It is admitted by the Freeman's Journal that the Pope,
after mature consideration of the evidence on both sides, has passed an official and formal condemnation on both boycotting and the "Plan of Campaign." Both are pronounced immoral, —the "Plan," because "it is unlawful to break voluntary contracts;" boycotting, because it is contrary to charity. The Parnellites assert that the decision will make no difference, and no doubt that is true, as regards the revolutionary party among their adherents ; but it will compel the priests to condemn the two forbidden methods, and will deepen the cleavage between them and their dangerous allies. It will, moreover, waken the consciences of the few pious Catholics who have been led away by the movement, will give decent Catholic tenants an excuse for honesty, and, above all, will restore some of the weakened respect for the Catholic Church. Those who respect that faith, without accepting it, were beginning to believe that the Papacy would neglect its plainest moral duties, and sanction agrarian crime all over the world, rather than run a faint risk of a petty and momentary schism. Fortunately, a moral duty is precisely the point on which Leo XIII. is firm.
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