Ranke's “Roemische Paepste” is on the Index, because the book belittles the constitutions and doctrines of the Catholic Church: not because of the true things the author says about Popes. Von Pastor's “History of the Popes” is not on the Index, notwithstanding the bitter truths he writes about Popes Alexander VI. and Leo X.
He who knows even the fundamental ideas of Kant's “Kritik der reinen Vernunft” will see that not only the Catholic Church, but every Christian denomination, might forfeit its existence if it showed itself indifferent towards it. Heresies are especially dangerous to the uneducated when they bear the names of authors of scientific repute. But the Church willingly grants the permission to read them when there is reason for it. Moreover, it was not Rome alone that took steps against Kant. This was done by the Prussian king Frederick II. also. One may recall his cabinet order, under minister Woellner, against Kant's “Religion innerhalb der Grenzen der blossen Vernunft.” Similarly the works of Spinoza were proceeded against, whereas his indictment by Rome now calls forth protest because he has since been assigned a prominent place among philosophers. Freudenthal registers a list of 500 sharp prohibitions issued against Spinoza's works during the years 1556-1580: they were condemned by the states of Holland, by the court, by synods and magistrates. Those judgments were passed during a period when the competent authorities had views different from those of to-day; when the state deemed it its duty to oppose the undermining of Christianity. The state's judgment has changed in many ways, Rome's judgment has remained the same. But the works of Kant and Spinoza likewise have remained the same, and so is Christianity, against which they occupy an irreconcilable position, still the same.
“In the moral world nothing can support that cannot also resist” is a truthful saying of Treitschke: it is also the principle of the Catholic Church. Without ever surrendering to the unchristian tendency of a time, she opposes error with unsubdued courage. If this be intolerance, it is not intolerance towards erring men but towards their errors, it is the intolerance that the gardener shows in uprooting harmful weeds, it is the intolerance of the physician towards disease. Obedience to the Index makes high moral demands upon the Catholic. But it has been characteristic of the Christian religion and of its faithful children never to shrink before any moral action where it appeared demanded. And if the preservation of moral purity exacts conscientious discipline, this is also true of the preservation of the pure faith, especially at a time when a neo-paganism in [pg 180] league with an uncontrolled mania for reading is threatening in many forms.
Galileo, and Other Topics.
Galileo Galilei—but few names have achieved equal fame. Men like Alexander and Cæsar, like Homer and Dante, have scarcely succeeded in writing their names with a sharper pencil on the tablet of history than the astronomer of Pisa. His grand discoveries in natural science have done little to crown his temples with the wreath of immortality—it was the fate of his life that did it. And one may add: if this fate had been caused by the French government, or by a Protestant General Assembly, he would never have obtained his position in history; but since this lot came to him by the human limitation of a Roman Church authority, his name is not only entered on the calendar of the anti-Roman journalist, it also stands surrounded with the halo of a Martyr in the esteem of serious scientists, who see in Galileo and in the consequent condemnation of the Copernican system the proof that dogma and science cannot agree, that the Catholic Church assumes a hostile attitude toward science. Whenever this theme is mentioned, Galileo's ghost is paraded. For this reason we cannot pass by this fact of history. To a son of the Church they are unpleasant recollections, but this shall not keep us from looking history firmly in the eye.
There are some other charges brought forth from history, but the Galileo case overshadows them all. We shall touch upon them but briefly, and then return to Galileo.
Attention is called to the Church's condemnation of the doctrine of Antipodes. The Priest Vigilius was accused in Rome, in 747, of having taught that there exists another world under the earth, and other people also, or another sun and moon (quod alius mundus et alii homines sub terra sint seu sol et luna). Such was his doctrine as stated by Pope Zacharias in his reply to Boniface, the Apostle of Germany, in which he said that he had cited Vigilius to Rome in order that his doctrine be thoroughly investigated: if it should turn out that this had [pg 181] really been taught by him, he would be condemned. Further particulars of his teaching are unknown, because it is mentioned only in the above passage. The assertion ascribed to him is that there is another world besides this one, with other inhabitants and with another sun and moon—an assertion scientifically absurd and dogmatically inadmissible, as this might call in question the common descent of mankind from one pair of parents. The anxiety and rebuke of the Pope is directed solely against the latter point. The condemnation of Vigilius has never taken place, for he remained in his office, won great respect, was elevated to the bishopric of Salzburg, and later canonized by Gregory IX. Had a condemnation of his particular doctrine taken place, this would not have involved the condemnation of the antipodean theory, in the sense that the side of the globe opposite to us is also inhabited by human beings, a proposition which does not conflict with any doctrine of faith. The doctrine described above has another tendency. The entire case is hidden in obscurity (Hefele, Conc. Gesch., 2d ed., III, 557 seq.).
Furthermore, it has been said that at the time when the universities were in close union with the Church, medical science could not advance because the Church had prohibited human anatomy (Prof. J. H. van't Hoff, Neue Freie Presse, December 29, 1907). In amplification it was said: “Boniface VIII. had forbidden every anatomical dissection of a body” (O. Zoeckler, Theologie und Naturwissenschaft, 1877, I, 342). What is true of this assertion?
In the first place, Boniface VIII. did not forbid anatomy. He merely prohibited in 1299 and 1300 the hideous custom then prevailing regarding the bodies of noblemen who had died away from home: they were disembowelled, dissected, and boiled, for the purpose of removing the flesh from the bones so that the latter could be transported the more easily. This process had nothing to do with anatomy. The wish to possess the bones of the dead did not seem to the Pope a sufficient reason for treating the human body in such a way (Cfr. Michael, Gesch. des deutschen Volkes III, 1903, 433). Nor does history know of any other prohibition of anatomy by the Church. It tells us, however, that Frederick II. in his excellent rules for the benefit of his Sicilian kingdom in the regulation of medical science among other things emphasizes the study of surgery: he ordered that no one be allowed to practise surgery who [pg 182]could not show by attestation of his professors that he had studied surgery for at least one year, especially that he had learned at school how to dissect bodies; a physician must be perfect in anatomy, else he may not undertake operations (Michael, l. c. 430). This was done and practised under the eyes of the Church. The accusers also seem ignorant of the fact that bodies of those executed were given to universities for dissection. In the year 1336 the medical students of Montpellier, the famous medical school under the immediate direction of the Church (see above, page 154) were granted the privilege of obtaining once a year an executed criminal's body for dissection. The same privilege was extended to the medical students of Lerida by King Juan I. on June 3, 1391, who decreed that the delinquent should be drowned pro speriencia seu anatomia fienda (Denifle, Die Universitaeten des Mittelalters, I, 1885, 507).
The story is also circulated that the fourth Lateran Council in 1215 prohibited monks from studying natural sciences and medicine (Deutschoester. Lehrerzeitung 15th Dec., 1909). It will suffice to quote this particular decree of the Lateran Council: “No clergyman is allowed to pronounce capital sentence, nor to execute it, nor to be present at its execution. No clergyman is allowed to draw up a document concerning a death sentence: at the courts this should be done by laymen. No clergyman is allowed to assume command of Rotarians (freebooters), of archers or any others who shed human blood; no subdeacon, deacon, or priest is allowed to practise that part of surgery by which cutting and burning is done, nor must any one pronounce a benediction at an ordeal” (Hefele, Koncil. Gesch., 2d ed., V, 1887, 887). This will thoroughly dispose of that charge.