DE PRESSKNSÉ ON MEN AND TARTIES. 187 



" Three events of iinniensc weight and senile have marked tlie 

 reign of Pius IX., and have given over Catholicism irretrievably 

 to ultramontane domination : the definition of the dogma of the 

 Immaculate Conception in 1854, the Austrian concordat of 185."), 

 iind the Encyclical of 18(»t. These acts shut up Catholicism in 

 a circle from which there is no es(,-ape. 



" We are not now discussing theology ; we are giving the his- 

 tory of a religious movement. In this view, the proclamation 

 of the Immaculate Conception seems to us the most important 

 fact in the annals of Catholicism for more than a centur}'. Noth- 

 ing but ab.solute inditferencc as to the result, or the absolute 

 certainty of success among our contemporaries, could have caused 

 the event to pass almost without notice. Nevertheless, let us re- 

 member the date of the eighth of December, 18'>4. It marks the 

 advent of a new Catholicism, which we may term ultra-Catholi- 

 cism, from which the spirit of the age and modern societ}' can 

 hope for neither truce nor mercy. 



" As to the manner of proceeding, care was taken that the rival 

 power to the papacy, the episcopacy, should find itself not only 

 nullified but vilitied — which is the most irreparable sort of de- 

 struction. They had an eye to this when the}^ invited to Rome 

 two hundred bishops. All deliberation was forbidden them, and 

 there they stood by, dumb and smiling, at the most solemn act 

 of Catholic life, the definition of a dogma. From that hour they 

 descended from the authority of pastors to the level of the flock, 

 and the everlasting ambition of Rome was satisfied. The iulal- 

 libility of the Pope, which France had run aground for centuries, 

 was under full headway amid the applauses of the Catholic 

 world. The theocracy of Gregory VII. was revived with greater 

 authority. The doctrinal and political consequences of it have 

 not been slow in follovriug, and the future will completely de- 

 velop them. 



" I know there arc worthy members of the clergy who blame, 

 and groan, and hope in secret. But is it possible for Catholicism 

 to go backward V At the point where it is now fighting, the 

 Church has, so to speak, bui-ncd its boats. All hope of reforma- 

 tion is lost. 



" The teeming movement of modern life is sundering itself 

 from the old counter-revwlutionary Church, frozen stiff by ultra- 

 montane dogma. In that Church superstition is spreading wide 

 its reign, having no congenial ally but the subtleties of scholas- 

 tic and rabbinic science. Bordas predicted v.hat would be the 



