T HE new Encyclical marks, we think, though one always speaks
with reserves about proclamations issued by the Papacy, at least a tendency to a fresh departure. Cautiously as he words his views, the Pope evidently wishes to recede from the boycotting policy which his predecessors have pursued towards the Italian Government. He permits the Bishops of Italy, when they see fit, to authorise their flocks to vote, or otherwise intervene in political discussion. That seems to Pro- testant Englishmen a very small concession ; but it is in fact an admission that the house of Savoy, however ill- advised or blameworthy, no longer appears to the Papacy so wicked that contact with it, whatever its immediate object, must necessarily defile. It is no longer pitch, but, let us say, earth or dirty water. Neither Pope nor Bishop can sanction an admitted immorality, and voting for or against the Government of Italy is therefore no longer immoral. The political effect of this recession from the sterner policy will not be of great direct importance, because a very small section of Italians have attended to the inhibition ; but so far as it is operative, it will increase the strength of the King's Government, and of Con- servatism generally. The families which, in North Italy especially, are sincerely Papal belong for the most part to those classes whose interests as well as their convictions induce them to dread as well as despise extreme Liberalism of any kind. They want above all things order, and if they enter the political arena at all, must, to be of the smallest weight, rally round the Throne. The house of Savoy, which is neither Protestant nor sceptical, though it has never admitted. the absolute right of the Papacy to terri- torial sovereignty, will feel that ; and the total effect of the Encyclical, though it is not reconciliation, will tend towards the long-desired modus vivendi between the Papacy and the " intruding Power." It is not, however, this new lenity of regard towards the existing system in Italy which constitutes the importance of the Encyclical. It is almost in form an abandonment of what we may describe as the " Manning" policy of the Roman Church. That policy may be best described as an alliance, informal but not the less real, between the Church and the extreme democracy. Betrayed by the Kings, and resolutely opposed by the middle classes and the aristocracy of the workmen, a section of the Curia, of which Cardinal Manning was one, brought themselves to believe that strength might be found for the Church in the adhesion of the very poor. That is always an attractive idea to those who remember the early progress of Christianity, and those in whom, however unconsciously, philanthropy has become a religion which almost swallows up their dogmatic faith. The cultivated, moreover, and especially the cultivated clergy, always have a secret dread of the " ugly rush " of the proletariat, and are apt to forget that " the masses " are not a mass, but a collection of an almost infinite number of grades, divided perhaps more deeply from each other than are those who reckon themselves above them. The suggestion, therefore, caught on even with persons so astute and experienced as the heads of the Roman Church ; and for some years past that Church has been accused of having coerced the Tories and embarrassed the Liberals of the countries under her dominion by playing off against them the lowest sections of the great body of the people. In Italy this movement has been very marked, and is believed to have led to scenes like those which some years ago disgraced Milan.
As might have been expected from his temperament, which is essentially that of a good-natured squire, the present Pope regards this policy with little favour. He is really a religious man, and the open and violent irreligion which usually marks that section of the Continental prole- tariat which calls itself Socialist probably at once disgusts and alarms him. Their language, no doubt, may be far in advance of their real thought, for thousands of them, while blaspheming, remain superstitious ; but it is such as no Christian priesthood in the world can be expected to tolerate with approval. In France they are almost openly anti-Christian, and aro intensely anti-Clerical ; and both in Italy and Austria they proclaim ideas the result of which would be that the Church as a mighty organisa- tion would cease to exist. The Pope, therefore, calls on all good Roman Catholics, whoa permitted to vote by their Bishops, to join in resisting these forces of disorder, and expressly names the Socialists as one of the parties from whom good is not to be expected. That in a Roman Catholic country is a. very grave reproof for them, and will at once discourage any attempt of the priests to form those secret alliances which, though constantly. exaggerated by a substantially sceptical Press, it is difficult to doubt have in many places and in many circumstances been more or less secretly arranged. Under an order which no priest of the Church will entirely disregard, he can no longer appeal to the mob as a political force, or even to the organised " Socialists " who are above the mob, but who proclaim themselves everywhere as " emancipated " from priestly guidance or control.
Some of the over-subtle leaders of the Roman Catholic Church who feel greatly the want of physical forces at their disposal will seriously regret this Encyclical ; but we fancy it will be found that, on the whole, Pius X. has been wisely advised to issue it. That the slave is the natural and instinctive friend of Christianity may be assumed, and consequently that Christianity owes much guidance and protection to the slave ; but it is not while the slave is attacking society, or blaspheming all creeds alike, that his assistance is religiously most acceptable. Roman Catholicism, considered as a, political force, will probably do better for itself by regaining its old conservative position, and announcing itself in sympathy with that' individualism which is the guarantee of property, and with which in the popular mind for many generations' it has been more or less habitually associated. No doubt its leaders proclaim with great wisdom, and, of course, entire truth, that they can accept any form of government' so long as it is sanctified by obedience to the Church, and allows perfect freedom to the successors of St. Peter. But it can hardly be wise as yet to throw over the Kings, or to arouse in the well-to-do a suspicion that at heart monks must always be in favour of Collectivism. The Papacy will certainly not regain temporal power by means of a' popular rush, and it is hard to see how a party which in France may almost be considered anti-Christian, which in Italy is simply irreligious, and which in Spain is clamouring for the secularisation of all Church property can be an available instrument for that triumph of the faith which the leaders of the Church, even when most absorbed in temporal matters, never entirely forget to be the raison d'être of their organisation. The Church may one day centuries hence accept Collectivism as an ideal realisation of the Christian scheme, but intermediately her natural alliance is in politics with those classes whose members, if they do too often disregard Christian precepts, never do it without a feeling that they are departing from the right way. The guiding force of the nations is With. them, and, at all events, while the struggle between Labour and Capital continues, it is probable that readiness to revhrence the precepts of the great organised. Churches will remain with them also. We hardly know why it should be so, for, in spite of Christ's cautions—as in the Parable of the Pennies—many adumbrations of Collectivism may be detected in the Gospels ; but at the present moment and on the Continent it is not from among the Socialists that a revival of religion as Roman Catholics understand it is to be expected. Even when they are rather Radicals than true Socialists they always incline, with Gambetta, to describe clericalism as the great enemy. It is the special note of Roman Catholicism that its devotees when sinters must always be more or less politically " clerical."
Previous page
