According to the German usage, his family sent him to many Universities, and thus he spent a short period successively at Goettingen, Berlin, Heidelberg, and Munich. He was everywhere an adept at athletic exercises and an ardent worker. After his examinations in law he was appointed referendary of the government of his natal city, Münster.
It seemed as if he had found his vocation in law and politics. It was about this time, 1838, that he beheld the venerable Archbishop of Cologne, Clement August von Droste Vischering, dragged a prisoner to the fortress of Minden. Indignant at this act of barbarity, Ketteler threw up his governmental position. On July 9, 1838, he wrote to his brother Wilderich: "As I do not care to serve a State which demands the sacrifice of my conscience, it seems to me that the priesthood is my most certain refuge. But how far I am from such a determination! To make me worthy of that sublime ministry would require a miracle greater than raising the dead to life." In 1841, he overcame his scruples, and went to seek counsel from Mgr. de Reisach, the Bishop of Eichstadt, who assured him that his vocation was genuine.
BISHOP KETTELER.
He entered the University of Munich, then at the zenith of its renown. Under the patronage of King Louis of Bavaria it had become the rendezvous of all that Catholic society esteemed as brilliant and distinguished. Görres, the great philosopher, was there with Philipps, the Professor of Law, and Doellinger, as yet orthodox in his teaching of history.
After three years of study he was ordained to the priesthood on June 1, 1844, after which he was appointed assistant in the little town of Beckum, in Westphalia, where he shared the labors of two young priests, one of whom, Brinckmann, afterwards also became a bishop. After two years he was sent as pastor to Hopsten on the confines of Hanover, where he spent his time in those duties which had become so dear to his heart, the care of the poor and the instruction of the young.
In 1848 he was sent as a deputy to the national Diet of Frankfort from a district composed chiefly of Protestants. Out of the 600 members present there, he found that forty were priests, while there were a few bishops and many notable Catholic laymen. Ketteler appeared in the tribune, a man with no political record and no literary glory. But his first speech aroused enthusiasm and proclaimed him one of the orators of the day. Ketteler demanded liberty of religious association for all creeds, liberty of education, and autonomy in the commune in all that concerns the public school and the interior administration. After the assassination of Prince Lichnowsky and General von Auerwald by the insurgents, the Abbe Ketteler was charged by the Assembly to pronounce the funeral oration.
Fifteen days after this event the first great Catholic Congress was held at Mentz, and instituted a programme in which Ketteler was for nearly thirty years to have a leading part. This was the Catholic action in the Social question.
In 1850 William Ketteler was consecrated Bishop of Mentz, and entered at once into his role as the great social reformer of Germany. His solicitude for the poor was constant and practical. For the sick poor he called into his diocese the Franciscans of Aix-la-Chapelle; for the orphans and abandoned children he founded establishments in 1856 and 1864. For the workingmen he founded, in 1851, a Geselleverein, or Workingmen's Association, one of the first of its kind, besides bureaus of aid, and circles and societies for procuring cheap lodging for the needy. He had remarked that the numerous class of servant girls were almost altogether without religious attendance, moral protection, or material assistance. With the aid of the Countess Ida von Hahn-Hahn he founded refuges for their kind, and looking then toward those others to whom the allurements of the world had proved too fascinating, he established a House of the Good Shepherd. His work in the direction of the poor and of the laboring men went on without ceasing. His Establishments of Hospitality for the Workers provided board and lodging at the price of eighteen pennies a day. In 1856 the Association of Notre Dame de Bon Secours came to the aid of those who, while out of a place for a time, could find lodging until another situation were found for them.
Nor was he content with the mere attention to the ordinary routine implied by such works. The service of his brilliant and well stored mind was also devoted to the cause, presenting some works that still remain authoritative guides in the matter of social economics. His great work in this regard was his Christianity and the Labor Question, written at a time when the doctrines of Lasalle and his companions were beginning to stir the workingmen into a campaign of violence and anarchy. The voice of the great prelate was heard also in the various congresses held every year in Germany to discuss questions of Catholic interest. In the Meeting of the Bishops at Fulda, in 1869, Mgr. Ketteler spoke eloquently upon the questions, "Does the Social Question Exist in Germany?" "Can the Church Aid Therein, and What is Her Duty?" "What are the Remedies at Her Disposal?" In the Catholic Congress of 1871, he delivered a masterly discourse upon Liberalism, Socialism, and Christianity.