At the death of Pius IX he left to whosoever should succeed him, as an official inheritance, the decision of the question whether or no the Church should acquiesce in and become reconciled to the abolition of the temporal power of the pope, or be agitated and possibly further disrupted by the demand for its restoration. In the meantime Italy had become an organized nation, and was so recognized throughout the world. The capital, after several removals, had been established at Rome, and legislative chambers were assembled almost within the shadow of the old senate-house of the Cæsars, under the checks and guards of a written Constitution, to enact laws for and in the name of the Italian people. A king existed, but without absolute power, and had attained great popularity on account of his eminent fitness and recognized fidelity to the trusts committed to him. It, consequently, required but little practical knowledge of affairs to foresee that the future peace and welfare of the Church depended, in a large degree, upon the policy to be pursued with regard to the temporal power—which no longer existed, but had been abolished by Roman Catholic populations, who had, with great deliberation and extraordinary unanimity, taken the right to manage their own political affairs into their own hands, in imitation of the example set them by the people of the United States. Thoughtful minds were inspired by the hope that moderate, wise, and conciliatory counsels would prevail with the new pope, whosoever he might be.
The occasion rendered it necessary that the distinction between the Church as a Christian organization, and the papacy as a magisterial power over temporals, should be observed; that is, that the ability of the former for Christian usefulness was left unimpaired, whilst the latter was only designed to make the pope an absolute monarch over the Italian people. Nobody understood this better than Pius IX, and, therefore, the year before his death he signalized the first important exhibition of his infallible authority by issuing a decree amending the Confession of Faith, which had been prescribed by Pius IV nearly three hundred years before, and an "allocution," or authoritative and ex-cathedra epistle to the clergy and the Church, with regard to the relations existing between the Church and the Government of Italy. The former concerns only those whose faith is influenced by it; the latter concerns all the progressive nations, and none more than the United States.
In this allocution he accused the invaders of his "civil principality"—that is, of his temporal power—with riding roughshod over every right, human and divine; with the attempt to undermine "all the institutions of the Church;" and characterized the act of establishing the Italian kingdom as one of "sovereign iniquity"—a "sacrilegious invasion." He complained that the ministers of religion "were deprived of the right of disapproving the laws of the State which they considered as violating those of the Church"—which was equivalent to asserting it to be a principle of faith that he and the clergy should be permitted to defy any law of a State which he and they considered violative of their prerogative rights. He pointed out "the shameful and obscene spectacle" to be seen in Rome, in "the temples erected in these latter days to dissenting worship;" in "schools of corruption scattered broadcast," and in "houses of perdition established everywhere"—thus intending, undoubtedly, to intimate what his meaning was when he said in his Syllabus, a few years before, that the Church could never be reconciled to the spirit of progress prevailing among the progressive nations. He insisted that the pope can not exist in Rome except as "a sovereign or a prisoner"—which has been disproved by all the subsequent years of actual experience—and that there can be no "peace, security, or tranquillity for the entire Catholic Church so long as the exercise of the supreme ecclesiastical ministry is at the mercy of the passions of party, the caprice of Governments, the vicissitudes of political elections, and of the projects and actions of designing men"—meaning thereby, in plain words, that the pope must be so supreme wheresoever his clergy are as to require them to execute his decrees, notwithstanding the laws of Governments shall expressly provide otherwise. He expresses this idea with equal plainness by saying that the pope "can not exercise full freedom in the power of his ministry" scattered throughout the world, so long as he "continues subject to the will of another party;" in other words, that he must be free to require his clergy, wheresoever they may be, to obey him and not the laws of any Government in conflict with his will. He congratulates himself that the "whole Catholic people," everywhere, are united with him in supporting all these propositions, and makes it known that he expects them "to take in hand the cause and defense of the Roman pontificate;" that is, the restoration of the temporal power and kingship of the pope. He expresses the belief that the attachment shown to him by the multitudes of pilgrims who visit Rome "will go on increasing until the day when the pastor of the universal Church will be restored at last to the possession of his full and genuine freedom"—which he can not enjoy without the crown of absolute monarchy upon his head. And with a view to the accomplishment of this, he instructs all the ministers of the Church, everywhere, to "exhort the faithful confided to them to make use of all the means which the laws of their country place within their reach; to act with promptness with those who govern; to induce these latter to consider more attentively the painful situation forced upon the head of the Church, and take effective measures towards dissipating the obstacles that stand in the way of his absolute independence."[191]
All this is plain and emphatic—not susceptible of misunderstanding. It makes the restoration of the temporal power of the pope, so as to make him king of Italy against the positive and expressed will of the people of that country, a politico-religious question, and commands the faithful in every part of the world to form themselves into a politico-religious party to influence the Governments of their respective countries to contribute to that result. This counsel is given in face of what the world knows to be the fact, that the temporal power can not be restored without war—without drenching the plains of Italy with blood, in order to force upon the people of Italy a king whom they have repudiated by their highest act of sovereignty.
This allocution was among the first fruits of the pope's infallibility, and makes known with distinctness the method dictated by Pius IX for reconstructing the papacy. At the time of its issuance he had encountered so many embarrassments without the ability to resist them successfully, he could scarcely have expected that his hopes would be realized during his pontificate. He was confronted by the existence of a kingdom, still Roman Catholic but not papal, within the limits of which Rome was included, and no man knew better than he that what he sought after would have to await the formation of a politico-religious party beyond the limits of Italy, and among the peoples of other nations, strong enough to coerce the Roman Catholic people of Italy, at the point of the bayonet, into obedience to the papacy they had repudiated. Therefore this infallible allocution may properly be considered his last pontifical will and testament, whereby he devised all his right and title to the temporal power to his successor; or perhaps it would be more apt to say, as the politicians do, that it was intended to be the main plank in the papal platform. How far it became so we shall see.
When, after the death of Pius IX, the cardinals assembled in Conclave, February 17, 1878, their first official act was specially significant. It displayed a settled purpose to hold the wavering, if there were any, to the policy of Pius IX with reference to the restoration of the temporal power, and to make that the test of fidelity to the Church; in other words, that his successor should be pledged to carry out that policy, and elected with that express view. The cardinals, therefore, entered into an agreement among themselves to confirm and maintain all the protests made by Pius IX against the Italian Government. This agreement was to the effect that they "thereby renewed all the protests and reservations made by the deceased sovereign pontiff, whether against the occupation of the States of the Church, or against the laws and decrees enacted to the detriment of the same Church and the Apostolic See;" and that they were unanimously "determined to follow the course marked out by the deceased pontiff, whatsoever trials may happen to befall them through the force of events."[192]
It may fairly be supposed that Cardinal Pecci was the projector of this plan of procedure, as it is stated by his biographer that he "stood in the foremost place at the head of his brethren." At all events, he, together with the other cardinals, was pledged to it. When, therefore, he was elected pope—as he was soon after—and took the name of Leo XIII, he accepted the pontificate under the solemn obligation so to employ all his powers and prerogatives as to regain the temporal power his predecessor had lost, upon the distinct ground that fidelity to the doctrines and faith of the Church required it.
In view of the result to be thus attained, the election of Leo XIII was unquestionably wise. Besides possessing the highest intellectual qualifications—being, in fact, one of the foremost men of the present time—his Christian character is pure and without a blemish. He is cool, calm, and deliberate in considering great questions, and not apt, as Pius IX was, to be misled by indiscreet advisers, or entrapped by enemies. His passions seemed well restrained, and he brought to the duties of his high office abilities far exceeding those of any of the eminent men who composed the College of Cardinals. There is not a sovereign in Europe of whom he is not the equal, if not the superior, in all such qualities as fit a man for rank, station, and authority. In the rightful and proper sphere of his spiritual duties he is "sans peur et sans reproche." But when he ventures to depart from that sphere, and employ the authority of his high office to reopen a political issue already closed, to deny to the people of Italy the right to regulate their own temporal affairs, as those of the United States have done, and prescribes or approves a plan of Church organization which shall measure the value of a professed Christian life by the depth to which its possessor shall sink in the mire of politico-religious controversy in those countries where Church and State have been separated, he presents himself to the world in another and different aspect. If, by imitating others who have grasped after kingly crowns, he sees proper to lay aside the rightful weapons of his spiritual ministry, and arm himself and his followers with such as pertain to the strife of politics, there can be no just ground of complaint against those whose policy of civil government he assails, if they shall arraign him and them at the bar of public opinion, and challenge his and their right to disturb the peace by scattering the seeds of discord among them.
The people of Italy achieved their independence by revolution, and decided to separate Church and State, and that they would not have the pope for their king; they put an end to the absolute monarchism of the papacy, and substituted a constitutional monarchy, with such checks and guards as they deemed necessary to their own protection. In doing this they exercised the same power of popular sovereignty as the people of the United States, when they decided that no king should ever rule over them. In each case the act was intended to be final—not subject to reversal by any earthly power. Neither country, therefore, has the right to plot against the quiet and peace of the other; nor have the populations of either the right to do so. All this is forbidden by the law of nations, and if knowingly tolerated would be, by that law, just cause of war. If a politico-religious party should be formed in Italy to change our institutions by reuniting Church and State, and substitute a king in the place of the people in the management of public affairs, it would incite the spirit of resistance in every loyal American heart. And if a politico-religious party, formed under any plea whatsoever, shall be permitted to combine in this country for the avowed object of reuniting Church and State in Italy, and compelling the people of that country to accept the pope as an absolute sovereign, in the face of the result they have accomplished by their revolution, wherein do we escape condemnation by the law of nations? The question whether or no any people shall exercise the right of self-government is political, not religious. This has been decided by the people of the United States. Consequently, to demand of them that they shall reverse this decision, violates the spirit of their institutions, and mocks at their authority.
No liberal and fair-minded people questioned the right of Pius IX to declare himself infallible, or that of others to concede it to him, in matters purely spiritual. Nor is this same right denied to Leo XIII. But when he extends his infallibility so far as to include authority over the fundamental principles of civil government, and thus seeks to imperil the fortunes of the modern progressive nations where Church and State have been separated, it should not be expected that those who share those fortunes in common will sanction his imperial assumption by direct affirmance or by silent acquiescence. The age of "passive obedience" has passed, and is not likely to be revived so long as the Reformation period shall continue to bear its rich and abundant fruits, like such as spring from the popular institutions of the United States. The fundamental principle upon which all such institutions rest is the separation of Church and State; for without that there can be no freedom of religious belief and no such development of the intellectual faculties as fits society for self-government. Every assault upon this great fundamental principle must be resisted, no matter under what pretense it may be made or from what quarter it shall come. When it was assaulted and condemned by the vacillating and irascible Pius IX, it was in far less peril than now, when the calm and sagacious Leo XIII has become the general-in-chief of the aggressive forces. The former was not even master of himself—the latter is master of vast multitudes of men.