The Irish standard. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn. ;) 1886-1920, 1893-01-21

grown gradually smaller within the las
quarter of century. Many OF then
have seen the Pope and were able tt
converse with him in his own language
They have read his letters and opinion
upon all the great questions of the age
And they have found him to be in line
with the best sentiments of the heart and
the best philosophers of the world The
vast majority of American Proteetants
are busy, energetic and humane peo
pie. It permitted to follow the bent Of
their inclinations they would manifest
little of that virnlent hatred common in
the religious history of the old world
They have religion but it is rather of a
philosophical than theological cast. II
they think on religion at all, it is the re-
ligion which lies ahead of the world, not
that which lies behind it. They have nc
more interest in old dogmatic lines and
effete creeds than they have in the old
colonial surveys and the military roads
of earlier days. When DR.. Fulton re.
turned from his western tour in the in
terest of the Pauline propaganda he ex-
pressed his deep chagrin at not being
able to arouse the Protestant world
against the Church of Rome. This, ]
take it, was good evidence that the Prot.
estant world had out-grown his kind of
preaching don't mean to say that
they had grown any nearer to the Catho-
lie Church, but they had grown farther
away from the theology of rot and rant.
But the mission of DR.. Fulton was not
entirely without fruit. In connection
with others working toward the same
end he awakened great apprehension in
the minds Of certain classes. Organiza-
tions began to spring up in every town
and hamlet. Through these centers in
fammatory literature was circulated
everywhere with liberal hand. Journals,
pamphlets and documents devoted en-
tirely to calumny and falsehoOd were
sown broadcast around the hearth stones
of the common people,.
Men who had been expelled from the
Catholic Church fifty years ago for
crimes Of immortality, men who had
rsnted SO long against the Catholic
Church that they were untitled for any
thing else, all came again in the role OF
hypocrisy and poured forth volumes OF
filth and slander in defense of liberty and
purity. These unclean birds, trembling
with senility, auttered up from the vaults
and cesspools, their wings heavy and
their craws distended with the dirt of
half century, to puke on the Church OF
Rome, and cav theology in behalf of q
religion which is said to be the religion
of both the old and the new testament.
In this ostering atmosphere OF intellec
tual decay and moral rot was bred the
microbe of the American Protestant As
sociatlon.
Passing from the A. P. AS, as an or
ganization, to the elements which com.
pose the society. might say that, while
it is politico>religio affair,it is not with.
out we'll defined business aims. It ie
difficult in these days to find society SO
humane and religious as to forget the
fact that
Man is born sinner,
And diurnally claims his dinner,
While the tread-mill world goes round.
Any society that entirely ignores this
fact will have few members and be OF
short duration. The A. p. Association
has neither forgotten nor ignored it. Or
CARNATIONS must hold out some temporal
Inducements. It must pay assessments
on the death of member; it must take
care cf it's poor and sick or it must pay
dividends as it goes. As temporal ad
vantage, the A. p. A. assures it's Nom
bers that the end and object of the SO.
ciety is to evict and eject Catholics that
are now in Office; to keep them out of Of
fee and employment in the future, and
boycott their trade and Industries. The
reward Of the A. P. A. is not to be sal
ary or dividend. It is to be pro-rata
division Of the spoils Of an anti Catholic
war. There are hundreds In it's ranks
who have no special antipathy to the
Catholic Church, unless they have re:
Gently cultivated enough to fit them for
the work to which the order is devoted.
Then there are thousands of those who
don't know enough about any church OF
form of religion to make them RESPONSE.
BILE for their opinion, one way or the
other. There is undoubtedly number
that may be classed az the honest and
the ignorant. These are the men who
act on the evidence laid before them. It
never occurs to them that it is. or could
be, after nineteen centuries Of Christian
ity, systematic and regularly estab-
lished propaganda for the sole purpose Of
circulating unvarnished lies and slanders
against the church Of Rome. Indeed il
lie to the credit of their hearts thst they
don't believe it, but it is equally discred-