The Fathers conducted them in the same spirit as when they were Redemptorists, and followed, as the community still continues to do, substantially the same method.  It is not easy to improve on St. Alphonsus.  But they did not fail to bring out the qualities and call for the peculiar virtues demanded by Divine Providence in these times.  Their preaching was distinguished by appeals to manliness and intelligence, as well as to the virtues distinctly supernatural.  The people were not only edified by their zeal and religious discipline, but the more observant were attracted by the Paulists’ freedom of spirit, and by their constant insistence on the use of the reasoning faculties to guide the emotions aroused by the sermons.  The missionaries were men of native independence, and their religious influence was productive of the same quality.  Great attention was paid to the doctrinal instructions.  As to special devotions, the Paulists have never had any to propagate, though competent and willing to assist the pastor in his own choice of such subsidiary religious aids.  Non-Catholics of all classes were drawn to hear the convert missionaries, and the exercises usually received flattering notices from the secular press.  An unrelenting warfare was carried on against the dangerous occasions of sin peculiar to our country and people, and the Fathers were from the beginning, and their community is yet well known for particular hostility to drunkenness, and to the most fruitful source of that detestable and widespread vice, the saloon.  Their antagonism to drunkenness showed their appreciation of its evil supremacy among the masses, and the condemnation of the saloon was a necessary result.

This attitude of the missionaries was often a bitter-sweet morsel to the pastors, nearly all of whom at that time had been trained in the Old World.  They were glad of the good done, yet sorry to see their liquor-dealers put to public shame.  One pastor is recorded as saying:  “The only people that have looked sad at this mission are the first men in my parish, the rum-sellers.”  The following is a piece of evidence worth publishing, though it is but one of very many which could be produced.  It is found in the Mission Record in Father Baker’s handwriting: 

“A Catholic one evening, on his way to the mission, stopped in a grog-shop and took a glass with the proprietor.  ’Won’t you go with me to hear the Fathers?’ said the guest.  ‘No,’ said the other, ’these men are too hard on us.  They want all of us liquor-dealers to shut up our shops.  If we were rich we could do it; but we an’t—­we are poor.  These men are too high and independent; Father wouldn’t dare to speak as they do.  But after all,’ continued he, ’they are good fellows; see the effect of their labors.’  Then, taking out of his pocket a crumpled letter which he had received through the post-office, and which was badly spelled and badly written, he read as follows:  ’SIR:  I send you three dollars which I received by mistake three years ago from your clerk.  And now I hope that you will stop selling damnation, and that God may give you grace to stop it.  Yours:  A Sinner.’”