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tolerant peer of the time solemnly explaining that his task was not to make a new inscription, but only to modify the old one, so that, for instance, in future the passer-by might be told that the City was burned, not "by the treachery and malice of the Popish faction," but by "the activity and energy of the Catholic party." Happily no such miserable modification was attempted. The old inscription stood, in all its grossness, until at last all men knew it for a lie, and Protestantism grew ashamed of it, and in 1831 utterly erased it. The Cardinal died in the belief that the same fate will some day overtake the Royal Declaration. thought it too offensive to be endured, and believed that some day the country would grant liberty of conscience to the King, or else be content with some simple subscription to the Protestant creed.

He

CHAPTER VIII

RESCUE WORK IN LONDON

HEN Herbert Vaughan came to Westminster

WHE straight from his struggle with the great

proselytising societies in the North of England, he had the hope that he might be spared that sort of trouble in London. In one respect the field had been splendidly covered. In nothing was Cardinal Manning more completely successful than in his efforts to provide the diocese with a network of Certified Poor Law Schools. Writing in 1899, Cardinal Vaughan said: "Formerly thousands were lost to the Faith in London by the Workhouse system. Through the zeal and perseverance of my eminent predecessor and by the enlightened sense of justice that has inspired the Guardians of the Poor, this cause of leakage has been stopped. No less than fiftyeight different Unions and Parishes within and beyond the Metropolitan area now give up all Catholic children to be educated in our Catholic Certified Poor Law Schools. They pay maintenance, while we are pledged to supply suitable buildings, training, and accommodation, at a heavy yearly charge which tends to increase rather than diminish."

Unfortunately, Cardinal Manning was less successful in his attempts to cope with the leakage which is the direct result of destitution. If he had been in a position

to provide a place in a Catholic Home for every Catholic child, possibly the difficulty with Dr. Barnardo might not have arisen. As it was, conflict was inevitable. Dr. Barnardo's position is best stated in his own words :

Frequently when a child of Roman Catholic parents has been brought to me for admission, I have expostulated with the poor relative who has pleaded on its behalf, and urged that application ought to be made, in the first instance, to his or her own religious adviser, in the person of the priest. In nearly every such case the reply has been made, 'I have done so; he says he cannot help me ; the priest has advised me to go to the workhouse myself or to send my boy or girl to the workhouse, and I won't do that.' In some instances such parents have told me that the priest has even been angry with them and ordered them off as beggars. The consequence has been that I have, although reluctantly, admitted a considerable number of children of Roman Catholic parents, or the offspring of mixed marriages, into the Homes. Let it be observed, however, that I have never received one such without first stating to the relative, plainly and clearly, in effect,' This Home is a Protestant Home. Your child, if admitted, will be brought up in the Protestant Faith, and will not be allowed to attend a Roman Catholic chapel or to be visited by a Roman Catholic priest. It will be taught to love the Word of God and prayer, to trust Christ, and to serve and honour Him, but none of the distinctive tenets of the Roman Catholic Church will be taught.' Again and again have poor Roman Catholics with whom I have remonstrated thus, said to me, 'Anything is better than the life we are now leading, and any place better than the place we are stopping in. Do take the child, for God's sake.'" I

No doubt such things happened. Poor men and women, with the light of hunger in their eyes, would go to Dr. Barnardo with their children and say, " For God's sake, take them!" That is one part of the story. But it often

Memoirs of Dr. Barnardo, by Mrs. Barnardo and James Marchant.

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happened that those poor Catholic parents afterwards found work, and were able to earn enough to keep their little homes together. Then came the miserable thought that they had given away their children, and that these were being brought up as Protestants and strangers. If they begged to have their children given back, they were shown the agreement they had signed. That agreement gave the Managers "of the said Protestant Homes" the right to detain the children until they became twenty-one years of age, to remove them without notice from Home to Home, or to board them out either in England or in the Colonies-also without notice. The parent was made to sign away his right to regain his children except with "the willing consent of the Managers," and even then he could get them back only when he had paid for their maintenance at the rate of six shillings a week for the whole time during which they had been in the Homes. Under these circumstances the unfortunate parents would go to their natural adviser, the priest. The priest, of course, would know that in English law such an agreement was absolutely void as against the inalienable right of the father to control the bringing-up of his children. But that knowledge helped very little. With Dr. Barnardo it was a settled principle never to surrender a child on the ground of religion. Uncertain whether his lost child was in Europe or in America, the ordinary working-class parent was absolutely powerless. Even when some Catholic took up his case and appealed to a Court of Justice, it was an unequal contest. Dr. Barnardo, with an income which his biographer tells us approached £200,000 a year, would face the most protracted litigation with equanimity, but for his opponents the cost even of

a successful suit was crippling and almost prohibitive. Even when the decision was in favour of the parent, it sometimes remained inoperative.

It may be thought that, dependent as he was on the public good will, Dr. Barnardo, for the sake of his work, would have dreaded anything like a public censure in a Court of Justice. He was a man ready to run great risks when he thought that he was in the right, and his attitude towards the Catholic Church at all times commanded the enthusiastic support of an influential section of his supporters. He has left it on record that some said, "Why should you give up any children, even for an hour, to the custody of a tyrannical, usurping, and heretical Church, whose doctrines are anti-scriptural and whose progress of late years in this kingdom is fraught with danger to our dearest liberties ?" Again, he states that he knows many earnest Protestants "who would even consider it almost better that the children should remain in their forlorn and outcast condition than that they should become attached to the dangerous errors of Romanism." There is no doubt that at one time Dr. Barnardo honestly thought that Catholics could never be relied on to keep faith with Protestants. It is fair to say that in his dealings with Catholics he had some unpleasant and disappointing experiences. During Cardinal Manning's lifetime an arrangement was come to by which the doctor undertook to refer Catholic applicants in the first place to the Catholic authorities. Unfortunately more was undertaken in Cardinal Manning's name than at that time it was possible to carry out. Great efforts were made, but the Catholic Church has in proportion to her numbers such an overwhelming share of the poverty of London,

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