THE LEGENDS, THE POPES, AND THE PASQUINADES.
[Sidenote: The Manufacture of St. Philomena.]
Before quitting the subject of the relics at Rome, I must give my
readers what Hare calls "the extraordinary history of the manufacture
of S. Filomena, now one of the most popular saints in Italy, and one
towards whom idolatry is carried out with frantic enthusiasm both at
Domo d'Ossola and in some of the Neapolitan States."
"In the year 1802, while some excavations were going forward in the
Catacombs of Priscilla, a sepulchre was discovered containing the
skeleton of a young female; on the exterior were rudely painted some
of the symbols constantly recurring in these chambers of the dead--an
anchor, an olive branch (emblems of Hope and Peace), a scourge, two
arrows, and a javelin; above them the following inscription, of which
the beginning and end were destroyed:
--"LUMENA PAX TE CUM FI"--
The remains, reasonably supposed to be those of one of the early
martyrs for the faith, were sealed up and deposited in the treasury
of relics in the Lateran; here they remained for some years unthought
of. On the return of Pius VII. from France, a Neapolitan prelate was
sent to congratulate him. One of the priests in his train, who wished
to create a sensation in his district, where the long residence of the
French had probably caused some decay of piety, begged for a few relics
to carry home, and these recently discovered remains were bestowed on
him; the inscription was translated somewhat freely to signify _Santa
Philomena, rest in peace_. Another priest, whose name is suppressed,
_because of his great humility_, was favored by a vision in the broad
noonday, in which he beheld the glorious virgin Filomena, who was
pleased to reveal to him that she had suffered death for preferring
the Christian faith and her vow of chastity to the addresses of the
emperor, who wished to make her his wife. This vision leaving much
of her history obscure, a certain young artist, whose name is also
suppressed, perhaps because of his great humility, was informed in a
vision that the emperor alluded to was Diocletian, and at the same
time the torments and persecutions suffered by the Christian virgin
Filomena, as well as her wonderful constancy, were also revealed to
him. There were some difficulties in the way of the Emperor Diocletian,
which _incline_ the writer of the _historical_ account to incline
to the opinion that the young artist in his wisdom _may_ have made
a mistake, and that the emperor may have been not Diocletian, but
Maximian. The facts, however, now admitted of no doubt; the relics
were carried by the priest Francesco da Lucia to Naples; they were
enclosed in a case of wood resembling in form the human body; this
figure was habited in a petticoat of white satin, and over it a crimson
tunic after the Greek fashion; the face was painted to represent
nature, a garland of flowers was placed on the head, and in the hands
a lily and a javelin with the point reversed, to express her purity
and her martyrdom; then she was laid in a half-sitting posture in a
sarcophagus, of which the sides were glass, and, after lying for some
time in state in the chapel of the Torres family in the Church of Sant'
Angiolo, she was carried in grand procession to Mugnano, a little town
about twenty miles from Naples, amid the acclamations of the people,
working many and surprising miracles by the way.... Such is the legend
of S. Filomena, and such the authority on which she has become within
the last twenty years one of the most popular saints in Italy."--_Mrs.
Jameson's Sacred and Legendary Art_, p. 671.
But, after all, the most extraordinary case of saint-manufacture is
not that of Philomena, but that of _Buddha_! I have not room for the
story here, but if any one wishes to know how the papacy made Buddha a
Christian saint, he will find the whole story, with the proofs, in _A
History of the Warfare of Science and Theology_, by Andrew D. White,
LL. D., late President and Professor of History at Cornell University,
and until recently United States Ambassador to Germany.
[Sidenote: "The Courteous Spaniard."]
A few days ago we visited the Church of St. Laurence Without the Walls,
where in a silver shrine under the high altar, the remains of St.
Laurence and St. Stephen are said to rest. The walls of the portico of
the church are covered with a series of frescoes, lately repainted. One
series represents the story of St. Stephen and that of the translation
of his relics to this church. "The relics of St. Stephen were preserved
at Constantinople, whither they had been transported from Jerusalem by
the Empress Eudoxia, wife of Theodosius II. Hearing that her daughter,
Eudoxia, wife of Valentinian II., Emperor of the West, was afflicted
with a devil, she begged her to come to Constantinople, that her demon
might be driven out by the touch of the relics. The younger Eudoxia
wished to comply, but the devil refused to leave her unless St. Stephen
was brought to Rome. An agreement was therefore made that the relics
of St. Stephen should be exchanged for those of St. Laurence. St.
Stephen arrived, and the Empress was immediately relieved of her devil;
but when the persons who had brought the relics of St. Stephen from
Constantinople were about to take those of St. Laurence back with them,
they all fell down dead! Pope Pelagius prayed for their restoration
to life, which was granted for a short time, to prove the efficacy of
prayer, but they all died again ten days later! Thus the Romans knew
that it would be criminal to fulfil their promise, and part with the
relics of St. Laurence, and the bodies of the two martyrs were laid in
the same sarcophagus." And thus we know how much more the Romans think
of relics than of honor and truth. "It is related that when they opened
the sarcophagus, and lowered into it the body of St. Stephen, St.
Laurence moved on one side, giving the place of honor on the right hand
to St. Stephen; hence, the common people of Rome have conferred on St.
Laurence the title of '_Il cortese Spagnuolo_'--the courteous Spaniard."
Another series of these pictures in the portico represents the story
of a sacristan who, coming to pray in this church before day, found it
filled with worshippers, and was told by St. Laurence himself that they
were the Apostle Peter, the first martyr, Stephen, and other apostles,
martyrs and virgins from paradise, and was ordered to go and tell the
Pope what he had seen, and bid him come and celebrate a solemn mass.
The sacristan objected that the Pope would not believe him, and asked
for some visible sign. Then St. Laurence ungirt his robe and gave him
his girdle. When the Pope was accompanying him back to the basilica
they met a funeral procession. To test the powers of the girdle, the
Pope laid it on the bier, and at once the dead arose and walked.
[Sidenote: The Miracles of St. Dominic.]
That is not the only miracle of resurrection offered to our credulity
by these ecclesiastical legends. The three principal frescoes in the
chapter house of the church of St. Sisto, recently painted by the
Padre Besson, represent three miracles of St. Dominic--in each case of
raising from the dead--the subjects being a mason who had fallen from
a scaffold when building this monastery, a child, and the young Lord
Napoleone Orsini, who had been thrown from his horse and instantly
killed, and who was brought to life by St. Dominic on this spot, as
is further commemorated by an inscription on the wall. But miracles
were nothing uncommon in the history of the founder of the powerful
Dominican Order. In the refectory of St. Marco, at Florence, we had
seen the fine fresco which represents the miraculous provision made
for him and his forty friars at a time of scarcity by two angels. The
refectory in which this miracle took place is at the Church of St.
Sabina, on the Aventine, in Rome; but there are three other things at
this church which interested us hardly less than the scene of that
miracle. One of them is the huge, pumpkin-shaped, black stone, two or
three times as big as a man's head, which the devil is said to have
hurled at St. Dominic one day when he found him lying prostrate in
prayer. This stone is the most conspicuous object in the church, being
set up on a pillar about three feet high, right in the middle of the
nave. Not far away is the marble slab on which the saint was lying at
the time that the formidable missile was thrown. The adversary's aim
was not good, and the saint was not harmed. The second thing of chief
interest here is the Chapel of the Rosary, at the other end of the same
aisle in which the marble slab lies, built on the very spot where St.
Dominic had the vision in which he received the rosary from the hands
of the Virgin. The supernatural gift is commemorated in a beautiful
painting by Sassoferato. It is hardly necessary to explain to any of my
readers that a rosary is a string of beads used by Roman Catholics to
keep the count of the number of _Pater-nosters_ and _Ave-Marias_ which
they repeat, and that this manner of "vain repetitions" was first used
by the Dominicans among Roman Catholics, though the custom was really
borrowed from the Mohammedans and Brahmins, who still use rosaries. The
third object is the famous orange tree, now six hundred and seventy
years old, which is said to have been brought from Spain and planted
in the court here by St. Dominic himself, orange trees having been
unknown in Rome before that time, and "which still lives, and is firmly
believed to flourish or fail with the fortunes of the Dominican Order."
Ladies are not allowed to approach this tree, so, as there were ladies
in our party, we all contented ourselves with a look at it through a
window. Hard by, of course, there is a room where things are sold to
pilgrims and visitors. There we bought a rosary, the beads of which
are made of the fruit of the plant called the Thorn of Christ, with
the exception of the bead next to the cross, which is a tiny dried
orange from St. Dominic's tree. Enclosed in the cross are a little
piece of the wood of the tree, and some earth from the catacombs where
the bodies of Sts. Peter and Paul, and of the holy virgin martyrs,
Sts. Agnes and Cecilia, reposed for some time. The printed leaflet
which accompanies our purchase tells us that "these rosaries, when
sold or ordered, are blessed and enriched with the indulgences of the
Rosary Confraternity and the papal blessing. When blessed they may be
distributed; _but if resold they lose all the indulgences_." (Italics
ours.)
Still another relic of great interest in this convent of St. Sabina
is the crucifix of Michele Ghislieri (afterwards Pope Pius V.). "One
day, as Ghislieri was about to kiss his crucifix, in the eagerness
of prayer, the image of Christ, says the legend, retired of its own
accord from his touch, for it had been poisoned by an enemy, and a kiss
would have been death."
[Sidenote: Sundry Miracles by Other Saints, and Images.]
In the Church of St. Gregory, on the C[oe]lian Hill, the thing that
interested us most was the picture by Badalocchi, "commemorating a
miracle on this spot, when, at the moment of elevation, the Host
is said to have bled in the hands of St. Gregory, to convince an
unbeliever of the truth of transubstantiation." This is the same
Gregory who presented certain foreign ambassadors with a handful of
earth from the arena of the Coliseum as a relic for their sovereigns,
so many martyrs having suffered death there, and "upon their receiving
the gift with disrespect, he pressed it, when blood flowed from the
soil."
Not far from the Church of St. Gregory we were shown the hermitage
where St. Giovanni de Matha lived. "Before he came to reside here he
had been miraculously brought from Tunis (whither he had gone on a
mission) to Ostia, in a boat without helm or sail, in which he knelt
without ceasing before the crucifix throughout the whole of his voyage!"
Time would fail me to tell of the miraculous surgical operation
performed by Sts. Cosmo and Damian upon a man who was praying in the
church dedicated to them, and who had a diseased leg amputated without
pain by the good saints while he slept; and not only so, but had a
sound leg, which they had taken from the body of a man just buried,
substituted for the diseased one. Nor can I dwell on the miraculous
blindness with which the guard sent to seize Pope St. Martin I. was
stricken the moment he caught sight of the pontiff in St. Maria
Maggiore, or the miraculous tears shed by an image of the Virgin
attached to a neighboring wall when she saw a cruel murder committed in
the street below, or the madonnas and crucifixes that spoke to saints
on various occasions. One of these, however, is too significant to be
omitted altogether. There is in the Church of St. Agostino a sculptured
image of the Madonna and child. "It is not long since the report was
spread that one day a poor woman called upon this image of the Madonna
for help; it began to speak, and replied, 'If I had only something,
then I could help thee, but I myself am so poor!' This story was
circulated, and very soon throngs of credulous people hastened hither
to kiss the foot of the Madonna, _and to present her with all kinds of
gifts_." (Italics mine.)
[Sidenote: How the Papal Treasury was Filled, and how it was Emptied.]
The evil methods employed at various times to replenish the papal
treasury are known to all readers of history. The best known, perhaps,
is the shameless traffic in indulgences by Tetzel, which helped to
precipitate the Reformation. Hare closes his account of the execution
of Beatrice Cenci for complicity in the murder of her father with the
statement that "sympathy will always follow one who sinned under the
most terrible of provocations, and whose cruel death was due to the
avarice of Clement VIII. for the riches which the church acquired by
the confiscation of the Cenci property," and cites the petition of
Gaspare Guizza (1601), in which he claims a reward from the Pope for
his service in apprehending one of the assassins of Francesco Cenci,
on the ground that thus "the other accomplices and their confessions
were secured, and _so many thousands of crowns brought into the
papal treasury_." The venality of Pope Alexander VI., Rodrigo Borgia
(1492-1503), "the wicked and avaricious father of Cæsar and Lucretia,
who is believed to have died of the poison which he intended for one
of his cardinals," is thus hit off by Pasquino:
"Vendit Alexander claves, altaria, Christum;
Emerat ille prius, vendere jure potest."
Of Innocent X. (1644-'55), Pasquino says, "Magis amat Olympiam quam
Olympium," referring to the shameful relations existing between this
Pope and his avaricious sister-in-law, Olympia Maidalchini, who made
it her business to secure the profits of the papacy in hard cash.
Trollope, in his _Life of Olympia_, says: "No appointment to office of
any kind was made except in consideration of a proportionable sum paid
down into her own coffers. This often amounted to three or four years'
revenue of the place to be granted. Bishoprics and benefices were sold
as fast as they became vacant. One story is told of an unlucky disciple
of Simon, who in treating with the Pope for a valuable see, just fallen
vacant, and hearing from her a price at which it might be his, far
exceeding all he could command, persuaded the members of his family to
sell all they had for the purpose of making this profitable investment.
The price was paid, and the bishopric was given him, but, with a
fearful resemblance to the case of Ananias, he died within the year,
and his ruined family saw the see a second time sold by the insatiable
and incorrigible Olympia.... During the last year of Innocent's life,
Olympia literally hardly ever quitted him. Once a week, we read, she
left the Vatican, secretly by night, accompanied by several porters
carrying sacks of coins, the proceeds of the week's extortions and
sales, to her own palace. And during these short absences she used to
lock the Pope into his chamber, and take the key with her!" She finally
"deserted him on his death-bed, making off with the accumulated spoils
of his ten years' papacy, which enabled her son, Don Camillo, to build
the Palazzo Doria Pamfili, in the Corso, and the beautiful Villa Doria
Pamfili," west of the Janiculan Hill. This villa, with its casino,
garden, lake, fountain, pine-shaded lawns and woods, and its fine view
of St. Peter's standing out against the green Campagna beyond, and
the blue Sabine mountains in the distance, is to this day one of the
loveliest villas in Italy, and the favorite resort of the latter-day
Romans and visitors to their city on the two afternoons of the week on
which it is open to pedestrians and two-horse carriages.
The notorious Simony practiced by the popes, in which, as we have just
seen, Olympia became such an adept, gave rise to the biting Latin
couplet--
"An Petrus Romæ fuerit, sub judice lis est;
Simonem Romæ nemo fuisse negat."
Some of the modern methods of making use of the Pope for purposes
of gain are less objectionable than those of Olympia. Dr. Alexander
Robertson, in his _Roman Catholic Church in Italy_, just published,
says: "One of the very latest novelties of the 'Pope's Shop' is a
penny-in-the-slot blessing machine. Specimens of this were lately to be
seen in the Corso, Rome, about half way between the Piazza Colonna and
the Piazza del Popolo. A penny is dropped into it. The cinematograph,
or wheel of life, goes round, when, lo! there appears a long procession
of richly clothed cardinals and monsignori, and then the Pope in a
sedan chair, accompanied by his Swiss Guards. As he is carried past
the spectator, he turns towards the window of his chair, a smile
overspreads his face, he raises his hands, and gives his blessing. On
these machines there is an inscription to the effect that the blessing
thus given and received is equivalent to that given by the Pope in
person in St. Peter's. Truly a novel way of turning an honest penny!"
We hear that a rash churchman, not liking the facts just stated,
undertook to deny them in the public prints, when up spoke some English
gentlemen, who had been in Rome recently, and bowled the churchman over
with the statement that they had themselves seen this blessing machine
on the Corso.
One never touches this subject of the vast wealth of the papacy without
calling to mind the well-known rejoinder of the great theologian,
Thomas Aquinas, when the Pope was showing him all his money and riches,
and said, "You see, Thomas, the church cannot now say what it said in
early times, 'Silver and gold have I none.'" "No," answered Aquinas,
"nor can it say, 'Rise up and walk'" (Acts iii. 6). This loss of
spiritual power, this loss of ability to minister salvation to others,
is one of the most melancholy results of the corruption of the papacy.
[Sidenote: Some Ugly Things in the Lives of the Popes.]
Dr. Alexander Robertson, in his recent book on _The Roman Catholic
Church in Italy_, which has received the hearty approval of the King
of Italy and his Prime Minister, says: "There are few, I daresay,
who have looked into the history of the popes, no matter what their
religious faith may be, who will not agree with me when I say that it
does not afford pleasant reading. One's intellect rebels against their
preposterous claims and pretensions, and one's moral sense against
their character and lives. Amongst them there were some good men, some
learned men, and some really able men; but, taking them all in all,
they were, beyond doubt, amongst the lowest class of men to be found
on the pages of history. To wade through their lives is to cross a
pestiferous moral swamp of worldliness, simony, nepotism, concubinage,
personal animosities, sanguinary feuds, forged decretals, plunderings,
poisonings, assassinations, massacres, death."[17]
One may smile at such papal peccadilloes as the vanity of Paul II.,
who was chiefly remarkable for his personal beauty, and was so vain
of his appearance that, when he was elected Pope, he wished to take
the name of Formosus. One may be amused at the intense self-esteem of
Urban VIII., of whose spoliation of ancient Rome Pasquino says, "Quod
non fecerunt barbari, fecerunt Barberini," and who, in the Barberini
palace, had the Virgin and angels represented as bringing in the
ornaments of the papacy at his coronation, and in another room a number
of the Barberini bees (the family crest) flocking against the sun, and
eclipsing it--to symbolize the splendor of the family. But our feeling
changes when we read that "he issued a bull by which the name, estates
and privileges of his house might pass to any living male descendant,
legitimate or illegitimate, whether child of prince or priest," lest
the family of Barberini might become absorbed in that of Colonna. And
we do not go far in our reading about such popes before the feeling of
amusement yields to one of sadness, indignation and horror. We need
not insist upon the story of the female Pope Joan, who is said to have
secured her election to the papal throne disguised as a man, and to
have reigned two years as John VIII., and then to have died a shameful
death; for, notwithstanding the indisputable fact that till 1600 her
head was included among the terra cotta representations of the other
popes in the Cathedral of Sienna, and was inscribed "Johannes VIII.,
Femina de Anglia," and that it was then changed into a head of Pope
Zacharias by the Grand Duke, at the request of Pope Clement VIII.,
the story is now generally discredited. But there are many other
facts, established beyond controversy, which explain fully the feeling
of the great majority of the Italian people and the verdict of the
accredited historians of the world. When the penitential Pope, Adrian
VI. (1522-'23), died of drinking too much beer, "the house of his
physician was hung with garlands by midnight revellers, and decorated
with the inscription, Liberatori Patriæ, S. P. Q. R.'" The nepotism of
the learned, brilliant and witty Paul III. "induced him to form Parma
into a duchy for his natural son Pierluigui, to build the Farnese
Palace, and to marry his grandson Ottavio to Marguerite, natural
daughter of Charles V." John XII., the first Pope who took a new name,
"scandalized Christendom by a life of murder, robbery, adultery and
incest." Of the tombs of the eighty-seven popes who were buried in the
old basilica of St. Peter's, only two were replaced when the present
building was erected, those of the two popes who lived in the time and
excited the indignation of Savonarola--"Sixtus IV., with whose cordial
concurrence the assassination of Lorenzo de' Medici was attempted,
and Innocent VIII., the main object of whose policy was to secure
place and power for his illegitimate children," sixteen in number, and
who is represented on his tomb as holding in his hand the spear of
"St. Longinus," which had pierced the side of Christ. This spear was
sent to Innocent VIII. by the Sultan Bajazet, nearly fifteen hundred
years after the crucifixion, and, as we have already seen, is now
preserved in St. Peter's as one of its four chief relics. Guicciardini
says of the death of Alexander VI.: "All Rome ran with indescribable
gladness to visit the corpse. Men could not satiate their eyes with
feeding on the carcase of the serpent who, by his unbounded ambition
and pestiferous perfidy, by every demonstration of horrible cruelty,
monstrous lust and unheard-of avarice, selling without distinction
things sacred and profane, had filled the world with venom."
"Pope Paul V. granted dispensations and pensions to any persons who
would assassinate Fra Paolo Sarpi; Pope Pius V. offered, as Mr. Froude
tells us, 'remission of sin to them and their heirs, with annuities,
honors and promotions, to any cook, brewer, baker, vintner, physician,
grocer, surgeon, or others,' who would make away with Queen Elizabeth;
and Pope Gregory XIII. offered a high place in heaven to any one who
would murder the Prince of Orange; and the poor wretch, Balthazar
Gerard, who did the infamous deed, actually told his judges 'that he
would soon be a saint in heaven, and would have the first place there
next to God,' whilst his family received a patent of nobility, and
entered into the possession of the estate of the Prince in the Franche
Comté--rewards promised for the commission of the crime by Cardinal
Granvelle." (Dr. Alexander Robertson's _Roman Catholic Church in
Italy_, p. 94.)
These are some of the things that help to explain not only the tone
of the pasquinades, not only the indictments of the world's leading
historians, which are to be presently cited, but also the present
attitude of something like twenty millions of the thirty-odd millions
of Italy's inhabitants, who have forsaken the church altogether.
What idea the people have of the Jesuits in particular is well shown
by the legend connected with the Piazza del Gesu, the great open space
in front of the Jesuit church, which is considered the windiest place
in Rome. The story is that the devil and the wind were one day taking a
walk together. "When they came to this square, the devil, who seemed to
be very devout, said to the wind, 'Just wait a minute, mio caro, while
I go into this church.' So the wind promised, and the devil went into
the Gesu, and has never come out again--and the wind is blowing about
in the Piazza del Gesu to this day."
[Sidenote: Pasquino's View of the Pope.]
One of the interesting objects in Rome is a mutilated statue called
Pasquino, which stands at the corner of the Orsini Palace, one of
the most central and public places in the city. The reason for the
interest attaching to this almost shapeless piece of marble is that
for centuries it was used for placarding those satires upon the popes
which, by their exceeding cleverness and biting truth, have made the
name of pasquinade famous the world over. No squib that was ever
affixed to that column had a keener edge than the one known as "The
Antithesis of Christ," which appeared at the beginning of the sixteenth
century, and runs as follows:
Christ said, "My kingdom is not of this world."
The Pope conquers cities by force.
Christ had a crown of thorns:
The Pope wears a triple diadem.
Christ washed the feet of his disciples:
The Pope has his kissed by kings.
Christ paid tribute:
The Pope takes it.
Christ fed the sheep:
The Pope wishes to be master of the world.
Christ carried on his shoulders the cross:
The Pope is carried on the shoulders of his servants in liveries
of gold.
Christ despised riches:
The Pope has no other passion than for gold.
Christ drove out the merchants from the temple:
The Pope welcomes them.
Christ preached peace:
The Pope is the torch of war.
Christ was meekness:
The Pope is pride personified.
Christ promulgated the laws that the Pope tramples under foot.
[Sidenote: What the Italians now Think about it.]
"But," some one may say, "the pasquinades were written long ago, and,
while they are doubtless true descriptions of the papacy of the past,
surely no one would take the same view now." For answer I may quote
the statement of Dr. Raffaelle Mariano, Professor of Philosophy in the
University of Naples, who is not a Protestant, but, as he tells us, was
"born in the Roman Catholic Church," and was "a fervent Catholic from
infancy." Speaking of the vast difference which he found between the
teachings of the church and those of the New Testament as to what is
necessary to salvation, he says, "Therefore, Roman Catholicism is not
only not Christianity, but it is the very antithesis of Christianity,"
a statement every whit as strong as Pasquino's. Some American
Protestants, especially those who have personal friends in the Roman
Catholic Church whom they honor and love--and there are many people in
that church who are richly worthy of honor and love, and who do not
approve of the evils we have been describing any more than we do--are
sometimes disposed to think that Protestant writers are too severe in
their condemnation of the Romish Church as a system. A visit to Italy,
the centre of Romanism, would quickly disabuse these overcharitable
Protestants of that impression. We have all read of such things as
are described above in connection with the relics and legends, but
they seem far away and unreal, and almost impossible, until we come
to the home of Romanism and find them all around us. Then it ceases
to surprise us that so large a proportion of the most intelligent men
in Italy occupy a position of indifference and unbelief, or hostility
and scorn, towards the Christian religion, for Romanism is the only
Christianity that most of them know. Let it be remembered, too, that
the King, able, conscientious, patriotic, devoted to the welfare of
his people, and the Prime Minister, Zanardelli, like his predecessor,
Crispi, and the members of Parliament, and the army and navy, and the
whole government which has given Italy such wonderful stability and
prosperity since the overthrow of the papal dominion and opened before
the nation a future of so much promise, are all standing aloof from
the Pope. Let any one see one of the great pilgrimages from every
part of the country to the tomb of Victor Emmanuel, who freed Italy,
as we saw it the other day, and observe the immense popularity of the
great liberator and his successors of the house of Savoy, and let him
note the firm opposition of Italy's leading men to the papacy, and he
will see that the view of the Pope which the secular newspapers so
persistently seek to force upon the people of the English-speaking
world simply cannot be that of the thoughtful men of Italy.
By the way, I see plenty of women confessing to the priests, but
very, very few men. The textbook used in the training of priests
as father-confessors, and the standard work of the church on that
subject, approved by Pope Leo XIII., is Liguori's _Moral Philosophy_.
"On July 14, 1901, the _Asino_, a daily newspaper published in Rome,
printed in its columns, and also in the form of large bills, which it
caused to be posted up in public places in the chief cities of Italy, a
challenge offering one thousand francs to any Roman Catholic newspaper
which would have the courage to print the Latin text, with an Italian
translation, of two passages in Liguori's book, which it specified.
The challenge was never taken up, and it never will be, for any one
daring to publish the passages named would certainly be prosecuted for
outraging public decency" (Dr. Alexander Robertson, _Roman Catholic
Church in Italy_, p. 149). Hare says, "It was a curious characteristic
of the laxity of morals in the time of Julius II. (1503-'13), that her
friends did not hesitate to bury the famous Aspasia of that age in
this church (St. Gregorio), and to inscribe upon her tomb: 'Imperia,
cortisana Romana, quæ digna tanto nomine, raræ inter homines formæ
specimen dedit.'... But this monument has now been removed."[18]
Most of the facts above cited, especially those concerning the legends
and the Popes, except where specific acknowledgment is made to other
writers, have been drawn from Hare's invaluable _Walks in Rome_. Let us
conclude the list with the testimonies of a few eminent men of
unimpeachable competence and veracity as to the character and influence
of the Roman Catholic Church as a system.
[Sidenote: Macaulay, Dickens and Gladstone on the Influence of
Romanism.]
In the first chapter of his _History of England_, Lord Macaulay says:
"From the time when the barbarians overran the Western Empire to the
time of the revival of letters, the influence of the Church of Rome
had been generally favorable to science, to civilization, to good
government. But during the last three centuries, to stunt the growth
of the human mind has been her chief object. Throughout Christendom,
whatever advance has been made in knowledge, in freedom, in wealth,
and in the arts of life, has been made in spite of her, and has
everywhere been in inverse proportion to her power. The loveliest and
most fertile provinces of Europe have, under her rule, been sunk in
poverty, in political servitude, and in intellectual torpor, while
Protestant countries, once proverbial for sterility and barbarism,
have been turned by skill and industry into gardens, and can boast of
a long list of heroes and statesmen, philosophers and poets. Whoever,
knowing what Italy and Scotland naturally are, and what, four hundred
years ago, they actually were, shall now compare the country round Rome
with the country round Edinburgh, will be able to form some judgment
as to the tendency of papal domination. The descent of Spain, once
the first among the monarchies, to the lowest depths of degradation,
the elevation of Holland, in spite of many natural disadvantages, to
a position such as no commonwealth so small has ever reached, teach
the same lesson. Whoever passes in Germany from a Roman Catholic to
a Protestant principality, in Switzerland from a Roman Catholic to a
Protestant canton, in Ireland from a Roman Catholic to a Protestant
county, finds that he has passed from a lower to a higher grade of
civilization. On the other side of the Atlantic the same law prevails.
The Protestants of the United States have left far behind them the
Roman Catholics of Mexico, Peru and Brazil. The Roman Catholics of
Lower Canada remain inert, while the whole continent round them is
in a ferment with Protestant activity and enterprise. The French
have doubtless shown an energy and intelligence which, even when
misdirected, have justly entitled them to be called a great people.
But this apparent exception, when examined, will be found to confirm
the rule, for in no country that is called Roman Catholic has the
Roman Catholic Church, during several generations, possessed so little
authority as in France."
Charles Dickens, in a letter written from Switzerland, in 1845, to
his friend and biographer, Forster, says: "In the Simplon, hard
by here, where (at the bridge of St. Maurice over the Rhone) the
Protestant canton ends and a Catholic canton begins, you might
separate two perfectly distinct and different conditions of humanity
by drawing a line with your stick in the dust on the ground. On the
Protestant side--neatness, cheerfulness, industry, education, continued
aspiration, at least, after better things. On the Catholic side--dirt,
disease, ignorance, squalor and misery. I have so constantly observed
the like of this since I came abroad that I have a sad misgiving that
the religion of Ireland lies at the root of all its sorrows." Writing
from Genoa, in 1846, Dickens says, "If I were a Swiss, with a hundred
thousand pounds, I would be as steady against the Catholic canons and
the propagation of Jesuitism as any Radical among them; believing the
dissemination of Catholicity to be the most horrible means of political
and social degradation left in the world."
In connection with Dickens' remark about Ireland, we may quote the
remarkable statement of Mr. Michael McCarthy, himself a Roman Catholic,
in his book, _Five Years in Ireland_, pp. 65 and 66, where, after
describing the welcome of the Belfast Corporation to Lord Cadogan on
his first visit, in 1895, to the Protestant North of Ireland, and
their glowing statements about the peaceful and prosperous condition
of their city and district, he contrasts this happy condition with
the unhappy state of the "rest of Ireland," meaning by that the
Roman Catholic parts. "In the rest of Ireland there is no social or
industrial progress to record. The man who would say of it that it
was 'progressing and prospering,' or that 'its work people were fully
employed,' or that there existed 'a continued development of its
industries,' or that its towns 'had increased in value and population,'
would be set down as a madman. It is in this seven-eighths of Ireland
that the growing and great organization of the Catholic Church has
taken root."
Mr. Gladstone, in an article on "Italy and her Church," in the _Church
Quarterly Review_ for October, 1875, says: "Profligacy, corruption and
ambition, continued for ages, unitedly and severally, their destructive
work upon the country, through the Curia and the papal chair; and in
doing it they of course have heavily tainted the faith of which that
chair was the guardian." Elsewhere he says, "There has never been any
more cunning blade devised against the freedom, the virtue and the
happiness of a people than Romanism."
Nathaniel Hawthorne, in his _Marble Faun_, which, by the way, contains
the most charming of all the descriptive writing about Rome, put
the case none too strongly when he spoke of being "disgusted with
the pretense of holiness and the reality of nastiness, each equally
omnipresent" in the city of the popes. The new government has wrought
a great change in this respect, and Rome is in many parts of it now
quite a clean city.
There, then, are the facts as to the influence of the Roman Catholic
Church. I am, of course, very far from saying that there are no good
people in that church. As I have already stated, I believe that there
are many good people in it, but my own observation has satisfied me
that the verdict of history as to the baleful influence of the system
is absolutely correct.
"What, then," some one may ask, "do the good people in that church
think of all the immoralities and frauds that it has condoned and
fostered?" The answer is that the really good people in that church
must grieve over them and deplore them just as the good people in other
churches do.
* * * * *
_P. S._--It is generally believed, and apparently with good reason,
that the new Pope, Pius X., is a better man than many of his
predecessors, and that he cannot be charged with the immoralities or
the ambition and avarice which characterized them. Let us hope that he
will have the courage to attempt some real reform in the lives of many
of his clergy.
FOOTNOTES:
[17] It was a bad day for the cause of truth when Foxe's _Book of
Martyrs_ was allowed to go out of general circulation. When I was a boy
it was no uncommon thing to see copies of it in American homes. Now it
is rarely seen. A new and corrected edition of it ought to be brought
out and given wide circulation. There have been not a few indications
this year that our people are forgetting some of the most instructive
history of all the past, and those who seem to be most oblivious of it
are the editors of some of the secular newspapers.
[18] There are other indications of some improvement in this matter,
but an Anglican resident in Italy, quoted by the _Review of Reviews_ as
"a painstaking and fair-minded" witness, says, "People are not shocked
by clerical immorality, but regard it as natural and inevitable." To an
Anglican friend a Roman prelate lamented that a certain cardinal was
not elected at the late conclave. But the Anglican replied, "He is a
man of conspicuous immorality." "No doubt," was the answer, "but you
Americans seem to think there is no virtue but chastity. The Cardinal
has not that, but he is an honest man."