republic extemporized upon the ruins of three monarchies--the
monarchy of glory, the monarchy of tradition, and the monarchy of
public opinion--in the midst of this nation, suddenly insurgent
and beyond either its aim or expectation sovereign, what became
of the Church? What did its ministers? If some of them
participated in the current dreams, certainly the majority were
full of anguish and alarm; they did not combat the new
institutions; they did not pretend to exercise any influence for
or against any party; they sought only to purify the Republic by
securing in it a place for Religion; they did not stand aloof
from the people; they showed themselves, in its great assemblages
and in its fêtes, planting the cross of Jesus by the side of the
tree of liberty.
{101}
Never did the Church stand so aloof from politics; never was she
more modest in her attitude; never less exacting--I will not say
more obsequious, as far as the Government or the public was
concerned; never more absorbed with her mission of piety and
morality, whatever the Government of France might be, and whoever
her masters.
And what in their turn was the conduct of the people toward the
Church? I do not mean to say that they confided in her, or showed
her much affection. The popular movement in 1848 was no doubt far
from being religious; and the ideas, acts, and language which
proceeded from it every instant, were well calculated to disturb
and sadden the hearts of Christians; but religion and its
ministers were in no respect ill treated, insulted, or
persecuted; their forms of worship were not interrupted: when
they showed themselves out of doors, they were received with
respect; and at the sight of a virtuous archbishop mortally
wounded in the streets, in the very endeavor to appease the civil
war by the exhibition of the cross, a painful stupor seized the
people; a pang of remorse and of shame traversed those masses of
disbelievers at the sight of a martyr.
{102}
It was clear that in the interval between 1830 and 1848, although
the Christian Church had not aroused in the people either faith
or sympathy, that Church had at least won liberty and peace. When
the revolutionary fever had subsided, when the Republic had given
itself a chief, and was waiting for a master, it was no longer in
the street, by popular impressions, but in the Assemblies, and by
the constituted authorities, that the great questions of the day
were put and were solved. There, too, the progress, which the
Catholic Church had made, became immediately evident, and its
gains were ascertained. It counted at this moment among its most
zealous servants a man new to public affairs, who had entered
political life as an adherent of the Legitimist Opposition to the
Monarchy of 1830, a man who accepted the Republic, and had
acquired in a few days a just renown by his courageous resistance
to anarchy.
{103}
By a choice, fortunate but at the same time unforeseen, M. de
Falloux became the Minister of Public Instruction and of Worship
in the first cabinet formed by the Prince President of the
Republic. The new minister immediately devoted himself to the
important measure that the Catholic Church had had in view ever
since the year 1830, that is, to the complete establishment,
under the sanction of the law, of the principle of liberty of
instruction. He proceeded in his task at once with intelligence
and boldness. To prepare his project of law, he appointed a
numerous commission, and summoned to it the most eminent men, who
represented views and interests the most diverse; laymen and
ecclesiastics, Romanists, Protestants and philosophers,
Republicans, Legitimists, Orleanists and Bonapartists, M. Thiers
and the Abbé Dupanloup, M. Cousin and M. de Montalembert, M.
Saint Marc Girardin and M. Cochin, M. Cuvier and the Abbé Sibour.
[Footnote 12]
[Footnote 12: The following is a complete list of the members
of the Commission, as given in the "Moniteur" of the 22d
June, 1849: M. Thiers, president; MM. Cousin, St. Marc
Girardin, Dubois, the Abbé Dupanloup, Peupin, Janvier,
Laurentie, Freslon, Ballaguet, de Montalembert, Fresneau,
Poulain de Bossay, Cuvier, Michel, Armand de Melun, Henri de
Riancey, Cochin, the Abbé Sibour, Roux-Lavergne, de
Montreuil-Housset, and Alexis Chevalier, secretary.]
{104}
M. Thiers was the president of this commission, which sat during
five months. It discussed every question respecting the
organization of public instruction with a passionate ardor, and,
at the same time, with an earnest and sincere desire to
conciliate, by their resolutions, all opinions. According to the
character of the times and the state of public sentiment,
critical and perilous situations precipitate men sometimes to the
commission of insane acts of violence, and sometimes keep them
within the line of fairness and prudence. The project of law
which issued from the commission of M. de Falloux had the merit
of prudence.
{105}
In making mutual concessions, the representatives of the
different systems took good care to protest that they did not
renounce their peculiar principles--a language which made
sometimes their resolutions have the air of a superficial and
incoherent compromise; but men could, nevertheless, observe how
conspicuous that project was for its large and practical
character, and its respect for different rights; and they could
also see how the State, the Church, and private establishments
were left free to compete in matters of public instruction. When
this project was discussed in the Legislative Assembly, M. de
Falloux was no longer minister; but the impulse had been given,
and his measure was out of danger; his successor, M. de Parien,
too, gave it the support which it deserved; and after a
discussion which occupied thirty-seven sittings, the Assembly, by
a strong majority, passed the law, without introducing any
important modification. The Liberty of Instruction was founded.
{106}
Fifteen years have passed, and it subsists. The State, the
Church, private institutions founded by laymen or by
ecclesiastics, have competed actively during all that period.
Religious congregations, Lazarists, Dominicans, Oratorians,
Jesuits, have in this struggle displayed all the enthusiasm of
faith, all the ardor of reciprocal rivalry. The Jesuits, since
the year 1850, have opened twenty colleges for secondary
instruction, and have founded at Paris, for courses of study
preparatory to the special schools, an establishment whose
successes have attracted the attention of the government and of
the public; for it sends every year to the Military Schools, the
Polytechnic, Naval, or Central, an extraordinary number of
successful candidates, who have passed with honor, although the
competition has been extensive and the examinations are severe.
{107}
A great school, founded by the Archbishop of Paris for the higher
branches of ecclesiastical study in the ancient house of the
Carmelites, has formed priests who, in the public examinations
and theses, have proved themselves capable of taking rank by the
side of the best pupils of the lay establishment of the "École
Normale Supérieure." Everywhere the University has encountered
numerous and ardent rivals; and it has been at the same time in
its own interior a prey to painful trials. Under the pretext of
an interest for studies of a scientific and practical nature,
classical and philosophical studies have been displaced and
depreciated. At the very moment that the University was losing
its privileges beyond, it saw its principles and its organization
shaken inside its walls.
Faithful to her convictions and traditions, even while accepting
the experiments and the struggles that were forced upon her, the
University has surmounted perils from within and rivalries from
without; on the one side, little by little, it has returned to
its system of a large and solid teaching of the classics; on the
other, the level of the studies in its principal establishments
has been raised, and the number of its pupils has been ever on
the increase.
{108}
The Lycées counted (in 1850) 19,300; they have now (1865) more
than 30,000 pupils. The State has thrown open the career of
instruction to the Church, and has at the same time redoubled its
own solicitude and success. Liberty of instruction has calmed
both the anxieties of the religious party that made them demand
it, and those anxieties of the laity which that liberty had
inspired. It has given peace to the State and to the Church, at
the same time that it has excited their emulation and stimulated
their progress.
An incident which made some noise at the time has, under the new
regime, shown the force of the Liberal spirit, and proved that,
when needed, it would have unforeseen defenders.
{109}
Under the influence of a blind zeal, a pious ecclesiastic, the
Abbé Graume, demanded by what right the literature of pagan
antiquity occupied the place it did in public teaching; denounced
it as "the devouring canker of modern societies;" and insisted
that the Christian classics should replace in our schools the
Greek and Latin classics. What was this but to reject one of the
great cradles of modern civilization; to condemn the renaissance
of literature in the fifteenth century, as well as the religious
reform in the sixteenth century; and to close to the minds of
rising generations of Christians the general history of the
world! This attack upon the system of public instruction which
had been in vigor during the last four centuries in all the
States of Christendom, met from a part of the Romanists with a
sympathetic reception: bishops, eminent for learning, thanked its
author; M. Veuillot constituted himself his champion. But in the
Catholic Church itself, as well as in the University, the fire of
the defense silenced that of the attack; ecclesiastics, as
eminent by their piety as by their science, the Bishop of Orleans
at their head, proclaimed aloud their sympathy for the
comprehensive scheme and the liberal studies which embrace all
the fair works of man's intelligence.
{110}
The Jesuits on this occasion set an example of broad views and
common sense; they introduced no modification into the programmes
of their colleges; the Pères Cahoux and Daniel demonstrated their
propriety, nay, their necessity; and the literature of the Greeks
and of the Romans has preserved in the education of Christians
the place which it gained in their history by the right of genius
and by the splendor of its productions.
Scarcely had this controversy on a literary and moral subject
been settled, when questions of far more gravity were raised, and
more profoundly agitated Christian society. Christians found
themselves attacked simultaneously upon scientific and upon
political grounds. Men denied to the Christian Faith its
reasonableness and its vital sources--to the Church of Rome its
traditional and historical régime, and the temporal power of its
chief.
{111}
Two things strike me in this double attack--on the one hand its
timidity, yet gravity; on the other, the powerful resistance
which it encounters. Nothing is less novel than a denial of the
supernatural character of Christianity, and of its primitive
facts, of its miracles, of the divinity of its founder. The
eighteenth century carried on this war in a far more violent,
rude, and iniquitous spirit than the nineteenth century has done.
M. Renan, in the attempt to dethrone Jesus, has at least treated
him with admiration and respect; not from calculation, I feel
assured, but from the natural tone of his mind. In our time, men
have instincts and tastes, at once inconsequent and prudent; at
the very time when they engage in a deadly struggle they affect
to carry thither the cool impartiality of spectators; they
flatter themselves that they unite the acumen of the critic to
the feeling of the poet. The skeptic shows no disinclination to
play the mystic; and the erudite man strives to cover with the
vail of fancy the ruin that he makes.
{112}
Hume was a more stubborn skeptic, and Voltaire an enemy more
daring. If I pass from philosophy to politics, and from books to
events, I observe the war undergoing a similar transformation.
What a contrast between the attacks of the Directory and the
Emperor Napoleon the First upon the Papacy, and the circumspect
and hesitating treatment of which, in spite of the blows that it
receives, the Papacy is in these days the object? Are we to
conclude that the general course of events has changed, and that
the flood, which for a century whirled Europe along, is arrested
and subsiding? Certainly not: there are abundant facts to prove
the contrary. Whether regarded as a religious or a political
question, whether considered as affecting opinions or interests,
the contest between authority and liberty, between faith and
incredulity, is carried on more earnestly and more systematically
now than ever: principles on each side are pushed to their
extreme consequences, and contrasted in a manner never before the
case.
{113}
But experience imposes a restraint upon men even where it does
not change them. In the years of internal order which the Empire
insured, and in the years of liberty to which the constitutional
Monarchy gave the sanction of its laws, the different parties
learned to appreciate the obstacles with which they had to
contend, and to measure their own strength and that of their
opponents: they now know that everything is not possible to them;
and necessity has inculcated a certain amount of equity and good
sense. The experience of the past, as well as that of each day,
convinces them of their inability to insure a complete success to
their systems and their designs. Its adversaries thought
Christianity expiring; but they soon saw that it was still full
of life: while they express their surprise and persevere in their
warfare, they admit its practical influence, render homage to its
moral value, and strive, although they contest its rights, to
appropriate to themselves the inheritance of its blessings.
{114}
The wind has often blown from the right quarter for Catholic
Absolutists during this century; they have enjoyed the favor of
more than one master, and more than once they have requited him
by devoted services. More than once, also, they have obtained
from the supreme head of their Church official declarations,
which have been used by them against the Catholic Liberals. The
Absolutists, nevertheless, have not succeeded in changing the
tendency of Christian societies; they have arrested the course
neither of ideas nor events; their defeats have cost them dearer
than their victories were worth; and in spite of the obstinate
infatuation of parties, I doubt whether they themselves believe
in the progress of their cause. And how often has the Papacy
itself in our days been insulted and despoiled? Has it not even
been vanquished and expelled?
{115}
Still, in spite of what it has suffered, sometimes from
revolutions, sometimes from arbitrary power, it has outlived not
only the triumphs of its enemies, but its own impolitic measures:
and at this day, assailed by freethinkers in spirituals, by
ambitious neighbors in temporals, menaced with abandonment even
by its protectors, it is more energetically defended and
efficaciously supported than it ever was at the commencement of
this century in its reverses. Pius VII. never received such
pecuniary contributions as have been forwarded to Pius IX. in his
necessities; and if the French bishops were now summoned to a
council, their conduct would, beyond doubt, be more dignified and
more influential than was that of their predecessors in 1811.
Why such changes in a situation itself in effect unchanged?
Whence these hesitating measures, this embarrassed attitude of
the adversaries of the Christian faith and of the Christian
Church? What cause at the same time gives such boldness and even
success to their defenders?
{116}
Each age has its own peculiar and characteristic mission, and one
from which it cannot escape; every human being has his share in
it, whether he knows it or not. As a consequence of the truths
and the errors, of the good and evil, of the triumphs and
reverses of the preceding centuries, the nineteenth century has
before it a special task, which will employ all its energies, and
which will also, I hope, constitute its glory. It has both in the
State and in the Church found the two supreme forces that preside
over man's life, and over that of society, Authority and Liberty,
in violent conflict, in turn intoxicated with victory, or
vanquished, ruined. It is the mission of the nineteenth century
to make them live together, and live in peace; or at least in an
antagonism entailing upon neither any mortal danger. The
recognition of, and respect for, authority; the acceptance and
guarantee of freedom; these are the imperative necessities which
our age is called upon to feel and to satisfy, both in State and
Church.
{117}
Nor does this imply, as is often pretended, any inconsistency or
any compromise of principle or any policy of expedients; it is
not by inconsistency that great questions are settled, it is not
by expedients that we content the cravings of men's souls, or
calm the anxieties of human society; for mankind yields genuine
submission and feels real confidence only where it believes in
the existence of truth and justice. The recognition, veneration,
and guarantee of the different rights which co-exist naturally
and necessarily in human societies--of the rights, both of
individuals and of the State--of the rights of religious society
and of civil society--of the rights of little local societies as
well as of the grand general society--of the rights of conscience
as well as of tradition--of the rights of the future as well as
of those of the past--these are the dominant principles of which
the nineteenth century has to insure the triumph.
{118}
Triumphs assured, if Liberals and Christians are both of them
determined to accomplish it! Notwithstanding all the violent
emotions of party, and of all our differences on intellectual and
social subjects, the consciousness of this situation is ever
before our minds; and whether we admit it or not, the alliance of
the liberal movement with the movement of awakened Christianity,
is the grand measure and the grand hope of the day.
A Catholic priest, now a bishop, inquiring the origin of the
actual disputes of religion, and their probable issue, expresses
himself as follows:--"Free institutions, freedom of conscience,
political liberty, civil liberty, individual liberty, liberty of
families, of education, and of opinions, equality before the
laws, the equal division of imposts and of public charges, these
are all points upon which we make no difficulty; we accept them
frankly; we appeal to them on solemn occasions of public
discussion; we accept, we invoke the principles and the liberties
proclaimed in 1789; even those who combat those principles and
those liberties admit that liberty of religion and free education
have become acknowledged, self-evident truths (_des verités de
bon sens_)." [Footnote 13]
[Footnote 13: De la Pacification religieuse. By the Abbé
Dupanloup, pp. 263, 294, 306. Paris, 1845.]
{119}
This Catholic, this bishop, is no timorous priest, disposed to
make every sacrifice for the purpose of conciliation. It is the
same priest, who, from the first attack made upon the
constitution of the Catholic Church, has always distinguished
himself by the warmth and ability with which he has defended it.
The Papacy, its rights, its temporal independence and spiritual
sovereignty never had a champion more resolute, more opposed to
weak concessions or fallacious compromises, more constantly
intrepid in the breach than the Bishop of Orleans.
{120}
When the contest was warmest, the Pope (Pius IX.) published his
"Encyclical" of the 8th of December, 1864. Exempt from every
feeling of prejudice and hostility, and having no connection or
relation with the Papacy to make me pause, I feel no hesitation
in saying what I think of this document, at once the occasion and
the pretext for such a stir. In my opinion the error was a grave
one. Regarded as doctrine, the "Encyclical" was dignified and yet
embarrassed, positive and yet evasive; it confounded in the same
sweeping condemnation salutary truths and pernicious errors, the
principles of liberty and the maxims of licentiousness; it made
an effort to maintain, in point of right, the ancient traditions
and pretensions of Rome, without avowing in point of fact that
the ideas and potent influences of modern civilization were the
objects of its declared and unceasing hostility. In a system like
that of the present day--a system of publicity and freedom of
discussion--this manner of proceeding, its inconsistencies, its
reticence, its obscurities, whether arising from instinct or
premeditation, have ceased to be good policy, and in fact serve
no purpose whatever.
{121}
As a measure to meet a particular emergency, the "Encyclical" of
the 8th of December 1864 did not resemble that of Gregory XVI. in
1832; it was not called for by such extravagances as those of the
_Avenir_, or those of the Abbé de la Mennais; no urgent
necessity, no public exigency required that Rome should pronounce
itself; the debate between the Catholic Absolutists and the
Catholic Liberals was of ancient date, and was evidently destined
to long duration; the Papacy could not flatter itself that it
could put an end to this contest by any peremptoriness of
decision; her indulgent consideration was as due to the one party
as to the other. Doubtless the Catholic Liberals had not shown
less zeal for her cause, nor had the services which they had
rendered been less important; it was not a moment of peril for
Rome, and Rome was bound in justice, without any open declaration
at least, to maintain toward them an attitude of reserve.
{122}
The party, even before the publication of the "Encyclical," had
earned, as it still merits, her gratitude and her esteem; neither
M. de Montalembert, nor the Prince Albert de Broglie, nor M. de
Falloux, nor M. Cochin, nor any of their friends had imitated the
example of the Abbé de la Mennais; nor has one of them shown
subsequently any irritation, or even uttered a word of complaint;
they have maintained a respectful silence. The Bishop of Orleans
has done even more. A man of action as well as of faith, he
thought in the midst of the storm excited by the "Encyclical" of
the 8th of December, that he was bound to consider the perils
rather than the faults, and that it became a priest who had
supported liberty to support authority also when the object of
attack. He threw himself into the arena to cover the Papacy at
all hazards with his valiant arms: after having played the part
of a sagacious counselor, he played that of a faithful champion,
and he inflicted upon her adversaries blows so sturdy, that the
latter were in their turn obliged to put themselves upon their
defense, even in the midst of the success that the "Encyclical"
had insured them.
{123}
The Bishop of Orleans is probably reserved for many other
struggles; he may even be hurried by a warlike temperament to
carry the war into a field where it is uncalled for; but I shall
be both surprised and grieved if he do not always remain what he
is at this moment in the Church of France, the most enlightened
representative of its mission, moral and social, as well as the
most intrepid defender of its true and legitimate interests.