Letters From Rome on the Council

Pius has even had his naïve but robust belief in his own heavenly illumination and vocation to proclaim new doctrines sensibly embodied in a picture. In a chamber beyond the Raphael Gallery there is a picture painted by his order; he stands in glorified attitude on a throne proclaiming his favourite dogma of the Immaculate Conception, while the Divine Trinity and the Holy Virgin look down from heaven well pleased upon him, and from the Cross, borne in the arms of an angel, flashes a bright ray on his countenance. Thus Pius stands in a special mystical relation to Mary; she guides and inspires the Council through him, and he in turn will proclaim, with its assent, the decrees she has inspired and which will destroy the monstrous errors of the present day, or will at least give them a fatal blow. Unfortunately, not one single decree has yet been brought out after exactly two months, and all the heresies continue just as strong as before the Council met. And yet the pregnant and successful Councils of the ancient Church did not require a longer time for their decisions; the Council of Nice was finished in two months, the Council of Chalcedon in six weeks. Certainly it was not then supposed that Mary had first to give the Pope, and then he to give the Council, the weapons for destroying heresies: they were content to rely on the Paraclete promised by Christ.

Meanwhile the present assembly has nothing in common with those ancient Synods, except in being composed of persons called Bishops. But our Bishops are unlike those of the ancient Church, for they have to yield up to the Curia three-fourths of the rights possessed by their predecessors, and it would be simply ridiculous to liken the state of tutelage and restraint they are now placed under by the Curia to the free and independent attitude of the fifth-century Councils. The more free-spoken among them have just addressed, on 2d February, another Petition to the Pope, requesting that the so-called Council Hall in St. Peter's may be exchanged for a more suitable chamber; for now that serious discussions on the dogmas and decrees are to begin – and the third Schema will be met with strong and persevering opposition in many of its articles – the present arrangement becomes still more intolerable than before. Any regular discussion is simply impossible in the present Council Hall; there is no doubt of that. “That is just right,” say the Papal officials; “we neither desire nor need discussion, but simply that the propositions should be voted.” “But this is an unheard-of thing, against all conciliar usage and all natural right,” reply the Bishops. Archbishop Darboy said, “We are called on to anathematize doctrines and persons; to pass sentences of spiritual death. But would any jury in the world pronounce capital sentence without first having heard the defence?” And thus the Council has entered on a very critical period, and a spirit of irritation is becoming visible, increased by the constantly deepening conviction that the Bishops are to be used for purposes alien to their minds and suicidal. One word describes the entire plot – outvoting by majorities. The united German, French and North American Bishops are opposed to a well disciplined army of about 500, who will vote as one man at the beck of the Pope. This army consists of 300 Papal boarders, the 62 Bishops of the Roman States who are doubly subject to him, 68 Neapolitans, 80 of the Spanish race, some 110 titular Bishops without dioceses, the Italian Cardinals, 30 Generals of Orders, etc.45 In a word, the Latin South is arrayed against the French and German North. And therefore the design of the Curia, to carry decrees or dogmas on every question of Church and State, etc., by a mere calculation of plus and minus, is doubly monstrous and utterly unchurchlike. For, first, it must inevitably produce a deep national irritation, if it is said hereafter in Germany, Bohemia, Hungary, France and the United States, “The Italians and Spaniards have triumphed over our views and interests at Rome, simply because their dioceses are much smaller than ours and they have 50 Bishops for 100,000 souls, while we have only one.” Secondly, it involves a complete break with the past of the Church and the practice of Councils. Some Bishops have examined the official records of the Council of Trent by the Roman historian Pallavicini, and have found there that Pius iv. directed his Legates – and that too with special reference to a decree on the fulness of Papal jurisdiction – to make no decrees the Bishops were not unanimously agreed upon.46

But now just the contrary is to take place. The decisive contest on that point – if it comes to an open contest – will not be fought on the third Schema, On the Church and the Pope, but at once on the first Schema, the handiwork of the Jesuits, when it is returned to the Council, professedly modified but in substance unchanged, from the Commission of two Jesuits and three Infallibilists. As we hear, no attention has been paid to the counter representations of the Bishops, some of whom have objected to it altogether as superfluous and mischievous, some as erroneous and exaggerated. It will now without further discussion, which is simply impossible in the Council Hall, be accepted by the mere majority of votes of the compact troop of Infallibilists, who are at the Pope's command as valets à tout faire, and proclaimed as a dogma by Pius, approbante Concilio, as the form runs. Thereby, according to approved Roman doctrine, has the Holy Ghost spoken by the mouth of His divine representative, “causa finita est;” and it only remains for the 150 or 200 opposing Bishops to make all haste to perform a great mental evolution, to change their laws of thought, to reverence as revealed truth what they have hitherto rejected as error, and to force the clergy and laity under them by excommunication and suspension to perform the same gymnastic feat of leaping at one jump from unbelief into firm and immoveable faith.

The modern and purely mechanical scholasticism has brought matters to such a pass that many seriously look upon the Council as a machine, which only needs turning to get new dogmas carried and authorized by the Holy Ghost. Formerly, theologians used to say that the voice of a General Council is nothing but the voice of the whole Church concentrated in one place; that every Bishop bears witness to the traditional belief of his Church and of his predecessors; and that the harmony of these testimonies proves what is the universal belief, and thus attests the truth and purity of the profession of faith sanctioned by the Council. But now all this is entirely changed. The Bishops have come, without any previous knowledge as to what they were to vote about; long-winded and ready-made documents are laid before them on questions most of them have never examined in their lives, of which their flocks at home know nothing and have never heard; they are expected to pass decrees the necessity and opportuneness of which appear to them highly problematical, and to pronounce a string of anathemas, because the Pope and Jesuits will it. They are cooped up in a treadmill called a Council, and must willingly or unwillingly grind what is thrown into it. It cannot indeed be exactly said that this procedure is new and unprecedented, for the same thing occurred, on a much smaller scale, at the Fifth Lateran Council under Julius ii. and Leo. x.; but then only the Italian Bishops were made use of, who had long been broken in to the rôle of flunkeys. Now, on the contrary, the Bishops of all nations have been brought into prison at Rome, and are to say Yea and Amen to the decrees the Curia and the Jesuits have drawn up and mean to make obligatory.

But the minority have taken courage, and stand on the defensive; and so the machine is at a standstill. The opponents of Infallibilism have not decreased; on the contrary, it is now thought that about 200 will vote against it. Many, who at first were only “inopportunists,” have now through more careful investigation of the question become decided opponents of the doctrine itself.

Antonelli does not spare assurances, that the Governments may be quite at ease as to the decrees to be issued by the Council; he says they only affect theology, that nothing will be changed in practical life by them, and that the Curia has no intention of employing them for the purpose of interfering with political affairs. But these reassuring declarations are only made orally; great care is taken to avoid putting them into a written, and therefore binding, form. Meanwhile the French Government perfectly comprehends the situation and the objects aimed at, and has already announced that it will fully support its Bishops and protect them against the threatened domination by majorities. Archbishop Lavigerie has gained nothing in Paris, and the decision of France has been communicated to the Cardinal Secretary of State, to the effect that the Government will not allow the 33 French Bishops and their allies of the German and English tongue to be crushed and forced into adopting dogmas they have rejected. The Civiltà has just been singing the praises of Count Daru, who is a living proof that there are still real statesmen; it will very soon adopt just the opposite tone.

Among the points which make the Bishops the more astonished, the longer they stay here and the more narrowly they inspect the condition of things, is the decline of study in Rome, and the want, not merely of learned men but even, and most especially, of well-grounded theologians. Rome was never a favourable soil for serious study and true learning; a resource was found in attracting foreigners here, which could easily be done by means of the great Religious Orders whose Generals reside here. But now these Orders, with the exception of the Jesuits, are in the same state of decay. Where are men of distinguished learning to be found among the Dominicans, Carmelites, Cistercians and Franciscans of our own day? To the Pope himself and those immediately about him this is a matter of indifference; Pius feels instinctively that, if there were real theologians at Rome, they would all offer at least a passive resistance to his penchant for creating new dogmas. Only the Jesuits and their pupils favour that sort of thing; and as long as there were real theologians in Rome, history knows of no Pope who was possessed with this abnormal passion for fabricating dogmas.

Now, indeed, among the 41 Italian Cardinals, only two are named as theologians, the Thomist Guidi and the Barnabite Lulio. Of the achievements of the latter nothing is known, and he has left the Jesuits to their own devices in the elaboration of the Schemata; but in the Council he is the chief representative of Roman theology. More distinguished than Lulio is the Piedmontese Prelate and Professor, Audisio, author of a History of the Popes, which of course cannot be measured by a German standard. Vincenzi, a good Orientalist and author of a learned – but in the main erroneous – apology for Origen, being a quiet, modest man who goes his own way, is thought nothing of here, and has neither title, dignities, nor benefices, although in knowledge he outweighs twenty Monsignori. De Rossi, the most acute and learned among the genuine Romans, who has educated himself by the study of German works, is a layman and therefore cannot be anything. The Dominican Modena, Secretary of the Congregation of the Index and as such director of the whole institution, who died a few weeks ago, passed here for a learned theologian, but no monuments of his knowledge and research are extant outside the Index. When a foreigner observed to him shortly before his death that, in order to condemn German or English books, one should understand something of the language, he showed great surprise at so unheard-of a demand, and replied that for Italians, who notoriously far excel all nations in genius and acuteness, if a foreigner translated a couple of passages from a book into Latin or Italian, that supplied quite enough materials for pronouncing a censure on the book. The Dominican Gatti has now succeeded Modena as Secretary of the Index, and therefore as supreme judge ex officio of the literature of the world. On his scientific capacity and literary achievements history is silent. And so the few learned works produced here have to be provided by foreigners domiciled at Rome.

Theiner publishes documents from the Archives, so far, that is, as they serve “the good cause;” much he is notoriously forbidden to publish. The French Benedictine, Pitra, now a Cardinal, edits the original documents of Greek canon law; the French Chaillot writes the single important Church journal or record, Analecta Juris Pontificii, where, notwithstanding its rigid Ultramontane line, useful collections or ancient treatises not previously printed may here and there be found. Dogmatics and theological philosophy —i. e., philosophy adapted to dogmatic needs and ends – are provided here by the three German Jesuits, Schrader, Franzelin and Kleutgen. For here Germans are only thought available when they have first been transformed into Jesuits and thereby, as far as possible, un-Germanized. That Order, on which the features of the Spanish national character of the sixteenth century are still indelibly impressed, cannot tolerate a genuine German in his natural shape; it would be compelled to eject him as Etna vomited out the brazen slipper of Empedocles. It is well known that the most industrious and learned of the Roman Prelates, Liverani, was obliged to leave Rome; he lives, I believe, at Florence.47

If we examine the names of the Professors at the Roman University of the Sapienza, we find among the teachers of theology, with the solitary exception of the Canon-Regular, Tizzani, who is now blind, only monks – Dominicans, Carmelites and Augustinians – and these mere names wholly unknown beyond the walls of Rome. No less lamentable is the view presented by the philosophical, mathematical and philological departments. The best that can be said of this University, the intellectual metropolis of 180,000,000, is about this, “que c'est une fille honnête qui ne fait pas parler d'elle.”

On the whole, the air here is much too raw, the soil inhospitable, the Index too near, and the censorship too merciless, for scientific works and serious investigations. The Italians say of a mindless work, “É scritto in tempo di Scirocco.” And here there is an intellectual scirocco established in permanence. And thus the brave German Benedictines, who assembled here some years ago under an Italian Abbot, Pescetelli, in St. Paul's without the Walls, have become victims of the unhealthy atmosphere – that is, besides the mental scirocco indigenous here, the sharp north wind blowing from the Gesù. They had energetic men among them, such as Nickes and others, were anxious to work in German fashion, and made a good beginning in a volume of Voices from Rome, published in 1860; a German Cardinal was their protector. But no sooner had they been denounced to the Pope by the Jesuits – German and of ill-repute for orthodoxy are synonymous terms here than they had to decamp. The Abbot, weary of these chicaneries, resigned his office and returned to Montecassino. But the Benedictines generally are looked on most unfavourably by the authorities here. As it was said in a capital sentence at Paris, in 1794, that the condemned man was “suspected of being suspected of deficient sense of citizenship,” so must it be said of the Benedictines here that they “are suspected of being suspected of a deficient sense of Papalism.” They are not devoted enough towards the Curia; these little religious communities cannot be so entirely kept in hand, the Jesuits from of old are hostile to them, and it is found in Rome that they have not hitherto rendered sufficient service to the great cause of strengthening Roman domination. They are therefore to be revolutionized, and, like the Jesuits and the Mendicant Orders, to receive a monarchical constitution. Their autocratic General will then reside in Rome, and the Pope will do with them what he did with the Dominicans, when he made Jandel, the Jesuit pupil, their General. Then the Benedictines will be for the Jesuits what the Gibeonites were for the Israelites, their “hewers of wood and drawers of water.”48

Such a project for revolutionizing the Benedictines, who would then of course cease to be sons of St. Benedict, is reputed to be among the measures prepared for the Council. If the present condition of Rome be compared with earlier ages, as late as Benedict xiv.'s reign, or even twenty or thirty years later, there is truly an enormous difference, and this deep decay and intellectual collapse cannot be explained by external causes merely; inward and more hidden motives must be taken into account, which I think I well understand, but will not here speak of. That does not trouble our Roman clergy of to-day; they institute no comparisons, and don't even know the names of the men who dwelt in the same spot a century ago. And the thought of their own poverty of intellect and culture, if it ever occurs to the Roman clerisy, does not at all hinder their always admiring themselves, like Dante's Rachel,

“Mai non si smagaDal suo miraglio, e siedo tutto giornoEll' é de' suoi begli occhi veder vaga.”49

Nineteenth Letter

Rome, Feb. 8, 1870.– It is a most exciting drama that is being exhibited here, and notwithstanding much that is both little and painful in its details, one of great and moving import; and those who have the opportunity of inspecting its machinery more narrowly, can hardly at times avoid feeling very strongly on the subject. The figure of Laocoon, with the snakes coiled round him, is constantly recurring to my mind; for I seem to be witnessing the strategical arts and skilful evolutions of a general, who is trying to surround a little band of opponents with his immensely superior forces, so as to compel them to lay down their arms and surrender at discretion without striking a blow. The disproportion is indeed enormous; first there is the Pope, whose mere name still is a host in itself, and that Pope is Pius, who for twenty-four years has had such homage and flatteries heaped upon him as no Pope ever had before, and who is accustomed to shake the Roman Olympus by his nod. Then there are the Cardinals and Prelates, the whole spiritual staff of Congregations – the Papal family – all fully united and resolved, and the contribuens plebs of foreign Bishops, who are fairly caught in the net, and will not be suffered to escape without the bonds and chains of the most stringent decrees securing their obedience. On the other side stand from 150 to 200 Bishops, of divers tongues and nations and now for the first time united by a common need and a common danger, like a snowball liable to melt at the first breath of milder air, and fighting like those Spaniards of the Cortes, who, with one foot chained to a stone, compelled the Mexicans to spare their lives. One asks every morning in doubt and terror, how far the solvents employed have attained their end? Many would gladly capitulate if only they were met half-way by tolerable conditions, and such would secure them a rather less cold reception on their return to their dioceses. Meanwhile the eyes and the hopes of all educated Catholics, not only in Germany but in Italy, France and North America, are fixed on the chosen band of 300 Bishops.

But how are matters likely to proceed? The Opposition is tough and tenacious. Every new Schema bears so unmistakeably the impress of the interests of either the Jesuits or the Curia, that the Bishops cannot help growing constantly more cautious, suspicious and reserved. And to make their designs still clearer, the Jesuits supply the practical commentary in their official journal, the Civiltà, to the effect that no measures of the Governments against the encroachments of the Church on the civil jurisdiction, or her summons to transgress the laws of the country, would bind the consciences of their subjects. The subjoined anathema against every one who refuses to acknowledge that laws are annulled by the ordinances of the Church (i. e., the Pope), is a sorry consolation for the Bishops; for experience has shown too often that courts of justice and statesmen don't trouble themselves about the excommunications incurred in the discharge of their official duties. The Bishops accordingly foresee nothing but endless rubs and collisions with the civil power, as well as with whole classes of the population at home; and when the Jesuits are commended to them as pledged and triumphant allies in the contest to be waged against Governments, constitutions and laws, they generally shake their heads suspiciously and with no particular feeling of triumphant joy.

The Pope's 300 episcopal foster-sons cost him 25,000 francs daily, and that makes the pleasant little sum of 1,500,000 francs for two sterile months, during which these doughty warriors have sat a good deal, but accomplished nothing by their sitting; for the old Roman proverb, “Romanus vincit sedendo,” has not been verified here. The Pope is gradually getting frightened at this daily expenditure, and, after the fashion of great lords, who readily lay the blame of the failure of their own plans on the bad advice of their subjects, he said to-day, in an outbreak of disgust, “per furia di farmi infallibile, mi faranno fallire.”

The proceedings of the Council must therefore be expedited and curtailed. At the same time nothing must be remitted of the matters it is to deal with and vote into canons and decrees. Therefore the order of business must be changed. Cardinal Antonelli says now that “the speeches have been too long and too many, and must be entirely put an end to; the Bishops must be content with handing over their observations in writing to the Commission of twenty-four or the Commission for Petitions.” He tries to sweeten the bitter draught to their lips by remarking that this decision is for their own advantage, for, after being so wearied out with the long sittings and listening to speeches, they must be glad to be relieved of the burden. The Bishops, however, experience no such joyful feeling, but say that the last vestige of conciliar freedom is now abolished. They have the more reason for saying so, since it is notorious that the Infallibilist and purely Romanist party is exclusively represented on the Commissions, so that it may be clearly foreseen that the remarks and suggestions of the liberal-minded and reforming Bishops will simply be thrown into the waste-paper basket, or, under the most favourable circumstances, be buried in the archives of St. Angelo. At the moment I am writing the new Regolamento has not yet been published, owing to the urgent requests and representations of certain Bishops. But to judge from Antonelli's statement, the authorities seem determined to drop the last veil, and show quite openly to the world that the Council has been arranged as a mere machine of Roman administration, and must therefore of course be forced back into the path from which it had wandered. Many a Bishop now looks back with painful regret to the Council of Trent, where, notwithstanding the haughty insolence of the Italians, the ambassadors of Spain and France acted as protectors to the foreign Prelates, and were a great check on the arbitrary violence of the Legates. Now, Antonelli assures every diplomatist who says a word on the unprecedented method of procedure, and the hostile character of the proposed decrees towards the State, that these things have only a theoretical and doctrinal significance, and that in practice the Curia will study a wise moderation, and place itself on a friendly footing with the Governments. He means, that when one fills one's arsenal with new and effective weapons, that is no proof that they will at once be discharged. I don't know whether this satisfies the diplomatists. Perhaps Count Trautmansdorff is satisfied, for his Government has repeatedly announced its resolve to wait quietly till the Council is over and the Curia is put in possession of all the decrees and dogmas it wants. Then, when the new doctrines are already inserted in all the catechisms and taught in all seminaries and enforced in every confessional, it will be time enough to consider what line the civil power should take in the matter. M. de Banneville and the Paris Government do not seem to be of this opinion. I don't imagine they are minded at Paris so entirely to sacrifice the Bishops to the arbitrary will of the Curia and its paid majority, and for the last few days the French ambassador has been engaged in a lively telegraphic correspondence with his own Government. We may very soon expect important disclosures.