Carl E. Olson's Blog, page 315

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You know the pro-abort crowd is running scared...

... when it starts fretting about the deep and unsolvable carpooling crises that would be caused by acknowledging that human life and "personhood" do in fact begin at conception:

And it's not just medical questions raised by personhood laws. Would pregnant women be counted as two people for the purposes of using carpool lanes on the highway? Could fetuses inherit property?

Wow, those are heavy questions. How much better to error on the side of destroying human life! The quote is from the conclusion of an NPR piece, "Abortion Foes Push To Redefine Personhood", which reports:

The question being raised in legal terms is: When does someone become a person?

The answer varies under the law. "The definition of personhood ranges if you're talking about property law, or inheritance, or how the census is taken," says Alexa Kolbi-Molinas, an attorney with the American Civil Liberties Union's Reproductive Freedom Project.

All those differences are exactly what Keith Mason wants to change. He's president of Personhood USA, a group that's trying to rewrite the laws and constitutions of every state — and some countries — to recognize someone as a person "exactly at creation," he says. "It's fertilization; it's when the sperm meets the egg."

Which begs the question: If someone really is a person and yet, for whatever reason, isn't recognized as such, shouldn't such an injustice be rectified? The NPR piece seems to take the position that Mason is simply going to create a lot of legal headaches for people, as though he is some sort of crank. But it's also evident that the pro-abort/pro-contraception crowd doesn't want reality to get in the way of their "reproductive justice". And, as Dr. Francis J. Beckwith demonstrates quite well in Defending Life (Cambridge, 2007), the supposed debate about when when a new human life begins has been over for a long time, regardless of what Nancy Pelosi might say. For example, Beckwith notes that in testimony given before a Senate Judiciary Committee thirty years ago, numerous medical authorities, professors, and physicians were unanimous way back then in saying that a new human life begins at conception. The French geneticist Jerome L. LeJeune said in his testimony: "To accept the fact that after fertilization has taken place a new human has come into being is no longer a matter of taste or opinion." (Of course, he wasn't mindful of the completely objective tastes and super-reasonable opinions of NPR, was he?) And, to take a more recent example, the textbook, Human Embryology and Teratology (Wiley-Liss, 2001; third edition), states:

It needs to be emphasized that life is continuous, as is also human life, so that the question, "When does (human) life begin?" is meaningless in terms of ontogeny. Although life is a continuous process, fertilization (which, incidentally, is not a "moment") is a critical landmark because, under ordinary circumstances, a new, genetically distinct human organism is formed when the chromosones of the male and female pronuclei blend in the oocyte." (p. 2).

In other words, not only does the process of fertilization/conception result in a new human life, referring to this new life as a mass of cells or a clump of tissue is completely opposed to scientific, medical fact: "a new, genetically distinct human organism is formed...". But that doesn't stop the author of the NPR piece from throwing up some of the usual smoke screens:

But while that fertilized egg may or may not signal the beginning of personhood, there's one thing it definitely does not begin. Medically, at least, fertilization does not mark the beginning of pregnancy.

"The medical community has really been quite clear about when pregnancy begins," says Dan Grossman, an obstetrician/gynecologist at the University of California, San Francisco, "and that definition is that pregnancy begins once implantation occurs."

That would be the implantation of the fertilized egg into the woman's uterus. One reason doctors don't consider a woman pregnant until after implantation is a practical one — that's when pregnancy can be detected by hormone changes in her urine.

The fact that fertilization happens before a pregnancy begins/implantation occurs is really neither here nor there, but it is a common ploy to throw people off track of the essential issue. The fact is, if a human being exists once fertilization takes place, it exists. Period. Trying to qualify it by saying or suggesting that it doesn't really exist until it is known via a pregnancy test is an obviously weak argument. As Beckwith notes, "it is not essential to your existence as a human being whether anyone knows you exist, for you are who you are regardless of whether others are aware of your existence. One interacts with a human being, one does not make a being human by interacting with it." (p. 73).

The NPR piece than moves on to the second objection (in the same order that Beckwith addresses them in his book):

But there's another reason, Grossman says. "It's really only about half of those fertilized eggs [that] actually result in an ongoing pregnancy."

The rest of the fertilized eggs either never begin dividing or never implant. Or they do implant but spontaneously abort. That can happen so early in pregnancy that the woman never even knows she was pregnant.

So from a medical point of view, considering every fertilized egg a person, with a person's full rights, wouldn't make a lot of sense, he says.

This is an especially illogical tact for, as Beckwith notes, "it does not logically follow from the number of unborn entities who die [by miscarriage or 'spontaneous abortion'] that these entities are by nature not human beings who have begun their existence." He points out that playing such a numbers game ignores a basic fact: "all human beings who are conceived die." Does this mean, therefore, that none of these—regardless of when they perish—are human beings?

There is more, including some hand-wringing over what this all means for those who use contraceptives. Of course, the connection between contraceptives and abortion is fairly obvious to anyone who has eyes to see, as Pope Paul VI did and as Pope John Paul II pointed out many times. But, really, doesn't all of that pale in comparison to questions about carpools?

On Ignatius Insight:

Benedict XVI reflects on Moses as intercessor and "a prefiguration of Christ"

From the Vatican Information Service:

VATICAN CITY, 1 JUN 2011 (VIS) - Benedict XVI dedicated today's general Wednesday audience catechesis to the figure of Moses who "carried out his function as mediator between God and Israel, making himself the bearer of the divine words and commands for his people, bringing them to the freedom of the Promised Land ... and, above all, praying".

  The Pope emphasized that Moses especially acts as intercessor when the people ask Aaron to build the golden calf while they are waiting for the prophet who has ascended Mount Sinai to receive the Tables of the Law. "Tired of following a path with a God who is invisible now that Moses the mediator has also gone, the people demand a tangible, palpable presence of the Lord and find an accessible god, within the reach of human beings, in Aaron's molten metal calf. This is a constant temptation on the path of faith: avoiding the divine mystery by building a comprehensible god that corresponds to our own preconceptions and plans".

  In the face of the Israelites' infidelity, God asks Moses to let him destroy that rebel people but Moses understands that those words are directed at him so that the prophet "might intervene and ask him not to do it. ... If God were to let his people perish, it could be interpreted as a sign of divine incapacity to fulfill the plan of salvation and God could not allow that: He is the good Lord who salves, the guarantor of life, the God of mercy and forgiveness, of  liberation from sin that kills. ... Moses had a concrete experience of the God of salvation. He was sent as the mediator of divine liberation and now, with his prayer, he becomes the interpreter of a dual concern, worried for the fate of his people but also worried for the honor due the Lord by the truth of his name. ... The love for his brothers and sisters and the love of God are united in his prayer of intercession and are inseparable. Moses, the intercessor, is the man between two loves that, in prayer, are superimpose in one single desire for good".

  "The intercessor does not make excuses for the sin of his people and does not list the presumed merits of either himself or his people. He appeals to God's generosity: a free God, completely love, who never ceases to seek those who have drawn away from him. ... Moses asks God to show himself even stronger than sin and death and, with his prayer, brings about this divine revelation".

  "In Moses who is at the top of the mountain - face to face with God, the intercessor of his people - the Fathers of the Church have seen a prefiguration of Christ who, atop the Cross, is truly before God, not just as friend but as Son. ... His intercession", the pontiff concluded, "is not just solidarity but identification with us. ... He gives us a forgiveness that transforms and renews. I believe we must meditate on this reality: Christ before God praying for us, identifying with us. From the heights of the Cross he didn't bring us new stone tablets of the law but himself as Covenant".

The many connections between Moses and the New Moses are both significant and fascinating, and have been noted by Benedict XVI in various writings. In Jesus of Nazareth: From the Baptism in the Jordan to the Transfiguration, he noted some of the ways in which the Sermon on the Mount revealed Jesus as the New Moses:

Jesus sits on the cathedra of Moses. But he does so not after the manner of teachers who are trained for the job in a school; he sits there as the greater Moses, who broadens the Covenant to include all nations. This also explains the significance of the mountain. The Evangelist does not tell us which of the hills of Galilee it was. But the very fact that it is the scene of Jesus' preaching makes it simply "the mountain"—the new Sinai. The "mountain" is th eplace where Jesus prays—where he is face-to-face with the Father. And that is exactly why it is also the place of his teachings, since his teaching comes forth from this most intimate exchange with the Father. The "mountain," then, is by the very nature of the case established as the new and definitive Sinai. (p. 66)

This same connection is summed up in the Catechism of the Catholic Church: "In Jesus, the same Word of God that had resounded on Mount Sinai to give the written Law to Moses, made itself heard anew on the Mount of the Beatitudes" (par. 581). There are several other connections, but one that is not noted as often is presented by Dr. Brant Pitre in his essay, "Jesus, the New Temple, and the New Priesthood" (Letter & Spirit: Temple and Contemplation [St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, 2008]). Pitre notes that the clearly delineated priestly hierarchy of the Sinaitic liturgy consisted of Moses overseeing the high priest (Aaron), "The 3" (Aaron, Nadab, Abihu), "The Twelve Pillars" or "Young Men" of the twelve tribes, and the seventy priestly elders of Israel. Likewise, Jesus named Peter as chief apostle, the inner three (Peter, James, and John), the Twelve Apostles of the new twelve tribes of the new Israel, and the seventy who were appointed and sent out. Pitre argues (convincingly, in my opinion) that "Jesus deliberately organized the various circles of his disciples to signify the imminent eschatological restoration of the sacrificial priesthood" (pp. 80-81).

Justin Martyr (the Apologist) Walks a Tightrope

Justin Martyr Walks a Tightrope | Rod Bennett | From "Justin Martyr", in Four Witnesses: The Early Church in Her Own Words | Ignatius Insight

Justin's conversion to Christianity is thought to have happened at the city of Ephesus, around A.D. 130, when our inquisitive young Samaritan was roughly thirty years of age. And though he was undoubtedly given a warm reception into the Christian congregation there in Asia—that venerable church founded by John, written to by Ignatius from the house of Polycarp—Justin, to tell the truth, may have raised a few eyebrows by his conduct as a new believer. For the fact is that he continued to frequent his old haunts. He kept all his old friendships and ran with the same unregenerate crowd he had associated with as a heathen. In short, Justin of Neapolis became known, much like his Lord before him, as "the friend of publicans and sinners"—only in Justin's case, the publicans and sinners were not prostitutes or winebibbers, but mystic Pythagorean mathematicians and long-faced logicians studiously following Xenophon and Parmenides. In other words, Justin became an apologist—a defender of the faith, a philosophical evangelist—and from the day of his redemption he seems to have been possessed by one burning desire: to see his own people, his brother philosophers, come to the knowledge of the truth.

The Dialogue with Trypho, which took place at Ephesus during this period, [17] gives us a window into Justin's methods. As it opens, we find him, wearing his pallium, walking among the colonnades of a great temple (possibly the same great temple of Diana where earlier Paul had raised the ire of the silversmiths [Acts 19]). Such places were where the philosophers of the day plied their trade, and little groups of them could always be found arguing, from sun up to sun down, on the steps of every pagan shrine in the Empire. On this particular day, Justin drew the attention of Trypho, the Hellenized rabbi, famous as one of the most learned Jews in the East. Yet it might just as well have been the representative of any of a hundred different world views who chose to debate him that day, for they all met here on equal terms, all contending (though they little knew it at the time) for the intellectual fate of Europe and the world.

In the case of Trypho, the conversation turns quickly to Old Testament prophecy and its alleged fulfillment in Jesus of Nazareth.

Continue reading on Ignatius Insight...

Listen to "Benedictus Moments" from Saint Luke Productions

New, from Leonardo Defilippis and the good folks at Saint Luke Productions, daily readings from Benedictus: Day by Day with Pope Benedict XVI (Magnficat/Ignatius Press), edited by Fr. Peter Cameron, O.P.:

 

"Finally, the thought came to me that Mary wants this book … and that's what kept me going."

The opening of a just-posted ZENIT interview with Fr. Andrew Apostoli, CFR, author of Fatima For Today: The Urgent Marian Message of Hope (also available as an electronic book and a downloadable audio file):

YONKERS, New York, MAY 31, 2011 (Zenit.org).- There's a lot to the story of Fatima that many Catholics don't know, according to the author of a new book on the 1917 miracle.

In "Fatima For Today: The Urgent Marian Message of Hope," (Ignatius Press), Father Andrew Apostoli brings the story of Fatima to a new generation.

"[Catholics] are learning a lot that they didn't know about Fatima," says Father Apostoli told ZENIT. "A lot of good Catholics probably have a general idea … the rough lines of it and some details, but there's a lot to the story."

Since seeing the film "Miracle of Fatima" as a young boy, Father Apostoli says that the apparitions have had a great impact on his life.

"It was such a stirring story of these little children, their courage, and the importance of the message that Mary was confiding to them." He says that he has tried faithfully to live as Our Lady requested, namely, keeping the devotion of the Five First Saturdays.

"That's a very important part of the message," the priest stated, "one, by the way, which Sr. Lucia -- the oldest of the three children of Fatima -- herself admitted was not being done in numbers that we need. It's one of the two things Our Lady requested for the conversion of Russia." The second being the consecration of Russia.

Father Apostoli's great devotion to Our Lady of Fatima prompted Ignatius Press to request that he write an in-depth book on the subject. Having wanted to work with the Catholic publisher, the priest readily agreed. "It was a challenging book, I have to say. I'd be up late and my brain would feel like mush after a while, I couldn't think. Finally, the thought came to me that Mary wants this book … and that's what kept me going."

To many, it may seem that a book on an occurrence that took place in a small village during the middle of World War I might not have much relevance today. However, both Pope John Paul II and Benedict XVI felt strongly that the message given during the Great War is just as meaningful today, if not more so.

Continue reading at ZENIT.org. Read an excerpt from the book (which is also available in  on Ignatius Insight:

"When Pregnancy Met Pregnancy": Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen on The Visitation

When Pregnancy Met Pregnancy | Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen on The Visitation | From The World's First Love | Ignatius Insight

One of the most beautiful moments in history was that when pregnancy met pregnancy when childbearers became the first heralds of the King of Kings. All pagan religions begin with the teachings of adults, but Christianity begins with the birth of a Child. From that day to this, Christians have ever been the defenders of the family and the love of generation. If we ever sat down to  write out what we would expect the Infinite God to do, certainly the last thing we would expect would be to see Him imprisoned in a carnal ciborium for nine months; and the next to last thing we would expect is that the "greatest man ever born of woman" while yet in his mother's womb, would salute the yet imprisoned God-man. But this is precisely what took place in the Visitation.

At the Annunciation the archangel told Mary that her cousin, Elizabeth, was about to become the mother of John the Baptist. Mary was then a young girl, but her cousin was ''advanced in years," that is, quite beyond the normal age of conceiving. "See, moreover, how it fares with thy cousin Elizabeth; she is old, yet she too has conceived a son; she who was reproached with barrenness is now in her sixth month, to prove that nothing is impossible with God. And Mary said, 'Behold the handmaid of the Lord, let it be done unto me according to thy word.' And with that the angel left her." (Luke 1:36-38)

The birth of Christ is without regard to man; the birth of John the Baptist is without regard to age! "Nothing is impossible with God." The Scripture continues the story: "In the days that followed, Mary rose up and went with all haste to a city of Juda, in the hill country where Zachary dwelt; and entering in she gave Elizabeth greeting. No sooner had Elizabeth heard Mary's greeting, than the child leaped in her womb; and Elizabeth herself was filled with the Holy Ghost; so that she cried out with a loud voice, "Blessed are thou among women and blessed is the fruit of thy womb. How have I deserved to be thus visited by the mother of my Lord? Why, as soon as ever the voice of thy greeting sounded in my ears, the child in my womb leaped for joy. Blessed art thou for thy believing; the message that was brought to thee from the Lord shall have fulfillment." (Luke 1:39-45)

Continue reading on Ignatius Insight...

When Bad Advice in Confession Becomes a Crime

When Bad Advice in Confession Becomes a Crime | Dr. Edward N. Peters | Homiletic & Pastoral Review

The canonical crime of solicitation is likely more widespread than many may suppose.

[image error]All would agree that if a given piece of advice is bad in the confessional, then a priest's giving it to a penitent would be, at a minimum, a failure in pastoral care. Depending on circumstances, a priest's proffering of bad advice in confession might even, as a violation of charity or justice, be sinful. But, that the giving of bad advice in confession could be a crime under Church law would be startling. And yet, exactly this reading of Canon 1387 of the 1983 Code of Canon Law is required, I suggest, in light of sound canonical tradition and recent Roman curial norms.

Canon 1387 states: "A priest who in the act, on the occasion, or under the pretext of confession solicits a penitent to sin against the sixth commandment of the Decalogue is to be punished, according to the gravity of the delict, by suspension, prohibitions, and privations; in graver cases he is to be dismissed from the clerical state." The image of solicitation that springs to mind here is, of course, that of a priest using the confessional to propose carnal liaisons to a female penitent.1 To be sure, such reprehensible behavior is criminalized by Canon 1387. But neither the text of Canon 1387 (specifically the phrase, "solicits a penitent to sin against the sixth commandment of the Decalogue") nor the tradition behind the modern canon construes the crime of solicitation that narrowly.

First, the canonical crime of solicitation is not limited to cases wherein a confessor's bad advice given is only toward a penitent's sexual misconduct with the priest himself. John Martin, commenting on Canon 1387 in the British-Irish canonical commentary Letter & Spirit (1985) at 799, observes: "The offence is committed whether the priest encourages the penitent to sin either with the priest himself or with any third party." Thomas Green, writing in the 2000 CLSA New Commentary (at 1591), agrees: "The delict might also be verified if the solicited sexual activity involves the penitent and a third party, not necessarily the priest and the penitent." And Leon del Amo in the 2004 Code of Canon Law Annotated (at 1077), notes: "The offense consists in soliciting the penitent to sin against the sixth commandment, either with the person soliciting or with a third party." No commentator on the 1983 Code disputes the understanding of solicitation in Canon 1387 as embracing not only a confessor's advice toward sexual sin between the penitent and the confessor himself, but also between the penitent and a third party. But to see clearly how a confessor's giving a penitent objectively immoral advice, even if such advice is directed toward the solitary acts of the penitent alone, can also constitute a form of solicitation, a review of  canonical commentary on the crime of solicitation under the earlier, 1917 Code, is helpful.

Read the entire article on HPRweb.com...

Memorial Day and Gratitude

David Mills of First Things writes of gratitude on Memorial Day:

Child of my schooling though I am, I'm still disturbed by my inability to feel moved as the old men march by in the Memorial Day parade. Yes, of course American motives were impure and some things the nation did were wicked. But that is not the veterans' fault. Yes, some were drafted and went to war under duress. But that does not reduce our debt to them.

They sacrificed for us, and are due praise for that, and much they accomplished made the world a better place. The Germans did not get a chance to kill all the Jews, to give an obvious example.

And they are also a kind of public memory of something for which we ought to feel grateful. As Robert Wilken wrote in "Keeping the Commandments," these incarnate public memories "are not abstractions, but concrete testimonies to the lives and convictions of those who have gone before us."

As John Lukacs has reminded us, there is "recorded" history and also "remembered" history. The things we remember in our common life quietly convey a precious inheritance that helps us keep faith with the dead and form, in unspoken ways, the sensibilities and attitudes, not to say hopes and dreams, of those who will follow us. There is no greater betrayal than to impoverish a generation yet unborn by willful acts of amnesia. What we honor in our public life has a bearing on how we live as individuals.

I'm not sure what the answer is to feeling too little gratitude on the day we ought to remember those to whom we owe much, except to follow the traditional Christian instruction to practice what you believe, and pray that the feeling of belief follows. Not that it matters much if it does.

I have thought of one thing to do, since my Church teaches us to pray for the departed: go to the cemetery at some regular interval and walk along the graves, praying for each soldier or sailor whose grave I find. They may have no one to pray for them. And I can pray for soldiers when I think of them, or read about them in a history book or see an exhibit at a museum, and pray for the soldiers I see in public. They may have no one to pray for them. These are little things, a tiny investment of time, but it is something.

Read his entire essay, "Old Men Deserving of Gratitude".

John Burger of National Catholic Register says, "Thank you!" to relatives who died in line of duty.

Victor Davis Hanson writes:

Sometimes we feel we are not good when we are not perfect, whether trying to stop a Stalinist North Vietnamese takeover of the south, or failing to secure Iraq before 2008. But the common story remains the same: For nearly a century, the American soldier has often been the last, indeed the only, impediment to butchery, enslavement, and autocracy.

It was the custom of great leaders from Pericles to Napoleon to declare that the graves of their soldiers in far-off foreign soils were testaments to their nations' grandeur, power, and reach; yet our white crosses in American cemeteries from Epinal, St.-Mihiel, and Normandy to Manila, Tunisia, and Sicily are tributes to American military courage and competency — and a willingness to see an end to wars that brutal men started and might have won had our youth not crossed the seas.

We should remember all that in the present age of cynicism and nihilism, recalling that nothing has really changed, as some Americans this Memorial Day seek to foster something better than Saddam Hussein, the Taliban, and Moammar Qaddafi. Behind every American soldier, dozens of their countrymen tonight sleep soundly — and hundreds more in their shadow abroad will wake up alive and safe.

Read his entire essay on National Review Online.

And some thoughts on war, peace, and the meaning of it all from Saint Augustine's City of God:

But the earthly city, which shall not be everlasting (for it will no longer be a city when it has been committed to the extreme penalty), has its good in this world, and rejoices in it with such joy as such things can afford. But as this is not a good which can discharge its devotees of all distresses, this city is often divided against itself by litigations, wars, quarrels, and such victories as are either life-destroying or short-lived.

For each part of it that arms against another part of it seeks to triumph over the nations through itself in bondage to vice. If, when it has conquered, it is inflated with pride, its victory is life-destroying; but if it turns its thoughts upon the common casualties of our mortal condition, and is rather anxious concerning the disasters that may befall it than elated with the successes already achieved, this victory, though of a higher kind, is still only short-lived; for it cannot abidingly rule over those whom it has victoriously subjugated.

But the things which this city desires cannot justly be said to be evil, for it is itself, in its own kind, better than all other human good. For it desires earthly peace for the sake of enjoying earthly goods, and it makes war in order to attain to this peace; since, if it has conquered, and there remains no one to resist it, it enjoys a peace which it had not while there were opposing parties who contested for the enjoyment of those things which were too small tosatisfy both. This peace is purchased by toilsome wars; it is obtained by what they style a glorious victory. Now, when victory remains with the party which had the juster cause, who hesitates to congratulate the victor, and style it a desirable peace?

These things, then, are good things, and without doubt the gifts of God. But if they neglect the better things of the heavenly city, which are secured by eternal victory and peace never-ending, and so inordinately covet these present good things that they believe them to be the only desirable things, or love them better than those things which are believed to be better—if this be so, then it is necessary that misery follow and ever increase.

— Book 15, chapter 4.

St. Joan of Arc's Five Great Deeds...

... as described by Mark Twain:

Yes, Orleans was in a delirium of felicity. She invited the King, and made sumptuous preparations to receive him, but—he didn't come. He was simply a serf at that time, and La Tremouille was his master. Master and serf were visiting together at the master's castle of Sully-sur-Loire.

At Beaugency Joan had engaged to bring about a reconciliation between the Constable Richemont and the King. She took Richemont to Sully-sur-Loire and made her promise good.

The great deeds of Joan of Arc are five:

1. The Raising of the Siege.

2. The Victory of Patay.

3. The Reconciliation at Sully-sur-Loire.

4. The Coronation of the King.

5. The Bloodless March.

We shall come to the Bloodless March presently (and the Coronation). It was the victorious long march which Joan made through the enemy's country from Gien to Rheims, and thence to the gates of Paris, capturing every English town and fortress that barred the road, from the beginning of the journey to the end of it; and this by the mere force of her name, and without shedding a drop of blood—perhaps the most extraordinary campaign in this regard in history—this is the most glorious of her military exploits.

The Reconciliation was one of Joan's most important achievements. No one else could have accomplished it; and, in fact, no one else of high consequence had any disposition to try. In brains, in scientific warfare, and in statesmanship the Constable Richemont was the ablest man in France. His loyalty was sincere; his probity was above suspicion—(and it made him sufficiently conspicuous in that trivial and conscienceless Court).

In restoring Richemont to France, Joan made thoroughly secure the successful completion of the great work which she had begun. She had never seen Richemont until he came to her with his little army. Was it not wonderful that at a glance she should know him for the one man who could finish and perfect her work and establish it in perpetuity? How was it that that child was able to do this? It was because she had the "seeing eye," as one of our knights had once said. Yes, she had that great gift—almost the highest and rarest that has been granted to man. Nothing of an extraordinary sort was still to be done, yet the remaining work could not safely be left to the King's idiots; for it would require wise statesmanship and long and patient though desultory hammering of the enemy. Now and then, for a quarter of a century yet, there would be a little fighting to do, and a handy man could carry that on with small disturbance to the rest of the country; and little by little, and with progressive certainty, the English would disappear from France.

And that happened. Under the influence of Richemont the King became at a later time a man—a man, a king, a brave and capable and determined soldier. Within six years after Patay he was leading storming parties himself; fighting in fortress ditches up to his waist in water, and climbing scaling-ladders under a furious fire with a pluck that would have satisfied even Joan of Arc. In time he and Richemont cleared away all the English; even from regions where the people had been under their mastership for three hundred years. In such regions wise and careful work was necessary, for the English rule had been fair and kindly; and men who have been ruled in that way are not always anxious for a change.

Which of Joan's five chief deeds shall we call the chiefest? It is my thought that each in its turn was that. This is saying that, taken as a whole, they equalized each other, and neither was then greater than its mate.

Do you perceive? Each was a stage in an ascent. To leave out one of them would defeat the journey; to achieve one of them at the wrong time and in the wrong place would have the same effect.

Consider the Coronation. As a masterpiece of diplomacy, where can you find its superior in our history? Did the King suspect its vast importance? No. Did his ministers? No. Did the astute Bedford, representative of the English crown? No. An advantage of incalculable importance was here under the eyes of the King and of Bedford; the King could get it by a bold stroke, Bedford could get it without an effort; but, being ignorant of its value, neither of them put forth his hand. Of all the wise people in high office in France, only one knew the priceless worth of this neglected prize—the untaught child of seventeen, Joan of Arc—and she had known it from the beginning as an essential detail of her mission.

How did she know it? It was simple: she was a peasant. That tells the whole story. She was of the people and knew the people; those others moved in a loftier sphere and knew nothing much about them. We make little account of that vague, formless, inert mass, that mighty underlying force which we call "the people"—an epithet which carries contempt with it. It is a strange attitude; for at bottom we know that the throne which the people support stands, and that when that support is removed nothing in this world can save it.

Now, then, consider this fact, and observe its importance. Whatever the parish priest believes his flock believes; they love him, they revere him; he is their unfailing friend, their dauntless protector, their comforter in sorrow, their helper in their day of need; he has their whole confidence; what he tells them to do, that they will do, with a blind and affectionate obedience, let it cost what it may. Add these facts thoughtfully together, and what is the sum? This: The parish priest governs the nation. What is the King, then, if the parish priest withdraws his support and deny his authority? Merely a shadow and no King; let him resign.

Do you get that idea? Then let us proceed. A priest is consecrated to his office by the awful hand of God, laid upon him by his appointed representative on earth. That consecration is final; nothing can undo it, nothing can remove it. Neither the Pope nor any other power can strip the priest of his office; God gave it, and it is forever sacred and secure. The dull parish knows all this. To priest and parish, whatsoever is anointed of God bears an office whose authority can no longer be disputed or assailed. To the parish priest, and to his subjects the nation, an uncrowned king is a similitude of a person who has been named for holy orders but has not been consecrated; he has no office, he has not been ordained, another may be appointed to his place. In a word, an uncrowned king is a doubtful king; but if God appoint him and His servant the Bishop anoint him, the doubt is annihilated; the priest and the parish are his loyal subjects straightway, and while he lives they will recognize no king but him.

To Joan of Arc, the peasant-girl, Charles VII. was no King until he was crowned; to her he was only the Dauphin; that is to say, the heir. If I have ever made her call him King, it was a mistake; she called him the Dauphin, and nothing else until after the Coronation. It shows you as in a mirror—for Joan was a mirror in which the lowly hosts of France were clearly reflected—that to all that vast underlying force called "the people," he was no King but only Dauphin before his crowning, and was indisputably and irrevocably King after it.

Now you understand what a colossal move on the political chess-board the Coronation was. Bedford realized this by and by, and tried to patch up his mistake by crowning his King; but what good could that do? None in the world.

Speaking of chess, Joan's great acts may be likened to that game. Each move was made in its proper order, and it as great and effective because it was made in its proper order and not out of it. Each, at the time made, seemed the greatest move; but the final result made them all recognizable as equally essential and equally important. This is the game, as played:

1. Joan moves to Orleans and Patay—check.

2. Then moves the Reconciliation—but does not proclaim check, it being a move for position, and to take effect later.

3. Next she moves the Coronation—check.

4. Next, the Bloodless March—check.

5. Final move (after her death), the reconciled Constable Richemont to the French King's elbow—checkmate.

From Twain's Joan of Arc (hardcover and electronic book format).