Church is their utter lack of knowledge of the different methods which prevail here for the maintenance of the Church. In Catholic Europe all that pertains to religious worship and the maintenance of the clergy is provided either by the State out of the common tax or by foundations made centuries ago by the generosity of pious benefactors. The poor were always the recipients; they received gratis of the fruits of the generosity of others. Here, on the contrary, all is different. The work of the Church is supported by the spontaneous offerings of the faithful.

Without entering into discussion of the merits of these different conditions, and with no intention of instituting comparisons, we are still convinced that whatever advantages derive from the older conditions, our method has this to say for itself: that the giving of each to each, the priest of his spiritual ministrations to the people, and the people a share of the fruits of their labors to the priest, contributes largely to keep in close touch priest and people alike, making each know the other better; and the interchange of possessions does much, as it always does, for cementing the bonds of charity and strengthening mutual affection and mutual confidence.

But however we may be convinced of the value of our system of church maintenance, it must be remembered that to these strangers it is all new. Doubtless it must at first be difficult for them to understand; but experience has taught that when our methods are patiently explained and not too rigidly enforced at the start, these new-comers will of themselves, like others before them, gradually and spontaneously grow into doing their duty in all this. The greatest care must be exercised lest an unnecessarily harsh rebuke repel from the doors of

the church those who have a right, common to all Catholics, to enter if they will. Patient teaching and kind persuasion will be found in this, as in all matters, to reap finally the most copious and satisfactory results.

We therefore recommend to all Rectors of the Diocese of Portland, and to all priests in care of souls under our jurisdiction, in the spirit of the day of Pentecost, an Apostolic solicitude and a Catholic charity towards all these new-coming brethren of the Faith who have taken up residence in the various parishes.

May the grace of the Holy Ghost, the Spirit of truth, the Comforter, quicken in your hearts an Apostolic zeal to fulfill by your efforts His eternal designs for the salvation of all the children of the Faith in the parishes under your care.

WILLIAM,

Bishop of Portland.

Given at Portland on the feast of Pentecost,

May 31, 1903.

EULOGY DELIVERED AT THE PONTIFICAL MASS OF REQUIEM FOR LEO XIII 1

"Ecce Sacerdos magnus, qui in diebus suis placuit Deo, et inventus est justus."

"Behold the high priest who in his day was pleasing to God and was found just."

It is rare indeed that all the world mourns. So varied are the interests of the nations, so different are the ideals of men, that not unfrequently the cause of grief to a portion of humanity may be but the incentive to rejoicing to another. When, once in an age, the funeral knell is tolled and all humanity, struck by common grief, bows its head and weeps, the fact is so unusual that it makes an epoch.

We are assisting at such a moment. Here in the stillness of the house of God we are gathered in grief, and we know that for once our grief is not borne alone, but that with our lamentation are mingled the sighs of all the children of men who with one voice, marred by no discordant note, chant this universal Requiem.

In Leo the Good the Church has lost her Chief Pastor; labor her protector; learning a master; the poor a father; the weak a defender; law a patron; Christianity a saint; humanity a man. Yet, not lost — nothing is ever lost to the world. There is besides the immortality of the soul the immortality of influence. The ripple of each act spreads noiselessly from the centre and grows larger, moving in marvelous ways each soul it passes for cen

1 The Cathedral, Portland, July 28, 1903.

turies after the human agent has ceased its action, and ends in God. When one life-work moves all souls and sets all hearts throbbing with a nobler pulse, we recognize the greatness of God in the greatness of a single man. Such a man was the great Pontiff, Leo, greatest among rulers and humblest among men.

Who can adequately speak the worth of him whom all the world praises? Why eulogize one whose eulogy is on the lips of every man? All the world is familiar now with his life, his character and his work; all have read of his boyhood spent upon the Lepine mountains, drinking in the pure air of the hills, climbing the rugged heights for a clearer view of the world's horizon and of the vastness of the firmament; of his student years of toil and patient labor, mastering the foundation of his great learning and forming the well-ordered mind and the disciplined heart and body of the Church's soldier; of his maturer years, when the training of boyhood and manhood found their worthy field in the halls of the universities, in the courts of kings, and in the assemblies of the world's rulers; of his long, brilliant, and useful episcopate; and finally of the crown and culmination of it all

- that for which all the rest was but a perfect preparation,- his glorious Pontificate, his twenty-five years reign upon the most exalted and most responsible throne of all the world, the Chair of Peter, as the spiritual ruler of three hundred millions of souls, the universal Bishop of Christendom, the common Father of the Faithful in Christ; a height so exalted that it dominates the globe like a city set upon a hill, a rostrum from which he who speaks is heard throughout the world, and a stage the smallest scenes of which are scrutinized by all humanity. No wonder men have fled and hidden themselves when

asked to mount this awful height! Common greatness there seems but mediocrity, and the smallest error or defect becomes a world-known fault.

Up to this awful eminence, led by the hand of the Almighty, calmly trusting in Him who can do all things, his own diffidence buried in his perfect trust in God's promises, serenely, dauntlessly, hopefully, prayerfully walked this man already old in years. The world stood all attention. It gauged the task. It shook its head in doubt, as a crowd gazes at one who attempts a hazardous feat. But the strength of God that had fortified his soul through years of preparation supported him then; that noble humility, which alone with God's grace enables a man to undertake so mighty a task, girded him with power; and, while men looked on in wonder, the new Pope took his seat upon the Chair of Peter with the calmness and confidence of one sent by God to rule His people.

The times were full of trouble. Strong men's hearts were faint within them. The Church had suffered grievous tribulations in the years just passed. It was a crucial time. Surely a strong and steady hand was needed to` steer well the Bark of Peter, to shape its course safe and true in that period of stress.

The weak, bowed form with a touch firm and sure, with a vision clear and fearless, with a strength and a light as if from on high, grasped the helm of the great ship, and, with the prayer for peace ever upon his lips, commanded like his Master the wind and the waves to be still. When the world saw the Bark of Peter move on once more securely as ever, but with an added vigor, and the aged figure of the helmsman never flinching, whether in gale or calm, whether the waves dashed high