Current Topics AT HOME AND ABROAD.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXII, Issue 1, 3 May 1895, Page 1

Current Topics AT HOME AND ABROAD.

+.—. — A friend has laid before us a book which has shocked him considerably. It purports to be an acconnt of a missionary tour made in South

HOLT LIABS.

America by the Rev Q. 0. Grubb, M.A. and party, with a historical (ketch from a missionary point of view by Lucy E. Guinness The book is called "South America the Neglected Contioent," and its author is one E. 0. Millard. We give the name, because we look upon such books as useful rending. Nothing can be m re useful in the particular way of exposing the nature of such miseionaries and their missions. There is nothing better calculated to dispel illusions than disgust. We have not then been able at all to share the shocked feeling of our friend. Familiarity, they say, breeds contempt, and it is very many years since our familiarity with productions such as this book begau. It is but an application of the old tune of the so-called Irish Church Missions to South America, and, without ever reading a word of i', to those accustomed to the strain the general contents of the book must be well known. It is simply ditto and ditto repeated — a rehash of all the old calumnies against the Catholic Chnrch, her priesthood and her people that mark that lowest development of Protestantism, controversial evangelicalism in Ireland. The representative of the Irish Scripture reader has had his hand in the pie, and the anecdotes and sketches peculiar to him abound in this volume. No doubt they are quite as true when referring to matters in South America as they were in reference to those in Connaught. The want of variety, indeed, seems somewhat dull. The readers of these inventions, however, are naturally not very difficult to Batiefy, and the writers understand the (oik they have to deal with. But are these people really conscious in their " poking fun '» at religion 1 Here, for example, is an event related by a missionary named Bwen :—": — " One of the first Spaniards I met in Buenos Ayros, though the *on of a Christian mother was himself an ungodly young man. . . He was anxious to learn English, aod kept with me, as I knew nothing of Spanish, One day in the garden, I repeated to him in Spanish a versa of Scripture which I had learnt for the purpose. My pronunciation was so incorrect that I feared be might not have understood, and also that if he had it might make him try to avoid me." The result was, nevertheless, that the young man was converted. Three weeks after Ewen meets a friend who says " You will be glad to hear that Miguel C— is converted. His mother tells me it ia through what you said to him in the garden." But had not exactly the same thing happened to Paddy B — in Connemara ? And fustian like this forms the better part of the narrative. Repulsive profanity, which seems even to mock what these people themselves profess to hold sacred is the general tone. But, in fact, self conceit is the god that they worship, and their own glorification is, possibly unconsciously, what they have at heart. In this particular instance) too, there are special reasons why such should be made more prominent. These missionaries are of a peculiar class. The Rev G. C. Grubb is a member of a family, hailing from Cahir in Tippsrary, for whom a rise in life made it advisable to renounce Quakerism for the genteeler creed of the Church of England. Mrs Lucy E. Guinness belongs to a fag-end of the family whom a pre-eminence in the brewing of malt liquor has elevated to the peerage. Social considerations also enter into the motives that influence them and in their persons the miseionionary becomes closely identified with the religious snob. Meantime, as a matter of fact, religion in South America occupies a creditable standing place. We lately quoted in our columns testimony to this effect given in the Uaited Statej by an English Catholic missionary who had just returned there — namely the Rev Father Vaughan a brother of the Cardinal Archbishop of Weßtminßter. Father Vaughan also testified to the good morals of the people and denounced the falsehoods disseminated by Evangelical missionaries whose impudent intrusion into the country and coarse attacks on religion were necessarily resented. It is a rehash of these vile calumnies served up with the peculiar sauce, a mighty flat and mawkish condiment, of the Irish Church Missions that the book contains. No decent stomach could remain unaffected by the

sickly mess. There is, nevertheless, a serious aspect of the matter. In the Bible, of which these people boaßt so much — bat which they make the slave of their own profane fancies and blasphemous conceits, obliging it to testify to the inspiration of every notion that comes into their heads, there remains the plain commandment—" Tbon shalt not bear false witness against tby neighbour." It is a curious thought that even these missionaries must yet account before the throne of God for every idle word that they have published, even in this disgusting and disgraceful book. And by tbe way there was also that idle word spoken at Auckland by tbe Rev G. 0. Grubb, who in bis self-glorification in that city falsely accused tbe Catholics of Wes'port of flocking in crowds to hear him — i statement, we say again, as we said at tbe time, in which there was not one word of troth. The Rev G. C. Grnbb, our readers will remember, was the Anglican clergyman who, some two or three years ago, presented tbe Right Rev Dr Nevill with another note of the Catholicity of his Churcb by coming to Dunedin and preaching Evangelical doctrine utterly abhorrent to the Bishop, under his Lordship's no9e. The conceit, in short, by which missionaries of the Rev G. C. Grubb's kind are inspired does not confine itself altogether to Ottholicism. Everyone in fact not similarly inspired is looked upon by such evangelists as doomed to perdition, and on the evangelist, consistently, in bis own mind, devolves the privilege of rescuing him. Conceit, nevertheless, in whatever form it displays itself is a contemptible motive. Its most contemptible manifestation is tbat made by it in the person of tbe Evangelical snob — but of what this interesting individual is capable no more revolting example can be found than this farrago of impudent calumny and holy lying called " South. America tbe Neglected Continent."

A CONTRAST WITH A VENGEANCE.

Bjt our missionaries draw a contrast between the benighted people of Sjuth America and their own happy countrymen in Hnglanl. " They are tiring and dying there in darkness, ' having no hope and without God in the world. 1 Say they were all here in our own Yorkshire." Say, then — that they were— and what would ihey profit? "The medical gentleman (Dr Fraser) whose evidence I publish," writes Hyndman in his " Historic »l Basis of Socialism " (p. 322), " assures me that cases of incest* are anything but uncommon. He complains of the anti-nuptial unchastity of our women, of the loose talk and conduct of girls who work in the fields, of the light way in which maidens part with their honour, and bow seldom either a parent's or a brother's blood boils with shame." Did oar mission* aries encounter anything worse than this, which is related of certain English counties into whose moral condition a commission, of which DrFraser was a member, had made inquiry i The b'ood in the veins of Spanish parents and brothers is certainly less cool. The chastity of Spanish maidens is proverbial. '■ I have often had Anglo-Saxons hurl at my bead," writes Max O'Rell in the North American Review for November 1894, " the number of French unfortunates who are to be seen in the West end of London. My answer has always been that if they were not less appreciated in France than in England, in France they would undoubtedly remain." And again be tells us of a man, an Englishman or an American, who, in his hearing, asked a newspaper woman in Paris for an indecent publication. "'We do not sell those things (Cet salitis /a) ' replied tbe good woman. And turning to me, she added: ' Only foreigners buy that.'" In the same periodical for March the same writer gives sorm further contrasts — which may »lso be taken as bearing comparatively on the moral influences of Protestantism. " Tbe proportion of illegitimate children to legitimate onep," be says, " is nine per cent in Paris, twelve per cent in New York, fifteen per cent in Chicago, and more than that in San Francisco. " There is more low, repulsive, unheard* of vice in a square block of Cuicago and San FranciECO," be adds, " than in a square mile of Paris." But, indeed, it needs a brazen face to boast of the religious benefits to be derived to-day by those who should live in England. Cases that have recently baen exposed, and more than one of them, stamp English society, even in it? more refined developments, with a brand of shame not to db surpassed, and hardly to be equalled, throughout the most brutal quarters of tbe world. And if the country were to be tbreateaed, and not undeservedly, it would appc.r, with the punishment of the cities of tbe plain

we cofcy doubt as to whether oar missionary friends would themselves count as the fifty righteous — or even as the ten— who might redeem it. Unscrupulous falsehood, at least, must tell against their claim?. The doubt, however, is one that they themselves will not; Rhare. They are as false in their minds with regard to their own merits and expected rewards as they are with their tongues towaida those who differ from them in belief. Wer« they sincere, and not itching for particular distinction and foreign experiences, with the advantages they entail, they would find plenty to do at home. " I know the West ecd and the Bast end of London ; " writes Mnx O'Rell o n e more, " I have seen Argyle street in Glasgow ; High Rtreet and the Canongate, in Edinburgh, on Saturday nights. I have viailtd the dives of Chicago, the dens of New York and San Francisco ; I have seen the gambling dens of Denver and the rest. I have seen Paris in all its nooks and corners, and I really cannot make up ray mind that Anglo-Saxon land scores in the comparison." Yet these apont'es of corceit and self -glorification run abroad, proclaiming their own excessive piety and the precious privileges exclusively enjoyed by those who inhabit a Protestant country. Is it not rather to be feared that wherever they obtain a footing not only hypocrisy and falsehood bat vice of the most revolting kinds — such as they have left behind them at home, and, at best, have not betn able to prevent, or heal, may follow in their wake f Aa we see, it is thick in the places whence they have come, and teaching such as theirs has done nothing to stem it. The state of religion in South America, may, perhaps, be capable of improvement. Father Vaughan, in fact, described it as, in some minor respects, imperfect. In the true Catholic homes of South America, however, as in all such Catholic homes, nothing will b« found to equal the condition of things. Hyndman quotes regarding the English peasantry — or that which is now once again— for the third time in recent years — before the world with respect to the English higher classes. No ; if South American Ca'holics came to Yorkshire it would not be to exchange darkness for light. We may rationally conclude, on the contrary, that they would run a risk of falling into vices of which at home they had hardly even so much as heard.

A WITNESS IN SPITE OF HIMSELf,

The Melbourne Age has published a leader on the change of feeling in England towards Catholicism, which haß been a marked characteristic of recent years. Cardinal Vaughan's assurance to the Pope, says our contemporary, was not necessary to recal] this, Not only is there greater tolerfincc or an adoption of Catholic practices by Anglican clergy, but there has been a great and almoet , unquestioned growth in the activities of Boman Catholicism. Appointments have been made, too, which, a few years ago, would hare set tb« country in a ferment. There has been a Catholic Lord Mayor of London ; a Catholic has been appointed professor of history at Oxford ; and circumstances may be imagined under which a Catholic might have had the prohibition removed in his favour from the woolsack. " Under the guidance of Henry Edward Manning, the Church to which he became a convert in middle age, and of which be was during a long life so distinguished an orna. men', recommended itself to the common people as their true friend and wise adviser." The Church, too, has made converts in unlikely places — among the Anglican mioißtry, in Universities which seemed tending towards unbelief, and even from the small band of aggressive supporters of the Comtist philosophy. All th'P, says the Age, proves a change that is startling, " when we look back to the comparatively recent times in which to be a ' Papist ' was not only sufficient to insure social ostracism, but also to expose one to the action of savage penal laws." Our contemporary, nevertheless, would not have the ' Romanist" become too much elated. To check his pride be himself resorts to bathos. Protestantism, he tells us, can show much more than all this in the Salvation Army — " which, beginning as late as 1875 with Mr Booth and his wife, now carries on its campaigns in every civilised and Bv»age country in the world, and has 13,000,000 of soldiers as ready to obey the orders of their 'General' as the moat devoted levies of Pope Leo." For our own part, we do not grudge Protestantism this manifestation of its strength. Bnt had our contemporary never heard the old proverb : " Much cry and little wool ? " Oar contemporary goes on to account for the change of feeling with which he deals — but here he has not much that is new to tell us. It is the old story of one who looks at the Church from the outside and pretends to explain what takes place within. Here it is useless to argue and vain to protest. A wilful man will have his way, and no man is moro wilful than the non-Catholic who takes it upon him to treat of Catholic matters. We shall simply deny the gratuitous r< petition that an acceptance of truth involves the " deep slumber of a settled conviction." The writer claims that this has) bepn " happily " said. — Are falsehood, then, and happiness identical I— Nor can we admit that the attraction the Ct-urch ex< rcises over maay who do not accept her teaching is due, as this writer also claims, to the charm of her Btateliness and ritual. The Greek Church, for example, has a very imposing ritual and very much Btateliness ; yet we hear little of the

ODDS AND ENDS.

attraction she exercises. People, moreover, have betn attracted by the Catholic Church who had little taste for ritual and, by nature, little reverence for etateliness, Oor contemporary again, who alludes alfio to the progress of the Church in America, finds consolation in what ho beliPvcß to be her defining influence \n continental Europe among the Latin races. He quotes as a proof that in France ahe is no longer tha Church of tho people the fact that the Government of that country has enforced the conscription oa the Seminarists. But the political apathy of a Catholic people may be blamable, may pvfn ba oulpablp, and yet may not bpnpeak tbpir rej^criou of religion. Those politicians were better acquainted with the true feoiiDg of France who, the othor day, sought to damage the candidature of M. Faare for tha Presidency by spreading abroad the report tbat he waa £\ Protestant. Moat significant, too, are the vi&its that have lately be>:n paid to the Vatican by representative Frenchmen. The un. founded speculation of our coutemporary with regard to the state ot thir.gg in France may show the value of his conclusions as to Italy and Spain, The writer in the Age, in fact, has built up, bnt failed to pull down. Ha hss very ably set forth the change of feeling in England towards the Catholic Church and her great progress in America. He has brought forward in opposition nothing of adequate worth. His article remains, in fact, what, as he gives us to understand he did not intend it to be, and in Bpite of him, a testimony to tha vitality of the Catholic faith. The lecture delivered by the viticultnral expert Signor Bragato in Dunedin on Friday evening repeatad with emphasis all that had previously been reported respecting that gentleman's favourauie opinion ot New Zealand's capabilities to become a fruit-growing country. Both the North and South islands he said seemed especially fit for the nse in question. He pointed out the great advantage the colony would have in being able to supply the European markets at a time of the year when as things are at present fruit is scarce there, Of the capabilities in particular of Central Otago Signor Bragato spoke highly— plums and apricots, for which, in a dried state, there is a large demand he spoke of as easily to be grown. It was, however, on the growth of the grape-vine that the speaker dwelt at greatest length. Thin he described as very profitable and as needing at the beginning but a small outlay and afterwards an easy course of cultivation. The cost of planting an acre with vines he said would be £10, and alter four years, the wine produced by it would be worth £30. Tha work of scarifying, ploughing, and pruning would be done yearly at an outlay of £2 10s and there would be no need for anything more, or for heavy machinery of any kind. Some of the chief vignerons in Victoria, he added, had not been worth £5 when they entered upon the task of vine-planting. The lecturer recommended that our Government should follow the example set them by tbat of Victoria in giving a bonus for the planting of vineyards— and also that they should provide easy means of carriage. He eaid he had boen surprised to see the rubbish sold in Dunedin while in Central Otago he had seen excellent fruit lying on the ground because there was no way of sending it to maiket. The lecturer argued also that by means of producing wine tha necessity for temperance societies would be done away with. Wine producing countries, he said, were noted for tho sobriety and industry of their people, and wine-drink-ing must prove an effectual cuie for drunkenness. It may, meantime, be concluded that Signor Bragato haa pointed out & certain road by which I ard times may be finally brought to an end in New Zealand, and a prosperous population, of smaller proprietors, settled on the lands. It is to be hoped that a united and persevering effort will be maJe to carry out the undertaking he recommends. We must acknowledge that Mr A C. Begg who, as president o{ tba Chamber of Commerce, iook the chair at Signor Bragato's lecture, acquitted himseU consistently. It was a difficult position that he had to fill. Mr Begg our Tartar-in-chief of prohibition forced to preside at a lecture in advocacy of wise making and of the creation of a thirst for wine among the multitude 1 Ho was, nevertheless, consistently dry in his summing up :— " The Chairman said he was Bure they were all obliged to Mr Bragato for the information ho had given. He was sure they were all agreed that it would be a good thing for New Zealand if it became a very sober country (laughter). They might not all agree witb Mr Bragato as to the means for making it sober, but they could agree it would be a gocd thing if the population of New Zealand waa made a good deal more sober than at present." Wine drinking forsooth. Let them draw their drink from the washpool—flavoured if pofsible with a wholesome touch of worm- wood. Hard, indeed, ia it to demand of Mr Begg that there should be a surrender of his ancient solitary reign by the deserving squatter — but that he should make room for a multitude cultivating tho vine and habitually looking upon the wine cup when it is red — why, it's little Bhort of robbery and murder. Onr " Civis '' has been posed by a corrcspon lent, or, any rate, he says co, Our " Civis " haa been asfced to give his opinion, as a Protestant, onHho proposal, as his correspondent puts it, •' to amalgamate the Church of England wi'h the Church of Rome." His cor-

respondent takes our " Civis " for a Proteatant because of his rows with the Tablet. But, says oar " Givie," that proves nothing. " A man doesn't need to be a Protestant to qualify for a row with tbe Tablet." Onr " Oivis " adds, in effect, that it does not suit his purpose to reveal cf what religion he is, at Ipnst in his character as a writer of notes. And, in fact, we may admit the matter to be doubtful. The question is one that we, for our part, should be sorry to be called upon to decide. Neverthele s, we have no hesitation in Baying that the Protestantism — not necessarily the religious Protestantism — of onr "Civis" is v«ry pronounced. The " ugly Puritan element " is one not easily to be got rid of, and it has its secular as well as its religious aspect. We hate never had the least difficulty about perceiving it in our " Oivis," and, in fact, it is very apparent in the note to which we now refer. It is not, therefore, frcm his personal experience that oar "Civis" derives his conclusion that it "doesn't need to be a Protestant to have a row with the Tablet." Whether in cases in which oar " Oivis " may have had a row, which might be taken as a meeting of Qreek with Grtek — as, for example, with Ritualist, Non-coo fc rmist, or Rationalist, his Protestantism was equally clear, it is not for us to say. We never go out of our way to interfere in matters that do not concern us. Tbe busybody and misobitf-maker, indeed, we look upon at rather a contemptible sort of person. That is not at all an agreeable rerun k to be suspected of a friendly young Czar who has just married a granddaughter of her Most Gracious Majesty, the Queen. He has, it is hinted, declared V. at if England does not accommodate herself to inch Chi no-Japa-nese arrangements as Russia finds suitable, she shall suffer for it in India. If these are the words of the bridegroom jast emerging from his honeymoon, what may we not expect by-and-by ? A worse sentiment could hardly be expressed after a year's experience of a mother-in-law. But the Ohino-Japaneae situation is of much interest — although as yet nothing can be very certainly foreseen as to how it may be determined. England should be interested in preventing the Japanese from obtaining an srdoe preponderance. But bow she can

may judge by the cab'p.grams very necessary to contradict fnlae notions respecting the financial position of the colony. The Financia I Timet reports of it as having made a good impression in England. Here, however, tbe impression made, that is on a certain party, is the worst imaginable. la Welling 'on, w« learn from the correspondent of the Daily Times, they are stamping mad, and denounce the Treasurer as one who bas very little regard for the troth. Meantime we ste tbe practical answer given to the stricturfs passed the other night bo humorously by Captain Russell on Mr Ward's absence. We thought so and moreover we said so. The Hon John McKenzie, speaking the o'her night at Hastings, went through »lmost all the figures gons through in Dunedin by Captain Ruppell with totally different, but quite as reliable reßults. Tbe Dunedin Star % nevertheless, points out that the Hon John left untouched Captain Russell's statement that each settler on Cheviot bad cost the G jvernment £1000 — that is, we suppose, £218,000 for there are 218 settlers There is no rule, however, without its exception, real or imaginary. An interesting calculation for tbe Star, meantime, and one that might very brilliantly display our contemporary's talents would be — that of tbe cost to the country, negatively of coarse, bat none the less tellingly, of every settler that Captain Russell and his party have generally managed to keep from settlement. A heavier cost than that of Cheviot ten times over bas been the cost to the country of their desert tracts. But there is the eagle ruffling up his feathers in a northern direction. " New York. April 25.— the Lower Honse of the Legislature of tbe State of New York has passed a resolution inviting Canada to agree to annexation by the Uni'ed States." The Lower House, we fancy, has had an idle hour. Lions and eagles of an tqual calibre know how to respect one another.

do so without furthering the Eistern advance of V ance or Kussia remains to be Been. On the authority of Mra Crawford, who is the Paris correspondent of Truth, the Queen is Baid to be in a dangerous state of health. Her Majesty, she saya, is Buffering from a rheumatic affection which at any moment may be fatal. She is, nevertheless, reported officially to be in excellent health. Bat the probabilities seem in favour of tba correspondent of Truth. A boßh- paragraph is going the rounds of the papers respecting something that took place in Hungary, and a mandate issued by a Cardinal named " Isidorius " — apparently a special elevation to the puiple made for the occasion by our good contemporary the Dunedin Star— forbidding the Catholic clergy in America to ride bicycles. Tbe fact is, nevertheless, that it was publishee at Borne some months ago that the Catholic clergy might make ess of bicycles if it Baited them — and at the same time it was stated that ths idea of the machine in question bad originated with a Catholic priest. Hunting wheels in Hungary, and creating cardinals at Rome is quite in keeping, meantime, with the idiosyncrasies of the Star and his likeminded bretbrca. Such wild-goose chases are altogether in their line. The British lion and the American eagle s:em pretty well matched. The scream of the bird does not mean much more than the roar of tbe beast. A British expedition has proceeded to Nicaragua to rtcover from that Republic a sum of £15,000 demanded as a penalty for the expulsion and arrest of certain British officials and subjects. President Cleveland, meantime, declares that no one most interfere with the Southern Republics, and no one muat dare to infringe tbe Monroe doctrine without incurring the vengeance of Uncle; Sam. The present case, howaver, he explains, does not call for interference, and the Britisher may walk off with his booty. Now-a-days eagle and lion are a little remarkable for caution— and no doubt they are right. If they would be as mild at ordinary times M in boars of danger, however, they might seem more respectable. Mr Ward appears to be doing good work in London. An address delivered there by him to the Chamber of Commerce, seemed, if we