On the three hundredth anniversary of the birth of Charles II there appeared in The Times a most interesting article on that monarch and his time by Keith Feiling. The typically English attitude of mind towards the history of that reign expressed in its lines must, however, have roused the attention of Catholic readers, especially his allusion to ‘the half truths of which Oates got hold.’

It is matter for conjecture how many of his non-Catholic readers were aware of the whole truth where it touches Titus Oates and the malignant story of his career. To be sure, no historian defends the man who, according to Macaulay, was ‘the founder of the school of false witnesses.’ Every Englishman has learned at school that Titus Oates was a miscreant of the most evil and mischievous genius; that the men who were condemned to death on the strength of his false accusation were innocent victims of a politically engineered plot which had as its background the end of frustrating the Catholic succession to the throne. The end, in the mind of the average protestant Englishman, was laudable, although it did not justify the means adopted by the Government in this case.

Upon my outgoing journey with a message I met you. You came down the lane unconscious of the dignity of your presence and unaware of the desire you stirred in roe to do you reverence. I would have left the trivial machine I rode and placed myself on my knees in the dust to express my admiration for all you represent.

You who all day consort with the Omnipotent Goodness and in your consorting plead for such as I— obtaining for us all the graces which too often go unthanked for.

You more than stirred in me the repressed desire for solitude in which alone may we creatures touch in our timidity His Garments. Around your tunics hung the history of centuries; the memory of the prophets who sought Him in the deserts; the serenity of the decades of mystical revelation which came from Him alone; and in the folds of your raiment I caught glimpses of His Saints and consorts of the future.

To Catholics marriage is a Sacrament. Wealthy persons treat it as a settlement in life. For ordinary people it may spell a career in the man’s case, and to the woman an emancipation from family ties. Doubting souls may call it a vocation. As regards the ‘masses,’ the only ‘classes’ which really count in these Labour days, marriage appears to be a lottery in more ways than one. Catholics, and I speak of adherents to the ‘old-established firm with its headquarters at Rome’ —the expression is Henry Labouchere’s—have a very definite conception of marriage. ‘Hoc est magnum sacramentum,’ exclaims St Paul. And he adds the proviso : ‘Dico autem in Christo et in Ecclesia.’ It is the life-long union of man and woman indissoluble as the union of Christ with His Church.

Marriage implies children. Catholics adopt this principle as their own. In Catholic countries the birth-rate remains at high tide. Their women accept child-birth as a natural incident of married life. Therefore, they are not afraid of it. Birth control is anathema to Catholics. And by this I mean artificial birth prevention. The Church does not forbid control by abstention. She insists on the Pauline precept of each party according to the other its due rights. But if both parties agree to live for a space as brother and sister, either to limit a family or for any other such reason, the Church does not say them nay. So far the Catholic standpoint. It is held wholly by High Churchmen, and partially by other religious bodies.

Probably very few of our readers need telling that The Friends of Blackfriars indicated by this title are not simply those courageous folk who take a friendly interest in this review, who even sometimes read it, and occasionally subscribe to it. The Friends of Blackfriars to whom we refer—a very considerably smaller band than our little group of readers—are those persons who have formed themselves into an association of helpers towards the maintenance and endowment of the Dominican Priory of the Holy Ghost, Blackfriars, Oxford.

On Trinity Sunday, the 24th of June, the Friends held their annual general meeting in the small lecture room at the Blackfriars Priory, Oxford. The bulk of the party came from London; there was a group from Oxford itself; and Cambridge and other parts of the country were represented. After a preliminary committee meeting the room was thrown open to all the Friends and to members of the Dominican Community. Mr. Edward Bullough presided, assisted by the Honorary Secretary, Miss M. M. C. Calthrop, and the Honorary Treasurer, Mr. George Bellord.

In all the world there is no town to compare with this little walled city seated on a spur of the Umbrian Hills. No place is so intimately and exclusively bound up with the ever-continuing memory of one man. For Assisi is Saint Francis, and Saint Francis is Assisi. One cannot remain an hour there without fully realising this all-embracing fact. Yet to appreciate all that Assisi stands for, a short stay of a day or two is not enough. Some persons, even Catholics, are content to limit their visit to this city which is so wholly a shrine, to a few hours, and even take it as a place to see en passant on a motor drive from Perugia.

I myself reached Assisi with somewhat mixed feelings. The whole countryside was enveloped in mist and driving rain. Accommodation at an Albergo seemed rough, after home comforts. And—worst of all—one felt little or no devotion, only dryness in place of exaltation, and, I am even ashamed to confess the word, a sense of possible boredom in contemplating a more than very brief stay. Yet in less than twenty-four hours this feeling of desolation gave way to intense joy and inward peace. Assisi’s Saint Francis had worked that magic spell over me that has been his to exercise during seven centuries on the hearts of men of good will. I cannot explain it otherwise. The weather for an Italian May continued atrocious, and the hotel food unappetising to an English palate. But one had found the spirit of Assisi, and nothing else mattered.