so high a degree of estimation, that he was chosen among the arbitrators who were to decide the succession to the throne of Aragon; and the Council of Constance sent deputies to invite him to take part in its deliberations. And then Jerome Savonarola, that constant friend of the French in Italy, the idol of Florence, whose liberties he defended, and whose morals he would fain have reformed. In vain was he burned alive amid an ungrateful people. In vain, I say, for his virtues and glory rose higher than the blaze of the pile. Pope Paul III. declared that he would hold any man suspected of heresy who should dare impute it to Savonarola; and St. Philip Neri always kept in his room an image of that great man.

Missions to the Indians.

Toward the end of the fifteenth century a new theatre opened to the ambition of the preachers by the discovery of the two Indies; nor must we forget the fact, that half the credit of this discovery is due to them; for after Christopher Columbus had met with a repulse in the courts of Portugal, England, and Castile, it was a Dominican, Brother Diego Deza, preceptor of the Infanta Don Juan of Castile, and confessor of Ferdinand the Catholic, who confirmed in his purpose the illustrious Genoese, and promised him success.

Scarce had the report of these new worlds met the ear of Europe, when a crowd of apostolic men rushed forth to follow wherever the conquerors should lead.

In 1503, two Friars-Preachers set out for the East Indies.

In 1510, two others reached the island of St. Domingo.

In 1513, Brother Thomas Ortir founded at Mexico the first Dominican convent.

In 1526, twelve Brothers-Preachers scattered themselves over New Spain, and established there a hundred houses and convents.

In 1529, fourteen Friars-Preachers repaired to Peru, having with them the famous Bartholomew de Las Casas, who had taken the habit of St. Dominic.

In 1540, there were in New Grenada thirteen convents, and sixty houses with churches attached.

In 1541, Chili possessed forty houses and convents.

In 1542, the Floridas were evangelized by Brother Louis Canceri. In 1549, we reckon in the peninsula of Malacca and the neighboring islands, eighteen convents, and sixty thousand Christians.

In 1550, the Dominicans founded a university in Lima.

In 1556, they entered the kingdom of Siam, and Brother Gaspard of the Cross had the glory of setting foot in China, where no missionary had preceded him.

In 1575, Brother Michael Bénavidès also penetrated to China with two companions, and built there the first Catholic church, under the invocation of the Archangel Gabriel. He composed a work on the Chinese language, and established a school for the education of children in the Christian religion.

In 1576, twenty-five brothers set out for the Philippine Isles; one of them, Brother Dominic Salazar, became the first bishop.

In 1584, the Dominicans evangelized the island of Mozambique and the eastern coast of Africa.

In 1602, they had a house in Japan.

In 1616, they established a university in the Manillas.

All these missions, and many others it would be wearisome to enumerate, were fertilized by blood, the purest and most generous. The two worlds seemed to vie in shedding Dominican blood. In Europe, the Protestants made it flow in torrents; while America, Asia, and Africa poured it out a libation to their various errors.

In 1537, Brother Julian, Bishop of Tlascala, and Brother Dominic Betanzos, prior of the province, established in a treatise the right of the Indians to liberty, property, and Christianity, and sent it by a deputation to Pope Paul III., praying him to issue a decree, confirming the doctrine they had laid down. Paul did not allow delay to hang on his decision. He solemnly declared that the Indians were men capable of receiving the Christian faith, entitled to the Sacraments of the Church, and not to be deprived of their liberty and fortunes without injustice. Many of the order of Preachers then acquired a venerated name. But one of these outshines all the others, and embodies, in his immortal memory, the glory of them all.

Las Casas.

Bartholomew de Las Casas, a gentleman of Seville, emigrated to America in 1502, at the age of twenty-eight. He had scarce set foot there, when his bowels were moved with compassion and horror at the spectacle which met his eyes. Instead of advancing his fortune, he determined to consecrate his life to the defence of America; and as a preparation, had himself initiated by the reception of the priesthood, in the profoundest mysteries of the redemption of the world. To the age of sixty-seven, as long as any strength upheld him, he ceased not to labor in this holy cause. Eight times was he sent to cross the ocean from America to the court of Spain, and from Spain to America, bearing with him complaints, and bringing back empty decrees. He was heard to exclaim, in presence of a council bent on universal monarchy, "All nations are equally free, and none have a right to encroach on the liberties of others." He had the boldness to present to Charles V. a memorial, under the title of "Destruction of the Indies by the Spaniards," in which he set forth the crimes of his countrymen in a style of cutting truth, thus sacrificing to justice his personal safety and the honor of his nation. Charles was sufficiently high-minded to name him "Protector-General of the Indies;" but this pompous title, notwithstanding the extensive powers annexed to it, only served to show him how little good is left in the power of a prince when he is exclusively devoted to ambition, and justice is a mere accident of his conscience. Once, in the midst of his labors, Las Casas looked sorrowfully into him. self and the age he lived in, and feeling that alone he was unable to carry the weight of his own heart, he put on, at the age of forty. eight, the habit of St. Dominic, as that which then covered all that From this he seemed to draw new strength and

was generous on earth.

new virtues; and his seventieth year beheld him a suppliant at the court of Spain on behalf of the Indians. This was not all. The old man, grown white in the apostleship, who had, when younger, refused the bishopric of Cusco, believed that now the episcopal office would suit his age, as a staff befits the traveller worn out with years and weariness. He accepted the bishopric of Chiapa, and the ocean bore him once more to the succor of America. This was the last time. Whether it was owing to the tenderness with which a man of seventy-seven yearns for the land of his infancy, or that he could not endure upon his death-bed the last groans of the Indian population, mown down by half a century of barbarity, he wished to die in Spain. But while his venerating country regarded him as a sublime light upon the point of dying out, as a relic which death had not yet quite consecrated, drawing new life from charity, he gained fifteen years of admirable old age. His voice, almost centenary, was heard once more in the Council of Castile on behalf of the Indians; and his hand, which men thought palsied by age, wrote the celebrated treatise on "The Tyranny of the Spaniards in the Indies." At length, full of days, mature in virtue and in glory, victorious over all his detractors, he died, at the age of ninety-two, in the convent of his order at Valladolid, leaving to posterity a religious and venerated

name.

LABORS OF THE ORDER AS TEACHERS OF CHRISTIAN THEOLOGY.

Science is the study of the relations which constitute and connect all beings, from God even to the atom, from infinite greatness to infinite littleness. Every step of this vast ladder throws light upon the preceding and succeeding step; because every relation, once penetrated, from whatever quarter, from below upward, or from above downward, is a revelation of some certain existence. In other words, the effect indicates the cause, being, as it is, its image; the cause explains the effect, inasmuch as it is its principle. Nevertheless, this reciprocity is not equal. The true light comes only from above; that which proceeds from below is merely a reflection. "Now," says St. Paul, "we see as in a mirror and an enigma; one day we shall see Him face to face."

Science, therefore, in our present state, is necessarily imperfect, because we do not see, face to face, the starting point and the goal, both of which God is. But, veiled as He is from our view, we are not without other means of knowing Him, independently of the reflection of Himself found in inferior beings. Before showing Himself, God has made affirmation; before appearing, He has declared His name. The voluntary reception of this sovereign word is called faith. Once in possession of this new element of knowledge, having once gained this eminence, and its commanding view, the Christian must descend to the lowest extremities of the universe, interpret from the relations which constitute the divine essence, those which belong to the things of man and nature; and then, by reversing the direction of his inquiries, verify the laws of infinite existence by those of finite beings. This comparison of two worlds-the illumination of the second, which is the effect, by the first which is the cause; this confirmation of the first, or cause, by the

second, or effect; this ebb and flow of light, this tide which comes from the ocean to the shore, and retires from the shore to the ocean; faith abiding in science, and science abiding in faith-such is the theology of the Christian.

Albert the Great.

There lived at Cologne, in the year 1245, a Dominican licentiate, so remarkable a genius that his age bestowed on him the name of "Great." Although more particularly versed in mathematics, physics, and medi cine, he then taught theology, and after having been advanced by it to the highest dignity, he voluntarily resigned them all to return to his schools. The close of his career was extraordinary. One day, as he was lecturing in public, he suddenly stopped short, like a man in painful quest of an idea, and after a silence of some moments, which amazed When I was young I had and troubled every one, he resumed thus: so much difficulty to learn, that I despaired of ever knowing anything; and for that reason determined on quitting the order of St. Dominic, that I might spare myself the shame of being continually in contrast with men of learning. While I continued to dwell upon this project, night and day, I imagined I saw in a dream the Mother of God, and that she inquired of me in what science I should like to become a proficient; whether in theology or the knowledge of nature. I replied, 'In the knowledge of nature.' She then said, 'You shall be gratified in your desire, and become the greatest of philosophers; but since you have not chosen the science of my Son, a day will come, when, losing this very science of Nature, you shall find yourself even as you are to-day.' Now, my children, the day foretold has come. Henceforward, I shall teach you no more; but I declare before you, for the last time, that I believe in all the articles of the creed, and I beg that the last sacraments of the Church may be brought me when my hour shall be at hand. If I have said or written anything contrary to faith, I retract it, and submit all my doctrines to my holy mother, the Church." Having so spoken, he left the chair, and his disciples embracing him, with tears, brought him back to his house, where he lived for three years in the utmost simplicity; even he who had been called the "miracle of nature, the prodigy of his age," and to whom posterity decreed the name of Albert the Great. But Albertus Magnus was not the man chosen to rear the edifice of Catholic theology. He had "preferred the science of nature to that of the Son of God."

St. Thomas Aquinas.

You

Toward the end of 1244, or the beginning of 1245, John the Teutonic, fourth master-general of the order of Preachers, came to Cologne, accompanied by a young Neapolitan, whom he presented to Brother Albert as a future disciple. In those days Europe was a land of liberty, and nations held out the hand to each other in the universities. might go for instruction where you thought proper. The young man whom John the Teutonic had just brought to the school of Albertus Magnus, was, on the father's side, great grandson of the Emperor Frederick I., cousin of the Emperor Henry VI., second cousin of the

reigning Emperor Frederick II.; and by his mother he was descended from the Norman princes, who had expelled the Arabs and Greeks from Italy, and conquered the two Sicilies. He was only seventeen years of age. It is told of him that his parents carried him away and placed him in a strong castle, in order to make him abandon his devotion, but without success. He pursued, it is said, with a brand from the fire, a woman who had been introduced into his apartment; and gained his two sisters to the religious life during the very conversation by which they hoped to dissuade him from it; and Pope Innocent IV., who had been asked to break the bonds which held him to the order of St. Dominic, listened to him with admiration, and offered to him the Abbey of Mount Cassino. Preceded by such reports, the young Count of Aquinas-now simply Brother Thomas-was in great consideration with his fellow-students. But nothing in him met their expectations. He was a plain young man who spoke little, and whose very eyes seemed dull. At length they came to believe he had nothing exalted about him but his birth, and he was called in mockery, the "great dull ox of Sicily." His master, Albert, himself, not knowing what to think of him, took occasion one day to question him upon some knotty points. The disciple answered with an apprehension and judgment so marvellous, that Albert felt the joy which a superior man alone can feel, when he meets another man destined to equal, or perhaps surpass, himself. He turned with emotion to the assembled youth, and said, "We call Brother Thomas a dumb ox, but the world will one day reëcho to the bellowing of his doctrine."

The fulfilment of the prophecy was not long delayed; Thomas of Aquinas became in a short time the most illustrious doctor of the Catholic Church, and his birth itself, royal as it was, disappears in the magnificence of his personal renown.

At the age of forty-one years, and when he had nine more to live, St. Thomas thought of the design which was the goal, as yet unknown, of his destiny. He proposed to himself to bring together the scattered materials of theology; and out of what you might expect to find a mere compilation, he constructed a master-piece, of which everybody speaks, even those who have not read it, as every one speaks of the pyramids, which scarce any one sees.

Theology is, as we have said, the science of the divine affirmations. When man simply accepts these affirmations he is in the state of faith. When he establishes the connection of these affirmations with each other, and with all the internal and external facts of the universe, his faith is of the theological or scientific kind. Consequently, theology results from the combination of the human with a divine element; but if this combination enlighten faith, it is, nevertheless, subject to great danger. For, give yourself a little scope in the order of visible things, and you will soon have reached the extreme limit of certainty belonging to them. And if you go a little farther, the mind brings back from these ill-explored regions little else than opinions calculated, in some instances, to damage the purity and solidity of its faith. One of the prime qualities, therefore, in a Catholic doctor, is discernment in the use of the human element. Now, this tact was found in St. Thomas to an eminent degree.