The Holy Father had made up his mind so early as the first days of September, 1870, to remain in the city. His presence, he felt confident, would so far prevent the evils which he feared. If he were gone, there would be less restraint on the usurping power, when it might wish to confiscate more convents, churches and church property generally. Almost all the foreign ambassadors remained with him; and this circumstance presented another cause why the new government would be more moderate and circumspect in its attacks on property.
A beautiful legend which the Holy Father recounted, at an interview with Cardinal De Bonnechose, was well calculated to reconcile the Catholic world to the stay of Pius IX. at Rome, even although he was there as a prisoner of the victorious king. And a prisoner he really was; for he could not have removed to any other country except by a successful stratagem, so closely guarded were all the approaches to the city by the myrmidons of the conqueror. Taking the cardinal aside, he informed him that he wished to present him with a memorial. “The object in itself is of little value. The intention with which I give it is all its worth.” It was a small plate of ivory, framed in gold, surmounted by the arms of the Holy See, and representing in the most exquisite manner a moving scene in the life of St. Peter. “You behold the subject of my frequent meditations for many years. When the prince of the apostles, fleeing from persecution, quitted Rome, he met, not far from [pg 360] the gate of Saint Sebastian, our Lord Himself, carrying His cross and looking extraordinarily sad: ‘Domine quo radis?’ ‘Lord, where are you going?’ exclaimed Peter. ‘I am going to Rome,’ replied our blessed Lord, ‘In order to be there crucified anew to die in your place, as your courage has failed you.’ ” “Peter understood,” continued the Holy Father, “and remained at Rome. I also remain. For if, at this moment, I left the eternal city, it would seem to me as if our Lord addressed to me the same words of reproach. The representation of this scene I am anxious to leave with you as a memorial. It may, in reality, be nothing more than a pious legend. But for me it in a decisive instruction.” Pius IX. then delivered the precious medallion to the cardinal.
GUARANTEES WHICH GUARANTEED NOTHING—£120,000 WITH WHICH NOTHING WAS PAID—PETER'S PENCE WHICH PAID EVERYTHING.
In order to give a coloring to his usurpation in the eyes of Christian Europe, and to set at rest any scruples which may have remained in the minds of his adherents, Victor Emmanuel caused a law to be enacted on the 13th March, 1871, which is known as the law of guarantees. This law declared the person of the Sovereign Pontiff sacred and inviolable, recognized his title and dignity of sovereign, assured to him an annual endowment of 3,225,000 francs (£120,000), together with the possession of the Vatican and Lateran Palaces, as well as the Pontifical Villa of Castel Gandolfo, and provided for the complete liberty of all future Conclaves and Œcumenical Councils. It requires two parties to every contract or agreement. The law of guarantees had no such condition, the Holy Father not being a party to it. He could not accept the honors which the new government pretended to confer, nor the money which it offered. It was not a government by any other law than that of the sword—that of a war not only undertaken against the unoffending, but also in violation of a solemn treaty. Neither was the treasure which it proffered its rightful property. It held it, [pg 361] indeed; but only as the robber holds the purse of his victim, whilst he mocks him by an offer of alms. It was also the merest mockery to pretend to recognize the Pope as a sovereign, whilst, in reality, he was detained as a prisoner, who could not pass beyond the gate of his garden without coming into the custody of the armed police or soldiery of the usurper, By the provisions of this same law of guarantees, full liberty was secured to the Sovereign Pontiff in the exercise of his spiritual office. The persecutions to which the ministers of the Church were frequently subjected, when they dared to obey the orders of the Pope in fulfilling the duties of his and their ministry, show to what extent the framers of the law were sincere. It need only be added, without further comment, that article eighteen confiscated, by anticipation, all ecclesiastical properties, under the pretence that they were to be reorganized, preserved and administered. No wonder that the Pope stigmatized such a law as hypocritical and iniquitous. In the supposition that he could have derived any benefit from accepting it, he would still have been at the mercy of a fickle king and parliament, to whom it was competent, at any moment, to change the law which they had made. The safety of the Holy Father, under Heaven, lay in this, that the newly erected kingdom of Victor Emmanuel was most ambitious to figure as a State among the States of Europe. To none of these would it have been pleasing to see the venerable Pontiff forcibly driven from the city of the Popes. It was necessary, as far as possible, to blindfold them.
“I have, indeed, great need of money.” said Pius IX., when the sum appropriated by the law of guarantees was first presented for his acceptance; “my children, everywhere, impose on themselves the most serious sacrifices in order to supply my wants, at all times so great, but to which you are daily adding. As it is a portion of the property that has been stolen from me, I could only accept it as restitution money. I will never sign a receipt which would appear to express my acquiescence in the robbery.” Every succeeding year the form, or [pg 362] rather the farce, of offering the subsidy was renewed and as often rejected. That the offer of so large a sum was hypocritical, and intended only for show, is well proved by the circumstance that the liberal Italian government deprived of their incomes and drove from their places of residence many bishops, whose wants were supplied in their great distress from the resources of the Holy Father.
Love is stronger than hate; and so well-beloved was Pius IX. throughout Catholic Christendom, that contributions of money from every country where there were any Catholics were poured into his treasury, in such abundance as more than compensated for the loss of his Italian revenue. Not only were these contributions, under the name of Peter's pence, sufficient to maintain the venerable Pontiff during the remainder of his days, without its being necessary to accept, as a royal benefaction, any portion of the property that was stolen from him, they also sufficed to enable him to continue their salaries to his former employees, who had almost all remained faithful, as well as to those still required for his service and for transacting the business of the Church. In addition to this, he retained on half or quarter pay a number of the soldiers of his former army, and maintained his establishment of Vigna Pia, together with the hospital of Tata Giovanni, from which the new Roman municipality had meanly withdrawn the subsidy, for no other reason than that in former times it had been a favorite institution of Pius IX. This was not all. The Holy Pontiff maintained, by means of popular schools, a necessary warfare against both Protestant and Atheistic propagandism. The former had been very active ever since the occupation of Rome by the Piedmontese. The various Protestant societies actually spent £100,000 yearly in the vain attempt to Protestantize the Romans. By 1st January, 1875, they had erected three churches and founded twelve missionary residences in the interest of divers denominations—Anglicans, Methodists, American Episcopalians, Vaudois, Baptists, Anabaptists, etc. The Italians have little taste for Protestantism in any of its [pg 363] forms. So there was no danger of discordant and jarring sects coming to prevail. It cannot be denied, however, that the movement increased the number of free-thinkers—a result no less calculated to afflict tho Holy Father.
When to these expenses are added those of sustaining the Sacred College, the prelature, the guards, the museums, and bishops that were exiled for the faith, there is shown a monthly expenditure of more than six hundred thousand francs, which is equal to seven millions and a half yearly. These expenses always increased as the elder bishops passed away. Pius IX. appointed successors. But as none of these could, in conscience, ask the royal exequatur, which, notwithstanding article sixteen of the notorious guarantees, was still in force, Victor Emmanuel had no hesitation in suppressing the revenues of the bishops. Pius IX. sent to the bishops who were thus deprived of their legitimate incomes five hundred francs monthly, and to archbishops from seven hundred to one thousand francs. He also labored to establish foundations for the education of ecclesiastical students whom a revolutionary and anti-Christian law made subject to military service, thus rendering morally impossible the following out of clerical vocations and the recruiting of the priesthood. From this and such like proceedings, it can easily be seen that the revolutionary regime, and the Italian government was nothing less, aimed at the extirpation of Christianity, and that civilization, the only possible civilization which follows in its train.
Misfortune, meanwhile, was not neglected by the Holy Pontiff. He sent vestments to the churches of Paris which had been pillaged by the Commune. He provided, habitually, in like manner, for the churches of poor and remote missions. In July, 1875, he sent twenty thousand francs to the people who had suffered by inundations in the southwest of France, and five thousand francs to such as had similarly suffered at Brescia, in Upper Italy. He bestowed, likewise, large sums for the rebuilding of churches—for instance, eight hundred francs for this pious purpose to the Bishop of Sarsina, and two thousand [pg 364] to the Bishop of Osimo. Charitable institutions were not overlooked, and the Princess Rospigliosi Champigny de Cadore received fifty thousand francs towards the support of the house of St. Mary Magdalen, the object of which was the preservation of young women in the city of Rome.
As regarded works of art or of public utility, the venerable Pontiff was no less munificent. He completed the restoration of the Church of Saint Ange in Peschiera, together with the magnificent contiguous portico called Octavia, and rebuilt the altar with the marbles found by Visconti in the emporium of the Emperors. The tomb of his illustrious predecessor Gregory VII., at Salerno, having become dilapidated, he undertook to restore it at his own cost, and renewed the fine epitaph which Pope Gregory himself had caused to be engraved on the sepulchral stone; Dileri justitiam et odici iniquitatem, et ecce in exilio mortor. (I loved righteousness and hated iniquity, and lo! I die in exile.)
Quite a number of people were employed in the manufacture of mosaics at the Vatican. On this the Romans justly prided themselves. Pius IX. continued to employ these artists, and, as in former times, presented their works to his guests or to the churches of Italy. If he was not still a king, he retained, at least, a truly royal prerogative—that of conferring gifts in every way worthy of royalty. Nothing could exceed the delicacy and graciousness with which he did so. Of this the two Russian Grand Dukes, brothers of the reigning Emperor, were witnesses, when he made a present to them of a splendid table, in mosaic, which they were observed to admire among the more humble furniture of his apartment. The funds must have been, indeed, abundant which could meet so many demands. Although despoiled of his revenues and property, the Holy Father was a richer monarch than the prince who robbed him. So liberally were Peter's pence bestowed and so economically managed, that Pius IX. was able to invest money for the benefit of his successor, although not to such an extent as to render the collection of Peter's pence in the future unnecessary.