THE EPISCOPAL JUBILEE OF LEO XIII.
THE unforeseen is the salt of history,—the only com- fort that can be offered to the many anxious souls who have been reduced to a calm despair by Mr. Pearson, s terrible picture of the Democratic future. Nowhere has the unforeseen had a larger field than in the fortunes of the Roman Church. A volume might be made up of the unfulfilled prophecies of which she has 'been the Object in the columns of the Times alone. She has tottered to her fall again and again. She has finally alienated the respect an intelli- gent sympathy of every honest and man more times than can be reckoned up. She has definitively cast in her lot with the losing side. She has, of her own deliberate choice, broken with all that is vital and progressive in human thought. She has taken for her share of the world's inhabitants the worn-out races whose extinction is only a question of time. She has, in fact, in the opinion of her critics, made every mistake that it is possible for a falling Church to make. And yet she lives, and not only lives, but flourishes and grows. If there is countries in which she is less powerful than she i was, t s among those that are most backward and un- progressive. She is stronger in England, in Germany, in prance, and in the United States. If she has lost ground, i it s in Ireland and in the South American Republics. The Pope's thoughts must have turned much on this aspect of the Church during the past week. He celebrated on Sunday his episcopal jubilee. He was a Bishop when Gregory XVI. was Pope, when the old European order was still unchanged, when France was yet a Monarchy, and Italy a geographical expression. The whole Pontificate of P. ius IX. had still to run its course,--the brief demo- cratic fervour, the long absolutist reaction, the months when n the Church planted trees of liberty, the years during which she sat at her ease protected by French bayonets, the conversion of the old Rome, the city of pilgrims, artists, and the English colony, into a new—and bankrupt —capital. Every age, perhaps, is given to exaggerate the changes it has witnessed ; but when he compares 1893 with 1843, Leo XIII. may be pardoned if he thinks that upon him, more than upon other men, the ends of the world are come. And yet, though so much is different, Leo XIII. is cele- brating his jubilee amid a sympathy for a parallel to which we should have to go back many centuries. No Pope since the Reformation—none for a long period before the Reformation—has enjoyed the same general good-will. Catholic and Protestant Governments, the oldest Monarchy and the newest Republic, combine to do him honour. His wisdom, his moderation, his kindliness, his love of peace, and his readiness to make sacrifices in order to secure it, are the theme of almost universal praise. And the praise has been well deserved. He can claim the very high merit of looking facts full in the face. He has fairly gauged the forces arrayed against him, and known when to yield and when to stand out. He has brought the German Kulturkampf to a successful issue, and seen the most powerful statesman of the modern world forced to undo his own work. Yet, wonderful as this success was, the Pope was not carried away by it. He could appreciate the distinction between reasonable and unreasonable demands on the part of the State, even when the reasonable demands were urged in an unreasonable spirit. In Germany, the State assumed to itself the right of direct interference in the internal management of the Church. In France, the State resisted the implied claim of the Church to determine the form of government. There was much to be said on behalf of the German pretension, and it was easy to put it forward as really prompted by a desire to bring the Church into greater accord with the national life, and to improve the standard of ecclesiastical culture. But anxious as Leo XIII. has always shown himself to be on good terms with Temporal Sovereigns—the king of Italy excepted—he saw that if the German claim were conceded, the Church would cease to be mistress in her own house, and on this ground he held out until even Prince Bismarck grew tired of the conflict. In France, the situation was to all ap- pearance far more unfavourable for the Church. In the Education Law, and in the Military Law, an avowed attack was made on two of the most important aspects of her work,—the training of children and the training of the clergy. Schools from which all mention of God was excluded were set up in every commune, and every young priest was compelled to spend an incongruous and un- necessary year in a barrack-room. It is not wonderful that under this treatment the French clergy came to regard the Republic as a necco sary and implacable enemy. It was reserved for the Pope to see that, so long as the clergy confounded the Republic with the Republican Government, Frenchmen would confound the Church with the Monarchy. To the policy which was born of this clearness of vision, he has steadily adhered under all the provocations that successive Ministers of Worship could offer him, and all the temptations supplied by the discredit the Panama business has brought upon the Republic. There is a remarkable contrast in this respect between Leo XIII. and his prede- cessor, Pius lx„ like Fuzzy-Wuzzy, was "a first-class fighting man." He never stopped to count the cost of the battle, or to weigh the odds against success. But he was nothing of a strategist. The moment he saw an enemy, he went for him, without stopping to ask himself whether the enmity was real or only apparent, or whether the ends which victory would bring might not be gained by some less dangerous method. The traditional policy of the Roman Church, in the development of which a century or two goes for nothing, was in abeyance during his reign. He fought as though the end of the world were close at hand, and the great point, when that end came, was to be found in arms on the right side. One exception, however, there is to this strongly marked distinction between the two Popes. Unlike in everything else, they are alike in their attitude to- wards the Kingdom of Italy. Where the Temporal Power is concerned, Leo XIII. is as obstinate as Pius IX. He can make large allowances for other Governments, but none for that which sits in the Quirinal. Of the motives which induced him to make no change in the Italian policy of the Vatican, the Pope has never given any ex- planation. It may be assumed, however, that he regards the security for his spiritual freedom offered by the Law of Guarantees as altogether illusory, and that he hopes that the Italian Government may hereafter be brought by force of circumstances to offer him better terms. As regards the first of these points, we have no doubt the Pope is right. The Law of Guarantees rests on no surer foundation than the Union between Ireland and Great Bri- tain, and it can hardly be said that this is a foundation which no current of popular feeling can shake. What is to prevent the Liberal Italian Ministry from making the repeal of the Law of Guarantees a party cry ? As regards the second point, the Pope is at least as likely to have accurate information as any foreign journalist. If he looks forward to the growth of political conditions which will make the union of the Conservative elements in the Italian people a first object with the Italian Monarchy, the recent bank scandals are not likely to have made him less sanguine. It is possible, too, that the very mildness with which he treats other Powers may be intended to show the Italian Government on what easy terms the support of the Church might be obtained, if some modue vivendi could but be discovered between the spiritual and the civil allegiance of the Italian people. Let the independence which the exercise of his spiritual function demands, be secured by some sanction higher than the passing will of a Parlia- mentary majority, and he might be to King Humbert what he has already been to President Ca,rnot.
These, we imagine, may be some of the thoughts with which Leo XIII. was occupied during the magnificent ceremonial of Sunday last. To any one it must have been both fatiguing and exciting, to a man of his age, both the fatigue and the excitement must have been extreme. And to Leo XIII. these things have all come in the last fifteen years of his life. For the first thirty-five years of his long episcopate, he was scarcely known beyond the limits of his diocese, and had little or no opportunity of shaping the Papal policy. Then came the sudden change which placed him in a position of singular dignity, and one which, as we have seen, it only rested with himself to make one of singular importance. The Papacy is the great opportunity of old men, and of men who have husbanded their powers of mind and will. It needed a long preparation of silence and waiting to turn Cardinal Pecci into Leo XIII.
Previous page
