The Sun.
London, England, 1868-06-23 00:00:00

CATHOLICITI IS POWER.

Catholics alone possess the power that can
govern a world. The principles which lie in
the armoury of the Church, and which are not
made for special occasions, according to the
dictates of momentary expediency, have a
might within them which, when fairly applied
to difficult questions, instantly effects a solu-
tion. The cardinal point which is at once
the centre of stability, and the law of Catholic
motion, from which radiates the broad and
far-extending lines of power, is fixed in a
dogma which the world hates, because it has
an instinctive consciousness that it is our one

grand fountain of strength. The only body of,
men on earth, as far as we are aware, which
claims to speak, not relative, but absolute and
unfailing truth, is that body which is spread
through earth, and is called Catholic. Those
who through pride, through lust of money or
of flesh, have broken off from the Church, or

have been cast out by her, cannot carry away
with them her strength. The very point which
is her fount of power, by their act of apostacy
they abandon. To it they cannot longer hold.
They have drifted out to sea, the wind caught
them, their moorings gave way, they drift and
scud, they lay motionless, or they are tossed
and shaken ; without chart or compass, they
are carried by wind and by wave in that
direction exactly in which the wind and the
wave is strongest. We move, and they move,
but with this difference—we move from a given
point to a given point, while they move from
nowhere to nowhere. Ours is the motion of
a craft under complete control of an experi-
enced captain ; their motion is that of the
heaving and sinking, the drifting and heavy,
objectless motion of a wreck. The powers
which ruined the ship keep playing upon her
to the last ; the first stitch of canvas which
gave way was but a harbinger of the future
triumph of the elements.
We are not here, of course, speaking of the
action of every man who calls himself Catholic.
Many there are, unfortunately, who, though
in the Church, do not live the full and perfect
life of the Church. Some see her power and
the grand reach of her principles. They can
grasp in theory the magnificent results which
would follow were she at the head, with her
laws of life thrilling through the activities of
nations. But they lack courage, or practical
talent, or they are deficient in Christian bold-
ness to face a hostile public opinion which is
strong with the convictions of millions. In
fact, they seem to doubt whether, after all,
numbers, if there be only sufficient of them,
are not able to prevail more effectually than
truth. Others see but partially the power of
principle in the Church. They cannot grasp it
as a whole. They see she has done marvellous
things, they know she is divine, and that she
will prevail ; but they do not know how, and
are content, either through their temperament,
or by reason of their isolation, to let things
take their course, and let her right herself.
Neither the rormer, nor these, are the men who
are to manifest to the world the power of life
which could be evoked from the mother of the
living. And there are other classes besides
these—there are those who live in the church,
profess her religion, and partake of her sacra-
ments, but seem to bear about with them an
acid which mounts into their minds whenever
they speak of her, or are called upon to defend
her, and pours itself forth most freely when-
ever a doubtful story is bandied about at her
expense, or any of her high ministers can be
spotted with human weakness, or with short-
coming which seem to cast a shadow on her
holiness. These men seem born by a blunder
into her communion. All their instincts and
tendencies, the whole tenor and drift of their
intellectual lives, run athwart or counter to her.
They are the thorn in her flesh, and a difficulty
in her path. If they read the fathers, it is to
find them at variance with her present dis-
cipline or tradition; if they interpret her saints,
it is to her disparagement; if they criticize her
history, it is to draw some ugly line across the
picture of her spotlessness; in a word, they are
ever ox the watch, not, perhaps, consciously,
but instinctively, to blemish and damage the
high honour of her fair name.
But, though men are frail—some lethargic
who see, others active who don't see, and
others who are both active and see, only act
in the wrong way, and see in the wrong light
—still, principles live. They never die, nor do
they catch the diseases and the deaths of men.
They are living energies, which only require
to be brought into play. They are the power
of life, tilt logic of action, the energy of good,
and penetrating as with the diffusive power
of light. Fill a mind with them, and send it
abroad through the earth—that man is a flame
of fire. In proportion as we live by them, and
in them, in that very same proportion are
we strong. For instance, what principle on
earth could be imagined more pregnant with
enormous force than the principle which we
have called the cardinal point of Catholic
power ? Imagine twenty millions of men, for
instance, who should be firmly impressed that
they had in their possession the exclusive
truth, that they were so directed that they
could not be wrong by any possibility; human
or divine—imagine these twenty millions of
men, each convinced in the bottom of his soul
that his truth—the truth they all held—was
the oily saving truth—imagine these twenty
millions of men again living with others, whom
they tenderly loved, but whom they felt were
holding falsehood in the place of truth, and
eating poison in the place of food—imagine
these twenty millions so situated,--would not
their power be overwhelming ? Would not
the very fact of their holding the principle
that their truth was the exclusive truth, the
infallible truth, be sufficient to account for the
immense influence they would exert ? The
power is not of numbers, but of
principle. For
imagine, on the contrary, that those twenty
million men, instead of holding their truth to
be exclusive, held the doctrine common in this
country, that what each man believes that is
truth for him, the whole ratiouale of their in-
fluence and power would be gone ! Or, if they
held the doctrine of exclusive truth, yet did not
admit its absolute certainty, the influence upon
them in its propagation would be very much
diminished. In a word, the power and force
of action is according to the perfection of the
principle. In proportion as those twenty
millions carried the cardinal point of Catho-
licity in all its purity in their minds, in that
same proportion would they bring a greater
power to bear. In proportion as this prin-
ciple relaxed hold upon them, in that same
proportion would they become helpless and
inactive. What can be said of a million can
be said of one man. If it is the principle
that is the power, it will be a power in one
man according to his measure as it is a power
in a million men. Every man, then, who is
in earnest and believes in the divine mission
of the Church, will do his utmost to make
her principles his own, and live with the
fulness of her strength. Every man, then,
who thus believes, and is thus earnest, will do
all he can—if he be in doubt—to discover her
mind, and seek every assistance to read her
aright. He would know where his strength
lies, what his true interests are, and would
conceive himself greatly blessed in possessing
a fountain of living waters of tratli from