“A Paulist should cultivate personal freedom without detriment to the community spirit; and, vice versa, the community spirit should not be allowed to be detrimental to personal freedom.  But when the individual life runs into eccentricity, license, and revolution, that is a violation and sacrifice of the community life.”

“The duty of the Paulist Superior is to elicit the spontaneous zeal of the Fathers and to further it with his authority.  For lack of one’s own initiative that of another may be used, and herein the Superior offers a constant help.  But the centre of action is individual, is in the soul moved by the Holy Ghost; not in the Superior of the community or in the authorities of the Church.  And if he be moved by the Holy Spirit, he will be most obedient to his superior; and he will not only be submissive to the authority of the Church, but careful to follow out her spirit.”

In explaining the routine of daily life Father Hecker said:  “The member of a community who does not make the common exercises [of religion] his first care is derelict of his duty.  A common exercise should be preferred to all other devotional practices or occupations whatever; as far as possible all other exercises ought to be made subordinate to common ones, which should never be omitted without permission of the superior.”

Father Hecker was once asked:  “Which would you prefer:  to have a rule and manner of life adapted to a large number of men, embracing many of a uniform type, men good enough for average work, intended to include and seeking to retain persons of mediocre spirit, and having a dim understanding of our peculiar institute? or would you prefer the rule to be made only for a select body, composed of such men as ——­and ——­, and the like?’” [Answer:] “I should prefer the rule to be made for the smaller and more select body of men.  Religious vocations are not common, but special.  It is a fatal mistake for religious to take the place of secular priests.”

No one can be misled by what he has read in the foregoing pages into the notion that Father Hecker had any other aim than the entire consecration of liberty and intelligence to the influence of the Holy Spirit.  To know Father Hecker well was to be more deeply impressed with his longing for the reign of the Spirit of God in men’s souls than even with his love of human liberty.  In his esteem the worth of the latter was altogether in proportion to its aptitude for the former.  His love of liberty was that of a means to an end—­the perfect oblation of the inner man to God.  He aimed at individuality because of his belief in the action of the Holy Ghost in the individual soul.  Such action, he was quick to maintain, is given to every Christian, but it is to be looked for in a high degree in those who are called by a special vocation to assist independent characters to find the spirit of God within them; or, if already known, to obey His direction implicitly.  Paulists after Father Hecker’s heart would be men whom experience and study had rendered fit instruments for disseminating the knowledge of the ways of God the Holy Ghost in men’s hearts; for instructing the faithful how to distinguish the voice of God in the soul from the vagaries of the imagination or the emotions of passion, and able to stimulate a ready and generous response to every call of God from within.