Chapter XVII: Preface (17)

Men breathed more freely when, after these hollow declamations, two British Bishops brought the clear practical sense of their race and country to bear on the question and the previous discussion of it. The first of them, Archbishop Errington, who was formerly Cardinal Wiseman’s coadjutor but soon got out of favour at Rome, pointedly characterized the vicious nature of the whole transaction; there were speeches on both sides, one affirming, another denying, and no one could feel that he had refuted anything or advanced his cause the least by his words. The Deputation alone had the privilege of referring to the speeches and examining them, and it belonged to the majority, not to the Council; “how it was formed, we know.” As a tribunal the Council was bound to institute a calm and searching investigation of facts, tradition and testimonies, and for this only one means was available, which was employed at the former great Councils including the Tridentine, to form deputations from both parties for earnest conference, where scientific examination might take the place of rhetorical harangues—from both parties, for it was idle with Bilio to bid them ignore the existence of two parties. “Modo in hôc Concilio fit aliter et illud ineptissime,” he concluded, and he proposed the formula, “Magisterium universalis Ecclesiæ est infallibile.”

The next speech, of Vitelleschi, who is Archbishop of Osimo but has never been in his diocese, though it is so near, left no impression; it was an exhortation to vote infallibility unanimously. And then followed Archbishop Conolly of Halifax with a speech such as has seldom been heard here. “Thrice,” he said, “have I asked for proof from Scripture according to its authentic interpretation, from Tradition and from Councils, that the Bishops of the Catholic Church ought to be excluded from the definition of dogmas; but my request has not been complied with, and now I adjure you, like the blind man on the way to Jericho, to give us sight that we may believe. Hitherto we have recognised the strongest motive for the credibility of Catholic doctrine in the general consent of the Church notified through the collective episcopate; this has been our shield against all external assailants, and by this powerful magnet we have drawn hundreds of thousands into the Church. Is this our invincible weapon of attack and defence now to be broken and trampled under foot, and the thousand-headed episcopate with the millions of faithful at its back to shrink into the voice and witness of a single man? Let the Deputation prove to us that it has really been always the belief of the Church that the Pope is everything and the Bishops nothing. The Council of Jerusalem did not adopt the formula of Peter but of John, who spoke before him, and in the Apostles’ Creed we do not say ‘Credo in Petrum et successores ejus,’ but ‘Credo in unam Ecclesiam Catholicam.’ We Bishops have no right to renounce for ourselves and our successors the hereditary and original rights of the episcopate, to renounce the promise of Christ, ‘I am with you to the end of the world.’ But now they want to reduce us to nullities, to tear the noblest jewel from our pontifical breastplate, to deprive us of the highest prerogative of our office, and to transform the whole Church and the Bishops with it into a rabble of blind men, among whom is one alone who sees, so that they must shut their eyes and believe whatever he tells them.”

Was it confidence of victory that moved the Legates to allow the bold and free-minded American, who spoke with the full weight of a deep and laboriously attained conviction, to bring these earnest words to a close without interruption, after they had recently reduced three of their own speakers in succession to silence? I know not. It was the unenviable lot of the Archbishop of Granada, Monzon y Martins Benvenuto, to follow Conolly. No one expects at this Council ideas or facts from a Spaniard, but merely bombast and abject protestations of homage. Since they no longer have Queen Isabella and the throne has been vacant, these prelates have transferred their undivided devotion to the Pope, and among the reptiles here they are the most cringing after the Neapolitans. Monzon said he thirsted for new dogmas, and the infallibility of the Pope did not satisfy him; he earnestly desired a second dogma, viz., the divine and inviolable nature of the States of the Church.

It was reported two days ago that Cardinal Morichini, who formerly as nuncio breathed some German air, intends to speak in Guidi’s sense, but since the scene between the Pope and Guidi has become known, it is generally thought that no Cardinal will be so foolhardy as to express any other opinion in Council than that of the inspired Pope. Meanwhile there are new speakers enrolled, among whom are Haynald, Strossmayer, the Bishops of Dijon, Constantine, Tarentaise, etc. The number considerably exceeds a hundred, but Errington has only too much reason for saying the debates are like a boy riding a rocking-horse—movement without advance.

You may imagine what capital the Jesuits make out of the speech of the Dominican Guidi. They are the supreme and thoroughly devoted body-guard of the Roman See, and can alone be implicitly trusted. And in fact nobody thinks it possible that a Jesuit should speak in Council like Guidi, as neither does any one here credit a Jesuit with sincere conviction of what he says; it is always known beforehand what he will say on any question, viz., what the Order considers for its interest and imposes as a corporate doctrine on its individual members. The sons of Ignatius remember now that the Dominicans have never been trustworthy. As early as 1303 the French appeal from Pope Boniface VIII. to a General Council was supported by 130 Dominicans at Paris, and at the Councils of Constance and Basle they took the most active part in the measures against papal omnipotence and in framing the mischievous canons of the fourth and fifth sessions of Constance; they joined Savonarola in opposing Alexander VI. and preferred being burned to submitting. And again they gave powerful aid in France to the establishment of the Gallican doctrine. And what, say the Jesuits, is the great Church history of the Dominican Natalis Alexander but an arsenal from which to this day the opponents of infallibility get their weapons?

Preparations are already being made for the festivities which are to accompany the promulgation of the new dogma. The Romans—the native population—cannot understand why a part of the Bishops resist it so stoutly, and no less mysterious to them is the fiery zeal of foreigners, especially Frenchmen, in its favour. Their view is that infallibility, as being likely to bring large sums of money into Rome, is certainly a profitable and praiseworthy affair, and they are accordingly ready for noisy demonstrations of joy. Plenty of sky-rockets will go up, there will be illuminations, the pillars of the churches will be clothed in red damask according to the local usage, and numberless wax-candles will be burnt. Some enthusiasts think the fountain of Trevi will that day flow with wine instead of water, and it is hoped that at nightfall a transparency of the famous picture painted by the Pope’s command to represent his infallibility will be shown to the faithful people. And next time the French Veuillotists choose to cry in the streets “Long live the infallible Pope!” some Romans will join the cry.

The festivities will absorb large sums of money, and the financiers are not without anxiety; for however lucrative the new dogma may prove by and bye, for the moment it is an unproductive capital, and the annual deficit of thirty million franks cannot be covered by promises of future prosperity. It has now been determined, since the huge bankruptcy of Langrand-Dumonceaux, who had been named a Roman Count, has created some alarm, to take in the Rhenish and Westphalian nobility with the ecclesiastical unions there as sureties, and thus to negotiate a loan of twenty million franks “al pari.” The noble presidents of the unions are said to have already signified their willingness.

The rewards of those for whom there are no Cardinal’s hats are already under consideration. It is said that about a hundred Bishops will be named “assistants at the Pontifical Throne” in recognition of their services. Others will be made “protonotarii apostolici,” most of them only “protonotarii sopranumerarii non participanti.” Several priests especially zealous for the good cause will be made titular Bishops, and others “prelati domestici” and “monsignori,” or “camerieri segreti,” etc. Then there are the distinctions by means of colours, and soon we shall be able to measure a man’s zeal for the new dogma at the first glance by seeing whether he wears the “abito paonazzo” or violet or scarlet. And there are exceptional decorations for use in church kept in reserve, like what the Archbishop of Algiers had given him.

The attitude of Ketteler creates astonishment and is studied as a riddle to which no solution can be found. The Pope said to-day, “Io non capisco, cosa vuole quel Ketteler, che un giorno distribuisce delle brochure contro di me e contro della mia infallibilità, e che il giorno dopo scrive nei giornali che sia pieno di devozione per me, e che crede alla mia infallibilità, pare che sia proprio mezzo,” and thereupon he made a gesture indicating that the Bishop of Mayence was not quite right in his head.

In fact Ketteler is the only man here who perplexes a reporter or historian. He has a work printed and distributed, in which infallibility is declared to be an unscriptural and unecclesiastical doctrine, and he says in his attack on me that according to his view Scripture and Tradition (_i.e._, the two only sources for the Church’s faith) do not justify its dogmatic definition. Yet he affirms that he was always an infallibilist believer and will soon be more so than ever. It is difficult to report on the performances of a theological gymnast who seems rather to balance himself in mid air than to have firm ground under his feet. Here it is thought that he follows the counsel of his powerful patrons in the German College and the Gesù, who have made him understand that the new dogma will certainly be proclaimed, and that he would do well to change as speedily as he can from an inopportunist to a zealous advocate and executor of the decree. He has lately been reproached by an influential theologian (Gass) with making his own Church worse than it is by his doctrine that the Catholic Church knows of no duty of obedience against conscience. It will certainly never occur to me, now or at any future time, to have recourse to the conscience of Bishop Ketteler; that would indeed be the last refuge one would fly to!

SIXTY-SECOND LETTER.

_Rome, June 30, 1870._—In the middle ages ecclesiastical controversies were decided by the ordeal of the cross. The representatives of both parties placed themselves before a large cross, with their arms stretched out in the form of a cross, and he whose arms first sank, or who fell exhausted to the ground, was conquered. The heat and the Roman fever have replaced this ordeal at the Council. The process which is to test the result has been going on for six weeks, and the majority will evidently come out of it with flying colours. It is composed chiefly of Italians and Spaniards of both hemispheres, who can bear such things much better than northerners, and as it is four times as numerous as the minority, gaps made in its ranks by sickness and death are soon filled up, and the phalanx remains firmly closed, while the Opposition receives the news of the sickness or departure of one of its members as heralding its growing discouragement and final defeat. How well the authorities understand the inestimable value of this new ally, the heat and mephitic exhalations, is shown by the laconic but significant words of the papal journalist, Veuillot, in his 125th Letter on the Council, “Et si la définition ne peut mûrir qu’au soleil, eh bien, on grillera.” As before, so now again Roman orthodoxy seems to have called fire to its aid, and for Bishops, who do not wish to be roasted according to Veuillot’s wish, flight is the only alternative.

Cardinal Guidi has received the most peremptory orders from the Pope to make a formal retractation of his speech in Council. The form and occasion of making it he may arrange with the Legates. He has already had an interview with Bilio. The Pope has forbidden him to receive visits, that he may be free to consider without distraction the greatness of his error. Solitary confinement is adopted in the penal legislation of other countries too as an efficient instrument of reformation. Guidi has told the Presidents that he is ready to give an explanation of his speech in a public sitting, if they will announce beforehand that he does so by the Pope’s desire; but he can make no retractation. Jandel, the Dominican General, intends now to deliver a speech in refutation of Guidi’s theory, which has been composed for him in the Gesù. Many think that Guidi will be deterred from letting things come to extremities by the terrible example of Cardinal Andrea, who was worried to death. A Cardinal, who lives out of the Roman States, may maintain a certain independence or even opposition, as the precedent of Cardinal Noailles shows, but in Rome this is impossible. As Archbishop of Bologna Guidi would be under the protection of the Italian Government, but thither he will never be allowed to return.

Heat, fever and intrigues—this is a brief description of the state of Rome, as regards the Council. The heat and pestilential miasmas are unendurable for foreigners from the north; already six French and four American Bishops have been obliged to save their lives by departure, and of those who stay in Rome a third are unable from their bodily ailments to attend the sittings. A Petition to the Pope is now in course of signature praying for a prorogation, on account of the danger to the lives of many foreign and aged prelates at this season of the year. I give you the text, but will observe that I hear most refuse to sign, some thinking the case a hopeless one, others of very ill repute in the Vatican fearing their adherence would only make it more so. The Petition runs thus—

“Beatissime Pater! Episcopi infrascripti, tam proprio quam aliorum permultorum Patrum nomine a benignitate S. V. reverenter, fiducialiter et enixe expostulant, ut ea, quæ sequuntur, paterne dignetur excipere:

“Ad Patres in Concilio Lateranensi v. sedentes hoc habebat, die XVII. Junii, Leo X. Papa ‘Quia jam temporis dispositione ... concedimus’ simulque Concilium Pontifex ad tempus autumnale prorogabat.—Pejor certe inpræsentiarum conditio nostra est. Calor æstivus, jam desinente mense Junio, nimius est, et de die in diem intolerabilior crescit; unde RR. Patrum, inter quos tot seniores sunt, annorum pondere pressi, et laboribus confecti, valetudo graviter periclitatur.—Timentur inprimis febres, quibus magis obnoxii sunt extranei hujusce temperiei regionis non assuefacti.

“Quidquid vero tentaverit et feliciter perfecerit liberalitas S. V., ut non paucis episcopis hospitia bona præberentur, plerique tamen relegati sunt in habitationes nimis augustas, sine aëre, calidissimas omninoque insalubres. Unde jam plures episcopi ob infirmitatem corporis abire coacti sunt, multi etiam Romæ infirmantur et Concilio adesse nequeunt, ut patet ex tot sedibus quæ in aulâ conciliari vacuæ apparent.

“Antequam igitur magis ac magis creverit ægrotorum numerus, quorum plures periculo hic occumbendi exponerentur, instantissime postulamus, B. Pater, ut S. V. aliquam Concilii suspensionem, quæ post festum S. Petri convenienter inciperet, concedere dignetur.

“Etenim, B. Pater, cum centum et viginti episcopi nomen suum dederint, ut in tanti momenti quæstione audiantur, evidens est, discussionem non posse intra paucos dies præcipitari, nisi magno rerum ac pacis religiosæ dispendio. Multo magis congruum esset atque necessarium brevem aliquam, ob ingruentes gravissimos æstatis calores, Concilio suspensionem dari.

“Nova vero Synodi periodus ad primam diem mensis Octobris forsitan indicari posset.

“S. V., si hoc, ut fidenter speramus, concesserit, gratissimos sensus nobis populisque nostris excitabit, utpote quæ gravissimæ omnium necessitati consuluerit.

“Pedes S. V. devote osculantes nosmet dicimus S. V. humillimos et obsequentissimos famulos in Christo filios.”

Attempts have already been made by word of mouth to secure some compassion from the Pope for the severe sufferings of the Bishops, but wholly in vain. His comments on the members of the minority, if rightly reported here, are so irritable and bitter that I scruple to mention them. But I must relate what occurred to-day at a farewell audience given to some Maltese Knights, who had come to exercise their privilege of keeping guard at an Œcumenical Council. The Pope first turned to an English member of the Order and wished him success in the scheme for introducing it into England, and then expressed his sympathy for that nation in his confident expectation of the speedy and innumerable conversions promised by Manning, adding the remark that the Italians were somewhat volatile. And the mildness of the expression, compared with former ebullitions of anger, proved that the infallibilist line of the Italian Bishops had covered in his eyes the political sins of the nation. But then he turned to the Germans, who were present in the greatest number, with the words, “I piu cattivi sono i Tedeschi, sono i piu cattivi di tutti, lo spirito Tedesco a guastato tutto.” Even that was not enough, but a Bohemian knight who was present had to listen to a stream of invectives against the conduct of Cardinal Schwarzenberg, which made a very unpleasant impression on him. As a French Bishop said to me to-day, it is a humiliating spectacle to see a man who, at the very moment when he is assimilating his office to the Godhead, recklessly displays the little weaknesses and passions which people are generally ashamed to expose to view.

It was clearly shown in the Congregations of 23d and 25th June that the majority only continue to tolerate the speeches of the Opposition as an almost unendurable nuisance. Loud murmurs alternated with the ringing of the Presidents’ bell. When Bishop Losanna of Biella, the senior of the Council, was speaking against burdening the Christian world with the new dogma, the Legate tried to ring him down. He entreated that at least out of regard for his advanced age they would let him finish the little he still had to say. In vain. The Legate went on ringing and the Bishop speaking, so that the assembly for some time was regaled with a duet between a bell and an—of course inaudible—human voice.

In the Congregation of the 23d Bishop Landriot of Rheims made a long speech in the interests of mediation and mutual concessions, which showed careful study, but was received with every sign of displeasure by the majority: he also proposed what Errington had wanted, that a Commission formed from both parties should examine the whole tradition on the subject and report the result to the Council. At this cries of “Oho, oho!” rose from the majority. Discouraged and intimidated the Archbishop concluded with the declaration that, if the Pope pleased to confirm the _Schema_, he submitted by anticipation, at which the faces which had grown black brightened up again and the apology for the French Church which he ended with was condoned.

The most remarkable speeches in the sitting of 25th June were those of the Bishop Legate of Trieste and Ketteler of Mayence. The first had the courage to say plainly that the manipulation of Scripture texts, which were pressed into the service of the new dogma in glaring contradiction to the authentic interpretation of the Church, was a sin. Ketteler’s speech created the greatest sensation from its decided tone, and its not betraying the contradiction in which he seems to find himself involved after his public declarations in Germany. I must indeed reckon on my report again displeasing and angering him, for this “mobile ingegno usato ad amar e a disamar in un punto” is wont to take it very ill if his bold transitions do not leave the same impression on others which floats before his own memory. But I will fulfil my duty as historian of the Council in spite of this. Ketteler urged that nobody had alleged any clear evidence for a personal and separate infallibility of the Pope being really contained in Scripture, Tradition and the consciousness of all Churches; it was only the opinion of a certain school—“placita cujusdam scholæ” he repeated several times emphatically. The Pope certainly had the right of proscribing doctrines which contradicted the dogmas already decided by the Church, but by no means the totally different right of formulating a new dogma without the consent of the episcopate. It was the greatest absurdity to believe or say “Pontificem in pectoris sui scrinio omnem traditionem repositam et infusam habere.” At these words murmurs arose in the assembly; all had shortly before heard and repeated to one another the Pope’s assertion, “La tradizione son’ io.” Then Ketteler attacked the theory of Cardinal Cajetan, the well-known first opponent of Luther, that Peter alone among the Apostles had a “potestas ordinaria” to be transmitted to his successors, while the “potestas specialis” conferred by Christ on the rest expired at their death, so that the Bishops are not successors of the Apostles but derive all their authority from the Pope. This mischievous system had been adopted by a certain school, and the _Schema_ before them was drawn up in accordance with it and in contradiction to all Catholic tradition. It placed the Bishops in the same relation to the Pope as priests occupied towards Bishops, which was unheard of. He protested against the whole system, and desired that in every dogmatic decree Holy Scripture and Tradition should be taken full account of: the Pope needed the co-operation of the Bishops as representatives of tradition. It was utterly wrong to believe that the _depositum fidei_ was committed to the Pope alone.

If the force and clearness of Ketteler’s speech evoked deep and serious reflection, an amusing episode occurred at the close of the sitting. The Irish Bishop Keane of Cloyne ascended the tribune. There is a story told of a German city whose sapient councillors carried the sunlight out of the street in sacks to light their town-hall, which had no windows; and so Keane informed his hearers that St. Peter brought the whole body of tradition with him to Rome well stored up; here and here alone it was still kept, and every Pope took what was required from the stock which he possessed as a whole genuine and entire.

Those who wish to prosecute psychological and ethical studies should come to Rome. Here they may observe how the three great powers of the world, as St. Augustine calls them, “Errores, amores, terrores,” work together in full harmony and activity; the last especially will aid the victory of the first—for how long He only knows who rules the destiny of man.

SIXTY-THIRD LETTER.

_Rome, July 2, 1870._—The Pope’s reported answer to those who spoke to him of the sufferings of the Bishops and their danger of death, and the consequent need for proroguing the Council, is passing from mouth to mouth. I should consider it a sin to publish it. Were it true, one would have to treat the man who could so speak as the Orsini treated Boniface viii. in his last days. If it is not true, it is very remarkable that the Romans have no hesitation in circulating it and really credit their Pope with it. This and the disdain bordering on simple contempt with which the Romans look down on the Bishops are among the indelible impressions they will take back with them over the Alps.

In the sitting of 28th June Bishop Vitali of Ferentino in the Roman States first inveighed against the long speeches of the Bishops, and then broke into a dithyrambic panegyric on his master, the Pope, who, like the Emperor Titus, was the “deliciæ orbis terrarum.” He was somewhat abruptly interrupted by the Legates in the middle of his rhapsody. Ginoulhiac, Archbishop of Lyons, who is the most learned member of the French episcopate after Maret, next delivered an ably and carefully composed speech, which was not interrupted. He appealed to the words and example of former Popes who had acknowledged—like _e.g._, Celestine I. in 430—that they were not masters of the faith but only guardians of the traditional doctrine, and that not singly but in unison with all Churches and their Bishops, as was clearly expressed in the decree. Pius VI., strong as was the pressure put upon him by France, delayed a long time the issue of the decree against the civil Constitution of the clergy of 1790, because, as he wrote to the King, the Pope must first conscientiously ascertain how the faithful will receive his decision. But a large section of Catholics were not at all disposed to receive this _Schema_, and the decree would evidently evoke the bitterest hostility to the Church where it did not already exist, and immensely increase it where it did. Pius VI. then said that, if the Roman See, the centre of the Church, lost its authority through exaggerating its claims, all was lost. Pius IX. should take care that this doctrine did not become a snare to innumerable Catholics. He concluded by commending the formula of St. Antoninus, which requires the consent of the episcopate.

In the sitting of 30th June a member of the almost extinct third party among the French, Sergent, Bishop of Quimper or Cornouailles, came forward. He proposed adding to the _Schema_, which might then be accepted, words requiring the co-operation for decisions on faith of the “episcopi, sive dispersi sive in Concilio congregati.” But he insisted on the superiority of the Pope to a Council according to the decree of Leo. X.,—or, as he said, the fifth Lateran Council, and defended the order of business imposed on this Council by Pius IX. But here he touched on a very sore place; the Bishops sit here under the continual conviction of having their hands tied in an illegitimate and tyrannical fashion, and knowing that the order of business is in direct contradiction to the independence of the ancient Councils. The Legates must have felt that the Opposition would say, “Hæc excusatio est accusatio,” and that it would give the requisite handle for again renewing their written protests by word of mouth now at the decisive moment. Sergent was therefore called to order.

After the Bishop of Aversa, who spoke as an ordinary infallibilist, Bishop Martin of Paderborn came forward and created a sensation. A German infallibilist, like Martin, who was not kneaded and dressed in the Jesuit school, is an interesting and curious phenomenon of itself, and produces somewhat the same impression as an European who voluntarily lives among savages and adopts their language and customs. But Bishop Martin’s appearance was remarkable on other grounds also. It was long since any one had been heard in the Council who spoke in so angry a tone and with such noise and visible endeavour to supplement his stammering utterance by the action of hands and feet. It was a difficult labour that Martin achieved, like a singer drowning his own voice, and doubly meritorious in these melting days. And here I may make a remark that should have been made before: the Hall has really gained lately in acoustic qualities, from having an awning stretched over it which acts as a sounding-board.

Martin shouted into the Hall that the personal infallibility of every Pope was inseparable from the primacy, for the Pope was the supreme legislator, and therefore he must of necessity be divinely preserved from all error. The Bishops of the minority were amazed at this statement, for none of them had expected a German Bishop to declare the whole code of the Inquisition, as promulgated by the Popes from Innocent III. to Paul V., infallible and inspired. But there was still better behind. Two German witnesses for infallibility were cited, Dr. Luther, on account of his letter to the Pope in 1518, and Dr. Pichler of 1870. Up to 1763 all Germans were stanch infallibilists, but then Febronianism came in and for a time obscured this light of pure doctrine, which had previously shone so bright in Catholic Germany. But an orthodox reaction had followed, thanks to the excellent catechism of the Jesuit Deharbe, the Provincial Synod of Cologne and several Pastorals. Martin then referred to Döllinger, and reproached him with having in his earlier works—which were not named—taught papal infallibility, whereas he now assailed it. The Bishop, who is a member of the Deputation, then proposed a formula he had devised, “Traditioni inhærentes docemus Pontificem, cum universalem Ecclesiam docet, vi divinæ assistentiæ errare non posse.” But that was not enough, without smiting down the opponents of the doctrine by a solemn anathema, as follows, “Si quis dixerit non nisi accedente consensu Episcoporum Romanum Pontificem errare non posse, anathema sit.” He moreover agreed with Spalding and Dechamps that parish priests and others having cure of souls should be required by a special admonition addressed to them to impress this doctrine of infallibility on their people often and emphatically from the pulpit.

The speech was delivered in the tone and manner of a confessor dealing with a hardened sinner in his last moments, and the Germans, from whose ranks the speaker had issued,—men like Rauscher, Haynald, Strossmayer, Hefele—sat shamefaced with their eyes on the ground, while the delight of the Italians and Spaniards could be read on their countenances at this humiliation of the nation which prides itself on the superior culture of its clergy. But they were surprised at Martin’s concluding declaration that no doubt in Germany great dangers for the Church would follow from the promulgation of the doctrine. It was mentioned in the Council Hall that, in a widely circulated school-book which had passed through eleven or twelve editions, Martin had taught the exact reverse of the doctrine he now so noisily and peremptorily maintained; but then it was observed in excuse for him that the heterodoxies of this book, though it bore his name, were no fault of his, as he had simply transcribed it from the papers of the late Professor Diekhoff, which were left in his charge.

SIXTY-FOURTH LETTER.

_Rome, July 5, 1870._—Rome is an excellent school for Bishops; a course of seven months at the Council produces wonderful results. One illusion after another is laid aside and an insight gained into the working of the huge machine and the forces that put it in motion, and the Bishops learn at last, though it be laboriously and not without tears, why they were summoned and what services alone are demanded of them. The historian Pachymeres relates that, when the people of Constantinople demanded a Council in 1282 in order to judge the unionist Patriarch, Bekkus, Bishop Theoktistus of Adrianople said that they treated Bishops like wooden spits on which Bekkus might be roasted, and which might then be thrown into the fire.(151) A very similar feeling has come over many Bishops here; they know that if they say _Non placet_ at last, they will be cast into the fire, after they have helped by their reluctant practical recognition of both the first and second order of business—destructive as both are to all real freedom—to forge the new spiritual yoke. And then they find their schoolroom a very narrow and uncomfortable one, and have at last discovered that it looks very like a prison cell.

It is but a game of moves and counter-moves as on a chessboard, only that no one dares to incur the penalty of high treason by saying “Check to the king,” or lifting a finger for such an audacious move. The minority were so confounded and irritated by the abrupt closing of the general debate, because they hoped to prolong it till prorogation became inevitable. For nobody doubted in April and May that this would follow at the end of June, and the notion was sedulously fostered by the official staff of the Council—the Legates and Secretary Fessler—and by the Pope himself. It is not long since Pius said to a French Bishop, “It would be barbarity on my part to want to keep the Bishops here in July.” And thus the Opposition, whenever they were shaken and disturbed by some violent act, let matters be hushed up and never gave any practical effect to their protests and complaints. But now the Court party say that it would indeed be tyrannical cruelty to keep us here, under ordinary circumstances, imprisoned in this furnace full of fevers, but it is justified by the abnormal situation. The grand and saving act of the infallibilist definition, which is to quicken the whole Church with new powers of life and introduce the golden age of absolute ecclesiastical dominion, cannot any longer be held in suspense. “You surely will not wish,” said Cardinal de Angelis to a Bishop who was urging the necessity of a prorogation, “that the Pope, after spending so many thousand scudi on the Bishops, should now be left alone in the Vatican without any recompense.” And Antonelli thinks the Bishops have only themselves to blame for their present suffering condition; why have they wasted so much time in speeches?

Since that shocking saying of the Pope’s, which I referred to in my last letter, has became known here, the Bishops have abandoned as hopeless the design of making a direct appeal to him for the prorogation of the Council on the score of the health and lives of its members. And this conviction has been further strengthened by the insolence of the Court theologian, Louis Veuillot. “Let yourselves be roasted, since it is only through this fiery ordeal that the precious wine of infallibility can be matured,” he exclaims to them, and they know now that they are inside a door over which the inscription is written

“Lasciate ogni speranza voi ch’ intrate.”

And now there is a new cause of alarm. It is said—perhaps the report is spread on purpose—that at last no Bishop will be allowed to depart till he has signed a bond laid before him declaring his entire and unconditional submission. We actually hear that, by a recent decision, leave of absence is only to be given to the Bishops in case of serious illness, that is, when they are no longer equal to the journey. Several prelates therefore have already inquired of the ambassadors of their Governments, what means of protection they could afford them in case of such violence being exercised. The ambassadors will be obliged to write home for further instructions, as it seems no such case had been foreseen as possible to occur. But so many astonishing and seemingly impossible things have happened during the last seven months that such an act would no longer excite even any particular surprise.

Guidi still appears in Council and shows himself in his votes an independent thinker and by no means a humiliated or broken man, but in his convent he is guarded like a prisoner and constantly urged by threats and persuasions to recant. When a remark was made to the Pope about his harsh treatment of this man, who still as Cardinal shares the numerous privileges of his order, he is reported to have said, “I summoned him, not as Cardinal, but as brother Guidi, whom I lifted out of the dust.” Guidi had drawn great displeasure on himself before by joining Cardinals Corsi and Riario Sforza in making representations to the Pope against the alteration introduced by his order in the sequence of the subjects for discussion, by which means the infallibilist _Schema_ was interpolated before its time. He lived in the Minerva with certain Bishops of his Order, Milella, Pastero, Alcazar and Manucillo, and their mutual conferences led to the matured conviction that the personal infallibility of the Pope is a novel doctrine, of late invention and unknown even to the great Thomas and the Thomist school, chiefly introduced in substance by the Jesuits. Guidi appeals to the fact that years ago he has taught this at Vienna, as was or easily might have been known. If he keeps firm, and Cardinal Silvestri, who often votes with the Opposition, joins their side in good earnest—five dissentient Cardinals, including Mathieu, Rauscher and Schwarzenberg—more Italian Bishops than the Court would like, may say _Non placet_. It is already remarked that they earnestly inquire among themselves whether the German and French minority are likely to remain firm at the decisive moment and not melt away, in which case they would be ready to vote with them. You may imagine how intensely Guidi is hated here. For the moment he might make O’Connell’s boast his own when he said he was “the best abused man in the British Empire.” What Persius said is equally true of the clerical “turba Remi” now,—“sequitur fortunam ut semper, et odit damnatos.” I may mention in illustration of the view prevalent among the majority, that Manning the other day told one of the most illustrious Bishops of the minority he had no further business in the Catholic Church and had better leave it. Even in the Council Hall Bishop Gastaldi of Saluzzo exclaimed to the minority that they were already blotted out of the book of life.

The internal history of the minority since the end of June consists mainly of their endeavours to avert the departure of the timid and home-sick and those attacked by fever. Hitherto leave has been given them readily enough when asked, but it is said this will not be so for the future. The Prince Bishop of Breslau, Förster, was urgently entreated to remain, and he seemed to be persuaded, but now he is gone,(152) and so are Purcell of Cincinnati, Vancsa, Archbishop of Fogaras, Greith of St. Gall, and others—a serious loss under present circumstances. The feeling of self-preservation at last overpowers every other; and what answer can be given to a man who says, when required to stay and help to save the truth, “If I am ill in bed with fever on the critical day, my vote is lost”? Moreover the burning atmosphere peculiar to Rome, impregnated with exhalations from the Pontine marshes, oppresses and enervates mind as well as body and cripples the energy of the will.

So on the 1st July an understanding was arrived at among the Opposition Bishops. It was felt more and more clearly that to go on with the speeches was a sterile and dreary business. For one solid and thoughtful speech from, _e.g._, Darboy, Strossmayer, Haynald, Guidi, Dupanloup, Ginoulhiac, Ketteler or Maret, one had to listen for long hours to the effusions of Spanish, Sicilian and Calabrian infallibilists, and the speeches of this party sound as if their authors had first studied the dedicatory epistles to the Popes which the Jesuits prefix to their works, and strung together the sonorous phrases contained in them. Moreover the conduct of the Legates had become palpable partisanship. For several days they offered demonstrative thanks to every speaker who gave up his turn; the bitterest attacks of the majority on their opponents passed unrebuked, and the murmurs and signs of impatience whenever infallibility was called in question grew more and more pronounced. It became evident that there was nothing really to be gained by prolonging the speeches, when all hope of getting the Council prorogued had to be abandoned.

At the sitting of July 2 the affair was to have been brought to a settlement. The minority had sketched out a notice in the Council Hall, stating that all speakers on their side withdrew, and handed it to Cardinal Mathieu to communicate to the French, but they declined to accept it, saying every one should be free to decide for himself. And so, on that day, out of twenty-two Fathers only four spoke, including Meignan of Chalons and Ramadie of Perpignan.

But it soon became irresistibly evident to both parties that it was advisable for them to put an end to the oratorical exercises. The Legates had frequently used the formula of the Index when a speaker gave up his turn, saying, “laudabiliter orationi renunciavit,” or “magnas ipsi agimus gratias.” The majority had two reasons for wanting the speeches to go on—first the wish of particular individuals to signalize themselves and lay up a stock of merits deserving reward; and secondly, that the Northern Bishops might succumb to the rays of the July sun, as Homer’s Achæans sunk under the arrows of Apollo. But they were made to understand that the Pope would account their simple “_Placet_, sans phrase” a sufficient service, and reward it according to their wish.

Moreover they felt secure about the eventual attitude of the minority, or at least a considerable portion of them, for it was known that two German Bishops had said, “We shall resist to the last moment, but then we shall submit, for we don’t wish to cause a schism.” This gave great joy to the Court party. I heard a monsignore say, “These are our best friends, more so than those who already vote for and with us, for their coming over at the critical moment can only be ascribed to the triumphant and irresistible power of the Holy Ghost poured out through the Pope upon the Council; each of them is a Saul converted into a Paul, who has found his Damascus here at Rome, and becomes a living trophy of the vice-godship of the Pope and the legitimacy and œcumenicity of this Council. We can desire nothing better for our cause than these late and sudden conversions.” And thus at last an understanding satisfactory to all parties was come to; on July 4 all the speakers enrolled withdrew, only reserving their right of presenting their observations in writing to the Deputation.

SIXTY-FIFTH LETTER.

_Rome, July 7, 1870._—I must go back a few days and tell you something more of the speeches made since St. Peter’s Day. It is for the interest of the contemporary world and of posterity that the Roman system of hushing up and deathlike silence should not be fully carried out, and that it should be known what truths have been uttered and what grounds alleged against the fatal decision of the majority and rejected by them.

Soon after Bishop Martin a man spoke who had gained the highest respect from all quarters, Verot, Bishop of Savannah, a really apostolical character, compared in America with St. Francis of Sales. On a former occasion, on June 15, he had pointedly criticised the conduct of the Court party and the attempt to surrender all that yet remains of the ancient constitution of the Church to a centralized papal absolutism. “If,” he said, “the Pope wants to possess and exercise a direct and immediate jurisdiction in my diocese, only let him come over to America himself, and bring with him plenty of the priests who are so abundant here to my country where there are so few; gladly will I attend him servant and observe how he, riding about in my huge diocese, judges and arranges everything on the spot.” And, as some Bishops of the majority had given out the favourite Roman watchword, that historical facts must yield to the clearness and _a priori_ certainty of doctrine, Verot replied briefly, “To me an ounce of historical facts outweighs a thousand pounds of your theories.” This time he was not interrupted, as he had always been before,—by most no doubt not understood. Maret too, in the sitting of July 1, attacked the projected absolutism which the Church was now to be saddled with. In the political world, he said, it is done away with and disappears more and more under a common feeling of repugnance, and now it is for the first time to be confirmed in the Church, and Christians, “the children of heavenly freedom,” are to be reduced, after the protection afforded by the consent of the episcopate is abolished, to spiritual slavery, and forced into blind subjection to the dictates of a single man. He said this in more courteous language than this brief epitome gives scope for.

Among the most important speeches was that which followed, of Bishop David of Saint Brieuc in Bretagne. It was one of the speeches of a kind I said in an early letter would not be tolerated, the result has refuted me. The Bishop said that the proposed article of faith was first invented in the fifteenth century, when a new form, different from that ordained by Christ, was given to the Church, at the expense of the inalienable rights both of the Bishops and the faithful. If the hypothesis of papal infallibility really belonged to the deposit of faith, it must have been defined and universally acknowledged in the earliest ages, as it would evidently be a fundamental doctrine indispensable for the whole Church. The parallel drawn between this and the lately defined and previously undetermined and open doctrine of the Immaculate Conception is quite irrelevant. It is clearly evident, he added, that this new attempt to exalt the Papacy will produce the same disturbance as the earlier one in the sixteenth century. A sign of it is the sudden and rapidly growing alienation of the French clergy from their Bishops, which is instigated from a distance. Passing on to a vindication of the much abused Gallican doctrine, he showed that the former Popes themselves declared it to be allowable and only reprobated the attempt to make it into a special and separate rule of faith for the French Church alone.

The Spanish Bishop of Cuenca, Payà-y-Rico, followed, and began by affirming in the bragging and bombastic style of his country, that in Spain the infallibilist doctrine had always prevailed. This was a glaring falsehood; it would have been enough to cite against him the names of Tostado, Escobar, Victoria, and others, the Spanish Bishops and theologians at Trent, and the fact that the Inquisition first made the doctrine dominant in Spain. But immediate replies are not permitted in the Council Hall, and the majority were so charmed with his disclosures that they loudly applauded him. Encouraged by this he turned round upon the Opposition, observing that a short interval was still allowed them to come over to the majority, and that, unless they made a good use of it, their only choice lay between a subsequent meritorious submission or condemnation for heresy.

The minority, who meet daily either in national or international conferences, were engaged in drawing up a formula requiring the consent of the episcopate as indispensable, but soon gave this up and resolved to abstain from any demonstration, as they could gain nothing by it. Several thought this would compel the majority, if they really wanted to gain the concurrence of the Opposition, to make proposals on their side for some tolerable formula. But at present that is highly improbable.

In the sitting of July 5, where the only business was to vote on the third chapter, in consequence of the general withdrawal of the speakers, an unexpected occurrence intervened. Some days before Bishop Martin of Paderborn had proposed in his own name and that of some of his colleagues that in a Supplement, designated as a _monitum_, the doctrinal authority of the Bishops should be mentioned, but only incidentally and in a sense compatible with the Pope’s prerogative of personal infallibility. When the Pope heard of this, he was much displeased, and peremptorily ordered that a canon should be laid before the Council for acceptance enouncing emphatically and under anathema the papal omnipotence over the whole Church. The Deputation had already had the third canon printed and distributed in the following amended form:—“Si quis dixerit, Romani Pontificis Primatum esse tantum officium inspectionis et directionis et supremam ipsius potestatem jurisdictionis in universam Ecclesiam non esse plenam, sed tantum extraordinariam et mediatam—anathema sit.” But in order to carry out the Pope’s command, the Bishop of Rovigo, as a member of the Deputation, read the canon in a more stringent form, which in fact left the extremest absolutist nothing to desire, but which was not in the printed text and was either not heard or not understood by the greater part of the Bishops, while yet it was to be voted on on the spot—in contradiction to the distinct directions of the order of business. This more stringent version of the canon runs thus:—

“Si quis dixerit, Romanum Pontificem habere tantummodo officium inspectionis vel directionis, non autem plenam et supremam potestatem jurisdictionis in universam Ecclesiam, tum in rebus, quæ ad fidem et mores, tum quæ ad disciplinam et regimen Ecclesiæ per totum orbem diffusæ pertinent; aut eum habere tantum potiores partes, non vero totam plenitudinem hujus supremæ potestatis; aut hanc ejus potestatem non esse ordinariam et immediatam sive in omnes ac singulas Ecclesias, sive in omnes et singulos pastores et fideles—anathema sit.”

A more shameless outwitting of a Council has never been attempted. Archbishop Darboy at once rose and protested against this juggling manœuvre, and the Legates were obliged, humiliating as it was for them, to let the matter drop for the present; but the addition will be brought forward again in a few days.

A proof has lately forced itself on my attention of the confusion of mind habitual to many of the Bishops of the majority. I asked one of them, who had expressed his surprise that so much fuss was made about this one dogma, whether he had formed any clear conception of its retrospective force and examined all the papal decisions, from Siricius in 385 to the Syllabus of 1864, which would be made by the infallibilist dogma into articles of faith. And it came out that this pastor of above a hundred thousand souls imagined that every Pope would be declared infallible, not for the past but for the future only!(153) But he was somewhat perplexed when I mentioned to him on the spur of the moment merely a couple of papal maxims on moral theology, which were now to be stamped with the seal of divinely inspired truths.

On Saturday the 9th the special voting is to take place on the emendation just mentioned of the third chapter of the third canon in the interests of papal absolutism, and on the same day or Monday the whole of the third chapter and the amendments on the fourth are to be voted on; on Wednesday, the 13th, the votes are to be taken on the whole _Schema_ “en bloc.” As yet the Opposition can still be reckoned at 97, exclusive of Guidi and the Dominican Bishops, who may not improbably come to its aid at the critical moment.

One of the witticisms circulating here, for which the Council affords matter to genuine Romans, is the following, that in the sitting of July 4 there was a great uproar among the Bishops, they were all set by the ears and the Pope himself ran away, and why all this? “E perchè tutta questa cagniara? perchè il Papa vuole esser _impeccabile_, e i vescovi non lo vogliono.”

SIXTY-SIXTH LETTER.