it. Elsewhere Pater tells us that as the very word ornament indicates what is in itself non-essential, so the one beauty of all literary style is of its very essence and independent, in prose and verse alike, of all removable decoration; that it may exist in its fullest lustre . . . as in Stendhal's Le Rouge et Le Noir, in a composition utterly adorned, with hardly a single suggestion of visibly beautiful things.'

Pater might have added here that this restraint was the secret of the success in art of his great Greek models and masters, that this was the Attic Manner.' To quote from the inspiring Harvard Lectures of S. H. Butcher:

"There are certain common characteristics which mark the Attic Manner. The speech is that of common life, correct and lucid, but the local idiom is raised above the co.amon-place: a beauty which conceals the hand of the artist. It is a certain well-bred elegance, which cannot be mistaken for pedantry: it wins the good-will of the reader by something which cannot be strictly defined: it does not speak in the language of emotion where emotion is wanting, but the glow of feeling is not lacking where it is necessary.

This excellent piece of literary criticism throws light upon very many questions connected with language and literature. It could be used for instance to explain why the prose writers of the age of Queen Anne succeeded in acquiring a great style while the poets on the whole so signally failed. It would even serve in our own country to hint at the reason of the literary charm one found in the conversation of the oldfashioned peasant of Co. Mayo, whose delightfully cultured accent and talk may soon, alas, be a thing of the past.

I will not apologise for drawing so freely upon my Commonplace Book in this matter, because a teacher with a sense of his own literary imperfections before him, must use where he can the teachings of the great writers who combine precept with example. In other words, like the nervous negro preacher he can only iterate, "For de Lawd's sake, boys, don' do as I does, do as I says!" So let the trusty Commonplace Book drive the nail home with a final quotation from Pater:

"In truth all art does but consist in the removal of surplusage, from the last finish of the gem-engraver blowing

away the last particle of invisible dust, back to the earliest divination of the finished work to be, lying somewhere according to Michael Angelo's fancy, in the rough-hewn block of stone."

Such rules are not for great genius-what rules are there for great genius?-but yet such rules are to be deduced from the work that all great genius has left us. And the man of talent best succeeds by trying always to do his work a little better than he can.

University College, Galway.

MAX DRENNAN.

THE LAST PARTING

He is not dead. They do not know,
Who pity her, her secret ease,
How he is near her, how they go
Her hand in his.

The last sad parting now is done.
She can look back as from afar
And pity her whose dearest one
Went to the War.

Now he is with her every day,
There is no salt dividing sea.
She leans on him in the old way,
Her staff is he.

The folk as they come in and out
Wonder at her pale joy: the while
She in the lightest fear or doubt

Turns to his smile.

KATHARINE ΤΥΝΑΝ.

655

A

PIGEONHOLE PARAGRAPHS

PROTESTANT dignitary, writing some years ago in

a High Church periodical on the past and present condition of missionary efforts in India, found little hope for Protestant missions unless they could enlist the help of a body such as the Christian Brothers. Dr. Gore, the well-known Anglican Bishop of Oxford, pays a hearty tribute of admiration to the Brothers and to other Catholic teaching institutes in his recently published book The War and the Church:

"You know that many besides Macaulay have reproached our English Church for lack of self-sacrifice, and have contrasted it with the Church of Rome, in which they have seen altogether more of the same heroic spirit which belongs to soldiers. They have not denied us the glory of kindness and goodness and faithfulness and all the circle of domestic virtues; only they have not seen in us the school of the heroic spirit, the school of sacrifice. Now, in part, these reproaches belong to an older day. . . . Nevertheless, there is truth in the reproach aimed at us. The Roman Church has been magnificently helped in the maintenance of religious education on its own lines, because it has been able to draw upon a vast store of voluntary sacrifice. Men have been found in multitudes who felt that they had the vocation to be teachers for Christ's sake and His little ones, and who, without hope or prospect but their work and their faith, have given themselves for teachers, wanting nothing for it but their barest living. There is hardly anything in modern Christendom nobler, or more successful in attaining its end, than the institution of the Christian Brothers; and the women's teaching Orders do not fall behind them. Why have we never struck anything like this store of deliberate and joyful sacrifice, with all our talk about the supreme im

portance of religious education? There has been something lacking."

Most of us are familiar with this touching passage from St. Patrick's "Confessions,"

"I read the heading of the letter which contained these words, The Voice of the Irish,' and methought I heard in my mind the voice of those who were near the wood of Focluth, which is by the western sea."

The Voice of the Irish was the title of a sonnet in our

March number of the present year. Father Francis P. Donnelly, S.J., has used the same phrase as a title to the following sonnet:

"The Voices of the Irish!" Hear them still

Great saint, not crying from one island's shore.
But echoing heavenward the whole world o'er,
Far from the green of Erin's vale and hill!
Pulpit or parliament their strong tones fill:
Hark, they outshout the cannon's rancorous roar;
Hotly they barter on trade's crowded floor.
And home and cloister with their sweetness thrill.
Lose not one whisper of one Irish voice!

Ah, multiply thy old apostleship

And Tara's cooling embers reinspire!

All saddened eyes will brighten and rejoice,
And every hand be pure and every lip,
When every heart is lit with thy new fire.

This and several other of the author's poems of similar Irish and religious feeling have been brought out by the house of Kenedy, New York, in postcard form, embellished gaily with Irish emblems in green and gold.

We Catholics of Europe hardly realize what a very large proportion of the Church belongs to the two American Continents. Taking the matter statistically, the total number of Catholics has been estimated by good authorities at about two hundred and fifty millions, and of those about a third are assigned to North and South America. Of course in

statistics of this kind all are reckoned who profess themselves to be Catholics when a census is taken by the State; it would be exceedingly difficult to estimate with any approach to accuracy the number who are genuine, practical Catholics. But we know something of the spirit that prevails in a country. The Republic of Columbia set a splendid example to Catholics the world over in the National Eucharistic Con

gress which it held some years ago. What about the great Republic of North America? We have a glowing testimony to the spirit of its Catholics in the Impressions' of the late Monsignor Benson which appeared in America in April of last year. We quote a passage.

"I cannot conceive any man being in doubt as to the future of Catholicism in this country. The congregations, the zeal, the activities, the businesslike methods-in all these matters America is incomparably ahead of Europe. The clean smartness of the churches; the departments of parish life; the variety of devotions; the numerous Masses; the very ornaments of the churches; the relations between the priests and people; all these things inspire the visitor from Europe with an extraordinary sense of hope; the churches are not exquisite sanctuaries for dreaming; they are the business offices of the supernatural; the clergy are not picturesque advocates of a beautiful medievalism, they are keen men devoted to the service of God; the people are not pathetic survivals from the Ages of Faith; they are communities of immortal souls bent upon salvation. There is a ring of assurance about Catholic voices; an air of confidence about Catholic movements; a swift, punctual, conscientious and efficient atmosphere about Catholic activities; a swing and energy about Catholic life, that promise well indeed for the future of the Church in this land. Catholicism has already won its place in American life, and holds it in such a fashion as to augur magnificently for the increase of its influence in the future. Such an organization, alone, as

that of the Knights of Columbus is security enough."

He sets down also what seemed to him the weakness in American Catholic life. The European tendency, he con