All this time the young Giovanni Mastaï-Ferretti was pursuing his studies as conveniently as he could under such circumstances. We do not recall these events in the earlier life of the boy idly, but with a very distinct purpose: to show that when in 1846 Pius IX. was elevated to the Papacy, and to the guardianship of the church’s temporalities, he stepped into no bed of roses. He stepped, on the contrary, into a very hot-bed of revolution—a revolution that, with less or more of secrecy, had overspread Europe, and that found its most convenient as well as its most necessary centre of attack in Rome and in the Papal States. Italy had long been the prey of Europe. The people had suffered terribly from foreign invasions. They suffered almost equally from home intrigues and jealousies. With all this the popes had nothing to do. It was simply a repetition of the history of the Italian peninsula from the disruption of the Roman Empire down. The outer barbarians were always knocking at her gates and trampling on her soil, invited there by native quarrels.
It is necessary to bear these things well in mind, in order to judge rightly of the difficulties against which Pius IX. had to contend. He was elected to an impoverished and disturbed principality, to a centre of revolution in an era of revolution. All Italy groaned with trouble. The people were ripe for any mad-cap scheme which should profess to better their condition. There was revolution in the air, all around them, all over the world. There were burning ideas afloat of people’s rights, and people’s wrongs, and people’s futures. Schemes of regeneration for the human race were abundant as the schemers; and some of these were very keen, far-sighted, and resolute men. Mazzini was one of them. His policy was simple enough, and it is the policy of all his followers to-day: For the people to rule you must first destroy the rulers—kings; before destroying the kings, who (in Europe at least) are the representatives of authority, you must destroy the priests who preach submission to lawful authority. Death to the priests! death to the kings! and then, long live the people!
That, we believe, is a fair presentation of the Mazzini programme for the regeneration of Italy and of the rest of the world. It has its fascinations for empty minds and empty stomachs, and the masses of the people, particularly of the Italians, just about the time of which we write had both empty minds and empty stomachs. The people of the Papal States, in common with the people of all the other Italian States, and, indeed, of states generally, were not in the happiest condition possible. Wars and foreign invasions and constant turmoil from day to day are not the best agents of good government. So Pius IX. came to an uneasy throne.
PIUS IX. AS A POLITICAL REFORMER.
The cry of the Roman people, of the whole Italian people, as of all people just then, was for reform. They wanted a share in the government; and there was no harm in that. The new pontiff began his reign by at once setting about practical reform. His scheme was excellent. The details of it must be found elsewhere. Practically it amounted to letting the people have a just and rational share in the government. It was not universal suffrage. But the Papal States were not the United States; and there are intelligent and patriotic men in the United States even who begin to doubt about the actual efficacy of universal suffrage as a panacea for all political or social evils. It is not long since Mr. Disraeli laid down the daring doctrine in the English House of Commons that universal suffrage was not a natural right of man, to which doctrine nobody seemed to object. The Pope, then, set earnestly and practically to work at every kind of reform. He set on foot a scheme of government which should admit the laity to their lawful place in civic functions. He looked to the laws of commerce, which were in a very bad state. He struck at vicious monopolies, in return for which the monopolists struck viciously at him. He was very careful about the finances, his treasury being low indeed, or rather non-existent. He advised the people, who, under the impulse of a steady conspiracy, seized every opportunity at the beginning of his reign of getting up festivals in his honor, to spend their money at home, or hoard it for an evil hour, or devote it to some charitable or educational purpose. He was clement to political offences. He was kind and charitable to the oppressed Jews of Rome, and removed their civil disabilities before England thought of doing so.
All this is matter of fact, beyond question or dispute. It was recognized by the outer world. All the crowned heads of Europe, with the exception of Austria and the Italian principalities, who found themselves in a position of painful contrast, sent their hearty congratulations to the Pope; and the voice of New York—non-Catholic New York—joined in with them. The Pope was, for the time being at least, the most popular man in the world as well as in Italy. And he deserved his popularity, for he was real and resolute in what he attempted.
WHY HE FAILED AS A REFORMER.
How, then, came the sad sequel? Why did all this fail? Pius IX. looked even beyond the Papal States in his political schemes. He wished for a united Italy. He was a true Italian. He proposed a confederation of the Italian States, which, without infringing on any people’s rights, should constitute one Italy, show a united front to the foreigner, and remove all excuse for foreign interference. Why was this, too, a failure?