590 



KOMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH. 



venerable brethro/i ; and, although the faithful com- 

 mitted to you, by letters or by grave documents in 

 form of protests, have shown us how outraged they 

 are at the condition that oppresses us, and how far 

 they are from being deceived by the cheats called 

 " safeguards," we yet consider it a part of our apos- 

 tolic duty that we should declare solemnly, through 

 you, to the whole world, that not only what are 

 called safeguards, and which are devised by the sub- 

 alpine government, but that all titles, honors, immu- 

 nities, and privileges, whatever shape they take, 

 under the general name of safeguards, or guarantee*, 

 can be of no avail whatever toward securing the 

 prompt and free use of the power divinely trans- 

 mitted to us, nor toward guarding the liberty neces- 

 sary for the Church. 



Such being the condition of affairs, as we have 

 repeatedly declared and professed that, without the 

 crime of breaking our solemn oath (at enthroniza- 

 tion), we can consent to no conciliation which, in 

 any manner, would destroy or diminish the rights of 

 God and of the Apostolic See, so now, as of our 

 bounden duty, we declare that we will never agree 

 to, or accept, nor can we so agree to or accept, those 

 cunningly wrought-out safeguards, or guarantees, 

 proposed by the subalpine government, whatever 

 their device ; or any_ others of whatsoever kind, or 

 however ratified, which, under the form of securing 

 our sacred power and liberty, shall have been offered 

 to us in lieu of, and in exchange for, that civil prin- 

 cipality with which Divine Providence willed that 

 the Holy Apostolic See should be furnished and 

 strengthened, and which is ratified to us by legiti- 

 mate and irrefragable titles, as well as by possession 

 for more than eleven centuries. For it is most clear 

 to every one that, were the Koman Pontiff to be sub- 

 jected to the rule of another prince, and not to be 

 possessed himself of a real sovereignty, he could be 

 exempt neither in his own person nor in the acts of 

 his apostolic ministry from the control of that ruler 

 to whom he would be subject, and who might become 

 a heretic or a persecutor of the Church ; or, again, 

 might be at war with other rulers, or, otherwise, in 

 a state of war. 



And, indeed, is not this very concession of safe- 

 guards, of which we speak, a most clear proof that 

 no other right than what the will of lay rulers pre- 

 scribes and decrees is attributed to us, who have the 

 divinely-given authority of making laws regarding 

 the moral and religious order to us, who are con- 

 stituted the interpreter, throughout the world, of 

 natural and of divine right. 



And as to what regards the relations of the Church 

 and civil society, you know perfectly well, venerable 

 brethren, that all the prerogatives 2 and all the rights 

 of authority necessary to governing the Universal 

 Church, have been received by us, in the person of 

 the most blessed Peter, directly from God Himself. 

 Nay, those prerogatives and rights, and the very 

 liberty of the Church, were born and acquired by 

 the blood of Jesus Christ, and are to be valued by 

 the infinite price of His divine blood. Ill, then, 

 would we deserve of the divine blood of our Ke- 

 deemer, were we which God forbid! to borrow 

 these our rights, especially lessened and debased as 

 they wish to lend them, from rulers of the earth, 

 who are sons, not masters, of the Church. Thus 

 said to princes, fittingly, that great light of sanctity 

 and doctrine, Anselm, Archbishop of Canterbury : 



Think not that tho Church of God is given you as to a 

 master, to make use of her, but that she is commended 

 to you as her advocate and champion. Nothing more 

 pleases God than the liberty of His Church. 



And the same saint wrote in another place, adding 

 incentives to duty : 



Never count that your dignity ib lessened, if you defend 

 and cherish the liberty of the Church. Deem not that it 

 humbles you, when you exalt her, Think not that you 

 are weakened when you strengthen her. Lift up your 

 eves, and look all about you ; examples are at your hand. 

 Meditate on the princes who fight against the Church, 



and trample on her. See whether it is profiting them ! 

 What is becoming of them is too plain to need speaking 

 of. Assuredly, they who promote her glory, with her 

 and in her, will find their own glory. tit. Anselm, Epp. 



^ And now, venerable brethren, after what at other 

 times, and here, we have explained to you, it surely 

 can be dark to no one that the wrongs done in these 

 woful times to the Holy See have redounded on the 

 whole Christian commonwealth. The wrongs of the 

 Apostles, as St. Bernard says, since these are tho 

 glorious rulers of the earth, affect every Christian ; 

 and since, as St. Anselm says, again, the Koman 

 Church works for all the churches, whosoever takes 

 away any thing belonging to her is recognized as 

 guilty of sacrilege, not only against her but against 

 all the churches. Nor is there a shadow of a doubt 

 that the keeping of the rights of this Apostolic See 

 is most closely joined and tied to the highest pur- 

 poses and interests of the whole Church, and to the 

 liberty of your episcopal ministry. 



Thinking and meditating on all these matters, we 

 are bound anew to enforce and to profess, what we 

 have oftentimes declared, with your unanimous con- 

 sent, that the civil sovereignty of the Holy See luis 

 been given to the Koman Pontiff by a singular coun- 

 sel of Divine Providence ; and that it is of necessity, 

 in order that the Koman Pontiff may exercise the 

 supreme power and authority, divinely given to him 

 by the Lord Christ Himself, of feeding and rulinf 

 the entire flock of the Lord with fullest liberty, and 

 may consult for the greater good of the Church, and 

 its interests and needs, that he shall never be subject 

 to any prince or civil power. 



You, venerable brethren, and with you the faithful 

 committed to your care, knowing these things well, 

 are justly moved, all of you, for religion's sake, and 

 for the sake of justice and of peace, the foundation 

 of all other good things, and you have given to the 

 memory of future generations the worthy sight of 

 faith and love, constancy and firmness on behalf of 

 the Church of God. and in her defence, in which you 

 have set a new and noble example. But, since the 

 God of all mercies is also the Author of these good 

 dispositions, we lift our eyes, our hearts, our hopes, 

 to Him ; unceasingly beseeching him that He will 

 increase, strengthen, and confirm the excellent dis- 

 positions and the piety that is common to you and to 

 the faithful ; and we, also, earnestly exhort you, and 

 the people committed to your watchfulness, that, as 

 the contest waxes in its heat, you will call to the 

 Lord with us, more fervently, and with more effusion 

 of heart, that He may Himself hasten the days when 

 He will again smile on us. 



God grant, also, that the rulers of this earth 

 whom it much imports that such a pernicious exam- 

 ple of usurpation as we endure may not take root 

 and flourish to the destruction of all power and order 

 may join with one consent of minds and wills, and 

 that, hushing quarrels, the disturbances of rebellions 

 being appeased, and the deadly counsels of the sects 

 abandoned, they may unite in one movement for 

 restoring to this Holy See its rights, and, with these, 

 his full liberty to the visible head of the Church, and 

 the desired calm to civil society 1 Nor less, vener- 

 able brethren, plead with the Divine mercy in your 

 prayers and in those of the faithful, that the hearts 

 of the wicked, escaping from the blindness of their 

 minds, may be converted, before the great and fear- 

 ful day of the Lord shall come ; or else that He, in 

 crushing their infamous counsels, will show how 

 foolish they are who strive to overthrow the rock 

 that Christ has set, and to violate His Divine privi- 



On these prayers our firmest hopes in God 

 are founded. " Think ye, that God can turn away 

 His ear from His most dear spouse, when she shall 

 have cried out to Him, while resisting those who 

 have been torturing her ? How will He not recog- 

 nize the bone of His bones, and the flesh of His 

 flesh ay, rather, in some sense, the spirit of His 

 Spirit? Now, indeed, is the hour of malice and the 



