To the Rt. Rev. O'Regan, Bishop of Chicago.
My Lord:—The more I consider your design to turn me out of the
colony which I have founded and of which I am the pastor, the more I believe
it a duty which I owe to myself, my friends and to my countrymen, to
protest before God and man against what you intend to do.
Not a single one of your priests stands higher than I do in the public
mind, neither is more loved and respected by his people than I am. I defy
my bitterest enemies to prove the contrary. And that character which is
my most precious treasure you intend to despoil me of by ignominiously
sending me away from among my people! Certainly, I have enemies, and
I am proud of it. The chief ones are well known in this country as the
most depraved of men. The cordial reception they say they have received
from you, has not taken away the stains they have on their foreheads.
By this letter, I again request you to make a public and most minute
inquest into my conduct. My conscience tells me that nothing can be found
against me. Such a public and fair dealing with me would confound my
accusers. But I speak of accusers, when I do not really know if I have
any. Where are they? What are their names? Of what sin do they
accuse me? All these questions, which I put to you last Tuesday, were left
unanswered! and would to God that you would answer them to-day, by giving
me their names. I am ready to meet them before any tribunal. Before
you strike the last blow on the victim of the most hellish plot, I request
you, in the name of God, to give a moment's attention to the following consequences
of my removal from this place at present.
You know I have a suit with Mr. Spink at the Urbana Court, for the
beginning of October. My lawyers and witnesses are all in Kankakee and
Iroquois counties; and in the very time I want most to be here to prove
my innocence and guard my honor, you order me to go to a place more
than 300 miles distant! Did you ever realize that by that strange conduct
you help Spink against your own priest? When at Kahokia, I will have
to bear the heavy expenses of traveling more than 300 miles, many times,
to consult my friends, or, be deprived of their valuable help! Is it pos-
ible that you thus try to tie my hands and feet, and deliver me into the
hands of my remorseless enemies? Since the beginning of that suit, Mr.
Spink proclaims that you help him, and that, with the perjured priests, you
have promised to do all in your power to crush me down! For the sake of
the sacred character you bear, do not show so publicly that Mr. Spink's
boastings are true. For the sake of your high position in the church, do not so
publicly lend a helping hand to the heartless land speculator of L'Erable.
He has already betrayed his Protestant friends to get a wife; he will, ere
long, betray you for less. Let me then live in peace here, till that suit is
over.
By turning me away from my settlement, you destroy it. More than
nine-tenths of the emigrants came here to live near me; by striking me you
strike them all.
Where will you find a priest who will love that people so much as to
give them, every year, from one to two thousand dollars, as I have invariably
done. It is at the price of those sacrifices that, with the poorest class
of emigrants from Canada, I have founded here in four years a settlement
which cannot be surpassed, or even equaled, in the United States, for its
progress. And now that I have spent my last cent to form this colony, you
turn me out of it. Our college, where 150 boys are receiving such a good
education, will be closed the very day I leave. For, you know very well
the teachers I got from Montreal will leave as soon as I will.
Ah! if you are merciless towards the priest of St. Anne, have pity on
these poor children. I would rather be condemned to death than to see
them destroy their intelligence by running in the streets. Let me then
finish my work here, and give me time to strengthen these young institutions,
which would fall to the ground with me.
If you turn me out or interdict me, as you say you will do, if I disobey
your orders, my enemies will proclaim that you treat me with that
rigor because you have found me guilty of some great iniquity, and this
necessarily will prejudice my judges against me. They will consider me as
a vile criminal. For who will suppose, in this free country, that there is a
class of men who can judge a man and condemn him as our Bishop of
Chicago is doing to-day, without giving him the names of his accusers or
telling him of what crimes he is accused.
In the name of God, I again ask you not to force me to leave my
colony before I prove my innocence, and the iniquity of Spink, to the honest
people of Urbana.
But, if you are deaf to my prayers, and if nothing can deter you from
your resolution, I do not wish to be in the unenviable position of an interdicted
priest among my countrymen. Send me, by return mail, my letters
of mission for the new places you intend trusting to my care. The sooner
I get there, the better for me and my people. I am ready! When on the
road of exile, I will pray the God of Abraham to give me the fortitude and
the faith he gave to Isaac, when laying his head on the altar, he willingly
presented his throat to the sword. I will pray my Saviour, bearing His
heavy cross to the top of Calvary, to direct and help my steps towards the
land of exile you have prepared for your
Devoted Priest,
C. CHINIQUY.
