The old sectarian prejudice may remain with a
few, "whose eyes," as Emerson says, "are in their hind-head, not
in their fore-head;" but the American people are not at heart
sectarian, and the nothingarianism so prevalent among them only
marks their state of transition from sectarian opinions to
positive Catholic faith. At any rate, it can no longer be
denied that Catholics are an integral, living, and growing
element in the American population, quite too numerous, too
wealthy, and too influential to be ignored. They have played too
conspicuous a part in the late troubles of the country, and
poured out too freely and too much of their richest and noblest
blood in defence of the unity of the nation and the integrity of
its domain, for that. Catholics henceforth must be treated as
standing, in all respects, on a footing of equality with any
other class of American citizens, and their views of political
science, or of any other science, be counted of equal importance,
and listened to with equal attention.
I have no fears that my book will be neglected because avowedly
by a Catholic author, and from a Catholic publishing house. They
who are not Catholics will read it, and it will enter into the
current of American literature, if it is one they must read in
order to be up with the living and growing thought of the age.
If it is not a book of that sort, it is not worth reading by any
one.
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