The chief thing that is to be regarded in him that doth anything, is the will and love wherewithal he doeth it. O Redeemer of the world! although thou has done much for us, and given us great gifts, and hast delivered us from many mischiefs, and hast promised us thy eternal and everlasting bliss, yet is all this, being so much that it maketh one astonished and afraid, far less than the love that thou bearest us. For love thou gavest thyself unto us: thou camest down from heaven, thou tookest flesh, and diest; and through the unspeakable love that thou borest us, thou hast created and redeemed us, and gavest thyself unto us in the Blessed Sacrament of the Eucharist, and deliveredst us from so many evils, and promisest us so great goods. Thy love is of such force towards us, that the least favors that thou doest us, coming polished with such singular fine love, we are never able to be sufficiently thankful for it, nor to requite, although we should thrust ourselves into flaming furnaces for love of thee.--_Southwell._ A FRENCH POET.[28] It is often said among those who assert much and investigate little that the control of science, of literature, and of art has passed beyond the domain of the ancient church, that her children have given up the contest, and that she no longer produces distinguished men. It seems to be an understood thing that sound Catholicism is not consistent with proficiency in any branch of the higher pursuits, and that every artist, scientist, and _littérateur_ ceases to be a good Christian in proportion as he is successful in his profession. There has been some apparent excuse for such an impression gaining ground, but it is none the less an erroneous impression. Especially of late years has it been triumphantly refuted, and nowhere with more _éclat_ than in the very stronghold, the _sanctum sanctorum_ of free thought and private judgment--England. There has arisen in that land of successful and jubilant materialism, that citadel of rationalism in matters of religion, a knot of men formidable for their learning, their eloquence, their taste, and their wit. But if even in England, under the shadow that was yet left hanging over the church from the effects of three hundred years of repression, the vitality of the old "olive-tree"[29] was amply proved by the grafting in and prosperous growth of so many new branches, still more was the fruitfulness of the ancient mother and mistress of all knowledge shown forth in Catholic France. That country has suffered sorely; it has been the experimental plaything of the world, it has been torn by unchristian politicians, gagged by Cæsarism, drenched in blood by demagogism; it has been deluged with a literature as shameless as it was attractive, until the name of France has become identified in the minds of many with deliberate and organized immorality. It is asserted that the names of her most famous novelists are synonymes