 
 society's progress. Thus Pius IX. has condemned the 
 following proposition: ''The best condition of all political 
 society requires in our time that the State be constituted 
 and governed regardless of religion, as if it did not exist, 
 or without recognizing any difference between the true and 
 
448 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 the false religion." (Encycl. Quanta Cura and Syllabus 
 Prop. 77, 78, 79, 80.) 
 
 C. It is easy now to indicate what should be the conduct of 
 the faithful children of the Church in regard to constitutions 
 which admit modern liberties. 
 
 a. When there is question of elaborating a constitution, 
 the legislators must, after considering before God the situa- 
 tion, the strength and the weakness of the society which they 
 represent, endeavor to realize the type of a Christian consti- 
 tution, and approximate as closely as possible to the ideal. 
 When they act under pressure of real necessity, they are not 
 censurable for tolerating an evil which they cannot prevent 
 without exciting disastrous and deplorable calamities, as 
 fatal to the Church as to the State. 
 
 6. If the constitution already exists, and if it is not con- 
 formable to the principles of the Church, true Catholics 
 obey it in everything which is not contrary to the laws of 
 God and of the Church ; they will never attempt to overthrow 
 the social edifice by violence, for this they know God 
 forbids. 
 
 c. If this constitution is the result of a transaction re- 
 quired by circumstances, they will be loyal to their oath of 
 allegiance, and if they are in power, they will not persecute 
 those in favor of whom they are pledged to exercise tolerance. 
 
 d. They wall beware, however, of saying that such a con- 
 stitution is, absolutely speaking, the best. Above all, they 
 will not claim that this civil tolerance is the result of a sacred 
 and imprescriptible natural right for those who enjoy it. 
 On the contrary, they will frankly proclaim true principles, 
 the exclusive rights of truth, of the Church of Jesus Christ. 
 While admitting the necessities of the time and of the country, 
 they will deplore these necessities, the imperfect state of 
 present society, the blindness of minds. They will neglect 
 no peaceable means of bringing about a better state of affairs, 
 using every lawful means authorized by the constitution itself. 
 In spreading about them, by speech and writing, the whole 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 449 
 
 truth, they will endeavor to render more and more possible, 
 by the turning of minds to true principles, the complete 
 observance of the laws of Christian society — a pledge of 
 prosperity for the State as well as for the Church. 
 
 IV. Notions concerning Liberty.^ 
 
 There are few questions concerning which thoughtlessness 
 or bad faith has called forth more errors and dangerous 
 sophisms than hberty. How many confound lawful and real 
 Hberty with a chimerical and even criminal independence!^ 
 How many see in the mere physical power we possess of 
 doing evil a justification, or rather a right, to do evil! If 
 man really had by nature the right to teach, to write, to do 
 whatsoever he would or could, it is evident that modern 
 Uberties would be most legitimate in themselves and as an 
 absolute thesis. 
 
 ''If," says Leo XIII., "in the discussions current concerning 
 Hberty, is meant that lawful and just hberty such as reason 
 
 ^ Balmes, ch. 67; Lilly, chapters on European History, vol. i.; 
 Gibbons, Faith, etc., ch. 17; Spalding, J. M., Miscell., Essay 7; Br. 
 W. vii. 479, 534, xx., xiii., xiv.; A. C. Q. vi. 517; C. W. x. 721, 
 XXXV. 639; M. liv. 15, Ixiii 457; D. R. III. Ser. xi. 62. 
 
 ^ Independence means that a being is indebted to no one, and, 
 consequently, has received nothing from another and has nothing to re- 
 ceive from any one whomsoever. This absolute independence belongs 
 and can belong only to God, because He alone possesses in Himself 
 the reason of His existence and of all His perfections, and He Him- 
 self is His own end and the source of His infinite happiness. Man, 
 on the contrary, possesses only a being which has been lent him: 
 he holds from God his existence, his faculties, and all that serves to 
 develop and exercise them. And this gift is bestowed by God upon 
 man every moment of his existence, for conservation, like creation, is 
 an uninterrupted act: if God were to cease for a moment to uphold 
 man, he would fall back at once into the abyss of his nothingness. 
 It follows, then, that man is completely and every moment dependent 
 upon his Creator; he is dependent by essence, for he is essentially or by 
 essence a created being. He is even more so, if possible, in the order 
 of grace and glory, to which the divine Goodness has raised him. 
 
450 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 and our word has just described, no one would dare to pursue 
 the Church with the sovereignly unjust accusation that she 
 is the enemy of hberty of governments. . . . The Church has 
 always deserved well of this excellent gift of our nature, and 
 she will not cease to deserve well of it. . . . And yet there are 
 many who believe that the Church is the enemy of human 
 liberty. This arises from the defective and, as it were, 
 contrary ideas which they form of liberty. This defective 
 and exaggerated idea of liberty causes it to be applied to 
 many things in which man, according to the judgment of 
 sound reason, cannot be free." 
 
 It is then of extreme importance, when speaking of liberty, 
 to make distinctions. 
 
 Liberty, in general, brings to our minds the idea of freedom 
 from any restraint whatever. But as these restraints may 
 be of a different nature, so there are different kinds of Hberty. 
 Physical or psychological hberty differs from moral hberty; 
 political Hberty must not be confounded with civil or social 
 Hberty; and when they speak of modern Hberties stiU another 
 meaning is given to Hberty. 
 
 1. Natural or physical liberty ^ which is also caUed Hberty of 
 indifference, liberty of choice or election, free-will, consists 
 in that disposition of our nature in virtue of which our will, 
 uniting all the conditions necessary to action, preserves the 
 faculty or power (physical power) to act or not to act, to 
 determine in favor of one thing rather than another. 
 
 Liberty consists essentially in the power of determining 
 one's own action by and through oneself; it does not consist 
 at all in the power of choosing evil. In fact God is infinitely 
 free, yet He cannot will evil; freely He chooses from among 
 the different forms and degrees of goodness the one He wishes 
 to realize in the created order. The saints in heaven also are 
 free; yet sin has become impossible with them; enHghtened 
 by the full light of truth and possessing the infinite good, 
 how can they have the sHghtest thought or least velleity 
 of renouncing this perfect happiness. The possibiHty of 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 451 
 
 violating the moral law, so far from being a perfection of our 
 nature, cannot even be called strength or power. This is very 
 evident: no one certainly would think of saying, "I have the 
 power to be ill." We say, ''Unfortunately I cannot always 
 keep well." In regard to the intelligence, no one would 
 consider it a mark of strength to be able to reason ill, to 
 draw false conclusions from true principles. This is evidently 
 a sign of weakness, an imperfection of the faculty. Then let 
 us be consistent and apply the same reasoning to liberty in 
 man ; let us say that being able to choose evil, that is, to turn 
 from our final end, which is happiness, is not a mark of power, 
 but, on the contrary, a weakness with which the faculty of 
 the will is afflicted as long as we are in this period of 
 probation. 
 
 Is man endowed with liberty? Of this there is no possible 
 doubt. The existence of free-will in man is an undeniable 
 fact attested by the analysis of our free act, by the innermost 
 sense of the individual, and the affirmation of all mankind. 
 On the other hand, to deny man's free-will would be to destroy 
 the foimdation of all morality and of society itself. 
 
 We are so free that, though human violence may restrain 
 our exterior actions, it has no power over the act of our will. 
 ''My body is in your hands," the martyr said to his perse- 
 cutors, " but you have no power over my soul." The Church 
 has always defended this liberty against all opinions to the 
 contrary. Liberty is a blessing; Leo XIII. calls it praestan- 
 tissimum donum, most excellent blesfeing of our nature; it 
 is in fact in virtue of our free-will that we are responsible 
 for our acts and that we can merit heaven. While animals 
 obey only the senses, and are impelled only by natural 
 instinct to seek that which is useful and to avoid that which 
 is injurious to them, man, enlightened by intelligence, resists 
 when he pleases the unreflecting inclinations of his passions: 
 this is the seal of his greatness. 
 
 We meet, however, philosophers called fatalists, determin- 
 ists (fatalism, determinism, is the natural consequence of 
 
452 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 materialism) who have ventured to deny the existence of 
 free-will. But this denial exists, and can exist, only in their 
 books; refuted by all mankind, it is still more strongly 
 denied by the actions and by the words of these same philos- 
 ophers. Every tongue which utters the words virtue and 
 vice, merit and demerit, praise and blame, reward and 
 punishment, conscience and remorse; every order intimated, 
 every law promulgated, every counsel asked, every repent- 
 ance expressed, every chastisement inflicted, proclaims hu- 
 man liberty, free-will, and shows what is the intimate con- 
 viction of the world and of philosophy. Do we not treat in 
 an absolutely different manner the children who have not 
 attained the age of reason, the insane, and men in the full 
 enjoyment of reason? Is there not a marked distinction 
 between the chains of the galley-slave and the manacles of 
 the insane? Whence is this difference, if it is not from 
 free-will? It is what, in our eyes, makes the first a crim- 
 inal, while the misdeeds of the second make him only an 
 object of pity.^ 
 
 2. Moral liberty, when there is question of an act or a series 
 of acts, consists in the absence of any obhgation binding the 
 will to perform or to omit these acts. 
 
 We are physically free ; this we have seen and have solidly, 
 though briefly, proved. But do we enjoy absolute moral 
 freedom? In other words, is our will restrained by no moral 
 obligation? Have we a right to do whatever our physical 
 strength leaves us free to accomphsh? No man in his senses 
 would dare to sustain this proposition; only an atheist can 
 and must affirm it. 
 
 It is evident to every reasoning mind that we cannot 
 rightfully or lawfully, that is, with the approval of conscience 
 or without neglecting a duty of conscience, do whatever our 
 natural power permits. A son, for example, may be strong 
 enough to kill his father, but no one would venture to say 
 
 ^ In defence of free-will see Ward, Ph. of Theism; Maher, S.J., 
 Psychology, ch. 18; A. C. Q. xxvii. p. 252; Rickaby, S.J., Essay 6. 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 453 
 
 that he had a right to do it. Hence there is an essential 
 difference between force and right. Might is not right. If 
 this distinction did not exist, we should have a right to 
 acquit as innocent the basest parricide ; the brigand who lies 
 in wait for the traveller, or openly attacks him, would have 
 the right to assassinate his victim, as he has the power or 
 the strength to do it. 
 
 LiberaUsm perpetually confounds physical or natural 
 liberty with moral liberty. Because of this confusion it 
 attributes to man a natural right to propagate error and evil, 
 and regards modern liberties as an absolute good. Man is 
 free, says liberahsm; this liberty is a right of his nature: 
 hence the State must respect and cause it to be respected. 
 Man, we answer, is free physically, so free that no one, not 
 even the State, can hinder an act of his will. But is he always 
 morally free? Has he a right to abuse his freedom to do 
 evil and to propagate it? If you affirm that he has, why 
 then, we ask, does the State make laws, erect tribunals and 
 prisons? Can one be punished for the exercise of a lawful 
 right? 
 
 It is well to remark also the equivocal interpretation 
 which the word power admits, for it is the double meaning 
 of this word which misleads many minds, and gives rise to 
 sophisms on the subject of liberty. I cannot morally or 
 lawfully do all that which I have the material or physical 
 power to do. 
 
 The foundation or primary basis of moral law or of the 
 obligation laid upon the human will is the will of God, the 
 Creator, the sovereign Master of man and his supreme law- 
 giver. Man's absolute independence of moral law can be 
 affirmed only by an atheist. 
 
 Hence it is absolutely false to say: man is free, therefore 
 he is subject to no authority. The contrary thesis is true. 
 Man is free, but he must make a lawful use of his liberty. 
 Man is free, but he must submit to God, and to all power 
 which comes from God. To refuse to recognize, absolutely 
 
454 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 or partially, the necessary authority of God over His creatures 
 is not only folly, a crime, but base ingratitude. Man's glory 
 and happiness, as well as his most imperative duty, consist, 
 on the contrary, in recognizing practically, in his moral, 
 private, and pubhc Hfe, his complete dependence on the 
 supreme Master of all things, on God, who is infinite Wisdom, 
 boundless Goodness, the supreme Good. 
 
 If man is incomparably superior to the animals, it is because 
 he is capable of making a lawful use of his hberty — a use 
 conformable to the noble nature with which God has endowed 
 him. An animal is irresistibly led to his end, but it is not 
 fitting that one whom God has destined for boundless happi- 
 ness should be forced against his will to his supreme end. 
 It is more glorious for God and for man that man merit this 
 happiness by making good use of his liberty, by regulating 
 his conduct by the light of reason and the divine precepts. 
 
 We see, therefore, that liberty does not, as it is frequently 
 supposed, consist essentially in being free to do as one wills, 
 particularly in freedom to do evil, to act contrary to the 
 fight of reason and faith, to turn from our last end, and to 
 prepare our own degradation, our own misery. This is an 
 abuse of liberty, or rather it is ficense. But the fiberty 
 truly to be prized, that which constitutes the nobility of our 
 being, is the power with which the will is endowed to choose 
 the means capable of aiding us to attain our final end; or, 
 what comes to the same thing, the power to do good. Montes- 
 quieu expresses this excellently well when he says that 
 ''fiberty can consist only in the power to do what we ought 
 to will. " 
 
 ''True liberty, that which is desirable in the individual 
 order," says Leo XIII., ''is that which frees man from the 
 slavery of error and of the passions, which are the worst of 
 tyrants.'^ "In human society liberty worthy of the name 
 does not consist in doing whatever we please, but in being 
 able, under the protection of the civil laws, freely to five 
 according to the requirements of the eternal law/' Un- 
 
CERTAIN PREROGATIVES OF THE CHURCH. 455 
 
 fortunately '' there is a large number of men who, after the 
 example of Lucifer — the author of these criminal words: 
 'I will not serve,' — understand by the word hberty only 
 that which is pure and absurd license. Such are they who 
 belong to that wide-spread and powerful school who, borrow- 
 ing their name from the word Hberty, would be called 
 liberals." (Encycl. cit.) 
 
 3. Political liberty is twofold in character, a. For a 
 nation it consists in political independence in regard to 
 other nations. Manifestly the Church approves of all such 
 lawful independence, since she lays it as a duty upon her 
 children throughout the world to give effectual proof of their 
 love for their country, and, at need, to lay down their Hves 
 to defend it from its enemies, h. For each individual it 
 consists in the right to take part, in a greater or less degree, 
 directly or indirectly (by right of election), in the government 
 of his country. It is evidently not the same in an absolute, an 
 aristocratic, a constitutional monarchy as in a simple republic. 
 
 Now, provided the sacred rights of religion are properly 
 respected, the Church shows no preference for any of these 
 various forms of government; she accommodates herself to 
 all, for she can save souls as easily in a Christian republic as 
 in a Christian monarchy. Therefore, provided a legitimate 
 government, whatever it may be, allows her the free exercise 
 of her own mission, without usurping any of her rights, the 
 Church, on her part, will never, in any way whatever, in- 
 terfere with the mission of the State to procure the temporal 
 welfare of the people. 
 
 4. Civil or social liberty, which is also called individual 
 liberty, may be defined as the power of each individual to 
 exercise his personal activity, to provide for his own interests 
 and those of his family, without hindrance on the part of his 
 fellow citizens or the government. It includes liberty of 
 person, of action, of proprietorship, of family, of community, 
 the right to fulfil all duties of charity, to foimd associations 
 for a laudable purpose, etc. 
 
456 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Political liberty is no doubt good and desirable, but the 
 modern or liberal State, the tendency of which is to attain 
 universal centralism, to enslave and absorb the most sacred 
 rights of the individual, of the family, of special societies, 
 would have us beheve that liberty par excellence resides in 
 the exercise of electoral rights. But in reahty what does 
 it avail me to enjoy a certain degree of pohtical liberty, that is, 
 to have a hundredth or a milhonth part of influence in the 
 constitution of pubhc powers, if this government which I 
 have contributed to establish binds my personal hberty in a 
 thousand ways by innumerable laws, and a pitiless bureau- 
 cracy capriciously regulates my every action, and imprisons 
 my Hfe in an absolute slavery of details? The history of the 
 present century, when men talk imceasingly of liberty, clearly 
 shows that to stifle the true Hberty of the citizen, and 
 particularly that of Catholic consciences, is the dream of 
 all who are striving to destroy Catholicism in order to estab- 
 lish upon its ruins a purely natural society. 
 
 Striking facts of history prove how great has ever been 
 the Church's sympathy with civil liberty. Who but the 
 Church estabhshed in the world of nations the only solid 
 foundation of true liberty and equality? Did she not, in the 
 midst of the terrible corruption wrought by pagan ideas and 
 morals, effectually teach mankind that all are brothers and 
 equals in the sight of God? Was it not the Church who 
 rigidly imposed upon all — upon those who govern, as well 
 as upon those who are governed — the duty of justice and 
 charity? Was it not the Church who, by her doctrines, her 
 laws, her institutions, effected the rehabilitation of woman, 
 of the slave, of the child, of the poor, of the laborer — in a 
 word, of all whose rights had been denied, nay, trampled 
 under foot? (See below, Ch. V.) 
 
CHAPTER IV. 
 CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 
 
 Holy in her Founder, ever pure in her doctrine and moral 
 teaching, the Church has never ceased to lead her members 
 to the practice of the most beautiful and even the most 
 heroic virtues. Thus, despite human infirmity and the 
 violence of human passions, CathoHcs have ever numbered 
 among them innumerable saints, apostles, ministers, men 
 of great and noble character, incapable of baseness, ready to 
 devote themselves to works of the highest perfection and 
 the most sublime charity. But though man may make a 
 noble use of his liberty, and wage a generous war against 
 his passions, nevertheless he is only too often led to heed 
 their voice. The grace of Baptism, and even that of Holy 
 Orders, does not destroy the evil incHnations of the human 
 heart. In the course of eighteen centuries abuses could not 
 but creep into the morals of Christian peoples; there could 
 not but be found sins and crimes among Catholics, and even 
 among priests and bishops neglectful of their duties. 
 
 But what do the enemies of Catholicism do at sight of these 
 inevitable human failings? Instead of admiring the marvels 
 wrought in souls by the doctrines of the Gospel, despite 
 the weakness of degenerate human nature and the allurements 
 of passion, they eagerly seize upon the abuses and faults to be 
 found during this long series of centuries, and, making them 
 the foundation of their polemics, never cease to cast them in 
 the face of the Church, as if she were responsible for them. 
 The regeneration which she has wrought in the world, her 
 persistent condemnation of all that is contrary to the divine 
 
 457 
 
45S CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 law, count as naught in their eyes; the crimes of a few bap- 
 tized reprobates furnish the arsenal of these scandal-mongers. 
 Yet, as this arsenal is not well furnished, they find them- 
 selves forced to resort continually to the same weapons, 
 notwithstanding they have become blunt and almost harm- 
 less; they ignore the most convincing refutations, and at 
 every opportunity cite the Inquisition, the condemnation of 
 Galileo, and a small number of similar charges. To guard 
 weak souls and defend the Church against these puerile 
 accusations, the apologist must show how little foundation 
 there is for them. This is what we shall do in the following 
 chapter.* 
 
 ART. I.— INTOLERANCE OF THE CHURCH.^ 
 
 I. In What Sense the Catholic Church is Intolerant. 
 
 If we understand the true meaning of this word, that is, in 
 the sense of dogmatic or doctrinal intolerance, it needs no 
 defence, and the Catholic Church is far from defending her- 
 self against this alleged reproach. Dogmatic, doctrinal, or 
 religious tolerance amounts to religious indifference, which 
 refuses to acknowledge any religion as exclusively true or 
 of obligation. Dogmatic intolerance, on the contrary, is 
 an essential prerogative of truth, and it is a universal and 
 r^cessary consequence of the very existence of the Catholic 
 religion, which alone is true and binding upon all men. 
 
 To reproach the Church with this intolerance is to reproach 
 
 ^ As to certain accusations prompted by ignorance or prejudice — 
 for example, that we are obliged to believe all the fancies it may 
 please the Pope to publish; that we adore the saints, their images 
 and relics; that our worship consists only in exterior ceremonies; 
 that to obtain the pardon of our sins, absolution without repentance 
 is sufficient; that with money we can buy the forgiveness of present 
 or future sins, and similar absurd charges — a Catholic with ordinary 
 religious instruction can readily refute them. — Editor. 
 
 *See references on pp. 435, 442; also Rickaby, Oxf. Conf., I., and 
 C. T. S., vol. 36; Milner, End of Contr., 1. 49. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 459 
 
 her with being and with beheving herself necessary truth. 
 It belongs to truth to exclude all that is contrary to it, and 
 consequently not only is true religion intolerant, but so 
 also is all science. There is nothing more intolerant than 
 mathematics, for the reason that it is founded on invariable 
 principles. The Church, by the very fact that she is certain 
 of possessing religious truth in its entirety, must inexorably 
 condemn all error. Thus Bossuet acknowledged that ''the 
 Catholic rehgion is the most severe and the least tolerant of 
 all religions;" and Jules Simon, a contemporary naturalist 
 philosopher, confesses that ''the lawfulness of ecclesiastical 
 intolerance is beyond dispute." 
 
 We readily acknowledge that, in this sense, the other 
 religious societies are not intolerant. J. J. Rousseau could 
 say of Protestantism: "The Protestant rehgion is tolerant 
 in principle, it is essentially tolerant, it is as tolerant as it is 
 possible to be, since the only dogma it does not tolerate is 
 that of intolerance." But such praise is the most crushing 
 refutation of a rehgious doctrine. 
 
 But if the Cathohc Church is justly intolerant of evil 
 doctrines and vice, as truth must necessarily be, she is full 
 of mercy for the erring and for sinners. Established for the 
 salvation of men, she leaves nothing undone to wrest souls 
 from their eternal ruin. Ever faithful to the command she 
 received from God, she has striven to convert the world by 
 the preaching of the Gospel, that is, she has striven to persuade 
 souls and has never resorted to violence or constraint. Like 
 her divine Master, she has at all times suffered persecutions 
 and shed her blood for the salvation of men. If at times 
 she has thought proper to chastise her own rebellious children, 
 it was in virtue of a right which no one thought of disputing, 
 and she has always administered chastisement with a motherly 
 hand, to convert her children or to remove scandal from 
 among them. Such has not been the conduct of heretical 
 sects, nor of the other enemies of the Church. 
 
460 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 II. Protestant Intolerance.' 
 
 It is remarkable that the same men who unjustly accuse 
 the Church of intolerance usually award the fullest approba- 
 tion to Protestantism, as if it represented the true tolerance 
 approved by sound reason. But if we question history 
 written by Protestants themselves, we shall see, as the 
 Protestant Menzel affirms, that ''where Protestantism 
 reigned, intolerance reigned." 
 
 1. Luther, the first founder of Protestantism, whom they 
 would represent as the apostle of tolerance and the liberator 
 of thought, notwithstanding he openly denies free-will, 
 publicly commanded his followers ''to gain heaven at the 
 point of the sword, to ascend to God on mountains of the 
 slain. ' ' His war-cry was, ' ' Live the Bible, death to Papists ! '^ 
 "Rush upon the Pope," he tells his followers, "and kill him, 
 as well as all about him, emperors, kings, princes, and rulers." 
 " We must wash our hands in their blood," the bold innovator 
 repeatedly cried. 
 
 These frequent exhortations to massacre met with only 
 too ready response, and resulted in the well-known war of 
 the peasants (1525) enkindled in Germany by the apostate 
 monk. As long as their ravages and cruelties were exercised 
 in Catholic countries the innovator approved of these un- 
 discipfined hordes; but when he found them, under the 
 
 ^ Orjanam, A. F., Protestantism and Liberty (London, 1874); 
 Spalding, M. J., MiscelL, Introduction and essays 10, 11, 12; 
 Bp. England's Works, vol. i., 1. 17 to Blanco White; Marcy, ch. 
 27 ff.; Kenrick, Vindication of Catholics, lect. 19; Craig, Christian 
 Persecutions; Martinet, Solution of Great Problems, ii., ch. 57 to 65; 
 Br. W. X.; C. W. xvi. 289. On the persecution of Catholics in 
 England and Ireland see works by Challoner, Moran, Pollen, Thompson, 
 Morris, Foley, Madden (Penal Laws) ; in Acadia, Shea, vol. i., p. 421 ff.; 
 A. C. Q. ix. 592, xii. 341; in Holland, D. R., Apr. 1894, p. 388; in 
 New England, Spalding, M. J., 1. c, essays 19, 20, 34; D. R. Old Ser. i. 
 314, xxxviii. 273; in Prussia, Spalding, J. L., Essays, etc.; Parsons, 
 Studies, VI., ch. 1. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 461 
 
 guidance of Munzer, invading countries where the Reforma- 
 tion had been estabUshed, he immediately excited Protestant 
 rulers against them. ''To arms, princes!" he exclaimed. 
 ''Strike, slay, kill them openly and in secret, for there is 
 nothing more diabolical than sedition; it is a dog which will 
 attack you if you do not destroy it." "It is not only your 
 right," he said again to Protestant princes, "it is also your 
 duty to establish the pure Gospel, to protect the new churches, 
 to destroy the authority of the Pope, and to allow no strange 
 doctrine to be propagated." "Admirable times," he ex- 
 claims elsewhere, "when princes can more easily merit 
 heaven by massacring the peasants and by shedding 
 blood than they could formerly by pouring forth prayers to 
 God. Every peasant slain is lost body and soul, and belongs 
 for eternity to the devil." More than one hundred thousand 
 of these unfortunate creatures perished, and Luther gloried 
 in these odious massacres. "It was I," he exclaimed, "who 
 shed this blood by the order of God." 
 
 Such was the cold-blooded cruelty of this leader of the 
 Reformation, whose barbarous exhortations were only too 
 faithfully followed. The sacrilegious robbery of churches 
 and monasteries, armed revolt, the massacre of entire popula- 
 tions, the Thirty Years' War which covered the country with 
 blood and ruins, were the high achievements which signaHzed 
 Protestantism in Germany. 
 
 2. And what was taking place in Switzerland? Calvin, 
 the most infamous and the most cruel of tyrants, wrote a 
 whole book solely to prove that heretics ought to be put to 
 death. Adding example to precept, he caused Michael 
 Servetus to be burned alive for the crime of heresy, James 
 Gruet to be beheaded for an attempt to subvert his church 
 ordinances, and Valentine Gentilis for deliberate heresy. 
 Antoni, Punch, Bolsec, Castellio, Ochino, Alicot, and a 
 hundred others paid with their lives for the unpardonable 
 boldness of censuring the reformer. To abstain from any 
 act of the new religion, such as preaching or coramunicating, 
 
462 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 constituted a crime of high treason, and was punished ac- 
 cordingly. ''Calvin," says Gallifet, a Protestant writer, 
 ''estabhshed first by craft and afterward by violence the 
 reign of the most ferocious intolerance, of the grossest super- 
 stition, of the most impious dogmas. . . . Only blood would 
 satisfy this base soul." This same man desired that Ana- 
 baptists should be treated as brigands. " In the legislation 
 conceived of by this monster," says Audin, "nothing but 
 the word death resounded; blood flowed everywhere. The 
 scaffold or the stake cut short all resistance." 
 
 Nor were the measures of Zwinglius more gentle. Witness 
 his letter of May 4, 1525, to Ambrose Blaurer, quoted by 
 Janssen in Ein zweites Wort an meine Kritiker, where he 
 declares it lawful to massacre priests, if necessary, in order 
 to abolish images and the Mass. 
 
 3. France presented a like spectacle. The Calvinist Hu- 
 guenots kindled a fierce civil war; pillaged Orleans, Pithi- 
 viers, Nimes, Auxerre, Bourges, Montpellier, whole prov- 
 inces ; massacred the inhabitants and destroyed the churches 
 they encountered in their route, hanging or drowning the 
 priests and religious who fell into their hands. At Orthes 
 they destroyed the whole Catholic population, numbering 
 three thousand souls. In the year 1562 alone they put to 
 death, according to their own account, four thousand priests 
 and religious, destroyed twenty thousand churches and 
 ninety hospitals. "The Queen of Navarre's violence tow- 
 ard priests and religious," says Bossuet, ''is well known: the 
 towers whence Cathohcs were cast and the abysses into which 
 they were flung are still shown. ' ' ^ 
 
 4. Similar intolerance prevailed in Denmark, where Lu- 
 theranism was introduced with Christian 11. , surnamed the 
 Nero of the North. Under his successor, Frederick II., such 
 horrors were perpetrated upon religious that even the Prot- 
 estant historian Mallet (Histoire du Denmark, t. vi.) says 
 
 ^ History of the Variations of Protestantism, vol. ii. See C. W., 
 Apr. 1898. Cfr. references to art. 7 below. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 463 
 
 that ^ 4n no country where the Reformation was established 
 did monks suffer such vexations as in Denmark ; " e very- 
 Catholic priest and every one who sheltered a priest were 
 under sentence of death. In Sweden, which became Lu- 
 theran under Gustavus Vasa, the cruelty of this prince toward 
 Catholics was so horrible and the massacres so terrible that 
 they excited the indignation of Luther himself. 
 
 5. The history of the schism in England, which sprang 
 from the passions of a debauched prince, says that Henry 
 VIII. condemned to the scaffold two queens, two cardinals, 
 twenty archbishops and bishops, more than five hundred 
 abbots, priors, monks, a host of doctors, dukes, counts and 
 other noblemen, among the latter the celebrated Thomas 
 More, more than seventy-two thousand CathoHcs of all ranks. 
 ''I would I could efface from our annals," says Fitz Wilham, 
 the Anghcan author of the '' Letters of Atticus," " all trace of 
 the long series of iniquities which accompanied the Reforma- 
 tion in England. They record injustice and oppression, 
 rapine, murder, and sacrilege. Such were the means by 
 which the inexorable and bloodthirsty tyrant Henry VIIL, 
 the founder of our faith, estabhshed the supremacy of his 
 new church. All who wished to preserve the rehgion of 
 their fathers and continue to adhere to the authority which 
 he himself had taught them to revere were treated as rebels, 
 and soon became his victims." It was principally under 
 the reign of the virgin queen, the good Elizabeth, as she was 
 called (1559-1603), that the persecutions against CathoHcs 
 assumed the most barbarous character. This worthy 
 daughter of Henry VIIL and Anne Boleyn put to death no 
 fewer Catholics than her father; her atrocities startled the 
 world and surpassed those of pagan antiquity. The massa- 
 cres she ordered in Ireland were so terrible that, according 
 to the Protestant writer Leland, ''httle more than ashes and 
 dead bodies remained for her Majesty Elizabeth to govern." 
 
 6. We cannot read without a shudder the account which the 
 Protestant historian Kerroux gives in his Ahregi de Vhistoire 
 
464 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 de la Hollande, t. ii., of the cruel tortures which Cathohcs 
 endured in the Netherlands. It is well known that in the 
 provinces of Brabant and Flanders alone the Gueux de- 
 stroyed in less than five days more than four hundred 
 churches and cathedrals; that they perpetrated upon priests, 
 religious, and the Catholic faithful atrocities which could 
 not be believed, if the lamentable facts were not confirmed 
 by incontestable historical documents. 
 
 Such was everywhere the conduct of Protestants toward 
 those who remained faithful to the religion of their fathers. 
 Let us not forget that the reformers proclaimed free in- 
 terpretation of the Scriptures, that is, the right to believe what 
 one pleases, as the fundamental dogma of the new rehgion. 
 
 III. Intolerance of Other Enemies of the 
 Church.^ 
 
 The philosophy of the eighteenth century has shown itself 
 little less gentle or tolerant than Protestantism. The same 
 Rousseau who vigorously protested against the cruel dogma 
 of intolerance, and who recognized nothing true in any 
 positive religion, does not hesitate to declare that the State 
 may prescribe a civil, consequently positive, rehgion and that 
 under pain of death ! It belongs to the sovereign, he says 
 in the Contrat social, 'Ho fix the articles of religion." Then 
 he adds these words, in which cruelty rivals effrontery: 
 '^ Without the power of compelhng any one to believe the 
 articles of faith contained in the religion of a country, the 
 sovereign may banish from the State those who do not 
 believe them, not on the ground of impiety, but as detri- 
 mental to the State. ... If any one after pubhcly ac- 
 knowledging these dogmas conduct himself as though he did 
 not beheve them, he should he put to death; he has committed 
 
 * On persecution in Russia and Poland see Parsons, Studies, V., 
 ch. 3, 4 (A. C. Q., xxii., xxiii.) ; D. R. Old Ser. xiv. 223, Oct. '95; C. W. 
 lix. 757; M. Ixxx. 166, Sept. '95. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 465 
 
 the greatest of crimes, he has hed before the law." Yet, 
 according to Rousseau, no man's faith should be forced. 
 
 This tolerance of the sophist of Geneva is still that of cer- 
 tain quasi-humanitarian philosophers of our day. Some 
 of them go so far as to regret that the reformers in 1793 did 
 not complete their work of destruction; they are only wait- 
 ing an opportunity to resort to brute force against Catholi- 
 cism in order to render the practice of it absolutely impos- 
 sible, to stifle it in the mire. Witness the urgent counsels 
 given by Edgar Quinet; they are addressed to all who, like 
 himself, are inspired with satanic hatred of the Church. 
 The events which have taken place before our eyes show 
 that these counsels of sovereign intolerance were understood 
 and followed. ^ 
 
 Remark. — No doubt there have been Catholic princes 
 who, through excess of imenlightened zeal, resorted to vio- 
 lence to convert infidels or sectarians, but in doing so they 
 followed their personal inspiration and not the rules of the 
 Church. The Church does not admit this kind of apostolate, 
 and she cannot be held responsible for that which she con- 
 demns. It is quite otherwise with Protestantism and in- 
 fidelity: here the very founders of the Reformation, the 
 leaders themselves of infidel philosophy, incited the most 
 cruel intolerance by word and example. Yet it is remarkable 
 how rarely the enemies of the Church are heard to condemn 
 these atrocities. On the contrary, they praise and encourage 
 the countries where Catholics are oppressed at the present 
 day, and their intolerant conduct is held up as worthy of 
 imitation. Is not this the climax of injustice, of unfairness, 
 of inconsistency? 
 
 ^ What a terrible commentary upon this modern " Gospel of Toler- 
 ance " is furnished by the Masonic persecution raging this very day 
 against the religious orders and the hierarchy in France I — Editor, 
 
466 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 IV. On the Maxim: Outside the Church there Is No 
 
 Salvation.^ 
 
 But the Catholic Church cannot, it will be said, defend 
 herself against the charge of intolerance and cruelty when 
 she publicly proclaims that there is no salvation for those 
 who die outside her fold. What numbers she condemns 
 to eternal damnation only because they do not belong to 
 the Church of Rome! We have already given in a few words 
 the solution of this difficulty. But what we have said re- 
 quires further development. We shall see whether the old 
 man whom Rousseau causes to speak in such moving terms, 
 really deserves our pity.^ 
 
 This maxim is only a perfectly rational conclusion of that 
 
 * Dr. Edw. Hawarden, Charity and Truth; Hay, Sincere Christian, 
 vol. ii., append.; Schanz, III., ch. 9; Ryder (C. T. S., vol. v.); Balmes, 
 Letters to a Sceptic, 1. 16; Hunter, i., n. 181; Walsh, The Saved and 
 Lost; Rickaby, Oxf. C, I., ch. 3; Br. W. v. 571; C. W. xxxi. 481, 
 xlvii. 145, xlviii. 509; A. E. R., July '92; M. Ivii. 363, Ixxiii. 236, 344. 
 
 ' Protestants figure most prominently among those who attack 
 the Catholic Church on the subject of this maxim. Yet this princi- 
 ple v/ith which they reproach the Church is a logical consequence of 
 the doctrine of their principal leaders. Hence they are in contradic- 
 tion with themselves. What right have they to censure in us that 
 which they themselves have to admit, that which is explicitly pro- 
 fessed in the formulas of faith drawn up in the earliest stages of 
 Protestantism ? For example, we read in the Helvetic Confession of 
 Faith of 1565: " There is no salvation outside the hurch, any more 
 than there was outside the ark; and if we would have life, we must 
 not separate from the true Church of Jesus Christ.' The Saxon, the 
 Belgian, and the Scotch Confessions of Faith are no less explicit on 
 this point. " Outside the Church," says also the Calvinist catechism 
 of the seventeenth century, "there is only damnation: all who sepa- 
 rate from the commimion of the faithful to form a sect apart should 
 not hope for salvation so long as they remain thus separated." 
 Moreover, Calvin himself affirms in his " Institutions " that " outside 
 the Church we cannot hope for the remission of sins or for 
 salvation." 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 467 
 
 which has been previously demonstrated. In fact, if the 
 true rehgion, that of Jesus Christ, is necessary for salvation, 
 and if this religion is exclusively that of the Church of Rome, 
 we have to acknowledge that outside the Church of Rome 
 there is no salvation; in other words, that no one can be 
 saved if he does not belong in some way to this Church. 
 Hence, if this doctrine is censurable, it is not the Church 
 that should be reproached therefor, but her divine Founder, 
 who made His religion obligatory for all. 
 
 To justify the Church, it is sufficient to state precisely the 
 meaning and scope of the incriminated formula. Let us 
 explain, therefore, in what way, according to Catholic doc- 
 trine, we must belong to the Church in order to be saved. 
 
 *'In this sentence: Outside the Church there is no salva- 
 tion, there is," says Card. Dechamps, ''as in every penal law, 
 a word to be supplied ; this word is voluntarily, since every 
 penal law supposes guilt, and guilt supposes in its turn two 
 conditions : fact and intention. Hence to the question : Does 
 the Church believe that there is no salvation for persons 
 who, born and brought up where they could have no knowl- 
 edge of the Church, are in invincible ignorance of the law 
 of Jesus Christ, but have faithfully followed the light they 
 possessed? we must answer that such is not the belief of 
 the Church." 1 
 
 It is certain, in fact, that a law is not of obligation when it 
 is not promulgated, and that it cannot bind the consciences of 
 those to whom it is unknown. Thus it was after He had said 
 to His apostles, ''Go preach the Gospel to every creature," 
 that Our Saviour added, " He that doth not believe is already 
 judged." The unbelief, therefore, which excludes from sal- 
 vation is that which knows and resists the truth. As St. 
 Paul says, " How then shall they call on him in whom they 
 have not beheved? Or how shall they believe him, of whom 
 
 ^ Newman, Certain Difficulties felt by Anglicans in Catholic Teach- 
 ing, vol. i., pp. 354-5; Lilly, Characteristics from the Writings of Card. 
 Manning, p. 247 ff. 
 
468 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 they have not heard? . . . Faith then cometh by hearing, 
 and hearing by the word of Christ. " (Rom. x. 14, 17.) 
 
 Moreover, the theological axiom which we have already 
 quoted: ''To him who does what depends upon himself God 
 will not refuse His grace, " is perfectly applicable to the present 
 question. He who shall have followed the hght of reason, 
 and lived in conformity with that which he beheves is truth, 
 cannot be lost. "One may," says the learned Cardinal 
 again, ''belong in heart, though not in body, to the Church. 
 Is it not very clear that every man in good faith belongs in 
 heart to the Church, since he would enter it if he recognized 
 it as teaching truth? Are not all who have a sincere and 
 general desire to chng to truth, to do God's will, in this dis- 
 position? It is, in other words, a question of baptism of 
 desire, a desire implicitly and adequately contained, as St. 
 Thomas Aquinas says, in the general will to use the means 
 of salvation granted by divine Providence to man. They, 
 therefore, who, in the event of recognizing the Church, are 
 prepared to cast themselves upon her bosom, are regarded 
 by God as her children, and will not fail to receive from Him 
 the light necessary for salvation. God the Creator, who 
 chose to be also the Saviour of the world, died for all men, 
 and the graces granted in view of this Victim whom the 
 eternal justice beheld immolated from the beginning of the 
 world, occisus ah origine mundi, were applied to all men 
 without exception. Hence no man is excluded from par- 
 ticipation in the fruits of the redemption save through his 
 own fault, through resistance to grace, and each one will be 
 judged according to that which he has received. Could 
 there be a doctrine more lenient and at the same time more 
 terrible: more lenient for the blind when their ignorance is 
 not culpable, and more terrible for the ungrateful who, to 
 avoid the hght which surrounds them, seek in darkness 
 reasons against the justice of God?" 
 
 Let us add a few words of explanation to those of the 
 eminent prelate; we shall take them for the most part from 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH, 469 
 
 P. Ollivier^s excellent statement of the subject in his fifty- 
 third and fifty-fourth Conferences. 
 
 Catholic doctrine distinguishes in the Church body and 
 soul. The body, or visible part, consists of the members 
 united in one society or exterior communion. The soul, or 
 the invisible part, is sanctifying grace, the principle of super- 
 natural hfe which renders man pleasing to God. To belong 
 fully, that is, by right and fact, to the body of the Church 
 it is necessary first to enter it by Baptism; then, when we 
 have attained the age of reason, to adhere to it voluntarily, 
 with full knowledge, by an act of Cathohc faith; finally, we 
 must not have incurred excommunication or have separated 
 from the Church by embracing error. To belong to the soul 
 of the Church it suffices, even if we do not form part of the 
 body, to be in a state of grace. Hence it is possible to belong 
 to the Church, and consequently to be saved, without forming 
 part of the body of the Church. In other terms, according to 
 Catholic doctrine, heretics, sectarians, and even infidels may 
 possess sanctifying grace and obtain salvation. Let us ex- 
 plain. 
 
 1. A child born of schismatic, heretic, or infidel parents 
 who receives Baptism, receives with it sanctifying grace, and 
 preserves this grace as long as he is not guilty of mortal sin. 
 He belongs to the soul of the Church, and if he dies in tliis state 
 he will undoubtedly be saved. This is supposing, of course, 
 that the child, attaining the use of reason, remains in invincible 
 ignorance of the true religion, because it is impossible for 
 him to learn of it, or he despises it because he has no doubt 
 whatever of the truth of the rehgion he professes. But 
 every one born or brought up in unbelief, heresy, or schism is 
 bound to search for the true religion as soon as any serious 
 doubts arise in his mind concerning the truth of his creed. 
 If he neglect to do this, he can no longer enjoy the benefit 
 of "good faith" and commits a grievous offence against God, 
 the source and object of the true religion. Let us add that 
 if a man, being in good faith (that is, by invincible ignorance) 
 
470 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 outside the visible unity of God's Church, has the misfortune 
 to lose sanctifying grace through grave sin, he may be recon- 
 ciled again with God. If the sect to which he belongs has re- 
 tained the Sacrament of Penance, his reconcihation will be 
 effected through sacramental confession accompanied with 
 at least imperfect contrition; if it rejects this sacrament, it 
 will be by the employment of means instituted in tliis sect 
 and regarded as indispensable, but in that case perfect con- 
 trition is necessary and the reason therefor is evident: he 
 must employ these means because, judging them indispen- 
 sable, he would be acting contrary to his conscience if he did 
 not have recourse to them. At the same time, perfect con- 
 trition is necessary in this case, as the means are inefficacious 
 of themselves. 
 
 2. As to 7ion-haptized children and adults who die without 
 attaining the use of reason, we have already stated (p. 249, 
 n. 1) what we are taught concerning their lot.^ They will 
 enjoy a natural good, the possession of which would have 
 constituted our happiness if we had not been raised to the 
 superior order, and they will be deprived only of the degree of 
 happiness resulting from the intuitive vision of God, a degree 
 of happiness which is due to no one.^ 
 
 Now to come to adult infidels, or unbaptized persons who 
 have attained the use of reason — that is, Jews, Mohammedans, 
 and pagans, — here is a summary of what the Church teaches 
 regarding them. None are excluded because of unbehef, 
 except those whose unbelief is voluntary, either directly or in 
 
 ^ Balmes, 1. c, 1. 15; C. W. li. 456. 
 
 * A large number of theologians, certainly the majority, not to say 
 the best authorities among them, affirm that the punishment of 
 original sin consists solely in the privation of supernatural happiness 
 (the sight of God) , a happiness, moreover, which is not due man. 
 
 St. Thomas maintains that children who die without Baptism not 
 only will not suffer the pain of sense, but not even sadness through 
 the pain of the damned, that is, through the privation of the beatific 
 vision. Grave theologians admit that these children will enjoy a 
 more or less perfect natural happiness. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THfi CHtJRCH. 471 
 
 its cause. As to those whose unbehef is the result of in- 
 vincible ignorance, if they are lost, it will not be because 
 they were ignorant of that which it was impossible for them 
 to know/ 
 
 Nay, more, we are permitted to believe that these men 
 may positively belong to the soul of the Church and conse- 
 quently be saved, as the Gentiles were before the coming of 
 the Messias. After the example of the Gentiles, they have 
 only to obey the natural law engraven in all hearts, and those 
 primitive traditions, preserved everywhere though frequently 
 altered, concerning God and His providence, the promise 
 of a Redeemer, the rewards and punishments which await 
 man in another life. True, the baptism of water is necessary 
 for all who know of its necessity and who can receive it; 
 but it may be supplied by the baptism of blood and the bap- 
 tism of desire. The baptism of blood suffices for it in those 
 who have not attained the use of reason, when they are put 
 to death for the cause of Christ; for this reason the Church 
 celebrates the feast of the Holy Innocents massacred at 
 Bethlehem by King Herod. The baptism of desire suffices 
 for those who, knowing the necessity of the baptism of water 
 and being for any reason whatever unable to receive it, have 
 an explicit desire for it, accompanied by perfect contrition 
 for grave sins. It is even certain that the implicit desire of 
 baptism, that is, an act of perfect love of God, for the reason 
 that it implies the will to do whatever God prescribes for 
 salvation, sufficed in the early ages of the Church for unbe- 
 Hevers among whom the Gospel had not yet been preached. 
 
 ' All theologians distinguish negative from positive unbelief. 
 Negative unbelief is not a sin. It is found in persons who do not 
 believe in Revelation because they are ignorant of it through no 
 fault of their own. Positive unbelief is a sin because it is found in 
 those to whom Revelation has been sufficiently revealed and taught. 
 Such persons will certainly be condemned to the suffering of the 
 damned and the pain of sense, for they are guilty of an actual sin of 
 positive unbelief. Muzarrelli, Du Salut des paiens. See also Balmes, 
 1. c, 1. 16; A. C. Q. be. 45; I. E. R., Feb. '93. 
 
472 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 The Church in fact regards the baptism of water as necessary 
 to salvation only from the period of the preaching of the Gos- 
 pel. This is expressly stated in the Council of Trent. Now 
 the Gospel was, and could be, promulgated only by degrees. 
 Therefore, if there were means of salvation besides Baptism 
 for the unbelievers of that period, because the Gospel had not 
 been announced to them, why should not these same means 
 exist for unbelievers of later centuries who, through no 
 fault of theirs, are in the same condition? This is not an 
 article of faith; but we are free to beheve it, and the Church 
 does not contradict it. The belief, moreover, is conformable 
 to the doctrine of great theologians, among whom we must 
 count St. Thomas and St. Alphonsus Liguori.^ 
 
 To sum up what we have said, let us observe that Catholic 
 doctrine excludes from salvation for not having embraced 
 
 * Let us observe also these words of a judicious writer, the Abb6 
 Ant. Pirenne, in his Etudes philosophiques sur les prindpales questions 
 de la religion revelee: " Let us suppose that a pagan (it is the same with 
 heretics and sectarians) dies loving God for Himself and above all 
 things, he is thereby saved. For with charity (supernatural) he has 
 everything: charity of itself justifies. And observe that the small- 
 est degree of charity is sufficient; for the essence of a virtue does not 
 consist in its intensity; a drop of water is as truly water as the 
 ocean, and the quantity of a thing does not influence its nature. 
 Thus charity exists with attachment to venial sin; above all, it may 
 exist without any sensible devotion. You are saved, then, if you 
 leave this life loving God for Himself and above all thiiigs that would 
 involve mortal sin. You are saved whatever the circumstances in 
 which you find yourself. If at this supreme moment* pagan, heretic, 
 or schismatic, you receive from God the gift of charity, even a small 
 degree of it which does not take away your attachment to venial sin, 
 you have sufficient for salvation, for charity renders contrition per- 
 fect; perfect charity and contrition include the desire, at least implicit 
 desire, for Baptism and confession. 
 
 "If we would know in what way charity is communicated to the 
 faithful, here is the reply of Leibnitz, a reply which he has borrowed 
 from Catholic theologians: ^God will give what is necessary to all 
 who do what humanly depends upon them, even if it were necessary to 
 vork a miracle.' '' 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 473 
 
 the true faith only those who have been wilfully ignorant 
 of revealed truth, that is, who have not wished to know it, and 
 those who, having an adequate knowledge of it, have refused 
 to embrace it. Those only are actuMly bound to enter the 
 Church who know her to be the necessary means of attaining 
 salvation. Hence the formula ''Outside the Church there 
 is no salvation" is in every way rational and logical; and 
 they who cite it against the Church do so in error or bad 
 faith — ^in error when they misapprehend the precise and full 
 meaning of the axiom, and in bad faith when they refuse to 
 acknowledge it. 
 
 But does not the rigor of the Inquisition contradict this 
 reputation for clemency which we would maintain for the 
 Church? The charge is unceasingly repeated in books, 
 journals, periodicals, and pamphlets hostile to our faith. 
 Hence it is necessary to treat separately a question which 
 gives rise to so much malicious declamation. 
 
 ART. II.— THE INQUISITION. 
 
 This is the great accusation made against the Church by 
 her enemies: the word Inquisition is cast in her face as sen- 
 tence of condemnation from which there is no appeal. 
 
 It is well to remark, first, that, with the exception of a 
 few who are ignorantly deceived or misled, hatred of the 
 Inquisition is confounded with hatred of the Church. 
 
 We know the style of argument used by the enemies of 
 this institution in their romances and plays. Their object 
 is to make a vivid impression on the imagination and excite 
 the feehngs by a touching picture or a clever dramatic ren- 
 dering. They take good care not to say that the tortures at 
 which they make us assist, though so contrary to our pres- 
 ent customs, were nevertheless conformable in every respect 
 to the penal code of past centuries and to the customs of all 
 the tribunals of those times. With them, the moment that 
 |)lood flows, that fires are kindled, the cause is judged; and the 
 
474 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 tribunal is wrong. They do not reason, they declaim; they 
 do not try to convince minds, but to excite the passions. 
 
 This is not the proper method of history: it should be 
 animated by no passion but love of truth. "The first law,'' 
 says Leo XIII. in a letter in which he strongly recommends 
 historical studies, " is to advance nothing that is false and to 
 shrink from no truth." 
 
 Above all things, we must carefully distinguish between 
 the ecclesiastical Inquisition and the Spanish Inquisition.^ 
 
 a. Inquisition means, generally, to search for heretics in 
 order to prevent the spread of their tenets, or to convert them. 
 In this sense the Inquisition dates from the beginning of 
 the Church. It has ever been the bounden duty of popes 
 and bishops to resist heresy, and to prevent its propagation, 
 either by gentle, persuasive measures or by means of chas- 
 tisements. 
 
 h. Nevertheless, by the Inquisition is generally understood 
 a court of justice, both civil and ecclesiastic, called the Holy 
 Office, estabhshed to take cognizance of the crime of heresy, 
 and to punish the guilty. This special tribunal dates only 
 from the beginning of the thirteenth century, when it was 
 estabhshed by Innocent III. to repress the heresy of the 
 Waldenses and the Albigenses.^ These sectaries, reproduc- 
 ing the heresy of the Manichseans, spread the spirit of rebelHon 
 with their errors, and, resorting to arms, threatened both 
 Church and State. After vain efforts to bring them back 
 to their common duty by instruction and moral suasion, the 
 
 ^Hefele, Life of Card. Ximenes; Parsons, Lies, p. 121 £f.; Studies, 
 IL, ch. 31; Balmes, ch. 36, 37. See Maistre; Dwenger; Hergenrother, 
 Catholic Church, etc., vol. ii.. Essay 17; Spalding, J. M., Miscell., 
 Essay 11; Lacordaire, The Order of St. Dominic, ch. 6; Sidney Smith, 
 S.J. (C. T. S. xix); A. C. Q. i. 254, xii. 691, xiii. 385 (on H. Lea's 
 deceiving book), XXV. 531 ff.; M. xlix. 82,lxxiv. 375; D. R. Old Ser. 
 xxviii. 421, New Ser. viii. 53, ix. 163, Apr. 1894, p. 309 (Albigenses) ; 
 C. C. S. L. ii. p. 7; also references on p. 442. 
 
 2 See Melia's work on the Waldenses; also Parsons, Studies, II., 
 ch.25, 27; L E. R., Nov. '94. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 475 
 
 two powers menaced united against the common enemy; it 
 was the duty of the ecclesiastical power to establish, that 
 is to verify, the crime, and of the civil power to administer 
 the punishment. The end of this ecclesiastical Inquisition 
 always was to preserve Cathohc nations from the poison of 
 heresy, and States from revolt, which was the usual conse- 
 quence of heresy. The office of Inquisitor was usually con- 
 fided to legates or delegates, among whom shone in the first 
 rank the sons of St. Dominick, but only from the year 1223, 
 that is, twelve years after the death of St. Dominick, which 
 fact, however, does not save the saint from being frequently 
 transformed into a Grand Inquisitor. 
 
 This Inquisition, born in the bosom of the mother 
 Church of all churches and successively introduced into all 
 parts of the Christian world, is certainly the work of the 
 Roman pontiffs, who have never regretted its establishment. 
 
 c. Quite different was the Spanish Inquisition founded by 
 Ferdinand and Isabella in 1481 to protect with the Christian 
 faith the nationality of Spain against the machinations of 
 the Jews and the Moors. ^ In this tribimal also we find two 
 distinct jurisdictions, one of which is exercised by the Church 
 and the other by the civil power. But here the civil power 
 had such a preponderating influence that a number of his- 
 torians, though inimical to Catholicism, regard the Spanish 
 Inquisition as more political than religious. 
 
 Nevertheless we do not pretend to disclaim for the Church 
 all responsibility in the Spanish Inquisition. We acknowl- 
 edge that Sixtus IV. approved the first thought of the In- 
 quisition in Spain and sanctioned its fundamental statutes. 
 It was from the Holy See that the ecclesiastical inquisitors 
 received their jurisdiction and all their powers. The king, 
 however, received from the Pope the privilege of naming 
 the inquisitors. 
 
 Object of the Discussion. — All discussion on the subject 
 
 * On the persecution of the Jews in Spain see C. W. liv. 360, Iv. 649, 
 851, Iviii. 49; see ib. Dec. 1899, "The Popes and the Jews." 
 
476 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 of the Inquisition may be reduced to the two following ques- 
 tions, very distinct one from the other. 
 
 First Question. — Was the institution of this tribunal lawful 
 in principle and moral right? 
 
 Second Question. — Do the proceedings of the Inquisition 
 as known to us through history merit the condemnation 
 with which our enemies would brand them, and can they 
 be made a charge against the Church? 
 
 Let us not forget that in all this discussion there is no ques- 
 tion of unbelievers, pagans or Jews, over which the Church 
 has no jurisdiction, but only of Christians, that is, of those 
 whom the regeneration of Baptism made amenable to the 
 laws of the Church. The first, says St. Thomas, certainly 
 should not be forced to obey the Church; the others, on the 
 contrary, should: contra vero, alteri sunt cogendi. 
 
 I. Lawfulness of the Inquisition in Principle. 
 
 A. On the Part of the Church. — There can be no doubt 
 of this in the mind of a Catholic. Popes and councils, saints 
 and doctors, Scripture and tradition proclaim that the Church 
 has the right, and that it is also her duty, to watch over the 
 purity of the faith, and to inflict penalties, even corporal 
 penalties, on her children who wander from the faith and 
 become a stone of stumbling to their brethren.^ This unde- 
 
 ^ In the light of Catholic dogma it is always a crime in an adult 
 Catholic "to wander from the faith." The Church teaches (a) that 
 faith is an imperative duty of man towards God, as without faith it 
 is impossible to please God; (6) that this faith is a supernatural gift 
 of God which man, once he has received it, cannot lose except by his 
 own free will ; (c) that she herself is the divinely appointed and in- 
 fallible teacher of revealed truth, which is the proper object of divine 
 faith; (d) that there cannot possibly be any reason whatever of 
 denying this faith once professed; (e) that consequently to wander 
 from the Catholic faith is a most grievous sin against God and against 
 His holy Church. 
 
 From this it follows evidently that the Catholic Church alone can 
 consistently claim the right of punishing apostasy from her faith; 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 477 
 
 niable right, which flows from the powers which Jesus Christ 
 has conferred upon her, the Church has always exercised; 
 she has always considered the crimes of heresy, of apostasy, 
 and of sacrilege as deserving of punishment as outrages 
 upon the honor, the property, or the life of a fellow being. 
 This doctrine and this conduct of the Church are perfectly 
 reasonable and lawful. In fact it is the right and duty of 
 every society to provide for the salvation of its members 
 and to watch over its own preservation. Without this right 
 it could not exist. The Church, a perfect society, proAdded 
 by her divine Founder with all that is necessary for her preser- 
 vation and her propagation, possesses this right then, and can, 
 in consequence, make laws and punish those of her subjects 
 who do not observe them. If they are recalcitrant and 
 contumacious, devios et contumaces, according to the ex- 
 pression of Benedict XIV., the Church, hke a tender but firm 
 mother, exercises her right, and fulfils her duty by correct- 
 ing them, in order that chastisement may bring them back 
 to the right path, and prevent others from being led away 
 by their pernicious example. She acts in this respect like 
 the father of a family who takes wise and efficacious meas- 
 ures to correct his children and to preserve his home from 
 anything of a nature to disturb its peace and happiness. 
 Her course is analogous to that of the governments of the 
 present day when they adopt vigorous precautions to pre- 
 vent the entrance of pestilence, cholera, or any epidemic 
 whatever, or when they establish a corps of special agents 
 to seek out malefactors, conspirators, assassins, and hand 
 them over to the vengeance of the law, and prevent the 
 execution of their nefarious designs. 
 
 The Inquisition was in religious society what parental 
 discipline is in the family, what health boards, police boards, 
 medical corps, and tribunals of justice are in civil society, that 
 
 and that no State can consistently put heresy on its criminal code 
 unless it professes the Catholic faith. — Editor. 
 
478 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 is, a means of conservation for itself and of preservation 
 for its members. 
 
 B. On the Part of the State. — When we wish to judge 
 the lawfulness of an institution we must transport ourselves 
 to the time when it was established. It is well known that 
 at the period of the Inquisition European society was pro- 
 foundly Christian; the people were as universally convinced 
 of the truth of CathoHc dogma as we, in our modern societies, 
 can be of the truth of the principles of the natural law; 
 hence revolt against God was justly regarded as no less 
 treasonable than revolt against the king. 
 
 Rulers and people, accepting Catholic faith as the only true 
 and divine religion, considered its preservation of paramount 
 importance to all natural advantages. The legislation of 
 the various countries of Europe was founded upon an inti- 
 mate union of Church and State. Consequently every overt 
 act of disobedience to the laws of religion was punishable 
 by the civil law. Human law cannot, of course, enter the 
 secret domain of conscience, accessible only to God; it cannot 
 prescribe interior acts or punish violations which are not 
 exterior. 
 
 Under such circumstances nothing could be more natural 
 than the establishment of tribunals the office of which was to 
 discover, by lawful and honest means, exterior violations of 
 the religious law, to discern between obstinate heretics and 
 those who were only misled for a time, to punish the real crim- 
 inals and proclaim the innocence of others. Such tribunals 
 were as lawful as the tribunals of the present day estabhshed 
 to judge offences against the State, or the person, reputa- 
 tion, or property of citizens. 
 
 It was because they were penetrated ^vith these truths 
 that Theodosius the Great, Justinian, Charlemagne, Otho 
 the Great, Louis IX., and all civiUzed rulers and nations 
 considered it no violation of liberty to punish heresy or 
 apostasy. 
 
 Conclusion. — In a society formed according to the prin- 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 479 
 
 ciples and based upon the legislation we have described, no 
 one could reasonably deny that the Church acted in all wisdom 
 in estabhshing in concert with the civil power, to which she 
 referred the chastisement of culprits, a tribunal for discern- 
 ing the real criminal with greater guarantees of justice, and 
 taking cognizance of an offence regarded as one of the gravest . 
 against both the social and the religious order. 
 
 If there are those who have any difficulty in accepting 
 this conclusion, it is because we live in an atmosphere steeped 
 in error. The enemies of the Church, to favor the propaga- 
 tion of evil and for their own safety, never cease to hold up 
 every attempt to repress impiety and heresy, as an outrage 
 upon what they falsely call the sacred rights of conscience. 
 
 It is nevertheless incontestable that no one has the right 
 to do evil, that no one has, or can have, as it is claimed at 
 the present day, a natural and imprescriptible right to think, 
 to write, and to propagate whatever he pleases. Created 
 by God and dependent upon Him for all things, man has no 
 right to outrage and blaspheme the Author of his existence. 
 Made a child of the Church by baptism, he has no right to 
 revolt against his Mother. Member of a society, he has no 
 right to break down the foundations upon which this society 
 rests. Endowed with free-will to do good meritoriously, 
 he has no right to abuse this faculty by corrupting his breth- 
 ren and leading them to evil. 
 
 It is no less incontestable that there are errors which are 
 criminal. Yes, there are perversions of reason which cannot 
 practically be distinguished from moral perversions. Man 
 is obhged, above all things, to cling to truth, and to preserve 
 his intelligence from error; this is evident, since to will it is 
 necessary to know, and to will righteously we must know the 
 truth. If there were no rule for thought, there could be none 
 for actions. What would then become of morals and of 
 society? Among culpable errors, sins of incredulity, heresy, 
 and apostasy rank first. In fact there is no outrage upon 
 the honor, the life, the property of man, a simple creature, 
 
480 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 which ranks in enormity with those monstrous crimes which 
 directly attack the Creator Himself. To refuse obstinately 
 to beheve in the revelation of God, when adequately known 
 and demonstrated, is a crime of treason against the Divine 
 Majesty, for it is, in a measure, denying the infinite truth of 
 God. Now at the time and in the countries where the Inqui- 
 sition reigned it was easy for all to have a complete moral 
 certainty (proportioned to the condition and development 
 of each mind) of the divinity of the Christian religion, and 
 of the Catholic Church.^ 
 
 II. The Proceedings of the Inquisition. 
 
 We have just proved that the Inquisition was lawful in 
 principle; that in the times and in the countries where it 
 was established it was lawful to adopt rigorous measures 
 against the propagation of religious errors. But is there 
 nothing censurable in the way in which this right was exer- 
 cised, was it not exercised with cruelty? This is the question 
 to be examined at present. We shall reply to it with the 
 aid of a few remarks. 
 
 First Remark. — Let us observe, first of all, that this 
 question is by no means as important as the first. It would, 
 in fact, be absurd to hold the Church responsible for abuses 
 of which the judges in the Inquisition may have been guilty. 
 Just as a man can be reasonably held responsible only for the 
 effects and results of his personal actions, in Hke manner a 
 social body can be charged only with what is the result of 
 its existence, of its social action, or, in other words, of its con- 
 stituent principles, of its laws, and the regular exercise of 
 authority. Would it be just to attribute to civil laws or 
 to mihtary regulations abuses of authority connected with 
 these laws and regulations, but condemned by them? Now 
 the abuses with which the Inquisition is charged are far from 
 being the fruit of the principles of CathoHcism : they are even 
 ^ See also, on Tolerance, references p. 442, 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 481 
 
 opposed to its spirit, and were in fact severely condemned 
 by the sovereign Pontiffs each time they were brought to 
 their knowledge. 
 
 Second Remark. — We must also bear in mind that the 
 judges charged to pronounce penal sentence for the crime of 
 heresy were civil judges; the ecclesiastical authority con- 
 fined itself to estabhshing the crime. The severe, the terrible 
 punishments, particularly the capital, were administered by 
 the government, of whom an account should be required 
 when there is occasion for censure. We have seen, moreover, 
 that a Christian and Catholic State, in lending the Church 
 the assistance of the secular arm, was only fulfilling a duty: 
 protecting the imprescriptible rights of truth and removing 
 all that endangered the capital interests of society. More- 
 over, the clemency which played so important a role in the 
 sentences of the Inquisition is the work of the Church, which 
 had no part in the punishments except to repress them, to 
 mitigate them, or to recommend the culprits to the indulgence 
 of the judge.^ Hence the reputation for mildness which the 
 ecclesiastical tribunals enjoyed. It was this reputation for 
 clemency which induced the Templars at the time of their 
 celebrated trial to ask expressly to be judged by the ecclesias- 
 tical Inquisition; they knew, historians tell us, that if they 
 went before such judges they would not be sentenced to 
 capital punishment. But Phihp le Bel, whose mind was 
 already made up, and who knew the inevitable consequence 
 of recourse to this tribunal, shut himself up with his state 
 council and summarily condemned the Templars to death.^ 
 
 Moreover, if the spirit of the Church is a spirit of mildness 
 we must expect to see it especially manifested at Rome. 
 Hence we find Clement IV. reproaching St. Louis himself 
 with the excessive severity of the laws which the great mon- 
 arch had made against blasphemers, and earnestly begging 
 him in his bull of 1208 to mitigate them. And in our own 
 
 ^ Hefele, Life of Ximenes, ch. 18. 
 
 » Parsons, Studies, IL, ch. 35; D. R;, Oct. '95, p. 329. 
 
482 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 day nowhere are Jews better treated than in Rome, so much 
 so that it has passed into a proverb that the city of the 
 popes is the paradise of the Jews. In Germany, where there 
 was a number of ecclesiastical sovereigns, a similar proverb 
 existed: ''It is good to hve under the cross." ''Never," 
 says Joseph de Maistre, " was there in these peaceful govern- 
 ments any question of capital punishment or persecution of 
 the enemies of the reigning powers." 
 
 Third Remark. — It is a mark of strange historical igno- 
 rance or singular audacity in calumny to represent cruel 
 sufferings and instruments of torture as belonging distinctly 
 and exclusively to the Inquisition. Yet we find this stated 
 constantly in anti-rehgious books and journals. Such pun- 
 ishments were in fact universal. It could be easily proved 
 that the tribimals of the Inquisition were generally much 
 more just and much less severe toward the accused than all 
 the civil tribimals of the period.^ Hefele, even accepting 
 the data of the partial historian Llorente, furnishes such 
 proof in regard to the Spanish Inquisition, the most decried 
 of all.^ If we would form an idea of the character of the 
 civil tribunals of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, we 
 ought to read the learned memoir of M. Poullet, professor 
 in the University of Louvain: Histoire du droit penal dans 
 le duche de Brabant, etc. Here is a passage from it: "The 
 greatest diversity, uncertainty, and arbitrariness reigned in 
 all the proceedings. The accused was deprived of the pre- 
 cious guarantee of a public trial; the judge could, if he chose, 
 refuse counsel to the defendant, nor was the latter allowed 
 to be present during the examination of witnesses." The 
 
 *The enemies of the Inquisition rely chiefly upon the testimony 
 of Llorente. To be convinced of the little reliance to be placed on 
 this writer it is sufficient to know that he destroyed the original 
 documents upon which he claimed to have based his work, hoping thus 
 to render it impossible to control or confute his assertions. See Stone, 
 A Brief for the Spanish Inquisition; Balmes, p. 456. 
 
 ' See Hefele's Life of Cardinal Ximenes, which contains much that 
 is interesting in regard to the Inquisition of Spain. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 483 
 
 same writer, speaking of the penalties, says: ''The general 
 system breathed only intimidation and public vengeance. 
 The penalty of death was frequently accompanied with a 
 series of revolting cruelties, the judges endeavoring to grad- 
 uate capital punishment according to the various degrees 
 of guilt in the delinquent. Below capital punishment 
 there were only corporal punishments, frequently irreparable, 
 always degrading. Nothing was done to reform the crim- 
 inal or to inspire him with better sentiments before returning 
 him to social life. Detention was used only as a punish- 
 ment and for slight offences. It had no place in the penal 
 system, properly speaking, and was never inflicted when 
 the judge had to repress a really grave violation or offence." 
 
 What is said here of the criminal laws of Brabant appHes to 
 the rest of Europe. It was a time when counterfeiters were 
 burned ahve, when those who used false weights and measures 
 were scourged with rods or condemned to death; burglary 
 led to the gallows ; those convicted a second time of theft were 
 also punished with death. To form an idea of the excessive 
 severity of the civil tribunals of that period it is sufficient to 
 read the Caroline Penal Code of Charles V., which governed 
 the German empire until the last century. 
 
 Fourth Remark. — The use of torture is made an accusa- 
 tion against the Inquisition. Who does not know that 
 torture was used in all the tribunals of Europe as a means of 
 discovering the truth? 
 
 There is a curious incident relative to this in the memoir 
 of M. Poullet. He says that in 1765 and 1766 the Belgian 
 Council were consulted by Charles de Lorraine concerning 
 certain reforms to be made in the Criminal Code, notably 
 the eventual abolition of torture. The whole Council voted 
 for preserving it, and on being consulted again, a few years 
 later, maintained their first opinion. 
 
 Let us observe also that the Inquisition abandoned the 
 use of torture before the other tribunals of Europe. " It is 
 certain," says Llorente, "that the Inquisition had long ceased 
 
484 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 to use torture." Moreover, contrary to the custom of all 
 civil tribunals, it never permitted torture to be used a second 
 time during the same trial, and it required that a physician 
 be present to determine the moment when the hfe of a 
 criminal was in danger. 
 
 Fifth Remark. — In regard to the Spanish Inquisition in 
 particular, we have no difficulty in recognizing that there 
 were abuses. How could it be otherwise when here, as 
 elsewhere, men were judges? At the same time it is im- 
 portant to bear in mind that: 
 
 a. The tribunal was more an institution of the State than 
 of the Church, and its members followed, not the instructions 
 of the popes, but the prescriptions of temporal princes. As 
 to the abuses with which it may be lawfully charged, the 
 Church was the first to condemn them. The popes pro- 
 tested against excessive severity, and they even went so far as 
 to grant those condenmed by the royal tribunal the right of 
 appealing to a special ecclesiastical judge. Later, finding 
 that the royal judges did not respect this right of appeal, the 
 sovereign Pontiff granted all condemned the right to claim 
 the interference of the Holy See. Spanish inquisitors were 
 even excommunicated despite the wrath of princes. 
 
 In a word, the Church used every influence in her power 
 to induce rulers and judges to imitate the example of her 
 gentleness and moderation. Therefore nothing is more 
 unjust and unreasonable than to hold the Papacy or the 
 Church responsible for excesses committed by the Spanish 
 tribunals. 
 
 h. It has been proved that the cruelties attributed to the 
 Spanish Inquisition have been exaggerated beyond measure 
 and with signal bad faith. Llorente himself, though so hostile 
 to the Church, acknowledges that the dungeons of the In- 
 quisition were dry, high-vaulted apartments, palaces in fact, 
 compared with the prisons of the other tribunals of Europe; 
 and that no prisoner of the Inquisition ever wore chains or an 
 iron collar. M. Bourgoing, ambassador to Spain, does not 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 485 
 
 hesitate to say, in his Tableau de VEspagne moderne: "I 
 acknowledge, in justice to truth, that the Inquisition might 
 be cited at the present day as a model of equity." 
 
 c. But there is nothing which inspires the ill-instructed 
 with greater horror than the thought of the autos da je. 
 They are usually represented as horrible scenes: a huge 
 caldron large enough to burn a multitude of victims, sur- 
 rounded by a crowd of fanatics, among whom figure promi- 
 nently the implacable judges of the Holy Office, contemplat- 
 ing with fierce joy a spectacle worthy of cannibals. 
 
 The truth is an auto da fe, that is, an ax^t of faith, did not 
 consist in burning or putting to death, but in acquitting 
 persons falsely accused, or reconciled with the Church. 
 In fact this tribunal, like the tribunal of penance, absolved 
 the repentant. Only obstinate heretics, as weU as those 
 whose offences were partly of a civil character, were handed 
 over to the secular arm. After this absolution the auto da 
 fe was finished and the ecclesiastical judge withdrew. 
 
 d. It is frequently alleged that the number of victims 
 immolated in a brief period by the Spanish Inquisition may 
 be estimated by hundreds of thousands ; now a fist furnished 
 by this same Llorente estimates the number of victims 
 during the three hundred and thirty-one years of the In- 
 quisition at about thirty-five thousand, and this list includes 
 criminals of various categories, who were also amenable to 
 these tribunals; for example, smugglers, magicians or sor- 
 cerers, usurers; and even then the fist is manifestly ex- 
 aggerated; for if Llorente is to be believed, in regard to the 
 autos da fe of Toledo of February 12th, May 1st, and De- 
 cember 10th, 1486, the number of victims was respectively 
 seven hundred, nine hundred, and seven hundred and fifty, 
 but in reahty there was not in this number a single victim: 
 it is a list of criminals, not of executions.^ 
 
 ^ Let us add a word in comparison with what was taking place at 
 the same time in Protestant countries. At Nuremberg, one of the 
 most enlightened cities of Germany, of the 50,000 souls who formed 
 
486 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Comparing the much-decried severity of the Spanish 
 Inquisition with the cruelty of Ehzabeth of England, Wilham 
 Cobbett, a Protestant author, affirms that this sanguinary 
 queen put more persons to death in one year than the In- 
 quisition did during the whole period of its existence. More- 
 over, we have seen that the intolerance of Protestants 
 toward Cathohcs was everywhere much more violent than 
 that of Cathohcs toward heretics; the Lutheran princes 
 tore their subjects from the Church by a hloody persecution. 
 And yet it is only against the CathoHc Church that the 
 charge of persecution is made. 
 
 Sixth Remark. — It is just to judge the tree by its fruit, 
 and to meet the charges against the Inquisition with the 
 salutary results it produced. It cannot be disputed that 
 it was owing in a great measure to this institution that 
 many of the countries of Europe preserved the faith intact 
 during centuries, and were preserved particularly from the 
 baneful invasion of intolerant and sanguinary Protestantism. 
 
 Spain, particularly, owes the Inquisition a large debt of 
 gratitude for the preservation of unity of faith, and for pre- 
 serving the country from the civil wars which devastated 
 so many other countries. Even Voltaire, the great enemy 
 of the Inquisition as well as of the Church, says: ''In Spain 
 during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries there were 
 
 the judiciary district, 356 perished on the scaffold in forty years 
 (1577-1617). To keep pace with this the Spanish Inquisition would 
 have had to execute 56,960 persons in the same period of time. At 
 Nordlingen, which counted 6000 inhabitants, 35 sorcerers were 
 burned in four years (1590-1594). If the Inquisition had exercised 
 the same rigor, it would have burned during the same lapse of time 
 46,500 sorcerers, that is, 11,000 more than the total number of those 
 who, condemned for all kinds of crimes, received capital punishment 
 during the whole time of its existence. This was the alleged excep- 
 tional rigor of the Spanish Inquisition. (On the famous trials for 
 Witchcraft see Hergenrother, Ch. and St., ii., Essay 16, p. 2; D. R. 
 xxx. 331; Birkhauser, Ch. Hist., pp. 473, 722, note; Parsons, vi. 534; 
 Spalding, M. J., Miscell., I., ch. 20; M., July 1902; U. B., July 1896, 
 p. 361; A. C. Q., July 1902. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 487 
 
 none of those bloody revolutions, those conspiracies, and 
 those cruel punishments which were witnessed in the other 
 courts of Europe. . . . Ejngs were not assassinated as in 
 France, and did not perish by the hand of the executioner 
 as in England." ''Look," says Joseph de Maistre, "at the 
 Thirty Years' War enkindled by the arguments of Luther, 
 the unheard-of excesses of the Anabaptists and the Peas- 
 ants; the civil wars of France, England, and Flanders; the 
 massacre of St. Bartholomew, the massacre of Merindol 
 and of Cevennes; the assassination of Mary Stuart, Henry 
 III., Henry IV., Charles I., Prince of Orange, etc. The 
 blood shed by the reformers would float a vessel. The 
 Inquisition, at most, shed only the blood of these murderers. 
 They need not tell us, therefore, that the Inquisition pro- 
 duced this abuse and that abuse; for that is not the ques- 
 tion, but rather whether, during the last three centuries, 
 Spain, in virtue of the Inquisition, did not enjoy more peace 
 and happiness than the other countries of Europe." 
 
 ''The Inquisition has been reproached," says the same 
 writer, "with its darkening influence on the human mind, 
 but the finest period of Spanish hterature was the reign of 
 Philip 11. . . . It is vain to reiterate that genius is chained 
 when forbidden to attack national dogmas; error can never 
 be estabhshed by force of repetition."^ 
 
 Seventh Remark. — We would make a final remark to 
 calm the vain terrors which certain men hke to excite. 
 Though the Church, as we have seen, has an incontestable 
 right to punish heretics, though she used this right when 
 she judged it fitting, yet she is not obliged to use it always, 
 she must even renounce the exercise of it when it becomes 
 impossible or injurious. Thus the Church has in reality 
 long since abandoned it, and the Inquisition remains only 
 as a historical memory and a bugbear in the service of igno- 
 rance and impiety. Those who affect to tremble at the 
 recollection of it have no reason to fear. The secular arm 
 * Robinson, W. C, Philip II. and his Vindication. 
 
4S8 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 is not suspended by the Church above their heads. Would 
 to Heaven CathoHcs were equally secure from the blows of 
 a secular arm of scant tolerance! 
 
 ART. III.— THE TRIAL OF GALILEO.* 
 
 This is another weapon of attack valued by the enemies 
 of the Church, for the reason that, in their opinion, it proves 
 the fallibility of the Church and the Pope, and their opposi- 
 tion to scientific progress. Let us see if the accusation is 
 well founded. 
 
 Historical Notice. — Galileo (1564-1642), a learned astron- 
 omer and distinguished philosopher, was born at Pisa, but 
 Hved at Florence. He adopted at the beginning of the 
 sixteenth century the opinion of the Canon Copernicus 
 (1473-1543), which held that the earth moved around a 
 stationary sun. But while Copernicus was allowed to teach 
 his theory undisturbed, Galileo was indirectly censured the 
 24th of February, 1616, by the Holy Office. 
 
 No book of Galileo is condemned in this censure pro- 
 nounced by the Holy Office, but the Copernican doctrine 
 in regard to the mobility of the earth and the immobility 
 of the sun is declared to be philosophically false, contrary to 
 the teaching of Holy Scripture, and formally heretical. This 
 censure was an act of a private nature in which no one but 
 the consultors of the Roman Congregation were concerned. 
 Therefore it excited no discussion. The following Thursday 
 the Pope, on the report of the Cardinals of the Holy Office, 
 ordered that Galileo be notified of this censure and that 
 he be forbidden to teach the doctrine of the mobility of 
 the earth. The order contains no word of Paul V. which 
 could be construed as qualifying the doctrme; moreover, 
 this again was merely a personal document having nothing 
 
 * Wegg-Prosser ; Parsons, Studies, IV.; Lies, p. 80; A. C. Q. vi. 85; 
 C. W. viii., xlvi. 110; D. R. New Ser. xvi. 351, xvii. 140, III. Ser. ii. 
 236; I. E. R., Apr. 1900. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 489 
 
 in common with an ex cathedra definition. Then followed 
 the decree of the Index of March 5, 1616, which prohibited 
 the hooks written in favor of the system of Copernicus. The 
 Pope's name does not appear in the decree: the Congrega- 
 tion spoke in its own name. No penance or abjuration 
 followed on the part of Galileo, who continued to live in 
 his villa near Florence, enjoying the friendship and favors 
 of Urban VIII. Finally, in 1633 a sentence was issued 
 condemning Galileo to retract what were called his errors. 
 It simply stated the culpability of Galileo and fixed the 
 penalties he was to endure. The decree of 1616 was re- 
 ferred to only as an historical fact. ''The Sacred Congre- 
 gation of the Index," it ran, ''has rendered a decree in which 
 the books which treat of this doctrine were prohibited, and 
 the doctrine itself declared false and contrary to the Scrip- 
 tures.'' There is no trace in it of the public intervention 
 of the sovereign Pontiff, either in qualifying as heretical 
 the heresy attributed to the Copernican system, or in the 
 examination and condemnation of Galileo. 
 
 We see even from this brief statement of the case that 
 the only important decree from a doctrinal point of view is 
 that of March 5, 1616, which attributes to the words of the 
 Bible a meaning which we know now the text does not bear 
 out. What are we to think of this decree? 
 
 I. The Decree of 1616 and the Infallibility op 
 THE Church. 
 
 This question is as simple as it is incontestable: the 
 decree of 1616 is not one of those sentences to which the 
 Church attributes the privilege of infallibihty. In effect: 
 
 1. We have already seen (p. 409) what conditions are 
 necessary to render the doctrinal teaching of the sover- 
 eign Pontiff infallible: he must speak ex cathedra, that is, 
 in the discharge of his office as pastor and doctor 
 of all Christians he must define, in virtue of his supreme 
 
490 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 apostolic authority, that a doctrine concerning faith or 
 morals is to be believed by the whole Church. Now, the in- 
 criminating decree of 1616 lacks the characters required 
 by the Vatican Council: it imposes no adherence to any 
 doctrine, it merely prohibits the hooks which teach the mobility 
 of the earth and the immobility of the sun; nor does it in- 
 sist that the last opinion shall be held as false and the first 
 as true. It prescribes what must be done, not what must 
 be believed. In brief, no doctrine is imposed as of faith 
 upon the whole Church; it is only a disciplinary enactment 
 to prevent the spread of certain books. It is true that the 
 considerations which precede the decree and which express 
 the motive dictating it, contain a doctrinal error; in effect 
 the theory of the movement of the earth is neither false nor 
 contrary to Holy Scripture; but the decision itself does not 
 go beyond a disciplinary enactment. Therefore, even if the 
 decree of 1616 contained an infallible definition of doctrine, 
 the considerations, as we have seen (ibid.), would not neces- 
 sarily partake of this infallibility. 
 
 2. To this decisive proof let us add that the very form 
 of the decree fully confirms what we say. In all the doc- 
 trinal definitions emanating from the Holy See and recog- 
 nized as infallible, the Pope always teaches directly and 
 not through the cardinals. There is not a single example 
 of a doctrinal definition generally recognized as infallible 
 which was rendered in the form of the decree concerning 
 Galileo. 
 
 3. Still another argument of great value is that contem- 
 porary documents prove that the Pope himself and the 
 persons of his court never considered the decree in question 
 an infallible definition. Nor did the theologians of the time 
 or those who followed them: not one can be cited who re- 
 garded this decree as definitive and infallible; a number, 
 on the contrary, could be named who categoricall}^ declared 
 the contrary. Their names and their statements can be 
 found in the works or articles referred to, especially Wegg- 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 491 
 
 Prosser and Parsons. Finally, the idea of regarding the decree 
 as an ex cathedra definition never occurred even to Galileo's 
 bitterest opponents, though such a definition would have 
 afforded them the best means of dealing a decisive blow to 
 his theories. 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. We have no difficulty in acknowledging 
 that the Roman Congregation erred in their much-to-be- 
 regretted condemnation of Galileo; carried away by their 
 extravagant fondness for Aristotle and the philosophic sys- 
 tem of his commentators, they made the mistake of imag- 
 ining that religion was endangered and Holy Scripture con- 
 tradicted by the system of Copernicus. 
 
 It is also true that Pope Urban VII. himself took an active 
 part in this erroneous judgment; but his responsibility is 
 wholly individual, wholly personal: it tells against the 
 scholar, the private theologian, but not against the sov- 
 ereign Pontiff speaking ex cathedra, that is, as sovereign 
 teacher of the universal Church. In fact all that theology 
 requires to constitute an ex cathedra decree is altogether 
 lacking here : the Pope not only made no solemn declaration, 
 but no bull, no encyclical, nor even a brief of the Holy Father 
 accompanied the sentence of the Holy Office of the Congre- 
 gation of the Index; nor was any confirmation or signature 
 asked of the sovereign Pontiff. And even such confirma- 
 tion would not be sufficient to pledge his infalfibihty. 
 
 2d. Though the system of Copernicus was true, Gahleo 
 did not know how to defend it, and it is not astonishing that 
 the weak arguments with which he tried to estabhsh his 
 theory excited violent contradiction. Moreover, if eccle- 
 siastical tribunals were deceived, scholars could not boast 
 of greater perspicacity, for numbers of them fell into the 
 same error, and, what is more, desired and urged the con- 
 demnation of Galileo. Hence science was no less at fault 
 than theology. We might add that Luther, Melanchthon, 
 and the reformers generally showed no more tolerance for 
 the new system. 
 
492 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 3d. If Galileo after his condemnation of 1616 had been more 
 prudent and less aggressive/ he would not have received a 
 second condemnation in 1633, and it is probable that the 
 system of Copernicus would soon have become popular, 
 for it had as partisans and defenders among the clergy a 
 number of renowned scholars. Unfortunately he had not 
 patience to trust the inevitable triumph of his ideas to time, 
 and he wrote a new work entitled '' Dialogues on the Two 
 Systems of the World, " in which he attacked those among 
 his adversaries who had been most indulgent toward him. 
 The Pope, particularly, believed himself insulted in the 
 ridiculous character of Simplicio. The partisans of the 
 Ptolemaic system, incensed by Galileo's conduct, asked and 
 obtained a new condemnation, which, however, did not 
 receive, any more than that of 1616, the authentic or public 
 confirmation of the sovereign Pontiff. 
 
 4th. No Cathohc attributes the privilege of infahibihty to 
 the Roman Congregations. They are subject to err, no 
 doubt; but this is not to say that they have no authority 
 and that their decrees may be defied. The father of a family 
 also may be mistaken, but he does not on that account lose 
 his right to the obedience of his children. Instituted to 
 examine doctrinal questions, and to watch over the purity 
 of the faith, these congregations have the right to forbid 
 the teaching of certain doctrines considered by them as 
 erroneous, suspicious, or dangerous. Such prohibition is 
 a measure of prudence, and is binding upon Catholics; at 
 the same time it is essentially provisory in its nature. If, 
 therefore, it is proved later that the danger does not exist, 
 or that it has ceased, the prohibition will be removed, or 
 cease of itself to exist for lack of cause. 
 
 Conclusion. — It is manifestly evident from the facts stated 
 
 above that the infallibility of the Church does not enter into 
 
 the questions of Galileo's condemnation; we have reason, 
 
 on the contrary, to recognize in it the providential assistance 
 
 * Dr. Whewell, History of Inductive Science, vol. i., p. 420. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 493 
 
 promised to the Church, when we consider that though nu- 
 merous theologians and possibly the Pope himself regarded 
 the Copernican system as contrary to the Holy Scripture, 
 God did not permit the head of the Church to pronounce 
 against it a judgment ex cathedra. 
 
 II. Was Galileo a Martyr to Science? 
 
 This second point is much less important than the first. 
 It implies both a question of principle and one of fact: is 
 the Church opposed to science, and did Galileo have to suffer 
 for his scientific conviction ? 
 
 1. So far from being opposed to the progress of science, 
 the Church has always stimulated intellectual activity; 
 she has always favored philosophy, belles-lettres, the sciences, 
 and the arts. This we have already proved, and we dem- 
 onstrate it still further in Chapter V. 
 
 In regard to the systematic and malicious opposition to 
 the progress of natural science attributed to the clergy at the 
 time of Galileo, it is clearly denied by the striking testimony 
 of the sympathy and protection then accorded to scientific 
 studies at Rome; by the remarkable labors of the Jesuits 
 Clavius, Griemberger, Guldin, Scheiner, Grimaldi, Riccioli; 
 of the canons or monks, hke Copernicus, Castelli, Renieri, 
 Cavaheri, Gassendi, and by the enthusiastic reception which 
 the discoveries of Galileo met with in the highest circles 
 of Rome ; by his intimacy and active correspondence with a 
 number of prelates such as Cardinals Barberini and Conti, 
 Mgr. Dini, Mgr. Ciampoli, the Archbishop Piccolomini, 
 Mgr. Virginio Cesarini. 
 
 Morover, the system of Aristarchus of Samos (third century 
 before Christ), which held that the earth revolved about the 
 sun, was freely taught without any protest on the part of the 
 Church. In 1435 Cardinal Cusa revived this system; then 
 Canon Copernicus in his immortal work Be orbium codestium 
 
494 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 revolutionihus had completely transformed it and applied it to 
 the discussion of heavenly appearances; his work had ob- 
 tained the support of Cardinal Schomberg and the approba- 
 tion of Pope Paul III. ; the new doctrine was taught in the 
 Italian schools and professed before the sovereign Pontiff 
 Clement VII., and no authorized protest was ever heard 
 within the Church. 
 
 2. To stimulate the hatred of the opponents of religion 
 an attempt has been made to represent Galileo as a martyr to 
 science, thrust into a dark dungeon and delivered up to the 
 horrors of torture. The truth is that from 1616 to 1633 he 
 peacefully continued his labors at Florence, where he wrote 
 the works we have mentioned. In regard to the period of 
 the second trial, it was proved by the testimony of all con- 
 temporaries most worthy of belief, as well as by the cor- 
 respondence of Gahleo himself, and the written proceedings 
 of the trial of 1633, that he not only was not tortured and 
 was not a martyr to science, but that, strictly speaking, he 
 was never imprisoned or deprived of his liberty either 
 before or after his sentence. ''We defy the most fanatical," 
 says M. Gilbert in La Revue des Questions scienti^ques (1877), 
 ''to state when and where, during or after his trial, Gahleo 
 endured an hour's detention in a real prison." While his 
 trial was pending he Hved at the palace of Nicohni, the Tuscan 
 ambassador, his devoted friend, who overwhelmed him with 
 attention ; on the eve of his examination he was taken to the 
 Minerva, where he remained from the 12th to the 13th of April, 
 1633, in the apartments of the judge-advocate of the Holy 
 Office, with permission "to wander in the vast chambers," 
 as Gahleo himself writes, and had the services not only 
 of his own servant, but of those of the ambassador. "As to 
 my health, I am well, thanks to God and the deUcate atten- 
 tion of the ambassador and his wife, who are most attentive 
 in affording me every comfort." Having fallen ill, he was 
 sent back by order of Pope Urban VIII. to the palace of the 
 ambassador, where he was allowed to receive his friends, 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 495 
 
 and to go and come as he pleased. He remained in this 
 brilliant prison until June 22d, the day of his condemnation. 
 By the judicial sentence he was to be detained at the apart- 
 ments of the fiscal of the Holy Office ; but the next day this 
 detention was changed to retirement at the palace of the 
 Grand Duke of Tuscany. Later, after a sojourn with his 
 devoted friend the Archbishop of Sienna, Gahleo passed the 
 rest of his Hfe at his own villa at Arcetri, which had been 
 assigned him for his permanent residence. Here he con- 
 tinued his scientific work and received the visits of the 
 learned and prominent persons of his time. He died in 
 1642, having drawn to the last day of his hfe the pension 
 allowed him by the Pope in 1630. 
 
 3. In regard to the torture which, it is claimed, was in- 
 fficted upon the illustrious astronomer, no confirmation of it 
 is found in the authentic and complete records published 
 by M. de TEpinois, which give the fullest details of the 
 trial. ''Never did Gahleo in letters to his most intimate 
 correspondents ever write a line from which it could be 
 inferred that he was subjected to torture. It is true that 
 in his final examination the learned Florentine was menaced 
 with torture, but it is equally certain that the menace was, 
 and could be, only a mere formahty." The inquisitorial 
 proceeding did not allow the actual use of the torture in 
 the case of old men and the sick. Now Gahleo was sixty- 
 nine years old and suffering from grave sickness. He 
 himself declares in a letter of 1634 that ' ' he suffered nothing 
 in his hfe or honor." See M. Gilbert's article already 
 quoted. 
 
 It was only about 1770, that is, one hundred and forty years 
 after the trial, that Itahan writers began to circulate the 
 report that Gahleo was put to the torture, acknowledging 
 at the same time that it was improbable. Now that we 
 possess the official documents of the trial, such a calumny 
 is absolutely untenable; hence it is never cited by reliable 
 writers, whatever the school to which they belong. We 
 
496 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 cannot hope, however, to see it disappear from the writings 
 hostile to rehgion.^ 
 
 Let us observe in passing that the famous e pur si muove, 
 ''nevertheless it moves," attributed to Galileo as he rose 
 from his knees after his abjuration, is a pure invention. For 
 the rest this story began to circulate only at the end of the 
 last century. Writers will continue nevertheless to quote 
 it as true, because of its fine effect in a romance or play. 
 
 Conclusion. — The enemies of the Church must be very 
 poor in arguments against her to repeat constantly this oft- 
 refuted error of an ecclesiastic tribunal. The error, unique in 
 its kind, was shared by a number of scholars, and is readily 
 explained by the circumstances of the times in which it 
 occurred. Their persistent use of this question, more than 
 two hundred years old, as a powerful weapon against the 
 Church, is all the more singular since Gahleo himself, to 
 whose opinion a number of cardinals and priests rallied, 
 was not an apostate, not a free-thinker, but a sincere and 
 honest Catholic; the rudest trials failed to shake his faith, 
 and he died piously in the bosom of the Catholic Church. 
 
 ART. IV.— THE MASSACRE OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW AND 
 THE REVOCATION OF THE EDICT OF NANTES. 
 
 1. Historical Notice. — In 1572, on the eve of the feast 
 of St. Bartholomew,^ Charles IX., yielding to the insistence 
 of Catharine de Medici, his mother, gave order for the 
 massacre of Admiral Cohgny and the other Huguenot 
 leaders hving in Paris or who had recently come to assist 
 at the marriage of the King of Navarre with Margaret of 
 Valois. The populace of Paris had long regarded the Hu- 
 
 * On Giordano Bruno, another so-called martyr of science, see 
 J. Mooney, Who was G. B.?; A. C. Q. xiv. 716; k. Ixvi. 357, Ixxv. 
 527; Parsons, Studies, III., ch. 31; Lies, p. 33. 
 
 2 Parsons, Lies, p. 221; Studies, III., ch. 23; Laughnan, S.J. (C. T. S. 
 xvii., XX.); C. W. viii., xli. 813, xlii. 254; M. Ixxvii. 175; D. R. 
 New Ser. iv. 281. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 497 
 
 guenots with hatred; they had not forgotten the promise 
 of the pillage of the capital made by the reformers to the 
 crafty followers recruited in Germany. Thus, when excited 
 by the sight of the blood shed on this memorable night by 
 the emissaries of the king, they rose in their turn, and venting 
 their rage upon the Protestants, put them to the sword before 
 any authority could quell their violence or arrest the carnage. 
 From the 25th of August to the 30th of October similar 
 massacres took place in several other cities of the kingdom. 
 
 We have no need to examine this event here from a his- 
 torical point of view. We shall find it most carefully treated 
 in M. Kervyn's beautiful work, Les Huguenots et les Gueux. 
 The minute researches of this historian, who advances noth- 
 ing which is not supported by authentic documents, throws 
 great Hght on this terrible drama. Our duty is to demon- 
 strate that there is not the shadow of foundation for hold- 
 ing religion responsible for this event. If there ever was 
 anything clearly demonstrated by the most incontestable 
 documents, it is that the St. Bartholomew massacre was a 
 purely political event ; religion had no part in it, neither was 
 it the agent or pretext, nor did it counsel it. No cardinal, 
 no bishop, no priest took part in the dehberations concerning 
 the massacre, any more than in its execution. 
 
 It is true that at the news of this terrible stroke of state 
 policy Gregory XIII. had solemn thanksgiving offered to 
 God, went in procession to the churches of St. Mark and 
 St. Louis, and had a medal struck commemorative of the 
 occasion. But we know what was the real and only object 
 of this demonstration : the court of Valois sent word to the 
 Pope that a terrible conspiracy against the throne had been 
 happily discovered and frustrated. Similar notices were 
 sent to the provinces of the kingdom and to all the Christian 
 courts. Later, when the whole truth was known, the sov- 
 ereign Pontiff in his discourses and in his bulls publicly 
 manifested his horror at the crime which had been perpe- 
 trated. 
 
498 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 We cannot hope, however, to see the enemies of the Church 
 rehnquish this weapon. Despite the refutations of learned 
 Protestants themselves, they persist in affirming that the 
 ministers of Catharine de Medici's vengeance were animated 
 by religious hatred; and the better to excite the passions 
 they continue, with Voltaire and a celebrated modern opera, 
 to mingle crucifixes with poignards, and to represent the 
 cardinal Charles de Lorraine, who was in Rome at the time, 
 as blessing in Paris the poignards destined for the massacre. 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. It may be well to observe that the number 
 of victims in the massacre has been singularly exaggerated. 
 It is impossible to get at the exact truth on this point: the 
 figures of the historians differ, but it has been estabhshed as 
 very probable that the number of victims did not exceed two 
 thousand — an enormous figure, no doubt, but considerably 
 less than the thirty thousand quoted by certain authors, and 
 particularly the one hundred thousand hazarded by Pere- 
 fixe. What confidence, moreover, can be placed in accounts 
 where palpable contradictions meet one at every step? The 
 Marty rology published by the Calvinists in 1582 speaks of 
 15,168 victims, but names only 786. Yet the author had 
 every reason to magnify this number; he wrote, moreover, 
 at a time when the crime was fresh and vivid in all minds; 
 and as his list contains only names of very little importance, 
 we may beheve that he gathered every item that could 
 increase the number of the martyrs and swell the volume 
 of the martyrology. 
 
 2d. Nor is there any proof that the massacre had been long 
 premeditated; the contrary seems to be well estabhshed. 
 M. Kervyn de Lettenhove sums up his opinion on the sub- 
 ject as follows: "That Catharine de Medici carefully pre- 
 pared the assassination of Coligny there is no possible doubt; 
 no doubt she secretly desired to be rid of all those whom, 
 she thought, she had any reason to fear, and particularly 
 the Huguenots, who at this time gave her much anxiety. 
 According to her own expression she desired to profit by 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 499 
 
 a favorable occasion, del caso. All contemporary testimony 
 disproves the existence of premeditation in the massacre 
 of St. Bartholomew, which, in face of an execrable conspiracy, 
 was only a defence which, though still more execrable, was 
 judged necessary. " (t. II. ch. xxxii.) 
 
 The historian concludes the same chapter thus: "Such 
 was this bloody day of St. Bartholomew, which, though 
 studied at times inaccurately as regards its causes and 
 its phases, adds a new blot, more odious than all the others, 
 to the ambition and craft of Catharine de Medici. In a 
 few hours the Huguenots, from the role of conspirators 
 passed as victims into history, and the queen mother, at a 
 time when she had every lawful weapon at hand, chose to 
 use those which will dishonor her memory forever.'' 
 
 2. The Revocation of the Edict of Nantes by Louis 
 XIV. has also become a theme of denunciations and accu- 
 sations; absurd as they are, they impress the ignorant, and 
 pass from mouth to mouth without examination. The 
 principles previously established in regard to the relations 
 which should exist between Church and State, and the facts 
 attested by impartial history, completely refute them, how- 
 ever.^ 
 
 Historical Notice. — Henry IV. by his edict of 1598 
 had granted the Huguenots not only liberty of conscience, 
 but also much liberty of worship and great privileges. Thus 
 he stipulated that they should be ehgible to all civil offices 
 and employments in the kingdom; that a sum of one 
 hundred and forty thousand pounds should be paid annually 
 for the maintenance of the ministers of the reformed re- 
 ligion ; that all the places, cities, and palaces, to the number 
 of 121, occupied by the Huguenots should be protected by a 
 guard of their own adherents, and the garrison paid by the 
 
 * Parsons, IV., ch. 11; Spalding, J. M., History of the Reforma- 
 tion, II., ch. 8; Stang, More about the Huguenots; Laughnan, S.J. 
 (C.T.S. XX., and in M. Ixxvi. 70, 234); A. C. Q. xix. 273; D. R., 
 July 1893, p. 599, Oct. 1894, p. 358; C. W., April 1898. 
 
500 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 king. This was nothing less, as Henry IV. himself said to 
 Sully, than the creation of a republican State in the heart 
 of France. By an edict of the 22d of October, 1685, Louis 
 XIV. revoked the former edict granting liberty of worship and 
 the privileges above named, leaving the Huguenots liberty 
 of conscience. 
 
 Let us observe, especially in the present case, that there is a 
 notable difference between these two expressions. Conscience 
 is something wholly interior, which necessarily escapes all ex- 
 terior opposition, wliile worship means something exterior and 
 sensible. When a sect is granted liberty of conscience only, 
 it is not allowed to hold assembhes, or pubhc worship, or 
 to proselyte. Its adherents are simply allowed to live in 
 peace in the country without suffering any inconvenience 
 because of their religious opinion and without being obliged 
 to take part in any other worship. Freedom of worship 
 means more: it permits the pubhc profession and practice 
 of any form of worship, as well as the organization of its 
 clergy, ceremonies, and rehgious practices. 
 
 Was the edict of 1685 lawful? Was it opportune? What 
 must we think of its execution and its results? 
 
 A. The lawfulness of the edict of Louis XIV. is easily 
 demonstrated. In fact the Edict of Nantes, 'even though we 
 regard it as a compact, properly speaking was by no means 
 an irrevocable compact. Even the Protestant Grotius 
 acknowledges this. ''The so-called reformers," he says, 
 ''should understand that these acts of tolerance are not 
 treaties, but royal edicts issued for the general good, and 
 revocable when the king judges fitting for the same general 
 good." Louis XIV. therefore had a right to revoke the 
 edict of his predecessors. 
 
 B. Whether this measure was opportune or not is an 
 historical question which, strictly speaking, does not belong 
 to our subject. But we shall make a few remarks upon it. 
 
 When we study attentively the condition of France and the 
 position of the king in 1598, we ask ourselves if Henry IV. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 501 
 
 can be blamed for the course he pursued. By means of his 
 second edict he restored peace to the kingdom and re-estab- 
 lished order throughout the land. We know, moreover, that 
 it was his intention to withdraw by degrees the clauses of the 
 former edict which created a State within a State. Louis XIII., 
 Richeheu, and Louis XIV. (before 1685) carried out the in- 
 tentions of Henry IV. By skilful and successive measures 
 they gradually reduced the liberty accorded to sectarians, 
 so that in 1685 the complete revocation of the edict was 
 effected without difficulty: the fruit was ripe and naturally 
 fell from the tree. 
 
 The revocation was a long-foreseen event, for which the 
 pubhc mind was prepared, hence it excited no serious opposi- 
 tion. Moreover, the conduct of the Huguenots abundantly 
 justified rigorous measures. Revolting against the State 
 after they had revolted against the Church, they were guilty 
 of numerous profanations. They went about destroying 
 crucifixes and images, burning churches and convents, and 
 thus excited against them the nation which was profoundly 
 CathoUc. ''These outrages, which were the chief features of 
 the Reformation, were also," says M. de Noailles, ''one of the 
 chief causes of the aversion which it inspired." Then the 
 danger threatened in Protestant doctrine, the insurrections 
 it excited in Germany, the seditious character which the 
 Huguenot meetings soon assumed, excited the Parliament 
 and authority more and more against them. Moreover, 
 three rebellions in less than ten years, and based upon 
 frivolous pretexts, were more than sufficient to open the 
 eyes of the bhndest to the dangerous character of these 
 heretics. 
 
 The act of Louis XIV., therefore, was not sudden and 
 unforeseen, but systematically planned and carried out, the 
 state of pubhc opinion helping him not a little to make 
 this decision. "The revocation of the Edict of Nantes," 
 according to Capefigue, "was a patient work, developed with 
 special care and prudence." See his Histoire de Louis XIV,, 
 
502 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ch. xxiv., which contains the plan and intentions of the king 
 as he himself wrote them. 
 
 C. What are we to think of the execution and the results 
 of that revocation ? 
 
 a. In regard to the first point, impartial writers generally 
 agree in censuring some of the measures adopted; they 
 acknowledge nevertheless that the king can be held respon- 
 sible for them only in as far as he trusted to agents who 
 deviated from his formal intentions. As to the clergy, 
 their share in the revocation consisted in the gentle measures 
 which accompanied its execution. 
 
 A truly deplorable effect of the edict of Louis XIV. which 
 ought to be mentioned was the hypocrisy and dissimulation 
 of Protestant families whose assumed CathoHcism was purely 
 exterior and compulsory. Their opposition to rehgion and 
 the State, though silent and passive at first, contribuxed 
 later in the eighteenth century to the triumph of an infidel 
 philosophy. It was particularly from 1685 that hbertines or 
 free-thinkers, conspiring with secret Protestants and Jan- 
 senists, began the fierce war which ended in the suppression 
 of the Jesuits and the outbreak of the French Revolution. 
 
 h. As to the material results of this revocation, it would be 
 difficult to appreciate them ; we have no accurate estimate of 
 the losses occasioned by the withdrawal of a certain number 
 of French subjects who abandoned their country. The 
 figures quoted later are manifestly exaggerated. Moreover, 
 the losses occasioned by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes 
 cannot be compared to the enormous losses in money and 
 human hfe which the Huguenots cost France. 
 
 Here also we would brand the shameless partiahty, bad 
 faith, and hypocrisy of a certain class of writers always 
 hostile to the Church. Certainly the governments of Ger- 
 many, of Switzerland, of Italy, following the example of the 
 sixteenth century, have in our day subjected Catholics to 
 the most cruel treatment. Yet these have never claimed, 
 like the Calvinists. to be a State within a State, nor have 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 503 
 
 they ever attempted to claim their rights with armed force. 
 On the contrary, they have always given, and still give, an 
 example of most complete submission to the laws. Why, 
 then, are they persecuted? Why are thousands of priests 
 and religious men and women expelled from their country? 
 Why? Simply because they are Roman CathoHcs. Now, do 
 we find one writer among free-thinkers, these vaunted ad- 
 vocates of Hberty, protesting against these outrages? No; 
 they prefer to reserve their denunciations for Louis XIV. 
 and the Inquisition. The motive which inspires them is only 
 too palpable. 
 
 ART. v.— CRUSADES AND SO-CALLED RELIGIOUS WARS. 
 
 1. We might refrain from treating this question of the 
 Crusades.^ We have only to read an impartial history to 
 find the justification of these warhke expeditions which 
 exhibit Christian society in all the splendor of rehgious 
 heroism. Let us observe, however, that the end or motive 
 of the Crusades was perfectly just, and that, so far from 
 having the disastrous effects sometimes attributed to them, 
 they were productive of the happiest results. 
 
 A. The Crusades had an end which was just, generous, and 
 civihzing. Mohammed had inspired his followers with the 
 ardor of proselytizing by the sword. Their fanaticism had 
 conquered Spain and, though arrested by the vaHant sword 
 of Charles Martel, meditated the conquest of the East and 
 the destruction of civilization. The Emperors of Constan- 
 tinople appealed to the Christians of the East to protect the 
 last bulwark of Europe, and the Church added her exhortation 
 to this pressing appeal. After Sylvester II. and Sergius IV. 
 had made a generous appeal in behalf of the Christians 
 
 * * Michaud, History of the Crusades ; * Ardier and Kingsford, The 
 Crusades; Parsons, Studies, 11. , ch. 18; Lies, p. 286; Alzog's History of 
 the Church, II., pp. 610, 611 ; Balmes, ch. 42; Spalding, J. M., Miscell., 
 ch. 7; A. C. Q. Jan. 1903; M. Aug. 1898. 
 
504 CHEISl^IAN AJ>OlOGE11CS. 
 
 of the Holy Land, St. Gregory VII. wrote to the Emperor in 
 1074: ''The Christians beyond the sea who are suffering 
 unheard-of outrages, and are daily massacred like sheep, 
 have sent to me in their great need, beseeching me to help 
 our brethren by every means in my power in order that the 
 Christian religion may not, God forbid, be completely anni- 
 hilated in our time.'^ 
 
 In answering the appeal made by Urban II. and Peter the 
 Hermit in the Council of Clermont (1095) the Christian 
 princes felt confident they were obeying the will of God. 
 Hitherto they had only defended themselves; now they 
 decided to carry the war into the heart of Islamism, which 
 it was their right and their duty to do, for all the religious and 
 social rights of European nations were threatened by the 
 Mohammedans. Was Europe to await quietly the shame 
 and scourge of slavery; was every Christian nation to allow 
 itself to be oppressed, instead of forming with all the others 
 a holy league against the enemies of the cross? ''When we 
 blame these enterprises," says the learned de Guignes in the 
 Mimoires de VAcademie des inscriptions et des belles-lettres 
 (t. Ixviii.), "it is because we have not sufficiently reflected 
 upon the state of the times. The Mussulmans had taken 
 possession of Syria, and had made themselves masters of 
 Africa, of Spain, and of all the islands of the Mediterranean, 
 whence they continually insulted the inhabitants on the 
 shores of Italy. Through Spain and Corsica they entered and 
 ravaged the southern provinces, and pillaged all the vessels 
 they encountered. Constantinople was a powerful barrier to 
 them; should they succeed in their attempt against it, all 
 Europe would be endangered and run the risk of falling into 
 their power. Attacking them in the centre of their empire 
 would reduce their strength and deal them a blow from which 
 they could never recover.'' 
 
 B. The Crusades, it is true, did not completely accomphsh 
 the end for which they were undertaken, but we may say with 
 Count de Maistre, " Though each one failed, yet all succeeded/' 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 505 
 
 To judge these vast enterprises we must take them as a 
 whole, without stopping at the abuses and faults which are 
 the result of human passions, and which are to be found in all 
 wars. Mgr. Pie, in the panegyric on St. Louis, enumerates 
 among the happy results of the Crusades: 
 
 1st. The Moslem conquest of Constantinople and the sub- 
 jugation of the East retarded four hundred years. 
 
 2d. The saving of the West and of Christian civilization 
 from the brutalizing rule of Islamism. The Ottoman power, 
 which for centuries threatened to swallow up everything, 
 was so weakened and received such a mortal blow that it 
 continued to exist only through the indulgence of Christianity. 
 
 3d. The people of Europe were delivered from the evils 
 which they brought upon themselves by the dissension and 
 incessant wars of prince with prince, lord with lord, city with 
 city. The passion for combats with which the knights were 
 filled found noble vent: ceasing to fight among themselves. 
 Christian warriors imited their efforts against the common 
 enemy. 
 
 4th. The condition of the people was improved; serfs 
 and vassals were freed by thousands; the commons acquired 
 rights and privileges which curbed the arbitrary and tyrannical 
 power of the lords. 
 
 5th. Agriculture, science, and the arts also reaped great 
 advantages. Who does not know that these expeditions 
 paved the way for the beautiful age of Leo X. and Louis XIV.? 
 
 6th. They were likewise productive of much spiritual good. 
 ''Can the Christian," exclaims Mgr. Pie, ''confine his gaze to 
 the present and forget the grand horizon which opens be- 
 yond the tomb? Ah! what matters it to me, a man of the 
 next life, what matters it to me that the Crusades are judged 
 wrong according to the cold and tardy computations of our 
 modem calculators, when the holy Abbot of Clairvaux 
 assures me that he learned from Heaven that this employment 
 of the mammon of iniquity secured to thousands of French- 
 men the imperishable treasures of supreme beatitude? 
 
506 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 The losses of the terrestrial country were soon forgotten, and 
 the heavenly country was enriched forever. Men of time, 
 you speak to me of numbers; and I, a priest of eternity, I 
 know but one number which interests me and which is 
 worthy of my attention, the eternal number of the elect." 
 
 All these advantages largely compensated for the checks 
 which the Crusaders suffered in consequence of dissensions 
 and rivalries among themselves and the perfidy of the 
 Greeks. 
 
 2. The name of religious wars is given specially to the 
 struggles between Catholics and Protestants during the latter 
 half of the sixteenth century. Among the most noted was 
 the first, which began with the massacre of Vassy (1562), 
 and the third, which terminated by the conversion of Henry 
 IV. and the Edict of Nantes. The same name is also apphed 
 to the wars of 1625 and 1626, under Louis XIII. ; and the war 
 of the Cevennes, or Camisards, under Louis XIV. They have 
 all served as a theme of denunciation for Protestants and 
 unbehevers, yet nothing is easier than to justify the Church 
 in regard to them. 
 
 1st. She has never admitted the Mohammedan principle 
 of imposing her doctrine by force. She has been content to 
 protect her rights acquired either over the society which she 
 formed, or the individuals who had sworn allegiance to her. 
 
 2d. The wars of religion from the thirteenth century have 
 been the work of heresy and its revolts against the constituent 
 principles of society. Heretics, not content with waging a 
 war of words, committed the most barbarous outrages upon 
 the property and persons of individuals; they were enemies 
 of order and civilization, whom rulers were obliged to sup- 
 press and chastise by force of arms. 
 
 3d. It is to be regretted that in these just and necessary 
 wars carried on by CathoHc princes there were at times cruel 
 reprisals, yet they could hardly have been prevented. It 
 would, however, be most unjust to attribute these excesses 
 to the Church, whose spirit is directly opposed to them. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 507 
 
 4th. Let us add with Montesquieu: ''It is arguing unfairly 
 against religion to enumerate all the evils it has produced 
 (or, rather, of which it has been the occasion or pretext), 
 without considering all the good it has effected; if I were to 
 relate all the evils caused by monarchies, by civil laws, by 
 republican governments, I should relate terrible things. '^ 
 
 If these arguments so often used against religion were 
 sound, we should be logically forced to condemn and to 
 destroy all institutions — royalty, civil government, military 
 institutions, and society itself. We cannot read the history 
 of any age without finding a series of crimes which fill us with 
 horror, of dissensions and civil wars which filled the world 
 with bloodshed. Even at the present day, despite our 
 advanced civilization, blood still flows on battle-fields. Would 
 it be logical to conclude that society must be abolished and 
 that it would be preferable for men to betake themselves 
 to the forest and live there like animals? Yet this is the 
 conclusion forced upon us when we close our eyes to the good 
 results of an institution excellent in its nature, to consider 
 only the abuses of which it may he capable. Such is not the 
 logic of a reasoning man : in considering the wars occasioned 
 by religion he pities humanity capable of abusing all that 
 is most sacred; but he is far from forgetting the innumer- 
 able and eminent benefits this humanity reaps from religion, 
 and the virtue it teaches man to practise. 
 
 ART. VI.— THE PAPAL POWER OVER TEMPORAL RULERS 
 IN THE MIDDLE AGES. 
 
 We know that in the Middle Ages the Pope was universally 
 regarded as the head of the Christian family, and acted 
 
 * Gosselin; Murphy, 1. c, ch. 9-20; Hergenrother, Catholic Church 
 and Christian State, vol. i., Essays 6-12; Manning, Vatican Decrees, 
 ch. 2; Kenrick, Primacy, ch. 15 ff.; Parsons; Studies, II., ch. 15; 
 Spalding, J. M., Miscell., Essay 8; Wiseman, Essays, vol. v. (on 
 Boniface VIII.) ; A. C. Q. xiv. 410, xv. 734; D. R. New Ser. xvi. 368; 
 M. Ixx. 24. Yorke-Wendtke, Discussion, pt. II. ; Br. W.xii.,xiii., passim. 
 
608 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 accordingly: he summoned sovereigns and their subjects 
 before his tribunals, decided disputes between kings, imposed 
 spiritual penalties upon scandalous and obstinate princes, 
 deprived of their dignities and their rights those who per- 
 sisted in their disorders. 
 
 As there is question of the heads of the Catholic Church, 
 their conduct evidently cannot escape the criticism of the 
 enemies of the Church; let us see what we must think of it. 
 
 I. The Power Exercised by the Popes in the Middle 
 Ages over Temporal Princes was Perfectly Lawful. 
 
 1. This power was founded on legislation, or the public 
 law of the time, that is, upon political constitutions which Chris- 
 tian peoples, their general assemblies, or their rulers, had 
 freely established. The Pope was then regarded by princes 
 and peoples as the natural head and the common father of 
 Christianity. It is not astonishing, then, that they acknowl- 
 edged his right to decide differences, to bring back the recal- 
 citrant to their duties, and to constrain the perverse and 
 obstinate by excommunicating or deposing them. 
 
 2. Most of the monarchies of the Middle Ages were both 
 elective and hereditary ; this was notably the case in France, 
 England, and Spain. Usually a member of the reigning 
 family was chosen ; but the son himself, to succeed the father, 
 had to be recognized by the national assembly. We can 
 readily understand that these assemblies imposed on the 
 sovereign elected conditions to which he pledged himself. 
 One condition was fidelity to the Cathohc faith, and it was 
 stipulated that if the prince deviated from it or persecuted 
 it, he lost his power. 
 
 3. Many princes, moreover, rendered homage for their 
 crown to the see of Peter, voluntarily placing in subjection 
 to it their States in the character of fiefs, and acknowledging 
 themselves its vassals.^ Of this number were John Lack- 
 
 * Hergenrother, 1. c, vol. ii., Essay 10. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 509 
 
 land, King of England (1213), Robert Guiscard of Naples 
 (1053), Roger II. of Sicily (1130), Peter II. of Aragon. St. 
 Stephen, King of Hungary, had also in the year 1000 
 offered homage for his kingdom, and Godfrey of Bouillon 
 for the kingdom of Jerusalem. In virtue of these acts the 
 Pope had over all these States the ordinary rights of a 
 suzerain, or paramount lord, over his vassals. We know 
 that feudal right conferred upon the suzerain the right to 
 punish the felony of a vassal who failed in any of his obh- 
 gations: he could take his fief from him or give the investi- 
 ture of it to another. The formula of the oaths taken by 
 the vassals of the Holy See, moreover, attest the existence 
 of this right in the sovereign Pontiff. Let us remark, in 
 passing, that the Pope never used this right by taking to 
 himself either the whole or a part of the States of a vassal 
 guilty of felony. 
 
 Remarks.— 1st. To judge the Middle Ages by the ideas 
 which prevailed after the Protestant Reformation, and partic- 
 ularly after the peace of Westphaha, when equal rights were 
 granted to the various Christian communities, would be to 
 commit a deplorable and absurd anachronism. ''AH Chris- 
 tians," says the learned Cardinal Hergenrother in his " Catholic 
 Church and Christian State," " formed in the Middle Ages but 
 one family. The head, the father, required for this family 
 was supplied by him whom all nations honored as common 
 father, the vicar of God, the successor of St. Peter, the 
 representative of Jesus Christ, to whom was confided the 
 power to feed the lambs and the sheep." "By entering the 
 Church," writes Canon Moulart, professor in the University 
 of Louvain; ''by taking Christianity as the religion of the 
 State itself; by recognizing in the end of religion the supreme 
 and sole end of all society composed of mankind; by making, 
 as a natural consequence of these premises, their laws in 
 harmony with supernatural dogmas and morals, the nations 
 of Europe attained a veritable union based upon a complete 
 uniformity of ideas, interests, tendencies, and legislation; 
 
610 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 and they thus formed Christendom." In this author's 
 beautiful work the question of the indirect temporal power 
 of the Pope is very fully treated {UEglise et VEtat). 
 
 The ceremonies which took place at the consecration of 
 the Emperor of the West show us the ideas of the time. The 
 Pope warned the Emperor that he received his power in order 
 to govern his subjects and to protect the true Church of God. 
 To these words the Emperor replied with the following oath : 
 '' 1, King of the Romans, by the grace of God future emperor, 
 do promise and swear before God and St. Peter to be 
 henceforth the protector and defender of the sovereign Pon- 
 tiff of the Holy Roman Church in all its necessities and 
 needs; I will guard and protect all its possessions, respect its 
 rights to the best of my power and knowledge, with the 
 assistance of God, in good and pure faith. So help me God 
 and the holy Gospels." 
 
 The tenor of this oath perfectly explains the language of 
 the vassals of Henry IV. at the time of his quarrel with 
 Gregory VII. or Hildebrand. They wrote the Emperor that 
 they had sworn allegiance to him, but on condition that he 
 should be king for the edification and not for the destruction 
 of the Church of God; on condition that he should govern 
 according to the laws of justice respecting the property and 
 the rights of all. They added that since he had been the 
 first to violate the compact, they were released from their 
 oath of allegiance. These words of the lords clearly mani- 
 fest the opinion of contemporaries in regard to the constitu- 
 tion of the empire. 
 
 2d. It may be asked if, as a number of authors say, the 
 power of the Popes in the Middle Ages had not still another 
 foundation than that which we have just indicated, whether 
 it was not also in virtue of the divine right proper to them 
 that the sovereign Pontiff frequently interfered in affairs 
 of State? This is a question concerning which there is much 
 controversy and upon which theologians differ. We cannot 
 give to the examination of this question, much less important 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 511 
 
 moreover, the developments it requires. Let us be satisfied 
 mth saying a few words on the subject. According to the 
 teaching of theology, the Pope, who has received from God 
 a direct power over spiritual things, they being his proper 
 domain, has received at the same time an indirect power over 
 temporal things, that is, as far as is necessary to the Church, 
 in order that she may fulfil her mission. But there is a great 
 variety of opinion as to what this indirect power consists of. 
 No doubt all theologians recognize the directive power of 
 the Pope: that it belongs to him to interpret authentically 
 the natural law and the divine law; to enlighten and direct 
 by his doctrinal decisions the consciences of princes and 
 Christian nations; to judge the morality of their acts, and 
 to inflict ecclesiastical penalties upon the guilty. But as to 
 whether he may go further — for example, depose monarchs 
 or rulers, release subjects from their oath of allegiance — 
 opinions are divided, and the Church has given no decision.^ 
 Bellarmin, for example, sustains that he can. Others, like 
 Bianchi and Gousset, say that the sovereign Pontiff does not 
 himself depose a ruler who is obstinate in ill doing, he confines 
 himself to declaring that the abuse of power has been such 
 that it entails ipso facto, of itself, the loss of this power. 
 There is, they say, a pledge, at least an implicit pledge, of 
 fidehty between the king and his subjects, and this pledge 
 is dissolved when it becomes impossible for the subjects to 
 preserve the faith unless the prince is deposed; for the obhga- 
 tion to preserve the faith is, they add, a divine law, while 
 that of obeying this or that sovereign is a human law, which 
 must yield to the divine. 
 
 Conclusion. — But whatever view we take of these con- 
 troverted questions, one thing remains certain, viz., that at 
 this time, when unity of faith was complete, and Church 
 and State were intimately united, there existed a veritable 
 agreement by which the ruler pledged himself to govern 
 
 * Manning, Newman, and others against Gladstone; Br. W. yi. 514, 
 vii. 554, X. 398, xi. often. 
 
512 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 with justice, to defend the faith, to suppress heresy, and not 
 to incur excommunication himself. This was incontestably 
 the public law of that period, and these are facts which must 
 be borne in mind when we consider this question. Was a 
 ruler false to his pledge? It belonged to the Head of Chris- 
 tianity to decide whether he merited excommunication, and 
 eventually whether it was time to declare the subjects 
 released from their oath of obedience to the unfaithful man- 
 datary who, by his own infidehty, had forfeited his former 
 rights. This affords a perfect explanation of the conduct of 
 St. Gregory VII. toward the Emperor of Germany,^ Henry 
 IV. ; that of Innocent III. toward John Lackland; of Innocent 
 IV. toward Frederick II.; of Boniface VIII. toward Phihp 
 le Bel. 
 
 II. The Popes Exercised their Rights in a Manner 
 Very Salutary to Society.^ 
 
 1. History attests that the Popes during the Middle Ages 
 rendered inestimable service on the one hand by preventing 
 princes from faihng in their duties, and on the other by 
 keeping the people in just submission. The people were 
 protected by them against the tyranny of rulers, and rulers 
 against the revolt of their subjects. See the history of John 
 Lackland, of the Emperor Henry IV., of Frederick I., of 
 Frederick 11.^ The Popes were the true safeguards of the 
 legitimate franchises of peoples. Protestant writers — Voigt, 
 
 ^ Life of Gregory VII. by Villemain. 
 
 ' Gosselin, p. II., ch. 4; Murphy, ch. 40; Brann; A. C. Q. iv. 222; 
 D. R., April 1894, p. 278. 
 
 ^In 1861 M. Guizot wrote in L'Eglise et la Societe: "All things 
 considered, the Papacy, and only the Papacy, could be the powerful 
 mediator by defending, in the name of religion, the natural rights 
 of man against States, princes, and the various nations themselves; 
 it was the Papacy which reconciled the weak with the strong by 
 always inculcating in all things justice, peace, and respect for duties 
 and engagements; in this way it laid the foundation-stone of inter- 
 national right by rising against the claims and passions of brute force.'' 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 513 
 
 in his history of Gregory VII., and Hurter, in that of Innocent 
 III.— prove with evidence that these Popes saved civilization 
 by their energetic resistance to the corruption of the age 
 and the ambitious and despotic aims of emperors Hke Henry 
 IV. and Frederick II. 
 
 2. The sentence of the sovereign Pontiff frequently de- 
 cided quarrels between princes. At the present day con- 
 gresses have taken the place of the sovereign Pontiff, but this 
 system does not offer the same guarantee of impartiality and 
 light; thus it did not prevent the partition of Poland, the 
 abohtion of the ecclesiastical principahties after the French 
 Revolution, the persecutions in Switzerland and elsewhere. 
 
 Remark. — The result of impartial study of this subject has 
 been to make the Papacy of the Middle Ages so highly appre- 
 ciated that Urquhart,^ a distinguished Protestant writer, did 
 not hesitate recently to ask that the present system of decid- 
 ing international questions by a congress be abandoned and 
 recourse be had to the supreme arbitration of the Pope. At 
 the end of the seventeenth century Leibnitz said: ''In my 
 opinion Europe and the civilized world ought to institute at 
 Rome a tribunal of arbitration presided over by the Pope, 
 which should take cognizance of the differences between 
 Christian princes. This tribunal estabhshed over princes 
 to direct and judge them would bring us back to the golden 
 age." The celebrated English minister, Pitt, was of the 
 same opinion. ''We must/' he wrote in 1794, "find a new 
 bond to unite us all. The Pope alone can form this bond. 
 Only Rome can make her impartial and unprejudiced voice 
 heard; for no one doubts for an instant the integrity of her 
 judgment." Finally, let us hear Voltaire himself: "The 
 interest of the human race requires that there be a curb 
 which will restrain sovereigns and protect the life of nations: 
 this curb of religion might by universal consent have been 
 placed in the hands of the Popes.'' 
 
 * An Appeal to the Pope. See O'ReUly, Life of Leo XIIL, ch. 33. 
 
514 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ART. VII.— THE TEMPORAL SOVEREIGNTY OF THE POPES. 
 
 This discussion concerning the power exercised in the 
 Middle Ages by the Popes over temporal princes leads us to 
 say a few words upon a very different question, but one of 
 great importance at the present time, the temporal power of 
 the Pope.^ 
 
 '' It was by a special providence of God that this authority 
 (the Church) was furnished with a civil principality as the 
 best safeguard of her independence '' (Leo XIIL, Encycl. 
 on Christian States). ''God/' says St. Anselm, "loves 
 nothing so much as the freedom of His Church.'' 
 
 History witnesses to the perfect lawfulness of the temporal 
 sovereignty of the Popes. It was brought about so naturally 
 by circumstances that, as J. De Maistre says, "the Popes 
 became sovereigns without knowing it, and even in spite of 
 themselves." In the fourth and particularly in the sixth 
 century the Church of Rome possessed vast territories in 
 several countries of Europe and in Africa. By law the 
 imperial sovereignty still existed, but in fact it had long 
 been supplanted by the paternal dominion of the Roman 
 pontiffs. We know how the invasion of the barbarians, 
 and the abandonment in which unhappy Italy was left 
 
 ^Dupanloup; Manning; Ming; Maglione; Schroeder; Chatard, 
 Essays 5, 15, 17; Gibbons, Faith of 0. F., ch. 12; Parsons, Studies, I., 
 p. 501; Abp. Hughes' Works, vol. ii.; Murphy, ch. 9; A. C. Q. xvii. 
 72, XXV. 776; C. W. xxv. 609, xxxv. 1, lii. 340, Iv. 425, Dec. 1900, 
 Feb. 1902; M. S. H., June 1901, June 1902; M. Ixvii. 305; I. E. R., 
 May 1893, Sept. 1896; Best, Victories of Rome; Lacordaire, conf. 4 
 on the Church. On Rome under the Popes see Miley; Maguire; C. W. 
 xxviii. 101. 
 
 The reader ought to remember that the term "the temporal 
 power of the Pope" is variously used by Catholic writers. Some, 
 like our author, use it to indicate the princely or sovereign power 
 which the Pope formerly exercised as civil ruler over the so-called 
 papal states. With others it means the power wielded by the Popes 
 of the Middle Ages over Christian nations and rulers in civil and 
 temporal affairs, as explained in the preceding article. — ^Editor. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 515 
 
 by the emperors of Byzantium, forced the populations to 
 seek the efficacious protection of the papacy, which several 
 times had saved them from the most imminent peril and 
 caused order and justice to reign among them. The temporal 
 supremacy of the Popes, tacitly acknowledged by the em- 
 perors of Constantinople, was singularly affirmed by the 
 solemn act of Pepin le Bref, in which he pledged himself to 
 have restored to the Holy See all the cities and territories 
 occupied by the Lombards. This promise was not only 
 executed, but new lands were added by him to the restored 
 provinces; and this liberahty was sanctioned in 754 by an 
 act of perpetual cession and abandonment to the Holy See, 
 signed by the King of the Lombards. Then followed the 
 rich donations of Charlemagne, and later those of Countess 
 Mathilda. The great emperor, as well as the French lords, 
 solemnly promised to preserve to the Holy See the States 
 which had been solemnly restored to it. 
 
 We see that de Maistre had reason to say, '' There is nothing 
 so evidently just in its origin as this Pontifical Sovereignty. 
 Hence it has been fearlessly said: If the possessions of the 
 head of the Church are questioned, let the reigning families 
 of the present day prepare to descend from the throne.'' 
 ''The temporal kingdom," says the Protestant Gibbon, '4s 
 founded upon a thousand years of respect, and the Popes' 
 noblest claim to temporal sovereignty is the free choice of a 
 people delivered by them from servitude." 
 
 We do not need to refute here the futile objections of those 
 who seek to prove that the spiritual power of the Pope is 
 incompatible with temporal power. We have the history of 
 the Papacy itself to prove that temporal independence is, 
 in the designs of Providence, a guarantee of the spiritual 
 independence necessary to the head of the universal Church.^ 
 
 The Bishop of Rome was not made Pope by acquiring the tem- 
 poral principality; but that principality was acquired by him, or 
 conferred on him, because he was already Pope, that he might be 
 independent in his spiritual government of the universal Church " 
 Br. W., xii., p. 456 f. 
 
516 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 "For the Pope/^ said Thiers in a celebrated discourse, 
 "there is no spiritual independence without temporal in- 
 dependence, without sovereignty." The truth of this is 
 sufficiently demonstrated by what takes place in Russia and 
 Constantinople. Napoleon himself recognized how important 
 it is for the sovereign Pontiff to be, as Bossuet says, "in a 
 state to exercise more freely for the general good and under 
 the protection of Christian rulers the heavenly power of 
 governing souls." Here are his words as reported by the 
 historian of Du Consulat et de V Empire: "The Pope is far 
 from Paris, and it is well he is; he is neither at Madrid nor at 
 Vienna, and for this reason we accept his spiritual authority. 
 At Vienna and at Madrid the same must be said. Do you 
 think that if he were at Paris the Austrians and Spaniards 
 would receive his decisions? It is most fortimate, therefore, 
 that he does not live among us, and that hving removed 
 from us he does not live among our rivals, but dwells in 
 that old Rome far from the influence of the German emperors, 
 far from the rulers of France and the kings of Spain, holding 
 the balance between the Catholic sovereigns, inchned always 
 a little toward the stronger, but protesting promptly if the 
 stronger becomes the oppressor. Centuries have brought this 
 about, and they have done well. For the government of 
 souls it is the best, the most beneficent institution that can 
 be imagined. I am not led to say this through any spirit of 
 devotion, but by reason." 
 
 We might add other proofs in favor of pontifical royalty, 
 notably its happy effect upon the interior administration of 
 the Church; but contemporary events set forth with still 
 greater prominence the advantages of this providential 
 institution. Moreover, the unanimity mth which the 
 enemies of the Church have applauded the sacrilegious out- 
 rages which we have had the misfortune to witness, their 
 eagerness to prevent the restoration of the temporal power, 
 make evident to all faithful children of the Church the 
 lawfulness and the opportuneness of the claims of the Holy 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 517 
 
 See and of the Catholic world. We unceasingly demand the 
 restoration of the temporal power of the Holy See in order 
 that the spiritual supremacy of the Popes may be exercised 
 freely and efficaciously.^ 
 
 ART, VIII.— BAD POPES. 
 
 One of the charges made against the holiness of the 
 Church is: the Church has not always been a school of 
 morality, since its very heads have disgraced the pontifical 
 chair. 
 
 After what we have said above, pp. 321 ff., the answer 
 to this question presents no difficulty. 
 
 The Church labors unceasingly for the sanctification of 
 her children: this is her mission. But the grace offered to 
 man to enfighten his intelhgence and strengthen his will 
 in no way constrains him. He may refuse this grace and 
 make his conduct contradict his belief, but he does so only 
 by stifling his conscience, by trampfing under foot a refigion 
 which imceasingly calls him to his duty, exhorts him to the 
 practice of virtue, and threatens him with most terrible 
 punishments if he persists in his evil-doing. Hence there 
 have always been sinners in the bosom of the Church; side 
 by side with great virtues we find vice and disorders, the 
 effects of the weakness and malice of man's heart. 
 
 The Popes themselves, notwithstanding their high calling 
 and their grave obligations, are men : if they are inf alHble in 
 their doctrinal teaching, they are not impeccable. They may 
 
 ^ " I will not, of course, condone the spoliation of the Papacy. 
 That spoUation remains a crime against international law, and a 
 blot on the history of Italy. I will not desist from proclaiming that 
 the fitting position of the Papacy amid the nations of Christendom 
 is one of plenary independence." Archbp. Ireland, Church and 
 Modern Society. 
 
 2 Murphy, ch. 37; Bp. England's Works, vol. ii., p. 436 ff.; D. R. 
 Old Ser. xxxviii. 1 ; C. W. xliv. 215, 365; Burnet, Path, ch. 9; Spalding, 
 Evid., lect. 7, n. 9. 
 
518 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 fall, as St. Peter himself fell, but their sin is the act of the 
 man and not of the Pontiff; these stains, wholly personal, 
 in no way mar the holiness or the authority of the Holy See.^ 
 This is a case for the apphcation of Our Saviour's words: 
 Do what they tell you and not what they do. (Matth. 
 xxiii. 3). 
 
 Remarks. — 1st. History shows us from St. Peter to Leo 
 XIII. 259 Popes, all of whom, with very few exceptions, were 
 irreproachable, and a great number of whom were men 
 eminent for their knowledge, their wisdom, and their virtues. 
 Is not this a spectacle as worthy of admiration as of respect? 
 Where shall we find in the civil order a dynasty comparable 
 to this series of the heads of the Church of Rome? 
 
 2d. They cite, it is true, a few Popes who seem to have been 
 an exception, particularly Stephen VI. and John XII. in 
 the tenth century, Benedict IX. in the eleventh, and Alex- 
 ander VI. at the end of the fifteenth century. But, first 
 of all, this number is very small; it is hardly perceptible 
 in the multitude of the others. Would it be just to protest 
 unceasingly against magistracy because a few magistrates 
 failed in their duty, or against printing because there are 
 writers who abuse the invention? 
 
 3d. Moreover, it is proved that many of the facts alleged 
 against the Popes have been, if not mahcious inventions, 
 greatly exaggerated or falsely represented. Witness the 
 absurd tale of the female Pope Joan, who, it was alleged, 
 occupied the chair of Peter under the name of John VIIL, 
 after the death of Leo IV., in 855. This fable, which was 
 current for a long time, is now recognized as one of the most 
 
 ^ " I maintain that if the ancestry of Judah's royal Une, magnificent 
 as it was and destined to be the forerunner of Him of whom St. Paul 
 had many and great things to declare, could yet include some of the 
 worst sinners, why might not the apostolical succession, in which 
 was, individually or collectively, naught so holy as He to whom all the 
 prophets bore witness, in whom was seen on earth all the glory of the 
 Father, full of grace and truth?" Purcell's Debate with Campbell, 
 p. 157. See also the excellent remarks ib. p. 156. 
 
CERTAIN ACCUSATIONS AGAINST THE CHURCH. 519 
 
 flagrant historical lies by Protestants themselves, and by 
 unbelievers, such as Dumoulin, Bayle, and Basnage.^ The 
 memory of more than one Pope unjustly defamed by writers 
 hostile to the Church has been completely restored, and, 
 what is more, by Protestant historians. This was the 
 case, for example, in regard to Gregory VII. and Inno- 
 cent III. 2 
 
 4th. We must further observe that no Pope, whatever 
 his private life, ever issued a decree contrary to the purity 
 of faith and morals; nor has one ever taught or instituted 
 anything for the purpose of legitimizing his disorders. Cer- 
 tainly we cannot say as much for the heads of Protestantism. 
 They desired nothing so much as to abolish cehbacy and 
 monastic vows. In the facts which we have stated above 
 we recognize a striking proof of the assistance which God 
 unceasingly grants His Church.^ 
 
 * Doellinger, Fables; Parsons, Studies, II., ch. 2; C. W. ix. 1. 
 
 ^ Dr. 0. Brownson, replying in C. W., April '69, to an attack on 
 the Popes by Harper^s Magazine, states that he has studied the 
 history of the Roman Pontiffs with great care and diligence, both 
 as an antipapist and as a papist, with an earnest desire to find facts 
 against the Popes and with an equally earnest desire to ascertain 
 the exact historical truth. As a result of his investigations he lays 
 down the rule ''that everything that reflects injuriously on the 
 character of a Bishop of Rome is presumptively false, and to be 
 accepted only on the most indubitable evidence." Br. W., xiii., 
 p. 147. 
 
 ^ " Nothing gives me more faith in the genuineness and truth of our 
 holy religion than when, in reviewing the history of these disgraceful 
 enormities, I find the Church, in the very midst of scandal enough 
 to blacken and overthrow any earthly institution, still supported 
 and upheld by the almighty hand of God; a Church that has stood 
 through all that the gentleman has laid to the charge of the merely 
 mortal men who have presided for a season over its destinies. A 
 few of them have erred in morals, but none of them in faith; sound 
 doctrine and sound morals were seen and admired, during these sad 
 eclipses, and infidel nations were, during that passing obscurity 
 in Rome, rejoicing in the beams of the orient Sun of justice heralded 
 by Catholic missionaries." Purcell's Debate, p. 145. 
 
620 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 In regard to special charges against certain Popes Tve 
 may consult ecclesiastical histories or special works, such as 
 those by Pastor and Mann. 
 
 EDITOR'S NOTE. 
 
 The author takes up in the present chapter certain accusations 
 against the Church taken from her history. But in a countless variety 
 of forms she is also charged with ''false, immoral, and blasphemous" 
 doctrines and practices, charges to which the Catholic apologist must 
 give a solid reply. This, however, would demand another volume. 
 Hence it must suffice here to tell the reader where he may find compara- 
 tively full answers to those vain accusations. 
 
 Much will be found in the books mentioned in the preface, p. 9. But 
 Dr. Ryder's ''Catholic Controversy" is undoubtedly the best popular 
 manual of this kind. Bishop England (his works, vols, i., ii., iii.). Card. 
 Gibbons (Faith of Our Fathers), Gother (The Papist Misrepresented), 
 Searle (Plain Facts), Conway (The Question Box), and Arnold's Catholic 
 Dictionary take up most of the subjects mentioned under the following 
 four heads: 
 
 1. The Doctrines of Confession (Hunter, III.; MeUa; Spalding, J. M,, 
 Miscell, II., n. 24; C. T. S. xxxiv.), Indulgences (ib., also Bp. Hedley, 
 O. S. B.); Probabilism and Casuistry (M. xliii. 185, Dec. 1901; Rickaby, 
 essay 3), Lying and Equivocation (U. B. Jan. '95; Rickaby, essay 4; 
 Jones, S.J,, Dishonest Criticism), Tyrannicide (A. C. Q. xxvii. ; Hergen- 
 roether, C. Ch., II., p. 233 ff. ; Gerard, Antidote), Intention in the adminis- 
 tration of sacraments (Bp. England, I., p. 474 £f. ; C. T. S. xxiv. ; Hunter, 
 III., n. 683; Dodsworth, Popular Delusions and Objections, etc., p. 
 54). See also Newmai, Development, p. 381 ff. 
 
 2. The practice of Simony in giving money for Masses and sacraments 
 (Ryder, p. 239; Searle, p. 221), for indulgences (Green; Bp. England, 
 III., p. 13 ff.), for dispensation from Fasting (e. g. Balla cruciata, Bp. 
 England, III., p. 191 ff.) and marriage impediments, for ecclesiastical 
 appointments and promotion to clerical orders (C. W. xxxiii. 245, xxxv. 
 738). See also Gerard; Dodsworth; C. T. S. vii., xi. 
 
 3. The practice of Superstition and even Idolatry in worshipping the 
 Sacred Heart of Jesus (Manning, Miscell., II., p. 1; Hunter, ll, n. 536; 
 Dalgairns, Devotion to the S. H., Introd. ; C. W. May 1901), the Bl. 
 Virgin Marv, the Saints and Angels, holy relics and images (Br. W. viii. 
 117 ff. ; Bp. England, II., p. 95 ff. ; C. T. S. xviii. xxx.'; A. E. R. Oct. 1902) ; 
 in using blessed articles, e. g. scapulars, medals, beads, and the crucifix; 
 in offering prayers for the Dead (Bp. England, I., 265 ff.). See also Br. 
 W. vi. 337 ff., 380 ff.; Newman, 1. c, 398 ff. ; Hunter, III., n. 842; De 
 Trevern; Bagshawe, Threshold; S^gur, Short and Famifiar Answers; 
 C. T. S. iv., v., xiv.; M. June 1898, May 1902; Garside. 
 
 4. Useless and injurious Observances, e. g. Celibacy (C. T. S. xli. ; J. C, 
 Why Should Priests Wed?; M. May 1898), Religious Vows and life in 
 Convents (Br. W. viii. 219; St. Thomas, Apology for Religious Orders; 
 Feasey; C.W. March 1901 ; M.Dec. 1899; D. R., Old Ser. xxx. 467; C T. 
 S. xix., xlvii.), Communion in one kind (Garside, p. 125), Fasting (Butler, 
 Feasts and Fasts, Tr. 5; Gaume, Catech., IV. p. 319 ff.); External Cere- 
 monial (Tyrrell; Bridgett; Bagshawe, Credentials, p. 258; Chatard, Truths, 
 n. 8; Burke, Reasonableness of Catholic Ceremonies; C. W. June, 1901), 
 Latin language in public service (C. T. S. ix. ; Bp. England, IT., p. 50 ff.). 
 
 5. On Scandals and Abuses in the Church see Allnatt, The Church 
 and the Sects, 1. 1; Searle; Dodsworth; Ricards, C. Ch., p. 94 f.; Spalding, 
 J. M., History of Reform., I., ch. 3. 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION ."^ 
 
 "The Church, the immortal work of a merciful God, al- 
 though by its nature, '^ says the Holy Father, "it aims 
 primarily at the salvation of souls and the eternal happiness 
 of heaven, confers, nevertheless, in the temporal order so 
 many and such great benefits that it could not produce more 
 or greater if it had been specially and chiefly instituted to 
 procure the prosperity of this present life'' (Encycl. on 
 Christian States). 
 
 This chapter will be a commentary upon these words 
 of Leo XIII. We shall show what the Church has done for 
 civilization and the temporal happiness of nations; but we 
 cannot give to this beautiful and vast subject the develop- 
 ment it requires, for that would need a volume. We shall 
 endeavor, however, to say sufficient to enable us to recognize 
 in the benefits which the Church has conferred upon the 
 world a new mark of her divine origin: the tree is known 
 by its fruits. 
 
 The object of civiHzation is the development, the perfec- 
 tion, the welfare of the whole man in all that relates to this 
 
 ' Leo XIIL, The Church and CivHization (O'Shea, N. Y.) ; Allies, 
 L, 11. ; Balmes; Manahan; Montalembert; Ozanam; Thebaud, Ch. 
 and M. W.; Moriarty; Murphy, pt. iv.; Hettinger, Rev. Rel., ch. 7; 
 Schanz, III., ch. 15; Gibbons, Ch. Herit.; Kenrick, Primacy, ch. 23; 
 Spalding, J. M., Miscell., Essays 7 and 46; Archbp. Hughes, I.; 
 Lacordaire, conf. 32 ff. on Cath. Doctr.; Br. W. ix., xii., xiv.; A. C. Q. 
 X. 193; D. R. Old Ser. xxxiv. (trade, manufacture), xlviii. 81, 422, 
 New Ser. vi. 297, xxi. 323, and xxii. 69 (usury laws) : C. W. i. 775, 
 iii. 638, Iviii. 1, xiii. 342 legislation), xxviii. 459 Gabor), xxix. 192 
 (medicine). 
 
522 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 present life. Man appears to us in the natural order in 
 three distinct though inseparable states: we may consider 
 him as an individual, as member of a family, as member 
 of a public society. If his happiness is to be complete, 
 the lawful needs of his soul and body must be satisfied; and 
 in his family as well as in civil society he must find order, 
 peace, joy, all that can lawfully conduce to the happiness of 
 life. In other words, the welfare and progress must extend 
 to the whole man and include in a just proportion and perfect 
 balance his material, intellectual, and moral interest; this 
 progress and these advantages must also extend to society 
 taken collectively, as well as to its individual members. We 
 have remarked, it is true, that the proper and immediate 
 mission of the Church is not to civihze nations and distribute 
 to them the benefits of this present life; she has a higher 
 end: to sanctify man, to reform him in his moral and 
 religious fife, and thus to lead him to the eternal happiness of 
 heaven. But it is very evident that in helping man to gov- 
 ern his passions, in reforming and perfecting souls, in setting 
 before them the reason for suffering and death, in teaching 
 them, with the prospect of heaven, to bear the trials of life 
 with patience, Christianity has borne its fruits from the 
 very beginning : it has contributed powerfully to the relative 
 welfare of mankind upon earth. By elevating and enno- 
 bling the individuals who compose society it necessarily 
 exercised a civilizing influence upon society itself. ''How 
 admirable is the Christian religion," says Montesquieu, 
 "which, though it seems to have no other object than the 
 happiness of the other life, yet makes our happiness in this." 
 It is easy to convince ourselves of the truth of those words, 
 which are, moreover, only a philosophic and social com- 
 mentary of the profound words of St. Paul: ''Godhness is 
 profitable to all things, having promise of the life that now 
 is, and of that which is to come.'' We may give a still 
 higher definition of civilization and say with M. Kurth 
 that "social perfection, or in other words civilization, con- 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 523 
 
 sists in that form of society which affords its members the 
 greatest facilities for attaining their final end." In fact, 
 in the designs of God, everything here below, and society 
 itself, is given to man to help him to attain this supreme end 
 of his existence, his eternal salvation. Hence no trace of 
 true civiHzation is to be found in pagan times. But as one 
 of the ends of this chapter is to answer the charges made 
 against the Church in the name of civiHzation, understood 
 in the ordinary sense, we shall assume our adversary's 
 views in order to refute them. 
 
 ART. I.— THE STATE OF THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST, 
 OR PAGAN CIVILIZATION.^ 
 
 I. A General Glance. 
 
 At the present day, when the Gospel has completely 
 changed and regenerated the world, we are apt to forget 
 the benefits we have received from it, or to enjoy them with 
 proud ingratitude. We speak with complacency of frater- 
 nity, equahty, philanthropy, of charity itself, but we are 
 prone to forget that the world is indebted to Jesus Christ 
 and to His Church for these noble sentiments and civilizing 
 virtues. 
 
 Certainly we are far from denying the material civilization 
 of the Roman world at the birth of the Church. We acknowl- 
 edge, on the contrary, that in this respect it had attained an 
 extraordinary degree of splendor. Our own times, despite 
 all our inventions and discoveries, can hardly be compared 
 to the old world. Count de Champagny gives a striking 
 picture in Les Cesars of this extraordinary prosperity of 
 Rome. Nor can we deny the high rank which pagan Rome 
 already held in the world of letters. No one would venture 
 to deny the writers of the age of Augustus and Pericles the 
 
 *Th^baud, Gentilism; Marcy; Allies, vol. i., ii., iii.; Alzog, Ch. 
 Hist., I., hist, introd.; Manahan, bk. i.; A. C. Q. v. 468. 
 
524 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 superior merit of form. Their style is enchanting, and the 
 art of the writer is carried to the highest degree. Yet under 
 this brilUant exterior and attractive form we find absolute 
 poverty of doctrine and lack of reality. In regard, partic- 
 ularly, to religious truths, the most fimdamental and the 
 most necessary to man in this world and in the next, nothing 
 but doubt, uncertainty, contradictions, and monstroiis errors 
 prevail. 
 
 But do this material grandeur and this intellectual superi- 
 ority constitute true civilization, or have they ever made a 
 people happy? Evidently not, for the true happiness of in- 
 dividuals as well as of peoples cannot consist in such enjoy- 
 ments. Man was created to know, to love, and to serve God 
 in this world, and to possess Him eternally in the next. 
 His mind and his heart are made for the True and the Good, 
 that is, for God Himself. In vain does man turn from his 
 last end, in vain does he despise or ignore it ; it nevertheless 
 remains his end, and the words of St. Augustine will never 
 cease to be true: "Thou hast made us, Lord, for Thy- 
 self, and our heart is restless until it finds rest in Thee.'' 
 Moreover, experience tells us plainly enough that the ca- 
 pacity of the human heart is infinite, so to speak; that its 
 desires are immense, and only immensity can fill it. Now, 
 neither in extent nor duration can immensity be found in 
 creatures. What do all creatures avail to satisfy the human 
 heart's hunger for happiness? They are hardly more than 
 a drop in the ocean. 
 
 And then, to speak only of ancient times and the very 
 centres of pagan civilization, it is well known that only a 
 limited class enjoyed the privileges of this temporal pros- 
 perity. Cicero tells us that in populous Rome there were 
 hardly two thousand landowners. In the reign of Nero 
 six great landholders possessed half the Roman province of 
 Africa, that is, a territory much larger than all England. 
 The masses were miserable and knew the pleasures of their 
 masters only to envy them. Pauperism was a deep and 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 525 
 
 hideous wound. The moral picture of the world before 
 Christianity given us by writers of antiquity is most sad and 
 appalhng. We have no difficulty in acknowledging that 
 noble thoughts, generous sentiments, kind and beneficent 
 deeds are to be found in pagan antiquity, for the image of 
 God in man, though horribly disfigured, has never been com- 
 pletely effaced. But it is no less certain that the salient 
 trait of all, the universal and dominant character of the 
 world before Christ, was pitiless hardness combined with 
 gross immorality of institutions and customs. Reality on 
 this point exceeds anything that can be imagined, and 
 there is nothing in the corruption of the present day that 
 can be compared to it. The gentlest among men and 
 the most polished nations exhibited a hardness of heart, 
 a contempt for humanity, a hatred of the poor, a horror of 
 the unfortunate, a thirst for blood, murder, and infamy of 
 all kinds, that we, with our centuries of Christian training, 
 can hardly conceive of. The whole world was given up to a 
 boundless pride, an unrestrained selfishness, a cruel sensuafity 
 which remorselessly sacrificed everything to its desires. 
 
 Let us hear how St. Paul sums up the history of the whole 
 ancient world. Addressing the Romans, whose triumphant 
 civilization had absorbed all the strength and all the vices 
 of the conquered peoples, he tells them to their face with 
 that intrepid firmness which fears no contradiction: You 
 are without affection, without fidelity; you are filled with 
 malice, with iniquity, with bitterness; hateful, hating one 
 another; finally, you are without mercy (Rom. i. and iii.; 
 Tit. iii.). And yet St. Paul is the most reserved of all the 
 writers of that time. Plato, Aristotle, Aristophanes, Plautus, 
 Titus, Livy, Tacitus, Juvenal, Suetonius, Plutarch, Seneca, 
 relate the horrors of pagan society with a good faith and 
 indifference which make one shudder. It is evident this was 
 the accepted and public morality of the most civilized nations. 
 Strangers, prisoners, the vanquished, slaves, debtors, the sick, 
 the poor, the aged, children, women, all who were weak, 
 
626 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 all who suffered, all who labored — in a word, the great ma- 
 jority of the human race was hated, despised, and oppressed. 
 The rest wallowed in the mire of vice. Vice itself was deified ; 
 it had its temples, its priests, its altars in every city of the 
 world; disorder became a social obligation, and immorality 
 a pubhc worship. (See above, p. 237 ff.) 
 
 Such was the pagan world before the coining of Christ. 
 Now to this world without pity, without love, without com- 
 passion, without virtue, plunged in every kind of error and 
 iniquity, succeeded the world we know, radiant with the 
 light of truth, of purity, of charity. What wrought this 
 wonderful transformation, so impossible to foresee? What 
 do we find at the point where these two worlds so 
 widely different meet? We find a cross, and on that cross 
 Jesus Christ, the Foimder of Christianity, djdng to redeem 
 and regenerate fallen and degraded humanity. 
 
 Do we need anything further to recognize the divinity 
 of Jesus Christ and His work, the Catholic Church? 
 
 But this general outline will hardly suffice to make us ap- 
 preciate the extent of the benefits we owe to Christ and to 
 the Church our Mother. We must enter somewhat more 
 into detail lest it be imagined that we have painted in exag- 
 gerated colors the brief picture which we have given of the 
 corruption and depravity of the pagan world. It is under- 
 stood, of course, that there are certain revolting details which 
 we shall be obliged to pass over in silence. 
 
 II. The Lot of Individuals. 
 
 We shall speak especially of slaves, gladiators, the poor, 
 the working classes, that is, of the great majority of mankind. 
 
 I. SLAVES.^ 
 
 1. Number of Slaves. — Mr. Duruy, formerly Minister of 
 Education in France, addressing the working men one 
 day, justly observed that if they had lived in ancient times 
 * See references below, p. 536. 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 527 
 
 probably not one among them would have been a free man; 
 they all would have groaned in the horrors of slavery. In 
 fact the liistorical number of these unfortunate creatures 
 is marvellous. In Attica alone the official census made by 
 Demetrius Phalereus gives the number of free citizens as 
 20,000, and the slaves as 40,000. At Rome one Roman 
 owned 1,000, another 10,000, another 20,000. According 
 to Chateaubriand and Mgr. De Sahnis six milhon men who 
 were called the king's people oppressed, persecuted, and 
 trampled under foot one hundred and twenty milhon slaves. 
 In brief, the number of the slaves was so great that the 
 senate, Seneca tells us, would never permit them to wear a 
 special dress lest they should reahze their numbers. ''There 
 was great alarm," he says, ''at the small number of free 
 men." It is to be noted, moreover, that slavery existed 
 everywhere, among the most civiHzed as well as the most 
 barbarous nations; hence we may say that at the coming 
 of Christ the greater number of mankind were slaves. 
 
 2. How Slaves were Regarded. — The unanimous teach- 
 ing of antiquity was that slavery was founded upon natural 
 law, that is, that among men some are bom to be free, 
 others to be slaves. " Nature, " says Aristotle, " requires that 
 there be slaves." Varron enumerates them among the 
 implements of labor. "There is, however, a difference," he 
 says, "oxen bellow, slaves speak, and the plough is silent." 
 "A wise husbandman," says Cato, the censor, "must get 
 rid of all implements no longer in use, worn-out ploughs, old 
 horses, aged slaves." Hence when sickness or old age ren- 
 dered them useless they were put to death or left to die of 
 hunger. Nor did the law take slaves under its protection. 
 On the contrary, it confirmed these barbarous doctrines. 
 In the eyes of the law a slave was not the servant but the 
 property of the master; he was not a man, but a chattel. 
 "He was null, rather than vile — non tarn vilis quam nullus; 
 there was no rest for him — non est otium servis; he counted 
 as nothing — pro nullis adhihentur; a slave has no right — 
 
528 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 servus nullum caput habet; he was as one dead — servitus morti 
 assimilatur." 
 
 3. Treatment of Slaves. — If such were the opinions 
 current among even good men, if such were the laws, we 
 can readily imagine the fate of the unfortunate creatures 
 condemned by birth, by the fortunes of war, by debt to 
 servitude. It fills one with horror to read the details on this 
 subject given by Fr. de Champagny in Les Cesars. Yet he 
 only repeats what is related by all the writers of antiquity 
 without the least protest or sign of disapproval. 
 
 The Roman law recognized no right in a slave — servus 
 nullum jus habet; hence his master could treat him hke a 
 domestic animal, overwhelm him with blows, torture him, 
 and even put him to death without being held responsible 
 by any one; there was no obligation towards a slave — in 
 personam servilem nulla cadit obligatio. The law required 
 that when a master was killed by one of his slaves, all 
 the others, whatever their number, dwelling under the 
 same roof should be crucified. It is needless to say that 
 the pagan masters, usually as selfish and cruel as they were 
 vicious, amply availed themselves of their absolute right over 
 their slaves, and exceeded, if possible, the ferocity of the 
 laws by their barbarous application of them. The lot of 
 these unfortunate creatures was frequently so terrible that 
 they sometimes flung themselves in despair into the arena 
 to be devoured by wild beasts. To lessen the expense of 
 the animals kept for the circus Cahgula ordered them to 
 be fed with slaves. 
 
 II. GLADIATORS. 
 
 In addition to slavery, there was something still more 
 horrible, before Christianity: the games of the circus and 
 the combats of the gladiators. The spectacle of men killing 
 one another or devoured by wild beasts was the great amuse- 
 ment, the supreme pleasure, of the Roman people. The 
 day being all too short for such pleasures, the slaughters 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 529 
 
 were prolonged into the night by the light of torches. All 
 that the populace asked of their base and tyrannical masters 
 in exchange for their liberty was bread and amusement — 
 partem et circenses. 
 
 It was this thirst for human blood which built the vast 
 enclosures the ruins of which we still admire, and organized 
 the great hunting expeditions in remote provinces for the 
 purpose of capturing alive the wild animals which were 
 baited with human victims. The nobles vied with one 
 another in the production of wild beasts for the slaughtering 
 of fellow creatures in the arena. 
 
 The human combats were still more horrible ; for example, 
 to cite a single instance, at the celebration of the triumph of 
 Titus, who was called the delight of mankind, thousands of 
 men were forced to fight to the death during one hundred 
 days; and this wise emperor himself delivered over to the 
 circus at the time of his father's obsequies five thousand 
 gladiators. The good Trajan to celebrate his triumph over 
 the Dacians gave to the games, which lasted one hundred and 
 twenty-three days, ten thousand gladiators and eleven thou- 
 sand wild beasts. 
 
 In the mock sea-fights for which immense reservoirs were 
 constructed, millions of victims perished by drowning. 
 *'It is estimated," says Loudun in his work L'Antiquite, 
 "that the spectacle of the gladiators cost, on an average, 
 thirty thousand men a year." In fact there were months 
 in which more than twenty thousand men slaughtered one 
 another for the amusement of the people. 
 
 And these hideous spectacles, which were at first confined 
 to the Romans, spread throughout the whole empire, into 
 Gaul, Greece, and Asia, and were, moreover, sanctioned by 
 the law and approved by the sages of the time; no pagan 
 was ever moved to pity by the fate of these unfortunate 
 creatures; the victims themselves, forgetting that they 
 had a right to live, died saluting the god Caesar. As for 
 Cicero, Pliny, and all the fine minds of the time, they saw ia 
 
530 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 these cruel games only a noble institution, and an excellent 
 discipline to fortify the people against suffering. Pliny 
 goes so far in his panegyric as to praise Trajan for not giving 
 the spectators to the games. But humane instincts did not 
 always prevail to this extent; on one occasion, when there 
 were no gladiators for the beasts, Cahgula, Tacitus tells us, 
 ordered that the first- comers among the spectators be thrown 
 into the arena, taking the precaution to have their tongues 
 cut out in order to stifle their cries. To satisfy the thirst of 
 the patricians for human blood, the senate, the same historian 
 says, decreed that the gladiators should no longer fight in 
 couples, but in masses as in a regular battle. 
 
 III. THE POOR AND THE UNFORTUNATE. 
 
 Marcus Aurelius the philosopher, who passes as a sage in 
 paganism, does not hesitate to declare it weakness to pity 
 the unfortunate, to weep with those who weep. Seneca says 
 that mercy is a vice of the heart, hence good people should 
 carefully avoid it. ''The true sage," he says again, ''is 
 devoid of pity. " The following, according to Cicero, are 
 some of the precepts of Stoicism : no one is compassionate 
 unless he is f oohsh or thoughtless ; a true man never allows 
 himself to be moved or touched; it is a misdemeanor and 
 a crime to heed the promptings of compassion. 
 
 We would not cite these painful and deplorable facts, 
 except that they enable us to appreciate the depth of the 
 abyss whence Jesus Christ raised the human race. In a 
 society where such maxims were universally accepted we 
 can readily understand that the afflicted, the poor, the 
 unfortunate, far from exciting pity, inspired generally 
 contempt, disgust, and horror. 
 
 "To give food and drink to a poor man," says Plautus, "is 
 a double folly: one loses what he gives, and prolongs the 
 misery of another." "The poor," says Epictetus, "are 
 abandoned like a dry, infected well, from which all turn with 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 531 
 
 disgust.'' At Athens as well as in Egypt a man who had no 
 food and asked for it was punished by the law with death. 
 
 IV. WORKMEN. 
 
 As to labor, we may say that it was generally regarded 
 with contempt among pagans; agriculture and all branches 
 of industry were considered dishonorable. Cicero is loath 
 to except in this general anathema medicine and architec- 
 ture. Aristotle proclaimed labor not worthy of a free man. 
 Plato was of the same opinion. Workmen were not re- 
 garded by the Greeks as worthy of the name of citizen. 
 According to Terence, to be respected one must lead an idle 
 hfe, and not be obhged to work for a Hvehhood. 
 
 No less painful things could also be related of the treatment 
 of the aged, of debtors, of prisoners, but the facts supported 
 by incontestable testimony, which we have just given, enable 
 us to divine what must have been their fate in this society 
 devoid of mercy. 
 
 III. The Family.* 
 
 We know to what a degree of degradation family life among 
 pagans had fallen. Brutal selfishness took the place of 
 mutual affection. The very weakness of women and children 
 placed them in abject submission to the head of the family, 
 who was not, as in Christian households, the spouse and father, 
 but the master and tyrant. This state of things was only 
 a logical consequence of the doctrines which prevailed. 
 
 A. Woman, in the eyes of pagan nations, was not man's 
 companion and equal; she was an inferior being both as 
 regards her origin and her destiny ; her condition was absolute 
 servitude. Greek philosophy, imitating the philosophy of 
 China, India, Persia, and Egypt, has always been pitiless 
 toward woman; it regarded her as an abject, unclean, wicked 
 being, having no soul; hence her humiliating and degrading 
 
 * See references below on p. 541. 
 
532 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 position; hence the practice of polygamy in the majority 
 of nations, with its innumerable train of miseries; hence, 
 among the Greeks and Romans, the habitual practice of 
 divorce, no less disastrous in its consequences, and which 
 could be obtained on the most frivolous and the vilest pre- 
 texts. Hence also the almost unlimited power of the husband 
 over the wife, and of the father over the daughter. At 
 every period of paganism, even among the most civihzed 
 people, the right of hfe and death which he exercised was 
 recognized and guaranteed by the laws. A daughter, 
 usually sold by her parents to the man she was to marry, 
 became the personal property of her husband, and endured 
 all the consequences of this position. 
 
 B. The Child. — Nor was the child treated any better; 
 it was also completely in the power of its father. At Rome, 
 when a child was born, it was laid at the feet of its father; if 
 he took it in his arms, it was allowed to Hve; hence the 
 expression suscipere liheros. If, on the contrary, he let it 
 lie on the ground, the child was strangled, or thrown with 
 the refuse into the great cesspool, or most frequently it 
 perished of hunger. Infanticide and a thousand other 
 revolting horrors were universally admitted and practised 
 among pagan nations. Had not TertulUan been certain 
 that he could not be contradicted, he would not have dared 
 thus to apostrophize the pagans of his time: ''Among those 
 who surround us and who thirst for the blood of Christians, 
 among you yourselves, O stern magistrates, so severe toward 
 us, who is there who has not put his own child to death?" 
 
 Moreover, the philosopher Seneca observes on the same 
 subject "that nothing is more reasonable than to remove 
 useless things from the house;" and the grave Quintillian 
 declares that "to kill a man is frequently a crime, but to 
 kill one's own children is frequently a very beautiful action." 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION 533 
 
 IV. Public Society and the Relations Between 
 Nations. 
 
 A. If the head of the family oppressed all who depended 
 upon him, he, in his turn, was a victim to the tyranny of the 
 State. Among pagans there was no sentiment of the in- 
 dependence and the dignity of man; individuals existed 
 only for the State; they were valued only in as far as they 
 were capable of serving the country. Country was a divinity 
 whose orders were to be obeyed at any price. ^'The State,'' 
 says Fustel de Coulanges in La Cite antique, '' considered 
 the body and soul of each individual its property; hence 
 its desire to mould this body and soul in such a way as 
 to derive the greatest benefit from them. . . . The human 
 person counted for very little before this holy and almost 
 divine authority called country or State. . . . There was no 
 guarantee for the hfe of a man when there was question of the 
 interest of the commonwealth. ... It was thought that 
 right, justice, morality, everything should yield to the in- 
 terest of the country. . . . The government called itself, by 
 turns, monarchy, aristocracy, democracy, but none of these 
 evolutions gave man true Hberty, individual hberty." 
 ''Paganism," says Balmes, "never seems to have dreamed 
 that the end, the object of society was the welfare, the hap- 
 piness of famihes and individuals." Hence the great Cor- 
 neille had indeed reason to make one of his heroes say: 
 
 " I thank the gods I am no Roman, 
 1 thus preserve a spark of nature human." 
 
 Every right and every sentiment of nature were outraged, 
 insulted, violated in these pitiless constitutions of pagan 
 antiquity. ''All the power of the Romans was vested in 
 Caesar; Caesar was the living law, the real divinity of the 
 State " (Perin, Les lois de la societe chretienne, t. ii.). "We 
 do not even find," says Laboulaye {UEtat et ses limites), 
 " that the ancients disputed with the master of the world 
 
534 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 what seems to us to-day the most sacred right of the in- 
 dividual, I mean conscience, inteUigence, labor. Rehgion, 
 education, letters, commerce, industry, everything was in 
 the hands of the emperor from the day when the people, 
 willingly or unwillingly, transferred to Caesar his sovereign 
 power. Neither Trajan nor Marcus AureHus doubted for a 
 moment that his power was unlimited. They governed in 
 the name of the people: to attempt to hmit this power 
 was a crime of high treason." 
 
 The worship of the God-State and the adoration of the 
 emperors may, we acknowledge, have produced certain acts 
 of fanatical patriotism, but certainly it was far from contrib- 
 uting to the happiness of citizens and of families. 
 
 B. The relations between nations were no less deplorable. 
 In vain do we seek in paganism the idea of fraternity of 
 nations, or the shadow of a principle of justice in their re- 
 lations. To the Romans, society was Rome ; to the Athenians, 
 Athens. Outside of Rome and Athens there existed for 
 them only coarse, barbarous peoples condemned to live 
 isolated and uncultivated. If a man owed everything to 
 his country, he recognized no rights in a strange nation. 
 Each nation considered the other as enemies, consequently 
 dreamed only of conquering one another. Hence wars were 
 incessant and victories always cruel: the vanquished were 
 massacred or reduced to slavery. The march of armies 
 was only too frequently signahzed by blood-stained ruins. 
 The complete destruction of Carthage, Numantia, Corinth, 
 and numerous other cities which were levelled to the ground, 
 bear adequate testimony to the implacable cruelty of the 
 conquerors. "Athens did not think she exceeded her right 
 when she decreed that all the Mitylenians, without distinction 
 of sex or age, were to be exterminated; when, the next day, 
 she revoked her decree and contented herself with putting 
 one thousand citizens to death and confiscating their lands 
 she believed herself humane and merciful." (M. Fustel de 
 Coulanges, 1. c.) 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 636 
 
 ART. II.— THE STATE OF THE WORLD AFTER CHRIST, OR 
 CHRISTIAN CIVILIZATION. 
 
 I. A General Glance. 
 
 "If Christ had not appeared upon earth," says Labou- 
 laye (L c.)/' I do not know how the world could have resisted 
 the despotism which was stifling it. I do not speak here as 
 a Christian, I set aside every religious question, and I am 
 only an historian. In this character I affirm that, in politics 
 as well as in morals and philosophy, the Gospel gave new 
 Hfe to souls. We have reason to date from the new era, 
 for a new society sprang from the Gospel.'' 
 
 We have spoken elsewhere of the miraculously rapid 
 propagation of the Church throughout the world known to 
 the ancients. Therefore it was impossible for the world to 
 remain as it was. At the same time, this marvellous change 
 could not be the work of a day; it was wrought by slow 
 but persevering labor. It is evident, moreover, that there 
 must needs have been fierce war between paganism and the 
 new religion ; between the empire of Satan and the kingdom 
 of Christ. On one side was material, brute force; on the 
 other, truth and her invincible patience. Hence we see 
 that Christian blood flowed for three centuries; but victory 
 could not fail to crown the work of God. With Constantine 
 the triumphant cross became a sign of honor, and by a truly 
 providential dispensation, the heir of the Caesars transferred 
 the capital of the empire to Byzantium, as if to permit the 
 seat of the spiritual power to be established at Rome, which 
 had hitherto been the seat of the civil power. 
 
 The Church did not wait this brilliant triumph to begin 
 her labor for the transformation of the pagan world. This 
 work of civilizing nations began the very day when the 
 head of the apostles, strengthened with power from on high, 
 wrought his first conversions. In fact the Church by 
 changing souls, by reforming the ideas, sentiments, and 
 morals of individuals and families, transformed mankind. 
 
536 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 In her doctrine, her laws, and her institutions she was the 
 antithesis of pagan society: by the very fact of her propa- 
 gation she must gradually transform the iniquitous laws 
 and cruel institutions of the countries she subjected to her 
 spiritual empire. ''According as Christianity developed 
 and realized the miracle of its universal propagation, Roman 
 jurisprudence could not but be affected by the influence of 
 Christian ideas: an indirect influence under the pagan 
 emperors, a direct influence under the emperors converted 
 to the new reUgion." A good summary of the principal 
 characters of the civilization due to the Catholic Church is 
 to be found in the twentieth chapter of Balmes' ''European 
 Civilization." Let us enter into a few details. 
 
 II. The Lot of Individuals. 
 
 I. SLAVES AND GLADIATORS.^ 
 
 A. By her doctrines and her institutions the Church could 
 not but ameUorate the condition of slaves, raise them from 
 their state of shame and degradation and, finally, free them 
 from their bonds. Thus she declares that the slave has 
 the same origin, the same nature, the same destiny as his 
 master; that his immortal soul is of the same value in the 
 eyes of God; that he also has been redeemed by the blood of 
 Jesus Christ ; that he has a right to seat himself at the same 
 eucharistic banquet; that he may occupy even a higher 
 place than his master in the kingdom of heaven, where 
 the degree of glory is proportioned only to virtue and 
 good works. ''There is neither Jew nor Greek,'' says St. 
 Paul, "there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male 
 nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" (Gal. iii.). 
 
 ^ Leo XIIL, Letter to the Bishops of Brazil, May 5, 1888, and 
 Encycl. on Abolition of Slavery in Africa, Nov. 20, 1890; Parsons, 
 Studies, VL, ch. 13; Brownlow; Balmes, ch. 15 ff.; Hughes, vol. i.; 
 England, vol. iii.; Br. W. xv.; A. C. Q. ix. 358, xiii. 577; M., Jan., Feb. 
 X890. 
 
tHE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 637 
 
 ''God is not a respecter of persons." ''I beseech thee/' 
 says the same apostle to a master to whom he was writing 
 in behalf of a runaway slave, ''I beseech thee for my son 
 whom I have begotten in my bonds, Onesimus . . . receive 
 him, not now as a servant, but instead of a servant a most 
 dear brother. ... If he hath wronged thee in anything, put 
 it to my account." Such is the doctrine of the Gospel. 
 Without annihilating the distinctions necessary for the 
 government of the world, without disturbing in any way 
 the hierarchy of conditions and powers, without forgetting 
 the duties of inferiors toward superiors, she pubHcly pro- 
 claims man's nobility before God. Could her doctrine fail 
 to result in softening the lot of the slave and in gradually 
 abolishing slavery itself?* 
 
 Let us remark, however, that the Church, despite her 
 soUcitude for these unfortunate creatures, never dreamed 
 of abolishing slavery at one blow; this she had neither the 
 right nor the power to do. Moreover, the political situation 
 of the time did not permit a simultaneous and universal 
 affranchisement: terrible disasters would have been the 
 consequence of a general decree of abolition. We know 
 that the whole social organization was then dependent upon 
 slavery: industry, agriculture, commerce were in the hands 
 of the slaves. Moreover, the slaves were not prepared for 
 independence ; to free them, before rescuing them from their 
 state of moral degradation, before making them men and 
 Christians, before securing them a means of subsistence, 
 would have been to overthrow society, to organize a general 
 
 ^ Though there was much that was unjust and against nature in the 
 treatment of slaves, yet it cannot be stated absolutely that slavery 
 itself is contrary to nature. It can never be allowed to reduce man 
 to a mere "thing," to arrogate to one's self an absolute right over the 
 life and conscience of one's fellow man, to deprive him of the rights of 
 husband and father. It is quite important to observe that such 
 was not the slavery sanctioned by the Mosaic law, nor the institution 
 of colonists (tenants) and serfs in the Middle Ages. Neither of 
 these implied any idea whatever of moral or social degradation. 
 
538 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 massacre in the world, and to condemn the slaves themselves 
 to still greater misery. 
 
 Witness, for example, the evils which followed when the 
 French Republic declared slaves in the colonies free. Inter- 
 ests connected with slavery had much to do with the disas- 
 trous Civil War in the United States between the North and 
 the South. Both regarded the negro as a sort of domestic 
 animal, but the South, in the interest of agriculture, wished 
 to preserve slavery; and the North, in the interest of the 
 manufactories, wished to abohsh it. Faithful to the traditions 
 of the Church, the bishops of America assembled in Council 
 at Baltimore desired that the negroes be gradually freed. 
 
 It was wisdom on the part of the Church to move as she 
 did, slowly: she could not proclaim the universal freedom 
 of the slaves, but by employing the means in her power she 
 efficaciously prepared the way for the complete suppression 
 of slavery. Under her inspiration and after her example 
 governments and individuals multiplied affranchisements, 
 and the laws of Christian princes favored them. Meanwhile 
 nothing was spared to render the condition of the unfortunate 
 creatures more endurable. For further details of the aboli- 
 tion of slavery see the works of Balmes and Bp. England. 
 
 As to the barbarous traffic called the slave trade, the Church, 
 always faithful to her doctrines, energetically protested from 
 the first against this horrible preying of man upon man. 
 Witness the noble and courageous language of the apostohc 
 letters of Pius II., Paul III., Urban VIIL, Benedict XIV. 
 (1462, 1537, 1639, 1741). At the beginning of the present 
 century Pius VII. succeeded in interesting the principal 
 European governments in the holy work of emancipating 
 slaves. Finally, Gregory XVI. issued, the 3d of November, 
 1839, new apostolic letters which afford additional proof of 
 the Church's maternal solicitude for the victims of inhuman 
 cupidity. And like testimony is furnished by the crusade 
 organized under the patronage of Leo XIII. to deliver 
 Africa from the horrible scourge which each year carries off 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 539 
 
 millions of free men to reduce them to the most cruel slavery. 
 Let us pray that, seconded by European powers and by the 
 devotion of generous hearts, the Church may bring happier 
 days to this desolate land. 
 
 B. The gladiatorial combats, which nothing could excuse 
 or justify in the eyes of a Christian, must naturally disappear 
 with slavery. These cruel games had been proscribed by an 
 edict issued in 392 in the name of Honorius and Arcadius. 
 Yet the taste for these sanguina y spectacles was not stifled : 
 it needed the blood of a martyr to abolish them completely. 
 On the 1st of January, 404, when Rome was celebrating the 
 election of the consuls, there appeared in the midst of the 
 Coliseum a monk from the East named Almachius. He 
 threw himself between the gladiators to separate them, then 
 turning to the crowd said: ''We celebrate to-day the octave 
 of the coming of the Son of God, the King of peace; cease, 
 then, these inhuman games invented by pagan cruelty." 
 At these words a terrible tumult arose in the amphitheatre. 
 The infuriated populace fell upon Almachius and tore him 
 to pieces. The next day Honorius stopped the gladiatorial 
 games. ^ 
 
 II. THE POOR AND THE UNFORTUNATE.' 
 
 The lot of the poor, of the unfortunate, of all the disinherited, 
 was changed on the day when Christ said, ''As long as you 
 did it to one of these My least brethren, you did it to Me '^ 
 (Matth. XXV. 40) ; and when He proclaimed the sentence to 
 be given at the Last Judgment, "I was hungry and you gave 
 Me to eat," etc. (ib. 35 ff.)- He never ceased during all His 
 life to repeat His precept, so new and strange to the pagan 
 world, to love all men as our brethren, as we love ourselves, 
 
 * See Butler's Lives of the Saints^ Jan. 1st. 
 
 ' Baluffi; Mulhane; Lacordaire, 1. c, conf. 33 on Cath. Doctr. and 
 Soc'y; C. W. iv. 434, viii. 703, 734, xlvii. 470; D. R. New Ser. xxix. 
 361, XXX. 89, xxxi. 12; HI., Ser. i. 26. 
 
540 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 or, rather, as Christ has loved us. He Himself, moreover, 
 chose to be born poor and to Hve in poverty; His apostles 
 were poor; the poor and the unfortunate of every kind were 
 the object of His special favor; it was for them specially 
 that He wrought His miracles; He was severe only to the 
 hard and pitiless rich. Is it astonishing, then, that the poor, 
 the sick, the abandoned, the aged, all who were objects of 
 contempt or a prey to suffering, found themselves in the first 
 ages of Christianity surrounded with devoted care? Assist- 
 ance of every kind was given to them with such ingenious 
 tenderness that the pagans were forced to exclaim, ''See 
 how these Christians love one another!" Many were even 
 attracted to the new rehgion by this hitherto imheard-of 
 charity. And afterward how many benevolent institutions 
 of every kind, how many religious orders were established 
 to relieve the numberless miseries to which mankind is a 
 prey! But let us not insist upon a truth so manifest and 
 of which we have already spoken (pp. 240 ff). 
 
 III. WORKING CLASSES. 
 
 It is needless to say how the Church has elevated and 
 ennobled labor and the laborer. The example of her Founder 
 Himself and of His first apostles speaks with sufficient 
 eloquence.^ 
 
 How numerous are the institutions and laws created or 
 inspired by her during eighteen centuries to lighten the lot 
 of the working classes, to reconcile the various classes of 
 society, to unite them by the powerful and indissoluble bond 
 of Christian charity! The admirable works founded by the 
 Church in favor of the working classes found their full de- 
 velopment in the bosom of the guilds or confraternities of the 
 Middle Ages. 
 
 ^Leo XIII., Encyclicals on Socialism, etc., Dec. 28, 1878;on Work- 
 ingmen, May 15, 1891, and on Christian Democracy, Jan. 18, 1901; 
 D. E. Apr., July 1902 (PoUt. Econ'y of LeoXHI.); Bayaert, ch. 6; 
 Soderini; Nitti, Oath. Socialism; Bp. Spalding, Socialism, etc. 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 541 
 
 In the last century, unfortunately, the most fatal doc- 
 trines overthrew the edifice so patiently reared by the Church. 
 The troubles and disorders which followed as an immediate 
 consequence are known to the world. But the Church is 
 never discouraged. She still labors with an ardor inspired 
 by her maternal love to save society from the cata- 
 clysm which threatens it. Witness the admirable encych- 
 cal of Leo XIII. on the condition of the working classes, 
 in which he indicates with so much wisdom the most 
 effectual remedies for the too real sufferings of the work- 
 ing classes. The encyclical gives a complete programme 
 of Christian economy, forming a striking contrast to the 
 anarchistic egotism of the French Revolution. Thus the 
 papacy, faithful to the traditions of the past, intervenes 
 once more as mediator in the terrible social struggles of the 
 present day. 
 
 III. Family Life.^ 
 
 A. Woman. — In the eyes of the Church woman is no longer, 
 as in pagan times, an inferior, degraded being, the slave 
 of her husband, an object of contempt to her own children; 
 she is the companion of man, the flesh of his flesh, the bone 
 of his bone; she has resumed in the household the place of 
 honor which belongs to her; she reigns there by virtue and 
 love, as the husband by authority. It was by reestablishing 
 the great law of the unity and indissolubiUty of marriage, 
 raised to the dignity of a sacrament, that the Church restored 
 to woman all her moral dignity. By presenting to the hom- 
 age of the faithful a woman. Virgin and Mother, to whom 
 
 ^ Devas; Evans; Humphrey, S.J. ; Monsabre; Riche, The Family; 
 Woolsey; Lacordaire, 1. c, conf. 34; Bp. Spalding, Socialism, etc., ch. 
 5; Br. W. iii., xii. 339, xiii. 526. On Marriage and Divorce see Leo 
 XIII., Encycl., Febr. 10, 1880; A. C. Q. v. 312, viii. 385, xvi. 611; 
 C. W. v., xvi. 585, 776, xxv. 340, xxxi. 550, xxxv. 11, xlviii. 23, 822; 
 M. xlviii. 254; M. S. H., Jan., Febr. 1900. On Woman see A. C. Q. 
 xi. 651 ; C. W. xv. 78, 255, 366, 487, xlv. 816; D. R. III. Ser. v. 288; 
 Br. W. xviii. 
 
542 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 Our Saviour Himself paid profoundest respect; by honoring 
 widows, by making Christian virgins the object of special 
 veneration, she has given to civiKzation one of its most 
 indispensable elements. 
 
 B. The Child. — The child in the eyes of the Christian is 
 a son of God and heir to the kingdom of heaven ; regenerated 
 by Baptism, he becomes the temple of the Holy Spirit. 
 Jesus Himself deigned to come into the world with all the 
 weakness and miseries of infancy; in public hfe He showed 
 special tenderness toward children; He even declared that 
 we must become like them to enter the kingdom of heaven; 
 finally, He pronounced terrible anathemas against all who 
 would scandalize them. Therefore, children since the coming 
 of Christ have become objects of tenderest solicitude; orphan- 
 ages, nurseries, schools, colleges, all that the most delicate 
 charity could invent, have been established for them. 
 
 IV. Public Society and the Relations Between 
 Nations. 
 
 A. From what we have said it is clearly evident that 
 pubUc society has been profoundly modified by the Church. 
 In fact, by changing the ideas of individuals, by reforming 
 family life, the Church transformed public opinion and 
 pubHc morals. No doubt vicious men did not completely 
 disappear from Christian society, for man preserves with 
 his imperfect liberty the possibility of failing in his duty, 
 but vice was forced to hide its head, it became a dishonor, 
 it no longer held the place it had held in pagan society. 
 
 By proclaiming that *'all power comes from God,'' and 
 that, though seated on a throne, princes and rulers are no 
 less obliged to obey the laws of God and to govern their 
 subjects by wise and just laws, the Church put an end to the 
 tyranny of the State, which hitherto had recognized no will 
 superior to its own. Thus, how far removed the legislation 
 
THE CHXJRCH AND CIVILIZATION. 543 
 
 of the reign of Nero from that of Theodosius, — ^that of 
 Caligula from that of St. Louis! 
 
 By repeating at the same time to the governed the clear 
 principle contained in the words of Jesus: '^ Render unto 
 Caesar the things that are Caesar's/' the Church regulated 
 the duties of subjects and abolished all they unjustly claimed 
 as rights. The Christian readily submits to lawful authority, 
 but tliis obedience is not abject, for it is paid to God's repre- 
 sentative; he preserves, moreover, a noble independence, 
 and when the commands of the human power positively 
 contradict the divine or the natural law, the subject, taking 
 refuge in the inviolable sanctuary of his conscience, proudly 
 repeats the words of the apostles: we cannot — non fossumusl 
 ''We must obey God rather than men."^ 
 
 B. It is evident that international relations could not but 
 assume a more humane and just character. Could peoples, 
 convinced that all men are brethren, children of God and of 
 the Church, continue to treat one another as barbarians and 
 inhumanly destroy one another? 
 
 V. Transformation of Barbarous Nations. 
 
 A word remains to be said of the work of the Church in 
 civihzing barbarous nations, who in the fourth and fifth 
 centuries, particularly, invaded all parts of the Roman world. 
 Roman society was, it would seem, too much weakened 
 by the dissolvent action of paganism to be capable of a 
 complete restoration. God used these barbarians as the 
 ministers of His vengeance upon the persecuting empire, 
 and at the same time to revive, after its conversion, the 
 languishing West. It would seem as though the leaders of 
 these savage hordes were conscious of their terrible mission: 
 they called themselves the scourges of God. The spectacle 
 Europe presented in the fifth century after it had been 
 literally ravaged by them witnessed to the horrible cruelty 
 
 'Lacordaire, 1. c, conf. 35. 
 
544 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 with which these avengers sent by God accomplished their 
 work. Let us content ourselves with a few brief quota- 
 tions : 
 
 ^*In Spain '* — ^it is the chronicler Idacius who speaks — 
 "pestilence and famine followed closely in the bloody foot- 
 steps of the barbarians, and the public distress was so great 
 that men fed upon the flesh of their fellow creatures, and 
 mothers devoured their own children.'^ 
 
 In Africa, St. Augustine was so grieved by the suffering 
 which the Vandals inflicted upon the inhabitants of Hippo, 
 and upon Africa in general, that he begged God to take him 
 to Himself. ''The saint beheld," says the historian Possi- 
 dius, ''cities ruined, villages destroyed, the inhabitants 
 massacred or put to flight. Some had expired in torments, 
 others had perished by the sword, others again, reduced to 
 slavery, served pitiless masters. Those who escaped the 
 conquerors took refuge in the woods or in the caves in the 
 rocks, where they died of hunger and misery." 
 
 Italy was no less fortunate, for she was pillaged from one 
 end to the other. The pillage of Rome by Alaric lasted three 
 days; that of Genseric with his Vandals two weeks, and 
 the ruin effected by the latter was so great that the word 
 vandalism has become a synonym for destruction.^ 
 
 The historian Guildas tells us that "the red tongue of 
 incendiarism swept Great Britain from sea to sea; that 
 fragments of towers and walls, stones of altars, blood-stained 
 bodies lay heaped together in the public places, and that the 
 only sepulchre for the dead was the houses in ruins, or the 
 stomach of the wild beasts and birds of prey." 
 
 These horrible ravages no longer astonish us when we learn 
 from history the physical, and particularly the intellectual 
 and moral, condition of the barbarians. We can form some 
 idea of it from the work of Ozanam, Les Germains avant le 
 Christianisme. In chapter iii. we find that family life among 
 these people differed httle from that of the pagans, of which 
 
 ^Allies, vol. iij. . 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 645 
 
 we have given a brief sketch. Here also the head of the 
 family was the tyrant to his wife, his children, and to his 
 slaves. The warriors themselves, the only Hving power 
 esteemed by the nation, were relegated to domestic duties 
 with the women when age or infirmities rendered them in- 
 capable of brandishing a battle-axe : if they were unable to 
 be of service, all that remained for them was to die. In 
 Sweden, old men ended their days by being thrown from the 
 top of high rocks; among the HeruH they were slain with 
 sword-thrusts, for it was supposed that in order to be re- 
 ceived by Odin into Walhalla one must bear the mark of 
 the sword. 
 
 Neither in the tastes nor in the morals of the barbarians; 
 neither in their pohtical institutions nor in their religion, 
 which was a sort of fetichism and flattered their instincts of 
 murder and carnage, was there anything which showed them 
 capable of regenerating the old society of Rome. Their 
 invasion would inevitably have annihilated all civilization 
 if the Church had not been at hand to subjugate the in- 
 vaders and effect harmony between the conquering and the 
 conquered race. 
 
 We have no need to state in detail the means by which the 
 Church transformed these fierce spirits into the Christian 
 nations which history presents to our admiration. Nourished 
 by the same teachers, subjected to the same religious laws, 
 obeying pastors chosen without distinction from the two 
 races, kneehng at the same altars, partaking of the same 
 eucharistic banquet, the Romans and the barbarians could 
 not but end by being fused into one new people, destined to 
 reap all the happy fruits of Christian civilization. Among 
 the institutions especially fitted to civiHze barbarous peoples 
 we may mention the Truce of God, the right of asylum, and 
 chivalry.^ 
 
 But here again the transformation was not wrought in a 
 day. The Church had a difficult task to enlighten the 
 * Parsons, Studies, II., ch. 19; Balmes, ch. 27. 
 
546 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 intelligence, to subdue the will, to modify the customs and 
 pohtical institutions of these naturally fierce men. Several 
 centuries were necessary to soften the savage harshness of 
 these rude natures and temper the fervid heat of their blood; 
 hence for a long time, side by side with the most heroic virtues 
 and veritable marvels of holiness, we find sanguinary customs 
 and monstrous crimes; but the Church, by force of perse- 
 verance and patient firmness, triumphed over the world of 
 barbarism as she triumphed over the pagan world. 
 
 VI. Catholic and Protestant Nations. 
 
 Before pursuing this study of the civilizing influence of the 
 Church, it may be well to refute, in a few words, a trite 
 objection, which nevertheless impresses unthinking minds. 
 It is founded on a comparison between Cathohc and Protes- 
 tant nations of Europe. There are not wanting men who 
 affirm that the civihzation of the latter is higher, and they 
 do not hesitate to attribute the honor of this alleged supe- 
 riority to Protestantism itself, and to hold it as a proof 
 of the lawfulness of the Reformation. Let us mention a 
 few principles which will suffice completely to destroy this 
 objection.^ 
 
 1. The falseness of Protestantism, as well as the truth of 
 CathoHcism, has been demonstrated by peremptory argu- 
 ments. Until the force of such proofs is weakened, all 
 conclusions of this kind will be absolutely of no value ; they 
 are merely a repetition of the gross sophism, post hoc aut 
 cum hoc, ergo propter hoc. Simple anteriority or concomitance 
 is in no way a relation of cause. 
 
 * Young; Haulleville; Balmes; Vaughan; Spalding, .J. L., Essays; 
 Spalding, J. M., Miscell., Essays 25-30, 43, 46; Newman, Anglican 
 Difficulties, vol. i., pt. 2; Ri cards, Cath. Chr., ch. 14; Alnatt, The 
 Church and the Sects, 11. 1, 2; Br. W. vii. 347, 517, xii. 309, xiii. 184, 
 201, 222 Csame in C. W. x.); A. C. Q. viii. 1, xxv. 791; C. W. ix. 52, 
 845, x. 50, xi. 106, xxii. 577, 721, xxiii. 30, xxxiv. 1 (Ireland and 
 England) ; D. R. New Ser. xxix. 418; U. B., Oct. '98. 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 547 
 
 2. Good is found where truth is. No doubt a false religion, 
 by means of the truths which it has preserved, may be useful 
 to the State, but it is no less true that religious truth, pure and 
 entire, will necessarily be more productive of good to the 
 State. Nor can it be otherwise, since true religion, at the 
 same time that it enhghtens the intelhgence, communicates 
 to the will the strength necessary to make our conduct in 
 harmony with our belief, and thus contributes powerfully to 
 the happiness of individuals, of families, and of society. 
 Moreover, we have demonstrated by incontestable facts thai 
 Catholicism created modern civihzation at a time when 
 there was no question of Protestantism. What it did in the 
 past is it not capable of doing in the present? Has truth or 
 the nature of man changed? 
 
 3. A rehgious doctrine which denies free-will, which de- 
 clares that faith alone is necessary for salvation, that good 
 works are reprehensible and of no avail in the sight of God, 
 which teaches the inadmissibihty of justice — is it fitted to 
 civilize nations, to procure them real peace and happiness? 
 With such principles what must become of public as well as 
 private morality? That innumerable Protestants do not 
 carry these disastrous maxims into practice only proves that 
 they are fortunately inconsistent, but it does not redound 
 to the praise of Protestantism or to the credit of its civihzing 
 power. 
 
 4. Even admitting that Protestant nations of the present 
 day possess a higher civilization (taking the word in the 
 sense of our opponents) than Catholic nations of Europe, 
 yet it cannot be the effect of the religion, for, the same causes 
 always producing the same effects, this superiority ought 
 to have been evident in each of the preceding centuries 
 since the beginning of the Reformation. Now history 
 undoubtedly attests the contrary. To convince ourselves 
 of this we have only to go back to the beginning of this 
 century, when Napoleon I. was the arbiter of Europe. 
 And before him it certainly was not Prussia or England 
 
548 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 which held the balance of poHtical power, but the most 
 profoundly Catholic nations, Spain, France, and Austria. 
 And if Protestantism is so preeminently civilizing, why are 
 not Sweden, Norway, and Denmark, so long invaded by the 
 Reformation, also at the head of civiHzed nations? On 
 the contrary, if France has lost her political preponderance, 
 it certainly has not been because her present government is 
 too deeply attached to the Church. 
 
 5. We are far from admitting, moreover, the superior 
 civilization claimed for nations separated from the Church. 
 If it were only a question of pohtical preponderance, of 
 material riches, of commercial genius or matters of a Hke 
 nature, we should have no difficulty in acknowledging that 
 at the present moment the balance is manifestly in favor of 
 Protestant nations. But a preponderance created by a 
 few successful combats may rapidly disappear for contrary 
 causes. Would civiHzation disappear at the same time 
 with victory? Who would venture to claim that Prussia's 
 success at Sadowa and Sedan was due to her rehgion? It 
 would be only too easy to draw from the history of preceding 
 centuries a diametrically opposite conclusion which tells in 
 favor of Catholicism. Would you say, for example, that 
 the invading barbarians were more civihzed than the nations 
 they conquered by their arms, or that the victorious Turks 
 surpassed in civilization their fallen enemies? In paganism 
 also there were rich and powerful nations, but their power 
 and their riches were purchased at the price of human dignity, 
 and individual Hberty trampled under foot in millions of 
 slaves by a small number of free men. Side by side with a 
 few colossal fortunes there may be the greatest misery and 
 still more deplorable degradation in the masses. 
 
 6. ''The question of the primacy of nations,'' says Aug. 
 Nicolas, ''is of all things in the world the vainest, as long as 
 we do not seek the standard which should serve as a basis of 
 appreciation. " This standard is certainly not wealth, or lux- 
 ury, or commerce, or industries, or powerful manufactories, or 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 549 
 
 even political power; it is man himself, it is, above all, his 
 soul, his intelligence, and his free-will. We have shown that 
 the Catholic Church has done everything for individual 
 liberty, for the advancement and sanctification of souls, and 
 thus for the happiness of individuals and of society. More- 
 over, as we have repeatedly observed, the Church by no 
 means despises material progress, the welfare of society; 
 she encourages, blesses, and hails with acclamation the dis- 
 coveries of science and the marvels of industry. But she 
 cannot forget that man is not placed in this world for the 
 enjoyment of temporal good, but, on the contrary, to love 
 and serve God and merit heaven; she unceasingly tells him, 
 on the authority of God's word, that it will avail him nothing 
 to gain the whole world if he lose his soul. She does not 
 wish that the ''spirit be sacrificed to the body and the body 
 to the machine, " and she declares with the Psalmist, "Happy 
 the people whose God is the Lord! " (Ps. cxliii.) In what way 
 can such maxims, which moderate all the passions and favor 
 all virtues, injure the true happiness of individuals, of fam- 
 ihes, and of nations, or hinder their triple development, 
 material, intellectual, and moral? The decalogue and the 
 Sermon on the Mount, which are the principle of all civihza- 
 tion, are nowhere taught more efficaciously than in the 
 Catholic Church. 
 
 We might appeal to facts here, and compare the morality 
 of Catholic and Protestant nations. But we do not think 
 that statistics on this point are sufficiently advanced to 
 enable us to form a complete judgment in the matter. Statis- 
 tics, however, as they stand at present are not favorable to 
 heretical nations. And if immorality is making alarming 
 progress in Cathohc countries, it is certainly not because the 
 precepts of Catholicism are too faithfully observed by the 
 people. We have shown, on the contrary, that the morality 
 of the founders of Protestantism could not but foster, and 
 did in reality cause, frightful immorality. (V. pp. 343 and 
 348.) Finally, even in Protestant countries the most moral 
 
650 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 as well as the happiest parts of the country are those where 
 Catholicism flourishes. As to the other provinces, we must 
 not forget that they are still largely influenced by what they 
 have retained of the teaching and practices of Catholicism 
 which they formerly possessed. If immorality is not greater 
 among them, it is despite the maxims of Luther and Calvin. 
 
 ART. III.— THE CHURCH AND INTELLECTUAL CULTURE.^ 
 
 I. The Influence of the Church on Letters and Science. 
 
 The object of civihzation, we have said, is the perfecting 
 of the whole man in all that relates to the present life, and it 
 includes not only his material interests, but also, and above 
 all, his moral and intellectual interests. 
 
 It is of capital importance to provide for the intellectual 
 perfection of man, for it is precisely his intelhgence which 
 distinguishes him from the animal. What part, then, has 
 the Church taken in this civilizing labor? We would state 
 it briefly before concluding this chapter. It will afford still 
 another answer to a charge already refuted, but which is as 
 wide-spread as it is unjust. 
 
 Let us begin first of all by recalling what we have said 
 elsewhere, viz., that the sole, proper, direct mission of the 
 Church, the end of her foundation, is to preserve the deposit 
 of Revelation brought by Jesus Christ, and to communicate 
 it to men of good-will, to enable them to attain salvation. 
 Therefore, even though the Church had not labored for the 
 intellectual progress of humanity it could not be alleged as a 
 charge against her. Who would think of accusing a com- 
 
 ^Azarias; Brennan; Townsend; Drane; Allies, ii.,iii., v.; Thebaud; 
 Maitland; Zahm; Spalding, J. M., Miscell., Essays 4 ff.; Balmes, ch. 
 69 ff. ; Newman, Anglican Difficulties, vol. i., pt. 2, 1. 8; Historical 
 Sketches, vol. iii. (universities); Br. W. ix. 457, 568; A. C. Q. i. 504; 
 viii. 264, xiii. 255, xvii. 263; xxv. 456, xxvii. 105; C. W. v., vi., xvi. 
 74, 145, xxi. 721, xliv. 145; D. R. III. Ser. i. 1, xiv. 243, July '97, July 
 '99. See also references p. 554. 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 551 
 
 mercial society of not promoting literature, or an academy 
 of sciences of not producing sculptors or musicians? It 
 would be no less absurd to attack the Church on the ground 
 that she had not contributed to the advanceitient of science 
 and letters. 
 
 Nevertheless, this Church which exercised such a salutary 
 influence upon the ancient world; which prepared the way 
 for the abolition of, and even to a great extent abolished, the 
 crying abuses which will be the eternal dishonor of paganism; 
 which can boast of having indirectly and over and above 
 its spiritual influence civihzed the barbarous nations estab- 
 hshed on the ruins of the Roman Empire, has also acquired 
 claims to the gratitude of nations for special benefits in the 
 intellectual order. 
 
 1. The proper work and mission of the Church is the moral 
 and religious teaching ot all mankind; yet the duty of teach- 
 ing imposed upon her ministers has never excluded the 
 various forms of knowledge which may adorn the human 
 intelligence. The Church's care of man, so dear to God, 
 saved by His precious blood, must extend to the whole man. 
 The human sciences, moreover, are far from being useless for 
 the subUme end of Christianity. They help the soul to 
 grasp more promptly the fundamental principles of faith and 
 the virtues which it teaches. They open a passage, as it 
 were, through which these virtues enter the intelligence 
 more easily and penetrate more deeply. Thus we find the 
 Church inscribes in her laws, in her canon law, these two 
 sentences which express her thought witli energetic brevity: 
 ''Ignorance is the mother of all error. Ignorance is hardly 
 tolerable in a layman, but in a priest it is inexcusable and 
 unpardonable.'' Who does not know St. Basil's homily on 
 "The profit which young men may derive from the read- 
 ing of profane authors?" St. Gregory Nazianzen, St. John 
 Clirysostom, St. Jerome were of like opinion, and employed 
 their leisure in spreading knowledge in the society which 
 they were endeavoring to win to God. ''The first of bless- 
 
552 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 ings," says St. Gregory Nazianzen, one of the greatest 
 Doctors of the Church, ' ' is knowledge ; and I mean not only 
 that which relates to salvation and the beauty of spiritual 
 things, I speak also of profane knowledge. To have only 
 morahty or science is to have but one eye, but those who 
 shine in both are perfect." 
 
 Such has also been the theory and the practice of the 
 Church. Recently the Vatican Council, speaking of scientific 
 studies, solemnly declared in its first dogmatic constitution 
 ^'that, far from being opposed to the study of the arts and 
 the sciences, the Church assists and encourages them in 
 numerous ways; for she knows, and does not despise, the 
 advantages which result from them to the fife of man. More- 
 over, as sciences come from God, the Master of all sciences, 
 the Church recognizes that the regular employment of them 
 should, with the assistance of grace, lead man to God. Cer- 
 tainly she does not forbid that the sciences, each in its own 
 sphere, make use of their proper principles and special 
 methods.'^ 
 
 Why, moreover, should the Church fear science? Has 
 she not just proclaimed by the authentic organ of the same 
 Council that no real conflict is possible between natural truth 
 and revealed truth, between human science and the re- 
 vealed word, between faith and reason? We ourselves have 
 demonstrated in the first part of this work that no such 
 conflict exists. God is the author of all being, and therefore 
 the author of all truths, whatever the order to which they 
 belong. 
 
 2. Not content with promoting all that can extend the 
 sphere of human knowledge, the Church has always been 
 the most ardent centre of intellectual activity. ''From the 
 fourth century,'' says the Protestant Guizot, "the intellectual 
 state of religious society and that of civil society could not 
 be compared: in one all was decadence, languor, and inertia; 
 in the other movement, ardor, and progress.'' In the bosom 
 of Christianity minds were unceasingly quickened by serious 
 
THE CHUECH AND CIVILIZATION. 553 
 
 and profound discussions. The accepted maxim: In neces- 
 sariis unitas, in dubiis libertas, was largely practised. ''Ex- 
 amine the government of the Church/' writes the same 
 author again; ''it appeals unceasingly to reason; liberty 
 dominates. What are its institutions, its means of action? 
 Provincial councils, national (plenary) councils, general coun- 
 cils, continued correspondence, continual publication of letters, 
 admonitions, writings. Never did government carry common 
 discussion and dehberation so far." It was in the general 
 councils, particularly, that this intellectual life was mani- 
 fested, and we may say with a writer that "even had their 
 decisions not been the work of divine inspiration they would 
 still remain as the most beautiful monuments of human 
 wisdom." (M. de Decker, UEglise et Vordre social chretien.) 
 
 "The old world is no more," says a judicious writer, "but 
 its learning has survived it. The Church has made her own 
 the two languages which were the instruments of its thought 
 and the vehicle of its knowledge: in appropriating them 
 she has immortalized them, and in immortahzing them 
 she saved the ideas with which they were impregnated, 
 the notions of which they were the receptacle, in a word, 
 all the intellectual treasure amassed in them; for a language 
 is like a stream of running water which holds in suspension 
 all the elements of the Hfe of a people." {De VEglise dans 
 ses rapports avec le developpement intellectual, by the Abbe 
 Pirenne.) 
 
 3. What a magnificent array of thinkers and writers is 
 offered us in the annals of the Church! She had hardly 
 emerged from the catacombs, this Church based on the 
 inspired books of the Old and the New Testament, than there 
 rose for her defence men hke Origen, Athenagoras, Justin, 
 Tertullian; later she produced the works of writers like 
 John Chrysostom, Basil, Gregory Nazianzen, Jerome, 
 Ambrose, Augustine, and Leo the Great; later still she 
 inspired the masterpieces of Albert the Great, of Anselm, of 
 Bonaventure, of Thomas Aquinas. Who may count the re- 
 
554 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 markable works, published in every language, setting forth, 
 demonstrating, developing, and defining religious truth? We 
 cannot forget that the most beautiful literary works of every 
 kind are due to Christian inspiration ; to be convinced of this 
 it suffices to mention '^ Jerusalem Delivered," ''The Divine 
 Comedy," "Polyeucte," and ''Athalie." If paganism had 
 its century of Pericles and Augustus, Christianity produced 
 that of Leo XIII. and Louis XIV.; if the first excelled 
 especially in Hterary form, the others surpassed them in 
 truth and elevation of thought, and in heroic sentiments. 
 
 4. Historians who have made a serious study of the Middle 
 Ages^ justly affirm that during this long period the in- 
 fluence of the Church was the only thing which held its 
 own, and which exercised its empire in the intellectual 
 world. ''The Church," says Guizot himself, "exercised a 
 great influence over the moral and intellectual order in 
 Europe. . . . The moral and intellectual developments of 
 Europe have been essentially theological." It was this 
 development of minds which rendered possible the literary 
 works of the beautiful Christian centuries, as well as the 
 great scientific discoveries at the end of the fifteenth century, 
 and those which followed as a consequence in later centuries. 
 
 Had the Church done nothing more than save the master- 
 pieces of pagan literature, she would still merit the gratitude 
 of all. When Europe was sacked by barbarous powers and be- 
 held all her Hbraries destroyed, it was the monks who rescued 
 from fire and pillage the manuscripts which we stifl possess. 
 
 ^ On the work of the Church in the Middle Ages see Digby; Mait- 
 land; Allies, vol. iv. ff.; Thebaud, Church and Moral World, ch. 6, 7; 
 Lilly, Chapters, vol. i., Claims, etc., ch. 4; Alnatt, Which is the True 
 Church, suppL; Shahan, Catholicism in the Middle Ages; Br. W. x., 
 xii.; Hergenrother, Cath. Church, etc., vol. i., Essay 6; Parsons, Studies, 
 II., ch. 1; A. C. Q. xiii, 589; C. W. v. 207, 397 (libraries, universities), 
 xxiii. 79 (commerce), xxv. 459, xxix. 358, xxxii. 262, 354, 650 (edu- 
 cation) , xxxiii. 377 (female education) ; D. R. Old Ser. xvii. 159, xxviii. 
 50, XXX. 273, New Ser. xix. 294, xxviii. 378 (how to study the M. A.) ; 
 L E. R., Dec. '99 (morality). 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 555 
 
 And when there was no means of multiplying these works, these 
 same monks, in their cells or in the scriptorium, transcribed 
 them and spread numerous copies. They devoted to these 
 labors the leisure left them from the education of children 
 and of young men, from the cultivating and redeeming of 
 lands, and from the construction of many of the magnificent 
 cathedrals which are to be found in Europe. 
 
 Much might be said in regard to other services of every 
 kind wliich the monasteries rendered society. While 
 Guizot affirms that the Benedictines cultivated the soil 
 of Europe, the rationalist Gibbon declares that ''one convent 
 of these religious probably did more for letters than the two 
 universities of Oxford and Cambridge." ''An abbey," says 
 A. Thierry, "was not only a place of prayer and contempla- 
 tion, but it was also a pubhc asylum against the invasion 
 of barbarism. Beside being a refuge for books and the 
 sciences, it contained workshops of every kind, and its lands 
 were model farms. It was the school to which the con- 
 querors came to learn how to cultivate and colonize the 
 lands they had acquired."^ 
 
 5. And the Popes particularly, what have they not done 
 for intellectual culture? "I should never conclude," says 
 Mgr. Freppel, "if I were to enumerate all the services ren- 
 dered by the papacy to the cause of science and letters. 
 Shall I point out to you a Pope at the head of the Latin 
 and Greek renaissance; the refugees from Constantinople 
 seeking protection under the shadow of the pontifical throne ; 
 Lascaris teaching Greek to astonished Europe on the Esquiline 
 beside the palace of Leo X. ; Nicholas V. maintaining a legion 
 of scholars for the collection of manuscripts in all parts of 
 the world; Pius 11. , the learned ^neas Sj^lvius, mingling his 
 own knowledge with the brilliant lights of his proteges? 
 
 * Montalembert; Feasey; Belloc; Henry; Newman, Hist. Sketches, 
 IL,ch. 3.4; Allies, viii.; Balmes,ch. 38-47; Gasquet, The Engl. Bible, 
 ch. 6 ff. (on Convent Schools); Lacordaire, 1. c, conf. 36; A. C. Q. vii. 
 331, xi. 597; D. R. Old Ser. xvii. 376, xxx. 272. 
 
556 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 And to come nearer to our own day, shall T cite Paul III. 
 encouraging Copernicus in his immortal discoveries; Gregory 
 XIII. furnishing from astronomy a more accurate distribu- 
 tion of time; Sixtus V. developing that Vatican library which 
 has been the admiration of the world; Urban VIII., whose 
 Latin poems are justly regarded as among the best produc- 
 tions of the kind in modern times; and, finally, that grand 
 Benedict XIV., to whom Voltaire himself renders homage, 
 haihng him as the most learned man of the eighteenth cen- 
 tury? " Each one's thoughts naturally turn here to the Pope 
 gloriously reigning, who by his learning, his writings, and 
 his works leads the march of contemporary civiHzation. 
 Who does not know the admirable zeal with which Leo XIII. 
 favors and recommends the higher studies, whether in 
 hterature, language, natural science, history, philosophy, 
 theology, in a word, in all the branches of human knowledge? 
 ''Nothing," he wrote recently, ''is more noble than literary 
 glory." Thus he earnestly extols the study of Roman 
 and Greek authors. "The models of Greece," he says, 
 "shine and excel to such an extent, and in every respect, 
 that one cannot conceive of anything more polished and 
 more perfect." The end the Holy Father has in view is 
 evident; it is, as he himself says, "that truth enlightened 
 by the splendor of thought and style may more easily pene- 
 trate, and be more deeply graven in minds." Moreover, 
 his grand intelligence and noble heart are keenly interested 
 in all that can contribute to the elevation and to the welfare 
 of humanity.^ 
 It is, therefore, a historical fact that in every period of the 
 
 * There is, however, a science which Leo XIII. condemns, the 
 science which plunges into matter and proclaims it eternal; the 
 science which reduces man to the level of the brute, and which by 
 its extravagances shakes the foundation of all moral, domestic, and 
 civil order. There is also a civilization which the Pope repudiates: 
 " It is certainly not that by which man is perfected in the threefold 
 manner we have mentioned; no, it cannot be that, since the Church, 
 so far from contesting it, lends it her most efficacious concurrence. It 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 557 
 
 Christian worid the papacy has always presided over scien- 
 tific and literary movements, just as it has been at the 
 head of rehgious and social movements.^ 
 
 II. The Church and the Fine Arts.^ 
 
 In regard to the Church's influence on the progress of the 
 fine arts, we must needs confine ourselves to a few brief but 
 significant words. ''Take away the monuments of Christian 
 art from the time of the catacombs to the present day; ehmi- 
 nate from public and private collections all the marvels of 
 painting and sculpture due to Christian genius, and you will 
 have," as Armengaud justly observes in his Les ceuvres de 
 r art Chretien, ''the best proof of this fact, viz., that religion 
 was the sole inspiration of great art, the founder of all the 
 rival schools, and the nursing mother of artists. It belonged 
 to her and to her alone to complete the sublime beauty of 
 pagan form by the still more subhme beauty of Christian 
 sentiment: ancient art had deified matter, modem art has 
 breathed into a soul." And to cite only Italy, look at the 
 glorious array of Christian painters who made the age from 
 Leo X. to Urban VIII. illustrious: Fra Bartolomeo, Leonardo 
 da Vinci, Raphael, Perugino, Andrea del Sarto, Correggio, 
 Giuho Romano, Daniel de Volterra, Michael Angelo, Palma 
 the elder, Titian, Paul Veronese, Tintoretto, the Caravaggios, 
 Guido, and Domenichino. Was it not Canova, the great 
 modern sculptor, who wrote Napoleon: "All religions foster 
 art, but none in the same degree as ours"? After a period 
 
 is a civilization which would supplant Christianity and destroy with 
 it all the good with which it has enriched us." 
 
 ^ On the Renaissance see Pastor, vol. i., Introd.; Lilly, Claims, etc., 
 ch. 5; C. T. S., vol. 45; Einstein. 
 
 ' Rio; Wiseman, Essays, vol. vi.; Kenrick, 1. c.,§ 1 ; Spalding, J. M., 
 Miscell., Essay 4; Spalding, J. L., Essays, p. 306; A. C. Q. ix. 625, 
 xiv. 234, XV. 228; C. W. i. 246, iv. 546, v., xv. 518, xxxv. 133, xlv. 
 398, lxxi.815; D.R. NewSer. iii. 402, xi. 234; M., July 1900, Febr. 
 1901. 
 
558 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 of lamentable indifference, our age cannot now extol suffi- 
 ciently the marvels of architecture, of sculpture, and of 
 painting of the Middle Ages. We justly admire the grave 
 and touching melodies of the Gregorian chant, and the 
 learned compositions of Orlando de Lassus, of Palestrina, 
 of Allegri. A master on hearing them in the Sistine Chapel 
 exclaimed: ''I have been listening to the angels, and repeat- 
 ing what they sang.^' 
 
 Wliile the Church thus gave souls, with the possession 
 of truth, the sentiment of the beautiful and the desire to 
 express it in art, the reformers of the sixteenth century 
 seeing only superstition in the pomp of our altars, idolatry 
 in the numerous masterpieces which adorned our churches, 
 remorselessly destroyed these marvels of Catholic art. ''The 
 Reformation," says Chateaubriand, ''penetrated with the 
 spirit of its founder, an envious and barbarous monk, de- 
 clared itself the enemy of the arts. In withdrawing the 
 imagination from the faculties of man, it cut the wings 
 of genius and arrested its flights. ... If the Reformation 
 had been completely successful in the beginning, it would 
 have established, at least for a time, another species of bar- 
 barism. . . . Europe, in fact the whole world, is covered with 
 monuments of the Catholic religion. We owe it this Gothic 
 architecture which equals in details and surpasses in grandeur 
 the monuments of Greece." 
 
 III. The Church and Education.* 
 
 I. POPULAR EDUCATION. 
 
 Reli^ous and moral teaching forms the basis of all true 
 civilization, or rather of society itself. If it does not rest 
 upon certain fundamental truths, admitted and practised 
 by the masses, not only the prosperity but the very existence 
 of society is constantly endangered. This is particularly 
 
 * See references above, p. 550. 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 559 
 
 true in the troubled times in which we hve. Victor Hugo 
 himself bears witness to this truth in his address to the 
 national assembly, Jan. 15, 1850. ''Rehgious teaching," he 
 says, ''is, in my opinion, more necessary to-day than ever. 
 The more a man advances, the more he . should believe. 
 The evil, I might almost say the one evil of our time, is a 
 tendency to stake all on this present life. In making tem- 
 poral, material Kfe the object and end of man we aggravate 
 all his miseries by the negation which this imphes: to the 
 burden of misfortune we add the insupportable weight of 
 future nothingness, and that which was only suffering, that 
 is, a law ordained of God, becomes despair, that is, the law 
 which reigns in hell. Hence the great social convulsions of 
 the day. Certainly, I am of those who desire to alleviate in 
 this life the material condition of those who suffer; but I do 
 not forget that the first means of alleviation is to give them 
 hope. How our finite miseries diminish when we are sus- 
 tained by an infinite hope! The duty of us all, whether 
 legislators, bishops, priests, writers, is ... to make all 
 look up to heaven, to direct all souls, to turn all expectations 
 toward a future life, where justice will be done, where wrongs 
 will be righted. Let us clearly proclaim it : no one will have 
 suffered unjustly or in vain. Let us not forget, and let us 
 impress upon all that hfe would be robbed of its dignity, 
 it would not be worth Hving if all ended with this world, if 
 annihilation were to be our lot. That which lightens labor, 
 which sanctifies work, which makes man good, wise, patient, 
 benevolent, just, and at the same time humble and great, 
 worthy of intelligence, worthy of liberty, is having before 
 him the perpetual vision of a better world shining through 
 the darkness of this life."^ There are men, nevertheless, 
 
 ^"Fly," says J. J. Rousseau himself, "fly those who, under pre- 
 text of explaining nature, sow desolating doctrines in the hearts of 
 men. Overturning, destroying, trampling under foot all that men 
 respect, they rob the afflicted of their last consolation in their misery; 
 they take from the powerful and the rich the only curbs of their 
 
560 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 who think otherwise : bhnding themselves to the truth, they 
 can conceive of no salvation for peoples save through the 
 spread of letters and science. Yet if they are in good faith, 
 they must recognize that, even on this ground, the Church 
 deserves the gratitude of all who are friends of the people. 
 
 There is, in effect, no historical fact more solidly estab- 
 lished than that of the Church's care for the instruction of 
 the masses. 
 
 1. What is the preaching of the Gospel but a marvellously 
 efficacious means of intellectual culture for nations? We 
 have said elsewhere that preaching is essential to the Church. 
 For by means of it the heavenly doctrine is spread through- 
 out the world. ^ What had been said of the prophet Christ 
 applied to Himself: The spirit of the Lord has sent Me 
 to preach the Gospel to the poor (Luke iv. 17 ff.)- And 
 His apostohc life was a continual preaching to the multitude. 
 His disciples, after His example, went through the world 
 announcing the truth which enlightens and purifies. ''Woe 
 is unto me if I preach not the Gospel," exclaims the Apostle 
 of nations (1 Cor. ix. 16. See also Rom. x. 18, where Ps. 
 xviii. 5 is applied to the Apostles). "There is no reUgion," 
 says Bergier, ''which has inspired its followers with so much 
 zeal for the instruction of the ignorant as Christianity; none 
 which has produced such a large number of scholars; with 
 the exception of Christian nations, nearly all are still ignorant 
 and barbarous; those who have had the misfortune to re- 
 passions; they wrest from the depths of hearts remorse for crime and 
 hope of virtue, and yet boast that they are the benefactors of the 
 human race. Truth, they protest, can never be harmful to men. I 
 agree with them. And this, in my opinion, is a great proof that what 
 they teach is not the truth." 
 
 ^ On Catholic and Protestant missions see Wiseman, Lect. on Doc- 
 trines of the Ch., 11. 6, 7; Marshall, Christ. Missions; Alzog, Ch. Hist., 
 III., p. 401 ff.; 921 ff.; Card. Moran in C. T. S. xxix.; the interesting 
 articles by Rev. A. H. Atteridge, S.J., in D. R. July '84, Apr. '85, 
 Jan. '87, Jan., Oct. '89; Archbp. Spalding, Evidences, 1. 4; A. C. Q. 
 Oct. 1901. 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 561 
 
 nounce Christianity have promptly relapsed into barbarism." 
 And this phenomenon is all the more remarkable that, as 
 Ozanam justly observes, paganism was never preached; never 
 did the ancient reUgions speak to the people assembled in 
 their temples.^ Now it cannot be disputed that the knowl- 
 edge of religious truths taught by the Church constitutes, 
 of itself, the richest treasure of the intelligence. The 
 catechism, it has been justly said, is the philosophy of 
 the people. Theodore Jouffroy, one of the representatives 
 of infidel philosophy, could not but acknowledge this. Hear 
 what he said to his numerous auditors at the Sorbonne, speak- 
 ing of the summary of Cathohc doctrine. ^' There is a Httle 
 book which children are taught, and upon which they are 
 questioned at church; read this little book, which is the 
 Catechism: you will find in it a solution of all the questions 
 I have proposed to you, of all without exception. Ask the 
 Christian the origin of human species, ask whither he is 
 going, how he is going, he will tell you. Ask that poor 
 child why he is on this earth, what is to become of him after 
 his death : he will give you a subhme reply, which he will not 
 imderstand, but which is no less admirable. Ask him how 
 the world was created and for what end; why God placed in 
 it animals and plants; how the earth was peopled, whether 
 by one family or by many; why men speak several languages; 
 why they suffer; why they struggle, and how all tliis is to 
 end: again he will tell you. Ask him concerning the origin 
 of the world and the origin of species, questions of race, the 
 destiny of man in this fife and in the next, man's relations 
 with God, the duties of man toward his fellow creatures, the 
 rights of man over creation : he will be equally able to answer. 
 And when he is a man he will hesitate no less concerning 
 natural right, political right, international right, for all this 
 comes, flows clearly, as of itself, from Christianity. This is 
 what I call a grand religion ; I recognize it by this sign : that 
 it leaves unanswered no question which interests humanity.'' 
 
 ^ See the beautiful pages of Lacordaire, conf. 24 on Cath. Doc, 
 
562 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 2. Wherever the Church has raised a temple she has huilt a 
 school. All authors who have written on the beginnings of the 
 Church are unanimous in pointing out the existence in the first 
 centuries of a cathedral school in each diocese. The Anglican 
 Bingham in his celebrated book on Ecclesiastical Antiquities, 
 the learned Thomassin in his still more celebrated work, 
 ''Ancient and Modern Ecclesiastical Discipline," Launoi, 
 Lingard, Louis Nardi, and a multitude of others make this very- 
 clear. The learned Benedictine authors of VHistoire litteraire 
 de la France, writing of the state of letters in Gaul in the first 
 centuries, say that "a Christian school invariably followed 
 the erection of a parish church." And after relating how 
 ''the Church and monastic orders in the sixth century were 
 the harbors where all that remained of letters and sciences 
 were saved from total shipwreck," they add: " The cathedrals 
 still had their schools where the same method of teaching was 
 followed as in the early centuries.' ' It is to be noted that 
 before the triumph of the Church imder Constantine there 
 were no parochial churches, only bishoprics: the flock was 
 governed directly by the bishop assisted by a few priests. 
 Later, when dioceses were divided into parishes, parochial 
 schools were added to the cathedral schools. 
 
 To appreciate the interest which the Church has always 
 taken in the education and instruction of the people, we have 
 only to open a collection of the Councils. At every period 
 we find these learned and holy assemblies occupied with the 
 question of education, and recommending it to the enlightened 
 care of pastors of souls. In the sixth century the Council of 
 Vaison cites the example, already old, of Italy, to remind the 
 priests of Gaul of their grave obhgation to elevate and 
 instruct youth. In the eighth century we find Theodulf, 
 Bishop of Orleans, beloved by Charlemagne for his learning 
 and his virtues, issuing the following decree, which is repro- 
 duced word for word in the capitularies or ecclesiastical 
 statutes of England of that time: "Let the priests maintain 
 schools in the market-towns and in the country; and if 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 563 
 
 any of the faithful wish to entrust their little children 
 to them to be instructed in letters, let them not refuse 
 to receive and instruct them; but, on the contrary, let 
 them teach them with perfect charity. And in instructing 
 the children let them require no salary, and receive nothing 
 except whatever the parents voluntarily offer through affec- 
 tion and gratitude." 
 
 We might cite a number of other Councils, for example, 
 that of Aix-la-Chapelle in 789, of Thionville in 805, of Mayence 
 in 813, of Rome in 826, of Paris in 829, of Valence in 885, 
 all of which spoke in analogous terms. 
 
 Charlemagne was most anxious for the education of his 
 people. Ansegis, Abbot of St. Vandrille, says, in his collec- 
 tion of the great Christian emperor's capitularies: ''Charle- 
 magne desired that there be schools in all the monasteries 
 and in all the bishoprics in order that the children of free 
 men as well as those of serfs be taught grammar, music, and 
 arithmetic." 
 
 We would also mention the eighteenth canon of the Third 
 Ecumenical Council of Lateran, held in 1171. Addressed to 
 the universal Church, it faithfully expresses the thought 
 of the Church herself: ''The Church like a pious mother is 
 bound to see that the poor whose parents cannot afford 
 to educate them shall not, for this reason, be deprived of 
 facilities for learning and making progress in letters and 
 science; therefore, we command that in all the cathedrals 
 a master with a suitable salary be provided for the free in- 
 struction of clerks and all poor scholars.^' 
 
 In fact, as Allain says in his erudite work, Uinstrudion 
 primaire en France avant la revolution, " the history of educa- 
 tion of every degree in the early part of the Middle Ages is 
 simply the history of the Church's efforts to preserve the 
 sciences, and to save the threatened civilization. From the 
 fifth to the twelfth century the clergy alone were occupied 
 with questions relating to education; and if we would have 
 an idea of the intellectual state of our fathers in those remote 
 
564 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 periods, we must have recourse to the ecclesiastical records, 
 we must study the Councils." 
 
 The same state of affairs prevailed in Germany as in France. 
 In a work entitled U instruction populaire dans V AlUmagne, 
 du Nord, Rendu, Inspector-General of the University of 
 France, speaking of the time preceding the Revolution, 
 expresses himself thus: "Catholicism had peopled Germany 
 with popular schools like the rest of Europe; it required 
 that the clergy call to these schools the children of serfs as 
 well as free men; that every priest having charge of souls 
 should give instruction himself, or have it given by a clerk; 
 that the bishops, in their turn^ should take care to build 
 schools where there were none; that the curate of each 
 parish should offer the poor free instruction. Cathohcism 
 did more; anticipating the thought of J. B. de la Salle, the 
 disciples of Gerard Van Groote taught poor children writing^ 
 reading, religion, and a few mechanical arts. From the 
 Netherlands, their native country, this brotherhood of the 
 fourteenth century carried the light of their charity to both 
 shores of the Rhine, to Westphalia, to Saxony^ to Pomerania, 
 to Prussia and Silesia. At the same time, monasteries of 
 women had provided the young girls of the people with 
 teachers which the Reformation took from them. . . . Thus 
 Cathohcism had laid the corner-stone of popular education 
 as well as of higher culture." 
 
 It is not astonishing, therefore, that in the sixteenth 
 century the Council of Trent found nothing to change in the 
 work of the education of the people, and that it was content 
 to give it its final perfection by the creation of the Petits 
 Seminaires. 
 
 The work of popular instruction by no means declined in 
 the two centuries that followed. Before 1789 France, for 
 example, was covered with schools for the instruction of the 
 people. Paris alone had at least five hundred. Even the 
 small villages were not without them, as we learn from the 
 terms of article twenty-five of the edict of 1695: ''The 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 565 
 
 superintendents, preceptors, masters, and mistresses in the 
 small villages shall be approved by the curates of the parishes, 
 or other ecclesiastics empowered to do so." In 1771 Guy 
 de Rousseau de Lacombe, advocate of the Parliament of 
 Paris, writes: ''Our late kings have united in their ordi- 
 nances the dispositions of their predecessors and those of the 
 Councils, and finding schools established almost everywhere, 
 they have been watchful to maintain their discipline and to 
 have them well attended." ''Each parish usually has," 
 says Daniel Jousse in a treatise written in 1709, "two charity 
 schools for poor children, one for boys and one for girls." 
 
 In a learned work of Ch. de Robillard de Beaurepaire, the 
 fruit of patient research, we find that in the ancient diocese 
 of Rouen there were 835 schools for boys and 306 schools 
 for girls, dispersed through the 1159 parishes visited by Mgr. 
 d'Aubigne. Analogous works attest the same care on the 
 part of the Church for the other dioceses of France. 
 
 In concluding the ninth chapter, entitled UEglise et 
 V instruction primaire, M. Allain expresses himself in the 
 following terms: "Whoever shall have read dispassionately 
 these extracts from our ancient synodal ordinances will be 
 convinced, I hope, of the zeal with which the Church labored 
 for the diffusion of primary education, and of the profound 
 wisdom of the regulations she made for masters and scholars. 
 The diocesan statutes of the last two centuries are an im- 
 perishable monument of her devotion to the interests of 
 education; they demonstrate the extent of her solicitude 
 for this important work and the intelhgent care she bestowed 
 on it. Those who dare to say that if anything was done in 
 France for primary instruction, it was done without the 
 Church, and in spite of her, show that they are absolutely 
 ignorant of her legislation and her works." 
 
 What we have said proclaims with eloquence the devotion 
 of the clergy to the great work of popular education. Not 
 content with exhorting, they preached by example, per- 
 forming the duties of teachers themselves at need, founding 
 
566 CHEISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 schools and robbing themselves to endow them. We have 
 here striking and numerous facts, the authority of which is 
 not weakened nor the memory effaced because there are 
 writers who dare to assert, without the shadow of proof, that, 
 ''though the Catholic faith predominated for many centuries, 
 it did nothing toward founding primary schools." And, 
 incredible as it may seem, even the Revolution in its famous 
 preface to the law of August 18, 1792, did not hesitate to 
 proclaim that ''the Brothers (of the Christian Schools) 
 merited well of the country." Nor is this unequivocal testi- 
 mony astonishing, for at the death of Blessed de la Salle his 
 disciples had schools in almost all the provinces of France, 
 and we know that their instruction was free. In fact it 
 was complained that they were too numerous: " Our market 
 towns and our villages," said in 1773 the magistrates and 
 prominent citizens of Saint- Die "swarm with schools; there 
 is not a hamlet without its pedagogue.". These are facts 
 which the calumniators of the Church should not ignore. 
 Perhaps they are also ignorant of Voltaire's opinion in regard 
 to the education of the masses. We shall confine ourselves 
 to quoting the following from a great number of similar 
 sentiments written by this man who so heartily despised 
 the people: "The laborer does not deserve to be educated; 
 it is sufficient for him if he knows how to handle the pick-axe, 
 the plane, or the file." " There must needs be ignorant beg- 
 gars." "The good bourgeois, not the workman, should be 
 educated." As to the people, "they must be made to wear 
 the yoke eternally and feel the goad." 
 
 It would be interesting to contrast the action of the Church 
 with what was done for the education of the people by the 
 French Revolution, which certain writers credit erroneously 
 with so many excellent things. But for lack of space we 
 shall limit ourselves to saying that the Revolution began 
 in 1792 by abolishing all the primary schools together with 
 the five hundred and sixty-two colleges then existing; as to 
 the universities, one only, that of Strasburg, was allowed, 
 
THE churOh and civilization. 567 
 
 because of its Protestantism, to remain; the twenty-three 
 others were suppressed. The lands and revenues of these 
 institutions were of course confiscated and the former 
 faculty foimd themselves dismissed, or obliged to apostatize. 
 And what was offered in their place? High-sounding 
 decrees, in spite of which the learned Chaptal, then Minister 
 of the Interior in France, says in 1801, ''pubHc education 
 has almost ceased; the generation which has just reached 
 its twentieth year is irrevocably sacrificed to ignorance; 
 the primary schools have almost disappeared.'' 
 
 No doubt the Empire and the succeeding governments 
 endeavored to repair the evil caused by the Revolution, 
 but their labor consisted only in restoring, to a certain extent, 
 the ruins accumulated by free thought. This does not 
 justify them, however, in attacking the Church, which for 
 centuries had done so much better and so much more for 
 the interests of education. 
 
 We must not imagine that free schools are an invention 
 of modem times. The majority of the schools, colleges, 
 and universities of the Middle Ages were founded and main- 
 tained by Catholic liberality.^ 
 
 II. UNIVERSITY AND COLLEGE EDUCATION. 
 
 University Education. — There is much to be said of the 
 important service rendered by the Church to philosophy, 
 hterature, and science, but we must confine ourselves to a 
 few leading facts.^ 
 
 *The free schools of those ages were the result of spontaneous 
 donations, and not, like most of the present day, supported by public 
 tax, — an additional burden imposed alike upon the poor and the 
 rich, under penalty of fine or imprisonment. Think of the enormous 
 sums required every year by the bureau of education in most of the 
 countries of Europe! 
 
 ' Cf. Rashdall's excellent work. 
 
568 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 It is well known that all the numerous and flourishing 
 universities of the Middle Ages were, from the eleventh and 
 twelfth century, founded by the Church, or sought her 
 approval or protection. To be sure, they were favored and 
 patronized by kings, but it is absolutely incontestable that 
 they grew and prospered under the shadow of the Holy See. 
 The Popes in the bulls of erection gave as a reason therefor 
 the duty incumbent upon them to dissipate the darkness 
 of ignorance, to spread and encourage the teaching of all the 
 sciences. Hence the name. University, Universis scientiis. 
 From the thirteenth century the Oriental languages were 
 taught in them, and in 1311 the General Council of Vienna 
 made these studies obligatory in the principal universities. 
 Let us remark further that the first collection for the history 
 of natural sciences was due to Pope Pius V. (1566-1572), 
 and that as early as the thirteenth century the Vatican 
 possessed a botanical and medical garden. 
 
 While the universities received their statutes and their 
 powers from the Pope, they were justly proud of numbering 
 among their illustrious masters such men as St. Anselm, 
 St. Bonaventure, Alexander de Hales, Albert the Great, 
 Duns Scotus, and St. Thomas Aquinas. 
 
 The number of their scholars corresponded to the high 
 grade of the teaching given. In the fifteenth century, when 
 the Protestant Reformation had overturned CathoHc Europe, 
 the Universities of Zwolle, Bois-le-Duc, Cologne, Deventer 
 nimibered respectively 800, 1200, 2000, 2200 students. The 
 University of Vienna harbored 3000, and even 7000 under 
 Maximilian I. ; the University of Paris, it is said, and that of 
 Cracow had as many as 15,000. The universal use of the 
 Latin tongue in the universities caused students from all 
 parts of the world to fiock to them. In Belgium the Univer- 
 sity of Louvain, founded in the fifteenth century by Martin V., 
 enjoyed the most brilhant reputation. According to Justus 
 Lipsius it numbered from 7000 to 8000 scholars and 2000 
 law students. No poor scholar was refused^ Catholic charity 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 569 
 
 having provided in advance for all their needs. In this 
 city alone there were more than forty colleges or houses 
 where poor scholars, conspicuous for talent or appHcation, 
 were gratuitously lodged and fed. M. Laurentie says that 
 the single university of Paris distributed six hundred and 
 nineteen scholarships founded by the clergy for poor 
 students. 
 
 Colleges. — As to the colleges, that is, the schools which, 
 with rehgion, included specially the study of classic antiquity, 
 they were to be found even in the most unimportant cities. 
 They were generally under the administration of the chief 
 magistrates, but nearly all the instruction was given by the 
 clergy, who had, moreover, undisputed right of supervision. 
 Here again it was Christian charity which richly endowed 
 these numerous establishments, founded scholarships, and 
 erected pubHc Hbraries. 
 
 We find in the recent and remarkable work of Albert 
 Duruy, U instruction 'puhlique et la revolution, interesting 
 statistics in regard to our subject. We learn that before 
 1789 France with a population of twenty-five milUon in- 
 habitants, had 562 colleges with 72,747 scholars. About 
 40,000 of this number received gratuitous or almost gratuitous 
 instruction. To-day the official records show to a popula- 
 tion of thirty-eight million inhabitants only 81 lyceums 
 and 325 colleges with 79,321 scholars; of these only 4949 
 receive scholarships of more or less importance. In the 
 single province of Franche-Comte there were more scholarships 
 than there are to-day in all France. These figures speak 
 eloquently and dispense with all commentary. We see that 
 Chevaher had indeed reason to say that ''since the Revo- 
 lution and the suppression of religious orders there has been 
 a strange retrogression in regard to secondary education.'' 
 
 Let us conclude, as the learned Hurter observes in his 
 History of Innocent III., that ''only superficial minds, who 
 have not studied historical records, who are either bhnded 
 by the alleged superiority of their day, or instigated by 
 
570 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 persistent hatred, dare to accuse the Church of having 
 favored ignorance." 
 
 We cannot conclude this chapter better than by quoting 
 a beautiful page of Balmes in which, presenting a brief 
 picture of European civihzation, he shows the Church's 
 innumerable claims to the gratitude of the people. 
 
 ''The individual animated by a lively sense of his own 
 dignity, abounding in activity, perseverance, energy, and 
 enjoying the simultaneous development of all his faculties; 
 woman elevated to the rank of the consort of man, and, as it 
 were, recompensed for the duty of obedience by the respectful 
 affection lavished upon her; the gentleness and constancy 
 of family ties, protected by the powerful guarantees of good 
 order and justice; an admirable public conscience, rich 
 in maxims of sublime morality, in laws of justice and equity, 
 in sentiments of honor and dignity; a conscience which 
 survives the shipwreck of private morality, and does not 
 allow unblushing corruption to reach the height which it 
 attained in antiquity; a general mildness of manners, which 
 in war prevents great excesses, and in peace renders life 
 more tranquil and pleasing; a profound respect for man and 
 all that belongs to him, which makes private acts of violence 
 very uncommon, and in all political constitutions serves as a 
 salutary check on governments; an ardent desire of perfec- 
 tion in all departments; an irresistible tendency, sometimes 
 ill-directed, but always active, to improve the condition 
 of the many; a secret impulse to protect the weak, to succor 
 the imfortunate — an impulse which sometimes pursues its 
 course with generous ardor, and which, whenever it is unable 
 to develop itself, remains in the heart of society, and pro- 
 duces there the uneasiness and disquietude of remorse; 
 a cosmopolitan spirit of imiversality, of propagandism, an 
 inexhaustible fund of resources to grow again without danger 
 of perishing, and for self-preservation in the most important 
 junctures; a generous impatience, which longs to anticipate 
 the future, and produces an incessant movement and agita- 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 571 
 
 tion, sometimes dangerous, but which are generally the 
 germs of great benefits, and the symptoms of a strong principle 
 of life, — such are the great characteristics wliich distinguish 
 European civiHzation; such are the features which place 
 it in a rank immensely supeiior to that of all other civih- 
 zations, ancient or modern." 
 
 GENERAL CONCLUSION. 
 
 All honor to the Catholic Church our Mother, who, after 
 drawing mankind from the deluge of corruption in which it 
 was plimged, raised it a second time from the ruins ac- 
 cumulated by barbarism! All honor to the Church which 
 has so admirably moulded the gross elements placed under 
 her hand by the irruption of the Germans and the other 
 barbarians; in fusing the new races with the old, she formed 
 the modem nations whose civiHzation casts such a bright 
 light in the world! All honor to the Church whose entire 
 history relates and proclaims the beneficent influence she 
 exercised from century to century to our own day! What 
 she reahzed in the past by her doctrine, her laws, her institu- 
 tions, and by the divine grace which she communicates to 
 souls, the Church can and still desires to realize, for she has 
 lost nothing of her fruitfulness and her immortal youth. 
 
 Yet, notwithstanding these great and inestimable services, 
 the Church has never, perhaps, encountered greater enmity. 
 In every part of the globe simultaneous and powerful attacks 
 are made upon her. Freemasonry,^ centralizing all the 
 forces at the disposition of the enemies of Jesus Christ, seems 
 to be exhausting all its efforts to falsify the prophecy which 
 proclaims the immortality of His divine work. 
 
 * On Freemasonry see Leo XIII., Encycl., Apr. 20, 1884; Pachtler, 
 The Secret Warfare of Freemasonry Against Church and State; 
 Dupanloup, Study of Freemasonry; Parsons, Studies, IV., ch. 18; 
 A. C. Q. 239, vi. 577; C. W. xxii. 145; M. li. 305, 474; I. E. R., 
 July, Sept., Oct. '99; D. R. III. Ser. xii. 144; A. E. R., Dec. '99, 
 Febr. 1900. 
 
572 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 We have no reason, however, despite this redoubled 
 manifestation of rage and hatred, to be anxious as to the 
 fate of the Church. Let us bear in mind the words of the 
 illustrious St. Augustine, uttered fourteen hundred years 
 ago. ''They behold the Church and they say: 'She is about 
 to die, and even her name will soon disappear; in a short 
 time there will be no more Christians; they have had their 
 day.' And while they are saying this, I see them die every 
 day, and the Church still remains, proclaiming the power 
 of God to succeeding generations." 
 
 "The Papacy," says, in his turn, Macaulay, the celebrated 
 publicist and Protestant historian, "the Papacy remains, 
 not in decay, not a mere antique, but full of hfe and useful 
 vigor. Nor do we see any sign which indicates that the 
 term of her long dominion is approaching. She saw the 
 commencement of all the governments and of all the eccle- 
 siastical establishments that now exist in the world; and we 
 feel no assurance that she is not destined to see the end of 
 them all. She was great and respected before the Saxon 
 had set foot on Britain, before the Frank had passed the 
 Rhine, when Grecian eloquence still flourished in Antioch, 
 when idols were still worshipped in the temple of Mecca. 
 And she may still exist in undiminished vigor when some 
 traveller from New Zealand shall, in the midst of a vast 
 sohtude, take his stand on a broken arch of London Bridge 
 to sketch the ruins of St. Paul's." 
 
 Yes; the divine promises permit us to look to the future 
 with confidence. The Church may be persecuted like her 
 divine Head; but is she not the Church militant here below? 
 Whole coimtries may lose the inestimable benefit of the 
 faith; but what she loses on the one hand. Providence 
 restores to her on the other. What is happening before 
 our eyes at this very moment? While the persecutions 
 excited by secret societies are raging everywhere against her, 
 the Church of Rome beholds the bonds of her indestructible 
 union growing ever stronger; the voice of the supreme 
 
THE CHURCH AND CIVILIZATION. 573 
 
 Pontiff was never heard with greater veneration and respect 
 by pastors and the faithful. And abroad, so far from disap- 
 pearing, the Gospel is extending its conquests in a manner 
 truly consoling. The work of the foreign missions, interrupted 
 by the trials of the last century, has received a new im- 
 petus. The Annals of the Propagation of the Faith attest 
 the marvels of contemporaneous apostolate in hitherto unex- 
 plored countries of Africa, in the most savage islands of 
 Oceanica, in the centre of Islamism, in the bosom of Asiatic 
 idolatry. To cite but one instance: At the first Plenary 
 Council in Baltimore in 1852 there were six archbishops and 
 twenty-six bishops; at the Plenary Council of Baltimore 
 held in 1866 there were seven archbishops and thirty-seven 
 bishops; at the time of the third Plenary Council in 1884 
 in the same city the Catholic Church of America numbered 
 twelve archbishops and sixty-three bishops. And now, at 
 the opening of the twentieth century, there are within the 
 United States fourteen Cathohc provinces and seventy-five 
 dioceses. Such is the progress of the faith in one country 
 during a period of only fifty years. 
 
 Moreover, the very sufferings of the Church are a greater 
 reason for confidence in the future, for the Church is the 
 hving image of Jesus Christ: Our Saviour had needs pass 
 through the agony of Gethsemani before attaining the glory 
 of His Resurrection. '^ Ought not Christ to have suffered 
 these things, and so to enter into His glory? " (Luke xxiv. 26.) 
 
 The fife of the Church in the future, therefore, will be, as 
 in the past, a perpetual series of alternating struggles and 
 triumphs, imtil the dawn of that day marked by Providence 
 when, leaving the arena which has witnessed all her glorious 
 combats, she will introduce the last elect into the heavenly 
 Jerusalem. 
 
 On this joyful and glorious day shall we be numbered 
 among the children of the Church triumphant? Shall we 
 have part in the boundless and never-ending happiness 
 which God has prepared from the beginning for His beloved 
 
574 CHRISTIAN APOLOGETICS. 
 
 children? Yes; it will be ours if, during our short pilgrim- 
 age in this world, we have been faithful in faith and works 
 to the Church our Mother; if, with her, we have courageously 
 labored, struggled, and suffered for the cause of God; if at 
 our last hour we can truly say, in the words of St. Paul: 
 ''I have fought the good fight, I have finished my course, 
 I have kept the faith. As to the rest, there is laid up for 
 me a crown of justice, which the Lord, the just Judge, will 
 render to me in that day.'' (2 Tim. iv. 7, 8.) 
 
 ** CJe Uortr (Hlotr sftall gibe unto Jgi'm tje 
 ttirone of Babiti ^i^ fattier: anti f^t st)all 
 tei'gn in tt)e Jouse of S^acob forebec, ann of 
 ?gis Itingtiom tfjere stall lie no enti/'— luke i. 
 32, 33- 
 
ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 Abraham in Egypt, 131. 
 Abuses in Church, 457 ; of Inquisi- 
 tion, 480 ; no proof against right, 
 
 507. 
 Accusations against the Church, 
 
 432, 457 ff. 
 Adam, prerogatives, 28, 248; body 
 
 created, 101 ; his sin, 246, 248 f. 
 Age of universe, 75; organisms, 97; 
 
 man, 99, 117 ff. 
 Agnosticism, 25. 
 Albigenses, 474. 
 Alluvia and deltas, 123 f. 
 America peopled, 116; Church in 
 
 A., 573. 
 Analogies between Christianity and 
 
 false religions, 260 f . 
 Anarchists, 429. 
 
 Anatomy of man and ape, 104 f. 
 Anglican schism, 344; orders, 353; 
 
 persecutions, 463. 
 Animals and man, 102 ff. 
 Annibale, Card., on spiritism, 180. 
 Antipopes, 334. 
 Antiquity of human race, 117 ff. ; 
 
 Egypt, 125; India, 128; China, 
 
 128 f. ; Chaldea, 129. 
 Ape and man, 102 f. 
 Apocryphal gospels, 156. 
 Apology, method of Christian, 
 
 161 f. : CathoUc, 8, 56, 300, 341. 
 Apostasy a crime, 476. 
 Apostles, their miracles, 208; au- 
 thority, 318; privileges, 331; 
 
 successors, 327 ff. ; A. and civil 
 
 power, 413. 
 Apostolicity of the Church, 327, 339 ; 
 
 A. not in Protestantism, 352; nor 
 
 in Greek schism, 370. 
 Apollonius of Thyania, 179. 
 Arbitration, papal, 51.3. 
 Ark of Noe. 84 f. 
 
 575 
 
 Art and the Church, 557. 
 
 Articles, fundamental and non- 
 fundamental, 315. 
 
 Assvrian discoveries and the Bible, 
 5S, 130 ff., 134 ff. 
 
 Astronomv and the Bible, 86 ff. 
 
 Atheism, 25; State A., 428. 
 
 Augustine, St., on faith, 40; Mosaic 
 davs, 80; miracles, 169; his di- 
 lem.ma, 222. 
 
 Authority of God, 42; Bible, 52; the 
 Church, 393 ff., 412; the apostles, 
 318; the Pope, 373 ff. ; the State, 
 413, 421 ; A. of Pentateuch, 56 ff. ; 
 gospels, 141 ff. ; evidence by A., 
 47 
 
 Authenticity, 56. 
 
 A nto da fe, 485. 
 
 Avignon, Popes at, 342. 
 
 Axioms, evidence of, 48. 
 
 Baalbak, ruins, 85, 
 
 Babel, tower of, 137. 
 
 Babylon, 136. 
 
 Baer, Dr. von, on unity of man- 
 kind, 112. 
 
 Balmes on civilizing influence of 
 Church, 570. 
 
 Baltimore councils, 573: on slav- 
 ery, 538. 
 
 Baptism of desire, 468, 471 ; blood, 
 471; water, 472. 
 
 Barbarians converted, 543 ff. 
 
 Bartholomew, massacre of St., 496 
 ff. ; Church not responsible, 497. 
 
 Beast and man, 102 ff. 
 
 Bergier on miracles, 170; Christian 
 education, 560. 
 
 Berthelot on science, 68. 
 
 Bible, books, 52; canon, 355, 358; 
 historic authority, 52, 55, 301; 
 inspiration, 54 ; interpretation, 
 
576 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 65, 70, 346; chronology, 86, 98, 
 118 f.; phraseology, 70, 79, 87; 
 variant readings, 60, 119, 147, 
 153; genealogies, 119; manu- 
 scripts, 60, 146; B., Church, and 
 the rule of faith, 355 ff. ; B. and 
 modern science, 63 ff., 70 f. ; 
 geology, 72 ff,, 120; astronomy, 
 88 ff.; biology, 93 ff.; paleon- 
 tology, 97, 120. 
 
 Biology, 93 ff. 
 
 Bishops successors of apostles, 307, 
 317, 320, 327; difference, 331. 
 See Episcopate. 
 
 Bollandists, 211, 337. 
 
 Books, CathoUc, 6; bad, 6, 396. 
 
 Bossuet's "Variations of Protes- 
 tantism," 346. 
 
 Boulanger on the deluge, 82. 
 
 Bourdaloue on faith, 40. 
 
 Broglie, de, on the gospels, 151; 
 Buddhism, 276. 
 
 Brownson, O., on Roman primacy, 
 387, n. ; bad popes, 519 n. 
 
 Bruno, Giordano, 496 n. 
 
 Buddha, 268. 
 
 Buddhism and Christianity, 265 ff. ; 
 its history, 268; dogma, 271; 
 moraUty, 274 ; practical B., 276 ff. 
 
 Csesarism, pagan, 533 ; in liberal- 
 ism, 430. 
 
 Calvin, 344, 348 f. ; intolerant, 461. 
 
 Camisards, war, 506. 
 
 Canonical mission, 329. 
 
 Canonization, 336 f . 
 
 Catechism, the, 561. 
 
 ''Cathohc," name, 338. 
 
 Catholic and Protestant nations, 
 546 ff. 
 
 Catholicism, liberal, 430 ff. 
 
 Catholics and modem govern- 
 ments, 423, 424 n. ; civil liberty, 
 424 n., 455 f.; modem liberties, 
 448 
 
 CathoHcity, 324, 326; of the Church, 
 324, 338; not in Protestantism, 
 324 ; nor in Greek schism, 369. 
 
 Cauchy on great men in Chris- 
 tianity, 297. 
 
 Causette on man and ape, 109. 
 
 Centralization, political, 456. 
 
 Certainty, 46 ; evidence, 46 ; kinds, 
 48, 176; C. of faith, 31, 33, 46, 
 50, 246 n. ; and infallibiHty, 400; 
 C. of miracles, 176 f. 
 
 Chalcedon, Council, on primacy, 
 388. 
 
 Chaldea, 129; discoveries, 130, 
 134 ff. 
 
 Charitv, Christian, 216, 536 ff.g 
 Buddhist, 275; perfect, 472. 
 
 Charlemagne, 336, 563. 
 
 Children, unbaptized, 470; pagan, 
 532; Christian, 542. 
 
 China, 128. 
 
 Christianity, its divinity, 160 ff., 
 293 f . ; establishment and propa- 
 gation, 217; conservation, 226; 
 fruits and results, 236 ff., 521 ff. ; 
 doctrine, 243 ff., 535 ff.; supe- 
 riority, 265, 296 ff. ; necessity, 
 obligation, 294; Ch. and false 
 religions, 259 ff. ; Buddhism, 
 265 ff. ; Ch. and the Church, 305; 
 and genius, 296, 553. 
 
 Chronology, biblical, 86, 98; un- 
 certain, 118 f. 
 
 Chronometers, geological, 121. 
 
 Church, the Catholic, 299 ff. ; 
 prophecies, 203; definition, 301; 
 a society, 303; visible, 306; its 
 origin, 303 ff. ; necessity, obliga- 
 tion, 305, 466 ff. ; mission, end, 
 306, 412, 418, 421, 550; consti- 
 tution, 307 ; perfect society, 308, 
 416 f.; true Church, 3i0 ff.; 
 notes, 311 ff. ; other attributes, 
 313; members, good and bad, 
 323, 468, 517; defections, 392; 
 legislation, 335 n. ; unity, 313, 
 331; sanctity, 321, 335; cath- 
 olicity, 324, 338; apostolicity, 
 327, 339; other prerogatives, 
 391 ff.; perpetuity, 391, 572; 
 indefectibiUty, 391 ff. ; au- 
 thority, 393; infallibility, 399; 
 independence, 411 ff. ; coercive 
 power, 398, 417, 476; body and 
 soul, 469; her rights, 416, 477; 
 temporal propertv, 417; Ch. and 
 Bible, 355 ff. ; Ch. and State, 396, 
 398,410 ff., 446; distinct, 41 5, 422; 
 Church superior, 412, 417; con- 
 flict, 417 ff.; union, 420 ff., 441; 
 Ch. and liberahsm, 424 ff. ; spirit 
 of times, 433 f. ; modem hber- 
 ties, 443 ff. ; civil liberty, 424 n., 
 455'; Ch. and civihzation, 521, 
 543; science, 41, 493, 550; let- 
 ters and education, 550; cul- 
 ture, 550 ff.; genius, 296, 553; 
 art, 557; persecutions, 215, 221, 
 227, 460 f.; tolerance, 441, 444, 
 458 ff. ; abuses, 457; she pro- 
 motes temporal happiness, 422, 
 
ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 577 
 
 549 ff.; Ch. and slavery, 53G; 
 
 charges against Ch., 432, 457 ff. 
 Churches, heretical and schismat- 
 
 ical, 300. See Sects. 
 Circumstances alter cases, 443. 
 Civilization, true, 521, 524; pagan, 
 
 236, 242, 523 ff.; Christian, 535; 
 
 Catholic and Protestant, 546. 
 Civiltd Cattolica on toleration, 444. 
 Claudius on loss of cosmic energy, 
 
 96. 
 Coercive power, 398, 417, 476; of 
 
 State, 440. 
 Colleges and the Church, 569. 
 Color of human races, 114. 
 Communication of attributes in 
 
 Christ, 292. 
 Concordats, 416, 418. 
 Confession. See Penance. 
 Conflict between faith and reason, 
 
 38, 42, 63; science and Bible, 63, 
 
 69; Church and State, 417. 
 Congregations. See Roman C. 
 Conscience, liberty of, 436, 500 
 Consciousness, 46. 
 Constance council, 334, 408 n. 
 Constantinople patriarchate, 361. 
 Contrition, perfect, 470, 472 n. 
 Conversion of St. Paul, 109; of 
 
 heathens, 338; barbarians, 543. 
 Copernicus, 89, 488, 493. 
 Cosmogony, 73. 
 Councils, ecumenical, 403, 404 ; and 
 
 Greek Church, 367 ; and primacy, 
 
 387; C. and education, 562. 
 Counsels, evangelical, 252. 
 Cranium, human, 115. 
 Creation of universe, 72, 93 ; light, 
 
 91; life, 92; man, 101. 
 Credibihty, 41, 48. 
 Criterion of certainty, 46 ff. 
 Crusades, 503. 
 Culture and the Church, 550. 
 
 Darras on the Bible and Oriental 
 discoveries, 139 f. 
 
 Darwdnism, 103 ff. 
 
 Dates, biblical, 118 f.; 155. See 
 Chronology. 
 
 Days of creation, 79, 91. 
 
 Decalogue, 27, 29, 549. 
 
 Dechamps, Card., on exclusive sal- 
 vation, 467 f. 
 
 Declaration of Galilean clergy, 407. 
 
 Definition ex Cathedra, 409, 489. 
 
 Deltas and alluvia, 123. 
 
 Deluge, Mosaic, 80. 
 
 Denmark, persecutions, 462, 
 
 Deposition of kings by Pope, 508 ff. 
 Descendants of Adam, 110; Noe, 
 
 86. 
 Determinism, 451 f. 
 Development of faith, 332. 
 Devil, miracles, 178. 
 Discipline of Church changeable, 
 
 333, 392; by proper authority, 
 
 434. 
 Discoveries, Oriental and Bible, 58, 
 
 130. 
 Divinitv of Christ, 285 ff. ; Church, 
 
 299 ff. 
 Doctors of the Church, 341 n. 
 Dogma, immutable, 332, 339; no 
 
 new dogmas, 339. 
 Dogmatic facts, 403. 
 Dominick, St., not Inquisitor, 475. 
 
 Earth, origin, 90; rotation, 89, 
 488 ff. ; why man's dwelling, 87; 
 how peopled, 116. 
 
 Ebers on Egypt and Bible, 134. 
 
 Edict of Nantes revoked, 499. 
 
 Education, rights of Church, 396; 
 liberty of E., 436 ; neutral or non- 
 sectarian, 396, 427 ; State monop- 
 oly, 430; need of religious K, 
 557; Church and E., 550; popu- 
 lar, 558; parish schools, 562; 
 higher E., 567. 
 
 Egyptian discoveries, 58, 130 ; his- 
 tory, 125. 
 
 Emperors and Popes in Middle 
 Ages, 509, 512. 
 
 End (purpose) of man, 28, 522; 
 universe, 251; Church, 306, 418, 
 550; State, 421, 429. 
 
 England. See Anglican. 
 
 Ephesus, council, on primacy, 388. 
 
 Episcopate, institution, 304, 318 ff. ; 
 its powers, 329, 393; apostolic 
 succession, 327, 330. See Bish- 
 ops. 
 
 Errors of paganism, 32; in Bible, 
 154 n. ; E. has no right, 479. 
 
 Esther, book of, and Persia, 138. 
 
 Euler on prayer, 168 n. ; unbelief, 
 296. 
 
 Evangelical counsels, 252.^ 
 
 Evidence, 46, 48; of faith, 46. 
 
 Evil, origin, 249. 
 
 Evolution, 95 ff. 
 
 Ex Cathedra, 409, 489. 
 
 Exequatur, 416. 
 
 Experience, evidence of, 46. 
 
 Faith, certainty, 31, 33, 46, 400; 
 
578 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 and reason, 38 ff. ; supernatural 
 grace, 42, 49, 51 ; and prayer, 42, 
 247 n. ; motives and preambles, 
 41, 247 n. ; evidence, 46; sources, 
 49; free act, 49 f., 246; difficul- 
 ties, 45, 50 f. ; " Good faith " and 
 invincible ignorance, 467, 471; 
 apostasy punishable, 476; right 
 of preservation, 477. 
 
 Family, pagan, 531 ; Christian, 541. 
 
 Fatahsm, 166 n., 451 f. 
 
 Fathers of the Church, 341 n. ; 
 apostolic, 143 n. ; F. on gospels, 
 143; unity of Church, 315; min- 
 istry, 320; St. Peter, 380. 
 
 Faye on stars not inhabited, 89 n. 
 
 Fiefs, papal, 508 f. 
 
 Filioque, 363. 
 
 Flavius, Joseph, on Pentateuch, 60. 
 
 Flints, 120, 122 f. 
 
 Florence, council, 363, 368; on 
 primacy, 389. 
 
 Fossils, 97 ff. ; human, 121 ff. 
 
 Frayssinous' ''Defense of Christi- 
 anity," 8. 
 
 Freemasonry and liberalism, 430; 
 great enemy of Church, 571. 
 
 Free-will, 450 ; existence, 451 ; F. 
 and faith, 50, 245 f. ; denied by 
 Luther, 349. 
 
 Freppel, bishop, on science, 67; 
 unbelief, 296. 
 
 Fundamentals and non-fundamen- 
 tals, 315. 
 
 Galileo, trial, 488 ff. ; and infalli- 
 bility, 489 ; G. not martyred, 493 ; 
 nor tortured, 495; E pur si 
 muove, 496. 
 
 Gallicanism, 407. 
 
 Gaume on pagan society, 238. 
 
 Genealogies, biblical, 119. 
 
 Generation, spontaneous, 93 ff. ; 
 reproductive, 112. 
 
 Geology and Bible, 72. 
 
 Germs, organic, 94 n. 
 
 Gibbon refuted, 223 ff. 
 
 Gladiators, 528, 539. 
 
 God's relations with man, 25, 451 n., 
 453 f.; knowable, 30, 47; au- 
 thority, 42; truthfulness, 49; 
 providence, 165 n. ; wisdom, 168, 
 294 ; love and mercy, 245 f . ; 
 glory, 251 ; rest, 77 n 
 
 Gospels, 53; authenticity, 141; in- 
 tegrity, 146; veracity, 148; 
 apocryphal, 156; myths, 156 f. 
 
 Government of Church, 307, 394, 
 
 397 ff. ; civil G., 421, 429; divine 
 and human G., 440. See Ministry, 
 State. 
 
 Grace, primitive, 28, 248; sanctify- 
 ing, 250; means, 254; Gr of 
 faith, 42, 49, 51. 
 
 Greek schism, 360; no unity, 366; 
 no sanctity, 368; not Catholic, 
 369; nor apostolic, 370; return, 
 371 ; Gr. and Russian, 369. 
 
 Grounds of faith. See Motives. 
 
 Guizot on papacy in Middle Ages, 
 512 n. ; on Church and education, 
 552. 
 
 Hair of human races, 115. 
 
 Happiness, natural and supernatu- 
 ral, 28, 420; temporal H. pro- 
 moted by Church, 422, 549. 
 
 Harlez, de, on Buddhism, 277. 
 
 Henry VIII. of England, 344, 348. 
 
 Heresy, 310, 314, 395; a crime, 476, 
 478. 
 
 Hergenroether, Card., on Middle 
 Ages, 509. 
 
 Hexahemeron, 76 ff., 98. 
 
 Hierarchy, Catholic, 307. 
 
 Hieroglyphics, 135. 
 
 Hir, le, on biblical chronology, 118; 
 ancient nations, 126; Bible and 
 tradition, 340 n. 
 
 History of religion, 259. 
 
 Holland, persecutions, 464. 
 
 Holy Office, 431, 474. 
 
 Hugo, Victor, on religious educa- 
 tion, 559. 
 
 Huguenots intolerant, 462; sedi- 
 tious, 501 ; St. Bartholomew, 496 ; 
 edict of Nantes, 499. 
 
 Huxley on man and ape, 103. 
 
 Hypnotism, 180 f. 
 
 Ignorance, invincible, 467, 469, 471. 
 Immaculate Conception, B. V. M., 
 
 408. 
 Immorality and unbelief, 296. 
 Immutability of God, 167; nature, 
 
 165; Church, 228, 392; dogma, 
 
 332 n., 432 f. 
 Incarnation, why on this earth, 87. 
 Indef edibility of Church, 391. 
 Independence of Church, 411; of 
 
 State, 415; of Pope, 514; society 
 
 dependent from God, 426; also 
 
 man, 451, 453, 479. 
 India, history, 128. 
 Infallibility of apostles, 331; of 
 
 Church, 391, 399; necessity, 400; 
 
ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 579 
 
 given by Christ, 401 ; object, 403 ; 
 seat, 404; Papal I., 404; its con- 
 ditions, 409; not impeccability, 
 404; nor inspiration, 403; Galli- 
 canism, 407; Galileo, 489; Ro- 
 man congregations not infallible, 
 492. 
 
 Infidelity. See Unbelief. 
 
 Inhabited stars, 89. 
 
 Inquisition, 473 ff. ; ecclesiastical 
 474; lawful, 476; abuses, 48U 
 clemency, 481, 484; effects, 48(3 
 Spanish I., 475; security, 482 
 abuses, 484; number of victims, 
 485; Protestant I., 485. 
 
 Inspiration of bible, 54. 
 
 Instinct, 107, 451. 
 
 Institution, canonical, 329. 
 
 Integrity of biblical books, 56; 
 Pentateuch, 60; gospels, 146. 
 
 Interpretation, biblical, 345; pri- 
 vate, 346; of dogma, 431. 
 
 Intolerance, Catholic, 458, 465; 
 Protestant, 460; infidel, 464 f. 
 See Tolerance. 
 
 Ireland, Archbp., on papal inde- 
 pendence, 517 n. 
 
 Islamism, spread, 225. 
 
 Jacolliot refuted, 256 n. 
 
 Jerusalem, destruction, 213; re- 
 building, 214. 
 
 Jesus Christ, divine mission, 160; 
 its proofs, 183; His miracles, 174, 
 183; their purpose, 186; His 
 Resurrection, 187 ; prophecies ful- 
 filled in Him, 206; His owti 
 prophecies, 212, 223; His doc- 
 trine, 243, 264; His manner of 
 teaching, 257; holiness, 278 
 character, 287 ; no impostor, 283 
 His divinity, 285 ; proofs, 286 n. 
 God-man, 291; Mary, His 
 mother, 292; His social royalty, 
 421; imitation and love of Ch., 
 282. 
 
 Jews, dispersion, 215; in Spain, 
 475. 
 
 Joan, Popess, 518. 
 
 Jonas and the fish, 66 n. 
 
 Joseph in Egypt, 131. 
 
 Josue and the sun, 65. 
 
 Jouffroy on catechism, 561. 
 
 Judgment, private, 346. 
 
 Julian, apostate, 214. 
 
 Jurisdiction and order, 329, 394, 
 398. 
 
 Justification, Protestant, 346 f. 
 
 Kennicot, Hebrew variants, 60 
 Keppler on Pentateuch, 66. 
 
 Laboring classes, pagan, 531; 
 Christian, 540. 
 
 Lacordaire, "Conferences," 8; on 
 Messianic prophecies, 206 ; 
 Christ's goodness, 279 f. 
 
 Lake dwellings, 125. 
 
 Languages, lUb; confusion of, 117. 
 
 Laplace's cosmogony, 73. 
 
 Lapparent on age of man, 121. 
 
 Laws of nature, 156 ff . ; of history, 
 217 n.; moral L., 217. 
 
 Lazarus resuscitated, 184. 
 
 Legislation of the Church, 335 n. ; 
 her power, 398. 
 
 Leibnitz on salvation, 472 n. ; on 
 papal arbitration, 513. 
 
 Lenormant on Egyptian history, 
 126. 
 
 Leo XIII. on infidel and Catholic 
 literature, 6; faith and reason, 
 41 ; science, 67 ; return of Greek 
 schismatics, 372; Church and 
 State, 410 ff.; concordats, 418; 
 papal sovereignty, 414, 514; du- 
 ties of civil power, 422 f., 428 f.; 
 tolerance, 442; liberalism, 425 ff., 
 428; liberal Catholicism, 431 n. ; 
 liberty, 449, 454 ff. ; temporal 
 benefits by the Church, 521; 
 higher education, 556. 
 
 Liberalism, 424 ff.; radical, 425; 
 effects, 426, 429; social (mod- 
 erate), 426; effects, 430; politi- 
 cal L., 424 n. ; economic, 425 n. ; 
 Cathohc, 430; L. and socialism, 
 429, 439; modem liberties, 435; 
 freemasonry, 430. 
 
 Liberties, modem, 435 fT. ; of con- 
 science and worship, 436, 500; 
 press, education, association, 
 436; false, 437; injurious, 438; 
 when tolerated, 442 fT. 
 
 Liberty, 449 ff. ; not license, 450; 
 physical, 440, 450, 453; moral, 
 440, 452; political and civil, 455; 
 and the Church, 424 n., 456; L. 
 of faith, 49, 246. 
 Libraries, Assyrian, 135. 
 Life, origin, 95, 97 ff. ; disappear- 
 ance, 96. 
 Light, creation of, 91. 
 Literature, its effect for good and 
 evil, 6; bad L., 6, 396; L. and the 
 Church, 553. 
 Liturgy. See Worship. 
 
580 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 Llorente, 482 n., 484. 
 
 Louis XIV. and Gallicanism, 407. 
 
 Love of God and faith, 245 n. ; of 
 
 Christ, 282 f . 
 I^uther, 343, 348; on good works 
 
 and sin, 350 ; intolerant, 460. 
 Lyell, on man's age, 121. 
 
 Magic and miracles, 178. 
 
 Magisterium, of the Church, 394; 
 twofold, 395; infallible, 400. 
 
 Man, his end, 28, 240 f., 420 f., 522; 
 origin, 99; and beast, 102, 451, 
 454; primeval m., 118 n. ; his 
 reason, 106; speech, 106; re- 
 ligious sense, 107; perfectibility, 
 107; supernatural gifts, 248; re- 
 demption, 247, 250; liberty, 449; 
 dependence, 451 n., 453, 479. 
 
 Manetho, historian, 126. 
 
 Mankind, age, 99; unity, 110; dis- 
 persion, 116. 
 
 Manuscripts of Pentateuch, 60; 
 gospels, 146. 
 
 Marks of the Church, 311 ff. 
 
 Martyrs, Christian, 229 ff.; their 
 testimony, 231, 233; number, 
 229, 232; no fanatics, 235 f . ; 
 "M. of science," 493, 496. 
 
 Mary, Mother of God, 292; Immac- 
 ulate Conception, 408. 
 
 Massacre of St. Bartholomew, 496 ff. 
 
 Materialism, 101 n. 
 
 Medispvalism, 432. 
 
 Men;^el, on Protestant intolerance, 
 460. 
 
 Messias, the, 36; prophecies, 200; 
 types, 203; expectation, 205. 
 
 Metempsychosis, Buddhist, 273. 
 
 Method, proper, of science, 38 f. ; 
 of Christian apology, 161 f.; of 
 Catholic apology, 8, 56, 300, 341. 
 
 Michael Cerularius, 361. 
 
 Middle Ages, laws, 441; penalties, 
 482; public law, 478 f., 508, 511 
 f.; power of popes, 507; civil- 
 ization, 554 ; schools, 562 ff. 
 
 Might not right, 453 ff. 
 
 Milton and St. Peter, 376 n. 
 
 Minimizing, 431, 433. 
 
 Ministry, eccl., its institution, 304, 
 307, 310 ff. ; unity, 317, 333; per- 
 petuity, 327 f., 330; powers, 329, 
 394, 397; Protestant M., 348, 
 353 
 
 Miracles, 161, 163 ff.; possible, 165; 
 and natural law, 170; knowable, 
 171; probative value, 181; M, 
 
 of Christ, 174, 183 ff.; apostles 
 208; Church, 323; saints, 21 1' 
 336; modern, 211, 337; moral! 
 217 f.; M. of the devil, 178; pa- 
 gan, 179. 
 
 Mission, canonical, 329. 
 
 Mohammedanism, 225, 504 f. 
 
 Monarchy, Church a, 307. 
 
 Monks and civilization, 554 f. 
 
 Monogenists, 110. 
 
 Monopoly of education, 430. 
 
 Morality, Christian, 252 f.; Bud- 
 dhist, 274; Protestant, 351; in- 
 dependent, lay, 425, 428; pagan, 
 237, 257, 521 ff. ; in Catholic and 
 Protestant countries, 546 ff. 
 
 Moses, 35; author of Pentateuch, 
 57, 61; Mosaic religion; 35 f. ; 
 abrogated, 36. 
 
 Motives of faith, 41, 46, 49, 246 n. 
 
 Moulart, Canon, on Middle Ages, 
 509. 
 
 Mueller, Max, on diversity of 
 languages, 117. 
 
 Mysteries of faith, 42 ff. ; of na- 
 ture 43 45 
 
 Myths,' bibUcal, 156 f. ; 302. 
 
 Nantes, edict of, 499. 
 
 Napoleon I. on papal sovereignty, 
 
 516. 
 Nature, its mysteries, 43, 45 ; laws, 
 
 166 n., 167; their harmony, 174. 
 Netherlands, persecutions, 464. 
 Newman, Card., on notes of Church, 
 
 312 n. 
 Niceea, Council, on pnmacy, 387 
 Nihilists, 429. 
 Ninive. See Assyria. 
 Nirvana, Buddhist, 273. 
 Noe's Ark, 84 f. 
 Notes of the Church, 311 ff. 
 Number of martyrs, 232; victims 
 
 of Inquisition, 485; Huguenots 
 
 killed, 498. 
 
 Objections against Pentateuch, 86; 
 gospels, 152; miracles, 173; Res- 
 urrection of Christ, 197; testi- 
 mony of martyrs, 233; spread 
 of Christianitv, 223; divinity of 
 Christ, 259; His teaching, 259; 
 unity of the Church, 334; her 
 power, 398; primacy of St. Peter, 
 377; papal principahty, 515. 
 
 Oldenberg on Buddhism, 275. 
 
 OUivier, Pere. on Mosaic days, 80; 
 
ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 581 
 
 why this planet was chosen for 
 
 Christ, 87 ; on primacy, 390. 
 Order and jurisdiction, 329 f. 
 Orders, Anglican, 353. 
 Ordination, 329. 
 Origin of universe, 72; earth and 
 
 stars, 90; light, 91; vegetation, 
 
 92; life, 95; man, 99. 
 Original sin, 249, 470 n. 
 "Orthodox" church, 365. 
 "Outside the Church no salvation," 
 
 466. 
 
 Pagan philosophy, 32; religion, 
 256; society, 237 f., 523 ff.; 
 P. nations converted, 218 ff., 526. 
 
 Paleontology, 97. 
 
 Papacy in Middle Ages, 508 ff. ; sal- 
 utary influence, 512; temporal 
 power, 514; P. and civilization, 
 555. See Pope. 
 
 Papal States, 514. 
 
 Pasteur on spontaneous generation, 
 94. 
 
 "Patriarch universal," 361. 
 
 Patriarchal religion, 34; gradually 
 corrupted, 35. 
 
 Patriarchates, eastern, 362 n., 366. 
 
 Paul, St., conversion, 209. 
 
 Peat-moors, 124. 
 
 Penance, sacrament, 254, 470. 
 
 Pentateuch, 52; authority, 56; 
 style, 59; integrity, 60; verac- 
 ity, 61 ; P. and modem sciences, 
 63 ; P. not a scientific book, 65 f . 
 
 Pentecost, miracle, 209. 
 
 Perfectibility of man, 107. 
 
 Perfection, Christian, 252. 
 
 Perpetuity of Church, 228. 
 
 Persecutions foretold, 215; pagan, 
 211 f., 233; Protestant, 460; 
 Huguenot, 498. 
 
 Peter, St., primacy, 304, 307, 373 
 ff, ; at Rome, 383; his succes- 
 sors, 327, 381. 
 
 Peter I. of Russia, 365. 
 
 Pf aff on Hexahemeron, 79 ; deluge, 
 84. 
 
 Photius, 361. 
 
 Pithom, city, 133. 
 
 Pie, Card., on miracle, 162; cm- 
 
 Pius IX., Svllabus, 419; on Church 
 
 and State, 419, 447. 
 Placet, royal, 416. 
 Planetary system, origin, 89. 
 Plurality of inhabited worlds, 
 
 90. 
 
 Politics without religion, 427. 
 
 Polygamy, pagan, 532. 
 
 Polygenists, 110. 
 
 Polytheism, 256; origin, 260 f. 
 
 "Poor Scholars," 563. 
 
 Poor, the, before Christ, 530; after 
 Ch., 539. 
 
 Pope, primacy, 373 ff. ; not only of 
 honor, but of jurisdiction or au- 
 thority, 373, 382; successor of 
 St. Peter, 381, 387; infallibility, 
 404; temporal power in Middle 
 Ages, 508; its nature, 510; inter- 
 national arbitrator, 513; tem- 
 poral sovereignty, 514; Popes 
 and Inquisition, 474; science, 
 443; civilization, 555; anti- 
 popes, 334; P. during schisms, 
 342; P. and bishops, 307, 382. 
 
 Popess Joan, 518. 
 
 Positivism, 25. 
 
 Poverty, pagan, 530; Christian, 
 539 
 
 Powers of Church, 329, 416; pope, 
 373, 382; State, 415. 
 
 Prayer and faith, 42, 247 n.; and 
 laws of nature, 165 f., 168; 
 means of grace, 254; the Lord's 
 P., 246 n., 277. 
 
 Primacy, Roman, 373 ff. See Pa- 
 pacy, Pope. P. of honor, 373. 
 
 Private judgment, 346. 
 
 Propagation of Christianity, 217, 
 338, 573; Islamism and Protes- 
 tantism, 225; Buddhism, 276. 
 
 Property, temporal, of Church, 417. 
 
 Prophecy, 161 f., 182 ff. ; Messianic 
 56 n., 200 ff. ; concerning Church, 
 208; by Christ, 212, 223. 
 
 Prophets, books of, 153. 
 
 Prosperity, temporal, in paganism, 
 523 ; in Catholic and Protestant 
 countries, 546. 
 
 Protestantism, spread, 225; found- 
 ers, 343; no ministry, 317; no 
 unity, 345; no sanctity, 348; 
 not catholic, 324, 352; nor 
 apostolic, 352 ; false Church, 343 ; 
 its fmits, 351; intolerant, 460; 
 formulas, 347, 466 n. ; Pr. and 
 the Greeks, 365 n., 366 n. ; an 
 exclusive salvation, 466 n. 
 
 Providence, divine, 165. 
 
 Purcell, Archbp., on bad popes, 
 518 n., 519 n. 
 
 Purgatory and the Greeks, 370 n. 
 
 Quatrefages on man, 108. 
 
582 
 
 ALPHABETICAL INDEX. 
 
 Races, human, 111; resemblances, 
 113; differences, 114. 
 
 Radical liberals, 425 ; consistent, 
 429, 
 
 Rationalism, 38; effects, 51, 425; 
 Social R., 427. 
 
 Rationalists on Pentateuch, 59 n., 
 miracles, 161; Providence, 165; 
 Church, 302. 
 
 Readings, variant, in Bible, 147, 
 153. 
 
 Reason, 47 ; and religion, 31 ; faith, 
 38 ; mysteries, 42 ; in man, 106. 
 
 Reformers, Protestant, 343, 348; 
 had no divine mission, 353; in- 
 tolerant, 460 ff. 
 
 Religion, natural, 25; supernat- 
 ural, 26; positive, 27; revealed, 
 29; historic phases, 34; patri- 
 archal, 34; Mosaic, 35; Chris- 
 tian, 36; its defence, 6, 8; study 
 of Cath. R., 7; its divinity, 37, 
 39; mysteries, 42; analogy be- 
 tween true and false R., 259 ff. ; 
 R. and education, 396, 427 ; poli- 
 tics, 427; State, 420, 425, 439. 
 
 Rehgious sense, 107, 260. 
 
 Renan refuted, 158; on deluge, 83; 
 Peter at Rome, 386. 
 
 Reproduction of species, 112. 
 
 Resurrection of Lazarus, 184; of 
 Christ, 187 f. 
 
 Revelation, divine, 29; possibility, 
 30, 44; necessity, 30; history, 
 34 ; proofs, 46, 161 ; sources, 52 ; 
 and science, 30, 39, 43, 67. 
 
 Right, 436 f. ; not the same as 
 might, 440, 452 ff. ; error and 
 evil have no rights, 437, 447, 479. 
 
 Rites, Oriental, 360; Congregation 
 of R. and miracles, 336. 
 
 Roman Congregations not infalli- 
 ble, 492. 
 
 Rome, see of Peter, 383 ff. 
 
 Rossi, J. B., Hebrew variants, 60. 
 
 Rousseau on miracles, 165; Christ, 
 279, 281; Protestant tolerance, 
 459; education, 559 n.; intol- 
 erant, 464. 
 
 Rule of faith, 355 ff. 
 
 Russia Christianized, 364; schism, 
 364 f.; holy synod, 365; rela- 
 tion to Greek schism, 369; re- 
 turn to Rome, 371. 
 
 Ruskin (and Milton) on St. Peter, 
 376 n. 
 
 Sabbath, 29, 34, 65, 77 n. 
 
 Sacraments, 254, 335, 397. 
 
 Saint-Hilaire on Buddhism, 267 f. 
 Saints in the Church, 336 f. 
 
 Salvation exclusively in the Church, 
 305, 466 ff. ; invincible igno- 
 rance, 467, 469; negative unbe- 
 lief, 470 n. ; S. of Jews, pagans, 
 471 f. ; of Gentiles before Christ, 
 471. 
 
 Samaritans, 57. 
 
 Sanctity of Christ, 278 ff. ; Church, 
 313, 321 ff., 457; not in Protes- 
 tantism, 348 ; nor schism, 368. 
 
 Sardica, Council, on primacy, 388. 
 
 Sargon, fasts of, 137. 
 
 Schism, 310, 314; Western, 334; 
 ancient, 342; Anglican, 344; 
 Greek, 360 ; Russian, 364. 
 
 Science and revelation, 30, 39, 43; 
 its proper method, 38; contra- 
 dictions, 71 ; Sc. and Pentateuch, 
 63 ; Christianity, 67 ff. ; miracles, 
 166; modem Sc, 64 n. 
 
 Scientists on spontaneous genera- 
 tion, 93; Mosaic creation, 69; 
 deluge, 82; Noe's ark, 85; unity 
 of mankind. 111 ; age of man, 121. 
 
 Schools. See Education. 
 
 Scriptures. See Bible. 
 
 Sects, ancient, 300, 360; Protes- 
 tant, 324, 343, 345, 352. 
 
 Serfs in Middle Ages, 537 n. 
 
 Separation of Church and State, 427, 
 430, 446. 
 
 Sense, internal, 46; external, 47; 
 moral and religious, 107 ff., 260. 
 
 Septuagint version, 56, 61. 
 
 Sin, origin, 249 f . ; in Protestant 
 doctrine, 349 f. 
 
 Sinners in the Church, 323, 517. 
 
 Slavery, pagan, 526; mitigated 
 and abolished, 536; Jewish, 
 537 n. 
 
 Slave-trade, 538. 
 
 Society, definition, 302; perfect, 
 308; S. and religion, 426, 428, 
 439; S. pagan, 533; Christian, 
 542. See State. 
 
 Sovereignty, temporal, of Pope, 
 514. 
 
 Species and races. 111, 114. 
 
 Speech, 106. 
 
 Spiritualism, 180. 
 
 Stars inhabited, 90 ; origin, 90 f. 
 
 State, its purpose, 421 ff., 429; 
 independence, 415; inferiority, 
 417 f. ; S. and Church, 396, 410, 
 446; duties toward Church, 420 
 
ALPHABETICAL INDEX, 
 
 583 
 
 ff. ; union with Church, 419; 
 
 separation from Church, 427, 430, 
 
 446. 
 Straus refuted, 156 f. 
 Succession, apostolic, 327, 330; 
 
 mode, 330. See Apostolicity. 
 Sufferings, 249, 251. 
 Sweden, intolerance, 463. 
 Syllabus of Pius IX., 419. 
 
 Templars, Knights, 481. 
 
 Testimony, evidence of, 44, 47, 49; 
 divine, 43; pagan T. for Penta- 
 teuch, 58. 
 
 Theocracy, 414. 
 
 Thesis and hypothesis, 443. 
 
 Thiers on papal sovereignty, 576. 
 
 Thierry, A., on monks of Middle 
 
 Tolerance, 442 ff.; allowed, 443; 
 conditions, 447; civil and dog- 
 matic, 446, 448, 458. See In- 
 tolerance. 
 
 Torture in Inquisition, 483; Gali- 
 leo trial, 494. 
 
 Tradition, 340; primitive, 35, 260; 
 Christian, 52; Jewish, 57, 63; 
 apostolic and divine, 340; T. on 
 deluge, 82; gospels, 142; Peter's 
 Roman sojourn, 384; papal in- 
 fallibility, 402. 
 
 Transformism, 99 ff. 
 
 Trinity, Bl, 45. 
 
 Truthfuhiess of Bible, 56; Penta- 
 teuch, 61 ; gospels, 148. 
 
 Ultramontanism, 432. 
 Unbaptized children, 470. 
 Unbelief, causes, 295 f. ; negative 
 
 and positive, 470 n. 
 Union of Church and State, 419 ff., 
 
 441. 
 Unity of human race, 110; of the 
 
 Church, 313, 331 ff., 401; no U. 
 
 in Protestantism, 345; nor in 
 
 schism, 366. 
 Universality. See Catholicity. 
 Universe, origin, 72; formation, 
 
 73; age, 75; destruction, 96 n. ; 
 
 destiny, 251. 
 
 Universities and the Church, 567 ff. 
 
 Valsecchi, "Foundations of Reli- 
 gion," 8. 
 
 Variants, biblical, 147, 153. 
 
 Variations in gospels, 153; in Prot- 
 estant beUef, 346. 
 
 Varieties in the species. 111 f. 
 
 Vassals, papal, and fiefs, 508 f. 
 
 Vatican Council on necessity of 
 revelation, 33; faith and reason, 
 38; miracles and prophecy, 163; 
 primacy, 389 ; papal infallibility, 
 405; dogma, 433; science, 552. 
 
 Veracity. See Truthfulness. 
 
 Vegetation, origin, 92. 
 
 Vigouroux on deluge, 84; Egypt, 
 127; India and China, 129. 
 
 Vincent of Lerins, 357. 
 
 Virchow, Dr., on creation, 93, 95; 
 man and monkey, 103; man's 
 age, 123. 
 
 Waldensians, 474. 
 
 Wandering of nations, 543. 
 
 Wars, Peasants' W. in Germany, 
 460; Thirty Years' W., 461; re- 
 ligious, in France, 506; Hugue- 
 nots, 501. 
 
 Wish to beUeve, 50, 246 n. 
 
 Will. See Freewill. 
 
 Wine in Egypt, 132. 
 
 Wiseman, Card., on gospels, 146. 
 
 Witchcraft, 486 n. 
 
 Woman, pagan, 531; Christian, 
 541. 
 
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 erty of W., 436, 443 n., 446, 
 500. 
 
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