Rome, April 10, 1870.—When it became known that the Solemn Session for accepting and proclaiming the first dogmatic decrees was to be held, not on the 11th April as first intended, but on the 24th, the question of how this interval should be used came to the front. For the moment general attention is directed towards Paris. The answer of Cardinal Antonelli, drawn up by Franchi, Archbishop of Thessalonica in partibus and one of the most active curialists in the affairs of the Council, arrived there March 24. According to the account of a French statesman, it produced the impression of being intended for a mediæval king, who could neither read nor write. The two main points in it are—(1.) that the Canones de Ecclesiâ contain no new claims and do not affect States which have a Concordat at all, and (2.) that no ambassador can be admitted to the Council.
The French Government oscillated a long time between [pg 405] the counsels of different advisers. The Bishop of Nevers represented the middle party, at whose head stands Cardinal Bonnechose; the Bishop of Constantine and afterwards the Bishop of Coutances might, as members of the Opposition, have come to a similar opinion. At first the plan found favour of not sending any special ambassador to the Council, but accrediting the ambassador to the Pope for the Council also. France would thereby have gained the start of Prussia, for it was hardly to be supposed that a Protestant diplomatist would claim the right of entering the Council. So much more important became the question, whether the Marquis de Banneville, who had meanwhile gone to Paris to justify his policy of inaction, would be superseded, or sent back to Rome in this double capacity, and therefore with increased powers. The latter course would be a significant concession to the inflexible Pope, a decided gain for the majority, and therefore a sensible blow for the Opposition. It would be a practical proof that Rome had only to resist, in order to intimidate France, and that the Imperial Government renounced all further interference with the Council. That was so obvious that a host of candidates for this weighty and honourable office were proposed to the [pg 406] minister. Baroche is said to have wished for it; Cornudet, a friend of Montalembert's, was much talked of, as well as Corcelles and Latour d'Auvergne, two men who seemed particularly well fitted to make the change of persons more acceptable at Rome. For some time the Duke of Broglie had the best prospect of it, who stands high among the Catholic laity as a political historian and student of Church history and the Fathers, but as a Liberal Catholic he belongs to the party the Pope hates above all others just now. To appoint him would have been at once to identify the French Government with the minority, and might, instead of conciliating, have led to results most abhorrent to the amiable and pious character of the Duke.
It was also a prevalent opinion that qualifications should be first attended to, and the best head among French statesmen be intrusted with this important mission—that men should be chosen like Rouher or Thiers, who had done service to the temporal power, but who stood quite aloof from the internal feuds of parties. To accredit them would make the withdrawal of the Romanizing Banneville less surprising and less irritating to the Curia. The Bishops of the middle party wanted the place for one of themselves. But [pg 407] they are not a body in much favour at Paris, and it was intimated to them that the best qualified prelates are not to be found in their ranks. Their representative, the Bishop of Nevers, came back in a state of irritation from Paris, where he is said to have found only three adherents of papal infallibility, two of whom were women. It is conjectured that the third was the Nuncio Chigi, who has affirmed that all Paris will illuminate the day the dogma is proclaimed.
The proposal for a Conference emerged again in the French Cabinet, but was rejected as inappropriate, for it would necessarily betray the weakness of a disunited ministry. At last the plan was adopted of sending a preliminary answer to Antonelli's letter, and waiting for the result of this before fixing on an ambassador. And so it was resolved at the beginning of April to draw up a note, which might at the same time be laid before the other powers, and serve as the basis for common action. It was communicated to the various Governments during last week, and is said to have been brought to Rome to-day by the Marquis de Banneville. But the Empress had meanwhile sent to Rome to get a more definite and authentic report of the views of the Bishops. But the answer did not [pg 408] reach Paris till after the note had been drawn up and despatched.
The only answer the minority needed to give was to communicate to the Government the various memorials they had presented to the Council, for these documents indicate the only policy which can be pursued with success, and which must be pursued. They deal not only with purely theological questions, but with the management of the Council, with questions of freedom and right which concern the lay world as much as the clergy. It is in the nature of things that the Governments should follow the lead of the Opposition, for to fall short of this would be to sacrifice their Bishops, while to go beyond it would be unjustifiable and dangerous.
It has now been again declared on the part of the minority, that their freedom is encroached upon by the order of business and the way the Presidents conduct affairs. The changes they asked for were not made, and their protests remained unanswered. In the opinion of many Bishops the legitimate freedom of the Council no longer exists, and over a hundred have said plainly that it would not be regarded as Œcumenical, if the question of making dogmatic definitions on faith and morals against the will of the minority is left [pg 409] doubtful. And this doubt, so far from being removed, has been changed into certainty at Rome. The Presidents passed over the demand of the Opposition in silence, although it threatened and called in question the very existence of the Council; they did not protect Strossmayer against the rude interruption which followed on his asserting the necessity for unanimity, but rather sided with it. The official press has openly attacked this view of the minority. Antonelli maintains the right of the Pope to make into a dogma the precise contrary of what the Council has unanimously accepted. According, therefore, to the well-known declarations already made by the minority, the Council has lost the character of Œcumenicity, and the See of Rome has abandoned the ground of Catholicism.
The various States must direct their attention to these points within these limits. They may pronounce in favour of the prorogation or reformation of the Council, but they cannot recognise it under its present conditions on any strictly Catholic principles. But to desire reforms now, after the experience of four months, during which the dominant spirit has manifested itself with such unscrupulous audacity, and after the determination to force through the infallibilist system in [pg 410] doctrine and practice in its crudest form by deceit and violence has become unmistakably clear, would betray a rare simplicity. The whole thing is settled by the question about majorities; and on that point, after what has passed, Rome can hardly yield now without giving up her claims altogether. An infallibility, which is subject to the veto of the minority of Bishops, ceases to be infallibility; the condition of moral unanimity in the Episcopate excludes it. And so the Council could not be saved without involving the Curia in a contradiction. A Council dominated by a Pope who holds himself infallible is a priori a nonentity. The Governments can only help it by securing it a speedy euthanasia. If they wished to act worthily and sincerely and in accordance with the gravity of the situation, they would have to declare, in union with the most influential Bishops, that the arbitrary and crooked way of managing the Council makes the establishment of any important decrees impossible; that the Vatican Council has lost all moral authority in the eyes of the world, and that the best thing would be to put an end to it with the least sacrifice of its dignity.
The Governments might use such language, but only after an open breach between the minority and the [pg 411] Presidents. The minority must have spoken their last word, and they have not done so yet. The interest of the Catholic Church requires that the Bishops should have the necessary time for forming and carrying out their resolutions, and that the crisis should not be precipitated by a catastrophe. The Council can do no good by the decrees fathered on it, but it has already done much good by the declarations of different sections of its members, by the speeches of individual Bishops, and the spirit manifested by a portion of them, and it will do much more very shortly. More than once have words been spoken there which have fired millions of hearts, have strengthened the bond of love and unity among Christians, and have openly indicated the real defects and the real remedies required for them. This seed of a better future in the Catholic Church will not be lost, but will bring forth abundant fruit. In each successive utterance genuine Catholic principles have come out more and more clearly, as the progress of the combat has forced them on the minority. The false problems, only hypocritically pre-arranged to be laid before the Council, disappear more and more. It becomes more and more clearly ascertained and acknowledged, that the contest is one of first principles, for the [pg 412] maintenance of divine truths and institutions against arbitrary violence and impudent deceit.
New declarations on the rights of the State and the conditions of a really Œcumenical Council, directly condemning the new Roman system of the Syllabus and Infallibilism, may perhaps appear in a few days. While in the highest degree critical and threatening for the Council, they might form the basis of sounder developments for the future. If particular States are to bring the matter to a decisive issue, it seems desirable that the Bishops should come forward with their resolutions designed to promote this end.