Vitelleschi is not quite clear as to whether all the incidents reported of the interview between the Pope and the Cardinal were correct. To him that is of no importance; Roman-like, he did not want anything to illustrate the relation of the Pope to his courtiers or to the Church. A few such scenes, more or less, would to him make no difference whatever.
As if to prepare for the deeds directly tending to the restoration of facts when the Council should have completed the restoration of ideas, the tales of the Crusaders of St. Peter continued to appear side by side with the notices of the legislative proceedings in the successive numbers of the Civiltá. To us one episode comes near home. It was on an April day that a company leaving Rome bore across the Campagna, with all the solemnity of a relic of the saints, the heart of one whose body, in the Agro Verano, the cemetery of St. Lorenzo, slept close by the tombs of the ancient martyrs, and amid those of the martyrs of Mentana. As the party reached a point on the hill within a few steps of the village,—a point from which St. Peter's appeared in the distance,—they saw a block of white marble, surrounded by four little columns, hung round by an iron chain. "Here," cried some zouaves who were of the party,—"Here is the spot to which Julian pushed on, chasing the enemies of God with fire and sword, passing through a thousand bullets, of which one carried away his cap; and here he fell shot down at point blank." Above the marble block rose "the cross of Mentana," and on it was cut the inscription, "Here fell, fighting for the See of St. Peter, Julian Watts-Russell, pontifical zouave, a young Englishman of 17 years and 10 months old, the most youthful who fell on the field of victory, and the nearest to Mentana." In this "angelic sepulchre," as the courtly historian calls it, the solemn party deposited their holy relic. Around were grouped the villagers, with a few zouaves, among whom were Mr. Vansittart, who had come to take up the arms of his fallen friend, and Wilfred Watts-Russell, the brother and the fellow-crusader of Julian. The rites were celebrated by a venerable old man, yet, says the narrator, a new priest, who now, perhaps, for the first time performed the funeral service. It was the father of Julian and Wilfred. "As we returned," moralizes the zealous historian, "we felt that we had committed to the ground the seed of martyrs."[438]
After the Guidi incident the debate dragged on. The heats were growing worse and worse. At length, on July 2, the weary wheels seemed as if they would go no longer. The list of speakers still inscribed threatened very considerable detention. Hefele had entered his name among the earliest, and when he applied for his turn found he was somewhere "in the fifties," and when he next applied, that he was in "the seventies." Had the minority foreseen what was hidden behind clouds, but ready to thunder forth, they would perhaps have kept the debate open; and so the Papacy would have been saved from the last fatal step. Just now, by a strange coincidence, appeared in the Civiltá the tale describing the march of the newly landed French troops for Mentana in 1867, with their sisters of mercy. "O France!" cried the literary crusader, "may the angels of God who to a field of just but terrible vengeance accompanied that host, warring only for celestial charity, evermore protect the land of generous hearts."[439] But, not knowing what was so near at hand, the minority at last reached the point at which men are ready to say, We are fighting in vain, and therefore fighting without justification. They agreed among themselves that they might as well give up their right to speak, and let matters be brought to a crisis. On July 4, when the Council met, Schwarzenberg and others gave up their right. The formidable name of Darboy was called. No Darboy was there. So that instead of a final argument in opposition, there was his conspicuous example in favour of withdrawing. For a long time every one who had done so had received marks of approbation both from the Council and from the Presidents, and every expedient had been used to induce men to abridge the discussion. It was soon apparent that the leaders of the Opposition had adopted a common policy. One after another waived his right. A couple of inconsiderable men claimed their turn, but said little. The bulk of the men on both sides entered into the general movement, and to the relief of all, and the delight of the triumphant majority, Cardinal De Luca announced that the list of the speakers was exhausted, and that the debate was closed. So, as early as half-past nine o'clock, people saw the Fathers gliding down the cathedral and dispersing over the city. They wondered what had released them so early, and, as Vitelleschi says, little realized the importance of their decisions, either to the Church or to the world.
Dated on the very day on which the discussion closed, the Civiltá issued an article on the Decline of Liberalism, which shows how the political aspects of the legislation, now nearly completed, were kept in view.[440] A Catholic gale, says the writer, seems to be passing over the world, vivifying and gladdening society, corrupted and worm-eaten by Liberalism.
A single people, the Roman, finds itself, by the special providence of God, free from this universal Liberal domination; and this Roman people alone, still happily governed according to the laws of God, in contradiction to the great principles of modern society, enjoys the sweet fruits of true progress, and is the object of admiration and envy; for of it alone can it be said, Happy is the people whose God is the Lord. As a drunken slave used to be exhibited to the Spartans to inspire them with hatred of intemperance, so Providence in almost every part of Europe has allowed slaves drunk and mad with Liberalism, slaves of tyrants sprung out of the dung-hill, to be exhibited till Europe, now weary of Liberalism, could only look to Rome and to her civil and religious head, not merely the sole guardian and faithful depositary, but the infallible herald of the principles of universal religion and truth, civilization and prosperity, even natural and social, among nations as well as among individuals. We may say that from the first stage of the movement to the last, it is nations and not individuals that are kept in view.
In Bavaria, Belgium, and Portugal, the writer asserts, the Catholics are escaping from the trammels of the Masons. In Austria the same process is in preparation. In France they are more resolved than ever to sustain Rome. In Italy Liberalism is exhausted, despised, divided, and falling. "Even in Protestant and heterodox countries, Rome, with her civil and religious prince, stands in much higher credit than Italy and other Liberal governments apparently stronger."
Sneering at an allusion of the Journal des Débats to the vaunted hopes of the Catholics, accompanied by the remark that in spite of their absurdity it was nevertheless prudent to keep an eye on the clock which was to sound the return of the hour for great things the Civiltá says it will not deny that Liberalism has some "bad quarters of an hour" before it. It equally thinks that now it is neither imprudent nor rash "to hope, and that within a time not remote, for the victory of Rome and its Pontiff-king, so far as Italy is concerned, and for the victory of the social, civil, and religious principles which that king represents and preclaims."
The triumph over intellect it holds to be patent and ascertained, and therefore this hope of a triumph in facts is reasonable.
Providence, continues the soothsayer, cannot permit the Church to be long the victim of the devices of the gates of hell, particularly of those devices with which the States of the Church are now beset. After making allusion to hopes which had been entertained of the Pope's death, and asserting his florid health and his prospect of living many years, he proceeds: "The Pontiff lives and reigns in Rome more secure, more glorious, more influential, more beloved than his enemies." Not only is the fact that this potentate was defended by the arms of France entirely absent from the consciousness of the writer, but he indulges in jibes clearly addressed to the very Emperor who had restored the Pontiff and kept him up. "Sound Catholic principles now seem to politicians the only support of material order and of economical interests." The writer goes on to show that all the implements of Liberalism have been employed on behalf of the Papacy, and that with success—meetings, addresses, collections, votes, illuminations.
Writing with an expectation that before its words came under the eye of his readers (p. 174) they would have already learned that the great word had been spoken, and that Papal infallibility had taken its place among revealed truths, the writer proceeds to indicate the range of the new attribute:—