WE have now arrived at the last period of Father Hecker's life, the long illness which completed his meed of suffering and of merit, and gradually drew him down to the grave. It will not be expected that we shall treat extensively of this subject; nor can one who writes in the beginning of the '90s about the closing scenes of a life which ended late in the '80s go very much into detail without bringing in the living. As to Father Hecker's latter days in this world, it may be said that his joy and courage and buoyancy of spirits, as well as his hopeful outlook upon men and things, were all tried in the furnace of extreme bodily suffering as well as of the most excruciating mental agony.

Four distinct epochs divide Father Hecker's life: one when in early days he was driven from home and business and ultimately into the Church by aspirations towards a higher life; another marks the extraordinary dealings of God with his soul during his novitiate and time of studies; the third was the struggle in Rome which produced the Paulist community; the fourth and last was the illness which we are now to consider. The closing scenes of his life are scattered over more than sixteen years, filled with almost every form of pain of body and darkness of soul.

From severe colds, acute headaches, and weakness of the digestive organs Father Hecker was a frequent sufferer. But towards the end of the year 1871 his headaches became much more painful, his appetite left him, and sleeplessness and excitability of the nervous system were added to his other ailments. Remedies of every kind were tried, but without permanent relief, and, although he lectured and preached and did his other work all winter and most of the following spring, his weakness increased, until by the summer of 1872 he was wholly incapacitated. The winter of 1872-3 was spent in the South without notable improvement, and early in the following summer, acting upon the advice of physicians, he went to Europe. "Look upon me as a dead man," he said with tears as he bade the community farewell; "God is trying me severely in soul and body, and I must have the courage to suffer crucifixion." He also assured us that whatever action should be taken in adopting the Constitutions, then under consideration, had his hearty approval beforehand. He was accompanied to Europe by Father Deshon, from whom he parted with deep emotion at Ragatz, a health resort in Switzerland.

Father Hecker remained more than two years in Europe, trying every change of climate and scene, and every other remedy advised by physicians, and returned to New York in October, 1875, with unimproved health. He had derived most benefit from a journey up the Nile in the winter of 1873-4, and a short visit to the Holy Land in the following spring. While in Europe his mind was busy, and he managed to meet many of his old friends there, and formed new and important acquaintances. In February, 1875, he published his pamphlet, An Exposition of the Church in View of the Present Needs of the Age, which contains his estimate of the evils of our times, especially in Europe, and the adequate remedy for them. On his return to New York he was too weak to bear the routine of the house in Fifty-ninth Street and lived with his brother George till the fall of 1879, when he removed to the convent, remaining with the community till his death nine years afterwards.

As to the physical sufferings of those last sixteen years, they were never such as to impair Father Hecker's mental soundness. He never had softening of the brain, as the state of his nerves before going to Europe seemed to indicate; nor had he heart disease, as was for a time suspected. His mental powers were intact from first to last, though his organs of speech were sometimes too slow for his thoughts. His digestion had been impaired by excessive abstinence in early manhood, dating back to a time before he was a Catholic, and his nervous system, also, had been injured by that means, as well as by the pressure of excessive work in later life. Gradual impoverishment of the blood was the result, and the dropping down of nervous force, till at last the body struck work altogether. Four or five years before his death Father Hecker became subject to frequent attacks of angina pectoris, said to be the most painful of all diseases. During the sixteen years of illness every symptom of bodily illness was aggravated by the least attention to community affairs or business matters, and also by interior trials which will presently be described.

He was not unwilling to trace his breaking down to excessive austerity in former years. Once when asked for advice about corporal mortification he answered: "Don't go too fast. Remember St. Bernard's regret for having gone too far with such things in his youth. For my part, for many years I practised frightful penances, and now I fear that much of my physical helplessness is due to that cause." His state was not one of utter debility, though that quickly resulted if watchfulness were relaxed, or from application to responsible duties. But his strength never was to much to speak of, "only so, so," to use his own expressions, which signified a very small amount of the power of exertion or endurance in the muscles and nerves.

"What about my health?" he wrote from Europe. "There are days when I feel quite myself, and then others when I sink down to the bottom. My condition of mind and body often perplexes me, and there is nothing left me but to abandon all into the hands of Divine Providence. The end of it all is entirely in the dark, and were there not parallel epochs in my past life, and similar things in the lives of some others which I have read, my perplexity would be greater."

And again, from Ragatz, in the summer of 1875:

"My state of health is much the same. I found last week that my pulse was bounding in a few hours from the sixties into the nineties without any apparent cause. Yesterday I determined to consult the leading physician here. He examined me, and, like all others, attributes everything to my nerves, resulting from impoverished blood. I say to myself: 1st, How long will the machine keep working in this style? 2d, There will be a smash-up some day. 3d, Or perhaps I shall be able to get up more steam and run it a while longer. Who knows?"

And in another letter from the same place:

"Even here, freed from all [labors], it often seems to me that a good breeze, if it struck me in the right place, would drive the soul out of my body, so lightly is it connected with it, so slightly do they hold together."

As already said, his trip to Egypt had given him a temporary relief, and this was due, so he supposed, to utter change of scene and to solitude. When it was over he wrote as follows:

"This trip has been in every respect much more to my benefit than my most sanguine expectations led me to hope. It seems to me almost like an inspiration, such have been its beneficial effects to my mind and body. In Nubia there reigned profound silence and repose, and in lower Egypt, although there is more activity and evidence of modern life, still it is quiet and tranquil. I feel somewhat like one who has been in solitude for three or four months."

"My daily rÉgime," he writes to his brother and Mrs. Hecker, from Italy, "has not changed these two years which I have spent in Europe. If I rise before nine I feel it the whole day. In the morning I awake about seven for good, and take a cup of tea with some bread and butter. I then read; sometimes, not often, I write a note in bed, and rise about nine or ten. I take a lunch at twelve and dine at six. My appetite is not much at any time. My sleep, so so. [All through his illness he went to bed at nine or shortly after.] I feel for the most part like a man balancing whether he will keep on swimming or go under the water. Sometimes I take a nap two or three times a day—if I can get it. There are weeks when I do not and cannot put my pen to paper. To write a note is a great effort. . . . Though my strength is so little my mind is not unoccupied, and I keep up some reading."

Just in what way his spiritual difficulties accelerated his bodily decline it is hard to say, for he was generally extremely reticent as to his interior life. A few words dropped unawares and at long intervals, and carefully taken down at the time, give fleeting glimpses into a soul which was a dark chamber of sorrow, though it was sometimes peaceful sorrow. To this we can fortunately add some sentences written in an unusually confidential mood in letters from Europe. Before his illness he was over-joyful, or so it seemed to some to whom this trait of his was a temptation. "Why," it was said, "religion seems to have no penitential side to Father Hecker at all." From the day of his ordination until his illness began he might have made the Psalmist's words his own: "There be many that say, Who shall show us any good? Lord, Thou hast set upon us the light of Thy countenance, Thou hast put gladness in my heart." But now the light of that radiant joy had faded away, and the face of God, though as present as ever before, loomed over him dark, threatening, and majestic. He had studied spiritual doctrine too well not to be ready for this trial, nor had it been sent to him without warning. Nevertheless the sensible presence of God's love had been so vivid and constant that he could alternate the joy of labor with that of prayer with the greatest ease. And now it was an alternation, not of choice but of dire compulsion, between bitter, helpless inaction, and a state of prayer which was a mere dread of an all-too-near Judge. It seemed to him as if he had boasted, "I said in my abundance I shall not be moved for ever," and now he must end the inspired sentence, "Thou hast turned away Thy face from me and I became troubled." When this obscuration of the Divine Love first grew upon him the misery of it was intolerable and was borne with extreme difficulty. The pain was lessened at intervals as time passed on, and before a year had elapsed, his letters from Europe, though they did not before complain of desolation, now show its previous existence by hailing the advent of seasons of interior peace. But from beginning to end of this entire period of his life we have not found a word of his speaking of joy. And again, even the peace would go and the desolation return; the face of God, not any time smiling, had lost its calm regard and was once more bent frowning upon him. The following extracts from letters written from Switzerland in the autumn of 1874, and within a month of each other, tell of these alternations of storm and calm:

"As to my health these last ten days I cannot say much. My interior trials have been such that it would be impossible that my health should improve under them. As long as they last I must expect to suffer. I see nothing before me but darkness, and there is nothing within my soul but desolation and bitterness. Cut off from all that formerly interested me, banished as it were from home and country, isolated from everything, the doors of heaven shut, I feel overwhelmed with misery and crushed to atoms. My being away from my former duties is a negative relief; it frees me from the additional burden and trouble which would necessarily fall upon me if I were within reach."

"There remains nothing for me but to confide in, to follow, and abandon myself to that Guide who has directed me from the beginning. I read Job, Jeremias, and Thomas a Kempis, and meditate on the sufferings of Our Lord and the character of His death. I recall to mind what I have read on these matters in spiritual writers and the Lives of the Saints. I reflect how from the very nature of the purification of the soul this darkness, bitterness, and desolation must be; but not a drop of consolation is distilled into my soul. The only words which come to my lips are 'My soul is sad unto death,' and these I repeat and repeat again. At all times, in rising and in going to bed, in company and at my meals, I whisper them to myself, while to others I appear cheerful and join in the talk. At the most I can but die; this is the lot of all, and no one can tell the moment when.

"Withal, I try to have patience, resignation, endurance, and trust in
God, waiting on His guidance and leaving all in His hands."

"Since my last I have had some relief from my interior trials, and no sooner does this take place than my body recovers some of its strength. It would not have been possible for me to have borne much longer the desolation which filled my soul. Each new trial, when passed, leaves me more quiet and tranquil. Past periods of my life give me hope that this trial will also come to an end. What will that be? How will it happen? and when? God alone knows. He that has led me so many years still guides me, and resistance to His will is worse than vain. Judging from that same past, my expectations to return to my former labors are not sanguine. It seems to me sometimes that I am cut off from these to be prepared for a deeper and broader basis for future action. But whether this will be so or not, is in the hands of God. Whatever He wills me to do, I must do it. My own will has become null, and all that is left for me to do is to wait on His good pleasure and His own time. To act or not to act, to suffer or not to suffer, to speak or to keep silence, to return to my former labors or never to return, to live on or die, all have become indifferent to me. I am in God's hands, with no will of my own; for He has taken it, and it is for Him to do with me whatever He pleases. If this be a source of pain to others, none but God knows what it has cost me. There as nothing, therefore, left but to wait in trust on God's will and His mercy and good pleasure."

And again the darkened heavens are above him:

"Death invited, alas! will not come. What a relief it would be from a continuous and prolonged death!"

The obscurity of the drawing of the Holy Ghost, as well as of God's designs, and his incessant fretting against this, partly involuntary and, as he confesses, partly voluntary also, "disturbs my health and reduces my strength."

Next to the evil self-company of an unforgiven sinner there is no loneliness so sad as that of the invalid. He needs company most who is worst company for himself. Yet Father Hecker has not left a single word which would suggest that during more than two years of absence from all his life associates in religion, as well as from his blood kindred, whom he loved with a powerful love, he felt the lack of human companionship. One reason for this was his contemplative nature, and this was the main reason. He was born to be a hermit, and was an active liver only by being born again for a special vocation. Another reason was that his mind was so constituted that, when subjected to trial, it rested better when quite out of sight of everybody and everything associated with past responsibilities. He bade adieu to Father Deshon when the latter left him at Ragatz with sorrow, but without reluctance; and when a year afterwards at was suggested that one of the community should come to Europe and keep him company, he refused without hesitation, saying that his companion would be burdened with a sick man's infirmities, or the sick man distressed by his companion's inactivity on his account. But towards the very end of his life there were times when he felt the need of congenial company and was extremely grateful for it. But this did not happen often, and when it did it was because the waves of despondency which submerged him were heavier and darker than usual.

The following extract from a letter shows this state of mind:

"As I get somewhat more accustomed to my separation from all that was so dear to me, the strangeness of my position seems to me more and more inexplicable. All the things which are going on in Fifty-ninth Street were once all to me, and nothing appeared beyond. To be separated from all; to look upon one's past as a dream; to become a stranger to one's self, wandering from city to city, from country to country, ever in a strange land and among strangers; to be attached to nothing; to see no definite future; to be an enigma to one's self; to find no light in any one to guide me, isolated from all except God—who will explain what all this means? where it will end? and how soon? As I become resigned to this state of things my health suffers less. Occasionally my interior trials and struggles are almost insupportable, but less so than if I were surrounded by those who have an affection for me. To worry others without their being able to give me any relief would only increase my suffering, and finally become unbearable. All is for the best! God's will be done!"

What he wrote to a friend suffering from illness he applied to himself; he made spiritual profit, as best he might, from separation from the men and the vocation he loved so well:

"I can sympathize with you more completely in your sickness being myself not well. To be shut off from the world, and cut off from human activity—and this is what it means to be sick—gives the soul the best conditions to love God alone, and this is Paradise upon earth. Blessed sickness! which detaches the soul from all creatures and unites it to its sovereign Good. But one's duties and responsibilities, what of these in the meantime? We must give them all up one day, and why not now? We think ourselves necessary, and others try to make us believe the same; there is but little truth and much self-love in this. 'What else do I require of thee,' says our Lord in Thomas À Kempis, 'than that thou shouldst resign thyself integrally to Me.' This is what our Lord is fighting for in our souls."

Yet in having his life-work torn away from him he was like a man whose leg has been crushed and then amputated, the phantom of the lost limb aching in every muscle, bone, and nerve. This was partly the secret of his pain while in Europe, at the mere thought of his former active life; it haunted him with memories of its lost opportunities, its shortcomings in motive or achievement, or what he fancied to be such, in view of the Divine justice, now always reckoning with him.

He was ever cheerful in word, even when the pallor of his face and the blazing of his eyes betrayed his bodily and spiritual pain. "The end of religion is joy, joy here no less than joy hereafter," he once insisted, and he argued long and energetically for the proposition; but meantime he was racked with inner agony and was too feeble to walk alone. In his letters and diaries he speaks of his illness and of its symptoms as of those of another person of whom he was giving news.

His wanderings in Europe were like gropings after the Divine will in the midst of the spirit's night, often in anguish, often in tranquillity, never in his former bounding joy, always with submission, beforehand, at the moment, and afterwards. Although the Divine Will gave a cold welcome, he sought no other refuge.

"There are a thousand things," he writes, "that would worry me if I would only let them, but with God's help I keep them on at arm's length. His grace suffices, or in His presence all the things of this world disappear. God alone has been always the whole desire of my heart, and what else can I wish than that His will may be wholly fulfilled in me. Having rooted everything else out of my heart, and cut me off from all things, what other desire can I have than that He who has begun the work should finish it according to His design. It is not important that I should know what that design is; it is enough that I am in His hands, to do with me whatever He pleases. To be and to live in His presence is all."

And again:

"The mind quiet both as to the past and the future, contented with the present moment: as to the past, leaving it out of sight; as to the future, unsolicitous. As to the present, satisfied to be outwardly homeless, cut on from all past friendships and relations. The present gives me all the conditions required for preparation for the future. Any time these two years past I would have made an entire renunciation of all relations to my past labors and position, but waited as a dictate of prudence. Now I feel ready to make it with calmness and in view of all its consequences."

"No sooner do I set my mind to pray than God fills it with Himself," Father Hecker was once heard to say. And this power of prayer by no means left him after 1872; only that the God who filled him was no longer revealed as the Supreme Love, but as the Supreme Majesty. "There was once a priest," he said, speaking of himself, "who had been very active for God, until at last God gave him a knowledge of the Divine Majesty. After seeing the Majesty of God that priest felt very strange and was much humbled, and knew how little a thing he was in comparison with God." Comparison with God! It was this that gave him, as it did Job, a terror of the Divine justice beyond words to express, and impressed that air of spiritual dejection upon him which struck his old friends as so strongly in contrast with his former happy and vivacious manners. "You will never know," he once said, while being helped into bed after a very sad day, "how much I have suffered till you are in heaven." Meantime this awful Deity, so prompt to enter Father Hecker's mind, coming at times like a withering blast from the desert, was still the only attraction of his soul, the only object of his love. He could no more keep his mind off God now than he could before, and now God killed him, and then He made him alive. The ideas of the Divine goodness, patience, mercy, and love which formerly welled up in abundant floods at the thought of God, at the same thought now were dried up and disappeared. "Oh!" he once exclaimed, "if I could only be sure that I shall not be damned!" This was said unawares while listening to the life of a saint. The reader will, therefore, understand that Father Hecker's inner trouble was not a state of mere aridity, a difficulty of concentration of mind on spiritual things, or a vagrancy of thought; it was a perpetual facing of his Divine Accuser and Judge, a trembling woe at the sight of Infinite Majesty on the part of one for whom the Divine love was the one necessary of life for soul and body. Yet he knew that this was really a higher form of prayer than any he had yet enjoyed, that it steadily purified his understanding by compelling ceaselessly repeated acts of faith in God's love, purified his will by constant resignation of every joy except God alone—God received by any mode in which it might please the Divine Majesty to reveal Himself. He was, therefore, willing, nay, in a true sense, glad thus to walk by mere faith and live by painful love. "I should deem it a misfortune if God should cure me of my infirmities and restore me to active usefulness, so much have I learned to appreciate the value of my passive condition of soul." This he said less than three years before his death. And about the same time, to a very intimate friend: "God revealed to me in my novitiate that at some future time I should suffer the crucifixion. I have always longed for it; but oh, now that it has come it is hard, oh, it is terrible!" And this he said weeping.

One aspect of the Divine Majesty which threatened for years to overpower him was the Last Judgment. "God has given me to see the terrors of the day of judgment," he once said, "and it has tried me with dreadful severity; but it is a wonderfully great privilege." Humility grew upon him day by day. No one who knew him well in his day of greatest power could think him a proud man, but his confidence in his vocation, and in himself is God's representative, had been immense. The following, from a memorandum, shows how he ended:

"I told him how courageous I felt. Answer: That is the way I used to feel. I used to say, O Lord! I feel as if I had the whole world on my shoulders; and all I've got to say is, O Lord! I am sorry you've given me such small potatoes to carry on my back. But now—well, when a mosquito comes in I say, Mosquito, have you any good to do me? Yes? Then I thank you, for I am glad to get good from a mosquito."

It will thus be seen that whatever diseases may have enfeebled Father Hecker's body, his spirit suffered from a malady known only to great souls—thirst for God. This gave him rest neither day nor night, or allowed him intervals of peace only to return with renewed force. Some men love gold too much for their peace of mind, some love women too much, and some power; men like Father Hecker love the Infinite Good too much to be happy in soul or sound in body unless He be revealed to them as a loving father. And this knowledge of God once possessed and lost again, although it breeds a purer, a more perfectly disinterested love, leaves both soul and body in a state of acute distress. "My soul thirsteth for Thee, my flesh longeth for Thee, in a dry and desert land without water."

Tried by these visitations, he was free to acknowledge that in past times he had been favored above others:

"Oh! there was a time," he said, "when I was borne along high above nature by the grace of God, and I feared that I should die without being subject to nature, and should never feel the need of the supernatural. But for many years now I have been left by God to my natural weakness and get nothing whatever except what I earn."

The following words of his indicate the cleansing process of these divine influences; it is from memoranda:

"He said to me once, after he had been for nine or ten years subject to almost unceasing desolation of spirit, 'all this suffering, though it has been excruciating, has greatly purified me and was of the last necessity to me. Oh, how proud I was! how vain I was! And these long years of abandonment by God have healed me.' I think this was the only time I ever knew him to connect his sufferings with fault. What he said may have referred to the mere temper and frame of his mind rather than to particular, specific faults. He undoubtedly thought more highly of human nature before that desolation began than he did at the end of it."

Meantime he used every aid for the assuagement of his interior sufferings, just as he conscientiously tried every means for the restoration of his bodily health. Good books helped him greatly. He recited his Breviary as he would read a new and interesting book, underlining here and there, and noting on the margins. But during most of his time of illness his infirmities made the Divine Office impossible. Every day he read or had read to him some parts of the Scriptures in English. "Without the Book of Job," he used to say, "I would have broken down completely." Lallemant, St. John of the Cross, St. Teresa, St. Catherine of Genoa, and other authors of a mystical tendency he frequently used. But next to the Scriptures no book served him so well during his illness as Abandonment, or Entire Surrender to Divine Providence, a small posthumous treatise of Father P. J. Caussade, S.J., edited and published by Father H. RamiÈre, S.J., with a strong defence of the author's doctrine by way of preface. At Father Hecker's suggestion it we translated into English by Miss Ella McMahon, and has already soothed many hearts in difficulties of every kind. It is an ingenious compendium of all spiritual wisdom, but it seemed to Father Hecker that submission to the Divine Will is taught in its pages as it has never been done since the time of the Apostles. The little French copy which he used is thumbed all to pieces. He used it incessantly when in great trouble of mind and knew it almost by heart. As he read its sentences or heard them read he would ejaculate, "Ah, how sweet that is!" "Oh, what a great truth!" "Oh, that is a most consoling doctrine!" just as a man exhausted with thirst and covered with dust, as he drinks and bathes at a gushing fountain in the desert, calls out and sighs and smiles.

Did he not find men here and there in his travels with whom he would take counsel and who could comfort him? There is little trace of it, though he never lacked sympathetic friends for his bodily ailments. In truth he tried to maintain a cheerful exterior, though occasionally he failed in his attempts to do so. Only once do we find by his letters and diaries that he opened his mind freely on his interior difficulties while in Europe, and that was to Cardinal Deschamps, who gave him, he writes, very great comfort.

No part of his sojourn in the Old World pleased and profited him so much as his trip up the Nile in the winter of 1873-4.

"In information of most various kinds," he writes, "it has been the richest four months of my whole life. The value intellectually and religiously as well as physically is incalculable. Given but one trip, it would puzzle me to name any which can compare with that up the Nile to Wady-Halfa. Nubia must be included. It has something of its own which you can find neither in Egypt nor elsewhere: silence, repose, almost total solitude, and its own peculiar people."

His companions were few in number and congenial in tastes, the climate mild and equable, and the people and country altogether novel. The journey, which extended into Nubia, was made in a flat-boat, the Sittina Miriam el Adra—Our Lady Mary the Virgin—the sail propelling them when the wind was fair, the crew towing them in calm weather; when the wind was contrary they tied up to the bank. The progress was, of course, slow, and yet his diary, the only one written during his illness with ample entries, shows that every day gave new enjoyment. He was provided with letters which enabled him to say Mass at the missionary stations along the river. The wonderful ruins of the ancient cities of Egypt gave him much entertainment. But his mind dwelt fondly on thoughts of Abraham, Joseph, and the chosen people, and especially upon the Holy Family, as well as the monks of the desert. He was much interested in the Mohammedan natives; their open practice of prayer, the instinctive readiness with which the idea of God and of eternity was welcomed to their thoughts, and, withal, their utter religious stagnation, which he traced to their ignorance of the Trinity, filled his mind with questions. How to convert these sluggish contemplatives, what type of Catholicity would be likely to flourish in the East, and how it could be reconciled with the stirring traits of the West, busied his mind. He often recalls his distant friends and contrasts new America with old Egypt. He wrote home when opportunity served, as thus to Father Hewit:

"With the hope that this note will reach you in due season, I greet you from this land from which Moses taught, and which our infant Saviour trod, with a right merry Christmas and a happy New Year to yourself and all the members of the community, all in the house, and the parishioners of St. Paul's. In my prayers all have a share and in the Holy Sacrifice of the altar. My heart and its affections are present with you. Could I realize its desire, I would shed a continuous flow of blessings on each one of you like a great river Nile—the river which Abraham saw and whose banks were hallowed by the footsteps of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. Remember me especially in all your prayers on these great festivals. Offer up a Mass for my special intention on each of them."

The excursion to Nubia and back did him so much good physically, and left his mind with a peace which seemed so settled, that for a time he had strong hopes of recovery; but he was soon undeceived.

On the 15th of April Father Hecker left Cairo for Jerusalem, and spent some weeks in the Holy Land, continuing to enjoy an interval of spiritual relief. He writes:

"In reciting the Gloria and the Credo, after having been in the localities where the great mysteries which they express took place, one is impressed in a wonderful manner with their actuality. The truths of our holy faith seem to saturate one's blood, enter into one's flesh, and penetrate even to the marrow of one's bones."

The first greeting which he sent from the holy places was a letter to his mother, full of expressions of the most tender affection and gratitude, as well as of ardent religious emotions produced by moving among the scenes of our Lord's life. He enclosed a little bunch of wild flowers plucked from Mount Sion. He soon returned to Europe to escape the hot summer of Palestine, and began his round of visits to health resorts, shrines, and occasionally to a friend of more than usual attraction. His brother John died about this time, and this news drew from him a letter of encouragement and condolence to their mother. To George Hecker and his wife he wrote often, his letters being full of affection, of entire submission to the Divine Will, and of religious sentiments.

The following may be of interest as indicating the return of his disconsolate frame of mind:

"I have taken to writing fables. Here is one: Once upon a time a bird was caught in a snare. The more it struggled to free itself, the more it got entangled. Exhausted, it resolved to wait with the vain hope that the fowler, when he came, would set it at liberty. His appearance, however, was not the signal for its restoration to smiling fields and fond companions, but the forerunner of death at his hands. Foolish bird! why did you go into the snare? Poor thing; it could not find food anywhere, and it was famishing with hunger; the seed was so attractive, and he who had baited the trap knew it full well, and that the bird could not resist its appetite. The fowler is our Lord. The bait is Divine Love. The bird is the soul. O skillful catcher of souls! O irresistible bait of Divine Love! O pitiable victim! but most blessed soul; for in the hands of our Lord the soul only dies to self to be transformed into God."

In all his journeyings in search of beneficial change of air or for the use of medicinal waters, he endeavored to take in the famous shrines; as for places noted in profane history, or the usual resorts of tourists, there is not the least mention of them in his letters, unless an exception be made in favor of those in Egypt and some art galleries in Europe. But, "attracted by St. Catherine," he went back to her relics at Genoa once more. Drawn by St. Francis de Sales, he made a visit to Annecy which had a soothing effect upon him, for that saint was another of his favorites. He often went out of his way to see a friend, or to seek the acquaintance of some man or woman of reputation in religious circles, and he was himself surprised at the number of those who had heard of him and wished to know him. He readily formed acquaintances, and American, English, and French fellow-travellers could easily have his conversation and company on condition that they would converse on religious matters, or on the graver social and racial topics. It was not a little singular that, although suffering from weakness of the nervous system, he could talk abstruse philosophy by the hour without mental fatigue. Discussing such points as the different movements of nature and grace, the various theories of apprehending the existence of God, or how to bring about conviction in the minds of non-Catholics on the claims of the Church, he could tire the strong brain of a well man. It was the things below which tired him. He illustrated his conversation by gleams of light reflected from his past experience. When circumstances condemn such generous souls as Father Hecker to inactivity, a favorite solace is picking up fragments of work or recalling high ideas from the crowded memory of their former zeal, often with much profit to those who listen. And this was no idle-minded or boastful trait in him, as we see from the following:

"Be assured I shall not follow my own will if I can help it. Every dictate of prudence and wisdom will be my guide. Until the clouds clear away I shall be quiet, waiting, watching and praying, seeking for light wherever there is a reasonable prospect of obtaining it. In the meanwhile my time is not misspent. The journeys which I have made, the persons whom I have met on my way—these and a thousand other things incident to my present way of life are the best of educators for improving one's mind, for correcting one's judgments, and for giving greater breadth to one's thoughts. . . . It seems to me that I almost see visibly and feel palpably the blessing of divine grace on the work of the community, in its harmony, in the success of its missions, in the special graces to its members, in their cheerfulness and zeal: all this, too, in my absence. My absence, therefore, cannot be displeasing to the Divine Will; rather these things seem to indicate the contrary, and they awake in my soul an inexpressible consolation."

But he said to one of his brethren afterwards: "Oh, father! I was sad all the time that I was in Europe. Why so? Well, it was because I was away from home, away from my work, away from my companions. And that was why I attached myself while there to those persons who felt as we did, and were of like views, and participated in our aims and purposes."

How he felt about his chances of recovery is shown by the following:

"I have nothing further to say about my health than that I have none. Were I twelve hours, or six, in my former state of health, my conscience would give me no moment of peace in my present position. It would worry me and set me to work. As it is I am tranquil, at peace, and doing nothing except willingly bearing feebleness and inertia."

From Paris, June 2, 1874, he writes to George and Josephine Hecker of a visit to Cardinal Deschamps in Brussels, where he met his old director, Father de Buggenoms. He expressed himself fully to them about the state of religion in Europe, and, although both were his admirers and warm friends, it was only on the third day that he made himself fully understood, and disabused their minds of reserves and suspicions. But before leaving "a complete understanding, warm sympathy, and entire approval" was the result. In one of the earlier

CHAPTERs of this Life we have adverted to Father Hecker's difficulty in making himself understood. On this occasion he suffered much pain, for which, he says, the joy of the final agreement amply repaid him.

He formed an intimate friendship with the AbbÉ Xavier Dufresne, a devout and enlightened priest of Geneva, and with his father, Doctor Dufresne, well known as the mainstay of all the works of charity and religion in that city. The AbbÉ Dufresne became much attached to Father Hecker. "The Almighty knows," he wrote to him, "how ardently I wish to see you again, for no one can feel more than I the want of your conversation, it was so greatly to my improvement." We have received from the AbbÉ Dufresne a memorial of Father Hecker, which is valuable as independent contemporary testimony. It is so appreciative and so instructive that we shall give the greater part of it as an appendix, together with two letters from Cardinal Newman written after Father Hecker's death.

The following is from a letter from Mrs. Craven, written early in 1875:

"That we have thought of you very often I need not tell you, nor yet that we have thought and talked of and pondered over the many and the great subjects which have been discussed during this week of delightful repose and solitude (though certainly not of silence). Let me, for one, tell you that many words of yours will be deeply and gratefully and usefully remembered, and that I feel as if all you explained to us in particular concerning the inward life which alone gives meaning and usefulness to outward signs and symbols (let them be ever so sacred), and the ways and means of quickening that inward life, all come home to me as a clear expression of my own thoughts by one who had read them better than myself."

Such was a devout and intellectual Frenchwoman's way of describing an influence similarly felt by men and women of all classes, and of the most diverse schools of thought, whom Father Hecker met in Europe.

This was written on hearing news of the community:

"It is consoling to see all these good works progressing [in the Paulist community]. To me they sound more like an echo of my past than the actual present. Before going up the Nile I used to say to some of my friends, that I once knew a man whose name was Hecker, but had lost his acquaintance, and I was going up the Nile to find him. Perhaps I would overtake him at Wady-Halfa in Nubia! But I didn't. Sometimes I think the search is in vain, and that I shall have to resign myself to his loss and begin a new life. Tuesday of this week my intention is to go to Milan and stop some days. I find friends in almost every city. Friday last I dined with the Archbishop of Turin, and have made the acquaintance of one or two priests here. Occasionally I visit museums, picture galleries, etc.; and thus time is outwardly passing by, until it pleases God to shed more light on my soul, and to impart more strength to my body, and make clear my path."

Here are his impressions of Rome after its occupation by the
Italians, together with an account of an audience with the Holy
Father:

"Rome is indeed changed, not so much outwardly, materially, as in spiritual atmosphere. It has lost its Christian exorcism and returned to its former pagan condition. The modern spirit, too, has entered it with activity in the material order. The old order, I fear, is never to return; that is to say, as it was; if it returns at all it will be on another basis. The last citadel has given way to the invasion of modern activity and push. Who would have dreamed of this twenty years ago? The charm of Rome is gone, even to non-Catholics, for they felt raised above themselves into a more congenial and spiritual atmosphere while here, and their souls enjoyed it, though their intellectual prejudices were opposed to the principles. The charm they were conscious of forced them back again to Rome in spite of themselves. But that charm has in a great measure gone.

"The other evening I had a very pleasant private audience with the Holy Father. Among other matters I showed him The Young Catholic which pleased him very much. He was struck with the size of the jackass in the picture of Ober-Ammergau, and asked if they grew so large in that country. I replied: 'Holy Father, asses nowadays grow large everywhere.' He laughed heartily and said, 'Bene trovato.'"

Father Hecker was in Rome when, in March, 1875, his old friend and patron and first spiritual adviser, Archbishop McCloskey, was made Cardinal. He was much rejoiced, and sent the Cardinal a rich silk cassock, and gave a public banquet to Monsignor Roncetti and Doctor Ubaldi, who were to carry the insignia of the cardinalate to New York. We are indebted to the kindness of Archbishop Corrigan for a copy of Father Hecker's letter of congratulation, the principal parts of which we subjoin. The view of public policy concerning the College of Cardinals expressed in this letter was developed at length in an article published by Father Hecker in The Catholic World, when Cardinal Gibbons was appointed; it will also be found in his latest volume, The Church and the Age:

"The choice of the Supreme Pontiff in making you the first Cardinal of the hierarchy of the United States gives great satisfaction here to all your friends. For as honors and dignities in the Church proceed by way of distinguished merit and abilities, the qualities which they have always recognized and esteemed in you are by the event made known to the whole world.

"This elevation to the cardinalate of an American prelate as a cheering sign that the dignities of the Church are open to men of merit of all nations, and it is to be hoped that every nation will be represented in the College of Cardinals in proportion to its importance, and in that way the Holy See will represent by its advisers the entire world, and render its universality more complete. The Church will be a gainer, and the world too; and I have no doubt that your appointment to this office in the Church will be, from this point of view, popular with the American people."

His continued and insensibly increasing weakness of body, as well as what seemed an unconquerable mental aversion to attempting even partially to resume his former career in the United States, seemed to settle negatively the question of his early return home. He began to think that it was God's will that he should permanently transfer his influence to the old World. His mind was full of the religious problems of Europe, and the notion of Paulists for Europe, differing in details from American Paulists but identical in spirit, soon occupied his thoughts. The reader will remember Father Hecker's conviction, expressed when leaving Rome after the Vatican Council, that the condition of things in the Old World invited the apostolate of a free community of wholly sanctified men, such as he would have the Paulists to be. He now became persuaded, or almost so, that God meant his illness to be the means of practically inaugurating such a movement. By it the dim outlines of men's yearnings for a religious awakening, which he everywhere met with among the European nations, could be brought out distinctly and realized by an adaptation of the essentials of community life to changed European conditions. He thought he could select the leading spirits for the work, and, without overtaxing his strength, teach them the principles and inspire them with the spirit necessary to success. All this is brought forward in his letters and discussed. But it was not to be in his time.

The following entries in his journal, made during the Lent of 1879, have this European, or rather universal, apostolate in view:

"The Holy Spirit is preparing the Church for an increased infusion of Himself in the hearts of the faithful. This increased action of the Holy Spirit will renew the whole face of the earth, in religion and in society. Souls will be inspired by Him to assist in bringing about this end.

"The question is how shall such souls co-operate with Him in preparation for this extraordinary outpouring of divine grace? The law of all extensive and effectual work is that of association. The inspiration and desire and strength to co-operate and associate in facilitating this preparation for the Holy Spirit must come to each soul from the Holy Spirit Himself.

"What will be the nature of this association and the special character of its work? The end to be had in view will be to set on foot a means of co-operation with the Church in the conquest of the whole world to Christ, the renewal of the Apostolic spirit and life. For unity, activity, and choice of means reliance should be had upon the bond of charity in the Holy Spirit and upon His inspirations.

"The central truth to actuate the members should be the Kingdom of Heaven within the soul, which should be made the burden of all sermons, explaining how it is to be gained now.

"Men will be called for who have that universal synthesis of truth which will solve the problems, eliminate the antagonisms, and meet the great needs of the age; men who will defend and uphold the Church against the attacks which threaten her destruction, with weapons suitable to the times; men who will turn all the genuine aspirations of the age, in science, in socialism, in politics, in spiritism, in religion, which are now perverted against the Church, into means of her defence and universal triumph.

"If it be asked, therefore, in what way the co-operation with the new phase of the Church in the increase of intensity and expansion of her divine life in the souls of men is to be instituted, the answer is as follows: By a movement . . . springing from the synthesis of the most exalted faith with all the good and true in the elements now placed in antagonism to the Church, thus eliminating antagonisms and vacating controversies. . . .'

"Can a certain number of souls be found who are actuated by the instinct of the Holy Spirit, the genius of grace, to form an associative effort in the special work of the present time? If there be such a work, and an associative effort be necessary, will not the Holy Spirit produce in souls, certain ones at least, such a vocation? Is not the bond of unity in the Holy Spirit which will unite such souls all that is needed in the present state of things to do this work?"

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