Current Topics. AT HOME AND ABROAD.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXIX, Issue 3, 17 January 1901, Page 1

Current Topics. AT HOME AND ABROAD.

A word to the wise. The following resolution, which was unanimously passed at the recent Catholic Congress in Sydney, is placed on record in the great memorial volume of its Proceedings just issued from the press : • That, in order to diffuse the advantages of a sound Catholic Press as widely as possible, the faithful be exhorted to extend a generous support to the Catholic newspapers of their respective districts; and that it is most desirable that a Catholic newspaper be taken in every Catholic home.' Trial by jury has been frequently described as ' the palladium of British liberty.' The phrase is a bit of overdrawn panegyric. But then, jury-worship has become a sort of superstition under the British flag. Trial by jury is, when at its best, a reasonably reliable, though by no means ideal, system of determining causes — that is to say, when the ' twelve good men and true ' who sit in judgment are free from all political, social, religious, and personal prejudices that might affect their purview of the case ; and when they are gifted, moreover, with the intelligence requisite for a proper sifting of the evidence, and sufficient honesty to give a verdict in accordance with it. Ideal judges are happily sufficiently plentiful. Ideal juries are, we fear, not much more abundant than Mantell's notornis or great coot. Perhaps this is the reason why innocent men accused of grave charges are said to display so commonly a preference for trial by a judge. We do not now contemplate such a very possible case as that to which Angelo refers in Measure for Measure, when he says to Escalus : . . . I not deny The jury, passing on the prisoner's life, May, in the sworn twelve, have a thief or two Guiltier than him they try. But the appeal to a jury is, in practically every instance, an appeal to a lower order of intelligence than that which is usually seated on the judicial bench. Mr. Sergeant Wilkins, for instance, used to drink sundry bottles of stout in the middle of the day in order cto fuddle his brain to the standard of a British jury.' Very few jurymen are accustomed to weigh evidence. Despite the corrective charge or summing-up of the judge, their minds are likely to be captured by the smart sophistries of the special pleader, or to be influenced by those emotional appeals which are even still considered almost as good ' practice ' as they were in the days when Dickens satirised them so unmercifully in the person of Sergeant Buzfuz. Hence the satirical definition of a jury as ' a body of men organised for the purpose of deciding which side has the smartest lawyer.' * ■ * Trial by jury gravely endangers the cause of justice in cases which arouse political, racial, or religious hate ; or in connection with which popular feeling is deeply stirred. In many such cases Catholics, despite certain fictions of the law, are placed at a grave and perilous disadvantage in these colonies. Referring to cases over which sectarian passion runs a ' banker '

THB CATHOLIC NBWSrAPIR.

CONCERNING JURIES.

— as in that which has lately been engrossing so much of public attention in New South Wales — a writer in the Austral Light says : ' The minority is always more or less at the mercy of the majority, and it is impossible for a Catholic on trial to have any but an entirely Protestant jury if such is desired by his opponent. 1 'Happily,' says the same writer, ' the principle of British fair-play, though it may be overboasted, does, in these matters, as a rule, prove its existence.' Nevertheless, jurors, 'misled by sectarian fanatics and evildisposed persons,' may occasionally depart from the principle that ' no man shall be persecuted on account of his religion.' The fair administration of justice demands that, in all cases around which there circles a devil's dance of sectarian or popular passion, the parties to the trial shall have the right, on ex-parte application, to have the issue or issues determined by a Bench of three or five judges.

THAT PAPAL ' PARDON.'

It is tolerably save to prophecy when you know. In our last issue we ventured to foretell what would be the real issue of the foolish story told in the Nineteenth Century for November, to the effect that the Holy Father had granted to Josef Mayr— who represented the part of Christ with such dignity and pathos at the Passion Play of Oberammergau in 1890 — 'a pardon not only for all his own sins, past, present, and future, but also, with a truly lavish generosity, for those of all his children.' We denounced the story as ' wholly untrue and calumnious,' and added : * The imaginative writer in the Nineteenth Century is probably attempting to describe the customary papal blessing, with plenary indulgence at the hour of death, which the Holy Father frequently bestows upon devout Catholics, sometimes proprio motu, but far more frequently in response to a request or supplied.* The editor of the London Catholic Times anticipated our intention by writing to Oberammergau for a copy of the document received by Josef Mayr. He received in reply a letter which completely sustains our anticipated explanation of the alleged ' pardon ' on which the writer in the Nineteenth Century builds up so gross a fairy tale. The letter, which was in German, is Englished as follows : 'Oberammergau, November 21, 1900. ' Dear Sir, — As regards the matter in question, the secretary of the Lord Bishop of Mullingar, Ireland [the Bishop of Meath, who resides at Mullingar], has also already written to me. The affair is very simple. The Princess Altieri in Rome. whose late husband had been a general in the Papal Noble Guards, was here for the Passion Play in 1890, and stayed with her daughter in the house of Mr. Mayr. Full of enthusiasm for the talents of this performer, who took the part of Christ, she procured for him and his family from the Holy Father a plenary indulgence for the hour of death. What that means, you, as a Catholic, must know. ' The indulgence for the hour of death, or rather the form for granting the same, is to be found in the Rituale Romanum, and the distinction conferred consists only in this, that the Holy Father personally granted the indulgence to Mayr by a written document. As a matter of fact, for instance, in my diocese any priest may grant this " indulgence in articulo mortis." There is, therefore, no question of forgiveness of sins. Of such a thing only ignorance and malevolence could speak.'

Every Catholic manual on the subject makes it cleaj that 'no indulgence can be obtained when there is sin unforgiven in the soul ' ; that 'to gain an indulgence we must not only have the intention of doing so, either actually at the moment, or virtually by reason of an intention previously fixed upon, but we must be in a state of grace at least when carrying out the ultimate condition to which the indulgence is attached, and fully discharge all the other conditions prescribed ' ; and that *to gain a plenary indulgence it is further necessary to be exempt from deliberate affection even for venial sin.' Mark now how plain a talc puts down the Ninctccnil: Century's repetition of the musty fiction that indulgences are a * pardon for siiib past, ptebent, and future.' The consecration of the great Benedictine A great order church of St. Anselmo in Rome gives a Euroof monks. pean contemporary occasion to publish the following interesting figures regarding the present condition of the Benedictine Order : — ' At present there are between 5000 and 6000 Benedictine monks, who are divided into thirteen " congregations," including the Cassinese, the Subiaco, the Anglo- Benedictine, Swiss, Bavarian, Beuron, French, two Austrian, Hungarian, two American, and Australian Congregations. Besides the " Black Monks," the Order has thrown off in its history many branches, such as the Cistercian Order, or "White Monks" (1000 members), the Trappists, or Reformed Cistercians (between 3000 and 4000), the Camaldulese Monks, etc. Altogether these form a body of about 12,000 religious. Finally, it is calculated that during the thirteen ccenturies of its existence this ancient Order has produced 24 popes, 200 cardinals, 1600 archbishops, 4000 bishops, besides 15,700 writers; also 1560 of its religious have been canonised, and 5000 have received minor honors in the Church. No less than 43 imperial personages and 44 royal ones have been members of the Order.' # * * The foundations of this remarkable Order were laid by St. Benedict at Subiaco in the year 529. His rule has been aptly described as ' a masterpiece of enlightened Christian wisdom and prudence.' For many long centuries the Benedictine monks were the chief agriculturists, engineers, physicians, educators, and civilisers of Western Europe. A Protestant writer has truly said that ' the world has never been indebted to any body of men as to the illustrious Order of Benedictine monks.' ' The pages of history,' says Feasy, in his Monasticism, ' literally blaze with the great names ot the mighty ones of this celebrated Order.' In one of his Historical Sketches Cardinal Newman tells us how St. Benedict ' found the world, physical and social, in ruins, and his mission was to restore it in the way, not of science, but of nature ; not as if setting about to do it, not professing to do it by any set time, or by any series of strokes, but so quietly, patiently, gradually, that often till the work was done, it was not known to be doing. It was a restoration rather than a visitation, correction, or conversion. The new world he helped to create was a growth rather than a structure. Silent men were observed about the country, or in the forest digging, cleaning, and building; and other silent men, not seen, were sitting in the cold cloister, tiring their eyes, and keeping their attention on the stretch, while they painfully deciphered, then copied and re-copied the manuscripts which they had saved, 'lhere was no one that contended or cried out, or drew attention to what was going on, but by degrees the woody swamp became a hermitage, a religious house, a farm, an abbey, a village, a seminary, a school of learning, and a city. Roads and villages connected it with other abbeys and cities which had similarly grown up, and what the haughty Alaric or fierce Attila had broken to pieces, these patient, meditative men have brought together and made live again. And then, when they had in the course of many years gained their peaceful victories, perhaps some new invaders came, and with fire and sword undid their slow and persevering toil in an hour. . . . Down in the dust lay the labor and civilisation of centuries — churches, colleges, cloisters, libraries— and nothing was left to them but to begin all over again ; but this they did without grudging, so promptly, cheerfully, and tranquilly, as if it were by some law of nature that the restoration came, and they were like the flowers and shrubs and great trees which they reared, and which when illtreated do not take vengeance or remember evil, but give forth fresh branches, leaves, and blossoms, perhaps in greater profusion, or with tichcr quality, for the very reason that the old were rudely broken oft.' To the Benedictine monks learning and civilisation owe a debt of gratitude which they can never repay. In one of his Essays (p. 371) Sir James Stephens sums up as follows the claims ot that illustrious Order to the gratitude of succeeding times: — 'The greatness of the Benedictines did not, however, consist either in their agricultural skill, their prodigies of architecture, or their priceless libraries, but in the parentage of countless men and women illustrious for active piety, for wisdom in the government of mankind, for profound learning, and for that contemplative spirit which discovers within the soul itself things beyond the limits of the perceptible creation.'