The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1880-07-31

| his tempest in teapot, and his assumed grief
| with the following This comparatively un-
known man has the infinite assumption to at
tempt to annihilate by one fell blow the we'll
matured convictions and preferences of those
| who own and highly prize AppIetons' Ameri-
can Cyclop1dia." What if this Miller, when
grinding his little grist at the johnson mill
had been bitterly denouncing Appletons' Roman
| Catholic Cyclop0dia in unmeasured terms. and
| also instrumental in bringing that ''B1fqhted
| Cyctop@did" Immediately under the critical
and Just eye OF the REV. DR.. WALKER, and
from him obtained the following scathing let
| ter and sent 1T to the unknown man." Such
are the facts, unpalatable as they must be to
| Mr.. Miller.
From J. e. MiIler-uow Appletons' hire
| ling
| BRATTLEBoRo, VT, March, 1878.
| MeSSrs. A. j: johnson & Son: Enclosed please
| find report for last week, and also copy of
! document signed by 80 persons who have or
dered JOHNSON'S ENCYCLOPEDIA, 10 of whom
reside in Vernon and IS in Brattleboro' and
there are more to follow Six of the leading mon
| exchanged 1ppleton's Reyised 16 volumes for
| JoHNsoN's. l could have taken more of them,
but never exchange unless obliged to do SO
| in order to sell JoHNsoN's. Everybody repu-
| dates the Condensed "Rdt-Trdp," and public
sentiment is setting strongly against Appleton'S;
and JoHNsoN's is steadily gaining ground, and
very few will deny Its superiority over all its
| competitors. Yours truly,
| ]. E. MILLER.
THE LETTER MILLER SENT THE UNKNOWN MAN.
| From Rev. DIR. Geo. Leon Walker,
Late Pastor Of Center Cong. Church, Neao
| Hdcen, Conn.
Having examined with a good deal of care
the two editions of AppletonS' Cyclopgdia with
| respect to certain charges made against the
| later edition, as betokening an undue papistic
| tendency in the representations made upon
| certain important historic subjects, 1 find,
month"; 70 H.
lief, that such charges have substantial basis
| OF truth. While in the great body of the ar
| tices so revised in the later edition the alter
alton is small in amount, yet such alterations
| are very numerous, and invariably tend in
| one direction, giving an unmistakable bias
toward high views of the claims of the papacy
| and low estimates of the wrongs committed by
that system. In several articles, howecer, more
than bias is manifest. A positive falsifca-
| ton of history is chargeable upon the COM
| piler of several important articles Among
| them may be specified those on the Council Of
| Constance IA very important council in its
bearing upon papal claims) and that on I1fal
| hbility In both these articles history is abso-
| lutey falsiied in the interest of the papistic
| claims. And it is difficult TO avoid the belief
| after survey of the whole work and the
| number OF the alterations and their uniform
| tendency, that the object Of such TeUisiop ards
| edition acceptable to upholders of the Roman
| Catholic pretentions. FEBRUARY, 1875
| s'The Laborer is worthy of his hire."-LUKE
| CHI. KIT
WANTED-Sombody to come to the defence
| of Roman Catholic Priest against the Outra-
| geous Aspersions of ID. Appleton Co., who,
| having contracted with the Rev. DR.. O'Reilly
| to take their Cyclopiedia and "cook' it from
| Beginning to End in the Interests of the Ro-
man Catholics, and he having done the Jes-
! utilizing so well as to enable the Appletons to
| dispose of Thousands of volumes of this
| "Blighted Book to Romanists, now, in order
| to sell it to Professionals the Appletons hypo-
| critically and publicly charge this Accom-
| plished Teacher of that Insidious and Despotic
Foreign Order with not doing that for which
| they Employed him, and which he Engaged to
| do; or, in common parlanoe, the Appletons
| virtually declare Father O'Reilly to be Hum
| bug and Fraud
"BUT THERE is A FRAUD SOME
| WHERE. Bacon.
| From the Rev. Dr. Leonard Woolsey
| Bacon,
Son Of the Rec. DR.. Leonard Bacon of Ner
| Hdren Conn.
THIRD PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, PITTsBURG,
MARCH, 1873.
The case of Appletons' Cyclop1did, in its re-
| latlons to the Roman Catholic Church, seems
to me very clear case as it is stated by the
publisher and the Rev. DR.. O'Reilly in cir
| III.
The language of DR.. O'Reilly's letter, circu-
lated by Messrs. Appleton among the Roman
Catholic priests, is so constructed as to admit
of double Interpretation, and if it had been
addressed to the public at large the intention
| of it might be open to doubt. But, consider
| ing it in view of the person from whom it
| comes and the persons for whom it is confess
| eddy intended, the letter, though not an ele-
| CANT document, is perfectly lucid one.
| First, it says: This much for the articles
| m nm he OIj In,
| ION, that he has the hearty sanction of the
| Most Reverend the Archbishop of New York
in his supervision of these articles, and his CO.
operation and advice at all times when ques-
ton or difficulty arises which needs the eye of
authority" 1t does not distinctly sag that he
| has supervised all these articles under the ad.
| vice OF the archbishop, but if it does not mean
this in circular soliciting the patronage of
the CATHOLIC clergy" what does it mean? And
what are ''the articles which touch in any way
on the Catholic religion" as these words ale
understood by Catholic writers and readers?
They include tamong other subjects) History,
Political Geography, Politics, Law, Moral
Statistics, Education. 1t is part of the COM
mon dialect of the Romish priesthood to speak
of these things as so affecting the Catholic
| religion" that they cannot be taught in any
system of public education without violence to
| consciences.
Secondly, DR.. O'Reily's letter promises mo
industry or labor shall be spared by me to
make every article touch as satisfactory as
it can be-" Satisfactory to whom? To the
people for whose eye he is writing, or to some
body else? If he noes not mean, in this special
circular to the Catholic clergy, that in the
vast range of subjects indicated he has taken
| pains to set forth that set of views and state
ments that is satisfactory to the Catholic
clergy and unsatisfactory to all the world be-
| sides, what does he mean?
Thirdly. Furthermore, the editors are re-
solved that this edition shall, in every depart
| ment, be distinguished by the utter absence of
sectdridn spirit" What do Catholic priests
| understand by ''sectarian spirit?" An ardent
| zeal for the ACKNOWLEDGMENT of their own re-
ligious party and bitter hatred of all others?
| Not at ALL That is not sectarianism Their
sect is not a sect: it is the Church. Sectarian-
ism consists in kindly disposition towards
| those bodies which have separated from the
| Church. And this is the thing that DR..
| O'Reilly promises his brother priests is to be
excluded fromsthis edition of Appletons' Cy-
clop@dio. And it is not only Dr. O'Reilly who
promises this 1t is Messrs. Appleton, who
| print this letter and send it to the Catholic
| priests to ''solict patronage" The Appletons
| are not fools. They know the impression these
| words are calculated to make those to
whom they send them, The Letter from the
| Editors" which attempts to represent the doc
| ument in question as mere pledge OF judicial
| impartality, is shamefully disingenuous 1t
is unworthy of a great publishing house, it is
ungorthy of the honorable reputation of Mr..
Ripley but there are names connected with
| this Cyclop9did of which it certainly is not
unworthy.
AS to the question whether the pledge of the
publishers to the Catholic clergy, that the
work should be cooked" from end to end to
! satisfy thu m, has been carried ont fully and in
good faith, have not time to sal isfy myself by
minute examination of the 1900 pages of the
work. The publishers assure us that it has not
been done, and that they never had the slight
est intention of doing it. The circular to the
Catholic priests, promising that "articles
which touch in any way on the Catholic re-
ligion'' shall be made "as satisfactory as they
can be-" was only one of their playful tricks
of the trade and they allege, with honest
pride, that O'Reilly never touched or saw the
articles which they had promised the priests
that he was to have the supervision Of. On
the other hand, so careful and scrupulous
man as the Rev. DIR. Walker declares, after
examination, that they have been as good as
their word, and that the work has been studi-
ously manipulated in the interest of Roman
ism. do not undertake to say which party
is getting cheated in this matter-whether the
Roman Catholic clergy or the general public.
But there is a fraud Somewhere; and until we
hear some complaint from those whose patron
age DR.. O'Reilly solicited, we shall infer that
they are not the sufferers.