The Pope, the Kings and the People / A History of the Movement to Make the Pope Governor of the World by a Universal Reconstruction of Society from the Issue of the Syllabus to the Close of the Vatican Council

by William Arthur

If inaccurate in his facts, Pius IX is orthodox in his policy, for just as bishops must be independent of the government of the country, so must the regulars be independent of the bishops, that power to set wheels in motion may be carried from the engine-house in Rome into the midst of a nation by two perfectly independent shafts. When the Church is a national one, a bishop has some stake in the country, though slight compared with his stake at the Vatican; and he must, at all events, keep up relations with the authorities. The former circumstance brings temptations to a "national spirit"—one of the standing evils cried down by the Curia. The latter circumstance may make it convenient that the bishop should not always know what is really the course of action being prepared. In both points of view the regulars can be utilized. Darius took care to have three separate powers in each province, all directly dependent on the Imperial Court alone.[62] And from his days highly organized Asiatic governments have had, besides the apparently omnipotent lieutenants, confidential agents in every province, depending directly on the metropolitan authorities.

The Pontiff commences his letter by reminding his venerable brother that he made professions of devotion to the Holy See on his elevation to that of Paris. Then he tells him that certain of his letters replying to animadversions of the Pope, show him to hold views opposed to the divine primacy of the Roman Pontiff over the whole Church. Darboy had asserted that the power of the Pope, in a diocese other than his own, was not ordinary and immediate, but such as should be interposed only as a last resource, in cases of manifest necessity. He had represented the intervention of the Pope, by the exercise of ordinary and immediate jurisdiction, as turning a diocese into a mission, and a bishop into a vicar apostolic. Moreover, he had said, in the French senate, that when such intervention took place at the private instance of individuals, it rendered the administration of the diocese all but impossible; and he had added that regulars, Nuncio, and Curia all aimed at bringing about such intervention as an ordinary thing, and that he would resist it and call upon the bishops and people to do so. He had even spoken of submitting letters apostolic to the government, and of having recourse to the lay power; nay, he had gone so far as to mention the Organic articles, though he could not be ignorant of how the Holy See had always protested against them.

The Pope could scarcely believe that his venerable brother had uttered such things, and was moved with wonder and anguish at finding him avowing the condemned opinions of Febronius, which a bishop ought to abhor. In denying the "immediate and ordinary" jurisdiction of the Pope, he had denied the decree of the fourth Lateran Council. The words "feed My lambs, feed My sheep" mean that believers all and singular are to be subject to Peter and his successors, as to the Lord Christ Himself, whose vicar upon earth the Roman Pontiff truly is. Every Catholic would reply to the charge as to a diocese being turned into a mission, and a bishop into a vicar apostolic, by saying that it was as false as it would be to say that prefects, judges, or provincial magistrates were not ordinary magistrates, because a direct, immediate, and ordinary power was held by the king or emperor.

St. Thomas Aquinas, continues the letter, had said "the Pope has a plenitude of pontifical power, as a king in his kingdom, but bishops are received into a share of the solicitude, like judges set over particular cities." As a Catholic bishop, Darboy ought to know that all had a right to appeal to Rome, none to appeal from her. Such a complaint as that the interference of Rome rendered the administration of a diocese almost impossible had never been made either in past ages or in the present one. When Darboy spoke of appealing to bishops and people, he ought to have known that the same had been done by Febronius, and that it was an offence against the divine Author of the constitution of the Church.

The Archbishop had not been informed against, proceeded the Pope, by the regulars, but, from other quarters the fact came before his Holiness that the Archbishop had exercised the right of visitation over them, on which he had been admonished, and of this admonition he had been pleased to speak, in the senate, as of a sentence delivered without the cause having been heard. It was hardly to be believed! The Archbishop knew the Decretals, and knew how, in all ages, the Popes had written in the same manner to bishops when they became aware of something in their sees which was not quite right.

As it was a question of the visitation of regulars, it must be remembered that the right of exemption had long been enjoyed by the Jesuits and Franciscans in Paris, and that the Apostolic See had exercised its own special or "privative" jurisdiction. Darboy had alleged that, by the law of the Council of Trent, regulars could not have canonical existence in any diocese without consent of the bishop, which consent had never been received by the monks in question. But, having been long on the ground, they had acquired a prescriptive right, by virtual, if not by express, consent of successive bishops. And as to the fact that the civil law forbade them to possess land, of what use were such laws in ecclesiastical administration? In these most turbulent and miserable times of noxious, odious rebellion, civil law might even deny to bishops their civil standing.

The Pontiff cannot dissemble his extreme surprise and annoyance that his venerable brother had attended the funeral of Marshal Magnan, the Grand Orient of the Freemasons, and had given the solemn absolution while the insignia of freemasonry were on the bier, and brethren of the condemned sect wearing its orders were present. The sect aimed at corrupting all minds and manners; at destroying every idea of honesty, virtue, truth, and justice; at diffusing monstrous opinions and abominable vices, fostering detestable crimes, and undermining all legitimate authority; yea, at overturning the Catholic Church and civil society, and at expelling God from heaven.

His Holiness cannot pass over the fact that it has come to his ears that an opinion has been expressed to the effect that acts of the Holy See do not compel obedience unless the civil government has given authority to carry them out. This opinion is pernicious, erroneous, and injurious to the authority of the Holy See and to the interests of the faithful. Furthermore, the Pope's venerable brother had incorrectly asserted in his speech that Benedict XIV in his Concordat with the King of Sardinia had agreed that the royal sanction should be required before pontifical acts were carried into execution; and that according to the instructions annexed to the Concordat, they were to be submitted to the senate, except when they dealt with matters of dogma or morals; which false assertion the venerable brother would not have made had he weighed the words of the instructions. The letter concludes with protestations of the Pope's affection for his venerable brother and his flock.

This epistle, after being long held in reserve, was launched into publicity at a time when Darboy's influence was threatening to be inconvenient in the Council, and when the French government had requested a cardinal's hat for him.[63]

It is, perhaps, not superfluous to remark that the terms "plenitude of power" as denoting the prerogative of the Pope, and "received to a share of the solicitude," as denoting the origin and nature of the bishop's authority, are not merely happy phrases, but scientific terms fitted to express the Papal theory of the Church constitution as opposed to the Episcopal theory. The Episcopal theory, holding that the office of all bishops is of divine institution, regards the Pope, not as the source of episcopal authority, but as supreme and ultimate arbiter. According to the Papal theory, the authority of the bishop is an emanation from that of the Pope, who, as monarch, unlimited by any co-ordinate authority, retains in his own hands not only extraordinary but ordinary, not only ultimate but immediate jurisdiction over every subject within the bounds assigned to a bishop. The latter is a prefect, not only liable to be discharged or imprisoned, but liable while retained in office to have any matter taken out of his hands and settled contrary to his views. This is the theory which, like a scourge of not small cords, is employed to flog Darboy, while the incongruous epithet "venerable brother," dangles at the handle—a vestige of a past age and an exploded theory. An emperor does not call his prefect "venerable brother."