¶ You can find excerpts of the interview of Hutton Gibson by Alex
Jones on January 24th 2007 right here in our Must read
section.
¶ Mgr. Jean-Joseph Gaume – French theologian
and author, b. at Fuans (Franche-Comté) in 1802; d. in 1879. While
attached to the Diocese of Nevers, he was successively professor of
theology, director of the petit séminaire, canon, and vicar-general of the
diocese, and had already published several works, when he left for Rome in
1841. Gregory XVI made him a knight of the Reformed Order of St.
Sylvester. A doctor of theology of the University of Prague, a member of
several societies of scholars, honorary vicar-general of several dioceses,
he received from Pius IX in 1854 the title of prothonotary apostolic.
Abbé Gaume is the author of numerous books treating of
theology, history, education. The author seeks the remote cause of the
religious and moral deterioration of his age, and he finds it in the
Renaissance, which was for society a resurrection of the paganism of
antiquity, prepared the way for the Revolution, and was, in fine, the
primal source of all the evil. Cf. "La Révolution" (8 vols., 1856),
"Histoire de la societé domestique" (2 vols., 1854), "Les Trois Rome"
(1857). To cure the ills of society it should have been necessary to
exclude pagan authors from classical studies. He composed his "Catéchisme
de Persévérance, ou Exposé de la Religion depuis l'origine du monde
jusqu'à nos jours" (8 vols., 1854); "La Religion et l'Eternité" (1859);
"Traité du Saint-Esprit" (1864). To this series of works belong his
"Manuel du Confesseur" (1854) and "l'Horloge de la Passion" (1857), which
he translated from St. Alphonsus Liguori.
The reform,
or rather the revolution which he deemed necessary in classic instruction
he had indicated as early as 1835 in his book "Le Catholicisme dans
l'éducation". He returned to the subject in 1851 in a work entitled "Le
Ver rongeur des sociétés modernes ou le Paganisme dans l'Education". The
support of Mgr. Gousset, Archbishop of Reims, of Mgr. Parisis, Bishop of
Arras, and of the articles of Louis Veuillot in "L'Univers", helped
provoke a lively debate among Catholics. After having shown that the
intellectual formation of youth during the first centuries of the Church
and throughout the Middle Ages was accomplished through the study of
Christian authors (ch. i-vi), Gaume proves that the Renaissance of the
sixteenth century perverted education throughout Europe by the
substitution of pagan writers for Christian authors. He brings forward the
testimony of men (viii-ix) and of facts (x-xxv), indicating the influence
of classical paganism on literature, speech, the arts, philosophy,
religion, the family, and society. It was the condemnation of the method
held in honour in the Church for three centuries; Benedictines, Jesuits,
Oratorians, the secular clergy themselves had made the pagan authors the
basis of the curriculum in their colleges. Gaume did not go so far as to
exclude the pagan texts; he allowed them some place in the three highest
classes (the course comprised eight), but banished them from the first
five years.
Consulted by the professors of his petit
séminaire as to the course to pursue, the Bishop of Orléans, Mgr.
Dupanloup, addressed them a letter on classical teaching, in which he
boldly declared himself in favour of the existing regulations and methods,
thus preserving for the ancient authors the rank they had held, but at the
same time assigned an important place to Holy Scripture, the Fathers, and
modern authors. Sharply attacked by Veuillot in "L'Univers", the bishop
retorted by issuing a pastoral on the classics and especially on the
interference of lay journalism in episcopal administration, and concluded
by enjoining on the professors of his petits séminaires to receive no
longer "L'Univers". Then the question became even more burning; newspaper
articles, brochures, pamphlets, even books succeeded one another on this
question which created a general commotion among educationists. Gaume
published his "Lettre sur le paganisme dans l'éducation". For a time it
seemed as though the diocese were on the point of division. At this
juncture Mgr. Dupanloup drew up a declaration which was signed by
forty-six prelates. It contained four articles, two of which dealt with
journalism in its relations with episcopal authority, and two with the use
of the classics. It was therein stated: (1) that the employment of the
ancient classics in secondary schools, when properly chosen, carefully
expurgated, and explained from a Christian point of view, was neither evil
nor dangerous; (2) that, however, the use of these ancient classics should
not be exclusive, but that it was useful to join to it in becoming
measure, as is generally done in all houses directed by the clergy, the
study and explanation of Christian authors. Abbé Gaume reduced their
claims: (1) the more comprehensive expurgation of pagan writers; (2) the
more extensive ìntroduction of Christian authors; (3) the Christian
teaching of pagan authors. The Abbé Gaume published further: "Bibliothèque
des classiques chrétiens, latins et grecs" (30 vols., 1852-55); "Poètes et
Prosateurs profanes complètement expurgés" (1857).