The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1903-09-12
italian View Of Plus x

A LEADING Italian paper publishes
4 a sketch of the new pope with this
F-adline: THE Man Who Smiles, -
and the qualification, strange though it
may seem wher applied to a pope, is
entirely truthful. The grim fight of the
conclave has brought forth the smiling
man, Plus Y. He has seen poverty
hard poverty, too; he used, when boy,
to walk miles and miles every day to
attend school. badly fed and badly shod
i'm the trying climate of northern TIA
ly. and he has met ali the hardships of
life with his serene, unalterable smile.
1t was a strange sight. to be sure, and
an interesting one, both from the stand
point of the historian and of the phil
osopher. and supposing that the same
historian and philosopher and even the
mere mortal in pursuit of impressions
and emotions universal, had, that same
day, a few hours earlier, witnessed the
first appearance Of the pope in the ca
thedral of St Peter, the contrast must
inevitably have struck him, between
the noble pale. serene countenance of
the new pontiff and the expression in
the faces of his defeated electors. They
ali wore a mask of coolness, de rigcur
during such an important ceremony as
4 conclave. but under the frozen mask
The most worldly passions strained the
muscles and wore out the alleged re-
pose and quietness of spirit No doubt
wen to our modern. Impartial and un-
Trejudiced minds the repetition of the
historic fight assumes a character of
Geep interest and almost epic grandeur
L
passion and worldly motives.
The characteristics OF the new pope
seem 10 be particularly the goodness
and simplicity inherent in j life lived
in wholesome contact Wiih nature. in
he practice OF all that is honest and
unaffected in the intercourse with
others. The family Of The pope is very
GUmble and poor but ii comes from a
long line Of pious and honest ancestors.
to whom rho most remarkable cilarac-
tcristics Of the pope's perSonality-the
more remarkable as they SAVIOR of old
Time purity Of mind and humbleness of
heart-can be traced. There are many
-uch quiet households among the poorer
and humber people of Italy, and their
offspring give sometimes unexpected re- |
suits.
The new pope is an enthusiastic lover /
or music. Even a gramophone will |
please him, not for any excellence of |
performance in itself, but because it /
suggests music. generally good music /
And even the suggestion Of good music |
pleases Plus y. The pope has n beau |
lful. clear baritone voice, which he al /
ways uses at ecclesiastical functions in |
a most effective way; he also plays |
equally well the piano and organ, and /
loves the old Gregorian "canto fermo:" /
from which accomplishments all lovers
OF sacred music infer, not without some
probability, the revival of sacred music
throughout the Catholic world
While the musical competence of the
new pope is above discussion, public
opinion seems 10 be quite uncertain as
to his classical training: in fact. very
marked doubts have been expressed as
10 the existence of the latter. But a
few young and learned priests who
have been under his tuition in the sem
mary at Mantova are ready to contra
dict any depreciative statement to this
effect. It seems that Plus X does not |
care to make show of his learning.
bur he possesses just as good stock
Of classical Information as any scholar
might justly be proud Of.
When he was teaching AZ MantoNa he
was Il member Of the board OF exam
iners in the most diverse departments.
and n young divinity students would
suddenly find himself helned out of