New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1873-09-15
REAOTIONARY FRANCE.
PILGRIMS AND POLITICS.

PILGRIMS AND POLITICS
THE RELIGIOUS REVIVAL AND MoNARcHIcAL RBAc-
lPRoM THR REGULAR CORRESPONDENT OF THE TRIBUNE
PARIS, Aug. Elf half million wasa correct
estmate-the faithful will tell you that it was too
low-of the number of those who had already this
year. at the date Of my 10th If July letter gone on
foot or wheels to pay their devotons at this that and
the other French shrine, by this it should be near
million and half. We are now in the hight
Of the pilgrimage season. Never in modern
times, il In any time. there another like it for
brisk and multitudnous pious pereRinatiOn One
day 1t is 1000 devotees about Eotre Dame de Ia
Garde another 10000 at Cambria, 10000 at Notre
Dame de Liesse, at La Salette and Lourdes,
beside great days and extraordinary occasions.
The af1luence is constant, with a sprinkling OF
miraculous cures from the tbaumaturgic springs OF
the last-named places. Hardly diocese whose
bishop does not exal the merits of local shrine
for convenience of tender-footed or short-winded
devotees of his flock.
But this outward and very visible pilgrimage Is
but one of the signs of that remarkable Religious
Revival before spoken of. What does it meant is a
large question. Nothing is easier, nor perhaps
falser than brief, boldly generalized answer. 1t
has too varied phases, too manifold and compcate
icihbiohn WIN eho PhOoShet PIS, anu iuoulo ooN'N
and political condition Of things in France let alone
all Western Europe to go no further, that any one
but an outsider. at q fixed point, looking in his
own camera obscura can take them in at compre-
hensive view. To observe with such lights as he
has and sketch little here aud there is enough for
dn outsider to attempt.
1t was until quite lately habtual with some OF the
most active leaders in the ostensble phases Of
the new religious movement to deprecate the charge
of it's being political. But 1t is and, though they
did not will it, must be. For, apart from the con-
sderaton that the spiritual and temporal man is an
indivisible unity, religious interests cannot be
wholly divorced from political questions now in de-
bate in States like France, the German Empire,
Austria, Switzerland, and Italy, where Church and
State are from of old married in tight though now
rusty wedlock, each claiming control of the keys
Here in France and since the great Revolution-to
90 no further and no further back-the Catholic
Church has opposed its forces whatever they for the
moment WERE TO what it designates as the reyolu-
tonary spirit. Generally speaking, it has always
opposed Repubcanism, and favored, as against 1t,
all monarchies from the unliked of Napoleon l..
to the dsliked one of Louis Philippe and the ques-
tionably allied one of Napoleon LII. 1t was among
the earliest issued of the successfully nsurgent
Prince Presidents DEGREES, after the coup dddt OF
1851, that one which reconsecrated the Pantheon
TO Ste Genevieve, and straightway responded to
that Mailing sign the higher clergy sent in their adj
hesion to the Elysee Early in the next month,
when the swearer of the oath Of the 10Th OF De-
cember had deigned to apprize them that again,
with their good leave. he was coming into tho
presence of God" waiting for his coming in the
Cathedral OF Notre Dame, were the arch
bishops, priests and deacons of the Roman
Catholic Church. When the Church perceived
that the swearer of the oath and all his associates
were ready she began her service. Having robes
whereon all down the back there was embroidered
the figure of a cross the bishops and high priests
went up to the high altar and scattered rich incense
and knelt and rose and knelt again. Then, i'll the
hearing of thousands, there peaed through the
aisles that hymn of praise which purports to watt
into heaven the thanksgiving of whole people for
some new and signal mercy vouchsafed to them by
Almighty God. 1t was because of what had been
done to France within the last 80 days that the
bosannas arose in NOtre Dame. Moreover, the
priests lifted their voices and cried aloud, chanting
and saving TO the Most High: Domino, Salrum fac
Ludoricum NdpOle0nem.' o Lord Save Louis Ma
poleon.D Response to which precation after some
delay, was Sedan.
But for 10 years that chant was never out Of the
mouths of all French clergy though after the Ital-
ian war it grew toward a canting lp-service. How
ever lamentable then it is not unnatural in this.
instance that considerable numbers of persons Bit
terly hostile to the Empire should come to regard
this prestly class and its following as their political
enemies its church as offensive political Insttu-
ton. During all the years of the Lower Empire,
and rapidly after 1859, Observation-Disclosures gaining
ground over whatever of Gallicanism and Liberal
ism remained among French Catholics, till it de-
creed itself the 1ROman triumph of 1870. The
Franco-Prusian war, with it's immediate results, had
for the at least temporary confirmation
of this victory, and the Religious Revival wo are
looking at. Heremen saw the captivity" of the
Pope the persecution Of the Church in Germany, at
home national and personal humiliation, loss and
suff ring of all kinds by the war, revolution with
anti-C Christian Gambetta and his fellows-the many
headed Beast-the Commune and Satan come to his
own again with petrolean flames Of hell-frs. This
was no time for dissension among the faithful.
Some liberal Catholics, indeed, though cast down
not destroyed, still occasionally raise their voices
little, so that twice within month
they have been gently raped on the coxcombs with
Papal briefs. On the whole, the Church party is at
one, and disciplined here as perhaps never before
since the days of st. Martin. It's zeal and activity
are manifest-and none the less sincere that they
are partly political and social in aim-they are in
eyitably 30 in tendency. The man at once member
of society, of civil community, and of Church or
anti-Church party, cannot well carry on his life
business under three distinct firms.
Events befallen since 1870. referred to above
naturally provoked and gave direction TO the pres
ent reli, ious movement Originating with the de-
won't by temperament OF intellectual conviction,
with whom trust in aid from above to be obtained