And a week afterwards:  “You should write often, for words of sympathy, hope, encouragement are much to me now in these trials, difficulties, and conflicts.  In all my Catholic life I have not experienced oppression and anxiety of mind in such a degree as I have for these ten days past.”

March 6:  “So far from my devotion to religion being diminished by recent events, it has, thank God, greatly increased; but many other things have been changed in me.  On many new points my intelligence has been awakened; experience has dispelled much ignorance, and on the whole I hope that my faith and heart have been more purified.  If God spares my life to return, I hope to come back more a man, a better Catholic, and more entirely devoted to the work of God.”

The following is from a copy of a letter to Father de Held dated November 2:  “One thing my trials have taught me, and this is the one thing important—­to love God more.  It almost seems that I did not know before what it is to love Him.”

When it became evident that the Holy See would decide the case so as to make it necessary for the Fathers to form a new society, Father Hecker did not accept even this as a final indication of Providence that external circumstances had made it possible for him to realize his long-cherished dreams of an American apostolate; for he was at liberty still to refuse.  He redoubled his prayers.  His pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Alphonsus is already known to the reader; he caused a novena of Masses to be said at the altar of Our Lady of Perpetual Help in the Redemptorist Church in Rome; he said Mass himself at all the great shrines, especially the Confession of St. Peter, the altar of St. Ignatius and that of St. Philip Neri; he earnestly entreated all his friends, old ones at home and new-found ones in Rome, to join with him in his prayers for light.

He furthermore took measures to obtain the counsel of wise and holy men.  Every one whom he thought worthy of his confidence was asked for an opinion.  Finally he drew up a formal document, known in this biography as the Roman Statement, and already familiar by reference and quotation, and placed it in the hands of the three religious whose names, in addition to those of Cardinal Barnabo and Archbishop Bedini, appear at the end of the extract we make from its original draft.  It opens with a summary of his conversion, entrance into religion, and missionary life, and embraces a full enough statement of the trouble with the General of the order—­a matter of notoriety at the time in the city of Rome.  He then describes his own interior aspirations and vocation to the apostolate in America, backing up the authority of that inner voice with the external testimonials of prelates and priests and laymen, whose letters had been procured by the Propaganda as evidence in the case before the Congregation of Bishops and Regulars.