BOOKS.

M. ABOUT ON THE HOMAN QUESTION.* MANY things besides the opportuneness of its subject have con- -spired to secure an unusually eager reception for M. About's new work. His literary celebrity which has had time to ripen but not time to lose the freshness and bloom of novelty ; the attractive- ness, irresistible for Frenchmen, of his antithetical style, twink- ling all over with quips and epigrams ; the universal attention which the Papal Government was impolitic enough to bespeak for his strictures by its efforts to suppress them—all have con- tributed towards the success he is now enjoying ; but more effectual than any of these things has been the general belief that M. About is not the man to assume for his pen a licence which his Imperial master would not secretly approve, however convenient it might be to make a show of discountenancing it. Be this as it may, the in- trinsic value of M. About's work is unquestionable. He studied his subject on the spot, travelling over the Papal States in all directions, conversing with men of all opinions, and scrutinizing everything with his own eyes. While thus engaged, he began a lames of articles in the literary part of the Moniteur, embodying the result of his observations and researches, but, apparently, with a certain degree of reserve, for he tells us that his contribu- tions had to undergo " quelques modifications imposees." But notwithstanding these compulsory modifications, the authorities of the Vatican were filled with anger and alarm. The offender was ordered to quit the Pope's dominions, urgent remonstrances were addressed to the French Government, which had allowed such scandalous matter to appear in its official journal, and the series was discontinued. The author waited patiently for the op- portunity he foresaw, and which has come to him within less than a year. Meanwhile he consulted recent Italian publications, and the best living authorities with whom he could converse or corre- spond, put his unfinished sketches in the fire, and set about writing anew, and this time without reserve. The result is now before us.

M. About's main conclusions are to this effect: the Papal Go- vernment is the worst and most absolute in Europe, and can never be otherwise until it ceases to be Papal. The ecclesias- tical caste reigns as in a conquered country. It is as useless to say to the Pope, " Let all important offices be filled by lay- men," as it would be to say to the Emperor of Austria, " Garrison your fortresses with Piedmontese." The extinction of the Pope's temporal sovereignty is the only radical cure for the evils under which his subjects groan ; but considering the improbability that so bold a remedy will be applied in our day, M. About would be content with the next best measure, that, namely, which has been proposed by Count Cavour. He would emancipate the Pope's Eastern provinces, and confine his despotism within its present limits on the Western side of the Appenines. By this means a vast amount of wrong would come to an end forthwith, and a great step would have been made towards the entire separation of the temporal and spiritual powers, two things which cannot be combined together without infinite detriment to both. The Pre- sident of the French Republic thought otherwise, when he united with Austria and Spain in destroying the Roman Republic.

" Napoleon III. believed also that the restoration of the Pope to a throne was necessary for the good of the Church. Perhaps even he believes so still; I would not swear it. But the reasons that actuated him were nu- merous and complicated. President, and nothing more, of the French Re- public, heir of a name that summoned him to the throne, resolved to ex- change his temporary magistracy for an Imperial crown, it was an object of the highest import to him to show Europe how Republics are put down. . . . . He knew besides that the restoration of the Pope would secure him a million or two of Catholic votes as a candidate for empire. But to these motives of personal interest were added others of a higher order, if that be possible He knew Rome ; he had lived in it ; it was within his own knowledge in what the government of the Pope differs from good govern- ments. His natural equity counselled him to give the subjects of the Holy Father, in exchange for the political autonomy of which he was depriving them, all the civil liberties and all the inoffensive rights which are enjoyed in well ordered states. He wrote to M. Edgar Ney, on the 18th August 1849, a letter which was in reality a memorandum addressed to the Pope. Amnesty, secularization, the Code Napoleon, a liberal government—these were what he promised the Romans in exchange for the Republic ; these were what he demanded of the Pope in exchange for a crown. This pro- gramme gave in four words a great lesson to the sovereign, a great consola- tion to the people. But it is easier to fit a breguet spring into a watch of Henri Quatre's time than to introduce a reform into the old pontifical ma- chine."

. The present condition of the Roman provinces and their people is intolerable. With the exception of the Conservative party, that is to say the men who have an interest in the Government and the wretches it has wholly brutified, all are profoundly dis- contented, and here is a summary statement of their grievances as reported by M. About.

" They say that the authority to which they are subjected, without hav- ing Esther asked for or accepted it, is the most thoroughly absolute that has been ever defined by Aristotle ; that the legislative, executive, and judicial powers are united, confounded and jumbled together in the same band, contrary to the usage of civilized states, and to Montesquieu's theory ; that they wil- lingly acknowledge the infallibility of the Pope in all religious questions, but that in civil matters it appears to them harder to bear ; that they do not refuse to obey, since, after all, man is not placed here below to follow his own caprice, but that they would be very glad to obey laws; that the rule of good pleasure, however good it may be, is not as well worth having as the Codeliapoleon ; that the reigning Pope is not a bad man, but that the arbitrary government of a priest, though he were infallible, will never be anything but a bad government.

• La Question Romaine. Par E. About. Published in Brussels by Melina and Co.; in London by Jeffs. " That by virtue of an ancient usage, which nothing has been able to eradicate, the Pope associates with himself, in the temporal government of his States, the chiefs, sub-chiefs, and spiritual employes of his Church ; that the cardinals, bishops, canons, and priests, sweep and forage the country pelf mell ; that in the hands of a single caste is lodged the power to admin- ister sacraments and provinces, to confirm little boys and the decisions of police courts, to ordain sub-deacons and issue orders to arrest, to draw rip passports to heaven for the dying and captain's commissions. That this confounding together of the spiritual and the temporal plants in all the high posts a multitude of men, excellent no doubt in the eyes of God, but insup- portable in the sight of the people ; strangers often to the country, some- times to business, always to family life, which is the basis of all society ; without special information unless it is in heavenly things; without child- ren, consequently indifferent to the nation's future ; without wives, which makes them dangerous in the present ; in fine without any aptitude to hear reason, because they believe themselves partakers of the pontifical infallibi- lity.

That these servants of a most clement and sometimes most severe God simultaneously abuse clemency and severity; that full of indulgence for indifferent persons, for their friends and for themselves, they treat with ex- treme rigour whoever has had the misfortune to offend the powers that be; that they more readily pardon the villain who cuts a man's throat than the imprudent person who blames an abuse.

16 That the Pope and the priests who assist him, not having learned the art of keeping accounts, mismanage the finances ; that the unskilful or dis- honest management of the public wealth might be tolerated two hundred years ago, when the expenses of public worship and of the court were de- frayed by 139 millions of catholics, but that the matter must be looked into a little more closely now that 3,124,668 individuls are obliged to provide for all.

" That they do not complain of having to pay taxes, since it is a usage everywhere established, but that they should like to see their money em- ployed on the things of earth. That the basilicas, churches, and convents constructed or maintained at their cost, delight them as Catholics and sad- den them as citizens; for, after all, these edifices but imperfectly supply the places of railroads, cross roads, the canalisation of rivers, and dykes against inundations • that faith, hope, and charity receive more encourage- ment than agriculture, commerce, and industry ; that public simplicity [naivete] is developed to the detriment of public instruction.

" That justice and police are too much concerned about the health of souls and too little about the health of bodies ; that they hinder honest men from damning themselves by blaspheming, reading bad books, or fre- quenting the society of liberals, but that they do not sufficiently hinder rascals from assassinating honest men ' • that properties are protected like persons, that is to say very badly, and that it is hard not to able to reckon upon anything except a stall in paradise.

That they are made to pay more than ten millions a year for the main- tenance of an army without instruction and without discipline, of pro- blematical courage and honour, and destined never to make war except against the citizens of the State ; that it is painful, when one must abso- lutely be beaten to have to pay for the stick. That they are forced more- over to lodge foreign armies, and particularly Austrians who are heavy handed, as being Germans.

"In fine, say they, this is not what the Pope premised us in his motu proprio of the 12th September ; and it is very sad to see inflallible persons failing to fulfil their most sacred engagements.

Having presented this fearful indictment on behalf of the Ro- man people in his first chapter, M. About devotes the rest of his work to the task of proving and developing its several counts, and winds up the pleadings in the following terms.

"M. le Comte de Rayneval, after having proved that everything is for the best in the kingdom of the Pope, terminates his celebrated note with a des- pairing conclusion. According to him the Roman question is one of those which are incapable of a final solution, and all the efforts of diplomacy can only postpone a catastrophe. "I am not such a pessimist. It seems to me that all political questions may be solved, and all catastrophes avoided. I believe even that war is not absolutely indispensable to the well-being of Italy, and the security of Eu- rope, and that conflagrations may be extinguished without discharges of cannon.

"You have seen the intolerable wretchedness and the legitimate discon- tent of the Pope's subjects. You know them enough to comprehend that Europe must relieve them and without delay, not only for the sake of ab- solute justice, but also in the interest of public peace. I have not left you in ignorance that all the evils which overwhelm these three millions of people are not to be attributed either to the weakness of the sovereign, or even to the perversity of the minister, but that they are the logical and ne- cessary consequences of a principle. Europe has no business to protest against consequences; itis the principle which must be admitted or rejected. If you approve of the Pope's temporal sovereignty, you must applaud everything, even to the conduct of Cardinal Antonelli. If the enormities of the ponti- fical government revolt you, it is the eclesiastical monarchy you must assail.

"Diplomacy protests from time to time against the consequences, without, however, discussing the premises. It writes most respectful memoranda praying the Pope to be inconsistent and to administer his States according to the principle of lay governments. If the Pope turns a deaf ear, diplomatists have nothing to complain of, since they recognize his independent sove- reignty. If he promises everything that is asked of him, and forgets to exe- cute his promises, diplomacy mast again put up with it: has it not acknow- ledged that the Sovereign Pontiff has the right to absolve men from their most sacred oaths ? If he complies with the solicitations of Europe, and pub- lishes liberal laws only to let them fall forthwith into desuetude, diploma- tists are again disarmed : to violate its own laws is a privilege of absolute monarchy. "I profess the highest admiration for our diplomatists of 1859. But there was no lack of good will or of capacityvip their colleagues of 1831. They addressed a memorandum to Gregory I . which is a masterpiece. They extorted from the Pope a real constitution which left nothing to be wished for, and guaranteed all the moral and material interests of the Ro- man nation. Some years later there was no sign of its existence, and abuses flowed from the ecclesiastical principle like a river from its source.

" We renewed the experiment in 1849. The Pope granted us the motu proprio of Portici, and the Romans gained nothing by it.

" Must our diplomatists recommence in 1859 this work of dupes ? A French engineer has demonstrated that embankments along the course of rivers cost much, do little good, and are always needing repairs ; whilst a simple dam at the source prevents the most terrible inundations. To the source, Messieurs les diplomates ! Ascend, if you please, to the temporal power of the Popes. " I do not venture, however, either to hope or demand that Europe shall forthwith apply the grand remedy. Gerontocracy is still too potent even in the youngest governments. Besides we are at peace, and radical reforms are possible only through war. The sabre alone has the privilege of cutting

through great difficulties at a blow. Diplomatists, that timid army of peace, proceed only by half measures.

" There is one which was proposed in 1814 by Count Aldini, in 1831 by Rossi, in 1855 by Count Cavour. These three statesmen, comprehending that it is impossible to limit the authority of the Pope in the kingdom in which it is exercised and over the people who are abandoned to it, coun- selled Europe to remedy the evil by reducing the extent of the States of the Church and the number of its subjects. " Nothing can be more just, natural, and easy than to emancipate the Adriatic provinces, and to shut up the Pope's despotism between the Medi- terranean and the'Appenines. I have shown that the towns of Ferrara, Ravenna, Bologna, Rimini, and Ancona are those that are most impatient of the, pontifical.yoke and the most worthy of freedom : deliver them. To accom- plish this miracle no more is needed than a stroke of the pen, and the eagle's quill that signed the treaty of Paris is still nibbed. "There would remain to the Pope a million of subjects and two millions of hectares, in a bad enough agricultural condition I admit ; but perhaps the diminution of his revenue would incite him to administer his property better, and to make a more profitable use of his resources.

" One of two things would ensue : either he would enter upon a good course of government, and the condition of his subjects would become en- durable ; or he would persist in the error of his predecessors, and the Mediterranean provinces would in their turn demand their independence. "At the worst, and in the last alternative, the Pope would still retain the City of Rome, his palaces, his temples, his cardinals, his prelates, his priests, his monks, his princes and his lackeys. Europe would send vic- tuals to this little colony.

" Rome, encompassed by the world's reverence as by a wall of China, would be, as it were, a foreign body in the midst of free and living Italy. The country would suffer from it neither more nor less than a veteran suffers from a ball forgotten by the surgeon. " But will the Pope and the cardinals easily make up their minds to be nothing but ministers of religion ? Will they renounce with a good grace their political influence ? Will they lose in one day the habit of interfering in our affairs, of setting princes in arms against one another, and of discreetly stirring up subjects against their kings? I doubt it. . " But princes, on their part, will be able to use the right of lawful self- defence. They will reperuse history. They will see that the strong go- vernments are those which have held religious authority in their own hands ; that the Senate of Rome did not allow the Carthaginian priests the privilege of preaching in Italy ; that the Queen of England and the Empe- ror of Russia are the heads of' the Anglican and the Russian religions, and that the sovereign metropolis of the churches of France ought by right to be in Paris."