Words of Wisdom.

BISHOP CURTIS, of Wilmington, Del., recently preached in the cathedral of Baltimore, Md., and made some points that are of interest to audiences more numerous than even that which heard him. No one not lost to the Catholic faith will seriously dispute these words of the bishop: "In these days men deny all the rights of God. They deny even the right of the Supreme Being to exist. We hear enough of the rights of man, but nothing in behalf of the rights of God. Of course men have certain rights which must be respected, but when they accept the duties and responsibilities of a certain station in life, they must expect their previous rights to give way to the demands of their new position. A man who desires to live in the city must give up his residence in the country, and take city life as it is; a man who desires to marry has to forego the freedom of single life. .President Cleveland cannot go abroad travelling now with the same impunity he could as a private citizen. His executive duties require his undivided attention. So it is with a priest. He forsakes his rights as layman to accept the rights given him as a clergyman, to give his life and efforts for the Church and for the poor. He has no right to go around electioneering, because there is plenty for him to do in the ministry; and if he has time to canvass votes he should give that leisure, if such it be, to his clerical duties instead."

Irish Discoverers of America

A THOUSAND YEARS AGO.

REV. J. P. BODFISH, rector of the cathedral of the Holy Cross, Boston, read a paper on the "Discovery of New England by the Northmen in the Tenth Century" before the Bostonian Society, at one of its recent meetings. Father Bodfish said the so-called New World is in reality the Old, and proofs of this are by no means wanting, but yet nothing shows the origin of these proofs. In the time of Plato the Atlantic Ocean was called the sea of darkness, and yet Plato spoke of an island to the westward, which he called Atlantis, and which was larger than Asia and Europe combined. The earliest missionaries in America describe the people they saw as bowing before the cross, and as the Irish, a maritime people, are said to have invaded Denmark, and there carried the Catholic religion, they might easily have crossed to North America, and may have been the first people to visit these shores. This, however, is merely conjecture. Near the close of the tenth century, the first voyage was performed by the Northmen from Asia to Denmark, Norway, and Greenland, from which latter place they went to Iceland, which had been settled by Irish monks A. D. 795. Greenland had several Catholic churches, and about A. D. 1100, a bishop had

charge of them. "Do the manuscripts show a pre-Columbian age?" asked Fr. Bodfish; and he then referred to the custom among the Northmen of relating all their histories, poems, etc., orally, writing and printing being unknown to them; and the degree of memory attained by these people, who were supported by the court, was surprising. The Roman style of printing was introduced among them towards the end of the twelfth century, and then the service of these historians ceased. The first voyage of the Northmen, in which New England was discovered, was by Lief, the son of Eric, who sailed from Greenland A. D. 1002, discovering first Newfoundland, then Nova Scotia, which they called Vinland, and afterwards sailing along the coast of New England until reaching Vineyard Sound and Mt. Hope Bay. They returned home in the spring, and the next year Lief's brother Thorwald made a voyage, and a second one A. D. 1004. On this latter, coming in contact with some of the natives, they murdered eight, and in a subsequent attack by the tribe of the slain, Thorwald was shot in the arm by an arrow, died, and was buried on the shore, his men returning to Vinland. A. D. 1007, three ships, with 140 men, women, and children, with cattle for a settlement, came to Nantucket and Buzzard's Bay, but dissension arose and the affair was a failure, with much suffering.

Fr. Bodfish, on the authority of Mr. Forbes, a celebrated archæologist of Rome, Italy, and others, claimed that the so-called old stone mill at Newport, R. I., was undoubtedly the work of the Normans. They would naturally, for a watch tower, erect it on a commanding site, as well, also, as a place of defence and against surprise, while the points of the building are perfectly with the points of the compass. The material and the method of using it point unmistakably to the Northmen. Woods Holl and others of like name are probably from the Norman, holl signifying a hill. In conclusion, Fr. Bodfish considered the Catholic evidence coming from the church history, and read from Dr. Richard Clark's lives of deceased bishops in this country, commencing with Eric, bishop of Vinland, A. D. 1121, and then said that it was the rule for all missionaries, and others of the priesthood of the Church, to send as often as possible to the Pope accounts of all matters, spiritual and temporal, which came under their notice, and accounts from those in New England must have been in Rome in the tenth and eleventh centuries. Columbus, during his troubles in fitting out his vessel, went to Rome, and while there was doubtless shown by the librarian maps of New England, and immediately on his return his sailors were quieted, and he sailed. While Columbus was entitled to all the credit for his bravery in battling with the ocean, it was far easier for the Northmen to sail along the coast, and far more likely they were the first to do so.

LET us humble ourselves profoundly, and acknowledge that if God be not our shield and armor, we shall be pierced through and through with every kind of sin. - St. Francis de Sales.

The Day We Celebrate.

THURSDAY will be Patrick's Day. Greater than St. George of merrie England, St. Andrew of bonnie Scotland, St. Denis of gay France, St. James of proud Spain, St. Patrick has established himself in our hearts and homes, has linked himself with our names, as no other patron saint has done with his people; and whether it is a Marshal that is proud of his descent from Irish kings, or a Prince of a ruling house that wants to curry favor with the people of the land from which he takes his title, the password to popularity and the cue to fatherland are found alike in the Christian name of Patrick. Nor let us ever forget that even as St. Patrick gave us Christianity, so did he give us a national emblem. Not lily, not rose, not thistle-no, none of these is blended with the history or the sainthood of France, England, or Scotland, as is the triple leaf with the Christianity and the nationality of Ireland. With a truly Celtic readiness our apostle plucked the tender trefoil at his feet, and thus popularly explained to his quick-pulsed hearers the tremendous mystery of the Trinity. Since that time the chosen leaf of bard and chief has been given a secular significance from the pen of the poet Moore, and every Irishman will join with us in praying that never may our country fail in the characteristics of love, and wit, and valor, which have been tunefully sung as springing from one stalk, that of Irish birth, and emblematized in one plant, the green immortal Shamrock. But if St. Patrick had Celtic readiness, Celtic courage to encounter single-handed the Druids, and unfold the truths of Christianity in the midst of a hostile court- if he loved the people for whom he labored with the purest and the noblest devotion, so had he the virtues of self restraint, persistency, prudence in an eminent degree, and there is really no use in imitating only the virtues that suit us, if we do not also model ourselves on the sterner traits which, by their judicious blending with those, make a character perfect. We do not mean to sermonize our readers this is no place for that; but it is plain that they are happier in the possession of a patron saint than most people, and all that they require for perfection, as things go here below, is the cultivation of the whole, not a moiety, of Patrick's historic virtues. He was eloquent, brave, witty, and resolute, and of a most self-sacrificing love. His selfdenial and his perseverance remain only to be imitated. Never had Irishmen greater need of those virtues. They have to face a world immersed in the gloom of international depression; they are striving for a goal which is given only to him that lasts and to the long enduring. Let the national holiday then be freely devoted to rational enjoyment, but let it not be lost in excess, squandered in dissipation. We are not of those who believe that in stimulants there is an unmixed evil, but when there is danger of immoderateness it is decidedly better totally to abstain. We notice that in the diocese of Ferns the Catholic bishop has, by the special privilege of his Holiness the Pope Leo, granted religious favors of the fullest kind to those who will abstain from intoxi

cating drinks on the eve of St. Patrick's Day, on the day itself, and the day after. It is not necessary for the general behavior of our people, who are by this time sufficiently schooled by the trials of adversity to be able to practise the virtues of self-restraint. If they are not large partakers in the blessings bestowed upon other and greater nations, they are also mercifully preserved from many of the calamities of flood and field, of war and pestilence by which those are decimated; and altogether there is much reason to be thankful that we are allowed to celebrate, under circumstances so little unfavorable, the festival of a saint whose history comes down to us through fourteen hundred years, fragmentary, indeed, in character, but with its great facts preserved undimmed by the mist of ages, and far removed from the legendary nature of the tales told of other tutelary beatifics, who yet have furnished battle cries to hosts, and spurred nations to more difficult deeds of conquest than that moral victory to which, in Patrick's name, we now invite our countrymen. Dublin Freeman's Journal.

Something About Lent:

THE Church invites her children to rejoice, at Christmas, for the birth of the Saviour is indeed a source of great joy; but she does not forget that he came into the world to suffer on account of our sins, that in the distance there is Good Friday; so three weeks before Lent she puts off her bright-colored vestments, the Gloria is no longer sung, and slowly we are prepared for the holy season of Lent, which began on the 23d of February.

On Ash-Wednesday the faithful receive the ashes on their foreheads, while the priest pronounces these words, "Remember, O man, that dust thou art, and into dust thou shalt return."

Formerly it was on Ash-Wednesday that sinners who wished to be reconciled to God, and be received into the communion of the faithful, began their public penance; the priest first heard their confessions, then they covered them with a hair skirt or sackcloth; they then put ashes on their foreheads, sprinkled them with holy water, and with all the clergy recited over them the seven penitential psalms. During the procession they walked barefooted; they were led out of the church, to be received back only on Holy Thursday. The door was closed upon them, and not till after this the Mass of the Faithful was sung.

The fast of Lent, the most celebrated fathers of the Church tell us, is of apostolic tradition, but it was only about the middle of the third century that it was made obligatory.

A single meal was allowed, and we read that towards the end of the eighth century Theodolphus, Bishop of Orleans, exhorted the faithful to abstain from eggs, cheese, milk, fish, and wine as much as they could. But he also adds that the use of these things may be allowed to the infirm and the sick, or to those who, working hard, have no other food

to sustain them, provided they make a moderate use of them, eating only once a day, and that in the evening!

Not later than two hundred years ago there could not have been found in a city of France ten families who did not abstain from AshWednesday till Easter Sunday. If a butcher sold a few pounds of meat for the sick, it was not seen, and it was at night that this meat was carried away. Wine was also forbidden.

We have said that Christians formerly took only one meal a day, and that in the evening after the Vesper service. We read, however, that in the fifteenth century this custom had changed, for the Bishop of Paris speaks of this meal being taken at the hour of noon; but it was only gradually that the Church saw herself obliged to tolerate the change.

Then, about the seventh century, we read that besides the noon meal, the religious of the Order of St. Benedict were allowed to eat in the evening a small piece of bread, but as they did not wish to lose any time, instead of having their evening reading in the hall of the chapel as usual, they had it in the refectory, and they called it "going to the collation," from the Latin name of the conference of these holy fathers. Thus the name "collation" was given, or transferred rather, from the reading of the conferences to the small evening repast; but how many people, in taking the evening collation, make the same holy use of the time as the good monks of old?

For the origin of fasting we must go back to the beginning of the world. It is a sign of grief. We read that Abraham, grieving for Sarah, and Jacob for Joseph, fasted while they mourned and prayed. The Jews fasted before and after the giving of the law. Joshua and the Ancients of Israel remained prostrated before the Ark from the morning until the evening, without taking any food. David, we are told, often fasted. The inhabitants of the city of Nineveh fasted for forty days at the preaching of Jonas, and on account of their repentance God spared their city which he had resolved to destroy.

There are in the Bible many other examples of fasting, but the greatest is that of our Saviour. He had not sinned, he had no need of doing penance, yet he fasted for forty days and forty nights! He came to teach mortification unto men, and he wished that in all the actions of our lives we should have in him a model and example. The young cannot fast, and the Church has dispensed them from it; but they can keep Lent, the rich in depriving themselves of luxuries and giving much to the poor, the poor in suffering patiently—all in doing better than ever before the duties belonging to their station in life.

MUST you be disquieted and troubled because of difficulties? Oh, by no means. It is the devil who is ferreting and spying about your mind, to see if he cannot find some door open to him. St. Francis de Sales.