THE PRESENT POSITION OF CATHOLICS IN PKANCE. 



181 



checkmated, however, partly by the obstinacy and fanaticism 

 of the extreme royalists and clericals, who opposed the methods 

 and policy of Leo ; partly by the imprudence and over-haste of 

 his supporters, especially the monks. These flung all caution 

 to the winds, threw themselves into electoral contests, 

 utilised malodorous pretendere like Boulanger, and proclaimed 

 their policy openly by their abominable press, their shameless 

 methods, and their innumerable organisations. The Picpubhc 

 was in the gravest danger from about 1886 onwards; audits 

 eyes were only opened eftectually by the crimes and scandals 

 of the Dreyfus case. 



To meet these dangers the Eepublicans rallied and formed 

 a united party, the hloc, under "Waldeck-Eousseau, which faced 

 the whole situation resolutely. It began by dealing with the 

 unauthorised religious orders and their p^roperty, and then it 

 passed on to education. Leo Xlll. behaved, as always, like a 

 statesman. He saw the shipwreck of his policy without any 

 idle recriminations. He allowed no disturbance over the anti- 

 monastic legislation : and he resolved to make the best terms 

 possible out of existing circumstances. As long as he lived, 

 separation was not a practical question : but, thanks to Pius X. 

 and his ad\isers, the whole aspect of things was changed in 

 the autumn of 1903. Cardinal Sarto was a nonentity, an 

 average Italian parochial ecclesiastic : a reader of nothing but 

 his breviary, and not a scholar of that ; trained only in and 

 by his seminary, and wholly undeveloped since ; absolutely 

 unversed in great affairs ; speaking no language but his own. 

 and that in a provincial dialect. He owed his election to tlie 

 veto, ostensibly of Austria, but more probably of Germany. 

 By this veto. Cardinal Eampolla, a great Secretary of State, the 

 confldant of Leo XIII., and a warm friend of France, w"as 

 excluded, though his election was absolutely certain, and was 

 on the point of being declared. The new Pope chose as his 

 Secretary of State a young man, half Irish, half Spaniard, and 

 a British subject, but not a francophil, and evidently a blind 

 tool of the Jesuits. Thus the diplomatic influence of Germany 

 and of the Society of Jesus has been supreme in the Vatican 

 since 190o, with the results which we have witnessed. It is 

 a very dangerous and sinister alliance : of militarism and 

 Jesuitism, of autocracy and theocracy, fortunately, it has not 

 been successful so far ; but circumstances might easily arise in 

 which thi^ combination would see a chance of reahsing their 

 several ambitions through war, especially after the late encour- 

 aging experiences of Austria : to which we have been able to 



