The Sun.
London, England, 1859-11-07 00:00:00

IRELAND.

DUBLIN, SATURDAY MORNING:
THE . PRIESTS AND THE POPE.

Ten columns of the Freeman of this morning
groan under the pressure of priestly oratory poured
eat on Thursday at the meeting of the clergy of
the diocese of Dublin, presided over by the Aposto-
lic delegate in Ireland. The chairman was of course
the star of the day's performance, and he played
his part to the unqualified satisfaction of his cleri-
cal audience. Dr. Cullen, in fact, left nothing for
his followers to say, and therefore, passing over the
speeches of Canons and Vicars-General and parish
priests, and the dii minores generally, it will be
necessary, even at the sacrifice of valuable space,
to " hear the Church" at this perilous crisis of her
temporal existence. The subjoined abridgement
even is wofully long, but there is no help for it.
After some prefatory remarks Archbishop Cullen
promeded as follows :

" While, last winter, thousands of the nobility and
gentry, and some of the highest personages of Eng-
land, were enjoying hospitality and protection in
Rome, and were obliged to admire the good order
and peaceable disposition of the population—while
an English accredited agent was assuring the autho-
rities of the country of the friendly dispositions of the
British Cabinet—Lord Malmesbury was drawing up
his despatches, since published by order of Parliament
in which he instructed his foreign agents to propose
to France and Austria a new arrangement, or rather
dismemberment of the Pope's States, though the
proposal was so manifestly unfair that he himself
was ashamed to take a direct part in its execution.
Lord Loftus and Sir J. Hudson were too happy to
re-echo the sentiments of their master in Vienna
and Turin, and. Count Cavour, the revolutionary
Minister f Piedmont, was so much iufluenced in
his proeeedings by their authority that he did not
hesitate to declare to Lord Cowley that England
was mainly responsible for the present position of
Sardinia, and that her statesmen, her orators, her
agents, and her press had excited the passions of
Italy: (Letter of Lord Cowley, Paris, March 28,
1859.) For the credit of Austria it mast be men-
tioned that we learn from a despatch of Lord
Loftus, of the 20th of January last, that she rejected
with indignation the projected dismemberment of
the Pope's States in which Lord Malmesbury in-
vited her to take part, promisin g to uphold byEn glish
influence any arrangement that might be made to
deprive the Pope of the government of his territory.
The facts I have referred to are a matter of history
given to the world in a Parliamentary return. Pro-
bably next year some other blue-book will furnish
las with the despatches of the present Secretary of
Foreign Affairs, which undoubtedly will not be
more favourable to the interests of the Holy See
than those of Lord Malmesbury. The only differ-
ence between the two secretaries appears to be,
that the former openly avows his enmity and hos-
tility, while the latter, publicly professing kindly
feeling, endeavours to deal a fatal blow through
the hands of others. Bat leaving rival statesmen
to justify their conduct to posterity, to their own
conscience, and to God, we cannot but regret that
the example given by them had a most baneful
influence and has given a great impetus to the
spirit of sedition and anarchy. The agents of the
Bible Society, as we are informed by the Times of
last Monday, have spread like locusts over a great
part of Italy, and are making every exertion to
undermine the attachment of the people to the
Catholic religion ; while the Evangelical Alliance
and the evangelical Lord Shaftesbury, for-
getting the maxims of the Gospel, under whose
name .they disguise their undertakings, encourage
committees to collect money for the purpose of arm-
ing outlaws, and rebels, and banditti of the worst
description, against a peace-loving, and. humane
Sovereign, who has never given to England, or to
any of her subjects, the least ground of complaint,
but, on the contrary, has always acted towards them
a kind and friendly part. Encouraged by diploma-
tists and statesmen, supplied with money by Evan-
gelical Committees, and poisoned with a fell hatred
of Catholicity by agents of Bible Societies, we are
not to be surprised that the enemies of the Pope
should have undertaken their work of destruction
with great energy and have occasioned great evils
in a short time. We cannot read, without horror
and indignation, the misdeeds of the men who are
favoured and protected by Biblicals and. Evangeli-
cals. Those misdeeds are described in a late Allo-
cution by the Pope himself. The leaders of the
faction,' says he, do not cease to use all their elm-
/Ring in corsupting the morals of the people, espe-
cially by books and newspapers published at Bo-
logna and elsewhere, in which every license is en-
couraged, the Vicar of Christ here on earth is lashed
with insults, the practices of religion and piety are
mocked, and the prayers used to the Immaculate
and. Most Holy Virgin Mary, Mother of God, and
to implore her most powerful patronage, are held ur
to scorn. Moreover, in the theatres public decency.
modesty, and virtue are attacked; and persons con-
secrated to God are exposed to the common contempt
and derision of all.' It is known, also, that every
honest man is at the mercy of the assassin's dagger,
that many distinguished personages have been mur-
dered or insulted merely because they were at-
tached to the Pope—that religious communities
have been dispersed, and that the pretended friends
of liberty have polluted the sacred name by
their crimes, and especially by desecrating the
house of God and stabling eheir horses in
public churches. To perpetuate and to trans-
mit to posterity the spirit by which they are ani-
mated, these same men are endeavourincs to draw to
themselves the education of the people, and. they
publicly prohibited the learned. and venerable Car-
dinal Archbishop of Boulogne to preside at the distri-
bution of prizes in the schools of that excellent body
of men, the Christian Brothers. The crimes and
outrages to which we have referred have filled the
paternal heart of his Holiness with grief and sor-
row, and in a few month he has been obliged to
drink the chalice of affliction to the very dregs.
While the Pope is thus assailed by the perfidy of
Evangelicals and the treacherous ingratitude of some
few of his own subjects on whom he had conferred
innumerable benefits, is it not meet and just for hi:
faithful children to raise their voices in his favour.
and to endeavour to console him by manifesting
their sentiments of respect and veneration ? It is
in this spirit that you have assembled to-day; you
are anxious to show how strongly you condemn the
insults that have been offered to the head of the
holy Catholic Church, and how deeply you feel and
resent the injuries that have been done to our lov-
ing and loved father, the father of the faithful, and
Christ's Vicar on earth. While it is in this spirit
alone that we fulfil the truly Catholic and filial
duty which we have assembled to discharge, I know
. that our feelings will be misrepresented, and that it
will be said that we are trembling for the fate of
Catholicity, and that we are endeavouring to prop
up a system now doomed to final destruction.
Many fanatical preachers will make this announce-
ment to their congregations, dancing with frantic
delight in their pulpits at the prospect of the fulfil-
ment of prophecies regarding the downfall of Rome,
which have been repeated 10,000 times, from the
days of Martin Luther to the present,- and as often
found to be the offspring of deluded imaginations.
• But what is the fact ? No Catholic is in the
slightest alarm about the permanent existence of
the spiritual authority of the Pope. The experi-
ence of past ages would be sufficient to remove
every doubt from the minds of the most timid.
For three centuries the Popes were persecuted by
all, the power of the Roman Empire. They were
cast into prison and driven into exile, and during
that period all the holy men who filled the chair of
St. Peter, with the exception of four or five, died
martyrs for their faith. Yet, whether in prison or
in exile, or concealed in the recesses of the cata-
combs, they continued to rule the Church, and
their prayers, and their patience, and their suf-
ferings were more powerful than the arms of Rome.
_ldolatry and superstition yielded to the humility
of the Cross, which was planted by the triumphant
Pontiffs on the proudest monuments of Paganism,
the Pantheon, the Capitol, and the Colisseum.
Before the end of the eighth century the whole of
the Papal States were recognised by all Europe
as the patrimony of St. Peter, and from that time
to the present, with trifling interruptions, the
Popes have continued to enjoy its dominion. Even
Protestant statesmen admit that it is a work of
extreme difficulty to contend with the successor of
St. Peter. In a.despatch of Lord Cowley, English
Ambassador in Paris, of the 19th of January last,
published by Parliament, we find the following re-
markable words—, It was a. saying of the first
Napoleon, somewh t paradoxical, no doubt, in his
mouth, that themPeanopaet
hisu mast bke,treated with as if
he had 300,000
The saying, how-
ever, showed the difficultya with tehßatofirm
mind had to contend when the headw of th
Catholic Church was his opponent. And if such
was the case in those days of irreligion and in-
fidelity, what must it now be when the Roman
Catholic Church has recovered so much of its then
lost authority ? In truth, the Pope's strength
lies in his weakness, and we may ask, what can
you do with a man who, the moment the pressure
is put upon him, exclaims, Do with me what you
will—drive me from Rome, but remember that
I 'am as much the Pope, whether' seated on a
barren rock, or on the throne of St. Peter.'
So far Lord Cowley, who writes like a man
who had not shut his eyes to great passing events,
and who speaks very differently from fanatical
preachers and evangelical supporters of treason and
sedition. The noble and generous Emperor of
Austria has boldly broken the chains which bound
the Church in his vast empire, and given a death-