I have read many Roman Catholic teachers of catechism. I doubt whether all those teachers did for Christianity as much as an artist—Sienkiewicz —did with his charming story, "Quo Vadis?" He aroused so much interest, and so many sympathies even among the unbelievers; I am sure he converted to Christianity many more than any propaganda fides working on a half-political, half-scientific foundation. He put Christianity on a purely religious foundation, and he was understood not only by the Roman Catholics but by the whole world. He found the very heart of the "noble catholicity," and he inspired the world. He showed once more that Christianity is a drama and not a science.
Sienkiewicz loved Christianity, but he saw that it was still far from gaining a decisive victory. He knew the horrible injustice done to his Christian nation by the surrounding Christian nations. He was horrified looking at Bismarck. He called Bismarck the "true adorer of Thor," because he was a true follower of a pagan philosophy expressed in the Iron Chancellor's sentence—Might over Right. Yet Sienkiewicz prophesied that "Germany in the future cannot live with Bismarck's spirit." She must change her spirit, she must expel Thor and again kneel before Christ, because the "Christian religion of two thousand years is an invincible power, a much greater power than bayonets."
Mickiewicz hoped that only the Christian religion can save mankind. Christ is for him the central person in the world's history. Christ never made concessions to evil. But His Church to-day is making compromises with all kinds of evil. The official Church is publishing diplomatic Notes and promoting the publishing of books. That is all. The Church is afraid of suffering, although "there are even to-day enough occasions for the Church to suffer." "Prelates wear the purple which symbolises martyrdom: But who on earth has heard lately of the martyrdom of a Cardinal?" Mickiewicz bitterly complains that the "high clergy deserted the way of the Cross. They never would suffer. In order to escape suffering they fled as refugees to books, theology and doctrines. But la force ne vient que de la douleur." "The lower clergy, the Russian as the Polish, conserved the depot of faith intact," but still they are in a darkness of prejudice and vice. It is remarkable how large a view of the Christian Church had Mickiewicz. He did not care only for the Roman Church. He called the Russian Orthodox and the Polish Roman Church by one name—"the Church of the North." He cared about Christ's Church, and he believed steadfastly in her Messianic rôle in the world. "The men of conventions must be defeated," he said. The pride of the high clergy and the fear of suffering must disappear. "The first need for a modern man is to be inspired and elevated, de s'allumer et de s'élever." The Church is the only bearer of inspiration and elevation; not the official Church, but the Messianic Church of "men of suffering, intuition and action," i.e., the primitive Church of Christ, which Sienkiewicz so magnificently described and for which Jan Huss so heroically fought.
In the beginning of the sixteenth century, a preacher of the Gospel in Trieste and Laibach, Primus Trubar, published successively the New Testament, Psalter and Catechism in the vulgar Slovene language. It produced the greatest imaginable excitement amongst the Slovene clergy and people. Christ and the Prophets spoke for the first time to the people in mountainous Carniola and Istria in a language that the people could understand. A minority of the clergy shared the popular excitement, whereas the majority was filled with fury against the innovator. But Trubar went his way courageously and continued to publish and republish the sacred books in the Slovene tongue. The affair had the usual ending: the violent persecution of the disturbers of the semper eadem, and the victory of the persecuted cause. Trubar died in exile from his country, his books were burnt, the churches in which his books had been read pulled down, and the people who dared to speak with Christ and the Prophets in their native language terrified. At the same time, the Turks, after having devastated Serbia and Croatia, descended on Slovenia with the sword, burning pulling down, and terrifying everywhere.
Yet the great question of the ecclesiastical language could not be stifled. Even before and after Trubar, the Slavs on the Adriatic coast of Dalmatia and Istria insisted on the so-called Glagoliza as the language which should be used in the divine service. Glagoliza is not the common language of the Croats and Slovenes, but it is an old and sacred form of the same tongue. Rome opposed for a long time, declined afterwards, opposed or half-opposed again, till the question is to-day brought to a very acute phase. Pope Paul V permitted the use of the Glagoliza in the Church. This permission was repeated by John VIII. and Urban VIII. There was printed a Missale Romanum, slavicâ linguâ, glagolitico charactere (Rome, 1893). Still, one can say that although it is theoretically allowed, it is practically forbidden. It is used to-day in some new places, like Krk, Cherso, Zara, Sebenico, in Senj, Spalato, etc. But the fact remains that the Southern Slavs, or the Slavs generally, do not like the Latin language in the divine service. For the Slav conscience it is something incongruous: the Latin language of Nero and the spirit of Christ. Every language is the bearer of a certain spirit. Latin is the bearer of a juristic and despotic spirit. Ranke said: "The Papal Church is a legacy of ancient Rome."[[1]] If this be true, the language doubtless was one of the principal reasons for it. With the language of the Cæsars also crept into the Church the spirit of the Cæsars. This spirit was brought to a triumph in 1870 at the Council of the Vatican.
As the Croats and Slovenes protested against the language of the Cæsars, so they protested also against the triumphant spirit of the Cæsars in the Church. Bishop Strossmayer opposed the dogma of Papal Infallibility with a sincerity, obstinacy and eloquence which can be compared only with the spirit of the "golden age" of Christian history. In a letter to an old Catholic friend, he wrote: "It is nonsense to say that the Popes cannot live without these miserable rags called temporary possessions."[[2]] Is this not true apostolic language? Again he wrote: "What occurs to-day in Rome is obviously God's punishment and at the same time a providential way to those reforms which the Church needs in order to fulfil her mission with more success in the future than she has done till now."[[3]] And to Dr. Döllinger he confessed quite openly: "And what about my nation and its future? It seems to me quite certain that it will one day get rid of Roman despotism."[[4]]
By its interference, religion can inspire science, and again science by its interference can purify religion. The most beautiful spectacle in human society is a priest