The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1874-11-25
..TuE VATICAN DEGREES"
or.apSrosFs,s PAMPHLET ON PAPAL IN
FALLI8ILgrY AND CIVIL ALLEGIANCE
r.FTTER FROM ARCHBISHOP BAYLEY.

The civil allegiance and duties OF members
Of his Church to the State! Giadstohe
aftirms that they do. ~ c,.s..,,o
n will he remembered that Mr.. Gladstone
,afe,v wrote an article in the Contemporary
Rerie,p upon the subject OF rltuaiism, 10
which. referring 10 the question Whetner
handful OF the clergy are or are BOT engaSeu
in an utterly hopeless and visionary eIor. 10
Romantic the Church and people OF Eng
49,. Mr. Gladstone said that ono time
since the bloody reign of Mary has such
,Schcmc been possible" but if it had bees
POSSIBLE in the seventeenth or eighteenth
centuries il would still have been impossl'
HE in the nineteenth, wben," among other
charges. "no one can become her
fRome,s) convert without renouncing
his moral and mental freedom and
placing his civil loyalty and duty at
the mercy Of another" &c. These words
were received with great Indignation Dy q
norton of the press in Ireland, where Glad-
s,one,s course in aiding TO disestabl!sh the
Pro,estant Church had won him many
friends. and had been made the subject OF
expostuIation with him, he says, by more
than one friend of his among those VINO
have been led to join the Roman Catholic
communion. In the present pamphlet he re.
iterates the views Of bis former article, ana
SAYS: ~ propose TO eXpostulate IN my
turn"
GLApsToNE's PROPOSITIONS.
TIE main force of the pamphlet is conce n.
trated upon the following propositions:
.That no one can now become convert
70 Rome without forfeitipg his moral and
mental freedom and placing bis civil loyalty
and duty Mt the mercy OF another that
other being The Pope. That all converts do
this deliberately he is, indeed, far from as
sorting; but he maintains that they are H.
eXoIably committed to it.
GAS 10 the individual loyalty Of Roman
Catholics, State disposed to generous or
candid Interpretation had no reason 10 be
uneasy. 1t was only with regard to requisi-
tions which might be made on them from
another quarter that apprehension could
exist. 1t was reasonable that England
should desire to know not only what the
Pope might do for himself, but to what de-
mands, By The constitution of their Church,
they were liable, ard how far it was possible
that such demands could touch their civil
duty. The theory which placed every hu.
man being, in things spiritual and things
TEMPORAL. at The feet of the Roman Pontltf
had not been an idolum specus-a mere the
ory of the chamber. Bran-pOwer never
SURPASSED in the political history of the world
had been devoted for centuries to the single
purpose of working it into the practice OF
Ebristepdom: had in the West achieved for an
impossible problem partial success, and had
in the East punished the obstinate independ-
encc OF the Church by that Latin conquest OF
Constantinople which tt1ectually prepared
the way for the downfall Of the Eastern
empire and the establishment OF the Turks
in Europe. What was really material,
therefore, was not whether the papal chair
laid claim to this or that particular power,
but whether it laid claim to some power
that included them all, and whether that
claim had received such sanction from the
authorities Of the Latin Church that there
remained within her borders absolutely no
tenable standiDg.ground from which war
against it could be maintained. Did the
Pope, then, claim infallbility? Or did he,
either without infalibility or with it, (and
il with it, SO much the wOrsc.) claim an
universal obedience from bis flock: And
were these claims, either or both, affirmed in
his Church by authority, which even the least
parl OF the members Of that Church must
admit to be binding upon conscencc?"
He argues that not merely Bishop Doyle,
but the collective body of the Wears Apos-
tolic who then governed the Roman Catho-
lies of Great Britain, utterly rcpudia,ed
these claims, the latter, for instance, declas-
ing:
THAT neither the Pope nor any other pre-
late or ecclesiastical person OF the Roman
Catholic Church has any right 10
interfere directly or indirectly in the civil 60
Yernment, nor to oppose in any
manner the performance of the civil duties
which are due 10 the king; while the Irish
Roman Catholic hierarchy publish an adj
dress containing the following article:
"They declare on oath their belief that it
is not an article of the Catholic faith, neither
are they thereby required to believe that the
Pope is intallible-" -.
Mr.. Gladstone then observes that "since
that time all these propositions have been
reversed. The Popc's lEialibilty, when be
speaks &c cGtbecsu GA faith and morals, has
been declared. with the assent of the bish-
ops of the Roman Church, TO be an article
of faith, binding OH the conscience of every
Christian; his claim TO the obedience of his
spiritual subjects has been declared in like
maarer without any Prsctical limit or re-
serves and his supremacy, without any re-
serve of civil rights, has been similarly az
firRled to include eSerytbpg which relates
to the discipline and g0rernment Of the
Church Throughout the world. And these
doctrines, we nov know 90 the highest au-
thority, it is OF necessity for salvation to
beliepe."
He adds:
1Wil it be sud, finally, that the infllIi-
bility touches only .matteref faith and NOR.
alss Oily matter of morals-: Will any of
the Rotnan casll:sts kinft;y acquaint us
what are the departments end functions of
human life which DO not and cannot fall
within the domain of mosaS::
Mol SEch q distinction would be the I'M.
worthy device Of Z shallow lsolicy, yainly
used to hide the daring Of that wild am
bition which at Rene, not trom the throne,
but from behind the throne, igromps the
movements OF the Vatican. ! care not
to ask il there be dregS or tatters OF
human lie, Fnch as -cs.a escape from the de-
Scription and boundary of n.osa!s sub.
: NIT that duty is Il power which lsaseS with
us in the morniDg and goes TO fess with lis
at night. 1T ia coeStensHe with the action
OF our intelligence. Itis the shadow which
,seea&eS TO us, &c where We will, and which
. only Leaves Us ~hen We teaye the light Of
life. So, them il is the slssreme direction OF
MS in respect 10 adj duty which the Pontitf
declares to belong to him, ;sacro dppsp 5ante
co0catos and this declaration he makes not
as an otiose opintos OF the scaools, but>s4nc.
lis fdeIbus eretzeatlsa et teaa1saa7n.''
But he further insists that tie Council has
establsshed something even wider in its
I, reach than the claim 70 infallibil.y, and ,aa,t
IS "the claim to an absolute and entire ai,e..
Adience,S This part of the DEGREES of n!s,
Council has not, Sir. Gladstone thinks, re-
ceiFed due attention.
ARCHBISHOP BAYLEY's LETTER on Mr.. GLAD
STONE.