Voici le relevé des opérations des Caisses d’épargne ordinaires avec la Caisse des dépôts et consignations du 1er au 10 octobre, 1906:—
Dépôts de fonds 2.830.949 fr. 72. Retraits de fonds 6.576.856 fr. 30. Excédent des retraits 3.745.906 fr. 58.
Excédent des retraits du 1er janvier au 10 octobre, 1906, 26.784.318 fr. 60.
[21] Thus Notre Dame might witness a Catholic Mass in the morning, a theosophical reunion at noon, and a positivist conference in the evening. The Swiss Catholics, 1872-6, had some such experiences: a venerable priest died recently at Berne who had refused to give up the keys of his church for other uses, and was imprisoned for many years; while the last prisoner of Chillon was the Catholic Bishop of Fribourg, another victim of the Swiss Kulturkampf.
[22] When public men and editors in France and elsewhere descant on German Associations cultuelles accepted by the Holy See that rejects them in France, they stand accused of ignorance or malevolence. M. Briand basely insinuated (Chambers, 9th November) that the Church in Germany was being ransomed by France: “Notre situation à nous est-elle la rançon de la situation d’un pays voisin? Je me borne à poser la question.” The fact is there is no such thing as German Associations cultuelles, each State of the Confederation has its own regulations. Bavaria has a concordat and a papal nuncio at Munich. The Governments of Würtemberg and the Grand Duchy of Baden made special conventions with the Holy See, 1857 and 1859. Alsace-Lorraine is still under the French Concordat of 1801 between Pius VII and the First Republic. Prussia and Hesse in 1873 and 1875 made special conventions with the Vatican. Prussia has a Legation to the Holy See at Rome. Moreover, in none of the German states is there separation of Church and State. They all recognize and subsidize the Catholic Church and one form of Protestantism. In Prussia several bishops are appointed senators by the King. In Alsace-Lorraine the Bishop of Strasburg is member of the Council of State. In Bavaria, Baden, Würtemberg, the prelates are members of the Upper House.
[23] What would Philippe de Commines have said had he heard of the little coup de main (November 20th, 1906), by which deputies and senators in quasi huis clos voted themselves an increase of 6000 francs without any “octroi or consentement” of the sovereign people, delivered from tyranny and servitude by the Revolution?
[24] There is in the Palace of the Doges at Venice an immense picture commemorating this Congress, where the Peace of Constance was prepared.
[25] In refreshing contrast with this record of persecution is the proclamation of religious liberty in Maryland, 1650. “The Catholics took quiet possession [of Maryland], and religious liberty obtained a home, its only home in the wide world ... every other country had persecuting laws.... Protestants were sheltered against Protestant intolerance. The disfranchized friends of Prelacy in Massachusetts and the Puritans from Virginia were welcomed to equal liberty of conscience and political rights as Roman Catholics in the province of Maryland.... In 1649 the General Assembly of Maryland passed an Act to this effect, yet five years later, when the Puritans obtained the ascendency there, they rewarded their benefactors by passing an Act forbidding that liberty of conscience be extended to ‘popery,’ ‘prelacy,’ and ‘licentiousness of opinion’” (Bancroft’s History of the United States, I, VII.).
Lecky corroborates this statement: “Hôpital and Lord Baltimore were the two first legislators who uniformly maintained liberty of conscience, and Maryland continues the one solitary home for the oppressed of every sect till Puritans succeeded in subverting Catholic rule, when they basely enacted the whole penal code against those who had so nobly and so generously received them” (History of Rationalism, II, 58).
An abridged copy of the Act of 1650, the first Act of religious toleration, will be found in the Appendix. The original from which I copied is in the archives of the Maryland Historical Society, Baltimore.