echoes.  His appearance was very dignified, his tall frame, his broad face and large features showing with striking effect.  His action was simple and not ungraceful, though frequently exceedingly energetic.  As he never sought emotional effects his power may be known by his unfailing success in holding his audience perfectly attentive throughout long argumentative discourses.  Energy of conviction was one of the strongest forces he possessed, and it took the shape of a gentle constraint with which his positive utterances of Catholic principles compelled assent.  Sincerity of belief and liberty of soul were admirably blended in his manner.  He never appeared in public without attracting many representatives of the mottled sectarianism of our population; and this pleased him much, for he loved them, felt at home with them, and was full of joy at the opportunity of addressing them.

He was chagrined at the apathy he sometimes met with among Catholics concerning the American apostolate.  He found priests who would devote much labor to collecting money for the propagation of the faith among distant heathen races, but very few who would make a serious effort for the conversion of their American fellow-citizens.  Are Americans of less worth in God’s eyes than pagans and Buddhists? he would ask.  He thought no differently of the people of the United States than St. Paul did of the Corinthians and Macedonians, groaning and travailing with them to bring them forth members of Christ; or than St. Francis Xavier did of the Japanese.

If asked how he was going to convert people, he would answer:  “I am a Catholic, and I know that I am right.  I can prove that I am right.  What more do I want than this, and honest men and women who will listen to me?” The confidence he had in the strength of the Catholic argument was absolute, and this he showed by his zeal.  His sole study was how to transmute this force into missionary form.  Of all the wonders of the intellectual world he felt that the greatest is the faith of Catholics, and he knew by the lesson of his early life that it is but slightly appreciated by the non-Catholic mind.  That Catholics permit this ignorance to continue was a puzzle to him.  And it was all the more annoying because any single one of them can multiply his influence indefinitely by his union with the most perfect organism ever known—­the Catholic Church.  The quiescence of a body of men, sincere and intelligent, infallibly certain of the means of obtaining eternal happiness, living in daily contact with other men ignorant and inquiring about this unspeakable privilege, and yet not taking instant measures to impart their knowledge, was to Father Hecker almost as great a wonder as the divine gift of faith itself, especially as Catholics are well furnished with leaders and are organized to spread the truth as one of their most sacred duties.