whom they were referred. The well-known course of the trivium and quadrivium, with little variation, can be traced from the days of Capella, in the fifth century, to the end of the ages of Faith. For many centuries it held undivided sway. It formed generations of wise and holy men. It formed men of every variety of type, of every variety of occupation. Philosophers, statesmen, lawgivers, kings, popes, soldiers, poets; men eloquent with the tongue, men eloquent with the pen-it laid for them all one thing in common-a broad, deep, consolidated, granite foundation of science, not secularized from God, but acknowledging and adoring Him in the midst. Him they know to be, the Stay, as well as the Maker of all. They felt, as it were, in their own weakness, that the scibile, like the foundations of the world itself, rested on the Living God-that "underneath were the Eternal Arms." God is not separate from knowledge in reality; nor is knowledge separate from God; nor was there one in those days who dared divorce them by a vicious abstraction from each other. Filled with the holy traditions of his childhood, and illumined by a Christian course of education, the Christian youth left the calm atmosphere of the cloister, the Presbytery, or Bishop's Palace, and commenced, with a heart as full of God as of knowledge, his university career.

At the university he found the same spirit, which he had learned to admire when poring over the Liber Passionum, or the Life of our Lord, in the days of his boyhood. He found that same spirit elevated, expanded, developed to a system,and fitting to the growth and maturity of his mind. What, as a boy, had merely the power to stir the depth of his heart or set his fancy in a flame, now could be weighed and appreciated by his intelligence, and become rooted in the newlycultivated ground of his expanding reason. What home had done for his heart, what school had done for his memory,that the University did for his intelligence. The spring of his affections had been directed to his Supreme Good in the first; his memory had been stored with a varied wealth of nova et vetera in the second; in the third, he learnt how to grasp his knowledge as a whole, how to understand the relations of its various parts, and their respective values: what was his own position-his relation to God, to man, to Creation; he learnt to adore his Maker, to grasp the scibile, and to understand himself; he was unfolded from the Christian boy into the Christian man; he was prepared to meet the world, to struggle with it, to do his work in his place, and ever to keep his eye upon that last end for which he was created. His infancy, his boyhood, his youth, his manhood, all were under one supreme,

absorbing, abiding influence, the influence of an unspotted Christian Religion, luminous in so many examples of the past, brilliant in so many examples of the present, streaming forth from every pore of that great society which pressed upon him on every side, and encompassed him with an atmosphere of faith and charity, which in itself was little less than a médecine of life and immortality.

Now, what is the impression left upon the mind by the outline we have attempted to draw? I do not ask whether it be true or false that classics were much studied before the Renaissance; nor do I enter into the influence of living Paganism on the Christian mind in the early ages. I am not discussing the good or evil effects of the revival of letters; nor is there need to settle the endless disputes which would make S. Jerome, S. Basil, S. Austin, and a dozen more Fathers and schoolmen, contradict each other, and themselves, in successive sentences on the question of education. Nor, supposing the students of the middle ages did pore over the writings of the Pagans, am I called upon to demonstrate that the wretched manuscripts from which they studied, were of themselves sufficient preservatives from danger. All these are very interesting, and by no means unimportant topics: but they have little to say to the one large general impression-the striking picture left upon the mind after the study of those fourteen centuries of Christianity. They may present, indeed, difficulties,—but they can no more prevent the onward flow of the majestic traditionary teaching of the Church, than the pebbles that raise a ripple in a stream can impede the steady progress of its

waters.

And this is where, in my poor opinion, Abbé Gaume, notwithstanding his breadth of view, made a great mistake. I will bring this forward now, because it leads straight to the answer. It was a natural mistake when we think of his position. He saw the crying need. He felt that some specific enemy had done these things. Besides, the public would not heed vague and general complaints. It must be a distinct charge against a specific evil. Where, then, could the devastating enemy be found-the wild beast which had done such slaughter? The Abbé tracked him to his earth, by the bloody footmarks of the French Revolution. Here, thought he to himself, is the animal at last, which has committed all this havoc we must destroy him, and then peace and plenty will be our share again :-little thinking, seemingly, that a forest which could produce one such beast, most probably would harbour many more.

That Pagan classics had a great share in the deterioration of VOL. VII.-NO. XIII. [New Series.]

the world on the Continent, where they were thrown into the furnaces of French and Italian minds, is a proposition, I presume, no thinking man would deny. But that the sum of human miseries, even on the Continent, should be put down exclusively to their door, seems to me very like ignoring altogether other causes of disorder, that, in reality, every one believe to have a substantive existence. I believe that the wood contains more than one wild beast; and that Pagan classics have quite enough to answer for on their own account, without being made the scapegoat for the accumulated sins of the civilized world. Had Abbé Gaume been satisfied with showing the real mischief they had done, and the real danger they contain; had he pointed out the abnormal position which they occupy; he would have rendered a still greater service to society. But, as has been said before, he drew a picture which repelled many, because the proportions were extravagant.

He made also, I think, another mistake; viz., in the particular shape which he gave to his practical suggestions. It would have been better to lay his whole stress and emphasis on the positive element which he desired to introduce; and to speak against classical studies only so far as their undue preeminence interferes with giving a primary place to what is really primary.

Still he has done incalculable service. His admirable development of the Christian "System," and its working in human life, has never been surpassed. It is a grand vision of a Christian intelligence; and the effects of the Pagan "system," which stands over against it, throw a strong glare of light upon the hideous proportions of the merely natural man. But, as I said just now, the desired end is not directly to overthrow what is heathen; but to do so indirectly through introducing what is Christian. Life is intensely positive; and to give life, or to sustain its energy, something positive is required. A negative good will not do; the good must be positive. As justification consists, not so much in being free from sin, as in being possessed of a positive spiritual favour; just as a man should not only avoid evil, but should do good also-so the remedy for the corrupt state of society must consist in some positive actual good:-a positive good, indeed, the privation of which constitutes that very disease which its presence is calculated to cure. What, then, is the disease of the present day? We have seen, Naturalism. What is Naturalism? F. Curci has already told us:-"The complete separation of the creature from the Creator in theory and in practice (p. 31). What is the privation or loss which constitutes this disease? The loss of the Creator. What the remedy? Join

man again to God. How is this effected? By realizing the Supernatural. "Realize the Supernatural"-this grand formula covers the entire area of the broad question of Paganism. It contains a force equal, nay, more than equal, to the energy of the disease. It is not a barren fact, or a mere hiatus, but a large, encompassing principle, pregnant with vitality-like the "Fiat lux" of old, which flashed day over creation.

This it is that was done in the fourteen first centuries of Christendom-the supernatural was realized. This, I maintain, is the grand, general impression left upon the mind after studying the history of that vast tract of Christianity. From the Apostles to the Apologists; from the Apologists to the columnal Fathers;-from the Catacombs to the glories of Mediæval times, this realization seems to have been the main governing law of the human spirit. I have only space to suggest that such was the case, and that this formula is a key capable of solving difficulties, which, without it, never could be answered. It explains the fear the Fathers had of ancient letters; it answers their seemingly conflicting statements upon classical lore. I do not at this moment remember one single instance, amongst the multitude which Abbé Landriot brings forward, of the favourable expression of Fathers and schoolmen regarding the study of Pagan classics, which cannot, by an application of our formula of the supernatural, be reconciled with (seemingly) conflicting extracts of the "Ver Rongeur."

But the question in hand is respecting ourselves-the remedy, not so much for the Naturalism of Protestants whom we cannot reach as of Catholics, whom we can. What is to give Catholic vigour to the rising generation? and what will preserve them against the awful dangers of English society -I not only speak of the rich but of the poor-of all, from the first to the last,-what? I would boldly proclaim to them, with the blast of a trumpet if I could,-Realize-learn at school to realize the Supernatural. I strongly suspect that scholarship will not be the cause of the loss of many souls amongst us just at present; but will not Naturalism? And supposing Pagan classics are too prominent, and absorb precious time which might be better spent, how is this evil first to be seen and then to be remedied? Simply, I say, by realizing the supernatural. The man who realizes the supernatural, truly realizes the divine order of things. He sees the multiplicity of things in the effulgence of one simple Light, which gives them unity, value, and proportion-in lumine Tuo videbimus lumen. As one perceives myriads of minute bright points floating in a sunbeam, each gradually sailing and sinking to its level,

according to the simplicity of a single law, so with the acts and the facts of life,-illuminated by the brightness of the supernatural, each would tend towards its proper place, according to its intrinsic worth in the mind of Him who is the All-Wisdom. For, the light of the supernatural being cast upon the facts and the acts of life, the eyes of the mind can clearly see the direction they are taking under the supreme law, and instead of crushing them or changing their true direction, through the obscurity and darkness of an unilluminated intelligence, it sees them, and each movement of them, so vividly in the light of the supernatural, that the mind has no difficulty in even forecasting their position and anticipating the order that they will occupy, in obedience to the mind of the Creator. Classical studies are one of these facts. Would you know the position they should occupy? Realize the Supernatural. See them in the Light: if you venture to move amongst them in the dark, your movements will result in utter confusion and disorder. The supernatural must be realized; for in the supernatural alone is the "lux vera" to be found.

How to realize the supernatural in detail; how to make it enter into the life of school; how it illuminates the whole course of teaching; how it throws its light upon the relation of master to boy, and of boy to master; how it dictates the conduct of boy to boy; how it gathers into one the whole Catholic system, and gives it a unity which becomes clearer and more developed as the mind expands and feels its way further towards truth; how it explains the system which stands in antagonism to itself, and lights up its hidden darkness, and makes manifest to the intelligence the broad chasm between the two; these are points which would occupy an entire article. Nor have I space left to demonstrate, were it necessary, how it is the specific against the noxious atmosphere of English society; how it sobers the mind, implants in it a sense of responsibility, and tends to make men earnest, devoted, and attached; how it can make them patterns of gentleness, refinement, and nobility, while it sinks the roots of true humility and modesty deep into their souls; how, in a word, it has the power, if applied in its fulness, to cast into shadow the mere veneering and gloss of the superficial education of the present day, and create substantial perfections, founded, not on the frail and perishing foundation of fashion or taste, but on the immutable principles of Christian philosophy all this, too, perforce, I must for the present leave alone, and rest in the hope that on another opportunity I may be suffered to develop the thoughts which fill my mind.

R. B. V.