THE LIFE AND LETTERS OF FREDERICK WILLIAM FABER, D.D., PRIEST OF THE ORATORY OF ST. PHILIP NERI. BY JOHN EDWARD BOWDEN, OF THE SAME CONGREGATION. With an Introduction by an American Clergyman. "Look out to God, love His glory, hate yourself, and be simple, and you will BALTIMORE: PUBLISHED BY JOHN MURPHY & Co. PHILADELPHIA J. B. LIPPINCOTT & Co. ... NEW YORK... CATHOLIC PUBLICATION SOCIETY. BOSTON... P. DONOHOE. Rev. H W FOOTH Entered, according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by JOHN MURPHY, in the Clerk's Office of the District Court of Maryland. IT Introduction to the American Edition. T has been the happy lot of some of God's servants to live in the affections of their fellow-men long after they have finished their course and entered into the joy of their Lord. To others a still greater privilege has been granted: to win the hearts of men to God, to enkindle within them the love of Jesus Christ, and bind them to His service. Who shall say to what a multitude of souls the name of St. Paul has been as a household word from the earliest days of Christianity to this hour? Once converted, the very errors of his previous life have ever since worked together unto good to those who love God. That union of the heart of the man with the soul of the Apostle, which his character so clearly exemplifies-that fusion of all human sympathies with divine virtues of the highest order how many has it drawn from the ends of the world of unbelief and sin to the knowledge of Jesus Christ, and then to the courageous imitation of His Sacred Heart, never more to be separated from Him? How truly may the same be said of St. Augustine. In one of his calmer moments, Luther asserted of him that he was the greatest teacher God had given to the Church since the days of the Apostles. But in that moral world, for the most part hidden from human scrutiny, who can appreciate what influence his name, his vir tues and labors, perhaps even his faults, have had in promoting the one grand object dearest to the angelic hosts to their and our Saviour-God—the glory of His Father, the salvation of sinners? May not the same be asserted with perfect truth of a St. Ignatius, St. Francis Xavier, St. Francis de Sales, and of many others whom history makes known to us: "rich men in virtue, whose memory is in benediction, and whose remembrance shall be sweet as honey in every mouth, and as music at a banquet of wine?"-Eccli. xliv. 45, 49. In this singularly favored class of God's servants Father Faber's name is enrolled; as far, at least, as human gratitude, reverence and love can forerun the judgment of that day when the good and evil of all hearts shall be revealed. Such is the thought of men who knew him long and well, themselves eminent for virtues and learning, and whom the Church has folded to her bosom and consecrated to the same eternal cause, heroic devotion to which has made so many of them confront one of the most worldly-minded generations this century has seen, with the doctrine: "Comfort, and luxury, and home, and ease, are not meant for those who wish to follow Christ-God's WILL be done, whatever that gracious Will may be!"* As long ago as August, 1835, when just on the verge of manhood, "his whole soul filled with the love of Christ," and the thought already often recurring “in what way he could best serve His cause," an acquaintance said of the youthful Faber: "I cannot tell why *Lett. lxxi., lxxii. |