In 1858 we procured the place in Highgate, known now as St. Joseph's Retreat. The Hyde was never satisfactory; it was suited neither to our spirit nor its working. At last Providence guided us to a most suitable position. Our rule prescribes that the houses of the Order should be outside the town, and near enough to be of service to it. Highgate is wonderfully adapted to all the requisitions of our rule and constitutions. Situated on the brow of a hill, it is far enough from the din and noise of London to be comparatively free from its turmoil, and sufficiently near for citizens to come to our church. The grounds are enclosed by trees; a hospital at one end and two roads meeting at the other, promise a freedom from intrusion and a continuance of the solitude we now enjoy. Father Ignatius concludes the year 1858 in Highgate; it was his first visit to the new house.
Towards the end of the next year we find him once more in France with our Provincial. They went on business interesting to the Order, and were nearly three weeks away. Father Ignatius ends another year in Highgate. It was then he translated the small "Life of Blessed Paul" from the Italian, a work he accomplished in about one month with the assistance of anamanuensis.
He gave a mission with three of the fathers in Westland Row, Dublin, in the beginning of the year 1860, and started off immediately after for his circuit of little missions. Our Provincial Chapter was held this year, but all were re-elected; so Father Ignatius remained as he was, second Consultor. It was this year he visited Althorp, after an absence of eighteen years from the home of his childhood. This visithe looked back to with a great deal of satisfaction, and his joy was increased when Lord and Lady Sarah Spencer returned his visit in Highgate, when he happened to be there, the next year. The friendly relations between him and his family seemed, if possible, to become closer and more cordial towards the end of his life.
He told us one day in recreation, when some one asked what became of the lady he was disposed to be married to, once in his life: "I passed by her house a few days ago. I believe her husband is a very excellent man, and that she is happy."
In 1862 he visited Althorp again. We saw him looking for a lock for one of his bags before he left Highgate for this visit, and some one asked him why he was so particular just then. "Oh," he said, "don't you know the servant in the big house will open it, in order to put my shaving tackle, brush, and so forth in their proper places, and I should not like to have a general stare at my habit, beads, and sandals." There was, however, a more general stare at them than he expected. During the visit, the volunteer corps were entertained by Lord Spencer. Father Ignatius was invited to the grand dinner; he sat next the Earl, and nothing would do for the latter but that his uncle should make a speech. Father Ignatius stood up inhisregimentals, habit, sandals, &c., and made, it seems, a very patriotic one.
This visit to Althorp Father Ignatius loved to recall to mind. It was a kind of thing that he could not enjoy at the time, so far did it go beyond his expectations. He went merely for a friendly visit, and found a great many old friends invited to increase his pleasure. When the ladies and gentlemen went off to dress for dinner, it is said that Father Ignatius told Lady Spencer that he supposed his full dress would not be quite in place at the table; he was told it would, and that all would be much delighted to see a specimen of the fashions he had learnt since his days of whist and repartee in the same hall. At the appointed time he presented himself in the dining-room in full Passionist costume. Lord Spencer was quite proud of his uncle, and the speech, and the cheer with which it was greeted at theVolunteers' dinner only enhanced the mutual joy of uncle and nephew.
As usual, this joy was tempered, and the alloy was administered by a clergyman, who evidently intended to get himself a name by putting himself into print in one of the local papers. This was a Mr. Watkins. He wrote a letter to theNorthampton Herald, containing a great deal of shallow criticism and ignorant remarks on Father Ignatius, and a sermon he preached at the opening of the cathedral. A smart paper warfare was carried on for some time between the two, which earned the Rev. Mr. Watkins the disapproval, if not the disgust, of his Protestant clerical and lay neighbours. This was rather a surprise, as all the old acquaintances of thequondamMr. Spencer had the highest regard for him; but this writer seems to have been one who never had the opportunity of forming a just opinion of his abilities or character. Ignorance may excuse his blunders, but the longest stretch of charity can scarcely overlook his manner of committing them.
After the visit to Althorp, Father Ignatius went to see Mr. De Lisle at Grace Dieu, and was present at the blessing of the present Abbot of Mount St. Bernard's. The secretary of the A. P. U. C. sent him another letter after this visit, which met the fate of similar communications on former occasions.
We find him in the beginning of the year 1863 in Liverpool, engaged in a mission at St. Augustine's.
After this mission he came to Highgate, on his way to Rome for our general chapter, and the few days he had on his hands before his departure were spent in visiting Lord Palmerston, Mr. Gladstone, and other notabilities, as well as receiving a visit from his nephew.
He arrived in Rome for the last time on the 22nd April, 1863. How strangely do his different visits to this city combine to give an idea of the stages of opinion through which his chequered life was fated to pass. In 1821, he entered it, promising himself a feast of absurdities, determined to sneer at what he did not understand, and repel by his thick shield of prejudice whatever might force itselfupon him as praiseworthy. He found something in his next visit in the pagan remains to please his Protestant taste, and left it for Germany with a kind of regret. In less than ten years he is there to despise the glory of the Caesars, and thinks more of a chapel which Peter's successor has endowed or adorned, than the platforms on which the fangs of the leopard tore the flower of our martyrs. His other visits were mostly official. He came glowing with the fervour of new projects, and left with only their embers generating a new step in his spiritual progress. Rome was always Rome, but he was not always the same. Any one who takes the trouble to compare his different visits with each other cannot fail to learn a lesson that will be more telling on his mind, than what comments upon them by another's pen could produce.
The General Chapter Father Ignatius was called to attend in 1863 had to deal with subjects that deeply concerned the interests of our Order. In this Chapter, our American province was canonically erected in the United States. A colony of ten Passionists was sent to California, and the Hospice of St. Nicholas, in Paris, established. Father Ignatius had, as usual, some papers to submit to the Roman Curia. The work to which his "little missions" were devoted had not yet received the seal of the Fisherman, and, until it was so blessed, its excellence could be a subject of doubt. He did receive the pontifical benediction for this, and for the institution of a new congregation of nuns, and began to enjoy the riches of this twofold blessing before he took his departure from the Eternal City.
Father Ignatius, ever himself, did not lose sight of lesser claims on his gratitude in the greater ones his zeal proposed to him. There was a family whom he had received into the Church during the course of his labours on the secular mission. The father, and four daughters, and a son, were all baptized by him. They were his great joy. He first received one girl, then the father, then another (who dreaded to speak to him), a third, and a fourth yielded to his charity and meekness in following the workings of grace. For them he always entertained a special regard, he would stay withthem when missionary work called him to a town in which they dwelled, and delighted to caress their children, edify themselves, and make himself at home in their dwellings during his stay. He obtained a rescript granting them a "plenary indulgence," signed by the Holy Father himself, which is still treasured up as a beautiful heirloom in their families. These favoured objects of his predilection were Mrs. Macky, of Birmingham; Mrs. Richardson and Mrs. Marshall, of Levenshulme, Manchester.
Before leaving Rome in 1863 he preached to nuns and schools, upon the conversion of England, with the same zeal as he did in 1850, if not with greater. That leading star lived with him; it is to be hoped it has not died with him. If the nineteenth century were an age of faith, and that the belief in God's miraculous interposition would move any to make experiments of holy wonders, we should expect to find engraved on his heart after death: "The Conversion of England!"
On June 21, after exactly two months' stay, he left the terrestrial Rome, or city of God, for ever. He arrives in London on the 3rd August, visits convents for his "crusade," now doubly dear to him; communicates his glad tidings to the infant congregations of nuns of Sutton, and holds himself in readiness for the approaching provincial chapter. The nuns here mentioned are a society established, a few years before, by our Father Gaudentius. Their primary object is the care and instruction of factory girls, their subsidiary one, the plain instruction of poor children.
Father Ignatius loved this institute. One of his common sayings was, "I do not understand how a girl with a wooden leg, no means and great docility, cannot make the evangelical vows," and he found himself at home with a sisterhood where his problem would be solved in part at least. He brought their rules to Rome, at this time, and received all the Pontifical sanctions he could possibly expect under the circumstances.
On August 21 of this year, our Provincial Chapter was held at Broadway. Here Father Ignatius was elected Rector of St. Anne's Retreat, Sutton. He entered on theoffice with a great deal of zeal and courage. In his first exhortation to the religious, he remarked that "new brooms sweep clean," but as he was a broom a little the worse for wear, which had been trimmed up for action after having so long lain by, the aphorism could not apply so well to him. It was nine years since he had filled the office of rector before, and the interval taught him many things regarding religious discipline which he now brought into action.
His rule might be calledmaternalrather than paternal, for it was characterized by the fondness of holy old age for youth. One change remarked in him, since his former rectorship, was, his spicing his gentle admonitions with a good deal of severity when occasion required it. He spoke to the community, after the evening recreation, once upon the conversion of England, and the bright look the horizon of religious opinion wore now in comparison to the time he first began his crusade. He hoped great things for England. At this part of his lecture, some ludicrous occurrence, which he did not observe, made one of the younger religious laugh. Father Ignatius turned upon him, and spoke with such vehemence that all seemed as if struck by a thunderbolt. They never heard him speak in that way before, and it was thought by many that the meek father could not "foam with indignation," even if he tried.
Towards the close of 1863 he professed several of the nuns of the Holy Family, for whom he had procured the indulgences at Rome, and he assisted at the deathbed of their first rev. mother early in 1864.
The days of the religious life of Father Ignatius might be numbered by his trials and crosses. It was not that a goodly share fell to him, as became his great holiness; but he happened to be so very keenly tried, that what generally assuages the bitterness of ordinary trials served, by a special disposition of Providence, to make his the more galling. His trials were multiplied in their infliction; the friends to whom he might unburthen himself were often their unconscious cause; and the remedies proposed for his comfort would be generally an aggravation of his sufferings. He had an abiding notion of his being alone and abandoned, which followed him like a shadow, even unto the grave. This feeling arose from his spirit of zeal. He burned to be doing more and more for God's glory every day, and sought to communicate to others some sparks of the flames that consumed himself. His projects for carrying out his ideas seldom met the cordial approval of superiors, and when he received such sanction, it was only after his schemes had been considerably toned down. This restraint he had always to bear.
When his plans were tolerated, or even approved, he could not find one to take them up as warmly as he wished. In fact, he found no second. Catholics have an instinctive aversion to anything that wears the appearance of novelty in their devotions. Father Ignatius's plans for the sanctification of Ireland, the conversion of England, and the perfection all should tend to, were very good things. No one could have the least objection to them; but, somehow, every one could not see his way to working them out. WhenFather Ignatius proposed the means he intended to adopt, the old Catholic shrugged his shoulders as if he had heard a temerarious proposition. It was new; the good old bishop that gave his life for his flock, or the saintly priest he had listened to from childhood, never proposed such a thing. He never read it in his books of piety, and though it seemed very good, it "did not go down with him." He listened to the holy Passionist, because he reverenced him; but he never encouraged his zeal with more than a cold assent.
Father Ignatius found this want of correspondence to his suggestions in every person even his own brethren in religion failed to be of accord with him. He was perpetually speaking upon his favourite topics, and never seemed satisfied with the work of his fellow-labourers if they did not take up his ideas. He often drew down upon himself severe animadversions on account of this state of mind. When fathers returned to the retreat, tired and wearied after a number of missions, they felt it rather hard to be told that they had done very little, because they had not set about their work in his way. He would be told very sharply that they should wish to see what he had done himself; that his chimerical notions looked well on paper, or sounded nicely in talk; that there was a surer way of guiding people to heaven than talking them into fancies beyond their comprehension. These remarks only served to bring out the virtue and humility of the saintly man. He became silent at once, or turned the conversation into another channel.
He had a still severer trial in this point. He very frequently attributed the caution of his superiors to want of zeal, and used to lecture them without human respect on what he thought to be their duty. On one occasion he went so far as to complain of this to Cardinal Wiseman; but the explanation was so satisfactory that he gave expression to different sentiments for the future. Whenever they spoke positively, he immediately acquiesced, and was most exact in carrying out their injunctions. His zeal was unbounded, and one of his superiors always said: "Father Ignatius will become a saint by the very thwarting of his plans." If he had not the virtue of submitting his judgment, it is hard tosay into what extravagances he might rush. This one trial was the staple of his religious life for more than thirty years.
We shall now give a few instances from his letters, and from anecdotes recorded of him, to show the spirit with which he bore this and kindred trials and crosses.
In 1853 he received a very severe letter from one of our Belgian fathers, who is in high repute for learning and virtue. He forwarded the letter to Father Eugene, who was then Provincial, accompanied by these remarks:—
"I thought of answering the enclosed letter from Father —— at once, before sending it to your Paternity; but, on looking it over again, I have changed my mind. The rule which I make for myself is, to mind what my superiors say on this matter and the conversion of England, and to charge them to stop my proceedings if they disapprove of them. I shall take what they say as coming from God, who has a right to dispose of all souls, and who may judge that the time for grace in England is not come, or never has to come. Besides, they are the proper judges whether my proceedings are correctin totoor in part. Your Paternity has lately expressed your mind upon the matter, and I have no scruple on the subject; but it is well you should know what others feel. I beg you to take this letter from Father —— as kindly meant, and, with me, to be thankful for it."
Another to his Provincial:—
"With regard to the principal topic of your Paternity's letter, I will first thank you, and thank God that I am thought worthy to be spoken and written to, without dissimulation or reserve, of what people think of me. If I make use with diligence of their remarks, I shall be able to gain ground in the esteem of God, and, perhaps, also in men's esteem; but that is not of consequence. Now, I suppose it would be best not to have said so much in explanation of my intentions in time past; and certainly I have said things which were vexing in the course of these explanations. It is no justification of this to allege that your Paternity's style of writing admonitions and reproofs is more severe than that of some persons, because I ought to receiveall with joy. But the cutting tone of some of your letters excites me to answer more or less in a cutting tone on my side, and I have given way to this temptation. It appears to me, it would be better if with me and others your tone was not so cutting. But God so appoints it for us, and so I had better prefer his judgment to my own, and persevere correcting myself, till I can answer cutting letters with the same gentle, affectionate language as I might the mildest ones. In this way I shall be the greatest gainer. So I will conclude with leaving it to your Paternity to decide in what tone you will correct me—only begging that you will not omit the correction when you see me in the wrong, and that you will inflict it, for charity's sake, at the risk even of suffering pain from my hasty and improper answers, which I cannot expect to correct at once, though I will try to do it. Will you let me meet you at the station when you pass through London, and accompany you to the station for the Dover Railway?"
In another letter, he writes:—
"I am frequently assailed with black doubts about the prudence of all my proceedings; but these pass by, and I go on again with brighter spirits than ever, and, in the end, I am astonished how Providence has carried me clear of danger and perplexities when they have threatened me the most. I trust it will be so now.
"I beg your Paternity will write to me again what you decide about St. Wilfrid's functions, and tell me what I can do by writing letters or otherwise. I feel better qualified to do what I am told, than to give advice what others should do."
As may be seen from some of the letters introduced above, Father Ignatius had to endure trials from the want of sympathy with his ways, in many of the English converts. One celebrated convert went so far as to prohibit his speaking of the conversion of England to any of the members of a community of which he was Superior. Another used to tell him that "England was already damned," and that it was no use praying for it. A third treated him to some sharp cuts about the work of his littlemissions, when answering an application of Father Ignatius to give one in his parish. These and many other crosses of the like nature, he used to complain of with deep feeling among his fellow religious. It is remarkable that those who crossed him had great respect for his holiness, and, very likely, their opposition proceeded from not giving him credit for much prudence.
An incident that happened to him in one of his journeys in Ireland will give an idea of how he bore humiliations. He was walking to one of the principal towns in Tipperary, and a vehicle overtook him on the road. The man in the car took compassion on the poor old priest, and asked him to "take a lift." Father Ignatius took his seat at once; before they had proceeded far together, his companion perceived that he spoke in an "English accent," and began to doubt his being a priest. There had been some ugly rows in the town, lately, on account of a gang of "soupers" that infested it, and it struck the good townsman that his waggon was carrying a veritable "souper. "What," thought he, "if the neighbours should see me carrying such a precious cargo?" And, without asking or waiting for an explanation, he unceremoniously told Father Ignatius "to get down, for he suspected he wasn't of the right sort." Father Ignatius complied at once, without the least murmur. When the man was about a mile ahead of his late fellow-traveller, and could not stifle the remorse occasioned by his hasty leave-taking, he resolved to turn back and catechise him. The result satisfied him, and the good father was invited to take a seat a second time. To atone for his almost unpardonable crime, as he thought it, the man invited him to stay at his house for the night, as it was then late. Father Ignatius said he was due at the priest's house, but in case he found nobody up there, he should be happy to avail himself of his friend's hospitality. They parted company in the town; Father Ignatius went to the priest's, and the other to his home. They were all in bed in the presbytery, and no answer was returned to the repeated knocks and rings of the benighted traveller. He went to the friend's house, but foundthey, too, were gone to bed. No word was left aboutFather Ignatius, and his strange accent made the housewife refuse him admittance. He went off without saying a word in explanation. The man bethought himself shortly after, and sent messengers to seek him, who overtook him outside the town, walking off to the next, which he expected to reach before morning.
Another time he undertook the foundation of a convent in Staffordshire. With his usual indifference in matters temporal, he made no material provision whatever for the reception of the sisters, except a bleak, unfurnished house. The reverend mother came, with three or four sisters, and was rather disconcerted at what she found before them. Father Ignatius was expected in a day or two, and as the time of his arrival approached, the reverend mother went into the reception-room, and there sate—
"A sullen dame,"Nursing her wrath to keep it warm."
Father Ignatius got a very hot reception. The lady scolded him heartily for his carelessness, and descanted most eloquently on the wants and grievances she had to endure since her arrival. He replied calmly that it was not his fault, that that department of the proceedings devolved on the parish priest. This only fired her the more—"Why didn't he tell the parish priest?" He then waited, quietly standing until she had exhausted her stock of abuse; whereupon he asked if she had done, and on receiving a nod in the affirmative, he said: "Oh, well, I know how I must approach your ladyship in future, I must make three bows in the Turkish fashion." So saying, he bowed nearly to the ground, retreated a step and bowed again, a third step backwards brought him to the door of the apartment, and when he had bowed still deeper than before, he stood up straight, took out a purse with some sovereigns in it, and spun it to the corner of the room in which the good nun sat petrified with astonishment:—"Take that now, and it may calm you a bit," was the good morning he bid her, as he closed the door after him, and went his way.
The tongue of slander assailed him again the last year ofhis life. We will give the occurrence in the words of the only one to whom the reverend mother told it in confidence. Father Ignatius himself never spoke of it.
"As our dear Lord loved him much, he wished to try him as he had tried the dearest and best-beloved of his servants. Therefore he permitted that his character should be assailed in the most vile manner by one who, through mistaken zeal, gave out the most injurious insinuations regarding our dear father and the late reverend mother. When Father Ignatius heard of it, he sent for the reverend mother to exhort her to bear the calumny with love and resignation. In speaking to her he said that God had asked all of him, and he had freely given all but his good name, and that he was ready now to offer as it had pleased God to ask for it; for all belonged to Him and he thanked Him for leaving him nothing. 'Will you not.' he continued, 'do the same? Do you not see that God is asking you for the dearest thing you can give? Give it, then, freely, and thank Him for taking it, for don't you see that by this you are resembling Him more closely? Besides, He has permitted this to happen, and if we do not give up our good name, which already belongs to Him, cheerfully and willingly, He will take it, in spite of us, and we shall lose the merit of our offering. How foolish, therefore, is it to go against God! Let us resign ourselves unreservedly into his hands. However, to remove any scandal that might follow, and to show this good priest that I have no ill-feeling against him, I will go and visit him on friendly terms.' And so he did."
Besides casual attacks of illness brought on by his want of care or great labours, he suffered during the latter part of his life from chronic ailments. His heart often troubled him, and medical men told him that he would very likely die of disease of the heart. He had an ulcer in one of his ancles for a number of years, and was often obliged to keep his bed on account of it. No one ever heard him complain, and yet his sufferings must have been very acute. We never remarked him rejoice so much over this painful sore, than when one of the fathers, who respected him much, andwanted to test his mortification, became a Job's comforter. He said: "You deserve to be lame, Father Ignatius, you made such use of your feet in the days of your dancing and sporting, that Almighty God is punishing you now, and the instruments of your pleasure are aptly turned into instruments of pain." He said it was quite true, and that he believed so himself, and that his only wish was that he might not lose a particle of the merit it would bring him, by any kind of complaint on his part. He got a rupture in 1863, and he simply remarked, "I have made another step down the hill to-day."
Whilst labouring under a complication of sufferings he never abated one jot of his round of duties, though requested to do so by his subjects. He was Superior, and exercised his privilege by doing more than any other instead of sparing himself. He did not take more rest nor divide his labours with his companions. During the time of his rectorship in Sutton, he used to preach and sing mass after hearing confessions all morning; attend sick calls, preach in some distant chapel in the evening, return at eleven o'clock, perhaps, and say his office, and be the first up to matins at two o'clock again. The only thing that seemed to pain him was a kind of holy envy. He used to say to the young priests: "Oh, how well it is for you that are young and buoyant, I am now stiff and old, and must have but a short time to labour for Almighty God; still I hope to be able to work to the last." This was his ordinary discourse the very year he died, and the young fathers were much struck by the coincidence between his wishes and their completion.
Father Ignatius Paoli, the Provincial, gave the cook orders to take special care of the indefatigable worn-out Rector. He was not to heed the fasts of the Rule, or at least to give the Superior the full supply of meagre diet. Father Ignatius took the indulgence thankfully for two or three days after returning from a mission; but when he saw a better portion served up for himself oftener than was customary for the other missionaries, he remonstrated with the brother cook. Next day he was served in the same manner, he then gave a prohibition, and at last scolded him.The good brother then told him that he was only carrying out the Provincial's orders. Father Ignatius was silent, but, after dinner, posted off to the doctor, and made him give a certificate of good health and ability to fast, which he forwarded to the Provincial. Father Provincial did not wish to deny him the opportunity of acquiring greater merit, and, at the same time, he would prolong so valuable a life. To save both ends he placed him under the obedience, as far as regarded his health, of one of the priests of his community, whom he strictly obeyed in this matter thenceforward.
Once he went on a sick-call in very wet weather, and either a cramp or an accident made him fall into a dirty slough, where he was wetted through and covered with mud. He came home in this state, and finding a friend of his at the house, who more or less fell into his way of thinking, he began to converse with him. The good father began to speak of the conversion of England, and sat in his wet clothes for a couple of hours, and likely would have stayed longer, so thoroughly was he engrossed with his favourite topic, if one of the religious had not come in, and frightened him off to change garments by his surprise and apprehension.
He seemed indifferent to cold; he would sit in his cell, the coldest day, and write until his fingers became numbed, and then he would warm them by rubbing his hands together rather than allow himself the luxury of a fire. He went to give a retreat somewhere in midwinter, and the room he had to lodge in was so exposed that the snow came in under the door. Here he slept, without bed or fire, for the first night of his stay. It was the thoughtlessness of his entertainers that left him in these cold quarters. In the morning some one remarked that very probably Father Ignatius slept in the dreary apartment alluded to. A person ran down to see, and there was the old saint amusing himself by gathering up the snow that came into his room, and making little balls of it for a kitten to run after. The kitten and himself seem to have become friends by having slept together in his rug the night before, and both were disappointed by the intrusion of the wondering visitor.
His humility was as remarkable to any one who knew him as was his zeal; and on this point also he was well tried. It is not generally known that in the beginning of his Passionist life he adopted the custom of praying before his sermons that God's glory would be promoted by them and himself be humiliated. At the opening of Sutton Church in 1852, he was sent for from London to preach a grand sermon in the evening. A little before the sermon he was walking up and down the corridor; the Provincial met him and asked more in joke than otherwise: "Well, Father Ignatius, what are you thinking of now?" "I am praying," he replied, "that if it be for the glory of God my sermon may be a complete failure as far as human eloquence is concerned." We may imagine the surprise of his Superior at hearing this extraordinary answer; it is believed that this was his general practice to the end. Contrary to the common notion that prevails among religious orders, he wished that the Order would receive humiliations as well as himself. He wished it to come to glory by its humiliations. On one occasion, he expected that the newspapers would make a noise about something that might be interpreted as humiliating to the community of which he was Superior. Father Ignatius addressed the community nearly in these words: We shall have something to thank God for tomorrow; the Protestants will make a great noise in the papers about this affair, and we must be prepared for a full feast of misrepresentations. Let us thank God now in anticipation." He was disappointed, however, as the papers were content with a bare notice of the matter.
Many persons did not give him credit for great humility; they thought his continual quoting of himself, and his readiness to speak about his doings, was, if not egotism, at least inconsistent with profound humility. We cannot answer this imputation better than by giving Father Faber's description of simplicity, which every one knows to be the very character of genuine humility:—
"But let us cast an eye at the action of simplicity in the spiritual life. Simplicity lives always in a composed consciousness of its own demerit and unworthiness. It ispossessed with a constant sense of what the soul is in the sight of God. It knows that we are worth no more than we are worth in His sight, and while it never takes its eye off that view of self, so it does not in any way seek to hide it from others. In fact it desires to be this, and no more than this, in the eyes of others; and it is pained when it is more. Every neighbour is, as it were, one of God's eyes, multiplying His presence; and simplicity acts as if every one saw us, knew us, and judged us as God does, and it has no wounded feeling that it is so. Thus, almost without direct effort, the soul of self-love is so narrowed that it has comparatively little room for action; although it never can be destroyed, nor its annoyance ever cease, except in the silence of the grave. The chains of human respect, which in the earlier stages of the spiritual life galled us so intolerably, now fall off from us, because simplicity has drawn us into the unclouded and unsetting light of the eye of God. There is no longer any hypocrisy. There is no good opinion to lose, because we know we deserve none, and doubt if we possess it. We believe we are loved in spite of our faults, and respected because of the grace which is in us, and which is not our own and no praise to us. All diplomacy is gone, for there is no one to circumvent and nothing to appropriate. There is no odious laying ourselves out for edification, but an inevitable and scarcely conscious letting of our light shine before men in such an obviously innocent and unintentional manner that it is on that account they glorify our Father who is in Heaven."—Blessed Sacrament, Book II., c. vii.
The secret by which Father Ignatius arrived at this perfect way of receiving trials was histhanking Godfor everything. When some one objected to him that we could not thank God for a trial when we did not feel grateful, "Never mind," he would say, "you take a hammer to break a big stone; the first stroke has no effect, the second seemingly no effect, and the third, and so on; but somewhere about the twentieth or hundredth the stone is broken, and no one stroke was heavier than the other. In the same way, begin to thank God, no matter about the feeling, continue,and you will soon break the hardest difficulties." His maxims and sayings on resignation would fill a good-sized volume were they collected together. We shall conclude this chapter with one picked by chance from his letters:
"In trials and crosses we are like a sick child, when its mother wants it to take some disagreeable medicine. The child kicks and screams and sprawls, and spits the medicine in its mother's face. That is just what we do when God sends us crosses and trials. But, like the mother, who will persevere in giving the medicine until the child has taken enough of it, God will send us crosses and trials until we have sufficient of them for the health of our souls."
Father Ignatius, for some months before his death, had a kind of sensation that his dissolution was near. He paid manylastvisits to his old friends, and, in arranging by letter for the greater number of flying visits, he used generally to say, "I suppose I shall not be able to pay many more." Writing to Mrs. Hutchinson in Edinburgh from St. Anne's Retreat, Button, in March, 1864, he says: "When I wrote to you some months ago in answer to your kind letter, I think I expressed a hope that I might again have the pleasure of conversation with you before the closing of our earthly pilgrimage. It was a distant and uncertain prospect then. Now it is become a near and likely one, and I write to express my satisfaction at it." He was heard to say by many that the volume of his journal he was writing would last him till the end of his life, and it is a curious circumstance that the last page of it is just half-written, and comes up to September 18, less than a fortnight before his death.
Our Father-General came from Rome to make the visitation of this province in May, 1864, and Father Ignatius acted as interpreter throughout the greater part of the visit. He was as young as ever in his plans for the conversion of England, sanctification of Ireland, and advancing all to perfection; and the approbation of the General to the main drift of his projects inflamed him with fresh ardour. A characteristic incident occurred during this visit. The Father-General was inspecting the books Father Ignatius was obliged to keep, as Rector of Sutton, and he found them rather irregular. The entries were neither clear nor orderly, and it was next to an impossibility to obtain anyexact notion of the income and expenditure of the house. The General called the Rector to his room, in order to rebuke him for his carelessness. He began to lecture, and when he had said something rather warm looked at Father Ignatius, to see what effect it might produce, when, to his surprise, he found that he had nodded off asleep. He awoke up in an instant, and complimented the Father-General on his patience. Such was the indifference he had reached to by the many and cutting rebukes he had borne through life.
In August, 1864, Father Ignatius wrote a long letter to Father Ignatius Paoli, our Provincial, about his doings, and he seemed as fresh in them as if he had but just commenced his crusade. We shall give one extract from this letter:
"I could hardly have the spirit to keep up this work (the sanctification of Ireland) if it was not for aiming at a result so greatly for the glory of God, and working with a resolution to conquer. How exceedingly would it add to my spirit if I knew that our body was penetrated with the same thought, and we thus were supporting each other!"
So late as September 8 he had prepared a paper embodying his intentions, which he intended to submit to Roman authority. Ever himself to the last.
Before leaving the retreat for his "raid" as he called it, in Scotland, he called all the members of the community, one by one, to conference; he did the same with a convent of nuns, of which he had spiritual charge. He gave them all special advices, which are not forgotten, and his last sermon to his brethren, a day or two before he left, on the conversion of England through their own sanctification, was singularly impressive. It moved many to tears; and, those who heard him, say it was the most thrilling ever heard from him on the subject. In talking over some matter of future importance with his Vicar, before he left for Scotland, he suddenly stopped short, saying, "Others will see after this," or some such words. All those who spoke with him confidentially recall some dubious half-meaning expressions that seemed to come from an inward consciousness of his approaching end.
He was remarked to be very sombre and reflective in hislast missions, but now and then his usual pleasant mood would show itself. The Rev. M. Conden, the priest at Cartsdyke, Greenock, in whose church he gave a little mission from September 14th to the 18th, writes as follows about his stay with him:—
"He preached morning and evening, heard confessions daily, pledged 200 young teetotallers, and received about £14 in voluntary offerings, for which he seemed most grateful. This mission, he said, was his 242nd of the kind; and the number of his teetotallers, since he himself took the pledge from Father Mathew in 1842, was 60,000.
"Every moment of his time here (refection hours alone excepted), from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m., was employed either in the mission exercises, or at his office, or in prayer, or in writing letters to arrange his future movements. He never rested. He seemed to have vowed all his time to some duty or other.
"Wood Cottage (late the Free Church Manse, but now the priest's house in Cartsdyke) rests on an eminence overlooking the town, harbour, and bay of Greenock, and is at a distance of from five to ten minutes' walk from St. Laurence's chapel. I noticed that the zigzag uphill walk fatigued him, and I offered to provide a conveyance; but he would not permit me, 'as he could not read his office so well in the carriage as when walking.'
"As he passed twice or thrice daily to and from my house and the chapel, his massive form and mild mien, his habit half concealed by his cloak, his broad-brimmed hat, and his breviary in hand, attracted the attention of the old and the curiosity of the young. One day, some of the latter followed him and eyed him closely, through the lattice-work in front of the cottage, until he had finished his office in the garden. He then turned towards the youngsters, and riveted his looks on them with intense interest and thoughtfulness. You might have imagined that they never had seen his like before, and that he had seen children for the first time in his long life. At length one of the lads broke the spell by observingto the others in a subdued and doubting tone, 'A big Hie-lander!' 'A Highlander,' said Father Ignatius, turning to me; 'they take my habit for an elongated kilt.'
"At dinner he was always very happy and communicative, that day in particular.
"'My religious habit,' said he, 'subjected me to many humorous remarks before the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, and to annoyances after it. One time a boy would cry out at me, "There's the Great Mogul;" another, "There goes Robinson Crusoe." "That's Napoleon," a third would shout; whilst a fourth, in a strange, clear, wild, musical tone, would sing out: "No, that's the devil himself." But, he continued, 'nothing half so sharp was ever said of me as of a very tall, lath-like Oratorian, who stood leaning, one day, against a wall, musing on something or nothing. Some London wags watched him attentively for some time, and, being divided in their opinions about him, one of them at length ended the dispute by observing, in a dry and droll way, "Why, that fellow must have grown by contract!"'
"Even after his frugal refection, Father Ignatius would never rest. Then, too, he must either read his breviary, or say his rosary, or write letters. On the day he finished his mission (Sunday, September 18), I besought him, as he had allowed himself little or no sleep since he began it, before proceeding to Port-Glasgow, to commence a new mission there that same evening, to recline on the sofa, even for half an hour. 'Oh no!' said he; 'I shall try to have my nap in the carriage, on my way.' The distance from Cartsdyke to Port Glasgow being no more than two or three miles, and there being a toll-bar about midway, he could have very little of his nap.
"During his mission here, he remarked repeatedly, both publicly and in private, that his health was never better, and his mind never clearer. He promised himself yet twenty years to work for the conversion of England, the sanctification of Ireland, and the unity of all in the faith. Might he not live to see this realized? Twenty years mightdo it, and were not his physical and mental powers fresh enough?
"But, with all this hope of heart and soul, I could, now and then, notice a shade of apprehension passing over his countenance, and hear, not without tears, his humble, but earnest self-reproaches at his inability to 'brighten up.' The manner in which he did this showed me plainly that he had a strong presentiment of his approaching end.
"My cottage being at some distance from my chapel, the bishop had allowed me to fit up in my house a little oratory, where I might keep the Blessed Sacrament, and say mass occasionally. By the time that Father Ignatius had concluded his mission, I had completed my oratory, and asked him to bless it. 'Under what title?' he asked. 'Under that of "Our Lady of the Seven Dolors," this (Sunday, September 18) being that festival of hers,' I replied. Father Ignatius became silent and absorbed for a considerable time and then said:—
"'Beautiful title! and appropriate! Here are the stations of the Cross! And this is the Feast of the Seven Dolors! Beautiful title!'
"'This,' he continued, 'reminds me of what I once read of St. Thomas of Canterbury. When passing for thelasttime through France to England, he was asked, by a gentleman who entertained him, to bless a little oratory which might be a memorial of his visit. "Under what title?" asked the Archbishop. "I shall leave the selection to your grace," said the host. "Well then," rejoined the Archbishop, "let it be to thefirst English martyr." He washimselfthe first martyr.
"'Our Lady of Dolors!' Beautiful Title! I am a Passionist. Here are the stations of the Cross; and this is the Feast of the Seven Dolors,' repeated Father Ignatius; and again he became absorbed and silent, so long that I thought he wanted never to bless my little oratory. He blessed it, however; and now is it by mere accident that on this, the eve of St. John of the Cross, Father Ignatius's disciple and friend, Father Alban, comes to bless the oratory cross,and set up the little memorial tablet which I have prepared with the following inscription?—
ORATE PRO ANIMAREV SSMI. PATRIS IGNATII (SPENCER)QUI DIE OCTODECIMO SEPTEMBRIS, A.D. 1864.HOC ORATORIUMSUB TITULO 'B. V. MARIAE DE SEPTEM DOLORIBUS,'BENEDIXIT.R.I.P."