Kitabı oku: «Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 4, April, 1886», sayfa 9

Some dogs take offence very easily. I know one absurd, diminutive creature, who has the greatest dislike to being talked about, and directly he hears any one mention his name even, he gets up and walks out of the room in the most dignified way possible, looking round all the time, as much as to say, "How dare you talk about me?"

Another dog belonging to a friend took great offence because he could not have his own way. He is a nice old dog, very old and quite blind, and has always lived with the same master, to whom he is quite devoted, accompanying him everywhere, and at night keeping guard on the mat at his bedroom door. A short time ago his master went on a visit to a house about sixty miles distant from his own home, and as usual his old favorite went with him. When night came, the old dog, having found out his master's room, posted himself, as he had always been accustomed to do, at his door. But the servants of the house, not knowing his ways, drove him downstairs. The next day the dog was gone; but was heard of soon afterwards, having returned to his own home. He had taken offence at not being allowed to sleep where he liked, and had found his way back, in spite of the distance and his blindness.

THE CALIFORNIA ROADRUNNER. (Geococcyx Californianus.)

A very singular and yet a very little known bird is the roadrunner chaparral cock, or, as it is known in Mexico and the Spanish sections of the United States, the paisano.

It belongs to the cuckoo family, but has none of the bad habits by which the European cuckoo is best known. It is a shy bird, but is not by any means an unfamiliar object in the south-western portions of the United States and in Mexico. Sometimes it wanders up into middle California, but not often, seeming to prefer the more deserted, hotter, and sandier parts of southern California, and from there stretching its habitat as far east as middle Texas.

It is not by any means a brilliantly colored bird, although some of its hues are very beautiful. The prevailing color of the roadrunner is olive green, which is marked with brown and white. The top of the head is blue black, and is furnished with an erectile crest. The eyes are surrounded by a line of bare skin.

It is not a large bird, being seldom twenty-four inches long, with a tail taking more than half of that length. The tail, indeed, is the most striking feature of the bird, being not only so very long, but seemingly endowed with the gift of perpetual motion, since it is never still, but bobs up and down, and sidewise, too, into every possible angle, and almost incessantly.

But while its tail is most striking, its legs are most remarkable, being not only long and stout, but wonderfully muscular, how muscular nobody would be able to imagine who had not put them to the test.

A traveller in Mexico tells of going out with his ranchero host to hunt hares with a brace of very fine hounds. Going over a long stretch of sandy plain, relieved only by pillars and clusters of cactus, the Mexican called the attention of his guest to an alert, comical-looking bird, some distance from them.

With the remark that the gentleman should see some rare coursing, the Mexican slipped the leashes of the straining hounds, which sprang off as if used to the sport, and darted after the bird. For a moment it seemed to the stranger a very poor use to put the dogs to, but he was not long in changing his mind.

Instead of taking wing, the bird tilted its long tail straight up into the air in a saucily defiant way, and started off on a run in a direct line ahead. It seemed an incredible thing that the slender dogs, with their space devouring bounds, should not at once overtake the little bird; but so it was. The legs of the paisano moved with marvellous rapidity, and enabled it to keep the hounds at their distance for a very long time, being finally overtaken only after one of the gamest races ever witnessed by the visiting sportsman.

The roadrunner, however, serves a better purpose in life than being run down by hounds. Cassin mentions a most singular circumstance among the peculiarities of the bird. It seems to have a mortal hatred of rattlesnakes, and no sooner sees one of those reptiles than it sets about in what, to the snake, might well seem a most diabolical way of compassing its death. Finding the snake asleep, it at once seeks out the spiniest of the small cacti, the prickly pear, and, with infinite pains and quietness, carries the leaves, which it breaks off, and puts them in a circle around the slumbering snake. When it has made a sufficient wall about the object of all this care, it rouses its victim with a sudden peck of its sharp beak, and then quickly retires to let the snake work out its own destruction, a thing it eventually does in a way that ought to gratify the roadrunner, if it has any sense of humor. Any one watching it would say it was expressing the liveliest emotion with its constantly and grotesquely moving tail.

The first impulse and act of the assaulted snake is to coil for a dart; its next to move away. It quickly realizes that it is hemmed in, in a circle, and finally makes a rash attempt to glide over the obstruction. The myriad of tiny needles prick it and drive it back. The angry snake, with small wisdom, attempts to retaliate by fastening its fangs into the offending cactus. The spines fill its mouth.

Angrier still, it again and again assaults the prickly wall, until, quite beside itself with rage, it seems to lose its wits completely, and writhing and twisting horribly, buries its envenomed fangs into its own body, dying finally from its self-inflicted wounds. After the catastrophe, the roadrunner indulges in a few gratified flirts of its long tail and goes off, perchance to find its reward in being run down by hounds set on by men.

John R. Coryell, in Scientific American.

Man is hard to satisfy. Poverty is the only thing he can get enough of

POWER OF THE "LORD'S PRAYER" AND THE "HAIL MARY."

In 1836, while connected with the Church of St. Roque, I was for a long time engaged in giving catechetical instruction to the children; not only the ordinary catechism, but what we called, and what is still called, catechism of perseverance, at which young persons of both sexes attended until their marriage.

One day I was called upon to solemnize the marriage of one of these young persons, who was very pious; she had most assiduously followed our instructions until the hour of this great engagement; her betrothed was a practical Catholic, so that it was one of those marriages which we can bless with hope and consolation.

Ordinarily an exhortation is given on these occasions; I said a few words according to the custom, and I still remember that while speaking I had a distraction; it was caused by a tall man, at least six foot high, who stood erect while every one else was seated, looking at me with a fixed, intense gaze, and, as he was one of the first witnesses at the ceremony, he stood scarcely three steps from me. This proximity, his great height, his original manner, and his fixed look, had, as you may readily understand, attracted my attention, for a moment, and then I cast the impression aside. After the ceremony all retired, and I thought all was finished; far from it. At five o'clock the next morning my bell was rung by the bridegroom, who came in great haste to summon me to a dying man, his uncle, the same tall man who had so singularly distracted me the previous evening. He was quite aged, seventy-four years old; he had taken cold at the wedding ceremony, and the physician declared he could not live. I started immediately, and as we went along the street, I asked, "Was your uncle a good Christian?" – "He was a good man; but we fear that he neglected his religious duties." – "Has he any idea of his dangerous condition?" – "Yes, he is fully sensible of it." – "Does he wish to see me?" – "Yes, when we saw that he was struck by death, we asked him if he would not like to see a priest, and he did not refuse. After a moment he said 'bring me the one I heard yesterday; he pleased me, and he will arrange my affairs.'"

The bridegroom informed me that his uncle had come from the country to attend his wedding, and he was then at a hotel in a cross street. (I have never since passed that hotel without emotion.) We entered, and I was left alone with him. Before me lay this poor old man dying. I approached, and he immediately held out his hand. There was something very frank and noble in his manner. "I am going to die," he said, "and I wish to do whatever is done at such a time. I am seventy-four years old, and for sixty years I have not been to confession. At fourteen I enlisted; I have been in all the wars of the Revolution and the empire; I have never thought of God during all the time, and I know not why. I now feel that I ought not to leave the world before being reconciled to Him, just as if I had always known Him." Touched by his frankness and his extraordinary sincere expression, I replied, "I will aid you to know Him, and God will aid us; such things are easy for those of an upright, candid heart." But it was not so very easy, after all, and you will readily perceive. When, by the assistance of many questions, I had finished his confession for him, "Now," I said, "I'll give you a penance." – "What is that? I have not the least idea of it." And, in truth, he had not the first idea of religion, of the Sacrament of Penance, or any other Sacrament… A poor, dying man, whose hairs were bleached by the snows of fourscore winters, was passing from earth without having a single idea of Christianity; merely an instinct prompted him to wish for a reconciliation with God before his death.

I explained the meaning of penance and said: "You suffer very much; offer your sufferings to our Blessed Lord, and that will enable me to give you an easy penance; you need only say the 'Our Father' and the 'Hail Mary.'" He looked at me for a moment with the most intent and piercing gaze, for, although so exhausted by age and sickness, he had a most extraordinary energy in his eye, and said "'Our Father,' 'Hail Mary!' What do they mean? I have never heard anything about them." Yes, this was the state which the poor miserable man had reached; seventy-four years old and he had forgotten even the prayers that infants in their mothers' arms lisp in childish accents. Religion was utterly obliterated from his soul! There remained nothing, nothing! I cast a look toward heaven, and I felt that a miracle was needed to bring back the pastor to enlighten his darkened soul.

"You ought to know, that those prayers are the most beautiful in religion. I will assist you; I will say them myself; you will say them afterward with me, and then you will find all you have lost."

Kneeling down by his bedside, and holding his hand in both of mine, I commenced. He let me say the two or three first invocations of the "Our Father," but when I said, "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them who trespass against us," he suddenly pressed my hand, and as one arousing from a long sleep he exclaimed, "Oh! I remember that. Yes! I think when I was a little boy my mother taught me something like that. Will you please commence it again?" I recommenced it and then instantaneously, from the depths of his soul, across his darkened mind, and from far away in his early childhood – across seventy-four years – across all those wars and all those battle-fields which had passed over his life and effaced from his soul all ideas of religion, came back to this old soldier the remembrance of his mother, and the prayers she had taught him when a little boy, and he commenced unaided to recall the words. One by one I saw them leave his soul, as if they had all been engulfed, and were now rising to the surface. At each sentence he interrupted himself: "Oh!" he exclaimed, "I remember – 'Our Father who art in heaven' – yes, indeed, that is it – 'Hallowed be Thy name' – that is it again! – I remember it all now! – 'Thy Kingdom come.' – Yes, yes, I remember I used to say all that – oh! isn't that prayer beautiful!" And when he came to the words "Forgive us our trespasses," – "Ah," he cried, "above all the rest, I remember that – those are the words that brought all the rest back to me; my mother used to make me say that whenever I did anything wrong." And in this manner he finished the "Our Father;" then he asked to say it with me, and seemed never weary in repeating it over and over.

"But," he exclaimed, "is there not another? Oh! yes, now I remember, my mother said there was a Blessed Virgin – stop – I must find that prayer also! But it won't come back. Say it to me so that I can remember, all about it." And when I repeated the first words, he interrupted me with a joyful cry, "Oh! yes, that is it, 'Hail Mary!'" And then, without waiting for me to take the lead, he continued, "full of grace, the Lord is with thee," and all the words seemed to flow miraculously from his soul, and with tears flowing down his cheeks, he repeated, "Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us poor sinners, now and the hour of our death."

Behold in this old man the power of the prayers which a pious mother had taught him in his childhood! Precious germs deposited in his soul, and a long time deposited there – but, thank God, they were there – and at the supreme moment, under a favorable ray of Divine grace, they burst forth to support him in his last hours, and to open for him the gates of a happy eternity! He never wearied in saying them, but continued constantly repeating them.

Finally, seeing that he was fatigued, I left him promising to return as soon as he had taken some repose. And I did return very soon, for I was most anxious to give him Holy Communion. He received the Viaticum with the most lively faith: all had been revealed with those two prayers. I had nothing more to teach him.

Bishop Doupanloup

"In this world there is nothing dearer to God Himself than the soul of a little child made to His own likeness and to His own image, born again and sanctified by the Holy Ghost. Innocent, those little ones are the nearest to Him of His servants upon earth, numbered among His saints. And they are the most exposed to all manner of peril in this loud and lordly world that passes them by, and accounts them to be cyphers in its reckoning, and legislates for them as if they were flocks in a field, or chattels, or property. Precious in God's sight, little barefooted, bareheaded children that pass through the streets have each an Angel Guardian, and yet they are surrounded by all the perils that prowl and make havoc in the cities where we dwell. The offspring of all the animals of the lower creation, almost as soon as they come into this world, are able to care for themselves; but man, who is the highest, and noblest, and like a god himself, is the most helpless. And, therefore, in that helpless infancy and tender childhood, those who cannot care for themselves, are committed to our guardianship." —Cardinal Manning.

Uneasy rests the foot that wears a corn

Lenten Pastorals

In Dublin, on Sunday, March 7, Archbishop Walsh said: With singular unanimity the leaders of all parties in the State have come at length to recognize the pressing need of a substantial construction of that system of government under which we at present live. So much is certain; but beyond this all is shrouded from our view in the uncertainty of the future. The minds of many among us are agitated. All around us are heard expressions of anxiety, and the fears and hopes of those who speculate as to what the next few weeks may bring forth. Amid all this uncertainty it is our special duty to turn to the throne of the Almighty and all-wise ruler of the universe in earnest supplication, that the light of the heavenly wisdom, by which kings reign and lawgivers decree just things, may not be wanting to those statesmen and public men by whom the momentous issues now raised will have to be decided, and on whose prudence in council, or action, in the public Senate of the empire provision to be made for the future protection of so many and such vital interests in spiritual, no less than in temporal, order must so largely depend.

From Galway it is learned that the pastoral read there contained this expression: "Let us ask that wretched tenants who find it impossible to meet their engagements at the present, and who are threatened with eviction from their humble homes, may be allowed at least a few months' respite until they can profit by the legislation which just and enlightened statesmanship will devise for their relief, and for the lasting peace and prosperity of Ireland."

Speaking at Lismore, Archbishop Croke said, that when he next had the pleasure of passing through the town, he hoped that the Irish cause would have wonderfully progressed, and that the great statesman, Mr. Gladstone, would have not only permanently and satisfactorily settled the land question, put an end to evictions and restored the Irish soil to the Irish people, but would have also carried through Parliament the changes now at hand, which would lead to the restoration of an Irish Parliament.

The Working Men. —New York Sun: "Never before in the history of labor in this country was it so united, and, consequently, so powerful. Its cohesion and unity of action are unexampled in the annals of trade organizations. Therefore, at this, of all moments, we say beware! Be moderate and be temperate. The true interests of the employer, if he be wise, are identical with your interests, and see to it now that no misuse of victory lead you to change places with the oppressor."

Notes on Current Topics

The Largest Donation Yet. – Fifteen thousand people attended two concerts given by Patrick S. Gilmore at Madison Square Gardens in aid of the Parliamentary fund. The two concerts netted $6,000. This beats all the Irish millionnaires of New York City.

Springfield Republican: No Irish patriotic movement before has approached the present one for unity and constancy of purpose, and it has been due to Parnell's cold temper and iron resolution, sustained by his steady success in his own clear-headed plan of advance.

Our Cardinal. —Lake Shore Visitor: The question of the Cardinalate is settled. If now some of the papers don't openly assert that there is a mistake somewhere the matter will very likely die out. In the meantime everybody seems to be satisfied. Cardinal Gibbons will be an ornament to the Church as its American Cardinal.

Parnell. —Dublin Freeman's Journal: If there ever was a time in the history of this country when a leader of the people was entitled to all the confidence that it is possible for the people to repose in him, that time is the present. Confidence in Mr. Parnell has never been misplaced by the inhabitants of this country. He has not only never led them wrong, but he has, on the contrary, surpassed all former Irish leaders in soundness of judgment and accuracy of prevision. The Irish people recognize the fact, and place full confidence in Mr. Parnell. The Galway incident affords a proof of this, of which the partisan press of England should make a note.

The Irish Bishops to Gladstone. – The bishops met, on the 18th inst., in Archbishop Walsh's residence in Dublin, and drew up a statement of their views on the Irish question, which they sent to Mr. Gladstone. The bishops say to the Premier that they consider that the result of the elections has answered Mr. Gladstone's appeal to the Irish people to "speak out." They add that the bishops believe that Home Rule would not affect the union or the supremacy of the Crown, and urge the suspension of evictions until the land question has been settled.

The Mayor of New York lectured for the benefit of the Carney Hospital, on Sunday evening, February 21. The theatre was crowded, and the Mayor delivered a very interesting lecture. The hospital will probably realize some fifteen hundred dollars from the lecture. New York Sun: His Honor Mayor Grace has been to Boston and has had a magnificent boom there. He made several speeches and impressed the Bostonians. We have never had a civic magistrate who could beat Mayor Grace in speaking. Boston always wakes up when a powerful New Yorker goes over there.

At the Recent Meeting of Englishmen and Scotchmen in London to form a "Home Rule Association," to assist the cause of Irish Home Rule, Lord Ashburnham took the chair. Lord Clifton, the son of the Earl of Darnley, spoke of "that great statesman, whom I am proud to call a near relation, my cousin, Mr. Parnell." The Irish leader is a cousin of Lord Darnley and Lord Clifton. The latter's words are remarkable at a time like the present.

Messrs. M. A. Ring & Sons, dealers in paper stock, Boston, who failed two years ago, compromised with their creditors in full, for twenty cents on the dollar, and continued their business without serious interruption. Meeting with fair success, the firm have voluntarily paid all their merchandise creditors the other eighty cents, with one exception, and that will be paid in full at an early date. It is seldom that so honorable a course of action is adopted after parties are released from all legal obligations, and it reflects credit on the honesty and energy of the young men composing the firm.

FIVE-DOLLAR PARLIAMENTARY FUND

Address to the Liberty-Loving People of New England

To the men and women of Boston and New England who love the cause of Liberty: At a meeting held in Union Hall, Boston, on the evening of February 16, the undersigned were appointed an executive committee and empowered to issue an address to the liberty-loving men and women of New England, in aid of the five-dollar parliamentary fund voted to be raised at the above meeting to uphold the constitutional efforts of Charles Stewart Parnell and his patriotic coadjutors in the British House of Commons, and their grand struggle for home rule for Ireland.

To the native and adopted citizen alike we appeal, and earnestly request that in every town and city of New England immediate action be taken to make this fund a success, and that the proceeds be sent through one common channel to Mr. Parnell. We hope the fund thus created will prove worthy of New England, whose people are largely composed of the Celtic race, and that free New England's tribute to struggling old Ireland will be such that its example will be followed in other sections of the country.

Let us make the five-dollar subscription list of New England to the Irish parliamentary fund famous in the history of this struggle of the Irish race.

We request that all who sympathize will add their names to the patriotic list, and that committees similar to that of Boston be formed in every town. Asa P. Potter, president of the Maverick National Bank, Col. Charles H. Taylor, editor of the Boston Globe, and J. B. Hand, Esq., have been appointed trustees of the fund, and we request that all moneys collected be sent to Mr. Parnell through them. We further ask that all newspapers in New England in sympathy with this movement kindly copy this address, and that those who wish to subscribe shall send their five dollars to the trustees or to either of the undersigned.

• Hugh O'Brien,

• Mayor of Boston,

Edward Riley

John E. Fitzgerald

John Boyle O'Reilly

Dominick Toy,

T. M. Bradley,

Patrick Maguire,

John R. Murphy,

John Miller,

W. W. Doherty,

• Executive Committee.

T. J. Murphy,

William Ferguson,

Secretaries.

Gradually Falling into Our Hands. – There is not a diocese in the Union which has not profited by sheriff's sales of Protestant educational property. The great seminary at Troy was once a Methodist college. Last month Archbishop Ryan bought out a Protestant college building and gave it over to the Sisters of the Good Shepherd. For thirty-five years it had been the Alma Mater of a local Protestant body. The Baptist College at Chicago will soon have a cross upon it. So the story goes – Protestantism receding and the Church making progress on every side. Next? Many of the school houses.

The Misses Drexel, the three daughters of the late F. A. Drexel, the Philadelphia banker, have purchased two hundred acres near Bristol upon which they will establish an industrial home and school for orphan boys to be placed under the care of the Christian Brothers.

Another proof has been given, if proof were wanting, of the influence which the Freemasons possess in ministerial circles in Italy, by the appointment of the Cavaliere Sisca to the post of Secretary of the Commission for Ecclesiastical Property. This Sisca is an apostate priest, who has gone through the form of a civil marriage. The appointment, therefore, is one more deliberate insult to the bishops and clergy of Italy, and is, in fact, one thoroughly worthy in all respects of the usurping government which has made it.

The restriction as to the days of the week (Monday and Tuesday) on which priests could heretofore celebrate the two weekly Requiem Masses allowed them, has been abrogated, and they are now free to suit their convenience as to the days they may prefer to select.

The charter of Brown University, Providence, R. I., requires that the president of that institution "must forever be of the denomination called Baptists." Forever! There won't be a live Baptist a hundred years hence. Then what will become of that charter, asks the Catholic Union and Times.

During the darkest hours of the Revolutionary War, when the finances of the Colonies were at the lowest ebb – when the Continental troops were actually suffering from the want of necessary food and clothing – the merchants of Philadelphia displayed one of the noblest acts of patriotism recorded in the annals of American history. In June, 1780, ninety-three of them subscribed three hundred thousand pounds "to support the credit of a bank to be established for furnishing a supply of provisions for the armies of the United States," and of these ninety-three subscribers, twenty-seven were members of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick, and these twenty-seven sons of Ireland contributed one hundred and three thousand pounds – more than one-third of the total amount. Among the records of the Friendly Sons of St. Patrick (now in possession of their successor, the Hibernian Society of Philadelphia), is subscribed to its By-Laws the autograph signature of Geo. Washington, an adopted member of the society.

The Only Men Wanted West. – Mr. F. A. Carle, the managing editor of the St. Paul Pioneer Press, said of the prospects of a young man in the West: "There is money for the young man who will go out there and 'hustle.' Those who don't want to do that can get along just as well in the East. If you go West with energy and perseverance and make up your mind to take what comes during the first few years without making a face at it, you will do well – much better than here. Those are the only kind of people that we want out here."

A Noble Work. – The Catholics of Pittsburgh, Penn., have begun a good work which should be taken up and developed all over the country. They have instituted a "Catholic Prisoners' Reform Association," the objects of which are to instruct the convicts during their imprisonment, provide them with good books, and to assist them to a new start in life when discharged. Bishop Phelan gives his countenance to the new society, and promises it a chaplain.

The Catholic total abstinence societies are not only doing a good work for the Irish in America, but they are not wanting in forwarding the welfare of the Irish in Ireland. The Catholic total abstinence societies of Philadelphia have just raised $8,500 for the Irish Parliamentary fund.

A Great University. – According to the annual statistics just issued, the Catholic University of Louvain had a much higher number of students during the academical year just closed (1884-85) than ever before – the inscriptions reaching a total of 1,638, as against 1,555 in the preceding year. Some idea of the rapid growth of the Alma Mater may be obtained from the following figures, showing the number of students registered:

Again, to show the influence which the University has had upon the ecclesiastical and professional life of Belgium, we may remark that, since its establishment in 1834, no less than 3,942 candidates have passed through the faculty of theology; 10,746 through that of law; 9,563 through that of medicine; 7,406 through that of science; and 5,762 through that of philosophy and letters (our "arts"). Again, during last year, the Alma Mater gave to Belgium 49 avocats, 15 notaries, 44 medical practitioners, and 39 engineers. Nearly all civilized countries are represented among the students; among the rest three English and one Irish.

A Protestant Clergyman, formerly American Consul at Amsterdam, says: "During the last thirty years the Roman Catholic Church has been extending its influence in Holland, until to-day the Romanists command nearly one-half of the population, and have, to a great extent, the control of the public schools and of popular elections."

The Perils and sufferings of missionaries in Manitoba are probably not greater anywhere else in the world. They undergo almost incredible hardships in following the Indians from place to place (the only way of gaining a lasting influence over them); travelling in dog-sleighs or on foot, their food often consisting of only dried fish unsalted. In past years two were drowned while crossing ice; their dog train also perished. Another missionary was drowned by the upsetting of a skiff in a squall whilst trying to save an Indian boy, who was his guide. Three priests were also frozen to death in a blizzard on the prairies.

Catholic Congress. – An interesting Congress is to mark next year. The recent Catholic Congress of Normandy appointed a section for Christian Apologetics, and this section has just decided to summon for 1887 a great "International Congress of Catholic Savants," to be held in Paris. The organizing committee, nominated at Rouen, met for the first time in Paris on December 28th, under the Presidency of Mgr. de Hulst, Rector of the Catholic Faculty of that city. The committee now consists of twenty-seven members resident in Paris, and twenty-eight in the provinces or abroad. Among these we may mention the eminent Bollandist and historian, Père de Smedt, S. J.; Professors Gilbert and de Harlez, of the University of Louvain; Kurth, of Liège; de Lapporent and Duchesne, of Paris, de Margerie, of Lille; Valson, of Lyons; Duilhé de St. Projet, of Toulouse; de Nadaillac, de Beaucourt, de l'Epinois, Paul Allard, and many other names illustrious in science, history, literature, and other departments of learning. The work of the Congress will fall into three divisions: 1. Philosophical and Social Sciences; 2. Exact and Natural Sciences; 3. Historical Sciences; and each division will comprehend five sections. The President will shortly issue a circular describing in detail the organization and plan of work, and inviting all the Catholic savants of Europe to participate in the preliminary labors, principally by the drawing up of memoirs, and fixing the actual state of science in regard to the various questions affecting Christian Faith.