a breach of the peace if several should fail to act in accordance with this compact.

The second article gives extracts from the resolutions adopted by the famous Diocesan Council of Pistoja in Tuscany, held in 1786 by Bishop Ricci. This Synod, which was attended by two hundred and thirty-four priests, took strong ground against the infallibility of the Pope, and in favor of thorough-going reforms; but it was promptly anathematized by the Pope, and finally failed, as all similar reformatory movements in the Roman Church have been failures.

French Reviews.

REVUE CHRETIENNE. (Christian Review.) No. IX. September 5, 1870.-1. PRESSENSE, Recent Excavations at Rome. The Palace of the Cæsars and the Catacombs. 2. BENJAMIN COUVE, Moral Criticism. 3. REY, Essay on the Death Penalty. 4. RUFFET, Lambert d'Avignon. 5. CHATONET, Refuge, (a Religious Poem.) No. X. October 10.-PRESSENSE, The National Defense.

No. XI. November.-1. PRESSENSE, The Situation. 2. ROGER HOLLARD, The 31st October. 3. PRESSENSE, The Question of Municipal Schools in the Department of the Seine. 4. BERSIER, The Good Side of the Siege of Paris.

No. XII. December.-1. PRESSENSE, The Situation. 2. H. C. MONOD, The Question of Communal Schools in the Department of the Seine.

No. XIII. December.-1. PRESSENSE, The Situation. 2. G. MONOD, Address at the General Prayer-Meeting held in the Temple of the Oratory on December 7. 3. FOLTZ, The Present Position of the Two Armies. 4. PRESSENSE, A Letter to the Journal des Debats on the Regeneration of France.

Like all the papers of Paris, the Revue Chretienne has passed through a severe ordeal during the last nine months. The siege of Paris by the Germans, as the above table of contents shows, has reduced this able exponent of Protestant principles to a small size, and the rule of the Commune has probably interfered with it still more, for we have received no number since those of December, 1870. The French Protestants, as was to be expected, warmly sympathized during the late war with the fate of their country, in spite of all the efforts made by fanatical priests to arouse popular prejudice against them as the co-religionists of the heretical Prussians. The republican form of government has many warm friends among the leading Protestants of France, and the pages of the above numbers of the Revue Chretienne fully prove how earnestly they participated in all the efforts for a liberal and yet lawful regeneration of their country; but their number was too small to show their influence during the late terrible crisis.

FOURTH SERIES, VOL. XXIII.-31

ART. IX.-FOREIGN RELIGIOUS INTELLIGENCE.

ROMAN CATHOLICISM,

THE OPPOSITION AGAINST THE VATICAN COUNCIL.-It is a remarkable proof of the marvelous strength of the Roman Catholic hierarchy that the opposition of the Bishops against the new doctrine of Papal Infallibility, which before the promulgation of the decree of the Vatican Council was so outspoken and unexpectedly determined, has now been entirely silenced. They know how to enforce obedience in Rome. Some of the members of the minority may have hoped to be able to escape an open submission by observing a total silence; but this would not satisfy the Pope. Every Bishop has been commanded to announce in an official circular to the whole clergy of his diocese the new doctrine of the Church, and, so far as we know, they now have all, with the only exception of three or four Orientals, obeyed. Great joy has in particular been produced by the submission of Bishop Dupanloup of Orleans, who, fervent in every thing he writes, is said to have delighted the Pope by the unexpectedly submissive tone of his letter of submission; but no Bishop of the whole world was watched with so great anxiety as the learned Bishop Hefele of Rottenburg, in Würtemberg. Having been from the earliest years of his priesthood Professor of Theology at Tübingen, the best Catholic theological school of the world, he has by numerous writings, and in particular by a voluminous history of all the Councils, acquired the reputation of one of the greatest Catholic scholars, and he is in particular looked upon as the most learned of all the Bishops. On this account alone his defection would have been a terrible blow; but not for this reason alone, for the open opposition of any German Bishop would have at once organized the tens of thousands of lay Catholics, who already had refused their submission, into an "Old Catholic Church." The Bishop appears to have long hesitated to comply with the orders of Rome, for the ultramontane papers of Germany, and even the ultramontane clergy of his own diocese, began to murmur against the indications of his disobedient spirit, and to suspect him of a heretical leaning. At length the Bishop has been induced to yield, and to issue the commanded pastoral letter to his diocese. An attentive reader need not to know any thing of the past history of the author of this document in order to see at once that it has been extorted from an undecided mind. Its language is that of the dryest judicial notification. It teems with so much learning that many of the less educated priests may have had some difficulty in understanding it at first reading. The main point is dispatched in a few lines, and the real meaning of the doctrine is said to consist in this-that formerly appeals from the decision of the Pope to an Ecumenical Council were regarded as lawful, while by the infallibility decree these appeals are in future inadmissible. It shows the importance which Rome attaches to the submission of this one man that this reluctant and undecided pastoral letter brought to its author at once a highly

recommendatory letter from the Papal Nuncio. Rome is overjoyed that the great ecclesiastical coup d'etat has been accomplished without a single Bishop in the wholly Christian countries raising the standard of revolt.

The conduct of the episcopate has probably confirmed the Holy Father and his advisers in the hope that without the leadership of a Bishop a serious rebellion would be impossible in a Church which wholly rests on the apostolical succession of an episcopal hierarchy. This hope, however, has probably been considerably disturbed by the events of the last months. In one country at least there has been a formidable beginning of a crystalized opposition. If the thousands of German Catholics who have made up their minds never to submit to the infallible Pope have not found a leader among their Bishops, they have the great satisfaction to have found as leader Dr. Döllinger, whom Catholic Germany has for nearly half a century revered as one of her greatest literary heroes, who has been the instructor of nearly every living German Bishop, and whom the Bishops, as long back as 1848, when their Church, in consequence of the great revolution of that year, had to undergo an entire reconstruction of her relation to the State, invited to their first national assembly as their theological adviser. Döllinger is now more than seventy years old. He is in the archdiocese of Munich the highest dignitary next to the Archbishop, and at the same time a member of the first Chamber of the Bavarian Parliament. He has always remained unyielding in his opposition to the decree of the Council, and among those who know him, not the least doubt was felt as to the reply he would give to the summons of the Archbishop to submit. His reply, which is dated March 28, is, in point of firmness and learning, fully up to the general expectation. Döllinger offers to prove before the annual meeting of the Bishops at Fulda, or before a committee of learned theologians appointed by the Archbishops, five points, namely: 1. That none of the biblical passages quoted by the Council in support of the new doctrinal decrees were interpreted by any of the Church Fathers in the sense which is now forced upon them. Having twice sworn, as a professor of theology, to accept and to interpret the Holy Scriptures no otherwise than according to the unanimous agreement of the fathers, Döllinger says he would violate his oath if he would accept the new decrees against the testimony of the Fathers. 2. The German Bishops now maintain that the doctrine of Papal Infallibility has been universally, or almost universally, believed in all the centuries of the Church. Döllinger, on the contrary, offers to prove that during the first one thousand years it was entirely unknown, and that it is contradicted by the clearest facts and testimonies. 3. He offers to prove that the Bishops of the Latin countries, Spain, Italy, South America, and France, who formed the large majority of the Bishops in Rome, were misled even as students of theology by theological band-books, in which the doctrine of Papal Infallibility is set forth after forged documents. He refers in particular to the works of Alfons Liguori and the Roman Jesuit, Perrone. 4. He offers to prove that two Ecumenical Councils and several Popes in the fifteenth century have decided the question of Papal Infallibility, and that their decisions directly

contradict the decree of the Vatican Council. 5. He finally offers to prove that the new decrees are thoroughly irreconcilable with the constitutions of the European States, and in support of this opinion he appeals to the judgment of any law faculty of the German universities. Döllinger next refers to several facts in the past ages of the Church to prove that his proposition is in accordance with the principles and the practice of the Church. He quotes in particular the Conference in 411 between two hundred and eighty-six Catholic and two hundred and seventy-nine Donatistic Bishops, and to the conferences between the Bohemians and the Councils of Constance and Basel. He recounts the efforts which were made by the German Bishops, including the Archbishop of Munich himself, during the Council to prevent the dogmatization of Papal Infallibility when they used to urge the same arguments with which now Döllinger supports his case. He concludes by saying that as a Christian, as a theologian, as a historian, and as a citizen, he cannot accept this doctrine.

The letter produced an extraordinary sensation throughout the Catholic world. The Archbishop at once (April 2) issued a pastoral letter, which was to be read from all the pulpits of the diocese, and soon followed this up by hurling against Döllinger the greater excommunication. As Döllinger in his letter had ventured to doubt whether any of the Catholic clergy really believed the new doctrine, numerous addresses were presented by the lower clergy to the Archbishop of Munich, assuring him of their sincere adhesion to the new doctrine. As the lower clergy are entirely in the hands of the Bishops, but few mustered courage to refuse the signing of the address which was presented to them; but outside of the parochial clergy the movement soon assumed large dimensions. Nearly a dozen professors of theology at the German universities openly sided with Döllinger, though they were, like him, suspended from priestly functions, and from the exercise of their professorial duties. The lay professors of the University of Munich almost unanimously (to the number of forty-four) signed a congratulatory address to Döllinger, thanking him for the bold stand taken, assuring him of their entire sympathy, and encouraging him to go forward. Similar addresses were sent to him by the Catholic lay professors of all the other universities. From the professors the movement extended to the students, who, throughout Germany, were unanimous in their demonstrations of sympathy. Many sympathetic addresses were also received from foreign countries, among which one signed by a large number of the professors of the University of Rome, naturally attracted special attention.

But only in Germany has a step been taken toward a practical organization. In all the large cities societies of "Old Catholics" have been formed, and several itinerant priests have been engaged to visit them and to preach to them. A general assembly of delegates from all parts of Germany is to be held in the course of the summer. The Town Council of Munich has removed from one of the city colleges a religious instructor for avowing his acceptance of the infallibility doctrine, and many Town Councils of Germany and Austria are determined to use all their power

in encouraging the Old Catholic movement against the papal hierarchy; but with all this the "Old Catholic " Church is still in a very embryonic state. It cannot assume definite shape until it has at least found Bishops to govern it, for only an Episcopal Catholic Church, like the Church of England and the Church of the Jansenists in Holland, can expect to rally considerable masses in its support.

A great deal will also depend on the attitude of the governments. If any of the governments-if, in particular, the government of the largest Catholic State, Bavaria-should comply with the wish of the Old Catholics, to regard them as the former Catholic State Church, to forbid the introduction of the doctrine of the Papal Infallibility into the pulpit and into the schools, to fill the episcopal sees and the theological chairs with men who repudiate the doctrine, it may yet be possible to sever the connection of a large portion of Catholic Germany with Rome. In all movements of this kind large masses are ready to follow the winning party, and no one in particular doubts that a large portion of the clergy, if they have to choose between the repudiation of papal infallibility or of their salary, would not hesitate to repudiate the former. In Bavaria a petition to the King to assume this position, and to protect the Old Catholic Church against the encroachments of Popery, received within a few days no less than twelve thousand signatures—a clear proof how important the movement would soon become if the government should be willing to take the desired course. The Committee which has circulated this petition embraces some of the highest officers of the kingdom, some representatives of the oldest nobility, and men who in literature and in politics have been thus far regarded as pillars of the Church. The petition calls the attention of the government to the fact that the Bavarian Bishops, although expressly forbidden by their government, have officially announced the infallibility doctrine, and that the clergy are now using the pulpit, the confessional, and all means within their power, to force this illegal doctrine upon a reluctant population. The petitioners represent that thousands and thousands of Catholic men are afraid of signing this petition, or are even making their submission, because they fear that the priests, by excommunicating them, will disturb their domestic peace, and ruin their business, and they therefore pray the King to put a stop to the lawless encroachments of the party which follows the dictates of Rome, and to head the combat against Italian arrogance and ignorance.

The government of Bavaria has never recognized the Vatican Council, and the King has repeatedly assured Döllinger of his personal sympathy with the course taken by him; but it is feared that he lacks the necessary firmness to play the part which the liberal Catholics of his kingdom, and of the whole world, hope he may play, and which, if successfully played, would secure to him an immortal fame in history. From the other Catholic princes nothing is to be expected. The Emperor of Austria is believed to have given a reluctant consent to the liberal legislation which has of iate been introduced into the empire. The present minority is suspected of ultramontane tendencies, and is very reserved in its official expressions.