THE MELBOURNE 'ARGUS' AND BISHOP MORAN'S LECTURE.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume II, Issue 110, 5 June 1875, Page 11

THE MELBOURNE 'ARGUS' AND BISHOP MORAN'S LECTURE.

Some kind friend in Victoria has 1 been good enough to send us ' The Argus * of the 18th May, in which there is a leader on Bishop Mohan's lecture on tlie " Bankruptcy of Liberalism." We are very much obliged to our anonymous friend, but regret he should have put himself to so much trouble to such little purpose, unless, indeed, it was his intention to amuse us. The article of our contemporary is not worth much. As a criticism on the lecture, it is jejune'vn.t\iG extreme, and as an evidence of industry, it is deplorable. The writer does not appear to have read the lecture which he makes such great pretence of criticising. Indeecf, there are so many passages in it coincident with certain parts of the leader which appeared in the ' Otago Daily Times,' in reference to the lecture,- that we are disposed to think that the ' Argus ' man derived all his information from our Dunedin contemporary. For example, ' The Argus ' says, ".Liberalism, according to this Catholic luminary, was born amid the terrors and outrages of the French Revolution." The ' Otago Daily Times' said the same substantially. But this is untrue, as we pointed out subsequently. Bishop Moban did not *ay what these two newspapers have attributed to him on this point. Again, the 'Argus" says, "It is hard to "believe that Bishop Moban is not densely ignorant of the principles and forces that have begotten, the revolutions of modern history, and what is worse, absolutely at fault with regard to the position and influence of his own church." !The 'Daily Times' said the same, though in different words. The ' Argus ' says, "We are paying the Bishop a higher compliment than he deserves, when we assert, with a whole shelf of historical authorities behind us, that the Papacy was a direct progenitor of the Revolution, and that the liberalism he denounces was largely nourished on its tyrannies and abuses." If the passage about the " whole shelf of historical authorities " and the compliment, be excepted, the ' Daily Times ' said the same. The coincidence is striking. We wish to be polite and duly sensible of the favor done us, but really we fail to see in what the compliment consists. It is very gratifying to us, however, to learn that the ' Argus ' man has behind him such an excellent library. But we regret that on the occasion of his writing this rather strong leader, he had not this " whole shelf of historical authorities" before him. To know that he only had it behind him, is net reassuring on the score of accuracy. An authority or two in support of his very extraordinary assertions would have been much more satisfactory than the assurance that he had a lot of authorities the back ground. Towards the end of his article, the writer in the ' Argus ' puts within brackets these words, " Cannot the ghosts of Alta and his butchered victims haunt the dreams of this unconscious cleric." Our contemporary has, some time or another, read Motley's Philippic, which he, as well as the author himself, has mistaken for calm, impartial history, and has treated his readers to this spicy passage by way of a finisher. But, although the reference is irrelevant, we must not find much fault with him, as it is only the usual red pepper with which newspaper writers generally season their otherwise insipid commonplace. The writer, of course, must in some way show that he is a man of learning and miscellaneous leading, and that if he only thought it worth his while, he could utterly demolish the Bishop's lecture. It might be a little difficult to do this in an intelligible way : but he could do if only he set about it, as is plain from the slashing article in which he has condescended to notice the poor production ! It is not necessary to say anymore on the subject today ; but should the editor of the c Argus ' change his position in reference to that " whole shelf full of historical authorities," and seriously set himself the task of refuting the lecture, we promise to forget the red pepper, the ghosts of Alta and his butchered victims," and Motley's impassioned romance, and calmly weigh his arguments. We would recommend him, r however, not to confine himself to such authorities as SisMoitbi, Cablyle, and Motlkt. Not one of these has written history.