earnestly studying the elements acting
and reacting upon our Church there. I have come to the conclusion that
the success of Holy Church throughout the world depends upon its
advance in the United States during the next few years. I have become
an American enthusiast! The glorious work of making America Catholic
is so fraught with consequences of vastest import that my blood surges
with the enthusiasm of an old Crusader! But there is much still to be
done. America is a field white for the harvest, almost unobstructed."

"Then," queried the Bishop, "you do not reckon Protestantism an
obstruction?"

"Protestantism!" the Secretary rejoined with a cynical laugh. "No, I
reckon it as nothing. Protestantism in America is decadent. It has
split, divided, and disintegrated, until it is scarcely recognizable.
Its adherents are falling away in great numbers. Its weak tenets and
senile faith hold but comparatively few and lukewarm supporters. It
has degenerated into a sort of social organization, with musicals,
pink teas, and church suppers as attractions. No, America is _bound_
to be classed as a Catholic nation--and I expect to live to see it
thus. Our material and spiritual progress in the United States is
amazing, showing how nobly American Catholics have responded to the
Holy Father's appeal. New dioceses are springing up everywhere.
Churches are multiplying with astonishing rapidity. The discouraging
outlook in Europe is more, far more, than counterbalanced by our
wonderful progress in the United States. We might say that the
Vatican now rests upon American backs, for the United States send
more Peter's Pence to Rome than all other Catholic countries
together. We practically control her polls and her press. America was
discovered by Christopher Columbus, a Catholic in the service of a
Catholic ruler. It is Catholic in essence, and it shall so be
recognized! The Holy Catholic Church always has been and always will
be the sole and _only_ Christian authority. The Catholic religion by
rights ought to be, and ultimately shall be, the exclusively
dominant religion of the world, and every other sort of worship shall
be banished--interdicted--destroyed!"

For a while Jose heard no more. His ears burned and his brain
throbbed. He had become conscious of but one all-absorbing thought,
the fact of his vassalage to a world-embracing political system,
working in the name of the Christ. Not a new thought, by any
means--indeed an old on