What is to be the Work of the Council--Fears caused by Grandiose
Projects--_Reform of the Church in Head and Members_--Statesmen evince
Concern.
Curiosity as to what the particular work of the Council was to be
grew all the more rapidly, because no authoritative indication of
it was given. Were the Jesuit tenets of Papal authority and Papal
infallibility to be raised into dogmas? Was the Pope to make another
offering to the Virgin by proclaiming as an article of faith, that her
body had been carried to heaven? By the repetition of such questions,
tens of millions partially awoke to the consciousness that they
belonged to a religion which knew not what might be its standard of
faith next year, much less did it know to what particular tenets it
might be committed.
Then, as to the position of the bishops, were they to be only
councillors, or also judges? If the latter, they would first hear the
doctors, as did their predecessors at Trent; would next deliberate,
and finally would formulate decrees, which decrees without alteration,
would be confirmed by the Pontiff. But if the bishops were no longer
judges of the faith, but simply councillors of the one judge, their
place would be to argue points, as the doctors had done at Trent, while
the decree should be that of the Pope, and they would merely assent.
Again, as to the composition of the Council, were the bishops _in
partibus_ to be members? Was Darboy, whose diocese counted two millions
of souls, to be balanced by some Court creature with a title from
Sardis or Ecbatana? or was Schwarzenberg, with Bohemia at his back,
to be balanced by an instrument of the Curia, who, independently of
his patrons, had not a month's bread to call his own? Were those who
represented ancient and numerous churches, and who were as far free
agents as men under Rome can be, to be voted against, man for man,
by vicars apostolic, without churches, or with only new and ignorant
ones--men depending on the Propaganda even for their travelling
expenses and board?
Finally, as to the mode of procedure, were the bishops, as they did at
Trent, to agree upon their own rules of procedure, to evolve by mutual
consultation the questions demanding solution, and to discuss them till
all were ready to vote? Or could there be truth in the suspicion that
everything was being cut and dried beforehand, and that the Court would
impose ready-made rules of procedure, and allow no one but itself to
introduce any subject for discussion?
As to the burning question of moral unanimity, would projected formulae
be passed from hand to hand, as was done at Trent, examined in meetings
of groups, retouched, and, if need be, remoulded till a form was
arrived at in which all but two or three acquiesced? Or was it possible
that formulae for new articles in a creed prepared behind the backs of
the bishops would be imposed on millions and for ever, by a majority
made up with the help of the bishops _in partibus_?
All this time, the nine determined men forming the secret Directing
Congregation, were coolly looking at the same questions, and, step
by step, as we shall see, when events bring out the secret plans,
were settling those questions in the sense most dreaded, and going
to lengths not, we believe, suggested in any of the anticipatory
expressions of fear.
Earnest theologians who had not been converted by the infallibilist
propaganda of recent years, were thrown into consternation. Some
bishops, able administrators, saw no essential difference between Papal
infallibility as a doctrine taught in many of the schools, and believed
by great numbers if rejected by others perhaps greater, and the same
opinion as an article of faith. In such a view, the men of thought saw
the superficial glance of "practical men," as they call themselves, who
never discover anything but by feeling it, and who live by acting out
to-day what others thought out in time gone by.
Little difference! thought the men of foresight. We are going to
be compelled to alter our catechisms and creed in the face of the
Protestants; going to be compelled to teach the opposite of what we
have always taught; going to part with immemorial safeguards against
altering the conditions of salvation, or further narrowing the terms
of membership in the Church--to part with the necessity before every
such change of the open and formal process of a General Council! The
proposed dogma is unlike any now in the creed, in the all-important
point of being self-multiplying. If it is adopted, we shall be liable
to have eternal obligations laid upon our souls, without a week's
warning.
Beside fears like these, others perhaps more general were those of
quiet Catholics wishing to live in peace and serve their respective
nations loyally, who being conscious that even now they were liable to
suspicion of a divided allegiance, feared that if the Jesuit tenets
became the creed, their political relations would be less comfortable,
and their prospects of office not so good. "At the Vatican," says _Ce
qui se Passe au Concile_, speaking of the mystery and the uneasiness
of this moment; "At the Vatican they spoke in low tones of grandiose
projects that were to transform the world, and by exalting Pius IX were
to confound the enemies of the Church." It was those grandiose projects
which made good citizens fear for their own future political standing.
Even feelings of this sort, as represented by _Holtgreven_, ought to
touch us, being those of silent millions awaiting in the dark the
sentence of their lords in Council. He says--
When we left the gymnasium, soon after the year 1860, there was no
pupil who could say that, even by hint, he had been taught there
that the Pope was infallible by himself, and without the consent
of the Church. The answer 128 in Martin's _Handbook of Religion_
is still too fresh in the memory of all; an answer which affirms
that the grace of infallibility belongs only to the collective body
of bishops, as successors of the Apostles.... Persons in office
and out of it, clergy, laity, and exalted Church dignitaries,
agreed that the pretensions of the Pope to power over kings and
nations, in matters of allegiance and such like, were not part of
their religion, but arose out of the state of the civil laws in
the middle ages.... Thus does the Catholic teacher teach in his
lectures on Church history, thus does the student learn; and this
view, which captivates the youth, putting his German heart at rest,
and rejoicing it, still gives him repose and removes every scruple
when, as a man, he lifts up the hand to swear allegiance to the
laws of the fatherland.[119]
Those of the French clergy whose education had been carried beyond the
usual round of Latin, logic, and manners, began to manifest misgivings
as to the effect of the impending change on men of enlarged culture. It
was in March, 1869, that the _Unitá_ published the Pope's famous letter
to the Archbishop of Paris, described in a former chapter. The Paris
correspondent of that journal, commenting upon it, calls the dignitary
who, in the eye of the world, would be his metropolitan and ordinary,
"a pretty fellow"--_bel soggetto_--whom no one would any longer look
upon as a candidate for the rank of Cardinal. In the same letter he
says that war against Prussia must break out, whether the occasion be
the Belgian railways, or complaints that Prussia violates the treaty of
Prague.
Fears as to coming changes, in their effect on men of culture, were
felt still more deeply in Germany, where the general education of
the clergy was higher than elsewhere. Both the German clergy and the
nobler of the French were unprepared for what they began, in secret,
to call Pius-cult, as it appeared in the language employed by the
favoured organs. One word in the prayer for the Pope, recommended by
the _Unitá_, on March 12, grated not on Protestant ears only. The _Ave
Maria_ was for a week to be followed by these petitions: "Eternal
Father, defend Pius IX! Eternal Word, assist Pius IX! Holy Spirit,
glorify Pius IX!"
Perhaps none of the publications now flowing from the Press excited
greater attention than one which was announced as being from the pen
of one of the best known of the Austrian clergy. It was entitled
_The Reform of the Romish Church in Head and Members_. Not only does
this author oppose the attempt to restore laws enforcing unity of
creed, but he actually does so on principle, as well as on the ground
of expediency. The longing of Rome for the subjection of the States
of the world, and for power again to employ the arm of the State in
her service, is, he contends, a delusion which will lead only to her
overthrow. Moreover, he lays down the startling principle that the
Church has nothing to ask but liberty to act in her own sphere _like
any private society_. This last position is utterly irreconcilable with
all the ordinary theories. He holds that anything granted to the Church
by the State beyond what is given to any other private society is an
evil, and also that every case, in the past, wherein Church and State
have joined hands in order to help one another to gain their respective
ends, has turned out ill for both of them. In modern times his ideal of
the normal relation of Church and State is that existing in America,
which he imagines works favourably for Romanism.
The author of _Reform in Head and Members_ looks on the system of
lower seminaries for boys and higher ones for young men, in which the
future clergy pass their youth separated from all society, leading an
unreal life, pursuing narrow studies and without knowledge of men, or
the possibility of acquiring any breadth of mind, as producing only
a race of priests unfit to lead an educated age. He declares that in
France, Italy, and Spain the system of close seminaries has destroyed
theological science among Catholics. He manifests the ordinary
contempt of German scholars for the showy and wordy pupils of the
Roman seminaries, and contends that Catholic theology does not bear
any comparison, as to talent and learning, with Protestant theology
in any country except Germany, where the priests have to study at the
universities. He further believes that the lamentable moral condition
of the Romish clergy is not a little to be ascribed to the seclusion
and unreality in which their youth is passed (p. 161).
The young priests in whose hands the guidance of the people is
to be placed, squander the fair and precious years of youth in
enclosures shut off from the world, and out of them do they go
forth into life without experience of men or of the world. Then
does the world, with all its charms, allurements, delights,
and seductions, rush in upon those narrow, inexperienced young
clergymen; and alas! only too many of them sink in a sea which to
them is new, strange, and untried.
He demands a thorough reform of this system, insisting that the
contempt shown by all respectable Italians for the priesthood is not to
be accounted for except on the ground of this wretched system and of
its wretched moral and religious results.
Another demand boldly made by this Austrian priest is for the
abolition of the vows of celibacy, so far as they are either perpetual
or obligatory. He would admit of vows that were both voluntary and
temporary. The corrupting effects of celibacy evidently leave him no
hope that it is capable of being rendered consistent with tolerable
morality. He treats this institution as purely local and Romish,
regarding its imposition upon the Catholic Church as a great public
evil, impossible to be justified. At page 117 he says, "Upon the law
of the Romish Church fall back all those moral abominations, beyond
measure and beyond number, which have arisen out of it, and which will
stain the Church as long as that law remains in force." When the writer
approaches the subject of bureaucratic centralization, the Catholic
rises against the Romanism which has fastened itself on the Churches
of other nations. This system of centralization as carried out by the
Curia is much too narrow legitimately to claim the name of national.
Our author wants to see an end of the system. He wonders what may be
the annual revenue paid into Rome from all quarters of the globe for
indults, dispensations, indulgencies, remissions of sins, and the fees
gained by all the inventions for what he calls selling poor parchment
and bad writing very dear. He does not, like many writers when they
touch this subject, break out into a passion against the huckstering of
their religion, but manifests a cold contempt, feeling that the system
is low and hollow.
The modern contrivance for making a bishop a tenant on a short lease is
calmly exposed. Formerly, as the author points out, a bishop used to
rule his own diocese; now he is no more than a delegate. He is allowed
to distribute such dispensations for the smaller sins against Church
law as do not pay any money tax, but his power to do this, as also his
power to perform several other of the acts essential to his office,
is no longer conveyed to him with the office itself. On the contrary,
for that power he is dependent upon a lease, never given for more than
five years, called the QUINQUENNIAL FACULTIES. If at the expiration of
one of these terms the Faculties are not renewed, he becomes a mere
lay figure in his chair, and would be at once exposed to his clergy
and people as under disgrace. By this means is he kept a perpetual
pensioner on the favour of the Curia, and in addition to the periodical
expiration of the ordinary lease, he is a tenant at will, liable any
day to have his Faculties withdrawn by the Holy Father.
The centralizing of the government of the Church in the See of
Rome, to effect which it was necessary to destroy the rights of
metropolitans and to curtail the jurisdiction of bishops, is a
state of things so unjustifiable and ruinous, that the well-being
of the Church urgently demands its removal. This absorption of all
the powers and rights of Church government is not to be justified
either by pleading the necessity of preserving the unity of the
Church, or by pleading the supreme hierarchical power, which
belongs to the See of Rome. The very necessity of manifesting
unity presupposes a number of persons entrusted with independent
functions of government; and if the incumbent of the highest
power of the Church strips the subordinate functionaries of all
authority, he makes himself the sole seat of power in the Church.
This writer would restore worship in the mother tongue.
Statesmen began to feel concern, at least such as did not belong to the
class finely laughed at by M. Veuillot, who do not think it necessary
to inform themselves on "the small affairs of the Catholic Church,"
although speaking, legislating, and perhaps writing on matters of which
those affairs form a considerable element.
Naturally such fears were sooner and more seriously felt by Roman
Catholic statesmen than by Protestant ones. Though _Von Lutz_,
Minister of Worship in Bavaria, spoke after the event, he tersely
expressed the apprehensions felt at this time--
"The Church lays down the principle that the Pope is Prince of
princes, and Lord Paramount (_Oberherr_) of all States. Do you
think it possible that States will put up with that? That the State
will quietly stand by while the bishop orders the parish priest to
preach against the law of the land, and while he deposes him if he
will not comply? Or must the State itself drive the parish priest
out of his home for refusing to misuse the pulpit, against the
State?"[120]
Bishop Fessler, of St. Pölten,[121] in a lengthy manifesto, gave a
clear intimation that the infallibility of the Pope would probably be
defined by the Council. This set many Catholics in Germany on preparing
to combat the intention announced, and set still more on saying that
as Fessler had been the first to face the German public with this
intimation, his fortune was made at Rome.
Bishop Dupanloup, of Orleans, put forth his best literary power in
what was called, by the _Constitutionnel_, an attempt to bring about a
reconciliation between the Council and the principles of 1789.[122] He
urged that they greatly erred who looked upon the approaching Council
as a menace against modern society, or as a declaration of war with
progress. On the contrary, freedom, fraternity and progress, so far
as they were true and good, had nothing to fear from this "senate of
humanity."
Bishop Von Ketteler, of Mainz, declared that the forthcoming Council
was the greatest event of our age[123]--
At least (added this doughty pupil of the Jesuits), in the work of
reconstruction; for as to destruction, certainly, there have been
greater events. As God provided for the Church and the world in
the century of the so-called Reformation, by means of the Council
of Trent, so has He in our century, which, still sadder to say, is
the century of Revolution, the century of demolition and universal
destruction, inspired the High Pontiff with the supreme remedy, the
convocation of the Vatican Council. The work of destruction is
manifestly hasting to its end. It is time to commence the work of
reconstruction, on the ancient foundation laid by Christ once for
all. This is precisely the work to which the Council is called.
These words we quote from the _Civiltá_, to which the whole document
seemed highly laudable.[124] But its translation is strong. Ketteler
did not use the term "reconstruction" for his German audience, but
"construction." He did not say that God had inspired the Pontiff, but
that the Spirit of God again assembled the General Council, the highest
Court of Judgment for the Truth on earth. This last form of words had
the merit of which our English tongue has within the last few years
presented some examples of all but incredible skill--the merit of
suggesting to a Protestant an idea that would not awaken his political
fears, and yet of representing to the Jesuits of the _Civiltá_ the
true doctrine. The Pope himself began to take part in the controversy
now gradually rising. The Abbé Belet had translated into French the
work of the Jesuit Father Weninger, published in New York. The Pope
wrote a brief to thank him, taking occasion at the same time harshly
to censure the great Bossuet, as a bishop who, in order to flatter the
civil power, contradicted his own proper opinions, and contradicted the
original doctrine of the Church.[125]
Pleasant to the military palate of Pius IX were the words of brave
Colonel Allet, in a soldierly order of the day, issued in December, to
his zouaves. After recounting in terse, strong terms, their services
against the Garibaldians, he says--
Soldiers! all is not over. Great dangers still threaten the Church.
Remember that in your regiment you stand, not merely as soldiers
marching side by side; you also represent a principle before the
world, the principle of the voluntary and disinterested defence
of the Holy See. You are the nucleus around which will unite in
the hour of danger the prayers, the succours, and the hopes of the
Catholic world. Be, then, true soldiers of God. You have not merely
duties, you have even a mission, and you will not fulfil it without
union, discipline, moral conduct, and military instruction. A third
battalion is formed. Your swelling ranks assure to you a larger
part in future struggles. We shall march together to the cry of
"Long Live Pius IX!"
Funereal solemnities on behalf of the fallen are proudly recorded as
having been celebrated in France, England, Germany, etc.
To these military consolations were added such as a crown and a nation
once great could now bestow. Queen Isabella strongly recommended from
the throne, and her Cortes almost unanimously voted, that the forces of
the nation, acting in alliance with the Emperor of the French, should
be ready to defend the Holy See.[126] What was more important, the King
of Prussia, in reply to Ledochowsky, spoke clearly in support of the
temporal power. It was also told with satisfaction how, at banquets,
both at Malines and Namur, the health of the Pope was drunk before that
of the King of Belgium, and how pleasantly the Nuncio gave the health
of the local and subordinate sovereign after that of his master, as the
Lord Paramount, had received its meed.[127]
It is not easy for us, whose faith has always rested on the fixed
standard of God's Word, to enter into all the feelings of suspense
which are to be read between the lines of a lecture by Professor
Menzel, then of Braunsberg, now of Bonn, printed for private
circulation among his former pupils.[128] He is teaching them the
doctrine of _Church_ infallibility, but not, as he had hitherto
done, in the twofold confidence of persuasion and personal security.
Persuasion abides, reinforced by fresh study and animated by assault.
But security is gone. The consciousness that he may never more be
allowed to teach this doctrine weighs upon all he utters. Before
another session, should his own faith not change, that of his chair
probably will. The Church which he had served, as permitting the
membership of those who denied the infallibility of the Pope, had been
catholic enough for him. But now, after pausing since the Reformation,
she had actively resumed the process of narrowing the terms of
membership by dogmatizing new shibboleths. One had been already added
in his own day. Another now hung overhead, still more momentous,
because it not only altered the doctrine of the Church, but altered the
standard of doctrine, and was moreover self-propagating--a seed bearing
fruit after its kind.
"This complete subversion of the old Catholic principle, _everywhere,
always, and by all_," cries the poor Professor, "has found its most
doughty champions in the Jesuits of the _Civiltá Cattolica_, with
their branch at _Maria Laach_, and in the Archbishops of Malines and
Westminster, Deschamps and Manning."[129] In the struggling argument of
the Teacher of this year, we cannot help hearing, by anticipation, the
sighs of the excommunicated of next year; excommunicated for holding
fast what he had always taught, with the sanction of the Church, and
from one of her chairs! And as the iron enters into his soul, he
evidently feels it hard that an English hand should be one of the
foremost in driving it home.
Professors looked from the chair on their classes not knowing what
they might have to teach a twelvemonth hence. Preachers looked from
the pulpit on their congregations weighted with the same uncertainty.
Editors wrote that the Catholic faith was thus and thus, feeling
that, perhaps, soon they must write the reverse, or else drop the
pen. Heads of families were perplexed as to what they should say to
their children, if compelled to believe what they and their fathers
had always resented as a false accusation against their religion.
Jurists wondered if they must either break with their clergy or
begin a campaign for reinstating canon law over civil. Kings whose
forefathers had compelled nations, by the sword, to wear the yoke of
Rome, chafed to think that their religion was to be "changed over
their heads." But all this time the silent arbiters of the Catholic's
destiny were patiently framing the decrees. Men moved and combined
to prevent new fetters from being forged for their souls next year;
but link was being already noiselessly added to link, by old,
cool, and resolute masters. The Emperor set to defend the Gallican
liberties for the millions of France, and the Emperor set to uphold
the Josephine safeguards for the millions of Austria, had no access to
the subterranean forge _Antra Ætnaca_ where chains and thunderbolts
were on the anvil, away from the ears of men. Turnus had not less
power over the island cave where the arms by which he was to fall were
being tempered. But, on the other hand, the Vulcan of the Syllabus
had more than one Venus at the Court of each potentate, wooing in his
interests, and pleading for his will. The truth, however, was to dawn
upon their subjects from behind gorgeous clouds of their beloved pomps
and ceremonies.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 119: _Holtgreven_, pp. 4, 5.]
[Footnote 120: Menzel, _Jesuitenumtriebe_, p. 119.]
[Footnote 121: _Das Letzte und das Nächste Concil_, p. 59.]
[Footnote 122: _Lettre sur le futur Concile OEcuménique._]
[Footnote 123: _Das Allgemeine Concil und seine Bedeutung für unsere
Zeit._]
[Footnote 124: Serie VII. vol. vi. p. 93.]
[Footnote 125: _Friedberg_, p. 487.]
[Footnote 126: _Civiltá_, VII. i. pp. 228-30.]
[Footnote 127: Id. 622.]
[Footnote 128: _Ueber das Subject der kirchlichen Unfehlbarheit._ (_Als
Manuscript gedruckt._) Braunsberg: 1870.]
[Footnote 129: P. 7.]