The Catholic bulletin. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1911-1995, 1914-05-30


the armament, only while the full noon
day sun, in it's dazzling splendors,
is unnoticed, unseen. The solemn
facts of revelation remain; and Christ
remains. Christ reigns. No, the ad-
vance of the world of man, progress
in discovery and science, marvellous
victories over matter and nature, have
made no change as to Christ and His
Kingdom; rather, as researches have
been intensified and a keener insight
into history has been obtained, do the
solemn facts regarding His life and
preaching and the supernatural inf1u-
ences working therein stand out in
clearer light and more broadening per-
spective.
God remains, and Christ remains,
amid all the whirlwinds of time, amid
all the perturbations and changes in
material and human things And well
it is for us that God and Christ do re-
main; else gloomy and miserable were
our existence
The soul of man clamors imperious-
ly for God; without Him it's cravings
are never stilled, its hopes and aspira-
tons never attain their goal BY it's
deepest forces the soul is impelled on
ward and upward; nothing within it
and nothing around it gives satisfac-
ton. The plenitude of truth and
goodness is it's need; the repose of as
sured bliss, in an immortal life, is it's
coveted goal. And all this comes only
from the eternal and the infinite. In
the presence of the human soul, hun
gering and thirsting, the world of
matter, in it's most alluring forms, is
a dismal failure. It's richest treas
ures placed on our tables, the craving
of the spirit still goes on; the most
Joyous feasting is unable to dispel the
despairing shadow of the swiftly ap-
preaching figure of darkening death.
Amazing is the victory of man over
nature; amazing the accumulation of
treasure and of enjoyment that he has
been able to wrest from it's bosom;
but amid it all the soul is not satiated
and never will it be satiated until the
Almighty God is within it's embrace.
draw its life, but from every word
proceeding from the mouth of God;
not in time, but in eternity, are it's
hopes realized, it's aspirations borne
into the peace of enduring fruition.
We need God; we need Him not
only as He reigns in the highest heav-
ems, Creator and Sovereign, the be-
ginning and the end of all created be-
ings; we need Him coming down to
mind and to heart in truth and in
grace, whispering to us a fuller mes.
sage of truth than mere reason re-
echoes, and inundating our hearts
with sWeeter and stronger love and
grace than natures richest overflow
ing can possibly dispense; we need the
God incarnated in Christ, teaching and
working in Palestine nineteen hundred
years ago, teaching and working amid
living humanity throughout all his
tory, down to our own ver1
selves. o the folly of men, who il
humanity's name bid Christ to recedv
from the embrace of humanity unde,
pretense that whatever of his place
in the history of the past, He is no
longer needed when the world of man
has come upon the scene, in it's new
est evolutions, potent and self-reliant,
all-suf1cient to itself in all its spheres
of life and activity! Christ removed,
what is there to build up the moral
life, without which man is no longer
the man, but only the beast; no longer
guided by reason, but by the lowest
and basest appetite. Will wealth and
material comforts subdue passion and
induce the practice of self-denying vir-
tue? We are putting wealth and ma
terial comforts to the test and what is
happening? The peril to good morals
increases because the means of graft
flying our passions is more readily at
hand. Will theories of Independent
morality morality for its own sake
win the practical adhesion of their
votaries? In the moment of tempta-
ton these theories break into shreds,