THE MAY CONFERENCE

My mail is not generally a heavy one, thank God! and when I do see a sheaf of letters on my table, I feel pretty certain that there is something unpleasant amongst them. I make it a rule, therefore, never to read a letter until breakfast is over; for I think we ought take our food, as the Lord intended, with a calm mind. And I am not one of those ascetics whom every mouthful they swallow seems to choke. I take what God sends with a thankful heart, and bless Him for it. And sure it was well I followed this wholesome practice the following morning; for I do not think I ever lost my equanimity so thoroughly as when, on opening a circular, I saw a formal and extended and appalling syllabus of our Conferences for that year. Up to this, our Conferences had been conferences—informal conventions, where we met, talked over our little troubles, discussed a rubrical or theological question in an academic fashion, and listened with patience and edification to some young man, who nervously read for an hour or so some carefully prepared paper on a given subject. Then, if the Master of Conferences wanted to show how well read he was, he put a few questions here and there around the table. But if he was very persistent, and the chase became too hot, it was easy to draw a red herring across the track, the aforesaid red herring generally taking the shape of one of those venerable questions, which, like the trisection of an angle, or the quadrature of a circle, or the secret of perpetual motion, shall never be finally solved. The red herring that did us most service, and was now, after the lapse of forty years' discussion, a battered skeleton, was "whether invincible ignorance on the part of the penitent as to the reservation of a particular sin excused from the reservation, or whether faculties in every case were withdrawn from the confessor." I believe the question has been warmly debated in the schools; but there it remains, suspended, like the Prophet's coffin (I am afraid my metaphors are getting mixed), between heaven and earth.

But altogether these conferences were nice, pleasant occasions for meeting the brethren and exchanging ideas. What was my consternation this morning to read a series of new rules, as dogmatic as an Act of Parliament, which put an end forever to the old order of things, and reduced our delightful meetings to a number of monthly examinations on Rubrics, Sacred Hermeneutics, Theology, and Ecclesiastical History. Our names were all to go into a hat, and the unfortunate prizeman was to be heckled and cross-examined by the chairman for ten minutes, like any ordinary Maynooth student at the Christmas and Easter examinations. Then came the Conference, after three or four poor fellows had been turned inside out. This was a paper to be read for three-quarters of an hour. Then came another cross-examination of that unhappy man; then a series of cross-questions, after we had all gone into the hat again. "And then," I said to myself with chagrin and disgust, "they will gather up all that remains of us from the floor and send us home for decent interment." Here is one little trifle, that would easily fill up a half-year's study in a theological seminary:—

PRO MENSE AUGUSTO.
(Die I^ma Mensis.)
1. Excerpta ex Statutis Dioecesanis et Nationalibus.
2. De Inspiratione Canonicorum Librorum.
3. Tractatus de Contractibus (Crolly).

"Good heavens," I exclaimed, as Father Letheby came in and read down the awful list in the second copy which I handed him, "imagine that! What in the world do bishops think? It is easy for them to be twirling their rings around their little fingers and studying the stones in their mitres. They have nothing else to do, as we all know, except the occasional day's amusement of knocking curates around, as you would pot balls on a billiard-table. But what consideration have they for us, poor hard-working missionary priests? What do they know about our heavy confessionals, our sick-calls, our catechising in the schools, our preparing for our sermons, our correspondence for our people, with Europe, Asia, Africa, America, and Oceanica, our—our—our—look at this! 'Excerpta ex Statutis!' That means reading over every blessed diocesan and national statute, that is, two ponderous volumes. Again, 'De Inspiratione'—the whole question of the Higher Criticism, volume after volume, Bull after Bull, articles in all the magazines, and the whole course of German exegetics. That's not enough! But here, as dessert, after junks of Rubrics, and indigestible slabs of controverted hermeneutics, come the light truffles and pÂtÉ de foie gras of Crolly's 'Contracts.' Begor, the next thing will be they'll want us to preach our sermons before them; and then this Master of Conferences,—he's a good fellow and an old classmate of my own; but of course he must exhibit his learning, and bring in all his Christy minstrel conundrums, as if any fool couldn't ask questions that twenty wise men couldn't answer;—and then he'll cock his head, like a duck under a shower, and look out of the window, and leave me stuck dead—"

There was a quiet smile around Father Letheby's mouth during this philippic. Then he said, smoothing out the paper:—

"There is a little clause here at the end, which I think, Father Dan, just affects you."

"Affects me? If there is, it didn't catch my eye. Show it to me."

I took the paper, and there, sure enough, was a little paragraph:—

I read that over three times to make quite sure of it, my curate looking down smilingly at me.

"If you are not of a certain standing, Father Dan, I'd like to know who is."

"True for you," I replied musingly. "I believe I am called the Patriarch of the Conference."

Visions of an old man, leaning back in his chair, whilst he was proof-protected against theological bullets, swam before me; and I began to feel like a man on a safe eminence, overlooking the battlefield, or a Spanish lady at a bullfight.

"'Pon my word," I said, at length, "I'm beginning to think there is something in it, after all. The Holy Ghost has something to say to our good and holy prelates. There is no doubt there was a great waste of time at these Conferences, and young men got into idle habits and neglected their theology; and, you know, that's a serious matter. In fact, it reaches sometimes to a mortal sin. We must all study now. And you see how practical the bishop is. There's Rubrics. Now, there's no doubt at all that a good many of us don't respect the ceremonies of the Mass. Go to Lisdoonvarna, and every fellow appears to have his own idea of—"

"Pardon me, sir," said Father Letheby, "I cannot quite follow you there. I must say I never saw the Rubrics half so well carried out in England as here at home. In fact, this complaint appears to be one of these satires on racial characteristics that are only half true, and take all their force from traditional misrepresentations."

Isn't that fine language? You see, he's taking a leaf or two out of my book.

"Well, but you can't deny that this question of Scriptural exegesis is one of these dominant questions that must arrest the attention of all who are interested in ecclesiastical or hieratical studies," said I, trying to keep pace with him.

"Quite true," he said; "and yet I should like to see these new-fangled theories about Scriptural inspiration, plenary or otherwise, lifted from the shaking quagmires of conjecture onto the solid ground of demonstration."

"You cannot deny whatever," I replied, just before giving in, "that Crolly's 'Contracts' is solid and well-reasoned and coherent argument; and look at its vast importance. It touches every question of social and civil life—"

"It is an excellent heliograph in sunny weather," he said; "but what about a muggy and misty day?"

"Well, God bless the bishop, whatever," I replied, throwing up the sponge; "if we haven't the ablest theologians, the smartest Master of Ceremonies, and the best Orientalists in Ireland, it won't be his fault. Dear me, how far-seeing and practical he is!"

"But about his ring and his mitre, sir?" said my curate. "You were pleased to make some observations a few minutes ago—"

"That'll do now," I replied. "My mare will be ready the morning of the Conference. You'll drive, and we must be in time."

That was a pleasant drive. May in Ireland! What does it mean? It means coming out of a dark tunnel into blinding sunshine; it means casting off the slough of winter, and gliding with crest erect and fresh habiliments under leafy trees and by the borders of shining seas, the crab-apple blossoms, pink and white, scenting the air over your head, and primroses and violets dappling the turf beneath your feet; it means lambs frisking around their tranquil mothers in the meadows, and children returning at evening with hands and pinafores full of the scented cowslip and the voluptuous woodbine; it means the pouring of wine-blood into empty veins, and the awakening of torpid faculties, and the deeper, stronger pulsations of the heart, and the fresh buoyancy of drooping and submerged spirits, and white clouds full of bird-music, as the larks call to their young and shake out the raptures of their full hearts, and the cheery salutations of the ploughmen, as the coulter turns over the rich, brown soil, and the rooks follow each furrow for food.

"A grand day, Mick!"

"Grand, your reverence, glory be to God!"

"Good weather for the spring work."

"Couldn't be better, your reverence."

We're out of hearing in a flash, for the little mare feels the springtime in her veins, and she covers the road at a spanking pace.

"You've thrown off twenty years of age, to-day, Father Dan," said Father Letheby, as he looked admiringly at his old pastor, then turned swiftly to his duty, and shook out the ribbons, and then drew them together firmly, and the little animal knew that a firm hand held her, and there was no fear.

"No wonder, my boy," I cried; "look at that!" And I pointed to the ανηριθμον gamma;ελασμα of old Æschylus; but what was his Ægean or even his Mare Magnum to the free and unfettered Atlantic? Oh! it was grand, grand! What do I care about your Riviera, and your feeble, languid Mediterranean? Give me our lofty cliffs, sun-scorched, storm-beaten, scarred and seamed by a thousand years of gloom and battle; and at their feet, firm-planted, the boundless infinity of the Atlantic!

We were in time, and I was snugly ensconced in my old corner up near the bishop's chair before the priests began to throng in. Now, I'd like to know this. If an old gentleman, not hitherto very remarkable for dandyism, chooses to brush his white, silvered hair over his coat-collar, and has put on a spotless suit of black cloth, and sports his gold chain and seals conspicuously, and wears his spectacles easily, and drops them in a genteel manner on the silk ribbon that is suspended around his neck; and if he is altogether neat and spruce, as becomes an ecclesiastic of some standing in his diocese, is that a reason why he should be stared at, and why men should put their hands in their pockets and whistle, and why rather perky young fellows should cry "Hallo!" and whisper, "Who's the stranger?" And even why the bishop, when he came in, and we all stood up, should smile with a lot of meaning when I kissed his sapphire ring and told him how well he looked?

"And I can reciprocate the compliment, Father Dan," his Lordship said; "I never saw you look better. All these vast changes and improvements that you are making at Kilronan seem to have quite rejuvenated you."

Father Letheby, at the end of the table, looked as demure as a nun.

"I must congratulate your Lordship also," I said, "on these radical changes your Lordship has made in the constitution of our Conference. It is quite clear that your Lordship means to give full scope to the budding talent of the diocese."

A groan of dissent ran round the table.

"I'm afraid you must give up your Greek studies, Father Dan," said the bishop; "you'll have barely time now to master the subject-matter of the Conference."

"That's true, my Lord, indeed," I replied, "it would take twenty hours out of the twenty-four, and seven days out of every week to meet all these demands, at least for a valetudinarian ('Oh! Oh!' from the table). But your Lordship, with your usual consideration, has taken into account the nimble intellects of these clever young men, and exempted the slow-moving, incomprehensive minds of poor old parish priests like myself." ("No! No!! No!!!" from the table.)

"Now, now," said the Master of Conferences, a thin, tall, high cheek-boned, deep-browed, eagle-eyed priest, whom I have already introduced as "a great theologian," "this won't do at all. We're drifting into the old ways again. I mustn't have any desultory conversation, but proceed at once to business. Now, my Lord, would you kindly draw a name?"

"Put in Father Dan! Put in Father Dan!" came from the table.

The bishop smilingly drew up number four; and the chairman called upon Father Michael Delany.

Father Michael squirmed and twisted in his seat. He was a very holy man, but a little peppery.

"Now, Father Michael," said the chairman blandly, "we'll take the Rubrics first. Let me see. Well, what do you do with your hands during the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice?"

"What do I do with my hands?" said Father Michael sullenly.

"Yes; what do you—do—with your hands?"

"That's a queer question," said Father Michael. "I suppose I keep them on me."

"Of course. But I mean what motions—or shall we call them gestures?—do you use?"

"What motions?"

"Yes. Well, I'll put it this way. There's an admirable book by an American priest, Father Wapelhorst, on the Ceremonies. Now, he wisely tells us in the end of the book what things to avoid. Could you tell me what to avoid—what not to do in this matter?"

"Don't you know, Father Michael?" said a sympathetic friend; "go on. Elevans et extendens—"

"Young man," said Father Michael, "thank you for your information, but I can manage my own business. What's this you were saying?" he cried, turning to the Master of Conferences.

"What mistakes might a priest make with his hands during celebration?"

"What mistakes? Well, he might put them in his pocket or behind his back, or—"

"Never mind, never mind. One question more. If you wore a pileolus, zucchetto, you know, at what part of the Mass would you remove it?"

"I wouldn't wear anything of the kind," said Father Michael; "the five vestments are enough for me, without any new-fangled things from Valladolid or Salamanca."

The chairman had graduated at Salamanca.

"My Lord," I interposed charitably, "I don't want to interfere with this interesting examination, but my sense of classical perfection and propriety is offended by this word in the syllabus of to-day's Conference. There is no such word in the Latin language as 'Primigeniis,'—'De Primigeniis textibus SacrÆ ScripturÆ—'"

"Now, Father Dan, this won't do," shouted the chairman. "I see what you're up to. There must be no interruptions here. Very good, Father Michael, very good indeed! Now, we'll take another. Father Dan, if you interrupt again, I'll put you into the hat. Well, number eighteen! Let me see. Ah, yes. Father Irwin!"

Poor Father Michael looked unhappy and discomfited. It is a funny paradox that that good and holy priest, who, his parishioners declared, "said Mass like an angel," so that not one of his congregation could read a line of their prayer-books, so absorbed were they in watching him, couldn't explain in totidem verbis the Rubrics he was daily and accurately practising.

Which, perhaps, exemplifies a maxim of the Chinese philosopher:—

Before Father Irwin was questioned, however, there was a delightful interlude.

Some one asked whether it was lawful for any one, not a bishop, to wear a zucchetto during the celebration of Mass. As usual, there was a pleasant diversity of opinion, some contending that the privilege was reserved to the episcopate, inasmuch as the great rubricists only contemplated bishops in laying down the rules for the removal and assumption of the zucchetto; others again maintained that any priest might wear one; and others limited the honor to regulars, who habitually wore the tonsure. The chairman, however, stopped the discussion peremptorily, and again asked (this time a very aged priest) the question he had put to Father Delany. The old man answered promptly:—

"The zucchetto, or pileolus, is removed at the end of the last secret prayer, and resumed after the ablutions."

"Quite right," said the chairman.

"By the way," said the old man, "you pronounce that word pileōlus. The word is pileŏlus."

"The word is pileōlus," said the chairman, whose throne wasn't exactly lined with velvet this day.

"Pardon me. The word is pileŏlus. You find it as such in the scansions of Horace."

"This is your province, Father Dan," said the bishop. "There's no one in the diocese so well qualified to adjudicate here—"

my Lord!" said I. I was drawing the bishop out. "There were ironical cheers at 'Agamemnona.'"

said the bishop, smiling. "Of course, we have many a rich depositary of classical lore here,

"My Lord," said I, pointing around the table,

("Oh! Oh! Oh!" from the Conference.)

Here the Master of Conference, seeing that the bishop was getting the worst of it, though his Lordship is a profound scholar, broke in:—

He looked at me significantly when he said, "dum mula ligatur," but I had the victory, and I didn't mind.

"Now, look here, Father Dan, you're simply intolerable. The Conference can't get along so long as you are here. You are forever intruding your classics when we want theology."

"I call his Lordship and the Conference to witness," I said, "that I did not originate this discussion. In fact, I passed over in charitable silence the chairman's gross mispronunciation of an ordinary classical word, although I suffered the tortures of Nessus by my forbearance—"

"There will be no end to this, my Lord," said the chairman. "That'll do, Father Dan. Now, Father Irwin."

I was silent, but I winked softly at myself.