The perfect unity that reigns in the hierarchy and the government of the church engenders a not less perfect unity in the entire body of the faithful. Indeed, all the members of the church are reunited and bound together by means of the central authority of Peter, always present in the pope, and, through him, in all the representatives of the episcopal hierarchy. All the faithful recognize this peculiar authority as that of Jesus Christ. It is by submission and obedience to it that they rise when fallen. It is by faith in this authority and its depositaries of every degree that they receive the teachings of the true faith. It is to this they have recourse in order to be admitted to the participation of the sacraments and all the treasures of the church. And thus all, whoever they may be, remain attached to this authority by the intelligence that affirms the same truth, the will that observes the same law, and the heart that draws from the same sources of life; a unity of faith, of obedience, and of the sacraments—a triple unity realized by Jesus Christ and his vicar, to whom all hearts, all inclinations, and all minds adhere as luminous rays to their centre and source. It is true that this adhesion has not among all the same strength and efficacy; sometimes it is purely exterior, and yet it exists in a certain manner till the rupture is consummated either by excommunication or by manifest schism and heresy. But, thanks be to God, the number of the faithful is always immense in whom this union is full and entire. And they accomplish thereby a mystery of unity still more close and wonderful than that which we have just considered. It is given to the authority of Peter, who visibly unites the faithful, to bind them also together invisibly by the ineffable tie of the communion of saints—the crown and full consummation of unity. But no; the vicar of Christ has yet another privilege by virtue of the power that he has received of binding and loosing in heaven as well as on earth—he opens the entrance to the eternal mansions. The souls submissive till the end to his authority, and ruled by the power of his attraction, rise and mount to become living stones in the harmonious construction of the celestial temple:
Fabri polita malleo,
Hanc saxa molem construunt,
Aptisque juncta nexibus,
Locantur in fastigio.
"This vast edifice, even to the pediment, is composed of stones polished by the mallet of the workman and skilfully joined together."
It is thus that the gigantic edifice of the Vatican dome, after taking root around the tomb of the apostles, springs up from the soil on its four enormous supports, binding them together by the key-stone of its vast arches, and then, gathering itself together, rises more and more resplendent, more and more transfigured, till, at the moment of uniting all its ascending lines, it half opens to form a sublime sanctuary around the Ancient of Days, whose form beams forth from its very top.
It is grand to assist in the basilica of St. Peter at one of these solemnities which are like splendid foreshadowings of the future state of souls in their glorious union with God. Behold around the choir the inscriptions engraved on marble. They recall the dearest and most solemn festival that has yet been celebrated in our age—the proclamation of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. That day witnessed under these arches the triumph of Catholic unity, as well as the triumph of the Virgin conceived without sin. The accounts of ocular witnesses, still remembered by all, have made us familiar with that great manifestation of the cor unum and the anima una, of the "one heart" and "one soul," when, at a word from Pius IX., the act of faith, full, absolute, and unanimous, burst forth in loving tones from the hearts of the two hundred prelates and bishops, and the multitudes of priests reunited in this basilica, then resounded with one accord from the souls of forty or fifty thousand of the faithful likewise assembled in the same church, and was prolonged in repeated echoes from the lips of the two hundred millions of Catholics scattered throughout the world. Since that time two or three manifestations almost as glorious have been made in this basilica, and in all cases the great episcopal hierarchy, represented by a vast deputation, have inclined before the word of their august chief, believing what he believes, approving what he approves, and condemning what he condemns; and in all cases also the universal voice of true Catholics, whether present at Rome bodily or only in spirit and in heart, has risen to hail with one acclamation the infallible decisions of the successor of Peter.
But how can we forget the last festival, so sweetly and deliciously touching, which has just been celebrated in this grand basilica? That also was a brilliant manifestation and triumph of unity; of that unity the sweetest and most beautiful of all others—that of brethren of the great Catholic family around their father and their pope, to celebrate with him the golden wedding of his old age so long and painfully tried, but ever courageous and serene, and always blessed by God. There were mingled people of all ages, of every condition, and, morally speaking, of every race and nation on the globe. And these representatives of all nations, divided among themselves not less by distance than by their interests, prejudices, and hereditary enmities, and perhaps—who knows?—on the point of renewing old fratricidal struggles, drawn in against their will by the calculations of human policy—they were all there, drawn together and united by mutual love for their common father! And doubtless there was among them another source of division. I refer to divergence of opinions—opinions more or less correct, more or less at variance with the truth. There are always such in the bosom of Catholic unity. But admire the strength of this unity, remaining still intact in the midst of these elements of discord. We know that every assent given to mere opinions is necessarily conditional in this sense—that every Catholic worthy of the name is always ready to yield them to the teachings of revealed truth. Adhesion to the faith, on the contrary, is absolute, without condition or reserve, and moreover, this adhesion extends not only to the truths that the church requires us directly and expressly to believe, but also to the whole order of truths contained in the depository of revelation. What takes place, then, when the soul of the believer finds himself clinging to an erroneous opinion? That which happens in the physical order when two forces are in opposition to one another—the more feeble is absorbed by the overruling force. By virtue of the same law of moral dynamics, faith, which is an absolute affirmation, neutralizes and absorbs an erroneous opinion, which is only a conditional affirmation; in other terms, the latter is disavowed—retracted by the very fact that he makes a genuine act of faith. And this is how, among Catholics, the unity of the faith bursts forth and triumphs even in the midst of the causes that would seem to destroy, or at least to modify, it.
You will not expect me to describe this sacerdotal festival in detail. It was at once solemn and grand, as well as simple, popular, and affecting. Besides, other accounts have made you as familiar with all this as it is possible to be with what is indescribable. I will only select from the wonderful whole one thing which perhaps escaped general attention. It was at the moment when the grandest Te Deum I ever heard was resounding beneath the arches of the basilica like the voice of the great deep. When this verse of the Ambrosian hymn was being chanted, Te per orbem terrarum sancta confitetur ecclesia!—"The holy church acknowledges thee throughout the whole earth"—Pius IX. raised his hands to his eyes as if to collect his thoughts. It was as if his mind wandered off from one hemisphere to the other—to every region where there is a Catholic church—and saw the entire world communing in thought with him, praying with him, and with him rendering glory and thanksgiving to God. And indeed, as you know, at that same hour, millions of souls scattered over the globe were united in a general concert of prayer in order to join themselves more completely to him who was more than ever the great Chief of Prayer, as the savages of the new world sublimely style the vicar of Jesus Christ.
I can boldly declare that in no time, no place, did any man, any king and father of a nation, any pontiff, perhaps any saint, have such an ovation, such a manifestation of universal love; and I say further that this was not merely a triumph, but a miracle of supernatural union in the church—a miracle doubtless presaging still greater to come.
I have said that this jubilee of Pius IX. drew representatives from the whole Catholic world to Rome. The city of unity was on that day also the city of Catholicity par excellence. This last characteristic, however, Rome does not manifest only on extraordinary occasions, but permanently by its physical and moral position. "If a nation possessed a cathedral surrounded by a portico to which each province had furnished an arcade or column which bore its name, this monument would be a harmonious emblem of the diversity to be found in the unity of this people. There is something analogous to this in the Christian world." In the shadow of the great basilica of the popes most nations have their church, their festivals, and their national tombs. Each one finds some sacred monument bearing on the history of his country. Every one breathes here, in the atmosphere of religion, his native air. National establishments, reunited in the same city by political or commercial interests, represent concord less than division. Counting-rooms are rivals, altars are brethren. This is one cause of the sentiment that almost every one experiences who lives for some time in Rome, far from his native country. "Nowhere does one feel so much at home as in this city."[77] If one comes from a remote province of Lower Brittany or from the extremities of Ireland, from the depths of Ethiopia, the Indies, or the two Americas, he finds everywhere sanctuaries, tombs, institutions, offerings ex-voto, and indeed all kinds of mementoes that recall the far-off country. The prelacy, the priesthood, and the religious orders have representatives from all countries. The army itself has a cosmopolitan character. You see there, under the noble garb of the Zouave, the dark skin of the African beside the white face of the Dutchman or Canadian. Whoever you may be, you are sure not to be wholly isolated or unknown. Soon a familiar accent or an unforeseen accident will reveal a compatriot or a friend. It is impossible to forget your country; it becomes dearer to you than ever. You appreciate it perhaps more fully, but the narrowness of your former attachment is destroyed by contact with the broad spirit of Catholicity which penetrates you.
He who has the leisure to examine certain statistics will find at Rome evidences of Catholicity even in examining the list of travellers, or the missives of the mails, or even the catalogues of gifts sent to the holy father, and especially that of the offerings he recently received for the jubilee of his priesthood. All this and many other things constantly verify a proverb now misinterpreted, and too trivial to be quoted, but which the ancients expressed very nobly, "All roads lead to Rome." There is this difference—the roads leading to the Rome of Sts. Peter and Paul are far more extended than those of the Rome of Romulus and Remus. What one only accomplished by force of arms, the other has effected by the universality of evangelical preaching.