still more clear in October, that the enemies of the secular power of
the Papacy are determined, united, predominant, and that there is
nowhere a protecting power which possesses the will, and at the same
time the means, of averting the catastrophe. I considered it
therefore probable that an interruption of the temporal dominion
would soon ensue--an interruption which, like others before it, would
also come to an end, and would be followed by a restoration. I
resolved, therefore, to take the opportunity, which the lectures gave
me, to prepare the public for the coming events, which already cast
their shadows upon us, and thus to prevent the scandals, the doubt,
and the offence which must inevitably arise if the States of the
Church should pass into other hands, although the pastorals of the
Bishops had so energetically asserted that they belonged to the
integrity of the Church. I meant, therefore, to say, the Church by
her nature can very well exist, and did exist for seven centuries,
without the territorial possessions of the Popes; afterwards this
possession became necessary, and, in spite of great changes and
vicissitudes, has discharged in most cases its function of serving as
a foundation for the independence and freedom of the Popes. As long
as the present state and arrangement of Europe endures, we can
discover no other means to secure to the Holy See its freedom, and
with it the confidence of all. But the knowledge and the power of God
reach farther than ours, and we must not presume to set bounds to the
Divine wisdom and omnipotence, or to say to it, In this way and no
other! Should, nevertheless, the threatening consummation ensue, and
should the Pope be robbed of his land, one of three eventualities
will assuredly come to pass. Either the loss of the State is only
temporary, and the territory will revert, after some intervening
casualties, either whole or in part, to its legitimate sovereign; or
Providence will bring about, by ways unknown to us, and combinations
which we cannot divine, a state of things in which the object,
namely, the independence and free action of the Holy See, will be
attained without the means which have hitherto served; or else we are
approaching great catastrophes in Europe, the doom of the whole
edifice of the present social order,--events of which the ruin of the
Roman State is only the precursor and the herald.
The reasons for which, of these three possibilities, I think the
first the most probable, I have developed in this book. Concerning
the second alternative, there is nothing to be said; it is an
unknown, and therefore, indescribable, quantity. Only we must retain
it against certain over-confident assertions which profess to know
the secret things to come, and, trespassing on the divine domain,
wish to subject the Future absolutely to the laws of the immediate
Past. That the third possibility must also be admitted, few of those
who studiously observe the signs of the time will dispute. One of the
ablest historians and statesmen--Niebuhr--wrote on the 5th October
1830: "If God does not miraculously aid, a destruction is in store
for us such as the Roman world underwent in the middle of the third
century--destruction of prosperity, of freedom, of civilisation, and
of literature." And we have proceeded much farther on the inclined
plane since then. The European Powers have overturned, or have
allowed to be overturned, the two pillars of their existence,--the
principle of legitimacy, and the public law of nations. Those
monarchs who have made themselves the slaves of the Revolution, to do
its work, are the active agents in the historical drama; the others
stand aside as quiet spectators, in expectation of inheriting
something, like Prussia and Russia, or bestowing encouragement and
assistance, like England; or as passive invalids, like Austria and
the sinking empire of Turkey. But the Revolution is a permanent
chronic disease, breaking out now in one place, now in another,
sometimes seizing several members together. The Pentarchy is
dissolved; the Holy Alliance, which, however defective or open to
abuse, was one form of political order, is buried; the right of might
prevails in Europe. Is it a process of renovation or a process of
dissolution in which European society is plunged? I still think the
former; but I must, as I have said, admit the possibility of the
other alternative. If it occurs, then, when the powers of destruction
have done their work, it will be the business of the Church at once
to co-operate actively in the reconstruction of social order out of
the ruins, both as a connecting civilising power, and as the
preserver and dispenser of moral and religious tradition. And thus
the Papacy, with or without territory, has its own function and its
appointed mission.
These, then, were the ideas from which I started; and it may be
supposed that my language concerning the immediate fate of the
temporal power of the Pope necessarily sounded ambiguous, that I
could not well come with the confidence which is given to
other--perhaps more far-sighted--men before my audience, and say,
Rely upon it, the States of the Church--the land from Radicofani to
Ceperano, from Ravenna to Civita Vecchia, shall and must and will
invariably remain to the Popes. Heaven and earth shall pass away
before the Roman State shall pass away. I could not do this, because
I did not at that time believe it, nor do I now; but am only
confident that the Holy See will not be permanently deprived of the
conditions necessary for the fulfilment of its mission. Thus the
substance of my words was this: Let no one lose faith in the Church
if the secular principality of the Pope should disappear for a
season, or for ever. It is not essence, but accident; not end, but
means; it began late; it was formerly something quite different from
what it is now. It justly appears to us indispensable, and as long as
the existing order lasts in Europe, it must be maintained at any
price; or if it is violently interrupted, it must be restored. But a
political settlement of Europe is conceivable in which it would be
superfluous, and then it would be an oppressive burden. At the same
time I wished to defend Pope Pius IX. and his government against many
accusations, and to point out that the inward infirmities and
deficiencies which undeniably exist in the country, by which the
State has been reduced to so deplorable a condition of weakness and
helplessness, were not attributable to him: that, on the contrary, he
has shown, both before and since 1848, the best will to reform; and
that by him, and under him, much has been really improved.
The newspaper reports, written down at home from memory, gave but an
inaccurate representation of a discourse which did not attempt in the
usual way to cut the knot, but which, with buts and ifs, and
referring to certain elements in the decision which are generally
left out of the calculation, spoke of an uncertain future, and of
various possibilities. This was not to be avoided. Any reproduction
which was not quite literal must, in spite of the good intentions of
the reporter, have given rise to false interpretations. When,
therefore, one of the most widely read papers reported the first
lecture, without any intentional falsification, but with omissions
which altered the sense and the tendency of my words, I immediately
proposed to the conductors to print my manuscript; but this offer was
declined. In other accounts in the daily press, I was often unable to
recognise my ideas; and words were put into my mouth which I had
never uttered. And here I will admit that, when I gave the lectures,
I did not think that they would be discussed by the press, but
expected that, like others of the same kind, they would at most be
mentioned in a couple of words, _in futuram oblivionem_. Of the
controversy which sprang up at once, in separate works and in
newspaper articles, in Germany, France, England, Italy, and even in
America, I shall not speak. Much of it I have not read. The writers
often did not even ask themselves whether the report which accident
put into their hands, and which they carelessly adopted, was at all
accurate. But I must refer to an account in one of the most popular
English periodicals, because I am there brought into a society to
which I do not belong. The author of an article in the July Number of
the _Edinburgh Review_ ... appeals to me, misunderstanding the drift
of my words, and erroneously believing that I had already published
an apology of my orthodoxy.... A sharp attack upon me in the _Dublin
Review_ I know only from extracts in English papers; but I can see
from the vehemence with which the writer pronounces himself against
liberal institutions, that, even after the appearance of this book, I
cannot reckon on coming to an understanding with him, ...
The excitement which was caused by my lectures, or rather by the
accounts of them in the papers, had this advantage, that it brought
to light, in a way which to many was unexpected, how widely, how
deeply, and how firmly the attachment of the people to the See of St
Peter is rooted. For the sake of this I was glad to accept all the
attacks and animosity which fell on me in consequence. But why, it
will be asked--and I have been asked innumerable times--why not cut
short misunderstandings by the immediate publication of the lectures,
which must, as a whole, have been written beforehand? why wait for
five months? For this I had two reasons: first, it was not merely a
question of misunderstanding. Much of what I had actually said had
made an unpleasant impression in many quarters, especially among our
optimists. I should, therefore, with my bare statements, have become
involved in an agitating discussion in pamphlets and newspapers, and
that was not an attractive prospect. The second reason was this: I
expected that the further progress of events in Italy, the
irresistible logic of facts, would dispose minds to receive certain
truths. I hoped that people would learn by degrees, in the school of
events, that it is not enough always to be reckoning with the figures
"revolution," "secret societies," "Mazzinism," "Atheism," or to
estimate things only by the standard supplied by the "Jew of Verona,"
but that other factors must be admitted into the calculation; for
instance, the condition of the Italian clergy, and its position
towards the laity, I wished, therefore, to let a few months go by
before I came before the public. Whether I judged rightly, the
reception of this book will show.
I thoroughly understand those who think it censurable that I should
have spoken in detail of situations and facts which are gladly
ignored, or touched with a light and hasty hand, and that especially
at the present crisis. I myself was restrained for ten years by these
considerations, in spite of the feeling which urged me to speak on
the question of the Roman government, and it required the
circumstances I have described, I may almost say, to compel me to
speak publicly on the subject. I beg of these persons to weigh the
following points. First, when an author openly exposes a state of
things already abundantly discussed in the press, if he draws away
the necessarily very transparent covering from the gaping wounds
which are not on the Church herself, but on an institution nearly
connected with her, and whose infirmities she is made to feel, it may
fairly be supposed that he does it, in agreement with the example of
earlier friends and great men of the Church, only to show the
possibility and the necessity of the cure, in order, so far as in him
lies, to weaken the reproach that the defenders of the Church see
only the mote in the eyes of others, not the beam in their own, and
with narrow-hearted prejudice endeavour to soften, or to dissimulate,
or to deny every fact which is or which appears unfavourable to their
cause. He does it in order that it may be understood that where the
powerlessness of men to effect a cure becomes manifest, God
interposes in order to sift on His threshing-floor the chaff from
the wheat, and to consume it with the fire of the catastrophes which
are only His judgments and remedies. Secondly, I could not, as a
historian, present the effects without going back to their causes;
and it was therefore my duty, as it is that of every religious
inquirer and observer, to try to contribute something to the
_Theodicee_. He that undertakes to write on such lofty interests,
which nearly affect the weal and woe of the Church, cannot avoid
examining and displaying the wisdom and justice of God in the conduct
of terrestrial events regarding them. The fate which has overtaken
the Roman States must above all be considered in the light of a
Divine ordinance for the advantage of the Church. Seen by that light,
it assumes the character of a trial, which will continue until the
object is attained, and the welfare of the Church so far secured.
It seemed evident to me, that as a new order of things in Europe lies
in the design of Providence, the disease, through which for the last
half-century the States of the Church unquestionably have passed,
might be the transition to a new form. To describe this malady
without overlooking or concealing any of the symptoms was, therefore,
an undertaking which I could not avoid. The disease has its source in
the inward contradiction and discord of the institutions and
conditions of the government; for the modern French institutions
stand there, without any reconciling qualifications, besides those of
the mediaeval hierarchy. Neither of these elements is strong enough to
expel the other; and either of them would, if it prevailed alone, be
again a form of disease. Yet, in the history of the last few years I
recognise symptoms of convalescence, however feeble, obscure, and
equivocal its traces may appear. What we behold is not death or
hopeless decay, it is a purifying process, painful, consuming,
penetrating bone and marrow,--such as God inflicts on His chosen
persons and institutions. There is abundance of dross, and time is
necessary before the gold can come pure out of the furnace. In the
course of this process it may happen that the territorial dominion
will be interrupted, that the State may be broken up or pass into
other hands; but it will revive, though perhaps in another form, and
with a different kind of government. In a word, _sanabilibus
laboramus malis_--that is what I wished to show; that, I believe, I
have shown. Now, and for the last forty years, the condition of the
Roman States is the heel of Achilles of the Catholic Church, the
standing reproach for adversaries throughout the world, and a
stumbling-block for thousands. Not as though the objections, which
are founded on the fact of this transitory disturbance and discord in
the social and political sphere, possessed any weight in a
theological point of view, but it cannot be denied that they are of
incalculable influence on the disposition of the world external to
the Church.
Whenever a state of disease has appeared in the Church, there has
been but one method of cure,--that of an awakened, renovated, healthy
consciousness and of an enlightened public opinion in the Church.
The goodwill of the ecclesiastical rulers and heads has not been able
to accomplish the cure, unless sustained by the general sense and
conviction of the clergy and of the laity. The healing of the great
malady of the sixteenth century, the true internal reformation of the
Church, only became possible when people ceased to disguise or to
deny the evil, and to pass it by with silence and concealment,--when
so powerful and irresistible a public opinion had formed itself in
the Church, that its commanding influence could no longer be evaded.
At the present day, what we want is the whole truth, not merely the
perception that the temporal power of the Pope is required by the
Church,--for that is obvious to everybody, at least out of Italy, and
everything has been said that can be said about it; but also the
knowledge of the conditions under which this power is possible for
the future. The history of the Popes is full of instances where their
best intentions were not fulfilled, and their strongest resolutions
broke down, because the interests of a firmly compacted class
resisted like an impenetrable hedge of thorns. Hadrian VI. was fully
resolved to set about the reformation in earnest; and yet he achieved
virtually nothing, and felt himself, though in possession of supreme
power, altogether powerless against the passive resistance of all
those who should have been his instruments in the work. Only when
public opinion, even in Italy, and in Rome itself, was awakened,
purified, and strengthened; when the cry for reform resounded
imperatively on every side,--then only was it possible for the Popes
to overcome the resistance in the inferior spheres, and gradually,
and step by step, to open the way for a more healthy state. May,
therefore, a powerful, healthy, unanimous public opinion in Catholic
Europe come to the aid of Pius IX.!...
Concerning another part of this book I have a few words to say. I
have given a survey of all the Churches and ecclesiastical
communities now existing. The obligation of attempting this presented
itself to me, because I had to explain both the universal importance
of the Papacy as a power for all the world, and the things which it
actually performs. This could not be done fully without exhibiting
the internal condition of the Churches which have rejected it, and
withdrawn from its influence. It is true that the plan increased
under my hands, and I endeavoured to give as clear a picture as
possible of the development which has accomplished itself in the
separated Churches since the Reformation, and through it, in
consequence of the views and principles which had been once for all
adopted. I have, therefore, admitted into my description no feature
which is not, in my opinion, an effect, a result, however remote, of
those principles and doctrines. There is doubtless room for
discussion in detail upon this point, and there will unavoidably be a
decided opposition to this book, if it should be noticed beyond the
limits of the Church to which I belong. I hope that there also the
justice will be done me of believing that I was far from having any
intention of offending; that I have only said what must be said, if
we would go to the bottom of these questions; that I had to do with
institutions which, because of the dogmas and principles from which
they spring, must, like a tree that is nailed to a wall, remain in
one position, however unnatural it may be. I am quite ready to admit
that, on the opposite side, the men are often better than the system
to which they are, or deem themselves, attached; and that, on the
contrary, in the Church the individuals are, on the average, inferior
in theory and in practice to the system under which they live....
The union of the two religions, which would be socially and
politically the salvation of Germany and of Europe, is not possible
at present; first because the greater, more active, and more
influential portion of the German Protestants do not desire it, for
political or religious reasons, in any form or under any practicable
conditions. It is impossible, secondly, because negotiations
concerning the mode and the conditions of union can no longer be
carried on. For this, plenipotentiaries on both sides are required;
and these only the Catholic Church is able to appoint, by virtue of
her ecclesiastical organisation, not the Protestants....
Nevertheless, theologically, Protestants and Catholics have come
nearer each other; for those capital doctrines, those articles with
which the Church was to stand or fall, for the sake of which the
Reformers declared separation from the Catholic Church to be
necessary, are now confuted and given up by Protestant theology, or
are retained only nominally, whilst other notions are connected with
the words.... Protestant theology is at the present day less hostile,
so to speak, than the theologians. For whilst theology has levelled
the strongest bulwarks and doctrinal barriers which the Reformation
had set up to confirm the separation, the divines, instead of viewing
favourably the consequent facilities for union, often labour, on the
contrary, to conceal the fact, or to provide new points of
difference. Many of them probably agree with Stahl of Berlin, who
said, shortly before his death, "Far from supposing that the breach
of the sixteenth century can be healed, we ought, if it had not
already occurred, to make it now." This, however, will not continue;
and a future generation, perhaps that which is even now growing up,
will rather adopt the recent declaration of Heinrich Leo, "In the
Roman Catholic Church a process of purification has taken place since
Luther's day; and if the Church had been in the days of Luther what
the Roman Catholic Church in Germany actually is at present, it would
never have occurred to him to assert his opposition so energetically
as to bring about a separation." Those who think thus will then be
the right men and the chosen instruments for the acceptable work of
the reconciliation of the Churches, and the true unity of Germany.
Upon the day when, on both sides, the conviction shall arise vivid
and strong that Christ really desires the unity of His Church, that
the division of Christendom, the multiplicity of Churches, is
displeasing to God, that he who helps to prolong the situation must
answer for it to the Lord,--on that day four-fifths of the
traditional polemics of the Protestants against the Church will with
one blow be set aside, like chaff and rubbish; for four-fifths
consist of misunderstandings, logomachies, and wilful falsifications,
or relate to personal, and therefore accidental, things, which are
utterly insignificant where only principles and dogmas are at stake.
On that day, also, much will be changed on the Catholic side.
Thenceforward the character of Luther and the Reformers will no more
be dragged forward in the pulpit. The clergy, mindful of the saying,
_interficite errores, diligite homines_, will always conduct
themselves towards members of other Churches in conformity with the
rules of charity, and will therefore assume, in all cases where there
are no clear proofs to the contrary, the _bona fides_ of opponents.
They will never forget that no man is convinced and won over by
bitter words and violent attacks, but that every one is rather
repelled by them. Warned by the words of the Epistle to the Romans
(xiv, 13), they will be more careful than heretofore to give to their
separate brethren no scandal, no grounds of accusation against the
Church. Accordingly, in popular instruction and in religious life,
they will always make the great truths of salvation the centre of all
their teaching: they will not treat secondary things in life and
doctrine as though they were of the first importance; but, on the
contrary, they will keep alive in the people the consciousness that
such things are but means to an end, and are only of inferior
consequence and subsidiary value.
Until that day shall dawn upon Germany, it is our duty as Catholics,
in the words of Cardinal Diepenbrock, "to bear the religious
separation in a spirit of penance for guilt incurred in common." We
must acknowledge that here also God has caused much good as well as
much evil to proceed from the errors of men, from the contests and
passions of the sixteenth century; that the anxiety of the German
nation to see the intolerable abuses and scandals in the Church
removed was fully justified, and sprang from the better qualities of
our people, and from their moral indignation at the desecration and
corruption of holy things, which were degraded to selfish and
hypocritical purposes.
We do not refuse to admit that the great separation, and the storms
and sufferings connected with it, was an awful judgment upon Catholic
Christendom, which clergy and laity had but too well deserved--a
judgment which has had an improving and salutary effect. The great
conflict of intellects has purified the European atmosphere, has
impelled the human mind on to new courses, and has promoted a rich
scientific and literary life. Protestant theology, with its restless
spirit of inquiry, has gone along by the side of the Catholic,
exciting and awakening, warning and vivifying; and every eminent
Catholic divine in Germany will gladly admit that he owes much to the
writings of Protestant scholars.
We must also acknowledge that in the Church the rust of abuses and of
a mechanical superstition is always forming afresh; that the
spiritual in religion is sometimes materialised, and therefore
degraded, deformed, and applied to their own loss, by the servants of
the Church, through their indolence and want of intelligence, and by
the people, through their ignorance. The true spirit of reform most,
therefore, never depart from the Church, but must periodically break
out with renovating strength, and penetrate the mind and the will of
the clergy. In this sense we do not refuse to admit the justice of a
call to penance, when it proceeds from those who are not of us,--that
is, of a warning carefully to examine our religious life and pastoral
conduct, and to remedy what is found defective.