New Britain herald., 1914-08-20

to visit the King of United Italy in his capital, was the first, with the exception of Prince Ferdinand of Bulgaria, since 1870, to- go as guest to the Quirinal.
 This, however, was not only caused by the feeling towards Italy but much more by the state of religious war with France, which was the most remarkable event in the last pontifi cate, and of which many have at tributed the responsibility to Plus K, while the hostilities had already be- gun under Leo XIII.
 France found imitators in Spain, which passed in parliament bills against Religious Congregations and the Clergy, leading to the recall of the Spanish ambassador to the Holy See; and in Portugal, where the re- public proclaimed on October 5, 1910, brought about complete separation between church and state. the ex. pulsion of the Religious Congrega. tions and the confiscation of their properties.
 While such serious crises were talk ing place between the Vatican and some of the Latin countries, which had been known in history as the most faithful to the Holy See, the re- lations with Italy, while maintaining in the outside form the usual char acter of hostility were in substance much more cordial. .a.
 Many Religious Services.
 It would take long to enumerate all the reforms of a religious character initiated by Plus X., such as that of restoring the GregorIan chants, of preaching every Sunday from a text from the Bible, himself giving the good example by having as long as his strength allowed him, the faith full of the different parishes of Rome gathering in the Courtyard of San Damase to hear him explain the Gospel story, and carry ing out one after the other as Pope the same ideas and principles which he had confessed and advocated as bishop and patriarch. One of his un- dertakings will leave an important mark in the history of the papacy- the qualification of ecclesiastic law He entrusted the work to an illus trious scholar in canon law, MET Pietro Gasparri, on whom he con- ferred the red hat in December. 1901 Another epoch-making task was that of the revision of the Vulgate, which he confided to Father Francis Aidan Gasquet, abbot-president of the Eng fish Benedictine Congregatic, so well known as a learned historian.
 Against Modernists.
 Plus X was determined to restore the most iron discipline among the Id 1nd tn O campaign against that section Of ec- clesiastics who professed unorthodox opinions and were called modernists. The encyclical promulgated on Sep tember 8, 1907, condemned the mod ernists and their doctrines.
 Following this several leaders of the modernist movement were ex- communicated in Italy, England and Germany. The Pope displayed even greater energy on November Is, 1907, when he reaffirmed the necessity of com batting by every possible means the spirit of rebellion, and ordered the bishops to watch and if necessary to dismiss the professor infected with the condemned doctrines and to pre- vent from taking orders those stu dents who were suspected of sympa- thisine with the movement.
 
 New rebellions broke out, and Plus x went further in the struggle with a new encyclical, in May, 1909, and more so by imposing the anti-modern- ist oath on all ecclesiastics.
 The pontiff reused storm of op- position to himself entirely unex- pected by his encyclical against the Protestants in general and those of the German reformation in particu- lar, on the occasion of the centennial of St. Charles Borromeo.
 -:.f -. Another Reform.
 Another very. important reform due to Plus x is that of the Roman yCuria, which was still ruled by the Bull of Sixtus V of January, 15SS. With this he reformed the offices, the ecclesi- astical courts and the Roman congre- gations, withdrawing America, Can ada, Newfoundland, Great Britain.