being preached by
Father T. J. Campbell, the Provincial of the Jesuits. The body was
placed in the vaults of the old cathedral.

The life we have been following is a harmonious whole from beginning
to end. The child tells of the youth, the youth promises a noble man,
and the promise is more than fulfilled. He was guileless; no dark
ways of forbidden pleasure ever heard the sound of his footstep.
There was no barter of conscience for ambition's prize. He was
fearless; from beginning to end there was no halt from want of
courage. Nor did he rush forward before the light came to show the
road, though he often chafed and panted to hear the word of Divine
command; he never moved at any other. But when the voice of God bade
him forward he never flinched at any obstacle. The ever-recurring
persuasion that there were so few who saw God's will as he saw it cut
him to the heart, and the mystery of the Divine times and moments
grew upon him with fatal force till the end, until he drooped and
pined away with grief that he could but taste the first-fruits. Yet
he was ever submissive to the Divine Will, to live, to die, to begin,
to end the work, to be alone or to be of many brethren, to lead or to
follow. Though a most active spirit, he was yet contemplative, and to
unite the manifestation of the Holy Spirit in the inner and outer
life was the end he always kept in view; but he was distinctively an
interior man.

Few men since the Apostles have felt a quicker pulse than Isaac
Hecker when the name of God was heard, or that of Jesus Christ or the
Holy Spirit. Few men have had a nobler pride in the Church of Christ,
or felt more one with her honor. Few men have grown into closer
kinship with all the family of God, from Mary the great mother and
the holy angels down to the simplest Catholic, than Isaac Hecker. But
his peculiar trait was fidelity to the inner voice. "There are some,"
he once said, "for whom the predominant influence is the external
one, authority, example, etc.; others in whose lives the interior
action of the Holy Spirit predominates. In my case, from my
childhood, God influenced me by an interior light and by the interior
touch of his Holy Spirit." The desperate demand of Philip, "Lord,
show us the Father and it is enough," was Father Hecker's cry all
through early life. After the founding of his community, in 1858, his
life was like an arctic year. From that date till 1872 there was no
set of sun. The unclouded he