When he was in the act of proclaiming the new dogma, the beams of the sun streamed gloriously upon him; the fact being that his throne was so fixed that this must take place if the sun shone at the time. Nevertheless, the visible rays were hailed as evidence of the light which makes manifest things not seen. The Pope sought, in the great fresco of Podesti, to popularize and perpetuate his own conception of this event, which is called, in French guide-books to the Vatican, the coup de soleil historique. That picture, filling an entire side of a chamber, near to the renowned frescoes of Raffaele, represents the Virgin looking down from celestial glory upon Pius IX, and, by the hand of an angel, who holds a cross, pouring a stream of supernal light on his enraptured eye. Hence may the faithful gather that this is the light by which he reveals the truth to men.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] Serie VII, viii. p. 668.
The Encyclical Quanta Cura, December 8, 1864—Causes of Ruin of Modern Society: rejection of the "force" of the Church—Religious Equality—Pretensions of Civil Law and of Parents to Control Education—Laws of Mortmain—Remedies—Restoration of the Authority of the Church—Connecting Links between Encyclical and Syllabus—Retrospect of Evidences that all Society was in Ruins—The Movement for Reconstruction.
The tenth anniversary of the auspicious day of "The Immaculate" being now at hand, Pius IX had, as we have seen, chosen its fore-eve for setting in motion the preparations for his General Council. He reserved for the day itself the great deed of publishing the Encyclical Quanta Cura and its accompanying Syllabus of Errors. It is said that the inception of those documents dates back to a point not very long subsequent to the proclamation of the Immaculate Conception, and that the first Special Congregation named to prepare them spent more than five years without agreeing, after which it was dissolved by his Holiness, and a second named, which completed the task.
The keynote of the Encyclical is that of an alarm, in the martial sense; not a panic cry, accompanied by a throwing away of arms, but a note of danger, with a call to take them up.
The cause assigned for alarm is the ruinous condition of society—that word being used in its political, not its domestic sense. The very bases of society were shaken by evil principles, which had spread on all sides and raised a "horrible tempest." Before proceeding to the errors to be now condemned, the Pontiff is careful to connect with them those other "principal errors of our sad times" which he had already condemned in previous encyclicals, allocutions, and letters apostolic. He thus lays the logical foundation for the collection of them in the Syllabus. He first reminds the bishops how he had stirred them up to war against these errors, and how he had also commanded the children of the Church to abhor and shun them. Secondly, he enumerates certain additional errors, condemns them in turn, and commands his sons to shun them likewise. Condemnations pronounced in this formal manner are judicial and sovereign. The Pontiff does not speak as a mere teacher, but as the supreme tribunal of the Church. The judgments pronounced are not for the guidance of individuals merely, but are a rule for every officer of the Church. Every such sentence fixes the state of the law.