WITH ME, OR AGAINST ME.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXV, Issue 12, 23 July 1897, Page 25

WITH ME, OR AGAINST ME.

(.From the Australian Messenger.)

The Press is a Catholic institution. A Catholic invented it. Catholics printed the first daily paper. A Catholic city was the birthplace of the art. The Catholic Church fostered its infancy Pone Nicholas letter, dated 1455, is the first publication having a date Seventeen years before Luther's rebellion over 200 cities in Eurorje had printing presses. At the Council of Lateran, Pope Leo X declared that printing was invented for the glory of God, for' the propagation of our holy faith, and for the advancement of knowledge. Ihe light and truth which comes from good reading are so great that we ordinarily see most people change their lives only by this way ; and if many sinners should be asked what was the occasion of their conversion they would almost invariably answer that it must be attributed to the reading of some books of devotion which moved them to take that resolution. Do we not know how that officer of the Queen of Ethiopia was reading, in his chariot the prophet Isaias, when God converted him by means of St Philip who took occasion from that reading to instruct him in the faith. All the guilt which we see around us, and which we cannot too earnestly deplore— crimes unprecedented and enormous becoming ordinary events which no longer occasion surprise— the eternal foundations of social order overturned— injustice converted into right, and licentiousness styled law— all that generations have revered as sacred for the last six thousand years oonsigned to ridicule and contempt— the most; monstrous paradoxes of libertinism and infidelity converted into maxims and doctrines — morality abandoned, faith largely extinguished, and the ties of humanity itself forgotten— these are the fruits of bad books the new poisoned branch which has sprung from the tree of knowledge, and which having, as it were, produced the fruit of a second original sin has once more pervert, d and degraded the human race The writer of a book called - The Power of the Press," informs us that 1 1.000, , 02 copies of absolutely vicious and Sabbath-breaking newspapers are circulated every year in Great Britain. There are about sixty cheap periodicals issued every week of a positively pernicious tendency. Some of them issue 100,000 copies a week, some 80 000 some 20,000, having amongbt the whole a yearly sale of 6,240 000 lhere are besides these, infidel and polluting publications which nevertheless have a yearly circulation of 10,400,000. And there are yet others so intensely wicked that the rest denounce them as wicked, and which can only be sold by stealth, whose issues this writer specifies as .520,000 annually. There are annually issued of infidel publications 12,200,200, and of atheistic works 624 000 All have their active distributors. They are met with in the railway carriage and on the steam-boat, scattering industriously and often gratuitously those seeds of evil with confident expectation Is there no remedy for all this ? We know of one only, but that can be made successful. It is contained in the advice of the late Pope i lus IX. to the people of the United States, when he said to them • Inundate the country with Catholic literature." Then he added that he blessed with very great heartiness all who aided in diffusing works in which the people will find an antidote to preserve them against the impiety of the perverse and filthy Press. Those who purchase and circulate Catholic periodicals papers and books do a truly apostolic work. They give to human souls the divine truth of God. The Catholic Press is the needle-gun of ?uth In God s name let us use it to the full. Every good book is a missionary, and a Catholic paper is a perpetual mission in the house that receives it. Our Catholic newspapers set before their readers the record of the progress of the Catholic Church throughout the world, but more especially in Australia, Europe, America and those British colonies whither the Celtic race has borne the true Faith A* mediums of thought they record the opinions, explain the views and defend the position of Catholics in Australia and elsewhere lhey bring the influence of well-conducted weekly journals to enlighten all their readers as to the true character of Catholicism its object and its worth, and thereby aid the cause which all Catholics have at heart, namely, the recovery of non-Catholics to the Latholio Faith. They chronicle, without offending Catholic taste the progress of the Church in her mission throughout the world noticing in the proper spirit the great work that Bhe performs and her mighty labours in the present no less than in the past, tor the elevation and conservation of the human race. £ ey r.v. t6ll the Btory and reverently maintain the opinions of a Church which converts the heathen and confounds the '• wise •" which restrains the luxuries of civilisation and teaches the barbarian the dignity of man ; which founds universities and provides schools for the poor ; which sanctifies Christian marriage forbids divorce, elevates woman to her true sphere, strengthens constitutional government, defends the weak and oppressed protects the orphan and gives aid to the needy ; which teaches the duty of the employed, but does not forget that masters should be ]U9t and considerate ; a Church which has never feared a tyrant Of

quailed before persecution ; a Church which is adapted to all ages to all ranks, to all conditions and to all times. Wicked men and sectaries spread everywhere countless publications against God, His Church and sound morality. We are not deserving of high praise if, for the best of causes, we do only that which the impious do for a wioked cause and take for the salvation of souls only the same pains which they take for their damnation ; but not in any w.iy to oppose them were disgraceful sloth. In this conflict of good and evil we cannot remain neutral ; we must take sides. "He that is not with Me is against Me," says Christ. In the face of such excessive danger to morality and to faith, not to struggle against the mischief is to become an accomplice in it ; not to banish its contagion far away is to be iufi cted with th.it contagion ; not to forbid the admission of tho-m writings which are filled with the impure filth of the most di.-gr.wjeful passions into our homes is to defile ourselves with their corruptions and to disseminate that corruption amongst others. In <t word, in this deadly war which every vice sustained by every error is at present waging against virtue, not to take an open Btmd on the side of virtue is to embrace the cause of vice.