Funding for the digitization of this title was provided by R.J. Taylor, Jr. Foundation.
About The banner of the South. (Augusta, Ga.) 1868-1870 | View Entire Issue (April 10, 1869)
4 REV. A. J. RYAN, Editor AUGUSTA, Ga., APRIL 10, 18G9. C3T ALL SUBSCRIPTIONS AND BUSINESS LETTERS FOR THE “BAN NER OF THE SOUTH” SHOULD BE ADDRESSED TO THE PUBLISHERS - L. T. BLOME & CO. PRESIDENT GRANT AND HIS ADMIN ISTRATION President Giant, as wc anticipated, bis proven himself a grand failure. Re gardless of his constitutional obligations, and the interests of the whole country, he has delivered himself up, body and soul, iuto the hands of the most unscrup ulous and partizan of the Radical pack. In his Cabinet appointments, he seems to have been guided entirely by one motive, and that, the “farming out” of offices to those who made him the most costly presents. Intellectually, it is the weak est Cabinet that has ever been organized, and we will here assert that it will be the most worthless aDd expensive to the peo ple of the United States. The new President has taken care, not only to reward those who lavished mo ney, houses, etc., upon him, but, in the distribution of the public offices, he has provided for all his own relations and family connexions—all which may be, and doubtless will be profitable to Mr. Grant and his family, but it is neither patriotic ou the part of the President, nor conducive to the welfare of the eoun fcry. Wc, of the South, can see but little to hope for from this 3lilitary President. Our best help is in a vigorous and per sistent reconstruction of our material re sources. Let polities alone. Radical reconstruction will exhaust itself after awhile, and then the South will triumph over her enemies at the South and at the North. There is a day of retribution coming ior those who have outraged the South-land and its people. In the mean time, let us preserve our honor untarn ished, and rebuild our broken fortunes. We shall vet briii£r our enemies down to the dust. IMMIGRATION. Wo have frequently expressed our selves in favor of offering such induce ments as would encourage a large immi gration to the South. We have never suggested any particular plan or propo sition, because, so many have been of fered, that we have found it difficult to present or endorse any of them. Per haps it was better to have a General Convention to discuss this subject, and agree upon some general plan which would be practicable and beneficial to the whole South. In the meantime, we find in the Marion (Ala) Common wealth, a very suggestive article on this important subject, in which it is stated that Col. Lee Crandall, of New Orleans, proposes a plan, of which the following is the substance : “He proposes the formation of a Joint Stock Immigration Company in each Southern State, to be managed and con trolled by officers selected by the stock holders, aud comprising a central office at some central point, with branch of fices or agencies wherever it may suit tiie directory of the Company to estab lish the same. Each stockholder con tributes so much land to the general mud, valued according to prevailing market rates in the section where loca nd, and voted (in election of Directors, etc.,) according to its relative value to the general aggregate. When subscriptions have been completed, k or whenever the limits of subscriptions have been reach ed, the lands subscribed are to - valued, and so modified as regards prices as to present inducements to the immi grant equal if not superior, to those held out to him in the Western States. The Company will then advertise these lands, their location, inducements, etc., through Northern papers of extensive influence and circulation, establish immigration agencies in the chief cities of the North, and thus turn that tide which lias made the West an Empire of unrivalled beauty and strength, into Southern channels, to pour its fertilizing floods on Southern fields. By these means, the first white covered wagon seen on our streets will not be permitted to choke off all further immigration by throwing prices up be yond the reach of light pockets. The lands subscribed will be held by the Com pany at the assessed tariff until the whole or nearly the whole capital stock of the concern in the lands so assessed has been exhausted. But the assessed rates will apply only to alternate sec tions or sub-divisions, of the land sub scribed. The remaining portions of the capitol stock will be held baok until the alternate sections have all been taken up. By this time the unsold lands will be worth four or five times their antecedent value, and these will then be thrown upon the market for what they will bring—if it be two hundred dollars per acre. But no lands belonging to the Company, will, in any event, be sold to other than those who propose to become, and who will bind themselves to become actual settlers” “To illustrate Col. Crandall’s idea, we will suppose that A. 1L C. and D. desire to form a corporation ou his plan. A. subscribes 1,000 a~res of black land, worth S2O per acre, B. puts in 2,000 acres of post-oak land worth ten dollars per acre, C. and I). put in 4,000 acres each of sandy land, worth $5 per acre. In this case, the values of their several subscriptions being equal, the stockhold ers, A. B. C. and D , will be entitled to equal votes (say forty votes each, or one vote for every SSOO worth of land), in the choice of a President and Board of Directors. They vote in person, or by proxy, for officers, who, when elected, assume at once the entire control and management of the Company’s lands. And after having arranged the lands subscribed, into subdivisions or tracts, (following the plats and maps of the same furnished by the owners,) they offer th 6 alternate sections, subdivisions or tracts subscribed by A. at half their market value, to-wit: at ten dollars per acre, pursuing the same plan with those sub scribed by the other partners—advertis ing the same through Northern journals of extensive influence and circulation, and inviting settlers to come and occupy them, through the medium of Immigra tion Agencies established by them in the Northern and Northeastern States. The influence of so powerful a corporation as this, would soon be extensive enough, and deep enough to lobby through the State Legislatures bills, offering great inducements to “actual settlers.” These added to the superior inducement of twenty-five cents for cotton, would soon show themselves amply sufficient for the attraction hither of such a swarm of ini - migrants that no amount of subscribed lands would be sufficient to furnish th cm homes and employment. The natural desire to secure cheap lands, under ex emption from governmental burdens for a term of years, would have a correspond ing tendency to make the emigrant come early. Hence, the rapidity with which our waste places would be rcpeoplcd, would soon shoot the reserved subscrip tions, contiguous as they must, in that event, be to the theatre of most rapid in crease, far beyond their present value. This would result in adding twice or three times as much solid value to the reservations as had in the first instance, been substracted from the alternate sec tions to make them sell. We should thus secure a lasting preponderance ot white blood in our population, besides the other and pecuniary benefits calcu lated to result therefrom.” At least, this is the opinion of the article referred to, and we do not doubt, but that his views are correct. At all events, the plan proposed seems to us worthy of atrial, and we submit it to our people for their consideration and action. It is important that something should be done in this regard, and the quicker the better A TRIBUTeTo IRELAND, The Baltimore Sun or the Louisville Courier-Journal, we don’t exactly know which, pays the following handsome but deserved tribute to Ireland and Irishmen, every word of which is true : “The celebration of St. Patrick’s day is an occasion of great interest to a large body of adopted citizens, as well as to the still larger number of uative birth united to them by ties of relation ship. The Irish in America have this curious and undeniable characteristic, that they never cease to be Irish, and at the same time are as good Americans as the best. They are, indeed, among the most remarkable of modern people. Genius, wit and eloquence seem to be the common heritage, in a greater or less degree, of the whole Irish race. Among their most prominent characteristics are the courage of the men, the purity ot the women, warm hearts and open hands of all, strong religious faith, and an im perishable love of old Ireland. The magnitude of the Irish element iti our population may be judged of by the fact that in the forty-six years, 1815-1860, the total number of immigrants arriving from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland on our shores was 2,750,874. In the same period 1,196,- 521 persons emigrated from the United Kingdom to the British Colonies in North America, a large portion of whom are known to have eventually settled iu the United States. By the ceusus of 1860, the population in the United States of Irish birth was 1,611,304, and that of German 1,301,136. Since that period the German clement has increased, re latively speaking. The greatest number of Irish reside in the States of New York, Pennsylvania, Illinois, Ohio, Wisconsin, and Michigan. It is computed that the four millions of emigrants in the United States in 1860, together with the num ber deceased, must have brought into the country an amount of property not less than $400,000,000, besides the much greater capital which the immi grants iu themselves represent, physi cally and intellectually. One fact to which we weuld call special attention is the large sums of money which have been sent by settlers in North America to friends in Great Britain, amounting, from 1848 to 1860, according to the re turns of banks and mercantile houses through which they have been forwarded, and not including sums remitted through other agencies, to $56,191,733. Taking as a standard the increase of population of Irish nativity from 1850 to 1860, which was about 751,000, the census of next year will probably give 2,362,304 persons of Irish nativity in this country, not couuting the large number of Irish descent. “No accession to our population from abroad has been more valuable than that of the Irish. They may be *said to have been the pioneers in the emigration to this country, and as such their labor was indispensable in all the industrial enter prises which have been necessary to the development of our national wealth. The public works of the country, the canals, the railroads, the clearing up of the Western wilderness, have been accom plished in great measure through their bone and muscle. They have formed the front ranks in the armies of peace as well as war. Their creative energies are as great as their destructive, and when we say that, we need add nothing further. In ail our battles, whether by sea or land, their courage has been con spicuous. In all the wars of England it is the Irish who lead the advance, and even in the late expedition to Abyssinia it was an Irish column which swept away the barbarians around Theodorus, at the moment when some of their own countrymen were lying in jail in England, or preparing to mount the scaffold, as the penalty of alleged treason. It is not, however, by theirphysical stamina alone, either in peace or war, that the Irish have been of value to our country. They have contributed to our moral, intellec tual, and political forces as largely as any class of emigrants, aud they and their descendants are among the leading and able men in all departments of our pub lic and private life. Henry Clay once pointed out a striking resemblance be tween the Irish and Kentuckians in their impulsive, hospitable, frank, intrepid character. In truth, they assimilate with our people with wonderful facility, and, may be said to be full fledged Americans before they step upon our shores. To those who are accustomed to speak of the poverty of the Irish peas antry as proof of a want ot industry and economy, wc need only to exhibit the prosperous condition of the same people here as an evidence that the state of things in their own island is due to other causes than the defect of the na tiotirf character, whilst the vast sums they have scut to their friends at home exhibit qualities ot heart which would do honor to any people. In fact, the amazing recuperative energies of the Irish people, which centuries of oppres sion have not bceu able to overcome, are proof of a vitality that seems capable of outliving the tyranny which has songht in vain to repress it, and ot show ing that the shamrock, like sonic other plants, has a power of forcing itself from the ground upward through the heaviest superincumbent pressure.” DO PRIESTS MARRY ? Wc see a statement going the rouuds of the secular press to the effect that the Priests of the Catholic Church are allowed tohnarry in Italy. Many intel ligent but credulous people, outside of the Catholic Church, believe this ridicu lous statement, and ask how is it ? There is but one universal law which rules the Church all over the world. Her doctrines, her teaching, her practices, her faith aud discipline are the same in Europe as in America, the same in Africa as in Asia and Oceaniea. The Catholic Priest makes a vow of celibacy from which no civil tribunal can ever relieve him. If, therefore, a Priest should marry, he would not only cease to be a Priest, but would be de prived of the Sacraments of the Church. THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AND THE BIBLE- The following is the teaching of the Catholic Church in regard to the use of the Holy Scriptures, misrepresentation to the contrary notwithstanding: “On the other hand, we Catholics hold that the word of God in general, both written and unwritten, in other words, the Bible and tradition taken together, constitute the mle of faith, or method appointed by Christ for finding out the true religion; and that, besides the rule itself, He has provided in His Haig Church, a living, speaking judge, to watch over it and explain it in all matters of controversy. — Rev. Dr. Milner's End of Controversy, p. 41. “It does not even appear that Chrtst gave His Apostles any command to write the Gospels, though he repeatedly and emphatically commanded them to preach it, (Matt. x.)and this to all the Nations of the earth. (Matt, xxviii.” In this ministry they all of them spent their lives, preaching the religion of Christ in every country from Judea to Spain in one direction, and to India in another; everywhere establishing churches, and commending their doctrine to faithful men who should be fit to teach others also.” 2 Tim., ii. 2. In short, it was not until the end of the fourth century that the canon of the Holy Scripture was fixed, and then it was fixed by the tradition and authority of the Church, declared in the Third Councilor Carthage and a decretal of Pope Innocent I.”— lbid—pp. 42, 54. “Nothingis further from the doctrine and practice of the Catholic Church than to slight the Holy Scriptures. So far from this, she had religiously preserved and perpetuated them from age to age during almost 1,500 years before Pro testants existed. She has consulted them, and confirmed her decrees from them in her several Councils She en joins her Pastors, whose business it is to instruct the faithful, to read and study them without intermission, knowing that “All Sciipture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. 2 Tim. iii, lb. '* * * Hence, the Catholic Church requires her Pastors who arc to preach and expound the word of God, to study this second part of her rule, no loss than the first part, with unremitting diligence; and she encourages those of her tlode, who are properly qualified and disposed, to read it for (heir edification.” —Ibid pp. 63,81. “The Catholic Church never did pro hibit the reading of the Scriptures to the laity.’— 'lbid, p. 292. “The Church has received the deposit of the Holy Scriptures from God, aoil nothing has she more at heart than to see her children nourished with the Divine Word, aud meditating on its ()ra _ cles. Yet., she surrounds this excellent reading with certain precautions which her maternal prudence has learned from faith and experience —Plain Tall » 119. “The Bible is pre-eminently the Book of the Priesthood. Besides the Euchar ist, it is the most precious deposit en trusted to the hands of the Priests who have been charged with the salvation of souls. By its proper use they enrich the souls of the people as well as their own souls.— lbid, p. 122. “As the Father hath sent me, ] also send you.”— John , xx, 21. “All power is given tc me in Heaven and on earth. Going, therefore, teach ve aU nations* * * teaching them to ob serve all things whatsoever 1 have com manded you.”— Matt, xxviii, 18. “ Obey your prelates, and be subject to them, for they watch as b urns to render an account of your souls.”— xiii., 17. “The Holy Ghost has placed you Bishops to rule the Church of God.” Acts xx., 28. “In all his (St. Paul’s) Epistles are certain things hard to be understood which the unlearned and the unstable wrest, as they do also the other Scrip tures to their own destruction .”—2 Peter ii>., 16. “ Brethren* •• ’hold the traditions , which you have learned, whether by word or by an Epistle.”— Thess. ii., 14 “ There are also many other things which Jesus did which if they were writ ten every one the world itself, I think would not be able to contain the books that should be written.— St. John, xxi 25. “ The things which thou hast heard of me by many witnesses the same commend to faithful men, who shall be fit to teach others also.”—2 Tim. ii., 2. “ I had many things to write unto thee; but I could not by ink and pen write to thee. But I hope speedily to see thee, and we will speak mouth to mouth."— St. John i., 16. The learned Protestant Casaubon con fessed that, “ the Fathers” of the Church were all on the Catholic side; the equally learned Obrectch testifies that in reading their works, “he was frequently pro yoked to throw them on the ground, find ing them so full of Popery.” What do they say ? St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, on his passage to Rome, whither he was going under sentence to be devoured by wild beasts, exhorted the Christians who got access to him, “ to guard themselves against the rising heresies, and to adhere with the utmost firmness to the tradition of the Apostles.” The same sentiment appears iu his epistles, as also in those of his fellow-martyr, St. Polyearp.-~2Y(.se6. Hist. I. iii. c. 30. Revel, ii., 8. St. Ireneus writes: “Nothing is more easy for those who seek for the truth than to mark in every Church the tradi tion which the Apostles have manifested to all the world.” * * * “In ex plaining the Scriptures, Christians are to attend to the Pastors of the Church s who, by the ordinance of God, have re ceived the inheritance of truth with the succession of their Sees.” — Advert. Heeres, 1. iii. c. 5; l. iv. c. 43. “ Since it would be tedious to enumer ate the succession of all the Churches, we appeal to the faith and tradition ot the greatest, most ancient, and best known Church—that of Koine, founded by the Apostles SS. Peter and Paul —for with this Church, all writers agree, as in her is preserved the traditions which comes down from the Apostles. —L. iii. c. 2. See also Tertullian, St. Clement, - Cvprian, Origen, etc., all of whom pm " Apostolic tradition on a level witn Scripture, and describe the Church _tb the expounder of them both, as do ao> St. Basil, St. Epiphanius, St. John Chrysostom, St. Vincent of Levies, aim other early writers. [Note — Chilling worth, a I’rote-tm,. writer, says: “ The word of God ti p' not consist in mere letters, whether vw > - t< u O'" printed, but in the true sense <>* it; which no one can better interpm than the irue Church to which [ [y' r committed this sacred pledge. 1 logomena to Polyejlott , cap . v. Dr. Balguy, another learned lkm°" ant writer, says: “Open your id*'' take the first page that occurs in eim Testament, and tell me, without disgui- • is there anything in it too hard toi understanding? If you find all » ’ you clear ami easy, you may t! aim 1 for giving you a privilege which m ; denied to many thousand sincere lievers.” — Discourses, p- 111- “ We are obliged to yield many
