The Seattle post-intelligencer. [volume] (Seattle, Wash. Terr. [Wash.]) 1888-1914, 1892-01-15
THE SPIRIT OF CARDINAL MAN
MING.

MING.
The late Cardinal Manning was a great
and good man. His intellectual power
was exhibited in his genius for organiza-
ton and execution; his humanity and
tenderness of heart was attested by per-
sonal imitation of Christ in his daily
walk and talk with his fellow-men. In
deed, so keen were Cardinal Manning's
democratic sympathies with all men,
whether within or without his church,
that he stood at the head of the modern
prophets who have both preached and
lived wha. might be called divine social
ism; that is, socialism to the extent that
Christ and every true. unselfsh lover of his
fellow-men is socialist.
The sanity and subtle Newman was the
greatest preacher. thinker and literary
genius of the Roman Catholic church of
our century, and OF Cardinal Manning it
can be said that he was the ablest execu-
tive Christian in the world. His social in
huence over the working masses of Eng
land OF all faiths was immense He not
only stamped his foot and like magician
made the waste places of England blossom
like the rose with wise charities, but he
girded up his loins and stepped down into
the ditch himself to give his hand TO the
poor and the perishing classes. He did
not go over TO Rome until seven
years after Newman became a Ro-
man Catholic, but in his forty years
of residence within the church of Rome it
Is safe TO say no English prelate, past or
present, ever did so much to make his
church vital force of true Christianity in
Xavier, Dominic, st. Francis Assist and
Fenelon seemed to breathe again in Card
nal Manning.
Cardinal Manning freshly illustrated the
potential quality of the socialistic element
OF Christianity which has made it the re-
hgion of democracy. The influences of
Christianity on society have been essen
tally socialistic. The angels appear to
the poor man; the promise of rest to the
sorroSful and heavy laden is made to the
poor; the germs of the influences that
live IN socialism and labor reform
were found in the philosophy and preach
ing, If not the practice, of primitive Chris
tianity. This il was that made Christian
ity go" from the start, for it fascinated
all the laboring classes of mankind and
planted those seeds that in our century
have borne, or at least are beginning To
hear full fruit. The march of Christian
lty under the Roman empire was because
the Christian evangelist preached fra
terniiy, or the brotherhood of man, and
proved his faith by his philanthropio
works, and this has been its surprising
vitality above other faiths 10 the present
hour. By its socialistic forces and inhu-
euce thrones have been undermined and
aristocracies upset, and today the forces
which Christianity unleashed threaten to
supplsnt individual philanthropy with
organized paternalism.
Cardinal Manning has been the Saint
Jerome of his time. but ne has been
wiser than Saint Jerome; he has clearly
seen that the church could not afford TO
ignore socialism; 1t must control and
subordinate its expression or anarchistic
socialism would upheave both church and
state. and if the prophets OF pessimism in
Europe, who frankly say that Christian
ity has opened the tioodgates of socialism"
do not prove true oracles, il will be due 10
the wise and conservative efforts of the
leading minds of the Catholic church, like
Manning in England and Gibbons in
America. whose influence with the work
ing classes is immense. Whether il was A
London dock strike or meeting for the
relief Of the Jews in Russia, or the famine
stricken peasants of Ireland. there you
found Cardinal Manning's inspiring, en-
couragjng and consolins presence. The
value of Cardinal Manning rs great pub
lie conseryator of law, order, industry
and content has been recognized by every
great English statesman for the last
twenty-five years, and Mr.. Gladstone
owes his success as political and social
reiormer something 10 the support and
sympathy that has been manifested for
his cause by Cardinal Manning.
The life Of this great man illustrates one
OF the essential principles of Jesus, which
has been defined as a severe and lofty
sustained self-consecration 20 right" for
he set an example Of anhroken unworldli-
ness. lie did not go 10 the Utopian ex-
treme Of the religious reformer of the
middle ages, but he never forgot that
Christ not only preached Temperance,
charity, honesty. justice and truth, but
also went further and preached above sill
things selfaenegation; the love of our