"On the one hand, we perceive the joyous acclaim with which the Reformation was at first hailed, and the general desertion, at the present day, of the principle of salvation by faith alone, a principle destructive of all church organization. On the other hand, we behold the universal recognition, at the present time, of the system of Copernicus, which, at its first appearance, was assailed with mockery, and branded with the title of revolutionary."
Dr. Hipler has plainly shown that Copernicus belongs to the Catholic ranks. The question now arises, Does he belong also to Germany? Politically, the bishopric of Ermland was in his time under Polish dominion. Nevertheless, to say nothing of the quiet, modest, and genial industry which Copernicus seems to have possessed as a German inheritance, it is certain that not only he, but also his mother, wrote letters in German; and a Greek inscription in a book belonging to his library shows that his name was pronounced Kópernik, with the German accent. Justly, therefore, does his statue occupy a place in the Walhalla of Ludwig I.
THE CHURCH BEYOND THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS.
The States and territories of the Pacific coast are, in many respects, "a land apart" from the rest of the Union. Separated from the other States by an immense tract of unsettled territory, no inconsiderable part of which must ever continue a desert, as well as by the great barrier of the Rocky Mountains, the western slope of that chain presents to the new-comer an aspect not less different from the shores of the Atlantic than the latter differ from the countries of Europe. The climate, with its semi-tropical division of wet and dry seasons, the evidently volcanic formation of its surface, the huge mountain chains, with all their accessories of valleys, precipices, torrents, and cataracts, which occupy most of its area, and the peculiar vegetation that covers its soil, all wear a foreign appearance to an Eastern visitor; and the people themselves, though forming an integral part of his own nation, are scarcely less strange to his eyes. Men of races hardly known on the eastern side of the Rocky Mountains meet him at every step; and not only do the different European and Asiatic races retain their national customs and characters much more tenaciously than the immigrant population of the Eastern States, but they have very considerably modified the character of their American fellow-settlers. The way in which California, and, to a considerable degree, Oregon, were settled was altogether different from the usual system of colonization which has added so many States to the Union, from Ohio to Nebraska, and from Mississippi and Texas to Minnesota. The journey to the Pacific coast before the completion of the Pacific Railroad involved as complete a separation from home associations, and as great a change from early habits, to an American, as does the voyage across the Atlantic to the European immigrant; and at its end he found himself in a country entirely different, both physically and socially, from all that he had been previously accustomed to. The influence of the old Spanish settlements, in which for years was to be found the only established society of the country, the mixture of men of all the European races on a footing of perfect equality in the pursuit of wealth, and the peculiarly adventurous and uncertain nature of mining life, which long formed the chief employment of the whole population, all tended to rub off the new-comers' national peculiarities and prejudices; and the result has been the growth of a well-marked national character among the few hundred thousand inhabitants of the Pacific coast.
Amid this cosmopolitan population the Catholic Church has taken firm root, and in no other part of the country does she reckon as large a proportion of the people within her fold, or exercise more influence over the public mind. She had preceded the march of American enterprise and the rush of gold-seekers on the shores of the Pacific; and when the pioneers of the new population pushed their way across the continent and descended the slope of the Sierra Nevada, they found her missions already established in California. While the American Republic was yet a thing of the future, and the west of the Alleghanies was still an almost untrodden wilderness, Catholic priests had already begun to gather into the fold of Peter the tribes beyond the Rocky Mountains. In the early half of the eighteenth century, the Jesuit Reductions of Lower California were only less famous than those of Paraguay; and to the zeal of the Franciscans who succeeded the Jesuits in 1767, Upper California owes the introduction of Christianity and civilization. In 1769, or a few months more than one hundred years ago, Father Junipero Lerra, with a company of his Franciscan brethren and a few Mexican settlers, founded the mission of San Diego, the first settlement made by civilized men within what is now the State of California. Before that year, indeed, although the ports of Monterey and San Diego were well known to the Spanish navigators, no European had ever penetrated into the interior of California, and even the existence of the noble bay of San Francisco was unknown to the civilized world until it was discovered and named by the humble friars. The salvation of souls, the hope of making known to the Indians the doctrines of Catholicity, were the motives which inspired the Franciscans to undertake a task which had long been deemed impracticable by the Spanish court in spite of its anxiety to extend its dominions to the north of Mexico. To raise up the despised aborigines to the dignity of Christian men, to show them the road to eternal happiness in another life, and, as a means to that end, to promote their well-being in this world, such were the objects for whose attainment the devoted missionaries separated themselves from their native land and the society of civilized men, to spend their lives among savages, who often rewarded their devotion only by shedding their blood. The Indians of California are in every respect a much inferior race to the tribes on the east of the Rocky Mountains. Many of them went wholly naked, they had no towns or villages, and although the country abounded in game, they were indifferent hunters, and depended mainly for subsistence on wild berries, roots, and grasshoppers. In tribal organization they were little if at all superior to the Australian savages, and of religious worship or morality they had scarcely an idea. Many of the southern tribes, especially, were fierce and warlike, and belonged to a kindred race to the Apaches, who still set at defiance all the attempts of the United States government to dislodge them from Arizona. Such were the men from whom the Franciscans undertook to form a Christian community; and of their success in so doing, the history of California for over sixty years is an irrefragable witness.
In spite of occasional outbreaks of hostility on the part of the Indians, and the destruction by them of a mission, the whole of the region between the coast range and the ocean, as far north as the Bay of San Francisco, was studded with such establishments before the close of the century. Fifteen thousand converted Indians enjoyed under the mild sway of the Franciscans a degree of prosperity almost unparalleled in the history of their race. The missions, which were eighteen in number, differed in size and importance, but were all conducted on the same general plan. The church and the community buildings, including the residence of the fathers, the store-houses and workshops, formed the centre of a village of Indian huts, the inhabitants of which were daily summoned by the church bells to mass, as a prelude to their labors, and again in the evening called back to rest by the notes of the Angelus. Religious instruction was given to all on Sundays and holidays, and to the newly converted and the children also. At other times during the day, the men worked at agricultural labor, or looked after the cattle belonging to the mission, and the unmarried women were employed at spinning, or some other labor suited to their strength, in a building specially provided for the purpose. The fathers, two or more of whom resided in each Reduction, were the rulers, the judges, the instructors, and the directors of work of their neophytes, who held all property in common. The white population was few in number, consisting mainly of small garrisons at different posts, intended to hold the wild Indians in awe, and some families of settlers who were chiefly engaged in stock-raising. The military commandant, who resided at Monterey, might be regarded as the governor of the country; but the fathers and their converts were entirely exempt from his jurisdiction, and were independent of all authority subordinate to the Spanish crown. The mission farms usually sufficed for the support of their inhabitants, but the external expenses of the communities were defrayed by a subsidy from the Spanish government and the "pious fund" of Spain, an association very similar to the Society for the Propagation of the Faith.
Such was the condition of California down to the end of the Spanish rule; and during the whole of that period, and for several years afterward, the missions continued to grow in numbers and prosperity. The payments of the government subsidy and the remittances from the pious fund became indeed very uncertain and irregular during the struggle of Mexico for independence; but the industrial condition of the missions was then such that they stood no longer in need of external aid, and indeed they were able to contribute largely to the support of the administration of the territory. The establishment of the Mexican Republic made for some years little change in the condition of the missions of California, and the services rendered by the fathers to civilization were more than once acknowledged by the Mexican Congress. But the mission property was too tempting a bait to the needy revolutionists who disputed for supreme power in that ill-starred country. In 1833, a decree of Congress deprived the Franciscans of all authority over the missions, and placed their property in the hands of lay administrators. The Indians were to receive certain portions of land, and some stock individually, and the rest was to be applied to the use of the state. The results were such as might be expected from the history of similar confiscation in foreign lands. The fruits of sixty years' patient toil were wasted during a few years of riotous plundering, in the name of state administration; the cattle belonging to the missions were stolen or killed; the churches and public works allowed to fall into ruin; the cultivation of the soil neglected; and the unfortunate Indians, deprived of their protectors, and handed over to the tender mercies of "liberal" officials, wandered away in thousands from their abodes, and either perished or relapsed into barbarism. The population of the missions in nine years dwindled from upward of thirty to little over four thousand Indians; and when their property was sold at auction in 1845, its value had fallen from several millions to a mere nothing. The native Spanish Californians, who clearly saw the fatal results of the overthrow of the missions to the prosperity of the country, made several attempts to restore them to their former condition, but in vain. The constant revolutions of which Mexico was the theatre effectually prevented such a restoration, and the fate of the Indians was sealed by the political changes which shortly afterward threw the country into the hands of another race and another government. Under the American régime they have dwindled to less than one tenth of their former numbers, and, with the exception of a certain number of the converts of the Franciscans, who have adopted partially the usages of civilized life, and become amalgamated with the Spanish population, the whole race seems doomed to disappear from the land.
Serious, however, as was the blow which the church received from the overthrow of the Franciscan missions, she did not abandon her hold upon California. From the date of Father Lerra's arrival in the country, a small stream of Spanish or Mexican immigration had been flowing into it, and building up its "pueblos" near, but altogether distinct from, the mission establishments. The separation of the races was one of the points jealously attended to by the Franciscans, as essential to the success of their civilizing efforts among the Indians; and the Indian churches and Indian cemeteries, which still remain in several of the missions, at a short distance from the Spanish churches and Spanish burying-grounds, show how far this policy was carried out. The experience of centuries of mission work had taught the Franciscans that free intercourse between a civilized and an uncivilized race invariably leads to the demoralization of both, and much of their success must be ascribed to the care with which they kept their neophytes apart from the white settlements. The latter, at the time of the secularization, contained a population of some five or six thousand, and, including the half-civilized Indians who still remained around the missions, the whole Catholic population probably amounted to fifteen thousand at the epoch of the American conquest. For the benefit of this population, after the overthrow of the missions, the holy see established in 1840 the diocese of California, including the peninsula of Lower California within its boundaries.