CATHOLICITY AND CIVILIZATION. In the old times of Roman domination the encampments of the legions in the provinces had always proved to be foci of civilization. The industry and order exhibited in them presented an example not lost on the surrounding barbarians of Britain, Gaul, and Germany. And, though it was no part of their duty to occupy themselves actively in the betterment of the conquered tribes, but rather to keep them in a depressed condition that aided in maintaining subjection, a steady improvement both in the individual and social condition took place. Under the ecclesiastical domination of Rome similar effects occurred. In the open country the monastery replaced the legionary encampment; in the village or town, the church was a centre of light. A powerful effect was produced by the elegant luxury of the former, and by the sacred and solemn monitions of the latter. In extolling the papal system for what it did in the organization of the family, the definition of civil policy, the construction of the states of Europe, our praise must be limited by the recollection that the chief object of ecclesiastical policy was the aggrandizement of the Church, not the promotion of civilization. The benefit obtained by the laity was not through any special intention, but incidental or collateral. There was no far-reaching, no persistent plan to ameliorate the physical condition of the nations. Nothing was done to favor their intellectual development; indeed, on the contrary, it was the settled policy to keep them not merely illiterate, but ignorant. Century after century passed away, and left the peasantry but little better than the cattle in the fields. Intercommunication and locomotion, which tend so powerfully to expand the ideas, received no encouragement; the majority of men died without ever having ventured out of the neighborhood in which they were born. For them there was no hope of personal improvement, none of the bettering of their lot; there were no comprehensive schemes for the avoidance of individual want, none for the resistance of famines. Pestilences were permitted to stalk forth unchecked, or at best opposed only by mummeries. Bad food, wretched clothing, inadequate shelter, were suffered to produce their result, and at the end of a thousand years the population of Europe had not doubled. If policy may be held accountable as much for the births it prevents as for the deaths it occasions, what a great responsibility there is here!