The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1868-05-03

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the workmen. He fitted up nice room, and
stored it well with books, periodicals, and
games, in which he invited them to pass their
leisure hours. He eildeavored to give them
good advice rs well as to comfort and eucOur-
age them. But II would not do. The attempt
to teseh others only brought homo the more
painfully to his mind how sorely he needed In
structien himself He was trying to feed other
men, while himself was starving. Cropping in
| the dark, blind, blind, blind, he was presuming
to guide the steps of his fellows. If he asserted
something respecting their duty, and they
questioned it, he knew of no infallible standard
| to which he could appeal. He could not tell
them what mans duty really was, for he knew
not why man was placed here, nor what placed
him, nor whittier he was bound, nor whether
he was bound anywhither. He did not like to
confess this to the men he was trying to help |;
but If they pressed him close, he stammered
and hesitated, and if they pressed him closer,
he was dumb. He persevered, however, for q
year: Then he gave it up, and resumed his
mined not to expend the whole of his energies,
| and most of his time, III earning that ridiculous
sum of nine cents day needed for keeping the
100 BODILY NY. apparatus going And as for guiding
nine cents, it would be time for him to teach
them when he himself had found ont something.
Fourierism came up about this time. Mr..
Brisbane, n young man OF fortune, returned
from Europe full of the dreams and theories of
Fourier; which he proceeded to expound to
the public in the young Tribune; and highly
! creditable it was, both to the man and to the
newspaper, to do and risk much in the dis
cussion of such a subject. To err in the service
OF man is nobler than to be wise for ones self.
Mr. Hecker became, acquainted with Mr.. Bris-
bane, discussed FOurerism with him, and,
without being able yet to point out the fathl
defect in the system, felt that it would not
work.
Up to this period-aboht the twenty second
year, of his age--he had never SO much as
thought of looking into the Roman Catholic
| mind that there could be anything worth con-
sldering in creed only known to him the
one held by Irish laborers and servants, whom
he had seen kneeling before the church doors
on Sunday mornings. He was led to think of
the Catholic Church through one Of its fercest
enemies. About twenty i've years ago there
or Brownlee, who conceived the brilliant and
original scheme of gaining distinction in his
profession by calling his Roman Catholic
the execrati6n of mankind. New York was q
very provincial place then, and there were stil
considerable number of persons living there
nature. So Brownlow, DID,, fourished for a
while. He denounced the Catholic Church
most fuently in the old Chatham street chapel,
the Do,enfaH Of Babylon, in which he continued
the work. In this amusing periodical he in
serted Q good many extracts from Catholic
the Middle Ages, and, especially, from those of
the more recent Council of Trent. can myself
remember an interesting list of anathemas"
in the D0,cnfdU of Babylon, which led me to ex-
pend a small sum at book-stall in the days of
my youth, in the purchase of the volume con-
tanning the complete catalogue of the same, as
pronounced by the council just named. 1t is
really remarkable how uniformly denunciation
and persecution help their objects. Almost
any Catholic priest you meet can name I" con-
yerts, !" who were made such by people of the
Brownlow species, and by such events as the
Philadelphia riots of 1874, in which one or
two Catholic churches were burned. Such
things excite iSqxiry, and when once person
has reached the point of suspecting that
Catholic priests are not the designing and in
sldious monsters which the Brownlows say they
are, reaction is apt to set in, which is often |
fold.
No one will be made Catholic by reading
such discourses as that which has the
honor to engage the readers attention, although
it is written in spirit of sincere respect for the
most venerable and the most indispensable of |
existing institutions. If you wish to make
style, and set on a mob to burn churches
Mt. Hecker was an occasional nearer of the |
ln19rlate Brownlow, and an occasional reader
of his DoUnfaU. He read with particular in |
terest, and with nascent approval. some of the |
decisions of the Council of Trent especially |
the one that repudiates Luthers doctrine
called justification by faith alone,D which had |
long appeared to him questionable, if not alb |
surd and injurious. 1t seemed to him, or began
TO DO so, that 1t was more congenial to human
nature, and more reasonable, for man to work
out his salvation and to be able to merit some
thing of his Creator. Even recently as
twenty-five years ago, many people still at
''tsneu importance TO uneSe tne0l0Slcal nlcetleS
which now few unprofessional persons regard
OF know anything about. SO long as ali are
agreed that good works to be done--as
many of them us possiblc-and bad works are
to be left undone-the modernized mind cares
little for the precise theological process by
winch these duties are established. 1t was also
pleasing to this young Protestant to know that
the Catholic Church, church, had uniformly
opposed the doctrines named after Calvin, who
burned his brother at the stake because that
brother indulged in some vagaries of opinion
upon subjects about which no mans opiuion
has any value since it cannot he founded upon
knowledge
But it was not these things that made this
Young inquirer after truth IL Roman Catholic.
The great conversions are not effected through