within the competency of a superior jurisdiction to control the action of the inferior, but in no manner can the inferior do this to the superior. In this matter of jurisdiction, what has to be done is to observe the rule prescribed by Pope Boniface VIII. in his dogmatic Bull Unam Sanctam Ecclesiam.' * It is well known how much has been spoken and written, both before and since the decree of the Vatican Council declaratory of Papal Infallibility as a dogma, to define what really does lie within the range of this Infallible attribute. This is not the place to consider the various tests which different authorities have alleged to be alone conclusive for marking off fallible from infallible utterances, as they may drop from Papal lips. Thus much alone has been laid down with certainty; that whenever a Pope does speak ex cathedrâ he is infallible, and that whatever is thus spoken is dogmatic, and consequently partakes of the sacredness of an article of faith. What then deserves to be carefully noted is how it is here unequivocally affirmed by the organ of true doctrine,' that the Bull Unam Sanctam, admittedly the extremest expression, that ever fell from any Pope's lips, of Papal pretensions to direct and wholesale supremacy in temporal matters, is comprised amongst the Pontifical utterances of which the dogmatic sacrosanctness is open to no doubt. For it should be stated that this attribution of high character does not rest on what, if standing by itself, might be deemed an inadvertent expression. It is spoken to more than once, and the allegation is substantiated by a very precise enunciation of the grounds which, according to the writer, are conclusive as to the dogmatic character of this Bull. Some liberal periodicals and writers will be shocked at hearing this Bull termed dogmatic.' But that it is so is manifest, whether one regards the matter of its contents or the authority whence it emanates. In it the Pontiff addresses himself to the whole Church, and speaks in the capacity of a teacher giving instruction about most important doctrinal points, such as are of a certainty the relations between the Church and the State. Besides, the Bull ends with an explicit definition: Subesse Romano Pontifici, omni humanæ creaturæ, declaramus, dicimus, definimus, et pronunciamus, omnino esse de necessitate salutis.'† Whether the declaratory allegations here made with such remarkable assurance will be implicitly acquiesced in by all who may claim to be every whit as sound Roman Catholics as Liberatore, we cannot stop to inquire. Our particular purpose is to seek from perfectly trustworthy sources authentic evidence as to the teaching propounded by the most authoritative modern school * P. 46. † P. 23. of a pre of Catholic divinity; and evidence of this kind on eminently important point-the amount and extent of Pontifical utterances from previous ages, which will be retrospectively covered through the Dogma of Infallibility with a sanction raising them to the position of Articles of Faith-we here obtain from a writer who comes before us with a well-nigh bewildering accumulation of vouchers for his plenary inspiration in what he says on this head. For here is the formidable chain of guarantees that Father Liberatore can point to for the perfect soundness of his exposition; first, he is a Jesuit divine held in acknowledged estimation as a mouth-piece of doctrine by the heads of the Order; then he is one of that picked number drafted from the body of the Order, and erected by Pius IX. into a special brotherhood, entrusted with the delicate task of making the world to know what is true doctrine; thirdly, he comes before us with a revision of his original composition, combining the benefit of matured afterthought and the corrections derivable from the protracted reflections of his superiors; fourthly (and in reference to the passage immediately before us this fact is of capital weight) the revision has been issued subsequently to the dogmatization of Infallibility and the serious controversy awakened thereby; and fifthly, to remove every shadow of doubt as to the complete concurrence of those who are at present entitled to speak in the name of the Church in the views expressed in this publication, there has been affixed thereto the (as far as the law of the land is concerned) perfectly superfluous stamp of episcopal approbation. In presence of this converging array of endorsements the fact must be deemed proven that, in the minds of the Society of Jesus and of Pius IX., the Bull Unam Sanctam is held to be an article of dogmatic utterance binding on the conscience of all who would be Catholics.* * In 1826, one who then was looked upon as an ecelesiastical authority of high degree, Bishop Doyle, in his public appeal to Lord Liverpool on behalf of the claims for Catholics to Emancipation wrote thus of this same Bull: If the Bull Unam Sanctam be objected to us, is it not reasonable to attend to us, whilst we say, that no Bull of any Pope can decide our judgment if it be not received and assented to by the pastors of the Church, an assent which this Bull Unam Sanctam never has had? The Bull was of a most odious kind, and should, therefore, according to a maxim admitted by all jurists, odiosa sunt restringenda, be restricted as much as possible to its sense.' 'Essay on Catholic Claims,' p. 37. On January 25, in that same year, all the Irish bishops signed also, it is true, a declaration : That it is not an article of the Catholic Faith, neither are Catholics required to believe that the Pope is infallible;' amongst the names subscribed being that of Dr. M'Hale, the living Archbishop of Tuam. Neither Bishop Doyle's emphatic statement nor this solemn Declaration was ever disapproved of by the Holy See. What then can be the permanent value attaching to any exposition minimising the bearing and possible effect on civil jurisdiction of the dogma of Infallibility, from however exalted a Prelate it may emanate, and however much it may appear to be acquiesced in at the present moment by the Holy See? The The function of the State, measured by these definitions, would therefore amount merely to that of an organised police, instituted for the enforcement of the Church's behests and the vigilant repression of dissent. This interpretation is in strict accordance with the saying, that the duty of the State is centred in protection of the Church,'* and that (these words being adopted from the reputed Ultramontane Legist Phillips) the primary condition of an efficacious alliance between the laws of the State and the laws of the Church lies in the application of coercive means, in every instance where spiritual penalty may be inadequate.'t This obligation to coerce-in other words to persecute-all who may differ, though ever so slightly, from any opinion propounded by the authorities of the Church for the time being, is insisted upon by Father Liberatore with reiterated emphasis, as a duty deriving its sacredness directly from Christ's injunction. The capital and substantial ground, wherefore liberty of conscience must be reprobated, is neither peace nor national unity, but in truth the obligation to profess the true faith, and thereby ensure the attainment of man's superior good. Peace and national unity may be invoked as a secondary ground (being likewise a benefit), but only on the supposition that the true faith is preserved. For in the contrary case the saying of Christ holds good, I came not to send peace but a sword; national discord being beyond comparison a lesser evil than persistence in some error regarding a point of faith,'-words distinctly enjoining the enforcement of religion at the sword's point. And again: 'Amongst the rights appertaining to a perfect society is that of coercing enemies, internal and external. Where between the State and the Church there is reciprocal alliance, there the right [to coerce enemies] is exercised by the latter through the agency of the former ... But where this alliance happens to have been broken, manifestly this right of the Church cannot perish, inasmuch as it takes its rise in the essence of social order with which the Church has been invested not by the State but by God.' Accordingly the best form of government, i.e., the form best answering to divine conception and the happiness of mankind' is where the State acts as the executioner of the Church's fulminations; though, in presence of the glaring fact that schism has asserted itself in a large portion of the Christian world, and the physical impossibility of enforcing everywhere at once that action of sharp repression conformable to Jesuit notions of the form best answering to divine conception,' Father Liberatore admits that 'out of regard to religious divisions which have already taken root' in some parts, 'prudence may counsel civil toleration of all forms of worship.' Consequently the acquiescence, which in some countries the Church has apparently yielded to the toleration of other religious persuasions, is no more than a feint, put on under the pressure of emergency, and a stratagem adopted for so long only as it may seem the most appropriate method for warding off additional difficulties. Here we find ourselves brought face to face with two points of the gravest interest--the view entertained by the Church as to what rights and faculties remain inherent in a State that may have apostatized from its communion, and as to the binding force on itself of any formal instrument it may have concluded with a Civil Power, be it Catholic or not. That the Church is credited with the right to impress into her service all the physical forces under the immediate direction of the State, we have been already told, as also that this right extends to the exercise of vigorous coercion through State agency against Dissenters. That this right, as emanating from a Divine origin, is affirmed not to lapse because a State, as represented by those in possession of governing power, may fall away from the Church, and thus deprive it of the means to set these forces in motion, this likewise we know. What we still have to be enlightened upon, by him who has so far been our ready guide and instructor, is what degree, if any, of legitimacy the Church in its conscience may recognise as still vested in a State which has apostatized, and with which the Church might have contracted public relations of comity. We admit that Father Liberatore glides over the general question with more rapidity than is his usual practice. His opinion on this important head is comprised in a few sentences, introduced in the course of a long dissertation on the duties of the State towards the Church, but, though few, the sentences are pregnant. After having insisted on the absolute obligation incumbent on the State to expend its forces in protection and defence of the Church,' he goes on to say that, whenever the State has apostatized, and ceased to fulfil this special duty, the same devolves of its own nature on the individual Faithful,' and that in this manner there arises in society a necessary disorder, namely, the existence of a legitimate power, which is independent of the public depositary of force.'t That it will be within the faculty of casuists to interpret these words differently from their plain sense, is what we are prepared for. The conclusion we have arrived at is that, bearing in mind the whole context of the argu * P. 74. † P. 77. ment, ment, these words, without any invocation of that merely probable interpretation which a Jesuit writer should not consider improper, do plainly express this doctrine-that in countries where the State in its corporate capacity does not make profession of the Catholic Faith, the Church, even though it might have adopted towards the powers that be an attitude of friendly understanding, will still consider the only depositaries of the faculties, which in its opinion appertain to the State, to be the congregation of those who have continued faithful to its communion; just as, according to the same authority, while the throne is occupied by one man, another can be held entitled to issue commands that are binding for the gravest action. That no unnatural strain has here been put upon the sentiments of our author, is clearly established by his most explicit language as to the possible binding force upon the Church itself of any engagement, however solemn in form, that it may have entered into with any State, even though orthodox. With an elaborateness of diction that closes all question as to his meaning, Father Liberatore affirms that, from the very nature of things, no Concordat can ever bind the Church, that it is a mere concession for the time of rights that are indelible, and which are only waived in deference to expediency, until the strain of exigency may have relaxed. This view was broached some years ago by the Vicomte de Bonald, who declared that a Concordat cannot be likened to a contract; for there is a radical impossibility that a contract can intervene between two entities (the spiritual and the temporal Power), whereof the one is sovereign, the other subject, the one presides, the other is subordinate.'* For the publication containing this passage Pius IX. addressed to the author a Brief of approbation. Some Catholics, however, demurred to M. de Bonald's opinion, and a controversy ensued. Amongst those who concurred with him most vigorously were Father (afterwards Cardinal) Tarquini and Liberatore, whose strenuous arguments the reader, if so inclined, may peruse for himself in the volume we have been quoting from. We have space only for these few emphatic sentences:- It is beyond doubt that Concordats, in whatever concerns matters spiritual and such as have any connection therewith, cannot have the character of bilateral contracts. . . . Concordats in this respect have the character of mere indulgences and privileges. . . . Whatever privilege may at any time have been granted, which might in any manner limit or curtail the exercise of Pontifical authority, is a mere indulgence, revocable * Deux questions sur le Concordat,' Genève, 1871. Vol. 138.-No. 275. H at |