The glorious Prelate heard these false charges with pity and disgust; he kept his own high way, and turned not to the right hand, neither to the left. Disdaining to reply to his injurious accusers, he appealed, in dignity and in respect, to the candid, enlightened, and generous spirit of the people of America; and thus, before a righteous and august Tribunal, he pleaded for himself: 66 : My public and private life has been devoted sedulously to the duties of my station. "I have never, in my life, done any action, or uttered any sentiment, tending to abridge a human being of all or any of the Rights of Conscience, which I claim to enjoy myself, under the American Constitution. "I have never asked or wished, that any denomination should be deprived of the Bible, or such version of the Bible, as that denomination conscientiously approved-in our Common or Public Schools. "I have never entered into intrigue, or collusion with any political party, or individual-and no political party, or individual, ever approached me with so insulting a proposition. "In all my public life in New York, I have done no action-uttered no sentiment, unworthy of a Christian Bishop and an American citizen. "I have always contended for the Right of Conscience, for all men, as universally as they are recognized in the American Constitution. "I have always preached that every denomination, Jews, Christians, Catholics, Protestants, of every sect and shade, were all entitled to the entire enjoyment of the Freedom of Conscience, without let or hindrance, from any other denomination, or set of denominations-no matter how small their number, or how unpopular the doctrines they professed. "I have always preached, both publicly and privately, the Christian obligation of peace and good will toward all men, even when they hate and persecute us. "I have been accustomed to pray publicly, in our churches, for the constituted authorities of the United States; for the welfare of my fellow citizens of all denominations, and without distinction. "I have never given but one vote since I became a citizen, and that on an occasion wholly unimportant. my life, "I have never, in the whole course of influenced my people, either individually or collectively, in their vote. "You, who must know something of human nature, need not be informed, that in all social outbreaks, particularly of a riotous character, the moral incendiary first fires the passions, and then the victims of those inflamed passions are prepared to apply the torch, or wield the murderous instrument against the objects of their fury. "Alas! alas! that men cannot be content to worship God according to the dictates of their conscience, without preventing their fellow mortals from enjoying the same privilege. On the school question, nothing more than the recognized legal Rights of Conscience has been claimed for the Catholic children. These rights, the Catholics, even under the most intolerant Governments, have never given up, and never will relinquish. They have been deprived of them by intolerant laws. If the American people are willing to enact such laws, we shall submit to pains and penalties. We interfere with no other denomination of citizenswe wish them to enjoy the same privileges that we claim for ourselves. Is not this the principle of the American Government? Is it not the pride, and the boast, and the glory of the American people? And if it be all this, why is it that Americans are opposed to it? "I am not a man of strife and contention. My disposition is, I trust, both pacific and benevolent. As a proof of this, I may mention that I have never had a personal altercation with a human being in my life that I have never had occasion to call others—or be called myself before any civil tribunal of the earth. It is true, that public duty has not unfrequently forced upon me the necessity of taking my stand in moral opposition to principles which I deemed injurious and unjust. But even then, I trust, I have made the distinction which Christian feeling suggests, between the cause and the person of the advocate arrayed against me. And though I have sometimes, perhaps, been severe on my opponents, I trust, that it proceeded not from any malice in the heart—it came on me rather as a species of intellectual indignation at witnessing bad logic employed to defend worse bigotry." It is said that the Bishop is a stern preacher in his pulpit, but a merciful Priest in his confessional. I have felt his influence in the one, and, strange to say, I have also felt it in the other. I have heard him reason of righteousness and judgment to come, until I have trembled as Felix before Paul; and beside my couch of nervous, fevered anguish, promoted by many anxieties, he stood a ministering angel; with that penetration which is the attribute of his order, he saw at once that the poor tortured body was afflicted by the excited mind; and thus he reproved my vain, my murmuring, irritable temper:-" Does this become a "Christian lady? Is this worthy of one who is "a wife and mother in Israel? Is this the example "you should place before your sons and your 66 daughters? Do you repine, even to sickness, "because you cannot possess, this hour, the trifle "that you have fixed your heart upon? Think 66 66 on this folly, think on this ingratitude, and repress that fretful and unwomanly temper, and "determine to subdue it; and to-morrow you |