10,000 leapers, 3,000 beggars, and 2,000 singers take part
in the =Leaping Procession at Echternach= in Luxemburg, which
is celebrated yearly on Whit-Tuesday. It was spoken of in the
sixteenth century as an ancient custom. After an “exciting”
sermon, the procession is formed in rows of from four to six
persons bound together by pocket-handkerchiefs held in their
hands; Wilibrord’s dance is played, and all jump in time to the
music, five steps forward and two backward, or two backward and
three forward, varied by three or four leaps to the right and
then as many to the left. Thus continually leaping the procession
goes through the streets of the city to the parish church, up
the sixty-two steps of the church stair and along the church
aisles to the tomb of Wilibrord (§ 78, 3). The dance is kept up
incessantly for two hours. The performers do so generally because
of a vow, or as penance for some fault, or to secure the saint’s
intercession for the cure of epilepsy and convulsive fits,
common in that region, mainly no doubt owing to such senseless
proceedings. The origin of the custom is obscure. Tradition
relates that soon after the death of Wilibrord a disease appeared
among the cattle which jumped incessantly in the stalls, till
the people went leaping in procession to Wilibrord’s tomb, and
the plague was stayed! But the custom is probably a Christian
adaptation of an old spring festival dance of pagan times
(§ 75, 3; comp. 2 Sam. vi. 14).
§ 188.12. =The Devotion of the Sacred Heart.=--Even after the
suppression of the Jesuit order the devotion of the Sacred Heart
(§ 156, 6) was zealously practised by the ex-Jesuits and their
friends. On the restoration of the order numerous brotherhoods
and sisterhoods, especially in France, devoted themselves to this
exercise, and the _revanche_ movement of A.D. 1870 used this as
one of its most powerful instruments. Crowds of pilgrims flocked
to Paray le Monial, and there, kneeling before the cradle of
Bethlehem, they besought the sacred heart of Jesus to save France
and Rome, and the refrain of all the pilgrim songs, “_Dieu, de
la clemence ... sauvez Rome et la France au nom du sacré-cœur_,”
became the spiritual Marseillaise of France returning to the
Catholic fold. From the money collected over the whole land a
beautiful church _du Sacré-Cœur_ has been erected on Montmartre
in Paris. The gratifying news was then brought from Rome that
the holy father had resolved on July 16th, 1875, the twenty-ninth
anniversary of his ascending the papal throne and the two
hundredth anniversary of the great occurrences at Paray le
Monial, that the whole world should give adoration to the sacred
heart. In France this day was fixed upon for the laying of the
foundation stone of the church at Montmartre, and the Archbishop
of Cologne, Paul Melchers, commanded Catholic Germany to show
greater zeal in the adoration of the sacred heart, “ordained by
divine revelation” two hundred years before.
§ 188.13. =Ultramontane Amulets.=--The Carmelites adopted a brown,
the Trinitarians a white, the Theatines a blue, the Servites
a black, and the Lazarites a red, scapular, assured by divine
visions that the wearing of them was a means of salvation. A
tract, entitled “_Gnaden und Ablässe des fünffachen Skapuliers_,”
published by episcopal authority at Münster in 1872, declared
that any layman who wore the five scapulars would participate
in all the graces and indulgences belonging to them severally.
The most useful of all was the Carmelite scapular, impenetrable
by bullets, impervious to daggers, rendering falls harmless,
stilling stormy seas, quenching fires, healing the possessed, the
sick, the wounded, etc.--The Benedictines had no scapulars, but
they had Benedict-medals, from which they drew a rich revenue.
This amulet first made its appearance in the Bavarian Abbey of
Metten. The tract, entitled, “_St. Benediktusbüchlein oder die
Medaille d. h. Benediktus_,” published at Münster in 1876, tells
how it cures sicknesses, relieves toothache, stops bleeding
at the nose, heals burns, overcomes the craving for drink,
protects from attacks of evil spirits, restrains skittish horses,
cures sick cattle, clears vineyards of blight, secures the
conversion of heretics and godless persons, etc.--In A.D. 1878
there appeared at Mainz, with approval of the bishop, a book in
its third edition, entitled, “_Der Seraphische Gürtel und dessen
wunderbare Reichtümer nach d. Franz. d. päpstl. Hausprälaten
Abbé v. Segur_,” according to which Sixtus V. in 1585 founded
the Archbrotherhood of the Girdle of St. Francis. It also affirms
that whoever wears this girdle day and night and repeats the six
enjoined paternosters, participates in all the indulgences of
the holy land and of all the basilicas and sanctuaries of Rome
and Assisi, and is entitled to liberate 1,000 souls a day from
purgatory.--Great miracles of healing and preservation from all
injuries to body and soul, property and goods, are attributed by
the Jesuits to the “_holy water of St. Ignatius_” (§ 149, 11),
the sale of which in Belgium, France, and Switzerland has proved
to them a lucrative business. But the mother of God has herself
favoured them with a still more powerful miracle-working water in
the fountains of Lourdes and Marpingen.
§ 188.14. We give in conclusion a specimen of =Ultramontane
pulpit eloquence=. A Bavarian priest, Kinzelmann, said in a
sermon in 1872: “We priests stand as far above the emperor, kings,
and princes as the heaven is above the earth.... Angels and
archangels stand beneath us, for we can in God’s stead forgive
sins. We occupy a position superior to that of the mother of God,
who only once bare Christ, whereas we create and beget him every
day. Yea, in a sense, we stand above God, who must always and
everywhere serve us, and at the consecration must descend from
heaven upon the mass,” etc.--An apotheosis of the priesthood
worthy of the Middle Ages.
§ 189. THE VATICAN COUNCIL.[548]
Immediately after Pius IX. had, at the centenary of St. Peter in 1867,
given a hint that a general council might be summoned at an early date,
the _Civiltà Cattolica_ of Rome made distinct statements to the effect
that the most prominent questions for discussion would be the confirming
of the syllabus (§ 185, 2), the sanctioning of the doctrine of papal
absolutism in the spirit of the bull _Unam sanctam_ of Boniface VIII.
(§ 110, 1), and the proclamation of papal infallibility. The _Civiltà_
had already taught that “when the pope thinks, it is God who thinks in
him.” When the council opened on the day of the immaculate conception,
December 8th, 1869, all conceivable devices of skilful diplomacy
were used by the Jesuit Camarilla, and friendly cajoling and violent
threatening on the part of the pope, in order to silence or win
over, and, in case this could not be done, to stifle and suppress
the opposition which even already was not inconsiderable in point
of numbers, but far more important in point of moral, theological,
and hierarchical influence. The result aimed at was secured. Of the
150 original opponents only fifty dared maintain their opposition to
the end, and even they cowardly shrank from a decisive conflict, and
wrote from their respective dioceses, as their Catholic faith obliged
them to do, notifying their most complete acquiescence.
§ 189.1. =Preliminary History of the Council.=--When Pius IX. on
the centenary of St. Peter made known to the assembled bishops
his intention to summon a general council, they expressed their
conviction that by the blessing of the immaculate Virgin it would
be a powerful means of securing unity, peace, and holiness. The
formal summons was issued on the day of St. Peter and St. Paul
of the following year, June 29th, 1868. The end for which the
council was convened was stated generally as follows: The saving
of the church and civil society from all evils threatening them,
the thwarting of the endeavours of all who seek the overthrow
of church and state, the uprooting of all modern errors and the
downfall of all godless enemies of the apostolical chair. In
Germany the Catholic General Assembly which met at Bamberg soon
after this declared that from this day a new epoch in the world’s
history would begin, for “either the salvation of the world would
result from this council, or the world is beyond the reach of
help.” This hopefulness prevailed throughout the whole Catholic
world. Fostered by the utterances of the _Civiltà Cattolica_, the
excitement grew from day to day. The learned bishop _in partibus_
Maret, dean of the theological faculty of Paris, now came
forward as an eloquent exponent of the Gallican liberties;
even the hitherto so strict Catholic, the Count Montalembert,
to the astonishment of everybody, assumed a bold and independent
attitude in regard to the council, and energetically protested
in a publication of March 7th, 1870, six days before his death,
against the intrigues of the Jesuits and the infallibility dogma
which it was proposed to authorize. But the greatest excitement
was occasioned by the work “_Der Papst und das Konzil_,”
published in Leipzig, 1869, under the pseudonym _Janus_, of which
the real authors were Döllinger, Friedrich, and Huber of Munich,
who brought up the heavy artillery of the most comprehensive
historical scholarship against the evident intentions of the
curia. The German bishops gathered at the tomb of St. Boniface
at Fulda in September, 1869, and issued from thence a general
pastoral letter to their disturbed flocks, declaring that it
was impossible that the council should decide otherwise than
in accordance with holy Scripture and the apostolic traditions
and what was already written upon the hearts of all believing
Catholics. Also the papal secretary, Card. Antonelli, quieted
the anxiety of the ambassadors of foreign powers at Rome by the
assurance that the Holy See had in view neither the confirming of
the syllabus nor the affirming of the dogma of infallibility. In
vain did the Bavarian premier, Prince Hohenlohe, insist that the
heads of other governments should combine in taking measures to
prevent any encroachment of the council upon the rights of the
state. The great powers resolved to maintain simply a watchful
attitude, and only too late addressed earnest expostulations and
threats.
§ 189.2. =The Organization of the Council.=--Of 1,044 prelates
entitled to take part in the council 767 made their appearance,
of whom 276 were Italians and 119 bishops _in partibus_, all
pliable satellites of the curia, as were also the greater number
of the missionary bishops, who, with their assistants in the
propaganda, were supported at the cost of the holy father. The
sixty-two bishops of the Papal States were doubly subject to the
pope, and of the eighty Spanish and South American bishops it was
affirmed in Rome that they would be ready at the bidding of the
holy father to define the Trinity as consisting of four persons.
Forty Italian cardinals and thirty generals of orders were
equally dependable. The Romance races were represented by no less
than 600, the German by no more than fourteen. For the first time
since general councils were held was the laity entirely excluded
from all influence in the proceedings, even the ambassadors of
Catholic and tolerant powers. The order of business drawn up
by the pope was arranged in all its details so as to cripple
the opposition. The right of all fathers of the council to make
proposals was indeed conceded, but a committee chosen by the pope
decided as to their admissibility. From the special commissions,
whose presidents were nominated by the pope, the drafts of
decrees were issued to the general congregation, where the
president could at will interrupt any speaker and require him
to retract. Instead of the unanimity required by the canon law
in matters of faith, a simple majority of votes was declared
sufficient. A formal protest of the minority against these and
similar unconstitutional proposals was left quite unheeded. The
proceedings were indeed taken down by shorthand reporters, but
not even members of council were allowed to see these reports.
The conclusions of the general congregation were sent back for
final revision to the special commissions, and when at last
brought up again in the public sessions, they were not discussed,
but simply voted on with a _placet_ or a _non-placet_. The right
transept of St. Peter’s was the meeting place of the council,
the acoustics of which were as bad as possible, but the pope
refused every request for more suitable accommodation. Besides,
the various members spoke with diverse accents, and many had but
a defective knowledge of Latin. Although absolute secresy was
enjoined on pain of falling into mortal sin, under the excitement
of the day so much trickled out and was in certain Romish circles
so carefully gathered and sifted, that a tolerably complete
insight was reached into the inner movements of the council. From
such sources the author of the “_Römischen Briefe_,” supposed
to have been Lord Acton, a friend and scholar of Döllinger, drew
the material for his account, which, carried by trusty messengers
beyond the bounds of the Papal State, reached Munich, and
there, after careful revision by Döllinger and his friends, were
published in the _Augsburg Allg. Zeitung_. Also Prof. Friedrich
of Munich, who had accompanied Card. Hohenlohe to Rome as
theological adviser, collected what he could learn in episcopal
and theological circles in a journal which was published at a
later date.
§ 189.3. =The Proceedings of the Council.=--The first public
session of December 8th, 1869, was occupied with opening
ceremonies; the second, of January 6th, with the subscription
of the confession of faith on the part of each member. The first
preliminary was the _schema_ of the faith, the second that on
church discipline. Then followed the _schema_ on the church and
the primacy of the pope in three articles: the legal position
of the church in reference to the state, the absolute supremacy
of the pope over the whole church on the principles of the
Pseudo-Isidore (§ 87, 2) and the assumptions of Gregory VII.,
Innocent III. and Boniface VIII., reproduced in the principal
propositions of the syllabus (§ 184, 2), and the outlines of a
catechism to be enforced as a manual for the instruction of youth
throughout the church. On March 6th there was added by way of
supplement to the _schema_ of the church a fourth article in the
form of a sketch of the decree of infallibility. Soon after the
opening of the council an agitation in this direction had been
started. An address to the pope emanating from the Jesuit college
petitioning for this was speedily signed by 400 subscribers.
A counter address with 137 signatures besought the pope not to
make any such proposal. At the head of the agitation in favour of
infallibility stood archbishops Manning of Westminster, Deschamps
of Mechlin, Spalding of Baltimore, and bishops Fessler of
St. Pölten, secretary of the council, Senestrey of Regensburg,
the “overthrower of thrones” (§ 197, 1), Martin of Paderborn, and,
as bishop _in partibus_, Mermillod of Geneva. Among the leaders
of the opposition the most prominent were cardinals Rauscher of
Vienna, Prince Schwarzenberg of Prague and Matthieu of Besançon,
Prince-bishop Förster of Breslau, archbishops Scherr of Munich,
Melchers of Cologne, Darboy of Paris, and Kenrick of St. Louis,
the bishops Ketteler of Mainz, Dinkel of Augsburg, Hefele
of Rottenburg, Strossmayer of Sirmium, Dupanloup of Orleans,
etc.--Owing to the discussions on the =Schema of the Faith= there
occurred on March 22nd a stormy scene, which in its wild uproar
reminds one of the disgraceful _Robber Synod of Ephesus_
(§ 52, 4). When Bishop Strossmayer objected to the statement
made in the preamble, that the indifferentism, pantheism, atheism,
and materialism prevailing in these days are chargeable upon
Protestantism, as contrary to truth, the furious fathers of the
majority amid shouts and roars, shaking of their fists, rushed
upon the platform, and the president was obliged to adjourn the
sitting. At the next session the objectionable statement was
withdrawn and the entire _schema_ of the faith was unanimously
adopted at the third public sitting of the council on April 24th.
=The Schema of the Church= came up for a consideration on
May 10th. The discussion turned first and mainly on the fourth
article about the infallibility of the pope. Its biblical
foundation was sought in Luke xxii. 32, its traditional basis
chiefly in the well-known passage of Irenæus (§ 34, 8) and on
its supposed endorsement by the general councils of Lyons and
Florence (§ 67, 4, 6), but the main stress was laid on its
necessarily following from the position of the pope as the
representative of Christ. The opposition party had from the
outset their position weakened by the conduct of many of their
adherents who, partly to avoid giving excessive annoyance to the
pope, and partly to leave a door open for their retreat, did not
contest the correctness of the doctrine in question, but all the
more decidedly urged the inopportuneness of its formal definition
as threatening the church with a schism and provocative of
dangerous conflicts with the civil power. The longer the decision
was deferred by passionate debates, the more determinedly did
the pope throw the whole weight of his influence into the scales.
By bewitching kindliness he won some, by sharp, angry words he
terrified others. He denounced opponents as sectarian enemies of
the church and the apostolic chair, and styled them ignoramuses,
slaves of princes, and cowards. He trusted the aid of the blessed
Virgin to ward off threatened division. To the question whether
he himself regarded the formulating of the dogma as opportune,
he answered: “No, but as necessary.” Urged by the Jesuits, he
confidently declared that it was notorious that the whole church
at all times taught the absolute infallibility of the pope;
and on another occasion he silenced a modest doubt as to a
sure tradition with the dictatorial words, _La tradizione
sono io_, adding the assurance, “As Abbáte Mastai I believe in
infallibility, as pope I have experienced it.” On July 13th the
final vote was called for in the general congregation. There were
371 who voted simply _placet_, sixty-one _placet juxta modum_,
_i.e._ with certain modifications, and eighty-eight _non placet_.
After a last hopeless attempt by a deputation to obtain the
pope’s consent to a milder formulating of the decree, Bishop
Ketteler vainly entreating on his knees, to save the unity and
peace of the church by some small concession, the fifty hitherto
steadfast members of the minority returned home, after emitting
a written declaration that they after as well as before must
continue to adhere to their negative vote, but from reverence and
respect for the person of the pope they declined to give effect
to it at a public session. On the following day, July 18th,
the fourth and last public sitting was held: 547 fathers voted
_placet_ and only two, Riccio of Cajazzo and Fitzgerald of Little
Rock, _non placet_. A violent storm had broken out during the
session and amid thunder and lightning, Pius IX., like “a second
Moses” (Exod. xix. 16), proclaimed in the _Pastor æternus_ the
absolute plenipotence and infallibility of himself and all his
predecessors and successors.--It was on the evening preceding
the proclamation of this new dogma that Napoleon III. proclaimed
war with Prussia, in consequence of which the pope lost the
last remnants of temporal sovereignty and every chance of its
restoration. Under the influence of the fever-fraught July sun,
the council now dwindled down to 150 members, and, after the
whole glory of the papal kingdom had gone down (§ 185, 3), on
October 20th, its sittings were suspended until better times.
The _schema_ of discipline and the preliminary sketch of a
catechism were not concluded; a subsequently introduced _schema_
on apostolic missions was left in the same state; and a petition
equally pressed by the Jesuits for the defining of the corporeal
ascension of Mary had not even reached the initial stage.
§ 189.4. =Acceptance of the Decrees of the Council.=--All
protests which during the council the minority had made
against the order of business determined on and against all
irregularities resulting from it, because not persisted in,
were regarded as invalid. Equally devoid of legal force was
their final written protest which they left behind, in which
they expressly declined to exercise their right of voting. And
the assent which they ultimately without exception gave to the
objective standpoint of the law and the faith of the Catholic
church, was not in the least necessary in order to make it appear
that the decisions of the council, drawn up with such unanimity
as had scarcely ever before been seen, were equally valid with
any of the decrees of the older councils. Thus the bishops
of the minority, if they did not wish to occasion a split of
unexampled dimensions and incalculable complications, quarrels,
and contentions in the church that boasted of a unity which had
hitherto been its strength and stay, could do nothing else than
yield at the twelfth hour to the pope’s demand that “_sacrificio
dell’intelletto_” which at the eleventh hour they had refused.
The German bishops, who had proved most steadfast at the council,
were now in the greatest haste to make their submission. Even
by the end of August, at Fulda, they joined their infallibilist
neighbours in addressing a pastoral letter, in which they most
solemnly declared that all true Catholics, as they valued their
soul’s salvation, must unconditionally accept the conclusions of
the council unanimously arrived at which are in no way prejudiced
by the “differences of opinion” elicited during the discussion.
At the same time they demanded of theological professors,
teachers of religion, and clergymen throughout the dioceses a
formal acceptance of these decrees as the inviolable standpoint
of their doctrinal teaching; they also took measures against
those who refused to yield, and excommunicated them. Even
Bishop Hefele, who did not sign this pastoral and was at
first determined not to yield nor swerve, at last gave way.
In his pastoral proclaiming the new dogma he gave it a quite
inadmissible interpretation: As the infallibility of the church,
so also that of the pope as a teacher, extends only to the
revealed doctrines of faith and morals, and even with reference
to them only the definitions proper and not the introductory
statements, grounds, and applications, belong to the infallible
department. But subsequently he cast himself unreservedly into
the arms of his colleagues assembled once again at Fulda in
September, 1872, where he also found his like-minded friend,
Bishop Haneberg of Spires. Yet he forbore demanding an express
assent from his former colleagues at Tübingen and his clergy, and
thus saved Württemberg from a threatened schism. Strossmayer held
out longest, but even he at last threw down his weapons. But many
of the most cultured and scholarly of the theological professors,
disgusted with the course events were taking, withdrew from the
field and continued silently to hold their own opinions. The
inferior clergy, for the most part trained by ultramontane bigots,
and held in the iron grasp of strict hierarchical discipline,
passed all bounds in their extravagant glorification of the new
dogma. And while among the liberal circles of the Catholic laity
it was laughed at and ridiculed, the bigoted nobles and the
masses who had long been used to the incensed atmosphere of an
enthusiastic adoration of the pope, bowed the knee in stupid
devotion to the papal god. But the brave heart of one noble
German lady broke with sorrow over the indignity done by the
Vatican decree and the characterlessness of the German bishops to
the church of which to her latest breath she remained in spirit a
devoted member. Amalie von Lasaulx, sister of the Munich scholar
Ernst von Lasaulx (§ 174, 4), from 1849 superioress of the
Sisters of Mercy in St. John’s Hospital at Bonn, lay beyond hope
of recovery on a sick-bed to which she had been brought by her
self-sacrificing and faithful discharge of the duties of her
calling, when there came to her from the lady superior of the
order at Nancy the peremptory demand to give in her adhesion to
the infallibility dogma. As she persistently and courageously
withstood all entreaties and threats, all adjurations and cruelly
tormenting importunings, she was deposed from office and driven
from the scene of her labours, and when, soon thereafter, in 1872,
she died, the habit of her order was stripped from her body. The
Old Catholics of Bonn, whose proceedings she had not countenanced,
charged themselves with securing for her a Christian burial.--No
state as such has recognised the council. Austria answered it by
abolishing the concordat and forbidding the proclamation of the
decrees. Bavaria and Saxony refused their _placet_; Hesse, Baden,
and Württemberg declared that the conclusions of the council
had not binding authority in law. Prussia indeed held to its
principle of not interfering in the internal affairs of the
Catholic church, but, partly for itself, partly as the leading
power of the new German empire, passed a series of laws in
order to resume its too readily abandoned rights of sovereignty
over the affairs of the Catholic church, and to insure itself
against further encroachments of ultramontanism upon the domain
of civil life (§ 197). The Romance states, on the other hand,
pre-eminently France, were prevented by internal troubles and
conflicts from taking any very decisive steps.
§ 190. THE OLD CATHOLICS.
A most promising reaction, mainly in Germany, led by men highly
respected and eminent for their learning, set in against the Vatican
Council and its decrees, in the so-called Old Catholic movement of the
liberal circles of the Catholic people, which went the length, even
in 1873, of establishing an independent and well organized episcopal
church. Since then, indeed, it has fallen far short of the all too
sanguine hopes and expectations at first entertained; but still
within narrower limits it continues steadily to spread and to rear for
itself a solid structure, while carefully, even nervously, shrinking
from anything revolutionary. More in touch with the demands of the
_Zeitgeist_ in its reformatory concessions, yet holding firmly in every
particular to the positive doctrines of orthodoxy, the Old Catholic
movement has made progress in Switzerland, while in other Catholic
countries its success has been relatively small.
§ 190.1. =Formation and Development of the Old Catholic Church
in the German Empire.=--In the beginning of August, 1870, the
hitherto exemplary Catholic professor Michelis of Braunsberg
(§ 191, 6), issued a public charge against Pius IX. as a heretic
and devourer of the church, and by the end of August several
distinguished theologians (Döllinger and Friedrich of Munich,
Reinkens, Weber, and Baltzer of Breslau, Knoodt of Bonn, and
the canonist Von Schulte of Prague) joined him at Nuremberg
in making a public declaration that the Vatican Council could
not be regarded as œcumenical, nor its new dogma as a Catholic
doctrine. This statement was subscribed to by forty-four Catholic
professors of the university of Munich with the rector at their
head, but without the theologians. Similarly, too, several
Catholic teachers in Breslau, Freiburg, Würzburg, and Bonn
protested, and still more energetically a gathering of Catholic
laymen at Königswinter. Besides the Breslau professors already
named, the Bonn professors Reusch, Langen, Hilgers, and Knoodt
refused to subscribe the council decrees at the call of their
bishop; whereas the Munich professors, with the exception of
Döllinger and Friedrich, yielded. A repeated injunction of his
archbishop in January, 1871, drew from Döllinger the statement
that he as a Christian, a theologian, a historian, and a citizen,
was obliged to reject the infallibility dogma, while at the
same time he was prepared before an assembly of bishops and
theologians to prove that it was opposed to Scripture, the
Fathers, tradition, and history. He was now literally overwhelmed
with complimentary addresses from Vienna, Würzburg, Munich, and
almost all other cities of Bavaria; and an address to government
on the dangers to the state threatened by the Vatican decrees
that lay at the Munich Museum, was quickly filled with 12,000
signatures. On April 14th, Döllinger was excommunicated, and
Professor Huber sent an exceedingly sharp reply to the archbishop.
After several preliminary meetings, the =first congress= of the
Old Catholics was held in Munich in September, 1871, attended
by 500 deputies from all parts of Germany. A programme was
unanimously adopted which, with protestation of firm adherence
to the faith, worship, and constitution of the ancient Catholic
church, maintained the invalidity of the Vatican decrees and the
excommunication occasioned by them, and, besides recognising the
Old Catholic church of Utrecht (§ 165, 8), expressed a hope of
reunion with the Greek church, as well as of a gradual progress
towards an understanding with the Protestant church. But when at
the second session the president, Dr. von Schulte, proposed the
setting up of independent public services with regular pastors,
and the establishing as soon as possible of an episcopal
government of their own, Döllinger contested the proposal as
a forsaking of the safe path of lawful opposition, taking the
baneful course of the Protestant Reformation, and tending toward
the formation of a sect. As, however, the proposal was carried
by an overwhelming majority, he declined to take further part
in their public assemblies and retired more into the background,
without otherwise opposing the prevailing current or detaching
himself from it. The second congress was held at Cologne in
the autumn of 1872. From the episcopal churches of England and
America, from the orthodox church of Russia, from France, Italy,
and Spain, were sent deputies and hearty friendly greetings.
Archbishop Loos of Utrecht, by the part which he took in the
congress, cemented more closely the union with the Old Catholics
of Holland. Even the German “_Protestantenverein_” was not
unrepresented. A committee chosen for the purpose drew up an
outline of a synodal and congregational order, which provides
for the election of bishops at an annual meeting at Pentecost
of a synod, of which all the clergy are members and to which the
congregations send deputies, one for every 200 members. Alongside
of the bishop stands a permanent synodal board of five priests
and seven laymen. The bishop and synodal board have the right of
vetoing doubtful decrees of synod. The choice of pastors lies
with the congregation; its confirmation belongs to the bishop.
In July, 1873, a bishop was elected in the Pantaleon church
of Cologne by an assembly of delegates, embracing twenty-two
priests and fifty-five laymen. The choice fell upon Professor
Reinkens, who, as meanwhile Bishop Loos of Utrecht had died, was
consecrated on August 11th, at Rotterdam, by Bishop Heykamp of
Deventer, and selected Bonn as his episcopal residence.
§ 190.2. The first synod of the German Old Catholics, consisting
of thirty clerical and fifty-nine lay members, met at Bonn in
May, 1874. It was agreed to continue the practice of auricular
confession, but without any pressure being put upon the
conscience or its observance being insisted upon at set times.
Similarly the moral value of fasting was recognised, but all
compulsory abstinence, and all distinctions of food as allowable
and unallowable, were abolished. The second synod, with reference
to the marriage law, took the position that civil regular
marriages ought also to have the blessing of the church; only
in the case of marriages with non-Christians and divorced parties
should this be refused. The third synod introduced a German
ritual in which the exorcism was omitted, while the Latin mass
was provisionally retained. The fourth synod allowed to such
congregations as might wish it the use of the vernacular in
several parts of the service of the mass. At all these synods the
lay members had persistently repeated the proposal to abolish the
obligatory celibacy of the clergy. But now the agitation,
especially on the part of the Baden representatives, had become
so keen, that at the fifth synod of 1878, in spite of the
warning read by Bishop Reinkens from the Dutch Old Catholics,
who threatened to withdraw from the communion, the proposal
was carried by seventy-five votes against twenty-two. The Bonn
professors, Langen and Menzel, foreseeing this result, had
absented themselves from the synod, Reusch immediately withdrew
and resigned his office as episcopal vicar-general, Friedrich
protested in the name of the Bavarian Old Catholics. Reinkens,
too, had vigorously opposed the movement; whereas Knoodt,
Michelis, and Von Schulte had favoured it. The synod of 1883
resolved to dispense the supper in both kinds to members of the
Anglican church residing in Germany, but among their own members
to follow meanwhile the usual practice of _communio sub una_.
The number of Old Catholic congregations in the German empire
is now 107, with 38,507 adherents and 56 priests.--Even at their
first congress the German Old Catholics, in opposition to the
unpatriotic and law-defying attitude of German ultramontanism,
had insisted upon love of country and obedience to the laws
of the state as an absolute Christian duty. Their newly chosen
bishop Reinkens, too, gave expression to this sentiment in
his first pastoral letter, and had the oath of allegiance
administered him by the Prussian, Baden, and Hessian governments.
But Bavaria felt obliged, on account of the terms of its
concordat, to refuse. At first the Old Catholics had advanced the
claim to be the only true representatives of the Catholic church
as it had existed before July 18th, 1870. At the Cologne congress
they let this assumption drop, and restricted their claims upon
the state to equal recognition with “the New Catholics,” equal
endowments for their bishop, and a fair proportion of the
churches and their revenues. Prussia responded with a yearly
episcopal grant of 16,000 thalers; Baden added about 6,000. It
proved more difficult to enforce their claim to church property.
A law was passed in Baden in 1874, which not only guaranteed
to the Old Catholic clergy their present benefices and incomes,
freed them from the jurisdiction of the Romish hierarchy, and
gave them permission to found independent congregations, but also
granted them a mutual right of possessing and using churches and
church furniture as well as sharing in church property according
to the numerical proportion of the two parties in the district.
A similar measure was introduced into the Prussian parliament,
and obtained the royal assent in July, 1875. Since then, however,
the interest of the government in the Old Catholic movement has
visibly cooled. In Baden, in 1886 the endowment had risen to
24,000 marks.
§ 190.3. =The Old Catholics in other Lands.=--=In Switzerland=
the Old, or rather, as it has there been called, the Christian,
Catholic movement, had its origin in 1871 in the diocese
of Basel-Solothurn, whence it soon spread through the whole
country. The national synod held at Olten in 1876 introduced
the vernacular into the church services, abolished the compulsory
celibacy of the clergy and obligatory confession of communicants,
and elected Professor Herzog bishop, Reinkens giving him
episcopal consecration. In 1879 the number of Christian Catholics
in German Switzerland amounted to about 70,000, with seventy-two
pastors. But since then, in consequence of the submission of the
Roman Catholics to the church laws condemned by Pius IX. they
have lost the majority in no fewer than thirty-nine out of the
forty-three congregations of Canton Bern, and therewith the
privileges attached. A proposal made in the grand council of
the canton in 1883 for the suppression of the Christian Catholic
theological faculty in the University of Bern, which has existed
since 1874, was rejected by one hundred and fifty votes against
thirteen.--=In Austria=, too, strong opposition was shown
to the infallibility dogma. At Vienna the first Old Catholic
congregation was formed in February, 1872, under the priest Anton;
and soon after others were established in Bohemia and Upper
Austria. But it was not till October, 1877, that they obtained
civil recognition on the ground that their doctrine is that
which the Catholic church professed before 1870. In June, 1880,
they held their first legally sanctioned synod. The provisional
synodical and congregational order was now definitely adopted,
and the use of the vernacular in the church services, the
abolition of compulsory fasting, confession, and celibacy,
as well as of surplice fees, and the abandoning of all but the
high festivals, were announced on the following Sunday. The
bitter hatred shown by the Czechs and the ultramontane clergy
to everything German has given to the Old Catholic movement for
some years past a new impulse and decided advantage.--=In France=
the Abbé Michaud of Paris lashed the characterlessness of the
episcopate and was excommunicated, and the Abbés Mouls and Junqua
of Bordeaux were ordered by the police to give up wearing the
clerical dress. Junqua, refusing to obey this order, was accused
by Cardinal Donnet, Bishop of Bordeaux, before the civil court,
and was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment. Not till 1879
did the ex-Carmelite Loyson of Paris lay the foundation of a
Catholic Gallican church, affiliated with the Swiss Old Catholics
(§ 187, 8).--=In Italy= since 1862, independently of the German
movement, yet on essentially the same grounds, a national Italian
church was started with very promising beginnings, which were
not, however, realized (§ 187, 7). Rare excitement was caused
throughout Italy by the procedure of Count Campello, canon of
St. Peter’s in Rome, who in 1881 publicly proclaimed his creed
in the Methodist Episcopal chapel, there renouncing the papacy,
and in a published manifesto addressed to the cathedral chapter
justified this step and made severe charges against the papal
curia; but soon after, in a letter to Loyson, he declared that
he, remaining faithful to the true Catholic church, did not
contemplate joining any Protestant sect severed from Catholic
unity, and in a communication to the Old Catholic Rieks of
Heidelberg professed to be in all points at one with the German
Old Catholics. Accordingly he sought to form in Rome a Catholic
reform party, whose interests he advocated in the journal _Il
Labaro_. The pope’s domestic chaplain, Monsignor Savarese, has
adopted a similar attitude. In December, 1883, he was received
by the pastor of the American Episcopal church at Rome into the
Old Catholic church on subscribing the Nicene Creed. In 1886 they
were joined by another domestic chaplain of the pope, Monsignor
Renier, formerly an intimate friend of Pius IX., who publicly
separated himself from the papal church, and with them took his
place at the head of a Catholic “_Congregation of St. Paul_” in
Rome.--Also the Episcopal _Iglesia Española_ in Spain (§ 205, 4),
and the Mexican _Iglesia de Jesus_ (§ 209, 1), must be regarded
as essentially of similar tendencies to the Old Catholics.
§ 191. CATHOLIC THEOLOGY, ESPECIALLY IN GERMANY.
Catholic theology in Germany, influenced by the scientific spirit
prevailing in Protestantism, received a considerable impulse. From
latitudinarian Josephinism it gradually rose toward a strictly
ecclesiastical attitude. Most important were its contributions in
the department of dogmatic and speculative theology. Besides and after
the schools of Hermes, Baader, and Günther, condemned by the papal
chair, appeared a whole series of speculative dogmatists who kept their
speculations within the limits of the church confession. Also in the
domain of church history, Catholic theology, after the epoch-making
productions of Möhler and Döllinger, has aided in reaching important
results, which, however, owing to the “tendency” character of
their researches, demand careful sifting. Least important are their
contributions to biblical criticism and exegesis. In general, however,
the theological _docents_ at the German universities give a scientific
character to their researches and lectures in respect of form and also
of matter, so far as the Tridentine limits will allow. But the more the
Jesuits obtained influence in Germany, the more was that scholasticism,
which repudiated the German university theology and opposed it with
perfidious suspicions and denunciations, naturalized, especially in the
episcopal seminaries, while it was recommended by Rome as the official
theology. The attempt, however, at the Munich Congress of Scholars
in 1863 to come to an understanding between the two tendencies failed,
owing to the contrariety of their principles and the opposition of
the Jesuits.--Outside of Germany, French theology, especially in the
department of history, manifested a praiseworthy activity. In Spain
theology has never outgrown the period of the Middle Ages. In Italy,
on the other hand, the study of Christian antiquities flourished,
stimulated by recent discoveries of treasures in catacombs, museums,
archives, and libraries.
§ 191.1. =Hermes and his School.=--The Bonn professor, =George
Hermes=, influenced in youth by the critical philosophy, passed
the Catholic dogma of Trent, assured it would stand the test,
through the fire of doubt and the scrutiny of reason, because
only what survives such examination could be scientifically
vindicated. He died in A.D. 1831, and left a school named after
him, mainly in Treves, Bonn, and Breslau. Gregory XVI. in 1835
condemned his writings, and the new Archbishop of Cologne,
Droste-Vischering, forbad students at Bonn attending the lectures
of Hermesians. These made every effort to secure the recall of
the papal censure. Braun and Elvenich went to Rome, but their
declaration that Hermes had not taught what the pope condemned
profited them as little as a similar statement had the Jansenists.
There now arose on both sides a bitter controversy, which
received new fuel from the Prusso-Cologne ecclesiastical strife
(§ 193, 1). Finally in 1844 professors Braun and Achterfeld of
Bonn were deprived of office by the coadjutor-Archbishop Geissel,
and the Prussian government acquiesced. The professors of the
Treves seminary and Baltzer of Breslau, the latter influenced
by Günther’s theology, retracted.--A year before Hermes’
condemnation the same pope had condemned the opposite theory of
Abbé =Bautain= of Strassburg, that the Christian dogmas cannot
be proved but only believed, and that therefore all use of reason
in the appropriation of the truths of salvation is excluded.
Bautain, as an obedient son of the church, immediately retracted,
“_laudabiliter se subjecit_.”
§ 191.2. =Baader and his School.=--Catholic theology for a long
time paid no regard to the development of German philosophy.
Only after Schelling, whose philosophy had many points of contact
with the Catholic doctrine, a general interest in such studies
was awakened as forming a speculative basis for Catholicism. To
the theosophy of Schelling based on that of the Görlitz shoemaker
(§ 160, 2), =Francis von Baader=, professor of speculative
dogmatics at Munich, though not a professional theologian, but
a physician and a mineralogist, attached himself. In his later
years he went over completely to ultramontanism. His scholar
=Franz Hoffmann= of Würzburg has given an exposition of Baader’s
speculative system. At Giessen this system was represented by
Leop. Schmid (§ 187, 3). All the Catholic adherents of this
school are distinguished by their friendly attitude toward
Protestantism.
§ 191.3. =Günther and his School.=--A theology of at least
equal speculative power and of more decidedly Catholic contents
than that of Baader, was set forth by the secular priest =Anton
Günther= of Vienna, a profound and original thinker of combative
humour, sprightly wit, and a roughness of expression sometimes
verging upon the burlesque. He recognised the necessity of going
up in philosophical and theological speculation to Descartes,
who held by the scholastic dualism of God and the creature, the
Absolute and the finite, spirit and nature, while all philosophy,
according to him, had been ever plunging deeper into pantheistic
monism. Thence he sought to solve the two problems of Christian
speculation, creation and incarnation, and undertook a war of
extermination against “all monism and semimonism, idealistic and
realistic pantheism, disguised and avowed semipantheism,” among
Catholics and Protestants. His first great work, “_Vorschule zur
Spekul. Theologie_,” published in 1828, treating of the theory
of creation and the theory of incarnation, was followed by a
long series of similar works. His most eminent scholars were
=Pabst=, doctor of medicine in Vienna, who gave clear expositions
of his master’s dark and aphoristic sayings, and =Veith=, who
popularized his teachings in sermons and practical treatises.
Some of the Hermesians, such as Baltzer of Breslau, entered the
rank of his scholars. The historico-political papers, however,
charged him with denying the mysteries of Christianity, rejecting
the traditional theology, etc., and Clemens, a _privatdocent_
of philosophy in Bonn, became the mouthpiece of this party. Thus
arose a passionate controversy, which called forth the attention
of Rome. We might have expected Günther to meet the fate of
Hermes twenty years before; but the matter was kept long under
consideration, for strong influence from Vienna was brought
to bear on his behalf. At last in January, 1857, the formal
reprobation of the Güntherian philosophy was announced, and
all his works put in the Index. Günther humbly submitted to the
sentence of the church. So too did =Baltzer=. But being suspected
at Rome, he was asked voluntarily to resign. This Baltzer refused
to do. Then Prince-Bishop Förster called upon the government
to deprive him; and when this failed, he withdrew from him the
_missio canonica_ and a third of his canonical revenues, and in
1870, on his opposing the infallibility dogma, he withheld the
other two-thirds. His salary from the State continued to be paid
in full till his death in A.D. 1871.
§ 191.4. =John Adam Möhler.=--None of all the Catholic
theologians of recent times attained the importance and influence
of Möhler in his short life of forty-two years. Stimulated
to seek higher scientific culture by the study mainly of
Schleiermacher’s works and those of other Protestants, and
putting all his rich endowments at the service of the church,
he won for himself among Catholics a position like that of
Schleiermacher among Protestants. His first treatise of 1825,
on the unity of the church, was followed by his “Athanasius the
Great,” and the work of his life, the “Symbolics” of 1832, in
its ninth edition in 1884, which with the apparatus of Protestant
science combats the Protestant church doctrine and presented
the Catholic doctrine in such an ennobled and sublimated form,
that Rome at first seriously thought of placing it in the Index.
Hitherto Protestants had utterly ignored the productions of
Catholic theology, but to overlook a scientific masterpiece like
this would be a confession of their own weakness. And in fact,
during the whole course of the controversy between the two
churches, no writing from the Catholic camp ever caused such
commotion among the Protestants as this. The ablest Protestant
replies are those of Nitsch [Nitzsch] and Baur. In 1835 Möhler
left Tübingen for Munich; but sickness hindered his scientific
labours, and, in 1838, in the full bloom of manhood, the Catholic
church and Catholic science had to mourn his death. He can
scarcely be said to have formed a school; but by writings,
addresses, and conversation he produced a scientific ferment in
the Catholic theology of Germany, which continued to work until
at last completely displaced by the scholasticism reintroduced
into favour by the Jesuits.
§ 191.5. =John Jos. Ignat. von Döllinger.=--Of all Catholic
theologians in Germany, alongside of and after Möhler, by far the
most famous on either side of the Alps was the church historian
Döllinger, professor at Munich since 1826. His first important
work issued in that same year was on the “Doctrine of the
Eucharist in the First Three Centuries.” His comprehensive
work, “The History of the Christian Church,” of 1833 (4 vols.,
London, 1840), was not carried beyond the second volume; and
his “Text-book of Church History” of 1836, was only carried
down to the Reformation. The tone of his writings was strictly
ecclesiastical, yet without condoning the moral faults of
the popes and hierarchy. Great excitement was produced by his
treatise on “The Reformation,” in which he gathered everything
that could be found unfavourable to the Reformers and their work,
and thus gained the summit of renown as a miracle of erudition
and a master of Catholic orthodoxy. Meanwhile in 1838 he had
taken part in controversies about mixed marriages (§ 193, 1), and
in 1843 over the genuflection question (§ 195, 2), with severely
hierarchical pamphlets. As delegate of the university since 1845
he defended with brilliant eloquence in the Bavarian chamber the
measures of the ultramontane government and the hierarchy, became
in 1847 Provost of St. Cajetan, but was also in the same year
involved in the overthrow of the Abel ministry, and was deprived
of his professorship. In the following year he was one of the
most distinguished of the Catholic section in the Frankfort
parliament, where he fought successfully in the hierarchical
interest for the unconditional freedom and independence of the
church. King Maximilian II. restored him to his professorship
in 1849. From this time his views of confessional matters became
milder and more moderate. He first caused great offence to his
ultramontane admirers at Easter, 1861, when he in a series of
public lectures delivered one on the Papal States then threatened,
in which he declared that the temporal power of the pope, the
abuses of which he had witnessed during a journey to Rome in 1857,
was by no means necessary for the Catholic church, but was rather
hurtful. The papal nuncio, who was present, ostentatiously left
the meeting, and the ultramontanes were beside themselves with
astonishment, horror, and wrath. Döllinger gave some modifying
explanations at the autumn assembly of the Catholic Union at
Munich in 1861. But soon thereafter appeared his work, “The
Church and the Churches” (London, 1862), which gave the lecture
slightly modified as an appendix. The “Fables respecting the
Popes of the Middle Ages” (London, 1871), was as little to the
taste of the ultramontanes. Indeed in these writings, especially
in the first named, the polemic against the Protestant Church
had all its old bitterness; but he is at least more just toward
Luther, whom he characterizes as “the most powerful man of the
people, the most popular character, which Germany ever possessed.”
And while he delivers a glowing panegyric on the person of the
pope, he lashes unrelentingly the misgovernment of the Papal
States. At the Congress of Scholars at Munich he contended for
the freedom of science. Döllinger as president of the congress
sent the pope a telegram which satisfied his holiness. But the
Jesuits looked deeper, and immediately “_il povero Döllinger_”
was loaded by the _Civiltà Cattolica_ with every conceivable
reproach. In A.D. 1868 nominated to the life office of imperial
councillor, he voted with the bishops against the liberal
education scheme of the government. But his battle against
the council and infallibility made the rent incurable, and his
angry archbishop hurled against him the great excommunication.
Then Vienna made him doctor of philosophy, Marburg, Oxford,
and Edinburgh gave him LL.D., and the senate of his university
unanimously elected him rector in 1871. But his tabooed lecture
room became more and more deserted. He took no prominent part
in the organizing of the Old Catholic church (§ 190, 1), but all
the more eagerly did he seek to promote its union negotiations
(§ 175, 6).
§ 191.6. =The Chief Representatives of Systematic
Theology.=--=Klee=, A.D. 1800-1840, of Bonn and Munich,
was a positivist of the old school, and during the Hermesian
controversy a supporter of the theology of the curia. =Hirscher=,
1788-1865, of Freiburg, numbered by the liberals as one of
their ornaments and by the fanatical ultramontanes as a heretic,
did much to promote a conciliatory and moderate Catholicism,
equally free from ultramontane and rationalistic tendencies,
abandoning nothing essential in the Catholic doctrine. =Hilgers=,
the Hermesian, afterwards joined the Old Catholics of Bonn.
=Staudenmaier= and =Sengler= of Freiburg and =Berlage= of Münster
held a distinguished rank as speculative theologians. In the same
department, =Kuhn= and =Drey= of Tübingen, =Ehrlich= of Prague,
=Deutinger= of Dillingen, a disciple of Schelling and Baader,
and as such persecuted, though a pious believing Catholic,
=Oischinger= of Munich, who in despair at the proclamation of the
Vatican decree suddenly stopped his fruitful literary activity,
=Dieringer= of Bonn, who for the same reason not only ceased to
write but also in 1871 resigned his professorship and retired to
a small country pastorate, and finally, =Hettinger= of Würzburg,
best known by his “_Apologie d. Christenthums_.”--While the
above-named, though suspected and opposed by the scholastic party,
strove to preserve intact their ecclesiastical Catholic character,
other representatives of this tendency by their struggles against
scholasticism and then against the Vatican Council, were driven
away from their orthodox position. Thus =Frohschammer= of Munich,
when his treatise on “The Origin of the Soul,” in which he
supported the theory of Generationism in opposition to the
Catholic doctrine of creationism, and other works were placed
in the Index, asked for a revision on the ground that he taught
nothing contrary to Catholic doctrine. He was stripped of all his
clerical functions, and students were prohibited attending his
lectures. He protested, and his rooms were more crowded than
ever. Subsequently, however, repudiated even by the Old Catholics,
he drifted more and more, not only from the church, but even
from belief in revelation. Against Strauss’ last work he wrote
a tract in which he sought to prove that “the old faith is
indeed untenable,” but that also “the new science” cannot take
its place, that a “new faith” must be introduced by going back
to the Christianity of Christ. =Michelis=, a man of wide culture
in the department of natural science and philology, as well as
theology and philosophy, had in his earlier position as professor
in Paderborn, Münster, and Braunsberg, supported by word and pen
a strictly ecclesiastical tendency; but the Vatican Council made
him one of the first and most zealous leaders of the Old Catholic
movement. His most important work is his “Catholic Dogmatics,”
of 1881, in which the Old Catholic conception of Christianity is
represented as the purified higher unity of the Protestant and
Vatican systems of doctrine.
§ 191.7. =The Chief Representatives of Historical Theology.=--The
first place after Möhler and Döllinger belongs to Möhler’s
scholar Hefele, from 1840 professor at Tübingen and from 1869
Bishop of Rottenburg, distinguished by the liberal spirit of his
researches. His treatises on the Honorius controversy made him
one of the most dangerous opponents of the infallibility dogma,
to which, however, he at last submitted (§ 189, 4). His most
important work is the “History of the Councils.” Hase criticised
the second edition of the work, severely but not without
sufficient grounds, by saying that in it “the bishop chokes
the scholar.” =Werner= of Vienna is a prolific writer in the
department of the history of theological literature; while
=Bach= of Munich and the Dominican =Denifle= have written on
the mediæval mystics, the latter also on the universities of
the Middle Ages. =Hergenröther= of Würzburg, by his monograph
on “Photius and the Greek Schism,” written in the interests of
his party, and by his polemic against the anti-Vatican movement,
and specially by his “Handbook of Church History,” rendered such
service to the papacy and the papal church, that Leo XIII. in
1879 made him a cardinal and librarian of the Vatican, with
the task of reorganizing the library.--Among the Old Catholics,
=Friedrich= of Munich, besides his historical account of the
Vatican Council, had written on Wessel, Huss, and the church
history of Germany. =Huber= of Munich, whose “Philosophy of the
Church Fathers” of 1859 was put in the Index, while his much
more liberal work on Erigena of 1861 passed without censure, in
later years wrote an exhaustive account of the Jesuit order and
a critical reply to Strauss’ “Old and New Faith.” =Pichler= of
Munich, by his conscientious research and criticism, drew down
upon him the papal censure, and his book on the “History of the
Division of the Eastern and Western Churches” had the honour
of being placed in the Index. His later studies and writings
estranged him more and more from Romanism, inspired him with the
idea of a national German church, and fostered in him a love for
the _Protestantenverein_ movement; but his unbridled bibliomania
while assistant in the Royal Library of St. Petersburg in 1871,
brought his public career to a sad and shameful end. The Old
Catholic Professor =Langen= of Bonn, wrote a four-volume work
against the Vatican dogma, discussed the “Trinitarian Doctrinal
Differences between the Eastern and Western Churches,” in the
interests of a union with the Greek church, and published an
able monograph on “John of Damascus,” as well as a thorough and
impartial “History of the Roman Church down to Nicholas I.,”
two vols., 1881, 1885.--In Rome the Oratorian =Aug. Theiner=
atoned for the literary errors of his youth (§ 187, 4) by his
zealous vindication of papal privileges. His chief works were the
continuation of the “_Annales Ecclesiastici_” of Baronius, and
the editing of the historical documents of the various Christian
nations. The Jesuits charged him with giving the anti-Vaticanists
aid from the library and sought to influence the pope against
him so as to deprive him of his office of prefect of the Vatican
archives. He was suspended from his duties, and though he
still retained his title and occupied his official residence
in the Vatican, the doors from it into the library were built
up. His edition of the “Acts of the Council of Trent,” which
was commenced, was also prohibited. But he succeeded in making
a transcript at Agram in Croatia, where in 1874 a portion of it,
the official protocol of the secretary of the Council, Massarelli,
was printed by the help of Bishop Strossmayer in an elegant
style but abbreviated, and therefore unsatisfactory. Cardinal
Angelo =Mai=, as principal Vatican librarian, distinguished
himself by his palimpsest studies in old classical as well as
patristic literature. And quite worthy of ranking with either
in carefulness, diligence, and patience was =De Rossi=, who
has laboured in the department of Christian archæology, and
is well known by his great work, “_Roma sotteranea cristiana_,”
published in 1864 ff.--=Xavier Kraus=, when his “Handbook” had
been adversely criticised, hastened to Rome, submitted all his
utterances to the judgment of the pope, and proclaimed on his
return that in the next edition he would explain what had been
misunderstood and withdraw what was objected to. The question
now rises, whether the more recent work of =Xav. Funk= can
escape a similar censure.
Among Catholic writers on canon lay the most notable are
=Walters= of Bonn, =Phillips= of Vienna, =Von Schulte= of Prague
and Bonn, who till the Vatican Council was one of the most zealous
advocates of the strict Catholic tendency, since then openly on
the side of the opposition, a keen supporter, and by word and pen
a vigorous promoter, of the Old Catholic movement, and =Vering=
of Prague, who occupies the ultramontane Vatican standpoint.
§ 191.8. =The Chief Representatives of Exegetical
Theology.=--=Hug= of Freiburg, in his “Introduction,” occupies
the biblical but ecclesiastically latitudinarian attitude of
Jahn. Leaving dogma unattacked and so himself unattacked, =Mövers=
of Breslau, best known by his work on the Phœnicians, a Richard
Simon of his age, developed a subtlety of destructive criticism
of the canon and history of the Old Testament which astonished
even the father of Protestant criticism, De Wette. =Kaulen= of
Bonn wrote an “Introduction to the Old and New Testament,” in
a fairly scientific spirit from the Vatican standpoint; while
=Maier= of Freiburg, wrote an introduction to the New Testament
and commentaries on some New Testament books.--The Old Catholic
=Reusch= of Bonn wrote “Introduction to the Old Testament,” and
“Nature and the Bible” (2 vols., Edin., 1886). =Sepp= of Munich,
silent since 1867, began his literary career with a “Life of
Christ,” a “History of the Apostles,” etc., in the spirit of
the romantic mystical school of Görres. His “Sketch of Church
Reform, beginning with a Revision of the Bible Canon,” caused
considerable excitement. With humble submission to the judgment
of his church, he demanded a correction of the Tridentine decrees
on Scripture in accordance with the results of modern science,
but the only response was the inclusion of his book in the Index.
§ 191.9. =The Chief Representatives of the New
Scholasticism.=--The official and most masterly representative of
this school for the whole Catholic world was the Jesuit =Perrone=,
1794-1876, professor of dogmatics of the _Collegium Romanum_,
the most widely read of the Catholic polemical writers, but not
worthy to tie the shoes of Bellarmin [Bellarmine], Bossuet, and
Möhler. In his “_Prælectiones Theologicæ_,” nine vols., which has
run through thirty-six editions, without knowing a word of German,
he displayed the grossest ignorance along with unparalleled
arrogance in his treatment of Protestant doctrine, history, and
personalities (§ 175, 2). The German Jesuit =Kleutgen= who, under
Pius IX., was the oracle of the Vatican in reference to German
affairs, introduced the new Roman scholasticism by his work “_Die
Theologie der Vorzeit_,” into the German episcopal seminaries,
whose teachers were mostly trained in the _Collegium Germanicum_
at Rome. Alongside of Perrone and Kleutgen, in the domain of
morals, the Jesuit =Gury= holds the first place, reproducing
in his works the whole abomination of probabilism, _reservatio
mentalis_, and the old Jesuit casuistry (§ 149, 10), with the
usual lasciviousness in questions affecting the sexes. Among
theologians of this tendency in German universities we mention
next =Denzinger= of Würzburg, who seeks in his works “to
lead dogmatics back from the aberrations of modern philosophic
speculations into the paths of the old schools.” His zealous
opposition to Güntherism did much to secure its emphatic
condemnation.
§ 191.10. =The Munich Congress of Catholic Scholars, 1863.=--In
order if possible to heal the daily widening cleft between the
scientific university theologians and the scholastic theologians
of the seminaries, and bring about a mutual understanding and
friendly co-operation between all the theological faculties,
Döllinger and his colleague Haneberg summoned a congress
at Munich, which was attended by about a hundred Catholic
scholars, mostly theologians. After high mass, accompanied with
the recitation of the Tridentine creed, the four days’ conference
began with a brilliant presidential address by Döllinger “On the
Past and Present of Catholic Theology.” The liberal views therein
enunciated occasioned violent and animated debates, to which,
however, it was readily admitted as a religious duty that all
scientific discussions and investigations should yield to the
dogmatic claims of the infallible authority of the church, as
thereby the true freedom of science can in no way be prejudiced.
A telegraphic report to the pope drawn up in this spirit by
Döllinger was responded to in a similar manner on the same
day with the apostolic blessing. But after the proceedings
_in extenso_ had become known, a papal brief was issued which
burdened the permission to hold further yearly assemblies with
such conditions as must have made them utterly fruitless. They
were indeed acquiesced in with a bad grace at the second and
last congress at Würzburg in 1864, but the whole scheme was
thus brought to an end.
§ 191.11. =Theological Journals.=--The most severely scientific
journal of this century is the Tübingen _Theol. Quartalschrift_,
which, however, since the Vatican Council has been struggling
to maintain a neutral position between the extremes of the Old
and the New Catholicism. In order if possible to displace it the
Jesuits Wieser and Stenstrup of Innsbruck [Innsbrück] started in
1877 their _Zeitschrift für Kath. Theologie_. The ably conducted
_Theol. Litteraturblatt_, started in 1866 by Prof. Reusch of Bonn,
had to be abandoned in 1878, after raising the standard of Old
Catholicism.
§ 191.12. =The Popes and Theological Science.=--What kind
of theology =Pius IX.= wished to have taught is shown by his
proclaiming St. Liguori (§ 165, 2) and St. Francis de Sales
(§ 157, 1) _doctores ecclesiæ_. =Leo XIII.=, on the other hand,
in 1879 recommended in the encyclical _Æterni patris_, in the
most urgent way, all Catholic schools to make the philosophy
of the angelical Aquinas (§ 103, 6) their foundation, founded
in 1880 an “Academy of St. Thomas Aquinas,” three out of its
thirty members being Germans, Kleutgen, Stöckl, and Morgott, and
gave 300,000 lire out of Peter’s pence for an edition of Aquinas’
works with the commentaries of “the most eminent expositors,”
setting aside “all those books which, while professing to be
derived from St. Thomas are really drawn from foreign and unholy
sources;” _i.e._, in accordance with the desires of the Jesuits,
omitting the strictly Thomist expositors (§ 149, 13), and giving
currency only to Jesuit interpretations. No wonder that the
Jesuit General Beckx in such circumstances submitted himself
“humbly,” being praised for this by the pope as a saint. But a
much greater, indeed a really great, service to the documentary
examination of the history of the Christian church and state has
been rendered by the same pope, undoubtedly at the instigation of
Cardinal Hergenröther, by the access granted not only to Catholic
but also to Protestant investigators to the exceedingly rich
treasures of the Vatican archives. Though still hedged round with
considerable limitations, the concession seems liberality itself
as compared with the stubborn refusal of Pius IX. to facilitate
the studies of any inquirer. With honest pride the pope could
inscribe on his bust placed in the library: “_Leo XIII. Pont.
Max. historiæ studiis consulens tabularii arcana reclusit a
1880_.”--But what the ends were which he had in view and what
the hopes that he cherished is seen from the rescript of August,
1883, in which he calls upon the cardinals De Luca, Pitra, and
Hergenröther, as prefects of the committee of studies, of the
library and archives, while proclaiming the great benefits which
the papacy has secured to Italy, to do their utmost to overthrow
“the lies uttered by the sects” on the history of the church,
especially in reference to the papacy, for, he adds, “we desire
that at last once more the truth should prevail.” Therefore
archives and library are to be opened to pious and learned
students “for the service of religion and science in order that
the historical untruths of the enemies of the church which have
found entrance even into the schoolbooks should be displaced by
the composition of good writings.” The firstfruits of the zeal
thus stimulated were the “_Monunenta ref. Lutheranæ ex tabulariis
S. Sedis_,” Ratisbon, 1883, published by the assistant keeper of
the archives P. Balan as an extinguisher to the Luther Jubilee of
that year. But this performance came so far short of the wishes
and expectations of the Roman zealots that by their influence the
editor was removed from his official position. The next attempt
of this sort was the edition by Hergenröther of the papal
_Regesta_ down to Leo X.