elation of facts; the bold assertion of deliberate falsehoods; the
deceptive headlines--and the people live on headlines; the insinuating
title which is often in flagrant contradiction to the dispatch it
underlines:--these are a few of its various strategies of attack. "The
Pope and the War," "Quebec and the War," "The Guelph Novitiate
Incident," are recent instances of what we refer to.

Some may object that the Catholics are of a rather susceptible nature
and always expect "privileges"--No, we only want the privileges of
truth, we mean fair play, equality, and justice.

What we say of the Press can also be said of periodical literature and
modern fiction. "The very nature of periodical literature," says
Cardinal Newman, "broken into small wholes and demanded punctually to
an hour involves the habit of extempore philosophy . . . and that
philosophy, we know is not Christian philosophy. The writers can give
no better guarantee for the philosophical truth of their principles
than their popularity at the moment and their happy conformity in
ethical character to the age which admires them."

Any one who has kept in touch with the stream of modern fiction is well
aware to what extent its waters are polluted and have contaminated the
mind and heart of our present generation. When the world has been
slaking its literary thirst at sources such as H. G. Wells, Galsworthy,
Ibanez--only to mention a few--should we be astonished that public
opinion is drifting to paganism? If theories of "Free Love" and
Divorce are rampant in our society, the responsibility to a great
extent lies with our modern novel. The novels that are written and
read, indicate the mind and morals of a people.

What could we not write of the _Moving-Picture_ and the _Stage_?
Suffice it to state with Rev. R. A. Knox--then an anglican minister,
and now a catholic priest: "When a nation has lost its hold of first
truths and its love for clear issues, which has had its morality sapped
by sentiment, thinks of Christian marriage in the light of the
problem-play . . . the moral fibre of that nation is gone." For, the
vision of life and the interpretation of its pleasures and sorrows,
that come from the glare of the foot-lights, or the dimness of the
Movie-Screen, are surely not that given by the Catholic Church. Over
the screen of the movies and the proscenium of the stage could we not
very often write what the author of the play "Enjoy Life," Max Hermann