CARDINAL NEWMAN'S DEFINITION OF A GENTLEMAN.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XIX, Issue 6, 7 November 1890, Page 25

CARDINAL NEWMAN'S DEFINITION OF A GENTLEMAN.

This is the late Cardinal Newman's attempt to define a gentleman. The remarkable passage occurs m bis " IX. Discouises Addressed to the Catholics <>f Dublin" :—"lt: — "It is almost a defiuition of a gentleman to say that he is one who never inflicts pa n. Tbiß description is both refined and, so far as it goes, accurate. He is mainly occupied in merely removing the obstacles which hinder the free <mi unembirrassed action of those about him, and he concurs with th«ir movements rather than takes the initiative himself. His benefits may be considered as parallel to what are called comforts or conveniences in arrangements of a personal nature — like an. ensy chair or a good fire, which do their part in dispelling cold ani fatigue, though nature provides both means of lest and animal heat without them. The true gentleman in like manner carefully avoids whatever may cause a jar or a jolt in the minds of those with whom he is cast— all clashing of opinion or collision of feeling, all restraint or suspicion or gloom or resent m p nt, his great concern being to make everyone at ease and at home. He has his eyes on all his company, he is tender towards the bashful, gentle towards the distant, and merciful towards the absurd. He can recollect to whom he is speaking ; he gu irds against unre .sonable allusions', or topics which may irritate ; he is seldjm prominent in conversation, and never wearisome. He makes light of favouis when he does them, and seems to be receiving when he is conferring. He never spe >ks of himself except when compelled, naver defends himself by a mere retort ; he has no ears for slander or gossip, is scrupulous in imputing m >iives to those who interfere with him, and interprets everything for the best. He is never mean or little in his disputes, never takes unfair advantage, never mistakes personalities or sharp saymgß for argument, or insinuates evil which he dare not Bay out, From a long-sighted prudence, he observes the maxim of the ancient sage, that we should ever conduct ourselves towards ou* enemy as if he were one day to be our friend. He has too much good Bcnse to be affronted at insults ; he is too well employed to remember injutits and too indolent to bear malice. He ia patient, forbearing, and r. signed on philosophical principles ; he submits to pain because it is inevitable, lo bereavement because it is irreparable, and to death because it is his destiny. If he engages in coa roversy of any kind, his disciplined intellect preserves him frum the blundering discourtesy of better, perhaps, but less educated minds, wbo, like blunt weapons, tear and hack instead of cutting clean, who mistake the point iv argument, waste ti.eir strength on trifles, misconceive their adversary, and leave the question more mvolved than they tiad it. He may be rfcbt or wrong in his opinion, but he is too clearheaded to be unjust ; lie is as simple as he is forcible, and as brief aB he is decisive. Nowhere shah we find greater candour, consideration, indulgence ; he throws himself into the mindß of his opponents, he accounts for their mistakes. He knows the weakness <f human rea on as well as its strength, its province, and its limits If he be an unbeliever he will be too profound and large-minded to ridicule religion or <o act agmn-t it ; he is too wise to be a dcgmatist or fa atic in his infi selity. Ha respects piety and devotion ; he even supports institutions, as venerable, beautiful, or useful, to which he does not aßsent ; he honours the

ministers of religion, and it contents him to decline its mysteries without assailing or denouncing them. He is a friend of religions toleration, and that not only because his philosophy has tauorht him to look on all forma of faith with an impartial eye, but also from the gantlanesn and efiF>micacy of feeling which is t ie attendant on civi-lii-ation. Not that ne might not hold a religion, too, in his own way, even when he is not a Christian . la that case bis religion is one of imagination and sentiment ; it is tha embodiment of those ideas of the -übhm j , majestic an 1 beautiful, without which there can be no larger philosophy. Some inus he acknowledges the bfting of God, sometimes he invests an unknown principe or qualities wioh the attributes of perfection An! this deductiou of his reason or creation in his fancy he nukes the occasion of suchtieellen thoughts, and tho start* ing point of bo varied and cyd'emvtic a teaching, that he even seams like a 'luciple of Cariatianuy its If. From the very accuracy ani steadfastness of his lo^ioai p <wers, he is able to see what sentiments are consistent in those who hold any religious doctrine at all, and he appears to others to feel and to hold a whole circle of theological truths, which exist in his mind not otherwise than a number of deductions Such are ome of the ltneam n's of the ethical cha aoter which the cultivated intellect will form, ap*rt from the religious principle. They are seen within the pale of the Church and without it, in holy men and in profligate ; they form the beau ideal of the world ; they partly assist a .d partly distort ihe development of the Catholic. They may subserve the education of a St. Francis de Sales or a Cardinal Pole ; they may be tne limits of contemplation of a Shaftsbury or a Gibbon. Basil and Julian were fellow-students at the schools of Athens ; and one became the saint and doctor of the Church, the other a scofflig and relentless foe."