It was the age, this wicked age of atheism, he told himself fiercely, that had corrupted her. She could not be altogether, altogether to blame that the current had been too swift for her to swim against. Perhaps the gentle Savior would yet touch her spirit with His mercy and guide her at last to the foot of His throne.
Doubt poisoned the very air she breathed; it broke out like boils and deep sores in the newspapers and books, symptoms of the corruption beneath; it was strident in the crass levity of the talk and slang of the street. It could not be escaped.
America, save for the Catholic fifteen million, doubted. The faithful stood like an island rising out of the waters of agnosticism. Was it strange that where the waves beat hardest, some of the sand was washed away?
Fifty years ago when he was a young man there had arisen in the world the great anti-Christ, who had been more harmful than Luther—Darwin, the monkey man. The Protestant churches, as ever uninspired, had first fought, then compromised with him. They tried to swallow and digest Darwinism. But Darwinism had digested them. The anthropoid ape had shaken the throne of Luther's Jehovan God. The greater anti-Christ had consumed the lesser.
The Church alone stood firm. She had admitted no orang-outangs to her communion table, and now her policy was justified by its fruits. Her faithful remained the only Christians in Christendom.
Ecclesia Depopulata, ran the old prophecy, the Church deserted. And the time was near upon them for the fulfillment of the words. France, Italy, Portugal, and even Spain, were in revolution against the Keys of Peter. The evil days were coming, Ecclesia Depopulata.
But a new age of faith was to follow, so also it was prophesied. The deathless Church could not die. Once again she was to rule a pious world in might, majesty, dominion and power—and her sway would endure until the last day.
He fell upon his knees in his bare ascetic study and presently arose refreshed, a fighting veteran in the army that will make no peace but a victor's.