ground. Why do you object to the Lord's Prayer, and to the Decalogue, and the reading of the Scriptures? Because you say "it offends our consciences." "We believe it is not the true version of the Word of God;" that version is "used as a means of attack upon our tenets." "The form and words are offensive to the conscience and belief of the Catholics." Be consistent now, gentlemen, if you object to reading that Bible or reciting from it. Is it because it is offensive in form and words. to your Catholic consciences? Will you be any better satisfied then if it is daily read to your children by their teachers? Will any bishop, any priest, tell me that he is willing to have that untrue version of God's word, so offensive to Catholic conscience and belief, read daily to his flock by their heretic teachers? No, if it is intolerant to ask the children to read or recite that Bible, it is intolerant to read it to them; if it is intolerant to ask them to recite the Ten Commandments, it is also intolerant to teach them. If to ask the Catholic children to join in repeating the pure religion, the simple and pathetic supplications of the Lord's Prayer, offends their consciences, then any instruction in piety from a Protestant is offensive, and the Bible must be banished forever from our schools.

Concede the first point, that you are bound to excuse Catliolic children from reciting from the Bible, and you are bound to concede that they shall not read it. Concede that they shall not read it, and you are bound to concede that it shall not be read to them. No other course is possible if the first false step is taken, and no one sees this so clearly as the priest who has so rashly commenced this attack upon our institutions. I appeal from bishop and priest, to the unfettered intelligence of our adopted citizens; I appeal to the countrymen of Burke, and Sheridan, and Grattan, and Curran. Do you, who wish to become American citizens, you who wish to draw closer the bonds of a common country and a common freedom, fear that your children will suffer because they, with united hands and hearts, lift up their tender voices in common prayer to that God who is the Father of all, whose rain falls alike upon the just and the unjust, who is the God of all nations, of all races, all climes ?

I repeat once and forever, that there is not any sectarianism intended or taught by the use of the Bible. We do not ask

If any

your children to adopt our translation as the true one. point of doctrine arises upon any text of our Bible or theirs, they are free in their faith as we are in ours. They are instructed to interpret the second commandment in one way, and we in another. No one wishes or seeks to disturb their faith; we do not ask them to say or to believe that ours is the true word of God, or the best translation of the tables of the law which God delivered to Moses. Our teachers, in their great duty, teach lessons of piety from the only source from which it can be taught, and the children are free to believe or disbelieve them, free to worship God according to the faith of their fathers, free in their faith, free in their consciences.

I repel altogether the specious pretence that our Bible is not the Bible, because the translation differs in some particulars from the Douay Bible. Every translation from the original Hebrew and Greek must of necessity vary-must of necessity be more or less perfect, according to the accuracy and perfection of the language into which it is translated, and the learning and skill of the translator. The Holy Scriptures have been translated into over two hundred different languages; but they are always the Bible. Not the Bible of the Catholic or the Calvinist not the Bible of the Methodist or the Episcopalianbut the Christian Bible.

As well may we be told that God's eternal sky is not the same. It clothes itself with vanishing, ever-changing beauty from season to season, from hour to hour. It robes itself in the tender violet hues of spring, the deep, cloudless transparency of midsummer, and the dark, steel-blue of a northern winter. It arrays itself equally in the delicate rose and opal hues of dawn-the imperial purple and gold of sunset-and at midnight it wears its royal robes of state, all flecked with countless stars; but in all changes in all climes-it is always God's eternal sky, the same sublime image of that wondrous eternity which lies behind us, and before us-the same holy symbol of the all-embracing love of our Heavenly Father.

And now may it please the Court, I have but to sum up this this part of my argument in a few words.

They say that the regulations of the school committee violate the Constitution, which protects all citizens in their liberty of conscience. I answer that their conscience is left free-they

are not called upon to believe or disbelieve any thing. Their faith is their own-we do not ask them to yield one iota of it. They may find offence in our laws, and in our customs. That is always the consequence of general laws. They found us with these institutions-they have accepted the benefits of them -they must bear with the inconveniences also. And, I say it in all kindness, but it is proper it should be said, there are many causes for offence which Protestant parents also find in the laws which compel their children to mingle with the children of the Catholics. Let us hope for mutual forbearance and mutual submission to the laws.

And now, may it please your Honor, that I have briefly discussed this great question in the cause, there is another issue which it is my duty to meet. This case has been planned and arranged with a great deal of artifice, the snare was very skilfully laid, but I think I shall be able to give Father Wiget good reason to regret that he selected this as the time, or the place, or the manner of taking his first step in the great movement of expelling the Bible from our schools. It is my duty to expose this artifice, and it is an easy task; in doing it, I shall also prove, beyond all possibility of question, that this is not a case of conscience or of scruples of conscience. The truth is, that a very cunning plan was laid, the object of which was to have a boy whipped for his religion, in order to raise the cry of religious persecution, as I will presently prove.

I cannot admit that the pretended objections raised by the Catholic pupils are "not mere fetches and pretences devised for the purpose of creating a difficulty." This case fortunately, very fortunately, is full of conclusive evidence to the contrary, and I beg the attention of the Court to it. No one can fail to remember the manner in which this cause was originally brought before the Court. It was pretended that an intelligent and interesting little boy, religiously educated, was bidden with threats to violate his tender conscience; that in vain he pleaded the commands of his parents, the solemn lessons of his religious instructor. His prayers and appeals were all in vain; he was ruthlessly beaten until his wicked persccutors, frightened and shocked at their own cruelty, ceased

* Letter from the Bishop of Boston to the School Committee.

their stripes, and endeavored to hide the bleeding evidence of their pitiless tortures. Has your Honor forgotten that picture of religious fanaticism and persecution, that touching picture of the infant saint and martyr? I am half inclined to believe that my learned friend, who opened and tried the case so ably and so well, had worked himself up to the faith that this small citizen had the already sprouting wings of a cherub under his waistcoat. He was a saint in embryo,-a small sized martyr in jacket and trowsers. I confess that I could not but sympathize with my friends, when all the poetry, all the picturesque charm and color of this picture was banished so rudely, on the last day of the trial. What a shocking blow was given to our sensibilities; what a ludicrous" behind the scenes appeared when we heard that this small saint, who was willing to be "kilt" for his conscience,-who vowed with infinite pathos that he would never be a coward to his religion ;-when we heard that this very small and somewhat dirty little martyr was out in the streets where the boys were playing marbles declaring with the true fervor of a pious Catholic, "Faith and I warn't agoin to repate thim damned Yankee prayers." What a very abominable and altogether absurd little cherub to be sure. I would have given money for one peep into the breasts of my friends on the other side, at that precise moment. wonder if, as they heard the poetry of their case, the glory and the beauty of their dream, vanish forever in the irrepressible titter which no one in the court house could resist, when that evidence was given,-I wonder if they did not say to each other, that Father Wiget's bread and butter saint ought to have been whipped once more, and more thoroughly. This, may it please your Honor, is the delicate, the tender, the more than feminine purity of conscience, which cannot submit to say "hallowed," instead of "sanctified," which does not revolt from the words of our "Ten Commandments," which accepts them all, acknowledges them all; but flies as from impurity, which shuns as sacrilege the repeating those very words, unless they are divided according to the holy dictation of Father Wiget.

*

* Wall testified that his objections to the commandments was because they were not divided as the Catholics divide them.

5

What volumes of the benignant teaching of the Jesuit, what touching pathos, what sweet infantine love of God, what tender delicacy of conscience, spoke in those words, "Faith and I warn't agoin to repate thim damned Yankee prayers." Was it for that pious ejaculation that Father Wiget gave the boy his symbolic medal of brass, whitewashed with silver, in that very memorable interview at the Jesuit's house, of which the boy, although it took place but the night before he was called as a witness, was really unable to remember a single word excepting the important, the saintly, the pious instruction to go home to his supper ?"

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I have a few words to say as to this boy and his father. There is a very material question of veracity to be settled between them and the teachers of the school who have been called as witnesses. If I am able to prove them wilfully false, your Honor will be compelled to admit there was a great motive for the falsehood; if they are proved to be wilfully false, no one can dare to say that this is a case of suffering for conscience sake; if they are proved to be false, and the teachers are relied upon, then, not only is this case at an end, but a plot is exposed which must excite the indignation of every hearer.

I remember, Sir, that I was assailed somewhat rudely by the able and eloquent senoir counsel, who told us that after my terrible cross-examination of his rather blasphemous and very profane little saint he nearly or perhaps quite fainted away. Perhaps it was the attempt to find out and confess what that very suggestive and significant and quite symbolic whitewashed medal was given to him for, which weakened little Saint Tom's tender frame. I remember that it was a question very general— very pertinent-very often asked-never answered-a question which has been asked a great many times since by persons who take an interest in this trial-What the priest did give that medal for, the night before the boy was to be a witness? This was on the first day of the trial. May I ask my eloquent friend, if that very interesting and quite painfully honest little martyr fainted away after that other very striking scene in court, on the last day of the trial, of which he has not yet spoken? I desire to recall that scene, with somewhat of form and precision, to the mind of the Court, for a flood of light is thrown from it all