A GHOST STORY OF THE REVOLUTION.
We have not many haunted spots now in our Empire State, or even in America, and very few genuine goblin stories, such as once upon a time, told by the fireside, made one afraid to look behind him; delightful old tales, implicitly believed in by narrator and listeners, and casting over all a shadow of utter and indefinable terror! Not that ghosts have ceased to come, but they are things of course now, and their position with regard to mortals in the flesh is entirely changed; the territory of spirit-land (at least a part of it) has been annexed, we may say, to our free and independent thirty-seven states; a regular intercourse has been opened; and, as the intangible parties in the compact have frequent and passing invitations to make earthly visits at certain specified periods, it is no more than civil in them to wait until they are expected.
Now, in years gone by it was quite otherwise; so far from being invited, they were universally shunned; man, woman, and child fled at the slightest indication of their presence; and as for speech, it was next to impossible for them to put in a single word before the terror-stricken mortal had speeded away, far beyond all hearing. Not much seemed the gain to either side by those interviews; occasionally some rogue was known to disgorge his ill-gotten pelf in consequence of the midnight apparitions of some phantom things, a warning to him to mend his ways; or some timid heart perhaps grew faint, and before long time ceased to beat, under the idea that it had received a supernatural summons to the unseen
world; but generally speaking, the shock of an intense and overpowering affright was about all that accrued to the sight-seer from the meeting—a terror so genuine that he was able to impart it to many a circle of eager listeners for an incredibly long period after the adventure.
But what attraction has modern America for sprites, spooks, brownies, fairies, and all that dainty ethereal tribe that may be met in the Old World? Or what, for the more solemn shadows that haunt dilapidated galleries, in the tumble-down ruins of ancient transatlantic castles? What homes have we for “elves and little people,” that dance for years, yes for centuries, on the same greensward in the Highlands of Scotland? Alas! in an incredibly short period grass here gives place to wheatfields, and fairy rings would be disrespectfully ploughed up and planted. Let any sociable brownie plan a visit to old friends, she would probably find the whole family, bag and baggage, moved off to the far West, and only strangers round the hearthstone. They love things old, and here all is new and cheerful under the tireless march of improvement. We have no black forest, no
“Castled crag of Drachenfels,”
but the primitive woodland yet clothes the mountain that “frowns o’er the wide and winding” river.
The nearest approach to a haunted castle is to be seen sometimes in travelling over the Western States. There, in some lonely inconvenient spot which no prudent man would have chosen for a homestead, an unfinished,
overgrown, weakly-looking wooden house tells its story, not of greatness gone by, but of greatness planned and never accomplished—a pitiful comment on the uncertainty of human affairs! It happens thus: Some settler, sadly miscalculating his resources, projects a palace in the wilderness on a scale of city splendor; that is, with parlor, dining-room, kitchen, bedrooms, and the little elegances of pantries and closets. The sides are enclosed, the roof is on, and the revenues he counted on as certain are not forthcoming. Then do papered walls and panelled doors with brass knobs, and visions of portico and piazza, all float away to the blue clouds; the hapless dreamer fits up one corner room for the reception of his whole household until he can find another location, and take a new start in the search after fortune, and so abandons his rickety palace to the lord of the soil. As the boards blacken in wind and storm, and one end blows down perhaps in some rough northwester, it gains the name of being haunted; and to ride past such a skeleton thing by moonlight or in the dim twilight, with the utter desolation of all around, and the yawning blackness of cavities which should have been doors and windows, it requires no great stretch of imagination to picture an unearthly head peeping out here and there. Very bold yeomen are known to always whip their horses to a full gallop as they approach and pass the fearful spot; and as for women and children, under that strange fascination by which the supernatural repels and yet attracts, they always gaze intently, and as surely “see something”!
Although goblin visits in our land are just now rather on the decline (except in a regular business way), there was a time when strange sights were seen and strange things happened; and,
although it may seem almost incredible, it is a fact well established in history that it was generally to the Dutch settled here, to that clearheaded, reasoning nation, so little likely to be deceived on any subject, that most of these revelations were made.
This certainly ensures for the tales the firm belief of all mankind. When an imaginative Hibernian or a lively, light-hearted Gaul announces a vision, it must be taken with some little allowance for flights of fancy, etc., etc.; but when a phlegmatic, cool-headed Hollander declares he has seen a spook, you may believe as if it was your own eyes.
For the precise period most prolific in signs, sights, and dreams, we must go back to the early days of our state, yet not to the first settlers. Their troubles, so numerous that it is scarcely possible to number them, had their origin in things tangible; and so closely did these troubles press daily on all sides, that the thoughts of the first colonists were entirely engrossed by the things of earth. To such a point did this downward tendency reach, that they seemed at times in danger of relapsing into heathendom, as may be seen from the reports sent back to Amsterdam, and yet extant among colonial papers, that they possessed neither school-houses nor churches. They did possess, however, three unfailing sources of annoyances and danger—an Indian warfare, neighbors on their eastern boundary of unparalleled audacity, and domestic bickerings in the perpetual strife kept up between Manhattan and Rensselaerwyck.
What might have happened if the Indians had been treated with common justice and honesty can be now only conjecture; but their wrongs began at the beginning. It is a dark
spot on the glories of the adventurous little yacht Half-Moon that her very first track through the waters of the magnificent Cahohatéa (now the Hudson) was marked with their blood, causelessly and wantonly shed.
Hendrik Hudson and his crew landed, we are told, on the western bank of the great bay, which was lined with “men, women, and children, by whom they were kindly received, and presented with tobacco and dried currants.”[68] A little further on were “very loving people and very old men, by whom the Europeans were well used.” They brought in their canoes to the voyagers all sorts of fruit and game, and on one occasion of a visit made by white men to the shore they broke their arrows and threw them in the fire to express their pacific intentions. Yet despite all this, when the vessel had advanced only a few miles, one of her crew fired and killed an Indian, without the least warning, for attempting to steal a pillow and some old garments.[69] No satisfaction was offered to the terrified savages, and they pushed off for the shore in their canoes, but they vowed a vengeance, and they kept the vow; so that, when some few years later one ship after another brought the enterprising individuals who first unpacked their household utensils and farm tools in the New World, they entered upon a stormy existence already prepared for them. It was not a glimpse of wraith or goblin that people feared to encounter in the lonely by-path, but the stealthy tread and dark visage of some lurking savage, ever watchful and merciless, ever close at hand when least expected. How often in the silent night, in how many little hamlets, in how many solitary huts, women and children
listened in speechless terror to the war-whoop, that fearful yell, and were made to feel Indian retaliation for the evil doings of fathers and husbands! Small time had they for ghostly fears. When the savages fled before European firearms, it was only to return. More than two thousand of them appeared in their canoes at one time before the little block-house at Manhattan, because Hendrik von Dyke, with an imprudence and wickedness perfectly disgraceful in a mynheer, had killed a squaw for stealing apples in his orchard. His orchard was on the present site of Rector Street.
But, though the Dutch colonists were generally at fault in provoking contention, they were also valiant, after some preparation, to meet it. When Claes Smit was ruthlessly murdered by the natives, some time about 1642, and they refused either to give up or punish his murderer because he had fled and could not be found, the colonists consented to march to battle,
“provided the director himself (Von Kieft) accompanied them to prevent disorder, also that he furnish, in addition to powder and ball, provision necessary for the expedition, such as bread and butter, and appoint a steward to take charge of the same, so that all waste be prevented.
“If any person require anything more than this bread and butter, he to provide himself therewith.”[70]
Finally, however, gunpowder prevailed; and the aborigines retreated to forests beyond the reach of the pale-faces; schoolmasters and ministers had been sent over from Holland, and the inhabitants of Manhattan Island, as well as the other little settlements up the river, began to live a
more spiritual life, and to gather around them by degrees all that troop of unearthly beings well-known in the mother country. Little children were encouraged to be good and expect Santa Klaus, and bad ones were no longer frightened into propriety with the threat of being devoured by some hideous Waranancongyn with tomahawk and scalping-knife.
One of the spots first renowned for ghostly adventures was a pleasant little valleylike place, on the northern limits of the town, called Medge Padje (now Maiden Lane), where a clear stream ran between grassy banks, so gentle and noiseless that it carried the gazer’s heart back—far back over the ocean to the canals of Faderlandt, and was a perfect relief from the lashing waves of the great North River. Hither, on pleasant summer afternoons, many a gude vrow would turn her steps with her troop of sturdy urchins, and, work in hand, knitting, knitting, all the way. But they were always careful to return before dark; for such fearful tales had been told, principally of a tall woman in white who always vanished in the direction of Golden Hill (now John Street), that no one cared to make her acquaintance.
Long years after this, when the palisades marking the extent of the city had been removed as far north as what is now Warren Street, and a field of barley flourished on the Heerewegh (now Broadway), somewhat about the present City Hall, we again hear of the same apparition. The Rev. John Kimball, passing along the little stream rather late at night, heard steps, and, looking behind him, saw the spectre; of course he fled. Doubtless she was the bearer of some important message from the spirit-land which she was anxious to communicate, but, as no one ever stopped
to listen, what it was can now never be known.
Mr. Watson, in his Annals of New York, relates a story given by a military gentleman of his own encounter with an apparition in that same place. The captain declares, and doubtless believed, that he bravely attacked it, and discovered only a mischievous mortal in disguise; but it is hardly probable that any mortal in his senses would be personating a ghost at midnight on haunted ground, so that the tale, being rather one-sided evidence, is doubtful.
Another solitary place was Windmill Lane,[71] which led from Broadway between Cortlandt and Liberty Streets down quite a steep hill, in a northwest direction, to the river edge, where stood a windmill. There was a time when this lane was the most northern street in the settlement; then house after house began to be built around the old mill, and the city crept up gradually in that direction. Among those who made their homes there was a French lady, Madame Blonspeaux, who had crossed the ocean to teach the rising generation all she knew—French and embroidery. Two paths led to her establishment, one through the Lane, the other through a wheatfield, where now is St. Paul’s church, and both were beset with spectres. Alas for the scholar kept in after the others were dismissed! Lightly did the offended majesty of madame weigh in the balance compared to what might possibly beleague the path homeward. There was a legend of a tall Indian who was always digging about for his bow and arrows, and a little short Dutchman about a foot high in breeches and cocked hat, who, the moment he found them, sprang into
sight from somewhere and kicked the dirt over them, and the Indian began his search again![72]
But the section of country most famous for spectral manifestations was the region about the Kaatskill Mountains. Darkly wooded glens, and lonely streams, and deep ravines offered the most ample facilities for all kinds of signs and wonders. Indeed, the Dutch settlers that dwelt in that by-place of existence, on the little cleared spots that here and there dotted the landscape, were so quiet and orderly, so far removed from the commotions that agitated the river colonies, no wonder ethereal beings found their companionship most congenial. These settlers had removed thither originally from the neighborhood of Fort Orange, and principally, nay, I may say solely, in disgust at the general uproar and discomfort which invested everything in proximity to that fort, under the joint dominion of the Patroon of Rensselaerwyck (or his agent), who resided there, and Director-General Petrus Stuyvesant, who fulminated his bulls from the south end of the Hudson; the contemporary edicts of the rival parties being always diametrically opposed to each other.
The truth is that, from the moment Director Stuyvesant landed at Manhattan, appointed there by the States-General of the United Netherlands, he had carried matters with such a high hand that everything succumbed before him. The boldest spirits bent to his rule, and (to continue the metaphor) he walked over them. His word was law without reason or explanation. He had even been known to shorten a troublesome state audience by tearing up the documents and dismissing the deputation.
Thus ruled the governor at Manhattan; but when Brant Arent Van Slechtenhorst was sent over from Holland as agent for the heir of the last patroon—Johannes Van Rensselaer, a minor—Petrus Stuyvesant met his match. Commander Slechtenhorst was in popular estimation “a person of stubborn and headstrong temper.”[73]
When Stuyvesant directed Carl von Brugge to quarry stone and cut wood for repairs on Fort Orange, nearly destroyed by a freshet, Brant dared the deputy to touch stone or stick at his peril, either for fortification or firewood; for the trees, root and branch, all belonged to his employer the patroon! He further forbade any of the inhabitants to aid them with horses, etc., while at the same time he was building a house himself not a pistol-shot from the fort. The news being carried to Manhattan, the director sent some soldiers to demolish the offending house now being built, and arrest the offender. This was more easily ordered than accomplished, so the soldiers held a parley with him, and were cautioned, among other bits of good advice, to take warning by one Jacob Jansen, who had not long before cut two fir-trees—eight days after he was seized with his plunder on the river by the patroon’s officer, and duly punished! with the stunning point to the climax: “Can’t he do so now?” All this being duly reported to the great director at Manhattan, it was deemed best to seek supplies beyond the domain of Rensselaerwyck, “stones from the mountains, rocks, and plains—timber from anywhere within the limits of New Netherlands—to have a wagon made, and take the horses of Jonas Bronck, who
was in debt to the company,” and whose opinions on the subject were of course of no consequence. As for pulling down the house recently erected, Herr Van Slechtenhorst pointed to the fact that Fort Orange stood on the very soil of his employer, and that it was his intention at some leisure day to annihilate it. So went matters, until at last, when Stuyvesant ordered a solemn fast, and Van Slechtenhorst absolved all in his latitude from obedience, human patience could stand it no longer, and the insulted autocrat rushed to Albany in the swiftest sailing sloop that could be found; there, as has been said, to meet his match.
But our business is not with these belligerents, but with those peacefully disposed burghers, who had grown tired more and more, year after year, with this turmoil, which seemed now to have reached its height. Armed soldiers were in their midst (for seven had been sent up from Manhattan), and when the talk was of razing houses, why, even the neighboring Indians came crowding in to ask what the Swannekins were about.
Happily another home opened to them, and very many packed up all their worldly goods and migrated. This home was the region about the Kaatskill. One part of the mission of Herr Van Slechtenhorst when sent over the ocean was “to acquire by purchase the lands around Kaatskill for the greater security of the colonie, as they were forming companies to remove thither.”[74]
On the land thus obtained, they had nothing to fear from Indian opposition, and the kind of domestic life they coveted is pictured in a lease yet extant in the Van Rensselaer family, dated 1651, wherein the tenant binds himself to “read
a sermon or portion of Scripture every Sunday and festival to the neighboring Christians, and to sing hymns before and after prayer, after the custom of the Church of Holland.” Years in that little nook of creation brought few great changes; their habitations had come to be grouped together somewhat town fashion, and were dignified by a name much too long, and unpronounceable except by a Dutch tongue, but well loved because traceable to Holland; and there life after life passed away like great waves in a stream—one disappears and another takes its place.
Such were the mortal inhabitants of the place; but the invisible portion of the community—their name was Legion! It seemed the very place of refuge for all sorts of bodiless personages who had been insulted and expelled from other places; indeed, if a census had been taken, according to the old wives’ stories, their aggregate numbers would have made up near half the population of the village.
In one portion of the spot which might truly have been called the supernatural reservation was a deep ravine, which bore traces of having once been the bed of a mountain stream. At this period (some time before the old French war), its sole inhabitants were a morose, ill-looking woodman and his aged mother, and their dwelling-place was a miserable hut perched on rocks, and so hidden by gnarled and twisted trees and a dense undergrowth of shrubs as to be almost invisible to any but its occupants. Why they established themselves in that uninviting place, or what were the events of their lives previous to their appearance there, their unintelligible English failed to communicate, nor was there aught in the sullen taciturnity of both of them
in the presence of a stranger, or in the loud and fearful bickerings heard ofttimes in their hovel by the passer-by, that created a desire to fathom the mystery. When the news arrived that French and English had met, the outcasts in the glen, strange to say were the only ones in the settlement whose fortunes seemed in any way to be affected by it. Their disputes were heard louder and more frequent than ever before, to end, alas! in a tragedy. The man, tired perhaps of his monotonous existence, and hoping also to better his fortunes, was desirous of joining the ranks of war, yet, feeling at the same time the necessity of his support to his old mother, he strove to wring from her a consent to his departure. It was sought in vain. The aged woman, to her consciousness of utter helplessness, added doubtless a natural desire for his safety, and consent was withheld. Opposition goaded him, and in a moment of passion he struck her lifeless to the ground.
The miserable parricide fled, and the hut fell in ruins. Time passed on, the war was ended, and peace restored.
And now, when the tragedy of the glen had grown to be an old story, only told by a winter evening’s fire, it began to be whispered—and it fairly petrified the senses of every hearer—that Dark Rob, as he was called, or his spectre, had returned to his old abode!
No one cared to investigate the matter very closely. A light was certainly seen flickering in the ruined hovel, and a phantom-like thing in human shape glided about the spot. No mortal would choose to remain there alone, so it must be the shade of Dark Rob, on the theatre of his unnatural crime!
Many an evil deed was related of him in this, his second sojourn in the
hut; but one of the most evil, because passing all comprehension, was the strange influence he contrived to acquire by ways unknown over a sturdy farmer named Jansen Van Dorp. How they first met was perfectly inexplicable; for goblin Rob had never been visible in any of the ordinary paths of the settlement, and, although Jans was one of the very few who laughed to scorn the idea of a ghost, he would scarcely venture in his sober senses to penetrate the dark shadows of the haunted hovel uninvited. In whatever way it happened, events proved their close intimacy; his steps were watched, and traced night after night to the hut, where they held their unholy orgies.
As a matter of course, the worldly affairs of Jans Van Dorp became disjointed things. His vrow had always borne a close resemblance to the helpmate of Socrates, and it is not to be supposed that such doings on the part of her truant spouse added to her sweetness of temper.
The most irritating part was the sudden taciturn spirit which seemed to possess the mynheer. Taunts, sneers, questions, reproaches, all were in vain! This was both new and alarming, because on no previous occasion had he ever been backward in contributing his share to the Babel din of their wordy skirmishes. It confirmed, alas! her worst suspicions, namely, that he was in toils and snares beyond all mortal power of extrication.
Great light was thrown on the affair by a shrewd neighbor, Effie Demson, who, having migrated to America from the Highlands of Scotland (and by some odd chance wandered down to the Kaatskill), was allowed to be especially versed in hobgoblin ethics. She affirmed that she had often heard from reliable authority that, whenever a
mortal is admitted to the society of spirits, an oath of secrecy is imposed under a penalty few would care to brave. She cited the cases of several imprudent individuals who, having violated this compact, suffered fearful consequences. One was Alice Pearson, of Byrehill, somewhere about 1588. Having been introduced to the invisible world by a friend, and joined them in “piping, mirth, and good cheer” (to use her own words), she was warned that, if she ever related what she had seen, “she should be martyred.” One day, when she began to speak of these things, an unseen blow took away her breath and left an ugly mark on her side; heedless of the warning, Alice continued her revelations until she was burned as a witch, thus fulfilling her doom.[75] Every one in the Highlands knew, too, the terrible visitation that had lighted on one kirk for having pried into secrets merely to publish them. Every one knew that he was a mere wandering gypsy in the universe, and would be to the end of time.
Effie generally concluded her oracles with the remnant of an old song, written about fairies particularly, but equally applicable to any unearthlies. It was called
“God a Mercy Will.
“To be sung or whistled to the tune of Meadow Brow by the learned; by the unlearned, to the tune of Fortune.
“A tell-tale in their companie
They never could endure,
But whoso kept not secrecy
Their deed was punished sure.
It was a just and Christian deed
To pinch such black and blue.”
Etc., etc., etc.
Poetica Stromata.
As this bore the antique date of 1648, and was written by Corbet,
Bishop of Norwich, it was considered good authority for anything.
This, then, explained the unusual silence of Jans Van Dorp, and it also half-reconciled his gude vrow to endure her unsatisfied curiosity. To wonder and to be afflicted night after night by his truant absence was bad enough, but to have seen him vanish in blue smoke would have been worse.
Things were passing thus in that sequestered little spot, while the great world without was agitated with mightier events—the opening scenes of the Revolutionary war. It is doubtful whether the faint rumors of it which penetrated the seclusion there would have excited the least attention, except for the fact that it was the only earthly topic on which Jans Van Dorp nowadays manifested the least interest. Every Dutch villager, whose business led him to the great cities, was questioned and cross-questioned on his return as to the precise state of things, with a minuteness which would have done honor to that renowned lawyer Heer Adrian Van der Donck, the first who landed in the New Netherlands. The one little gray newspaper that arrived weekly, and had hitherto circulated among his neighbors until it was quite illegible, was now packed immediately in his great-coat pocket and taken to his ghostly partner. All this was a perfect labyrinth of mystery, and furnished texts for many a sage conjecture and dubious shake of the head. Some hinted that Jans Van Dorp might mean to put in execution the threat he had been so often heard to hurl at his irritating helpmate when her vexatious volubility exceeded all bounds of endurance—that he’d be off to some war. But time puts an end to all things, although it does not always explain things to universal satisfaction. What
Jans or the goblin thought or meant can never be fathomed, but some things are matters of history; and it is a testified fact that the very moment this little dingy newspaper brought tidings that the first cannons of battle had boomed, Jansen Van Dorp started as if his doom was somehow connected with it. It was a night, dark and stormy, but he seized his hat, and rushed from the cheerful glow of his own home to the pitchy darkness without, and they whispered he was bound to the haunted hovel! Too probable, for from that hour neither Jans nor spectre was ever seen there more.
It should rather be said, never seen as mortal could be seen, for by many he was still considered an inhabitant of the settlement, although lost for ever to his hapless vrow. He had visited her in dreams, and warned her of something she could not exactly remember, but very terrible, and given on these occasions such
diverse accounts of himself, it was hard to tell what to believe. To Effie he had frequently presented himself. She had seen him in the coffee dregs, in leaves at the bottom of her tea-cup, in a mirror which she had cut triangular for that express purpose, and, finally, in a tremendous thunder-storm, standing close beside her.
As he gave no sign on these occasions, her charitable conclusion was that he had nothing very good to relate of himself.
Many months after this, one of the most intelligent mynheers of the settlement, having been called by business to a far eastern city, declared on his return that, among a troop of soldiers marching to the frontiers, he had recognized Jans Van Dorp and Dark Rob; but, as he failed in speaking to them, his assertion passed for nothing, and his story was dismissed as mere moonshine, too absurd to be believed.
[68] O’Callaghan. Hist. New Neths., vol. i. p. 37.
[69] Ibid. vol. i. ch. 2.
[70] O’Callaghan, Hist. vol. i. bk. iii. ch. 2.
[71] Watson’s Annals of New York.
[72] The writer of this possesses two pieces of embroidery done by one of madame’s pupils.
[73] O’Callaghan, Hist., vol. ii. p. 72.
[74] O’Callaghan, Hist., vol. ii. ch. iv.
[75] Trials from the Criminal Records of Scotland. By R. Pitcairn, Esq.
THE RELIGIOUS MOVEMENT IN GERMANY, AND THE FRACTION DU CENTRE IN THE GERMAN PARLIAMENT.
TRANSLATED FROM THE REVUE GENERALE.
An apathetic calm generally succeeds to political agitation at the close of legislative sessions. An exception to this rule prevails in the German Empire, inasmuch as the attacks against the Fraction du Centre, which began during the session, increased to an actual storm at the close of the diet. Most of the foreign journals have spoken of this phenomenon, but in so unsatisfactory a manner that perhaps a more minute account of the movement will not be displeasing to the readers of the Revue Générale.
I have already indicated in a general way, in an account of the parties in the German Parliament, the attitude and tendency of the Catholic party, or the so-called Fraction du Centre.
The bases upon which it is founded are as follows:
“Justitia fundamentum regnorum.
The Fraction au Centre in the German Parliament limits its activity by the following principles:
“I. The fundamental characteristics of the empire as a confederation (Bundesstaat) shall be maintained. Conformably to this principle, all efforts shall be opposed that tend to modify the federal character of the constitution of the empire, and the spontaneity and independence of the several states in their interior affairs shall only be sacrificed when the general interests evidently require it.
“II. The material and moral welfare of the popular classes shall be urgently insisted upon. The civil and religious liberty of all the subjects of the empire shall be secured by means of constitutional guarantees, and religious associations, in particular, shall be protected against legislative encroachments.
“III. The Fraction weighs and forms resolutions in accordance with these principles, upon all questions submitted to the deliberation of the parliament, but without forbidding isolated members to vote in the assembly contrary to the decisions of the Fraction.”
The Fraction remained faithful to these principles during the session of the parliament that has just closed. It avoided all extreme views, and manifested no systematic hostility to the government. Nevertheless, the very fact that it is composed of Catholics firmly resolved to defend the rights and liberties of the church against all attacks, and that these Catholics were elected from the most prosperous and intelligent sections of Germany, where pseudo-liberalism thought its rule immovably established, sufficed to excite against the Fraction a coalition of all who were opposed to the church. Their invectives began with the debates on the address. The form of address
proposed by the national liberal party contained, besides some expressions in praise of the historic views of the adversaries of the Papacy, the following sentence: “The days of interference with the national affairs of other kingdoms will, we trust, never return under any pretext or under any form.” This sentence, destructive of all national rights, was evidently aimed against Rome, as was partly acknowledged: the Italian revolution was not to be checked by diplomatic representations in the accomplishment of its designs against the visible head of the church. Naturally, it would not have occurred to any one to impose absolute passiveness on the powerful German Empire in its relations with neighboring states. The party of the Centre drew up a counter-schedule, which did not contain the proposition of absolute non-intervention we have just referred to, but which was nevertheless in conformity with the address of the liberals. This counter-schedule did not demand, either directly or indirectly, any intervention in favor of the Pope: it contained nothing that clashed either with the government or the other parties, and consequently was not the object of criticism in any quarter. So true is this, that the Allgemeine Zeitung of Augsburg, the chief organ of anti-religious liberalism, could not disguise its preference for the schedule of the Centre as to its substance as well as form. Nevertheless, though the Centre remained wholly on the defensive, and its orators exhibited the greatest moderation, a real storm of invectives was raised against them and the church by the journalists of all the other parties and by the parliament. Even the so-called conservatives took sides against the Centre, whose motion, thanks to these outcries, only obtained sixty votes. A
proposition made shortly after by the Centre in the interests of civil liberty met the same fate. This proposition had for its object the admission of several principles into the constitution of the German Empire which had been sanctioned by the Prussian constitution. As these principles guaranteed the independence of the church—the Evangelical as well as the Catholic (Art. 15, Pruss. const.)—the proposition was opposed with extreme bitterness, even by a large majority of the Catholic deputies who did not belong to the Fraction du Centre. Among these was Count de Frankenberg, of Silesia. This noble member had given his electors a written promise to vote in accordance with the proposition of the Fraction du Centre. But in the speech he made against it, he declared that he did not consider the time chosen by the Fraction as opportune. In his ignorance of judicial things, he probably is not familiar with the adage: Quod sine die debetur, statim debetur.
The Fraction du Centre made no other independent motions during the session that could incur any attacks. But the “clerical party” was attacked the more vehemently at the elections, so the Centre found itself still exposed to a cross fire. The whole affair has been related in the journals. We will confine ourselves to an incident that gives a tolerably correct idea of the majority.
Before the election of Dr. Schüttinger, nominated from the district of Bamberg, and belonging to the Fraction du Centre, the curate of a small town within that district announced from the pulpit, after divine service, that those of his parishioners who had confidence in him could assemble at his house after church to learn which candidate was preferable, according to his opinion. This invitation
appeared to the majority an intolerable infringement on electoral liberty as well as an abuse of the pulpit, and the election of Dr. Schüttinger was annulled. A new ballot gave the same candidate a thousand more votes than at first. At the next session, the validity of this re-election will be submitted to the decision of the parliament, and the question arises if the majority will be fully satisfied respecting the electoral liberty of the district of Bamberg. But the Belgian Catholics know by long experience what their adversaries mean by electoral manœuvres.
In all the occurrences we have referred to, the government showed itself entirely passive, so there was no real conflict between it and the party of the Centre. When the debate took place respecting Alsace-Lorraine, our party proposed to ensure to those provinces the most independent existence possible, and a separate constitution. Prince Bismarck did not exactly agree with this, but his opinions coincided far oftener with those of the deputies Windthorst and Reichensperger than with those of the leaders of the other parties. On the whole, no instance can be mentioned in which the Fraction du Centre is in flagrant hostility to that powerful statesman. It even openly opposed an interpellation respecting the Roman question, in order not to excite any irritating debates and appear suspicious of the good intentions of the emperor and chancellor. In spite of this, it was reported during the session that the Fraction du Centre had incurred the disapprobation of the chancellor of the empire. The Deutsche Reichscorrespondenz, the organ of the so-called liberal conservatives, gave some foundation to this report by pretending that the Count de Tauffkirchen had, according to the instructions of Prince Bismarck,
accused the Fraction du Centre to Cardinal Antonelli of having assumed an attitude hostile to the government of the empire, and that the cardinal had expressed his disapproval of this attitude not only before the Count de Tauffkirchen, but in a letter addressed to the leaders of the Fraction. This assertion being repeated in several quarters, the said leaders denied it in the journals. Driven to the wall, the Deutsche Reichscorrespondenz then brought up the case of the Count de Frankenberg already mentioned, and at last Prince Bismarck himself declared the blame really proceeded from Cardinal Antonelli. This induced the Bishop of Mayence to ascertain the correct account of the matter from the cardinal. His eminence replied that it had been incorrectly reported to him that the Fraction du Centre had insisted upon the Emperor of Germany’s intervention in favor of the Pope, and that, under the existing circumstances, he had declared such a step inopportune. At the same time, the cardinal assured the Bishop of Mayence and his friends that he had a particular esteem for the members of the Fraction du Centre and its proclivities. Thus failed the effort made at the court of Rome to bring discredit on the Fraction among Catholics, for at once a great number of Catholics gave in their full adhesion to the Fraction, and besought it to persevere courageously. This effort had, moreover, a comic side, for until now the Fraction had been represented as the servile tool of the Roman curia, whence it received its orders on all important questions.
No general interest would be felt in all these facts, if they were not the clear prelude of an act the consequences of which cannot be foreseen. It is not the acts of the Fraction
du Centre that provoke the violent attacks against it: it is its very existence that is considered a crime. Those hostile to the church had calculated, without distinction of party, that the very first diet of the German Empire would aim a blow at “Romanism” in Germany, on the ruins of which would afterwards rise a national German church, that might finally end in a cosmopolitan “Humanitarianism,” without dogmas, without sacraments, and without altars—the very beau idéal of freemasonry. Everything, in fact, seemed propitious for the realization of this hope. The two principal Catholic nations successively conquered, the Roman race suffering from incessant convulsions, the head of the Catholic Church a prisoner at the Vatican, and, finally, a schism that seemed likely to arise on account of the dogma of infallibility—all seemed to form a breach by which it was hoped their opponents would be overcome. Only, as an ancient adage says: “Man proposes, but God disposes!”
The election of the Prussian deputies and the members of the German Parliament has already paralyzed the action of these regenerators of humanity, by rousing the Catholics to an energy not easily to be surmounted. The complete union of the representatives elected, and their bold stand, showed it would be quite useless for the legislative assemblies at Berlin to make any serious charge against Catholicism. On the contrary, it was hoped at Berlin that the initiative would be taken by Munich, where “the Luther of the nineteenth century” had raised a standard of revolt against the Roman Pontificate. But Munich was likewise under the influence of illusions. It was supposed that Mgr. Hefele, the Bishop of Rothenberg,
would add the sanction of episcopal authority to the influence of the learned Professor Döllinger, and thus sustain his course. It was still more certain that a great number of the pupils of the theological seminaries would respond to the appeal of Döllinger and his able adherents. Döllinger, it may be remembered, had publicly declared that thousands of priests thought exactly as he did.
But Bishop Hefele remained faithful to the Pope, and the German clergy unanimously declared that Döllinger’s assertion was a calumny. The King of Bavaria himself, who had given Döllinger so many proofs of his esteem, hesitated a long time about giving him his support, because he could not help seeing that the anti-ecclesiastical movement was chiefly led by a political party whose efforts openly tended to mediatize the reigning houses of the second and third ranks in order to form a united and centralized Germany, in imitation of the empire of Napoleon III. These efforts naturally met with the most favorable concurrence on the part of the democrats; for an empire of this kind, established on a broad and “liberal” basis, would lead, by a sort of fatality, to a republic, especially if they first succeeded in doing away with the religious and historic traditions.
Immediately after the close of the parliament, a fire was opened at Berlin upon the “clericals,” and especially upon the Fraction du Centre. The official journals did their best to open the way to “modern progress” by removing all the obstacles that might impede it, and to increase the diplomatic pressure that had so long been exerting its influence on the Bavarian cabinet. The whole German press, with the exception of a dozen journals, naturally joined in the chorus, and then began an attack on the
Catholics, the like of which had not been witnessed since the Archbishop of Cologne was sent under guard to the fortress of Minden, under the pretext that he had conspired with the two revolutionary parties against the Prussian government.
The German Catholics are accustomed to these kinds of accusations, which have passed through all possible variations. Thus, the Catholics of the Rhenish provinces have been successively accused, according to the circumstances of the moment, of plotting with France, Belgium, Bavaria, and Austria, against Prussia, and of considering the Pope as their legitimate sovereign. Foreigners can hardly credit what I am obliged to relate here, and, if they should, it would excite their risibility. Unfortunately, these absurdities have a serious side for the Prussian Catholics. Independently of the circumstance that these perfidious calumnies, systematically repeated, might pervert public opinion in those sections of Germany where Protestantism prevails, they serve as a pretext for practically refusing Catholics the open equality which they should share with the adherents of other religions. For example, all the higher offices of influence are, with very rare exceptions, filled by Protestants, who, as a matter of course, specially favor the interests of their co-religionists in every way, and, so to speak, are obliged to do so, because genuine Catholics are officially designated as unpatriotic. An exact list of the functionaries of the German communes and government, drawn up with reference to the religion of each one, would be a valuable statistic, because it would incontestably establish how far the principle of suum cuique, which constitutionally recognizes the equality of Christian sects, is really applied. It is evident that
such a report will never be published or drawn up by the authorities, consequently the formation of a private agency to effect such an object is an urgent necessity. Perhaps this report might at last put an end to the constantly repeated accusations of the base ingratitude of Catholics against the Prussian government. The clear judgment of Frederick William IV., and the constitutions that sprang from the events of 1848, guaranteed a liberty of action to the Catholic Church and its organs which had not existed in any German state since the peace of Westphalia. The Prussian Catholics displayed a lively gratitude for this, and flattered themselves with the hope that several crying injustices which weighed on them would be removed, especially in the conferring of public offices and the nomination of professors at the universities. This hope was then the more reasonable, because, in the war against France, Catholics, as well as Protestants, shed their blood on the battle-fields, and submitted to the heaviest requisitions. The religious orders particularly signalized themselves by their services, as the recently published report of the Knights of Malta (Catholics) prove. Unfortunately, this hope has already given place to serious preoccupation.
Prince Bismarck appears no longer able to endure repose. Having vanquished our foreign enemies, he seems to aim, unless all appearances deceive us, at making adversaries of the Catholics of Germany and causing them to feel the weight of his hand. Perhaps he is influenced by the consideration that military unity, to be on a solid basis, should be founded on, or crowned by, political and religious unity. At all events, this is the opinion of the liberal party, whose course involuntarily recalls the expression of Tacitus, “Ruere in servitium;”
whereas, while M. de Bismarck was rising to power, they abused him beyond all bounds. These worshippers of success have for allies the Catholics who are not willing to submit to the decrees of the Council of the Vatican. In the jargon of the liberals, these Neo-Protestants are designated as old Catholics, while the immense majority of Catholics who now, as formerly, consider the authority of the Pope and bishops in religious things as higher than that of certain professors, are styled Neo-Catholics, absolutely as if they had abandoned the faith of the church. A foreigner would find it difficult to understand how it is possible to give a completely opposite meaning to the real signification of a word, and this in a country like Germany, which prides itself on its intelligence.
But it is not the anti-religious journals alone that take this liberty. M. de Mühler himself, the Prussian minister of the public worship, treats the Catholics, who remain faithful to the decrees of the Pope and bishops as rebels to the government. Immediately after the suspension of the council, he took under his protection the professors, even those who were priests, who refused to submit to the decisions of the council and the bishops, and encouraged them in their revolt against ecclesiastical authority. Recently, à propos of the affair of the Bishop of Ermland, he went so far as to submit to the ministry of Prussia, composed exclusively of Protestants, a resolution to ascertain what Catholics should be considered as orthodox, and he ordered a priest named Wollmann, who had been excluded from the fold of the church by major excommunication, to retain his professorship as religious instructor in the Catholic college of Braunsberg. The students, unwilling to receive religious instruction from a fallen priest, left the college.
They were thus obliged to give up most of their studies, as there is no other establishment of the kind at Braunsberg. It should also be remarked that the College of Braunsberg was founded by a bishop and sustained by Catholic foundations. In Silesia, another priest named Kaminski, likewise excommunicated, was appointed to a church that he might celebrate the divine service for those who protested against the Council of the Vatican. In a word, every where there is any reason, or even a pretext, the episcopal authority is sacrificed to those who refuse them the obedience solemnly sworn to them, or become unfaithful to the church by calling the episcopal crosier the bâton of a police officer. On all sides were declarations, more and more threatening, that an end must be made of “Romanism,” that German science should take the place of idolatrous papistry, and the echo of this cry is to be found in the papers that seek their inspiration from the ministerial bureaux.
But in spite of the great power of the Prussian government, the centralists, to their severe mortification, were doubtful about succeeding in fully organizing a persecution against the Catholics unless the other German governments, or at least the most important of them, declare war against the church. The Würtemberg government was so wise as to declare from the first that it would ignore the decisions of the Council of the Vatican as long as no one was influenced by it against the laws and constitution of the kingdom. As this evidently would never be the case, the Würtemberg ministry, if the national liberals who have just begun an outcry in the assembly of representations at Stuttgart do not impose a different policy on them, will consequently remain strictly passive
with respect to the church, as is the case in Belgium, Holland, England, the United States, and every country where genuine liberty prevails. The statesmen who govern those countries do not allow their slumbers to be disturbed by the decrees of the Council of the Vatican, and deem it beneath their dignity to regard them as a pretext to form a kind of Cæsaro-papism.
As we have remarked, the course of the Bavarian government in the ulterior development of this agitation, will be of great importance. The pressure brought to bear on that government by Prussia and all the parties inimical to the church has led to the retirement of Count Bray, whose devotedness to the church is well-known. Nevertheless, the king has not fully decided to create, by an open rupture with the religious authorities, unforeseen complications in his kingdom, already so shaken, and to recompense by moral violence the fidelity of those of his subjects who have shown themselves the most devoted partisans of the dynasty of Wittelsbach. This question, so painful for the majority of Bavarians, will be doubtless decided before this article is published.
Having given a general outline of the present state of affairs, I am led to ask myself what, before the end of the year, will be the stand of the Catholic representatives who are still faithful to the church in the legislative assemblies of Prussia and the German empire. The reports of those deputies to their electors appear to me adapted to strengthen them in their resolution to continue to struggle courageously against the supremacy of the state as well as against revolutionary absolution, and to remain defenders of the church and of all constitutional rights against the false apostles of liberty and an
arbitrary ministry. At all events, I imagine these deputies will smile with pity when they hear themselves styled unpatriotic by some parties in imitation of a part of the journals hostile to the church, or even accused of conspiring with foreigners or the Internationale. Some papers, in fact, have not shrunk from the ridicule attached to such foolish accusations. Does not this having to resort to such imputations prove the want of any serious charge against the members of the Centre? They are evidently not credited by those who make use of them, nor is any attempt made to convince others of their truth.
The members of the Fraction du Centre figure, for the most part, among the notabilities of their districts. Many of them have occupied or occupy some public office with honor: and several have, for many years, showed their constant zeal in the old Prussian house of legislation, where they had a seat, and gave their devoted support to the government in the crisis of the year 1848 and the following year, often at the expense of their popularity. They were often known to defend the authorities against the attacks of those who are now endeavoring to excite the government against them.
In support of what I have just stated, it is sufficient to recall the names of those whom the confidence of their colleagues chose as a committee of the Fraction du Centre in the German parliament and the Prussian house of representatives. I will mention M. de Savigny, the son of the illustrious jurisconsult so well-known throughout the whole world, who was formerly Prussian minister at Brussels, and latterly the representative of the King of Prussia at the Diet of Frankfort; M. Windthorst, who was president of the
house of representatives in Hanover, and twice minister of justice in that kingdom; the Baron d’Arétin, the vice-president of the upper house in the kingdom of Bavaria; M. de Mallinkrodt, the counsellor of the Prussian regency; the Prince de Loewenstein; the Count de Landsberg-Velen, a hereditary member of the Prussian house of lords, etc. Perhaps I may be permitted to mention also my brother, a counsellor of the Prussian Court of Cassation, who was one of the most active leaders of the conservative party when the government was the object of the most violent attacks.[76]
He who consecrates his time and strength to the cause of justice and religious liberty, or uses them in the arena of political combat, should not expect to reap any gratitude, but the leaders of the Centre and their friends could not foresee that they would be exposed to the calumnies I have alluded to. The only appreciable grievance uttered against the Hanoverian and Bavarian members of their Fraction is, that the former disapproved of the annexation of their country to Prussia, and the latter used its influence to prevent Bavaria from joining the new German Empire. But these deputies have stated publicly that, these measures having been decided by vote, they were ready not only to fall in with the new order of things, but to endeavor to strengthen it, which cannot be the case if the national liberal party is not opposed, the evident tendency of which is not of a
nature to fortify the constitution of the empire, being directed against the federative principle, which is the fundamental characteristic of this constitution. No one has a right to suspect the statements and character of these men who merit the esteem of all honorable people for having defended in a purely conservative sense, and by all legal means, the traditions of their ancestors, to which they remain faithful, and which they wish to maintain as long as their duty evidently requires it.
To the Fraction du Centre in the German Parliament belongs also M. Kraetzig, the leader of the Catholic department of the ministry of public worship, which has just been dissolved. This division, composed of three counsellors belonging to the Catholic faith, was organized by Frederick William IV. with the benevolent intention of giving the Catholics of Prussia a sort of guarantee for the suitable administration of the funds for public worship: it was not wished that such matters should be decided by a Protestant government without at least listening to the advice of the Catholic functionaries. (The leader of the Catholic department of public worship had only a consultative voice.) The existence of this division was a pledge to the Catholics, being an assurance that their religious interests would never fall into hostile or indifferent hands. If we except the Prince de Hohenzollern, no Catholic ever had a seat in the ministerial council, and especially no Catholic was ever appointed minister of public instruction. The suppression of this division, decreed on the eighth of last July, is the more serious a symptom that it has been applauded by the journals opposed to the church, and with a joy equal to that manifested at the measures taken in Alsace against the brothers
devoted to instruction and against the Catholic press. The party of the Centre will naturally oppose with all its might the current of opinion which these acts prove to exist in the region of power. Its voice, it is true, will be stifled by the majority, but it will not be raised the less energetically for liberty and justice, with the hope of seeing a better day dawn, and, whatever the event, with the conviction of having fulfilled an obligation of conscience not only toward the church, but to the state.
The hope of soon seeing the clouds disperse that have been accumulating of late around Germany in so unexpected a manner is founded on the political prudence, the experience, and the opinions of the Emperor William. It is not possible for this monarch crowned with laurels, after having established peace with foreign powers through the bravery and fidelity of the whole German nation, to authorize the persecution of millions of Germans on account of their faith, and consent to sacrifice the national peace—the peace which is especially due to his royal brother, whose memory is still blessed by Catholics. There is no doubt but the appeals of the Catholic population will be heard and listened to, as soon as they reach the foot of the throne. The statesman who, in such an unparalleled manner, has been so highly exalted to the very steps of that throne, and whose celebrated name is displayed, without his consent I am persuaded, on the standard of the enemies of the church, cannot be ignorant that, when these troubles shall have assumed more formidable proportions, it will be more difficult to overcome moral resistance than to triumph over physical obstacles, and that measures of policy will be powerless against the former. He will hardly consider it chivalric; with all the
enormous material resources of the state at his disposal, to enter into a combat against people who can and will only oppose him passively, as is suitable in the defence of a cause which represents the most powerful interests of humanity.
But perhaps all these hopes are illusory; perhaps we are about to see in our Fatherland the beginning of a sad and fruitless struggle, such as has so exhausted the strength of other countries by giving a free course to the most dangerous passions. In this case the Catholics of Germany should prepare themselves to endure a long succession of contradictions, for their moral courage will be severely tried. They will have to make sacrifices of all kinds for their faith, recalling the precept of the Gospel that commands us not only to render to Cæsar the things that are Cæsar’s, but also to God the things that are God’s, whatever may happen, whatever may be the consequence of such a struggle, the church of God, which has always been victorious through patience, will never yield either under assaults of unbelief or the attacks of a false science, that in its pride seems to declare anew: Eritis sicut Deus. Truth is great, and it will prevail: Magna est veritas et prævalebit.
A. Reichensperger.
Cologne, Aug., 1871.
[76] The modesty of the eminent author of this article did not permit him to mention his own name among the most illustrious members of the Fraction du Centre. It would be ungrateful not to supply this omission by adding to the valiant champions enumerated above the man whose multiplied labors, marked by his superior intelligence and ardor of feeling, are at once an honor to Germany and the church.—(Note of the Editor.)