St. Alphonsus Liguori has stated that one of the clearest tokens that a person is on the way to eternal happiness is an eagerness to hear the word of God. The writer of these instructions has uniformly found, during the experience of many years, that this excellent disposition exists in a high degree of perfection among the inmates of our convents. And yet very many of those devout souls are so situated that for months they cannot hear any religious instruction, at least not such discourses as apply the sacred truths of revelation to the peculiar needs of their holy vocation. It is to supply this want of oral addresses that these pages are respectfully presented; they are chiefly intended to be read in community, where a little effort of the imagination may suffice to produce about the same impression as if they were uttered by the lips of a priest of God. Let us consider this excerpt: "First then the nature of holiness. We will take as our instructor in this important matter our dear Lord Himself. He gave this great lesson for all future ages on the night before His sacred passion, when He discoursed for the last time in this life with His Apostles. Let us imagine that we are seated with them before the Divine teacher, treasuring up in our loving hearts every word that falls from His sacred lips. He spoke as follows; St. John, who was present, has recorded the very words: "I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit, he will take away; and everyone that beareth fruit, he will purge it, that it may bring forth more fruit. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself unless it abide in the vine, so neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you the branches: he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same beareth much fruit; for without me you can do nothing. If anyone abide not in me, he shall be cast forth as a branch and shall wither, and they shall gather him up and cast him into the fire, and he burneth. If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, you shall ask whatever you will, and it shall be done unto you. In this is my Father glorified that you bring forth very much fruit, and become my disciples" (XV, 18)." And this should show that these instructions, although written for religious apply to all Christians: "St. Teresa tells us clearly, in that remarkable autobiography which she wrote by the order of her confessor, that she was a very imperfect religious during nearly twenty years, and that she was converted by prayer. To quote her own words: "I wish," she writes, "that I could obtain leave to declare the many times I failed, during this period, in my obligations to God, because I was not supported by the strong pillar of mental prayer. I passed through this tempestuous sea almost twenty years, between these fallings and risings, (though I rose very imperfectly, since I fell again so quickly, ) and in this kind of life, which was so far below perfection, I made almost no account of venial sins; and for mortal ones, I feared them, it is true, but not so much as I ought to have done, since I did not avoid the dangerous occasions. " And the Saint adds: "The reason why I have given this account is. . that it may be understood how great a blessing God bestows on that soul which He disposes to practise mental prayer with a good will, even though she were not SO well prepared for it as she should be. But if she perseveres therein, whatever sins she may commit, whatever temptations may be presented to her, or whatever falls she may receive in a thousand different ways from the devil, I consider it certain that our Lord will, in the end, bring her safe to the port of salvation. ""

Although this book is intended for Jesuits, all Christians can benefit from the Spiritual Exercises of Saint Ignatius. The original exercises are meant for a month long retreat. By being reorganized for eight days, more people can take advantage of these holy exercises. The Text of the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius, as translated into English from the Spanish Autograph, and edited for private circulation by Rev. John Morris, S. J., is printed in a small volume of only 125 pages. That little work contains all that the Saint composed in the Grotto of Manresa, and he never afterward wrote any additions to the text. But in explaining his Exercises to his first companions, and to others who made the retreat under his direction, he would adapt the details to their characters and the various circumstances. His followers did the same, without writing further additions or commentaries on the original text; they followed in their practice the traditional method as it had come to them from Their saintly founder. In the course of time, as was natural, considerable departures from the first process took place, some of which induced the danger of gradually losing the very spirit of the original Exercises. Among the learned men of our Society who labored most successfully to check such tendency, one of the most distinguished was the Father General John Roothaan, who in 1834 addressed a circular letter to all his subject, earnestly warning them against this peril. At the same time he furnished them a masterly work on the original Spanish and Latin texts, which he accompanied with a most valuable commentary. For those preferring a Latin guide book, whether in making the Exercises themselves, or in explaining them to others, no work is more commendable than that masterpiece of Father Roothaan. Still, both before and since its publication, many other editions of the Exercises and commentaries on the same have been printed, both in Latin and in various modern languages, with full approbation and warm commendations of the Superiors of the Society; and excellent reasons appear to exist why successive generations of Jesuits should continue their efforts to enrich this valuable literature. In particular the eight days retreat, which all our members perform every year, gains additional interest and impressiveness when a wider range is presented, affording a choice among a large number of approved guide books to direct them through this fertile region of spirituality. The spirit permeating all of these must ever be the same, so too the main outline of the truths proposed and the general plan of the Exercises. Yet experience shows that there remains a wide room for variety in comments, suggestions and practical applications. Therefore, when the time for each one's annual retreat comes round, there is shown by many Fathers an earnest desire for some late publication on the subject, that will lend new zest to the familiar solid doctrine. To satisfy such reasonable wishes is the chief reason why the present pages are modestly presented to his brethren by THE AUTHOR

This was originally a series of lectures, which include: The foundation of jurisprudence Craniomity Abortion Wiews of Scientists and Sociologists Venereal Diseases The Physicians Professional Rights and Duties The Nature of Insanity The Legal Aspects of Insanity Hypnotisim and the Borderland of Science Let us consider this on insanity: "That cases involving an insane condition of mind must be of frequent occurrence, both in the medical and in the legal professions, is apparent from the large and rapidly increasing amount of lunacy in our modern civilization. Wharton and Stille's "Medical Jurisprudence" states (sec. 770, note) that in 1850 there was in Great Britain one lunatic to about one thousand persons; only thirty years later the Lunacy Commission of Great Britain reported one lunatic to 357 persons in England and Wales, that is, nearly three times as many." And this introducing the last lecture: "IN this last lecture of our course I propose to make a brief excursion with you into the border-land of science, a region chiefly occupied by imposture and superstition. To show there is such a territory, we have only to name a few of its inhabitants, such as mesmerism. animal magnetism, odylism, hypnotism, mind-reading, faith-cures, clairvoyance, spiritism, including table-rapping, spirit-rapping, most of which have been used in connection with medicine. I do not maintain that all of these are mere vagaries, empty shadows, without the least reality, mere ghosts and hobgoblins, mere phantoms of the heat oppressed brain, or cunning devices of impostors to deceive a gullible crowd of the ignorant public. Yet most of these are such beyond a doubt, and as such are totally unworthy of our attention."

ONE of the brightest glories of the Catholic Church shines forth in the zeal she has ever displayed for the propagation of the Gospel. From the time when Christ said to His Apostles: "Go ye into the whole world and preach the Gospel to every creature," they and their successors, the missionaries of every age, have bravely carried on the sacred task entrusted to them, without any interruption whatsoever; and they are seen to-day as they have been seen all along, in every known portion of the earth, extending the kingdom of Christ, and preparing numberless souls for the enjoyment of heavenly bliss. In the United States in particular the Church has nobly performed this divine mission. She has sent her heroic sons, bishops and priests, in large numbers to every tribe. If the aboriginal population, baptizing, teaching, and civilizing its scattered millions, successful in converting and sanctifying large portions of them, notwithstanding the active opposition of false religionists. Many of the most glowing pages of the great Protestant historian of the United States, George Bancroft, contain magnificent descriptions of the devoted labors of our Catholic missionaries, whose wonderful exploits he narrates with all the brilliancy and interest which attach to the writinJts of Prescott in his records of the Conquest of Mexico by Hernando Cortez. But every Christian feels, while reading such works, how far the sacred purpose and the self-sacrifice of the missionaries among the Indians surpnss in nobility the dauntless courage of the steel-clad warriors. Father de Smet went all across the wild west in the mid 1800's. From Missouri, de Smet went west to the Pottawatomie mission at Saint Marys, Kansas. Then this 'black robe' was sent to the Rocky Mountains and on to Oregon. Fromn here Father de Smet is sent to Rome where he meets Pope Gregory XVI. Eventually Father de Smet was back in Saint Louis in the Missouri province of the Jesuits.