The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1871-04-26

The King OF Bavaria has just written y
King of Bavaria is a young man Of twenty
six. Dr. Dollinger Is an old man of seventy
two. When the layman aud the priest, the
king and the subject aggressive youth and
conservative old age, so meet and so agree,
there is only one xplanation-which Is, that
the national sentiment is not divided. No
reader of the HERALD is ignorant Of the fact
that DR.. Dollinger was, before and during the
Council, the soul Of the anti-infallibilist party.
The sentiment against infallibility was gen.
eral-it was English, American, French, Ger
man; but the learning, the exhaustive re-
search, the just conclusion, came from the
Munich Professor. 1t was he who inspired
Strozmayer of Hungary, the Prince Primate
of Bohemia, the Archbishop Of Munich and
the rest. The opposition to the dogma which,
while the Council was in session, was
strong, became weak directly the Council
was dispersed. Our American bishops, as
well as some Of the English and French and
German bishops, as qnietly and with as much
grace as was possible in the circumstances
swallowed the leek. DR.. Dollinger is the one
man who has stood out, and for conscience
sake braved all the consequences. Loving the
Catholic Church dearly, and believing that
the unity of Christianity was stil possible
under the Catholic banner, he fought and still
fights against what he considers an innovation,
a wrong, folly. For dong so he has been
accommodated. Let it not be forgotten that
in bis manifesto, the full text Of which we pub
lshed last Sunday, he asked, in humble terms,
to be heard at the approaching Assembly of
Bishops at Fulda, and, if that could not be
granted, before commission named and pre-
sided over by his archbishop. His argument
for this hearing was that, 80 far as he could
find out the truth, thousands of the clergy and
hundreds of thousands of the laity were
opposed to the dogma of infallbility. "All my
friends" he says, ''are of my mind" ''Nobody
believes it" is what hear from every lip.
In face of such request, backed up by
the best of reasons, the accommodation is
especially impolitic If the impolicy of the ex-
communication required further proof we
should find it in the fact that the course of the
learned professor and divine has been for
mally endorsed by forty -four out of his sixty
two colleagues in the University of Munich.
After prasing him for the course he had taken
and promising to stand by him, they ask, 'Ts
God in need of your lie ?" and they answer,
'sWe and thousands like us, emphatically like
you, reverend sir, say No." Add to all this
what we said at the outset-tbat the young
King is at his back. One other fact ought not
to be forgotten in connection with this D6llin-
ger-Papal affair. 1t is this South Germany
by its union with North Germany has found
at least intellectual liberty This also is i'm
portant. The national Parliaments in Vienna
and Berlin have both, within few days, pro-
nounced against the ultramontanists. Dollinger
is stronger man than Hyacinthe. Old as be
is he may prove another Luther. However
all this trouble may end, and it is not one whit
less interesting to us on this Continent than to
the Europeans, we cannot help saying that this
first fruit of infalliblity is an ything but sweet.
Ais well that ends we'll but the end of this
play is not yet.