Communications
COMMUNICATIONS NEO-PAGANISM Rome, Italy. TO the Editor:—I had intended not to afflict your readers with any further discussion of paganism, new or old. Buf in your issue of May 28 Mr. Donald...
...From what little I know of theology, however, I would say that in the case of all "pagans" such reasons may be roughly grouped under two heads, superbia and invincible ignorance...
...One also is a pagan who is simply not a Christian...
...and, as defined by Catholics less kindly than Mr...
...Williams...
...FROM TEMPERANCE TO WHEELERISM Tuxedo, N. Y. TO the Editor:—I wish to congratulate Mr...
...But he forbore...
...But by what authority does he classify me among infidels and unbaptized persons...
...Williams, remember him as one pottering amiably among his "innumerable seedlings," his "several hundred gladiola bulbs," and laughing with Santayana, "Gentlemen, it is April...
...But what have they to do with me...
...I am afraid that Mr...
...of being slothfully stuck in the mire of ancient habit, et cetera ad infinitum...
...of arrested spiritual development ; of inconsistency...
...But as I cannot accept Mr...
...Why, upon the authority of Mr...
...Nor do I think that even the kindliness of Mr...
...Harvey Wickham...
...To which Mr...
...But he probably still understands what is meant by the rights of eminent domain...
...Williams, is one who is not a Christian...
...of being stiff-necked, or weak-kneed...
...of clinging to reserved sins...
...Here, since it is obvious that I am not a Protestant, Mr...
...even though it was then already May, and time runneth now to August and September, and the night cometh when no man shall work, least of all in a pagan garden...
...My felicitations from the point of view of fairness, vision, accuracy, and last—but not least—courtesy in his intelligent reply...
...Williams anywhere imply that I was unattached in this utter and damnable sense...
...Alice G. Warren...
...Powell merely wishes to assert that I am a sinner, there is no argument, and I certainly shall not prolong this now intolerably personal discussion by offering, to him at least, so much as a plea in abatement...
...This is unfortunate, and I hope he will eventually find time to take them up again...
...Williams's "Middletown to Rome," in The Commonweal of April 30: "He [Mr...
...Powell's declared indebtedness to "Gilbert White, Richard Jefferies, Alexander Smith and other such simple fellows," we both are Catholics in so far as we are anything at all, and that the feast of Christ the King was proclaimed for us as well as for others...
...Powell in lieu of a father confessor, this is no place for the whys and wherefores...
...Williams will be found to be of that mollycoddle sort which would prevent him from calling a spade a spade...
...Wickham is [himself] a pagan...
...of lack of heart and of faith, or of bad faith...
...Moreover, had he really listened to those Catholics less kind than Mr...
...His fencing is childlike, but a direct thrust might have run me through...
...He might have accused me of wilful blindness...
...Moreover, wordsplitting aside, the plain fact is that I am not a pagan, unless my total disattachment from that mode of thought makes me one according to some other page of Webster yet to be cited...
...But of course if the idea be—as I am sure it is not—to call attention to my practical shortcomings, and to be extreme to mark what is done amiss, why, vide ut supra...
...Williams...
...Of course, if Mr...
...But not even Webster makes Mohammedanism and Judaism the only escapes from the swamps and deserts of Pagania...
...May his tribe increase...
...Wickham will hardly agree with these definitions, but they are of record, nevertheless...
...Williams, above all had he thought to consult someone in authority, he probably would have learned that even I, even himself, even that Bertrand Russell whom he so mch admires, even Jews and Mohammedans and the worshipers of Baal are, whether Christians or not, nevertheless Catholics in the sense of rightly belonging to the Church...
...Information on binding will be given upon application to the offices of The Commonweal...
...The title page and index for Volume XI of The Commonweal are now ready...
...True, I am not a Mohammedan, and not a Jew...
...Powell does not quite grasp the exceeding catholicity of Catholicism...
...One is a pagan who is neither a Christian, a Mohammedan, nor a Jew...
...Wickham] lives in Rome . . . not a member of the Catholic Church, in fact so far as I know, he is still, as ever, personally detached from all organizations...
...On the contrary, I agree with them perfectly, especially with the one put on record by those Catholics less kind than Mr...
...I may even venture, I think, to claim that I am a Catholic in a narrower sense—say politically, and in philosophy...
...One may fail to realize it, or fail to acknowledge it...
...I regret that I am not a Catholic in the commoner and yet fuller and deeper meaning of the word...
...Yes, I am even a papist, and regard the reformation as a calamity second only to the great rejection of the Jews, though doubtless a calamity necessary to the final perfection of some pattern which we cannot see...
...Powell might have had me...
...He says that philosophical and legal studies are "far behind" him...
...of pride, vainglory and hypocrisy...
...C. P. Conolly on his letter in The Commonweal of June 18...
...This, Mr...
...Powell, is what comes of fencing with mere words, maneuvering for merely verbal advantages, and paying no attention to the core of meaning which sometimes even words inclose...
...To prove his point he quotes from Mr...
...Either one of them is roughly and sufficiently accurate for every-day speech...
...Powell's thesis (or Miss Thesis, to use one of his own expressions which here would seem to have a certain aptness) contains another implication, unexpressed but nevertheless felt, namely, that, in the eyes of Catholics not entirely blinded by kindness, none are Christians save those who are communicants of the Church—or, in more Norwalkian language, of the "Catholic Church...
...I therefore make bold to assert that notwithstanding my alleged paganism and Mr...
...Donald Powell, of Norwalk, Connecticut, takes the button off the foil by saying, "If Mr...
...Michael Williams is correct, Mr...
...Arrangements have been made for binding Volume XI in leather or cloth...
...Indeed, it is not so easy to be a pagan as it was in the days of Pericles...
...Powell adds, "A pagan, as defined by Webster, is one who is neither a Christian, a Mohammedan, nor a Jew...
...These will be sent upon request...
...The only question is that of our relation to it, which cannot be that of absolute non-attachment...
...So I shall always remember him with a kindliness almost equal to that of Mr...
...But it is simply impossible here on earth to stand outside of the universal...
...Not to be attached to any organization does not necessarily signify that one has no attachment, no love for, or belief in any organization, nor did Mr...
...The definitions do not enter into all the theological and philosophical niceties of the subject...
Vol. 12 • July 1930 • No. 12
