"There was and they retired in triumph. only one doubt among the audience," says Lacordaire, in a letter which he soon afterward addressed to the pope on the subject of the "Avenir;""is it really true, they asked each other, that such is the Catholic religion?" A most natural doubt-we shall soon see how it was resolved. This first success emboldened the party. They determined on a new trial of strength with their opponents. Lacordaire, who had already been advocate, priest, and journalist, was to figure in the new character of schoolmaster. Liberty of instruction had been inscribed in the charter of 1830, but no law to regulate and define its exercise had yet been promulgated; to open a school without the authorization of the government, was therefore at the time illegal. Nevertheless, in the spring of 1831, De Coux, Montalembert, and Lacordaire opened one without such authorization, after having boldly and publicly announced their intention of doing so. A few days after, when Lacordaire was in the midst of his instructions to the some twenty children who had been recruited among the poorer class, a commissary of police made his appearance, summoned the unlawful educationist to retire, and on his refusal to obey, turned him and his pupils out of door, with the aid of some sergens de ville. This, of course, led to another prosecution; but Montalembert being called to the peerage by the death of his father, the case, this time, was brought before the Chambre des Paris. There, in the highest court of the realm, Lacordaire, as well as De Coux, and the young count, had the satisfaction of delivering fine speeches on their favorite topics; but the noble assembly, less intelligent, or more so than the jury, pronounced their condemnation, and imposed a fine upon them. This was a trifle; the "Avenir" would have survived all similar prosecutions, and doubtless some new move in advance would have been made, when dangers of a different kind assailed the intrepid journal. It had raised a division among the clergy in France, and had made no small commotion among the people at large. The episcopate and the older members of the priesthood were furious at seeing a pretended Catholic publication attack their reverend Gallican Church, and those institutions which she had declared "were to remain for ever unshaken;" many of the younger clergy, on the other hand, admirers of the masterly works of La 66 beside being novel, seemed based on a phi losophical system; the adherents of th Orleans dynasty, and the partisans of Le gitimacy equally regarded the democrati Avenir" as dangerous, the one because i attacked monarchy in the abstract, the othe because it assailed their visionary "best of re publics;" while the mass of the people were mute with astonishment, and could no more understand the advocacy of liberty of conscience and liberty of the press than Ananias could at first believe in the conversion of the persecuting Saul. Things at last came to a crisis. Rome was entreated, and that by both sides, to give a decision on the subject; but Rome at first refused. She neither approved nor con demned. The opposition of the senior clergy to the "Avenir" waxed hotter. The position of its editors became at last untenable. The temporary suspension of the journal, which had existed only a year, was resolved upon; and in November, 1831, three of its chiefs, Lamennais, Montalembert, and Lacordaire set out for Rome, to ascertain in person in what light their principles were regarded at head-quarters. It is plain they had their misgivings. Before the suspension of the "Avenir," its editors had published in it a declaration of their principles; at Rome they presented to the pontiff a memorial from the pen of Lacordaire, expletive of this declaration. This done, and their views thus clearly explained, they waited for a judgment on them. But in vain. Rome was then sufficiently hostile to the Orleans dynasty, but she feared to compromise her authority in France by any very open countenance of its assailants; she was ready enough to assault the spirit of independence which the Gallican Church had so long displayed, but she doubted if a principle struggled for by Gerbert, asserted by Saint Louis, formerly ratified in 1682, and ever since fully acted on, were to be best attacked by a war of newspapers, particularly when the zeal-devoured journalists were in her own eyes far from being beyond suspicion. Farther, the critical position of political affairs in Europe, and more particularly the state of Italy itself, threatened as it was both from within and from without, not to speak of the traditional and natural horror which she entertained for such doctrines as liberty of conscience and of the press, rendered it completely impossible for her to reply approvingly. But on the other hand, however attack on the Gallican Church, she was too much pleased with the crusade of her strange auxiliaries on her own especial behalf, and saw too well the importance of retaining the services of such men in case of need, to run he risk of extinguishing their ardor by a lirect condemnation. What she really had wished was that the "Avenir" should coninue, but without her sanction, so that at ny time she might have been able to disVow and sacrifice it. This desire the unvelcome appearance of the three pilgrim ditors disappointed; nevertheless, hinting lisapprobation without saying what she dispproved, she pursued her policy of gaining ime. It was only after Lamennais and Monalembert had set out on their return to France, the former proclaiming loudly that, ince the pontiff would decide nothing, he vas about to resume his journal, that Rome ronounced a decisive censure. Fearing, robably, that the re-appearance of the 'Avenir," after the visit of its chiefs to the Vatican, might give rise to the suspicion that hey had met with secret, if not with open ncouragement there, the pope made up his hind at last, and issued his famous encyclial letter of 15th August, 1832. Lacordaire, who had anticipated such a result, had left Rome four months before his companions, xpressing his resolution to take no part in he resurrection of the "Avenir," and aleady somewhat estranged from his master, hose discomfiture he foresaw. Possibly with a view to avoid him, he took a journey to Germany, but Lamennais and Montalemert were returning to Paris by a circuitous oute, and Lacordaire met them accidentally t Munich. It seemed as if they had enountered each other expressly, that they ight receive conjointly the thunders launchagainst them, for it was while they were gether at Munich that they heard of the cyclical letter. The thunder was thunder deed; aghast they hastened back to Paris, d the day after their arrival they published the newspapers a distinct and formal dearation of their submission. esced in words which qualified liberty of the press as "a most pernicious, never-to-be-sufficiently execrated and detestable thing""deterrima illa ac nunquam satis execranda et detestabilis libertas artis librariæ.' They who had striven so hard for the promotion of papal sovereignty, who had endeavored so zealously to connect it with what they conceived to be the rising cause of democracy, and to detach it from the sinking fortunes of kings, in the firm conviction that so they were doing their church some service, now humbly submitted to be characterized by its supreme head as "arrogant," as " madmen,' as "troubled with a wild lust of forming opinions for themselves," and as guilty of most "base machinations," not to speak of the insinuation, that it was "only a desire of novelty and of promoting universal sedition which lay concealed--simulato in religione pietate-under the mask of a pretended piety. Lamennais, defeat on his brow and bitterness in his heart, retired to the shady woods of La Chesnaie, his favorite retreat in his native Brittany; Lacordaire returned to his former humble position in the convent of the Visitation, where he prepared himself for preaching, and "read St. Augustin with all his might." In the winter of 1833-34, he preached at the College Stanislas; his "Conferences" were very popular, but they were not altogether to the taste of his superiors, and he was even severely censured for them. Nevertheless, as his fidelity to the holy see was beyond suspicion, while his fame as a preacher was already very considerable, he was regarded as a safe as well as a valuable instrument, whose remaining errors would disappear if he were allowed time. With Lamennais it was very different. While all thought him subdued and silenced, he was recruiting his strength at La Chesnaie, dismissing his scruples, and preparing to come forth as the champion of philosophy and democracy. And accordingly, in May, 1834, despite of the remonstrances of M. de Quélen, the then archbishop of Paris, he published his "Paroles d'un Croyant," and cried in a This was as complete and humbling as their voice that rung through Europe, that there nemies could have wished. They who had his gauntlet lay. This remarkable work, efended liberty of conscience with so much which, were it only for the poetry of its conal, now gave in their adhesion to the papal ceptions and the energy of its style, deserves eclaration, that liberty of conscience was "an a place amongst the highest productions of surd and erroneous idea," which "flows modern literature, terrified the one party and om that most stinking source, Indiferent- produced unbounded enthusiasm in the other, n"-"ex hoc putidissimo indifferentismi by its popular, undisguised, and vigorous nte"-if it it be not rather an insane raving Liberalism. Rome, of course, very speedily -“ deliramentum." They who had so stoutly | took cognizance of the “ Scriptural Mar things should be uttered with impunity, more especially by a priest, the little work of a few score pages was honored with a special anathema. In an encyclical letter of 7th July, the pope declared to his "venerable brethren" that he was "struck with horror at the very first glance he cast on this book, so small in size but so immense in its perversity, that his heart sunk within him as he read on, and that it would be too painful, therefore, to pass in review all that this wickedest offspring of impiety and audacity heaped together, with a view to the disturbance of all things human and divine.” And so the Abbé Lamennais, whose portrait Leo XII. had placed in his oratory, whom he had called the last Father of the Church, and on whom he would have conferred the cardinal's hat if the disinterestedness and modesty of the simple man had not made him decline the offer, was deposed from his priesthood and excommunicated by Gregory XVI. Beside all this from Rome, the "Paroles d'un Croyant" brought against their author an attack from his old disciple. Lacordaire, whom anathema had convinced and maranatha converted, seemed to think it necessary for his own justification to give some reason for his change of opinion. The " Paroles," which he probably regarded as a defiance to his church, afforded him an opportunity, and he published his "Considerations on the Philosophical System of M. de Lamennais." This work was intended to refute the system developed in the "Essay on Indifference.' Lamennais had argued with great effect in favor of common sense. Starting from the point "that the first act of reason is necessarily an act of faith," and that no ereated being is in a position to say I am, unless he begin by saying I believe, inasmuch as consciousness itself is not an act of reason but of faith; and having shown from this that the individual reason of any one man can only conduct him to profound and universal doubt, seeing that "he cannot even prove himself" -cannot by reasoning establish even to himself his own existence-and that he is able at most to say, "it is probable that I exist" -he goes on to establish that" the unbroken tradition, the universal agreement of mankind, is the seal of truth," that (we have already quoted the dictum) "what all men agree in believing to be true is true.” and that “the general reason, that is, by the united an consistent reason of the whole human race has an absolute certainty, by which the rea son of each individual becomes possessed o a sure guide and rule for the appreciating and testing of its own proper workings. When, as he thinks satisfactorily, Lamennais has thus shown the true and only grounds on which reason rests, in trying to demonstrate that it begins by faith, and depends on the common and perpetual consent of mankind he goes on to maintain that faith in its turn must to a certain extent be subject to reason and that in all our belief a rational judgment must be exercised, the rational judgment of the individual being, however, always depen dent upon and responsible to the principles of infallible common sense. The elucidation of the proper relations between reason and faith thus constitutes his whole end and aim At this philosophy he had arrived in the effort and hope to prop up Romanism. Exasperated at the attacks so long and so vigorously made on his church by the arms of reason, he had accepted the combat and defied his adversaries at their weapons; the concluding part of his argument is therefore devoted to an attempted proof of the harmony he discovers between the Romanist dogmas and the dictates of reason or the voice of common sense. Here, however, we do not follow him, as the controversy between him and Lacordaire turns entirely on the doctrines we have endeavored to sketch above. Lacordaire will, as regards his church, have nothing to do with reason. He rests her claims on other grounds. The general reason of the human race he, therefore, will by no means admit to be the source, as Lamennais says, of all authority. "To pretend to prove the authority of the church by the authority of the general reason of the human race, in making this general reason the source of certitude, is to adopt Protestantism on a greater scale, for, according to such a system, every belief whatever will depend originally on general reason; which seems contradictory of the existence of an authority out of, beyond, and superior to it." This is the essence of all Lacordaire's reasoning. He thought he had demonstrated a fatal contradiction in the system of his old master. Lamennais would deduce the authority of the Roman Church both from her reason," asked Lacordaire, in triumph, "be as you say the source of all belief, how can belief in the church's authority be independent of it?" on the pontiffs themselves, which, were their real history lost, would lead men to suppose that they had constituted an unbroken succession of meek beings, distinguished by their learning and virtues, by the absence of world To this Lamennais retorted that, according to his antagonist, "Catholicism is radi-ly ambition and the purity of their love for the cally out of the pale of human reason, that truth, he comes to what is the real argument thus we should believe in it-believe in the of the letter, and propounds it by proclaiming Scriptures believe in the church-without his discovery "that there is war in Europe! any reason for so believing; that, in the The seat of this war, however, and who second place, these truths henceforth rest on the belligerent parties are, it is apparently nothing, or only on an internal impression not so easy to find out; for a long time Laproduced by God himself, who thus forms in cordaire looks about him in vain, and puts the soul, by his omnipotence, that faith which every possible case of contention before he he demands of men that they render." arrives at the true one. There is no war between the peoples; there is no war between the monarchs; there is no war between the peoples and the monarchs--between monarchy and republicanism, that is to say, there is no war between tyranny and liberty. Nor is the sought for war to be found between opposed ideas, between particular points of doctrine. "In France," says Lacordaire, contemptuously, "our authors write dramas and romances, our journalists articles for and against every possible ministry, but no one troubles himself about ideas. Such was the debate. It is evident that the opponents have not detected the ambiguity of the term belief. There are two kinds of belief. There is an intellectual beliefthe belief of which Lamennais speaks the belief which forces itself even on the devils -the result of reason, be that derived from common sense or elsewhere; but there is another belief, on which Lamennais only stumbles, which is not an intellectual, belief, which may be wanting where intellectual belief exists, and which mere intellectual belief can never produce. This latter was the belief which Lacordaire, a passionate admirer of St. Augustin, would fain have elucidated, but which, as his principles unfortunately forced him to connect it with faith in Romanism, he was far from showing in its true light. But as our object is merely to state the controversy, on this subject we of Course do not enter. Lacordaire had renounced deism, he had recanted his former philosophic opinions, he had shown unqualified submission to Rome. he had declared "he belonged only to the church and to the archbishop, his natural superior" still he was not yet entirely to be depended upon. It was thought by those in auhority over him, that the air of Rome would do him good. To Rome, accordingly, he went, or was sent, the effects of which we now will At last, he tells us where the war is carried on, and between whom :-"It is in a higher region than those of ideas, kings, and peoples; it is nothing less than a war between the two forms of human intelligenceit is between faith and reason, between the power of Catholicism and that of Rationalism-both as old as the world, but contending now on a grander scale, because both have arrived at a point which will no longer admit of a war of outposts, but demands a decisive issue. All know the history and the doctrine of Catholicism; it descends from God by the patriarchs, by the Jewish people, and by Jesus Christ; it teaches that human reason does not suffice of itself in any order of things. Rationalism, too, is of long descent; it comes from the devil, through all those who have imitated his pride, and its doctrine is, that human reason suffices for itself in every order of things, both for living and for dying. To arrive at being, in the intellectual world, the absolute sovereign of its own ideas-in the moral world the last judge of its own actions-in the social world to recognise no other auAfter a fine description of Rome, and a thority than that which it has directly electpoetical glance at the position of Italy, geo-ed-in the material world to conquer the eleraphically and politically considered; after aying his tribute of gratitude to Charlemagne, as being the "founder of pontifical berty." by his confirmation of the pope's race. In December, 1836, Lacordaire wrote his etter "Sur le Saint-Siége," a work which ve shall shortly notice here, for, though it vas not published till two years later, it is the composition and not the publication which marks the era in the author's principles. ments, and to draw from them the only real happiness; such is the aim of Rationalism,* It will, of course, be observed that the term Rationalism is here employed in its most extended sense, and and the charter it destines to the human race. Its success is evidently possible only by the destruction of Catholicism, which professes doctrines diametrically opposite." Such was the new declaration of Lacordaire. It is evidently nothing more than a following out of the controversy with Lamennais. The latter tried to harmonize reason and faith. Lacordaire declares that the struggle between them shall be one for life and death. Their harmony, indeed, is what he dreads the most, for in its essence it is nothing else than Protestantism, which he considers even 66 worse than Rationalism, and more dangerous than the Greek schism." A Romanist like Lacordaire cannot, of course, see that while we trust to faith as the sure and only "evidence of things not seen," we must at the same time "be able to give a reason for the faith that is in us." 66 Any one attempting to refute Lacordaire would be obliged, in the first place, to destroy his assumptions that Romanism and Christianity are identical, that the terms "the Church, and the Church of Rome," are synonymous, that those who will not entirely exclude reason from religion are Rationalists, and that those who will not admit the "descent from the devil," of which he speaks, are Materialists, and seek in the elements their sole felicity. All such points have, however, been discussed over and over again, and will continue to be so while such men as Lacordaire exist. We cannot, however, refrain from here quoting a passage from Bourdaloue, aptly cited by a critic before us:"Thus to think"-Bourdaloue was combating principles such as Lacordaire's-" is to be wanting in faith, for faith-I speak of Christian faith-is not a mere acquiescing in believing, nor a simple submission of the mind, but a reasonable acquiescence and submission; but how shall it be a reasonable acquiescing and submission if reason have no share in the operation ?" So writes the most logical divine the French church boasts; but as Lacordaire rails at the Gallican spirit of Bossuet, so, perhaps, he may despise the argumentation of Bourdaloue; there remains, however, a dilemma which is applicable to the present subject as well as to his attack upon the philosophy of Lamennais, and from which we do not see how he can well escape. "If faith," we would ask him, "be all, and reason here be nothing, why then reason ? Is it not absurd to reason against reasoning?" his former political creed, which Lacordair makes in it. The quondam republican write thus:-"It might even be said that none bu monarchical parties exist in France, did w not discover in the sink of society a factionI scarce know how to name it-which be lieves itself republican, and of which w want the courage to speak ill, only becaus it has the chance of cutting our heads off in the interval between two monarchies. The papacy has not to choose between the caus of the kings and that of the peoples. Would to Heaven the question were reduced to so simple terms, and that Europe were divided into two so clearly defined parties, the party of the good and the party of the evil.” As Lacordaire was a royalist when he wrote these words, it is easy to determine which is his good and which his evil, however differently he may have spoken and acted both before and since. But how shall we explain this passage?"France is the most monarchical country in the world; the one which in the last thirty years has given her monarchs the most numerous marks of affection." Is he laughing at our beards? The truth is, that Lacordaire was now at his aphelion from philosophy and democracy, and, as was to be expected from the very eccentric orbit in which he moves, the extremity to which he had shot away was of the remotest. It is probable, also, that very strong language was necessary completely to clear himself from any remaining suspicions as to his politics, and that it was from this cause that the democrat student of Dijon, the ex-editor of the " Avenir," and the former friend of Lamennais, was led to speak of republicanism being discernible only in the sink of society." But the expression was unfortunate, for whence had his own previous republicanism risen? and whence was to rise his republicanism of 1848? From the exhalations of the "sink of society." Though Lacordaire might now justly hope that he would for the future be no more an object of suspicion to his superiors, it was to place himself, it is said, to a certain degree beyond their control that he resolved upon an important step, which he carried into execution in 1839. As a Dominican he would be dependent chiefly on the head of his order. Accordingly, with the view of joining that religious body, he entered the Monastery of La Minerva, at Rome, as a novice. Here he wrote his "Memoir in Favor of the Reestablishment of the Order of Preaching Prior" a remerkeble work in m |
