The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1874-04-19
d / O N
II III E S l B Y l. s .
Il CLASSIC, CHRISTIAN NOTEL,
MILES GERALD KEoN,
Author of " Harding, the Money Spinner" etc.
From the Catholic World.
Il CLASSIC, CHRISTIAN NOVEL,
From the Catholic world.I
tContinued.)
PART ~.

81 think" said Augustus, "that we should
all now be glad to lear Dionysius the Athe-
MAN." An eager hum of assent and approval
arose from the jaded and stated, but iuquisitive
and critical society around.
"Thore are in your philosophy" continued
Augustus, Z" two leading principles my Athe.
MAN, in support of which am both curious
and anxious to hear you advance some SOLID
and convincing reasons You despise, as
Cicero despised it, the notion of a plurality of
! gods. You affirm there is only one. You say
| that god who could begin to be o god, or
| begin at all, can be no god and that the true
King of all kings, is tho giver of whatever
exists, and the recipient Of nothing That he
is without a body, pure and holy intelligence.
That every thing else is his work, there
never were, and never will be, and never could
be, any limits either of his power or of his
knowledge. At the same time, you reject the
notion, adopted in some Greek systems, that
he is the soul of the visible universe and this
universe his body; affirming him to be antece.
dent to and Independent of all things, and all
other things to be absolutely dependent upon
him.
" Is it not SOL"
"Yes," answered Dionysius; "such is my
assured conviction"
"Ths, then," said Augustus, els the first
question upon which 1 wish to hear you and
the second is, whether4hat force OF principle
within each of us which thinks, reflects; rea-
sons, and is conscious of itself, will perish q
our death, or will live beyond it, and is of
such nature that it will never perish, as
Plato, Xenophon, Cicero, and many other
illustrious mon and very great thinkers have
ardently commended"
"Ah!" said Dionysius, in a voice indescriba-
bly, sweet and thrilling, while all turned their
eyes toward him; unless that God himself
assist me, shall be quite unequal to the task
you impose upon me, Augustus. 1 am not
worthy to treat the subject upon which you
desire me to speak. You are aware that many
learned persons in our Europe expect, and for
a long time have expected, some divine being
to appear one day among men. / see the able
governor of Rome, Lucius Piso None will
accuse Piso of credulity, none suppose him a
weaver of idle fancies, or a dreamer Of gratu-
itous reveres. An able administrator, ap
accomplished man Of tho world, and, il he will
pardon me, more inclined to be too sarcastic
than too indulgent, he, nevertheless, despises
not this expectation. Our learned friend
Strabo, whom 1 me, will tell you
moreover how it prevails, and has from i'm
memorial times prevailed, in various and often
perverted forms, yet with an Underlying
essence of permanent identity, among the
nations which make some thirty O.
languages resound through the immense ex-
,anses Of Asia. Bot Domitius Afer desires to
Interrupt me-"
Afer said:
al do not discern how this ancient and
Mysterious expectation which Goats vaguely
through the traditions of all mankind, and in
more definite shape forms the groundwork
or the whole religion of the Jewish nation,
an be at all connected either with the immor-
atty of the thinking principle inside of rs,
II with the question whether there is one
upreme, absolute, and eternal God who made
his universe"
"All would have added )" replied Disnysius,
in regard to that expectation was, that after
he appearance Of this universal bsnsfastor,
many spblirs ideas which hitherto oniy the
tEsugeas intelleosa hare entertained win pre-