The Express.
London, England, 1864-11-21 00:00:00

[Stamped, id. Additional.]

FRANCE.

(now oOR owl oolusroeurs,.l
PARIS, SATURDAY EVINTRO.
The semi-official journals are now authorised to
be very hard upon the Pope. The Pays, which not
long ago was edifyingly pious, now publishes an
article with the heading, startling indeed to catholic
ears, "The Abuse of a Pontifical Brief." The
occasion for this sally is a letter written by one of
the Pope's secretaries, and by his Holiness's com-
mand, to Count du Val de Beaulieu ou the subject
of his book, "Free Error in a Free State," and
which letter, the Monde says, cannot be too widely
promulgated. This letter, the Pays says, shows
but too plainly that the Pope flatters him-
self that he is still invested, as his predecessors of
the middle ages pretended to be invested, with an
universal sovereignty, a general and supreme right
to direct as may seem best to himself the social
tendencies and political development of nations.
The Pays cites that great Gallican autho-
rity,' Bossuet, to show that this is a
reverie " which the French clergy has from
time immemorial repudiated," and one, moreover,
which no "well-informed or prudent catholic"
stands up for at this time of day. The Pays tells
Use court al Rome roundly that in the words of
Bossuet, these obsolete pretensions "are lament-
able," and that it is incomprehensible how profess-
ing friends of the Holy See should attempt to keep
up in France "ruinous illusions," which can only
tend to prejudice the "most serious interests of
religion and the Holy See." I look upon this
attack upon the Pope by the Pays as a not unim-
portant corollary of the approbation which the
semi-official press has been ordered to give to the
speeches of General La Marmon and the Marquis
de Pepoli.
. . _ .

The news given in the Paris letter of one of your
contemporaries, that when France withdraws her
troops from Rome she would have no objection to
see a Spanish garrison take her place, seems to me
so outrageously improbable that I cannot pass it
over without notice. Such an arrangement would
be altogether contrary to the:convention, which con-
templates indeed the formation of a Papal army
strengthened by foreign recruits, provided (and this
vague proviso, which some opponents of the con-
vention are too apt to forget, is very important)
that the entire effective be not so large as to assume
an aggressive attitude, but certainly excludes the
idea of France evacuating Rome in favour of the
principles of nationality and non-intervention, only
for the purpose of allowing a bigoted and retrograde
power like Spain to take her place.
A story has been going the round of the papers,
and has puzzled some people, to the effect that the
Duke de Persigny has just been converted to the
principle of freedom of the press. The foundation
for this unlikely tale has now come to light, and it
tarns out to be little else than • clever puff
which M. Emile de Girardin has contrived
to get inserted in the Europe of Frankfort for his
last new book. M. de Girardin's books are only
reproductions of his newspaper articles. He sent
a complimentary copy to M. de Persigny, and the
latter acknowledged the present in a polite letter,
the text of which is not published by the Europe,
but from which some isolated phrases are selected,
calculated to create a momentary sensation in the
minds of those who do not know M. de Persigny
thoroughly. The moat important thing he says is,
that he is " very anxious about the question of the
press, and would be indisposed to maintain the
present system without serious modifications."
Very likely M. de Persigny would like to change
the fittings of certain fetters which cause obvious
blisters, and make the gaoler odious ; but liberty
can never be expected from him.
The Courtier du Dimanche publishes to-day an
opinion of M. Destuarest, the batonnier, adhering
to the many legal opinions already given, that the
Minister of the Interior, in suspending that journal
a second time in respect of only one set of two
"warnings, "acted illegally and infringed the prin-
ciple of non Us in idem. The Council of State
will have to decide the question, and its ingenuity
will be sorely taxed if this quasi judicial body shall
receive positive orders to interpret the law in
favour of the government. I continue to think
that the exams of power is too glaring for it to be
possible for the government not to be shamed into
confessing its error.
The Bourse finished rather weak, with very little
change in quotations.