Pontifical capacity, adopts the typical phrase which the Society puts forward as its specific motto. Again, the document is not merely a testimonial, but an Apostolical Charter conferring privileges on a body of writers exclusively confined to the Society of Jesus, for the grant whereof there exists no precedent. In order that there may be at all times appointed men,' it is said in this remarkable Brief . . capable of fighting the good fight, and continually defending by their writings the Catholic cause and sound doctrine.

we here

desire that the Religious of the illustrious Society of Jesus should constitute a College of Writers, composed of members of the Society, who by seasonable and apt writings . . . should prove champions of the Catholic faith, its doctrine, and its right, with all their powers. The said Religious, most zealously seconding our desires with every possible care and study, already in 1850 undertook to write and publish a periodical entitled “La Civiltà Cattolica." Following in the footsteps of their predecessors, and sparing neither care nor labour, these men had nothing more at heart than, through this diligently and wisely edited periodical, in writings learned and profound, to shield and defend inanfully the truth of our august faith, the supreme dignity, authority, power, and right of this Apostolical See, and to teach and propagate the doctrine that is true. . . Wherefore it is our most earnest desire that so sublime a work should for ever prove stable and flourish, Ad Majorem Dei Gloriam, the salvation of souls, and the daily greater promotion of the right method of studies. Accordingly by these letters in virtue of Apostolical authority we erect in perpetuity this College of Writers of the Society of Jesus of the periodical popularly termed the "Civiltà Cattolica," to exist in a house set apart for themselves, and constitute it according to the laws and privileges possessed and enjoyed by other Colleges of the said Society, under the express condition, that this College shall in all things depend absolutely on the General.'*

Three facts are noticeable in this document:-1. Throughout it, the cause of the Church as a teaching body is identified by its acknowledged Head with that of the Civiltà Cattolica.' 2. The Supreme Pontiff, exercising his ecclesiastical prerogative in the most solemn form, calls into existence as a champion of true doctrine' a special corporation, which by Apostolical Charter must be restricted to members of the Society of Jesus. 3. That corporation is constituted not for a term but in perpetuity; and is therefore proclaimed to be an organic institu

*The Brief, dated February 12, 1866, will be found in the 'Civiltà Cattolica of April 17 of that year.

tion of the Church. In presence of so superlative a warrant, we should be justified in quoting indiscriminately from the 'Civiltà Cattolica.' We confine ourselves, however, to the writings of one contributor, Father Liberatore, for two reasons; because he is avowedly held in the highest estimation at Rome, and because we have a reprint of the author's contributions, which combines the triple advantage of matured revision-of issue subsequent to the Vatican Council,-and of renewed high ecclesiastical approval affixed to this reissue.

At first sight, no maxims could seem more conformable to the personal interests of those clothed with temporal sovereignty, as regards the obligation of subjects to yield absolute obedience under all circumstances, than those propounded by our Divines. At no time can it be lawful to rebel,' says Gury, and he stigmatises, in the words of St. Liguori, as most pernicious, Gerson's opinion that a monarch might lawfully be judged by the whole nation, in the event of his ruling in violation of justice.'* On scanning closely, however, the propositions in Gury bearing on the relations between princes and subjects, we cannot dismiss the impression, that the terms in which they are stated do not exclude the possibility of extracting a plausible justification, not merely for occasional insurrection but even, under specific conditions, for making attempts on the lives of those in possession of sovereign power, under no better warrant than the intimated assent of whoever may be considered as the legitimate claimant. Once more we impress on the reader that, in deducing inferences from propositions in Jesuit writers, we advisedly proceed upon the principle, that the terms, to be appreciated at their value, must be tested by every sense they can be made to bear without a glaringly forced strain. For, according to Jesuit doctrine, any opinion, that can be brought into apparent conformity with terms employed by any single writer of authority, may be safely accepted and acted upon by an individual, even in opposition to the mind of his spiritual adviser. Therefore, when engaged in fathoming the scope of a proposition, we are bound always to note carefully every construction of which the terms employed might be physically capable-a point ever present also to the minds of a school of doctors, than whom there have been no more consummate masters in the art of weighing expressions.

Accordingly, in scrutinizing these particular propositions, there appears to us to run through all the terms employed a latitude, difficult to consider accidental, which affords ground

* Gury, vol. i. p. 248.

for

for such a mental distinction between those in merely physical possession and those with legitimate ownership of a throne, and of all that is assumed to appertain thereto in the nature of rights, as might furnish to any one in search thereof the justification for assuming, at a merely verbal intimation from him who is considered legitimate, a mission to slay him who is considered an intruder. Is it lawful to slay a tyrant?' asks Gury; and no answer apparently could be more distinct, ‘certainly it is lawful to kill neither a tyrannical governor (tyrannum regiminis) nor a legitimate prince tyrannically governing and oppressing a people. No more is it lawful to kill a tyrannical usurper, when once in possession . . . nor a tyrant not yet in complete possession, otherwise than with the sanction of the legitimate prince.'* The point to note is the proviso for drawing a distinction between what is due to the actual ruler and to him who is considered the legitimate prince, though no definition is given as to a test for establishing legitimacy. The mere assent of the latter-independent of any judicial sentenceis declared sufficient to justify an attempt on the intruder's life, the apparent qualification as to his not having attained complete possession being reduced to something merely nominal, inasmuch as there is nothing in the terms of the proposition which makes it indispensable to bring in evidence of incomplete possession, more than that half-a-dozen of individuals were still mentally withholding allegiance.

The positive distinction drawn between the degrees of right vested in sovereigns de facto and sovereigns de jure becomes enhanced and emphasized when the relative attributes of the Sovereign Pontiff and of all princes, however thoroughly de jure, are discussed. We venture to maintain that the language of the leading Jesuit Divines, on this particular matter, is such as not merely to leave an opening for, but to constrain the construction, that they claim for the Supreme Pontiff all the same superior prerogatives over princes, though perfectly de jure, which they consider these to possess over rulers de facto. Therefore we are compelled to conclude that, in so far as the terminology and reasoning of these Jesuit Doctors can be taken as the authentic expression of doctrine accepted by the Church, an order from Rome to slay a ruler would, under particular circumstances, be one that a faithful member of the Church could execute with a clear conscience. It would be simply monstrous to insinuate the probability of any order of this nature emanating from Pius IX. Whatever may be

the untoward acts to which passion may impel those who direct, or will direct, the Church of Rome, of this we may be confident, that the present conscience of the age is too keen to let a Pope, like his sainted predecessor Pius V., send an assassin on a mission for slaying a contumacious prince. But, notwithstanding a confident assurance of this kind, the employment, by leading modern Jesuit Doctors, of language which by fair construction does express an assertion in principle of acts of this nature, is a circumstance as noteworthy as it is characteristic of the present spirit of their doctrine. Passing on, however, from what we are readily disposed to consider a dead letter and mere anachronism, we come to matter of far more practical importance, the distinct claim set up, in behalf of the Church, to such direct supremacy in matters appertaining to civil existence as would constitute, if carried into execution, a most material encroachment on what in every modern polity has become the recognised domain of the State.

6

'The State,' declares Father Liberatore, must understand itself to be a subordinate sovereignty, exercising ministerial functions under a superior sovereignty, and governing the people conformably to the will of that lord, to whom it is subject.'* Who that lord may be we are left in no doubt. It is that Sovereign Pontiff, the visible monarch' of 'God's realm on earth,' to whom 'every baptized person is more strictly subject than to any temporal ruler whatever.'† Still a division is recognised in the immeasurable labour that would be heaped on the shoulders of the Pontiff if he were himself to administer directly this universal empire; and the definition of such division gives us a statement in clear terms of what functional attributes it is conceded shall fall within the jurisdiction of the State. Its independence of action, we are told, is to be absolutely restricted to matters directly relating to the mere physical well-being of material life (finance, the army, trade, domestic peace, and relations with other nations), but in no wise can it be that in matters directly concerning charity, justice, morals, the State should be otherwise than bound to conform to the rules dictated by the Church, while even in the matters before mentioned as being within its competency, the State would be under the negative obligation to do nothing hurtful to the morals of its subjects or the obedience due to God. For where the contrary has happened, the Church has clearly the right to remedy and cancel whatever may have been appointed wrongly and immorally in the temporal order of things.' Therefore the civil ruler of a Chris

tian people must be in subordination to the Christian priesthood, and especially to the Roman Pontiff. And, again, The temporal sword, symbol of civil authority, has to be subordinate to the spiritual sword, symbol of priestly authority;'† all which, we are told a few lines further on, is a peremptory sentence to be called in question by no one who would be a true Catholic.'

Having been made acquainted with these indelible principles, on which no compromise can be tolerated, that are to fix the line between the provinces of ecclesiastical and temporal powers, we are treated to the following theorems in completer definition of the respective natures of these two entities. We have it stated as of positive certainty that, through institution of the Church, society has been subjected by divine law to the rule of a new supreme power, sacerdotal authority, which is utterly independent of State authority,' and that, by the advent of Christianity, State authority has been confined within narrower bounds,' a thesis which will be self-evident only to minds not startled at hearing it also affirmed that our Saviour on no occasion manifested indifference to a temporal estate, and that, in very truth, his kingdom is here below, and will abide unto 'the fulfilment of time.'§ Novel dogmatic versions of Christian facts, which, after having been uttered with the oracular curtness of an infallible illumination, are then presented by Father Liberatore as indefeasible title deeds for the perennial maintenance of the Pope's temporal sovereignty as absolutely essential to the observance of what constitutes the spirit of Christ's doctrine! If any doubt be yet entertained whether it can really enter into the conception of this accredited organ of the 'true doctrine' to claim for the Church the right, whenever this may suit its pleasure, to interfere with, arrest, suspend, and annul the faculties of State authority, even in a matter so wholly outside all conceivable affinity to spiritual agencies as the mode and manner for employment of the armed force, we submit the following passage-not dovetailed by selection, but standing consecutively in the text as it does here-and to which can never be denied the merit of clear language:The Church is empowered to amend and to cancel the civil laws, or the sentences proceeding from a secular court, whenever these may be in collision with spiritual weal, and she has the faculty to check the abuse of the executive and of the armed forces, or even to prescribe their employment whenever the require ments for the protection of the Christian Faith may demand this. The jurisdiction of the Church is higher than the civil. Now it is † P. 28

* P. 22.

$ P. 37.