make that fashionable, outside of the Catholic Church, and make them willing to subsist on the fortieth part of a university professor's salary, throwing in their health and their life as a martyr's contribution to the cause. We trust, indeed, that higher education and university development will, in the United States at least, move to a lighter step, and march on with a more cheerful air. But the observation made here by the reviewer whom we quoted before is quite apposite. Without being a Catholic, he implicitly pays that tribute which all history must concur in paying to the Catholic spirit and to Catholic times. He observes that the great work can never be furthered except by the same principles which founded the great monuments of educational zeal abiding to our day. "Higher education always did require the help of the patron of letters and of the founder of the college."

Nor is it only in letters, but in the most favored pursuits of science does the same financial obstruction bar the way. We have heard a plea made and reiterated, under the taking title of the "Endowment of Research." It was taken up and re-echoed far and wide. "The waste of water-power at Niagara," was the querulous strain indulged in, “is as nothing compared with the waste of brainpower, which results from compelling a man of exceptional qualifications to earn his own living. The owner of a great estate admits that the important charities of his town have a well-founded claim on his purse. It would not require a very great change of heart for him to feel a vivid sense of shame if a few scholars are not carrying on their researches at his expense." This appeal, instructive on its own account, had come reverberating from divers magazines on both sides of the ocean, when an Oxford professor had occasion the other day to deliver an address in his capacity as president of a newly-chartered institute of chemistry. He thought fit to animadvert upon the terms of this appeal. He called it "cant." He thought scientists might manage to live by their science, no matter how. His contention was that men of science had a right to live; let them use their science as a means of livelihood and live by it anyhow. To this a solemn editorial in a leading scientific journal gravely responded, protesting. It propounded its views on the whole duty of a chemist, and took the professor solemnly to task for his profane and low views.

Common spectators like ourselves may have a right to infer that, even on the privileged ground of science, finances are an element of disturbance; and, if so, how much more troublesome may they not be in the work of Catholic lectures. To these we now return; and we say that if the popular Catholic lecture would only go of itself, and the right kind of people would only come of themselves, and the expenses of the hall and other matters would only adjust

themselves automatically, while enlightenment could shine over all meanwhile, there would be no need of much financial management, nor of an organized arrangement to consolidate the business basis of the scheme. But, as things are, the one thing indispensable, next to the finances themselves, is some good management to set them in order and to keep them so.

There is no doubt but that much activity has lately been exhibited in the interest of Catholic lecturing. A suggestion was made some months ago, and it was credited to a distinguished writer in this QUARTERLY, that public conferences should be given by able Catholics on points of Christian doctrine; that the men who expounded such points should be able, by their ability and eloquence, to command the attendance of the curious and interested; and that the places chosen for the conferences should be those which could easily be reached by the mass of the infidel and the indifferent. Various laudable efforts have recently been made here and there. In Chicago a series of popular lectures have been given, apparently with such satisfaction that we have caught the echo of commendation returning from the other side of the Atlantic. In Baltimore we have seen a similar programme followed, and so far encouraging in its results as to suggest a flattering inference, which has, in fact, been drawn with regard to the prospects of a new university. Elsewhere similar efforts assume proportions to arrest general attention, and the excellent results upon mixed audiences seem positive indications of a great field opening. On this account, so much the more importance attaches to forming a right estimate of the whole enterprise.

In none of these instances which we have cited was the effort made separate from a Catholic institution, and flung out, as it were, into the midst of the general population. Yet this is a salient point to command a certain portion of the field. There is a large body of the population which labors under the weight of sheer prejudice with regard to our institutions; and though the presentation of philosophical subjects, of ethical and scientific questions, may well be considered to leave the collegiate hall free from the imputation of what the narrow mind calls " sectarianism," yet there is no arguing with a certain order of prejudice, there is no making it liberal, and a large class of the infidel and the indifferent will no more enter a Catholic institution than they will gather round a Catholic pulpit. Protestantism is not what it was. Indeed, there is little left of any Protestantism which can claim to have been before. That spirit of sectarianism which started in the sanctuary has now had time to find its way to the theatre. It has no pulpit, nor does it care to see one; no altar, nor will it hear from one; no

temple, nor will it find itself inside of one. There is "the appointed desolation"-barren infidelity.

This movement, which we call Protestantism, began in a disturbance, not unprovoked, of moral, social, and national life. It maintained, at first, a set of doctrines which the necessities of the moment postulated. The moment flitted, the necessities changed, and the doctrines grew. Able men and busy generations were not wanting to make them grow; and the law by which they did grow made them disintegrate into new systems, decompose into ulterior elements, and finally crumble into the dust which to-day strews all natural science with the thinnest residue of the supernatural. The law of dissolution which has brought it down to this is simply that of men's minds being active and every man having a mind of his own. When once the process of error and corruption has begun, nothing can withstand such a solvent as the action of men's minds upon the tenets and doctrines which are submitted to their criticism. This solvent is technically rationalism. It is a destroyer which has grown on the vitals of Protestantism; and the system of independent and wilful thought, which began at the pulpit and listened to the answers returned to it from the pulpit, is to-day abroad in the wide, wide world, as a wandering rationalism that knows neither guide nor compass, has neither faith nor hope, and is without God in the world. Now, it seems very useless to look for this fugitive spirit except by pursuing it, and on this view we could conceive a party of laymen organizing to have skepticism sought out and confronted, wherever it is likely to be found.

The Catholic Lecture Bureau of St. Louis started out upon such a principle. It formed itself of twelve laymen, who were moving about in the various walks of social and business life, and who by their position and influence could command attention and help to direct public opinion. They took special pains to select a subject which should be of live interest to every man of the times, and should enjoy a fair chance of engaging the widest attention by being treated in a public hall. The subject chosen was "Culture and its Relation to the Modern Mind;" which relation naturally divided itself into the four aspects of religion, arts, science and social life. The gentlemen tendered an invitation to different lecturers, soliciting the favor of hearing them treat the whole subject in due order before an audience indiscriminate as to its religion, but as select as could be in point of culture. The result of their negotiation was that the Right Rev. Bishop Keane, of Richmond, spoke of the religious sentiment under the title of the "Light of the World;" Rev. Thomas O'Gorman, of Merriam Park, Minn., treated the social aspect under the name of "Man's Aims in Society;" Right Rev. Bishop Spalding discussed the side of the liberal arts under

the head of "Self-Education;" and the Rev. Thomas Hughes, S. J., treated the side of "Scientific Culture." The audience in actual attendance comprised the best representation of the non-Catholic community. And it is confidently affirmed that financially, as well as intellectually, it has been the most successful course of lectures given in St. Louis, whether under Catholic or non-Catholic auspices.

Be that as it may, we are not of the opinion that any personal attractiveness or intellectual excellence of individual men will ever succeed in making of a lecture programme a financial success. If the one before us has been successful, it is owing, we imagine, to the constitution of a bureau. Here it is just the same as with mercantile enterprise. The best work offered will not bring customers, unless the work is brought home to the customers. They expect to be waited upon. Style and lecturing are become such a common commodity, not without proving to be counterfeit sometimes, that the public are to be excused if they show themselves not over-hasty in running to a lecture hall. We know of a case in a single great city where, in a short space of time, one popular preacher of great name, a New England divine, and another speaker of not less notoriety, failed utterly to gather an audience, the one a single time, the other twice. We must understand, then, that clever management, proper advertising, personal activity on the part of laymen who are themselves moving in the different walks of social life and are prominent,-all these are functions of what we conceive as a business bureau. Their time and personal concurrence in the work are perhaps of more value than the financial risks which they are willing to stand. And certainly no greater title to respect could add dignity and weight to their invitation, when they solicit the best talent in the country to lecture under their auspices, than that they themselves should be known to be' acting on pure Catholic principle, to be risking money, sacrificing time, and devoting all surplus proceeds to the poor, merely for the sake of rendering possible a work of highest zeal, of genuine devotion, and of true Christian charity.

We should anticipate some specific difficulties in an enterprise like this. It has often seemed to us that Catholics might be excused from many things, not only because their numbers are limited, but also because what they have in the way of means, and what they themselves are in personal ability, are both largely preoccupied in work and business of their own. And when there is question of new efforts in the way of charity or zeal, though true charity is boundless, and zeal is a fire that never burns too brightly, still we say that the general excuse has often seemed plausible. The men are preoccupied; their available funds are preëngaged in

charities already urgent. Money, therefore, and what is often more precious than money, the personal work and personal activity, and the time necessary for this, are oftentimes not forthcoming. Whatever the case may have been with regard to the efforts of this bureau, we observe that no lay speaker was engaged to expound any part of their first year's programme. The fact suggests a useful reflection; whether perhaps, even if capable men are really preoccupied by business, such work as this may not be rightly classed by them under the head of business. If endowing a charity with permanent funds is generous, why should it not be generous, nay, from a Catholic point of view, imperative, to endow the public mind with the funds of one's mental treasures? seems the noblest business that can claim a place; and, if a place, then its own degree of precedence.

And to finish our sketch of the work with an observation upon the subjects treated, we would not have it understood that only the negative work of meeting rationalistic ills, and curing the diseases of the mind, is the full function to be discharged in this lay mission of lecturing. It is true that one part of the function is medicinal and corrective; but the better part is primarily corroborative and constructive. All that is positive in Christianity, and all which in Christendom is due to the progress of the Church, is a principal part of the lecturer's work before the world. If Protestantism has retrograded and disintegrated, the spirit of Christianity, and all that is due to the influence of the Church, has gone forward on its way with the advance of years. If Protestantism is not where it was, neither are we, but in quite an opposite sense. Whether the "Reformation" had come or not to leaven the mass of Christendom with the leaven of the Scribes and Pharisees, the Church would still have continued leavening it with her spirit as of old. That spirit of hers is truth in every order; not merely in matters of faith and morals, but in matters of art also, of science, of industry, of social progress. The institutions which she had founded early have all developed, from constitutional governments down to primary schools. The literatures which she had set a-growing, and for which she had stood as godmother in fostering the national life of peoples, were all in process of unfolding when Protestantism came, and they were still to be beautified in their respective tongues. The art of printing, which had been invented, was already at work in making all the treasures of enlightenment a common property of men. The fine arts owned the Church as their sole custodian and patroness. Science was to march forward, keeping the line on which her priests and scientific men had set it moving. Protestantism came. Did that change the rights of ownership and the prerogatives of patronage and taste? It did