This was written on hearing news of the community: 

“It is consoling to see all these good works progressing [in the Paulist community].  To me they sound more like an echo of my past than the actual present.  Before going up the Nile I used to say to some of my friends, that I once knew a man whose name was Hecker, but had lost his acquaintance, and I was going up the Nile to find him.  Perhaps I would overtake him at Wady-Halfa in Nubia!  But I didn’t.  Sometimes I think the search is in vain, and that I shall have to resign myself to his loss and begin a new life.  Tuesday of this week my intention is to go to Milan and stop some days.  I find friends in almost every city.  Friday last I dined with the Archbishop of Turin, and have made the acquaintance of one or two priests here.  Occasionally I visit museums, picture galleries, etc.; and thus time is outwardly passing by, until it pleases God to shed more light on my soul, and to impart more strength to my body, and make clear my path.”

Here are his impressions of Rome after its occupation by the Italians, together with an account of an audience with the Holy Father: 

“Rome is indeed changed, not so much outwardly, materially, as in spiritual atmosphere.  It has lost its Christian exorcism and returned to its former pagan condition.  The modern spirit, too, has entered it with activity in the material order.  The old order, I fear, is never to return; that is to say, as it was; if it returns at all it will be on another basis.  The last citadel has given way to the invasion of modern activity and push.  Who would have dreamed of this twenty years ago?  The charm of Rome is gone, even to non-Catholics, for they felt raised above themselves into a more congenial and spiritual atmosphere while here, and their souls enjoyed it, though their intellectual prejudices were opposed to the principles.  The charm they were conscious of forced them back again to Rome in spite of themselves.  But that charm has in a great measure gone.

“The other evening I had a very pleasant private audience with the Holy Father.  Among other matters I showed him The Young Catholic which pleased him very much.  He was struck with the size of the jackass in the picture of Ober-Ammergau, and asked if they grew so large in that country.  I replied:  ’Holy Father, asses nowadays grow large everywhere.’  He laughed heartily and said, ’Bene trovato.’"

Father Hecker was in Rome when, in March, 1875, his old friend and patron and first spiritual adviser, Archbishop McCloskey, was made Cardinal.  He was much rejoiced, and sent the Cardinal a rich silk cassock, and gave a public banquet to Monsignor Roncetti and Doctor Ubaldi, who were to carry the insignia of the cardinalate to New York.  We are indebted to the kindness of Archbishop Corrigan for a copy of Father Hecker’s letter of congratulation, the principal parts of which we subjoin.  The view of public policy concerning the College of Cardinals expressed in this letter was developed at length in an article published by Father Hecker in The Catholic World, when Cardinal Gibbons was appointed; it will also be found in his latest volume, The Church and the Age: