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There was the greatest excitement beforehand. His eloquence was already known from his former speech, which was rendered more significant from the Legates interrupting him. Had he been again interrupted this time, every one felt that the freedom of the Council would be in the greatest danger. Strossmayer's tact and moderation prevented it, although it was observed that Cardinal Bilio wished on one occasion to make the Presidents interfere. When Strossmayer mounted the tribune, somebody was heard to say, "That is the Bishop against whom the bell will be used."

THIRTEENTH LETTER.

Lately, for the first time, a local priest, Leonardo Proja, in a work published here, has openly expressed his confidence that the Council will at once condemn the shocking error of setting aside the supreme dominion of the Pope over the nations, even in civil matters as an invention of the Middle Ages.

FOURTEENTH LETTER.

Midway between the two opposite camps there stands a body of some 150 Prelates of different nations, averse to the new dogma and to the whole plan of fabricating dogmas, to which the Jesuits are impelling the Pope, and alive to the necessity and desirableness of many reforms, but who, on various grounds, shrink from speaking out plainly and with the guarantee of their names.

As far as I can gather from personal intercourse of various kinds with many of the Infallibilist Bishops, their zeal is chiefly due to the following notions:--

For the rest, it involves a logical contradiction on the part of the Infallibilists to lay any special weight on mere numbers, for nothing turns on the votes of the Bishops in their system, but everything depends on the decision of the Pope. If 600 Bishops were ranged on one side and the Pope with 6 Bishops on the other, the 600 would be thereby proved to be in error and the 6 in possession of the truth. Cardinal Noailles observed very correctly, 150 years ago, that 300 Bishops, who proclaim a doctrinal principle on the mere word of a Pope whom they regard as infallible, have no more weight than one single Bishop who votes on his own personal conviction. The opposition of the minority, as might be expected from their antecedents of the last twenty years, is indeed wrapped up in cotton, but at bottom it is positive enough. It comes to saying that, if the Pope really wishes the Council to take in hand the question of Infallibility, witnesses must be heard on the subject.

Simor, Patriarch of Hungary, has not, or at least not yet, subscribed the Address, but he spoke emphatically against the dogma in the meeting of German Bishops on January 16. All the other Hungarian Bishops at Rome, thirteen in number, have signed the Address; only the Greek Uniate Bishop of Papp-Szilaghy has, like Simor, omitted to do so. The North Italian Bishops too have determined on an address, substantially identical with the German one.

The French Address, which thirty-three Bishops agreed to on January 15, at a meeting at Cardinal Mathieu's, differs somewhat in wording from the German, but the contents are the same in the main, and it is hoped to get forty signatures for this; twenty French Bishops wish to abstain from signing anything, and something under twenty have signed Manning's address, so that there are still twice as many French on the side of the Opposition as of the definition. We may add seventeen North Americans, who have accepted the German Address, with the omission of the clauses omitted in the French one, while the North Italians adopted it unaltered. The opposition to the dogma has thus maintained an universal character, including the most various nationalities. But it would be hardly feasible to decide a new dogma by mere counting of heads, treating the Bishops, like the privates of a regiment, as all equal, so that one vote is worth just the same as another. An analysis of the component elements of this majority, and a comparison of it with the Opposition in scientific culture and representation of souls, would give sufficiently impressive results.

The most startling phenomenon is presented by the Belgian and English Bishops. The former are all on the Infallibilist side, and there can be no doubt that they understand the political importance of the new dogma. They apparently wish to make the breach incurable between the Catholics of the younger generation and the Liberal party, who adhere to the Belgian Constitution; for no Catholic for the future can at once recognise the doctrine of Papal Infallibility and the principles of the Belgian civil law, without contradiction. What makes the majority of English Bishops zealous adherents of Infallibilism it is hard to say; they are not in other respects disposed to be led by Manning. Nor can we assume that, like the Belgians, they deliberately wish to make the Catholic Church of their country the irreconcilable foe of the British Constitution, though that would be the inevitable consequence of the doctrine. It has been pointed out to these Prelates from England, that the solemn declarations of English and Irish Catholics are still preserved in the State Archives, in which they formally renounced belief in Papal Infallibility, and purchased thereby the abolition of the old penal laws and Emancipation. Thus it is said in the "Declaration and Protestation," signed by 1740 persons, including 241 priests, "We acknowledge no infallibility in the Pope." In the "Form of Oath and Declaration," taken in 1793 by all Irish Catholics, occur the words, "I also declare that it is not an article of the Catholic faith, neither am I thereby required to believe or profess, that the Pope is infallible." And a Synod of Irish Bishops, in 1810, declared this oath and declaration to be "a constituent part of the Roman Catholic religion, as taught by the Bishops; a formula affirmed by the Roman Catholic Churches in Ireland, and sanctioned and approved by the other Roman Catholic Churches."

I hear that, among the Irish Bishops, Moriarty is averse to breaking with the ancient tradition of his Church. Bishop Brown of Newport, an open and decided opponent of Infallibilism, is kept away by ill health; Ullathorne of Birmingham and Archbishop MacHale of Tuam wish also to keep clear of it, but without signing the address. Bishop Clifford of Clifton, on the contrary, as I hear, has signed it. So Manning's following among his countrymen is a very divided one.

FIFTEENTH LETTER.

Among the Cardinals, de Angelis, de Luca, Bilio, and Capalti are considered the four Papal pillars of the Council. Bilio, a Barnabite, and still a young man, passes in Rome for an eminent theologian, and while the other Cardinals and Monsignori would hold it a sin to understand German, he knows two German words, which he constantly repeats, but always with a shudder, "deutsche Wissenschaft." He thinks German science something like the witches' caldron in Macbeth--full of horrible ingredients.

As little did they dare to interrupt Darboy, Archbishop of Paris, when he ascended the tribune and began as follows:--"We are told we are not to make long speeches, but I have a great deal to say. We are told again not to repeat what has been said by others, but at the same time we are kept shut up in this Hall, where for the most part we cannot understand one another; we are not allowed to examine the stenographic reports of our speeches, and the only answer made to our representations is always the same--'The Pope wills it.' I don't know therefore what has been said by the speakers who have preceded me." He then went on to speak of the rights of the Bishops, their degradation by the Roman centralizing system, "the caves, wherein the Roman doctors have buried themselves from the light of day," etc. He spoke in admirable style, and was listened to with rapt attention, though at every word his auditors expected an interruption from the Legate; but it never came. Darboy himself said afterwards that he had done like Cond?, and flung his marshal's staff into the ranks of the enemy.

The following occurrence was comic:--You know in what repute the supple and complaisant Fessler, Bishop of St. P?lten, is held here, the first herald for retailing the new dogma to the world. Not long ago, Charbonnel, the Capuchin Bishop of Sozopolis, placed himself near him, and began to speak of clerical place-hunting, the eagerness for distinctions and promotions among Bishops, and the crooked ways they often take to obtain them, and pointed so unmistakeably by look and gesticulation at his neighbour, the Secretary, that on going out Fessler said it was high time to put an end to the Council, which was every day getting more disagreeable. The question was then started by German and Hungarian Bishops whether it would not be better, as Martin thought, to substitute lay-brothers for clergymen's housekeepers, or whether the restoration of "the common life"--the Chrodogang institute--of course in a very modified form, should be attempted. They overlooked the fact that such matters cannot be regulated by a Council, but must be arranged according to the disposition and circumstances of the clergy in the various dioceses. Haynald, Meignan, Bishop of Ch?lons, and the Chaldean Patriarch, insisted that mere school questions should not be decided by the Council without any necessity, and that some freedom of movement must be left to Science. But the word freedom has nowhere so ill a sound as at Rome. Only one kind of freedom can be spoken of here--the freedom of the Church; and, in their favourite and accustomed manner of speech, by the Church is intended the Pope, and by freedom domination over the State, according to the Decretals. And to talk of freedom of Science! The Council, if it entertained such views, would be forgetting altogether that it was only called together for two purposes--to increase the plenary power of the Pope, and to aggrandize the Jesuits. But the Order has, like the Paris labourer of 1848, "le droit du travail;" it is not content to exist only, but must work--of course in its own way,--and for this it requires two things: first, new dogmas; and secondly, plenty of condemnations and anathemas. The business of the Council is to provide both.

I have heard many, and especially French, Prelates say, during the last few days, sometimes in obscure hints, sometimes clearly, that the Council will soon--in a few weeks--be closed or dissolved; an opinion all the more surprising, because nothing as yet has been done. In that case the Bull with the many Excommunications will have to be treated as issuing from the Council. But the only relation of the Bishops to that Bull is as the suffering and punished party.

SEVENTEENTH LETTER.

That Bull, with its many curses and cases reserved to the Pope, which fills the Jesuits with hope and joy , is for the Bishops a source of discouragement and despair, so that the Bishop of Trent is said to have lately observed that he would rather resign his See than publish it. It is now asserted that the Pope has again suspended it, partly on account of remonstrances of the French Government, partly to put the Bishops in better humour for the Infallibilist definition.

On Sunday, January 23, the Commission named by the Pope for examining motions proposed held its first sitting, under the presidency of Cardinal Patrizzi and not of the Pope himself, as was thought--seven weeks after the Council met and when a number of motions had long been awaiting its scrutiny. This delay had evidently been designed. It has now been resolved to arrange and examine proposals, not according to subjects but nations, so that the proposals of the French, Germans, etc., will be separately discussed and decided upon.

EIGHTEENTH LETTER.

Pius has even had his na?ve but robust belief in his own heavenly illumination and vocation to proclaim new doctrines sensibly embodied in a picture. In a chamber beyond the Raphael Gallery there is a picture painted by his order; he stands in glorified attitude on a throne proclaiming his favourite dogma of the Immaculate Conception, while the Divine Trinity and the Holy Virgin look down from heaven well pleased upon him, and from the Cross, borne in the arms of an angel, flashes a bright ray on his countenance. Thus Pius stands in a special mystical relation to Mary; she guides and inspires the Council through him, and he in turn will proclaim, with its assent, the decrees she has inspired and which will destroy the monstrous errors of the present day, or will at least give them a fatal blow. Unfortunately, not one single decree has yet been brought out after exactly two months, and all the heresies continue just as strong as before the Council met. And yet the pregnant and successful Councils of the ancient Church did not require a longer time for their decisions; the Council of Nice was finished in two months, the Council of Chalcedon in six weeks. Certainly it was not then supposed that Mary had first to give the Pope, and then he to give the Council, the weapons for destroying heresies: they were content to rely on the Paraclete promised by Christ.

But the minority have taken courage, and stand on the defensive; and so the machine is at a standstill. The opponents of Infallibilism have not decreased; on the contrary, it is now thought that about 200 will vote against it. Many, who at first were only "inopportunists," have now through more careful investigation of the question become decided opponents of the doctrine itself.

If we examine the names of the Professors at the Roman University of the Sapienza, we find among the teachers of theology, with the solitary exception of the Canon-Regular, Tizzani, who is now blind, only monks--Dominicans, Carmelites and Augustinians--and these mere names wholly unknown beyond the walls of Rome. No less lamentable is the view presented by the philosophical, mathematical and philological departments. The best that can be said of this University, the intellectual metropolis of 180,000,000, is about this, "que c'est une fille honn?te qui ne fait pas parler d'elle."

"Mai non si smaga Dal suo miraglio, e siedo tutto giorno Ell' ? de' suoi begli occhi veder vaga."

NINETEENTH LETTER.

The Pope's 300 episcopal foster-sons cost him 25,000 francs daily, and that makes the pleasant little sum of 1,500,000 francs for two sterile months, during which these doughty warriors have sat a good deal, but accomplished nothing by their sitting; for the old Roman proverb, "Romanus vincit sedendo," has not been verified here. The Pope is gradually getting frightened at this daily expenditure, and, after the fashion of great lords, who readily lay the blame of the failure of their own plans on the bad advice of their subjects, he said to-day, in an outbreak of disgust, "per furia di farmi infallibile, mi faranno fallire."

The second Letter of the famous Oratorian and member of the French Academy, Father Gratry, has just come here, and has produced a great impression. It treats of the gross forgeries by which the way for the introduction of the doctrine of Papal Infallibility has been gradually prepared, first in the ninth and then in the thirteenth century; and dwells especially on the fact that the theologians--above all Thomas Aquinas, who rules in the schools, and his many disciples and followers--were deceived by these fabrications, and that even the Popes themselves were misled by them. Gratry's exposition is clear and convincing; but he goes beyond the middle ages. He shows how dishonestly the Breviary was tampered with at Rome at the end of the sixteenth century, and how, up to the present time the Jesuits, Perrone and Wenninger,--the latter in a truly amazing fashion--have followed the practice of citing fabulous or corrupted testimonies.

TWENTIETH LETTER.

Then, again, it is a position that can easily be mastered by means of the majority. A minority may be invincible on the ground of dogma, but not of expediency. Everything can be ventured to combat a false doctrine, but not to hinder an imprudence or a premature definition. In questions of faith one dare not give in; not so in questions of discretion only. And then the Council must have been sooner or later driven from the ground of inopportuneness, if it was not shipwrecked on the order of business; for it was a point of view the decision could not finally hinge upon, in presence of a preponderating majority.

The defection of part of the Opposition was thus only a question of time, though it became more difficult for individuals after each act done in union, and many an inopportunist has advanced to theological contradiction of the dogma. But the attempt to make the rejection of the doctrine the principle of the party forced the contrast more and more on the minds of individuals. Among the Germans primarily, and in the groups of leading Bishops from different countries who took counsel together, a more determined spirit gradually developed itself, and it was seen that their adversaries made capital out of every sign of unclearness of view among the Opposition. They were constantly spreading reports that on the main point all were united, and that at most there were not above twenty opponents of the dogma, including only two Germans, who were adherents of Hermes and G?nther; perhaps only five opponents in all, or none at all. In presence of these assertions a public declaration seemed necessary, less for the faithful at home than for non-Catholics, who ask about the doctrine. The Bishops of the Opposition told themselves that honour and episcopal duty demanded that a Bishop should not withhold his belief on a fundamental question, at a moment when all have to speak, the moment of danger. The very success of the inopportunist policy is no true success. It is no victory of the truth, when it is not openly proclaimed in the contest. Those who do not fight under the banner of their own convictions are not on equal terms with their adversaries.

Thus the view has been more and more making way, that not only must every definition be avoided as dangerous, but that the doctrine of the Roman theologians and their adherents in the Episcopate must be rejected as false. And this brought men more and more to the scientific ground. It was no longer a mere affair of personal conviction, but of direct evidence, and the moment was come for literary argument to assert its place in the proceedings of the Council. The position of the mere inopportunists became more difficult, and the band which held the party together was loosened. Their adversaries at once zealously availed themselves of this favourable crisis; nearly every Bishop of the minority was plied with various intermediate formulas and conciliar proposals. Attempts were made to sow disunion among the leaders; political jealousies at home, and whatever else could be made use of, were seized upon to undermine mutual confidence. Some were to be deceived by the phantom of a middle party, and were told that they might take a position as peacemakers at the head of a mediating section--of course in the anticipation that every one who makes concessions and admits the principle of the definition will pass over to the majority. Against all these attempts the Bishops of the minority have, on the whole, though not without some wavering, kept firm and true. But still the transition to the strictly theological standpoint, where individual conviction on the question of Infallibility must be decisively recognised and represented, cannot be accomplished without an internal conflict and shaking of the party.

TWENTY-FIRST LETTER.

TWENTY-SECOND LETTER.

These ecclesiastical maxims, which deprive the laws of the land of all force and of all obligation for the conscience, are partly those already in existence, partly those any Pope may issue hereafter whenever it pleases him.

It is a stately edifice of universal Papal dominion whereon the keystone of Infallibility, which bears and upholds the whole, is to be placed, so that every command and ordinance of the Pope, even in political matters, is infallible, as the Jesuit Schrader has so clearly and forcibly pointed out. And to this must be added further a vast and infinite domain for infallible decisions, viz., "all that is requisite for preserving the revealed deposit in its integrity." Who can specify what is included here, or fix any limits to it?

Two other links in this world-embracing chain are not visible, which are yet necessary for its coherence. The Interdict, which robbed whole populations of divine service and sacraments, must be restored in its ancient splendour, and the Pope's right to dispense from oaths must be distinctly asserted.

The Fathers of the Council have daily opportunities of feeling how useful the temporal power is for the plenary jurisdiction of the Papacy. Were they assembled anywhere else than in Rome, there would be the possibility of holding a real Synod in the sense and manner of the Ancient Church, while the so-called Synod in Rome is in fact the mere painted corpse of a Council laid out on a bed of state.

Soul and freedom are wanting. On any other soil than that of the States of the Church, the Bishops could assemble in a room where they could debate and understand one another, while they are now forcibly detained in the Council Hall. They could come to a mutual understanding by means of the press, by printed proposals or statements of opinion, weekly reports and the like. Anywhere else such treatment as the Patriarch of Babylon experienced would have been impossible; he has now taken refuge under the protection of the French Embassy. But here the King of Rome lends to the Pontiff the means of enforcing unreserved submission, and it is like the lion's den, "vestigia nulla retrorsum."

Many a French Bishop has shared the experiences of the famous Lamennais thirty-eight years ago, who came to the Eternal City full of ardent devotion to the Chair of Peter and firm faith in its infallibility, and on his departure, after a long stay there, wrote to a friend, "Restait Rome; j'y suis all? et j'ai vu l? la plus infame cloaque qui ait jamais souill? les regards humains." I will not transcribe what follows, though it was lately read to me by a Bishop. It may be seen in his Letters. But this I can testify: there are men in the French Episcopate who used to be zealous champions of the temporal power, but who would now bear its loss with great equanimity, if only the calamity of the decrees chartered for the Council could be thereby warded off.

Yesterday, February 14, the ice was broken at last. The Bishop of Belley for the first time mentioned the Infallibility doctrine in the General Congregation, observing that the Council should at once proclaim it and go home, as that was the only object they had been summoned to Rome for.

TWENTY-THIRD LETTER.

It seemed to me important to ascertain more precisely the attitude of the Dominicans--who are still a powerful corporation, through their possessing such influential offices as the Inquisition, Index, Mastership of the Sacred Palace, etc.--towards Infallibilism. They have always been the standing rivals and opponents of the Jesuits, and before 1773 were often able to resist them successfully. Now, of course, everywhere out of Rome, they are out-flanked and repressed by the Jesuits, while in Rome they have no influence with the Pope. Yet they too are all decided Infallibilists, and that because of their great theologian, Thomas Aquinas. That he himself became implicated in this notion only through means of the forgeries in Gratian, and of another great fabrication, with spurious passages of the Fathers, specially devised for his own benefit, they neither know, nor are willing to believe when told of it. They say they have once sworn to the doctrine of St. Thomas, and must therefore adhere to the Infallibilist doctrine introduced by him into the schools, to avoid perjury.

A certain feeling of discouragement betrays itself among many Infallibilists, and there is much in the occurrences of the last few weeks to account for it. Thus the Archbishop of Milan, whose diocese nearly equals in extent the whole States of the Church, has received an address from his clergy and people expressing agreement with his work against the dogma, which has greatly rejoiced him. And the news of the state of feeling in Germany is disheartening. Golden results had been reckoned on from the efforts of the Jesuits and their pupils there for the last twenty years. It was supposed here that a very considerable number of people beyond the Alps must be inspired with zeal for Papal Infallibility. When the impulse given by D?llinger evoked so many and such weighty expressions of opinion on the other side, it was confidently expected in Rome that a strong popular demonstration in favour of the dogma would burst out, like a mighty hurricane, from every district in Germany, as the 800 Jesuits at work there would easily be able to bring that to pass. But now it is evident that no single man of influence in the whole country will make himself responsible by name for this opinion, and that all who are eminent for authority and knowledge--especially historians and theologians--protest against the proposed new dogma. Even the Jesuit Catechism has not been able to effect everything in this respect. Can a new dogma be fabricated for Spaniards, Italians and South Americans exclusively? And even in North Italy an opposition is being manifested. It is a questionable policy to show to the German people so openly the gulf between their religious thoughts and desires and those of the Latin nations, and even to widen that gulf. And in what position would the episcopal signataries of the Fulda Pastoral find themselves, after giving such an explicit assurance to Catholic Germany, "that the Council would establish no new or different dogmas from those already written by faith on the hearts and consciences of all German Catholics"? The faith and conscience of the German Catholics, both theologians and laity, have now spoken loudly and unequivocally enough. And it is utterly impossible for a German Bishop to return home from the Council with the new dogma ready-made in his hand, and say to his flock, like St. Paul, "Ye foolish Germans, who hath bewitched you?" "You don't know yourselves what you have hitherto held in your faith and conscience. See, here is the true bread for your souls, just brought fresh from the bake-house of the Council. This is what you ought long ago to have believed; be converted, and confess that to be white which you have thought was black, and that to be a divine truth which you have taken for an invention of man." It cannot be presumed that a Bishop would willingly contemplate exposing himself to the ridicule of all Germany.

TWENTY-FOURTH LETTER.

The Ultramontanes are--Rodez, Aire, N?mes, Angoul?me, Poictiers , Belley, St. Diez, Strasburg, Le Puy, Tulle, St. Jean de Maurienne, Langres, St. Claude, Blois, Chartres, Meaux, Versailles, Amiens, Beauvais, Rennes , Seez, Moulins, Toulouse, Carcassonne, Montauban, Laval and Le Mans--twenty-seven votes.

In the Third Party, headed by the Cardinal-Archbishop of Rouen, are included P?rigueus, Bourges, Tarantaise, Cambray, Arras, Nevers, Troyes, Pamiers, Tours--ten votes.

The Bishops of Digne, Fr?jus, Toulon and Soissons are described as doubtful.

TWENTY-FIFTH LETTER.

It is hardly necessary to observe to your readers that everything which takes place here turns on the question of Infallibility. The new order of business is merely the outer covering for this kernel. "With Infallibility we have all we desire or need," say the Italians, if that is gained we may "let the nigger go," and can dispense with his services for the future. But for German theologians, whose hair stands on end at the new order of business and all it involves, I can find no other consolation than what they may derive from the following Persian tale. An English ambassador sent to Persia--I think it was Morier--paid the usual visits at Teheran, and was introduced to the younger son of the Shah. He found him groping about blindfold in the room, and feeling for the furniture in it. The Prince explained this strange business by telling him that it was the rule for the younger sons to be blinded at the death of the Shah, in order to make them incapable of succeeding, and that he wished to prepare and practise himself beforehand for the fate impending over him. "Go ye, and do likewise."

If the German theologians should still have courage to present an address to their Bishops, the subscription might be, "Morituri vos salutant." Why have these theologians come to such utter discomfiture?

Here one already hears shouts of triumph; the day of retribution will soon come for those proud Transalpines, when they must bend their necks under the Caudine yoke of the new dogma, or await suspension, degradation, etc.

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