The Birmingham age-herald., 1914-08-20

1 it was announced that the war and the l intense heat in Rome had combined to deDress him. In bed he continued to dream of the conflict by night and to discuss l it by day.
 T shall not cease to implore God to put stop to this inhuman butchery,'
 he declared. His physicians had to deal with this mental condition as we'll as physical suffering. Arrangements were made by which Cardinal Merry Del Val.
 the papal secretary of state, would rem der his holiness daily report of the war situation. The pope desired to see 1 some way in which he might exert his | influence to check the bloodshed and he was the more affected because any action seemed useless.
 Urged Public Prayer
 At the commencement of the European crlsls he had addressed an exhortation to all Catholics of the world, asking them to lift their souls toward Christ, who alone was able to aid, and he called on the clergy to offer public prayer The break between Austria and Ser via from the first became a source of great grief to him, for the Vatican was most friendly toward both nations He was inexpressibly shocked, he said. at the assassination of Archduke Francis Ferdinand, the heir to the Austrian l throne, who like all the Hapsburgs was
 
 thetie toward little Servia with which i, the Vatican but recently had concluded a friendly concordat
 l The popes views on peace embodied | in an allocution delivered at the con- sistory at which he created 13 new cardinals last May, constituted such 8 remarkable document that the Carneg gie Peace union, founded in February by Andrew Carnegie with an endowment of $2000,000, decided to begin among l the clergy of the Roman Catholic l church it's educational activities in be- l half of disarmament and arbitration I by sending to each of the 23,00 priests 1 Of the United States and Canada d 1 copy of this allocution In it the pope | referred to men of distinction and l force planning schemes for preventing 2 the calamities of revolutions and the | slaughter of war and for insuring the | blessing of peace," which, coupled with | the fact that he spoke at length with , the three American cardinals-Gibbons | Farley and O'Connell-was interpreted as referring to the efforts of Presi- dent Wilson and Secretary of State | Bryan in behalf of universal peace | To-day" he said. "peace or war in society and the state does not depend so much on the rulers as on the mu1- | titudes. Deprived of the light of truth revealed by God unused to the dis | multitude, the prey of blind passions ! rush to the common ruin instigated by clever agitators who seek nothing but | their own advantage"
 Giuseppe Melchiorre Sarto, known to the world as Pope Plus X, was elect ed to the pontificaate on August 1, 1903 and during his occupancy of his exalted office as head of the Roman Catholic church he was confronted with some of the most momentous problems, reli eious and governmental. with which the Holy See has had to deal in mod ern times.
 Pope Plus was born on June 2, 1885, at Riese, in the Venetian provinces, the first child of Gian- Battista Sarto a postman, and his wife Margherita. Giuseppe's early career was influenced by the village priest who took liking for the hoy, taught him to read and write and drummed into the youthful head the rudiments of Latin. At the age of II years he entered the sem | mary at Castelfranco, not far from his birthplace, and for four years every | day he tramped to school, usually 1 barefooIed until he reached the out skirts of the village, where he would slip on his shoes to keep up appear ance.
 | From Castelfranco he passed in 1850 to the seminary at Padua, and in 1858, at
 the age of 25, was ordained priest and took up his studies at Tombolo In 1S6f he had his first parish of importance, | that of Sazano. where he remained Tor Il years In addition to his ecclesiastical duties Father Sarto contributed largely to the support of his mother and sisters,
 who found life hard struggle, especially | in the winter.
 Appointed Professor
 | His eloouence led to his being called | xa t, xrie- l1o npa Ion
 of the disocese, and shortly after he was appointed professor of theology in the | seminary. Nine years of strenuous work | followed, crowned in 1884, by his assum- ing the mitre as Bishop of Mantua. | Leo XIII conferred upon Bishop Sarto
 the title of Roman Count" and in the ! consistory of June 1885, created him car dinal, giving him the Roman church of San Bernardo from which to take his | title He was so poor that he was un- able to pay the fees connected with the | accordance of the new dignity, but some | of his admirers came forward and pro- vided him with the necessary funds. l Creating him cardinal, Leo XIII ap- pointed him also patriarch of Venice, but he did not leave Mantua until a
 year later, owing to conflict between the Italian government and the Holy See over the right of the House of Savoy to be | consulted before the appointment of a | patriarch, the government having inher- ited the rights of the Republic of Venice. l The dispute was cut short by King Hum- | bert also appointing Cardinal Sarto as | patriarch of Venice.
 The patriarch's relations with the House l of Savoy were always most cordial. Every
 time that their majesties or the princes visited Venice he paid them visit and presented his homage. He was one of Queen Margherita's confessors, and only | a few months before the death of Leo XIII he was next the Count of Turin in public when he (the patriarch) blessed
 the foundation stone of the new Campa-
 nile in Piazza San Marco. He was the | candidate of Leo XIII as his successor
 but he so little realized the future that when he left Venice, in July, 1903. for the
 conclave in Rome, he bought return
 ticket.
 In the conclave the struggle was for
 and against Cardinal Rampollo, Lee XIII's secretary of state, whose chances
 were lost when Cardinal Puzyn pro-
 nounced the veto of Austria against him which veto was supposed to represent
 the triple alliance. Then, needing a ''com- promize'' pope, all eyes turned to Cardina Sarto, who at first refused, but was after ward induced to accept the high position being elected almost unanimously on Au-
 gust 4. assuming the title of Pope Plus x, Bishop of Rome and Vicar of Jesus Christi Successor of St. Peter, Prince o1 the Apostles: Supreme Pontiff of the Uni versal Church: Patriarch of the West Primate of Italy: Archbishop and Metro
 politan of the Roman Province and Sov- ereign of the Temporal Dominions of ths Holy Roman Church.
 Spirit of MOdesty