The Sun.
London, England, 1867-12-10 00:00:00

there.

ALISON ON THE TE:I7IPORAL POWER,

(From Alison's " ilistory of Eniope.")
Napoleon has protested at St. Helena, and appa-
rently with truth, that he was not privy to the actual
seizure of the Pope, and that when he first received
the news he was at a loss what to do with his august
captive. But it requires no argument to show that
neither Miollis nor Radet would have ventured on
such a step unless they had been well assured that it
was conformable, if not to the formal instructions,
at least to the secret wishes of the Emperor. "It is
of little moment," says Tribaudeau, " whether Napo-
leon ordered the seizure of the Pope; he did not disap-
prove of it ; he profited by it, and took upon him-
self its whole responsibility."

Bossuet has assigned the reason with his usual
elevation of thought, why such a spoliation of all
the possessions of the supreme Pontiff by a secular
power ever must be prejudicial to the best inte-
rests of religion. " God had chosen," says he, " that
the Church, the common mother of all nations,
should be independent of all in its temporal affairs,
and that the common centre to which all the faithful
should look for the unity of their faith, should be
placed in a situation above the partialities, which
the different interests and jealousies of States might
occasion. The Church, independent in its head of
all temporal powers, finds itself in a situation more
freely to exercise, for the common good and pro-
tection of Christian kings, its celestial power of
ruling the mind when it holds in the right baud the
balance even amidst so many empires, often in a
state of hostility; it maintains unity in all its parts,
'sometimes by inflexible decrees and sometimes by
sage concessions." The principle which calls
for the independence of the head of the
Church from all temporal sovereignties, is
the same which requires the emancipation of
its subordinate ministers from dependence on the
contributions of their flocks. Human nature iu
every rank is the same, the thraldom of vice and
passion is felt alike in the cottage as on the throne.
The subjection of the supreme Pontiff to the direct
control of France or Austria is as fatal to his cha-
racter and respectability as the control of the rural
congregations is to the utility of the village pastor.
• • . . Equity in judment, whether in temporal
or spiritual matters, can never be attained except
by such as are independent of those to whom
the judgment is to be applied : coercion
of vice, whether in humble or exalted stations,
can never be effected by those who depend
upon that vice for their support : the due
direction of thought can never he given but by those
who are not constrained to bend to the thoughts of
others. It will ever be the great object of tyranny,
whether regal or Democratic, to beat down this
central independent authority ; to render the censors
of morals subservient to the dominant power; and
under the specious pretence of emancipating man-
kind from spiritual shackles, in effect to subject
them to a far more grievous temporal oppression.

The immutability of the Roman Catholic Church
amidst all these disasters is not the least remarkable
circumstance in this age of wonders. It appeared un-
changed when the deluge subsided on the fall of Na-
poleon. It survived alike the captivity of the Pope
and the overthrow of his temporal power. " Again
doomed to death the milk-white hind was still fated
not to die. Even before the funeral rites had bee❑

performed over the ashes of Pius VI. a great reac-
tion had commenced, which, after the lapse of more
than forty years, appears to be still in progress.

Anarchy has had its day, a uew order of things
had arisen out of the confusion—new dynasties,
new laws, new titles ; and amidst them emerged
the ancient religion. The Arabs have a fable
that the great pyramid was built by the antedi-
luvian kings, and alone of all the works of man

bore the weight of the Flood : such as this was
the fate of the Papacy. It had been buried under
the great inundation ; but its deep foundations had

remained unshaken ; and when the waters ab.ited,
it appeared alone amidst the ruins of a world that
had passed away. The Republic of llolland was
gone, and the empire of Germany, and the great
Council of Venice, and the old Helvetian League,
and the House of Bourbon, and the parliaments and
aristocracy of France. Europe was full of young
creations, a French Empire, a Kingdom of Italy, a
Confederation of the Rhine. Nor had the late

events affected only territorial limits and politica:
institutions : the destruction of property, the corn•
position and spirit of society, bad through great part
of Catholic Europe undergone a complete change
But the unchangeable Church was still there."

" What does the Pope mean," said Napoleon to
Eugene, in July, 1807, " the threat of excommu-
nicating me ? Does he think the world has gone
back a thousand years ? Does he suppose the arms

will fall from the hands of my soldiers g" Within

two years after these remarkable words were
written the Pope did excommunicate him, in return
for the confiscation of his whole dominions ; and
in less than four years more the mins did fall from
the hands of his suldiers ; and the hosts, apparently

invincible, which he had collected were dispersed
and ruined by the blasts of winter. " The wea-
pons of the soldiers," says Segur, in describing the
Russian retreat, " appeared of an insupportable
weight to their stiffened arms. During their fre-
quent falls they fell from their hands; and destitute
of the power of raising them up from the ground
they were left in the snow. They did not throw
them away, famine and cold tore them from their
grasp." Salgues, in Memoires pour Historie
Generale de la France sous Napoleon,' says : " The
soldiers could no longer hold their weapons, they
fell from the hands even of the bravest and most
robust." He extorted from the supreme Pontiff at
Fontainebleau, in 1813, after the terrors and ex-
haustion of a long captivity, a renunciation of the
rights of the Church over the Roman States ; and
within a year after, he himself was compelled at
Fontainebleau to sign the abdication of all his
dominions. He consigned Cardinal Pacca and
several other prelates, the courageous counsellors
of the bull of excommunication, to a dreary im-
prisonment of four years amidst the snow of the
Alps; and he himself was shortly after doomed to
a painful exile of six on the rock of St. Helena.
There is something in these marvellous coinci-
dences, beyond the operations of chance, and
which even a Protestant historian feels bound to
mark for the observation of future ages. The
world has not gone back a thousand years, but that
Being exists with whom a thousand years is as
one day, and one day as a thousand years. And
without ascribing these events to any deviation
from ordinary laws, or supposing that the common
Father " who sees with equal eye, as Lord of all,"
the varied modes of worship of His different crea-
tures, had interposed in a peculiar manner in favour
of any particular Church, we may without pre-
sumption rest in the humble belief that the laws
of the moral world are of universal application ;
and there are limits to the oppression of virtue
even in this scene of trial, and that when a power,
elevated on the ascendancy of passion and crime,
has gone such a length as to outrage alike the
principles of justice and the religious feelings of a
whole quarter of the globe, the period is not far
distant when the aroused indignation of mankind
will bring about its punishment. (Alison's
" History of Europe," vol. viii., pp. 221-223.)

His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales leaves
Sandringham to-morrow on a visit to the Earl and Coun-
tess of Dudley at Buckenham, near Cromer, where his
Royal Highness will remain till Thursday. The Earl of
Dudley has invited a distieguished circle to meet hi= Royal
Highness for shooting.

The Marchioness of Nbercorn and Lord George
Hamilton left Chesterfield House on Saturday fur Cannes.

The Earl of Bective and Ladies Madeline and
Adelaide Taylour have left Virginia Lodge, Cavan, on a
tour of visits.

The Earl and Countess of Dunmore have arrived
at Claridge's Hotel from Itaby Castle, Durham.
THE WEATHER.—Winter seems now to have set
in good earnest. Another fall of snow took place in the
metropolis early yesterday morning, accompanied by a
bitterly cold wind. In the early part of the day the great
amount of truffle along the principal thoroughfared caused
the snow to melt, but this having frozen, the roads and
footways soon became slippery. No serious accident has
been reported, although the horses cotthl scarcely retain
their footing.