Hugh Quigley - The Cross and the Shamrock

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"O, Paul," she replied, "was very poor authority on the subject, being a
bachelor when he wrote that passage. Probably in after life his opinions
underwent a change on the subject. I am aware of his oddity in that
way."

"Do you joke, miss?" said the priest, solemnly. "If you do not joke, I
have no hesitation in saying you blaspheme, in thus trifling with the
words of the Holy Ghost."

"I am serious, sir," she said; "it is your church that is guilty of
misinterpretation of God's word, and, in addition, denies its 'free use'
to the people."

"I hope my church, miss, will never allow her children to trifle with
God's holy word as you have now been guilty of," said the priest.

"What's this? At theology again, Amanda? I think you have met your match
at last, daughter," said Mr. Prying. "This young lady has taken to the
study of Scripture and theology," continued he; "she and the several
ministers who visit here are ever at controversy, and she seldom comes
off second best, I tell you."

"Don't you speak so, father," she said; "no, I don't, neither. I have
been arguing with this gentleman about celibacy, and we can't agree
about the interpretation of a text; that's all. But this is the
birthright of every American citizen, the right to differ; the right to
read the word of God, and to interpret it each for himself, without let
or hinderance."

"I have no great desire, nor does it at all accord with my notions of
propriety, I assure you," said the priest, "to enter into controversial
disputations around the fireside, in a family whose hospitality I am
enjoying, and especially when a lady is my antagonist."

"O you need not be particular," said this female bore; "we are used to
such discussions. I had a few questions to put to you as a Catholic
priest, of which I had taken notes, and my object is information on
those points, as much as the refutation of your church doctrines."

"Any information you require I am ready to afford, if in my power; but I
have a horror--I suppose from the invariable habit of my past life--of
introducing either political or religious discussions into the fireside
family circle."

"We are always disputing here," she said. "I am a Presbyterian, Cassius
a Universalist, Wesley a Methodist, and Cyrus has taken to the spiritual
rapping, and is a 'medium.' So you see controversy is no novelty here."

"In Europe, miss," said the priest, "we never introduce----"

"In Europe," she said, interrupting Father Ugo, "there is nothing but
tyranny, despotism, poverty, and superstition. We despise the customs of
Europe, sir. I am told," she added, after a glance at her notes, "that
priests in general, and you in particular, forbid Catholics to attend
the meetings, or join in the prayers or worship, of other denominations.
Is this true, or how can you reconcile it with liberty or religion?"

"Certainly," said the priest, "it is our duty to guard the Catholics
from such immoral customs. We do not believe any of the sectarian
denominations, into which I regret to learn your family is divided,
derive their existence or institutions from God, or contain the
_ordinary means_ of salvation. And while under this belief, in which we
are joined by millions upon millions of Christians, living and dead, how
can we join your prayer or worship, when we know it to be spurious and
illegitimate?"

"I shall, before I am done with you, sir," she replied, "prove your
church idolatrous, and all Papists idolaters; and this is one of the
proofs, this horrid opinion of yours, sir."

"It is not my _opinion_ at all, miss," said he, coolly; "it is my
_faith_, and that of God's church in all ages. Now, on the very plea
that we all are idolaters, as you call us, for this very reason you
should except your hired help from joining in your 'long prayers.' For
if you have any faith in God, or believe you address him in prayer, why
should you insult and mock him by taking an unenlightened, Papistical
idolater to join your petitions? If you were to go to ask a favor of a
king, or of the president, would you deem it prudent to take one to
accompany you who was guilty of high treason? Would not this lead to
your certain rejection from the presence of majesty or excellency with
disgrace and punishment? Now, Catholics, if they be idolaters, are
guilty of treason against Heaven. Do not, then, insult heaven and its
divine Majesty, by asking them to join in your 'holy prayers.'"

This "nonplussed" the self-confident and vain Amanda; all she could
answer was, that "that was fine Jesuitism."

"Meditate well on it," said the priest, "and repent, if you have been
guilty of violating the laws of God, the laws of your country, and the
dictates of reason, by compelling Catholics to join in your, to them,
repulsive and unlawful worship. Forgive me, miss; I must be off. Good
by. God bless you," said he, departing.

CHAPTER XVI.

THE ENLIGHTENED CITIZENS.

"Any news this morning, squire?" said Mr. Wakely, the tavern keeper, to
his _honor_ Squire Wilson, as he entered the bar room with a cigar in
his mouth.

"Wal, nothin' except this report of the turning of old uncle Jacob
Prying, if we can give credit to such a rumor."

"I seed the priest riding past here two days since," said the tavern
man, "and his team half dead from driving. There can be little doubt of
Jac's conversion to the Romish faith. I asked that young lad Paul, who
used to stop at Prying's, and he said it was true."

"'Tis really astonishing," said Benjamin Lifford, the Quaker. "I'd have
let him die without a minister, if he did not content himself with the
inflooence of the speerit. These is how I would sarve thee, Jacob."

"I consider Mr. Prying rather simple to allow such a man as the priest
to come into his house at all," said his _honor_ Squire Wilson, the
Universalist.

"Had it been my brother," said old Elder Fussel, "I would pay no
attention to the dying request of old uncle Jacob. That would be the way
to bring him to."

"That would be cruel," said High Sheriff Walter, "seeing that Jacob
left him all his property, real and personal. Besides, this is a free
country, and I say a man ought to be allowed to embrace any religion he
has a mind to. That's my creed, at all events."

"Yes," said Mr. Ebenezer White, the Methodist class leader, "_pervided_
the creed he wanted to jine was the religion of the Bible; otherwise
not."

"Do not the Roman Catholics ground their doctrines on the Bible?" said
the sheriff. "That they do, and their Bible contains many books that
yours does not contain."

"Nonsense, sheriff!" said his enlightened _honor_. "The Papists never
read the Bible. I have a boy, Thomas Noonan,--you know him,--and he
neither will read it himself, nor listen to it read. The priest won't
allow him. No Catholic is allowed to have or read a Bible."

"You state what is not true," said a loud, emphatic voice from behind
the stove. It was the voice of Murty O'Dwyer.

"I guess, squire, you are in error there," said the sheriff. "My boy,
you know, Patrick, a very strict Catholic, every month at confession
with the priest, has a Bible with him in my house, which Bible the
priest gave him. I have read the book time and again. Nay, I heard the
priest preach out of our Bible last summer."

"Is it not astonishing," began Murty again, "that, though ye all differ
in opinion, ye agree in hating and maligning the church of Christ?
Though ye can't 'join in love,' ye know well how to 'join in hate.' Here
are unbaptized Quakers, groaning Methodists, blaspheming Presbyterians,
faithless Universalists and Unitarians, and humbug spiritual rappers;
and yet ye not only coincide in hating the pope, but ye are all
intolerant and cruel save this gentleman here," said he, pointing to Mr.
Walter. "Now, will any body tell me whence is this hatred?" said the
Irishman, pausing. "Is it grounded on knowledge or well-formed opinion?
No; for ye are all grossly ignorant of the principles and facts of
Catholicity, as ye have shown by your statements about the Bible. In
truth, it is impossible to evade the conclusion that ye hate the church
for the same cause that the devil envied and hated our first parents;
namely, because he saw them the heirs of that bliss which he and his
rebellious crew had lost."

"Take care what you say, my man; the law does not suffer any person to
disparage the Bible so," said the squire, threateningly.

"I am not afraid, sir, to speak my mind, whatever you, as the
representative of the law, may threaten. 'Tis really amazing that ye
should be so busy and troubled about Catholics, take such pains in
kidnapping Catholic children, and forcing Catholic servants to go to
listen to your disgusting prayers and bellowing preachers, when your own
children are beyond your control; go to bed like cattle, without ever
bending a knee in prayer; and if they go to 'meeting,' as it is properly
called, it is only to mock the 'old fool' who holds forth to them."

"There is some truth in what he says," added the sheriff, looking at the
squire.

"Agree among yourselves first," said the Irish peasant, "before you
commence to convert Catholics. Convert the rowdies that crowd your
village and city tavern bar rooms before you extend your zeal to those
who are in no need of it, or on whom it will be all spent in vain. Agree
about the meaning of one single text in your Bible before you hand it to
us for our study."

"We all agree it's the word of God."

"Well, the word of God cannot contradict itself, and yet the religious
system of each of you contradicts that of his neighbor. One man says
Christ is God; another denies this; and both quote Scripture in proof.
This man says bishops are necessary and divinely appointed; the next man
denies this totally. The Quaker denies what the disciple of Calvin or
Knox believes, while the Universalist ignores what the latter professes;
and now the Mormons, spiritual rappers, and Transcendentalists explode
the Bible altogether. The Catholic church, with those countless millions
of her children that constitute her body, has been reading the Bible and
studying it these nineteen hundred years, and never yet, with all her
learning, could find two opposite meanings to one single text; never
once contradicted herself."

"You don't say the Catholics are allowed the use of the Bible, do you?
or that there was any Bible in the world but the one Luther found in the
monastery hid, in the year 1517?" said the elder, who did not well hear,
as he was somewhat deaf.

"Do you seriously believe that we Catholics have not leave to use the
Bible? I tell you we have, and always had, the unquestioned right to its
proper use. Even before the art of printing was discovered by a
Catholic, and when books were scarce, a Bible, in large, plain writing,
was chained to a stand or desk in each parish church in most countries,
so that all who wished could read. I saw one of these stands, which
turned on a pivot, in an old Catholic church in Yorkshire, England,
where it remains to this day. And as regards the absurdity that Luther
found the only copy of the Bible extant in a monastery or university,
that story is refuted by the fact that there were millions of Bibles,
and countless editions of it, printed before Luther was born. Indeed, I
have just read in this Protestant paper, here, that there is a Bible in
Cincinnati, printed in 1470; that is, nearly fifty years before Luther
began to revolt."

"Why, Betsey Darcy, that jined our kirk at the late revivals, told us,
public, in the meeting house, that the priests in Ireland would not
allow any Catholic to read the Bible; and she said that was the first
one she ever saw which I handed to her," said the pious elder.

"Don't you believe her, elder," said Murty, "for I saw that same girl
handle a true Protestant Bible in Ireland, when she attempted to father
her illegitimate child on an honest man, but when she was, instead,
convicted of perjury the most gross. She has had two other fatherless
children since she came to 'free America;' and now, after having been
rejected from the humblest society of Catholics on account of her
immoralities, she, of course, takes refuge among the impeccable saints
of Presbyterianism, where she ranks high in the scale of sanctity."

"Sartin," said the sheriff; "she is a hard one, I do believe. I saw her
drunk at the donation visit of dominie Grinoble, last winter."

"Yes," said Murty, "when you get such a convert as this unfortunate
reprobate, you boast and write tracts to herald the conquest; but such
conversions as those of Spencer, Brownson, Wilberforce, Newman, Lords
Camden, or Freeling, are as nothing in your eyes. You stuff your ears
when you hear of them, cautiously keep them out of hearing of your sons
and daughters, and these glorious conversions never appear in your
shabby, lying newspapers. I do really pity the blindness of
Protestants," said he, rising and walking out of doors.

Next day after these events, the funeral of uncle Jacob took place, and
these ministers, whom, while he lived, he could not endure, and who
heartily hated him, came, when he was dead, to offer their services over
his remains. If any thing was required to show the meanness and
inconsistency of Protestantism and its teachers in this country, it is
the readiness with which they will officiate over the body of a man
dead, over whose soul, while living, they could exert not the smallest
influence. We have known several instances where Methodist and
Presbyterian hirelings, in consideration of the fee of three or five
dollars paid them, preached long sermons, and opened the gates of _their
Elysium_ to the souls of men who became converted from the sects to
which these hireling parsons belonged. Nay, in cases where the deceased
committed suicide by hanging or poisoning, we heard parsons officiate,
and promise the friends, for certain, that the soul of the suicide was
in glory, because sometime ago he happened to get religion, or join the
Sons of Temperance, or conform to some other requirement of fanaticism.
Thus, in the present case of uncle Jacob, Mr. Barker, the Methodist, and
Parson Grinoble, the Presbyterian, and Mr. Gulmore, another style of
Presbyterianism, all three vied to see who would _be hired_ to do the
last service to him whom, while alive, they all despised. Mr. Gulmore,
however, had the best luck, and accordingly mounted the pulpit to pass
sentence on the departed soul of uncle Jacob. He descanted for a
considerable time on the virtues of the deceased while young, told all
he knew of his religious experience, not forgetting the virtues of the
entire family, and what they had done for religion by circulation of
tracts, by subscription to Bible societies, by adopting and raising of
destitute orphans, and other good deeds, all tending to the honor of
Calvinism. "The only instance of any thing like want of belief that
happened for a hundred years in the family," said he, "was the seduction
of our brother to the ranks of Popery. His faith was weak, my friends,"
he continued; "but if he did not believe strongly, _we believed_, and
our faith saved him. His soul is in glory, I have no doubt. The faith of
his family and all our faith saved him. Glory be to the Lord. Amen."

The conclusion of this discourse was applied to the warning of the
faithful against the influence of the Papists; the necessity and
obligation incumbent on all to compel their Catholic servants to join
their prayer and other meetings; and, above all, to take care that all
Popish books and publications, should be excluded from their houses. "We
are fallen on dangerous times, my friends," he said; "and if the friends
of the Bible and free religion do not combine their efforts against the
common enemy, our institutions are doomed, and the glory of our country
is extinguished forever."

The reader is not to imagine that Mr. Gulmore and men of his class are
so brutally ignorant as some would imagine. When, therefore, we hear
them speak of our _institutions_ being in danger, they mean the
_institutions_ of heresy and sectarianism; namely, parsons, and their
wives and children, and countless sects and contradictions in
creed--institutions that, sure enough, are in imminent danger, and
doomed to fall before the irresistible and unerring progress of
Catholicity. But will this divinely decreed result be injurious to the
progress or prosperity of the republic? On the contrary, there can never
be a real union among the States till the minds of the people, north and
south, are united in faith and sentiment. And by the annihilation of
sectarianism and its castes, the people will be freed from a very
burdensome tax now going to the support of a large and lazy body of men,
women, and children, whose only object in existence seems to be to eat
and consume, and who, besides, by their idleness and habits, keep up a
system of detraction, jealousy, and discord among otherwise
well-disposed citizens, that, like so many cancers, are eating into the
very vitals of the public morals. Let not the American citizen,
therefore, bewail the certain decline and rapid decay of the
_institutions_ of sectarianism, but rather pray for the dawn of that
glorious approaching day when, as we are but a one people and a united
nation, we may have but one religion, and a country that will know no
sectional divisions.

CHAPTER XVII.

"HE AND HIS WHOLE HOUSE BELIEVED."

Paul, now, though full of anxiety and care on account of his young
charge, was comparatively well off. His good fortune removed him from
the neighborhood of all that was low, fanatical, and cruel in New York,
to the capital of Vermont. And he felt the change for the better,
sensibly, in quitting the birthplace of "Millerism," and going into a
comparatively enlightened region. He thought there were, as he said,
some gentlemen and ladies here in Vermont; but he could never see one of
either species, properly so called, where he lately lived. The truth
was, Mr. Clarke, his present employer, was a well-bred, full-blooded
Yankee; and though his notions of Catholicity were such as he gleaned
from the rabid discourses of half-educated preachers, and a few
anti-Popery tracts which he read, his gentle and noble mind could not
sanction for an instant any thing like persecution on account of
religion. Hence, besides the favorable impression which the talents of
Paul made on him, he considered it time to show him some kindness, to
compensate for the ill treatment he underwent under the machinations of
Parson Gulmore and Amanda Prying, and their clerical associates.

"Paul," said Mr. Clarke, on Saturday night, at supper, "I am glad you
are beginning to like this part of the country. I will endeavor to
convince you that all America is not like your late home in York: all
parsons are not like Mr. Gulmore, whose conduct in regard to your
letters I cannot sufficiently condemn; nor are all young ladies of the
same temper as Miss Amanda Prying."

"I do not blame Amanda much, sir," said the youth, fearing that he might
be led to any thing bordering on detraction; "she was very kind to me in
all things, except that she wanted to keep me from mass, and tried to
force my sister and myself to attend Mr. Gulmore's church."

"That was very wrong of her, Paul. I do not think Miss Martha, here,
will be so cruel as to require you to do any thing against your will;
nor would she interfere with your letters to your friends, as I have no
doubt Amanda has interfered. Well, Martha," said the good-natured
father, looking with pride towards his eldest daughter, a bright girl of
sixteen, "are you going to force Paul with you to church; to compel him,
whether he likes it or not, to eat flesh meat on days forbidden by his
church? And will you forbid him to write to his uncle, who, I doubt not,
is a very respectable gentleman in Ireland?"

"God forbid, father, that I should be guilty of half that. However, we
shall be very glad if Paul comes to our meeting house, seeing we often
go to hear the priest, Father O'C----, of the Catholic church."

"I should be very sorry to disoblige any body, but especially one so
amiable as yourself, miss," said Paul; "but I do not think I can
conscientiously go to any church except the Catholic church."

Mr. and Mrs. Clarke smiled, and a significant glance passed between them
at the gallantry of this speech.

"Why, Paul," said he, "I think you are a leetle too particular. It would
do you no harm to hear our preacher, Mr. Holdforth; I do not see what
can be wrong in it, no more than our going to hear the priest."

"The only difference is," said Paul, quickly, "that our religion and
service being right, and yours being wrong, you can attend our service
without scruple, but I could not attend yours without sin. It would be a
loss of time, a bad way to spend the Sabbath, or Sunday; the sin of
curiosity, or the danger of being an encourager of, or countenancing, a
false worship, unauthorized by God or his church."

"Ah, Paul," said the editor, "this is taking a high ground, and rather a
new one to me; and besides, this is not very logical, for this is what
we want to see. This is just the question in dispute between the Roman
Catholic church and the Protestant; viz., to which of the two belongs
true and lawful worship."

"You are a lawyer, sir," said Paul, "and you must know well the evidence
is all in favor of the Catholic church--being that founded by Christ,
and ruled and guided by the apostles. For, go back to the very apostolic
ages, and you will find the rites and the ceremonies of the church,
recorded in the writings of the ancient fathers,--as, for instance, in
the works of Tertullian, Ireneus, Ignatius,--to be the very same as
those now practised in the Catholic church in this country and all over
the world."

"I confess, Paul," said he, "that the external evidences are rather
favorable to Catholicity; but we principally depend on internal
evidence, or the feelings of our minds."

"That," said Paul, "is no evidence at all; for you have to do with
external facts. Institutions, history, monuments, testimony of men,
customs, and habits, are the only evidence you can bring to bear on this
controversy. How would you like to try a criminal by internal
evidence--to tell a jury that you had 'internal evidence' of the
innocence or guilt of the man accused? How could you discover whether or
not Caesar lived by the light of internal evidence? Is it by internal
evidence you learn that such cities as Rome, Paris, or Constantinople
exist? No, sir; it is by _external_ evidence, which is altogether in
favor of our church; and this is more valuable than all the internal
evidence that ever existed in the minds of fanatics, from Simon Magus to
John Wesley, or from the Gnostics to the spiritual rappers."

"Husband," said Mrs. Clarke, "I am afraid of your reputation in this
argument about religion."

"Madam, it is not _reputation_ I seek, but truth; and if I can find it
in the Catholic church, I shall embrace it myself, and all my family."

"You may bid adieu to most of your subscribers, then, after you become a
Roman Catholic," said madam.

"My dear wife," said he, impressively, "you ought to know me
sufficiently well to be convinced that not only the success of my
journal, but even the entire of my means, with my personal feelings,
would be willingly sacrificed by me, in order to secure for myself, and
for you all, what is infinitely beyond all earthly or temporal
considerations; namely, the salvation of our immortal souls."

"I did not want to insinuate, my dear, for a moment, that you could be
influenced by such a consideration as the success of your journal in a
matter of such everlasting importance. I only dropped the remark
casually and without reflection," said madam.

In order to explain more fully the seriousness of Mr. Clarke's desire to
learn more and more regarding the Catholic church, and to account for
his rather too easy concession to the arguments of Paul, we think it
right to state that he had lately become a member of a literary and
religious society established in his native city, under the
presidentship of a minister of an Episcopal church. The object of this
society, partly religious and partly literary, was to infuse a new
spirit into the thinning ranks of Episcopalianism, by searching for, and
bringing to light, in the popular form of lectures and dissertations,
the evidences in favor of Protestantism, which, they supposed, were to
be found in the writings of the primitive or ante-Nicene sages of the
church. We do not think it would be appropriate to class this society
under the appellative "Puseyite," for they had no direct connection or
communication with that now rather celebrated school of schismatics,
but undoubtedly the objects of both were analogous. Mr. Clarke's
occupation was so much confined to the business of his lawyer's office,
and his time so much engrossed by the attention required of him as an
editor, that he had very little leisure to attend the regular meetings
of the society, of which he was elected an honorary member; and hence,
while he was at home and at the table, the whole discourse was on
religion; for these were his only leisure hours. Paul he found not only
well instructed in his religion, but capable of explaining very
satisfactorily to him various points connected with such an important
matter as that on which his mind of late turned its attention, and on
which he desired the fullest information.

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