Chapter VIII: Preface (8)

_Rome, March 8, 1870._—“Habemus Papam falli nescium!” The Bishops of the Manning and Deschamps party are in raptures; all Rome, say the Infallibilist devotees, is in the highest spirits. The great doctrine, on which, as all the Jesuits and their disciples assure us, hinges the salvation of humanity and the regeneration of science and literature, was published on March 6 in the form of a supplement to the _Schema de Ecclesiâ_. The Pope bears witness of himself that he is infallible as teacher of the Church, and the great majority of the Council will readily assent. Already they are exulting in that moment of triumph when the Pope from his throne in the Hall, “sacro Concilio approbante,” and amid the pealing of all the bells in Rome, will proclaim to the world that it is now fortunate enough to possess an infallible teacher and judge in all questions of faith and morals, guaranteed by God Himself. Day and hour for the proclamation will be chosen with the greatest deliberation and foresight, and here another ground for clinging so pertinaciously to the present Council Hall comes out. It was thought quite incomprehensible why “the master” insulted 750 aged men by compelling them, in spite of all wishes and representations and the evidence of his own senses, to hold their sittings in a Chamber so utterly unfit for the purpose. In a city so abounding in churches and halls as Rome this seemed an act rather of ill-tempered caprice than of hospitable care. It was known of course that the previous expectations of the Vatican had been disappointed, that it had been hoped the _Schemata_ would be received by acclamation or by storm, as it were, without discussion, and that the Hall had been chosen on the very ground of its acoustic defects being adapted to that end. Now however a new recommendation of the Hall betrays itself. At a certain hour on a clear and cloudless day the rays of the sun fall exactly on the place where the Pope’s throne stands, so that Pius may hope, by help of careful arrangements about the time, to stand in a glory of sunlight at the moment when he announces to the world the divine revelation of his own infallibility. It is on this wise, as we said before, that he has had himself represented in the memorial picture of the proclamation of the Immaculate Conception. At the Coronation of Charles X. of France doves were let fly into the church. And so in Rome also a dove might be trained, so as to make it hover above the Pope at the moment of his apotheosis being proclaimed by his own mouth, which would make the effect quite irresistible.

In this state of things the eyes of all men are turned on the Bishops united, or rather not united but only assembled, in Council. The great majority are much in the disposition of the Athenians, when Alexander sent word to them that he had become a god, and wished to be worshipped as such. The popular assembly cried out that, if Alexander really wished to be a god, he was one. So say 300 Bishops: “We eat the Pope’s bread and drink his wine and rest under his roof, so—let him be infallible.” And 100 Bishops say: “We are nothing but titular Bishops, with no dioceses or flocks; from whom but the Pope do we get our titles? So—let him be infallible.” Others again say: “We call ourselves Bishops or Vicars-Apostolic by favour of the Pope, and during his good pleasure. Let him then be infallible.” Lastly others say: “The _Curia_ has us in its power, and we need it at every step; the Pope must be infallible, since he desires it.” Thus we have 550 born infallibilists. And to them must be added those whom the Italians—_e.g._, Mamiani—call more curtly than courteously “gli Energumeni stranieri,” prelates of the Manning type _et id genus omne_, who really take part as volunteers in this campaign for the triumph of papal infallibility and the domination of souls. Many, like Sieyès formerly, will vote “la mort et sans phrase,” but we shall read of unctuous motives alleged by the volunteers for their votes. They want infallibility for themselves as well as others; for themselves, because then there will be no further need “to dig,” for which they have “neither hand nor foot,” but all doctrines will be received ready made, measured and cut out by the Jesuits and stamped and guaranteed as genuine in the Roman printing-office; for others, because thereby every doubt or suspicion or inconvenient demand in matters of doctrine will be summarily got rid of and suppressed.

It is three months to-day since the Council was opened. Viewed from without, the circumstances could hardly have been more favourable; in national diversities and universality of representation the assembly surpassed all former Councils, nor was it so obvious at the beginning that under this bright outside was concealed a crying and iniquitous inequality of representation, and that here again the mastery was placed in the hands of the Italians. But how have all hopes been deceived now, and who had thought of this lamentable upshot!

Lamartine desired of his age that Italy should produce “des hommes et non de la poussière humaine.” For three months have these 750 prelates been assembled—in theory the very flower of the Catholic world, the pastors of 180 million souls, men with a rich experience at their back. They were at once separated into two parties, one of 600 and the other of about 150. On which side are the men and on which the human dust? What have these 600 done in the three months they have been together, what have they brought to an issue, and what thoughts or sparks of intelligence have been struck out of this daily contact with so many high dignitaries from the four quarters of the world? Their utter sterility, aimlessness and poverty of thought—their passively resigning themselves to a mere assent to the thoughts and words of others—all this, when watched close at hand, makes a painful impression. It is true that European history since 1789 has accustomed us to the infirmities and follies and the unproductiveness of great deliberative assemblies; it has become an every-day phenomenon, and in our days one’s expectations from an ecclesiastical assembly can only be of the most moderate kind. There is no fear there of rash and hasty decisions or revolutionary measures. But La Bruyere’s saying, “A great assembly always becomes a rabble,” is verified even at Rome, and the Italians of 1870 have already begun to emulate the example of their ancestors in 1562. Just as the majority at Trent knew how to reduce a disagreeable speaker to silence by wild cries and coughing and scraping with their feet, so is it now at the Vatican Council. It is the humiliating feeling of intellectual impotence and of deficiency alike in knowledge, eloquence and mind, as compared with the minority, from whom almost everything emanates that can be called life or thought in the Council. They feel their abject littleness, in their thankless rôle of being a mere echo of the _Schemata_ and Canons proposed, and having to present in so unadorned and undisguised a form that “sacrificio dell’ intelletto” which the Jesuits so eagerly commend. The honour of being afterwards lauded, as one of the 600 organs of the Holy Ghost at this Council, has to be purchased rather dear. But we cannot in fact come to close quarters and converse with these Bishops of the majority, without being reminded of the reply of a Dane to a Frenchman, who said to him (before the Revolution) that the highest Order in France was that of the Holy Ghost. “Notre Saint Esprit est un éléphant,” answered the Dane. But the situation is almost too serious for such thoughts.

A synopsis of the outstanding measures has been presented to the Council. There are altogether 51 _Schemata_: 3 on “Faith,” 28 on “Discipline,” 18 on “Religious Orders,” 2 on “Oriental Church affairs:” of these 39 have not yet been distributed, and 46 not discussed; 12 are in the hands of the Bishops, of which 5 have been already discussed and are to be again presented and examined, after being modified by the Commission. This is obviously matter enough for two years’ work; yet the Council Hall and the hitherto irresistible and invulnerable majority will conspire to push the 51 _Schemata_ expeditiously through the Council, unabbreviated and hardly altered. If only the master at last praises and rewards his servants!

Meanwhile 34 French Bishops have signed a Statement of Protest against the new order of business. I hear that the perversity of deciding doctrines by counting heads is emphatically dwelt on. The same document has been subscribed by 33 German Bishops, with certain additions. Cardinals Mathieu and Rauscher, while professing their agreement, did not think it well to sign. Some 10 or 12 Germans have accepted a shorter but more precise and pointed address, maintaining the same principles. Some Orientals too have signed, while the deliberations of the Americans, on the other hand, came to no result.

Such declarations are necessary for the outer world and for the satisfaction of their own consciences, but they can hardly be expected to produce any effect, nor do the signataries themselves anticipate any important change being made in the new _regolamento_. Would that their representations were formal protests, declaring that they would take no further part in an assembly lacking the necessary conditions of a true Council! But neither the French nor Germans could resolve on that. It would be hard even for a man like Dupanloup, who may be reckoned a leader of the Opposition, openly to contradict his own earlier writings about the Pope. The question suggests itself, If Pius, before his infallibility is made a dogma, has said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life,” what will he say when his apotheosis is accomplished? What words of human language will suffice adequately to denote the sublimity of his position? A former saying of a member of the Italian aristocracy, well known for his witty remarks, occurs to me, “Gli altri Papi credevano esser Vicarii di Christo, ma questo Papa crede che nostro Signore sia il suo Vicario in cielo.”

We live here in the place whereof Tacitus wrote eighteen centuries ago, “Cupido dominandi cunctis affectibus flagrantior est.”(61)

If infallibility is defined, every member of the Roman Congregations has the pleasing certainty that he possesses “divinæ particulam auræ.” Pius is as firm and resolved as ever; the Jesuits have told him that, if the new dogma produces any confusion and scandal in the Church, it matters nothing—other dogmatic decisions have led to great confusion, but have remained triumphant; in a hundred years all will be quiet. Father Piccirillo, the editor of the _Civiltà_ and special favourite of Pius, has consoled other prelates in the same way.

The _Schema de Ecclesiâ_ has been compared with the lecture notes of a Jesuit Professor at the Collegio Romano, and the two are shown to agree precisely. Even the most abject _Placet_-men of the majority feel rather ashamed of this; they had not quite expected to be summoned to Rome, simply in order to formulate the lecture notes of a Jesuit into dogmatic decrees for the whole Church.

An individual so insignificant intellectually, that I never expected to have any occasion for mentioning his name, and who is regarded in German circles as the standing joke of the Council, a certain Wolanski, has just been placed on the Congregation of the Index, as censor for German books. He would be utterly incompetent even to transcribe the work of a German theologian for the press. But in Rome they like, from time to time, to give a kick of this sort to foreigners.

_Postscript._—I have just been put in a position to tell you something of the contents of the episcopal protest against the new order of business. In respect to the thirteenth article it is objected, that in former Councils a method of voting simply designed to secure expedition (“eo expedito modo”) has never been adopted—a form “quo nullus certe alius gravitati et maturitati deliberationis, imo et ipsi libertati minus favet.” It is added, that even in political assemblies the right is granted of demanding that votes should be taken by calling names. It is not rapidity of decision, but prudence and the utmost possible security, that is the important point. “Quod in Concilio maxime refert, non est ut cito res expediatur, sed ut caute et tutissime peragatur. Longe satius est paucas quæstiones expendere et prudenter solvere, quam multo numerosiores proponere et decurtatis discussionibus suffragiisque præcipitanter collectis res tam graves irrevocabiliter definire.” The document goes on to protest against the regulation for first counting the votes of those who assent to the proposed decrees, and not till after this has been done of those who reject them. This is quite wrong; “Cum in quæstionibus fidei tutius sit sistere et definitionem differre, quam temere progredi, ideo conditio dissentientium favorabilior esse debet, et ipsis prioritas in dandis suffragiis excedenda esset.” The memorialists further desire that, in the definition of a dogma or the establishment of a canon armed with anathema, the votes should be orally given by _Placet_ and _Non placet_, not by rising and sitting down. And then great stress is laid on the point of dogmas not being decided by a mere majority but only by moral unanimity, so that any decree opposed by a considerable number of Bishops may be held to be rejected. The Bishops say, “Cum dogmata constent Ecclesiarum consensu, ut ait Bellarminus,” moral unanimity is necessary. There is a further demand or request of the Bishops, “ut suffragia patrum non super _toto Schemate_ et quasi _in globo_, sed seorsim super unâquâque definitione, super unoquoque Canone, per _Placet_ aut _Non placet_ sigillatim rogentur et edantur.” The Fathers should also be free, according to the Pope’s previous arrangement, to give in their remarks in writing. But the following is the most important passage:—“Id autem quod spectat ad numerum suffragiorum requisitum ut quæstiones dogmaticæ solvantur, in quo quidem rei summa est et totius Concilii cardo vertitur, ita grave est, ut nonnisi admitteretur, quod reverenter et enixe postulamus, conscientia nostra intolerabili pondere premeretur. Timeremus, ne Concilii Œcumenici character in dubium vocari posset, ne ansa hostibus præberetur, S. Sedem et Concilium impetendi, sicque demum apud populum Christianum hujus Concilii auctoritas labefactaretur, ‘quasi veritate et libertate caruerit,’ quod his turbatissimis temporibus tanta esset calamitas ut pejor excogitari non possit.” On this we might however observe with all respect, that a greater calamity is quite conceivable, and that is the sanctioning of a doctrine exegetically, dogmatically and historically untenable by an assembly calling itself a Council. The Protest ends with these words:—“Spe freti futurum ut hæ nostræ gravissimæ animadversiones ab Eminentiis vestris benevolenti animo accipiantur, earumque, quae par est, ratio habeatur, nosmet profitemur: Eminentiarum Vestrarum addictissimos et obsequentissimos famulos.”

TWENTY-EIGHTH LETTER.

_Rome, March 9._—The decree on infallibility appeared on Sunday, March 6, just a year after the project was announced in the _Allgemeine Zeitung_. The Bishops knew three weeks before, through an indiscretion of Perrone’s, that it was drawn up. But its extreme and unqualified form will have taken many by surprise. Men could hardly believe that the Roman See would publicly confess so huge an excess of ambition, and itself court a reproach of which the Catholic Church may indeed be cleared, but the Papacy never. The circumstances preceding the appearance of this composition, which will be a phenomenon in the world’s history, are hardly less remarkable and significant than the text itself.

It was decided on February 21, at a meeting of the French Cabinet presided over by the Emperor, to send a special ambassador to the Council. A despatch to this effect was forwarded to Rome the same evening. The notion so greatly displeased the Marquis de Banneville, that he delayed carrying out his instructions and sent word of his anxieties to Paris. Here he said quite openly that he could remain no longer, and must go to Paris to get the decision reversed. He contented himself however with sending an _attaché_ to France. At last, on March 1, the design of the French Government was communicated to Cardinal Antonelli, and three days afterwards, on March 4, the Marquis de Banneville came to receive his reply. The Cardinal was unfortunately prevented by an attack of gout from seeing him. And thus the answer has been given in the unexpected form of a dogmatic decree.

Not less remarkable is the coincidence of the decree with the publication of Count Daru’s Letter. Its publication, which proclaims to the world the policy of the French Cabinet towards the Court of Rome, has excited the greater sensation in Rome, as it could not have emanated from any ordinary correspondent. The letter was only known to the English Government, and there was no copy in England except in the hands of the Ministry. It cannot be supposed that it would be offered for publication without the connivance of Count Daru himself, and this conjecture is confirmed by the tone of the _Français_, Count Daru’s organ, on the subject. It was open to it to disavow the letters, which are addressed to a private individual, and not, as the _Times_ incorrectly stated, to a French prelate. But instead of seizing on this loophole, the _Français_ says that the private letters of the minister contain nothing different from his public despatches. What gives these things the greater weight is that they imply the probability of interpellations, in Paris as well as in Florence, and the ministry must be presumed to be determined to persist to the end in the path it has entered upon.

But the clearest light is thrown on the act of the _Curia_, when we look at its relation to the simultaneous movement among the minority.

The new order of business seemed to many calculated to bring the internal split in the Opposition to the surface. To accept it was equivalent to accepting the dogma itself. To reject it was to intimate the resolution not to surrender the rights of Bishops, of whom St. Thomas says, “Obtinent in Ecclesiâ summum potestatem,” and therefore not to recognise the Pope’s infallibility. But it has just been explained in the most emphatic terms in Father Gratry’s Letters, which are in the hands of all the Bishops, how difficult it is to coquet with the Jesuit dogmas without falling into the old Jesuit system of morality. However, this much desired division only occurred on a very limited scale.

The Opposition resolved to protest against the order of business. The Protest is said to have been drawn up by skilful French hands, and was subscribed on March 4 by thirty-four French Bishops, and another, signed by almost the same number of German Bishops, was presented to the Legates two days later. A very high estimate is formed of its importance here. According to the Roman view the majority of the Council has no better right than the minority to proclaim a new dogma, for the right belongs to the Pope alone, who can just as well elevate the teaching of the minority as of the majority into a dogma. And therefore, in maintaining that no dogma can be defined without the universal consent—the moral unanimity—of the Episcopate, and that a Council which receives a dogma without that consent is liable to be rejected as not free and Œcumenical, the Bishops are not only protesting against the threatened encroachments of the majority, but just as much against the claim of the Pope to define dogmas by his own authority. I have lately cited the words of Pius IV. on that point. In putting forward and defending their right and qualification to be witnesses of the faith and representatives of their Churches, the Bishops are not only vindicating a position very difficult to assail, but at the same time shaking the principal foundation of the present Council. In the first place the minority represent relatively far greater numbers of Catholics than their adversaries, and in the next place the bulk of the majority is artificially swelled by a crowd of prelates who really represent no Churches and only bear witness for themselves. That many of them have been simply created to give their services at this Council, is notorious. According to the official Roman register, fifty-one Bishops _in partibus_ were named between June 1866 and August 1869. By every one of these creations the Pope has neutralized by his own plenary power the vote of an Archbishop of Paris or Vienna; in other words, he has put some favourite Roman monsignore on an equality, as regards the decisions of the Council, with a venerable Church containing more than a million of souls. The presence of such elements in the assembly gives grounds for doubting whether it can be regarded as a real representation of the whole Church, and so this declaration of the Bishops is like knocking a nail in the coffin of the Œcumenical Council.

I have mentioned that the Protest of the French Bishops was handed in on March 4. That day was the beginning of the decisive crisis for the Opposition. The adhesion of the Germans was next awaited; it followed on the 6th March, and their example is pretty sure to be followed by other nations. The prospect of this danger, combined with the news from France, brought the long preconcerted resolve of the other side to sudden and immediate maturity. A few days before they had not intended to come forward with the decree yet. But now the great object was to cut short any further development on the part of the Opposition, and, if possible, to hinder the German Protest. The existing situation seems even to have influenced the form of the decree. For a moment the French middle party—Bonnechose, Lavigerie, etc.—had fancied a professedly moderate formula would be carried, but now the counsels of the most determined infallibilists prevailed, and the Pope, in great visible excitement, gave his assent to the decree in the form in which it has been published. This took place on March 5. The decree is dated March 6. With the view of stopping the German Protest, they did not wait for the next sitting to distribute the printed copies to the Fathers in Council as usual, but sent them direct to their houses. This was the answer to the protesting movement.

Considering that none of the former addresses of the minority—some twelve have been presented—have been taken the slightest notice of, there were of course the best reasons for anticipating no better fate for this last. But it has served another purpose. It was an intimation on the part of the signataries that their patience has reached its limits. The Protest did not indeed pledge them to any definite course of action. But it certainly imposes on them the duty of not tolerating anything further of the same kind, and not lending a hand to any decision affecting the whole future of the Church, under conditions they have themselves declared to imperil the authority and solidity of the Council. Either the Protest means nothing, and the signataries are as persuaded of its worthlessness and insincerity as their adversaries, or it means that they will not allow the great dogma to come on for discussion unless they obtain an assurance that no dogma shall be proclaimed by Pope or Council without a moral unanimity. The _Curia_ have known how to give so emphatic an expression to their contempt for the Opposition, that even the sharpest and bitterest words would show less scorn and insolence than their act. By choosing the precise moment, when the minority declare that their conscience is troubled and in doubt about the legitimacy and result of the Council altogether, for bringing forward the very decree which has all along been the main cause of that doubt and trouble of conscience, they proclaim plainly and emphatically that they know the Opposition regards its own words as nothing but words, and that there is no earnest manly decision or religious conviction behind them. The conscientiousness of the Opposition, _i.e._ of the most distinguished French and German Bishops, could not be put to a prompter, a more crucial, or a more decisive test.

How will this test be borne? How will the doctrine of the Church and the honour of two nations be saved? The events of the next few days will decide.

TWENTY-NINTH LETTER.

_Rome, March 15._—Livy relates that, in the battle at the Thrasimene Lake, the combatants on either side, Romans and Carthaginians, felt nothing of the earthquake under their feet. Here in Rome it is not so much the heat of the contest that makes the great body of Bishops unconscious of the moral earthquake which has begun to shake the Church, for there is no strife in the ranks of the majority, and their intercourse with the other party is very small. But every one thinks first of his own home and diocese, and the Italians, Spaniards and South Americans—nearly 500 prelates in all—have abundant cause for reckoning on absolute indifference and ease, on a passive and generally willing assent. In those countries it is only money questions, the contest about Church property, that stirs men’s minds. How much is to be left to the clergy or taken from them, that is the question here. And the Bishops hope that papal infallibility will give some added force to the papal decisions on the inviolability of Church property.

Among the Opposition Bishops many are still in good spirits and full of confidence. “We are too many, and we represent too considerable portions of the Christian world, for our resistance to be ignored and our votes thrust aside,” is what many of them still assert. But the dominant party don’t admit this. Antonelli says: “As soon as the Pope promulgates a decree with the assent of a great number of Bishops, he is infallible, and therefore a minority of opposing votes need not be attended to.” Naturally—for he, like other Italians, moves in the circle of papal infallibility which he, as advocate and financier, considers to belong to the “grandes idées de l’Église.” He would certainly, if asked, agree with the view of Cardinal Jacobazzi, about 1530, that the Pope could hold an Œcumenical Council with one Bishop only and issue an infallible decree. The state of the case is this: if the decree is published by the Pope with the assent of the majority of the Council, it is ruled that the gift of infallibility has all along resided in the Popes alone, and that the supreme authority in dogmas has only been derived to General Councils from them, whether by their taking part in the proceedings or confirming them. On this theory, even a very considerable number of opposing Bishops have no rights; the Pope could issue a dogmatic decree with the minority against the votes of the majority, for he and he alone would always be the organ of the Holy Ghost. Either no reply will be given to the complaints of the Bishops about the new order of business, any more than to their previous memorials, or they will be told that it is reserved to the Pope to settle whether a decree or _Schema_ voted by a majority only shall be promulgated, since he, being alone infallible, can do what he pleases. In this sense the silence of Section 14 may well be interpreted.

All the talk about “inopportuneness” is now quite at an end. I had predicted that from the first. Any Bishop who wanted to discuss now, whether it was the right time for making the new dogma, would be laughed at rather than listened to. It has been decided by 500 Bishops with the Pope that the decree is opportune, and in saying that the question is about the truth of articles of faith, not their convenience, they have reason and history on their side.

There are said to be 100 Opinions or Objections of the Bishops about or against the _Schema_ on the Church, already in the hands of the Commission of Faith. Among them is the memorial of an eminent German Bishop, whose bosom two souls seem to inhabit, and who therefore occupies the singular position at once of a friend of papal infallibility and an opponent of the definition and member of the Opposition. He read his paper in the meeting of German Bishops, and it was received with general approval, in spite of the pungent comments it contained on the new order of business in connection with the publication of the _Schema_ on infallibility a few days later, as being a disgrace to the Council and the Church.

Count Trautmansdorff and M. Beust have received from Antonelli one of those quieting and entirely conciliatory answers that clerical statesman is so fond of pouring forth in all directions.(62) Its substance is as follows: in theory, and as regards what the scholastics called universals, where high and far-reaching principles have to be established, the Church is inexorable; there she cannot abandon an iota of her claims, and must draw and force home the sword of anathema. She must therefore necessarily pronounce modern civilisation, with its freedoms, a medley of soul-destroying errors, must raise the banner of coercion and forcible suppression, and accordingly condemn freedom of religious profession and of the press. But in practice—in Concordats and special Indults and concessions of graces—the Pope is not so strict and inexorable; there he is open to negotiations, and the separate Governments can obtain from him as a favour the actual toleration of what in theory he most solemnly condemns, of course only _durante beneplacito_, so long as it pleases him and the Governments behave well and don’t deserve to be punished by the withdrawal of their indults and privileges. And that is so long as circumstances remain unaltered, for it is self-evident that, as soon as the temper of public opinion and the political situation become such as to offer any prospect of an ecclesiastical pretension being successfully urged, the indult will be abrogated and the practice conformed to the theory. Antonelli always has both pockets full of such distinctions between the strict and hard theory and the mild and indulgent pliability in practice, and no diplomatist leaves him without such consolation. De Banneville has always been satisfied with the fare thus set before him by the Secretary of State. Trautmansdorff has so far the advantage, that the doctrines of Church and State imposed by the Court of Rome on the Council give the Austrian Government a very convenient handle for declaring the legal abolition of the Concordat, which is practically torn to pieces already; for with a Pope who has become infallible and feels himself called to be the supreme judge of right and wrong, though there may indeed be an armistice, no real and genuine peace and no treaty is possible.

Moreover nothing can be more convenient and elastic than the theory Antonelli expounds with all the unction of priestly diplomacy to the representatives of the European Governments. It makes everything—persons and institutions, governments and peoples—ultimately dependent on the indulgence and favour of the Pope. By the higher and divine law, so runs this doctrine, everything in the world should properly be differently arranged; the censorship of the Holy Office, religious coercion and clerical immunities, in a word the whole system of canon law, should flourish everywhere in full vigour as in the States of the Church. But the Vicar of God is merciful; he condescends to the evil condition of States and of mankind, and does what is so easily done in Rome, he dispenses—for at Rome obsolete laws are maintained simply to supply matter for dispensations,—he declares his readiness to tolerate what in itself is to be condemned, out of regard for the unfavourable circumstances of the age, and thus all at last falls under the sceptre of the Pope, who rules at one time by favour and dispensations, at another by strict law. Constitutions and laws will be allowed to exist for awhile, and until further notice. This however is no recognition of them, but only an “indult,” for which sovereigns and statesmen and nations must be thankful while it lasts, but which may at any moment be revoked.

The plan of acclamation, announced by the Jesuits as far back as February 1869, still counts many friends. There are 600 episcopal throats ready to shout, and these prelates had the rather get the affair settled in that summary fashion, because they would then be spared the hearing of things which bring a blush to many a face. For the Opposition Bishops could bring forward reasons and facts which, if once spoken in this place, would make a powerful echo and come unrefuted before the present and future generations. Of all possible questions that of infallibility is certainly the one which can least be discussed here and before 275 Italian prelates. What has happened in the last sittings, the exaltation of some and the bitterness of others, gives no hope of a quiet examination, but on the contrary leads us to expect that the majority will make the fullest use either of their physical preponderance or of the new rights given them by the Pope for reducing their adversaries to silence. Many who are resolved to gratify the Pope’s desire by their _Placet_, are apprehensive that the objections of their opponents might leave the unpleasant taste of an unanswered argument in their mouths, and that the sting of a vote given without adequate knowledge and examination might remain fixed in the conscience of the Bishops. In this connection the answer of a North American Bishop of the infallibilist party is significant. He said that he remembered having heard, when in the theological class in his seminary, that the condemnation of Pope Honorius by the Sixth Council meant nothing, and now in his old age nobody could require him to study and examine the question for himself.

Since the appearance of Gratry’s Letters, what is most especially dreaded is the mention and discussion of the forgeries and fictions that have been perpetrated for centuries past in the interest of the Papacy. Should they really come to be spoken of in the Council Hall, one may be quite prepared for Legate Capalti, even if he is not presiding, striking his bell till it bursts. The Italian and Spanish majority would sooner let a speaker teach Arianism and Pelagianism than touch on this sore. Cyprian, pseudo-Isidore, Anselm, Deusdedit, Gratian, Thomas Aquinas and Cyril—these are now terrible names, and hundreds here would fain stop their ears when they are uttered. “Is there then no balm in Gilead, no physician?” Just now a theologian or historian would be worth his weight in gold, who could produce evidence that all these forgeries and inventions are genuine monuments of Christian antiquity, and that the whole edifice of papal absolutism has been built up with the purest and most conscientious loyalty to truth. For this “horse” they would now, like Richard III. of England, offer a kingdom. For the first time the world, with a free press in full possession, is to accept a new dogma with all its extensive belongings—to accept it in faith, at a time when historical criticism has attained a power against which Rome is impotent, and when its conclusions pass into the literature and the common consciousness of all thinking men with a rapidity hitherto unprecedented. The works will soon be counted not by hundreds but by thousands, which relate and make capital out of the fact that from the year 500 to 1600 deliberate fraud was at work in Rome and elsewhere for disseminating, supporting, and finding a basis for, the notion of infallibility. If they imagine in Rome that they can escape this power by means of the Index and similar fulminations, such as some French Bishops have hurled at Father Gratry, that is like sending a couple of old women with syringes to put out a palace on fire.

The leader and oracle of the infallibilists, Archbishop Manning, knows something of the contradictions of history to his pet dogma. He has heard something of the long chain of forgeries, but he demonstrates to his associates by a bold method of logic, that it is an article of faith that is at issue here, and that history and historical criticism can have nothing to say to it. “It is not, therefore, by criticism on past history, but by acts of faith in the living voice of the Church at this hour, that we can know the faith.”(63) The faith which removes mountains will be equally ready—such is clearly his meaning—to make away with the facts of history. Whether any German Bishop will be found to offer his countrymen these stones to digest, time will show.

Of what French infallibilists are capable has been evidenced in the case of Bishop Pie of Poictiers, who is, next to Plantier of Nîmes, the leader of this faction. He introduces into his Lenten Pastoral the history of Uzza, who wanted, with a good object, to support the tottering Ark, and was punished by being burned to death. The Ark, he says, is the Church and its doctrine, and whoever touches it with the best intentions, be he layman or priest, commits a grievous crime and audacious sacrilege, which must bring down on his head the most terrible wrath of God. The animals, which draw the waggon containing the Ark, are the Bishops. If then, proceeds Pie, any of these oxen swerve from the road and kick (_regimbent_), there are plenty more at hand to bring back the cart into the right track, for—and here the oxen suddenly become horses (_coursiers_)—all the steeds of the sacred cart do not stumble at the same time. Thus does this prelate expound to his flock the position of the majority and minority at the Council, and for their full consolation he adds: “Moreover there is one supreme and divinely enlightened driver of the cart, who is liable to no error, and he will know how to deal with the shying and stumbling of the horses.” According to Bishop Pie therefore, the waggon of the Church is sometimes drawn by horses—the Opposition who make _sou-bresaut_ and _écarts_; sometimes by steady-going oxen—the great majority,—and among these last the Bishop of Poictiers with amiable modesty reckons himself. If the readers of the _Allgemeine Zeitung_ doubt whether a highly respected leader of the majority and member of the Commission on Faith has really written such nonsense, I can only refer them to the document itself, which will no doubt be reprinted in the _Univers_ or _Monde_.(64)

There are many indications that the wishes of the clique of zealots, who wanted to get the infallible Pope made out of hand on St. Joseph’s day, will not be realized, but that a longer interval will have to be allowed. The _Schema_ “on Faith” prepared by the Commission, viz., by the above-named Bishop Pie, and containing the philosophical and theological matter for the Council, was to have been distributed last week, and even Bishops of the minority had received professedly confidential notice of it; but no such distribution took place. So the Session of this week too will fall through, and it is not easy to see how this first fruit of the Council can well be imparted to the expectant world before Easter. And here I constantly come across the view that the postponement of the discussion on the grand _Schema de Ecclesiâ_, with the article on infallibility, is done with a purpose. The Opposition is still too strong and compact; it is hoped that some members will be detached from it every week, and that several will leave Rome; some Austrians are gone already. Everything depends on making the Opposition so small and weak, that they may be walked over, and may seem only to exist as a captive band of German Barbarians to grace the triumphal procession of the Latins, and then to be surrendered to those “exécuteurs des hautes œuvres de la justice de Rome,” MM. Veuillot and Maguelonne, the editors of the _Univers_ and the _Correspondance de Rome_.(65) This delay is of course a severe trial of patience for the majority who are hungering after the new bread of faith.

I will not conceal that even among the highest Roman dignitaries the infallibilist dogma provokes expressions of discontent. Are they honestly and sincerely meant? The voting will show. The _mot d’ordre_ has gone forth to correspondents of foreign journals, to say that the whole Opposition is thoroughly broken up, and that some are deserting and the rest running away. But as yet these are wishes rather than facts. As far as I can see, the French and German Bishops, who wish to maintain the ancient doctrine of the Church and reject the new dogma, hold firmly together. Some Bishops said, directly after the publication of the supplementary _Schema_ on infallibility, that their only choice lay between a schism or a false doctrine; nothing else was left them except to resign their Sees. And your readers would be astonished if I could venture to mention their names—names of the highest repute.

The war of extermination against the Theological Faculties of the German Universities is to be energetically carried on. The Bishop of Ratisbon’s measure is only a premonitory feeler. Some particular exceptions however might be made, as long as the chairs were filled by pupils of the Jesuits. The German College is now to be the nursery for professors of theology and philosophy at German Seminaries and High Schools. This reminds one of the Alexandrian Psaphon, who kept a whole aviary of parrots, and taught them to scream, “Great is the God, Psaphon,” and then let them fly, so that they carried over land and sea the fame of his godhead. In Rome there is fortunately an abundance of such aviaries. There are colleges here for England, Scotland, Ireland, France, Germany and Hungary, Belgium, Poland, and North and South America, and thousands of their inmates have already been indoctrinated in Psaphon’s fashion.

THIRTIETH LETTER.

_Rome, March 20, 1870._—At last the greatest theologian of Catholic England, in fact the only man of learning there who would be called in Germany a real theologian, has spoken out in the great controversy. Dr. Newman is superior of the Birmingham Oratory. It has long been notorious that he deplored the condition of the English (Catholic) Church, which has for many years been brought under the convert yoke, and sympathized with the old Catholics, both clergy and laity, who are now crushed under it; so much so, that the convert party there tried to brand him with the reputation of heterodoxy, and strangers intending to visit the illustrious Oratorian were warned not to incur suspicion by doing so. Newman had accordingly maintained a persistent silence in the controversies going on in England, desirous as everybody was and is to know his judgment upon the question which is now “gladius animam Ecclesiæ pertransiens.” But in the midst of this silence he had opened his heart, in a letter to a Bishop who is a friend of his own, on the uncomfortable and dangerous position into which an “aggressive and insolent faction” has brought the Church, and disturbed so many of the truest souls. He says:(66)

“... Such letters, if they could be circulated, would do much to reassure the many minds which are at present distressed when they look towards Rome.

“Rome ought to be a name to lighten the heart at all times, and a Council’s proper office is, when some great heresy or other evil impends, to inspire hope and confidence in the faithful; but now we have the greatest meeting which ever has been, and that at Rome, infusing into us by the accredited organs of Rome and of its partisans (such as the _Civiltà_ [the _Armonia_], the _Univers_, and the _Tablet_) little else than fear and dismay. When we are all at rest, and have no doubts, and—at least practically, not to say doctrinally—hold the Holy Father to be infallible, suddenly there is thunder in the clearest sky, and we are told to prepare for something, we know not what, to try our faith, we know not how. No impending danger is to be averted, but a great difficulty is to be created. Is this the proper work of an Œcumenical Council?

“As to myself personally, please God, I do not expect any trial at all; but I cannot help suffering with the many souls who are suffering, and I look with anxiety at the prospect of having to defend decisions which may not be difficult to my own private judgment, but may be most difficult to maintain logically in the face of historical facts.

“What have we done to be treated as the faithful never were treated before? When has a definition _de fide_ been a luxury of devotion and not a stern, painful necessity? Why should an aggressive, insolent faction be allowed to ‘make the heart of the just sad, whom the Lord hath not made sorrowful’? Why cannot we be let alone when we have pursued peace and thought no evil?

“I assure you, my lord, some of the truest minds are driven one way and another, and do not know where to rest their feet—one day determining ‘to give up all theology as a bad job,’ and recklessly to believe henceforth almost that the Pope is impeccable, at another tempted to ‘believe all the worst which a book like Janus says,’—others doubting about ‘the capacity possessed by bishops drawn from all corners of the earth to judge what is fitting for European society,’ and then, again, angry with the Holy See for listening to ‘the flattery of a clique of Jesuits, Redemptorists, and converts.’

“Then, again, think of the store of Pontifical scandals in the history of eighteen centuries, which have partly been poured forth and partly are still to come. What Murphy inflicted upon us in one way M. Veuillot is indirectly bringing on us in another. And then again the blight which is falling upon the multitude of Anglican ritualists, etc., who themselves, perhaps—at least their leaders—may never become Catholics, but who are leavening the various English denominations and parties (far beyond their own range) with principles and sentiments tending towards their ultimate absorption into the Catholic Church.

“With these thoughts ever before me, I am continually asking myself whether I ought not to make my feelings public; but all I do is to pray those early doctors of the Church, whose intercession would decide the matter (Augustine, Ambrose, and Jerome, Athanasius, Chrysostom, and Basil) to avert this great calamity.

“If it is God’s will that the Pope’s infallibility be defined, then is it God’s will to throw back ‘the times and moments’ of that triumph which He has destined for His kingdom, and I shall feel I have but to bow my head to His adorable, inscrutable Providence.

“You have not touched upon the subject yourself, but I think you will allow me to express to you feelings which, for the most part, I keep to myself....”

Thus writes Newman in most glaring contrast to Manning. The latter was long nothing but his admiring disciple, and does not possess a tenth part of the learning of his master. He owes simply to his infallibilist zeal acquired in Rome his elevation to the Archbishopric of Westminster, to which the Pope appointed him, in anticipation of his present services, against the will of the English Catholics and the election of the Bishops. The Roman correspondent of the _Standard_ having published extracts from Newman’s letter, he took occasion to come forward and say that he had no wish to conceal that he “deeply deplored the policy, the spirit, the measures of various persons lay and ecclesiastical, who are urging the definition of that theological opinion” (of papal infallibility), while on the other hand he has “a firm belief that a greater power than that of any man or set of men will overrule the deliberations of the Council to the determination of Catholic and Apostolic truth, and what its Fathers eventually proclaim _with one voice_ will be the Word of God.”

No one knows better than Newman that, next to the Jesuits, two of his old Oxford friends and disciples, Manning and Ward, are the chief authors of the whole infallibilist agitation. Well for him that he does not live in Manning’s diocese! In the English clerical journals, _e.g._, the _Weekly Register_, the fact has lately several times come to light, that English priests who utter a word against infallibility are promptly reduced to silence by threats of suspension and deprivation. Every infallibilist, who has the power, is also a terrorist, for he feels instinctively that free and open discussion would be the death of his darling dogma. Under these circumstances it is very significant that some of the English Bishops are bold and honest enough to speak their minds plainly, to the effect that the English Catholics had gained all their political rights on the repeated assurance, and with the express condition, that the doctrine of papal infallibility would not be taught and received in the English Church, and that on that ground they have felt bound to repudiate this opinion. The chief among these Bishops are Clifford, Bishop of Clifton, and Archbishop Errington.(67)

I can give you the precise facts of the affair about Montalembert’s Requiem from the most authentic sources, and it is worth while to do so, for it speaks volumes on the present state of things. The news of his death had reached Rome some hours, when a considerable number of foreigners, chiefly French, were admitted to an audience with the Pope. Immediately after the first words of blessing and encouragement, which they had come to request of him, Pius went on to speak of the man whose death had just been announced to him, saying that he had done great services to the Church, “mais il était malheureusement de ces Catholiques libéraux qui ne sont que demi-catholiques. Il y a quelques jours il écrivait des paroles”—here the Pope made a pause, and then proceeded—“Enfin, j’espère qu’il est bien mort”—or probably “qu’il a fait une bonne mort”—“L’orgueil était son principal défaut, c’est lui qui l’a égaré.”

While this was going on in the Vatican, Bougaud, one of the Vicar-Generals of the Bishop of Orleans, was inviting his countrymen from the pulpit of the French church of St. Louis to a Requiem for the illustrious dead, to be held next day in the church of Ara Celi. Archbishop Merode, Grand Almoner of the Pope and brother-in-law of Montalembert, had so arranged it, because it is an ancient privilege of the Roman patricians to have funeral services solemnized for them in this church, and Montalembert had been named a patrician by Pius IX. in recognition of his services in restoring the States of the Church and bringing back the Pope to Rome. He had contributed more than any of his contemporaries to that restoration, and it was he whose speech in the National Assembly at Paris in 1848 had decided the question of the Roman expedition. Bougaud had also mentioned that. Many had heard on the day before the service that it had been suddenly forbidden; nevertheless at the appointed hour in the morning about twenty French Bishops appeared with many priests and a large assemblage of laymen, the _élite_ of the French visitors now in Rome. There before the entrance of the church they found M. Veuillot, the old and implacable opponent and accuser of Montalembert, standing among a group of sacristy officials, who announced to all comers that the Pope had forbidden any service being held or any prayers offered there for the departed Count. They thought this incredible and forced their way into the church, and here the sacristans informed them that, by special order of the Pope, not only was the intended Requiem stopped but the usual masses must be suspended, as long as the French remained in the church. By degrees the congregation broke up, and about an hour afterwards, when the church was empty, a French priest contrived to say a low mass in a side chapel.