And with that threat on my head, as a Damocles’ sword, I had to take to the door, which he had opened, without any au revoir. Thanks be to God, this first persecution and these outrages I received for my dear Bible’s sake, did not diminish my respect for God’s Holy Word nor my confidence in it. On the contrary, on reaching home, I took it, fell on my knees, and pressing it to my heart, I asked my Heavenly Father to grant me the favor to love it more sincerely, and follow its divine teachings with more fidelity, till the end of my life.
Chapter LVI.
PUBLIC ACTS OF SIMONY—THEFTS AND BRIGANDAGE OF BISHOP O’REGAN—GENERAL CRY OF INDIGNATION—I DETERMINE TO RESIST HIM TO HIS FACE—HE EMPLOYS MR. SPINK AGAIN TO SEND ME TO GAOL, AND HE FAILS—DRAGS ME AS A PRISONER TO URBANA IN THE SPRING OF 1856 AND FAILS AGAIN—ABRAHAM LINCOLN DEFENDS ME—MY DEAR BIBLE BECOMES MORE THAN EVER MY LIGHT AND MY COUNSELOR.
A month had hardly elapsed since the ecclesiastical retreat, when all the cities of Illinois, were filled by the most strange and humiliating clamors against our bishop. From Chicago to Cairo, it would have been difficult to go to a single town, without having, from the most respectable people, or reading in big letters, in some of the most influential papers, that Bishop O’Regan was a thief or a simoniac, a perjurer, or even something worse. The bitterest complaints were crossing each other over the breadth and length of Illinois, from almost every congregation:
“He has stolen the beautiful and costly vestments we bought for our church,” cried the French Canadians of Chicago. “He has swindled us out of a fine lot given us to build our church, sold it for $40,000, and pocketed the money, for his own private use, without giving us any notice,” said the Germans.
“His thirst for money is so great,” said the whole Catholic people of Illinois, “that he is selling even the bones of the dead to fill his treasures!”
I had not forgotten the bold attempt of the bishop to wrench my little property from my hands, at his first visit to my colony.
The highway thief who puts his dagger at the breast of the traveler, threatening to take away his life, if he does not give him his purse, does not appear more infamous to his victim than that bishop appeared to me, that day. But my hope, then, was, that this was an isolated and exceptional case in the life of my superior; and I did not whisper a word of it to anybody. I began to think differently, however, when I saw the numerous articles in the principal papers of the State, signed by the most respectable names, accusing him of theft, simony and lies. My hope, at first, was that there were many exaggerations in those reports. But they came thicker, day after day, I thought my duty was to go to Chicago, and see for myself, to what extent those rumors were true. I went directly to the French Canadian church; and to my unspeakable dismay, I found that it was too true that the bishop had stolen the fine church vestments, which my countrymen had bought for their own priest, for grand festivals; and he had transferred them to the cathedral of St. Mary for his own personal use. The indignation of my poor countrymen knew no bounds. It was really deplorable to hear with what supreme disgust, and want of respect, they were speaking of their bishop. Unfortunately, the Germans and Irish people were still ahead of them in their unguarded, disrespectful denunciations. Several spoke of prosecuting him before the civil courts, to force him to disgorge what he had stolen; and it was with the greatest difficulty that I succeeded in preventing some of them from mobbing and insulting him publicly in the streets, or even in his own palace. The only way I could find to appease them was to promise that I would speak to his lordship, and tell him that it was the desire of my countrymen to have those vestments restored to them.
The second thing I did was to go to the cemetery, and see for myself, to what extent it was true or not that our bishop was selling the very bones of his diocesans, in order to make money.
On my way to the Roman Catholic graveyard, I met a great many cart-loads of sand, which, I was told by the carters, had been taken from the cemetery; but I did not like to stop them till I was at the very door of the consecrated spot. There, I found three carters, who were just leaving the grounds. I asked and obtained from them, the permission to search the sand which they carried, to see if there were not some bones. I could not find any in the first cart; and my hope was that it would be the same in the two others. But, to my horror and shame, I found the inferior jaw of a child, in the second; and part of the bones of an arm, and almost the whole foot of a human being, in the third cart! I politely requested the carters to show me the very place where they had dug that sand, and they complied with my prayer. To my unspeakable regret and shame, I found that the bishop had told an unmitigated falsehood when, to appease the public indignation against his sacrilegious trade, he had published that he was selling only the sand which was outside of the fence, on the very border of the lake.