Modernism; A Record and Review (Paperback)

This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1908 edition. Excerpt: ...and decay." They no doubt express the faith in the Church which the novelist would desire to claim as his own. " You have turned to me," says the Saint, " without knowing what you did, to learn that the Church is not the hierarchy only, but is the universal assembly of the faithful, a gens sancta; that from the depth of every Christian heart may burst forth the living water of the same fountain head, of the same Truth." And with this conception of the Church, Fogazzaro is able to give his answer. What is needed for the reform of the Church is a great Saint, one of those master souls of the great lay world, who have so often, in times past, arisen to testify of God and His immediate present claims. And Fogazzaro has not feared to snatch his Saint from the gutter of modern decadence. He is no other than that Piero Maironi, whose neurotic liaison with Jeanne Dessalle was chronicled in his last novel. the " Piccolo Mondo Moderno." Yet, daring as the venture was, no one, I think, who reads this novel will say that it has not succeeded. Maironi concentrates about himself all those men of goodwill, whether formally in communion with the Church or not, whether or not they will ever formally enter within her pale, who are naturally Christian, who are of the soul of the Church. And we feel that, in spite of all the occasional extravagance of his portraiture, he had the right to draw them, and that in him the Church was coming to her true self and recognizing and fostering her own children. Here is his story, very baldly told. Brought to penitence through the death of his wife and the ministrations of a holy priest, Don Giuseppe Flores, Maironi had fled from his sin and from all knowledge of his old world....