THE LATE FATHER BRIDGETT.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXVII, Issue 23, 8 June 1899, Page 10

THE LATE FATHER BRIDGETT.

In the April issue of the JnJ, Month! i/ Rev. Father Russell, S J., gives some reminibecnc s ot his triend, the late Kather Bridgett. C.S.>.R. After stating that Father Bndgett's work as a priest was, besides h ome eighty missions cruelly as a preacher and confessor at*i Limenck. Liverpool, and London besides discharging- the onerous^ duties of Hector tor moreihan thirty years, and that his sermons, all ot which he made it an invariable custom to write, filled some twenty-seven volumes at his death. Father Russell says : I think I can claim the merit of being the nrst to induce Father Bridgett to punt some ot his writings, about the year LS7O, when we lived near each other in Limerick. Father William Maher, S.J., of Farm street. London, was then editing the English Mi.\ien//cr of the Samil Hi-art, which at Ihat time was a sixpenny' magazine. Fattier Maher was one ot tho-e editors, generally the most efficient, who never write a line themselves ; and he allowed an Irish con tit, i to fill a good oeal ot his space each month, with his own prose and verse, or with tiie prose and verse that he induced iriends to piace at his disposal. The many contributions which in the first eh \en half-yearly vo ume.s bore the signatures W.L., MM., T A F., 1.F., KM., A.D., J..M..M., and WML, came from and through thu Crescent. Limerick ; and to these were added through the same medium T.E.8., F.H., and E.V., for Father Bridgett, be- ides his own, communicated some very devotional pieces by his con/ row Father Hall and Father Vaughan. C.SS.R. His first contribution to the M,^0,,/cr seems to be 'Brother Gile3 and the Theologian,' which, under the title 'Daily Grace,' is the second last in his volume, titmnif* and Up, y ram* on Sacred Subjects, published in the last 3 oar of his hie. But he has left many beautiful poems of this series uncolleeted. He seems to have gathered by preference his shorter pieces, as if to justify a remark he makes in one of his letters to me • Like the tat little robin, my muse has a very short song and \ery short flight, but not so pretty a note.' Some of his prose contributions before 1573 were ' The Two Mothers,' ' Protestant Testimony in Favour of Prayers to tbe Saints,' and 'Good Friday in England.' Father Bndgett's contributions to the Metxeni/o <>t tin .sacral 11, art ceased in 1573, for the summer of that year saw the birth ot the Inxh Monthly, on which he was so good as to bestow his shorter pieces Irom time to time ever after. At this time he had been remo\ed from Limerick to London. Father Bridgett's last appeal ance in our pages was so late as last September, but thea only m a letter giving a most interesting account of some of Cardinal Newman's motives for writing Lox* and Gain.

A MAN Of VAsT AXD VAKIKI) ERUDITION.

Preaching on Ea«ter Sunday at Kirkham, England, Father McLaughhn paid a well-deserved tribute to the memory of the late Liridgett. He said that Father Bridgett was a man of truly giant mum. ot \ast and varitd erudition. ' Like Mr. Gladstone, he was an indefatigable— l might say an insatiable— reader. He grasped a subject witn marvellous quickness and accuracy. He acquired knuv\ ledge easily, and could iue it with singular promptness and apptuiuMtuhc"-, Ihs knowledge of the Scripture was something qum> e\(.tp'io:i.il, and he .seemed to know its meaning with an iuiuiUuii that looked almost like inspiration. Few of those who htard him liarmom-e — it i may u-e that word — passages of the \\ntings whatever leligiutis si.bjcot ho was handling, could lail to be struck by iae nle'» that he had the Old lesiameni as well as the .New, both ;is to woids m,d sense, at bus command. His power ut applying it in s U moils, logUhv-- and conferences always si\mul to me unique. He was, 01." ot the lew whom people of all clasps pour .ii. d neb the t< s- ultu ;iu d as well as the most highly ulucuUd. could hsu n to wiin delight to over an hour, and would be su:ry trial, he .'nn'-hdl s, M j ;n. ile wrote a number ot books, which aboil-id w uli i are niteusUMg. and most useful information — and mtwiniaLiuii v. huh em be conliehntly and saiely relied upon. Tv.o ot tfiem Wii,- Our Lmhjx Don nj, which giws the history ot Lmrhind's pre- Reformation " devotion to iiiu rde-ul \ngin. and Ihi Jln^ul L'mhuint, which covers the -vino iinunil m lehienee to tlie Real Presence. These two of thimsuws. not io sp ta k ot the others, which are equally able, on h. t'i be suiluunt to kei p mm ircsh m the memory of the I.e. pi'- ot th-^e countries lor gciiei.uious. Few men ot the time n..>< done nioie, whe'hu by \oiee or pen. to dissipate anti-Catholic 1 1\ ju u.e ,iv! ! unite 1 the interests ot the or.c true Chuich than the mm w nose' great mits and i\ui«uk.ibie w oiks of zeal I am now r. calling. But, abo\e and beyond all. he was an eminently holy man. hi d one to whom w.is particularly dear our Lord's favourite pne\pt oi ir lv rnal ch.u ny, • This is Aly commandment, that you i lose one another as 1 h.ue lomil you." For these reasons, as well as tor many otlu is winch it would be dillicult to enumerate, he has a cl .mi to the gratitude not only ot the Catholics of these parts, bat oi ;.ll Lnglish->peaking Catholics throughout the world. And the debt of gratitude which is due to him cannot be better paid than b} oiieniig pmyers tor his repose. 1