Jesuit fathers, White, and Altham, and Brock, and others, who accompanied the first Roman Catholic colonists to Maryland, came over with the purpose in their minds to plant religious toleration and freedom of conscience in the New World. The idea is preposterous; and he who is credulous enough to believe it, is also ready to believe that Gregory VII., and Adrian IV., and Alexander III., and Innocent III., and Boniface VIII., made the service of God the sole motive of their lives, and undertook no efforts to seize upon the temporal sceptres of kings.

Whatsoever, then, was done in the Colony of Maryland in favor of religious toleration was done only in obedience to the charter, and against the known and steady policy both of the Church of Rome and the Jesuits. Nobody can jus tify the intolerance of the Episcopalians of Virginia or the Puritans of New England; and while we may now congrat ulate ourselves that counteracting influences were planted in Maryland, it should not be forgotten that those who brought them accepted toleration from compulsion, and employed all the arts and cunning of Jesuitism to get rid of it. Intolerance, it is true, accorded with the spirit of that age, and some allowance-but no apology—is to be made for it on that account. But the first influences, that set in against it were Protestant exclusively, not Roman Catholic. Nowhere in the Roman Catholic world could religious toleration obtain a foot-hold. Although great men and laymen of the Church gave it their support, Rome would not permit it, and her fiat was the law of the Church: "when Rome has spoken," said Augustine," that is the end of the matter."

The first legislation in Maryland in favor of freedom of conscience was in 1649, fifteen years after the colony had been planted. Earlier assemblies had enacted laws, but they were not approved by Lord Baltimore, and were, therefore, lost. It was necessary in passing all these that the colonists, while preserving the legal rights of the Proprietary, should, at the same time, be careful to express their allegiance to the English monarch. They had the example of Virginia before them to teach them how necessary it was that their legislation should conform to their charter, in or der to avoid a forfeiture. This conformity to the charter

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693

was the expression of their allegiance. Without it Lord Baltimore could not legally have approved of their legisla tion, and the displeasure of the king would have been incurred. In any aspect of the question, then, the legislation of 1649 was a necessary duty imposed by their fundamental law, and was almost in the language of the charter. It was an act of legal obedience, nothing more. If, apart from this, it had the hearty assent of the Roman Catholic laymen of the colony, that only goes to show, what has often appeared elsewhere, that liberal-minded men of that Church have had courage enough to defy the papacy, in their advocacy of the inalienable natural rights of mankind. To these, if such were the fact, all possible honor is due, and we should not be slow to render it. And even now, in the present aspect of affairs, it may well be left unchallenged; for neither then nor now could religious toleration obtain the sanction and approval of the papacy. It could not have done so then, because Innocent X. was pope, and he, in a pontifical bull, ex cathedra, denounced the Treaty of Westphalia, which ended the Thirty Years' War by restoring peace to Germany, and placed every religious sect on an equal footing; declaring it to be "prejudicial to the Catholic religion, to divine worship, to the safety of souls, to the Apostolic See," and "null, vain, iniquitous."(") It could not be done now, because Pius IX. has announced, in his Syllabus of 1864 and elsewhere, that it is in violation of God's law and the faith of the Church; that Innocent X. and all other intolerant popes were infallible; and that unqualified and unresisting obedience is due both to the doctrines set forth by them, as well as to those which have been set forth by him. If the Roman Catholic laymen of Maryland, in 1649, were so far removed from the immediate influence of Innocent X. that they dared to give expression to their honest sentiments in favor of toleration, let us cherish their memory with affection. But the immediate question which concerns us now, and which is practical in all its bearings, is this: Are the Roman Catholic laymen of the United States at this time

(*) "History of Germany," by Menzel, vol. ii., p. 395; Cormenin, vol. ii., p. 321.

sufficiently removed from the immediate influence of Pius IX. to stand firmly by the honest sentiments of their own hearts, and defend religious toleration at the hazard of incurring excommunication and anathema? If they are—if our free institutions have given growth and strength to their natural love of liberty, and they cherish the hope that they may be preserved as an asylum where Protestants and Roman Catholics may mingle together in harmony, and enjoy whatsoever forms of religious belief their consciences shall approve, then to them also should appropriate honors be given.

And this is the great question to which all our inquiries tend. How it is to be decided, and what shall be the character of the struggle through which a decision shall be reached, is known only to the Searcher of all hearts. The head of the pope no longer wears a crown, but he will tolerate no subjects whose submissive obedience is not the same as if he did. With him there can be no religion without this obedience; there can be no service of God without serving him. If this is to be the religion of the Roman Catholic population of the United States, then the obligation of self-protection will require measures of defense against it. What these shall be it would be premature to discuss until this preliminary question shall have been decided. And this can not be put off much longer. It is crowding upon us every day, and each demand from Rome increases its proportions.

PAPAL THEORY OF GOVERNMENT.

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CHAPTER XXIII.

The Papal Theory of Government.-The Kind of Christian State it requires. -The Laws of Theodosius and Justinian.-The Ordinances in France in the Times of her Kings most in Favor at Rome. -No Other Religion than the Roman Catholic allowed.-Heresy made a Crime against the State. -Modes of punishing Heretics.-These Laws required by the Church.— The State Heretical without them.-The Protestant System.-Separates the Church and the State.-Is in Obedience to the Example of Christ and the Apostles.-The Harmony they established between the Spiritual and Temporal Powers disturbed by the Popes.-The Consequences of disturbing this Harmony.-Papal Doctrines in the United States.-They subject the State to the Government of the Pope.-How far they do this.-In All Temporals which concern the Faith or Morality.-The Government can not stand if this Doctrine prevail.-The Extent to which it is carried.— It is based upon the Bull Unam Sanctam of Boniface VIII.—“Temporal Monarchy" claimed as Necessary for the World.-Harmonious Condition of the First Christians. - Churches planted in Asia before those in Europe. The Work well done by the Apostles.-Jerusalem the "Mother Church."-No Necessity for Another at Rome.-The Consequences of Opposition to the Apostolic Plan.-They lead to the Reformation.-Effect of the Reformation.-Present Efforts of the Papacy to turn the World back. The Contest in the United States.-Conclusion.

PROTESTANT no less than Roman Catholic Christians assign to the spiritual and temporal powers a common foundation in the order and appointment of God. But they dif fer with them essentially in the application of this general principle to the civil affairs of government.

The papal theory of government, taking this principle as the starting point, reaches the following results: that the Church and the State, having this common origin, are bound to extend mutual aid to each other; that the Church, belonging to the spiritual or higher order, is bound to see that both the State and individuals conform, in their laws and conduct, to the law of God; and that, as the two powers are thus united in the common end of obtaining order and holding society together, they should also be so united in their action that the Church, as the superior, may always be in a

condition to command obedience from the State, as the inferior. As it regards all those things which do not concern the law of God or the moral well-being of society, the State is left to deal with its citizens, collectively and individually, without any interference from the Church. This is its sepa rate and independent sphere of action. But whenever questions arise which involve conformity to the law of God or of morality, then the Church is bound to interfere and prescribe the rule of conduct both to the State and the individual. This is called the separate and independent sphere of the Church. Correlative obligations arise out of these relations. The chiefest of these is, that when the Church commands what the law of God and morality require, the State is bound to obey, just as each individual is. And if it does not obey, it, like the individual, is subject to whatsoever penalty the Church may prescribe for disobedience. (')

In looking through the history of such governments as have been constructed upon the papal plan, we find many illustrations of the manner in which these principles have been practically applied, especially in reference to the inflic tion of such penalties as the Church has from time to time imposed for the violation of its laws. The codes of the emperors Theodosius and Justinian contain many laws relating to religion, enacted only in obedience to the command of the Church; merely, says Domat, in his great work on the Civil Law, "to enforce the observance of the laws which the

() "Politics, or the science which treats of the State, its rights, duties, and relations, presents from its ethical character many points of contact with revealed truth. The principles on which it is based flow from the natural law. They can never, therefore, be in real contradiction with the precepts of the divine and positive law. Hence the State, if it only remains true to its fundamental principles, must ever be in the completest harmony with the Church and revelation. Now, so long as this harmony continues, the Church has neither call nor right to interfere with the State, for earthly politics do not fall within her direct jurisdiction. The moment, however, the State becomes unfaithful to its principles, and contravenes the divine and positive law, that moment it is the Church's right and duty, as guardian of revealed truth, to interfere, and to proclaim to the State the truths which it has ignored, and to condemn the erroneous maxims which it has adopted."- When does the Church speak Infallibly? by Thomas Francis Knox, of the London Oratory, London ed., pp. 70, 71.

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