The Sun.
London, England, 1866-10-08 00:00:00

ARCHBISHOP MANNING ON THE

PAPACY.

Yesterday being " Rosary Sunday," according to
the announcement made by Archbishop Manning in
his recent Pastoral a Pastoral having especial re-
ference, it may be remembered, to the position in
which the Temporal Power of the Pope now stands
by reason of the famous Convention between France
and Italy coming into operation between the 15th
of September and the beginning of December next
—solemn offices, together with numerous masses
and communions, were offered up in behalf of the
Sovereign Pontiff by the Catholic congregations of
London, and for that matter indeed among the
whole body of `the Catholics throughout England
and Scotland. At the pro-Cathedral of St. Mary's,
Moorfields, more especially, the services were con-
ducted, as under the circumstances was but natural,
with more than ordinary solemnity. The Arch-
bishop assisted pontifically at the High Mass,
and preached after the Gospel to a densely crowded
and profoundly attentive congregation, composed of
Protestants and Catholics amicably mingled together
—his sermon, particularly towards the close of it,
being most eloquently and, generally throughout
it, most impressively appropriate to the occasion.
Taking as his text the two opening verses of the
thirteenth chapter of St. Paul to the Romans—" Let
every soul be subject to higher powers ; for there
is no power but from God ; and those that are, are
ordained of • God : therefore he that resisteth the
power resisteth the ordinance of God : and they
that resist purchase to themselves damnation"—
[Omnis anima potestatibus sublimioribus subdita
sit : non est enim potestas nisi a Deo : qum autem
sunt, h Deo ordinataa sunt : itaque qui resistit
potestati, Dei ordinationi resistit : qui autem re-
sistant, ipsi sibi damnationem acquirunt.]--The
Archbishop began by saying that on that day the
whole of the Catholic Church in England and Scot-
land united together in a solemn act of supplication
for the Divine protection to the person and the
authority of the Vicar of Jesus Christ. And this,
moreover, upon a day especially dear and sweet to
the heart of every Catholic—the feast of the Rosary
full full of memories of the perils and victories of Chris
tendom, and of gracious interpositions in behalf
of the Church of God throughout the world—
dear to all alike, to the Pontiff and to the
lowliest of the faithful, to the oldest and to the
least, to saints and to little children carry-
ing the string of beads in their hand. In
the eyes of the world no doubt that day, the act
in which they were then engaged was as a solemnity
of folly. But the foolishness of God was wiser than
men. Speaking to the children of the Church, the
faithful fervent Catholic piety living strong within
them, rendered superfluous the accumulation of rea-
sons for the authority of the Sovereign Pontiff.
Submission to that authority being the instinct of
their hearts, they needed no arguments to enforce
upon them its recognition. They understood and
perceived to the full that the spiritual authority
of the Church was a direct institution
from Heaven the Temporal Power being
afterwards added to it by a Divine ordination..
Addressing himself to those, however, among
the congregation who were not believers in
these matters—he could hardly fail .to mitigate
the asperity of such as had hitherto not un-
derstood. On Earth there was no authority, he
said, so directly or conspicuously ordained of God
as that of the Sovereign Pontiff. And his re-
liance in being able to enforce a recognition of
this, even upon the minds of dispassionate Pro-
testants, was based upon the Justice of the
cause, upon the Force of Truth, upon the honesty
of his fellow-countrymen, but beyond all, upon the
working of the ineffable grace.of God. The words
of the Holy Ghost Himself protected the Sovereign
Pontiff upon earth. The authority of the Papacy
was two-fold ; first of all, purely spiritual, but
afterwards mingled or blended with temporal autho-
rity. No one could resist with impunity the sentence
of the apostle. The words of the Holy Ghost indi-
cate that this Power is a Power ordained of God—
" Thou art Peter, and upon this Rock I will
build my church, and the gates of hell
shall not prevail against it." - But the -very-
first conclusion to be drawn in regard to all Power
he maintained was, that the Power was ordained of
God. It was first spoken of the Empire of Rome,
steeped in the blood of the Saints, that old Roman
Empire to which though pagan the disciples of our
Lord were told by Him that they owed obedience.
How much more must /that be said of every
Christian authority throughout the world. In effect
all authority came, not from Universal Suffrage, not
from plebiscite, but from the author of human
Society, that is from God. Comparing the crime of
Treason, as opposed to Authority, to Heresy as
opposed to Truth, and to Schism as opposed to Unity,
he maintained that if society were of man without
God's authorization, then by necessity the highest civil
crime lost its highest guilt. Treason, sedition, re-
bellion, were more than simply crimes against man
—they were sins against. God. England, Ireland,
and Scotland had become bound together, as they
were in one sovereignty growing up like all other
earthly powers with a sovereign authority which
demands obedience—first Anarchy, then the Hep-
tarchy, then a Monarchy of three kingdoms, all
bound together under one authority by the law of
sovereignty. What sovereignty on earth, however,
could compete with that of the Papacy, based as it
is upon a tradition of a thousand years ? Even in
the five preceding centuries it was already grow-
ing—informal, no doubt, and incohate. But
so likewise was Britain, during the epoch of
Saxon anarchy, before its various provinces be-
came at length united into one new monarchy.
Descanting at some length upon the historical evi-
dences of the wholly exceptional antiquity of the
Pontifical power when viewed simply as a Temporal
Power among the sovereignties of the world, the
Archbishop exposed the notion of depreciating it
or setting it aside, so to speak, with three rhymes
from Dante. The astounding fact of the transfe-
rence of the imperial power of Rome, of the ancient
pagan Roman Empire from Rome to Constantinople,
he insisted upon it, had been manifestly caused, as
the Roman law declares, by the direct motion or in-
tervention of God. It arose, he said, from the mani-
fest unfitness of the two totally distinct and an-
tagonistic authorities existing in the same city.
In Rome was left no Sovereign ruler clothed with
power save the Pontiff. The power, the temporal
power then devolving upon or assumed by the
Pontiff, was the donation of no man—was the
gift neither of Pepin nor of Charlemagne. The
throne had become vacant then, as he strikingly
expressed it, by the visitation of God. He
claimed the right of Sovereignty there by
Divine Providence for the Temporal Power—a
right confirmed, • he said, by possession during a
length of time 'surpassing that which could be
claimed by any other sovereignty—confirmed, he
would say, by the very disturbances of that possession,
proving the right of that possession. No crowned
monarch in the world held power reaching back so
far, so high, so remotely, as the Sovereign Pontiff.
England was delivered over to barbarian anarchy,
France was overrun by rude and savage hordes,
Germany was a forest, when the Pontiffs were
even then reigning in the midst of the
already dawning Christian civilization. They were
then planting and nurturing the first seeds of this
majestic Christendom—now trembling like an arch
held together only by the keystone of the Spiritual
and Temporal Power of the Sovereign Pontiff. If
possession confirms then did this one—and posses-
sion was proverbially among ourselves nine points
of the law. Even a wrong, an abuse, a conquest, as
was well known, became gilded by possession. And
if long possession confirms even a conquest founded
on injustice, how much more must it confirm an
authority founded originally neither upon
conquest nor upon injustice, an authority in
its origin bloodless and beneficent ? What'
authority on earth, in fact, could stand if not upon
the existing authority of long possession. Among
earthly sovereignties there was no higher authority
than the Civil Power. The Sovereign Pontiff's how-
ever was—it was higher than the Civil Power : for,
above the Temporal Power was the Spiritual Power,
the Power divinely instituted, the kingdom not of
this world, the authority founded upon Peter, upon
the Rock, and against which, until the end of the