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    April 7, 1860.] 1 lie Leader> cmd Salur'...

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    ' . AMERICANISMS.* ' . ' '¦ . • ¦ rpilE ...

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    *3>roiitlrmntat or, If'It and llniuunr l...

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    The Papal Tdeal.* \F Arious Efforts Have...

    abbev and voluntarily -suffered the severest discipline of the cloister , . exchanging all the con . forts of rank and wealth , for the privations of ' a severe monastic life . Ever after , he W regardless of tire external trills of fortune , and bore adversity vvith the same equam-S as prosperity ; -so that , when he fell . into the power of Napoleon ? wef was carried -off forcibly , « without lmen , without his spectacles , " and with only ten pence in his pocket , he never for a moment lost his serenity , and in his interview with h « Imperial captor , proved quite his equal in spirit and resolution . Iso doubt he felt throughout that he was . a system impersquated , and haa not the shadow of fear , AH Dr . Wiseman ' s efforts , therefore , , enlist our sympathy for the man , as displaying individual heroism of an unworldly kind—notwithstanding- the pressure of destitution and the inconvenience of . imprisonm ent—necessarily fail for there was nothing . even in the captive condition of Pius VIL that put him to the smallest real inconvenience or inspired him with the slightest terror . The state of mind which he retained was part of the system , and implied in the discipline to which he had subjected his youth . Ever mindful that he was a Pope , he forgot that he was also a Man ; the school that had made him the former , had unmade the latter , He , perhaps , also , was a sincere celibate , and not a mere hypocritic sham . Dr . Wiseman throws : no light on this point , but leaves us to infer that in it , whether as monk or pope his hero was immaculate . As the latter , he is praised lor ffoino- through the routine of his daily duties with exemplary rWiiTaritv and patience . He had , in fact , all the virtues of an accurate machine , and was a faithful servant of the Church as wellas its master , Nevertheless , the Papal Church fell into tribulation in his time , from the defective working of the system of which he - >> was a part What did he do to improve that working-, or the system itself ? Cardinal Wiseman replies , " that which befitted a in an who was ricither before nor behind his age . " Had Piusacted otherwise , he contends , and probably with justice , "he would have been ridiculed , deserted , and abused by all parties , whig- or tory , conservative or radical , as a fanatic , an unreasonable phenomenon , a man 'behind the age , which had outgrown revolutionary fancies . . ; That is enough . Pius VII . was a respectable cog- in the wheel , not a . j spirit re « ulating its motion or modifying its structure , as he might , 5 have done , from within . The highest claim set upfor ^ mn ( and ; this claim is expressed in a paragraph not to be exceeded in the picturesque grandiloquence of its expression , or the mutac ot its " march ) is one purely of an histrionic kind—his beliaviour at a striking public , ceremonial . We are invited to contemplate the j Pope , « s borne aloft on an estrade and ¦ beneath a canopy , -in . the | ¦ attitude of worship , clasping the golden Monstrance with an intensity j of devotion that nothing- might disturb ; " the hands firmly and immovably clasped at the base of the sacred vessel ; the head bent down , not in feebleness but in homage ; the closed eyes , that saw none of the state and magnificence around , but shut out the world from the calm and silent meditation within ; the noble features so composed that no etrpresHi ' on of human feeling or of earthly thought . could be traced irpon , or gathered from , them ; the bare head , scarcely ever uncovered except then , witvli locks still dark floating unheeded in the breeze '« -these characteristic forms and appearances of a human frame , unmoving and unwaveringas a sculptured figure , * ni ° -ht have been taken as the purest and subhmest , symbol oi entranced adoration . " And what is the ineanhig of this ? > ot content with being Christ's Vicar , the Pope will alsorepresent tho Jewish Lawgiver when conversing with ( Jod on Sinai;—and thus , borne cm the shoulders of ' . inarching men , his Holiness , without any warrant from Scripture , mounted on a public p latform , a »™ fving sta « -e , enacts before a street-crowd ( i blasphemous mockeixot that mysterious act in the life of the Hebrew leader . Bitfi . our Cardinal insists on our regarding the scene us a reality . " Abstracted ^ says the writer , " from all that sense could perceive , and qpntred . in one thought , in one act of mind , soul , and heart , in one dutjf , L «™ duty PI of his sublime office , one privilege [ whence derived fj '' , of his- ' supremo commission ; — ho [ the Pope ] felt , and was , and you knew him to ho , what ¦ . Mosus was on this mountain , -hface to face , fop all the people , with God _; the Vicar , with his Supreme Pontiff ; tho chief shepherd , with the Prince of Pastors ; the highest and frrst of living men , with the One living God , " And this , in so many words , is the Cardinal's sincere belief on this point ; he bus educated his mind to credit this—the veriest absurdity that was ever played gll to delude a gaping populace—as » uv actual interview botweon'tho 1 ope , as Mosos , mid QoA as the One Living Doity . J 3 c that as it , may , this mountebank exhibition is ,, in the CVdiniil ' a opinion , the highest . effort of which Pius VII . was capable j a piece of acting m which he excelled all other nctors . Tho imagination of Cavuinnl Wisoman seems , indeed , to lmve been strangely impressed with a conviction of ; tho identity of tho Pope and HMTosos , Wo nioet with the idea again in hia Life of Leo 3 fU . and also with that othor idea to which wo have alluded , and by which a necessary diminution is made between the Pontiff and a inun . _ liilco them both in the conglpinorato as they stand m the text , lie is describing tho coronation of Leo : — « But tho Pono himself , aa ho flrafc roao , and than Imolh at tho deacon ' s approach , must have defied tho sharpest eyo that aouyhfc in hiei « ft j ^ of human fiwlhw . Dcop arid u l-abaorbin | $ dovotion Imparted it glow to hie paKturv ' s ! an 1 , h wovor hie person fnight bo aummndod by olv . l pomp S figlouB mi gr . iuoonco , It was clour that his spli'lb wub ooneoume of only oneSingle Prosecco , and stood na much ulono aa Mmw could be said U , lo zvlth Onool / ioi' only besides hlmaolf on Stnttl . Still aotiug ^ purq aoting ^ and with that characteristic ,, too * I ¦ which Dr . Johnson intended to express whon ho paid ot dug

    celebrated Garrick that " Punch has no fecluu / s . 1 he sanctuary is to the Pupe a theatre ; and , in the Cardinal ' s mind , this is its principal and characteristic excellence . The notion , it may be said , is in . keeping with the encouragement that the Clmrch has given to art . But we must pause , for we are told that Leo XII . was a reforming Pope . He showed himself , indeed ^ qui te as great a patron of Art as any of his predecessors , but he was most anxious , forsooth , that morality should not be compromised by iL A group of statues in the new gallery erected by his predecessor disappeared after his -first visit , as " gradually other pieces of ¦ ancient sculpture offensive to Christian modesty . " VYhen a magnificent collection of engravings representing Canova ' s works had been prepared , he purchased , " says the Cardinal , . " the plat .-s at an iinmeiise cost— -I believe at Florence—that he might stippres . s and destroy such as were not consistent with delicacy of morals . " In other words , Leo XII . was guilty of a great act of vandalism . We hope that his other reforms were better directed . That of the suppression of the cross of light usually suspended from this dome of St . Peter ' s on Thursday and Friday of the Holy " Week certainly was not . " It was over-beautiful ; it attracted multitudes who went only to . see its grand effects . Enough ! The man ' s teuden- _ eies were ' evidently all to the ascetic . . -, "¦/¦ Two other Popes remain ; Pius VIII ., acute in canon law , and Gregory XVI ., profound in antiquarian research . . Of those four Popes , the last was the only one who enjoyed a robust constitution : the others were infirm in health . It has ever been the policy of the Cardinalate to select the aged and the weak for the Apostolic Chair . A really vigorous Pope wouid endanger the whole systeni . lhe present Pope tried to do something , and the Ayorld knows , what came of it . Compelled now to attempt nothing , Cardinal Antonelli has ¦ long held him in chains , aiid the ancient course of corruption - still maintains a ruinous proclivity froni bad to worse , from worse to worst . The last stage ^ has been 4 oug neared , and there is hopej therefore , that things may soon mend . Allis now . in agiUitioii ; everywhere the world ecclesiastic trembles . Shocks . of an enrthquake from time to time are perceptible . A thorough revolution was needed , and is now at hand . From the old systeni higher ...- ¦ ¦ results thail those described in Cardinal "Wiseman's book were not : obtainable , liead in the inner spirit , those results are mean and unsatisfactory—frequently perverse and retrograde , never prog-res- . ' sive—never ' in the interest of life and truth , _ bufc , mere hypocritical pretences , whose real aim ' was to support . exfstin . gr abuses where these were profitablfe to individuals . The best of Popes could not be other tlian a more or less accomplished actor in a certain round of routine ceremonials ; the real business of the papacy is managed by office-holders over whom he has no control . Such a state must soon perish . Let the finger of Reform but touch one stone , and the ' entire edifice must fall into cureless ruin .

    April 7, 1860.] 1 Lie Leader> Cmd Salur'...

    April 7 , 1860 . ] 1 lie Leader > cmd Salur'day [ Analyst . j &\

    ' . Americanisms.* ' . ' '¦ . • ¦ Rpile ...

    ' . AMERICANISMS . * ' . ' '¦ . ¦ rpilE Yankee nptjon of a joke is gross in the extreme . Neither neat-X ness nor brilliancy is attempted . - Along sailbr-Hke yarn , involving an impossibility or a quasi-bull—Hibernian only in its form , but Uot in its r spint-i-passe ^ for a standard jest . Its journalism is also in . lcstud with abortive attempts at wit , ; clumsy in ^ their kind , and impracticable in their execution . An America ^ editor sustains himself by impudent assertion , coarse abuse , and verbal clenching , void of meaning , but abrogating cleverness . In the latter , both writer and reader take the will for the deed- and probably , if the pun , however poor , relate to some topic or event of the moment of any iiHcreSt , both laugh—for want pf something better to laugh at . They are like great boys at school , as yet halfeducatcd who make tentative efforts at lmniour , whioli require time and experience to- ' ripen . ' A certain proviuc . ialisiii , in fact , infects' their local literature , wliich may be fitted for its local habitation , but is no wise built for a cosmopolitan iijuucnee : B . cyond its birtliplacc it has no vuluc ; after its birthday it has no . life . * ¦ ¦ ,. , ,. , . . ,, e The editor of the Louisville Journal and bis publishers are evidently ot a very different opinion . For nine-aml-twenty years the former hud pleased himself and his readers in that periodical witli his " wit and humour in paragraphs ; " and in the N < tw YvrA Ledyar , within tho last two vcars . ho hus carried on a similar game to tho . satisfaction of Jus public And now the time has nrrived when the powers have declared that these witticisms should take a permanent place in English literature . Accordingly we have them in a book . These gems of journalism are enshrined in a volume of their own . Qf these specially preserved paragraphs , there are probably more than two thousand ; and one reasonably expected that , many of them would , at least , nrovo amusing . We must , of course , make allowance for newspaper jokes becoming stale and out of date . The bloom would necessarily have boon brushed oil' from several of them by the mere wing of tirno ; but one might havo hoped for a flown or two that would still respond to question . Alas ! it is scarcely possible to produce a tolerable example ot wit or humour . We dip into the book ut a venture , and produce t' »« following , which it may bo considered is oi > o of the bant . nnfftKirt " The Padiioah paper calls one of our city contemporaries , a notable editor . ' Probably he inwns nut at / la . " ., . T | .. This faculty of small punning is characteristic of tho collection . Hie next , no <} oubb , was reckoned capital s— ¦ .,...., ' n of a * , i , h » «• WO suppose there can be up dippu ^ 'S th « fact thftt tho flrst 4 rktic expedition was got up by Noah . " ' :

    *3>Roiitlrmntat Or, If'it And Llniuunr L...

    * 3 > roiitlrmntat or , If'It and llniuunr la 1 ' araf / rapha . JJ ^ -tho Editor of tho iZliotZ Jo ^ ml , -Now York : . JJurfcy and Juokaon ; London : S . Jjow , Soiib , and Oo . . Mo Uwsvn- ' J . UakoU HJghurd I 3 oi » lloy . ««„ , ««« li in / ini '' N ltltuir ( North Curollmv ) kttwncn and Clmn «>( crs . Jty " * "» who vw tftlwi Smr . iUustruted by JoUu MoLo . mn . V » mv * m Uw , Son , nnd Oo ^

• Citation
  • Leader (1850-1860), April 7, 1860, page 15, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse-os.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_07041860/page/15/