charity, such a reflection of God's uncreated love, such an outward realization of the longings of His sacred heart, Who was anointed to make the nations of one mind upon the earth, and to preach the Gospel to the poor, and deliverance to the captive, and sight to the blind, and to heal the contrite heart, and to set at liberty them that are bruised, and to make the widow's heart sing for joy? What a mother Rome has been to the nations of the earth! She saw them sitting in darkness and in the shadow of death, and she had compassion on them, and guided their feet into the way of peace. She gathered them under the shadow of her wings, and watched over them with unwearied care, and told them the things that were for their peace. If they had only suffered her, she would have brought them to the measure of the age of the fulness of Christ, and all good things, and true riches and real blessings she would have added unto them. Had Rome only had her way, wars would have ceased upon the earth, for she herself would have been the arbiter of the quarrels of mankind, and would have guarded with jealousy the administration of the law of nations. Then would the nations themselves-the strongest with the weakest, the greatest with the least-have been gathered in peace around her throne, and the vision of Isaias, the son of Amos, would have been fulfilled: "Ephraim would not have envied Juda, nor would Juda have fought against Ephraim. The sword would have been turned into the ploughshare, and the spear into the sickle: nation would not have lifted up sword against nation, neither would they have been exercised any more to war." Nay, she would have broken down the wall of separation between them; for it is Rome alone upon the earth who has realized the truth that "there is neither Greek nor Jew, barbarian nor Scythian," but that all are one in Christ; and there would have been one fold and one shepherd. But it was not yet to be. The nations, or some of them at least, grew tired of her gentle sway, and jealous of the sweet supremacy of the Vicar of the king of kings. There came a day when they called evil good and good evil, and put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter, and darkness for light and light for darkness; and in that day they began to hate the name of Rome. They let go her guiding hand, which had led them so faithfully along the narrow path of truth and life, and wandered, each one by itself, unguided and unblessed, far away from her into the endless wilderness of error and destruction. Yet Rome never forgot her love for the children she had born to God. Again and again she sent to look for them; again and again she sought to bring them back into her arms. Against hope she believed in hope, and wrestled for them with God in prayer. And so it came to pass that when all was lost she began to find; when all was destroyed, and not a stone was left upon a stone, she began to build. They complained of her riches, she came to them in poverty; and now, again, after centuries of waiting, she is stealing her silent way back into the hearts of some of them, ready to begin again the renewal of the world. And so too for the sufferings of nations, who has ever felt like Rome? What friend, at this very moment, has poor bleeding and fettered Poland but the Vicar of Christ, who only the other day wept over her fate? Where now can she look for succour but to the love of Rome? Even in Catholic countries, how small is the sympathy with other sister nations of the faith when laid low by suffering or persecution! How seldom are public prayers or solemn intercession offered for their wants! But it is not so in Rome. If one nation suffer, Rome suffers with it; if one nation glory, Rome glories with it; for they are all her children, and she loves them with a mother's love. Surely, there is no greater thing upon the earth than the Catholicity of the love of Rome. And as for the nations of the world, so also has been her love for her own children at home. Thirty years ago it was stated in this Review that it would be impossible to name a want of man for which the love of Rome has not made provision. "To protect helpless infancy, and provide for decrepit age; to shield the innocent from temptation, and bring back the fallen from crime; to spare the blushes of ingenuous and shrinking poverty; to assist the tottering exertions of struggling merit, and repair the broken fortunes of honest but unsuccessful industry; to afford consolation and relief to the sick, the prisoner, and the dying, and secure the honours and advantages of Christian burial for the dead; such are the leading objects, branching out into a thousand details, of the comprehensive, the truly Catholic charity of Rome."* This was literally true at the time when it was written, and thirty years have but added to the love of Rome. Who can think without pride of the twenty-two hospitals standing ever open for the relief of the suffering and sick ("as nearly perfect, we are told, as it is possible to render institutions of human origin "), where no order or recommendation from governor or subscriber is required, no question asked as to the creed or circumstances of the applicant, and no distinction * See DUBLIN REVIEW, No. XI. + Rome and its Institutions. By Mr. Maguire. Ch. xvi. for his sake has lifted up the Blessed Sacrament in every church, and all her children are praying for his soul? Nor after death does she suffer them to leave him. She bids them take his poor headless body and place it reverently in a Christian grave, and she comes herself with sweet-smelling incense and holy rite to honour it as the temple of the Holy Ghost. And she tells them to have masses offered for his soul, and thus purified and clean to give it back again to the God who gave it. As of old, so also now, she teaches her children to bury the dead, and some of them she sends into the lone Campagna, lest haply some poor labourer who has died far away from the homes of men, of sudden death, should lie uncared for and unburied; for nothing can escape her maternal love. Others, again, she sends to the relief of those who are ashamed to beg, or to help poor debtors in their difficulties, and lessen the load which is weighing down their lives, while, by a refinement of her love, she would have others to provide an advocate to plead the cause of those who are suffering unjustly but are too poor to vindicate their rights. And, as if all this were not enough, she has inspired the brotherhood of the Holy Apostles with the compassionate thought of setting apart a little space in some of the central churches of the city, where they who are in need may place a written statement of their wants, and thus be relieved in the privacy of their own homes, nor any shame be brought upon their honest poverty. What a perfect realization of that faith which works by love! What a deference to the beauty of that poverty which the Church alone has ventured to call holy! And O how different from the spurious charity of our own country, where poverty, if not looked upon as crime, is always suspected and too often hated, where buildings somewhat worse than prisons are built for the helpless and the aged, and where Christian men have found out a way of feeding the poor of Christ by eating and drinking themselves at some festive board, and Christian women can come to the succour of those who are in need by listening themselves to soft music or mingling in the pleasant dance, clad in the gay luxury of too often immodest dress, while, perhaps, the wearied hands that have ministered to their vanity are sinking helpless to the ground, and soon will be laid idle in the grave! Better, perhaps, such charity than none at all! Be it so; but then let us call it by its right name. It is not, it can never be, the charity of Christ. But it may be asked, Have not "Charity Balls' found their way even into Rome? Perhaps; but then they are the charities of modern society, inventions of the nineteenth century, not the inspirations of the Bride of Christ, not the charities of Rome. Even in Rome there is the Carnival; but then Christian Rome sanctifies the Carnival prostrate before the altar of her God. And it is through the gates of such a city as this that the Protestant Dean of Canterbury could tell us, in Good Words, that he went away rejoicing, thanking God that his face was set homewards, and that the walls of Rome, where God's law was not kept, would soon be left far behind. Yet his face was set towards that other great city which, like old Pagan Rome, "sitteth upon many waters," and is "full of the abominations of the earth"; in which God's law is so kept, that the streets are stained with the blood of helpless infants murdered by their own mothers' hands! Good words indeed! bidding Englishmen and Englishwomen to thank God that they are not as other men are, or even as those poor inhabitants of Rome. When will men first cast out the mote which is in their own eye before they try to cast out the beam which is in their brother's eye. Yet again we say: "by their fruits ye shall know them"! Thus reflected on His own city are seen some of the attributes of God, "coalescing in the flower and bloom of their combination in the glory and beauty of His eternal excellence." "The Lord God Almighty is the temple thereof, and the Lamb, for the glory of God hath enlightened it, and the Lamb is the lamp thereof." "Great is the Lord, and exceedingly to be praised in the city of our God, in His holy mountain. With the joy of the whole earth is Mount Sion founded on the sides of the north, the city of the Great King"! Such are some of the thoughts which have been called up in our minds by the work of M. Veuillot. We have not attempted to review it, for it is not a new work, and has already been some years before the public, and we have feared lest the fragrance of Rome, which has been so lovingly gathered into its pages, should evaporate in passing through our hands. But because at this very moment Rome is more than ever the object of all our love, and all our prayers, we have ventured to recall to our readers' recollection a work, whose every page is suggestive of the fragrance, and interprets to us the language, and breathes the spirit of the city of the living God. Bitter with a sarcasm which has made bad men fear its author, yet tender with much love, it is an offering to Rome of a strong man's devotion, joined with the affection and humility of a little child. They who do not love Rome will not understand it. They who do understand it will love Rome all the more. And never, surely, was Rome more worthy of our love, or more full of majesty in the sight of angels and of men than at the present moment. Weak, as almost with a woman's weakness, while the rage and hatred, and madness of the armies of the evil one are at her gate, she is standing alone against Satan and the world; and yet not alone, because He is with her who is "Prince of the kings of the earth." And it is at such a time as this that she has gathered together the Princes and Bishops of Christ's Universal Church in her own great basilica over the body of S. Peter, to take counsel with her for the things which are for the peace of God's kingdom, and the healing of the nations. Before what we are writing meets our reader's eye, they will have met. Beneath them will be the rock of Peter, and around them the Everlasting Arms, and above them the Eternal Dove. What may seem good to the Holy Ghost and to them we cannot tell, but His Word which has brought them together will not return to Him empty. "He will cause the light of His countenance to shine upon them, that they may know His way upon earth, His salvation among the nations." And the day shall surely come when our children's children, even as we ourselves look back to the glories of Ephesus or Trent, will speak to one another, with greatful hearts, of the victory of Rome in the first Council of the Vatican. ART. III. THE ENGLISH PROTESTANT MARRIAGE IT LAW. Bill for Legalizing Marriage with a Deceased Wife's Sister. was quite natural and to be expected that those who, for many years, have been agitating for a repeal of the law which makes void a marriage with the sister of a deceased wife, would seize the opportunity afforded by the meeting of a new Parliament, which largely represents the classes over which Anglicanism and the other traditions of the classes hitherto dominant in our polity have little or no influence. The vote on the second reading of Mr. Chambers's Bill shows that their calculations were not unfounded. There is much reason to fear that the measure may at no distant time be carried; for our reliance on the House of Lords on such questions is not what it might have been before it passed the Act, by virtue of which Lord Penzance is daily pronouncing the dissolution of marriages. It is certain that, if carried, the change effected will be found in its results far more important than most |