The penal Bill disendowing without disestablishing the Roman Church in
Prussia is sure to pass, and it is even stated that it is to be followed by severer measures intended to destroy the Roman Catholic Episcopacy altogether, by making the lay element - supreme. This, however, is at present only rumour, but the first two clauses of the Disendowment Bill have passed the Diet, the first by 263 votes against 88. Prince Bismarck supported the Bill with a speech on Tuesday in which he quite agreed that all men ought to serve God rather than man, but thought it was serving God rather than man to serve the German Emperor rather than the Pope. He charged the Roman Catho- lics with hypocrisy in pretending both that their cause had gained by persecution, and that the Catholic Church had been destroyed by it. He concluded his speech by an odd remark, the drift of which we do not quite understand :—" From this law, too, I expect no result" ("Ich ertearte auch von diesem Gesetze keinen Erfoly"). Surely the Prince does not mean that he expects no one to suffer under it, for in that case he would not apparently class it in the same category with the former laws, which -certainly have had enough result of that sort, though not the result of putting down Romanism. Probably he means that it will not extinguish the spirit of the Roman Catholics. We should think not. He must take to his old recipe, "blood and iron," to do that. At present be is but whetting the edge of Roman Catholic conviction.
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