To understand well the terms in which this letter was couched, we will premise:
It is impossible to know beyond all doubt whether the Police or the Administration had instigated the false visionaries, or whether they were the innocent victims of universal suspicion, and it would be still more difficult to establish this point by regular documents. In such cases, the proofs, when any are in existence, are always destroyed by interested hands. To arrive then at the truth, there remains only the general complexion of events, and the unanimous feeling of a contemporary public―a feeling sometimes certainly very just, but often also imbued with passion and stained with error. In presence of such incomplete elements, of this shade mingled with light, and this light mingled with shade, a historian has only to recount authentic facts, to express his doubts, uneasiness and scruples, with regard to the rest, and to leave the reader to decide the question and determine in his own mind on which side the greater probability rests.
Whatever, therefore, was the reason, or the unknown hand which had instigated two or three street-boys to play the part of Visionaries, M. Jacomet, M. Massy, and their friends, displayed the greatest eagerness in exaggerating these childish tricks and turning them to the best advantage. They exerted themselves to the utmost to invite the attention of the multitude to this quarter, and to divert it from the really grave events, such as the divine ecstasies of Bernadette, the gushing forth of the Spring, and the cures of those that were sick, which had captivated the faith of the people. When the battle is lost on one point, eminent strategists endeavor, by some well-contrived feint, to lure the enemy towards a portion of the field full of ambuscades, and mines ready to explode as soon as they reach it. This is what they term, “making a diversion.”
The sudden disappearance of the false visions and false Visionaries before the aroused attention and far-seeing threats of the Abbé Peyramale, blasted, from the very first day, the hopes which had been conceived by the profound tacticians of the free-thinking party.
The good sense of the public remained firm on the true ground of the question, and did not allow itself to be deceived. This was not the case with the high-reasoning powers of the Minister, M. Rouland. Let us see how it happened that his strong mind was led astray.
Attempting one more desperate effort against the triumphant and irresistible force of circumstances, and employing the last resources of their genius to produce at all cost out of these paltry incidents a last chance of resisting defeat and of resuming the offensive, the Prefect and Jacomet had forwarded to the Minister of Public Worship, the most hyperbolical and fantastic picture of these child scenes. Now, owing to an illusion scarcely conceivable in a statesman who had had experience of official life in these, our days, M. Rouland placed the blindest confidence in official reports. Faith is never lost, whatever may be said to the contrary, but it is often misplaced. Rouland, the philosopher, had no faith in our Lady of Lourdes, proving her claims by cures and miracles, but he had faith in the Prefect and Jacomet. These two gentlemen then made him believe, that, under the shade of the Rocks of Massabielle, children had the audacity to play the part of priests, and that the people, represented by creatures of impure life, crowned them with laurels, or with flowers, etc., etc. They did not disguise to him the utter impotency of violent measures against the general agitation of the public mind. According to them, material force was vanquished and the civil authority at bay. The religious authority alone could save the situation by energetic action against the popular belief. Driven to desperation and knowing little of what became the dignity of a Christian Bishop, they dared to imagine, that a pressure from the higher authorities judiciously brought to bear on Monseigneur Laurence, might determine him to condemn what was passing, and act according to their own views. For this reason they suggested to the Minister a personal appeal to the Bishop, as the best means of extrication from the present difficulties.
This was to urge his excellency in the direction towards which he naturally inclined. M. Rouland was well-known to have a tendency to mix himself up with religious questions, and he experienced much pleasure in drawing up programs for the guidance of the successors of the Apostles.
The Minister, notwithstanding his having been formerly Procureur-Général, never once thought of asking himself the question why―if the reports he had received were correct―the Parquet had not prosecuted before the tribunals the authors of the profanations brought to his notice. This strange inaction of the Magistracy with regard to these asserted disorders never once excited his suspicions.
Accepting then with a candor more than ministerial the romances of the Police and the Prefect and fancying that he saw his way clearly in the business; deeming himself a theologian of the first water and something more than an Archbishop, seeing that he was the Minister of Public Worship, M. Rouland, from the interior of his cabinet, formed a peremptory judgment on the actual state of things, and wrote to the Bishop of Tarbes a letter, which was in all respects a worthy counterpart of the one he addressed at the commencement of the affair to the Prefect and which we have already quoted. It was from beginning to end impregnated with the same official piety. On re-perusing it to-day, by the light of historical truth, it is impossible to avoid smiling sadly at the manner―sometimes so monstrously barefaced―in which those who govern are at times deceived―we might almost say impudently mocked and held up to derision―by the inferior agents of their administration. We cannot in fact regard without a melancholy irony of mind the following letter written by the very Minister who at no very distant period of time was to affix his signature to a paper authorizing the erection of a spacious church on the Rocks of Massabielle, in eternal memory of the Apparitions of the Most Blessed Virgin Mary.
MONSEIGNEUR,―The latest intelligence I have received touching the affair of Lourdes appears to me to be of a nature calculated to cause deep sorrow to all sincerely religious men. These benedictions of chaplets by mere children, these manifestations in which may be remarked women of doubtful morality, these crowns placed on the heads of visionaries, these grotesque ceremonies, more parodies of religious ones, could not fail of giving free scope to the attacks of protestant and other journals, if the central authority did not interfere to moderate the ardor of their discussions on religious subjects. These scandalous scenes do not throw less discredit on Religion in the eyes of the population, and I think it my duty, Monseigneur, to call anew your most serious attention towards these facts. . . . .
These much to be regretted manifestations seem to me also to be of a nature to induce the Clergy to break through the reserve they have hitherto maintained. I can but make a pressing appeal on that subject to all your prudence and firmness, and ask you whether you do not think it advisable to reprove in the most public manner profanations of the kind.
Accept, etc., ROULAND, Minister of Public Instruction and Public Worship.
