rtyrdom, and in fact he often made that declaration. In
him the most heroic virtue was faith. He had come into the Catholic
Church in spite of the most extreme natural repugnance, and he
remained in it, overcoming the perpetual objection of Protestants
that Catholicity could not be the truth because Catholic countries
had become the least powerful and the least prosperous in the
civilized world. On this point he loved to expound the text of
Scripture which says that it is better to lose an eye and an arm and
enter into the kingdom of heaven, than to save both, and fall into
hell. His piety was wholly interior. It consisted in the perpetual
exercise of the presence of God. He had a natural disinclination for
devotional practices as they are in vogue among the southern races.

His tendency was to spiritualize as much as possible all the
devotions in use in the Church. His own principal one was to the Holy
Ghost and His divine Gifts. He never spoke of the Incarnation and the
Eucharist without deep emotion and a contagious love. As to devotion
to the Blessed Virgin, he explained it in a most elevated manner,
ever showing, and with great dignity and nobility of manner, how it
flowed from the principle of the divine maternity. The last book he
sent me was one on the Blessed Virgin written by an American priest.
Since Father Hecker's death I have never failed a single day to
invoke him in my prayers, and to his intercession I attribute many
graces obtained, some of them very important.

III

Father Hecker had a marvellous openness of heart. I heard him relate
several times the story of his life, his conversion, his joining the
Redemptorists, his case before the Roman Congregations, and the
founding of the Paulist community. I can still recall the banks of
the Lake of Geneva at the Villa Bartoloni, where Father Hecker,
walking with a friend and myself, told us of his leaving the
Redemptorist order. It was the way in which he talked of so delicate
a matter that enabled me to appreciate that the man was a saint. He
liked to repeat, while on this subject, what Cardinal Deschamps had
said of him: "Here is a man who has been able to leave our
Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer without committing even a
venial sin."

In my opinion, Father Hecker was, after Pere Lacordaire, the most
remarkable sacred orator of the century. This does not apply to his
writings, for his ideas lost much of their force in the process of
getting i