Pilgrimage from the Alps to the Tiber

by J. A. Wylie

Some few there are who, more daring by nature, or specially strengthened from above, adventure on the immense hazards of flight. Of these, some are caught, thrown into a dungeon, and are heard of no more. Others find their way to England, or some other Protestant State. But here new trials await them. They are ignorant of our language perhaps. They find themselves among strangers, whose manners seem to them cold and distant. They are without means of living; and, carrying with them too, it may be, some of the stains of their former profession, they encounter difficulties which are the more stumbling that they are unexpected. On these various grounds, the number of priests who leave the Church of Rome has been, and always will be, small, till some great revolution or upbreak takes place in that Church.

But, making the most ample allowance for all these classes,—for the men who are atheists and infidels,—for the mere worldings, whose only tie to their Church is the gain it brings them,—and for those who are either doubters, or whose doubts have passed into full conviction that the Church of the Pope is not the Church of Jesus Christ,—making, I say, full allowance for all these, I have little doubt that the majority of the priests in Italy,—it may be not much more than a majority, but still a majority,—are sincere believers in their system.

They are not ignorant of the frauds, the knaveries, the fables, and hypocrisies, by which that system is supported. They cannot shut their eyes to these, which they regard, in fact, as sanctified by the end to which they are devoted; but they separate between these and the system itself; and though they cannot tell the line where truth ends and falsehood begins, still they look upon their system, on the whole, as founded in truth, and carrying with it the sanction of Heaven. Indeed, belief is a weak term to express the power the system has over them. It is rather a paralyzing awe, a freezing terror, like that with which his grim deity inspires the barbarian, which holds captive the strongest mind, and lays reason and conscience prostrate in the dust. Such I believe to be the state of mind of the greater number of the Italian priesthood.

But how comes this? What is it which has produced this universal slavery? Is it the Pope? Is it the cardinals? Is it the Jesuits? No; for these men, though the tyrants of others, are themselves slaves. All are bound by the same chain of adamant, to the car of the same demon. A mournful procession of dead men truly, with the triple crown in front, and the sandals of the barefooted Capuchin bringing up the rear. What is it, I repeat, that holds the whole body in subjection, from the Pope down to the friar? It is the system, the abstract system, with its overwhelming prestige,—that system which lives on though popes die; the genius of the Papacy, if you will. This is the real monarch of that spiritual kingdom.

A little power of mental abstraction,—and the subtile genius of the Italian gives him that power in a high degree,—will enable any one to separate betwixt the system and its agents. Some one has remarked, that he could form an abstraction of a lord mayor, not only without his horse, and gown, and gold chain, but even without the stature, features, hands, and feet of any particular lord mayor. The same can be done of the Papacy. We can form an abstraction of the Papacy not only without the tiara and the keys, but even without the stature and lineaments, the hands and feet, of any particular Pope. When we have formed such an abstraction, we have got the real ruler of the Papacy. That it is the system that is the dominant power in the Church of Rome, is evident from this one fact, namely, that councils have sometimes deposed the Pope to save the Papacy. There is in the Pope's kirk, then, a power greater than the Pope. The system has taken body and shape, as it were, and sits upon the Seven Hills, a mysterious, awe-inspiring divinity or demon; and the Pope, equally with the friar, bows his head and does obeisance. Wherever the pontiff looks,—whether backward into history, or around him in the world,—there are the monuments of this ever living, ever present, and all pervading power. It requires more force than the mind of fallen man is capable of, to believe that a system which has filled history with its deeds and the world with its trophies, which has compelled the homage of myriads and myriads of minds, and before which the haughtiest conquerors and the most puissant intellects have bowed with the docility of children, is, after all, an unreality,—a mere spectre of the middle ages,—a ghost conjured up by credulity and knavery from the tombs of defunct idolatries. This, I say, is the true state of things in Italy. Its priesthood are subdued by their own system,—by its high claims to antiquity,—its world-wide dominion,—its imposing though faded magnificence,—its perverted logic,—its pseudo sanctity. These not only carry it over the reason, but in some degree over the senses also; and the more fully persuaded the priests are of the truth and divinity of their system, they feel only the more fully warranted to employ fraud and force in its support,—the winking Madonna to convince one class, and the dungeon and the iron chain to silence the other.

Having spoken of the abstract and spiritual power that reigns over Italy, and, I may say, over the whole Catholic world, let me now speak of the corporeal and human machinery by which the Papacy is carried on.

First comes the Pope. Pio Nono is a man of sixty-three. His years and the various misfortunes of his reign sit lightly upon him. Were the Pope much given to reflection, there are not wanting unpleasant topics enough to darken the clear Italian sunlight, as it streams in through the windows of the Vatican palace. Once was he chased from Rome; and now that he is returned, can he call Rome his own? Not he. The real master of Rome is the commandant of the French garrison. And while outside the walls are the dead whom he slew with the sword of France, inside are the living, whose sullen scowl or fierce glare he may see through the French files, as he rides out of an afternoon.[9] But Pio Nono takes all in good part. There is not a wrinkle on his brow; no unpleasant thought appears to shade the jovial light of his broad face. He sits down to dinner with evidently a good appetite; he sleeps soundly at night, and troubles not his poor head by brooding over misfortunes which he cannot mend, or charging himself with the direction of plots which he is not competent to manage. But, if not fitted to take the lead in cabinets, nature has formed him to shine in a procession. He has a portly figure, a face radiant with blandness, dissimulation, and vanity; and he looks every inch the Pope, as he is carried shoulder-high in St Peter's, and sits blazing in his jewelled tiara and purple robes, between two huge fans of peacocks' feathers. To these accomplishments he adds that of a fine voice; and when he gives his blessing from the balcony of St Peter's, or assembles the Romans in the Forum, as he did on a late occasion, when he lifted up hands dripping with his subjects' blood, to call his hearers to repentance, his tones ring out, in the deep calm air of Rome, clear and loud as those of a bell. Such is the man who is the nominal head of the Papacy. We say the nominal head; for such a system as the Papacy, involving the consideration of so many interests, and requiring such skilful steering to clear the rocks and quicksands amid which the bark of Peter is now moving, demands the presence at the helm of a steadier hand and a clearer eye than those of Pio Nono.

I come next to the College of Cardinals. In so large a body we find, as might be expected, various grades of both intellectual and moral character; and of course there are the corresponding indications on their faces. An overbearing arrogance, which always communicates to the countenance an air of vulgarity, more or less, is a very prevailing trait. The average intellect in the sacred college is not so high as one would expect in men who have risen to the top of their profession; and for this reason, perhaps, that birth has fully more to do with their elevation than talent or services. One scrutinises their faces curiously when one remembers that these men are the living representatives of the apostles. They profess to hold the rank, to be clothed with the functions, and to inherit the supernatural endowments, of the first inspired preachers. There you may look for the burning eloquence of a Paul, the boldness of a Peter, the love of a John, the humility, patience, zeal, of all. You go round the circle, and examine one by one the faces of these living Pauls and Peters. Verily, if their prototypes were like their modern representatives, the spread of the gospel at first was by far the mightiest miracle the world ever saw. On one you find the unmistakeable marks of sordid appetite and self-indulgence: on another, low intrigue has imprinted the most sinister lines: a third is a mere man of the world;—his prayers and vigils have been kept at the shrine of pleasure. But along with much that is sordid and worldly, there are astute and far-seeing minds in the sacred college; and foremost in this class stands Antonelli. His pale face, and clear, cold, penetrating eye, reveal the presiding genius of the Papacy. He is the Prime Minister of the Pope; and though his is not the brow on which the tiara sits, he is the real head of the system. From his station on the Seven Hills his keen eye watches and directs every movement in the papal world. Those mighty projects which the Papacy is endeavouring to realize in every part of the earth have their first birth in his fertile and daring brain.

His family are well known at Rome, and some of his ancestors were men of renown in their own way. His uncle was the most famous Italian brigand of modern times, and his exploits are still celebrated in the popular songs of the country. The occupation of the yet more celebrated nephew is not so dissimilar after all; for what is Antonelli, but the leader of a crew of bandits, whose hordes scour Europe, arrayed in sacerdotal garb, and in the name of heaven rob men of their wealth, their liberty, and their souls, and carry back their booty to their den on the Seven Hills.