more, then will unfold countless delicate spiritual powers unguessed to-day in the dreary uniformity of money-making. Longing for glory, longing for service, will play upon a humanity responsive, high-mettled, eager."

As we look back on earlier generations and see the waste of energy in accomplishing slowly, or not at all, what is now done quickly, so later generations may look on us with pity in view of our waste of effort on that which pertains to the material side of life. There may be, will be, a finer race of men, when through inheritance and a more equitable distribution of goods, much becomes automatic which is now laborious, and when time and vitality are set free for the higher enjoyments and services of society. The significance of corporate immortality is not the mere continuance of the race, but its improvement and elevation by means of the heritage of comfort, of knowlege, and of morality which enables the new generation to begin, as it were, where the vanishing generation leaves off, to possess and use habitually, almost automatically, what its predecessors gained by conscious and constant struggle.

Progress in religious thought proceeds along similar lines. Beliefs which we assume as a matter of course were once matter of intense difference. The postulates of to-day were gained in the controversies of yesterday. We can scarcely realize that common opinions respecting the church of God, his government of the world, the kingdom of God in society, and the spiritual conditions of eternal destiny, have, at one time and another, been disputed and even rejected. These beliefs are not, of course, automatically held in any mechanical sense, or without consciousness on our part of their value; but they are taken for granted, are the accepted conditions under which we expend our direct effort to realize them in the actual life and need of the world. It may therefore be hoped that certain conceptions of God's revelation of himself in Christianity, for which the few are now contending against the many, will become the generally accepted postulates of the Christian faith, and that energy now consumed in discussion will be liberated for a larger and finer service in the purification of earthly society. The saints and religious heroes of the future may not surpass those of the early age, but society as a whole will rise to a higher level of spirituality through the common appropriation of the noblest faiths.

The point of view we have taken looks out on many related questions. Is the extension of automatic action a limitation of personal freedom? It is sometimes argued that habit produces involuntary, even necessitated action, and that the process is constantly going on, until the very appearance of choice vanishes. But the considerations we have been presenting look the other way. The extension of automatic action in the lower range of faculties is the enlargement of freedom and power in realizing the higher objects of personal life, for it is growing facility in the application of means to ends. The more things a man can do without conscious effort, in the use of his bodily powers, in the use of

reasoning faculties, of memory, of languages, of music, the wider range he has in the great pursuits of literature, science, philosophy, art, and religion. He has more power and he has wider area. Animals have more automatic action at the start, but make little appreciable gain upon it, and get no release for higher uses. Man, by increasing his unconscious and subconscious action, of which he has but little at the start, widens his range continually, and increases the effectiveness of his personality, which guides native and acquired powers to the ends he may choose. And there is no ascertained limit to enlargement of power through the extension of habitual action into the various facilities of which man is capable.

One of the strongest supports of the belief in personal immortality is at this point. The capability of mastering many branches of knowledge and of gaining many kinds of power seems unlimited. The more one learns, the more he is able to learn. What is wanting is not ability, but time. We can hardly believe that a creature who has the capacity for becoming facile to the point of automatism in so many physical and mental attainments will lack time to realize his vast possibilities, or will ever reach a stage in learning, or skill, or insight, or appreciation which must be called the final stage of knowledge or power.

THEOLOGICAL AND RELIGIOUS INTELLIGENCE.

THE CONGRESS OF CATHOLIC SAVANTS.

[Translated from the author's MS. by Rev. Charles C. Starbuck.]

WHILE the Evangelical Alliance was holding its general assembly at Florence, the Catholics were meeting at Paris in a scientific congress. This is a fact to which, somewhat curiously, the Protestant journals of France have paid no attention; they have not even thought it worth while to mention it. We might allege in excuse that their thoughts were entirely engaged with the important gatherings that have just been held in Italy; but such an excuse would amount to nothing. It is only too well known that we are accustomed to view Catholicism only on its weak sides; we are no longer capable of comprehending, nor even of studying, its real life. But if it is really our enemy, it is singularly bad policy not to keep an eye on its movements; otherwise we are condemning ourselves to the mere reiteration of commonplace criticisms against it, and are preparing for ourselves unhappy surprises.

Is this congress, however, of real significance? Let the reader judge by the following account. In 1885 a local assembly of the Catholics of Normandy was about to meet at Rouen, having in view the organization and encouragement of certain works of charity, of Christian patronage, of apostolic activity, and of instruction. Some gentlemen, who had promised to assist at this congress, asked themselves whether they ought not to avail themselves of this reunion of enlightened priests and competent laymen to lay before them a grave question. They had been struck

with a twofold fact. On the one hand, it is always science which unbelievers oppose to Catholicism; on the other hand, respect for science is so universal that it would be dangerous to allow men to believe any longer in a radical antinomy between the character of a Catholic and that of a savant. Among those on whose minds this peril weighed was Canon Duilhé de Saint-Projet, author of a "Scientific Apology for Christianity," which in a few years has reached a third edition and has been translated into the principal languages of Europe. M. Duilhé de SaintProjet succeeded in impressing the organizers of the Rouen congress with the gravity of the question; a section was created charged with the duty of studying the means of warding off this danger, and after long and serious deliberations this section expressed the desire that a scientific congress of Catholics might be convened with the least possible delay. This desire was realized in 1888; it has just been realized in 1891, and it will be again in 1894. We see by this that we are not dealing with a casual fact, but with one which it is hoped to elevate into established usage. It is a new line of proceeding which Catholicism thus appears minded to adopt, and it behooves us to consider its import.

I.

The enterprise of which we speak, and which we see to have turned out a genuine success, was not well received at first. In the beginning it encountered difficulties on all hands, and if the men who initiated it had been easy to intimidate they would soon have renounced their plans; but they had not lightly embarked on an ill-devised adventure. They had weighed beforehand the seriousness of the obstacles; they had foreseen the various objections, and were not behindhand with their

answers.

They encountered at the beginning the hardly-concealed opposition of Catholic savants. These advanced a very plausible pretext. "Science," said they, "is ill-suited for public display; it ought not to lie at the mercy of a more or less transitory fashion. If the congress succeeds but indifferently, such a failure would be very prejudicial to Catholic savants." This motive of hesitation, unquestionably, was very honorable; but those who expressed it might well have added another reason of deeper import, but one which it was more embarrassing to avow. Many of them cultivate the sciences without any arrière-pensée; feeling themselves good Catholics, not being annoyed by the ecclesiastical authorities, they are little inclined to ask how the liberty of their researches is compatible with the Syllabus. This problem dismays them. They do not permit themselves to approach it, and declare themselves incompetent to resolve it; they remain submissive Catholics and free savants, without exploring a contradiction which they end by no longer so much as perceiving. This explains why M. Duilhé de SaintProjet's proposition was received with so little warmth. Without closely entering into their own sentiments, many Catholic savants have had vague forebodings of painful questions of conscience; they have stood aghast at the possibility of coming in collision with problems which they choose rather not to see. This is at the bottom of so many hesitations, which those who felt them did not judge it wise to explain distinctly.

It is curious, but the theologians have been at one with the savants in

rendering homage to the good intentions of the initiators and in raising up obstacles before them. Their motives are easily divined. They were bethinking themselves within what limits the innovating spirit of thought could be indulged in the liberty which it desires. "Would one be strong enough to say to the savants, 'So far may you go, and no farther'?" Especially, would one succeed in interdicting them from the examination of certain questions appertaining alike to science and to faith? Priests do not love to raise certain cases of conscience in the souls of laymen; no wonder, therefore, if they were somewhat dismayed at the idea of a scientific congress of Catholics.

In view of such difficulties, the organizers of the congress held themselves on their guard against an offensive precipitancy. They had in view, not a half success, but an entire, a brilliant success. It would not have sufficed them to gather together certain priests and certain laysavants; they wished to evoke a veritable manifestation of Catholicism. Ambitions of such a scope were incompatible with haste; accordingly, they postponed till April of 1888 the congress which it had been originally intended to hold in 1887. This delay gave room for the inauguration of a vast propaganda for obtaining adhesions, for combating the objections of the undecided, but, above all, for securing the intervention of the supreme authority of the church. The Archbishop of Paris was heart and soul with the initiators of the enterprise; he undertook to submit their project to the Pope, to whom, after some negotiations, he dispatched a memorial on the question. This memorial was at once submitted to examination by a special commission. Now, Rome is not only the capital of orthodoxy, it is also a marvelous centre of information. Not only was decision given there that the project contained nothing heretical, but it was also judged that it matched exactly with the special necessities of France, and that it saw the light at the most suitable season. Accordingly, under date of May 20, 1887, a papal brief was addressed to the Archbishop of Paris in the terms following: "The matter which you have in hand is laudable in itself and honorable to you. It may also well be fruitful of happy results, as well for the genuine honor of the sciences as for the defense of the Catholic faith." Moreover, to this full and formal encouragement, which closed the mouths of waverers, the Holy Father added counsels admonitory of the temerarious: "In particular, things divine are too exalted and too sacred to be suitable for discussion in a congress, not to say that many of you lack the authority implied in holy orders. Accordingly, even in such questions as have a certain affinity with theology, properly so called, each one will see to it that he remains within his proper range, of scientist, historian, mathematician, or critic, without ever usurping the province of the theologian."

It is easy to divine the result. The Pope's brief was accepted as a word of command. No one any longer believed himself at liberty to advance any objection to the initiators of the enterprise; silent if not enthusiastic acquiescence had become a duty. Adhesions forthwith began to come in from all points of the Catholic world; they amounted to more than 1,600, and of this number not far from 600 were from foreign nations, Austria-Hungary, Belgium, the Netherlands, Italy, England, and Germany. More than 400 members took part in the proceedings of the congress; among them there was remarked an American prelate, M. O'Reilly, who was at the head of a pilgrimage to Montmartre.

We cannot afford the space to give in detail the history of the congress; it lasted four days, and displayed a great activity. It was divided into six sections: (1) religious sciences, (2) philosophy, (3) law and political economy, (4) history, (5) mathematical, physical, and natural sciences, (6) anthropology. The papers read and discussed in these sections have been published in two volumes. The success was complete; the quality of the adhesions had been as eminently satisfactory as their quantity. Savants of the first order had given their personal attendance, and had thus contributed to secure to the congress the attention of the indifferent and even of the anti-religious public.

The initiators of the work had good reason to felicitate themselves on their perseverance. All the difficulties anticipated had been surmounted; to the initial fears and hesitations had succeeded a universal enthusiasm, and it had been unanimously decided to convene a second congress in April of 1891. Has the satisfaction been as great at the Vatican? The facts shall answer for us. As soon as preparations were in progress for the second congress, thirty cardinals of the Roman Curia and of different countries, almost all the French bishops, and about fifty foreign bishops declared themselves the patrons of the enterprise and recommended it to the Catholic world. And the Pope himself, in a brief of the 16th of March last, took occasion to express to the Archbishop of Paris his sympathy and his good wishes for the assembly which was about to gather. Is there not deep significance in such a prodigality of encouragements?

Need we say that a work undertaken under such auspices, so powerfully sustained by all the authorities of the church, could not fail of success? This time adherents have reached the number of 2,500, of whom 1,700 were French. Among foreign countries, Canada and the United States (especially the Catholic University of Washington) had sent in adhesions and some memoirs. More than 600 persons took part in the congress; 149 memoirs were read and discussed during the sittings. The course of proceedings had been admirably organized. The sections, now numbering seven (a new one having been created for philology), held forty-four sittings in four days, from the 2d to the 6th of April. They did not always work separately; when a question appeared to belong to two sections, these joined in studying it together. Thus the sections of philosophy and of anthropology held joint session to study the problem of heredity, those of history and of the religious sciences to discuss the origins of Christianity. At other times a section would subdivide, to give opportunity for specialists to meet and discuss some detail.

It is impossible for us, even in a dry list, to enumerate the problems that have been agitated in these sessions and the conclusions that have been sanctioned; but some general remarks suggest themselves. First of all, the discussions have not been governed by the apologetic interest. Unquestionably it was not wholly wanting, and in certain cases it has been distinctly visible. For instance, we find the essay made to demonstrate how, saving the rights of the First Cause and the immediate creation of the human soul, the philosophical doctrine of evolution can be accepted by Christians. So also the proof was attempted that the most certain results of contemporary science accommodate themselves better to the metaphysical framework of St. Thomas Aquinas than to that of Descartes. Indeed, there were even present imperturbable dis