It was left to an enemy of the Church to supply me with this most vital church document. William Ewart Gladstone attacked the Syllabus with righteous wrath, and I found the text in his volume “Rome and the Newest Fashions in Religion.” This Syllabus is extremely awkward to quote, for the reason that the propositions are all negative—a list of statements which are condemned; and some of the statements themselves are negative, so that you find yourself with double negatives to disentangle. A few of the most important of the propositions will have to suffice; and let me say that I have brushed up my rusty Latin for the occasion, and made certain that the translations are literal and precise. Bear in mind that this is the Supreme Pontiff speaking ex cathedra, which is the same as the voice of God; so the following statements are not subject to question or revision, so long as the Holy Catholic Church endures. Thus, formally and finally, we are told that it is an error to teach that:
15. Every man is free to embrace and profess the religion he shall believe true, guided by the light of reason.
This of course means that every man is not free to embrace and profess his own religion; and carries the obvious corollary that every man must let the Catholic Church tell him what religion to embrace.
17. We may entertain at least a well-founded hope for the eternal salvation of all those who are in no manner in the true Church of Christ.
This means, in brief, that all non-Catholics are damned eternally, and it is false doctrine to teach otherwise.
20. The ecclesiastical power must not exercise its authority without the permission and assent of the civil government.
This means that the Church may exercise its authority without the consent of the State; that, for example, the Church may marry and annul marriage, in defiance of the civil laws. This must be taken in connection with
30. The immunity of the Church and of ecclesiastical persons derives its origin from civil law.
This means that the Church and its priests are immune to civil law, and this immunity comes from God, and cannot be taken away by the State. If the Church could maintain this proposition in America, neither the Church nor any ecclesiastic could be sued or tried by the regular courts, but only by courts of their own.
42. In the case of conflicting laws between the two powers, the civil law ought to prevail.