The justification for the writing of this book, if justification is needed, must be that the author has been asked to write it. He has been asked by friends, who are not themselves Catholic, to describe to them, as far as he is able, the inner spirit, what the French admirably call the <vie interieure> of the Catholic Church. Its history, more or less, especially from one angle, they know; they know besides much of the active life of the Catholic Church which is to be seen every day, and almost everywhere, about them.

They are acquainted with much of her teaching, some of which is also their own; some, as they understand it, is not, and is even repugnant to them. But they feel, and indeed are sure, that there is also something else contained in the idea of the Catholic Church, something which lies beneath both the history and the teaching, which has produced the one in the past and gives life to the other in the present, and which, therefore, must be more important than either for a right understanding of the Catholic Church. If they could discover this hidden thing, if they could realize its working as a Catholic realizes it, perhaps that alone would throw light on many differences of judgment. What is seen on the surface can only be an outward manifestation of that which is within. That these exterior signs of Catholic life may exist at all, there must be an interior spirit, a soul permeating Catholicism, which gives the unity, the consistency, the solidarity it certainly possesses; which is displayed, not without enthusiasm, in the lives of all true "practicing" Catholics; and which produces the fruit that has everywhere, and in every generation, been produced by the Catholic Church.

Therefore, the author presumes, one has been asked to describe that inner life who himself shares it, who himself lives in it, and who, he sincerely hopes, lives by it. Surely this can be the only way by which even a glimmering of the truth can be gained. No one goes to a Russian Soviet to learn the truth about the soul of England; in like manner no one who sincerely wishes to know the Catholic Church as she is, seeks his knowledge from one whose pen is dipped in gall, whose mouth spits venom, and whose mind, on this point at least, is only a confusion. Such a writer can never tell the truth, no matter what may be his subject. For right understanding demands sympathy, hatred must ever be blinding; and even if hatred, in its most evil sense, is not there, still its half-sister, prejudice, can twist and turn this truth to its own purpose, till the picture that is finally painted can never be more than a caricature. This is particularly true in dealing with matters of religion. "He grasps both what is patent and what is latent in religious matters," says St. Augustine, "who keeps charity in his heart. Love leads him to inquire, love guides him in his search, love bids him knock at the door; when at last he has found what he has sought, love enables him to keep it."[1]

It is as an answer, then, to a request of this kind that the writer has made the attempt contained in this volume; and in the spirit in which it has been written he asked that it may be read. Though what is called Theology must inevitably at times come into its pages, still he offers here no work of either theology or apologetic; he holds no brief, and he accepts none, either to defend his Church or to prove the truth of what she teaches. He has been asked simply to state her case, almost to expose his own soul, at least to explain his inmost belief in regard to the things of God and man, for those who wish to hear it. He trusts, therefore, and he thinks he will not be disappointed, that his readers will, at the very least, give him the credit of sincere faith in what he writes; and, next, will accept what he has to say, not only as his own private conclusion and view, but as the belief which he shares with his fellow Catholics, either explicitly in form or implicitly in practice, and which is founded on evidence such as, to him at least, is according to reason and convincing. If the account here given were not this, if it were merely an exposition of the writer's beliefs and no more, it could not be a reliable expression of the Catholic mind. He sincerely believes in and loves his Church, to which he is no convert, but which has come down to him from the days when every soul in England was Catholic. He thanks God every day for the gift of the faith which came to him as an infant; and he regrets nothing more than that so many of his fellow countrymen have lost this inheritance which once belonged to their forefathers. He knows that many, perhaps most, of his readers do not share that faith and love, do not regret that the inheritance has passed from them. Still, not on that account does he condemn them, or even feel altogether estranged. He has lived long enough, under many varied circumstances, to learn that fundamental differences of thought, especially in matters of religion, are due to many causes, very few of which are under the control of man himself. "The Spirit breatheth where he listeth"; "the kingdom of heaven is like unto leaven," whose action is secret. The method of Jesus Christ our Lord was never one of compulsion; but when one came to inquire He "looked on him and loved him," and to another who merely showed appreciation of His-words He said: "Thou art not far from the kingdom of God."

In the same way, and he hopes in the same spirit, the writer has had and still has many friends, Protestant and pagan, Mohammedan, Hindu and Parsee, and he has seen for himself the wonderful working of the grace of God among them all. Many a time he has reminded himself, with the evidence of facts before him, that Jesus Christ our Lord came into this world "not to judge the world, but that the world may be saved by Him"; and that He died, shedding the last drop of His blood, not for Catholics only, not even for Christians only, but for all men whoever and whatever they might be. As St. Augustine has well said, in times not too much unlike our own, with his vision, as usual, including the whole world: 'The Redeemer came and paid the price; He poured out His blood and with it bought the world. Do you ask me what He bought? See the price He gave and you will discover what He bought. The price is the blood of Christ Himself. What is adequate to a price like that? What, but the whole world? What, but all the nations of the world? Indeed they make little of the price that has been paid, or else they must be very proud, who say either that it is so little as only to have bought the men of Africa, or that they themselves are so important that such a price was paid for them alone. Let not such people think too much of themselves, let them beware of their pride. He Who gave so much gave it for all."[2]

On this account the author writes at variance with no one, but only with the hope that what he writes may bring men closer together: "that we may know them, and may be known by them"—<ut cognoscamus et cognoscamur>—as the present Holy Father said to him not long ago. Not-a word therefore, that he puts down is intended to be controversial, or to reflect in any way on the convictions, that is, the genuine convictions, of another; if a phrase of this kind creeps in, it will be intended to be no more than an illustration by way of contrast. He writes only the positive truth as he knows it, for friends who have asked him to write it, and he asks that his words may be read and interpreted as a friend would read and interpret the writing of a friend.

There may be some who would claim that the account here given of the soul of the Catholic Church does not belong to the Catholic Church alone; that much of it belongs to all Christianity, and is shared by the particular Church to which they belong. To these the writer can only reply: Thank God! Then after all we are not so fundamentally separated as we supposed. Would that everything that is here written could be said of us all, as it could once have been said of our forefathers! Then the reunion of Christendom would not be long delayed. If the discovery of a large common ground is the only fruit of this book, it will not have been written in vain.

Note.—The quotations from the Scriptures throughout this study will ordinarily be taken from the Douai Version, as being more familiar to the writer himself and to Catholics in general.

As we read again what we have written in the chapters that follow, we are conscious of the dividing line that separates men into two camps today, camps which become more and more defined. On the one side are those, of whatever creed, who accept the supernatural as a reality, on the other are those who do not. To the latter there is no beyond, or if there is it does not concern them. God may or may not be; in either case He does not come into their reckoning. Therefore for them every definition of every fundamental principle of life must be framed without Him. Life itself and its object; duty and its obligations; freedom and its consequent responsibilities; love and its return; sacrifice and its reward; evil, its significance, its guilt, its punishment, its cure; good, its value, its nobility, its recompense, its fruit; man's relations with himself, with his fellow men, with his country, with friends and enemies, with the whole human race; possession, power, pleasure; right and justice; truth and honesty; virtue and vice; all these things, for him to whom the supernatural means nothing, must be given definitions utterly different from those accepted by believers in God. Indeed there can be no definitions; where man is himself his own ideal, his own standard, his own judge, his own goal, all these things, however the fact may be disguised, must in the end be subject to his own service, must become means to satisfy, to complete himself.

For such this book can have no meaning whatsoever. It will only irritate him, it may stir his contempt. He will call it a mass of self-delusion, unscientific—a word that does not belong to this generation only—antiquated, a dream wanting in common sense, not confirmed by experience, perhaps even a bondage, invented by priests and religious to trap and enthrall free man. To one who may see only this in the book, we would ask him to lay it down; it is not meant for him. We would only say to him that the life and ideals it has attempted to describe, are those of fifteen hundred years; that though they are old yet are they also new, fresh as the infants and children who, in millions annually, continue to imbibe them and build their lives upon them. Nay more, apart from the three hundred and fifty millions of believing Christians, there are hundreds of millions more, whom sometimes we call pagans, to whom the supernatural is a great reality, and for whom the ideal here described has a full and acceptable meaning.

Modern unbelief is a very isolated thing; it looms large, but in comparison with the race of man, and even with the Christendom in which it raises its head, it is very small, confined, in a groove all its own. It is called the new paganism; in justice to the true pagan we should give it another name, for the true pagan condemns it even more than do Christian men.

But on the other side there are those to whom God and the supernatural are a great reality, who know in whom they have believed, and are certain that they have not been mistaken. They believe, not as an opinion only, that they belong to God, and that God has a care of His own. They believe that God has spoken, has told us things we could never have discovered of ourselves, has, in His love and care, given us laws and commandments for the ordering of our lives. Therefore, for them, because He has spoken, life and duty, love and sacrifice, evil and good, right and justice, have meanings and definitions far-more clear and certain than man could ever devise of himself; they have sanctions which make them and the civilization built upon them, far more stable than anything man of himself can build. It is for these in the first place that this book is written, whether they agree with all it contains or not; at least their judgment will rest upon first principles concerning which reader and writer are agreed.

Without that initial agreement progress in mutual understanding is impossible.

I am asked to describe the Catholic mind; where am I to begin? Or what aspect of it, for there are many, shall I try to analyze? At all events, wherever my course may ultimately lead, I can begin with the fact of God. I know there is God, one and true, objectively real, containing in Himself all that I mean by the word personality and more. I know that He is beyond, and independent of, creation, that creation and all that is in it depends and must depend on Him; yet that He is near to it, and in every creature in it, that He is near to me, as near as I am to myself. I know that He is almighty, and that nothing is impossible to Him, that He is what the theologians call immense, intimately permeating all things so that nothing at all is hidden from Him, not even man's most secret thoughts, not the past, nor the future, nor any cause, nor any effect. I know my God is infinite in wisdom, and can never do other than that which is best in His own designs; that He is perfect in justice, even while His boundless mercy is above all His works; that He has a providential care of all the things that He has made, and, above all, of men, that they may be saved unto Himself.

I know my God is not only real, more real than I am myself, not only just, not only merciful, not only infinitely true, and faithful and secure; He is also a God of love. Infinitely loving, infinitely worthy of all love, is this God of mine, so loving, so lovable, that He is love itself; from Him all love comes, to Him all love returns. I cannot think of God, but my thought, if it be true, must be tempered by love; I cannot judge of His acts unless they are seen with the eyes of love; if I would discover anything at all about Him it must be sought entirely through love. I know that in this one God of mine there are three Persons, whom we little creatures call the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost. We call them by these names because by love they have been so revealed to us, by love we have been shown their relations one with another; and when we grasp anything at all of the meaning of the Blessed Trinity, we find that it is no more nor less than the infinitely perfect expression of infinitely perfect love. The Father and the Son, the Father giving to the Son all He has, all He is, Himself; the Son and the Father, the Son giving back to the Father all He is, all He has; the Holy Spirit—how feebly we express Him!—the mutual love of the-Father and the Son, infinite and therefore one; such is my God, seen from this darkness after a dark manner, whom one day I trust I shall see face to face.

And if there is no other key to the knowledge of my God in Himself but that of love, neither is there any other key to the knowledge of His dealings with His creatures. He knows me, this God of mine, far better than I know myself, far better than anyone else can know me; and in spite of that He loves me. He knows my nothingness, my weakness, my sinfulness, yet for all that He looks on me with pity and with love. From all eternity—I can speak in human language only—He had me in His mind and loved me; and because of that love in time He made me, because He wanted me. That same love drove Him not only to make me a human being, but to make Himself man, for me and like me; having given me myself, love impelled Him to give me Himself as well.

He became man for me, but that was not enough. He must still go on giving; He must give me all He had. He must give me His life. He must die for me. For love of me, He lived for me; for love of me, He died for me; for love of me He rose again; having risen, having "passed out of this life to the Father," yet He loved me still. For love of me He ascended into heaven, as He said, to prepare a place for me; that where He was I might also be, when time shall be no more, for all eternity.

But even this was not enough for this tremendous lover. When He had gone from this earth He would not leave us orphans; He would still come to us. It was expedient that He should go, but He would return. So long as I remain in the valley of this death, He would abide as well. As for the means of His abiding, He would find it; and He found it in a little bread and a little wine. Love made Him pour Himself out once more; He gave Himself to me wholly and entirely in the Blessed Sacrament. And even this was not enough for this God of love. Had He willed merely to abide with me upon this earth as my companion He might have come to me in some other way. He might well have stood by my side as Man, transfigured perhaps, and in all His present glory; and I would have known Him and would have adored, lovingly adored, like the beggar born blind whom He healed in the lower city of Jerusalem. But He willed much more; love clamored for more, and it would not be denied. For love of me He united Himself to me. Through that same Blessed Sacrament He came into me; with His own life He fed my life:" He that eateth me, the same also shall live by me. He that eateth this bread shall live for ever."

Yet more, for love is never satisfied upon this earth; it must always be giving, it must always crave for a return. Therefore would He be still further one with me; as He had found the means by which He could come into me, so would He have me be drawn into Him. He would live on this earth in yet another way; His spirit, His life should dwell among men even as the life of the vine dwells in its branches, more than the heat of the fire dwells in the red-hot iron, as the very soul of man dwells in his body. He would dwell in a new body, a mystical body indeed but none the less real, which He would call His Church. He would have me a member of that body, a part of Himself, grafted in Him as the branch is grafted in the vine, and drawing my very substance from Him. He would have me live, no, not me, but He Himself would live in me, by means of His own living organism which is the Church. Thus, from beginning to end is the story of this God of love's dealing with me perfectly consistent; it is all just like God.

Granted love, granted the all-devouring and all-giving love of this infinitely loving God, who can do all things, to whom nothing is impossible or difficult, I see how His gifts to me follow one another, drawing Him down to me, and drawing me up to Him, till all else fades away and I am lost, if only I will have it so, in His fond embrace.

God loved me before I was, Therefore He made me.
God loved me after I was made, Therefore He became man for me.
God loved me after He had become man for me, Therefore He died for me.
God loved me after He had died for me, Therefore He rose again for me.
God loved me after He had risen for me, Therefore He ascended into heaven for me.
God loved me after His ascension, Therefore He came back to me.
God loved me after He had come back to me, Therefore He entered into me.
God loved me after He had entered into me, Therefore He made me one with Himself
A member of His own body "Which is the Church."

This and more is my God to me, even here and now in this life; what He will be to me when we shall meet face to face, "eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive." Or at least this and more He would be to me if I would allow Him. For here is another manifestation of His love. He has left it to me to accept that love, or to reject it. For perfect love, as we know, has three functions; it longs to possess its beloved, it longs to give to its beloved, it longs for its beloved to return this love. And that this may be done, that it may be perfect, love must be voluntary, the beloved must be free. God loves all the creatures He has made, and in return they tell unceasingly His glory. <Coeli enarrant gloriam Dei, et opera manuum suarum annuntiat firmamentum.> But they cannot do otherwise, their love is not their own, any more than the reflection in the mirror belongs to the mirror that reflects it.

The other creatures of earth are the mirror of God; they are beautiful because they reflect Him, lovable because, and in so far as, they reflect His love; but in themselves they are only His creatures, the work of His hands, with no will or choice of their own by which they may give Him that voluntary love which makes of love a perfect consummation.

To man alone on this earth has this power to choose freely, and to give freely, been given. That He may have that consummation, that He may have the glory of love freely returned to Him, by His own creature, for His own sake, my God of love if I may use the word with reverence, has run the risk. He has made a creature that should be under no compulsion; He has given to me, His beloved, the power to say whether I will love Him or not. He has shown me much of His beauty. He has made the heavens tell me His glory, He has told me the secret of Himself, in a thousand ways He has bribed me and allured me. Plainly He has asked me for my love; He has even demanded it as a commandment, as His one and only -commandment, leaving me to eat of the fruit of all the other trees in His garden. But still He has left me free. In spite of all the attractions, in spite of the cords with which He has bound me about and drawn me, I have the power within me to refuse Him, to deny Him, to say I will not love Him, but will love some other thing, even myself, in His place.

And free man has failed Him. I have failed Him. He has tested me, He has put me on my trial that I might prove my love, for love is not content with words; and I have failed. I have said to Him: "Lord, Lord," but I have not entered into the kingdom. I have preferred myself to Him, I have put some glittering trifle, some passing satisfaction, before His infinite golden love. The very power of loving, which was His unique gift to me, in which I was most like Him, of which He alone was wholly worthy, I have taken away and given to other things, and have wasted it on them. This is what I mean by sin. I have cut myself off from the love of God as far as I have been able; I have told Him to His face that I do not want Him but prefer another. I have offered Him the injury and insult not only of putting Him in the second place, but of giving Him no place at all, behind me and out of my sight. I have turned my back upon Him, I have despised Him, and I have said that I would be willing to abide by the consequences.

This I have done, deliberately done. Whatever excuse I may make for myself, my abysmal ignorance, my blindness, my weakness, my fascination at the moment the pressure of circumstances against me, there have been times when I have known full well what I was choosing. I have felt His loving eyes upon me, and His hands outstretched to help me, yet I have preferred to go my own way, and to leave Him for my own desire. And having left Him, having deliberately made my choice, obviously now it was impossible for me to undo it of myself. What I have so deliberately surrendered I cannot of myself take back. From the beginning I had no claim to it, it was His own free gift to me; much less therefore now, when I have rejected it. I could not even ask for it again; I had sinned against heaven and against my Father. At most I could only plead, because I know that Father's abiding love, that I should be taken as one of His hired servants. 

But my God was still the God of love, and He loved me still with an everlasting love. Though I had turned away and had gone into a far country to escape Him, yet He pursued me with pity; He could not change. I had robbed Him of His rights, not only of those due from one beloved for whom He had done so much, but also of those due to Him from His creature; still He would not strike. Had another done to me what I had done to Him, I might justly have cast him off. He would not so treat me. Even if repentance had been possible, I had nothing with which to repay Him; I had offended the Infinite, I had committed an infinite offense, and that no finite creature could put right. I had thrown away my own powers of loving, and had no right to any other lot but that of my own choice. Yet He found a solution, to Himself as well as to me; infinite in mercy and goodness, infinite and constant in love, He devised a way by which this debt should be paid. Full justice should be done to Himself, at the same time love should be given back to me if I would have it. If I would, I should be forgiven; I should be restored to the rank I had lost; out of the ruin of myself I should be remade; I should be given a new and clean heart, nay, one with a greater power of loving than ever my heart had before.

How was this to be done? Again I must speak in human language, for I know no other. I must express the truth in the only way in which I see it, "as in a glass after a dark manner", nevertheless I know that the shadow which I see is real, though but the shadow of a reality still greater. One day this too I shall know even as I am known. God the Father looked down on His beloved creature, wayward as he was; He still looked on him and loved him. God the Son, the Mind, the Word of the Father looked down on His creature likewise; for "through Him all things were that were made, and without Him was made nothing." He saw the injury done by man to the Father, which man himself could never set right. God the Holy Ghost, the love of the Father and the Son, saw the injustice; and injustice must be atoned. It could not be that for all eternity this discord should remain; though a divine atonement were needed, yet would a loving and almighty God find the means. In spite of himself man should be saved, if he would but accept the salvation offered to him. God Himself would save him, though He would need to become man to pay the price, though it would cost Him the last drop of His blood to convince man of His sincerity.

This, in substance, is what the Christian means by the doctrine of the Atonement and the Redemption. Looked at from the human side alone, and with only human vision to fathom it, it seems incredible, perhaps even fanciful, a poetic dream and no more; St. Paul himself at times seems staggered by the wonderful thing that has been done. But looked at from the side of God, with the vision and love of God to guide us, we recognize in that outpouring of Himself the completest expression of His nature. We say it is just like God to do such a thing, in such a magnificent way. He is essential love, and if ever there was done an act of love the Redemption was such an act. It was an act beyond the dream of man; yet was it worthy of, in complete keeping with the infinite love of an infinitely loving God, bestowing Himself in an infinitely loving manner.

Man could never have conceived it; hearing of it, measuring it with his natural concepts alone, he doubts whether such an extremity of love is possible. Accepting it, because God Himself has said it is so, on the authority and assurance of Him who has done it, man is driven to declare that only a God of love could have conceived it, only a God of love would have done it. It is a deed worthy of God.

"God so loved the world as to give his only begotten Son" (John iii, 16).
"Christ loved me and gave himself for me" (Gal. ii, 20).
"In this we have known the charity of God because he hath laid down his life for us" (I John iii, 16).

"By this hath the charity of God appeared towards us, because God hath sent his only begotten Son into the world, that we may live by him. In this is charity; not as though we had loved God, but because he hath first loved us and sent his Son to be a propitiation for our sins (I John iv, 9, 10).

And yet love has not yielded one whit of the debt of honor due to God Himself. For it has to be remembered that besides being infinitely loving and merciful God is also infinitely just, just to all His creatures, just to Himself, and the work of the Son of God made man, besides being an act of infinite love is also an act of infinite justice. The offense of sin committed against an infinite God is, because of Him who has been offended, an offense infinite in its consequences; yet by the satisfaction of the Man God the reparation is complete, infinite for infinite. Nay more, when we consider the Person who has made the reparation, it is superabundant; the homage of the infinite Man God gives to the Father far greater glory than the sin of finite man has tarnished.

"Where sin abounded grace did more abound, that as sin hath reigned to death, so also grace might reign by justice unto life everlasting, through Jesus Christ our Lord" (Rom. v, 20, 21).

Thus at once the infinite mercy of God has been given the fullest scope, even while infinite justice has been fully satisfied.

"Mercy and truth hath met each other; justice and peace have kissed. Truth is sprung out of the earth; and justice hath looked down from heaven" (Ps. lxxxiv, 11, 12).

The Word of God made flesh, truly God and truly Man, the one Person, the Person of the Word, the Eternal Son of God, the Person of our Lord Jesus Christ, Man and God: on that essential truth Christianity is founded, to secure it she fought for centuries and her children died in thousands, by it and upon it she built our civilization, without it she is not. Modify it, and at once the essence of Christianity is modified. Explain away the Godhead, and Christianity loses all that vision, and hope and love, and driving power, all that glory in suffering and energy to die, all that straining after an ideal which, since the days of Jesus Christ, has given a new meaning to life, and has been the character stamped upon its growth. Without this foundation Christianity, and the civilization which still bears its name, differs in nothing from any other civilization or creed. It can claim no priority, it can give no explanation of its own effect on the history of mankind; when the infidel says in contempt that it excels in battleships and guns and nought else, it has nothing to reply. But once the belief is accepted, and becomes a basis of life, all is at once made clear. For this we need not go beyond our natural experience; even here on earth the effects are seen easily enough. The first, as is obvious, is the ennobling of human nature itself. Because God the Son became Man, man himself has received a nobler status. That the Word of God, the true Son of God, out of love for mankind, should have so wedded Himself to it, and should have given His life for it, at once raises human nature to a rank akin to His own. Out of love the Incarnate Word has given to human nature His own personality, He has raised it unto Himself; and if that is the measure of the love of God for man, how much more must the love of man for his fellow man be raised above anything it had been before!

"My dearest, if God so loved us, we ought also to love one another.... If we love one another, God abideth in us, and his charity is perfected in us.... Let us therefore love God, because he hath first loved us. If any man say I love God, and hateth his brother, he is a liar; for how can he hate his brother, whom he seeth, and love God whom he seeth not?" (I John iv, 11-20).

In these words St. John sums up the practical result of the Incarnation and Redemption on the life of man in this world. In doing so he gives us the key to the history of Christendom. But, secondly, not only is human nature as a whole, in the Person of Jesus Christ our Lord, so ennobled and praised; we, too, every human being who is a partaker of that human nature, is also ennobled in himself. For this Jesus Christ, who is God, is also our Brother in the flesh; in some sense, however remote, every man is related to Him. Not only that, as we hope to see at greater length in another chapter, He has left on earth His mystical body. Into that body He has incorporated those who believe in and love Him. He has made them partakers of His own divine nobility.

Through Him and in Him we become the adopted sons of God, we share in the life divine. Even as the Word of God has given Himself to, and lives in, the human Jesus Christ, even so, as we shall see, though in a lower order, has Jesus Christ our Lord given Himself to us, and made us one with Him. St. Paul never tires of repeating it. We are members of that living, mystical body; as such we have been given the right to claim His satisfaction for our own, His merits for our own, His very prayer for our own, that as our own we may offer them to God, in expiation for our misdeeds and to win from Him His mercy and favors restored. Thus do our feeble, human petitions, the paltry acts of reparation we are able to make, the little sacrifices we may offer, become of value in and "through Jesus Christ our Lord"; for the Father will not ignore prayers and sacrifices, however small, that are steeped in the blood and instinct with the life of His own well-beloved Son.

The Eternal Son of God had become incarnate on earth in the Person of the Man Christ Jesus, that He might give us His all, that He might be one with us, and that, being made one with man, He might lift up mankind once more to the plane from which it had fallen, might restore to it the veritable sonship of God. This much we have seen to be at the root of the Christian faith; without it our faith differs in nothing from any other creed, founded on intellect and nature only. Jesus Christ, the God Man, truly God and truly Man, not merely a man endowed with special divine union, has lived upon this earth the life of man, has given, as man, to His Father, God in heaven, the perfect service of a perfect Man. He has taken on Himself the headship of the human race; He has shouldered its sorrows, even its sins and its wickednesses; He has carried those sins to the Father, and, humbled before Him, has acknowledged their guilt. Since man of himself could make no just atonement, He has offered to atone, as Man, in man's stead.

His offer has been accepted, and He has gone through with it, to the last bitter drop of the cup. Thus is Jesus Christ to us our Benefactor, our one Beloved; what we owe to Him is beyond reckoning, for all eternity we shall sing the praises of Him who has done so much for man.

The Catholic rejoices in dwelling on all that he owes to Jesus Christ, all that Jesus Christ has done for him and still does for him: "Ever living to make intercession for us." He sees in Him, not only the figure of history, but the ever living Mediator between the offended Father and himself: "yesterday, today and the same for ever." And He is the Mediator not by concession only but by right; for since He united in Himself the nature of God and the nature of man, He was born, as it were, for that office. His name signifies it, given to Him before He was born: "Thou shalt call his name Jesus, because he shall save his people from their sins." As the Head of the human race, "the first born of every creature," He has the right, and the prerogative, to act as its spokesman with the Father. But He would not be that and no more; He would not be merely a superman condescending to those beneath Him. He would be "made in all things like to man, without sin"; He would "bear our sorrows and carry our grief"; He would take our burdened upon His own shoulders that so He might speak to the Father as one of us.

Infinite sympathy and pity for mankind, love which was an everlasting love, intensified, if in our human effort to express the truth the word may be used, by experience of life in the flesh, all should be brought to bear upon Him, to urge Him to plead in our behalf.

Such is the meaning of that "emptying of Himself" of which St. Paul makes so much. On the other hand, as God, He is equal to the Father and the Holy Spirit, and has free access to both. As a " well-beloved Son in whom the Father is well pleased," He can come before that Father; He can speak to Him, as with right of His own, and He can claim to be heard. Therefore, both from the side of man and from the side of God, He stands the one worthy and sufficient Mediator between them both. And this, to the Catholic, is the first significance of His life on earth. He has taken upon Himself the terrible load of man's temptations: "We have not a high priest who cannot have compassion on our infirmities: but one tempted in all things like as we are, without sin" (Heb. iv, 15). He has offered Himself as a victim for man's yielding to them. He has fulfilled that oblation, utterly, completely, by the sacrifice of Himself on Calvary, by obedience unto death, by love unto death, than which there is no love greater, atoning in kind for man's disobedience, for his lack of love.

And the atoning value of this sacrifice has been rendered infinite; first, because of the infinite value of that Victim who, of His own free choice, has been offered; and secondly, because of the extreme to which He has gone in His surrender. For in truth He need not have gone so far. To satisfy all justice one single act of homage of Jesus Christ our Lord would have been atonement enough; had He perished as a child with the victims of Herod at Bethlehem, had He breathed but a breath and died as an infant in His mother's arms, in the sight of the Father this Son of His love would have done enough to redeem the world. But it would not have been enough to satisfy the craving of love divine, burning in the heart of Jesus Christ Himself. "Christ loved me and gave Himself for me." He would not merely make satisfaction; He would give till nothing else remained; He would "empty Himself," He would pour Himself out, flowing over.

To satisfy Himself He must give to the limit, "that where sin abounded grace might more abound . . . Through Jesus Christ our Lord" (Rom. v, 20), and if "greater love than this no man hath, that he lay down his life for his friend," then must He prove His love to be equal to that test, whether strict justice demanded it or not.

By this means has our Mediator, Jesus Christ, won for man, not forgiveness only and therefore redemption only; He has won for him all those other graces and powers by means of which he may be drawn to the closest union with God. In this light does St. Paul repeatedly sum up the life's work of his Lord and Savior:

"Blessed be God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ: as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in his sight, in charity: who hath predestined us unto the adoption of children through Jesus Christ unto himself, according to the promise of his will; with the praise and glory of his grace in which he hath graced us in his beloved Son. In whom we have redemption through his blood, the remission of sins, according to the riches of his grace" (Eph. i, 3-7)

All this, in the first place, Jesus Christ our Lord has done, has won for mankind, in His capacity as Mediator, by His life and death. But He has done much more. To encourage weak man in his effort to rise to higher things, to give him confidence and strength, over and above that which he can have of himself, He has instituted and left for the use of men, what we know as the whole sacramental system. He has given His Father, as from man, His own life and blood: He has given to man, as from His Father, those free gifts of supernatural strength, those seven outward signs which themselves confer the graces they signify. That man may be able the better to meet every vital moment of life, that he may the more surely fulfill, in Jesus Christ, the duties belonging to each state, that, so far as may be, he may live on earth the very life of Jesus Christ Himself, He has given to him those channels of grace which shall be readily opened to him if and when-he wills it. The blood of Jesus Christ has been given to the Father; by the Father it is given back to man through the Sacraments.

The Sacraments are the veins of Christ's mystical body, dispensing that blood, and life with it, to all the members. Furthermore, if also man wills it, He has given to everyone the power, which of course of himself he has not, to make to the Father satisfaction of his own and to win, to deserve, merit for himself. Of himself, as we have seen, natural man can do nothing of worth in the order of the supernatural; but he "can do all things in him who strengthens him." Incorporated in Jesus Christ, in the real sense we shall later consider, man partakes of the life of Jesus, his own deeds are made one with those of his Master and Lord even as the deeds of my hand are mine. As the branch of the vine is impregnated with the life of the vine itself, as on that account it bears fruit which of itself it could never bear, even so are the deeds of the man who is grafted in Christ Jesus impregnated through and through with that divine charity of which Jesus Christ is the principle and source. With Him, and in Him, and through Him, they become in themselves deeds of the kind called satisfactory, that is pleasing to God in the order not of nature but of Christ, worthy of merit, fruitful in prayer and petition.

In the third place, Jesus Christ our Lord is our Mediator in the matter of religious obligation; that is of the duty which is owed by man to God. It is the duty, the function of the creature to give glory to its creator, even as the work of art gives glory to the artist whose mind has conceived it and whose hand has executed it. "The heavens show forth the glory of God: and the firmament declareth the work of his hands" (Ps. xviii, I). It is, further, the duty of the creature endowed with higher faculties, for instance, with understanding and free will, to give to God yet further glory, corresponding to the trust that his Creator has placed in him; even as the King's representative, his viceroy, entrusted with the King's insignia and powers, honors his King most by being most worthy of him wherever he may be. And as the painted picture, by giving glory to its maker, finds therein its own chief glory; as the written book is of value because of the author revealed in it, for its wisdom is no more than the reflection of the mind which has conceived it; as the King's vicegerent is then most honored when he is most worthy of his King; so does the creature find its own noblest glory in reflecting the glory of God its Creator, its truest use of reason in reflecting His mind, its worthiest use of life in His service.

Still, even taken at its best, how poor and dull a thing is the glory which the creature of itself can give to its Creator! How much more is that power of giving lessened when we consider the fallen state of man! But Jesus Christ comes to his rescue. Now, at last, united with Him, the creature can praise and honor its God, can render Him homage and service, with a tongue and a hand, a mind and a will, and love and a proof of that love, worthy of God Himself. In union with the heart of Jesus Christ the creature can utter its own heart; and God the Father finds its utterings worthy even that He should hear. Nay more, for Christ our Lord lives in His creature, communicates to it His own power of giving praise and reverence, and glory. When then it speaks its own words, it is no longer itself that speaks, but Christ its Lord that speaks in it.

Jesus Christ is not only our sovereign and sufficient Mediator, making all things new; He is also our great High Priest, the High Priest of the New Law. It must strike every reader of the Old Testament how the religion there expressed centered in the priest, and the priest's sacrifice. It must strike him no less how the prophecy of Him that was to come was that which spoke of Him as "a priest forever according to the order of Melchisedech." When He had come and gone, there is no more emphatic analysis of the work He did than the Epistle to the Hebrews; and that Epistle is entirely concerned with the Priesthood of Jesus Christ our Lord. Or rather it goes further. Not only is He a Priest, He is the one and only Priest, in the fullest sense, of the New Dispensation, and His sacrifice stands alone. Whereas before His coming all sacrifices had been symbolic only, His sacrifice was more than a symbol; it was real, and it was no more nor less than the sacrifice of Himself. And since He could die only once, therefore the sacrifice He offered could be only one; one nevertheless which amply compensated for all that was required. In this light not only in the Epistle to the Hebrews, in many other places the work and significance of Jesus upon earth are summed up. "Christ also hath loved us, and hath delivered himself for us, an oblation and a sacrifice to God for an odor of sweetness" (Eph. v, 2). "For there is one God, and one Mediator of God and man, the man Christ Jesus; who gave himself a redemption for all, a testimony in due times" (I Tim. ii, 5, 6).

"Christ, having come an high priest of-the good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is, not of this creation; neither by the blood of goats and of calves, but by his own blood, entered once into the Holies, having obtained eternal redemption. For if the blood of goats and of oxen, and the ashes of an heifer, being sprinkled, sanctify such as are defiled, to the cleansing of the flesh; how much more shall the blood of Christ, who by the Holy Ghost offered himself unspotted unto God, cleanse our conscience from dead works, to serve the living God? And therefore he is the mediator of the New Testament: that by means of his death for the redemption of those transgressions which were under the former testament, they that are called may receive the promise of eternal inheritance" (Heb. ix, 11-15). In other words, Jesus Christ our Lord, our Sovereign High Priest, made expiation for the sins of the world by the sacrifice of His own self, the shedding of His own blood.

He has established a new covenant between God and man; through Him who has sacrificed Himself man and God are brought together. Such is the meaning and significance of the Passion and Death of Jesus Christ to the Catholic mind; this is the reason why the Catholic makes so much of the sign of the cross and the crucifix. The Passion to him is much more than a mere superhuman act of moral courage; it is more even than a superhuman act of love; it is far more than the greatest of human tragedies.

It was a solemn sacrifice in the truest sense, of a Victim made by Himself, in a free oblation. "He was offered because he willed it"—"by a merciful and faithful high priest"—"that he might be a propitiation for the sins of many" (Heb. viii, 17). The outpouring of the blood of that Victim has purified the world; it has washed out the handwriting that was against fallen man. On Calvary the work of the Atonement, the Redemption, was completed: "Behold the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sins of the world." On Calvary by a voluntary act of perfect obedience, and of perfect love, in a perfect Victim and by a perfect Priest, a perfect and complete sacrifice was accomplished. Justice was perfectly fulfilled, love was perfectly satisfied; for the first time on earth God was given perfect glory, and man was saved and redeemed.

What this means in practice to the Catholic, St. Bernard has expressed very beautifully. Thus he speaks in one of his sermons: "Jesus weeps, but not as others weep, at least not for the same reason. In others it is feeling that prevails, in Him it is love. They weep because of what they suffer, He weeps out of compassion, because of what others suffer or will suffer. They lament the heavy yoke that weighs upon the sons of Adam; He bewails the yoke which those same sons of Adam have imposed upon themselves, the evil they have done. Nay more; for the evil they have done He now sheds tears, soon He will shed His very blood. Oh, the hardness of my heart! Would that, O Lord, even as the Word was made flesh, so my heart might become a thing of flesh no less, instead of the stone that it is! This is what Thou hast promised by the prophet who has said: I will take away from you the heart of stone, and will give you a heart of flesh (Ezech. xi, 19).

"Brethren, the tears of Christ fill me with shame and grief. I was reveling without in the courtyard while in the secret of the King's chamber the sentence of death was being passed upon me. The King's only Son heard what was being said; He laid aside His crown, He clothed Himself in sackcloth, He sprinkled ashes upon His head, He laid bare His feet, He came forth weeping and lamenting that this poor little slave had been condemned to death. I look at Him as on a sudden He comes out; I am struck dumb with the strangeness of the sight; I ask the reason and I hear. What shall I do? Shall I go on with my sport, and so make sport of His tears? Surely I must be foolish and mad, since I will not follow Him, since along with Him I will not weep.

"This is the reason for my shame; but what of my grief and fear? . . . I know nothing of this awful truth; I thought myself safe and secure; and behold the Son of a Virgin is sent, the Son of God most high, and the order is given that He must be put to death, just that by the balsam of His precious blood my wounds may be healed! "The Son of God is all compassionate and weeps: shall man witness the Passion and laugh?"

It remained and it remains for each individual man that comes into the world, only that man should accept, should apply to himself the fruits of that sacrifice, the charity, the satisfaction, the merits of his divine Redeemer. That he may be able to do this to the fullest; that man may continue through all succeeding ages and in every place, to glorify God in a manner worthy of Him, and may have the fruits of this redemption applied to himself in a very torrent, Jesus Christ our Lord, the night before He suffered, instituted a sacrifice of memorial. In that sacrifice, under the species or appearance of bread and wine, the "priest forever according to the order of Melchisedech" continues to offer Himself as a victim for us all, and will continue so to offer Himself to the end of time.

So has Jesus Christ reconciled man with God. But He has also looked manward. It is impossible to suppose that He would come into the world and do all this, and then leave the world still to grope in its utter blackness. He is the light that is to come into the world, to enlighten every man that will believe in Him. Repeatedly He claimed this title for Himself; He was the light, and the light was the life of man. We may look back and see for ourselves how He has fulfilled His mission; since the coming of Christ to earth, wheresoever His influence has spread, life in the world has become a new thing.

We may look about us today, and see how that enlightenment still goes on. In His own time the pagan culture, with all its help from human reason, was played out; its philosophers no longer believed in it, its people had outlived it, superstition followed superstition; and men no longer knew, or very much cared, what they believed. The forms were kept, the exterior clothes of religion, for without them it seemed that civilization itself must collapse. But the forms no longer had a meaning, or if they had, it was often the opposite to that which they had at first contained. Even among the Jews there had been a falling away, a perversion of ideals, substitution of convention for truth. The one true God still remained their belief; but He was the God of Abraham only. The law had divorced itself from religion, had become an end in itself, and no longer a means, and there had followed a bondage which had become intolerable.

Jesus Christ came into the midst of all this. He rose above legalism; He spoke "as one having authority and not as the scribes"; and the authority He claimed was that of the direct Messenger of God Himself. He gave back to man that religion of the spirit for which human nature craved. The human race was of itself purblind, wandering "like sheep without a shepherd" as, left to itself, it had always wandered and it always will.

He gave to it a means of safe guidance, no less than His own infallibility; and this He established for all time in His mystical body, the living Church. Given that Christ is God, given that He is "yesterday, today and the same for ever," infallibility surely must follow as an easy consequence. It is not a mere question of history or development, for history and development are themselves fallible. As it is itself something more than human, so must it rest on a superhuman basis. It rests, not on history, but on Jesus Christ Himself, who cannot deceive or be deceived, who has promised to be with His own "all days, even to the consummation of the world," who lived, and died, and rose again "to give witness to the truth." Had He done less, then would He have done no more than groping man before Him; having done it, we recognize in His lasting infallibility the only becoming seal of the Word of God.

<Veritas Domini manet in aeternum>: "The truth of the Lord remaineth for ever." And what He taught answered in all respects to the eager question of the human soul. What was that human soul? What was life? Whence had it come, and why? What was its goal, its purpose? He told it, as one having authority, in the name of God Himself, that it had come from God and to God it must return; from God who would be to it a Father, who had created it for His very own, who had sanctified and blessed it beyond all believing, who, by His Providence, cared for it at every moment of its being. It had come from God who loved it with an everlasting love, who had adopted it and clothed it as a son of His own, who had breathed His own life into it that it might rise above itself, might reach beyond this world and this world's narrow horizon, might become a member of His own kingdom, His own household. What then was it in itself? Let it recognize its dignity, its worth with this new life in it; in comparison with it the whole world were a trifle. "What shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" It was no longer a mere creature, it was now an adopted member of the household of God Himself, a brother of the Word Incarnate, a member of His mystical body, a branch of Him the Vine, a child of His Church, founded on a rock that nothing should ever destroy, a treasured thing, even in the eyes of God Himself, seeing that it had been bought by the blood of His own Son, His own eternal, infinitely beloved Son Himself.

This was the human soul as Jesus Christ saw it, and as He described it to the soul itself. It was a picture beyond anything any philosophers before Him had conceived, or any seer had divined. Man looked up from his darkness to the mountains whence came this new light; and the light was a new life. For in the truth and vision that this light revealed life itself assumed a new meaning and significance. What was it to be? To what purpose? Its destiny was not the grave, but the house of God the Father, not the laying up of trifles that perish, but of a crown incorruptible. Its fullness of being was just the knowledge of the Father, the love of Him received and returned, the likeness to Him as the likeness of a child to a parent, growing daily in perfection, making of this sordid existence another thing, giving it a new meaning, a new ideal, a new goal, crowning it all with the certainty of another life, in which death would be swallowed up in victory. No wonder those who heard Him were "in admiration at his doctrine" (Matt. vii, 28). It was at once human and divine, perfectly responding to man's cravings, the answer to his questionings, the fulfillment of his noblest dreams, truth supernatural, yet never for a moment beyond the range of his everyday life.

"Blessed are ye poor, for yours is the kingdom of heaven."
"Blessed are ye that hunger now, for you shall be filled."
"Blessed are ye that weep now, for you shall laugh."
"Blessed shall you be when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man's sake. Be glad in that day and rejoice, for behold your reward is great in heaven" (Luke vi, 20-25).

No wonder again that His enemies, when they had heard Him, came away saying: "Never did any man speak as this man hath spoken" (John vii, 46). For He spoke as one who saw and knew what no other man could conceive, and that in language which no other man has equaled, with a clearness, an emphasis, a conviction, a certainty, yes, with a mastery of word and phrase which was its own pledge of truth. He was the Way, the Truth, the Life. He claimed the title, and no man dared to deny Him. Alone of all men He could ask: "Which of you shall convict me of sin?" Alone He could say: "Come to me all ye that labor and are burdened and I will refresh you"; and when He so called there was no one who dared to say to Him that His claim was arrogant.

Lastly, for the litany must end, Jesus Christ was not one to confine Himself to words. Of all that He taught He was the perfect model; perhaps most of all in this, that He was a model whom every man that comes into the world can take for his own ideal. Of no other man, not the greatest, can this safely be said. We may see in others ideals of this quality or that, of this or that virtue; but even to the greatest, if we would be just, we must grant the margin that is common to all men. Jesus Christ stands alone. He needs no margin, His perfection is confined to no one virtue or quality; look for any limitation in Him and you will not find it. He became Man, He lived among men His human-divine life, the equal of man in all things, hidden away as most true greatness is hidden, obedient as all men must obey, showing in all that He did how closely united are prayer and action, how man might sanctify, and so make perfect, every condition of social life, how he might face, and ultimately bring to good, every trial and adversity, every failure and every success. He taught, by example and experience as well as by word, patience and endurance, and hope in suffering; He braved every wrong which He knew His followers would one day have to face. He endured agony of body and soul; He bore contempt from men, ignominy and shame, ingratitude, insolence, abandonment, treason, injustice, cruelty, deprivation, every insult that comes in the lot of man. No man should ever have to say that his doom was worse than the doom of Jesus Christ.

And yet, in spite of all, though the completed picture is that of "a worm and no man," in whom "there was no sightliness that we should be desirous of him" —yet is His example all attraction." "When I shall be lifted up, I will draw all things to myself." So He had said of Himself on one occasion, and indeed throughout all time His prophecy has been fulfilled. That sinless and undeserving Sufferer, enduring what He did, out of pure love for those who by right ought to have suffered in His place, has founded a new civilization; His sufferings have borne their fruit in this world as well as in the next. The sign of the cross has been seen in the sky; on Jesus Christ, and Him crucified, Christendom has been built. Through the ages He has drawn about Him countless men and women to whom suffering itself, on His account, has become a joy. For it has made them the more like to Him; it has made them one with Him; it has enabled them to "fill up what was wanting" in His own suffering; it has given them the means to prove their love for Him, even as He has used the same means to prove His love for them. It has enabled them to share His life, and to do, in Him and with Him, the work for God and man for which He Lived and for which He died. Nor is the procession ended. Jesus Christ and-His Cross will remain the ideal of millions to the end of time; in that more than all things lies man's salvation, even through the valley of this death.

For one who believes all that has here been said, and more, of Jesus Christ his Lord, and the Catholic believes it with all his heart and soul, can it be strange that Jesus Christ and His Passion occupy so prominent a place in all his thoughts and words, indeed in all his life? "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain," says St. Paul; and the Catholic understands exactly what the Apostle means. "I know nothing but Jesus Christ; and him crucified." So once more St. Paul sums up his mind; and the saints have repeated the summary again and again, with an emphasis that rings true in every word. "I live, now not I, but Christ lives in me," he says in another place; and the Catholic would gladly call it the expression of his own ideal. Others may wonder and doubt; to some He may be a stumbling block, to others a scandal and a folly; nevertheless there are those who know, and to them He is "Christ the power of God and the glory of God."

Jesus Christ, the Son of God from all eternity, yet also truly the Son of man in time; born into this world of a woman of our race; remaining truly God, for that He could not alter, yet also becoming truly Man; this Jesus Christ has come among men, because as God He loved man, loved me, with an everlasting love. He has lived a man's life for me, He has risen again from the dead. Because as God and Man He continues to love me, He lives for me now; in heaven before His Father and mine, "ever living to make intercession for me"; here on earth, ever renewing the oblation of Himself that He has made once for all. He lives within me even as I am within myself; He feeds my life with His own life, if I will have Him, every day. He calls me His own brother, the son of His own Father, His intimate friend, between whom and Himself there is no inequality. He gives me a share in His own inheritance, pleads to His Father for me "His own," that "where He is I also may be," let the handwriting against me be what it may. He turns all my sorrow into joy, all my joy into still greater rejoicing, for His sake more than for my own. He proves to me, by methods and evidences and arguments far more convincing and final than those of human reason, yet which my human reason everywhere confirms, that all this is real and true, that it is a work which only God could accomplish, a love which only God could show; yet which, when accomplished and shown, is found to be wholly worthy of Him. "God is faithful."

Jesus Christ is all this and more to me, how then can He be other than the ultimate object of my thoughts, the captor of my affections? Jesus Christ, who has made Himself so much to me, what shall I not be to Him? Jesus Christ, who has done so much for me, what shall I not do for Him? Who has endured so much for me, what shall I not endure for Him? It is true that so long as I live this life on earth I must needs occupy myself with other things. I must take my place among men, I must do that duty which it belongs to me to do. My love must needs go out to others, indeed, let it go out to as many as it may, and as fully as they will let me give it, for that does but make me the more akin to Him, the Lover of all mankind. Still must my thoughts, and my aims, and my affections not stop with them; they must pass through and beyond them all, if they are to find their rest and satisfaction. For they have discovered Him, and He transcends all else. He has revealed Himself, and now they must hunger after Him, as the hart panteth after the waters. They have found Him and they can never again let Him go; mind and heart can henceforth find their final peace in Him alone.

Indeed, Jesus Christ, once He is known, is all in all. Other things there are in life, beautiful, good, desirable, worthy of a man's natural love and ambition; we can appreciate and cherish them all. Other men and women there are, admirable, noble, lovable, worthy of the best we can give them, worthy of our lives. Love of country is ours, no less than it is that of other men, perhaps it is more; the evidence of blood and of service has proved it in every ordeal. Nevertheless, behind all these things, transcending them all, giving to them all a still greater lustre by reason of the light He pours upon them, stands the figure of our Lord and Beloved, Jesus Christ. The believing Christian reads his Gospels. Others may, if they will have it so, excel him in technical knowledge. They may know quite possibly better than he knows, the land of Palestine. the ways and manner of the Pharisees and Scribes, the shape of the stones on which Jesus trod, even here and there the reading of a word of a phrase in the sacred text itself. But Him who walks through those Gospels and comes out of them, who passes down from them through the ages, who is among us now, "yesterday, today and the same forever"; Him the believing Christian knows, or can know, for his very own, better than he knows his own mother, and his mother who has taught him rejoices to yield her place.

And knowing Him he follows. He listens to his Christ's every word, and gives to it Christ's meaning, not his own. He meditates upon His sayings, looks for the meaning He gave them, not the meaning he himself desires, or a self-occupied and sophisticated generation suggests. He counts His virtues, and sees in them the ideal of true manhood, whether he himself can rise to that ideal or not. Or when he must act, when in the business of life he must pass a judgment or come to a decision of his own, instinctively, almost unconsciously, he looks towards that Ideal and asks himself: what would the Master wish me to do? How would He have me to act? What advice does He give me for my guidance? How in this special case would He Himself have spoken or acted?

For He is the infallible Truth, and human judgment is then most true when it is most in harmony with the judgment of Jesus Christ. If again, the Christian would pray, if he would escape for a moment from the valley of this death, and would lift up his eyes to the mountains whence cometh help; if he would raise his mind and heart to God, and find communion with Him, instinctively he reaches towards Jesus Christ our Lord. "No man cometh to the Father but by me." His thoughts unite themselves with the thoughts of Jesus Christ; together, "through the same Jesus Christ our Lord," as the liturgy never tires of repeating, they rise to the throne of the Father who is in heaven, praying that His name may be hallowed, that His kingdom may come, that His will may always and everywhere be done. In the company of Jesus Christ hands raised with His hands, voice joined to His voice, we may sing the glory of God, even we His puny creatures, as He deserves that He should be glorified; we may adore Him, we may thank Him, we may ask of Him our daily bread, our forgiveness, protection from whatever may befall, with the trust of a child and a son.

Or when prayer is ended, and the Christian must set himself to his daily task, be it for God or man, he has before him the model working man, the Carpenter of Nazareth to His thirtieth year, earning His livelihood like any other man, serving and obeying and cherishing His mother, serving the villagers about Him. Or he may see the travel-worn teacher of the hill-side, who knew hunger and thirst, who had not where to lay His head, who at times was weary and overcome with sleep, who was so beset that He could not take His food, who, once at least, was "sorrowful unto death." When he has occasion to meet other men, to speak with them, to deal with them, while he does not in the least forget all that belongs to them as men, still may he also remember that Jesus Christ lives or longs to live in the hearts of these His creatures even as He lives in his own. When he speaks and acts with them, when he serves them, he deals with Him.

"As often as you do it to the least of these, you do it to me," is an incentive which has created the long line of martyrs of charity, the lasting armament of the Church of God. Thus is Jesus Christ, his Lord and his Ideal, the focus of the Christian's thoughts; He is no less, as we have just said, the focus of his affections. For if among ourselves, among men of goodwill, to know a good man is to love him, how much more must this be true of Jesus Christ, of Him whom no man could accuse of sin, whom the crowd that looked on could only describe as the one "who did all-things well," whom His very enemies were driven to call "Good Master!" He is the All-beauty, the All-goodness, the All-truth; meek and humble as He is, so that all may approach Him as being like themselves, yet in Him are united all the perfections of the Godhead, with all the fascinations of the perfect man. He has proved it in His life on earth, and in every action of it; He proves it for us now every day, if only we will read the signs aright.

"Which of you shall convince me of sin?"
"I am the light of the world. He that followeth me, walketh not in darkness, but shall have the light of life."
"I am the way and the truth and the light."
"Come to me all ye that labor and are burdened, and I will refresh you. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me, because I am meek and humble of heart; and you shall have rest for your souls."

"If any man come to me he shall not thirst." These cries have echoed through the centuries, as much as they echoed through the Temple court, or down the lanes of Judaea. Now, as then, every charge brought against Him has fallen to the ground, convicted of falsehood in its very utterance. The witnesses have not agreed; the only charge that has been found sufficient for His condemnation has been that He has "made Himself the Son of God." Now, as then, the multitudes have followed Him; while a few have been drawn more closely, and have found every word of His promise true to overflowing.

Indeed He has kept His word. He has not left us orphans, He has come to us; He is with us all clays even to the consummation of the world. Those who know the secret of His strong attraction alone can tell of it; those who do not know, who have never so much as conceived what the name of Jesus Christ means—how can they venture to deny or repudiate that of which they know nothing? Let men of other learning keep to their lore, and we will respect them for it; we will sit at their feet as their disciples. But do not let them, on the strength of that learning, presume to lay down dogma on that of which, by their own confession, they do not know anything at all. <Ne sutor ultra crepidam>. For there are those who do know Jesus Christ, not about Him only, and they are of every degree, from the lowest to the highest, the dullest to the keenest intellects, the most ignorant to the most learned; if variety of appeal and acceptance is a test of truth, then does the truth of Jesus Christ, and of the Church He has founded, stand out conspicuously above every other. These are they who have experience of His love and return it; who have Him always present before their eyes; who feel His hand guiding their own, and know they are under no delusion.

And these are they whose one word about Him is alone worth more than all denials, and all the shallow proofs of those denials, coming from those who know not what they say, and therefore are to be forgiven; who have never come near Him, and therefore are to be pitied; who are separated from Him by two thousand years of time, for they have failed to find Him as He is, if indeed He is to them more than a myth. The Christian who is worth the name knows "in whom he has believed," and he lives in His presence and in His company. Listen to St. Bernard, one chance witness out of many, for he was one who knew:

"Lord, by Thy help may we follow Thee, by Thee may we come to Thee, for Thou art the Way, the Truth and the Life. Thou art the Way by Thy example, the Truth by Thy promise, the Life by the gifts Thou dost bestow. Thou hast said, I am the Way in which to walk, the Truth to be sought, the Life in which to dwell; the Way that has no deviation, the Truth that has no error, the Life that has no death; the straight Way, the Truth infallible, the unending Life; the wide and spacious Way, the strong and universal Truth, the Life delectable, ever glorious."

Or again, hear St. Theresa; though her language goes beyond the experience of most, yet the Catholic understands and responds to every word she says. She is in trouble in her work for God; every hand seems to be turned against her; but the fact of Jesus Christ, as objectively real to her as she is to herself, is a lasting consolation in distress, and encouragement and source of strength. In language such as this she tells us what Jesus Christ is to her and to every Catholic, each in his own degree: "Alone as I was, without a single friend to give me a word of counsel, I could neither pray nor read, but as I remained for hours and hours together, uneasy in mind and afflicted in spirit, on account of the weight of my trouble, I began to fear that, perhaps after all I was being tricked by the devil, and wondered what on earth I could do for my relief. Not a gleam of hope seemed to shine upon me, from earth or from heaven; except just this, and this only, that in the midst of my fear. and dangers I never forgot how Jesus Christ my Lord must certainly see the burdened of all I endured.

"O my Lord Jesus Christ! What a true friend you are, and how powerful! For when you wish to be with us you can be, and you always do wish it so long as we will give you welcome. May everything created, O Lord of all the world, praise you and bless you I If only I could tramp the whole world over, proclaiming everywhere with all the strength that is in me, what a faithful friend you are to anyone who will be a friend with you!

My dear Lord, all else fails and passes away; you, the Lord of them all, never fail, you never pass away. What you allow those who love you to endure for you is all too little.

O my Lord, how kindly, how nobly (literally—how like a gentleman), how tenderly, how sweetly you succeed in handling and making sure of your own! If only one could secure that one would love nothing but just you alone! You seem, my own dear Lord, to put one who loves you to the test with rods and agonies, only that, just when you have brought her to her last extreme, she may understand all the boundless limits of your love."

Allusion has already been made to Jesus Christ our Lord as the Head of the human race, and to His mystical body, in which the Christian is incorporated; for a fuller understanding of the Christian life, and of the Christian Church as accepted by the Catholic, it is needful to examine the meaning of the term more closely. For, to the Catholic, it is much more than a metaphor, much more than a happy way of stating our relation with Jesus Christ our Lord; His own repeated words, and words of those, like St. Paul and St. Peter, who have been His best interpreters, have left us in no doubt that this incorporation is in some sense a real thing. The mystical body, of which Jesus Christ our Lord is the Head and His followers are the members, has a true and living and life-giving existence, the fruits of which are to be seen, as the Catholic believes, both within the soul of every Christian and in the world about him.

First, we may consider the words of Jesus Christ our Lord Himself. And here let it be said that when we study His words, in this place or elsewhere, it is not so much their literal interpretation that we are looking for, as the mind of Him who spoke them.

Taken by themselves they may well be given either too much meaning or too little; when they are brought together, when they are compared with one another, then we may hope they will give us the background of His mind, which is the chief matter that concerns us.

We may begin with that last scene on the side of Olivet, when the preaching of Jesus had definitely ceased, and when He concluded by foreshadowing to His Twelve the end of time and the final judgment. The just shall be separated from the wicked; they shall receive their reward: "Come ye blessed of my Father," because of their service to Him.

"I was hungry and you gave me to eat: I was thirsty and you gave me to drink: I was a stranger and you took me in: naked and you covered me: sick and you visited me: I was in prison and you came to me" (Matt. xxv, 35-36).

The just will wonder when they ever did these things; they will ask when they had ever seen Him in this plight, and He will answer: Amen I say to you, as often as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me" (Matt. xxv, 40).

They are moving words; they open out a new vista of the relations of man to man, both the sufferer and the benefactor, and put them on an entirely new plane. It may be said that they convey no more than that Christ our Lord takes an act of kindness done to the poor and suffering as if it were done to Himself, and if they are considered by themselves alone this may be true; yet even that meaning is a new thing, even that gives a new significance to charity. But if the reward He offers is also considered, if furthermore the words are taken in relation with others that He spoke at other times, we may easily see that His meaning is something more. The words are in the same category with those others, spoken one day to the Twelve apart: "He that heareth you, heareth me, and he that despiseth you despiseth me."

But nowhere is He more explicit than in His address at the Last Supper. There He had given His disciples what He had called "a new commandment."

"A new commandment I give unto you, that you love one another as I have loved you, that you also love one another" (John xiii, 34).

This is much more than has hitherto been said; it is much more than the general precept that we must love our neighbor as ourselves. It sets before us as a standard His own disinterested love, which has made Him annihilate Himself for the sake of His beloved.

To love my neighbor as I love myself is one thing; to love him even as Jesus Christ our Lord loves me is quite another; for He loves me far more than I love myself, He has done for me far more than I have done or could ever do. He asks of me a love for others which, of myself, is more than I can give; He asks me to love them with His love. But immediately on this, that He may show us where we have the means of doing the impossible, that He may put it within our reach, He makes the well-known comparison: "Abide in me: and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you the branches. He that abideth in me and I in him, the same beareth much fruit: for without me you can do nothing.... As the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you. Abide in my love" (John xv, 1-9).

In this way is it made possible for us to keep His "new commandment." We are to love our neighbor, not only as ourselves, but as Jesus Christ loves us; and that is rendered yet more sublime, we are to love our neighbor as the Father has loved the Son: "As the Father hath loved me, I also have loved you. As I have loved you, do you love one another." Impossible for us of ourselves, but possible if we "abide in Him," if we "abide in His love," if we love with His love and live with His life. In some mystic way, mystic but none the less real, or the words we have quoted have no meaning, we are united to Jesus Christ, to the Word Incarnate, to the Man-God, so that His life and His love are ours. As the engrafted branch becomes united to the vine and is made one with it, in such a way that the life of the one becomes the life of the other, so we are united with Him; with the result that, while of ourselves we can do nothing, now we are able to do that which is done by Jesus Christ our Lord Himself. "The Word was made flesh and dwelt amongst us . . . full of grace and truth . . . and of His fullness we have all received" (John i, 14, 16), not merely in a bestowal of a gift as from one friend to another> but by a communication of life itself. And if of life then also of the container of life, which is the body; if we are one life with Christ, then in some real sense we are one body with Christ also. We are incorporated in Him; we are members of that frame of which He is the Head; in a quite new but very real sense, in Him "we live and move and have our being", we live, now not we, but He lives in us; we bear the marks of Christ upon our body.

The same is again emphasized by Jesus our Lord in the solemn prayer with which the Last Supper concluded. He begins with the appeal that His own should be given eternal life; and by "His own" He lets it be seen that He means not only His Apostles, but also their disciples, and all Christians, all believers in Him, to the end of time. Thus does He pray to His Father:

"And not for them only do I pray, but for them also who through their word shall believe in me. That they all may be one, as thou, Father, in me and I in thee: that they also may be one in us; that the world may believe that thou hast sent me. And the glory which thou hast given me, I have given to them: that they may be one, as we also are one. I in them, and thou in me: that they may be made perfect in one: and the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me" (John XVII, 20-23).

"As thou, Father, in me and I in thee."—"That they may be one in us."—"That they may be one as we also are one."—"That they may be made perfect in one."—That this perfect union may prove to the world "that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them as thou hast loved me."—This is more than metaphor; it is far more than the mere extravagant language of love; it rings too true, and is too repeatedly emphatic, to be the invention of any human writer. It is a positive teaching, repeated that it may not be mistaken, expressed as the main idea in the mind and heart of Jesus Christ our Lord at the most crucial moment of His life; and the oneness with His own of which He speaks is daringly compared with the oneness which exists between God the Father and God the Son: "as thou and I are one." Two Persons, yet one Godhead; two Persons, Jesus Christ and myself, yet one life, one body, even the body of Jesus Christ Himself. We can all say it, and claim the privilege; every true believer in, and faithful follower of, Christ can claim it; therefore in Him, made members of His one same body, equal branches of one same vine, receiving from Him each the same life, we are members one of another.

We are loved by the Father even as Jesus Christ is loved, for we are His body; we are of the family of the Father, for we are coheirs with Christ; we are raised to a dignity which gives a new meaning to life, a new significance to all creation. We are ennobled, and by that ennobling are compelled to endeavor to live up to the honor, to make ourselves more noble; we understand better now why, early in His life, Jesus Christ our Lord put before us that strange-sounding and seemingly impossible standard: "Be ye therefore perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matt. v, 48).

Thus is the doctrine of the mystical but no less real union of the Christian with Christ an integral part of Christ's own teaching. St. Paul takes hold of the same, and makes it the basis of all he has to say; it is to him the root meaning of the term Christianity, and of the Christian Church. That Church, to him, was less an organization, more an organism; not an institution, but a living thing; and the older he grew in the ways of God and the experience of men the more he insisted on this concept. It is worthy of note that the light was first given to him at the moment of his conversion; three times the story is told, and in each narration, the same is emphasized. Saul was struck to the ground. The voice he heard did not say: "Why persecutest thou my people?" but, "Why persecutest thou me?" And when Saul asked who it was that. spoke, he received the answer: "I am Jesus whom thou persecutest" (Acts, ix, 5).

Saul never forgot the lesson of those words. He would seem to have made them the chief subject for his life's meditation, so that their significance, and their consequences, grew upon him more and more. To be a Christian was to be one with Christ; to be a member of the Church was to be a member of that living body of which Christ was the Head: when we have said that, we have said almost all that need be said to explain the soul of the great Apostle of the Gentiles. Thus he writes to his wavering Corinthians, who had not yet grasped the need for unity among themselves: "As the body is one and hath many members; and all the members of the body, whereas they are many, are yet one body: so also is Christ. For in one spirit were we all baptized into one body, whether Jews or gentiles, whether bond or free: and in one Spirit have we all been made to drink. For the body also is not one but many.... Now you are the body of Christ, and members of members" (I Cor. Xii, 12-27).

Even more explicit is his mind much later, in the Epistle to the Ephesians. And here it is well to remember the difference between the circumstances of these two letters. In the Epistle to the Corinthians he was dealing with still but partially formed Christians, and he had himself still some way to go before he found the words that would express the truth as he knew it. Here, in the Epistle to the Ephesians, he is dealing with those whom he had known from the earliest days of his apostolate. He has no misgivings about their steadfastness; he is sure he can give them the best he has to give, and they will not misunderstand; the whole Epistle rings with the emotion of a deeply affectionate heart, striving to give of its very best to those it loves dearly. Moreover, in the interval, Paul himself has spent long years in prison. He has had many hours to meditate upon the vision he has seen, to watch the growth of that living thing as it has spread about the Roman Empire, not by any organization, not by system, but like a tree by its own internal life; and he has found at last the words by which his thoughts may be sufficiently expressed. Hence, when he writes, it is no longer only as a glorious bond of union that he describes the mystical body; that is not enough. It is as a consummation, a goal, attainable even in this world, giving us an ideal, a standard, the attainment of which is its own reward, is the perfect man. Thus he writes:

"I, therefore, a prisoner in the Lord, beseech you that you walk worthy of the vocation in which-you are called: with all humility and mildness, with patience, supporting one another in charity. Careful to keep the unity of the spirit in the bond of peace. One body and one spirit: as you are called in one hope of your calling. One Lord, one faith, one baptism. One God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in us all" (Eph. iv, 1-6).

This is his ideal; how is it to be secured? The rest of the Epistle makes it clear. It is by "the building up the body of Christ; until we all meet in the unity of faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the age of the fullness of Christ: that henceforth we be no more children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine . . . but doing the truth in charity, we may in all things grow up in him who is the Head, even Christ; from whom the whole body, being compacted and fitly joined together, by what every joint supplieth, according to the operation in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body, unto the edifying of itself in charity" (Eph. iv, 12-16).

Thus does St. Paul develop what he has mentioned in an earlier chapter when he has said of Jesus Christ his Lord: "He hath subjected all things under his feet, and hath made him head over all the Church, which is his body, and the fullness of him who is filled all in all" (Eph. i, 22-23).

It is explicit enough. To St. Paul, and to the whole Church that was one with him, besides the historic Christ who has lived His thirty-three years on this earth and has died, there is also a mystic Christ, the same as the former and yet distinct—how feeble are human words and ideas when we would express the supernatural!—who continues in the world, living among and in men, a Christ with a head, a soul, and members, making together one living spiritual body.

"Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with spiritual blessings in heavenly places, in Christ: as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and unspotted in his sight, in charity.

Who hath predestined us unto the adoption of children, through Jesus Christ unto himself, according to the purpose of his will: unto the praise of the glory of his grace, in which he hath graced us in his beloved Son" (Eph. i, 3-6).

For the man to whom this is a vivid truth, clearly it must have an effect on his whole outlook on life. It is true we have described an ideal, and not every man can rise to an ideal; nevertheless, even for the meanest who still believes, the light is before him and shines upon his path. Even here he has something to live for when all else is drab; something far more noble than all this world has to offer, though it offer of its best. It gives to things of the world a new value, a new proportion; it gives to the world itself a totally new perspective. It throws a new light on the tenets of the Christian faith which some men disparagingly call dogmas; it finds a new starting-point for reason itself, adding new arguments, creating new vistas which reason of itself could never have discovered. Let us take, for example, one among many, what the Catholic means by the sacramental life. The sacraments, to him who believes in the indwelling of Jesus Christ, are very much more than the mere ceremonial which is seen from without. They are the ingrafting into the body; they are the joints of the limbs; they are the channels through which the blood of Jesus Christ flows down into the members. Because He Himself has prescribed them and has given to them their efficacy, by their very act the movement of life is started, by them it is increased and fostered. The significance of Baptism gives a new significance, likewise, to all the sacraments that follow. By the simple act, according to His promise, and thanks to nothing of our own, it incorporates us into the body and life of Christ; and the rest, by their simple act, and thanks to nothing of our own, increase the same life within us. Above all is this true of the Sacrament of the Holy Eucharist, that which the Catholic fondly calls the Blessed Sacrament. It is the food of the life of the soul. But the life which it goes to feed is no less than that of Jesus Christ living in us, and that life can be fed by nothing less than the living Christ who comes to us. The Catholic needs little stirring to be devoted to the Holy Eucharist. It is his glory, his pledge of the love of God, the daily sustenance of that life within him, which is far more dear to him than the life he lives in the valley of this death. It is the coming of a Friend above all friends, who enters into his very heart, or rather who draws him into a Heart that loves as does none other.—How can the Catholic do otherwise than long that other men should know and glory in this Way, and Truth, and Life, even as he knows it, and glories in it himself?

Nor is it only by way of the sacraments that the Life of Christ within us may grow to more and more. Every act of merit that we do, once we are united by Baptism to Christ, gives us an increase of the life divine, unites us yet more closely to Him. Above all is this true when we live, and move, and act in union with Him; when we let Him direct us, when we seek from His hand the vital motion that we need, when me invite Hum to live in us, and work through us, entirely, so far as that is possible, according to His own will and not ours. Then we know we are truly His members, truly the branches of the vine, that urges its sap through us to fecundity. Then, indeed, when He does His own will in us and through us, He lives in us in a real way; and by every act we do in this union we recognize it more and more: "He who abideth in me, and I in him, he beareth much fruit" (John xv, 5).

This, then, in practical life, as a consequence of Christ's indwelling in him, is the second ideal to which the Catholic would strive to attain. He would keep before him the union between himself and the living Christ, as a fact in itself, to be cultivated more and more. Thus he knows that he will fulfill the first purpose of his being. He will give to God the praise, and reverence, and service that is his first duty; by so doing he will make of himself, both in this world and for the next, the perfect thing that God would have him to be. He would allow no day to pass but he would offer it to his God, in union with Christ who lives in him. He would rise in the morning of each day and would at once unite himself with his Christ, in His company would offer himself to the Father to do the Father's holy will "Hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven," is every true Christian's morning offering. In the rest of his prayer it is Jesus Christ his Lord whom he keeps before himself above all else, his inspiration and his guide. If he makes a meditation, and he makes many a one without knowing it, he looks to His example for his guidance, studies truth and virtue, and the ideals of all manhood as they are expressed in Him, asks Him for light that he may see what is best, for strength to put that understanding into effect. If he would have more, daily Mass is always near him. To assist at daily Mass is to him no extravagance, it is not even a sign of excessive devotion or holiness; it is just a natural act for the man who believes that Jesus Christ his Lord died for him, that he renews the oblation every day upon the altar, that kneeling at the foot of the cross as it is represented there, he can best join in the sacrifice of love, winning pardon for himself, winning the grace and favor of God for all men. Nor is he content only with daily Mass. He knows that there is, for him, if he will have it, daily communion; and those who make use of that offer, in England alone, are, thank God! to be numbered by thousands.

In that communion they begin their day by singing their Magnificat; in it they renew that bond of union with their Master and Lord which at all costs they would preserve; in it they hold converse, the first in the day, with Him whose ear is ever ready to listen; in it they put before Him their needs, and not only their own, but the needs of the whole Church, the needs of all men. They come away from it with another light in their eyes, a new calm in their hearts, a peace which the world cannot give, nor can it take away. Who shall say that a day so begun will be a wasted or a futile day? Who shall say that a nation among whom this is a daily occurrence, is not benefited both in the eyes of God and of man?

Thus would the fervent Catholic begin his day, if not always in fact, at least always in spirit; if he does not or cannot do these things, at least he does not look on his brother or sister who does them as in any way strange or peculiar. Thence he goes out to his daily task. The commonest laborer can carry with him the remembrance, not only that Jesus Christ too, was a working man, but that today He works in him. He may remind himself that even as he labors, at whatever task, he labors no less in union with Christ, a working member of His body, for the universal good. He comes to his meals, he takes his hour of leisure, mindful that He too, ate and drank, was hungry and thirsty and weary, and took His needed rest, sometimes "in a desert place apart," sometimes in a cottage with His friends; that what He did then He does now, in those who are living members of His body. During the day, as may be seen, in any Catholic Church, at almost any hour, and in almost any place, he will think it no strange thing, but only right, that he should call upon his Friend of friends in His own house, hold a minute's conversation with Him, renew with Him their mutual agreement. "Come to me, all ye that labor and are burdened, and I will refresh you," has for him a practical meaning in his daily life; in his hour of need he does not forget Him who "is able to save them that come to God by Him: ever living to make intercession for us" (Heb. vii, 25). If this is at the root of the Catholic's mind, because of its union with Christ, in the ordinary routine of his private life, no less is it at the root of his relation with his neighbor.

Subconsciously, at least, the Catholic cannot lay aside the revelation that Jesus Christ our Lord lives in all men, or longs to live in them if already He is not there; all men, like himself, are or are called to be members of that mystical body which is Christ, to which he himself belongs. Hence he has his own definition of, and attitude towards, authority. He does not forget that of lawful authority his Master said: "He that heareth you heareth me, and he that despiseth you despiseth me" (Luke x, 16); and even of that authority which was unworthy of its trust He could say: "On the chair of Moses have sat the Scribes and Pharisees. All things, therefore, that they shall say to you, observe and do; but according to their works do ye not" (Matt. xxiii, 3). Therefore, in obeying a lawful master, whoever he may be, who commands a lawful act, whatever it may be, he knows that He obeys Jesus Christ our Lord Himself; only when the command is not lawful, when it violates a higher law, must he resist even unto death. He knows, too, that in the act of obeying he is most like to Him who could sum up thirty years of His life in the simple words, "He was subject to them"; and whose whole history is told in those other words: "Made obedient even unto death."

In like manner, with regard to his fellow-man, he holds and follows a principle which is not new, but which, in matter of fact, has transformed the world, has founded our civilization, and which today is being called into question to the jeopardy of all our foundations of society. "Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my brethren, you did it to me" (Matt. xxv, 40); this, as we have already said, repeated in various forms by the Founder of Christendom, is the key, though we may have forgotten it, to all our present understanding of social life. The Christian has been taught through the ages to see in the meanest of his neighbors his Lord and Master, his beloved Christ, to serve Christ in him, to love him even as he loves himself, nay more, as we have said elsewhere, to love him even as Christ Himself loves him. He remembers St. Paul pleading for Onesimus, the runaway slave, to his master Philemon; he finds it easy, nay, after centuries, it has become natural, to accept the doctrine that among men there is neither master nor slave. The master himself will temper his command when he remembers that his servant is to him as Christ our Lord, "as he that serveth"; the equal will not make it his aim to bring down or overreach his equal, since that equal is to him in the place of Christ. Under that guidance Christianity has always been a religion of mutual service; it has been so marked in the past, it is so marked everywhere today. Let Christianity, let the Catholic Church be fostered, and charity in deed will grow with her; check her, and charity decays, a fact which our British Government knows well, and turns to good account in countries where, without her aid, little or nothing could be done.

And even if we look outside the Christian pale, if we consider those, whether abroad or at home, for whom Jesus Christ our Lord means nothing, the true follower of Christ bears in mind that these come no less within the range of Christ's immeasurable love.

Though they may sin, though they may despise and flout Him, still did Jesus plead for them: "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." Though they flee from Him, though they believe, because so they have been taught, that He is a false teacher, a danger to their freedom and their rights, a misguided leader to-be shunned, to be fought, if possible to be crushed with His following after Him, still does He pursue them with His love, and while they live will not let them go. He would have even them incorporated in Himself, received into His fold. "Other sheep have I, that are not of this fold; them also must I bring." In regard to all these the true follower of Jesus Christ would think as He thinks, would labor as He labors. He knows in this, as in all things, that Christ the King of Man, whose kingdom covers the whole world, whose rights are beyond all question, appeals to him to help Him in the noble work of restoring all things in Him, of making all one in Him, and by prayer, by word, by deed, by example, even, if he be called to it, by giving himself wholly to the task, he offers to the service all that he may. Believing what he does of Jesus Christ, of His mystical body, and longing to include all men in that body, every Christian, if he is true to himself, must needs be an Apostle. "So let your light shine before men that they may see your good works, and may glorify your Father who is in heaven" (Matt. v, 16).

Lastly, in dealing with our enemies, with Jesus Christ a totally new mind has come into the world. Aristotle, as his <Ethics> show, had a-noble concept of man, yet in his attitude to insult and injury he could see no nobility but in justice, as he conceived it, and revenge. Even the Old Testament demanded "an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth." Jesus Christ proposed another standard.

"You have heard that it hath been said: Thou shalt love thy neighbor and hate thine enemy. But I say to you: love your enemies; do good to them that hate you, and pray for them that persecute you: that you may be the children of your Father who is in heaven, who maketh his sun to rise on the good and the bad, and raineth upon the just and the unjust. For if you love them that love you, what reward shall you have? Do not even the publicans this? And if you salute your brethren only, what do you more? Do not also the heathen this? Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matt. v, 43-48).

It was then, and it is today, a lesson hard for human nature to learn, yet did He never flinch in repeating it. And in time human nature understood. It was the last lesson His Apostles grasped, though it had been given to them from the beginning; when it was learnt, then it became the chief lesson they had to teach to others. In that alone the world has found a new light, and a new life, "through Jesus Christ."

"And they stoned Stephen, invoking and saying: Lord Jesus, receive my spirit. And falling on his knees he cried with a loud voice, saying: 'Lord, lay not this sin to their charge.' And when he had said this he fell asleep in the Lord" (Acts vii, 58, 59).

St. Paul and St. Peter are full of the same. "Be not overcome by evil, but overcome evil by good" (Rom. xii, 21).

"For this is thank-worthy: if for conscience' sake towards God, a man endure sorrows, suffering wrongfully. For what giving is it, if, committing sin, and being buffeted for it, you endure? But if doing well you suffer patiently: this is thank-worthy before God. For unto this are ye called: because Christ also suffered for us, leaving you an example, that you should follow his footsteps. Who did not sin, neither was guile found in his mouth.

Who, when he was reviled, did not revile; when he suffered, he threatened not; but delivered himself to him that judged him unjustly. Who his own self bore our sins in his body upon the tree: that we, being dead to sins, should live to justice: by whose stripes you were healed. For you were as sheep going astray: but now you are converted to the shepherd and bishop of your souls" (I Pet. ii, 19-2 5).

All of which St. Paul is able to sum up in his practical, ever-memorable definition of Christian charity, the like of which is to be found nowhere before him: "Charity is patient, is kind; Charity envieth not, dealeth not perversely; is not puffed up, is not ambitious; seeketh not her own, is not provoked to anger; thinketh no evil; rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth with the truth; excuseth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. Charity never fadeth away" (I Cor. xiii, 4-8).

Such, we may say, is the working programme of the Christian who looks upon his faith as no more nor less than incorporation in the mystical body of Jesus Christ our Lord. His life is the life of Christ Himself: "For me to live is Christ and to die is gain" (Phil. i, 21). His ideal is to reproduce Him, to let Christ live in him: "I live, now not I, but Christ liveth in me" (Gal. ii, 20). When he recalls that incorporation, and in consequence his own nobility as a veritable adopted son of God, the rest becomes not difficult. He has now another outlook; his horizon has extended beyond the limit of this world.

Everything in this life becomes of less importance in itself: it is chiefly now of value as a means to a greater end, as a means of proving love and service of his Lord. That this love may be developed it must needs be exercised, and it finds its object in man whom Christ also loves. Thus do all his dealings with his fellow-men take on a new significance. To love them as members of the body of Christ is to love Christ Himself, to render them a service is to render a service to Him; and this, he knows full well, will be paid him back a hundredfold in an increase of love, whatever may be its seeming fate here and now. And to love God and our fellow-men even as this—that is the fulfillment of the Law, that is, for him, the perfection of a man, even judged by the standards of this world. There are other ideals: this one may seem to some fanciful and unreal. But it has been taught by One who was the very truth, and who, in the teaching of it, stands alone among men; and it has been lived by millions during nineteen hundred years, it lies today at the back of all that we mean by Christian civilization, as distinguished from every other. It is lived by millions still; and even for those of us who feel that its perfection is too high to be attained by such imperfect creatures as ourselves, even for us it is a glorious light in the distance, to approach to which is a sure line of progress, surpassing every other that man has devised both for ourselves and for the whole human race.

When, then, I ask myself what my Church means to me, I am immediately swallowed up in a greater whole, as a stone in a building, as a branch in a tree, as a limb in a body. My Church is much more to me than I am to myself; she lives more than I do; I live only as a part of her. So absorbing does this become that her thoughts are my thoughts, her ideals are mine, the goal she has before her is my goal; in a real and to me quite natural sense, I live, now not I, but she lives in me. As my hand pays no regard to itself but regards only me to whom it belongs, as it has no life of its own, but only what comes to it from me the living person, so can I, as a Catholic, regard not myself but the body to which I belong, and live, not of myself, but in so. far as I imbibe the life of her who lives independently of me, and whose life's blood flows through me. In her I live, and move, and have my being; so natural has this become to me that I cannot think of myself as myself, except as an isolated creature, a dead and dismembered limb, in which true life is not. My life is her life, my being is her being, she has my love and my service, as I myself have the entire devotion and service of my hand. She is the living organism, I am but an organ; she is the body, I am but a member; she is the living thing, I am but a portion; she is the Bride of Jesus Christ, I am but a feature.

And I can give my Church this homage and surrender because I believe that her spirit is the spirit of Christ Himself. He dwells in her as in His own body, she has risen with Him from the tomb; with Him, having risen, she can die no more, death can no more have dominion over her. With her, and through her, and therefore "in Christ Jesus" I too am risen from the dead; I am filled with His spirit, I am no longer my natural dead self, I am a member of Him; when this body dies, then I shall know what it is to live. I see now as in a glass after a dark manner, but then I shall see face to face. He is the real living head of this real living body; I am a limb, a part of that same body, and that body is the body of Christ. So close, so alive, so invigorating is the Catholic Church to her true members, so near, through her, are they united to Jesus Christ our Lord.

Something has already been said of the place of the Saints of God, the Church Triumphant, in the mystical body of Christ; but so markedly Catholic is this devotion, especially towards her whom he fondly calls the Queen of all the Saints, that, at the risk of some repetition, this would seem the fitting place to speak of that devotion further.

The Catholic knows full well that there is but one God, and one Mediator, Jesus Christ. "For there is one God; and one mediator of God and man, the man Christ Jesus; who gave himself a redemption for all, a testimony in due times" (I Tim. ii, 5, 6). Nevertheless the Catholic believes that it has pleased the wisdom and bounty of God to give us other helps, other protectors, intercessors, models, of our own kith and kin, who, because of this human relationship with us, may be, or rather may appear to be, in some sense nearer to us. He -has made use of every means that may draw us more to Him, not least of that touch of nature which makes the whole world kin. These are the saints, members of that same mystical body of which we are members, who have lived their lives under-like conditions to our own, who under those conditions have reproduced in themselves the traits and perfections of Jesus Christ our Lord, who have reduced His teaching to practice, and have therefore become for us both an example and an inspiration, and who are all the time our own brethren. We hear of their deeds, for God and for man, and we are led to ask ourselves: "Why cannot I do what these and those have done?" We think of them in their heaven of reward, and we know that love does not die. We conclude, and the evidence of Scripture confirms our conclusion, that from their place beside the throne of God they hear us and help us; nay more, we believe that from time to time God shows that He approves our devotion by special favors granted through their intercession. We honor them for their own sakes; we honor them because of the honor their lives have given to God and to man. We speak to them as friend speaks to friend; we ask them to assist us, as the poor man asks the rich man whom he trusts and loves, as the traveler along an unknown road will ask guidance of one who has already explored it.

Moreover, when we honor them we believe that we do but honor God the more. For it is no less than His reflection in them that we honor. We honor them because God has honored them, for the reasons that He has honored them, in the way that we believe He would have us honor those who have served Him well, whom He has loved, and has markedly approved. When we invoke their intercession, it is to God that our petition goes in the last resort; we ask a favored brother to pray with us at the feet of our common Father. When we set them before ourselves for our imitation, it is Jesus Christ reflected in them that we propose to imitate. "Be ye followers of me," St. Paul said boldly to his neophytes, "as I am of Christ." We make use of them for our encouragement, as we all make use of the great men who have gone before us: "A brother helped by a brother is like a strong city." We ask them to show us how we, too, like them, may reproduce Jesus Christ our Lord in ourselves. Far from interfering with our worship of God, or of the Incarnate Word of God, the devotion to the saints does but draw us the nearer to them both, as the experience of centuries has proved; it completes our worship and confirms it. In their company we are in the company of Him whom they have loved above all else; no man ever yet had true devotion to the worthiest followers of Jesus Christ but longed to follow Him as they did.

And in return we are confident that the saints in heaven have regard for us. If they are our brethren, we are no less theirs; if our love keeps them in our hearts, that same love, rendered the more keen by their union now with God, keeps us no less in theirs. As they stand around the throne of God, their warfare over, their victory won, their voices cannot but be powerful with Him for whom they have lived and died; hence we invoke them, ask for their aid, looking into heaven with our purblind eyes, knowing very well that our aspirations will be graciously received. We live in the dark, groping as we may; we see as in a mirror only, and the mirror is but of this earth's making. We know well that "eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man to conceive what God hath prepared for them that love Him;'; but we do the little we can. And those who see "face to face," after they themselves have gone through the valley of this death, will not, when they look back on us, be wanting to us in their pity and love. When we in our turn come to die, we have confidence that they will welcome us into their company; not least because we have held their memory in honor and affection, and have gloried in them as in those of our own whom the King has delighted to reward.

But among the saints there is one who, in the Catholic mind, holds rank pre-eminently and apart; let us then consider her with her prerogatives. The Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother on earth of the Son of God, the Word Incarnate, Jesus Christ our Lord, holds her unique position essentially because of that Motherhood. On the day of the Incarnation Mary, the Maid of Nazareth, became the real Mother of God come down to earth. She gave of her body for the making of His body, of her blood for the building of His human life; had she no other claim that this on the reverence and devotion of believing man, this alone would be enough. But the record of the Incarnation sanctions much more; every word in the narrative is full of meaning, and the Catholic Church in every generation has lived upon it. She is saluted with respect by an angel, in words that at once place her above all other men and women. Before the message is given she is pronounced "full of grace"; "the Lord is with her" in a way that belongs to her alone; she is "blessed among all women"; there is nothing comparable to honor such as this paid to any other human being, in all the generations of mankind from Adam till today. When the message is delivered, it is more than just a son that is announced; it is a Savior, a Redeemer, the fulfillment of the desire of the nations. All this proclaims the nature of her Motherhood.

"Behold thou shalt conceive in thy womb and shall bear a son, and thou shalt call his name Jesus (i.e. Savior). He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Most High. And the Lord God shall give him the throne of David his father, and he shall reign in the house of Jacob forever" (Luke i, 31, 32).

Such a message is no less than the announcement of the Messias that was looked for; and Mary knew it well. Still, that the promise might be fulfilled, her free consent was to be given; the design of God for the redemption of the world was made to depend upon the "fiat" of the Maid of Nazareth. Freely she gave that consent, and at once the work of the Incarnation and Redemption was begun; and God would have the whole world thank that little maiden for the word she uttered. "Behold the handmaid of the Lord, according to thy word be it done to me."

It was an act of complete surrender. As her preceding question declared, it cost her much; she knew too, what it would imply in the future, to be the chosen companion of Him who was to redeem the world. A few days later she made a prophecy, and wonderfully has that prophecy been fulfilled.

"My soul doth magnify the Lord And my spirit hath rejoiced In God my Savior Because he hath regarded his handmaid's lowliness For behold from henceforth All generations shall call me blessed."—(Luke i, 46-48).

Thus does Mary stand in a place unique, the Mother of our Lord Jesus Christ the Redeemer, by her own consent associated with Him in His work as no other creature could be, the second Eve, the mother of the new life, in contrast with the first Eve at every point. We cannot wonder that, by anticipation, the all-possessing and all-loving Lord blessed that soul and adorned it from the beginning of its being, as He has blessed no other.

Moreover, in that she was the actual Mother of Jesus Christ, the Son of God, Mary was at once placed in a new relationship with the Blessed Trinity, far transcending that of any other creature. She was the chosen beloved of the Father, His personal associate in the work of the Incarnation. She was the Mother of the Son of God, with a mother's natural right to His respect, His love, and even on earth to His obedience. Nay more, because of the intimate union that exists between son and mother, she had a further claim to share with Him in whatsoever lot might befall Him; His joys were her joys, His sorrows were her sorrows, when the final victory came, who could have a greater part in it than she? Further, she was in a way peculiarly intimate, peculiarly her own, the living Temple of the Holy Ghost, as the Angel had foretold to her: "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee and the power of the Most High shall overshadow thee" (Luke i, 35). She was His privileged sanctuary, His spouse; with Him, in dependence on Him, but none the less with full and free co-operation on her part, she would fulfill her mission as the Mother of Jesus Christ, as the Mother of all men engendering them unto God.

Nor is this last a merely empty and poetic title. Mary has a special claim to be called the Mother of mankind; we have a special right to call her Mother. We have considered elsewhere in this chapter the meaning and significance of that mystical body of which Jesus Christ our Lord is the Head. Mary, as His Mother, as the Mother of that vital influence which has given life to that mystical body, in so far is also the Mother of that body. In a true though mystical sense the living members of that body can look upon her as their Mother; the Mother of Jesus Christ according to the flesh is the Mother of all His members according to the spirit. And as if He would Himself formally confirm and sanction this interpretation, as if He would encourage His disciples to draw it out to its logical conclusion, Jesus Christ our Lord suffered to be enacted and to be recorded for all time that memorable episode on Calvary. At the moment when the work of the Redemption was about to be completed by His death, when, in the ordinary course of nature, the Mother's heart would have been broken with the breaking of the heart of the Son, and when, therefore, she must have died with Him, Jesus paused in His great ordeal and looked upon her. He showed to her His beloved disciple John, through him bestowed on her the rest of humankind, and said: "Woman, behold thy son." In that gift He substituted John for Himself in His Mother's heart. He bade the Mother find in His disciple an object that would give an outlet to her Mother's love: "As often as you did it to the least of these you did it to me." Likewise to John He showed Mary. He bade him be a son to her in His own place even as He had been. "Behold thy Mother," he said; and "from that moment the disciple took her to his own." From that moment and because of the commission, every loving disciple of the Son has taken the Mother to his own heart. This is no novel or fantastic interpretation of the passage of St. John. It has come down through the ages, from and beyond the days of Origen; what it has meant to Christendom, the liberation of and reverence for women, the conquest of barbarian brutality, the foundation and development of chivalry, the respect for chastity, and with it for all the moral law, not least the joy and hope it has brought into the lives of the poor and down-trodden, all this historians never tire of repeating.

Upon these two titles, Mary the Mother of God, and Mary the Mother of Mankind, the whole practice of the Catholic's devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary is built. She is the second Eve as her Son is the second Adam; as through a woman came the Fall, so through a woman came the Restoration. On this account she stands alone; thus united to the Son of God she is Immaculate, free from stain of sin as is no other human being whom God has made. As His Mother He delights Himself to honor her, as His Mother He delights that she should be honored by others; as her Son He delights to grant to her what she asks, when she pleads with Him on behalf of her many children. The Catholic must needs restrain himself from saying more. He loves Mary with a child's affection, he thinks of her and sings her praises with a child's heart. Through all time her name has been on his lips; she has been the inspiration of his literature and his art; all that is most beautiful in Christendom has come to it through her. And today the very hovels of the poorest, the most sordid stratum of our vaunted civilization, finds its one illumination and relief in devotedness to the Maid of Nazareth.

Indeed it is true to say that a religion is best tested by the help it gives to the poor; under that test how many of our modern sophistries come to nothing! But with the Catholic Church it is not so; it is par excellence everywhere the religion of the poor—<pauperes evangelizantur.>" And this is specially true of the devotion to the Blessed Virgin.

It was the month of May during the last year of the War in one of the poorest quarters in one of our large towns. Before a statue of our Lady a poor woman was kneeling. Her son was at the front, her only bread-winner. Tears were in her eyes as she was heard to exclaim: "Mother of God, be good to my lad and I'll be good to yours!"

This only we would add. The more a man appreciates and loves the Son, the more, as experience abundantly proves, will he come to appreciate and love the Mother; and conversely, the more he loves the Mother, the more will he grow in devotion to the Son, seeing that in the first place it is on that Son's account that he honors her.

It would be impossible to form an idea of the Catholic mind without understanding in some degree at least, what the Catholic thinks of that which he calls the Holy Mass. It is to him far more than a religious ceremony or practice of devotion; it is a rite at which he is present, as if it were the center of all that he calls religion. He goes to Mass, and the essential of his duty is looked upon as done; no other service can take its place, nor any number of them. All that has been said in the preceding chapters has led up to this; indeed it has been difficult to exclude it from much that has been hitherto explained.

Looking at Catholics in actual life, we have only to watch them in our streets about us to realize that for them all the Mass is the focus of their faith. On any morning in the year, not on Sundays only, in any church that is open to the people, they are to be found in groups before the altar, rich and poor alike, hearing Mass before the day's work begins; go into a truly Catholic country, and you will i