University of Virginia Library

Chapter LVIII.

ADDRESS FROM MY PEOPLE, ASKING ME TO REMAIN—ADDRESS
OF THE PEOPLE TO THF BISHOP—I AM AGAIN DRAGGED AS
A PRISONER BY THE SHERIFF TO URBANA—PERJURY OF
THE PRIEST LEBELLE — ABRAHAM LINCOLN'S ANXIETY
ABOUT THE ISSUE OF THE PROSECUTION—MY DISTRESS—
NIGHT OF DESSOLATION—THE RESCUE—MISS PHILOMENE
MOFFAT SENT BY GOD TO SAVE ME—LEBELLE'S CONFESSION
AND DISTRESS—SPINK WITHDRAWS HIS SUIT—MY INNOCENCE
ACKNOWLEDGED—NOBLE WORDS AND CONDUCT OF
ABRAHAM LINCOLN—THE OATH OF MISS PHILOMENE
MOFFAT.

THE Sabbath afternoon after the three drunken priests nailed
their unsigned, unsealed, untestified, and consequently null
sentence of excommunication, to the door of our chapel, the
people had gathered from every part of our colony into the large
hall of the court-house of Kankakee City to hear several addresses
on their duties of the day, and they unanimously passed
the following resolution:

"Resolved. That we, French Canadians of the County of Kankakee,
do hereby decide to give our moral support to Rev. C. Chiniquy, in the persecution
now exerted against him by the Bishop of Chicago, in violation of
the laws of the church, expressed and sanctioned by the Councils."

After this resolution had been voted, Mr. Bechard, who is
now one of the principal members of the parliament of Canada,
and who was then a merchant of Kankakee City, presented to
me the following address, which had also been unanimously
voted by the people:

"Dear and Beloved Pastor:—For several years we have been witnesses
of the persecution of which you are the subject, on the part of the
bad priests, your neighbors, and on the part of the unworthy Bishop of
Chicago: but we also have been the witnesses of your sacerdotal virtues—

of your forbearance of their calumnies—and our respect and affection for
your person has but increased at the sight of those trials.

"We know that you are persecuted, not only because you are a Canadian
priest, and that you like us, but also because you do us good in making
a sacrifice of your own private fortune to build school-houses and to feed
our teachers at your own table. We know that the Bishop of Chicago, who
resembles more an angry wolf than a pastor of the church, having destroyed
the prosperous congregation of Chicago by taking away from them their
splendid church, which they had built at the cost of many sacrifices, and
giving it to the Irish population, and having discouraged the worthy population
of Bourbonnais Grove in forcing on them drunken and scandalous
priests, wants to take you away from among us, to please Spink, the greatest
enemy of the French population. They even say that the bishop, carrying
iniquity to its extreme bonds, wanted to interdict you. But as our church
cannot, and is not willing to sanction evil and calumny, we know that all
those interdicts, based on falsehood and spite, are null and void.

"We therefore solicit you not to give way in presence of the perfidious
plots of your enemies, and not to leave us. Stay among us as our pastor
and our father, and we solemnly promise to sustain you in all your hardships
to the end, and to defend you against our enemies. Stay among us,
to instruct us in our duties by your eloquent speeches, and to enlighten us
by your pious examples. Stay among us, to guard us against the perfidious
designs of the Bishop of Chicago, who wants to discourage and destroy our
prosperous colony, as he has already discouraged and destroyed other congregations
of the French Canadians, by leaving them without a pastor, or
by forcing on them unworthy priests."

The stern and unanimous determination of my countrymen
to stand by me in the impending struggle is one of the greatest
blessings which God has ever given me. It filled me with a
courage which nothing could hereafter shake. But the people
of St. Anne did not think that it was enough to show to the
bishop that nothing could ever shake the resolution they had
taken to live and die free men. They gathered in a public and
immense meeting on the Sabbath after the sham excommunication,
to adopt the following address to the Bishop of Chicago,
a copy of which was sent to every Bishop of the United States
and Canada, and to Pope Pius IX:

"To His Lordship, Anthony O'Regan of Chicago:—We, the
undersigned, inhabitants of the parish of St. Anne, Beaver settlement, seeing
with sorrow that you have discarded our humble request, which we have
sent you by four delegates, and have persisted in trying to drive away
our honest and worthy priest, who has edified us in all circumstances

by his public and religious conduct, and having, contrary to the rules of our
holy church and common sense, struck our worthy pastor, Mr. Chiniquy,
with excommunication, having caused him to be announced as a schismatic
priest, and having forbidden us to communicate with him in religious matters,
are hereby protesting against the unjust and iniquitous manner in
which you have struck him, refusing him the privilege of justifying himself
and proving his innocence.

"Consequently, we declare that we are ready at all times as good
Catholics, to obey all your orders and ordinances that are in accordance
with the laws of the Gospel and the Church, but that we are not willing to
follow you in all your errors of judgments, in your injustices and covetous
caprices. Telling you, as St. Jerome wrote to his Bishop, that as long as
you will treat us as your children, we will obey you as a father; but as soon
as you will treat us as our master, we shall cease to consider you as our
father. Considering Mr. Chiniquy as a good and virtuous priest, worthy of
the place he occupies, and possessing as yet all his sacerdotal powers, in
spite of your null and ridiculous sentence, we have unanimously decided to
keep him among us as our pastor; therefore praying your Lordship not to
put yourself to the trouble of seeking another priest for us. More yet: we
have unanimously decided to sustain him and furnish him the means to go
as far as Rome, if he cannot have justice in America.

"We further declare that it has been dishonorable and shameful for our
bishop and for our holy religion to have seen, coming under the walls of
our chapel, bringing the orders of the prince of the church of a representative
of Christ, three men covered with their sacerdotal garments, having
their tongues half paralyzed by the effects of brandy, and who, turning their
backs to the church, went into the house and barn of one of our settlers and
there emptied their bottles. And from there, taking their seats in their
buggies, went towards the settlement of L'Erable, singing drunken songs
and hallooing like wild Indians. Will your lordship be influenced by such
a set of men, who seem to have for their mission to degrade the sacrados
and Catholicism?

"We conclude, in hoping that your lordship will not persist in your
decision, given in a moment of madness and spite; that you will reconsider
your acts, and that you will retract your unjust, null and ridiculous excommunication,
and by these means avoid the scandal of which your precipitation
is the cause. We then hope that, changing your determination, you
will work for the welfare of our holy religion, and not to its degredation, in
which your intolerant conduct would lead us, and that you will not persist
in trying to drive our worthy pastor, Rev. Charles Chiniquy, from the
flourishing colony that he has founded at the cost of the abandonment of
his native land, of the sacrifice of the high position he had in Canada: that
you will bring peace between you and us, and that we shall have in the
Bishop of Chicago not a tyrant, but a father, and that you will have in us

not rebels, but faithful children, by our virtues and our good example.
Subscribing ourselves the obedient children of the church.

This address, singned by more than five hundred men, all
heads of families, and reproduced by almost the whole press in
the United States, fell as a thunderclap on the head of the heartless
destroyer of our people. But it did not change his destructive
plans. It had just the contrary effect. As a tiger, mortally
wounded by the sure shots of the hunters, he filled the country
with his roaring, hoping to frighten us by his new denunciations.
He published the most lying stories to explain his conduct, and
to show the world that he had good reasons for destroying the
French congregation of Chicago, and trying the same experiment
on St. Anne.

In order to refute his false statements, and to show more
clearly to the whole world the reason I had, as a Catholic priest,
to resist him, I addressed the following letter to his lordship:

"Rt. Rev'd O'Regan:—You seem to be surprised that I have offered
the holy sacrifice of mass since our last interview. Here are some of my
reasons for so doing.

"1st. You have not suspended me; far from it, you have given me
fifteen days to consider what I should do, threatening only to interdict me
after that time, if I would not obey your orders.

"2nd. If you have been so ill-advised as to suspend me, for the crime
of telling you that my intention was to live the live of a retired priest in my
little colony, sooner than be exiled at my age, your sentence is ridiculous
and null; and if you were as expert in the jure Canonico as in the art of
pocketing our money, you would know that you are yourself suspended
ipso facto for a year, and that I have nothing to fear or to expect from
you now.

"3rd. When I bowed down before the altar of Jesus Christ, twenty
four years ago, to receive the priesthood, my intention was to be the minister
of the Catholic Church, but not a slave of a lawless tyrant.

"4th. Remember the famous words of Tertullian, `Nimi potestas,
nulla potestas.' For the sake of peace, I have, with many others, tolerated
your despotism till now; but my patience is at an end, and for the sake of
our holy church, which you are destroying, I am determined with many to
oppose an insurmountable wall to your tyranny.

"5th. I did not come here, you know well, as an ordinary missionary;
but I got from your predecessor the permission to form a colony of my emigrating
countrymen. I was not sent here in 1851 to take care of any congregation.
It was a complete wilderness; but I was sent to form a colony
of Catholics. I planted my cross in a wilderness. In a great part, with my
own money, I have built a chapel, a college and a female academy. I
have called from everywhere my countrymen—nine-tenths of them came
here only to live with me, and because I had the pledged word of my
bishop to do that work. And as long as I live the life of a good priest I
deny you the right to forbid me to remain in my colony which wants my
help and my presence.

"6th. You have never shown me your authority (but once) except in
the most tyrannical way. But now, seeing that the more humble I am
before you, the more insolent you grow, I have taken the resolution to
stand by my rights as a Catholic priest and as an American citizen.

"7th. You remember, that in our second interview you forbade me to
have the good preceptors we have now for our children, and you turned into
ridicule the idea I had to call them from Canada. Was that the act of a
bishop or of a mean despot?

"8th. A few days after you ordered me to live on good terms with R.
R. LeBelle and Carthavel, though you were well acquainted with their
scandalous lives, and twice you threatened me with suspension for refusing
to become a friend of those two rogues! And you have so much made a
fool of yourself before the four gentlemen I sent to you to be the witnesses
of your iniqnity and my innocence, that you have acknowledged before them
that one of your principal reasons for turning me out of my colony was,
that I had not been able to keep peace with three priests whom you acknowledged
to be depraved and unworthy priests! Is not that surpassing
wickedness and tyranny of anything recorded in the blackest pages of the
most daring tyrants? You want to punish by exile a gentleman and a
good priest, because he cannot agree to become the friend of two public
rogues! I thank you, Bishop O'Regan, to have made that public confession
in the presence of unimpeachable witnesses. I do not want to advise you
to be hereafter very prudent in what you intend to do against the reputation
and character of the priest of St. Anne. If you continue to denounce me as
you have done since a few weeks, and to tell the people what you think
fit against me, I have awful things to publish of your injustice and
tyranny.

"As Judas sold our Saviour to his enemies, so you have sold me to

my enemy of L'Erable. But be certain that you shall not deliver up your
victim as you like.

"For withdrawing a suit which you have incited against my honor,
and which you shall certainly lose, you drag me out from my home and
order me to the land of exile, and you cover that iniquity with the appearance
of zeal for the public peace, just as Pilate delivered his victim into the
hands of their enemies to make peace with them.

"Shame on you, Bishop O'Regan! For the sake of God, do not
oblige me to reveal to the world what I know against you. Do not oblige
me, in self-defence, to strike, in you, my merciless persecutor. If you have
no pity for me, have pity on yourself, and on the church which that coming
struggle will so much injure.

"It is not enough for you to have so badly treated my poor countrymen
of Chicago—your hatred against the French Canadians cannot be satisfied
except when you have taken away from them the only consolation they
have in this land of exile—to possess in their midst a priest of their own
nation whom they love and respect as a father! My poor countrymen of
Chicago, with many hard sacrifices, had built a fine church for themselves
and a house for their priest. You have taken their church from their hands
and given it to the Irish; you have sold the house of their priests, after
turning him out; and what have you done with the $1,500 you got
as its price? Public rumor says that you are employing that money to
support the most unjust and infamous suit against one of their priests.
Continue a little longer, and you may be sure that the cursing of my poor
countrymen against you will be heard in heaven and that the God of
Justice will give them an avenger!

"You have, at three different times, threatened to interdict and excommunicate
me if I would not give you my little personal properties! and as
many times you have said in my teeth, that I was a bad priest, because I
refused to act according to your rapacious tyranny!

"The impious Ahab, murdering Naboth to get his fields, is risen from
the dead in your person. You cannot kill my body, since I am protected by
the glorious flag of the United States; but you do worse, you try to destroy
my honor and my character, which are dearer to me than my life. In a
moral way you give my blood to be licked by your dogs. But remember
the words of the prophet to Ahab, `In this place where the dogs have licked
the blood of Naboth, they shall lick thy blood also.' For every false witness
you shall bring against me, I shall have a hundred unimpeachable ones
against you. Thousands and thousands of religious Irish, and generous
Germans, and liberty and fair-play-loving French Canadians, will help me in
that struggle. I do not address you these words as a threat, but as a friendly
warning.

"Keep quiet, my lord; do not let yourself be guided by your quick temper;
do not be so free in the use of suspense and interdicts. These terrible

arms are two-edged swords, which very often hurt more the imprudent who
make use of them than those whom they intend to strike.

"I wish to live in peace with you. I take my God to witness, that to
this day I have done everything to keep peace with you. But the peace I
want is the peace which St. Jerome speaks of when, writing to his bishop,
he tells him:

" `It is no use to speak of peace with the lips, if we destroy it with our
works. It is a very different way to work for peace, from trying to submit
every one to an abject slavery. We, also, want peace. Not only we
desire it, but we implore you instantly to give it. However, the peace we
want is the peace of Christ—a true peace, a peace without hatred, a peace
which is not a masked war, a peace which is not to crush enemies, but a
peace which unites friends.

" `How can we call that peace which is nothing but tyranny? Why should
we not call everything by its proper name? Let us call hatred—what is
hatred. And let us say that peace reigns only when a true love exists. We
are not the authors of the troubles and divisions which exist in the church.
A father must love his children. A bishop, as well as a father, must wish
to be loved, but not feared. The old proverb says, One hates whom he
fears, and we naturally wish for the death of the one we hate. If you do
not try to crush the religious men under your power they will submit
themselves to your authority. Offer them the kiss of love and peace and
they will obey you. But liberty refuses to yield as soon as you try to crush
it down. The best way to be obeyed by a free man is not to deal with
him as with a slave. We know the laws of the church, and we do not
ignore the rights which belong to every man. We have learned many
things, not only from experience, but also from the study of books. The
king who strikes his subjects with an iron rod, or who thinks that his fingers
must be heavier than his father's hand, has soon destroyed the kingdom
even of the peaceful and mild David. The people of Rome refused to bear
the yoke of their proud king.

" `We have left our country in order to live in peace. In this solitude
our intention was to respect the authority of the pontiffs of Christ (we
mean those who teach the true faith). We want to respect them not as our
masters, but as our fathers. Our intention was to respect them as bishops,
not as usurpers and tyrants who want to reduce us to slavery by the abuse
of their power. We are not so vain as to ignore what is due to the priests
of Christ, for to receive them is to receive the very one whose bishops they
are. But let them be satisfied with the respect which is due to them. Let
them remember that they are fathers, not masters of those who have given
up everything in order to enjoy the privileges of a peaceful solitude. May
Christ who is our mighty God grant that we should be united not by a
false peace, but by a true and loyal love, lest that by biting each other we
destroy each other.'

[Letter of St. Jerome to his bishop.]

"You have a great opinion of the episcopal power, and so have I. But
St. Paul and all the Holy Fathers that I have read, have also told us many
things of the dignity of the priest (alter Christus Sacerdos). I am your
brother and equal in many things; do not forget it. I know my dignity as a
man and a priest, and I shall sooner lose my life than to surrender them to
any man, even a bishop. If you think you can deal with me as a carter
with his horse, drawing him where he likes, you will soon see your
error.

"I neither drink strong wines nor smoke, and the many hours that
others spend in emptying their bottles and smoking their pipes, I read my dear
books—I study the admirable laws of the church and the Gospel of Christ.
I love my books and the holy laws of our church, because they teach me
my rights as well as my duties. They tell me that many years ago a general
council, which is something above you, has annulled your unjust sentenca,
and brought upon your head the very penalty you intended to impose upon
me. They tell me that any sentence from you coming (from your own
profession) from bad and criminal motives, is null, and will fall powerless at
my feet.

"But I tell you again, that I desire to live in peace with you. The false
reports of LeBelle and Carthevel have disturbed that peace; but it is still in
your power to have it for yourself and give it to me. I am sure that the
sentence you say you have preferred against me comes from a misunderstanding,
and your wisdom and charity, if you can hear their voice, can
very easily set everything as it was two months ago. It is still in your
power to have a warm friend, or an immovable adversary in Kankakee
County. It would be both equitable and honorable in you to extinguish
the fires of discord which you have so unfortunately enkindled, by drawing
back a sentence which you would never have preferred if you had not been
deceived. You would be blessed by the Church of Illinois, and particularly
by the 10,000 French Canadians who surround me, and are ready to support
me at all hazards.

"Do not be angry from the seeming harsh words which you find in this
letter. Nobody, but I, could tell you these sad truths, though every one
of your priests, and particularly those who flatter you the most, repeat
them every day.

"By kind and honest proceedings you can get everything from me,
even the last drop of my blood; but you will find me an immovable rock if
you approach me as you have already done (but once) with insult and tyrannical
threats.

"You have not been ordained a bishop to rule over us according to
your fancy, but you have the eternal laws of justice and equity to guide you.
You have the laws of the church to obey as well as her humblest child, and
as soon as you do anything against these imperishable laws you are powerless
to obtain your object. It is not only lawful, but a duty to resist you.

When you strike without a legitimate or a canonical cause; when you try
to take away my character to please some of your friends; when you order
me to exile to stop a suit which you are exciting against me; when you
punish me for the crime of refusing to obey tho orders you gave me to be
the friend of three public rogues; when you threaten me with excommunication,
because I do not give you my little personal properties, I have nothing
to fear from your interdicts and excommunication.

"What a sad lot for me, and what a shame for you, if by your continual
attacks at the door of our churches or in the public press, you oblige me
to expose your injustice. It is yet time for you to avoid that. Instead of
striking me like an outcast, come and give me the paternal hand of charity,
instead of continuing that fraticidal combat, come and heal the wounds you
have made and already received. Instead of insulting me by driving me
away from my colony to the land of exile, come and bless the great work I
have begun here for the glory of God and the good of my people. Instead
of destroying the college and the female academy, for the erection of whtch
I have expended my last cent, and whose teachers are fed at my table, come
and bless the three hundred little children who are daily attending our
schools.

"Instead of sacrificing me to the hatred of my enemies, come and
strengthen my heart against their fury.

"I tell you again, that no consideration whatever will induce me to
surrender my right as a Catholic priest and as an American citizen. By the
first title you cannot interdict me, as long as I am a good priest, for the
crime of wishing to live in my colony and among my people. By the second
title, you cannot turn me out from my home.

It was the first time that a Roman Catholic priest, with his
whole people, had dared to speak such language to a Bishop of
Rome on this continent. Never yet had the unbearable tyranny
of those haughty men received such a public rebuke. Our fearless
words fell as a bombshell in the camp of the Roman Catholic
hierachy of America.

With very few exceptions, the press of the State of Illinois,
whose columns had so often echoed the cries of indignation
raised everywhere against the tyranny of Bishop O'Regan,
took sides with me. Hundreds of priests, not only from Illinois,
but from every corner of the United States, addressed their
warmest thanks to me for the stand I had taken, and asked me,
in the name of God and for the honor of the church, not to
yield an inch of my rights. Many promised to support us at

the court of Romc, by writing themselves to the Pope, to denounce
not only the Bishop of Illinois, but several others, who,
though not so openly bad, were yet trampling under their feet
the most sacred rights of the priests and the people. Unfortunately
those priests gave me a saddening knowledge of their
cowardice by putting in their letters "absolutely confidential."
They all promised to help me when I was storming the strong
fortress of the enemy, provided I would go alone in the gap,
and that they would keep themselves behind thick walls, far
from shot and shell.

However, this did not disturb me, for my God knows it, my
trust was not in my own strength, but in his protection. I was
sure that I was in the right, that the Gospel of Christ was on
my side, that all the canons and laws of the councils were in my
favor.

My library was filled with the best books on the canons and
laws passed in the great councils of my church. It was written
in big letters in the celebrated work, "Histoire du droit canonique."
There is no arbitrary power in the Church of Christ.—
Vol. iii., page 139.

The Council of Augsburg, held in 1548 (Can. 24), had declared
that, "no sentence of excommunication will be passed,
except for great crimes."

The Pope St. Gregory had said: "That censures are null
when not inflicted for great sins or for faults which have not
been clearly proved."

"An unjust excommunication does not bind before God
those against whom it has been hushed. But it injures only the
one who has proffered it."—Eccl. Laws, by Hericourt, c. xxii.,
No. 50.

"If an unjust sentence is pronounced against any one, he
must not pay any attention to it; for, before God and his Church,
an unjust sentence cannot injure anybody. Let, then, that person
do nothing to get such an unjust sentence repealed, for it
cannot injure him."—St. Gelace—The Pope—(Canoni bin est.)

The canonists conclude, from all the laws of the church on
that matter, "That if a priest is unjustly interdicted or excommunicated

he may continue to officiate without any fear of becoming
irregular."—Eccl. Laws, by Hericourt, c. xxii., No. 51.

Protected by these laws, and hundreds of others too long to
enumerate, which my church had passed in every age, strengthened
by the voice of my conscience, which assured me that I
had done nothing to deserve to be interdicted or excommunicated;
sure, besides, of the testimony brought by our four delegates
that the bishop himself had declared that I was one of
his best priests, that he wanted to give me my letters to go and
perform the functions of my ministry in Kahokia: above all,
knowing the unanimous will of my people that I should remain
with them and continue the great and good work so providentially
trusted to me in my colony, and regarding this as an indication
of the divine will, I determined to remain, in spite of the
Bishop of Chicago. All the councils of my church were telling
me that he had no power to injure me, and that all his official
acts were null.

But if he were spiritually powerless against me, it was not
so in temporal matters. His power and his desire to injure us
had increased with his hatred, since he had read our letters and
seen them in all the papers of Chicago.

The first thing he did was to reconcile himself to the priest
LeBelle, whom he had turned out ignominiously from his diocese
some time before. That priest had since that obtained a fine
situation in the diocese of Michigan. He invited him to his
palace, and petted him several days. I felt that the reconciliation
of those two men meant nothing good for me. But my hope
was, more than ever, that the merciful God who had protected
me so many times against them, would save me again from
their machinations. The air was, however, filled with the
strangest rumors against me. It was said everywhere that Mr.
LeBelle was to bring such charges against my character that I
would be sent to the penitentiary.

What were the new iniquities to be laid to my charge? No
one could tell. But the few partisans and friends of the bishop.
Messrs. LeBelle and Spink, were jubilant and sure that I was to
be forever destroyed.

At last, the time arrived when the Sheriff of Kankakee had
to drag me again as a criminal and a prisoner to Urbana, and
deliver me into the hands of the sheriff of that city. I arrived
here on the 20th of October, with my lawyers, Messrs. Osgood
and Paddock, and a dozen witnesses. Mr. Abraham Lincoln
had preceded me only by a few minutes from Springfield. He
was in the company of Judge David Davis, since Vice-President
of the United States, when I met him.

The jury having been selected and sworn, the Rev. Mr.
LeBelle was the first witness called to testify and say what he
knew against my character.

Mr. Lincoln objected to that kind of testimony, and tried to
prove that Mr. Spink had no right to bring his new suit against
me by attacking my character. But Judge Davis ruled that the
prosecution had that right in the case that was before him. Mr.
LeBelle had, then, full liberty to say anything he wanted, and
he availed himself of his privilege. His testimony lasted nearly
an hour, and was too long to be given here. I will only say
that he began by declaring that "Chiniquy was one of the vilest
men of the day—that every kind of bad rumors were constantly
circulating against him." He gave a good number of those
rumors, though he could not positively swear if they were
founded on truth or not, for he had not investigated them. But
he said there was one of which he was sure, for he had authenticated
it thoroughly. He expressed a great deal of apparent
regret that he was forced to reveal to the world such things
which were not only against the honor of Chiniquy, but, to
some extent, involved the good name of a dear sister, Madame
Bosse. But as he was to speak the truth before God, he could
not help it—the sad truth must be told. "Mr. Chiniquy," he
said, "had attempted to do the most infamous things with my
own sister, Madame Bosse. She herself has told me the whole
story under oath, and she would be here to unmask the wicked
man to-day before the whole world, if she were not forced to
silence, at home, from a severe illness."

Though every word of that story was a perjury, there was
such a color of truth and sincerity in my accuser, that his testimony

fell upon me and my lawyers and all my friends as a
thunderbolt. A man who has never heard such a calumny
brought against him before a jury in a court-house packed with
people, composed of friends and foes, will never understand
what I felt in this the darkest hour of my life. My God only
knows the weight and the bitterness of the waves of desolation
which then passed over my soul.

After that testimony was given, there was a lull, and a most
profound silence in the court-room. All the eyes were turned
upon me, and I heard many voices speaking of me, whispering,
"The villain!" Those voices passed through my soul as poisoned
arrows. Though innocent, I wished that the ground would
open under my feet and bring me down to the darkest abysses,
to conceal me from the eyes of my friends and the whole world.

However, Mr. Lincoln soon interrupted the silence by addressing
to LeBelle such cross-questions that his testimony, in
the minds of many, soon lost much of its power. And he did
still more destroy the effect of his (LeBelle's) false oath, when,
he brought my twelve witnesses, who were among the most
respectable citizens of Bourbonnais, formerly the parishioners of
Mr. LeBelle. Those twelve gentlemen swore that Mr. LeBelle
was such a drunkard and vicious man, that he was so publicly
my enemy on account of the many rebukes I had given to his
private and public vices, that they would not believe a word of
what he said, even upon his oath.

At ten P. M., the court was adjourned, to meet again the next
morning, and I went to the room of Mr. Lincoln with my two
other lawyers, to confer about the morning's work. My mind
was unspeakably sad. Life had never been such a burden to me
as in that hour. I was tempted, like Job, to curse the hour
when I was born. I could see in the faces of my lawyers,
though they tried to conceal it, that they were also full of
anxiety.

"My dear Mr. Chiniquy," said Mr. Lincoln, "though I
hope, to-morrow, to destroy the testimony of Mr. LeBelle
against you, I must concede that I see great dangers ahead.
There is not the least doubt in my mind that every word he has

said is a sworn lie; but my fear is that the jury thinks differently.
I am a pretty good judge in these matters. I feel that our jurymen
think that you are guilty. There is only one way to perfectly
destroy the power of a false witness—it is by another
direct testimony against what he has said, or by showing from
his very lips that he has perjured himself. I failed to do that
last night, though I have diminished, to a great extent, the force
of his testimony. Can you not prove an alibi, or can you not
bring witnesses who were there in the same house that day,
who would flatly and directly contradict what your remorseless
enemy has said against you?"

I answered him: "How can I try to do such a thing when
they have been shrewd enough not to fix the very date of the
alleged crime against me?"

"You are correct, you are perfectly correct, Mr. Chiniquy,"
answered Mr. Lincoln, "as they have refused to specify the
date, we cannot try that. I have never seen two such skillful
rogues as those two priests! There is really a diabolical skill in
the plan they have concocted for your destruction. It is evident
that the bishop is at the bottom of the plot. You remember
how I have forced LeBelle to confess that he was now on the
most friendly terms with the Bishop of Chicago, since he has
become the chief of your accusers. Though I do not give up
the hope of rescuing you from the hands of your enemies, I
do not like to conceal from you that I have several reasons
to fear that you will be declared guilty and condemned to a
heavy penalty, or to the penitentiary, though I am sure you
are perfectly innocent. It is very probable that we will have to
confront that sister of LeBelle tomorrow. Her sickness is
probably a feint, in order not to appear here except after the
brother will have prepared the public mind in her favor. At
all events, if she does not come, they will send some justice of
the peace to get her sworn testimony, which will be more difficult
to rebut than her own verbal declarations. That woman
is evidently in the hands of the bishop and her brother priest,
ready to swear anything they order her, and I know nothing so
difficult as to refure such female testimonies, particularly when

they are absent from the court. The only way to be sure of
a favorable verdict to-morrow is, that God Almighty would
take our part and show your innocence! Go to Him and
pray, for He alone can save you."

Mr. Lincoln was exceedingly solemn when he addressed
those words to me, and they went very deep into my soul.

I have often been asked if Abraham Lincoln had any religion,
but I have never had any doubt about his profound confidence in
God, since I heard those words falling from his lips in that hour
of anxiety. I had not been able to conceal my deep distress.
Burning tears were rolling on my cheeks when he was speaking,
and there was on his face the expression of friendly sympathy
which I shall never forget. Without being able to say a word,
I left him to go to my little room. It was nearly eleven
o'clock. I locked the door and fell on my knees to pray, but I
was unable to say a single word. The horrible sworn calumnies
thrown at my face by a priest of my own church were ringing
in my ears! my honor and my good name so cruelly and forever
destroyed! all my friends and my dear people covered with an
eternal confusion! and more than that, the sentence of condemnation
which was probably to be hurled against me the next
day in the presence of the whole country, whose eyes were upon
me! All those things were before me, not only as horrible
phantoms, but as heavy mountains, under the burdens of which
I could not breathe. At last the fountains of tears were opened,
and it relieved me to weep; I could then speak and cry: "Oh!
my God! have mercy upon me! thou knowest my innocence!
hast thou not promised that those who trust in thee cannot perish!
Oh! do not let me perish, when Thou art the only One in whom
I trust! Come to my help! Save me!"

From eleven P. M., to three in the morning I cried to God,
and raised my supplicating hands to his throne of mercy. But
I confess to my confusion, it seemed to me in certain moments,
that it was useless to pray and to cry, for though innocent, I was
doomed to perish. I was in the hands of my enemies. My God
had forsaken me!

What an awful night I spent! I hope none of my readers

will ever know by their own experience the agony of spirit I
endured. I had no other expectation than to be forever dishonored,
and sent to the penitentiary next morning!

But God had not forsaken me! He had again heard my
cries, and was, once more, to show me His infinite mercy!

At three o'clock A. M., I heard three knocks at my door, and
I quickly went to open it. "Who was there? Abraham Lincoln,
with a face beaming with joy!"

I could hardly believe my eyes. But I was not mistaken.
It was my noble-hearted friend, the most honest lawyer of Illinois!—one
of the noblest men Heaven has ever given to earth!
It was Abraham Lincoln, who had been given me as my Saviour!
On seeing me bathed with tears, he exclaimed, "Cheer up,
Mr. Chiniquy, I have the perjured priests in my hands. Their
diabolical plot is all known, and if they do not fly away before
the dawn of day, they will surely be lynched. Bless the Lord,
you are saved!"

The sudden passage of extreme desolation to an extreme joy
came near killing me. I felt as suffocated, and unable to utter
a single word. I took his hand, pressed it to my lips, and bathed
it with tears of joy. I said: "May God forever bless you, dear
Mr. Lincoln. But please tell me how you can bring me such
glorious news!"

Here is the simple but marvellous story, as told me by that
great and good man, whom God had made the messenger of his
mercies towards me:

"As soon as LeBelle had given his perjured testimony against
you yesterday," said Mr. Lincoln, "one of the agents of the
Chicago press telegraphed to some of the principal papers of
Chicago: `It is probable that Mr. Chiniquy will be condemned;
for the testimony of the Rev. Mr. LeBelle seems to leave no
doubt that he is guilty.' And the little Irish boys, to sell their
papers, filled the streets with the cries: `Chiniquy will be hung!
Chiniquy will be hung!' The Roman Catholics were so glad
to hear that, that ten thousand extra copies have been sold.
Among those who bought those papers was a friend of yours,
called Terrien, who went to his wife and told her that you were

to be condemned, and when the woman heard that, she said, `It
is too bad, for I know Mr. Chiniquy is not guilty.'

" `How do you know that?' said her husband. She answered:
`I was there when the priest LeBelle made the plot, and promised
to give his sister two-eighties of good land if she would swear a
false oath—and accuse him of a crime which that woman said
he had not even thought of with her.'

" `If it be so,' said Terrien, "we cannot allow Mr. Chiniquy
to be condemned. Come with me to Urbana.'

"But that woman being quite unwell, said to her husband,
`You know well I cannot go; but Miss Philomene Moffat was
with me then. She knows every particular of that wicked plot
as well as I do. She is well; go and take her to Urbana. There
is no doubt that her testimony will prevent the condemnation of
Mr. Chiniquy.'

"Narcisse Terrien started immediately: and when you were
praying God to come to your help, He was sending your deliverer
at the full speed of the railroad cars. Miss Moffat has
just given me the details of that diabolical plot. I have advised
her not to show herself before the Court is opened. I will, then,
send for her, and when she will have given, under oath, before
the Court, the details she has just given me, I pity Spink with
his perjured priests. As I told you, I would not be surprised if
they were lynched: for there is a terrible excitement in town
among many people who from the beginning, suspect that the
priests have perjured themselves to destroy you.

"Now your suit is gained, and to-morrow, you will have
the greatest triumph a man ever got over his confounded foes.
But you are in need of a rest as well as myself. Good-bye."

After thanking God for that marvellous deliverance, I went
to bed and took the needed rest.

But what was the priest LeBeile doing in that very moment?
Unable to sleep after the awful perjury he had just made, he had
watched the arrival of the trains from Chicago with an anxious
mind, for he was aware through the confessions he had heard,
that there were two persons in that city who knew his plot and
his false oath; and though he had the promises from them that

they would never reveal it to anybody, he was not without some
fearful apprehensions that I might, by some way or other, become
acquainted with his abominable conspiracy. Not long after the
arrival of the trains from Chicago, he came down from his
room to see in the book where travelers register their names, if
there was any newcomers from Chicago, and what was his dismay
when he saw the first name entered was "Philomene Moffat!"
That very name, Philomene Moffat, who some time before, had
gone to confess to him that she had heard the whole plot from
his own lips, when he had promised 160 acres of land to persuade
his sister to perjure herself in order to destroy me. A
deadly presentiment chilled the blood in his veins! "Would it
be possible that this girl is here to reveal and prove my perjury
before the world?"

He immediately sent for her, when she was just coming from
meeting Mr. Lincoln.

"Miss Philomene Moffat here!" he exclaimed, when he saw
her. "What are you coming here for, this night?" he said.

"You will know it, sir, to-morrow morning," she answered.

"Ah! wretched girl! you come to destroy me?" he exclaimed.

She replied: "I do not come to destroy you, for you are
already destroyed. Mr. Lincoln knows everything."

"Oh! my God! my God!" he exclaimed, striking his forehead
with his hands. Then taking a big bundle of bank notes
from his pocket-book, he said: "Here are one hundred dollars
for you, if you take the morning train and go back to Chicago."

"If you would offer me as much gold as this house could
contain, I would not go," she replied.

He then left her abruptly, ran to the sleeping-room of Spink,
and told him: "Withdraw your suit against Chiniquy; we are
lost; he knows all."

Without losing a moment, he went to the sleeping-room of
his co-priest, and told him: "Make haste—dress yourself and
let us take the morning train; we have no business here, Chiniquy
knows all our secrets."

When the hour of opening the court came, there was an immense

crowd, not only inside, but outside its walls. Mr. Spink,
pale as a man condemned to death, rose before the Judge, and
said: "Please the court, allow me to withdraw my prosecution
against Mr. Chiniquy. I am now persuaded that he is not guilty
of the faults brought against him before this tribunal."

Abraham Lincoln, having accepted that reparation in my
name, made a short, but one of the most admirable speeches I
had ever heard, on the cruel injustices I had suffered from my
merciless persecutors, and denounced the rascality of the priests
who had perjured themselves, with such terrible colors, that it
had been very wise on their part to fly away and disappear
before the opening of the court. For the whole city was ransacked
for them by hundreds, who blamed me for forgiving
them and refusing to have my revenge for the wrong they had
done me. But I thought that my enemies were sufficiently punished
by the awful public disclosures of their infernal plot. It
seemed that the dear Saviour who had so visibly protected me,
was to be obeyed, when he was whispering in my soul, "Forgive
them and love them as thyself."

Was not Spink sufficiently punished by the complete ruin
which was brought upon him by the loss of the suit? For
having gone to Bishop O'Regan to be indemnified for the enormous
expenses of such a long prosecution, at such a distance, the
bishop coldly answered him: "I had promised to indemnify you
if you would put Chiniquy down, as you promised me. But as
it is Chiniquy who has put you down, I have not a cent to give
you."

Abraham Lincoln had not only defended me with the zeal
and talent of the ablest lawyer I have ever known, but as the
most devoted and noblest friend I ever had. After giving more
than a year of his precious time to my defense, when he had
pleaded during two long sessions of the Court of Urbana, without
receiving a cent from me, I considered that I was owing him
a great sum of money. My other two lawyers, who had not
done the half of his work, asked me a thousand dollars each, and
I had not thought that too much. After thanking him for the
inappreciable services he had rendered me, I requested him

to show me his bill, assuring him that, though I would not be
able to pay the whole cash, I would pay him to the last cent, if
he had the kindness to wait a little for the balance.

He answered me with a smile and an air of inimitable kindness,
which was peculiar to him: "My dear Mr. Chiniquy, I
feel proud and honored to have been called to defend you. But
I have done it less as a lawyer than as a friend. The money I
should receive from you would take away the pleasure I feel at
having fought your battle. Your case is unique in my whole practice.
I have never met a man so cruelly persecuted as you have
been, and who deserves it so little. Your enemies are devils incarnate.
The plot they had concocted against you is the most hellish
one I ever knew. But the way you have been saved from their
hand, the appearance of that young and intelligent Miss Moffat,
who was really sent by God in the very hour of need, when, I
confess it again, I thought everything was nearly lost, is one of
the most extraordinary occurrences I ever saw. It makes me
remember what I have too often forgotten, and what my mother
often told me when young—that our God is a prayer-hearing
God. This good thought, sown into my young heart by that
dear mother's hand, was just in my mind when I told you, `Go
and pray, God alone can save you.' But I confess to you that I
had not faith enough to believe that your prayer would be so
quickly and so marvellously answered by the sudden appearance
of that interesting young lady, last night. Now let us speak of
what you owe me. Well!—Well!—how much do you owe me?
You owe me nothing! for I suppose you are quite ruined. The
expenses of such a suit, I know, must be enormous. Your enemies
want to ruin you. Will I help them to finish your ruin,
when I hope I have the right to be put among the most sincere
and devoted of your friends?"

"You are right," I answered him; "you are the most devoted
and noblest friend God ever gave me, and I am nearly ruined
by my enemies. But you are the father of a pretty large
family; you must support them. Your traveling expenses in
coming, twice, here for me from Springfield; your hotel bills
during the two terms you have defended me, must be very considerable.

It is not just that you should receive nothing in return
for such work and expenses."

"Well! well!" he answered, "I will give you a promissory
note which you will sign." Taking then a small piece of paper,
he wrote:

He handed me the note, saying, "Can you sign that?"

After reading it, I said, "Dear Mr. Lincoln, this is a joke.
It is not possible that you ask only fifty dollars for services which
are worth at least two thousand dollars."

He then tapped me with the right hand on the shoulders and
said: "Sign that; it is enough. I will pinch some rich man for
that and make them pay the rest of the bill," and he laughed
outright.

When Abraham Lincoln was writing the due-bill, the relaxation
of the great strain upon my mind, and the great kindness
of my benefactor and defender in charging me so little tor
such a service, and the terrible presentiment that he would pay

with his life what he had done for me, caused me to break into
sobs and tears.

As Mr. Lincoln had finished writing the due bill, he turned
round to me, and said, "Father Chiniquy, what are you crying
for? ought you not to be the most happy man alive? you have
beaten your enemies and gained the most glorious victory, and
you will come out of all your troubles in triumph."

"Dear Mr. Lincoln," I answered, "allow me to tell you that
the joy I should naturally feel for such a victory is destroyed in
my mind by the fear of what it may cost you. There were,
then, in the crowd, not less than ten or twelve Jesuits from
Chicago and St. Louis, who came to hear my sentence of condemnation
to the penitentiary. But it was on their heads that you
have brought the thunders of heaven and earth! nothing can be
compared to the expression of their rage against you, when you
not only wrenched me from their cruel hands, but you were
making the walls of the court-house tremble under the awful
and superhumanly eloquent denunciation of their infamy, diabolical
malice, and total want of Christian and human principle,
in the plot they had formed for my destruction. What troubles
my soul, just now, and draws my tears, is that it seems to me
that I have read your sentence of death in their bloody eyes.
How many other noble victims have already fallen at their feet!

He tried to divert my mind, at first, with a joke, "Sign this,"
said he, "It will be my warrant of death."

But after I had signed, he became more solemn, and said, "I
know that Jesuits never forget nor forsake. But man must not
care how and where he dies, provided he dies at the post of
honor and duty," and he left me.

Here is the sworn declaration of Miss Philomene Moffat,
now Mrs. Philomene Schwartz:

"Philomene Schwartz being first duly sworn, deposes and says: T
she is of the age of forty-three years, and resides at 484 Milwaukee
Avenue, Chicago; that her maiden name was Philomene Moffat, that she

knew Father LeBelle, the Roman Catholic priest of the French Catholics
of Chicago during his lifetime, and knows Rev. Father Chiniquy; that
about the month of May, A. D. 1854, in company with Miss Eugenia
Bossey, the housekeeper of her uncle, the Rev'd Mr. LeBelle, who was
then living at the parsonage on Clark street, Chicago, while we were sitting
in the room of Miss Bossey, the Rev. Mr. LeBelle was talking with his
sister, Mrs. Bossey, in the adjoining room, not suspecting that we were
there hearing his conversation, through the door, which was partly opened;
though we could neither see him nor his sister, we heard every word of
what they said together, the substance of which is as follows—Rev. Mr.
LeBelle said in substance, to Mrs. Bossey, his sister:

" `You know that Mr. Chiniquy is a dangerous man, and he is my
enemy, having already persuaded several of my congregation to settle in
his colony. You must help me to put him down, by accusing him of having
tried to do a criminal action with you.'

"Madame Bossey answered: `I cannot say such a thing against Mr.
Chiniquy, when I know it is absolutely false.'

"Rev. M. LeBelle replied: `If you refuse to comply with my request,
I will not give you the one hundred and sixty acres of land I intended to
give you; you will live and die poor.'

"Madame Bossey answered: `I prefer never to have that land, and I
like better to live and die poor, than to perjure myself to please you.'

"The Rev. Mr. LeBelle, several times, urged his sister, Mrs. Bossey, to
comply with his desires, but she refused. At last, weeping and crying, she
said: `I prefer never to have an inch of land than to damn my soul for
swearing to a falsehood.'

"The Rev. Mr. LeBelle then said:

" `Mr. Chiniquy will destroy our holy religion and our people if we do
not destroy him. If you think that the swearing I ask you to do is a sin,
you will come to confess to me, and I will pardon it in the absolution I will
give you.'

" `Have you the power to forgive a false oath?' replied Mrs. Bossey to
her brother, the priest.

" `Yes,' he answered, `I have that power; for Christ has said to all his
priests, "What you shall bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and what
you shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." '

"Mrs. Bossey then said: `If you promise that you will forgive that
false oath, and if you give me the one hundred and sixty acres of land you
promised, I will do what you want.'

"The Rev'd Mr. LeBelle then said: `All right!' I could not hear any
more of that conversation, for in that instant Miss Eugenia Bossey,
who had kept still and silent with us, made some noise and shut the
door.

"Affiant further states: That some time later I went to confess to Rev.
Mr. LeBelle, and I told him that I had lost confidence in him, He asked me
why? I answered: `I lost my confidence in you since I heard your conversation
with your sister, when you tried to persuade her to perjure herself
in order to destroy Father Chiniquy.'

"Affiant further says: "That in the month of October, A. D. 1856, the
Rev'd Mr. Chiniquy had to defend himself, before the civil and criminal
court of Urbana, Illinois, in an action brought against him by Peter Spink;
some one wrote from Urbana to a paper of Chicago, that Father Chiniquy
was probably to be condemned. The paper which published that letter
was much read by the Roman Catholics, who were glad to hear that that
priest was to be punished. Among those who read that paper was Narcisse
Terrien. He had lately been married to Miss Sara Chaussey, who told
him that Father Chiniquy was innocent; that she was present with me
when Rev'd LeBelle prepared the plot with his sister, Mrs. Bossey, and had
promised her a large piece of land if she would swear falsely against Father
Chiniquy. Mr. Narcisse Terrien wanted to go with his wife to the help of
Father Chiniquy, but she was unwell and could not go. He came to ask
me if I remembered well the conversation of Rev'd Mr. LeBelle, and if I
would consent to go to Urbana to expose the whole plot before the court,
and I consented.

"We started that same evening for Urbana, where we arrived late at
night. I immediately met Mr. Abraham Lincoln, one of the lawyers of
Father Chiniquy, and told him all that I knew about the plot.

"That very same night the Rev'd Mr. LeBelle, having seen my name
on the hotel register, came to me much excited and troubled, and said,
Philomene, what are you here for?'

"I answered him, `I cannot exactly tell you that; but you will probably
know it tomorrow at the court-house!'

" `Oh, wretched girl!' he exclaimed, `you have come to destroy me.'

" `I do not come to destroy you,' I replied, `for you are already destroyed!'

"Then drawing from his portmonnaie-book a big bundle of bank-notes,
which he said was worth one hundred dollars, he said: `I will give you all
this money if you will leave by the morning train and go back to Chicago.'

"I answered him: `Though you would offer me as much gold as this
room can contain, I cannot do what you ask.'

"He then seemed exceedingly distressed, and he disappeared. The next
morning Peter Spink requested the court to allow him to withdraw his
accusations against Father Chiniquy, and to stop his prosecutions, having,
he said, found out that he, Father Chiniquy, was innocent of the things
brought against him, and his request was granted. Then the innocence
and honesty of Father Chiniquy was acknowledged by the court after it

had been proclaimed by Abraham Lincoln, who was afterwards elected
President of the United States.

"(Signed) PHILOMENE SCHWARTZ.[6]

"I, Stephen R. Moore, a Notary Public in the County of Kankakee,
in the State of Illinois, and duly authorized by law to adminster oaths, do
hereby certify that, on this 21st day of October, A. D. 1881, Philomene
Schwartz personally appeared before me, and made oath that the above
affidavit by her subscribed is true, as therein stated. In witness whereto, I
have hereunto set my hand and notarial seal.