“In the Exposition I follow simply the footsteps of the Church as indicated in her history, in the Encyclicals of Pius IX., and the Vatican Council.  The Church is God acting directly on the human race, guiding it to its true destiny, the road of all true progress.”

The Exposition, as already said, had been talked to all comers by Father Hecker, and in various parts of Europe, but was put into shape in the autumn of 1874, while he was in the north of Italy.  He took it to Rome and offered it to the Propaganda Press.  No fault was found with it; many high dignitaries, some of them members of the Congregation of the Sacred Palace, which has charge of the censorship, heartily approved of it and would have it published at once; but at the last moment this was decided by the authorities to be inexpedient.  It was then sent to London, and Pickering brought it out anonymously, and it was at once put into French by Mrs. Craven.  It was published as a leader in The Catholic World about the same time, and in 1887 formed the first chapter of The Church and the Age, a compilation of Father Hecker’s more important later essays.

The Exposition contributes to the solution of the race problem as it affects religion.  A glance at Europe shows the radical difference which is symbolized by the terms Transalpine and Cisalpine, Latin and Teutonic.  The one group of races most readily clings to the interior virtues of religion, the other to external institutions.  The problem is how to reconcile them, how to bring both into unity.  Father Hecker believed that the Latin race had crowned its work in the Vatican Council and done it gloriously, and that the time had arrived to invite the Teutonic race to develop its force in the interior life of the Church.  There are passages in the following letter which indicate the weight of this racial problem to him, as well as the supernatural earnestness which he brought to the study of it.  It serves to explain a remark he once made:  “I wrote the Exposition while I was having very many lights about the Holy Ghost—­I couldn’t help but write it.”

“PARIS, June 11, 1874.

“DEAR GEORGE AND JOSEPHINE:  There is not much for me to add to my letter of the third of this month.  My preparations are made to go to Mayence during the Catholic Assembly, which commences on the fifteenth and lasts three days.  There I shall meet several persons whom I am interested in and wish to see.  Besides, ecclesiastical affairs in the German Empire are in a very critical state, and this must add to the interest of the Assembly.  Meeting, as I frequently do, the leading minds of Europe, enables me to compare views, appreciate difficulties, and hear objections.