Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 1, January 1886

He took possession of his diocese early in the summer, making St. Mary's his pro-cathedral, till the erection of his cathedral, of which he laid the corner-stone soon after his arrival. A visitation of his diocese followed, and then began the work of developing the Catholic interests in the portion of the State. His diocese contained forty-four churches, and about as many clergymen, with but few institutions of education or charity. Its progress was steady, solid and effectual. He added new priests, well chosen and trained, introduced the Fathers of the Society of Jesus, the Oblates of Mary Immaculate, the Christian Brothers, the Ladies of the Sacred Heart. His Cathedral was completed and was recognized as one of the greatest ornaments of the city; but all extravagance was avoided and discouraged. Churches were reared suited to the means of the flock, and the tepid, careless and indifferent were recalled to their Christian duties, till the diocese assumed a new spirit. None but those who lived there, and witnessed the progress, can form a conception of what Bishop McCloskey accomplished while he gave the best period of his life to the diocese of Albany.

More than a hundred churches, and nearly a hundred priests, with schools, academies, hospitals, asylums, were the fruits of the Catholic life aroused by his zeal.

As Bishop of Albany he took part in the Seventh Provincial Council of Baltimore in 1849; the first Plenary Council, in 1852; and the first of New York, 1854. In all these his prudence and wisdom deeply impressed his associates, as many of them have testified. In his diocese his relations to his clergy in his Synod, and in occasional directions, showed a gentle consideration for others, which overcame all obstacles.

On the death of Archbishop Hughes, to whom he had long since been named successor, the voice of the bishops of the Province, as well as the desire of the clergy and people of the diocese, solicited from the Holy See the promotion of Bishop McCloskey, and the successor of St. Peter soon pronounced the definitive word. He returned to New York just as the terrible civil war came to a close; and the paralyzed country could look to its future. Under his impulse the new Cathedral was completed and dedicated with a pomp never yet witnessed in the Western World. The State of New York for some years had suffered from a want of churches; but amid a war draining the wealth and blood of the country, it would have been rash to attempt to erect them when all value were fictitious. Now, under the impulse of the quiet and retiring Archbishop, old churches were enlarged; new parishes were formed and endowed with churches; schools increased in number and efficacy. While increasing the number of his parochial clergy both in numbers and in the thorough education he so highly esteemed, Archbishop McCloskey gave the religious orders every encouragement, and introduced others. Communities of religious women, for various forms of charity, also found a hearty support from him. In the administration of the diocese, and the direction of these communities, he displayed his wonted wisdom in selecting as his Vicar General, the Rev. William Quinn, whose ability of a remarkable order had already been tested.

Archbishop McCloskey took part in the Second Plenary Council of Baltimore, in 1866, whose acts are such a code of doctrine and discipline. "Of it he was a burning and a shining light," said Archbishop Gibbons. "He was conspicuous alike for his eloquence in the pulpit, and for his wisdom in the council chamber. I well remember the discourse he delivered at the opening session. The clear, silvery tones of his voice, the grace of his gestures and manner, the persuasive eloquence and charm of his words are indelibly imprinted on my memory and imagination. Just before ascending the pulpit, a telegram was handed to him, announcing the destruction by fire of his Cathedral. He did not betray the slightest emotion, notwithstanding the sudden and calamitous news. Next morning I expressed to him my surprise at his imperturbable manner. "The damage," he replied, "is done, and I cannot undo it. We must calmly submit to the will of Providence.""

The decrees of the Plenary Council, with those of the Council of New York, were promulgated by him in a Synod held by him at New York, in September, 1868.

The next year he was summoned to attend a General Council at Rome, the first held in the church since the Synod of Trent. The Council of the Vatican had been equalled by but few in the number of bishops, by none in the universality of the representation. Before modern science had facilitated modes of travel and communication, the area including those who attended was comparatively limited. To the Vatican Council, however, they came not from all parts of Europe only, but from Palestine, India and China; from the Moslem States of Africa; the European colonies; the negro kingdoms of the interior; America sent her bishops from Canada and the United States; the Spanish republics, Australia and the islands of the Pacific even had their bishops seated beside those of the most ancient Sees. Here Archbishop McCloskey was a conspicuous figure, respected for learning, experience, the firmness with which he held the opinion he mildly but conclusively advanced. In the committee on discipline his wisdom excited the highest admiration of the presiding cardinal.

When the impious seizure of Rome made the sovereign Pontiff a prisoner in the Vatican, the proceedings of the council were deferred to better days, which the Church still prayfully awaits. Archbishop McCloskey returned to his diocese; but the malaria of the Campagna had affected his health, never rugged, and shattered some years previously by a railroad accident, on a journey required by his high office. But he resumed his accustomed duties, inspiring good works, or guiding and supporting them like the Catholic Protectory, the Catholic Union of New York, and its branch since developed to such wide-reaching influence, the Xavier Union.

The impression which he had produced at Rome, from his early visit as a young priest to his dignified course in age as a Father of the Council of the Vatican, led to a new and singular honor, in which the whole country shared his honor. In the consistory held March 15, 1875, Pope Pius IX. created Archbishop McCloskey a Cardinal Priest of the Holy Roman Church, his title being that of Sancta Maria supra Minervam, the very church from which Rt. Rev. Dr. Concanen was taken to preside over the diocese of New York as its first bishop. The insignia of the high dignity soon reached the city borne by a member of the Pope's noble guard and a Papal Ablegate. The berretta was formerly presented to him in St. Patrick's Cathedral, April 22, 1875. According to usage he soon after visited Rome and took possession of the church from which he derived his title. He was summoned to the conclave held on the death of Pope Pius IX., but arrived only after the election of Pope Leo XIII., to whom he paid homage, receiving from his hands the Cardinal's hat, the last ceremonial connected with his appointment.

After his return he resumed his usual duties, but they soon required the aid of a younger prelate, though all his suffragans were ever ready to relieve their venerated Metropolitan by officiating for him. He finally solicited the appointment of the young but tried Bishop of Newark as his coadjutor, and Bishop Michael Augustine Corrigan was promoted to the titular See of Petra, October 1, 1880. Gradually his health declined and for a time he was dangerously ill; but retirement to Mount St. Vincent's, where in the castellated mansion erected by Forrest, he had the devoted care of the Sisters of Charity, and visits to Newport seemed to revive for a time his waning strength. His mind remained clear, and he continued to direct the affairs of his diocese, convening a Provincial Council, the acts of which were transmitted to Rome. "The Cardinal's fidelity to duty clung to him to the end. He continued to plead for his flock at God's altar, as long as he had power to stand. Even when the effort to say Mass would so fatigue him that he could do nothing else that morning, he continued, at least, on feast days, to offer the Holy Sacrifice. He said his last Mass on the Feast of the Ascension, 1884." At the Plenary Council in Baltimore, at the close of that year, the diocese was represented by his coadjutor.

From the time of his last Mass he was unable to read or write; unable to move a single step without assistance. In this condition he lingered, sinking by a slow and gradual decline, but preserving his serenity and the full possession of his mental faculties. "None of those around him," says Archbishop Corrigan, "ever heard the first syllable of complaint. It was again his service of the Lord, such as our Lord ordained it. To those who sympathized with him in his helplessness, the sweet answer would be made: 'It is God's will. Thy will, O Lord, be done on earth as it is in heaven.' Fulfilling God's will, he passed away, calmly and in peace, as the whole course of his life had been, and without a struggle; 'the last words he was able to utter, being the Hail Mary.'"

The death of our first American Cardinal, October 10th, 1885, called forth from the press, and from the clergy of other denominations, a uniform expression of deep and touching respect. He had won many moral victories without fighting battles; his victories left no rancor. Everywhere at Catholic altars Masses were offered for the repose of his soul, and when the tidings crossed the Atlantic, the solemn services at Paris and Rome attested the sense of his merit, and of the Church's loss.

His funeral in New York was most imposing. Around the grand Cathedral, as around a fretted rock of marble, surged the waves of people, like a sea. The vast interior was filled, and beneath the groined roof he had reared, lay, in his pontifical vestments,—the hat, insignia of his highest dignity, at his feet,—the mild and gentle and patient Cardinal McCloskey, his life's work well and nobly ended.

The solemn Mass, the deep tones of the organ, the Gregorian notes of the choirs moved all to pray for the soul of one whose life had been given to the service of God. The Archbishop of Baltimore, the Most Rev. James Gibbons, pronounced the funeral discourse, and then the body was laid beside those of his predecessors in the crypt beneath.

A month later, and again the Dies Iræ resounded through that noble monument of his love for religion. The Month's Mind, that touching tribute which our Church pays her departed, called forth from the Most Rev. Michael A. Corrigan, who knew him so well and so intimately, words full of touching reminiscences.

Bishop Lynch, of Charleston, S. C., who knew him so intimately, thus described him a few years ago before the hand of disease had changed him. "In personal appearance the Cardinal is about five feet ten inches in height, straight, and thin in person and apparently frail, though his chest is full, and the tones of his voice when preaching are clear and far reaching. His features are regular and finely chiselled. The brow is lofty, the nose thin and straight, the eyes keen, quick and penetrating; the thin lips, even in repose, seeming to preserve the memory of a smile; the whole expression of the countenance, one of serious thought and placid repose. Yet you feel or see indications of activity ready to manifest itself through the brows, the eyes or the lips. In fact his temperament is decidedly nervous; and if you observe the natural promptness and decision of his movements, you might almost think him quick and naturally impetuous. There could be no greater mistake; or, if he is such by natural disposition, this is one of the points where his seminary training has taught him to control and master himself. The forte of his character is his unchanging equanimity. And yet there must have been in him a wondrous amount of nervous energy to enable him to survive very serious injuries to his frame in early life, and to endure the severe physical labors of an American bishop for thirty years.... Piety, learning, experience, zeal—every bishop should have these as a matter of course. He has more. In address, gentle, frank and winning, he at once puts you at ease, and makes you feel you are speaking to a father or a friend in whom you may unreservedly confide. Soft and delicate in manners as a lady, none could ever presume in his presence to say a word or do an act tinged with rudeness, still less indelicacy. Kind and patient with all who come to him, he is especially considerate with his clergy. To them he is just in his decisions, wise in his counsels and exhortations, ever anxious to aid them in their difficulties. Tender and lenient as a mother to those who wish to do right, and to correct evil, he is inflexible when a principle is at stake, and can be stern when the offender is obdurate. Notoriety and display are supremely distasteful to him. He would have his work done, and thoroughly done, and his own name or his part in it never mentioned. He studiously avoids coming before the public, save in his ecclesiastical functions, or where a sense of duty drives him to it. He prefers to work quietly and industriously in the sphere of his duties. Here, he is unflagging, so ordering matters that work never accumulates on his hands through his own neglect."

The Pope and the Mikado

The following is the text of the letter addressed by His Holiness to the Mikado of Japan:—

To the Illustrious and Most Mighty Emperor of All Japan, LEO PP. XIII., greeting.

August Emperor:

Though separated from each other by a vast intervening expanse of space, we are none the less fully aware here of your pre-eminent, anxious care in promoting all that is for the good of Japan. In truth, the measures Your Imperial Majesty has taken for the increase of civilization, and especially for the moral culture of your people, call for the praise and approval of all who desire the welfare of nations and that interchange of benefits which are the natural fruit of a more refined culture,—the more so that, with greater moral polish, the minds of men are more fitted to imbibe wisdom and to embrace the light of truth. For these reasons we beg of you that you will graciously be pleased to accept this visible expression of our good-will with the same sincerity with which it is tendered.

The very reason, indeed, which has moved us to despatch this letter to Your Majesty, has been our wish of publicly expressing the pleasure of our heart. For the favors which have been vouchsafed to every missionary and Christian, we are truly beholden to you. By their own testimony we have been made acquainted with your grace and goodness to both priests and laymen. Nothing truly, in your power, could be more praiseworthy as a matter of justice or more beneficent to the common weal, inasmuch as you will find the Catholic religion a powerful auxiliary in maintaining the stability of your Empire.

For all dominion is founded on justice, and of justice there is not a principle which is not laid down in the precepts of Christianity. And thus, all they who bear the name of Christian, are above all enjoined,—not through fear of punishments, but by the voice of religion,—to reverence the kingly sway, to obey the laws, and not to seek for ought in public affairs save that which is peaceful and upright. We most earnestly beseech you, therefore, to grant the utmost freedom in your power to all Christians, and to deign, as heretofore, to protect their institutions with your patronage and favor. We, on our part, shall suppliantly beseech God, the author of all good, that he may grant your beneficial undertakings their wished-for outcome, and may bestow upon Your Majesty, and the whole realm of Japan, blessings and favors increasing day by day.

Given in Rome, at St. Peter's, on the twelfth day of May, 1885, in the eighth year of Our Pontificate.

Order of the Buried Alive

The order of the Buried Alive in Rome, the Convent of the Sepolte Vivo, is a remnant of the Middle Ages in the life of to-day. The London Queen's correspondent had the privilege of an entrance within, one after another, of the five iron doors, and talking with the Mother Superior through the thick swathing of a woollen veil, but ordinary communication with the convent is carried on through the "barrel," which fills an opening in the wall. Over the barrel is written: "Who will live contented within these walls, let her leave at the gate every earthly care." You knock at the barrel, which turns slowly around till it shows a section like that of an orange from which one of the quarters has been cut.

You speak to the invisible sister, who asks your will; and she answers you in good Italian and cultivated intonation. You hear the voice quite distinctly, but as if it was far, far away. She is really separated from you by a slender slice of wood, but she is absolutely invisible. Not the smallest ray of light, nor the smallest chink is visible between you and her. Sound travels through the barrel, but sight is absolutely excluded. These nuns live on charity, keeping two Lents in the year—one from November to Christmas, the other the ordinary Lent of Catholic Christendom. Living, therefore, on charity, they may eat whatever is given to them, saving always "flesh meat" during the fasting time.

If you take them a cake or a loaf of bread, a roll of chocolate bonbons, a basket of eggs, it is all good for them. They must be absolutely without food for twenty-four hours before they may ask help from the outside world; and when they have looked starvation in the face, then they may ring a bell, which means: "Help us! we are famishing!" Perhaps you take them nothing eatable, but you place on the edge of the cut orange, by which you sit, some money, demanding in return their "cartolini," or little papers.

The barrel turns slowly round, then back again, and you find on the ledge, where you had laid your lire, a paper of "cartolini." These are very small, thin, light-printed slips, neatly folded in tiny packets, three to each packet, which, if you swallow in faith, will cure you of all disease. After your talk is ended, the barrel turns around once more and presents its face as of an immovable and impenetrable-looking barrier. One of the pretty traditions of Rome is, that each sister has her day, when she throws a flower over the convent wall as a sign to her watching friends that she is still alive. When she has been gathered to the majority, the flower is not thrown, and the veil has fallen forever.

Harvard College and the Catholic Theory of Education

Slowly, but with unmistakable certainty, the logic of the Catholic teaching regarding true education is forcing itself upon non-Catholic minds. Day by day some prominent Protestant comes boldly to the front and declares his belief that education must be based upon religion. One of the latest accessions to this correct theory is President Eliot, of Harvard College, who declared at a recent meeting of Boston schoolteachers that,—

"The great problem is that of combining religions with secular education. This was no problem sixty or seventy years ago, for then our people were homogeneous. Now, the population is heterogeneous. Religious teaching can best be combined with secular teaching and followed in countries of heterogeneous population, like Germany, Austria, France and Belgium, where the government pays for the instruction, and the religious teachers belonging to different denominations are admitted to the public schools at fixed times. That is the only way out of the difficulty.... I see, growing up on every side, parochial schools—that is, Catholic schools—which take large numbers of children out of the public schools of the city. That is a great misfortune, and the remedy is to admit religious instructors to teach these children in the public schools. This is what is done in Europe. And all those who are strongly interested in the successful maintenance of our public school system will urge the adoption of the method I have described for religious education."

These are strong words, and coming from such a source cannot fail to have their legitimate result. The fearlessness and sincerity of President Eliot in thus stating his position on this most important subject merits the appreciation of every American, Catholic or Protestant.

We add in connection with the above, the remarks of the Christian Advocate, a Protestant paper published at San Francisco, Cal.:—

"The course which the Roman Catholic Hierarchy, in this country, are taking in regard to the education of children is, from their standpoint, worthy of praise. They see that in order to keep their children under the rule of the Church, they must keep them from the public schools, where they think Protestant influence predominates. Therefore they are providing for them in their parochial schools and academies at an extra expense that does credit to their zeal and devotion. Their plans are broad, deep and far-reaching, and they are a unit in the prosecution of them. They are loyal to their convictions, making everything subservient to the interests of their religion. Understanding, as they do, the importance of moulding character in the formative period, they look diligently after the religious culture of their children. In all this they are deserving of commendation, and Protestants may receive valuable hints from them of tenacity of grip and self-denying devotion to their faith."

An Affecting Incident at Sea

Seldom have passengers by our great Atlantic steamers witnessed so solemn and impressive a scene as that at which it fell to the lot of the passengers in the outward voyage of the Inman liner, "City of Chester," to assist. It appears that one of the passengers was a Mr. John Enright, a native of Kerry, who, having amassed a fortune in America, had gone to Ireland to take out with him to his home in St. Louis three young nieces who had recently become orphans. During the passage Mr. Enright died from an affection of the heart; and the three little orphans were left once more without a protector. Fortunately there were amongst the passengers the Rev. Father Tobin, of the Cathedral, St. Louis; the Rev. Father Henry, of the Church of St. Laurence O'Toole, St. Louis; and the Rev. Father Clarkson, of New York. Father Henry was the Celebrant of the Mass of Requiem; and Colonel Mapleson and his London Opera Company, who were also on board, volunteered their services for the choir. They chanted, with devotional effect, the De Profundis and the Miserere; and Madame Marie Roze sang, "Oh, rest in the Lord," from "Elijah." The bell of the ship was then tolled; and a procession was formed, headed by Captain Condron, of the "City of Chester." The coffin, which was enveloped in the American flag, was borne to the side of the ship, from which it was gently lowered into the sea. The passengers paid every attention to the orphans during the remainder of the voyage, at the termination of which they were forwarded to the residence of their late uncle in St. Louis.

Sing, Sing for Christmas

Sing, sing for Christmas! Welcome happy day!For Christ is born our Saviour, to take our sins away;Sing, sing a joyful song, loud and clear to-day,To praise our Lord and Saviour, who in the manger lay.Sing, sing for Christmas! Echo, earth! and cryOf worship, honor, glory, and praise to God on high;Sing, sing the joyful song; let it never cease;Of glory in the highest, on earth good-will to man.

Dead Man's Island

THE STORY OF AN IRISH COUNTRY TOWNT. P. O'Connor, M. P

CHAPTER XVII.

THE DOOMED NATION

A passion of anger and despair swept over Ireland when it was at last announced that Crowe had sold the pass. For some days the people were in the same dazed and helpless condition of mind that followed the potato blight of '46. In that terrible year one of the strange and most universally observed phenomena was that the people looked, for days after the advent of the blight that brought the certainty of hunger and death, silent and motionless and apathetic. And so it was now, when there came a blight, less quickly, but as surely, destructive of national life and hope. There was a dread presentiment that this was a blow from which the nation was not destined to recover for many a long day, and though they could not reason about it, the people had the instinctive feeling that the rule of the landlord was now fixed more tightly than ever, and that emancipation was postponed to a day beyond that of the present generation.