Mosul, which is about the same latitude, severe frosts frequently occur, and the Tigris at Nineveh is sometimes nearly frozen over. The climatic conditions, therefore, are such as to render an occurrence of the Parhelia physically possible. I was anxious, however, to ascertain whether the Parhelia had actually been seen there, and in 1905 I wrote to Dr. Hume Griffith, who was in charge of the Medical Mission at Mosul, asking him whether he had seen the Parhelia, and if not, if he would keep a look out for it, at the same time sending him a full description of the phenomenon. Dr. Griffith replied saying that he had not seen the Parhelia, but that he would watch for it. In the autumn of 1907 he was returning to England on furlough, and after crossing the desert that lies between the Tigris and the Euphrates he had encamped for the night on the banks of the river Khabur. Late that evening, by a remarkable coincidence, he saw a fine display of the Parhelia. In a subsequent letter to me Dr. Griffith described what he saw: "Your previous letter had passed from my mind, and when my wife called me out of our tent to see 'the glorious sky' I had forgotten that our tent was pitched for the night on the banks of the river Khabur. The month was November, about the first week, the evening was cold and inclined to be frosty, the sun was setting, and from it projected spokes of various hues, with an appearance of a wheel within a wheel . . . the huge wing-shaped appearance on each side of the wheel spread far up into the heavens. The whole phenomenon lasted only a few minutes as the sun sank to rest. After watching it and discussing the curious wheel-like appearance I suddenly thought of where we stood, and of your long forgotten letter, and wondered whether this was what you had asked me to look out for." There can be no doubt that what Dr. Griffith saw was the Parhelia, though in this case the most prominent features of the phenomenon were the two halos and the tangential arcs at the sides of the outer halo which were extended upwards to a great height. We have therefore evidence that the Parhelia has been seen on the very spot where Ezekiel saw his Vision, and that Ezekiel gives a description agreeing at every point with that of the Parhelia. These facts taken together force upon us the conviction that Ezekiel had the Parhelia before him at the time of his Vision, and that this phenomenon constituted the natural object on which the Vision was based. In conclusion I would suggest that the Vision of Ezekiel does not lose anything of its spiritual value, that it is not in any degree less of an inspired message, owing to the fact of its being based upon a natural phenomenon. On the contrary, it gains in impressiveness and significance, and the idea that God has chosen the most magnificent of all natural phenomena to convey to man a knowledge of His Glory and Perfection is in agreement with the truths of Revelation. 496TH ORDINARY GENERAL MEETING. MONDAY, APRIL 19TH, 1909. PROFESSOR E. HULL, LL.D., F.R.S. (VICE-PRESIDENT), IN THE CHAIR. The Minutes of the previous Meeting were read and confirmed. The following paper was then read by the author : THE CATHOLICS IN PRESENT POSITION OF Y paper was announced on your list of subjects as " Modern Christianity in France," but what I wish to bring before you may be described more accurately, perhaps, as "The Present Position of Catholics in France." I venture, therefore, to substitute this title for the other, both as a convenience to my hearers and as a guidance to myself, through a tortuous and complicated labyrinth. The present position of catholics in France can only be understood through a knowledge of their past, and I must begin by explaining some of their old positions, as briefly as I can. From the fall of the Roman Empire in the west down to 1789, the gallican church was the most influential and one of the most wealthy organisations within the papal communion. It was also the most intensely national and, on the whole, the freest. All patronage worth having was at the disposal of the crown. The royal supremacy was more active and arbitrary than it ever was in England. No papal decrees or definitions. had any validity until they had been scrutinised and accepted by the lawyers, ratified by the various parliaments, sanctioned by the king and promulgated by his executive. There was no quarrel with Rome and no breach in the traditional fabric of catholic unity; but the monarchy secured most effectually that the pope should exercise no jurisdiction within the realm of France. The prerogatives of the State and the national autonomy of the church were guarded with the most jealous care. By this achievement, French statesmanship, as I venture to think, showed itself more enlightened and unselfish than some of our English politicians in the sixteenth century. At any rate, the church of France was not isolated in Christendom; its continuity could not be challenged; and it was the chief barrier, for the whole of Latin Christianity, against papal centralisation and aggression. As long as gallicanism flourished, the triumph of ultramontanism was impossible. This was a great achievement. It gives us a clue to all that has happened since, and we are not concerned at present with the manifold and internal defects of the old gallican church. Let us rather be grateful to it for this very difficult and important thing which it achieved, by which, as usual, France was a benefactor and a model to all the nations. In 1789, all serious and educated laymen and the vast majority of parochial clergy, not only accepted, but welcomed the Revolution. They welcomed it as churchmen, because they saw in it an opportunity for securing those ecclesiastical reforms which the better part of the nation, enlightened by the philosophers, had long and earnestly desired. They recognised as well, with their admirable French logic, that the rights of man, as the Revolution enunciated them, are clearly deducible from the New Testament, and that the three words, Liberty, Equality, Fraternity, which sum up the whole spirit of the Revolution, are also a summary of the gospel, so far as we are able to infer the conceptions of the Christ Himself. As, in those days, the church undoubtedly was the nation, and the nation was the church, it cannot be denied that French catholicism accepted the Revolution, and adapted it to its ecclesiastical affairs. In questions of doctrine, the French assemblies were rigorously and even scrupulously conservative; but in all matters of organisation they initiated reforms which made the church more national, more efficient, more equitable in government and patronage. We cannot enter into the details of the Constitution Civile du Clergé, so I will only say two things about it: first, that if ever we should be disestablished or reformed, and if in the process we do not let ourselves be annexed by an ambitious and aggressive clericalism, there is no ecclesiastical constitution which is more worthy of our serious consideration; and secondly, if this constitution had had a fair trial, and had been maintained, religion in France and, consequently, in the largest part of Christendom, would have been in a much healthier condition than it is to-day. The Constitution Civile, however, interfered with vested interests. The papacy opposed it on various flimsy pretexts, but really to maintain and extend its own authority, while the French bishops disliked it because it reduced their incomes and prerogatives. The papacy and the episcopate mis-led a king, who, like our own Charles I., was timid, unintelligent and insincere. They frightened a large number of the clergy, and they seduced that mischievous and credulous section of the laity which is always inclined to be more fanatical than the clergy themselves. They utilised and exacerbated the emigrant nobility, intrigued with hostile and reactionary governments, operated with foreign invaders, subordinated patriotism and even the national safety to professional interests; and by all these machinations played on the ignorance and fanaticism of the peasantry in many districts. These tactics led inevitably to reaction and reprisals on the part of the majority, and are chiefly responsible for the worst excesses and crimes of the revolutionary factions. Everybody talks glibly enough about the Reign of Terror. Few Englishmen realise what caused that terror, which was perfectly genuine and only too well founded; and still fewer know anything about the wholesale atrocities committed by the abominable White Terror, i.e., by partisans of the pope, the bishops and the nobles. In spite of all these violences on both sides the Constitution Civile did good work. It prospered, it was extending itself through the nation, and would have satisfied it. Unfortunately, it had an uncompromising enemy in Napoleon. It was far too liberal to suit his designs; and, for his own ends, he effected the concordat of 1801. It was not the first time that a French sovereign and a pope had sacrificed the interests of the gallican church to their own convenience. The result of the concordat was to end gallicanism, by leaving the French church exposed to ultramontane developments and aggressions; this, of course, was not Napoleon's intention, but the inevitable effects of the concordat were foreseen by Talleyrand, and by a few other wise men, who knew what gallicanism had been and who understood the papacy. For ultramontanism came in, like a rising flood, with the restoration of Pius VII. in 1814. It was due to three causes : First, to that political reaction which was a natural consequence |