A Set-Back for Mr. Kensit.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 21, 12 June 1902, Page 3

A Set- Back for Mr. Kensit.

The bigoted 'gutter-journals' who make a regular trade of attacking and abusing the Catholic Church are usually cunning enough to give their scurrilous statements a perfecdy general application so that, in the present imperfect state of the English libel law, there is no one particular individual who has the right to bring the libellers to book and claim redress. Occasionally, however, their zeal outruns their discretion, or rather, it would be more correct to say, their malice gets the better of their cunning ; they fix upon someone indh idual the stigma of the calumny they wish to circulate, and then — they soon have reason to be sorry for i. Thus, a short time ago, the Methodist Times of London, allowed a correspondent to apply, in its columns, Ware's notorious forgery, the ' Jesuit Oath,' to an individual member of the Jesuit body in Flngland, and at once the son of Ignatius instructed his solicitor lo t.ike action in the matter. The offending paper tried to brazen it out for a while, but soon found the case was hopeless, and in the end it wisely went down on its editorial marrow-bones and humbly apologised. * This time it is dir old friend the Rock — a Church of England organ edited by the notorious Kensit — which has had the misfortune to strike a snag. Some time ago this journal amiably referred to Father Bernard Vaughan, S.J., as *an outlaw, a Jesuit, and a member ot a seditious order,' and as soon as possible a writ for libel was served on Kensit on behalf of Father Vaughan. Kensit, who never so far forgets himself as to allow his Protestant principles to put him out of pocket, promptly sent a circular to the newpapers imploring aid to fight those wicked Jesuits. One of these circulars was sent to the Wellington Tunes and its receipt was acknowledged in the following terms : — ' The editor of the Rock, a London newspaper, sends us a letter stating that a libel action has been raised against him because of some comments he made upon the Jesuits, and he appeals for funds to help him in his fight against " the wealthiest corporation in the world." The letter,' adds the Times, 'is declined with thanks, its language being of too violent a partisan character.' Other papers however have evidently been more easily gulled and Kensit was enabled to fight the matter out. The result of the tussle was announced in the cable messages in Saturday's papers, and is a complete victory for Father Vaughan, the Rock being mulcted in £300 damages in addition to the very heavy costs which the It gal proceedings Would be sure to involve. So long as Kensit does not p'iy the piper out of his own pocket — and on that point we may make ourselves perfectly certain — this lesson will have no particular effect on him ; but it is surely not too much to hope that even the most gullible of his dupes will get tired of supporting such a man when the net result of their efforts is nothing more than to secure a substantial contribution to the furtherance of the very organisation which it is their one object in life to destroy.