The Sun.
London, England, 1867-12-17 00:00:00

FRANCE AND THE POPE.

There is no keener observer of public opinion
than the Emperor Napoleon. He watches every
movement of the political barometer, and shapes
his course accordingly. During the eventful period
in which he has ruled over France with absolute
sway, he has shown no indications of high political
principles, of great statesmanlike ideas, or of a con-
sistent policy. We know that more than once he
has given the impulse to the Revolution, and more
than once put it down by the sword. He saved
France from anarchy and socialism, and he gave
up Italy to the Revolution. He has been on the
side of the Papacy and against it. Ile has endea-
voured to harmonize the most conflicting interests,
and to reconcile the most antagonistic principles,
but he has gained no man's confidence. Yet, for
a long time, his policy of playing fast and loose,
of taking the stronger and deserting the weaker
side, or when the opposing forces were pretty
evenly balanced, of steering a middle course, now
favouring the one, and now the other, gave him
the power which he coveted of being the master
of the situation. Such tactics are not power,
but slavery. Napoleon does not mould events,
but follows them, does not create public opinion,
but listens to it. Had France been anti Christian
and anti-Papal, Napoleon, out of jealousy, might
have broken up Italy, but he never would have
saved Rome for the sake of the Papacy. But France
has pronounced itself distinctly and unmistakably
on the side of the Pope. Napoleon has no room for
doubt, no choice, he has broken with Italy and
the Revolution, and at the bidding of Catholic
France he has become, whether he like it or not,
the soldier of the Pope.
In spite of the profound religious indifferentism
which characterizes so many of the educated
classes, and of the immorality of the working men
of the cities ; in spite of the active and rabid infi-
delity of a large portion of the press and of the
literature of France, the power of Catholicism, re-
ligious, political, and social, is fast gaining the
upper hand in the country of Voltaire. Before
long, the anti-Christian Revolution in Europe will
have to reckon with France as with its deadliest
enemy.

As an indication of the growth of this Catholic
power, the debates in the French Chamber on the
Papal question are deserving of the closest atten.
tion. It will not have escaped attention that in
the Senate where the influence of the Government
issupreme, the Foreign Minister, M. de Moustier,
contented him self with a repetition of the ambi-
guous phrases which Napoleon has invariably made
use of to cloak his policy in the Roman question.
M. de Moustier, as the mouth-piece of the Em-
peror, declared that the Government aimed, as it
ever had done, at the reconciliation of the Pope
and the Italian Government ; that it would provide
effectually for the Pope's safety, but that the per-
manent occupation of the Papal States by France
was impossible. After the recent conduct of the
Italian Government and its proved complicity with
the invasion of the Papal States, such a declara-
tion of policy on the part of the French Govern-
ment was simply an encouragement of the Italian
Revolution. As such, fortunately for France, it
was regarded in the Lower Chamber. Interpella-
tions were raised to call the Government to ac-
count. The Catholic Opposition made itself
sensibly felt ; and although, perhaps, Government
might reckon on a majority, had it persevered in
the policy traced out in the Senate, yet the
minority would have been formidable, both from
its number and from its influential character, and
still from the sympathy and support it would
have met with, under its reverse, in every parish of
every province in France.

M. Thiers, in a speech which created a great

sensation, attacked the Cabinet of the Tuileries for
its ambiguous policy, and showed, from the course
the Government had hitherto pursued, that Italy
might fairly question the sincerity of France's de-
sire to protect the Pope from spoliation. He de-
clared that the Government was bound on re-
ligious, national, and political grounds to protect
the Pope, and never to allow Italy to take pos-
session of Rome. M. Thiers ended by demanding
from the Government a clear and categorical state-
ment of its policy ; he called upon it never to
allow the Pope to be deprived of his present terri-
tories.

The " Never ! never ! never !" of M. Thiers was
caught up as a watchword ; and the attitude of the
Chambers, and the determination of the Catholic
leaders, were not lost upon the Government. After
due consultation with the Emperor, M. Rouher
pronounced the memorable words that " never shall
Italy take possession of Rome." The "Never !
never ! never !" of M. Thiers, re-echoed by the vast
majority of the Chamber, was accepted by the Go-
vernment. Never shall Italy take possession of
Rome, is the solemn word of France, pledged to
the Catholic world. At a word from M. Berryer,
Napoleon's Minister reascended the tribune, and
declared " that when he said never shall Italy take
possession of Rome, he meant to speak of the pre-
sent Papal territory in all its integrity."
France has fairly supported her title as eldest
daughter of the Church ; her Catholic character is
made manifest once more to Italy and the Re-
volution. What France means is now clear beyond
question—whatever becomes of united Italy Rome
shall never be its capital. As to the " co-existence"
of revolutionary Italy and the Temporal Sove-
reignty of the Papacy we do not believe in it. We
agree with the Union that M. Thiers has rightly
defined the dilemma : it lies between the main-
tenance of the Pope and the fall of Italian unity.
There is no medium. And what is Italian unity,
that an honest man and a Christian should not re-
joice over its fall ? It is founded on the violation
of justice, of national law, and of the sacred rights
of religion. Italian unity is a monstrous fiction.
The kirigdom as it now exists began in robbery,
and is ending in bankruptcy. During its brief
existence it has presented the melancholy spectacle
of an impious minority delivering over a nation
to political immorality and to public hostility to
the Church of the people. If revolutionary Italy
commit suicide, as NI. Thiers' suggests, on the sword
of France, or if Napoleon, who made it, unmake it
again, Europe will be delivered from an evil, and
the children of the Revolution in every nation
will have learnt a lesson which they will not lightly
forget. In following the will of Catholic France
Napoleon has done well and wisely ; in guarantee-
ing the actual territory now in possession of the
Pope he has mortally offended the European Re-
volution. Let him break with that lawless and
impious association, and undo the evil which he
has done. Let him crown his work by restoring
to the Papal Sovereignty all that has been taken
from it by the Revolution ; and then history will
record of Napoleon 111. that at the end of his
reign he had the grace and courage to undo the evil
of its commencement.— Westminster Gazette.

MR. BRAND, M.P., ON PARLIAMENTARY
REFORM.

The Right lion. 11. Brand and Lord Pelham,
the members for the borough of Lewes, gave their
annual address to their constituents in the lecture
hall of that town on Friday evening last. In the
course of his speech,

Mr. BRAND remarked that some of those who
were present might have felt suprised that a Con-
servative Government should have brought forward
a Reform Bill. For his part he had never felt that
sentiment of surprise. He had had some experience
of the Conservative party. They possessed a qua-
lity of passive resistance to good measures which
was most remarkable, b'it they also possessed an-
other quality still more remarkable—namely, that
of discerning very accurately when they could no
longer hope to offer further resistance to the pas-
sage of such measures, and then, like sensible men,
they resisted no longer. (Laughter.) But that
was not all. Seeing that resistance was hopelcs,
they actually adopted the measures which they had
before opposed. (Cheers.) In support of this the
right hon. gentleman referred to the conduct of the
Conservative party in regard to Catholic Emanci-
pation and Free Trade. He proceeded to say that
if there were one measure more than another
which the Conservative party, time out of
mind, had opposed with a tenacity worthy
of a better cause, it was the reduction
of the borough franchise. But, seeing that it was
no longer possible to resist such a measure, they
themselves last session proposed household suffrige.
He was, however, far from saying that it was not
open for the Conservative party t 6 deal with Re-
form. On the contrary, he was rather disposed to
invite the Conservatives to adopt Liberal measures.
There was a wide field open to the Conservatives if
they desired to be held in esteem as men of progress.
For instance, they might settle the question of
Church rates, notwithstanding the fact that they
had rallied to the cry of "No surrender" in regard
to Church-rates for many years. So also they
might open the doors of the Universities, acting
upon the principle that the Universities were made
for the people and not the people for the Universi-
ties. (Hear, hear.) They might also take up our
present system of national education, and frame it
on a more comprehensive basis. Then they might
deal with the grievances of Ireland. They had, in-
deed, a wide field before them. Now, although, as
he just now remarked, he was not surprised that the
Conservative party had dealt with Reform, he was
bound to say that since the Reform Bill was passed
certain revelations had been made with regard to the
Conservative party which had filled him with much
surprise. The Chancellor of the Exchequer had
stated that the leading members of the Conservative
party had, ever since the year 1859, been in favour
of household suffrage, and speaking more recently
in Edinburgh he went on to say that during the
same period—that is, since 1859—he had been edu-
cating the Conservative party on the question of
Reform. Well, he (Mr. Brand) did not under-
stand, if that were so, how the leading Conserva-
tives could reconcile their conduct with the speeches
they had been making ever since 1859. He wished to
call attention to an election address written by the
present Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1865, a few
days after the House of Commons had thrown out
Mr. Baines's moderate proposition for reduction of
the borough franchise. It was to this effect :—" A
few nights ago the House of Commons, impatient
of protracted legislation, reflected the candour of
the community, and declared by a vast majority
that the franchise in boroughs should not be lowered,
and that the principle (lateral) on which Lord
Derby wished to extend it was the just one. The
efforts of the Opposition during the last six years,
therefore, have not been insignificant or useless."
And yet the Chancellor of the Exchequer now
asserted that ever since 1859 the leading members
of the Conservative party had been iu favour of
household suffrage. (Cheers and laughter.) It was
quite a new feature in Parliamentary Government
that the leading members of a great party should
behind the stage hold one set of opinions, and then,
stepping on to the public stage, profess another. If
things were to be called by their right names, if a
spade were to be called a spade, he should call that
political double-dealing. His own impression was
that the Conservatives were reformers under pres-
sure, that they would very soon collapse, and that
they would be found out. (Cheers.) Still, he sup-
posed that Englishmen who love fair play would
give them a chance. But he would remind those
voters who were going to exercise the privilege for
the first time a great political cry of which was much
in vogue many years ago—" Measures, not men."
Now, as far as it went, it was not a bad cry, but
there was another cry very much better, and that
was—" Measures and men." (Cheers.) He knew,
speaking now as an elector, whom he served and re-
spected—viz., the man who to maintain his prin-
ciples bad sacrificed power and place, and be should
be very much surprised if the electors of England
at large did not recognise that fact in 1869.
(Cheers.)