THE MAJORITY AT THE VATICAN COUNCIL.
ITo THE EDITOR OF THE " SPECTATOR:1
'SIR, —I have not seen the record of the Vatican Council quoted in your last impression as stating the number of Italian Bishops at 106 (including those of the Roman States) and of Bishops in diartibus (including missionary Bishops) at only 53. But there must be some great mistake, either in the quotation or the authority referred to. On turning to the forty-seventh -of the Letters of Quirinus (p. 540 of the English translation), I find the Bishops of the Italian Kingdom reckoned at 120—only 10 of whom joined the opposition—those of the (former) States of the Church at 143, and the titular Bishops without dioceses (i.e., ex- 'elusive of missionary Bishops) at 120, moat of whom were created by the present Pope,—some 50 of them, it is elsewhere stated, -during the preparations for the Council. Quirinus is generally ?far the most reliable authority on the Council, and the attempts hitherto made, as, e.g., by Bishop Ketteler, to impeach his accuracy Fhave signally failed. Bat even supposing there is some Accidental exaggeration in the statement, there can be no doubt that the numbers cited in the Spectator are considerably 'under half the vast amount. It follows, of course, that the writer's inferences as to the Pope being able to reckon on "about -200 votes" would also be enormously below the mark, even if the Spanish prelates, both home and colonial, amounting to over 100, were not quite as "safe," for the most part, as their Italian and titular brethren.
Archbishop Kenrick gives the ordinary computation in his first pamphlet, and, I think, reckons the Italians only at 274, but I shave not got it by me to refer to. In his recent Erkleirung addressed to the Archbishop of Munich, Dr. Dollinger speaks of he Bishops of Italy, Spain, South America, and France (the French are about 90), as fonhing "the immense majority" of those present at Rome.
As the point is one of some importance, especially just now, I Ftrust you may be able to find room for this correction.—I am,
[There was a mistake in our numbers. The right numbers of }Bishops present, not entitled to be present, should have been, Italian Bishops, including States of the Church, 162, and titular Bishops in partibus present, exclusive of Missionary Bishops, 53. For the rest, as for the Spanish Bishops, their votes may have been "sale ;" but if so, they were safe, we suppose, for reasons in- dependent of any special pressure,—because the Catholicity of the Spanish priesthood is ultramontane, and not because the opinions of the prelates were overruled by illegitimate influence. Why was not Spain as much entitled to an independent vote on one side, as Germany or Hungary on the other? We suppose the Liberal Catholics trust Quirinus most, and the Roman Catholics trust the Pope most.—En. Spectator.]
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