Though Hamlet's soul is not avowedly at stake, it is none the less so in reality. Its eternal loss or gain ever present to his mind, seems to haunt him through the drama and to loom up in the background of every Act in larger or smaller proportions. From the start, we are fascinated by his character. His noble nature, adorned with high intellectual gifts. and moral worth, and beauty, so wins our admiration and our sympathy, that in watchful eagerness, we accompany him in his moral struggles with ever increasing interest. We see ! him in an insufferable mental agony, aweary of the world and of life, sighing for death, and yet resolving in Christian fortitude, to bear "the heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks that flesh is heir to," rather than transgress the law of the Almighty. We see him, delicate of conscience and alert against the wiles of the evil spirit, testing the nature and veracity of the ghost. We see him in filial devotion, pledging himself to the work of "revenge," for which he sacrifices the world, life, and all, save the eternal welfare of his immortal soul. We see him sorely tempted in almost daily conflicts, when he beats down the insurrection of the man against the superman, an insurrection of blind irascible passions, which in rebellion against reason and conscience, urge him to throw his sense of Christian duty to the winds, and at once to strike the criminal in a personal revenge, even though thereby he taint his immortal soul. We see him, resolved upon a punishment approved by Christian principles of justice, seeking zealously for proofs which will justify his act before the eyes of his fellowmen, his conscience, and his God, and on this appearing hopeless, turning to an all-ruling Providence, whose Divinity shapes our destinies if we but trust in Him. We see him a solitary, wandering amid the noisy and irreligious crew of an immoral court, alone concerned with his unworthy mother, whom, from a sense of filial devotion and of

Christian piety, he labors to awaken from a sinful love, to a sense of shame and of peril to her soul. We see him everywhere in sharp contrast with the powers of evil, a noble Christian youth, who, though afflicted by the deepest melancholy at the sight of wickedness triumphant, maintains, like the lone rose in the desert waste, the fragrance of integrity. We see him at last, when, after pardoning in a Christian spirit of forgiveness the murderous act of his treacherous friend, he falls a sacrifice to sacred duty; but he falls victorious over evil, and the consciousness of this fact prompts him to appeal from time to eternity.

Our interest in the Prince survives the catastrophe. Our sympathy, which he has won, and even our affection, compel us to follow him in spirit to the life beyond the grave. That mourning cortege with martial strains, and roar of cannon, and all the glittering pomp of war, may fetter the mind of the worldling or unbeliever who cannot soar above the perishable; but the Christian man of faith accompanies in thought the hero's immortal spirit in its flight to the world invisible. The storm clouds rolling by, have left the skies impressively serene, and in the calm, deep silence of the scene, the Christian peers in fancy far beyond those twinkling sentinels of Heaven into the spirit realm where he may fondly hope that the soul of such a noble man of nature has safely reached the haven of celestial rest. His was a painful conflict, his the victory, and his now a crown enduring with the eternal years. Let our farewell to the noble-minded Prince, be re-echoed in the tender and inspiring words of his own true friend:

"Good night, sweet prince;

And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!"

APPENDIX

NOTE ON THE DOCTRINE OF REPENTANCE AND JUSTIFICATION IN RELATION TO THE CONFLICT

OF THE KING AT PRAYER (page 315)

Radically opposed to the notion of justification by faith alone. is the doctrine of the Church. She teaches that man in his very creation was by the bounty of God elevated to a supernatural state and ennobled by certain supernatural gifts and graces which, transcending his human nature, were in no manner due to it. He was, moreover, free from concupiscence, so that his sensuous appetites were perfectly subject to reason, and this freedom he was to transfer to posterity. This absolute dominion of reason over the appetites of his lower nature, was not, however, a perfection natural to his being, but wholly a preternatural gift, that is a gift not due to human nature, nor was it, on the other hand, the essence of original justice which consisted in sanctifying grace.

When man by sin forfeited his supernatural gifts he, nevertheless, retained all that belonged to his natural being as man. His sin of disobedience is commonly called original, because it formally consists in the privation of original justice by reason of the primordial sin of our common nature in the person of our first forefather. From original sin, followed, however, an inclination to evil, because of the loss of the restraining elements of original justice; for man's reason, by means of his supernatural gifts, perfectly restrained the forces of his inferior nature; and the subtraction of these gifts meant the loss of these restraints, and this loss is called "the wounding of our nature." (St. Thom. I. 2. Q. 85.)

In falling from his high estate, man's lower nature rebelled against his rational soul; his lower appetites began to lust against his spirit; and concupiscence, now unchecked, obscured the mind, and without destroying freedom of will, nevertheless, rendered it less firm in resisting evil and in pursuing good. Hence, if man's fallen nature be compared with his former state of original justice, he may be said to be wounded in his nature, or to be changed for the worse in the exercise of his powers both of soul and body.

Concupiscence in its widest acceptation is any yearning of the soul for good; but in its strict and specific acceptation, it signifies

a desire of the lower appetite contrary to reason. To understan how the sensuous and rational appetite can be opposed, it shoul be borne in mind that their natural objects are altogether differen The object of the former is the gratification of the senses; the object of the latter is the good of the whole rational nature, and consists in the subordination of the lower to the rational faculties and aga in the subordination of man to God, his supreme good and ultimate end. But the lower appetite being of itself unrestrained, pursues sensuous gratifications independently of the understanding, and without regard to the good of the higher faculties. Hence, desires contrary to the real good and order of reason may, and often do arise in it, previous to the attention of the mind, and solicit the will to assent while they more or less hinder reason from consider ing their lawfulness or unlawfulness. Such is concupiscence in its strict and specific sense. As long however, as deliberation is not impeded completely, the rational will is able to resist such desires. and withhold consent. If in fact the will resists, a struggle ensues: the sensuous appetite rebelliously demanding its gratification, reason on the contrary clinging to its own spiritual interests, and asserting its control. "The flesh lusteth against the spirit, and the spirit against the flesh."

From these considerations, it is plain that the opposition be tween appetite and reason is natural in man, and, though an imperfection, is not a corruption of human nature. Concupiscence is an effect of original sin, and inclines to sin, but its inordinate desires have not in themselves the nature of sin, and though it be true that they are temptations to sin, becoming the stronger and the more frequent, the oftener they are indulged, nevertheless, they cannot contract the nature of sin unless consent is given them by the will; for sin, being the free and deliberate transgression of the law of God, can only be in man's rational will. Though by the merits of Christ, original sin is wiped out by the sacrament of baptism, and the soul is cleansed and justified again by the infusion of sanctifying grace, yet freedom from concupiscence is not restored to man by this sacrament any more than is the gift of immortality; abundant grace is, however, given by which man may triumph over rebellious sense, and merit life everlasting.

Rejecting the new doctrine of the "Reformers" that concupi scence is original sin, that it corrupts human nature and destroys free will, the Church, moreover denies that a sinner is justified before God by faith alone. Faith, it is true, is the first subjective and indispensable condition for justification, and the root from which God's approval must spring. Both the Catholic and Protestant Christian believe that for salvation man must adhere to