Conflicting Manifestoes by Bishops--Attacks on
Bossuet--Darboy--Dupanloup combats Infallibility--His relations
with Dr. Pusey--Deschamps replies--Manning's Manifesto--Retort of
Friedrich--Discordant Episcopal Witnesses.
In November 1869 the Bishop of Versailles, writing of Bossuet, said
that the fame of the Eagle of Meaux was from day to day declining
(_Friedberg_, p. 81). This was but a symptom of the new war against
nationalism. Professor Ceccucci, though writing for a French audience,
did not scruple to say, "If Bossuet escaped excommunication, he owed it
to the benign and paternal indulgence of the Holy See" (_Frond_, iv. p.
112). Bishop Dupanloup soon took occasion to show that Innocent XI sent
Bossuet two briefs congratulating him on having written in a manner
calculated to win back heretics and increase the propagating power of
the Church.[165] If the Church, even before infallibility had been
proclaimed, began to be so conscious of its narrowness that it could
hardly contain Bossuet, what will it be when a few centuries more have
passed over it?
As the opening of the Council drew nearer, feeling grew warmer in
political and religious circles. Archbishop Darboy sketched the
impending dangers in a pastoral--
"You have been told that articles of faith which hitherto you have
not been bound to believe, are to be imposed upon you; that points
affecting civil society and the relations of Church and State are
to be treated in a spirit opposed to the laws and usages of the
age; that a certain vote is to be carried by acclamation; that the
bishops will not be free, and that the minority, even if eloquent,
will be treated as an opposition, and will soon be put down by the
majority.... It must be owned that much has been done to spread
these alarms by writers taking different sides."[166]
Bishop Dupanloup, when about leaving home for the Council, published
a memorable letter. He seemed to regard the desire of the French
clergy for centralization as the origin of the cry for a dogma. The
change, however, from a national to a Papal spirit was natural. Was it
likely that youths from the schools of the Christian Brothers, passed
through an episcopal seminary, would comprehend the national spirit
and episcopal convictions of Darboy or even of Dupanloup?[167] The
lower education of the country had been just long enough in the hands
of Rome to begin to bear fruit. Dupanloup meant no ill to France when
he succeeded in binding Louis Philippe to Gregory XVI, by inducing him
to give the priests their way in schools, in return for forbearance in
baptizing the Comte de Paris, as the son of a mixed marriage, and of a
mother who refused to abjure her Protestantism. But he then did one of
the most hurtful deeds to France, and to the future of European peace,
that man could have done.
This letter, cries Sambin, gave an episcopal head to the revolt;
... the objection was pointed against the opportuneness of
defining the dogma of infallibility, but it was hardly possible
to be deceived--the principle of infallibility itself seemed to
be attacked.... The acts of the sovereign Pontiff were presented
in a light so far from the truth, that a feeling of profound
astonishment passed through the ranks of pastors and people. They
were grieved to see the paling away of the triple halo which had
hitherto hovered around the author's brow (_Sambin_, p. 49).
This was published in France in 1872, after Dupanloup had "submitted,"
and rendered new and conspicuous service to the Papacy. As Dupanloup's
pamphlet will be hard to find hereafter, and as it is a representative
document, we may give a general idea of the argument it presents.
For two years, says Dupanloup, thousands of printed papers have been
circulated in the streets, containing a vow to believe in the personal
infallibility of the Pope. Agents have got them signed by persons who
did not understand the first word of the question.
He contrasts the confidence and freedom of speech granted to the
_Civiltá_ and the _Univers_ with the secrecy observed toward bishops.
Naming Manning and Deschamps as the leaders in the agitation for the
new dogma, he adds, "I say new, because for eighteen hundred years the
faithful have not, on pain of ceasing to be Catholics, been bound to
believe it." Alluding to the freedom which, it was said, the bishops
would have in the Council, he asks what freedom was left to them even
now, when any who expressed an unwelcome opinion were denounced in the
papers, beforehand, as schismatics or heretics.... "After having taught
for eighteen hundred and seventy years, the Church is now to come and
ask in a Council, Who has the right of teaching with infallibility?...
When the oak is twenty centuries old, digging to find the parent acorn
under the roots is the way to shake the tree."
The Bishop proceeds, with tact and great earnestness, to plead for
the necessity of moral unanimity in defining new dogmas. He relates a
fact of interest, and one very closely affecting the person of Pius
IX. We have seen that, in 1864, the Pope formally initiated official
preparations for the Council; that he had long before 1867 decided
important questions as to its constitution and procedure; that he had
set commissions to work, consulted bishops in different countries, and
ordered nuncios to select theologians; and that it was only political
perplexity which prevented the assembly of 1867 from being the General
Council.
Yet Bishop Dupanloup, whether then aware of these facts or not, makes
the following statement--
I well remember, and more bishops than one who were present in
Rome in 1867 can recall, the fact that one of the most serious
anxieties of Pius IX, before deciding on holding the Vatican
Council, was, lest questions should arise calculated to provoke
stormy discussions, and divisions in the episcopate. But the Pope
remembered the sagacious conduct of the Council of Trent and of
Pius IV, and proceeded, in the hope that it would not be forgotten
at the future Council.
One of Dupanloup's solemn sayings is, "I have read and read again the
catechism of the Council of Trent, on purpose to find if it spoke Yes
or No about the infallibility of the Pope; I have ascertained that it
does not say a word about it."
Again, he states that in 1867 one hundred and eighty-eight Anglican
ministers wrote to the Pope asking for the basis of a union. In
his reply, the Pope spoke of the authority of the Church and the
supremacy of the Pope, but he did not speak of his infallibility. Yet
journalists, screening themselves behind his name, tried to shut the
mouths of bishops by attacks full of violence and gall. This was meant
for M. Veuillot, who was not slow to reply.
As to Greeks and Protestants, Dupanloup points out that what is
proposed amounts to telling them, "A ditch now separates us; we are
going to make it an abyss.... Two years ago. Dr. Pusey said to me in
Orleans, 'There are eight thousand of us in England, daily praying for
a union.'" ... When Pitt thought of relaxing laws against Catholics in
England and Ireland, he asked several learned bodies what was the real
doctrine of the Roman Church on the power of the Pope. "I have under my
eyes the replies of the Universities of Paris, Douay, Louvain, Alcala,
Salamanca, and Valladolid." They all "answer expressly that neither the
Pope nor the Cardinals, nor yet any body or individual in the Roman
Church, hold from Jesus Christ any civil authority over England, any
power to release the subjects of his Britannic Majesty from their oath
of fidelity." Such doctrine was calculated to reassure Pitt, as against
the contrary doctrine, professed in celebrated Bulls by more Popes than
one. But what if the Pope be declared infallible?
As to Catholic governments, their standing jealousy of the
ecclesiastical power would be increased. Had not Boniface VIII
taught that the temporal sword also belonged to Peter, and that the
spiritual power had a right to institute and judge the temporal? Had
not Paul III released all the subjects of Henry VIII from their oath
of allegiance, offered England to any one who would conquer it, and
given all the goods of the dissident English, real and personal, to the
conqueror? Was not that Bull a great misfortune to Christendom? "I am
sad--and who would not be sad?--in recalling these great and painful
historical facts; but they force us to it--those whose levity and
rashness have stirred these burning questions." After the dogma shall
have been proclaimed, he contends that from the point of view occupied
by governments, "all civil and political rights, like all religious
belief, will be in the hand of a single man." The journals which claim
to be purest in their Romanism "treat the doctrine, so strongly held by
the Catholic sovereigns, as well as others, that each of the two powers
is independent in its own sphere, as tainted with atheism."
The following passage in the Bishop's argument suffices to show that
there may be more senses of the statement that Catholics do not owe any
divided allegiance, than plain English folk ever dreamed of in their
philosophy--
We lately read, as quoted with praise in a French paper, the
following, which compares those to the Manicheans who deny that
the two swords are in the same hand: "Are there two sources of
authority and power, two supreme ends for the members of the same
society, two different objects in the intention of the Being who
orders all and two distinct destinies in one and the same man, who
is both member of a Church and of a State? Who does not see the
absurdity of such a system? It is the dualism of the Manicheans if
not atheism."
We ought to interject the remark that "the two swords in the same hand"
is not strict but popular language. The two are in the same _power_,
but only one is in the spiritual hand. Again, the taunt of Manicheism
frequently falls from Jesuit pens. Boniface VIII set the example of
calling people something like Manicheans, if they believed in any
supreme power in princes on a level with that of the Pope.
Coming to the crucial question, What is speaking _ex cathedrâ_?
Bishop Dupanloup shows that the diversity of doctrine on this point
is almost endless, and perplexing beyond belief. The lay Professor of
Theology in the seminary of the Archdiocese of Westminster, Dr. Ward,
formerly an Anglican minister, goes beyond the great majority. They
hold that a condition necessary to an infallible utterance is that the
Pope shall address the whole Church, but Dr. Ward thinks that this is
not necessary. The majority think that the intention of binding the
belief of the faithful must be clearly expressed, but Dr. Ward again
thinks that it need not be so. Phillips, the German doctor, holds that
the Pope need not consult a Council, the Roman Church, the Cardinals,
or any one; nor is it necessary that he should maturely deliberate
or carefully study the matter by the light of God's written word and
of tradition, or even that he should put up a prayer to God before
pronouncing sentence. "Without any one of these conditions," says the
Bishop, "his decision would not be less valid, authentic, or obligatory
on the whole Church, than if he had observed every condition dictated
by faith, piety, and good sense." He adds the words of Phillips, that
the definition _ex cathedrâ_ may be verbal or written and with or
without anathema, but must be given by him to all believing Christians
as Vicar of Jesus Christ, in the name of the Apostles Peter and Paul,
or in virtue of the authority of the Holy See, or in other similar
terms. The Church, he says, according to Phillips, has no right to fix
any condition or restriction whatever.
Citing the cases of Popes Stephen VI, Honorius, and Pascal II,
Dupanloup shows that heavy facts obstruct the historical path to the
new dogma.
He proceeds to point out that the difference between the universal
infallibilists and the dogmatical infallibilists is very grave. The
former argue that the dogma, if adopted in the sense of the latter,
would involve a peril. A Pope infallible in some cases and fallible
in others is, they think, a contradiction. If, as a private teacher,
the Pope should err in doctrine, might he not impose his error on the
Church? If this is not possible, you have either a Pope who thinks
one thing and defines another, or a perpetual miracle! And why
distinguish, ask the universal infallibilists, when Christ has not
distinguished? "That thy faith fail not"--that means the faith of Peter
in every sense, personal and pastoral. These theologians contend that a
Pope could not, even if he would, fall into an error, public or private.
As to the effect of the change on the episcopate, Dupanloup contends
that Councils will be rendered superfluous. Hitherto, the bishops
have been judges of the faith, real judges, though in union with the
Pope--co-judges, as was said by Benedict XIV. But if the proposed
change is made, their judgment before or after will be of little
account; as Monsignor Manning has said, the Pope can determine "without
the episcopate, and independently of it." The bishops, he proceeds,
are now Doctors, not mere echoes. With the Pope they constitute the
Teaching Church. After the change they will not be a voice, only an
echo.
Drawing a glowing picture of the services of the French bishops to the
Papacy, he says--
"Ah! I dare to affirm that so much devotion to Rome and to the
Catholic world gives to the Church of France the right to be
trusted, to be heard." He adds, anticipating his arrival in Rome,
"I shall no sooner touch the sacred ground, no sooner kiss the tomb
of the Apostles, than I shall feel myself in peace, out of the
battle, in the midst of an assembly presided over by a father and
composed of brethren. There the noises will all die away, the rash
interferences will cease, the indiscretions will disappear, the
winds and waves will be calmed down."
The statement, frequently repeated, that Bishop Dupanloup in this
letter admitted the doctrine, and contested only the opportuneness of
defining it, is incorrect. This was pointed out at the time by Dr.
Reusch, of Bonn, in the _Literaturblatt_. Dupanloup once or twice
says that he will not touch the question of its truth, one way or the
other. He never, directly or indirectly, indicates belief in it. Many
of his arguments more than indirectly oppose the very substance of the
doctrine. He plainly feels that it is unscriptural, uncatholic, and
unwise; but he knows that it is and has long been gospel in Rome.
Bishop Dupanloup was replied to by Archbishop Deschamps, of Malines.
Monsignor Deschamps was following the straight path to the purple.
He roundly lectured Dupanloup. "Why should not that trouble me which
rejoices the enemies of the faith and of the Church?" "You have
committed an error, Monsignor," he says, repeatedly. He correctly
states that Dupanloup has not confined himself to the question of
opportuneness. "You have handled the principal question, ... your
fears have disturbed your vision."[168] Dupanloup prepared a rejoinder
to Deschamps, but was prevented from publishing it by circumstances
which taught him that in leaving France for Rome he had not passed
from disturbance to tranquillity, but from regulated conflict to
all-triumphant violence, compelling inaction, unless action was on
its own side. In Rome, where any movement of an ecclesiastic is often
accounted for by the prospect of some ribbon, robe, or perquisite, it
was freely said that Napoleon had promised Dupanloup the archbishopric
of Lyons if he would head the Gallicans. An English paper repeated this
Roman scandal, fathering it on well informed circles. Certain circles
are always well informed as to the motives of men who oppose them.
The pastoral from the banks of the Thames forms a contrast to that
from the banks of the Loire. True, Archbishop Manning no longer speaks
of the extinction of Protestantism, or the restoration of the Pope's
dominion over the East, as probable effects of the Council. He even
shows some dawning consciousness that the war which he had announced
in 1867 with a light heart, would not be carried through so lightly.
In the earlier part of his treatise he more than once coolly speaks of
the bishops as being unanimous in the belief of Papal infallibility!
Before the conclusion, Bishop Maret's work extorts the admission that
he must now call that doctrine Ultramontane, which two years before, he
had asserted to be Catholic. He none the less eagerly presses for the
carrying out of the programme. The Church is far too large. She permits
differences of belief, which are not only unseemly, but dangerous.
After an outbreak of questioning thought and conflicting will, such as
had been occasioned by a simple demand for only one or two new dogmas,
tighter and tighter binding up seems to Dr. Manning to be not merely
becoming, but even necessary.
While panting for additional fetters for his own Church, he speaks
of Protestants as sighing for something beyond insular narrowness.
In fact, it would seem as if he had no perception of the difference
between a big sect and a large creed, or of the possible harmony
between a local organization and a universal brotherhood. There is
no insular narrowness, much less Pontine-Marsh narrowness, in the
definition of a Church given by the English Church, whereby she
marks her relation to all other Churches. That definition is large,
catholic, and scriptural. It leaves the English Churchman free from
any obligation to unchurch other Christians, and therefore he may rest
and be thankful, when others feel bound, by the narrowness of their
sect, to unchurch him. The Church of Christ was catholic when she could
number only one hundred and thirty adherents in the whole world. She
will never become more catholic than she was then. No sect can increase
its catholicity by adding millions of ignorant and bigoted people, and
calling them Christians.
Dr. Manning resented, as a sort of rebellion, objections taken
against multiplying terms of membership, and adding new conditions of
salvation. To him every increase of narrowness seemed an increase of
unity. If there are men in the English Church sighing in a similar way
for bonds and anathemas which, thank God! our island does not forge,
they are not the men inspired by the catholic creed of their own
Church, but men infected by the municipal creed of the Popes.
Like Dupanloup, Archbishop Manning made an attack and provoked a
retort. He denounced the historical school of theologians in Germany,
and especially in Munich, and was pitilessly cut up by Friedrich,
in the _Literaturblatt_. The Archbishop, like Auguste Comte, had
reached a point in the development of theory when it was necessary
that it should conquer history. Preparatory to the attack on the
Catholic Faculty of Munich, he writes in mother English matter like
the following (p. 10): "_The day is past for appeals to antiquity._
If Christianity and the Christian Scriptures are to be maintained in
controversy against sceptical criticism, the unbroken, world-wide
witness of the Catholic Church must be invoked."
A number of equally exposed positions are taken up in face of the
Liberal Catholic scholars, and that with all the contempt which
official power often feels for reasoning power--
"They who, under the pretensions of historical criticism, deny the
witness of the Catholic Church to be the _maximum_ of evidence,
even in a historical sense, likewise ruin the foundation of
moral certainty in respect to Christianity altogether" (p. 125).
"No historical certainty can be called science except only by
courtesy. It is time that the pretensions of 'historical science'
and 'scientific historians' be reduced to their proper sphere
and limits. And this the Council will do, not by contention or
anathema, but by the words 'It hath seemed good to the Holy Ghost
and to us'" (_id._).
However confused in his ideas of catholicity and of historical
authority the Archbishop had become, the struggle he had done something
to occasion and to exasperate already began to awake him to the
difference between an ordinary addition to the creed and that change of
base which he was moving heaven and earth to procure--
There is a difference, also, between a definition of the
infallibility of the Pope and that of any other Christian doctrine.
In the latter case the authority of the Church may be sufficient to
overcome any doubt. In the former _it is this very authority, the
principle and foundation of all certainty in faith_, which is in
question (p. 31).
These portentous words tell where Dr. Manning had placed himself--in
pupilage to a power which, having left the divine "fountain of all
certainty in faith," was disputing as to what cistern, of all the
cisterns it had hewn out, was the one into which the true spring
overflowed. Where will the dogma be found to conquer the history made
by the Archbishop's own hand when he wrote those words--history proving
that after he had been for years flourishing before Anglicans his Papal
Society as affording absolute certainty in faith, he himself declared
her to be in the throes of a combat as to "the principle and fountain
of all certainty in faith"? Where will a dogma be found to conquer
the history made at the moment when his Papal Society, in accordance
with his wishes, adopted an unchangeable decree, which, _if true_,
proves that for all the time of her existence, she had not only been
fallible, but had indeed failed, and that right grievously--failed as
to the doctrine of her head, by withholding from him the recognition
of his attributes and rights? If from the beginning the Popes were
infallible, the Church, which never consented to recognize them as such
till 1870, had up to that year failed in the doctrine of her head, and
failed in opposition to her head. If they were not from the beginning
infallible, she in 1870 failed in the doctrine of her head, and failed
in conjunction with her head. The decree of 1870 fixes her in the fork,
and out of it she cannot wrestle: if the decree was true she had been
in a fault of faith up to that day; if it was not true, she committed
that day a fault in faith.
Archbishop Manning did not fail to hold out once more a warning to the
governments. For some months past the tone of the Vatican Press had
been that of men who felt that they now held the internal peace of many
a nation at their mercy; being able to menace almost any government
with serious unrest, and some with overthrow. The habit of insinuating
such threats seems to be native to the bad air which Dr. Newman truly
speaks of as hanging around the foot of the Pope's rock.[169] But the
following is too close a copy of those revolutionary vaticinations for
the banks of the Thames--
The Catholic Church now stands alone, as in the beginning, in its
divine isolation and power. "Be wise now therefore, O ye kings; be
instructed, ye judges of the earth." There is an abyss before you,
into which thrones, and rights, and laws, and liberties may sink
together. You have to choose between the Revolution and the Church
of God. As you choose, so will your lot be. The General Council
gives to the world one more witness for the truths, laws, and
sanctities which include all that is pure, noble, just, venerable
upon earth. It will be an evil day for any State in Europe if it
engage in conflict with the Church of God. No weapon formed against
it ever yet has prospered (p. 130).
The last words might be enough to account for Cardinal Manning's
dislike of history. They flatly contradict it, and it flatly
contradicts them; for by the Church of God is here meant the Church
of the Pope. The weapons which have most prospered from the days of
the Reformation to this day are those that have been turned against
the Pope. The nations that have most prospered have been those that
have declared him a pretender; and in these nations the reigns that
have been distinguished for prosperity have been the most decidedly
Protestant. England was long ago put to the choice between the
Reformation and the Church of the Pope, and happily chose the good
part, and as she chose, so, ever blessed be the God of nations, has
been our lot. We will repeat the choice of our fathers, and the lot
of our children shall be better and better. And they will have to
pity, even more than we are called to pity, those who, having rejected
reformation, have placed themselves under a continual terror and a
liability to a periodical outburst of revolution.
Friedrich, in the _Literaturblatt_ (v. p. 164), replied to the attack
on the historical theologians of Munich. He said that the abuses of
the middle ages had crept in through the total neglect of history. On
the other hand, Protestant theology had risen up and had matured as a
strictly historical theology. Baronius had attempted to win this weapon
back to the service of Rome, and the Munich scholars had followed in
his steps. If archives and original works were to be wrested out of
their hands, it meant nothing more nor less than laying down their arms
in the presence of their antagonists. Friedrich would not allow the
ambiguous expression "the witness of the Church" to cover anything more
than her infallible utterances.
He said that the Archbishop had a false idea of the way in which a
Council should proceed, because he seemed to think that the Church
might speak without first using all human means to ascertain the
truth. If he thought so, he was under a delusion of which a careful
study of the history of the Councils might cure him. The statement of
Manning, "I have already said," that the proofs of Papal infallibility
outweighed those of the infallibility of the Church without the
Pope, provoked the remark that as the Archbishop had adduced only
his own authority, "I have already said," we might still doubt the
infallibility of the proofs until he had produced his credentials as
one inspired. Friedrich says that while blaming others for attempting
to influence the Council, Manning himself tried to impose his authority
upon it, in such a manner that it might be fancied that the Council was
not to utter the words of the Holy Ghost, but those of the Archbishop
of Westminster. Thus he indignantly flings back in the face of the
prelate the assertion that it was an attempt to interfere with the
freedom of the Council when the Theological Faculty of Munich gave an
opinion to the king of the country in answer to questions put by him.
The Archbishop, he protests, has no title to deprive theologians of
their calling, or of their right to investigate historical evidences or
to give their views, so long as the Church has not spoken.
He reminds the Archbishop that, severe as he is against those who do
not go as far as himself, even he does not go far enough, for his
allies now begin to require people to say, that the Church may define
dogmas without having any support in the Bible and tradition, and that
indeed when nothing but apocryphal documents are in favour of the
definition. And, moreover, that the authority of a General Council (as
distinguished from that of the Pope) is only human authority. These
innovations, says the sturdy German, we abhor; and then he leaves the
Englishman to the care of his Jesuit allies with these words: "If what
everybody here says" (he writes in Rome) "is true, that the Archbishop,
at every opportunity, declares we have only one school to fear, the
historical school, I grant to him and grant to his allies that they
have the light of history to fear."
With various feelings the bishops now set forth to bear witness as to
the faith of their respective Churches. This was the most dignified
of the professed duties of a bishop in Councils as they used to be.
It had some show of a foundation so long as the rule of "apostolic"
tradition was adhered to. Of course, however, that became antiquated.
So "ecclesiastical" tradition was set up side by side with apostolic,
as what was so called had been set up side by side with the Word of God.
Darboy set out, from his diocese of two millions of souls, to bear
witness that the doctrine of Papal infallibility was not the faith,
and never had been, on the banks of the Seine. Manning set out to
testify that it was the faith and the tradition on the banks of the
Thames. Clifford set out from Clifton to declare that it was not the
faith on the Avon. Deschamps went to prove that it was the faith in
Malines. Dupanloup went to prove that it was not, and never had been,
the faith in Orleans. Cullen left Dublin to demonstrate that it was,
and ever had been, the true faith of Ireland. MacHale left Connaught,
bracing up his fourscore years, to go and bear witness that it was
not the faith he had learned, no, nor any of his coevals. Spalding
embarked from Baltimore to testify that it was the ancient faith in
America. Kenrick set forth from St. Louis to protest that this was the
reverse of the truth, and to prove that he had never been taught it
in Maynooth, and even to tell of the first time when the doctrine was
broached within the walls of that college. Rauscher left Vienna and
Schwarzenberg Prague; Haynald left Hungary and Strossmayer Croatia; Von
Scherr left Munich, Melchers Cologne, and Förster Breslau, to testify
that the faith and tradition of their Churches had not ignored, but had
withstood, the new doctrine. They had to add that the conscience of the
people was so set against it that it was as much as the authority of
the Church was worth to attempt to impose it upon them. Von Ketteler
left Mainz to testify loudly, but with so uncertain a sound that no
ordinary man could "know what was piped or harped."
On the other hand, the bishops of Spain, Italy, and South America
almost unanimously sallied forth to testify that in their Churches the
new dogma was an old doctrine.
Their testimony was reinforced by some from more ancient sees. Hassun
set out from New Rome, as the Orientals call Constantinople, to bear
witness, as Patriarch of Cilicia, that the City of Paul, and the
Churches planted by him, had always held the faith and tradition of
Papal infallibility. Valerga turned his back on the Mount of Olives, on
Sion, and on Bethlehem, to give evidence, in the sight of God and man,
that the Church of Jerusalem had always held the faith, and conserved
the tradition, that the Roman Pontiff was infallible and his decrees
irreformable.
Darboy, in his farewell pastoral, said to the Catholics of Paris, "In
these matters, bishops are witnesses who prove, not authors who invent."
Had the contest lain between these two forces, the weight of talent,
character, and supporting Churches would have decided it in favour of
the _status quo_. But bishops sailed from Jaffna in Ceylon, and Jaro
in the Philippines, from India, China, and Siam, from Swan River and
New Caledonia, to swamp with their traditions those of Bishops from
Churches which might pretend to have a tradition. The fact that theirs
could not set up any such claim was one objection urged against their
votes, another being that they were dependent on the Propaganda. With
these came also a number of Oriental bishops, in the same financial
position, of whom Vitelleschi says that they brought the finest
wardrobes and the steadiest votes. In aid of these a thick growth of
bishops _in partibus_ sprang out of the well-warmed conserves of Court
patronage.
Roughly stated, the result was, that out of Italy and Spain old and
educated Churches, when represented by prelates trained in their own
bosom, generally declared in opposition to the new dogma. Where they
did otherwise, they were often represented by prelates trained _in
Rome_, and, like Cullen and Manning, specially selected to imbue the
National Church with the municipal theology of Rome, and, in case
of need, to impose it upon the clergy. Those from really ancient
cities, like Jerusalem, who supported the Curia, were dependents of
the Propaganda. With these came the occupants of sees created by Pius
IX, most of which, from Westminster to Oceania, were represented by
witnesses in favour of infallibility.
Many of the bishops had for travelling companion a small pamphlet. It
was called _Considerations_ (_Erwägungen?_), and put the case against
Papal infallibility in a form and compass seldom equalled, in any
composition, for clearness, depth, fulness, and compression. It was no
secret that the author was Döllinger, but he had not chosen to put his
name on the title.
In this manner was prepared for the world a drama of many scenes, which
has left permanently in the eye of history four great spectacles--(1)
How an ancient aristocracy, claiming to be the senate of humanity, was
made the instrument of destroying its own legislative rights; (2) How
masters of ceremony, habituated to employ it for both political and
religious ends, were made its victims, ceremony being brought into
operation to carry away surreptitiously their constitutional forms,
and with them their legal privileges; (3) How they who had declared
"ecclesiastical" tradition to be as good a foundation for doctrine as
the Word of God, went through the process of building on the sand; (4)
How a Head of the human species, a King of kings and Lord of lords, was
erected by priests, and humiliated by Providence.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 165: Letter as printed in _Otto Mesi_, p. 413, and now (but
also in French) in _Eight Months at Rome_, p. 277.]
[Footnote 166: _Friedberg_, p. 287.]
[Footnote 167: The author of _Reform in Head and Members_ says (p.
156): "The theological lecture-rooms of the Sorbonne are empty, and
the fame and splendour of France in theological science, in which
she once took so high a place, have been extinguished, since the
clergy began to receive their education--that is, as much education
as was indispensable--in the smaller episcopal seminaries, and their
theological training in the greater ones. There is no theological
science at all in France now." He supports this broad assertion by
details given by Bouix, a well-known Ultramontane writer.]
[Footnote 168: _Stimmen_, _N.F._, vi. p. 57.]
[Footnote 169: _Letter to the Duke of Norfolk._]