CALIFORNIA

THE LIFE OF CARDINAL VAUGHAN

CA

CHAPTER I

THIRD ARCHBISHOP OF WESTMINSTER

ARDINAL MANNING died on the morning of January 14th, 1892. The day before his death he had made his last public profession of faith in the presence of the Chapter, and all through the last night of his life the Bishop of Salford was at his bedside. Writing to the present Bishop of Salford, Dr. Casartelli, Herbert Vaughan said: "It has been a great consolation to me to help my old friend of forty-one years to die. From 4 a.m. to 7.30 the time was spent in ejaculatory prayers." Writing more fully to Mrs. Ward, he says: "A few lines about the Cardinal's death will interest you. He refused to take any more drugs and gave himself up to prayer. From 4 to 7.30 I made ejaculatory prayers for him, repeating oftener those he loved best, such as 'Dulcissime Jesu non sis mihi judex sed salvator,' and 'Fiat, ‹ Laudetur,' &c., 'Jesus, mercy!' 'Mary, help!' &c., &c., with acts of faith, hope, charity, and contrition. At 7.30 I said it was time for Mass, and asked whether he would like me to go and say it for him-he was still clear and conscious." Before that Mass was over the Cardinal was dead.

Cardinal Manning had lived his life, and his work was

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done, but his death meant a great blank in the world of English Catholicism. There was never any doubt at all, however, as to who would be chosen to succeed him. The choice of the Chapter, of the Bishops, and of the Holy See was so discounted by public opinion, that when the official news came it seemed only the ratification of the popular selection. The "Rome Correspondents" and news agencies were so sure that the Bishop of Salford would now be called to Westminster that they announced the appointment three or four times before it was actually made.

The Westminster Chapter met at the Pro-Cathedral, Kensington, on February 9th, to choose a terna. They sent up the following names in alphabetical order: those of the Bishop of Salford; Dr. Hedley, Bishop of Newport; and Mgr. Gilbert, Vicar-General of Westminster. At a meeting held on the following day at Archbishop's House, under the presidency of William Vaughan, Bishop of Plymouth, the English Bishops adopted the terna chosen by the Chapter and, recommending Herbert Vaughan, forwarded the document to Rome.

There was one man who viewed these proceedings with apprehension and disapproval. With a strange mingling of humility and self-knowledge, and a detachment of which few men are capable, Herbert Vaughan silently passed in review his own qualities and capacities, and then contrasted them with those which might fairly be expected of the occupant of the See of Westminster. All his life he underrated his own intellectual powers, and when he thought of Cardinal Manning and all he had been in the face of the English people he seemed to see his own deficiencies as in a glass. He was not the man to shrink from the sight-on the contrary, he

looked at it steadily, in his own brave, unblinking way, until he was satisfied that he was fitter to be a Bishop in a Lancashire city than Metropolitan in London. The conviction that some one else would make a better Archbishop than he carried with it an imperative duty. There was not a moment to be lost; it was thought that the appointment to the vacant See would be made within the fortnight. Without taking counsel with any one he sat down and wrote a letter for submission to the Holy See.

After noting that the terna chosen by the Chapter had been approved by the Bishops, and saying he thinks it more respectful to submit his remonstrances before the matter has come under the consideration of the Pope, he says: "A person may succeed in the subordinate position of a Bishop in a provincial city such as Manchester, and yet be very unfit to be Metropolitan and fill the See of Westminster. The duties are altogether of a different order, and they require altogether different qualifications. I do not possess these higher qualifications, and feeling convinced of this I should be risking my own peace of mind and the salvation of my soul were I not, upon the first opportunity, to press this consideration upon the mind of your Holiness. The See of Westminster ought to be occupied by a Bishop distinguished for some gift of superior learning or by remarkable sanctity, for he ought to be commended to the Church and to the people of England (for whose conversion he may be able to do more than any one else) by some manifest superiority or excellence. Holy Father, it is no mock modesty or fashion of speech which makes the confession that I have no qualification of learning for such a post. I do not excel as a preacher, an author, a theologian, a philosopher, or even