Prince Napoleon has broken with a certain number of his
own supporters, by virtually indicating, in a published letter, his own approval of the decrees dissolving the Jesuits and summoning all other religious Orders to apply for authorisation to the State. This letter signally supports the view of Prince Napoleon contained in Mr. Senior's published" Conversations," which Prince Napoleon's friends at first attempted to disown. No doubt his democratic imperialism, anxiously as he often endeavours to conceal it, is of a type very far indeed from favourable to the complete liberty of religious organisation. At heart, like many democrats, and all Imperial democrats, he would keep the sternest possible curb on religion, treating it as a force which is often quite uncontrollable for the purposes of democracy, especially of a democracy crowned. Whether Prince. Napoleon will really lose much support by his letter is not so easy to say. The truth is, he has so little to lose, that it is not easy for him to lose much.
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