The morning star and Catholic messenger. [volume] (New Orleans [La.]) 1868-1881, 1874-04-26
Another Infamous Outrage.
,Froa tie pub!in Matte. Anrn .

: IFroa tie Dublin Nation Aprn, a.
On Tuesday last the Archbishop of Co
logne was forcibly dragged from his hous
to a common prison cell, by the lcca
agents of the German civil power. H,
was carried off as a criminal would be wh,
had committed murder, or robbery. or per
jury, or forgery; yet be had been guilty O
none OF these crimes, DOR of any other ac
morally reprehensible. He had merely
discharged his duty as bishop of the Ca
thoilc Church, as ne had been accustomed
to DO, without !eprocf from the Govern.
ment, for many years I: discharged il in a
manner npfiinching, it is true, but also IN
obtrusive and inoffensve. For this. DO
/ licemen went on Tuesday last to his house,
arrested him il the name CT the Emperor,
! escorted him through The streets of the
! proud old cathedral city, and lodged him in
common Jail, leaving him to pick his
way amongst burglars ard footpads.
The bare recital of the facts is positively
revolving and almost incredible. To thin /
that such Circumstance could occur in az
age Of professed enlightenment aud lib
erality, in one of the most "civilizedn and
"cultivased- nations Of the world To
think that there should be In such a nation
and IN such an age such gross and out
Iageous interference on the part of the
State in religion To think, in a word.
that spirit of persecution, than which a
hercer, more determined, m ore blind, and
unreasonlpg did not inspire the deeds of
Nero, Diocletian, or Elizabeth, could exist
in this year of grace. 1874! one would
have imagined that Bismarck and his fo,-
lowers would learn something from history:
would consider the fate of ali previous at.
tempts to break up and destroy the Cath
oiic Church would especially, reflect how
hercely, how doggedly, how brutally, how
long, and yet how fruitlessly, England at
tempted to root Catholicism out of Ireland.
be only explanation we can conceive for
such phenomenon as Germany presen is to- |
day IN the impIisoning of her Catholic pre-
lates for doing their duty to their Church, is |
mat suggested by the saying that those
make mad and the imprisonment of the
Atch oishop of Cologne, if it is not an act
d madness, is, to our thinking, an act OF
power not more outrageously tyrannical
nan 1t Is lncomprehen sible.
VI course, we know what is Said in de-
ence OF the BIsmarckian policy. Weknow
bat the Catholic bishops and clergy of
, germany are accused of treason to the
'atherland of desiring to subject the
tate, even in temporal matters, to the :
dominion of the Holy See: of, in the in
nlting language of traducers of Catholi
consistent with the liberty OF the citizen.
We know all this, we have heard it usqus
a ndusedm from every Protestant print in
he three Kingdoms. But this also we
noW-tnat these charges, brought for
yard again and again though they are
nth such persistence and vehemence. have
ct been substantiated, and that they are ;
ne and all of piece with the excuses I
nth which tyranny ds always, and in ali ;
laces, attempted to justify it's excuses.
can never be forgotten how Bismarck ,
Ias challenged to prove the truth of his {
ccusations against the Catholic Church of
and that from that day to this s
g has never in response produced a single t
article OF any kind of evidence whatever. {
very day, indeed, practical refutation is 8
horded by the very acts of the Catholic r
ishops and clergy, against whom the only '
hence that the utmost ingenuity of an Ar t
as eyed and Maehiav Gillian bureaucracy can '
iiege or suggest is q compliance with the '
lost solemn obligations of their Office i
ne state OF affairs in Prussia just now
'ouId be exactly paralleled here if, in the !
lords of Fortnigktiy Reriew, the Arch
lsaop of Tuam were sent to prison for i
ppointing parish priests who have not | :
cen educated at Oxford, if the admins. .
ration of every Catholic parish in Ireland l.
'ere subject to the sanction of the Home 2
ecretary in England, and the curriculum of t
very Catholic seminary to the theological I
censorship of the Protestant President of J.
ne Council of Education. :
Can this state of things last long. or q
ave good result ultimately for those I
no have brought it about If history
an tell US anything on the subject, as y
lredly its answer will be decided mega f
We.