A SECTARIAN DIPLOMATIC SERVICE.
Our federal government, as a government, is absolutely forbidden by the Constitution to have anything whatever to do with religion; but the State Department has been for years and is now conducted as if it were an agency for a religious sectarian propaganda. The gentlemen whom it has sent to represent us at foreign courts have acted, in numberless instances and with few exceptions, as if they were the emissaries of Protestant or infidel missionary societies rather than as the ambassadors, ministers, and chargés d’affaires of a government which professes no religion, but which nevertheless has among its citizens eight millions of Roman Catholics, more or less, whose rights and opinions it is bound at least to respect. Many of these gentlemen have seemed to believe that one of their principal duties, especially if accredited to a Catholic country, was to form intimate associations with conspirators and agitators; to espouse their cause; and to fill their despatches to Mr. Seward, Mr. Fish, and Mr. Evarts with absurd but pernicious misrepresentations concerning the relations of the church towards education, civil freedom, and material progress. It may be admitted that many of these agents have erred rather through ignorance than malice; not a few of them have received but a limited education; it is only lately that a knowledge of the French language has been deemed requisite for even an ambassador. Scores of our ministers and chargés d’affaires have been sent abroad, remained for a few years, and returned, without acquiring more than a mere smattering of the language of the country to which they were accredited. Too frequently these misrepresentatives of ours fall into the hands of the agents of the secret sects which are plotting all over the world for the destruction of the church and the overthrow of Christian society, and receive from these sources the erroneous and pernicious views of affairs which they transmit to Washington. One of our diplomatists, returning from a long residence in the capital of a Catholic country, had for a fellow-traveller on the steamship an American Catholic.
“I envy you your residence in ——,” said this gentleman; “the intellectual society there is agreeable. Were you not well acquainted with Father —— and Mgr. ——?” naming two individuals of wide-spread celebrity.
“Oh! no,” replied the astute statesman, “not at all; I never met them. They are Papists, you know, and I never cared to waste my time with men who pray to idols, and pretend to believe that a piece of bread is God. Besides,” he added, with ingenuous simplicity, “my interpreter, a very shrewd fellow, told me all the priests in —— were bitter foes of our free republican institutions, and I thought it my duty to keep aloof from them.”
A perusal of the Red Books for the last two years inclines one to believe that many of our ministers to foreign countries derive their opinions and their information chiefly from their “interpreters.” The Hon. Mr. Scadder, rewarded for his eminent services to his party by being torn from his sorrowing constituents at Watertoast, and sent to represent us at the proud court of a papistical sovereign, may be at the mercy of any wag who chooses to humbug him with fantastical lies, or of any emissary from a Masonic sect who is instructed to fill his mind with misrepresentations; but Mr. Fish and Mr. Evarts are men of culture, and are supposed, at least, to be able to distinguish a hawk from a handsaw. It is of them that we chiefly complain. If the exigencies of party have made it impossible for them to select the best men for our diplomatic service, and if they have been obliged to put up with Mr. Scadder and his kind, it has at least been always in their power to cause our foreign agents to understand that it is no part of their duty to write despatches calumniating the Catholic Church, or to employ themselves in promoting the missionary enterprises of Protestant sects in Catholic countries. Had Mr. Fish and Mr. Evarts possessed a true idea of their own official duties, they never could have permitted one of their agents to write a second time such despatches as some of those contained in the Red Books before us. They would have administered to their Scadders, and Marshes, and Beales, and Partridges, and Bassetts a rebuke that would have opened the eyes of these public servants and taught them a useful lesson. Mr. Fish, we know, is a prominent and zealous member of the Protestant Episcopal Church; Mr. Evarts, we believe, is an adherent of the same sect. In their private capacity they have at least a legal right to do what they can to advance the interests of their own communion, and to expose and check the diabolical designs of the Man of Sin. But as Secretary of State at Washington Mr. Fish had not, and Mr. Evarts has not, any right to instruct, encourage, or even permit our agents abroad to calumniate the Catholic Church, to encourage conspiracies against her, or to spend their time, which belongs to the country, and the money with which the country supplies them, in promoting Anti-Catholic propagandism. Such a course is as bad a policy as it is un-American. We trust that the present Secretary of State will give this matter his immediate and careful attention; and the Senate and the House of Representatives would do well to look into it. Let him, as becomes his duty, inform the diplomatic agents of this republic that they are sent and paid to attend to the material and political interests of our country, and are expected to keep to themselves their religious opinions, whatever those opinions may be, in their correspondence with the Department of State. A proper sense of dignity on the part of the American who holds the office of the Secretary of State, and a decent respect for others, would not suffer that a diplomatic agent under his control should use his political position to insult the religious convictions of so large, important, and patriotic a portion of his fellow-citizens. Catholic citizens ask no favors as Catholics, and the time has gone by for them to accept silently from the hired agents of our common country insults to their religious faith. No one deprecates more than we do to see the tendency of the Catholic vote in this country given almost exclusively to one of its political parties. The only way in which to prevent this is by the opposite party putting an end to the display of bigotry and fanaticism against the Catholic Church.
The Department of the Interior, in its Indian Bureau, has repeatedly been guilty of gross violations of good faith and fair dealing towards the Catholic Church; but this has been due, probably, to the direct pressure put upon it by the various sects, whose cupidity was excited by the hope of reaping where Catholic priests had sown. But the foreign agents of the State Department often appear to have gone out of their way, in mere wantonness, to insult, irritate, and injure Catholic interests and feeling. Imagine the collector of the port of New York writing official despatches to the Secretary of the Treasury, informing him that, in the absence of anything better to do, he had been giving his mind to an investigation of Catholicism in this metropolis, and that he had arrived at the conclusion that much of the pauperism of the city was due to the facts that the entire Catholic population were in the habit of refusing to work on eight days of the year—days known in the superstitious jargon of the Papists as “days of obligation”—and that vast sums of money were exacted by the priests from their ignorant and degraded dupes, and sent over to Rome to support in idle luxury the pampered pope! It is probable that Secretary Sherman would administer to the collector a severe reprimand, and that this particular letter would not form part of the annual treasury report. But this is precisely the sort of news with which our minister to Hayti—Mr. Ebenezer Bassett—regales Mr. Evarts, so much to the apparent satisfaction of the latter that Mr. Bassett again and again returns to the subject and dwells upon it with unction. Or fancy Postmaster James sending a despatch to Mr. Key to cheer him with the happy intelligence that an unfrocked and disgraced Catholic priest had started a brand-new sect of his own in New York, and predicting that in a short time a majority of the Papists would desert their pastors and joyfully embrace the new gospel. But this is in substance the intelligence that such a man as Mr. Bancroft most delighted to send from Berlin. The collector of the port and the postmaster would be as much out of the line of their duty in the cases we have mentioned as Mr. Bassett and Mr. Bancroft have been. The duty of our foreign representatives is to promote the commercial, financial, and political interests of this republic at the courts to which they are accredited, and not to make themselves channels for the conveyance of idle, false, and scandalous gossip, much less to interfere in the domestic affairs of the countries to which they are sent, or allow themselves to be used as the tools of secret societies or of Methodist or any other missionary boards.
We have at present thirteen envoys extraordinary and ministers plenipotentiary—in Austria, Brazil, Chili, China, France, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Peru, Russia, and Spain; eight ministers resident—in the Argentine Republic, Belgium, Central American States, Hawaiian Islands, Netherlands, Sweden and Norway, Turkey, and Venezuela; and two ministers resident and consuls-general, in Hayti and Liberia. There are also five chargés d’affaires—in Denmark, Greece, Portugal, Switzerland, and Uruguay and Paraguay. We have no representative in Bolivia, Ecuador, or the United States of Colombia. The great majority of the inhabitants of nineteen of the above-named thirty-one countries are Roman Catholics; yet not one of our foreign representatives is a Catholic. We ask not is this fair, but is it good policy? The population of these nineteen Roman Catholic nations is in round numbers, and according to the latest enumerations, about 170,000,000 souls; but we now are, and so far as we know almost always have been, represented at their capitals by Protestants. Of this, in itself, we do not complain. Wisdom—nay, even common sense—would indeed seem to dictate that the best results would be attained, other things being equal, by sending Catholics as envoys to Catholic countries. An American Catholic in a Catholic country finds himself in sympathy with, and not in antagonism to, the religious habits and modes of thought of the people; and his path towards the accomplishment of any good and worthy object is greatly smoothed by this fact. We believe that intelligent, clever, patriotic, Catholic envoys at Vienna, Rio Janeiro, Santiago, Paris, Rome, Mexico, Lima, Madrid, Buenos Ayres, Brussels, Guatemala, Caracas, Port au Prince, Lisbon, Montevideo, Asuncion, Quito, Bogota, and La Paz would have been more successful in accomplishing the best and highest duties of diplomatic representatives of this republic than Messrs. Beale, Partridge, Logan, Washburne, Marsh, Foster, Gibbs, Cushing, Osborne, Merrill, Williamson, Russell, Bassett, Moran, and Caldwell have been. We are certain that they would not have committed the sins against good taste and propriety which must be laid at the door of nearly all these gentlemen; they surely would not have committed the still graver offences of which we shall have to give some instances. We wish to except from this remark, however, Mr. Moran, long our faithful and exemplary secretary of legation at London, and for the last two or three years our chief representative at Lisbon. Although not a Catholic, Mr. Moran is a gentleman of excellent culture, of correct opinions concerning his official duties, and a very skilful diplomatist. One may look in vain through his despatches for anything that should not be there. We wish we could say half as much for some of his confrères.
Let us take, as an instance, our misrepresentative at Rome, Mr. George P. Marsh, of Vermont. Mr. Marsh leaves us in no doubt whether or not he is in full sympathy with the worst political elements in Italy, and inspired by a lively hatred of the church. He deems it one of his most pressing duties to assail and calumniate the Pope; he seems never so happy as when he can give a false and malicious interpretation to the acts of the Papal See; he appears never so miserable as when he finds himself disappointed in his fond anticipation of seeing the Italian government invade the Vatican, drive out the Pope, and finish up what is left of the church in Italy. In what Mr. Marsh is pleased to call his mind, the church in Italy is a ravening wolf, wounded, sick, and in a trap, but still with life enough in her to make her dangerous, and to render it necessary that she should be knocked on the head as soon as possible. Whenever Mr. Marsh observes indications of a willingness on the part of the government to let the wolf live a little longer, or even to make terms with her, he scolds and laments at a fearful rate. He writes as if he were a member of the Extreme Left, and evidently draws his inspiration from the most advanced radical sources. “I see no reason to expect,” says he, “any more vigorous resistance to the encroachments of the church from this administration”—the administration that was in power in November, 1876. What is it that Mr. Marsh would wish? What can be “the encroachments of the church” in Italy—the “encroachments” of men disarmed, despoiled, captive, and helpless as far as human agency is concerned? The elections for members of the Chamber of Deputies in November, 1876, were regarded by Mr. Marsh as evidence that the electors were greatly dissatisfied with the government as it had been administered. Doubtless they were. Mr. Marsh speaks of “the heavy burdens of taxation imposed by it upon the people”; of its “financial difficulties that prevent the execution of important works of public improvement”; of its failure even to attempt “the abolition of the macinto tax, or of any of the financial abuses which weigh so heavily on the poor.” But his remedy for this is simply “a more vigorous resistance to the encroachments of the church”—a little more plundering, a little more confiscation; the seizure of the Vatican, for instance, and the sale of its treasures at public auction, would no doubt put a few million lire in the public treasury. That would suit the amiable Mr. Marsh exactly. But the Italians hesitate, and Mr. Marsh is disgusted with them. At times he informs Mr. Evarts of terrible secrets—confidential information which could only have been communicated to him under the pledge of solemn secrecy by one of those practical jokers who lounge about the cafés in Rome and exercise their ingenuity in beguiling simple foreigners with incredible canards. In a despatch dated April 23, 1877, Mr. Marsh gives an account of a seditious outbreak that had occurred in Central and Southern Italy, instigated by people who were well dressed and who had plenty of money, but whose purpose, as explained by themselves, was “not only the overthrow of the existing government, but the destruction of all established civil, social, and religious institutions, and the triumph of universal anarchy.” These, in fact, were members of Mr. Marsh’s own party; but his secret informant in Rome made him believe that they were in the pay of the Pope, and probably Jesuits in disguise! “Long live Pius IX.! was shouted by the Internationalists at Benevento in the same breath with their cries of sedition,” writes Mr. Marsh; and he goes on to warn Mr. Evarts that “the number of persons prepared to lend a ready ear to the promptings of International emissaries”—videlicet the Jesuits in disguise aforesaid—“already large, is increasing; and that Italy may be the theatre of convulsions, to resist which will demand the most strenuous efforts of wise rulers and the most self-sacrificing patriotism on the part of the governing classes,” but always in the direction of resisting “the further encroachments of the church.” Mr. Marsh indulged in glowing hopes when the so-called Clerical Abuses Bill passed the Chamber of Deputies. He described the measure as “a bill for repressing the license of the clergy in public attacks upon the ecclesiastical policy of the government,” and looked for the happiest results to follow its enforcement. Mr. Marsh is an American citizen; he is the representative of a government which plumes itself upon the almost unchecked freedom of its citizens; he is paid by a people whose political shibboleth is “free speech.” If Mr. Marsh were running for Congress in Vermont instead of exercising his powerful intellect as minister at Rome, what would he say concerning an attempt by Congress to enact that the penalty of fine and imprisonment should be inflicted upon every clergyman or minister who should “attack the policy,” for instance, of the government seizing all the Methodist and Baptist meeting-houses throughout the country, and converting them into barracks? The Italian bill was worse than this, for it inflicted these penalties upon every priest who, even in the discharge of his duties as a director, might “disturb the peace of families” by advising a mother to teach her children that it was a sin to steal. But the Italian senate was less brave than Mr. Marsh, and his heart was almost broken by its final rejection of the bill. “This rejection,” he moans, in his despatch of April 23, “will encourage the clergy to measures of more active hostility against the state.” He feels so cut up about it that he returns to the subject in his despatch of May 10, and is so far carried away by his feelings as to write that
“The violence of the clergy and of their lay supporters in Italy and France is almost beyond description, and any one living among them has abundant opportunities of being convinced that they are prepared to resort to arms in support of the pretensions of the Papacy and of the principles of the Syllabus of 1864!”
A viler calumny, a more wicked falsehood against the French and Italian clergy has seldom been written. We are amazed, not that Mr. Marsh should have written it, but that Mr. Evarts should have allowed such balderdash to be printed. But Mr. Marsh grows worse as he goes on. In his despatch of May 26 he almost excels himself. He takes it as a personal grievance that the Pope has compared Prince Bismarck to Attila; he is impatient for the abrogation of the Law of Guarantees; he is certain that sooner or later “a violent conflict between the government and the church is inevitable,” and he wishes it to come rather sooner than later. Apparently he is anxious to assist at the final sacrifice, and he is tormented with the fear that the crafty Papists may cheat him out of that gratification.
“The Roman Curia,” he writes, “is at all times shrouded in such mystery that the purposes of those who administer it (sic) are very rarely foreshadowed, and no positive predictions can ever be hazarded concerning it beyond the general presumption that its future will be like its past.” In all soberness and earnestness we ask Mr. Evarts whether Mr. Marsh is kept in Rome for the purpose of writing nonsense about the “mystery” of the “Roman Curia”? What has he to do with the affairs of the Holy See? He is not accredited to the Vatican; he has no more to do with the Pope than our minister at London has to do with the Archbishop of Canterbury. True, the Pope is a far more important personage than is Mr. Tait; but Mr. Marsh, as we understand it, was not sent to Rome to occupy himself about the Pope. Instead of attending to his own business he goes out of his way to insult the Holy Father, and through him the entire Catholic population of the United States. If everything were as it should be, we should have as our representative at Rome, the capital of Christendom and the seat of the head of the universal church, a Catholic statesman. We do not insist upon this; but we do insist that our representative at Rome should be at least a fair-minded, candid, well-educated, and discreet gentleman, and not an ignorant, rude, prejudiced, and foolish dupe like Mr. Marsh. That we may not be accused of doing him injustice, let us give here the exact text of the essential portions of his despatch of May 26 last, to which we have already referred:
“The excesses of the clericals,” he writes, “are producing their natural and legitimate effect in a feeling of dissatisfaction with the position in which Italy has placed herself toward the Papacy by the Law of Guarantees. A recent allocution by the Pope, in which, for acts of the German government, Count Bismarck is likened to Attila, is much commented upon, and it is seriously asked whether Italy can protect herself against all responsibility for tolerating the use of such language in public discourses by the Pope, and its circulation through the press, under the plea that, by the seventh article of the law referred to, she has enacted that the Pope ‘is free to perform all the functions of his spiritual ministry, and to affix to the doors of the basilicas and churches of Rome all acts of that ministry.’ Such questions are bringing more clearly into view the incongruities and inconveniences of the anomalous position in which the general sovereignty of the state and the still higher virtual sovereignty of the Papacy, admitted by the terms of the Law of Guarantees, are placed toward each other. The Syllabus of 1864, having been promulgated before the enactment of that law, was notice to all the world of the extent of the inalienable rights claimed by the Papacy, and it is not a violent stretch of Vatican logic to maintain that, in spite of its protests, the law in question is legally a recognition of those claims. In fact, there are many occasions of collision between the two jurisdictions, such, for example, as the right of asylum implied in the extraterritoriality of the Vatican, which can never be avoided or reconciled without such an abandonment of the claims of one of the parties as will be yielded only to superior force; and hence a violent conflict between them is at any time probable, and at no distant day certainly inevitable. Such occasions were expected by many to arise from the pilgrimages to Rome on the fiftieth episcopal anniversary of the present Pope. But the number of pilgrims thus far has not reached the tithe of that predicted, probably not amounting in all to ten thousand, while the garrison and municipal police have been quietly strengthened to a force abundantly able to repress any disturbance. The death of Pius IX. and the election of his successor, events almost hourly expected, are looked to as probably fraught with important changes in the attitude of the Papacy toward Italy, and in the general policy of the church. For this expectation I see no ground, though the Roman Curia is at all times shrouded in such mystery that the purposes of those who administer it are very rarely foreshadowed, and no positive predictions can ever be hazarded concerning it beyond the general presumption that its future will be like its past.”
Mr. Edward F. Beale, of Pennsylvania, was our representative at Vienna, having been sent there to succeed that ardent anti-Catholic, Mr. John Jay, and being now in his turn superseded by Mr. Kasson, of Iowa. Mr. Beale’s career at the Austrian capital was brief but not brilliant. In August, 1876, he undertook to instruct Mr. Fish concerning the drift of public opinion, not only in Austria but in France and England, upon the Eastern question. He had ascertained that the prevailing sentiment in these countries was “religious fervor”; the people were so much in love with Christianity and so full of hatred of Moslemism in that they desired nothing more than to see Russia enter Constantinople, and to drive the Turks out of Europe “bag and baggage.” “It is a question of faith which will govern Europe,” writes the astute Mr. Beale, “and a crusade is quite as possible now as when Peter the Hermit preached.” The European congress which is about to assemble as we are writing will not disturb itself about any “question of faith”; its members will concern themselves only with questions of boundaries, fleets, and money. But not content with forecasting the future, Mr. Beale reverts to the past, and kindly undertakes to furnish the State Department with easy lessons in European history. Thus, in a despatch dated September 27, 1876, and apropos des bottes, he bids Mr. Fish to remember that
“It is interesting to recall that in Bosnia originated the first Protestant movement of Western Europe, and that even before the heresies (as the Catholic Church calls them) of John Huss in Bohemia she had sent out her missionaries to preach the Gospel as she read it, and to disseminate her religious views over the rest of the world. When the persecutions of the Church of Rome were at their worst she offered a generous asylum to her co-religionists, many of whom found here what had been denied them at home—the right to worship God after their own forms and belief.”
In point of fact, the heretics of Bosnia, at the time referred to by our erudite minister at Vienna, were advocating principles utterly subversive of order and tending directly to anarchy. They taught that a subject was released from all allegiance to a ruler if that ruler were in a state of mortal sin, and each subject was to judge for himself as to the spiritual condition of his ruler. The Church of Rome had no hesitation in setting the seal of her condemnation upon this vagary of Protestantism, and even Mr. Beale would probably admit that she was right in so doing. But he evidently was ignorant of the facts, and was anxious only to air his newly-acquired learning and to have a fling at the church. Is there among the secret instructions of our State Department to its agents a rule to this effect: “When you have nothing else to write about, pitch into the Pope”?
It is a far cry from Vienna to Port au Prince; but our misrepresentative in Hayti next demands our attention. He, of all his brethren, is perhaps the most vulgar, insolent, and ignorant; but he is one of the most outspoken. The United States pay him $7,500 a year, and have done so since 1869. How much the Protestant Episcopal Church pays him, if anything, we do not know; but he seems to have given much of his time and influence to the advancement of the interests of that body, and to the abuse of the Roman Catholic clergy of the island. Several of Mr. Bassett’s despatches contain eulogiums upon a “Rev. Dr. Holly,” who, he says, was “at Grace Church, New York, in 1874, ordained bishop of Hayti,” and whom Mr. Bassett appears to have taken under his special protection and care. Now, there is no “bishop of Hayti”; there is an archbishop of Port au Prince, the Most Rev. Alexius Guilloux; and he has four suffragans, the bishops of Cap-Haitien, Les Cayes, Gonayves, and Port Paix. “The Rev. Dr. Holly” has no more right to call himself bishop of Hayti than he has to call himself the Pope of Rome; but Mr. Bassett deems it very hard indeed that the archbishop, the bishops, and the clergy of Hayti have taken the liberty of warning their people that “the Rev. Dr. Holly” is not bishop, and that his teachings that marriage is not a sacrament, and that the first duty of a Christian is to revolt against the church, are not to be accepted. In May Mr. Bassett writes to Mr. Evarts that “the Roman Catholic archbishop and his clergy have assumed a pretension to supremacy over the civil code, notably in the matter of marriage”; and in July he writes again a long letter upon “the introduction and growth of Protestantism in Hayti and its influence upon the government.” He admits that in 1804 “Romanism,” which was “then, as now, the faith professed by a great majority of the Haytian people,” “was declared to be the religion of the state and placed under the state’s special protection and support,” and that “it still continues to enjoy that protection and support.” But he complains that “the Roman priesthood have made many strongly-directed and persistent but truly uncommendable efforts to cause to be suppressed, or effectively placed under ban, every other form of worship and belief than their own.” Mr. Bassett is not the only Protestant who cannot or will not understand the difference between the duty of Catholic prelates in a country where heresy does not exist and where it is sought to be introduced from outside, and their duty in countries like our own, where theoretically all religions are placed on the same footing, and the government is absolutely forbidden by its organic law to interfere in any way for the propagation of religious truth or the suppression of religious error. The first ruler of Hayti who endeavored to introduce Protestantism into the island was, according to Mr. Bassett, “Henri Christophe, the autocratic king of the north of Hayti,” who in 1815, although “himself a Roman Catholic,” engaged a clergyman of the Church of England to propagate heresy in his dominions. But King Henri, five years afterwards, “died by his own hand,” and Protestantism made no further progress “until, in 1861, the Protestant Episcopal Church of the United States was pleased to establish a mission with the Rev. J. T. Holly as its pastor.”
He hit upon the idea “of raising up a national clergy in Hayti—a policy which seems never to have been thought of by any other religious denomination in this country, and which opened a new road and gave a new impetus to Protestantism here. The mission continued to grow. It was encouraged and visited in 1863 by Bishop Lee, of Delaware; in 1866 by Bishop Burgess, of Maine; and in 1872 by Bishop Coxe, of Western New York; and finally the Rev. Dr. Holly was, at Grace Church, New York City, in 1874, ordained bishop of Hayti. So that since 1874 there has been established in Hayti an independent Protestant Church, with the distinguishing feature that all its clergy are citizens of the country, several of them educated in the United States under the vigilance of Bishop Holly.”
There are ninety-three Catholic priests in Hayti, and of these nearly all are educated and cultured French gentlemen, who are undoubtedly far better able to discharge the duties of the priestly office than the native apostates who have been “educated in the United States under the vigilance of Bishop Holly.” But Mr. Bassett has the ignorant malice to vilify them and to display his own foolishness in this happy style:
“The French Roman Catholic priest, in coming to Hayti, leaves behind him all his social ties, in the hope of returning to them within eight or ten years, the average period of his labors here. All that he receives while in the country, over and above his scanty personal wants, goes abroad to enrich France at the expense of the Haytian people, and he even bends his energies to accumulate. In addition to his salary from the government, which ranges from 20,000 francs to the archbishop to 1,200 francs to the country curate, he is allowed a tariff of prices for all public religious services performed by him. Baptisms, marriages, funerals, dispensations, indulgences, Masses for the dead—services for each of these yield him by law a revenue ranging from 50 cents up to $50. Not only this, but he can collect offerings from the faithful, and it is even affirmed that many such offerings are made to him under the dread secrecy inspired by the confessional.
“It is true that France lost open political control over this island in 1804, but by means of the Roman Catholic clergy she has maintained almost exclusive control over the religious affairs of these people. Indeed, the domination which she once held over their bodies was hardly more complete than that which she still holds over their consciences and spiritual susceptibilities. The priests, in their present controversy with the government, which is outlined in my No. 501 already referred to, do not fail to rely upon the spiritual subjugation of the Haytian to the papal system of Rome, in connection with their own supposed power over him as citizens of a country which once held him in physical bondage, and to whose interests they themselves are devoted.
“In the light of these facts it is no cause for astonishment that the Haytian government, aroused and inspired by the policy and success of the Protestant Bishop Holly in raising up and establishing a national clergy for the Protestant Episcopal denomination, should seek to conserve its own integrity and the resources of its people, as well as to avoid continual misunderstandings with a class of foreigners resident here and shielded by the dignity of sacerdotal robes, by stimulating and encouraging the young men of the country to enter the ecclesiastical vocation.
“Meanwhile, it ought not to be unknown to those who feel bound by the holy injunction to have the Gospel preached to all the world that in Hayti the door stands wide open for every kind of Christian missionary work.”
And it is for writing such stuff as this that we pay Mr. Ebenezer Bassett $7,500 a year—that is to say, as much as is received by thirty of the “country curates” whom he reviles.
Our space is limited, and we have but skimmed through our two Red Books. We should have been glad to have followed the erratic flight of Mr. Partridge, our late minister to Brazil, who fills quires of paper with ridiculous nonsense about “the exactions of Rome,” the wickedness of “the ultramontane party,” and the awful danger that the Brazilian ministry “will yield to the demands of the Roman Curia.” Nothing escapes the birds-eye view of this Partridge; he unconsciously explains much that would otherwise be mysterious by stating that the prime minister of the cabinet is “a member of the Masonic fraternity”; but the scope of his intellect is best shown by his remark that “the throwing of stones at the bishop of Rio, as he ascended the pulpit to preach,” was “a trick of the Jesuits.” It would have been pleasant to congratulate Mr. Orth, who was our representative at Vienna in 1876, upon his sagacity in advocating, with hysterical warmth, the law for the virtual confiscation and destruction of the houses of the religious orders in Austria—a measure denounced by Cardinal Schwarzenberg and thirty-one archbishops and bishops as “a law which equally violates the equality and personal freedom of the citizen, the dignity of religion, the honor of the Catholic Church, and the members of religious orders,” but which, in Mr. Orth’s opinion, was “sound and salutary, and demanded by the progressive spirit of the age.” A page or two is deserved by Mr. Williamson, who gives us a history of a presidential campaign in Chili, in which all the virtues are attributed to the Masonic candidate, and all that is devilish is ascribed to “the church party,” “the ultramontanes,” and “the church.” Delightful would it be to tarry with Mr. Scruggs, our talented and courteous minister at Bogota, who commences one of his despatches thus: “In April last one Bermudez, a bishop of the Roman Catholic Church, proclaimed against the public-school system of this republic,” and who gives an account of the events which followed, closing his glowing periods with the cheerful assurance that “the church property will probably be appropriated to pay the war debt.” The letters of our Mr. Rublee, at Berne, apropos of the Old-Catholic schism in Switzerland; of our Mr. Nicholas Fish, who during a brief interregnum represented us at Berlin; and of several of our other agents, furnish equally tempting matter for comment. But we must pass by them with the remark that none of them are quite so outrageous as those of Mr. Bassett, Mr. Beale, and Mr. Marsh.
The present administration has made changes in six of our most important embassies. Mr. Kasson has been appointed to Vienna, Mr. Stoughton to St. Petersburg, Mr. Hilliard to Brazil, Mr. Lowell to Madrid, Mr. Welsh to London, and Mr. Bayard Taylor to Berlin. It goes without saying that none of these gentlemen have received any diplomatic training. Mr. Kasson is a respectable provincial lawyer, who has sat in Congress, and who rendered important services to his party by going to Florida and taking care that the electoral vote of that State was properly counted. What he knows about Austria, and how he may deport himself there, remains to be seen. Without being extravagant, one may indulge the hope that he may prove to be an improvement upon Mr. Beale. Mr. Welsh is an old and worthy merchant of Philadelphia, a prominent member of the Protestant Episcopal Church, and an extensive dealer in sugars: but we have yet to learn what are his qualifications for the weighty duties of minister to the court of St. James. Mr. Lowell is a poet, a man of letters, and a scholar who has done honor to his country; but we should be inclined to doubt his fitness for managing our commercial and political affairs at the court of King Alfonso. Mr. Taylor is a good journalist, in a certain way; he has been a traveller of some experience, and he is an ardent admirer and a close student of Schiller and of Goethe; but he has himself been swift to disclaim the idea that these things made him fit for the post to which he has been appointed, and he rather ridiculed the notion that he had been appointed minister to Berlin in order that he might there finish his great work—a new biography of Goethe. There is much to be said on both sides of the question, “Is it worth while to keep up our diplomatic service at all?” We should be inclined to take the affirmative; but we are not disposed to enter into the discussion at present. One thing, however, is certain, and that is the necessity of freeing the service from the weight of men like Marsh, Beale, Partridge, Orth, Williamson, and Scruggs. There are others as bad, but these will serve as types of the worst. In no sense can they be said to rightly represent this great, free, and noble people; in every sense they may be said to misrepresent the Catholic population of the republic, whose interests, rights, and feelings can no longer be, as they never ought to have been, safely trampled upon by any administration or by any party. Whatever party does this betrays an un-American spirit; its policy is a bad one both for the country and itself, and unless it changes for the better its reign will be short.
THE ARCHIEPISCOPAL PALACE AT BENEVENTUM.[[51]]
Beneventum is a small town of about fifteen thousand inhabitants, situated geographically in the kingdom of Naples. It formerly depended, spiritually and temporally, on the Holy See, which also held jurisdiction over part of the territory of the ancient duchy; the other part being subject to the king of Naples as to temporal affairs, and to the archbishop of Beneventum as to those of a spiritual nature.
The archiepiscopal palace, or the episcopio, to use the old term, stands in its proper place, next the cathedral, flanking the apsis. One of the wings faces the market square, where public gratitude has erected a marble statue to Pope Benedict XIII., the immortal benefactor of the city, of which he had been archbishop under the title of Cardinal Orsini. The entrance is to the south. At the west, from the garden terrace, or the windows of the conventino, is a superb view over a fertile valley, the verdure of which extends up the very sides of the mountains that fade away in bluish tints on the horizon. It is at once in the city from the proximity of the inhabitants, and in the country as to its pure air, calm solitude, and the enchanting aspect of a landscape that always commands attention and admiration.
The building is not, strictly speaking, a palace.[[52]] It is large and spacious, but not lofty or elegant. Nothing in its exterior bespeaks its occupant. It might be taken for a theological seminary or a convent, wrapped as it is in gloomy silence, and surrounded by thick walls. Its general appearance is dismal and unattractive. Only an archæologist would take any pleasure in examining the huge stones of which the walls are built. These stones were hewn out in the time of the Romans, and more than one have the characteristic trou de louve by which they were raised and put in place. They were probably taken from the amphitheatre, for the misfortune that made the Coliseum at Rome an inexhaustible quarry for the construction of so many palaces, like the Farnese, Barberini, etc., also befell the theatre of Beneventum, of which but a bare outline remains, though great blocks from it are to be found at every step in the private dwellings and the walls that surround the city. After the earthquakes of June 5, 1688, and March 4, 1702, the exterior of the palace was greatly modified by Cardinal Orsini, but the building, as a whole, is ancient, and many features of the walls, like the belfry of the cathedral, carry us back to the middle ages. Let us study it in detail, for in more than one respect it presents a model worthy of imitation.[[53]]
The portal of the palace is monumental. It has a semi-circular arch, which is more graceful than a square entrance, and more conformable to ecclesiastical traditions. And the tympanum which fits into the arch or ogive offers ample space to the sculptor or painter for decoration. Against the lintel rest the folding doors. These are open all day, however, for the house of a bishop is like that of a father who cannot shut out his children. Above are the arms of Cardinal Orsini, carven in stone. Two other scutcheons once hung beside them: one of Pius IX., destroyed when his temporal power was suppressed in the duchy of Beneventum—that is, in 1860, when the kingdom of Naples was overrun by the Garibaldian hordes; the other that of Cardinal Carafa, the actual archbishop, who was driven into exile, and whose palace was devastated.
Two enormous lions, taken from the front of the Duomo, stand at the sides of the entrance. They have come down from Roman times. They are not of remarkable workmanship, but the outlines are good. There is life in their partly stretched-out forms, and pride in the pose of their heads. The paws are pressed resolutely together. One of them grasps a head covered with a helmet, and the other the remains, probably, of one of those nude children to be seen in the mouths of the crouching lions watching at the doors of the churches at Rome, symbolic of helplessness and innocence that need aid and protection from the strong. When the lion is represented crushing a beast or holding a warrior’s head, it signifies the vice to be overcome, the enemy to be annihilated.
Some look upon the lion as the emblem of justice. This queen of the cardinal virtues is generally represented as a woman with various attributes, such as the book of the law, the balance wherein actions are weighed, the sword to smite the guilty, the eagle to show her imperial nature, and the globe indicating the extent of her empire. On the public square at Bari is to be seen a lion of the twelfth century, with the brief but significant inscription, Cvstos Ivsticie, on its collar. The lion, then, does not represent justice itself. That virtue is only exercised in the temple, either by God or by his representative. But the lion stands, like the guardian of Justice, watching at the door of the Holy Place in which she has taken up her abode. Nothing, then, could be more suitable for the door of a bishop, the unflinching enemy of vice as well as the sure protector of virtue, than these two lions, type of the power conferred by the church on her ministers. And they are specially emblematic of the firmness and energy of Cardinal Orsini, who had them placed here.
The wall through which the gateway is cut is bordered by a line of merlons, the peculiar form of which reminds one of Cordova and the Alhambra. They produce a picturesque effect, but are not of the slightest utility. They are the relics of feudal authority and power, the last vestige of which is the annual payment of the cathédratique, identical with the nominal tribute some lords required of their vassals, of no importance in itself, but typical of the honor due from the inferior to the pre-eminence of his lawful chief—in signum præeminentiæ et honoris, to quote the holy canons revived by Cardinal Orsini, and maintained to our day, particularly in this point, by the collateral descendant of Pope Paul IV., who for more than thirty years has occupied the see of Beneventum.
From the top of the wall rises one of those small open belfries called bell-gables. It is of the most primitive construction, being a mere extension of a part of the wall through which an opening for a bell has been made. It terminates in a gable like a mitre, on which are an iron cross fleurdelisée and a small vane to mark the direction of the wind. The cross is always appropriate for a belfry, large or small, if not obligatory, as Anastasius the Bibliothecarius insists in his works. The vane is no less traditional at Rome, where it is generally in the shape of a little banner (the origin of which is quite feudal), wherein the armorial ensigns are so cut as to be emblazoned against the azure sky. Here the vane is shaped like a flame. It once bore the arms of the resident archbishop, but the rain has washed off the color, and the surface is now corroded by rust.
The small bell is of the kind called nola. In ancient times it was rung whenever the archbishop left his palace or re-entered it, as the bells of St. Peter’s at Rome announce the visit and departure of the pope. Later it only rang when he set out on a journey and at his coming back. Now it is mute, and no longer announces his appearance in public or his return to the palace.
Passing through the gateway, we come to the court. On the left are the carriage and store houses, and, beyond, the saddle-room, which was quite brilliant in former times when the cardinals went forth in gala array. At the right is an arched passage leading to the interior of the palace, and further on is the porter’s lodge, formerly the guard-house of the curia armata.
Around the court are many ancient monuments and inscriptions, which constitute a small museum, begun long since by the archbishops. There is an Egyptian obelisk of red granite, broken in two, which once stood in the cathedral court. It is covered from top to bottom with hieroglyphics relating to the deeds of some old king. Domitian consecrated it to Isis. On another side are three fragments of fine marble columns: one of cipollino, so called on account of its greenish veins, which resemble those of an onion, in Italian cipolla; the second, of what is called porta santa, because the casing of the door in the Vatican basilica, opened only at the Jubilee, is of this marble, which is of a pale violet color, or a purple that has lost its freshness; and the third is of breccia corallina, the white ground of which is relieved by reddish veins.
The ancient inscriptions collected here, whether sepulchral, votive, or commemorative, are not rare. But they are noteworthy for their clearness and brevity. How expressive, for instance, are these four lines consecrated to the manes of Vibbius Optatus, who died in the flower of youth:
D. M. A. Vibbio . Opta
To. Vix. An. XI. M. XI. D. XIX.
Parent. Infelicissimi
Fecer.
The unfortunate parents had no illustrious name to bequeath to posterity. The discreet marble only echoes a profound grief.
Here is a landmark, rounded at the top, and hewn to a point at the bottom, the better to insert it in the ground, that once stood on the Appian Way, which passes triumphantly through the arch raised to the glory of Trajan at one end of Beneventum.
Beneventum, which copied Rome, even in the device of its senate: S. P. Q. B.—Senatus populusque Beneventanus—had a magistrature of ediles at its head, who made generous provision for the embellishment of the city. Here is a pedestal on which this municipal corps pompously proclaimed itself:
Splendidissimus ordo Beneventanorum.
One cannot help exclaiming, in view of the present order of things:
“Comment en un plomb vil l’or pur s’est-il changé!”
How into vile dross hath the pure gold changed!
The Romans loved statuary, and were lavish of it in all their public as well as private dwellings. Above all, their sculptors produced divinities and illustrious men, but sometimes the principal members of a household, if not the whole family, to adorn the atrium. Who does not remember the Balbus family in the Museum at Naples, the father and son on horseback, and the rest gathered around them? Here we find several statues, both nude and draped. Nudity was chiefly confined to heroes and the gods. It signified apotheosis—the ascension to a higher world. The terrestrial garb was laid aside; only a glorified body remained. Pagan art showed itself incapable of fully expressing a state indicated in the middle ages by a radiance surrounding the transfigured body. We have an admirable example of the immediate change to the glorified state in Perugino’s immortal production in the Sala del Cambio at Perugia. There the bankers and money-changers have constantly before their eyes a symbol of the change wrought by divine power on a body in the state of celestial beatitude. Paganism divested the body of its garments, but did not render it luminous. It only invented a symbol which the church has retained to designate the saints—the nimbus around the head, as the most noble part of man because the seat of the intelligence. But it could go no further. From Apollo, who alone had the nimbus in the beginning to express in a measure the luminous atmosphere of the sun, personified in him, it passed to other divinities, and finally even to those to whom the senate accorded the title of divine, thus becoming the equivalent of divus. It is really amusing to see, on the Arch of Constantine at Rome, the Emperor Trajan so divinized that his bare head is surrounded by a nimbus, though he is engaged in the chase. The nude among the Romans was, therefore, a conventional way of expressing what was right in substance, the immutation wrought by glory, and was not intended to excite ignoble passion. In other cases their statues were modestly draped, though sometimes a little too much of the form was revealed by the clinging folds of the garments.
There are several sarcophagi in the court, with nothing extraordinary about them, but even in the most unpretending affording proof of artistic taste. They are adorned with scenic masques, vases of fruit, the genii of the seasons, etc., which have their significance and are not without poetry. Here is one with a medallion of its former occupant in the centre—a portrait full of life and animation, as if he still were under illusion as to his nothingness. It is supported by two genii, winged and nude, as if bearing him to the celestial regions—winged, because they are fulfilling a mission; nude, to indicate their celestial origin. This emblem was common in ancient times. The middle ages did nothing but Christianize it by substituting angels for genii, and placing in their hands, not the body, but the soul, of the deceased, about to receive the reward of his sanctity and good works. We see them on the tomb of King Dagobert, in the abbatial church of St. Denis, snatching the soul of the king from the demon who was endeavoring to bear it away.
But we have lingered too long in the precincts. Let us enter the palace, and first visit the prisons—for prisons there are, the archbishop of Beneventum, as we have said, having formerly a twofold jurisdiction, temporal as well as spiritual. His tribunal of justice imposed the canonical penalties. Fines seem to have been specially employed, for among the officials of the Curia there was one to receive and apply them to some religious object. At the same time there was a register in which they were faithfully recorded. There were, too, different degrees of imprisonment. In the carcere alla larga there was comparative liberty. The purgatorio indicates a temporary expiation. The inferno was perhaps the prison from which death alone could be looked forward to as a release. The two latter correspond to the carcere duro of the Venetians. There are similar ones, but not so spacious, in the governor’s castle overlooking Beneventum, which also bore the terrible names of purgatorio and inferno.[[54]] Cardinal Orsini, who, though severe, was of a humane disposition, visited these prisons in 1704, at which time there were only three prisoners, it appears, from the report of his visit. After assuring himself that the vaults were in a good condition, capable of resisting all efforts at escape, confornicatæ et proinde tutæ, he saw the necessity of obviating the dampness of the ground by a brick pavement, ut humiditas arceatur, and ordered the inferno to be closed for ever, because, as he said, it was a very damp and atrocious place. A thoughtfulness so full of humanity is something to dwell on. The very text should be cited: “Eminentissimus archiepiscopus utpote humidissimam et immanissimam claudi demandavit et quod sub pœna excommunicationis nemo ibi detendatur.” The prisoners must have been delighted at a threat so much to their advantage.
The cardinal, preoccupied also with their spiritual condition, found means of providing them with a chapel where they could attend Mass and on festivals hear a sermon. Their cells were sprinkled with holy water to drive away the malign spirit, and ornamented with pictures of devotion. They were forbidden to play cards or read bad books, and were to go to confession six times a year—at Christmas, Easter, Whitsunday, St. Peter’s day, Assumption, and All Saints. Every month the vicar-general visited them to listen to their grievances, remove all grounds of complaint, and assure himself that all orders had been executed. And the cardinal, who always kept an eye on everything himself, went to see them twice a year.
One item in the register of accounts is particularly touching. Cardinal Orsini increased the ration of bread from time to time at his own expense, and had a fire made in the winter, that the prisoners might not suffer from the cold.
The three soldiers employed to make the necessary arrests were under the command of a baricello, or corporal, all of whom, with the jailer, were lodged in the guardiola beside the arched passage which connects the two interior courts.
The second court is bounded on one side by the sacristy of the cathedral, and on the other by the stables and the jubilee hospice. The stables, built by Mgr. Pacca (of the same family from which the cardinal of that name descended), are large enough for about twenty horses—none too many for the archbishop and his suite, for his visits could not always be made in a carriage. Even in our day a cross-bearer precedes his eminence on horseback, clothed in a violet cassock and mantellone, and in former times the cortége must have been much more imposing.
The hospice affords a proof of Cardinal Orsini’s inexhaustible charity. He had before built a special asylum for pilgrims, not far from the palace, under the title of St. Bartholomew, patron of the city. There is nothing left now to remind one of it, except a narrow street still called the Via dei pellegrini. But on extraordinary occasions, as at the time of a jubilee, this asylum was insufficient, and the cardinal accordingly set apart a whole wing of his palace to lodge those who came to Beneventum or were on their way to Rome to gain the indulgence of the Holy Year. This hospice had two entrances to admit the sexes separately: one opening into the first court, the other into the second. The latter has on its lintel this inscription, which gives the precise date and object of the foundation:
Xenodochivm Archiepiscopale
Vrsinvm pro An. Ivbilæi MDCC.
Nor was the cardinal content to give them benches and tables in such numbers as still to be spoken of. He had the bare walls relieved by paintings of some religious subject. In the room where public prayers were offered and the rosary sung, as it still is daily in the cathedral to a peculiar air handed down by tradition, was painted Our Lady of the Rosary, with St. Dominic and St. Catharine of Siena at her feet. In the refectory was depicted a scene from the life of the Blessed Ambrogio Sansedoni, a Dominican friar. He was in the habit of serving five pilgrims in honor of the five wounds of our Lord. One day, while waiting on his guests, his eyes being opened by the Holy Spirit, denoted by the white dove on his shoulder, he saw with astonishment that they were five angels sent by God to reward his charity. In the room where the pilgrims’ feet were washed is to be seen the Blessed Andrea de Franchi, also a Dominican, humbly prostrate before a pilgrim who afterwards reveals himself to be the Saviour.
In the arched passage we find a staircase, leading on the one hand to the hall of state, and on the other to the curia. Taking the latter direction, we pass beneath a statue of St. Philip Neri, larger than life, for which reason it is called St. Filippone. Before it burns a votive lamp, a tribute of gratitude from Cardinal Orsini. Higher up are two medallions of the fifteenth century: one of the Blessed Virgin modestly veiled, her hands folded, borne to heaven by two angels; the other represents St. Mark with his usual attribute, the winged lion. The walls of the court-room are enlivened by a series of landscapes, alternating with the Orsini arms, but the most appropriate decoration is the sentence from the writings of St. Jerome:
Privsqvam avdias
Ne Ivdicaveris
Qvemqvam
D. Hieron:
De Sept: eccl.
Gradibvs.
To judge no one without first hearing him is one of those axioms it seems useless to repeat, and yet how many precipitate judgments, how many sentences that would not be rendered, were so obvious a duty heeded!
The metropolitan archives are between the chancery and the office of the vicar-general, which pour into it every week a mass of official documents for preservation. On the ceiling are emblazoned the arms of Cardinal Banditi, who fitted up the room with conveniences for the registers and papers, distributing them, according to their contents, among the large pigeon-holes which extend from the floor to the very ceiling, and are literally crammed with documents. To find one’s way through such an accumulation requires the sagacity and good memory of an archivist like the present one, whose patience is only equalled by his wish to oblige. Beneventum is full of such excellent priests, who are ready to spend their leisure moments in aiding you in your researches.
It is here Cardinal Orsini may best be studied, and that we can learn to what an extent he sacrificed himself for his flock, thereby meriting to become, by the unanimous suffrage of the Sacred College, the successor of Pope Innocent XIII. His incessant activity is shown by the Diario of six volumes in folio in which, till his elevation to the Papacy, his secretary, day by day, noted down the most minute details of his official life. It begins December 1, 1685, the date of his preconization as archbishop of Beneventum by Pope Innocent XI.
The contents refer chiefly to his pastoral visits, ordinations, both regular and extraordinary; assisting at the offices of the cathedral, preaching in pontificals with seven deacons around him; confirmation, with examination of the children on the eve; general communions, baptisms, visits to the dying, visits of devotion to churches; consecration of bishops, churches, altars, and chalices; blessings of all kinds, including vestments; religious professions; processions wearing the red hat; attending lectures on the Holy Scriptures by a theologian; exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, absolution of the excommunicated, synods, provincial councils, consultations in cases of conscience, instructions to the people after the Gospel, saying the rosary with the faithful, teaching children the catechism, journeys, etc., etc.
At the end of the year a summary was made of his principal labors. We give that of the year 1694: Cardinal Orsini baptized 67 children and confirmed 13,851; conferred orders on 841 clerks, 503 porters, 450 lectors, 449 exorcists, 435 acolytes, 436 subdeacons, 434 deacons, and 457 priests; consecrated 12 bishops, 100 churches, 100 stationary altars, 500 portable altars, 176 patens, and 188 chalices; blessed 5 abbots and 4 abbesses; received the profession of 88 nuns; performed 6 marriages; administered extreme unction 8 times; placed 13 corner-stones, and blessed 14 cemeteries and 234 bells.
What a proof of his activity, combined with a very complicated administration! But let us cite a few items from this unpretending diary:
“In the evening I kept vigil before the relics exposed in the church to be consecrated on the morrow.
“In the morning I solemnly consecrated the church of the Most Holy Annunciation at Jelsi, preached to the congregation, and then said Low Mass. This church is the CXXXV.
“I solemnly administered the sacrament of confirmation in the church to 34 boys and 24 girls, in all 58.
“Assisted in cappa at a sermon on the Blessed Sacrament by one of the students of my seminary.
“Assisted in cappa at the Mass of the feria, chanted (it was in Lent), and at the sermon.
“At Fragnitello I was received with the usual ceremonies, but, what was unusual (and this greatly affected me), all the men, women, and children came out to meet me a mile distant, with olive branches in their hands, showing by this manifestation the joy in their hearts. God be for ever blessed!”
At the end of the year the cardinal signed the register to guarantee the authenticity of the contents. He adopted this formula:
“Annus 1695, Deo propitio, hic terminatur.
“Ita est. Ego fr. Vin. Mar. card. archiepiscopus m(anu) p(ropria).”
The old palaces had a hall of state for exceptional occasions, when the bishop had to appear in all his dignity. There is such an apartment here, and it is of grand proportions. It is adorned with the portraits and arms of the prelates who have occupied the see, with a concise notice of each. Among them are fourteen saints and two beati: viz., SS. Photinus, Januarius, Dorus, Apollonius, Cassian, Januarius II., Emilius, John, Tamarus, Sophus, Marcian, Zeno, Barbato, and Milon. The latter belongs to the eleventh century, St. Photinus to the first, and the remainder range between the fourth and seventh. The Blessed Giacomo Capocci and Blessed Monaldi lived in the fourteenth century. Let us hope, as the cause has been introduced, we may soon add the Venerable Orsini.
From St. Photinus to his Eminence Cardinal Carafa di Traeto there are fifty-one bishops and seventy-one archbishops. The see was not made archiepiscopal till the year 969, during the pontificate of Pope John XIII. Of the twenty-three cardinal archbishops two became popes: Alexander Farnese, under the name of Paul III.; and Cardinal Orsini, under that of Benedict XIII. Three other popes were likewise from Beneventum—St. Felix (526), Victor III. (1086), and Gregory VIII. (1187).
As an example of the concise and elegant manner in which these prelates’ lives are noticed, we give that of St. Milon, a native of Auvergne:
“LIX. Archiep. VIII. S. Milo ex Arvernia
in Gallia oriundus, VIII. Beneventanus
archiepiscopus, ille idem qui
pietate et literis Stephanum Grandimontensis
familiæ fundatorem erudivit. Provincialem
synodum consummavit A.D.
MLXXV. Obiit die XXIII. Februarii
A.D. MLXXVI. cum sedisset paucis
supra annum mensibus.”
Above these records of the bishops is a long array of armorial ensigns, in which, unfortunately, the arms and seal are often confounded, though essentially different. The archbishops of Beneventum have used for ages a seal of lead on their diplomas and licenses, similar to the bulla of the popes. On one side, separated by a cross, are the heads of the Blessed Virgin, titular of the cathedral, and of St. Bartholomew, the patron of the city and diocese. On the other side are the name and title of the actual archbishop. This seal, in spite of the principles of archæology and heraldry, is given as a coat of arms to the bishops who had none, beginning with St. Photinus, and continuing to the seventh century. From the time of St. Barbato, who died in 682, another seal is added in parti to the bulla, representing a bishop on horseback crossing a bridge and precipitating a dragon into the water. This is doubtless St. Barbato himself, and perhaps refers to the golden viper which he abolished the worship of at Beneventum, transforming it into a chalice, on which, says tradition, was graven the Lord’s Supper.[[55]] This counter-seal is maintained from the seventh to the eleventh century, when the bulla is resumed under Amelius (1072).
The first arms really heraldic make their appearance under Cardinal Roger, the sixteenth archbishop, who died in 1221. The red hat is found on the escutcheons of the twelfth century, though not conceded to cardinals till about a hundred years later (at the Council of Lyons), and not to be seen on their arms before the fourteenth century. But this may be on the same principle that St. Jerome is usually represented with a cardinal’s hat at his side.
The bulla, seal, and arms, from the first, bear the tiara and crosier. The latter adds nothing to the significance, and does not imply any special privilege, being common to bishops and abbots. As to the tiara, even with a single crown at the base, it is a manifest usurpation. The archbishops of Beneventum, it is true, wore it in the middle ages, as is shown by a document of the fourteenth century and the reliefs on the bronze doors of the cathedral. But Paul II., and later St. Pius V., by a motu proprio, the original of which is to be seen in the archives of the chapter, condemned the practice in formal terms. If the tiara is no longer admissible on ceremonial occasions, why retain it on the arms? And this tiara is boldly surrounded by a nimbus when placed over the arms of the canonized bishops, though none of them ever wore it, with the exception, perhaps, of St. Milon. The nimbus is suitable for the head, which represents the whole body, whereas the covering of the head, however sonorous its name or rich its make, should not have an emblem which denotes elevation on our altars and a claim to public veneration. This would be a grave error, infringing on the liturgy as well as iconography.
The archbishops of Beneventum had a mania for imitating the pope. Thus, they wore the tiara, had the Blessed Sacrament borne before them in their visits, styled themselves Servus servorum Dei, issued diplomas in solemn form after the style of the Cancellaria, sealed them sub plumbo, and imposed on the bishops of the province the annual visit ad limina B. Bartholomæi apostoli. Of all these usurpations, only the tiara remains on the arms, and the bulla on the licenses; but even these are too much, for the tiara and bulla are essentially papal, and rightfully belong to the Sovereign Pontiff alone.
On the walls of the apartment are painted en camaïeu all the sainted bishops of Beneventum in simulated niches, clothed pontifically, with the tiara on their heads. One alone has a distinguishing attribute—St. Barbato, who has in his hand the viper of gold. St. Photinus, according to the Diptychon of Beneventum, was ordained and sent here by St. Peter in the year 40. He is believed to be of Greek origin. From him to St. Januarius, who was martyred in 305, is a long interval with no names, though tradition tells us the see had eleven occupants in the time. This loss of names is said to be owing to Diocletian, who ordered the writings of Christians to be destroyed. There is a similar vacancy in all the sees in France, but this is no argument against their apostolic origin. The first founders might receive their mission from St. Peter or his immediate successors, and the difficulties of the times might prevent their being at once replaced. The churches had to exist as best they could for a long period, and were perhaps governed by bishops with no fixed residence or distinct territory.
To complete the parallel with Rome, Beneventum is said to have had a woman for one of its bishops, as the papal see, according to its enemies, was fraudulently occupied by Pope Joan. Cardinal Orsini spiritedly replies to this calumny in the noble words inscribed next the name of Bishop Enrico, who died in 1170: “Ex errore in necrologio monialium S. Petri orta fuit fabula de Sebastiana moniali pro archiepiscopo habita ne fabula sua vacaret Beneventana Sedes in hac Sebastiana ut Romana de sua Johanna.” This calumny sprang from a false interpretation of the record in the necrology of the abbey of San Pietro for November 29: “Obiit archiepiscopus et Sebastian. mon.” The archbishop and the nun might certainly die on the same day, without being, on that account, one and the same person.
On the east wall of the hall is painted the city of Beneventum, surrounded by the principal towns of the diocese and the sees of the suffragans. As their number is considerable, the frescos are continued in the passage leading to the sacristy. They are not without interest, though perhaps maps would be preferable, after the manner of those, so striking and complete, which adorn the gallery of Gregory XIII. at the Vatican.
As conferences and ecclesiastical assemblies, as well as the Mandatum on Holy Thursday, were held in this hall, there is a permanent throne of carved wood, but it stands between the windows on one side, instead of being at the end in capite aulæ, the proper place, where the entrance now is from the private apartments.
One of the doors in the hall opens into the Monte di Pietà, founded by Cardinal Orsini to relieve the poor of his diocese, where money was lent on articles pledged and without the least interest, conformably to the bulls of Leo X. and Paul V., which definitely regulated such institutions. He established, moreover, a Mons Frumentarius, or wheat fund, to furnish grain to the poor in want of bread, or to sow, at the mere recommendation of their curate, and inscribed over the door appropriate texts from Holy Writ, showing him to be the comforter of the poor:
Mons frumentarius Beneventanus erectus anno Domini 1694.
Factus es fortitudo pauperi, fortitudo egeno[[56]] (Isaias xxv.)
Eripiet de angustia[[57]] pauperem (Job xxxvi.)
Revolutions have naturally put an end to these charitable institutions, without substituting anything more to the advantage of the people, but they cannot efface the memory of the incomparable prelate who founded them. Canonico Feuli has reason to say in his Bulletino Ecclesiastico that “others may equal Orsini, but can never surpass him.”
At the top of the staircase is a kind of marquise, supported by elegant columns, before the door leading to the private apartments. Above are the Orsini arms of inlaid marbles, the colors conformed to the rules of heraldry, and the inscription:
Fr. Vinc. Maria. Ord. Præd. Card. Ursino. Archiep. An. MDCCVIII.
which reminds us that Cardinal Orsini belonged to the Dominican Order. Even when pope he continued to be a frate. From him emanated the celebrated constitution which admonished bishops chosen from the regular orders to remember, by the color of their costume, the solemn profession they had once made.
The most striking thing in the antechamber is a double band of emblematic medallions on the walls, with explanatory mottoes, such as were popular in the sixteenth century. They all refer to the obligations of a bishop, and evidently allude to Cardinal Orsini as the model of one. They begin with the holy name of God in Greek, with the Sanctus, Sanctus, Sanctus, the angels’ eternal song of praise. We will rapidly review the other emblems here employed to raise the mind from the visible to the invisible, the material to the spiritual.
The telescope, which enables the human eye to penetrate the profound mysteries of the heavens. So the spiritual world is opened by prayer and meditation. Alta a longe cognoscit (Ps. cxxxvii. 6).
A dog, guarding the fold: emblem of pastoral vigilance. Vt vitam habeant (St. John x. 10).
The mitre, supported by a column: episcopal firmness. Firmalitvr et non flectetvr (Ecclus. xv. 3).
The wine-press overflowing with the juice of the grape: emblem of the spiritual harvest. Vt fructvm plvs afferat (St. John xv. 2).
A clock, which tells the hours and minutes: the value of time. Particvla non te prætereat (Ecclus. xiv. 14).
The crane, emblem of vigilance, because it was formerly believed to sleep on one foot; the other holding a stone, which, when it fell, awoke it. Excvbat in custodiis (Num. xviii. 4).
The horse, held in check by a vigorous hand: self-government. Ne declines in ira (Ps. xxvi. 9).
The elephant, believed every morning to adore the sun at its rising: humility before God. Hvmiliat semetipsvm (Philipp. ii. 8).
The lamp which burns and gives light: figure of the bishop consuming himself for others. Vt ardeat et lvceat (St. John v. 35).[[58]]
The pelican, nourishing its young with the blood from its own breast: a lively expression of extreme devotedness. Reficiam vos (St. Matt. xi. 28).
The crosier is the shepherd’s crook. It terminates with a graceful hook for the purpose of drawing the lambs more gently. It was once a saying: “It is good to live under the crosier!” Svm pastor bonvs (St. John x. 2).
The sun, shedding its rays on a balance: equity under the inflexible eye of God. Æqvitatem vidit vvltvs eivs (Ps. x. 8).
The honeycomb, in which the bee deposits its honey gathered from the flowers: activity and sweetness. Mansvetvm exaltant (Ps. cxlix. 4).
The stag, which, according to an old notion, attracted serpents by its breath in order to exterminate them: the might of the Holy Spirit, of which a bishop is the organ. Flavit Spiritvs eivs (Ps. cxlvii. 18).
The trumpet, which, though sonorous, can give forth sweet notes. In spiritv lenitatis (Gal. vi. 1).
The mill, turned by the water, grinds wheat to feed the hungry. A bishop, above all, should be the father of the poor and needy. Frangit esvrienti (Isai. lviii. 7).
A painting representing the sun: the divine attributes should be reproduced in a bishop. In eandem imaginem (2 Cor. iii. 18).
The fox, emblem of the transgressor, flies before the dog, symbol of episcopal vigilance. A facie tva fvgiam (Ps. cxxxviii. 7).
The dolphin, by the odor it exhales, draws to it the fish of the sea: the influence of virtue. In odorem cvrrimvs (Cant. i. 3).
An anvil, struck by two hammers at once, without being moved: strength to resist exterior assaults. Fortitvdinem meam cvstodiam (Ps. lviii. 10).
The phœnix, which springs to new life on the pile where it is consumed: the power of multiplying time. Mvltiplicabo dies (Prov. ix. 2).
The bear, taking its young in its paws, to teach them to stand and walk: paternal direction of souls. Donec formetvr (Gal. iv. 19).
The compass, turning its needle to the polar star. A bishop should not be guided by human influences. Hanc reqviram (Ps. xxvi. 4).
The rain, watering the garden: going about doing good. Pertransiit benefaciendo (Acts x. 38).
The pomegranate contains a great number of seeds: a bishop shelters the multitude. Coperit mvltitvdinem (St. James v. 20).
The mitre, surrounded by an aureola: the splendor sanctity adds to the episcopal dignity. Contvlit et splendorem (Judith x. 4).
The eagle, trying its eaglets by making them look at the sun: God alone should be looked to in trial. Cvm probatvs fverit (St. James i. 12).
A tree, the vigor of which is only increased by age: experience increases one’s efficiency. Fortior cvm senverit (Prov. xxii. 6).
At one end of the antechamber is the library, formerly containing a fine collection of books, mostly belonging to Cardinal Orsini, but now unfortunately scattered. He also established a printing-press in the palace for the purpose of publishing his own edicts, licenses, and pamphlets for the direction of his clergy. A small oratory opens into the library with its marble altar turned towards the East and its walls covered with paintings. One of these is a votive picture from Cardinal Orsini after his miraculous preservation in the earthquake of 1688 by the special intervention of St. Philip Neri, representing him buried among the ruins of his palace, his head alone visible, resting on a picture of the saint, who, in consequence of this memorable circumstance, has ever since been regarded as one of the patrons of Beneventum.
It is said that when Cardinal Orsini was leaving Beneventum for Rome, he turned towards the weeping inhabitants, and, after praying silently for an instant, promised them his protection henceforth against earthquakes, and, in fact, not only has the city been spared when serious disasters have occurred in the country around, but no citizen of Beneventum has received any injury, even when exposed elsewhere to terrible danger. Many families keep with veneration a bust of the holy cardinal in their houses, or some object once belonging to him, and attribute to this devotion a special protection.
There is nothing of interest in the private rooms once occupied by Cardinal Orsini. One would like to see his unpretending furniture, his pictures of devotion, the kneeling-stool where he so often prayed for his flock, and the books he daily used, but they are all gone. There is not even an authentic likeness of him,[[59]] though he resided here thirty-eight years, and expended in the restoration and embellishment of the palace 64,589 ducats of his personal fortune.
We have already alluded to the quarter of the palace called il conventino, because it has the aspect of a monastery. It is divided by a corridor, with cells on both sides that communicate with each other, or can be made private at pleasure. Here, without any luxury or display, Cardinal Orsini lodged the bishops convoked for the provincial councils, and generously provided for every expense these assemblies involved. The priests who accompanied them were lodged in the convent of San Modesto, where nothing was wanting to their comfort. The register of accounts gives some curious details as to the supplies. Macaroni necessarily played an important rôle. Snow was furnished for refreshing drinks. And as the wine called Lachryma would doubtless have been too heavy, it was previously tempered by a strong addition of the ordinary red wine!
But the patience of the reader is already exhausted with these details. As we have implied, the archiepiscopal palace of Beneventum is not precisely artistic, and yet it is interesting and curious. If the account has been unreasonably prolonged, the memory of Cardinal Orsini is a sufficient justification. We cannot make too prominent the name and labors of those who lived only for the church, and sacrificed themselves for its development and glory. Quam multa, quam opportuna, quam grandia accepta referunt beneficia, let us say, in conclusion, with the inscription on the hospital at Beneventum, graven on marble to the praise of Fra Vincenzo Maria, priest of the title of St. Sixtus, Cardinal Orsini.