Dedication
To you, boys of the Oratory School, past and present, this collection of devotional papers by Cardinal Newman is dedicated. They are a memento both of the Cardinal’s constant thought of you, and of his confident assurance that, after his death, you would pray for his soul.
Prefatory Notice
The Papers by the late Cardinal Newman contained in this collection were likely, most of them, to have formed part of what he proposed to call a “Year-Book of Devotion” for reading and meditation according to the Seasons and the Feasts of the year. The intention of composing such a book had been in the Cardinal’s mind as far back as the early years of his Catholic life, but, though it was never abandoned, various circumstances hindered him from pursuing it, and no portion of this volume was put together with this idea. The book would have varied greatly in the matter of its subjects and in their treatment. For instance, some papers on the Notes of the Church would have formed one subject; of these, excepting some mere preparatory fragments, nothing was written. Again, some sermons would also have formed a part of the readings. A scheme, drawn out by him, of Litanies to run through the whole year shows what he had thought of in that respect, though only the few here printed were put together by him. “The Sayings of the Saints of the Desert” would have been extended over the whole year instead of covering only the few months for which he had prepared them. The “Meditations for Eight Days” were intended to be carried through at least five weeks, and a scheme of them was drawn out for that purpose. The “Dream of Gerontius,” if not written expressly for the volume, was to have been added as a November reading, and “Gerontius” was likely not to have stood alone as a poem. Indeed, the book would have become a repository of the Cardinal’s thoughts on the various devotional subjects which occupied his mind.
But there are not the materials for such a book. All, then, that has been possible towards carrying out the Cardinal’s intention has been to put together such papers as, from what was said by the Cardinal, are considered as likely to have come within the compass of the contemplated volume. It is hoped that this will gratify many of the late Cardinal’s friends, some of whom have expressed a strong desire to have some examples of his devotions, or to know the devotions which most attracted him, and which they might make their own. The Meditations on Christian Doctrine would probably have been more numerous, but that the Cardinal destroyed many such writings of his upon the death of his great friend Father St. John, to whose discretion he had intended to commit them. There are here included, therefore, it is believed, nearly all of the Cardinal’s devotional papers which are likely to be forthcoming.
That the papers can be presented at all, especially the majority of the Meditations, is owing, it is believed, to the circumstances which accompanied their origin. It was the Cardinal’s custom to note down, in the roughest way, any thought that particularly struck him while meditating, that he might reflect upon it during the day or pursue it in the future; and thus he was led on to enlarge such thoughts, and write out the notes and rewrite them carefully (for he always, he said, could meditate best with a pen in his hand). It is chiefly to this custom of the Cardinal’s, of keeping the current of holy thoughts within his easy reach, that we owe, it is believed, the preservation of the greater part of this volume.
The headings of the different subjects, and their parts and chapters, have all, with one or two exceptions, been carefully written by their author, but their order evidently had not always been fully determined. It is to Father Ryder and to Father Eaglesim that this volume is especially indebted: to the former for some important suggestions and curtailments, for the sake of greater clearness; and to the latter for the present order and the supply of the few headings wanted, as well as in other respects.
There were a few friends whose names Cardinal Newman desired to have associated in some way with his own, on account of the special nature of their services to him—services dating, in some cases, from his first years as a Catholic; and now that most of these friends have been removed by death, this book seems to be an especially appropriate place for the purpose. Such was Cardinal Alimonda, late Archbishop of Turin, for services in a time of most serious trouble, very many years ago—services which had been carried on so quietly that the name even of this good friend was unknown to our Cardinal until their elevation at one and the same time to the Sacred College, when an intimacy at once sprang up, and all opportunities were taken by each for maintaining it. Such was Cardinal Place, Archbishop of Rennes, recently deceased, for a number of kindnesses shown to himself, but especially for his many years of care and attention to an ancient friend of the Cardinal’s family, Miss Maria Rosina de Giberne, afterwards Sister Maria Pia of the Visitation at Autun, in France—a lady now deceased, who, besides many lesser good offices to the Cardinal, had, when he was in a most extraordinary difficulty arising from a legal trial, rendered him a service which was as signal as it was unique. Three others there are—Cardinal Macchi, with whom a first acquaintance placed him, almost at once, on a footing of fraternal intimacy; Cardinal Capecelatro, the present Archbishop of Capua; and Monsignor Stonor, Archbishop of Trebizond. Cardinal Capecelatro, a member of the Oratory at Naples, had from his early life been unremitting in his kindness to our Cardinal, though in this case also they were personally unacquainted until they met in Rome in 1879, when both were there for promotion to honour. The services of Cardinal Capecelatro were such that though our Cardinal could not, from modesty, make mention of them, yet he found an opportunity for acknowledging his sense of them, by dictating from his death-bed a few words of dedication to his Eminence for a small volume which in course of time will be published—the delay of which publication suggests the mention of his Eminence’s name here. Cardinal Newman’s own words of Archbishop Stonor, the last time of speaking of him, will best convey the tribute of gratitude which the Cardinal, with much warmth and earnestness paid him. “All these years that I have been Cardinal,” he said, “Monsignor Stonor has been a friend indeed, for he has let me make use of him whensoever and for whatsoever I have chosen, and I don’t know what I should have done without him.” One name more there is to mention—and it belongs to America, where though our Cardinal had so many friends, one was pre-eminently such—that of Bishop James O’Connor, Bishop of Omaha, whose unaffected kindness was most grateful to our Cardinal, lasting as it did through all but the whole of his Catholic lifetime. For Bishop James O’Connor the Cardinal had a great affection, remembering always, with something of gratitude, the modesty and simplicity with which, as a youth, the future Bishop attached himself to him and to Father St. John when the three were at Propaganda together, thus forming a friendship which distance and years did not lessen, and which later on was enlivened by personal intercourse when the visits ad limina Apostolorum brought Bishop O’Connor through England.
This list of names drawn together from countries so wide apart suggests that this book must not be regarded as though only for the service of a few friends. It is hoped that the character of the book itself will secure for it a still wider circulation
Wm. P. Neville
The Oratory, Birmingham:
Easter, 1893.