The Sun.
London, England, 1855-08-17 00:00:00

SPIRIT OF THE PUBLIC JOURNA LS.

(From the Times of this day.)
That the Pope is infallible in matters of doctrine
we have long since learnt, but that this infallibi-
lity extends in any degree to either the matter or
manner of his " allocutions" we are disposed utterly
t. o deny. A wordy and rambling style, a loose and
incorrect manner of speaking, and, worse than all,
a pompous affectation of superior dignity and sanc-
tity, are the leading characteristics of these long
and lugubrious orations. We know not whose
faith they confirm, whose reason they convince, or
whose passions they inflame; to us they appear
wearisome in the extreme, and better calculated to
provoke sleep than to extort obedience. The Go-
vernment of Sardinia has lately learnt from this
unexceptionable quarter that it is guilty of ini-
quity, and that the Pope on a former occasion
hoped that the Bishops would have persuaded
them to do better things, and that they would de-
sist from persecuting the Church, and hasten to
repair the mischief they had done. Let not, how-
ever, Sardinia presume to carry matters too far.
The Pope, to use a vulgar idiom, far too expressive
for a Pope, "will not stand it;" he is naturally
mild, but his predecessors have never shrunk from
using necessary severity. There is no other hope
of bringing things round to a right state, and so
let the unregenerate and rebellious children of the
Church look to it, for evil is before them. The
Pope once more raises his apostolic voice to re-
prove, to condemn, to declare null and void the
laws of Piedmont, and to denounce the greater ex-
communication upon all those who have dared to
approve, to propose, or sanction these laws ; and
he concludes, as the Church of Rome has ever been
wont to do, with a solemn prayer for the kingdom
whose laws he assumes to abrogate, and the persons
whose souls he believes he is consigning to eternal
perdition. The Pope next proceeds to treat of the
affairs of Spain, and recites with much minuteness
a treaty concluded in 1851, in which he had pro-
vided that the Catholic religion should alone be
tolerated, that bishops should be obeyed in all
things, and that the right of the Church to extend
her possessions—through the medium, we sup-
pose of the last wills and testaments of her re-
pentant children—should not be interfered with ;
and the Pope tells us, with much simplicity and
good faith, that he flattered himself he had
made rather a good thing than otherwise of this
same convention, especially when he considered
the attachment of the Spanish nation to the Ca-
tholic faith and the chair of St. Peter. Judge,
then, of his disgust, when he finds that here also
he has been deceived, that outrages have been
committed, that Church property is to be sold,
and the jurisdiction of the Church in many ways
interfered with. The Pope protests that he will
forbid the faithful from taking part in such sales,
that he will make a flaw in the title of all church
lands sold already under his consent, and he ad-
monishes all persons concerned in those matters to
repent and sin no more.
This is a pretty picture drawn by the hand of
the Supreme Pontiff himself of the way in which
he is disposing of the inheritance bequeathed by
St. Peter to his successors. Devout Piedmont is
lost—devouter Spain is following close upon her
footsteps, and, although measures of the most ex-
treme severity are resorted to, they seem to be ut-
terly void, and have no effect. We say measures of
the most extreme severity, for there is no weapon
which can be drawn from the mediaeval armoury of
the Popes which is not brought into requisition
for the purpose of demolishing the contumacious
enemies of the Church. It is of no use to preach a
crusade against the enemies of the Church, for in
these dark days of mawkish Liberalism there is no
Simon de Montfort or Duke de Guise to execute
her justice by the lance or the poniard ; and
France, which still shows some regard for the chair
of St. Peter, employs her troops in maintaining the
tottering authority of the Pope's crazy throne, and
rescues him from the vengeance which he would
fain wreak on his disobedient vassals. The Pope
dare not preach a crusade, but what he dares do he
does heartily. He will not tolerate that the Go-
vernments of Spain and Sardinia should exercise
that right of regulating their affairs which is in-
herent iu the Government of every free nation.
The Pope goes a step further than he did in his
attack on the liberties and independence of this
nation. He contented himself with ignoring our
laws ; the laws of Sardinia and Spain he professes
utterly to make void and set, aside. If this claim
be allowed, no law whatever is valid which has not
received the previous sanction of the Pope, and any
law, however valid, from which that sanction is
ultimately withdrawn becomes worthless. The tem-
poral is swallowed up in the spiritual part of his
power, and he broadly proposes to these delinquent
I nations to submit to this invasion of their rights,
or to take the Government of the country into
their own hands and replace the Church of Rome
in the dominion she has lost. Wrap this up in
what language you will, it really amounts to an
invitation to the subjects of these Princes to cast
off their allegiance, to expel them from the throne,
and to set up in their stead some one having a
duller sense of national honour, and a fainter idea
of that independence of foreign interference which
is the natural right of every member of the great
European confederacy. And these exhortations to
rebellion, these proud pretensions to annihilate
laws solemnly passed by the national councils of
two independent nations, emanate from a petty
Italian Prince, who, while he assumes to regulate,
the internal polity of other States, is so little
master of his own that, like the tyrants of ancient
Greece, he dare not put arms in the hands of his
own people, but supports himself partly by the aid
of foreign mercenaries, partly
.by the troops of a
Power which finds a convenience in prolonging
his rickety existence.
The extremities of insolence and weakness, o
abject dependence and insolent aggression, were
never better or more forcibly displayed than by
the present Pope. Here is a man who cannot
keep up even the semblance of personal indepen-
dence, the suburbs of whose capital are infested
with banditti, whose finances are hopelessly disor-
dered, and whose life, if left to the affection of his
own subjects, would not be worth half an hour's
purchase, regulating from between the bars of his
prison the affairs of foreign countries, stirring up
discord, provoking revolution, denouncing, threat-
ening, anathematising, nullifying, as if the world
were at his feet, and he were the only arbiter and
controller of the destinies of Europe ? Truly we
may ask, how long shall this man be a snare to us ?
—how long is Europe to tolerate this miserable
counterfeit of mediaeval priestcraft, founded upon
mediaeval superstition ? —this attempt to import
into modern times that power against which the
intellect of man rose up in successful rebellion
three centuries ago ? Are we always to have a
revolutionary power ready, if its demands be com-
plied with, to lend its aid to tyranny in kings, and
if they be refused, to raise up their subjects in
mutiny against them ? It behoves
those who be-
lieve that the Papacy is a conservative institution
well to consider these things ; and we apprehend, if
they do so, they will not fail to arrive at the con-
clusion that, whatever be its spiritual merits, as a
temporal institution, the Papacy is an evil unmiti-
gated by any countervailing advantage.

( From the Daily News of this day.) 1
There is more than at once strikes the eye in
Sir Do Lacy Evans's speech on Tuesday last. The
hon. and gallant member must have felt strongly
the importance of his subject, and also have been
most anxious to publish to the country his views
on the conduct of the war, or he would never have
selected the last half-hour of the last day of the ses-
sion to deliver those opinions which are founded
upon professional experience extending over nearly
half a century, as well as upon the latest experience
in the Crimea. On all topics connected with mili-
tary affairs no man in the House of Commons is
heard with so much a ttention as the veteran who re-
presents Westminster, and out of doors his knowledge
and gallantry always carry with them that weight
and respect which these qualities ever command
amongst Englishmen. The occasion and the oppor-
tunity for his speech were so appropriate that
they could hardly have been accidental, and accord-
ingly we find that both iu this country and France
the last warning from Parliament to the Ministry,
and the reply of the Premier, have formed the prin-
cipal subject of discussion since the prorogation.
Sir De Lacy contrasts unfavourably the measures
now taking to prosecute the war against Russiawe
_lir
) those employed when we were pitted agaillnest u
con-
present Allies in the Peninsula. We had,
field
when
Ple
with
tends, no less than 80,000 men in the
Wellington was fighting against the Jeieflutiteengaenn
Napoleon, besides a Portuguese C
40,000 more, the latter being
officered number which could
of
men. Nor was this the highest
ering
be reckoned under our
lbanners d
At one period—that is
that mEonmgleignitli
ous and prolonged strugg before the
120,000 efficient Bri-
parts of Spain. When
say, for two years befothan
f the Portuguese Contingent
the Englisbhy army r©-
tot
is turnedh s ol
di
e rs
e ciency of to-day in the
home—nondo
returns
from the seat of war,
thesewere underfigure armsfigures
are in
compared variousthed
fi .
cannot
for a moment be denied. Even Lord Palmerston
s
deffid"t made to conquer our present enemynot attempt to refute what the gallant General
asserted, but tried to extenuate the shortcomings
of himself, his colleagues, and the Aberdeen Minis-
try, by declaring that, although we might be be-
hind hand in the number of
Crimea as compared with thosenien sdenestpalithetdo theto
Spain during the last years of the war, the forces
now employed were as numerous as those of the
Government of that day at the commencement of
# hootilitieo. In a celta,ua* acne this is true ; but all