bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
‘A Gentleman-Saint’
Authors: Hughes C. M. 
Published: July 2007

In this year of Byron’s centenary, Leigh Hunt’s name inevitably recurs. His relations with Byron are told and re-told, and ‘the common weakness of throwing the principal character into a high light by darkening the shadows around those who surrounded him’ at times relegates Hunt to the outer darkness. He is ‘sly and venomous’ according to one critic, who on Byron himself is admirable. It is not, however, our intention to discuss the Byron-Hunt episode. A severance of friendship is always a tragedy. And an attempt to justify the one at the expense of the other is only to accentuate the tragic note. We can afford to forget that they ever ceased to be friends. We may leave Byron in his ‘high light,’ but we would fain dissipate somewhat the shadows that surround Leigh Hunt’s name, not by putting forward a reasoned defence of the man and his actions, but by recalling one of his Essays wherein he describes his discovery of a Saint. The genuine appreciation of goodness and virtue which the Essay exhibits may help us to see him in his true light—to see him, perhaps, as Shelley saw him :One of those happy soulsWhich are the salt o! the earth, and without whomThis world would smell like what it is—a tomb;Who is, what others seem.The essay is to be found in The Seer; or, Common f laces Refreshed, a collection of Hunt’s Essays published in 1841.
The Love of the Soule
Authors: Martin M. Gregory 
Published: July 2007

[While the name and the story—a spiritual romance—of Blessed Edmund Campion are known to all, we are probably less familiar with the name of his contemporary and friend at Oxford, Gregory Martin, one of the notable scholars of the day, who spoke the word that under God converted Edmund Campion.Martin, after giving brilliant promise in his studies, left Oxford in 1569 to accept the post of tutor to the sons of the Duke of Norfolk, but resigned it in the following year when the duke’s household were ordered to conform outwardly to the new religion.Before leaving England to practise his religion unmolested in Flanders, he made his appeal to his friend Campion, entreating him to abandon the idea of a merely worldly career, to choose the better part, and to accompany him into poverty. The pleading prevailed, in that as we know, Campion turned his back on Oxford and entered the Society of Jesus.Martin went to Douay, there presided over by Dr. Allen and was ordained Priest in 1573. He then went to Rome to take part in the foundation of the English College—but in 1578 was recalled to Rheims. There his great work was the translation of the Bible from the Vulgate into English, the version which came to be known as the Rheims Version. Martin died at Rheims, 1582. His death was a blow to Dr. Allen and the College; for he was not only a fervent Catholic, but a ripe scholar, and one with the intellectual modesty that characterises the true scholar—one of Oxford’s most distinguished sons.
What of Erasmus?
Authors: Brennan R. Edward 
Published: July 2007

There is a saying that Erasmus laid the egg which Luther hatched. I have often wondered just how much truth there is in this expression. Opinion seems to vary. Some Catholics have read into it the condemnation of Erasmus as a secret heretic inwardly gnawing at the very vitals of the Church. Few perhaps until late years have made any honest attempt to interpret the great Humanist’s position in the light of his own explanations or by reference to the times in which he lived. No one wants to condone the faults of Erasmus, and heaven knows they were many. But let us not overlook the good points in his character, or the excuses for the bad ones.At the beginning of the sixteenth century, Erasmus occupied an enviable place among the esthetes of the new Humanistic learning. He may be taken as a fair example of the critical attitude of mind in which many of the best and most loyal Catholics approached the religious problems of the age. Alive to all the abuses that prevailed among his fellow-ecclesiastics, Erasmus is perhaps injudicious at times in the manner in which he insists upon reform. But after we have sifted the matter to the bottom, we shall find that in most cases his ideas are just. He demanded a thoroughly literary education for the Churchmen of his day to put them in touch with the leading spirits of Humanism. Had they possessed this knowledge, there is little doubt but that the tide of religious affairs could have been changed for a saner direction.
The Cambridge Summer School
Authors: Jarrett Bede 
Published: July 2007

From August 4th to August 9th, the annual meeting of the Summer School of Catholic Studies at Cambridge took place. Each year this Cambridge Summer School has devoted itself to a particular subject, which it has set itself to study and explain. Previously the Religion of the Scriptures, the Eucharist, the Papacy, had been so treated; this year, in accordance with the desires of the Pope, expressed in his encyclical Studiorum Ducem, the principle matter discussed was St. Thomas Aquinas, his Life, Times and Teaching.The solemn opening of the School was made in the impressive Church of Our Lady and the English Martyrs with a sermon by Father Martindale, S.J. In an interesting way Fr. Martindale examined the break-up of thought and life that had taken place since the sixteenth century, its dissociation of part with part, in matters intellectual and spiritual, in culture, and, especially, in the principles of action. Saved as Catholics were from spiritual and doctrinal separation, they yet remained caught in the cleavage of politics and culture, and severed therefore in large measure through Protestant and over-nationalised party narrowness from proper contact with each other. To bridge this gulf betwixt nations, sciences, and religious groups was the ideal and hope of many; but it could be effected only by a common possession of principles, and these in turn must depend upon a common philosophical basis and a common faith. Both philosophy and faith sprang from the teaching of Christ. The statement of this teaching by the Early Church Fathers held Christendom together for two hundred years, by St. Augustine for another eight hundred, by St. Thomas from the thirteenth century till the Reformation.
The Dry-Rot in the Capitalistic System
Authors: Worts F. R. 
Published: July 2007

The critics of the economic system of modern industrial and commercial life are legion. Since the famous attack of Marx, this so-called ‘Capitalistic System” has been continually assailed and defended with an ever-increasing power of learning and ‘judgment born of experience.’ From every angle and vantage-point Capitalism has been viewed from without: while from within its many secrets of good and evil have been dragged forth into the light of day either for admiration or for shame. Of the many far-reaching truths concerning its nature which we have thus slowly discovered, perhaps the chief is the most alarming—its incalculable strength. So deep and strong are its roots—avarice and coveteousness, so enormous is its growth—its jungled strength covers the earth, so dominant is its influence—no civilised people can escape it, that it can and does defy the legion of critics to check its growth or lessen its influence. As some monstrous, hydra-headed giant of the fairy story, Capitalism smiles horrifically upon its millions of victims, who see nothing more in the smile than the hope of their present safety. And up till now, there is no sign of a ‘Jack-the-Giant-Killer’ in the legion of critics.To add to the volume of criticism of this economic system seems gratuitous. Yet there does appear to the writer some good reason for hoping that its gigantic monstrosity is not so strong as it looks, and indeed even to-day a weakness, latent but radical, in its system, is being slowly exposed.
A Hymn of St. Thomas Aquinas
Authors: Phillimore John Swinnerton 
Published: July 2007

Several hands have attempted versions of Adoro te; it would be impertinent to add another attempt without a word of prefatory justification. My object has been to supply what doubtless others also have desiderated, such an English rendering of these twenty-eight lines as will sing naturally to the plain chant melody in the Vatican edition.St. Thomas’s hymns to some appear doggerels. And certainly they are severely stript of all adventitious ornament or poeticism. But there is one merit that cannot be denied to them by the most envious critic : an immense significance. They are so crowded with meaning that each may be called a little Summa of Eucharistic theology, with a variation from the festal didactics of Lauda Sion—appropriate to an Office—to the devout personal effusion of Adoro te. Eucharistic theology reduced within the strict dimensions of verse, and, more particularly, of ‘singing-verse.’ The verse form serves both for economy of bulk in expression and for a mnemonic device. The virtue of good doggerels is that they are not easily forgotten, and I cannot believe that St. Thomas was not deliberately making a mnemonic compendium of the simplest statement of Catholic doctrine about Transubstantiation. Perhaps he was at the same time executing a lyrical impulse to give to this truth the most chastened and disciplined form of verbal beauty. Lyrics or doggerels, it beats me to decide which they are.Anyhow, the peculiar quality of this hymn makes a peculiar problem for the translator—and all translators of Latin hymns travel a road that is milestoned with the skeletons of predecessors who have failed horribly—for two reasons.
Art and Love
Authors: Gill Eric 
Published: July 2007

I.According to the teaching of the Catholic Church, and this teaching is necessarily true, for the Catholic Church teaches with the authority of God Himself, the reason of man’s existence is that he may know, serve and love God. Every activity of man must be directed to those ends, otherwise man is false to himself, for he is acting against his nature, and false to God, for he is acting against his Maker.For such a creature as man, then, the work he does is not primarily that he may earn the food he eats, the shelter he needs and the food and shelter for the children he begets. Food and shelter are not the ends for which man works. On the contrary, man’s work is the end to which food and shelter are the means. We say that man’s work is the end. That is to say, it is the immediate or proximate end. The ultimate end, the final end is God. All food and shelter are things to help man in his work; all work is to help man to his God.Now under the stress of an irreligious and therefore an ill-organised society, these things are forgotten or denied; God Himself is forgotten or denied, and men think of themselves as working merely in order to live. Food and shelter are proclaimed to be the ends for which men work and, being reduced to the level of a means to merely earthly existence, work is degraded and derided. This is indeed the curse of Adam; for Adam sinned when he ceased to contemplate his God.
The ‘Materialism’ of the Labour Movement
Authors: James Stanley B. 
Published: July 2007

The attack made on the Church to-day is, not merely different from, but, the exact opposite of, that made in the sixteenth century. What was then an offence is now a recommendation; what was then a mitigating circumstance is now a stumbling block. At the time of the ‘Reformation’ the accusation was one of superstition and materialism, though the latter word was not used. Our opponents posed as more spiritual in their conception of worship. Speech took the place of corporeal action. The pulpit replaced the altar and the preacher ousted the priest. The sacramental idea was almost completely lost.It is startling to turn from these criticisms to the censure of Catholicism, and, indeed, of all forms of religion, current at the present time. Other-worldliness is the favourite charge. We are said to divert the attention of the democracy from those material interests in the understanding of which lies its hope of salvation, and to fix it on an unreal heaven and hell. Dogmas are derided because they lead to what are regarded as unprofitable discussions concerning abstruse matters remote from everyday needs. It is we now who are too ‘spiritual.’This wave of materialistic thought finds the old-fashioned types of Protestantism entirely unprepared. The preacher addresses himself to empty pews. The exhortation to face the possibilities of the Future Life falls on deaf ears. Even the moral idealism that is adopted as a substitute for doctrinal truth fares no better; it is stigmatised as bourgeois ideology.
God-Made and Machine-Made
Authors: Gray John 
Published: July 2007

It is not superfluous to praise the divine gifts much and often. Certain weapons, the sledge and its derivatives, among which the wheel with its derivatives, are given man together with his environment, a true revelation by the Beneficent. At a chosen moment, as a civilization unfolds, man is allowed to economize his powers, to increase and multiply those things which, rightly used, lead him through rational to the uncreated Beauty. The moment is that of mechanical invention.This new thing—I call it new with necessary reservations—is so familiar that only the observant detect it. To the many, turning on the tap or the electric light, travelling by the railway, are underivedly natural processes; the postage stamp hardly differs from a leaf.Yet, blind and deaf men, think of a bridge, a beautiful concrete bridge, and the white ribbon crossing it in long and splendid curves, marvellously engineered; and the exquisite vehicles speeding upon it, so fair and swift, so strong in their sweetness, that they have to brake down at villages. 10 MPH brings tears to the eyes. What seems to be a word ‘yomph’ means ten miles an hour. There is exultation in the word if it is remembered what blows rained on the buttocks of the war prisoner marching to Shusan the Palace before the driver got two miles an hour out of him. You read at the foot of hills : ‘Loosen the hame rein,’ ‘Give him his head.’ I have never read, ‘For God’s sake carry her bundle or her baby.’
The Church During the Renaissance
Authors: Leibell J. F. 
Published: July 2007

The epoch known as the Renaissance is the most complex in all history. Various forces were at work moulding the national, economic, intellectual and moral life of the people. Religion was not the least important of these factors. After the fall of the Roman Empire, the Church was the sole means of civilization for the nations. From the time of Charles the Great, Church and State had worked hand in hand, with but little friction. Under the sway of Gregory VII and Innocent III, the temporal power of the papacy was secured. Philip the Fair and the exile in Avignon weakened papal rule. Pope after pope tried to protect and increase the so-called Donation of Constantine and the estates of Matilda of Tuscany which formed the bulk of the Patrimony of St. Peter.During the fifteenth century there was a change among the people in their attitude toward the Church. The economic growth of cities, the increase of commerce resulting from inventions and discoveries, the strengthening of central governments and the rise of national kingships, lessened subserviency to papal authority. But above all, the intellectual Renaissance developed an independence of thought which in many cases led to a change of dogma.The continent was dotted with universities which had grown up under papal patronage and enjoyed exceptional privileges. This was particularly true of the University of Paris. Within the walls of these seats of learning, Aristotle was honoured and St. Thomas Aquinas taught. Scholastic deductions had much to do with the intellectual activity of Copernicus and Columbus.
The Rejected Virgin
Authors: Vincent William 
Published: July 2007

It was finished. As far as his narrow workshop would allow, the artist stepped back, brush still in hand, to look at his work.It was full sunset, and the crimson rays stole through the open window, filling the untidy room with a warm glow. Opposite the window the brilliantly-coloured, sharp-cut statue stood out in bold relief against the glowing light. The artist gazed at it with critical pride. It was his great work, the tour de force of his many struggling years. Not that he wanted public recognition for his masterpiece; but he was glad that in his own eyes he had justified himself as a cutter of wood and stone. These things, dead to most men, he had learnt to touch with reverence and treat with patience. They had their moods almost like human beings; moods that commanded respect and consideration. Undue liberties were not to be taken with them. Humility had gradually taught him how to approach them, and in return they had yielded obediently to his touch.When the commission had come to him from St. Faith’s to carve a statue in wood of the seated Madonna and Child, he knew this was to be the supreme test of his art. He thanked God for the privilege of such a holy subject, and chose the piece of birchwood with loving care. His thoughts turned to the Mother and Son. She was to be a Queen on her throne, with the Little King standing on her knees.
Stazned Glass
Authors: Williams M. Meredith 
Published: July 2007

The little church of St. Peter the Apostle at Edinburgh, which has been so richly blessed in many ways, has lately been adorned with two windows, the work of Morris and Gertrude Alice Meredith Williams. These windows dazzle not only the eye, but the understanding; for it is difficult to believe what is here so evident, that modern artists have vindicated skill and courage even in competition with the great glass which is among the highest achievements of man. Mr. Meredith Williams has been good enough to put his signature to some remarks on the early glass which he and his gifted wife have specially and deeply studied, and the hopes there are of emulating what has been done in the past.The windows are small, namely, seven feet or so in height. They are situated in the Chapel of the Madonna and back the north. The chapel has the choir chamber above it, and is separated from the church by an arcade of two arches opposite the windows. If this description is clear, it is evident that the jewel lights have an unparalleled position; and that ‘the eyes of a panther in the dark’ are severely outclassed by them.The subject of the work is loaded as full as it can carry. The borders contain a multitude of emblematical matters; angels, the summit of creation next to the Immaculate Herself, are justly in much evidence; that Jerusalem which is above, and is our mother, appears as a Gothic town in the upper parts; instruments of the sacred Passion are figured,
Produce, Prospects and Prosperity
Authors: Cooper Gordon 
Published: July 2007

Although, in the distribution of mandated territory, considerable ingenuity was utilised in reconciling vested and imperial interests, the general public were not particularly interested in the matter, and in consequence very little publicity was given to the question. This is to be regretted, in that, in the opinion of the writer, that question more vitally affects every inhabitant of the British Isles than any scheme of Reparations, any theory of Balance of Power, or any dream of a League of Nations. If this opinion, and the grounds upon which it is based, can be sufficiently advertised, there will be possibly more attention paid to what is one of the greatest practical problems of the peace than has hitherto been the case, and more sympathy displayed in the struggles of those who, in bad climates at times, and under bad conditions always, are endeavouring to retain in a healthy condition those industries that will in the future become more or less the life-blood of the Empire.As the standard of living improves in temperate climates, the cost of production of raw materials in those regions increases almost proportionally, retarded only by the small economies that machinery, improved methods and co-operation in the provision of power can effect. The use of substitutes from the tropics is therefore essential, if the standard of living is not to retrogress under economic pressure. Imperially speaking, then, the conservation and development of our tropical assets is a paramount duty. Whether that duty has not been seriously neglected in the past may be an open question, but that it is entirely overlooked at the present moment—Exhibition or no Exhibition —is a tragically patent fact.
A Catholic in South America
Authors: Oakes C. S. Cosby 
Published: July 2007

The state of the Catholic Church in Latin-American countries is so often and so glibly misrepresented by ‘our separated brethren’ who sometimes succeed in misleading even Catholics, that it may be of interest to some to read the impressions of one who spent some two years in Peru, several months in Chile, and made short visits to Panama, Brazil and Argentina.Some of the impressions gained are necessarily superficial, as they were gleaned in the course of visits of no more than a few days’ duration in Panama, Rio de Janeiro and Buenos Aires. In Chile, however, and still more in Peru, there was more time and more opportunity for observation, conversation and the forming of definite opinions.Setting forth from San Francisco for that most fascinating voyage down the coast of Mexico and South America to Callao, I had considerable misgivings as to the state of affairs I might expect to find upon my arrival in Peru, and I carried with me a plentiful supply of prejudice. Arriving at Panama early one Sunday morning, I took the electric tram to the old Spanish city in order to hear Mass. It was half-past eight, and, to my dismay, the policeman of whom I enquired my way to a church informed me that I was too late, there were no more Masses. A kindly passer-by, however, told me that at nine the Bishop of X would be present at Mass in the Church of Las Mercedes; so thither I went, thankful to exchange the torrid, sweltering streets for the cool bareness of the church with its glassless windows. The edifice was already packed, but a well-dressed negro courteously insisted on giving me his place.
Speciosae et Delicatae Assimilavi Filiam Sion
Authors: Gary John 
Published: July 2007

Tell us, shepherds, what you saw;Tell us, were you not afraid?We saw the King of glory laid,A Babe, upon a little straw.Neither of you was afraid;Neither were you filled with awe.We saw Him lying on the straw,The Baby; and we saw the Maid.Tell us, was the Lady bright?Was the Baby strange and rare?Though we have travelled everywhere We never saw so fair a sight.Were there angels and a throne?Was the stable filled with light?The Maid was like a starry night;And He was like a golden sun.Tell us if the Mother smiled;Tell us what the Maiden said.The Babe was lying on His bed;And She was looking at Her Child.Shepherds twain, who speak so fair, Lead the way to Bethlehem.An angel guided us to them;And Bethlehem is everywhere.John Gray.