A few days after the strange and
providential night spent with the repentant thieves, I received the following
letter signed by Chambers and his unfortunate criminal friends:
"Dear Father Chiniquy:We are condemned to death. Please come and help us
to meet our sentence as Christians."
I will not attempt to say what I felt when I entered the damp and dark cells
where the culprits were enchained. No human words can express those things.
Their tears and their sobs were going through my heart as a two-edged sword.
Only one of them had, at first, his eyes dried, and kept silent: Chambers, the
most guilty of all.
After the others had requested me to hear the confession of their sins, and
prepare them for death, Chambers said: "You know that I am a Protestant.
But I am married to a Roman Catholic, who is your penitent. You have persuaded
my two so dear sisters to give up their Protestantism and become Catholics.
I have many times desired to follow them. My criminal life alone has prevented
me from doing so. But now I am determined to do what I consider to be the will
of God in this important matter. Please, tell me what I must do to become a
Catholic."
I was a sincere Roman Catholic priest, believing that out of the Church of Rome
there was no salvation. The conversion of that great sinner seemed to me a miracle
of the grace of God; it was for me a happy distraction in the desolation I felt
in that dungeon.
I spent the next eight days in hearing their confessions, reading the lives
of some saints, with several chapters of the Bible, as the Seven Penitential
Psalms, the sufferings and death of Christ, the history of the Prodigal Son,
ect. And I instructed Chambers, as well as the shortness of the time allowed
me, in the faith of the Church of Rome. I usually entered the cells at about
9 a.m., and left them only at 9 p.m.
After I had spent much time in exhorting them, reading and praying, several
times, I asked them to tell me some of the details of the murders and thefts
they had committed, which might be to me as a lesson of human depravity, which
would help me when preaching on the natural corruption and malice of the human
heart, when once the fear and the love, or even the faith in God, were completely
set aside.
The facts I then heard very soon convinced me of the need we have of a religion,
and what would become of the world if the atheists could succeed in sweeping
away the notions of a future punishment after death, or the fear and the love
of God from among men.
When absolutely left to his own depravity, without any religion to stop him
on the rapid declivity of his uncontrollable passions, man is more cruel than
the wild beasts. The existence of society would be impossible without a religion
and a God to protect it.
Though I am in favour of liberty of conscience in its highest sense, I think
that the atheist ought to be punished like the murderer and the thief for his
doctrines tend to make a murderer and a thief of every man. No law, no society
is possible if there is no God to sanction and protect them.
But the more we were approaching the fatal day, when I had to go on the scaffold
with those unfortunate men, and to see them launched into eternity, the more
I felt horrified. The tears, the sobs, and the cries of those unfortunate men
had so melted my heart, my soul, and my strong nerves, they had so subdued my
unconquerable will, and that stern determination to do my duty at any cost,
which had been my character till then, that I was shaking from head to feet,
when thinking of that awful hour.
Besides that, my constant intercourse with those criminals these last few days,
their unbounded confidence in me, their gratitude for my devotedness to them,
their desolation, and their cries when speaking of their fathers or mothers,
wives or children, had filled my heart with a measure of sympathy which I would
vainly try to express. They were no more thieves and murderers to me, whose
bloody deeds had at first chilled the blood in my veins; they were the friends
of my bosom the beloved children whom cruel beasts had wounded. They were dearer
to me than my own life not only I felt happy to mix my tears with theirs, and
unite my ardent prayers to God for mercy with them, but I would have felt happy
to shed my blood in order to save their lives. As several of them belonged to
the most reputable families of Quebec and vicinity, I thought I could easily
interest the clergy and the most respectable citizens to sign a petition to
the governor, Lord Gosford, asking him to change their sentence of death into
one of perpetual exile to the distant penal colony of Botany Bay in Australia.
The governor was my friend. Colonel Vassal, who was my uncle, and the adjutant-general
of the militia of the whole country, had introduced me to his Excellency, who
many times had overloaded me with the marks of his interest and kindness, and
my hope was that he would not refuse me the favour I was to ask him, when the
petition would be signed by the Bishop, the Catholic priests, the ministers
of the different Protestant denominations of the city, and hundreds of the principal
citizens of Quebec. I presented the petition myself, accompanied by the secretary
of the Archbishop. But to my great distress the Governor answered me that those
men had committed so many murders, and kept the country in terror for so many
years, that it was absolutely necessary they should be punished according to
the sentence of the court. Who can tell the desolation of those unfortunate
men, when, with a voice choked by my sobs and my tears, I told them that the
governor had refused to grant the favour I had asked him for them. They fell
on the ground and filled their cells with cries which would have broken the
hardest heart. From those very cells we were hearing the noise of the men who
were preparing the scaffold where they were to be hanged the next day. I tried
to pray and read, but I was unable to do so. My desolation was too great to
utter a single word. I felt as if I were to be hanged with them and to say the
whole truth, I think I would have been glad to hear that I was to be hanged
the next day to save their lives. For there was a fear in me, which was haunting
me as a phantom from hell, the last three days. It seemed that, in spite of
all my efforts, prayers, confessions, absolutions, and sacraments, these men
were not converted, and that they were to be launched into eternity with all
their sins.
When I was comparing the calm and true repentance of the two thieves, with whom
I spent the night a few weeks before in the carriage, with the noisy expressions
of sorrow of those newly converted sinners, I could not help finding an immeasurable
distance between the first and second of those penitents. No doubt had remained
in my mind about the first, but I had serious apprehensions about the last.
Several circumstances, which it would be too long and useless to mention here,
were distressing me by the fear that all my chaplets, indulgences, medals, scapulars,
holy waters, signs of the cross, prayers to the Virgin, auricular confession,
absolutions, used in the conversion of these sinners, had not the divine and
perfect power of a simple book to the dying Saviour on the cross. I was saying
to myself with anxiety: "Would it be possible that those Protestants, who
were with me in the carriage, had the true ways of repentance, pardon, peace,
and life eternal in that simple look to the great victim, and that we Roman
Catholics with our signs of the cross and holy waters, our crucifixes and prayers
to the saints, our scapulars and medals, our so humiliating auricular confession,
were only distracting the mind, the soul, and the heart of the sinner from the
true and only source of salvation, Christ!" In the midst of those distressing
thoughts I almost regretting having helped Chambers in giving up his Protestantism
for my Romanism.
At about 4 p.m. I made a supreme effort to shake off my desolation, and nerve
myself for the solemn duties God had entrusted to me. I put a few questions
to those desolated men, to see if they were really repentant and converted.
Their answers added to my fear that I had spoken too much of the virgins and
the saints, the indulgences, medals and scapulars, integrity of confession,
and not enough of Christ dying on the cross for them. It is true I had spoken
of Christ and His death to them, but this had been so much mixed up with exhortation
to trust in Mary, put their confidence in their medals, scapulars, confessions,
ect., that it became almost evident to me that in our religion Christ was like
a precious pearl lost in a mountain of sand and dust. This fear soon caused
my distress to be unbearable.
I then went to the private, neat little room, which the gaoler had kindly allotted
to me, and I fell on my knees to pray God for myself and for my poor convicts.
Though this prayer brought some calm to my mind, my distress was still very
great. It was then that the thought came again to my mind to go the governor
and make a new and supreme effort to have the sentence of death changed into
that of perpetual exile to Botany Bay, and without a moment of delay I went
to his palace.
It was about 7 p.m. when he reluctantly admitted me to his presence, telling
me, when shaking hands, "I hope, Mr. Chiniquy, you are not coming to renew
your request of the morning, for I cannot grant it."
Without a word to answer I fell on my knees, and for more than ten minutes I
spoke as I had never spoken before. I spoke as we speak when we are the ambassadors
of God in a message of mercy. I spoke with my lips. I spoke with my tears. I
spoke with my sobs and my cries. I spoke with my supplicating hands lifted to
heaven. For some time the governor was mute and as if stunned. He was not only
a noble-minded man, but he had a most tender, affectionate, and kind heart.
His tears soon began to flow with mine, and his sobs mixed with my sobs; with
a voice halfsuffocated by his emotion, he extended his friendly hand and said:
"Father Chiniquy, you ask me a favour which I ought not to give, but I
cannot resist your arguments, when your tears, your sobs, and your cries are
like arrows which pierce and break my heart. I will give you the favour you
ask."
It was nearly 10 p.m. when I knocked at the door of the gaoler, asking his permission
to see my dear friends in their cells, to tell them that I had obtained their
pardon, that they would not die. That gentleman could hardly believe me. It
was only after reading twice the document I had in my hands that he saw that
I told him the truth.
Looking at that parchment again, he said: "Have you noticed that it is
covered and almost spoiled by the spots evidently made with the tears of the
governor. You must be a kind of sorcerer to have melted the heart of such a
man, and have wrenched from his hands the pardon of such convicts; for I know
he was absolutely unwilling to grant the pardon."
"I am not a sorcerer," I answered. "But you remember that our
Saviour Jesus Christ had said, somewhere, that He had brought a fire from heaven
well, it is evident that He has thrown some sparks of that fire into my poor
heart, for it was so fiercely burning when I was at the feet of the governor,
that I think I would have died at his feet, had he not granted me that favour.
No doubt that some sparks of that fire have also fallen on his soul and in his
heart when I was speaking, for his cries, his tears, and his sobs were filling
his room, and showing that he was suffering as much as myself. It was that he
might not be consumed by that fire that he granted my request. I am now the
most happy man under heaven. Please, make haste. Come with me and open the cells
of those unfortunate men that I may tell what our merciful God has done for
them." When entering their desolated cells I was unable to contain myself;
I cried out: "Rejoice and bless the Lord, my dear friends! You will not
die to-morrow!I bring you your pardon with me!"
Two of them fainted, and came very near dying from excess of surprise and joy.
The others, unable to contain their emotions, were crying and weeping for joy.
They threw their arms around me to press me to their bosom, kiss my hands and
cover them with their tears of joy. I knelt with them and thanked God, after
which I told them how they must promise to God to serve Him faithfully after
such a manifestation of His mercies. I read to them the 100th, 101st, 102nd,
and 103rd Psalms, and I left them after twelve o'clock at night to go and take
some rest. I was in need of it after a whole day of such work and emotions.
The next day I wanted to see my dear prisoners early, and I was with them before
7 a. m. As the whole country had been glad to hear that they were to be hanged
that very day, the crowds were beginning to gather at that early hour to witness
the death of those great culprits. The feelings of indignation were almost unmanageable
when they heard that they were not to be hanged, but only to be exiled for their
life to Botany Bay. For a time it was feared that the mob would break the doors
of the gaol and lynch the culprits. Though very few priests were more respected
and loved by the people, they would have probably torn me to pieces when they
heard that it was I who had deprived the gibbet of its victims that day. The
chief of police had to take extraordinary measures to prevent the wrath of the
mob from doing mischief. He advised me not to show myself for a few days in
the streets.
More than a month passed before all the thieves and murderers in Canada, to
the number of about seventy, who had been sentenced to be exiled to Botany Bay,
could be gathered into the ship which was to take them into that distant land.
I thought it was my duty during that interval to visit my penitents in gaol
every day, and instruct them on the duties of the new life they were called
upon to live. When the day of their departure arrived I gave a Roman Catholic
New Testament, translated by De Sacy, to each of them to read and meditate on
their long and tedious journey, and I bade them adieu, recommending them to
the mercy of God, and the protection of the Virgin Mary and all the Saints.
Some months later I heard, that on the sea Chambers had broken his chains and
those of some of his companions, with the intention of taking possession of
the ship, and escaping on some distant shore. But he had been betrayed, and
was hanged on his arrival at Liverpool.
I had almost lost sight of those emotional days of my young years of priesthood.
Those facts were silently lying among the big piles of the daily records which
I had faithfully kept since the very days of my collegiate life at Nicolet,
when, in 1878, I was called by the grand English colony of Australia, formerly
known by me only as the penal colony of Botany Bay.
Some time after my arrival, when I was lecturing in one of the young and thriving
cities of that country, whose future destinies promise to be so great, a rich
carross, drawn by two splendid English horses, with two men in livery, stopped
before the house where I had put up for a few days. A venerable gentleman alighted
from the carriage and knocked at the door as I was looking at him from the window.
I went to the door, to save trouble to my host, and I opened it. In saluting
me, the stranger said: "Is Father Chiniquy here?"
"Yes, sir," I answered. "Father Chiniquy is the guest of this
family."
"Could I have the honour of a few minutes' conversation with him?"
replied the old gentleman.
"As I am Father Chiniquy, I can at once answer you that I will feel much
pleasure in granting your request."
"Oh, dear Father Chiniquy," quickly replied the stranger, "is
it possible that it is you? Can I be absolutely alone with you for half an hour,
without any one to see and hear us?"
"Certainly," I said; "my comfortable rooms are upstairs, and
I am absolutely alone there.Please, sir, come and follow me."
When alone with me the stranger said:
"Do you not know me?"
"How can I know you, sir?" I answered. "I do not even remember
ever having seen you?"
"You have not only seen me, but you have heard the confession of my sins
many times; and you have spent many hours in the same room with me," replied
the old gentleman.
"Please tell me where and when I have seen you, and also be kind enough
to give me your name; for all those things have escaped from my memory."
"Do you remember the murderer and thief, Chambers, who was condemned to
death in Quebec, in 1837, with eight of his accomplices?" asked the stranger.
"Yes, sir; I remember well Chambers and the unfortunate men he was leading
in the ways of iniquity," I replied.
"Well, dear Father Chiniquy, I am one of the criminals who filled Canada
with terror for several years, and who were caught and rightly condemned to
death. When condemned, we selected you for our father confessor, with the hope
that through your influence we might escape the gallows; and we were not disappointed.
You obtained our pardon; the sentence of death was commuted into a life of exile
to Botany Bay. My name in Canada was A , but here they call me B .God has blessed
me since in many ways; but it is to you I owe my life, and all the privileges
of my present existence. After God, you are my saviour. I come to thank and
bless you for what you have done for me."
In saying that, he threw himself into my arms, pressed me to his heart, and
bathed my face and my hands with his tears of joy and gratitude.
But his joy did not exceed mine, and my surprise was equal to my joy to find
him apparently in such good circumstances. After I had knelt with him to thank
and bless God for what I had heard, I asked him to relate to me the details
of his strange and marvelous story. Here is a short resume of his answer:
"After you had given us your last benediction when on board the ship which
was to take us from Quebec to Botany Bay, the first thing I did was to open
the New Testament you had given me and the other culprits, with the advice to
read it with a praying heart. It was the first time in my life I had that book
in my hand. You were the only priest in Canada who would put such a book in
the hands of common people. But I must confess that its first reading did not
do me much good, for I read it more to amuse myself and satisfy my curiosity
than through any good and Christian motive. The only good I received from that
first reading was that I clearly understood, for the first time, why the priests
of Rome fear and hate that book, and why they take it out of the hands of their
parishioners when they hear that they have it. It was in vain that I looked
for mass, indulgences, chaplets, purgatory, auricular confession, Lent, holy
water, the worship of Mary, or prayers in an unknown tongue. I concluded from
my first reading of the Gospel that our priests were very wise to prevent us
from reading a book which was really demolishing our Roman Catholic Church,
and felt surprised that you had put in our hands a book which seemed to me so
opposed to the belief and practice of our religion as you taught it to us when
in gaol, and my confidence in your good judgment was much shaken. To tell you
the truth, the first reading of the Gospel went far to demolish my Roman Catholic
faith, and to make a wreck of the religion taught me by my parents and at the
college, and even by you. For a few weeks I became more of a skeptic than anything
else. The only good that first reading of the Holy Book did me was to give me
more serious thoughts, and prevent me from uniting myself to Chambers and his
conspirators in their foolish plot for taking possession of the ship and escaping
to some unknown and distant shore. He had been shrewd enough to conceal a very
small but exceedingly sharp saw between his toes before coming to the ship,
with which he had already cut the chains of eighteen of the prisoners, when
he was betrayed, and hanged on his arrival at Liverpool.
"But if my first reading of the Gospel did not do me much good, I cannot
say the same thing of the second. I remember that, when handing to us that holy
book, you had told us never to read it except after a fervent prayer to God
for help and light to understand it. I was really tired of my former life. In
giving up the fear and the love of God I had fallen into the deepest abyss of
human depravity and misery, till I had come very near ending my life on the
scaffold. I felt the need of a change. You had often repeated to us the words
of our Saviour, 'Come unto Me, all ye who are weary and heavy laden, and I will
give you rest;' but, with all the other priests, you had always mixed those
admirable and saving words with the invocation to Mary, the confidence in our
medals, scapulars, signs of the cross, holy waters, indulgences, auricular confessions,
that the sublime appeal of Christ had always been, as it always will be, drowned
in the Church of Rome by those absurd and impious superstitions and practices.
"One morning, after I had spent a sleepless night, and feeling as pressed
down under the weight of my sins, I opened my Gospel book, after an ardent prayer
for light and guidance, and my eyes fell on these words of John, 'Behold, the
Lamb of God, who taketh away the sin of the world!' (John i. 29). These words
fell upon my poor guilty soul with a divine, irresistible power. With tears
and cries of an unspeakable desolation I spent the day in crying, 'O Lamb of
God, who taketh away the sins of the world, have mercy on me! Take away my sins!'
The day was not over when I felt and knew that my cries had been heard at the
mercyseat. The Lamb of God had taken away my sins! He had changed my heart and
made quite a new man of me. From that day the reading of the Gospel was to my
soul what bread is to the poor hungry man, and what pure and refreshing waters
are to the thirsty traveler. My joy, my unspeakable joy, was to read the holy
book and speak with my companions in chains of the dear Saviour's love for the
poor sinners; and, thanks be to God, a good number of them have found Him altogether
precious, having been sincerely converted in the dark holes of that ship. When
working hard at Sydney with the other culprits, I felt my chains to be as light
as feathers when I was sure that the heavy chains of my sins were gone; and
though working hard under a burning sun from morning till night, I felt happy,
and my heart was full of joy when I was sure that my Saviour had prepared a
throne for me in His kingdom, and that He had bought a crown of eternal glory
for me by dying on the cross to redeem my guilty soul.
"I had hardly spent a year in Australia, in the midst of the convicts,
when a minister of the Gospel, accompanied by another gentleman, came to me
and said: 'Your perfectly good behavoiur and your Christian life have attracted
the attention and admiration of the authorities, and the governor sends us to
hand you this document, which says that you are no more a criminal before the
law, but that you have your pardon, and you can live the life of an honourable
citizen, by continuing to walk in the ways of God.' After speaking so, the gentleman
put one hundred dollars in my hands, and added: 'Go and be a faithful follower
of the Lord Jesus, and God Almighty will bless you and make you prosper in all
your ways.' All this seemed to me as a dream or vision from heaven. I would
hardly believe my ears or my eyes. But it was not a dream, it was a reality.
My merciful Heavenly Father had again heard my humble supplications; after having
taken away the heavy chains of my sins, He had mercifully taken away the chains
which wounded my feet and my hands. I spent several days and nights in weeping
and crying for joy, and in blessing the God of my salvation, Jesus the Redeemer
of my soul and my body.
"Some years after that we heard of the discoveries of the rich gold mines
in several parts of Australia. "After having prayed God to guide me, I
bought a bag of hard crackers, a ham and cheese, and started for the mines in
company with several who were going, like myself, in search of gold. But I soon
preferred to be alone. For I wanted to pray and to be united to my God, even
when walking. After a long march, I reached a beautiful spot, between three
small hills, at the foot of which a little brook was running down towards the
plain below. The sun was scorching, there was no shade, and I was much tired,
I sat on a flat stone to take my dinner, and quenching my thirst with the water
of the brook, I was eating and blessing my God at the same time for His mercies,
when suddenly my eyes fell on a stone by the brook, which was about the size
of a goose egg. But the rays of the sun was dancing on the stone, as if it had
been a mirror. I went and picked it up. The stone was almost all gold of the
purest kind! It was almost enough to make me rich. I knelt to thank and bless
God for this new token of His mercy toward me, and I began to look around and
see if I would not find some new piece of the precious metal, and you may imagine
my joy when I found that the ground was not only literally covered with pieces
of gold of every size from half an inch to the smallest dimensions, but that
the very sand was in great part composed of gold. In a very short time it was
the will of God that I could carry to the bank particles of gold to the value
of several thousand pounds. I continued to cover myself with rags, and have
old boots on in order not to excite the suspicion of any one of the fortune
which I was accumulating so rapidly. When I had about $80,000 deposited in the
banks, a gentleman offered me $80,000 more for my claim, and I sold it. The
money was invested by me on a piece of land which soon became the site of an
important city, and I soon became one of the wealthy men of Australia. I then
begun to study hard and improve the little education I had received in Canada.
I married, and my God has made me father of several children. The people where
I settled with my fortune and wife, not knowing my antecedents, have raised
me to the first dignities of the place. Please, dear Mr. Chiniquy, come and
take dinner with me to-morrow, that I may show you my house and some of my other
properties, and also that I may introduce you to my wife and children. Let me
ask the favour not to make them suspect that you have known me in Canada, for
they think that I am an European." When telling me his marvelous adventures,
which I am obliged to condense and abridge, his voice was many times choked
by his emotion, his tears and sobs, and more than once he had to stop. As for
me, I was absolutely beside myself with admiration at the mysterious ways through
which God leads His elect in all ages. "Now, I understood why my God had
given me such a marvelous power over the Governor of Canada when I wrenched
your pardon from his hands almost in spite of himself." I said: "That
merciful God willed to save you, and you are saved! May His name be for ever
blessed."
The next day, it was my privilege to be with his family, at dinner. And never
in my life, have I seen a more happy mother, and a more interesting family.
The long table was actually surrounded by them. After dinner he showed me his
beautiful garden and his rich palace, after which, throwing himself into my
arms, he said: "Dear Father Chiniquy, all those things belong to you. It
is to you after God that I owe my wife, all the blessings of a large and Christian
family, and the honour of the high position I have in this country. May the
God of heaven for ever bless you for what you have done for me." I answered
him: "Dear friend, you owe me nothing, I have been nothing but a feeble
instrument of the mercies of God towards you. To that great merciful God alone
be the praise and the glory. Please ask your family to come here and join with
us in singing to the praise of God the 103rd Psalm." And we sang together:
"Bless the Lord, O my soul, and all that is within me bless His holy name.
He hath not dealt with us after our sins; not rewarded us according to our iniquities.
For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is His mercy toward them
that fear Him. As far as the east is from the west, so far hath Here moved our
transgressions from us. Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth
them that fear Him." After the singing of that Psalm, I bade him adieu
for the second time, never to meet him again except in that Promised Land, where
we shall sing the eternal Hallelujah around the throne of the Lamb, who was
slain for us, and who redeemed us in His blood.