POPULAR OBJECTIONS TO PAPAL INFALLIBILITY.

I have read carefully, my dear Philo, your very welcome letter, and cordially reciprocate the kind feelings it expresses. It has recalled our early friendship, which, with me, at least, has never been forgotten or diminished. I see, from your observations on the recent definition of the Papal Infallibility by the Council of the Vatican, that you still think as we both thought in our school-boy days, when we wondered what sort of people Catholics must be to believe that a man could be infallible, to take their faith from a man called the Pope, and to obey and even worship him, as we were told, as God. We were then in some measure excusable for supposing that they must be exceedingly stupid and destitute of reason and of every grain of common sense; for neither of us had then ever seen a Catholic, and knew nothing of their faith or worship except what our Protestant masters, who held them to be no better than the heathen, told us; but are you, my dear Philo, equally excusable for thinking now as you did then? Have you had no opportunity of correcting the error into which we were both led?

You say, “The Council, by its decree defining the Pope when teaching the universal church to be infallible or exempt from error in all matters pertaining to faith and morals, makes the Pope God, clothes him with the incommunicable attributes of the Divinity, and consequently requires us to reverence and worship him as God.” Are you not a little hasty in this conclusion? You tell me that you

believe in the plenary inspiration and consequent infallible authority of the Scriptures of the Old and New Testaments; you then, of course, believe in God and the supernatural order, or that Christian faith is supernaturally revealed to man, and recorded in a book called the Bible. But through what medium was the revelation made and recorded? Certainly through men who spoke or wrote as they were moved by the Holy Ghost, or what they were taught by our Lord himself, and enabled by the Spirit to commit truthfully and without error to writing. All this, you tell me, you believe and hold.

Now, were these inspired penmen, prophets, apostles, and evangelists each God, or clothed with the incommunicable attributes of the Divinity? You do not believe it. Why, then, does the declaration of the Pope’s infallibility declare him to be God? The sacred penmen, you believe, were infallible in what they wrote, and yet without becoming God, or ceasing to be men; why may not the Pope, then, be infallible without being God, or ceasing to be a man like you and me? Do you say the sacred writers were infallible by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, not by nature? Well, do Catholics pretend that the Pope is infallible by nature, or otherwise than through the supernatural assistance of the Holy Ghost protecting him from error in teaching the faith taught by the prophets and apostles? I am not aware that they do.

Catholics, I am told, make a distinction between divine inspiration

and divine assistance. The prophets and apostles were divinely inspired to reveal truth; the Pope, according to Catholics, is divinely assisted to teach infallibly the truth revealed through the prophets and apostles, or as taught to the apostles by our Lord himself while he was yet with them. Now, if the inspiration which rendered the prophets and apostles infallible in revealing the truth which was hitherto hidden did not clothe them with the incommunicable attributes of God, how can you pretend that the assistance of the Spirit to teach infallibly what God revealed through them, which is far less, makes the Pope God, or clothes his nature with the attributes of God? If more did not do it in their case, how can less do it in his?

You say, “All men are fallible, and no man can teach infallibly.” All men are fallible, it is true, in their own nature; but that no man by supernatural inspiration and assistance can teach infallibly, neither you nor I believe. We both hold, for instance, that St. Peter was a man, and yet that he was an infallible teacher of the word of God. We hold the same of St. Paul, of St. John, of St. Matthew, of St. Mark, and of St. Luke. Say you they were infallible not by their natural endowments, but only through the supernatural external assistance of the Holy Ghost? But Catholics, if I understand them, hold the Pope to be infallible not by nature or by his own natural powers, but only by the supernatural assistance of the Holy Ghost. Grant the supernatural assistance of the Holy Ghost, and there is no more difficulty in believing the Pope is infallible in his teachings than in believing, as you and I do, that St. Peter and St. Paul were infallible in teaching the revelation of God, whether by word or letter.

Do you not, my dear Philo, confound, in the case of the Popes, infallibility with omniscience, and assume that the Vatican Council, in declaring the Pope infallible in matters pertaining to faith and morals, has actually declared him to be omniscient, and therefore God? This is a mistake: first, because the infallibility declared is not universal; and, second, because the infallibility declared is supernatural and by divine assistance and protection. The Pope is declared to be infallible only when he is teaching the universal church faith and morals, and in condemning the errors repugnant thereto, and even then only by supernatural assistance and protection of the Holy Ghost. The Pope, as a man, is no more infallible than other men: he is infallible only in exercising his function of universal doctor, or teacher of the whole church, and, as this is by the Holy Ghost, the infallibility, like omniscience itself, pertains to God, not to him as a man, and is attached to his function, not to his person. If our Lord, who is perfect God as well as perfect man, has appointed him to the office of universal teacher, and promised him the assistance and protection of the Spirit, there is no difficulty in believing him infallible, even if his personal knowledge should turn out to be no greater than yours or mine. The Pope is simply guided by the Spirit to the truth already revealed and deposited with the church, and, for the most part, at least, contained in the Holy Scriptures, and is simply protected from error in declaring it.

Indeed, my dear Philo, Catholics claim no more for the Pope than our old Presbyterian parson claimed for himself and for each and every individual of the regenerate or true people of God. He taught us, as you well know, that the regenerate

soul is guided by the Spirit into all truth, and protected from all error, at least as to essentials. Some, perhaps most Protestants, go farther than this, and claim to have an infallible authority for their faith in the Bible interpreted by private judgment, and therefore claim for private judgment pretty much the same infallibility that the Council of the Vatican claims for the Pope. Either, then, all regenerate souls, nay, all men, if Protestants are right, are each God, or else the declaration of the Council does not, actually or virtually, declare the Pope to be God, or anything more or less than a man supernaturally assisted by the Holy Ghost to perform the duties of the office to which the Council holds he is supernaturally appointed by Him who has all power in heaven and earth, and is King of kings and Lord of lords.

You say, “The supposition of an infallible Pope is repugnant to the rights and activity of the mind.” I do not see it. The human mind can hardly be said to have any rights in presence of its Creator. If any right it has, it is the right to be governed by the word of God alone, and not to be held subject to any human authority or opinions of men. My mind is outraged when it is subjected to the fallible opinions of men, and obliged to hold them as truth, when I have no adequate authority for believing that they are not erroneous. How then its rights can be denied by its being furnished with an infallible guide to the truth, to the word of God, its supreme law, instead of the words of man, is what I do not exactly comprehend, and I do not believe you can comprehend any better than I. An infallible authority lessens the activity of the mind in groping after truth, if you will; but truth being the element of the mind,

that for which it was created, and without which it can neither live nor operate at all, cannot very well destroy its activity by being possessed. Does the possession of truth leave no scope for mental activity? If so, what is to constitute the beatitude of the blest in heaven? Your objection strikes me as absurd; for the real activity of the mind is in knowing, appropriating, and using the truth to fulfil the purpose of our existence and to gain the end for which God has made us.

You say, again, that “an infallible authority destroys man’s free agency and takes away his moral responsibility.” The intellect, you are aware, my dear Philo, if prescinded from the will, is not free. I am not free in regard to pure intellections. I cannot, if I would, believe that two concretes are five, or only three; and I am obliged to admit that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles. I may refuse to turn my attention to one or another class of subjects, but I see and judge as I must, not as I will or choose. Free agency and moral responsibility, therefore, attach to the will, not to the intellect, and are enhanced in proportion to my knowledge or understanding of the truth. The authority teaching me infallibly the truth, I am bound by the law of God to accept and obey. So far from destroying free agency, it manifestly confirms it, and, instead of taking away moral responsibility, raises it to the highest possible pitch; for it leaves the mind without the shadow of an excuse for not believing. You forget, my dear Philo, that infallible authority presenting infallible truth is not only a command to the will, but the highest possible reason to the understanding. But at any rate, the objection is as valid against the infallibility of the Bible,

asserted by Protestants, as against the infallibility of the Pope, asserted by Catholics.

You say, furthermore, “The claim of infallibility for the Pope is incompatible with civil and religious liberty. If the Pope is infallible in all questions touching faith and morals, his authority is supreme, overrides all other powers, and subjects to him our whole life, religious, moral, domestic, social, and political.” But if so, what, then, if he is infallible? You forget that this is no more than Protestants themselves claim for the Bible. Do you admit that any state, sovereign prince, head of a family, or individual has the right, in thought, word, or deed, to contradict or go counter to the law of God as contained in the infallible Bible? Do you not hold that every one is subject in all things whatsoever to the infallible authority of the Holy Scriptures? Well, how can the subjection of our whole life—religious, moral, domestic, social, and political—to the authority of an infallible book be less incompatible with civil and religious liberty than its subjection to an infallible Pope? If the Pope is really infallible, he can enjoin nothing in faith or morals not enjoined by the law of God. Do you pretend that subjection to the law of God is incompatible with civil and religious liberty? If so, you must say with Proudhon, “God is a tyrant, and you must either abolish God or give up the defence of liberty. Once admit God, and you must admit the Catholic Church, Pope, and all.” Now, I am not in the habit, any more than Catholics are, of regarding God and liberty as antagonistic, the one to the other. I have always been accustomed to regard liberty not as freedom from all restraint, but as simply freedom from all unjust restraint, or restraint not imposed by the law of

God, which is the law of right and justice. His law is the basis, and obedience to it and it alone is the necessary condition, of all true liberty in any and every department of life. Why, then, should the assertion of the infallible authority of the Pope to declare the law of God, which you and I both hold binds all men and nations, be incompatible with liberty? The law of God is just, and the measure or standard of justice, and justice is the foundation and guarantee of liberty. Your objection is not well taken.

What you really object to, my dear Philo, is not, it strikes me, an infallible, but a fallible Pope claiming to be infallible. But suppose the Pope to be infallible in the sense defined by the Council, it is absurd to object to him as dangerous to liberty, civil or religious, because the Holy Ghost prevents him from declaring anything to be the law of God which is not so, and because, being assisted by the same Holy Ghost, he is always able to decide infallibly what that law does or does not require; and as long as the law as he declares it is observed, no one can be subjected to an unjust authority, oppressed, or deprived of any of his rights.

“You concede,” you say, “the supremacy of the law of God, and that all laws which contravene it, or are not transcripts of it, are violences, not laws, and are null and void from the beginning; but this is something very different from subjecting all individuals and the whole secular order to the authority of an infallible Pope upheld by the whole hierarchy, and backed by a huge corporation that extends over the whole world.” But where is the difference, if the Pope, by divine assistance and protection, is really infallible? The Pope, if infallible, can be so only from the supernatural appointment

and assistance of God as his vicar, and, if infallible, he can declare and apply only what is the law of God or authorized by the law of God. You are wrong, then, old friend, in objecting to the infallible authority; for that is what is needed to establish the divine order in human affairs, and to make the church really the kingdom of God on earth. Your objection and your reasoning are misdirected, and should be directed to prove that Catholics assert infallibility for a Pope who, in fact, is not infallible, but fallible.

You and all Protestants claim infallible authority for the Bible read and interpreted by each individual for himself, or, rather, by each sect for itself. Unless this interpretation is by an infallible authority, which it confessedly is not, you have in the Bible practically only a fallible authority, yet claim to have an infallible authority; and hence you claim and seek to enforce in the name of the Bible your own very fallible and contradictory opinions or theories. You are guilty, then, of precisely the offence you charge against Catholics, that of claiming infallibility for a fallible authority, and of which it is possible Catholics are not guilty, and, if the Pope be infallible, not only are not, but cannot be guilty. You have, as I have said—even conceding, as I do, the Bible in its true meaning to be infallible—practically no infallible authority. You have no infallible authority to determine and declare the law of God contained in the Bible. You have not the law itself, but only your view of it, which is only a human view, and therefore fallible. To subject men to a mere human view or to a mere human authority, I need not say, is intolerable despotism; and hence your Protestantism is incompatible either with civil or religious liberty, for all men

are born equal, and no man or body of men has, except by divine appointment or delegation, any dominion over another.

Hence, as you and I both know, there is no solid basis or security for liberty under Protestantism. If Protestants grow indifferent and do not attempt to govern in the name of the Bible, there may be license, anarchy, a moral and political chaos; but if they are in earnest, and attempt to enforce the authority of the Bible as they understand it, they only enforce their own view of it, and, consequently, can establish only a spiritual despotism either in church or state. In Geneva, Scotland, in every state in Europe that became Protestant, in Virginia, in Massachusetts, in Connecticut, the dominant sect, you know, in early times established an odious tyranny, and would tolerate no opinion hostile to its own. Owing to certain reminiscences of principles inculcated in pre-Reformation times, and to the growing indifference of Protestants to their religion at the time our republic was instituted, and still more to the dissensions among Protestants themselves, civil and religious liberty were recognized here in the United States, but it had and has no basis and no guarantee, except in parchment constitutions, not worth the parchment on which they are engrossed, and which the people may alter at will; and even now the Evangelical sects are trying to unite their forces to abolish religious liberty, without which civil liberty is an empty name. The founder of Methodism was no friend to civil liberty, and he proved himself the bitter enemy of religious liberty by creating, or doing more than any other man to create, the shameful Gordon riots in England in 1780. Let the Methodists become, as they bid fair to become, the dominant sect

in the country, and able to command a majority of the votes of the American people, and both civil and spiritual despotism will be fastened on the country, for Methodism has only a human authority.

The sort of security Protestantism gives to religious liberty may be seen in the proceedings of the general government against the Mormons. It does not interfere with their religion: it pretends it only enforces against them the laws of the Union—laws, by the way, made expressly against them. All the government needs to suppress any religion or religious denomination it does not like is to pass laws prohibiting some of its practices on the plea that they are contrary to morality or the public good, and then take care to execute them. Queen Elizabeth held religious liberty sacred, and abhorred the very thought of persecuting Catholics. She only executed the laws against them. She enacted a law enjoining an oath of supremacy, and making it high treason to refuse to take it, and which she knew every Catholic was obliged in conscience to refuse to take; and then she could hang, draw, and quarter them, not as Catholics, but as traitors. Her judges only executed the laws of the realm against them. I have, as you well know, no sympathy with the Mormons, and I detest their peculiar doctrines and practices, but the principle on which the government proceeds against them would justify it, or any sect that could control it, in suppressing the church, and all Protestant sects even but itself.

Laws in favor of liberty amount to nothing, for all laws may be repealed. The Bible is no safeguard. Under it and by its supposed authority, Catholics have suffered the most cruel persecutions; even when not deprived of life, they have been deprived

of the common rights of men by Protestant governments led on by Protestant ministers. Thus the Bible commands the extirpation of idolaters. But Protestants, by their private judgment, declared Catholics to be idolaters, and hence in the name of the Bible took from them their churches, their schools, colleges, and universities, confiscated their goods, and imprisoned them, exiled them, or cut their throats. The pretence of legislating only in regard to morality avails nothing for religious liberty; for morality depends on dogma, and is only the practical application of the great principles of religion to individual, domestic, social, and political life. You cannot touch a moral question without touching a religious question, for religion and morality are inseparable; your only possible security for liberty is in having a divinely instituted authority that is infallible in faith and morals, competent to tell the state as well as individuals how far it may go, and where it must stop.

You object, finally, my dear Philo, that the assertion of the infallibility of the Pope is incompatible with the assertion of the sovereignty of the people and the independence of secular government. The people and all secular governments, you have conceded, are subject to the law of God. Neither the people nor secular governments are independent of the divine law, and have only the authority it gives them, and the freedom and independence it allows them. How can they lose any right or authority they have or can have by having the divine law, under which they hold, infallibly declared and applied? It is singular, my old schoolfellow, that so acute, subtle, and so able a lawyer as I know you to be, should have the misfortune, as a theologian, to object to the very thing

you really wish to maintain, and which can alone save you from the evils you seek to avoid. Now, what it is necessary to know in order to determine the rights and powers of government, is to know precisely what in relation to government the law of God—including both the natural law and the revealed law, which are really only two parts of one and the same divine law—ordains, what it prescribes, and what it forbids. This knowledge can only in part be derived through natural reason, because the law is in part supernatural, and can be known only by faith: it cannot be derived with certainty from the Scriptures interpreted by our own fallible judgment or by any human authority: it can be obtained infallibly from the teaching and decisions of an infallible Pope, if really infallible. The infallible Pope will give to the people all the sovereignty they have under the law of God, and maintain for civil government all the rights and powers, all the freedom and independence of action, the law of God gives it. What more do you want? What more dare you assert for civil government or for popular sovereignty? Would you put the people in the place of God, and raise the secular order above the spiritual, man above God? Certainly not, at least not avowedly either to yourself or to others. Then, how can you pretend the Papal infallibility is incompatible with the sovereignty of the people and the independence of civil government? Do you want the line unsettled, and the law of God

left undefined, and remitted, as you remit the Bible, to the private judgment of each people or each government, to be interpreted by each for itself, and as it sees proper? But that were to make the divine law practically of no effect, and to leave each people and each government without any law but what it chooses to be to itself. It practically emancipates the secular order from the law of God, and asserts complete civil absolutism.

The fact is, my dear Philo, you and many others in your own minds regard liberty and authority as mutually hostile powers. It is the error of the age, and hence we see the nations alternating between the mob and the despot, each hostile alike to liberty and authority. Both liberty and authority are founded in the divine order, and without recognizing and conforming to that order neither can be maintained. To restrain liberty by an authority that rests on a human basis alone is to destroy it; as to restrain authority by liberty not defined by the law of God, or by popular sovereignty to be defined by popular sovereignty, is to lose all authority, and to rush into anarchy and universal license. There is no true liberty and no legitimate government independent of the divine order; consequently, none without an infallible authority to present and maintain it. The question is, Has God, or has he not, established an infallible authority to declare his law?  Yours affectionately,

Damian.

THE FOXVILLES OF FOXVILLE.

A TALE OF THE PERIOD.

I.

At a huge country-house, not many years ago, some few days after the close of the Christmas and New Year’s festivities, the usual family circle, with one exception, met at the breakfast-table. A man on horseback had just pulled up at the house-door with the family letter-bag from the nearest town. The letters and papers were handed to the head of the family, who glanced over the addresses with the quick eye of a practised man of business, and placed one of the letters on an empty plate reserved for the absent member of the party.

“Oh! For Susy!” exclaimed a young lady, who seemed put to her wits’ end to make herself still younger, for she was the elder daughter of the house, past twenty-six, and disengaged. “I should like to know whom that’s from! A gentleman’s hand, I declare!” And she eyed the characters with a searching scrutiny, but they would tell no more tales.

“Don’t be so curious, Matilda. I shall recommend Susy to keep her letter a secret,” said an obnoxious brother, by name Augustus, one year the junior of the first speaker.

“Yes! you would encourage her in every kind of deception, you would! She is quite artful enough,” answered Matilda. “If I were papa,

I would soon see who sends the letter. What can make Susy late, this morning? She is invariably so regular.”

“No, child!” said a white-headed old gentleman, Mr. Foxville, the happy father of Matilda, Augustus, and Susan, his stock of direct descendants, and all told, “I never meddle with other people’s business. Susy is a good girl, and she will let me have any news that may interest me.”

“You are quite right; but she has a duty to her mamma,” said Mrs. Foxville, with a grand matronly air. “Papa allows me to open all his letters, though he never opens mine: and that’s as it should be. If Susy does not come down soon, as I am privileged, I will open the letter. It is a genteel hand, I perceive.

“Well, well,” observed Mr. Foxville, “patience, patience! We can wait.”

“She is my child, Mr. Foxville,” replied the matron.

“Shall I fetch Susy down?” asked Matilda, with curiosity fermenting within her.

“Do, my dear,” said Mrs. Foxville, laboring under the same complaint, but affecting more indifference.

With much nimbleness the sprightly Matilda dashed out of the room, having first made an attempt to carry off the letter.

“Stop!” cried Augustus, putting his hand on it. “Suppose you bring Susy to the letter, and not the letter to Susy! Fair is fair,” he added, with something like distrust in the fair letter-carrier.

In a few seconds Matilda and Susy entered the room, the arm of the elder affectionately wound round the waist of the younger sister.

“Are you not well, Susy?” asked Mr. Foxville kindly.

“Perfectly!” replied Susy, giving her papa his morning kiss.

“There is a letter for you,” said the enviable father.

“Thank you,” answered Susy, and she slipt the letter unopened into a little dress pocket, coloring and tremulous as she did so.

“I could not wait like you for the news, Susy,” said her mother frankly, as she watched her daughter closely.

“I would not be so rude as to read letters before others,” answered Susy.

“Not at all rude!” observed Mrs. Foxville, with one of her grand airs. “There is nobody here but the family: that makes all the difference. I would wish to make you sensible of that, my child. Etiquette should not be pushed too far when we are en famille.”

The last words were delivered with a deal of self-importance, as if she had just solved a new problem of politeness and was vain of her discovery.

“Of course!” cried Matilda. “Do not hesitate, Susy. I should not. I could not take matters so coolly. The letter may be from some dear, dear friend!”

“Take my advice, Susy,” said that horrible Augustus. “Breakfast first, and dessert afterwards.”

“Dessert indeed! It may be some dreadful intelligence. So none of

your interference, Gussy!” rejoined Matilda.

“Then I would not spoil my appetite; and my recommendation holds good,” pursued that provoking brother.

“Ay! ay,” said Foxville senior; “your breakfast first, girl.” And this put an end to the dispute, for the old gentleman saw that Susy was pained at the discussion.

II.

It was true, as Miss Matilda Foxville had observed, that her sister Susy was the most regular in that exemplary household whenever there was a demand on her energies in domestic affairs, or on her good nature in diffusing happiness and cheerfulness around her. The fact that she had deviated from her usual course into the exceptional irregularity referred to, naturally called for comment such as any strange occurrence would provoke; and the uninitiated as naturally puzzled themselves with unsatisfactory conjectures. But the plain truth was this: Susy’s absence was caused by nothing less than a consciousness that a particular letter would arrive for her that morning. She imagined that she should betray less concern about the letter, and keep her nerves more under control, by an apparently accidental absence of a few minutes from the breakfast-table, than if she ran the risk of being present at the opening of the post-bag, and of manifesting her expectation and her too probable excitement at its realization.

Susy had, as we have seen, only partially succeeded; but, under shelter of the timely command of her father, she managed to conceal a great deal of her uneasiness at the expense of a charge of indifference

toward her correspondents—a charge she was disposed to invite rather than disprove.

This little ruse, however, she was unable to carry very much further; for Matilda, more and more perplexed, and proportionably more curious, than ever, became, after the morning meal, more endearing in both manner and speech towards her sister than was customary with one who generally adopted the language of admonition or complaint. It was very clear that these famous time-honored weapons for eliciting obedience and respect would fail in the present instance; and Matilda had not spent twenty-six years of her valuable existence without acquiring an amount of knowledge that led her to that certain conclusion. But wheedling and an implied solicitude for her sister’s welfare were more insidious and keener instruments to open the confidence-chest of the unsuspecting Susy.

“I hope you will have good news,” began Matilda when the sisters were alone. Then she added, as if some sudden idea struck her, “But I forgot! I will leave you and come again presently, Susy dear; you would like to read and answer your letter?”

What it was that Miss Matilda professed to have forgotten would puzzle most men; but it was a phrase habitual to her, and coming from a person of her experience, it probably conveyed all she intended to those of her own sex who enjoyed her familiarity. Susy, whether she understood the form of expression or not, was attracted by her sister’s winning ways and most unusual condescension, and was quite prepared to open her heart to her.

“Don’t go, Till,” she said, blushing. “I have something to say to you.”

“To me!” exclaimed the delighted Matilda with well-feigned surprise. “Pray tell me what it is!”

“It is the letter,” said Susy.

“Oh! that’s quite private,” pursued Matilda, “if I might judge by your putting it aside unopened.”

“But there is confidence between sisters?”

“Most undoubtedly. Would I not unbosom myself to you?”

“You shall, then, be the first to learn the news, but it must soon be family property,” said Susy, opening the letter, and reading it as Matilda looked over her shoulder. “I ought, perhaps, to show it to papa first,” she added, as a glow diffused itself over her face and neck.

“Yes; it is indeed matter for papa’s consideration: it is meant for him. But whom is it from?” said Matilda, in a fever to see the name on the last page, which Susy had not yet turned to.

“Nathaniel Wodehouse!” said Susy, in trembling accents, as she sank down on a chair to support herself in her novel situation.

“That trumpery fellow! faugh!” exclaimed Matilda boldly. “I would soon settle his business. Let me pen you a reply, will you?”

“Matilda! sister Till!” cried Susy in amazement, and recalled to herself. “How often have I heard you say what a charming, handsome man he is!”

“I! I!” said Matilda, ascending the gamut in her ejaculations. “I call him charming and handsome!” Then, with tremendous emphasis inspired by rage, she added, “Never!”

“Well, then,” followed up her merciless witness, roused by her sister’s vain denial, “he is charming and handsome! And you know it.”

III.

Mr. Foxville was a retired butcher who had made a fortune, and still did a little business on ‘Change to keep his hand in, and preserve his mental faculties from rusting. Besides the newspaper, which many will contend was his “best public instructor,” he had not many intellectual resources; and as he allowed himself little recreation, he devoted a great deal of time to journal-reading and the study of stocks and the share-list. Here was a fair amount of work for a busy mind; and very busy was Mr. Foxville in keeping a sharp eye on his investments.

Being fond of a country life, he bought several acres of land when he gave up business; and he had built himself an unwieldy mansion, and was erecting smaller houses and cottages at a respectful distance from his own. This cluster of dwellings he proposed to call Foxville, while his own big, special habitation he called Foxville House. The name was not adopted without reflection, and more than one debate between himself and wife.

Foxville’s patronymic was simply Fox. That did very well for business, but it was deemed unsuited for higher exigencies. Foxtown was invented and discussed, but it gave no satisfaction. Was there anything distinguished in Foxtown? Nothing! Husband and wife were one on that point.

At length, Mrs. Fox bethought her of a French tutor to her girls, and that excellent gentleman bore the name of Portville. Monsieur Portville was a very agreeable man, to ladies especially; and that circumstance associated something pleasant with his name to the ear of Mrs. Fox. It was a habit with Mr. Fox,

who could not remember names, to put the cart before the horse in endeavoring to call names to his recollection, and he always spoke of the Frenchman as Villeport. In facetious moments he would reduce this again to Vile Port, maintaining that this was the original name. Although it was by no means a complimentary cognomen, Mr. Fox had no intention of showing disrespect, for he had a rough kind of regard for the tutor, and only vented a poor joke at his expense, deriving his inspiration perhaps from the remembrance of a compound beverage familiar to Fox in his younger days in the country which had the honor of his birth. If Portville was euphonious, why not Foxville? Such was the argument of Mrs. Fox, and that settled the question.

Mrs. Foxville was the daughter of a grocer, who had so many daughters that all he could do for them was to make them a home and allow them a limited portion for their wardrobe—totally insufficient, according to their unanimous opinion, for their position! Mrs. Foxville was the oldest, and was the first to enter into wedlock. She would have scorned an alliance with a butcher, so superior did she think her father’s calling, though on what grounds she never clearly stated; but the prosperity of young Fox proved a compensation strong enough to convert a woman’s uprising negative into a positive affirmative.

The correctness of the lady’s judgment could not be questioned in the days that lengthened Fox into Foxville. She continued, however, to regard herself as more than the equal of her husband; and she always spoke of my house, my family, my children Matilda, Augustus, and Susy, as if poor Foxville had no concern

or partnership in the property. Sometimes he would slip in ‘our’ in place of ‘my,’ and he always spoke in this manner himself, but both the correction or amendment and the example had no effect on the ‘singular’ appropriation, which seemed, it may be supposed, to convey higher origin and standing than if lowered by a joint ownership.

Miss Matilda Foxville’s characteristics have sufficiently developed themselves, and Augustus, beyond being a plague to his elder sister, had no character at all. He was an existence, and little more; still, he was not without importance as the heir of a goodly estate.

Foxville House never failed to throw open its hospitable portals during Christmas week, and, not many days before the receipt of Susy’s letter, a large number of guests had found a warm welcome within them. Nathaniel Wodehouse was invariably the life of these social gatherings, and in the estimation of the Misses Foxville evidently he possessed qualifications for the prominent part he took. He stood high in favor with Miss Matilda, there is no denying the fact. For him more than for any other male thing, she chignoned, and painted, and got herself up in the best style of fashion. She nearly succeeded in reducing twenty-six to twenty by other than arithmetical rules. But what, after all, are twenty-six summers? No great span in the life of a really handsome woman; yet, in Miss Matilda, so unpliable was her disposition, and so set was her general deportment, that candor must admit that the six years beyond twenty had produced a perceptible difference. She made the best of them, however, for Nathaniel Wodehouse.

Can it be wondered at, therefore, that she thought he had some appreciative

taste? He was charming and good-looking most certainly; and he was very gallant, as he ought to have been, to Miss Foxville. No one invited him with more empressement than Matilda did to revisit Foxville House. Susy was shy and reserved; Matilda had outlived all that, and safely pronounced Nathaniel excellent company: so did Mrs. Foxville—so did Mr. Foxville. Augustus had no settled conviction on this head; and Susy was silent.

Even when Matilda spoke to her under sisterly secrecy, and used the epithets which she subsequently wished to revoke, Susy committed herself no further than by an exclamation of “Do you think so?” accompanied by a smile of doubtful acquiescence. When, however, Matilda, repenting of her admission, boldly denied it, Susy, as we have seen; held her to it unflinchingly.

It is sometimes good to come after others, and Scripture, politeness, and good sense forbid our presumptuously taking the best places. Susy enjoyed in this respect an advantage which nature had given her. She had all the benefit of being eight years younger than her sister, for she was at once the youngest, the prettiest, and the most amiable of the Foxvilles. Nathaniel would have been blind indeed if he had not made that discovery; and what that discovery led to, the intimated tenor of his letter has abundantly proved. One result, however, he had not foreseen, and that was the burning jealousy it excited in the bosom of Matilda Foxville, although he was prepared to incur her displeasure.

IV.

Foxville House always was in commotion when Matilda had a hand in

it. When she was agitated, her agitation vibrated in every part of that spacious dwelling; and now she was stung to madness in such a way by Susy’s taunt that she rushed about like a maniac on fire. It was her worst policy, but she had lost the rudder of her discretion, and she cast herself adrift on the surging waves of her own fury.

From one apartment to another she flew in a whirlwind of passion in search of her mother, whom she would have found very near to Susy’s room if she had not darted downstairs with headlong precipitation. Up-stairs she flew again, and at length flounced into the room in which Mrs. Foxville was eagerly awaiting the issue of the consultation between her daughters.

“What has happened, Matilda?” asked Mrs. Foxville. “Your look startles me.”

“You will be startled!” gasped Matilda.

“Calm yourself, my child, and tell at your leisure what is amiss,” replied the mother, her words being at variance with her feverish anxiety for the news.

“What do you think, mamma? Nathaniel Wodehouse has had the audacity to propose to Susy!”

“Nathaniel Wodehouse! Without means! A beggar! I shall put a stop to that. No genteel poverty for me or either of my girls!”

“I was sure that you would save poor Susy! What is the use of his gentility with nothing to support it?”

“You always were sensible, Matilda; and no doubt Susy is wise enough to see the matter in the same light.”

“There you mistake, mamma; Susy is such a weak fool! The silly thing is over head and ears in love with

him. She idolizes him! It is positively awful—wicked!”

“Oh! that’s it, is it? And without asking my opinion? Deliberate disobedience! Let me see her this moment. I must talk to her!”

Forthwith the mother and elder daughter sought out the unfortunate Susy, and joined in giving her one of those ‘talkings to,’ as they termed them, which only ladies can inflict on one another. Susy let fall a tear or two, made very short replies, for she could scarcely squeeze a word in, and bore her rebukes with exemplary patience, contenting herself with asserting that she would comply with the request of the letter and lay it before her father.

“Let me catch you showing the letter to your father this day!” exclaimed Mrs. Foxville indignantly.

“To-morrow will do,” replied Susy. “Papa must see it.”

It was then agreed that Susy should reserve the letter for her father’s perusal next day, on Mrs. Foxville consenting to take the blame for delay on her own shoulders; and it was finally stipulated that both the elder Foxville and Augustus should be kept in the dark for the next twenty-four hours.

Mrs. Foxville did not, however, consider herself bound by this contract, though not the least important of the high contracting parties. In fact, she intended to turn the interval to what she deemed the best account. Accordingly, she seized the opportunity which Mrs. Caudle, as depicted by Douglas Jerrold, devoted to curtain lectures, and plainly gave Mr. Foxville to understand that “she wouldn’t have it,” meaning the match in question, for she stated she knew that Wodehouse was as poor as a church mouse. “He was all outside show,”

she said—“all flimsy, with no backbone.” She added that “that wouldn’t do for her girls,” and, having warned her husband at great length and with great force, she concluded her lecture by observing, “And now you know your duty to my child, and I shall expect you to perform it.”

“Our child, my dear—our dear Susy is entitled to the best counsel I can give her.”

“I knew you would take her part!” cried Mrs. Foxville. “Dear Susy, indeed! She is a very bad Susy. I would have you, Mr. Foxville, respect a mother’s feelings!”

“Well, well; yes, yes, to be sure I will,” replied the husband, who was as valiant as an ox and nearly as strong in muscle, but was now in dread of a second lecture. “I will, you may depend upon it.”

With this promise on his lips he composed himself to sleep, after having first noticed its soothing effect—for which he took credit to himself—on his partner.

The next day, Mr. Foxville had some conversation alone with Susy. A little kindness soon reassured her, and, like a true-hearted daughter, she did not attempt to conceal her attachment to Nathaniel from her father. She opened her mind to him, and promised to abide by his advice; and on the question of questions—that of fortune—she professed her belief that Nathaniel Wodehouse would not be found in the forlorn condition in which her mamma and sister, in spite of her, had insisted. She acknowledged that she had no proof of this but her lover’s word, which, she said, Matilda had derided. Her lover’s word! that was all—sufficient for Susy! But she approved of her father’s fully satisfying himself on this point, as a duty to his family and to her.

There are several ways of giving advice. It is a favorite plan with some to administer it as they would physic, and the more nauseous it is, the more they seem to like administering it; and they would quarrel with their best friend for not taking it. Even among the more considerate, not every one has the modesty not to have his equanimity disturbed by having his advice asked and then disregarded. Mr. Foxville was not one of either of these classes. He might allowably be a little more positive in counselling his own daughter, but practically he followed in her regard his usual method, heedless of all the admonitions of his better half. That method was to pile up all the pros and cons which occurred to him on both sides of a question, and leave his client very much to his own decision. In effect, this was to offer no advice at all, but the course of proceedings looked grave and offended no one, while it enabled him to remain true to his maxim of never meddling in other people’s business. The only stumbling-block with Mr. Foxville, in the present instance, was a suitable position for his daughter, and that he would look into as a matter of imperative necessity. The rest he would leave to those most vitally interested, after his usual formal statement of all the disadvantages, which always came first, and then the advantages of the case under consideration. Susy was accordingly much comforted by her father’s good sense and feeling, instead of being cowed and heart-broken as Mrs. Foxville and Matilda had expected to see her.

“You are a perfect fool!” said Mrs. Foxville to her husband on observing Susy’s cheerful face after the tête-à-tête. “You have not the nerve to manage my child! I must take her

in hand, poor noodle that she is. Ha! she is just like you. There’s a nice pair for you!”

Mr. Foxville attached little importance to these disparaging remarks, with the like of which he was familiar; but he invariably did things his own way, and left consequences to take care of themselves. He responded, therefore, good-humoredly:

“Not too hasty, my dear! I shall see Nathaniel Wodehouse, whether you approve of it or not. That is all I have to say.”

And Foxville kept his word, for he resolutely refrained from opening his lips to renew the discussion. Not so Mrs. Foxville. She had a very great deal to say, but eventually wound up by the following menace:

“Beware how you ruin my child! You shall answer for it. I’ll let you know whether I am to be nobody in my own house!”

The tremendous ferment which shook the Foxvilles at length began to act upon Augustus. That young man had his own view of Susy’s conduct.

“I tell you what, Susy,” said he, “Wodehouse is no gentleman. He is a sneak. Didn’t he get the better of me in an examination before old Dr. Playfair, and when I challenged him to fight it out, and prove who was the better man, didn’t he decline? A pretty thing to marry a man like that. Marry him, Susy, and see what I will do!”

Poor Susy was now regarded by all her family, with the exception of her father, who remained silent, as a reprobate and outcast. When she sat down to her meals, she was treated as if she were supported by charity. At other times she was watched like a criminal. Her fortitude and good conscience, nevertheless, sustained her under her unmerited wrongs.

In the meantime, the two gentlemen, Foxville and Wodehouse, conferred together. Mrs. Foxville at first insisted on being present; but it was to no purpose. Mr. Foxville’s hardihood gave him the victory. He was declared to be the most obstinate of men; he bore the imputation and triumphed.

“What good have you done?” sneered Mrs. Foxville, when the meeting was over.

“Our Susy and Nathaniel will be man and wife!” replied the imperturbable Foxville.

“Oh!” was the sole response, in a tone that boded little harmony if the baffled Mrs. Foxville could have her way.

“Ay, ay,” continued Foxville. “Nat’s the richest man within a dozen miles of this place. I tell you, I have proof of it. Look, there’s a little present, as he called it, for you!”

Foxville pulled out of his pocket a magnificent set of jewels in the neatest of morocco cases, and handed the gift to his wife.

What a transformation on the countenance and in the manner of Mrs. Foxville! Who could have suggested such a happy idea to Nathaniel as the magical present which turned out to be such a talisman of power? That secret was never known but to Susy and Nathaniel, and it cannot be divulged.

As Mrs. Foxville gazed with rapture on the jewels, her eyes vied in sparkling with the diamonds.

“Well, I cannot help forgiving him!” exclaimed the pacified lady. “Who would have thought this of Nathaniel Wodehouse? Twelve months ago I know he was scarcely worth a penny. But are you quite sure that you have not been taken in?”

“Trust old Foxville for that, eh?

I have seen how he came by his money. Old Simpson, his uncle, died last March, and left him sole heir.”

“Simpson his uncle! A good family! My father knew him well.”

Mrs. Foxville’s was not altogether a vain boast: the late Mr. Simpson had been the best customer at her father’s grocery.

Augustus now joined his parents unexpectedly.

“Gussy, my boy,” cried his father, “Nat is the happy man, after all! He could buy up all of Foxville if he chose. He wants you to dine with him at his club to-morrow. Do as you like. I meddle in no man’s business!”

“Of course I will! He is a better fellow than I took him to be,” said the sensible Augustus. “And here comes Susy,” he added, seeing his sister approaching.

“Susy, we congratulate you,” exclaimed the overjoyed father. “The course of true love runs smoothly a little too soon, eh?”

Susy blushed scarlet.

“Kiss me, my darling girl,” said Mrs. Foxville.

“Bravo!” sang out Augustus.

“But Till must hear the news! Let me fetch Matilda!” And he ran off with all speed, and soon returned with his sister.

“I told you I had something to show you,” said he, addressing Matilda. “Look at that picture! We only want Nat to make us thoroughly jolly. You will make a superb bridesmaid, Till, though I say it!”

“Not I indeed!” replied Matilda, with a grand toss of her head.

“You won’t for Susy?” the terrible Augustus went on. “That’s cruel of you; but I’ll give you a chance. So don’t despair; it’s often a first step to matrimony!”

Matilda bit her lip till it nearly bled, but she suffered not a word to escape her.

“For shame, Gussy!” cried Susy, as she flung herself, half-smiling, half-crying, on her sister’s neck.

* * * * *

With great adroitness Nathaniel eventually made his peace with Matilda, though it was rather a truce than a peace; but sufficient harmony was in a little time restored to Foxville House to make Susy’s wedding go off with éclat.