C. CHINIQUY. · Section 2

C. CHINIQUY.

I would never have published this letter, if I had foreseen its effects on the farmers of Canada. In a few days after its appearance, their farms fell to half their value. Every one, in some parishes, wanted to sell their lands and emigrate to the west. It was only for want of purchasers that we did not see an emigration which would have surely ruined Canada. I was frightened by its immediate effect on the public mind. However, while some were praising me to the skies, for having published it, others were cursing me, and calling me a traitor. The very day after its publication, I was in Quebec, where the bishops of Canada were met in council. The first one I met, was my Lord De Charbonel, Bishop of Toronto. After having blessed me, he pressed my hand and said:

“I have just read your admirable letter. It is one of the most beautiful and eloquently written articles I ever read. The Spirit of God has surely inspired every one of its sentences. I have, just now, forwarded six copies of it to different journals of France and Belgium, where they will be republished and do an incalculable amount of good, by directing the French-speaking Catholic emigrants towards a country where they will run no risk of losing their faith, with the assurance of securing a future of unbounded prosperity for their families. Your name will be put among the names of the greatest benefactors of humanity.”

Though these compliments seemed to me much exaggerated and unmerited, I cannot deny that they pleased me, by adding to my hopes and convictions that great good would surely come from the plan I had of gathering all the Roman Catholic emigrants on the same spot, to form such large and strong congregations; that they would have nothing to fear from heretics. I thanked the bishop for his kind and friendly words, and left him to go and present my respectful salutations to my Bishop of Montreal, my Lord Bourget, and give him a short sketch of my voyage to the far west. I found him alone in his room, in the very act of reading my letter. A lioness, who had just lost her whelps, would not have looked upon me with more angry and threatening eyes than that bishop did.

“Is it possible,” he said, “Mr. Chiniquy, that your hand has written and signed such a perfidious document? How could you so cruelly pierce the bosom of your own country, after her dealing so nobly with you? Do you not see that your treasonable letter will give such an impetus to emigration that our most thriving parishes will soon be turned into solitude? Though you do not say it, we feel at every line of that letter, that you also will leave your country, to give help and comfort to our natural enemies.”

Surprised by this unexpected burst of bad feelings, I kept my _sang froid_, and answered:

“My lord, your lordship has surely misunderstood me, if you have found in my letter any treasonable plan to ruin our country. Please read it again, and you will see that every line has been inspired by the purest motives of patriotism, and the highest views of religion. How is it possible that the worthy Bishop of Toronto should have told me that the Spirit of God Himself had dictated every line of that letter, when my good bishop’s opinion is so completely opposite?”

The abrupt answer the bishop gave to these remarks, clearly indicated that my absence would be more welcome than my presence. I left him, after asking his blessing, which he gave me in the coldest manner possible.

On the 25th of August, I was back at Longueuil, from my voyage to Quebec, which I had extended as far as Kamouraska, to see again the noble-hearted parishioners, whose unanimity in taking the pledge of temperance, and admirable fidelity in keeping it then, had filled my heart with such joy.

I related my last interview with Bishop Bourget to my faithful friend Mr. Brassard. He answered me:

“The present bad feelings of the Bishop of Montreal against you, are no secret to me. Unfortunately the low-minded men who surround and council him, are as unable as the bishop himself, to understand your exalted views in directing the steps of the Roman Catholics towards the splendid valley of the Mississippi. They are beside themselves, because they see that you will easily succeed in forming a grand colony of French-speaking people in Illinois. Now, I am sure of what I say, though I am not free to tell you how it came to my knowledge; there is a plot somewhere to dishonor and destroy you, at once. Those who are at the head of that plot, hope that if they can succeed in destroying your popularity, nobody will be tempted to follow you to Illinois. For, though you have concealed it as well as you could, it is evident to every one now, that you are the man selected by the bishops of the west to direct the uncertain steps of the poor emigrants towards those rich lands.”

“Do you mean, my dear Mr. Brassard,” I replied, “that there are priests around the Bishop of Montreal, cruel and vile enough to forge calumnies against me, and spread them before the country in such a way that I shall be unable to refute them.”

“It is just what I mean,” answered Mr. Brassard. “Mind what I tell you; the bishop has made use of you to reform his diocese. He likes you for that work. But your popularity is too great, to-day, for your enemies; they want to get rid of you, and no means will be too vile or criminal to accomplish your destruction, if they can attain their object.”

“But, my dear Mr. Brassard, can you give me any details of the plots which are in store against me?” I asked.

“No! I cannot, for I know them not. But be on your guard; for your few, but powerful enemies, are jubilant. They speak of the absolute impotency to which you will soon be reduced; if you accomplish what they so maliciously and falsely call your treacherous objects.”

I answered; “Our Saviour has said to all His disciples; ‘In the world, ye shall have tribulations. But be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.’ I am more determined than ever, to put my trust in God and fear no man.”

Two hours after this conversation, I received the following from the Rev. M. Pare, secretary to the Bishop:

TO THE REV. MR. CHINIQUY,

Apostle of Temperance.

MY DEAR SIR:—My lord Bishop of Montreal would like to see you upon some important business. Please come at your earliest convenience.

Yours truly,

JOS. PARE, Secretary.

The next morning I was alone with Monseigneur Bourget, who received me very kindly. He seemed at first to have entirely banished the bad feelings he had shown in our last interview at Quebec. After making some friendly remarks on my continual labors and success in the cause of temperance, he stopped for a moment, and seemed embarrassed how to resume the conversation. At last he said:

“Are you not the father confessor of Mrs. Chenier?”

“Yes! my lord. I have been her confessor since I lived in Longueuil.”

“Very well, very well,” he rejoined, “I suppose that you know that her only child is a nun, in the Congregation Convent.”

“Yes! my lord, I know it,” I replied.

“Could you not induce Mrs Chenier to become a nun also?” asked the bishop.

“I never thought of that, my lord,” I answered, “and I do not see why I should advise her to exchange her beautiful cottage, washed by the fresh and pure waters of the St. Lawrence, where she looks so happy and cheerful, for the gloomy walls of the nunnery.”

“But she is still young and beautiful; she may be deceived by temptation when she is there, in that beautiful house, surrounded by all the enjoyments of her fortune,” replied the bishop.

“I understand your lordship. Yes, Mrs Chenier has the reputation of being rich; though I know nothing of her fortune, she has kept well the charms and freshness of her youth. However, I think that the best remedy against the temptations you seem to dread so much for her, is to advise her to marry. A good Christian husband seems to me a much better remedy against the dangers, to which your lordship alludes, than the cheerless walls of a nunnery.”

“You speak just as a Protestant,” rejoined the bishop, with an evident nervous irritation. “We remark that, though you hear the confessions of a great number of young ladies, there is not a single one of them who has ever become a nun. You seem to ignore, that the vow of chastity is the shortest way to a life of holiness in this world and happiness in the next.”

“I am sorry to differ from your lordship, in that matter,” I replied. “But I cannot help it, the remedy you have found against sin is quite modern. The old remedy offered by our God Himself, is very different and much better, I think.

“‘It is not good that man shall remain alone, I will make a help-mate for him,’ said our Creator in the earthly paradise. ‘And to avoid fornication, let every man have his wife, and let every woman have her husband,’ said the same God, through His apostle Paul.

“I know too well how the great majority of nuns keep their vows of chastity, to believe that the modern remedy against the temptations you mention, is an improvement on the old one found and given by our God!” I answered.

With an angry look, the bishop replied:

“This is Protestantism, Mr. Chiniquy. This is sheer Protestantism.”

“I respectfully ask your pardon for differing from your lordship. This is not Protestantism. It is simply and absolutely the ‘pure word of God.’ But, my lord, God knows that it is my sincere desire, as it is my interest and my duty, to do all in my power to deserve your esteem. I do not want to vex nor disobey you. Please give me a good reason why I should advise Mrs. Chenier to enter a monastery, and I will comply with your request the very first time she comes to confess.”

Resuming his most amiable manner, the bishop answered me:

“My first reason is, the spiritual good which she would receive from her vows of perpetual chastity and poverty in nunnery. The second reason is, that the lady is rich; and we are in need of money. We would soon possess her whole fortune; for her only child is already in the Congregation Convent.”

“My dear bishop,” I replied, “you already know what I think of your first reason. After having investigated that fact, not in the Protestant books, but from the lips of the nuns themselves, as well as from their father confessors, I am fully convinced that the real virtue of purity is much better kept in the homes of our Christian mothers, married sisters, and female friends, than in the secret rooms, not to say prisons, where the poor nuns are enchained by the heavy fetters assumed by their vows, which the great majority curse when they cannot break them.

“And for the second reason, your lordship gives me to induce Mrs. Chenier becoming a nun, I am again sorry to say, that I cannot conscientiously accept it. I have not consecrated myself to the priesthood to deprive respectable families of their legal inheritance in order to enrich myself, or anybody else. I know she has poor relations who need her fortune after her death.”

“Do you pretend to say that your bishop is a thief?” angrily rejoined the bishop.

“No, my lord! By no means. No doubt, from your high standpoint of view, your lordship may see things in a very different aspect, from what I see them, in the low position I occupy in the church. But, as your lordship is bound to follow the dictates of your conscience in everything, I also feel obliged to give heed to the voice of mine.”

This painful conversation had already lasted too long. I was anxious to see the end of it; for I could easily read in the face of my superior that every word I uttered was sealing my doom. I rose up to take leave of him, and said: “My lord, I beg your pardon for disappointing your lordship.”

He coldly answered me:

“It is not the first time, though I would it were the last, that you show such a want of respect and submission to the will of your superiors. But, as I feel it is a conscientious affair on your part, I have no ill-will against you, and I am happy to tell you that I entertain for you all my past esteem. The only favor I ask from you, just now, is that this conversation may be kept secret.”

I answered: “It is still more to my interest than yours to keep this unfortunate affair a secret between us. I hope that neither your lordship, nor the Great God, who alone has heard us, will ever make it an imperious duty for me to mention it.”

“What good news do you bring me from the bishop’s palace?” asked my venerable friend, Mr. Brassard, when I returned, late in the afternoon.

“I would have very spicy, though unpalatable news to give you, had not the bishop asked me to keep what has been said between us a secret.”

Mr. Brassard laughed outright, at my answer, and replied:

“A secret! a secret! Ah! but it is a gazette secret; for the bishop has bothered me, as well as many others, with that matter, frequently, since your return from Illinois. Several times he has asked us to persuade you to advise your devoted penitent, Mrs. Chenier, to become a nun. I knew he invited you to his palace, yesterday, for that object.”

“The eyes and the heart of our poor bishop,” continued Mr. Brassard, “are too firmly fixed on the fortune of that lady. Hence, his zeal about the salvation of her soul, through the monastic life. In vain I tried to dissuade the bishop from speaking to you on that subject, on account of your prejudices against our good nuns. He would not listen to me. No doubt you have realized my worst anticipations; you have, with your usual stubbornness, refused to yield to his demands. I fear you have added to his bad feelings, and consummated your disgrace.”

“What a deceitful man that bishop is,” I answered indignantly. “He has given me to understand that this was a most sacred secret between him and me; when I see, by what you say, that it is nothing else than a farcical secret, known by the hundreds who have heard of it.

“But please, my dear Mr. Brassard, tell me, is it not a burning shame that our nunneries are changed into real traps, to steal cheat and ruin so many unsuspecting families? I have no words to express my disgust and indignation, when I see that all those great demonstrations and eloquent tirades about the perfection and holiness of the nuns, on the part of our spiritual rulers, are nothing else, in reality, than a veil to conceal their stealing operations. Do you not feel that those poor nuns are the victims of the most stupendous system of swindling the world has ever seen?

“I know that there are some honorable exceptions. For instance, the nunnery you have founded here, is an exception. You have not built it to enrich yourself, as you have spent your last cent in its erection. But you and I are only simpletons, who have, till now, ignored the terrible secrets which put that machine of the nunneries and monkeries in motion. I am more than ever disgusted and terrified, not only by the unspeakable corruptions, but also by the stupendous system of swindling which is their foundation stone. If the cities of Quebec and Montreal could know what I know of the incalculable sums of money secretly stolen through the confessional to aid our bishops in building the famous cathedrals and splendid palaces, or to cover themselves with robes of silk, satin, silver and gold; to live more luxurious than the Pashas of Turkey, they would set fire to all those palatial buildings; they would hang the confessors who have thrown the poor nuns into these dungeons, under the pretext of saving their souls, when the real motive was to lay hands on their inheritance and raise their colossal fortunes.

The bishop has opened before me a most deplorable and shameful page of the history of our church. It makes me understand many facts which were a mystery to me till to-day. Now I understand the terrible wrath of the English people in the days of old, and of the French people more recently, when they so violently wrenched from the hands of the clergy the enormous wealth they had accumulated during the dark ages. I have condemned those great nations till now. But, to-day, I absolve them. I am sure that those men, though blind and cruel in their vengeance, were the ministers of the justice of God. The God of heaven could not, forever, tolerate a sacrilegious system of swindling, as I know, now, to be in operation from one end to the other, not only of Canada, but of the whole world, under the mask of religion. I know that the bishop and his flatterers will hate and persecute me for my stern opposition to his rapacity. But I do feel happy and proud of his hatred.

The God of truth and justice, the God of the gospel, will be on my side, when they attack me. I do not fear them; let them come. That bishop surely did not know me, when he thought that I would consent to be the instrument of his hypocrisy, and that, under the false pretext of a delusive perfection, I would throw that lady into a dungeon for her life, that he might become rich with her inheritance.”

Mr. Brassard answered me: “I cannot blame you for your disobeying the bishop, in this instance. I foretold him what has occurred; for I knew what you think of the nuns. Though I do not go as far as you in that, I cannot absolutely shut my eyes to the facts which stare us in the face. Those monkish communities have, in every age, been the principal cause of the calamities which have befallen the church. For their love of riches, their pride and laziness, with their other scandals, have always been the same.

“Had I been able to foresee what has occurred inside the walls of the nunnery I built up here, I never would have erected it. However, now that I have built it, it is the child of my old age; I feel bound to support it to the end. This does not prevent me from being afflicted when I see the facility with which our poor nuns yield to the criminal desires of their too weak confessors. Who could have thought, for instance, that that lean and ugly superior of the oblates, Father Allard, could have fallen in love with his young nuns, and that so many would have lost their hearts on his account. Have you heard how the young men of our village, indignant at his spending the greater part of the night with the nuns, have whipped him, when he was crossing the bridge, not long before his leaving Longueuil for Africa? It is evident that our bishop multiplies too fast those religious houses.

“My fear is that they will, sooner than we expect, bring upon our Church of Canada the same cataclysms which have so often desolated her in England, France, Germany and even in Italy.”

The clock struck twelve just when this last sentence fell from the lips of Mr. Brassard. It was quite time to take some rest. When leaving me for his sleeping room, he said: “My dear Chiniquy, gird your loins well, sharpen your sword for the impending conflict. My fear is that the bishop and his advisers will never forget your wrenching from their hands the booty they were coveting so long.

“They will never forgive the spirit of independence with which you have rebuked them.

“In fact, the conflict is already begun; may God protect you against the open blows, and the secret machinations they have in store for you.”

I answered him: “I do not fear them. I put my trust in God. It is for His honor I am fighting and suffering. He will surely protect me from those sacrilegious traders in souls.”