Page:Life in the Old World - Vol. II.djvu/233

Rh one God, and in the unity a Trinity, without confounding the persons, and without separating the substance. Because the person of the Father is one, the person of the Son is one, and the person of the Holy Ghost is one, but in these there is one substance and one divinity.”

The many repetitions of the prayers, the exhortations, and the conjurations, rendered the ceremony long and wearisome. I was particularly struck with the symbolism of the circumstance when the young, newly-baptized for she also underwent the rite of baptism anew was led by the priest into the church, she holding fast by a broad scarf which he wore around his neck. Yes, she had given up the evangelical liberty, in which the human being is alone led by the Lord, to be guided by the leading-strings of the priest and the priesthood, for, according to the Roman Catholic doctrine, the priesthood constitutes the church. She had gone back from the church of the independent manhood to that of the child not yet of age. But, perhaps she was one of those who require this latter means of help to support them in the conflict with evil. Confession, and a good, true, Christian father-confessor, evidently constitute an important means for this purpose.

“A good father-confessor,” it depends upon that. The honest avowal of the Catholic Christian, as that of Madame Guion and Madame Dudevant, (George Sand), has shown us that the father-confessor may be as often injurious as profitable.

By the side of the young girl, stood during the ceremony, in quality of god-mother, the Marchioness