enjoy the spectacle of a combat a outrance between the
Papacy and a Roman Catholic Power. The civil authority even in France, where it is spoken of as if it were semi- divine, is too well aware of the inconveniences which such a conflict would entail, and too much afraid of an alliance between the Church and the militarism which influences all classes in French society. A conscription implies an immense weight of influence in the hands of the caste which the conscripts obey, and that caste is rarely or never favourable to a Republic. The governine. men even in Germany dread that section of their voters to whom the Papacy suggests decisions ; and though Frenchmen as a body may be more or less agnostic, they are swayed in details by their wives and daughters, and would grow slowly annoyed with a Government which compelled them to pay for the offices which for centuries have been pro- vided either out of the wealth of the Church or out of the general revenue of the State. On the other hand, the Papacy, haughty as are its pretensions, has learned by the experience of centuries to avoid desperate decisions, and when governed by honest men never quite forgets that its raison d'être is to save, if not mankind, at least its own devotees, and not to cut them off irretrievably from the merit and the safety to be found in submission. It is centuries since a Pope has ventured to issue the one decree which can coerce a Roman Catholic State, and, by placing a nation under an Interdict, compel the humblest man to consider as a matter personal to himself what his rulers are doing. That most democratic of expedients may one day be adopted as a counsel of despair, perhaps with results which will surprise philosophers ; but the Papacy fears lest the humbler clergy, who do not expect bishoprics, should feel compassion for their flocks, and should, by pleading their dread of the civil authority, assume a practical independence of Rome. It is, no doubt, a, very singular fact in history that in no case since the death of Henry VIII. has the pride of nationality induced a Roman Catholic Government to come to a final rupture with Rome; nor has the influence of any ambitious ecclesiastic been sufficient to induce his colleagues to accept the separation of their national Church from the grand corporation which, in a world that is mostly heathen, has maintained consistently through the ages that its rights are universal. The Papacy, however, has never forgotten the English precedent, and never provokes a national Church into general and permanent rebellion.
We incline to believe, therefore, in spite of much that is now reported, that the conflict between the Vatican and the French electorate will end, like the Kulturkampf, in a compromise not altogether to the discredit of the ecclesi- astical power. We must admit, however, that the present quarrel is a very serious one, and may even end by possi- bility, as it ended during the Revolution, in a momentary " rending of the seamless robe." Speaking as we should speak if the Papacy were a temporal power, we should say that the present Pope, though an able and conscientious man, has fallen into bad hands,—is informed and guided, that is, by men whose zeal is far in excess of their judgment. His present Secretary of State, Mgr. Merry del Val, has not the serene adroitness of Cardinal Rampolla. The method by which he has advised the Pope to avenge the Church on a hostile French Ministry is singularly imprudent. He has tried to make of an ecclesiastical prerogative—which is, we suppose, undoubted—an in- strument to override the Concordat, which is at all events the basis of the claim of the French clergy to a State provision. The Pope has summoned two recal- citrant Bishops to Rome to explain their recent con- duct, and has threatened one of them who does not intend to obey with excommunication, which will, of course, prevent his exercising any episcopal function. Unfortunately, the first motive of the Concordat is to prevent that very method of action. Under the provisions of that great treaty the Pope has no power to appoint or to remove a Bishop without the previous consent of the civil authority. Yet it is clear that if his Holiness can excommunicate a Bishop without that consent, he can, in practice, depose him from his chair. The French Govern- ment has, therefore, a clear legal right of remonstrance, and it has used this right, it is stated, in the most peremptory style. It has not merely requested the Pope to reconsider his judgment, or to comply with the formulas settled by the Concordat, but has demanded that he should cancel the letters despatched from the Holy Office, which under the system of the Church is the department which most directly represents the Pope. If the Cabinet which sanctioned this demand did not intend it as an insult, it must be singularly wanting in com- prehension of ecclesiastical etiquettes. The Pope cannot withdraw the letters merely because he is ordered in that rough style. His mouthpieces may state—indeed, it is said, have stated—that the letters conveyed only warnings, and not orders, to the offending prelate ; but it is rumoured that the Government will treat that answer as an evasion and not a withdrawal, and will declare that the Concordat has been broken, thus throwing all blame for the Disestablishment of the Church, which it is understood will follow, upon the Papacy alone.
A way out will, as we have hinted, doubtless be found, for one cannot imagine the diplomacy of the Vatican, trained by a thousand years of crises, wanting in the skill to baffle even M. Combes. But there is just one chance of the quarrel being pushed to extreme results. We expect compromise ; but to that opinion we must make one reserve. We do not feel quite certain that the present advisers of the Pope value the Concordat as greatly as has been the custom to imagine. It hampers them at every turn, and they may think that they would be freer and stronger for dealing with the Church of France if it were. disestablished. The Pope would then claim the absolute right of appointing and removing the greater ecclesiastics, and therefore, to use again the language of politics, of tuning the "faithful" electors to express themselves in one and the same key. As one-third of the French electorate is Conservative, and con- sequently either in accord or in alliance with clerics, this would be a most serious embarrassment to any French Government, and more especially to one which is well aware that the Bloc upon which it depends for its majority is divided by many rifts that it is most difficult to bridge. The " faithful " might hold the balance of power, as they do now in the German Chamber, and might insist, upon terms which the Government would find more difficult to endure than the broken Concordat. Germany, be it remembered, has. readmitted the Jesuits. Nevertheless, France is not Ger- many, and the risk involved in such a policy will, we think, appal the older counsellors of the Vatican. It may be taken as quite certain that the French Chambers will not accept Cavour's motto, Libera Chiesa in libero State, but will at least endeavour to keep the strong grip of the civil authority upon the most formidable of all the asso- ciations within the Republic ; and it is by no means clear that the mass of the population, which regards the civil authority as its main protection against both capitalists and clerics, will not support them in that endeavour. The Chambers may fail, for it remains true that you cannot cut down a ghost with a sword ; but they have on their side an influence which the Vatican, in spite of its iron determination, may secretly dread. There has always existed a Gallican party in the French Church, a party which, though in no way Protestant, regards Rome as more or less hostile, and which, pleading always compassion for the people, may assure to them the continuance of the offices which to the mind of a French peasant constitute the usefulness of the Church. He at least cares nothing for the curious threat that France shall cease to be considered the protector of all Christians in the East. In that event, despite the utter failure of the " constitutional " Bishops during the Revo- lution, the Papacy might lose France. It is most im- probable, however, that the Vatican will allow matters to be pushed so far, or will hesitate, if the danger becomes acute, to remove, as the French Government has already suggested, its present over-zealous advisers. The majority of influential members of the Curia are not the kind of men who love extreme courses, or who are disposed to allow a Jesuit Secretary of State to ride roughshod over the great tradition that, though the Church holds the depositum Fidei to be inviolable, and can meet any attack on it only by the old non possumus, it can make almost any concession regarding matters of discipline. The necessity of asking civil consent to the removal of a Bishop is, after all, only a question of discipline.
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