In The Catholic World of April last, we vindicated the fair fame of the Catholic Church from some foul aspersions of a Protestant minister, the Rev. M. Hobart Seymour, contained in a book of his entitled, Nights among the Romanists.
The matter was a very simple one. This reverend gentleman, in the opening chapter of his book, gave us the "moral results of the Romish System," as he elegantly, in accordance with the exigencies of modern controversy, styles the Catholic Church. This "moral result" was, that Catholics are, everywhere, beyond comparison, more unchaste than Protestants—say from three or four to twelve times as much so. We do not exaggerate in the least. Every reader who reads this book will draw this conclusion. As The New Englander says, "The effect of this exhibit on the mind of the reader is overwhelming. To the Protestant reader it serves to close the case, at the outset, against the pretensions of the Roman Catholic Church to be the institution ordained of Christ to destroy the works of the devil."
This conclusion was reached by a comparison of the statistics of many Roman Catholic countries of Europe with Protestant England, in regard to homicide.
Then by comparing the amount of illegitimacy in certain Catholic cities with that in certain other Protestant cities in Europe. Passing by the first branch of the subject for reasons which we assigned, and which prevent us from taking up the matter now, we considered the second very fully and completely. We examined, with the utmost care and fidelity, the statistics of illegitimacy of all the leading countries of Europe, including the whole population of both city and country, and found Mr. Seymour's conclusions, in this respect, were utterly and completely false. The complete exhibit showed that, taking the number of illegitimate births as a standard of comparison, Catholic countries are not in any degree more unchaste than Protestant, but, on the contrary, the difference is in their favor quite decidedly, though not with that overwhelming preponderance claimed by Mr. Seymour in favor of Protestantism.
He states that he has taken his figures from official documents, (and we have not disputed this,) but these same documents give the account for the countries as well as for the cities, and Mr. Seymour cannot be allowed to plead ignorance in reference to them. He cannot, therefore, be excused from wilful and deliberate deception, when he suppresses these statistics so necessary to form a judgment in the case, and only gives such portions of them as shall seem to sustain a false conclusion. This is the true suppressio veri and suggestio falsi, which is certainly one of the meanest and most cowardly forms of lying known.
We felt a natural indignation at being made the victims of such treatment, and denounced the Rev. Mr. Seymour as a calumniator, and called on the Rev. L. W. Bacon, who had warmly recommended him and his book, to withdraw his recommendation, and cease to abet the circulation of a vile calumny, even though the Catholic Church were the object of it.
Mr. Bacon, in reply to our article, comes out in The New Englander, endorsing not only the statements, but the unjust and wicked conclusions of Mr. Seymour, and claims to have refuted the statements of The Catholic World. We will now proceed to show in what fashion he has done this.
The conclusions of Mr. Seymour in regard to the "moral results of the Romish system," rest mainly in a comparison of the city of London with the capitals of four Catholic countries, showing that while the rate of illegitimacy is only 4 per cent in the former, it varies from 33 to 51 per cent in the latter. This is reinforced by tables of ten Prussian cities (of which, by the by, the best two are Catholic cities) with ten Austrian; another of five English cities with the same number of Italian, with similar, though by no means such striking results. Then, lest countries should seem to get the go-by, various Protestant countries are compared with provinces of the Austrian empire, which, it is needless to say, make a bad show in the comparison.
As we have said before, we did not impugn in The Catholic World the accuracy of these figures, but we pointed out that we could not trust them as indicating the morality of London, Liverpool, and the English cities, because the rate of illegitimacy in them was lower than in the whole of England; and it is a most violent and incredible supposition, that cities acknowledged to be the hotbeds of vice should be purer than the countries in which they are situated. We suggested that other forms of impurity had probably replaced illegitimacy, and that, after all, London, Liverpool, etc., were not much, if any, better than the continental cities. We quoted some figures in reference to the amount of what is called the "social evil" in London, etc., from The Church and the World, a ritualistic journal. This, and this alone, Mr. Bacon attacks, of all that is contained in our article. Our other reasons in regard to the morality of London, etc., are left entirely unnoticed. We gave also some, as we conceived, very grave and strong reasons why the figures of illegitimacy should not be regarded as conclusive in regard to the continental cities. We pointed out the existence of very large establishments in them for the reception of foundlings, receiving all infants deposited in them; and suggested that, for this reason alone, the illegitimacy of whole districts of country would all show itself in the city. This is obvious enough; for example, if a large hospital of this kind existed in New York City, no one doubts it would receive infants from New Jersey, Connecticut, and all the adjacent country, and the rate of illegitimacy would represent all this part of the country, rather than the city alone. Mr. Bacon has not vouchsafed to give one word of reply to all this, or to discuss the matter at all. Now, as it concerns the good name of a large class of his fellow-men, and is evidence in rebuttal of a very grave accusation against them, this really seems more like the conduct of a partisan determined on victory at any rate, rather than of a Christian gentleman seeking to vindicate a fellow-Christian from an imputation against his character.
But whatever might be said about the comparative morality of certain cities, we vindicated the Catholic Church from the charge of having produced a moral result incomparably worse than Protestantism, and completely destroyed the overwhelming effect calculated to be produced on the Protestant mind by Mr. Seymour's conclusions, by giving one complete table of the percentage of illegitimacy in all the chief countries of Europe, both Protestant and Catholic, as follows: