Antonelli says that no ambassadors can be admitted, for if it were conceded to the French, it could not be refused to other powers, Austria, Bavaria, or even Prussia. He is quite right there. It has been a main object from the first with this Council to give a striking [pg 376] example of the entire exclusion of the lay element in ecclesiastical deliberations. It is just because the Governments and States are so deeply concerned in the projected decrees, because their rights and laws and their whole future are affected, that they are not to be heard or admitted. In presence of the representative of his Government, many a Bishop would think twice before assenting to a decree flatly contradicting the laws and political principles of his country. And then the admission of ambassadors would break through the mystery, and make the strict silence imposed on the Bishops almost useless. A large number of them, and above all the entire Opposition, would be very glad of this, but for that very reason the ruling powers detest it the more. As a foretaste and practical illustration of what the maxims of the Schema de Ecclesiâ will lead to, when made into dogmas, it is worth while to notice the decision issued by the Pope and his Penitentiary in September 1869, when this Schema had just been drawn up, on the question whether a priest could swear to observe the Austrian Constitution. To take the oath absolutely was forbidden; he can only take it with an express reservation of the laws of the Church, and—which is very significant—he must state [pg 377] publicly that he only takes the oath, even with this reservation, by virtue of papal permission. That is a new and very important step on the road to be trodden with the aid of the Council. Every clergyman is to be reminded, and to remind others, in merely discharging a simple civil obligation, that he is dependent on the Pope in the matter, and may not properly speaking swear civil fealty and obedience to the laws without papal permission, not even in the conditional form which makes the oath itself illusory. This is quite after the mind of the Jesuits, who have always shown a special predilection for the doctrine that every cleric is not a subject and citizen with corresponding rights, but simply a subaltern and servant of the Pope. This is a prologue to the twenty-one Canons of the Schema de Ecclesiâ.
I have just learnt from the Kölner Volkszeitung that the chaplain of a prelate here charges me with a gross falsehood in reference to the words of the Pope. He appeals to the Paris Union, which has the words used by the Pope, “Je suis la voie, la vérité, et la vie,” with the passage inserted by the editor. I had cited the words from the Observateur Catholique of 1866 (p. 357), where they are authenticated by the signature of an ear-witness, MacSheeby, and correspond entirely with the statement [pg 378] of the Union. But in the Monde, which was not in my reach, a totally different version is given, which has no similarity to that authenticated by Roman correspondents in the Union and Observateur, and does not connect the words, “I am the way,” etc., with the Pope at all. It must remain uncertain after this whether the version of the Monde or of the two other journals is the genuine one.
Thirty-Second Letter.
Rome, March 28, 1870.—The Bishops who have attacked the new order of business, because it brought into view the possibility of a dogmatic definition being carried without the consensus moraliter unanimis, received the desired answer in no doubtful form at the sitting of Tuesday, the 22d. The measures of the Curia for a month past have been unmistakably contributing more and more to produce a worthy and loyal-hearted attitude among the minority. After long dallying, Rome has brought the secrets of her policy a little too boldly and conspicuously into view. Hardly was the domination of the majority in matters of faith fixed by the stricter regolamento, when the Pope had the proclamation of his own infallibility proposed in the most arrogant form. On this followed the attempt to press it to an immediate decision, and then the determination to admit no ambassadors of the Governments. If these [pg 380] proceedings were not enough to lay bare the perilous nature of the whole situation, the Pope and the zealots of his party supplied the remaining proof,—the former, by his conduct about Falloux, about Montalembert on the day the news of his death arrived, about the Munich theologians in secret consistory, and about the so-called Liberal or “half-Catholics” on every occasion; the latter by their growing impatience about the infallibility definition, and their assurances that there is no real opposition to this dogma, and that, if there was, it could not hold its ground after the promulgation had taken place. And so the opponents of the decree must know at last that they have to deal with a blind and unscrupulous zeal, not with a theological system carefully thought out and placed on an intellectual basis; that the contest has to be carried on against the whole power and influence of the Pope, and not, as had been maintained with transparent hypocrisy, only against the wishes of the noisy and independent party of the Civiltà and its allied journalists. They begin to use more earnest and manlier language, the language of clear apprehension and conscientious conviction. If the comments handed in last week on the Schema de Ecclesiâ, and the protests against any hurrying of the discussion [pg 381] on it, were known to the world, the Catholic Episcopate and the strong reflux current here would appear in a very different light from what might be gathered from the previous course of things. Not a few of these opinions drawn up by the Bishops breathe a truly apostolic spirit, and deal with the Roman proposals in the tone of genuine theology. An influential theologian of a Religious Order has pronounced of one of them, that it exceeds in force and weight the treatise which appeared in Germany last year, Reform of the Church in Her Head and Her Members.[69] It has been urged by English prelates that it concerns their honour to resist the promulgation of a dogma, the explicit repudiation of which by the Irish Bishops was an efficacious condition of Catholic Emancipation. The American Protest contains a more threatening warning than the German, and the German is stronger than the French.
After these declarations the attitude of the minority was clearly defined, and invincible by any foe from without. Their contention is, that no right exists in the Church to sanction a dogma against the will and belief of an important portion of the Episcopate, and that only by abandoning any claim to such a right can [pg 382] the Council be regarded as really Œcumenical. To be quite consistent, the minority ought to take no further part in the Council till this point, on the decision of which they rightly hold its authority to depend, is settled; for their protest implied the doubt whether they were taking part in a true or only a seeming Council, whether they were acting in union with the Holy Ghost or co-operating to carry out a gigantic and sacrilegious deception. Yet the words expressly stating this doubt, and making the distinct withdrawal of the theory of voting dogmas by majorities a condition of any further participation in the proceedings, were not adopted into any of the Protests. This implied that the signataries would appear in the next General Congregation, that they refrained from a suspicious attitude, and were unwilling to interpret the ambiguous order of business in malam partem, until facts compelled them to do so. A conflict which might have such incalculable results was to be avoided, till necessity made it a positive duty; and that was not the case as long as a favourable interpretation of the regolamento continued possible.
Thus the minority committed the strategical blunder of postponing a conflict which they saw to be inevitable, [pg 383] and when they could not know whether any more favourable opportunity for entering on it for the benefit of the Church would occur in the future. There is hardly anything doubtful or open to double interpretation in the order of business, when more closely examined. Every Bishop sees quite clearly that it is specially arranged for overcoming the opposition of the minority, and will be used without scruple for that end.[70] And who knows how many members of the present Opposition, if once the Curia applies its last lever, will have strength to resist to extremities? how many are ready, by humble submission or by resigning their Sees, to quiet their consciences and sacrifice their flocks to error? There are men among them better fitted for the contest against the principle formally enounced in the revised order of business, than for the contest against infallibility. The Bishop of Mayence, e.g., passes for one of the strongest and most decided opponents of the regolamento, which I mention as a point of great importance at this moment. The resolve of the protesting Bishops, to avoid the threatened conflict at present, can only be justified if another and better opportunity for [pg 384] defending the cause of the Church occurs in the future course of the Council and before any decision is arrived at. Had they been willing, after handing in their protests, to go on quietly joining in the proceedings, without doing anything to give emphasis to the step they had taken, they would in fact have bent under the yoke of the majority. They only needed to keep silent: that implied everything. For it would necessarily be assumed that they had withdrawn or forgotten their protests, and to continue to act upon and submit to the new order of business themselves would imply that they had renounced their resistance to any of its particular details. It was therefore all the more essential for them to let it be clearly known how far their concessions would extend, and what was their final limit. Unless they did this, they would either seem not quite sincere, or would have really accepted the regolamento with its obvious consequences. The Council, the Presidents, the Pope, the expectant Catholic world without, had a right to know their real intentions, and whether they meant to adhere to their declarations. The first voting on the propositions of the Schema de Fide could not fail to decide this point. Thus it became a necessity to put this question of principle in the [pg 385] front at the reopening of the deliberations of the Council.
Meanwhile the concessions of the Presidents and the majority on some points had elicited a more friendly feeling in the Opposition. The discussion on infallibility was postponed, and the first Schema was returned from the Commission with important modifications. Even the shameful treatment of Montalembert could not altogether destroy this conciliatory state of feeling. Ginoulhiac, the learned Bishop of Grenoble, who was to be preconised as Archbishop of Lyons on Monday the 21st, undertook on the 22d to meet the discreet concessions of the infallibilists in a kindred spirit. He was indeed obliged to make his speech on the Tuesday, though he had not been preconised on the day before. The French, who have no Cardinal—for Mathieu's custom is to go away at any critical moment, and he was not then returned—had gladly left to one of the Austrian Cardinals the less pleasing duty of declaring their attitude towards the regolamento. Schwarzenberg did but slightly glance at it in his speech and yet was called to order. Archbishop Kenrick of St. Louis, one of the most imposing figures in the Council, touched on the theme more closely, and dwelt on the office of Bishops [pg 386] as witnesses and judges of faith, in the sense which forms the basis of the opposition of the minority. Lastly, Strossmayer ascended the tribune, and then followed a scene which, for dramatic force and theological significance, almost exceeded anything in the past history of Councils. He began by referring to that passage at the opening of the Schema, where Protestantism is made responsible for modern unbelief—“systematum monstra, mythismi, rationalismi, indifferentismi nomine designata.” He blamed the perversity and injustice of these words, referring to the religious indifference among Catholics which preceded the Reformation, and the horrors of the Revolution, which were caused by godlessness among Catholics, not among Protestants. He added that the able champions of Christian doctrine among the Protestants ought not to be forgotten, to many of whom St. Augustine's words applied, “errant, sed bonâ fide errant;” Catholics had produced no better refutations of the errors enumerated in the Schema than had been written by Protestants, and all Christians were indebted to such men as Leibnitz and Guizot.
Each one of these statements, and the two names, were received with loud murmurs, which at last broke out into [pg 387] a storm of indignation. The President, De Angelis, cried out, “Hicce non est locus laudandi Protestantes.” And he was right, for the Palace of the Inquisition is hardly a hundred paces from the place where he was speaking. Strossmayer exclaimed, in the midst of a great uproar, “That alone can be imposed on the faithful as a dogma, which has a moral unanimity of the Bishops of the Church in its favour.” At these words a frightful tumult arose. Several Bishops sprang from their seats, rushed to the tribune, and shook their fists in the speaker's face. Place, Bishop of Marseilles, one of the boldest of the minority and the first to give in his public adhesion to Dupanloup's Pastoral, cried out, “Ego illum non damno.” Thereupon a shout resounded from all sides, “Omnes, omnes illum damnamus.” The President called Strossmayer to order, but he did not leave the tribune till he had solemnly protested against the violence to which he had been subjected. There was hardly less excitement in the church outside than in the Council Hall. Some thought the Garibaldians had broken in: others, with more presence of mind, thought infallibility had been proclaimed, and these last began shouting “Long live the infallible Pope!” A Bishop of the United States said afterwards, not [pg 388] without a sense of patriotic pride, that he knew now of one assembly still rougher than the Congress of his own country.