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In a series of articles in The Catholic World published in 1887, and before referred to, Father Hecker called Dr. Brownson's road to the Church the philosophical road.
Brownson's; he is as fair and square as Euclid; a real honest, strong thinker, and one that knows what he is talking about, for he has tried all sorts of religions, pretty much.
"Of course that sort of thing has its rough points for the second man, but in this case I do not think they amount to much. Brownson's affair with the younger lady would have come to an end as soon as she had discovered the rocks in his character, but her mother broke it off before it came to that.
He performed the remarkable feat, when the support of American letters was slight, of founding and conducting almost single-handed, from 1838 to 1843, his famous Quarterly Review, which was a power in the land. He started it again in 1844 as 'Brownson's Quarterly Review, and resumed it thirty years later in still a third series.
Much as Isaac Hecker had considered the matter, studying, reading, praying, assuring himself from time to time that if any church were true this was the one, and that to enter it was probably his duty, now that Brownson's weight was likewise thrown into the scale and it went down with a warning thud, he thrilled through with apprehension.
Brownson's difficulties and these were much like his own do we find any trace of his discovering in Anglicanism a germ of Catholicity unfolding from the chrysalis of genuine Protestantism and casting it off. This was readily perceived in Isaac Hecker's bearing and conversation by acute Episcopalians themselves, as in the case of Dr.
Brownson's; he is as fair and square as Euclid; a real honest, strong thinker, and one that knows what he is talking about, for he has tried all sorts of religions, pretty much.
As might be expected from one who had such an aversion for Calvinism, the view of human nature taken by the author is what some would call optimistic, and the tone with regard to the religious honesty of non-Catholic Americans extremely hopeful. Perhaps herein was Dr. Brownson's reason for an adverse, or almost adverse, criticism on the book in his Review.
Brownson's soul was intensely faithful to its personal convictions, faithful unto heroism for that is the temper of men who seek the whole truth free from cowardice, or narrowness, or bias. He has admitted that the effect of his intercourse with the bishop was not fortunate.
Brownson's mental vigor and positiveness were very agreeable to a candid mind which was speculatively adrift and experimenting, and, as it seemed to me, which was more emotional than logical.
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