Current Topics

New Zealand Tablet, Volume V, Issue 262, 10 May 1878, Page 1

Current Topics

AT HOME A AB7IOAD.

♦ 7E mantle ojrPope Pins IX. has certainly fallen upon the shoulders of Leo. XTII. Amongst tlie first acts of our Holy Fntber's reign lias been the conferring of his blessing npon the Catholic Press. On 2fith February last, M. Eugene- Yeuillot wrote as follows to the ZTnircrs from Eome*:^"^ia£litl^e honour and the happiness of being (received "by iJis Holiness yesterday evening. Christ.* Vicar has blessed our work and all those connected with it. He said that he knew and had long been a reader of the Univei's. whose devotion to the Church he praised. He asked me about Lonis Veniilot, whose services he highly esteems. The Pope added that the religious Press, that is, like us, faithful to the teaching; of the Holy See, had a noble part to play ; that it must maintain firmly the rights of the Church. His Holiness concluded repeating that he blessed us fill, and sent a special blessing to Louis Ycuillot." We recognise tho claim of M. Louis Yeuillot to receive so great a reward for his long years of labour in upholding the Catholic cause in Europe, and it giros us great pleasure to see him thus fortified against the sneers and open attacks of his multitudinous enemies. He is one, indeed, who has encountered a large share of the vituperation of the Protestant and infidel newspapers, and his truly Catholic aspirations for the welfare of the Church have even been made the standard against which the anti-Catholic voice has especially declaimed. "It is the contemplation of the behaviour of the Christian subjects of Turkey ,|' says the Saturday Fevieiv, " which has kept Europe in such a state of roind as to make it hope that the idea of a moderate Pope, and not tho idea of M. Veuillot, will prevail in the Catholic world." Europe must indeed be singularly acute if it can detect any connection between the behaviour of these Christians of the Greek Church and the See of Peter. Does it not know that Rome has no more bitter enemy or more rebellious child, — for all baptised Christians belong in some sort to the Pope as our lato Holy Father informed the Emporor of Germany ? Pint this drivel — and it is the merest disconnected drivel — is beside the question- What we liave to do with is tho fact that the groat '■ Rcviler '' has been disappointed, and that a Pope, who docs fulfil the idea of M. Veniilot sits in thq, chair of the Fisherman, and has conferred his blessing on M. Veuillot, and the T'nirrrs, and the Catholic Tress. For onrsclvos we feel our courage renewed once mote by the benediction of His Holiness, and we trust that we shall continue to be included in it by doing our utmost, in our limited sphere, towards maintaining at all times the rights of the Church.

"Oh ! hoo I hate to hear a hash insist." There is somewliere or other in Dunedin a certain club which is bent on deep discussion. We do not know where is its place of meeting, nor do we recognise the names of any of its members. But the jlub must be in existence, for a contemporary furnishes us with long reports of its pi'oceedings. We are not in the habit of perusing these reports regularly, for we desire to avoid the state of confusion arrived at by those unfortunate devils, who, Milton informs uf, sat apart upon a hill and reasoned of all sorts of things which it was impossible for them to understand. Therefore we spare our limited intellect, and avoid placing ourselves in danger of going daft. We are not in a position then to criticise the proceedings of this club, and feel justified only in saying that, so far as we have followed its conversations, they by no means remind us of those out of which we have gathered our motto— the '• Noctes Ambrosi.inse" There is, however, one gentleman amongst the members of the club to which we refer in whom we ought to feel some interest. He is an Irishman and a Roman Catholic ; both of which facts entitle him to our consideration. We know he is an Irishman because there is an O' before his name, and we know he is a Roman Catholic because he has plainly stated such to be the case. We need hardly enter into any very long argument to prove that the O' befoi % e a man's name at once points out his nature, characteristics, and race to be Irish, for, on all hands, it. is admitted to have done so from the very earliest times. In fact we recognise one of the elders who attended on King Priam. a|; the Sksean gate to have been Irish

because he was named O'Calep->n. Although.bythe way, the Greek scribe who took down the name from Homer's dictation stupidly wrote the O' with a v instead~o£ the apostrophe, — a mistake which .was not detected hy the poet, no doubt owing to his "blindness, and which, therefore, has been continued to the present day. This elder, then, was Irish, made so, by his O' which plainly shows that he was not a Trojan in the same way that the O' of Mr. O'Donnell, of whom we speak, shows that he is not to be mistakenior a Cockney. Of this Irish elder's religion we cannot certainly judge, for it is not distinctly mentioned that he was a Roman Catholic, butvthcre isnothingin the world tc- prevent his having, had very nearly ns c'leai* Ideas} on the creed in'qnestion as the Milesian of whom out contemporary reports For if there were such things as Roman Catholic crows this gentleman might be hung up up to frighten them by the display of his ignorance and imbecility, just as at present he has been introduced to amuse the geese of other creeds, or no creeds, by the exhibition of his assumed knowledge. There is a Scotch gentleman, too, in the club, who is very short and very sharp, but the soul of reason, and he, to be sure, takes it out of Mr. O'Donnell at his will, and hy a home thrust or two makes our Irish friend show to the assembly how very big a." fool he is. We have, "however, no intention of following- the course of a discussion at the club : we desire to shun the megrim, and therefore • we shall confine ourselves to an answer, which it strikes us is an ■ obvious one to that stock argument, "Search the Scriptures,'" which we find last week advanced, to his discomfiture, against our Irish scarecrow. The Jews were told to search the Scriptures, not for the purpose of interpreting them at their will, but to find in them a certain definite meaning. The interpretation was given to them : it was that Jesus of N"azareth was the Messiah, and that, and that only, was what it was lawful for them to discover by their search. The passage in question really is condemnatory of the Protestant position, for it proves that out Lord did what the Church now does, — i.c, declared the meaning of certain passages, and desired that those "who read them should place such an interpretation on them. The Church recommends the faithful to study the Scriptures in this same sense to-day.

A COXTempobauy, amongst certain paragraphs culled from the news bronghl by the Suez Mail, gives ns one which it heads "British Pluck."' The '• British pluck," however, exemplified, proves to be the gallant conduct of ,1 number of men. of that distinctly Irish Regiment, the Connaught Hangers, led on by Major Garrett Moore, a member of the ancient Irish family of O'Moore, and who hails from the banks of the Shannon. The paragraph runs thus : — •" The SSth Regiment, the Conuaught Rangers, were always hard, hitters, and I never knew the enemy yet that was pleased at meeting either the 87th or the 88th. Regiments when they came down to the charge with fixed bayonets, shouting ' Faugh-a-ballagh ' — clear the road or clear the way. The following will prove how Irishmen can fight, "as the Kaffirs are no chickens, and also that British soldiers will always succeed, with' the bayonet, if properly used. The small body of men of the 88th Regiment (only forty in number) engaged in the vecent battle with the Gaika Kaffirs, near the Komglia, behaved splendidly, and maintained the prestige of the SSth as one of the best fighting regiments of the British army. They were confronted hy a lai'ge number of Gaikas, variously estimated, at from 600 to 1,000, who came out shouting, yelling, and brandishing their guns. Forming his small hand into squai'e, Major Moore told them to wait until the enemy were within a distance of 100 yards, when a volley frotn the Sniders did fearful execution, and caused the Kaffirs to halt, bufc only for a moment. Shouting, hooting, and yelling as only naked savages can do, they came on. like a stone wall until within five yards distant of the small band of soldiers, when Major Moore gave the order, ' Men of the 88th, fire a volley and charge bayonets ! ' Quick as lightning the order was' executed, ihe men of the SSth were in amongst the Gaikas, and handled thebayonels in fine style.' The Kaffirs fought desperately, but Irish pluck was too much for them, and the result was that they turned and fled, leaving 100 dead on the field. Major Moov is a dashing officer. "While attempting to save a mounted policeman named Guise, who was badly wounded at the time, he was attacked by two Kaffirs, and wounded through the arm with an assegai. He succeeded^ however,

in shooting both the Kaffirs with his revolver." Major Moore is" all that is said here of him and more besides. He is not only a brave soldier, but, as we have good reason to know, a true-hearted gentleman, an honour not only to the service in which he has distinguished himself, but also, what is still more, to the country which gave him to that service. His " pluck " however is not " British pluck ; " it has descended to him with the ancient blood of Irish chieftains which., flows in his veinsj and which has ere now 1 asserted itself on many a' battlefield..

A few years ago when the Burmese embassy was in London, the Archbishop of Canterbury made~some remarks with respect .to the. number of Easterns that were in England, referring especially to the religions professed by them. An answer was written to his Grace in the Times, if we understand aright by the ambassadors themselves or some members of their suite, in which the Archbishop was accused of commenting on systems of which he knew nothing, and whence it was clear that the writers had a perfect comprehension of the state of religion in his Grace's arch-diocese, and were by no means inclined by it to the adoption of Protestant Christianity. We read the correspondence at the time, and were much amused with it, but unfortunately we have not retained a very distinct recollection of its particulars. It appears, however, that the affair was even more ominous than we supposed, for now it seems that the Archbishop bids fair to • have one of the heathen creeds, which he considered it a blemish to find professed umn'terfered with in London, actcalljj not only openly, but even controversially, under his vevy nose. \.&t least we find a paragraph in a contemporary to the effect thaft certain Buddhist priests are about to make a missionary tour in America and England, and, strange to say, there is nothing either extraordinary or incredible in the statement. Extremes have met, and " modern thought " has prepared the way in the West for the engrafting there of this ancient Eastern system oi belief to which wo refer. It may be remembered that a little time ago we gave a sketch of that German otitcome of the evolutionary theory -which is known as " Pessimism," and which bears a strong resemblance to the teaching of Bhuddism. This is widely spread, and supported by men of reputation for genius and learning, and there can be no doubt but that for those minds which reject Christianity, and rush on to the eager adoption of evolution in a rash anticipation of the cautious steps of science, there is much that is specious in the system. Europe, then, presents a fair field for the efforts of these Eastern apostles, and we shall be by no means surprised to find them secure there, as well as in America, a large body of adherents. It may be, indeed, that we arc also destined to see them welcomed to the shores of New Zealand, and that here in Dunedin, as a set-off to the Princess Theatre, we shall have a Temple of Fo, where ,another evolutionist sect will dispute the doctrine that mankind is on a stampede between the ape and the angel, by asserting the axiom of Sakyamouni, " Evil is existence," and declaring that the suiamwi homini consists in the attainment of Nirvvana. In fact, the man may not only be bom, but may even be already a good lump of a gossoon, who as a cabinet minister shall endeavour to introduce and support measures calculated to prepare the minds of New Zealand children for the adoption of the system in question, and it may be that in his sinister design lie will be aided by the assent and approbation of such ministers of Christian sects as shall still be found amongst us. Whether he be now engaged in handling the plough or the tawse, however, it is a pity that the accidents of colonial life are favourable to his rise in the social and political scales, so that it shall be hereafter in his power to help in. heathenising the Land. •

When, some fifty or sixty years ago, the Signor Silvio Pellico was arrested by the Austrian Government and imprisoned, first in the leads of Venice, and afterwards at Spielberg he was .harshly treated. It is impossible to read his account of his prison life without great indignation against the perpetrators of so gross an injustice and cruelty, but dai-k as is the picture, it is relieved by contemplating the sympathy felt for the poor captive by certain of those officeTs to whose care he was committeed. Tremerello, the turnkey at Venice, wis not unkind, and, at Spielberg, Schiller was in truth a rough diamond. Considerate warders were, in short, the rule, and we cannot but think that it speaks -well for a Catholic country that a class of its people, of all others exposed to the most hardening influences, remained humane and kind-hearted. We are in a position to-day to contrast the treatment this Italian gentleman received in Austria, half a century ago, at the bands of the turnkeys and prison officers generally, with that of some other prisoners lately slrat up in a gaol of the period, and placed under the care of officials belonging to that Anglo-Saxon race which boasts itself the most enlightened and Christian in the world. And what do we find 1 The benighted A\istrians continued men, and kind-hearted men. They fulfilled, indeed, the duties of their calling, and carried out the rigorous discipline enjoined upon them, but so far as it was possible they alleviated

the sufferings of their prisoners by sympathy and humanity. The American warders in the prison of New Jersey, on the contrary, became as brutes : the prisoners were relinquished to their mercies, and, as it has recently been proved, they treated them horribly. They invented tortures, and applied them so cruelly that sometimes their victims died of the suffering inflicted. They gagged and fettered them, and bound them for fifteen' hours at a time to a thing called a stretcher, which was declared, by an official who made a trial of it, to be unendurable for. even a few minutes. The prison doctors, also, have been convicted of the most savage conduct. At Spielberg, the surgeon who cut off Maroncelli's leg shed tears when his patient presented him with a rose, the only reward in his power to give ; but the doctors at New Jersey, when they were called to attend a prisoner wlio had fainted, or otherwise become unconscious, an occurrence which seems to have been frequent, poured alcohol upon his flesh, and ignited it. If the wretched sufferer then, sprang up trader the torture of the burn he was declared to have "been shamming. Certainly it is a world progressing towards perfection, and the great land of secularism has all but developed into a terrestrial Paradise.

An American editor has produced the following from his queer brain :—": — " Clothes pins are now shipped to New Zealand. The natives use them for earrings, but an old chief who got hold of one with a half horse power spring in its back, and hooked it on his nose, was looking around ten minutes afterward for a missionary to kill." We cannofcsay anything about the clothes pins, but we can assure our unknown contemporary that we in New Zealand have had one other of his country's institutions' introduced amongst us, which aspires to lead us all by the nose, and which will indubitably end in killing, not missionaries, perhaps, but missionary work. It is secularism, whose victim is Christianity.

This is the age of strange discoveries, and, if that announced by Mr. A. H. Severn arrive at being established, it will indeed, as he says, " open up another field for thinking minds." This gentleman, who is very well known in New Zealand, professes to have discovered a simple instrument by which sound may be conveyed without the intervention of the ear to the brain of deaf persons. "We are reminded by it of the lament of Samson Agonistes : " if it be true

That light is in the soul, She all in every part ; why was the sight To such a tender ball as the eye confined, So obvious, and so easy to be qnenched ; And not, as feeling, through all parts diffused, That she might look at will through every pore ?" One discovery may lead to another, and the soul may at length be enabled to see, also, although the ordinary organ of sight be destroyed. .

If our secular schools in Dunedin are to prosper under the management of their school committees, we shall have an instance of "progression by antagonism." It is a pity the Daily Times considered it necessary, as he informs us in his leader of last Monday, to thin out his report of the late meeting of the committee, for the slight sketch of their shindy he has given is very amusing. We do not know that any of it is very profitable, although our contemporary seems to imply that he considers it so, for he tells us that he " omitted much which it Avould have been, no profit to the public to hear discussed," and therefore. we conclude that what he has published is considered by him as useful to the community in general. We have read the report, however, carefully, and cannot perceive exactly wherein its profitableness consists. The impertinence, and truculence, and something more, of Mr. Fish, we aye well acquainted with, and we aye fully persuaded no profit may be gained by reading these oft displayed characteristics reported of. The dignity of Professor Macgregor and Mr. Bell, indeed, might afford a lesson had it been acted upon, but that of the editor was, edit.or-like, but verbal, and the Professor's only succeeded in carrying him as far as the door of the room in which he found himself ; so that nothing decided may be acquired from contemplating this. It may nevertheless be profitable, perhaps, to know that the Board and the Committee are at loggerheads, that the former has connected itself with a ring, as we learn from Mr. Kobin, and that the latter cannot enter upon the discussion of a petty appointment without coming to the verge of a freefight. That we say may, perhaps, be profitable, but it is certainly amusing. Meantime, it is to be hoped that the discipline of the Educational Olympus may not be introduced into the regions governed, for if it be, we may look out to see an abundance of road metal flying through the air, and black eyes and broken noses by the hundredBoth schoolmasters and pupils must learn to take warning by their superiors of the committee, and to shun rigorously their example.

Five years ago, when the secular system was introduced into Victoria it was predicted that all the wants of society in the educational line were about to be supplied ; larrikinism was to perish utterly nd the gutter children, to becope a nightmare of the past, Five years

however, have gone by, and still the gutter seems to have raised its goodly brood ; at least, if we may judge from the fragrance of its blossom, the larrikins. The Melbourne Swn, and the Australasian furnish us with a few details concerning those young gentlemen that show they are still to the fore and as charming as ever, if not more so. The place in which they the most present themselves to good society is in the gallery of the theatres, and Professor Pearson might learn a lesson by going there to contemplate their '-tricks and their manners." He had better, however, wait until the Truant Inspector is u>t /ait aeconipli, and secure a phalanx to accompany him ; the •' repose," of the Vere de Vere caste will not there meet his gaze, nor will his nostrils 'be greeted by the mille flews of the Ladies' College. The 1 statements of our authorities are briefly these : the young Jj beasts" lean over the front of .the gallery, howling, shrieking, blaspheming', and spitting. ', ,The actors can hardly be heard, but all too plainly ar,e the filth and blasphemies of the odious crew rehearsed in the ears of the audience, so that the place is hardly fit for the presence of ladies and children. Here is a specimen of a conversation with one of the band. " Why," said I, (correspondent of Sun) "do you not go into the pit these hot nights. It is nothing like so hot as where yWtia've been ? " ' '- His reply rathei- startled me, but he appeared to be essentially a ?' geritie,'; youth,, who had studied economy. "No (expletive) fear, cocky ; . i ; I only pays a . tannner to go up with the gods, and then* Ihas-aianner to spend on lush, and drink jolly old Greville's health." Again we are told by "Taliite" in the Australasian •'Untamed gorillas wo'flicL b'e,h'ave better. They are loud in voice, filthy in language-, boisterous in manner, dirty in person, barren in thought. • ' They'give n f o attention to the performance, and they pay their sixpences, presumably, for the opportunity of gratifying their love of imbecile horseplay. , \ I cau imagine well enough, what sweet husbands arid fathersf-they will make in a few years from this time." Such is the' s^a'tb' of 'Melbourne, after five years of education, free, secular," and comp^s6ry,-^the system which it was boasted would reach all classes^iad-provide'.f or all needs. But only think what fine felloW3f thdso wojflld be. for.t Companions for the girls and boys of reputable parents. V£h~e' Surfs correspondent was worked up into a fever by witnessing 'decent children within hearing of the ruffians ; our gasconading ex-Professor, and many like-minded with him amongst ourselves, would compel such children into close association with them. This is the soul of secularism, the three almighty R.s, and libertinage unlimited.

We confaS that the warning to fortify their ports received from the Imperial Government by the colonial authorities is to us anything but reassuring. We had so far concluded that the Pacific fleet would have been sufficient to 'have prevented the ravages in these seas of Russian cruisers or privateers, and it is by no means agreeable to be thus authoritatively undeceived. We do not de&ire, on the other hand, unnecessarily to alarm our, readers, but we consider that the duty devolves upon us of preparing them to meet what may, perhaps, happen, so that they may not be taken unawares, but may now adopt measures to prevent not only the- probability but tho possibility of their becoming victims to 'the violence of unbridled and ferocious men. The fortification of our harbours should undoubtedly be proceeded with at once, but it would be most unwise to depend only upon this. Let us not disguise it from ourselves ; should a Russian privateer or cruiser succeed in gaining an entrance into any port in the colonies, and thus have the town at its mercy, a mere raid on the banks would not satisfy its requirements. The armed ruffians manning it would net be go easily contented, nor would they leave the place without marking their presence with many a blood-stained and dishearth. 'It is against this that we have to provide, and to possibility eYerjr man and youth in the colony should be fuinishtd with, aiid exercised in the use of a rifle and revolver. This need not involve any devotion, of time that cannot be spared to'volunteer exercises or-military discipline, all that would be needed would be for each man or lad possessing a weapon to be sufficiently versed in its use to be able to' .haadle ')£ carefully and familiarly, load it without delay, and discharge it with a fair aim. We address our remarks especially to our Catholic readers, for they may depend upon, it that, in event of a Russian attack upon' 'or entry into ' any of pur towns, the Catholic Church, Presbytery, and Convent would indubitably be selected for sack and outrage. Although all sects and classes amongst us,, then, are interested in insuring a warm reception to our possible, unwelcome. -visitors, we, Catholics, are doubly bound to make ourselves xeady for them. But' let the whole community every - where.be on the alert, 'the .participle cosaque was not groundlessly invented. „, ,

The conviction otthc Catholic, mind for the last few years has been that our late beloved Holy Father had attained to heroic sanctity, but) for obvious leaeoue/the opinion was not yery lowUy expressed.

during the life-time of the holy Pontiff. Already, however, there is evident a disposition to declare openly that Pius IX was a saint in the strict sense of the word, and none of the proofs of his great sanctity appear to be wanting. We do not presume to anticipate the judgement of the Church, and what we now write is written with the understanding that it is but the expression of a private individual's belief, adopted from the study he has made of the subject he writes of, but we are emboldened to put forward such a view by the knowledge that a dignatoiy of the Church, lately preaching before an assembly of the Cardinals, professed a similar belief, and alluded to v the probability of the late Pope's being honoured with the honours due to sanctity in-the heroic degree. It may be, therefore, that, even in our own days, we shall have Ihe great happiness of hearing him, whose memory we must ever revere as that of a saint, and love as that of a father, authoritatively recognised as Pope St. Pius the Great.