The San Francisco Examiner - Sunday, April 21, 1895

DOES VICE FOLLOW CULTURE?
MONSIGNOR CAPEL, IN VIEW
OF THE WILDE CASE, AD-
VANCES A MOST STARTLING
THEORY ON THE SUBJECT.

THE Oscar Wilde scandal has shocked the world with its revelations of the gross forms of vice into which the super-esthetical votaries of the peculiar school of culture that afflicts the end of the century have fallen.

The hints that have come across the water suggests that only a small corner of the wickedness in London high life has been uncovered by the proceedings in court. And there are those who are ready to believe that the poison of Wilde’s precepts and practice has rotted out the heart and manhood of the highest society in England.

There is no one on this Coast better qualified to give an opinion upon the state of this society and the causes that have brought it about than Monsignor Capel, the EXAMINER presents below an interview with him on the latest development of a false and debasing school of culture.

Monsignor Capel is now at Arno, near Sacramento, acting as tutor to the children of the late Count Valensin, but he is still the same acute and alert man of religion and learning as in the days when he was one of the most brilliant figures in Catholic society in England, and was using his powers of argument and persuasion with marvelous success in bringing converts from the aristocratic families of the island into the fold of the Roman church. The life of quiet study, the literary work and the teaching that now occupy his time have not dulled his interest in the affairs of the circles in which he moved. As he had, in his intercourse with the best and most cultured families of the nation, an opportunity for observing the inner life of this class with the completeness not to be excelled by anyone not of their own order, his opinions are entitled to great respect. Monsignor Capel has not in this interview defined the "culture" to which he attributes the outbreaks of depravity, but it is evidently that of the "esthetes" of the Wilde school, of the "art for art’s sake" school that has plastered literature and painting with indecency, and of the schools that reject religious morality as part of the intellectual training of men.

A representative of the EXAMINER met the Monsignor at Arno, and the churchman conversed frankly on the subject of Wilde and the degraded members of the aristocracy who were his associates, though he expressed at the same time his disinclination to speak of so revolting a subject as the scandals in which they are involved.

"In reply to your very delicate question, it is appalling to hear of the unnatural crimes committed by men who have been trained in the highest modern culture. To my mind to have blazoned throughout the civilized world the latest heinous deed is a grave responsibility. But it may be providential, if it will lead to a thorough examination of our much vaunted estheticism."

"Then you assume that culture, as we understand it, is undesirable?"

"Assuredly not. I do not undervalue culture. But my contention is that as propounded by its best votaries, neither in our own day nor in the past has it proved efficient in controlling men's passions. In the deplorable instance before us, England is the theatre. But those familiar with modern life know full well like crimes are common, though in varying proportion, whatever this so-called culture obtains. It is not unreasonable to conclude it is wanting in some essential element to make it a controlling moral power."

"But surely you must concede, Monsignor, that culture is refining."

"Beyond all doubt it is in a certain sense refining, but its inefficiency is shown from the beginning. The Greeks generated it. Homer, Hesiod, Pindar, Æschylus, Sophocles, Aristophanes furnished the heroic, didactic, lyric, tragic and comic poetry. Herodotus and Thuycidides added, respectively, pictorial and philosophic history. Oratory followed as a consequence of political life. Socrates, Plato and Aristotle crowned the intellectual fabric with philosophy. The study of all these constituted the culture, the paidcia, of the Greeks. In this, its matured state, it had rejected the religion of Homer and had divorced religion and morality. Egotism, proud self-counsciousness and impurity were rampant."

"But were not the latter more the result of accident than the natural sequence of this school of culture?"

"No; this was not accidental. The Romans introduced this Hellenic culture, and called it humanitas, with what awful results may be read in the Epistle of St. Paul addressed to them, and in the pages of Martial and Juvenal. In the days of the decadence of the Empire, among the cultured class the most detestable and unnatural crimes were prevalent, and hardly met with rebuke."

"Do you recall, Monsignor, any other instance where this high order of culture led to human demoralisation?"

"Yes; another instance. The revival of letters in the fifteenth century familiarized the modern world with the art, the learning and culture of Greece. Mon thought the semi-pagan philosophy a new panacea. ‘Culture is religion for this world, religion for the next,' became the new text, and the floodgate of vice was opened."

"But is not ignorance still more dangerous?"

"Pray do not be deceived. Human nature is ever the same. Ignorance is not man's greatest wound. To bring his passions into subjection under a strong will and in obedience to conscience can never be accomplished by mere instruction, or by an adoration of the beautiful. The vices of our own day prove it."

"How then, and by what means shall this drifting toward unnatural crime be arrested?"

"What can? Return to the old ways. Let the ideal be to seek first the kingdom of God. Turn to the author of life for that aid which He has established. Seek it by using the means he has established. Pray. Meditate on his law. Grow familiar with the heroes of holiness whose lives are recorded. Make the gospel law the daily food of the soul in thought and affection."

"Are not those base appetites engendered in youth, Monsignor?"

"Yes; unhappily it is too true. The unnatural crimes are first learned in the schools. Trusting too much to the honor of children and neglecting a proper surveillance afford the wicked opportunity. The practice acquired follows youth to the universities and enslaves the individual in manhood."

"Among the practices of religion, confession exercises is the most beneficial means of preventing and remedying this terrible evil. Where practiced the crime is unknown. This is testified to, not only by Catholics, but by high church clergymen, who have introduced it into schools. Of course, there are certain vicious natures in whom such wickedness can only be regarded as a mania."

The extent of this mania Monsignor Capel deplored, and charged the indolent and luxurious habits of the aristocracy, combined with the laxity of the public schools, with the fault. He had met Oscar Wilde, and he declared that he had left a most disagreeable impression upon him. The heavy, sensuous face, the pasty complexion and the mass of loose flesh under the esthete’s eyes, were a bad indication of his character. The Queensberrys are, in the opinion of the Monsignor, a very eccentric family. The brother of the present Marquis, who is now a Catholic priest, he knew very well, and he, too, was given to odd and injudicious proceedings.

Oscar Wilde was not in high standing with the best men at Oxford. The good, manly fellows despised him, and those of set religious views avoided him. Only the black sheep were his associates, and those who were intimately acquainted with his university career were not astonished at his downfall.