Chapter XXI: The June Revolution

The New Era (L’Ére Nouvelle) — The days of blood — Archbishop Affre
1848.

Pere Lacordaire relates in his Memoirs that his mind was in a state of great perplexity after the February Revolution. He was divided between a Limited Monarchy—which he had always preferred—and a Republic which he did not believe would be stable in France, but which in fact now existed. He asked himself, whether it would not be wiser to support it openly in the interest of institutions, the non existence of which had brought about the ruin of two thrones and two dynasties.

” Now,” he writes, “at the very moment that I was thus deliberat­ing, the Abbé Maret and Frederic Ozanam knocked at my door. They came to inform me that uneasiness and uncertainty reigned in the minds of Catholics, that such confusion and hesitancy would easily throw the new regime into hostility, and snatch from us the chances of gaining that liberty which the previous government had persistently refused: ‘ The Republic,’ they added, is well disposed in our favour. We cannot reproach it with any of the acts of irreligion and barbarity which signalised the Revolution of 183o. It believes and hopes in us. Are we to disappoint it? What other course can we adopt? To what other party can we attach ourselves? What will there be before us but ruin? What is a Republic if it be not the natural government of society, when its sheet-anchor and its traditions have been lost?’ ”

Portrait of Frederic Ozanam in 1852, miniature copy of the portrait by Janmot Louis (1814-1892), probably made by the artist himself.

“My two visitors went much further than I. While I saw in the Republic but a necessity of the moment, which it would be necessary to accept in all sincerity until men’s minds had been naturally diverted into a new channel, they had loftier and more general views upon the democratic future of European society. That created such a gap between us that co-operation under a common standard seemed impossible. But danger was imminent . . . Implored to decide by those voices of friends, I yielded to the tyranny of events; and although it was repugnant to me to become a journalist, I declared openly on the side of those who offered me a flag—in which religion, Republic, and liberty were interwoven…

The prospectus of the The New Era appeared on the 1st March. It declared that the journal would not belong to any party, that it would hold itself independent of all, in order to be in a position to speak the truth to all with impartiality, but always with moderation and charity.

On the day following the appearance of the journal, the 16th April, the editor received a note from His Grace the Archbishop of Paris, Monsignor Aff re, in which he did more than merely give encouragement; lie made the journal almost his own, guaranteed its prudence, and congratulated it on performing a great civic and religious duty. He wrote as follows: “The personal knowledge which I have of the principles of the founders of your paper, constrains me forthwith to give you a measure of support which I have withheld from papers published during the previous government. Not only am I com­pletely re-assured against the danger of any attempt to resuscitate the Avenir, but I know that you will wage war against all that was reprehensible in its theories. Catholics will not, I am sure, be slow to recognise this. But what they will appreciate above all in your paper is the honesty, frankness, and generosity which, taking what is best from all sides, has one aim and one aim only, the salvation of religion and of fatherland.”

” What will please them and will win new readers for you is the simple devotion which, instead of calculating the chances of an un­certain future, discharges with steadiness and with intelligence the duty of the present; a devotion which threats will not deter, which grows in intensity with danger, which is willing to sacrifice rest, fortune and glory itself, if need be, for the good of the country. We all count upon you for this spirit, for it is Faith which sustains and illumines it, because it sees the all-powerful intervention of God in those mighty revolutions which change the face of the earth.”

” As you have noticed, that intervention has never been so clearly demonstrated as in the new political state of France. Let us trust in God rather than in ourselves. We shall find true courage in that sentiment. Yours very sincerely, Denis, Archbishop of Paris.”

Thus conscious of being on the right path and henceforward leaning on the arm of his Archbishop, Ozanam threw himself into this new work with all his strength, as he did into every work which was marked out for him by the will of God.

Only three weeks later, on the 7th May, he was able to inform his brother that he was corresponding through his journal with at least 600 priests. They were the first subscribers to The New Era. He adds “That work, and my course of lectures, which I have resumed, use up all my strength, which is not as robust as I should wish, if I am to judge by the extreme weakness which my military exploits in the National Guard caused me.” Mounting guard at the gates of the Legislative Assembly had almost worn him out with fatigue and heat. “I had to protect the place as I could not enlighten it.”

One of his first serious contributions to The New Era was a series of articles dealing with a Bill to establish Divorce, which a Minister of Justice, Cremieux, a Jew, had introduced in the Assembly, and which constituted an attack on the family and society.

The Press of the day does not give any adequate idea whatever of the amount and accuracy of knowledge displayed in that thesis, which pulsated with eloquence and with the emotion caused by a great and imminent danger. M. Cremieux had brought forward the Bill in the name of liberalism and democracy. Ozanam repudiates “that time-worn liberalism, which was always distinguished by hatred for religion rather than by love of liberty, and which was bent upon the ruin of noble institutions, even as the Philosophy of the i8th cen­tury was bent upon the destruction of belief . . .”

He repudiates it in the name of the young Republic: “The recent Revolution burst forth against the corruption of a society which had not even the courage to hate evil. It can only achieve its aim by the creation of a better state of society, which will be built up by work, by self-denial, by all that ordinarily develops conscience and character. Such a society is poor and hardworking, and needs only to be chaste to have the foundations of national strength. It must have severe laws, it must grow on manly habits to obtain what Providence has promised. Providence has certainly not allowed such great events to happen to produce a common-place result.”

There were still more terrible things to happen in those days. The bloody days of the 23rd, 24th and 25th June, 1848, were at hand. Ozanam was to be engaged in the laborious duties of a National Guard, which tried his physical strength. God was about to call on His soldier for another service in the cause of peace and sublime devotion.

Ozanam was not called upon to fire. He wrote to his brother immediately after those days of terror: “My company was stationed nearly all the time at the corner of the Rue Garanciere and the Rue Palatine, later, at the corner of the Rue Madame and the Rue de Fleurus. There were excursions and alarms, occasional shots close by, and bad patrols on the boulevards. But thank God, we did not fire a cartridge.”

He was ready for every emergency: “My conscience was easy, and I should not have recoiled from any danger. But I am free to admit that it is a terrible moment when a man bids, what he believes to be, his last farewell to his wife and child.”

But what then had been what I have called the sublime idea of the soldier of God? I am taking the account from the historian of La seconde Republique: “Ozanam was on active service with M. Cornudet and M. Bailly on Sunday, 25th June, at a military post at the Rue Madame; they were discussing sinister rumours which pointed to the prolongation of the struggle. The idea of inviting His Grace the Archbishop to intervene, suddenly occurred to their troubled minds. It seemed to them that it would be a great triumph for the Church, if His Grace could mediate between the parties to this terrible Civil War. They went at once to talk it over with the Abbé Buquet, Vicar-General. He approved of their project and have them a letter in a large envelope which would procure a safe conduct for them through the barricades to the Archbishop.

” His Grace, Dr. Afire, received them as graciously as usual, and after having heard their project said, with perfect simplicity: I have been obsessed with that idea since yesterday, but how can I bring it about? How can I reach the insurgents? Would General Cavaignac permit such a step to be taken? Where can he be found?”

” In answer to all his objections the visitors assured him that he would be received on all sides with veneration: You are right,’ he said with an air of submission. ‘ Very well then, I shall go. I shall put on my cassock so as not to attract attention and you will point out the way to me.’

“As he was about to get ready, a priest entered and related to him in terror some awful incidents of the insurrection, which he had witnessed a few moments previously. His Grace heard him with emotion and continued his preparations.”

” He was ready in a few minutes. The young men insisted res­pectfully that he should put on his purple soutane and wear his pec­toral cross: ‘ I shall do as you wish,’ he said with the same simplicity. Before setting out for the scene of the struggle, he went first with them to the Provost-Marshal to obtain permission.”

“All cars were stopped and they had to walk. It would be impossible to do justice to the veneration and enthusiasm with which His Grace was received. It was a triumphant march from the Ile-St.-Louis to the National Assembly. The troops, the National Guard, the mov­able columns, stood to arms and gave a general salute. Men raised their hats and women and children bowed. It was a most impressive sight.”

“General Cavaignac received the Archbishop with respect and ad­miration. The General appreciated heroism if not Christianity. He first represented to him the danger he was about to run. He informed him that General Brea, sent forward to parley, had been taken a prisoner by the insurgents. He begged him not to expose himself to such danger. But His Grace’s resolution was unshakeable, and the by­standers still remember the simplicity with which he said, ‘ I shall go.’

” The General praised his courage. He had drawn up with M. Senard a few hours before a proclamation, calling on workmen to lay down arms and promising a full indemnity. He placed a copy in the Arch­bishop’s hands with the intention of facilitating his undertaking.”

” The Archbishop returned to his house, took a repast, and made his confession as if going to death. He then took the road to the insurgent quarters. M. Ozanam, M. Cornudet and M. Bailly begged for the honour of accompanying him. Solicitous that none should be exposed to danger for his sake, he refused, saying that their uniform of the National Guard would make his mission more difficult by pre­senting the appearance of an escort. He would go with his two priests and his servant-man. They left him, in obedience, but in grief.”

We shall abridge the rest of the account, which does not directly concern us here.

” It is impossible to describe the emotion which prevailed at the sight of the Archbishop on foot, wending his way to the Place de la Bastille. The guards presented their arms to be blessed: officers begged him not to go to his death: thinking that he was going to the ambulances, women brought him linen and lint for the wounded. He replied to those who emphasized his danger, ‘ My life is a little thing.’ Moving forward, he quoted for his Vicar-Generals, Very Rev. Peres Jacquemet and Ravinet the words of the Gospel: ‘ The good shepherd giveth his life for his flock!’ His countenance seemed illumined! ”

“At the Place de l’Arsenal he stopped for a few brief moments to chat with and bless the poor wounded soldiers. It was eight o’clock in the evening and the fight was being waged savagely. When he had arrived at the Place de la Bastille, the prelate spoke to the colonel in command and asked to have the ‘Cease Fire ‘ sounded: ‘ I shall go forward alone,’ he said, ‘ to those unfortunate men who have been misled.’ The soldiers’ fire ceased, that of the insurgents first slackened then ceased. The Archbishop moved out into the Square. A young member of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, named Brechemin, went in advance. He raised his white handkerchief high on the branch of a tree, and thus reached the first barricade. Not awaiting the return of the young man, the heroic prelate passed through a shop at the corner of the Faubourg St. Antoine, which had a door opening on each street, and thus reached the large barricade which closed up that area. A number of insurgents came down on the Square, several soldiers closed in also, eager to fraternise. The Archbishop, reading from the promise of pardon, which he held in his hand, was already beginning to move their hearts to reconciliation, when a single shot went off. A frightful discharge followed immediately. The Archbishop fell mortally wounded into a workman’s arms, saying: ‘Friend, I am wounded.’ The insurgents themselves, startled at the fall of that great victim, carried him to the house of the Cure of Quinze-Vingts. His Grace the Archbishop died the next day, his last words being, ‘ May my blood be the last to be shed.’ ”

The event, which had taken place early in the night, was not generally known in the city until the following morning, owing to the state of general disorder. The news was received universally with feelings of horror and grief. Ozanam and his two friends, M. Cornudet and M. Bailly felt consternation at the event, mingled at first with bitter remorse. But when they recalled to mind that the inspiration of self-sacrifice had come to the Archbishop before their arrival, and that he would probably have carried it out even if they had not come: that one fruit of the sacrifice had been the sudden end of the insurrec­tion, and that his blood had been the last shed: and, lastly, when they witnessed the honour which redounded not only to the Archbishop, but to the clergy and the whole Church: and, above all, the pardon and the favours which the voluntary self-sacrifice of the Shepherd was to bring down on the entire flock, those noble counsellors could well satisfy themselves, that they had been, in that matter, but the unconscious instruments of a merciful Providence.

That is, indeed, the sentiment which shines through the following few lines, written by Ozanam on the 3rd July: “It was not a riot but a civil war which was waged, the most difficult to end of all wars, for, smouldering, it waits for an opportunity to burst out again. I have no hope save in God and in the merits of the holy Archbishop. By a chain of circumstances which it would take too long to explain, I had the honour of accompanying him when he walked through the streets to the quarters of General Cavaignac, amid the acclamations of the multitude. About himself Ozanam says nothing more¹.

He wrote in another letter: “What a happy thing it is at such moments to have dear ones out of Paris.” At the moment when popular agitation began, Ozanam had at once arranged to send away his wife and child, whom he installed for the summer months at Bellevue near Meudon. He had had at the same time his father-in-law carried away to the country very ill. Since his son’s death he had been a prey to melancholy, on which the terror of these bloody days was super-imposed. He died from a violent attack on the 24th July, 1848.

Ozanam mourned for him, not without religions consolation: “My excellent and beloved father-in-law,” he wrote “died in our arms. He had all the consolations of a Christian, well-spent life and of a happy death . . . M. Soulacroix lived a good Christian life. He bore his sufferings in a still more Christian manner, and he departed this life with sentiments of faith, hope and charity, and a desire for Heaven, which inspires perfect confidence that we shall see him there if we are worthy to follow him. But how hard it is in times of difficulty to be deprived of such a tender father, and of a man of such counsel and courage.”

If he described himself as afflicted by domestic grief, he was over­whelmed by the causes for national mourning; but he was still un­dismayed. lie wrote on the 31st July to Count Champagny: “Alas! my dear sir, you ask me for my views on the present situation. We are under the judgment of God. In the dark cloud of grief, under which we are living, I can no longer see whither we are being led, unless that Providence is leading us whither He wills. When one witnesses generals wounded and dead, the flower of the African army gone, the heroic Archbishop killed, and Chateaubriand no more, who, in a way, represented ancient France, it seems to me as if our very fatherland were crumbling away. It appears to be disappearing and bearing with it all that we held dear: liberty itself, which now seems possible only in a state of siege: the growing popularity of Catholicism, compromised by the present difficulties of Pius IX. But I have not at any time concealed from myself the difficulties and dangers of the situation. I have always believed in the invasion of the barbarians. I believe in it now more than ever. I think that it will be slow and sanguinary, but that it must sooner or later give way before the Christian Law. I t will then regenerate the world. I am certain that we shall witness the horrors of the struggle, I am not so certain that our children will see its close.”

Then comes the sublime word, the sublimity of faith which moves mountains:—” Let us pray; we must not believe that the end of France has come. Because at this moment, the end of France would be the end of the world. Can it possibly be believed that the temporal destiny of Christianity has run its course and that God has no further use for this world but to fudge it? That is what I shall never say. Even were all modern society annihilated, I should be still assured that God, in His omnipotence, could with greater ease, raise up a new state of society, than that He could confine the effects of the Precious Blood of His Son to the little good, which the last eighteen hundred centuries have produced.”

Now was the time for Ozanam to work harder than ever, mingling with the poor people to comfort them in their troubles and enlighten them in their errors. The Society of St. Vincent de Paul on one side, and The New Era on another, were to co-operate in the double apostolate of corporal and spiritual aid, for the poverty-stricken as well as for the ruling classes in Paris and in France.

The consequences of the June insurrection threw France, and more particularly Paris, into a deplorable condition of suffering and destitution. The immediate shutting down of the national workshops left 267,000 workmen in the Capital out of work. Fear paralysed in­dustry and commerce. The manufacturing houses were closed and orders countermanded. Capitalists were in hiding, the landed proprietors had fled Paris, and were not in any hurry to return: public funds were quoted at ridiculous prices: the resources of charity had been exhausted by the ruin or the absence of those who provided them. Thus societies and houses of charity were forced to turn away from their doors, their poor, their children, and their sick clients. What was going to become of the multitude without work, without credit, without food, and without hope?

Ozanam was consumed with pity at the spectacle: “Wearied of the controversies which are agitating Paris, I am stricken with sorrow at the spectacle of the misery which is desolating it,” he wrote to M. Foisset. “The Society of St. Vincent de Paul has great responsibili­ties cast upon it. Perhaps God has allowed it to progress so rapidly, in order to enable it to perform the work which He was getting ready for it. It is good to see at close quarters, the poor men, unarmed, among their wives and children, whom we have formerly seen too often in the clubs and at the barricades. It will then be seen with astonishment, how much Christianity, and consequently how much hope, there is in the people. Ah! if we only had saints! But how can we doubt that God has them in reserve for an age to which He gave Pius IX and the Archbishop of Paris?”

The Society of St. Vincent de Paul had just received a high tribute of confidence from the Government. Grants had been voted by the National Assembly for the benefit of the poor in the Department of the Seine, and its distribution in the homes was entrusted, in part, to the Conferences in regular contact with those poor. Several Mayors in Paris had acted similarly, notably Dr. Trelat, Physician to the

Asylum and Mayor of the XIIth Ward. The celebrated doctor was not at all too religious, but he stated from actual knowledge, that such a responsible matter could not be entrusted to more reliable or more experienced hands.

It was with those conditions prevailing that the Quarterly General Meeting of the Society was held on the 2nd August in a hall attached to St. Sulpice Church. The moment was solemn. M. Adolphe Baudon, who had succeeded the venerable M. Gossin as President-General on the r4th February, had just had his leg fractured at the barricade of the Petit-Pont de la Cite. Ozanam, as Vice-President, took his place. At his right sat the chairman of the meeting, the Abbé Fournier, future Bishop of Nantes, Member of the National Assembly. At his left was M. Augustin Cochin, Secretary-General. Ozanam began by assuring the meeting that their beloved and courageous President would not be lost to them: “He will not go from us as do the glorious dead and wounded, who depart one after another, seeming to bear our fatherland away with them.”

He mentioned the names of some of the members who perished during those sad days:M. Lean, a member of the Conference of St. Paul-St. Louis, a brilliant mining engineer and one of the most promis­ing students of the Polythecnic: M. Charre, President of the Conference in Montmartre: “lie was only twenty-two years of age: a young Law student crowned with success, a naturalist, an arch2eologist, an only son, rich, intelligent, to whom all honour and happiness was beckoning. He was hit fighting by his father’s side. After ten hours of agony he breathed his soul to God, Who will have taken into account the sacrifice of his youth, the mourning of his brothers in the Society, and the tears of the poor.”

The memory of His Grace, Archbishop Afire, received mournful tribute in his address: “He was a father to our growing Society. He had recently handed over a large sum of money to it, for the benefit and the instruction of young migratory workmen in Paris. Thus the good of the people occupied all his thoughts up to the time when he was to die for the safety of the people. God permitted, in that sup­reme moment, that the humble Society of St. Vincent de Paul should be represented near the Archbishop by one of its members bearing a flag of truce. That is a domestic tribute and a family tradition which we wish to be mentioned in the account of that death which history will record with honour. My dear Brothers, many among you will remember the day when a preacher, whom we all love, cried out in Notre Dame in the presence of the Abbé Afire, then Vicar-General of the diocese: ‘ My God, give us saints, it is too long since we have seen any.’ God is generous, my dear Brothers, you asked for saints and He has given you martyrs.”

When the tribute has been paid to the dead, duty to the living must be attended to. Ozanam advises the distributors of State aid to be messengers of peace to the insurgents. Their task as mediators between the conqueror and the vanquished should not be limited to giving charity; they should strive to rehabilitate charity in the eyes of those poor, duped, embittered workmen, by showing them that it was prompt, compassionate, merciful, forgetful of the past: “Sons of St. Vincent de Paul, let us learn of Him to forget ourselves, to devote ourselves to the service of God and the good of men. Let us learn of Him that holy preference which shows most love to those who suffer most.”

Ozanam next thanked private and foreign contributors. The pre­vious year, Ozanam had carried on a propaganda, and with what fervour! for Ireland, which was then decimated with famine and typhus. One hundred and fifty thousand francs had been collected and forwarded to the Council in Dublin. To-day, it was Ireland’s turn, who, mindful of Paris and its trials, begged of her to accept the balance of 50,000 francs for her wounded and her unemployed workmen. Ozanam was full of admiration for the offer and insisted that it should be accepted: “It was a rare example of that fraternity of charity which knows no distinction of nationality in the sight of God.”

M. Augustin Cochin spoke after Ozanam and also delivered a beau­tiful address, animated with the same zeal. His report on the Society stated that 69 Conferences had been founded in 1847, bringing their total number of 363 (334 Conferences, 29 Councils) on the 1st January, 1848, to 393 to date (the August meeting). Of that number England had 17, Holland 16, Canada Ir. The enthusiasm of M. Cochin burst forth: “There is scarce a day in the year, or an hour in the day, on which men are not gathered together at some spot in the Christian world, under the patronage of St. Vincent de Paul, to perform works for the good of man and the glory of God, good works in which they have one prayer, one faith, and one Rule. No frontiers divide them, the horizon broadens daily, and each day sees new constellations of charity appear in the Vincentian firmament.”

M. Baudon’s wound necessitated a long absence, and an equally long period of vice-presidency for Ozanam. During the close of that ter­rible year he was the effective acting-President of the Society. He congratulated it on the fact that it had survived the troubles and was intact. He encouraged it to redoubled energy for that year: “Do we not owe something to Providence, my dear Brothers, who has preserved us when so many others have perished? Is it enough to continue to do the little which we have been accustomed to do? When the hardships of the time are inventing new forms of suffering, can we rest satisfied with old remedies?”

What did lie mean? More active recruitment for the Conferences; a more ardent search for the unfortunate poor who were in hiding, for those who were ashamed to beg, hard-working men who had been accustomed to live by their work and whom a long enforced idleness had reduced to penury.

He asked himself in the month of September: “What will the opening year be like for France? I do not know, but I know that it will be for our Society one of those periods in the campaign, which cause most fatigue but which count double. Go to the unhappy poor with your offering, no matter how small it may be. If we had but the widow’s mite to offer, the poor will at least have had the consolation of having clasped the hand of a friend, of having heard a Christian point of view, of having been taught to honour their poverty as the Saviour’s crown of thorns.”

The year’s campaign opened, at the close of 1848, with an epidemic of cholera. Uneasy for the safety of his wife and child, Ozanam placed them in Versailles. On the 22nd April, 1849, he called together and organised, with his colleagues on the Council, a band of forty picked men to carry temporal and spiritual aid to the victims of cholera, whom special reasons prevented from being taken to hospital. By the time of the next Quarterly General Meeting of the Society, on the 19th July, the first forty had become one hundred and twelve. “Surely it was a small number,” he said, “to go to the aid of a decimated people, with an administration thrown altogether out of gear, and science completely beaten. But those one hundred and twelve picked men did not wait to contrast their insignificance with the greatness of the danger and of the need. Divided into nine sections amongst the most severely visited quarters, they placed their services at the disposal of the Sisters of Charity and of the medical ambulances. Upwards of two thousand sick received their ministrations in the space of two months. Three-fourths of those recovered; the rest died a happy death fortified with the rights of the Church.”

Ozanam regretted that he could not report in detail the horror and desolation of the time: “Entire streets depopulated in a few nights, but pardon and grace harvesting all the time with full hands: all the poor people wishing to die in the priest’s arms: then the unheard of homage, the shouts of joy, the flowers scattered beneath the feet of the new Archbishop, His Grace Dr. Sibour, as he made his pilgrimage to the tomb of St. Genevieve. Then again, the gratitude of families, the emotion of the crowd, who were astonished and amazed that young men should, for the glory of Jesus Christ, leave their homes to enter the stricken faubourg, to nurse the sick and bury the dead.”

” His Grace the Archbishop has officially undertaken the adoption of orphans. The Society of St. Vincent de Paul will do its part. In how many other centres in the provinces has not the same been done? Thus Faith is coming back in the footsteps of Charity, and Religion, now knocking at doors which had been long closed to it, will bring in with it peace, reconciliation and the promise of Eternity.”

A contrast of the effects of political action and charitable work which was made at the same Quarterly General Meeting, suggested the names of Richelieu and of St. Vincent de Paul, living near one another, amid the evils of the Thirty Years’ War and the destruction of political factions. Ozanam exclaimed in beautiful language: “The great Minister certainly played a glorious part, but who could, and who would if he could, continue it to-day? Richelieu was but a man of one country, of one period, of a few years. St. Vincent de Paul is, on the other hand, for all lands and for all time. His name is cele­brated wherever the sun illumines the Crucifix on a church-tower. His spirit visits the hospitals and schools of our faubourgs in the persons of his Sisters, as well as the Missions of Lebanon, China and Texas, which are manned with his sons. His work never grows old: who does not wish to-day to continue it? If we have courage and faith, gentlemen, what will keep us back?

1. This is according to the account given by Ozanam’s brother, ch. XVIII, p. 393—by Pere Lacordaire in his funeral notice, VIII, p. 253—and in the notes to Ozanam’s letters, p. 237—in the Historie de Is seconds Rdpublique by M. Pierre de la Gorce. All are agreed in attributing to Ozanam and his companions the idea of approaching the Archbishop. On the other hand, a letter of M. Cornudet to his sister attributes it in the first instance to the Abbé Buquet, as appears in the Bulletin of the Society of St. Vincent de Paul, May 1894.