have represented to himself the idea which we have extracted from the Greek; in fact, Bellarmine and Baronius have interpreted his translation as we have interpreted the original. But, as was stated at the outset, not every translator who has seized the true sense of his text embodies that sense clearly in the words he selects. This has probably been the misfortune of Dionysius in the present in

stance.

As an appendix to our discussion, I beg leave to suggest to those who still cling to the idea that in the clause, "Since this is also the Roman Bishop's custom," the Council meant, "Since it is also the Roman Bishop's custom to be a Patriarch," that there is a grave difficulty inherent in this interpretation. To be frank, I do not believe that, in the age of the Nicene Council, the Pope was a Patriarch. When was his patriarchate founded? What were its boundaries? What special prerogatives did the Pope claim or exercise in virtue of this adventitious dignity? The chief office of the ancient patriarchs was to ordain, judge, and depose bishops and metropolitans, and to convoke and preside over synods. The Bishop of Alexandria had been, from time immemorial, every inch a patriarch throughout his vast domain. The Bishop of Antioch enjoyed a similar authority throughout the great diocese of Oriens. Their jurisdiction was immediate and ordinary, and there is no difficulty in defining its nature and the limits within which it was exercised. If, therefore, the Council had "illustrated the sort of power," which it accorded to the Bishop of Alexandria, "by referring to a similar power exercised by the" Bishop of Antioch, then the term of comparison would be clearly intelligible; because both were patriarchs, with pretty much the same sort of power and the same extent of territory. But who has ever defined satisfactorily the limits and nature of Rome's patriarchal sway? Protestant writers have circumscribed this "Roman Patriarchate," some within the radius of a hundred miles, others within the confines of the urban vicariate.1 Catholic writers are more generous, and make the “Patriarch of Rome" a donation of the entire Western World. But, on both sides, there is difficulty; for the Protestants have to explain how it is we find the Pope exercising great authority beyond the boundaries in which they have hemmed him; whilst the Catholics have to explain how it is that the Roman Pontiffs are not found to have ordained Bishops in Milan, or presided over synods in Carthage. In both cases the patriarchal robes they have made for the Pope do not fit him; the first is entirely too small, the second too large. And as neither party will abandon its unproved assumption, that the Pope was, in the technical sense of the

1 Southern and Central Italy and the adjacent islands.

word, a patriarch, the Protestants have to fall back upon the easy doctrine of Papal aggression, and the Catholic controversialists are obliged to contend that “the Pope had authority over the whole West, but did not exercise it equally in all places." Surely the Pope had authority over East and West, as Head of the Church; but when we ask what particular part of the Church he exercised that authority, in immediately performing in person the routine work, it will not do to make distinctions between the having, and the exercising, of authority. The Egyptian Bishops at Chalcedon protested that "nothing could be done by a Bishop of their country without the consent of the Patriarch of Alexandria." Can anything similar to this be said of the early Western Church? Not by any means. The various provinces of Europe and Africa were governed by their bishops and metropolitans, and whenever the Pope stepped in it was as the successor of St. Peter, "to whom the care of the whole vineyard had been intrusted." The notion, then, that the Bishops of Rome, Alexandria, and Antioch, like Jupiter and his two brothers, had divided the world among them, was not conceived at that early day, but was the offspring of schismatical brains in Constantinople. The Patriarchates did not enter into the original constitution of the Church, which existed before them, and has survived them. That interpretation of our canon, therefore, which is adopted generally by Protestants and admitted by several Catholic writers, is founded in error. The Council cannot have illustrated the powers confirmed to the Patriarch of Alexandria by referring to a similar exercise of power by the "Roman Patriarch," because this latter personage had no existence. Whatever powers the Bishop of Rome exercised beyond the narrow boundaries of his little province-which certainly did not constitute a patriarchate-he exercised in virtue of his "primacy over all." It ought not to be overlooked, moreover, that the Popes intervened more frequently in the East than they did in the West, because in that turbulent quarter of the globe it more frequently happened that knots were to be cut worthy of the Vicar of Christ. But whenever the emergency called for Papal intervention, the Roman Pontiffs did not pause to consider in what patriarchate their authority was needed. A fuller elucidation of this point is foreign to our present purpose.

I hope that my readers will not consider that my investigation of this subject has been excessively minute. Should they be inclined to think so, let them take up any of the heterodox historians who have treated of Papal supremacy, and see how prominently this Nicene Canon figures in their pet theory of the gradual aggrandizement of the Bishop of Rome. To that theory it is essential to assume that at the epoch of the Council of Nicaea the au

thority of the Roman Pontiff was circumscribed by very narrow limits. Unless Protestants make good this assertion, no force of rhetoric can avail to establish their system.

Never mind, then, their voluminous rhetoric; shake this one column and their oratorical edifice will tumble upon their heads. When the Bishop of Rome first met the assembled Universal Church, was he considered a " Bishop like any other?" Was he a metropolitan "enjoined to take care of suburban churches?" or a patriarch with "proper limits assigned" him by an unsuspecting council? If I have been even moderately successful in my efforts, I have demonstrated that the Vicar of Christ at his first emerging from the gloomy atmosphere of the Catacombs into the free open sunlight, had already attained the full measure of his greatness.

THE LAWS OF THE CHURCH WITH REGARD TO SECRET SOCIETIES.

W

HAT laws has the Church enacted against secret societies? Why does she inflict so severe penalties on their members? What societies incur her condemnation? These are the questions which it is proposed briefly to answer in this article, guided by the best authorities on the subject.

I.

First, then, what laws has the Church enacted against secret societies? As far back as 1738 Pope Clement XII. excommunicated the Freemasons: this excommunication was renewed in 1751 by Benedict XIV., in 1821 by Pius VII., and in 1826 by Leo XII. But the weightiest authority on the subject is the Papal ConstituApostolicæ Sedis," promulgated by His Holiness Pius IX. on October 12th, A.D. 1869. By this most important document the Supreme Pontiff, just when the Vatican Council began its labors, proclaimed to the Catholic world the censures, "latæ sententiæ," which were to remain in vigor, and the exact limits assigned to each, while he abolished by the same Constitution all former censures not therein renewed. Of the excommunications which are there stated as remaining in force, there are four classes. Of the first the absolution is in a special manner reserved to the Supreme Pontiff; of the second class, absolution is usually reserved to the same; of the third class, it is reserved to the bishops; and of the fourth, absolution is not reserved, but allowed to every ordinary

confessor. Now among those of the second class, i. e., among those usually reserved to the Pope, and therefore considered very weighty, the fourth case regards the present subject. It states that all those are ipso facto excommunicated "who become members of the Masonic Lodges or of the Carbonari, or of other societies of the same kind, which openly or secretly plot against the Church or against legitimate powers; and likewise all who in any way show favor to such societies; and all those who do not denounce their secret chiefs or leaders until they shall have denounced them."

The evils, then, which the members of the condemned societies incur, as seen from this last document in particular, may be reduced to three heads.

1. They render themselves guilty of a grievous mortal sin, thereby forfeiting their right to heaven, as Esau sold his birthright for a mess of pottage; and this although they should see no evil in said societies, provided they know the prohibition of the Church. For the sin is incurred by disobeying the laws of the Church in a grievous matter. It is the Pope's right and duty to feed the lambs and the sheep of Christ, to lead them into wholesome pastures, and to keep them away from poisonous fields. Whenever the Church through her Supreme Pastor threatens a grievous censure against those who pursue any certain course, she thereby most solemnly forbids that course: to disobey her is to disobey Christ, who has said to her: "He who hears you, hears Me; and he who despiseth you, despiseth Me." And this Pope Leo XII. declared when he said: "Be convinced that no one can be a member of those societies without making himself guilty of a most grievous crime." Quin gravissimi flagitii reus sit. When a power constituted by Almighty God decides a point it is not for inferiors to judge whether the decision be right or wrong. What is the use of having a teaching body on earth if every one is to be his own judge after all? This spirit of private judgment is the very principle of Protestantism.

2. They incur excommunication, i. e., over and above the grievous sin of disobedience, the members of the condemned societies incur as a penalty the heaviest censure that the Church can inflict on any one by the power granted her by Christ: "What you shall bind. on earth shall be bound in heaven." She separates such rebellious children from her communion, and thereby from all participation in the spiritual blessings of which she is the dispenser through the sacred blood of Christ, and through his commission to his Church: "As the Father hath sent Me, I also send you." "And behold, I am with you even to the consummation of the world." The excommunicated Catholic is entirely deprived of all the Sacraments as long as his excommunication lasts; he has no share whatever

1

in the public prayers and sacrifices which the Church in union with Christ is ever offering up for all her children; he is disowned by her and he is no longer her child; she has no blessings for him in life, and if he die in that state she has no Christian burial for him after death; she offers no prayers for the repose of his poor soul. He has knowingly and willingly separated himself from her communion, and he must bear the consequences. Should he have become a member without knowing these consequences, the only way he can avoid these great evils is to withdraw at once from the condemned societies as soon as he becomes aware of these penalties.

3. This excommunication is usually reserved to the Supreme Pontiff, i. e., one who has incurred this excommunication, even when he repents, when he severs all connection with the condemned societies, and humbly applies for absolution, cannot be absolved by an ordinary confessor, but only by the Pope or by one who has been delegated by the Pope for that purpose. We must add, however, that in this missionary country our bishops and priests possess more powers in such matters than in Catholic lands; and that when a sinner is in danger of death any priest in any country can absolve him from all his sins, notwithstanding the excommunication. For the Church is a merciful mother, and does not wish any one to die without hope. Such absolution, however, "by any priest," supposes that no recourse can be had to the Pope or to one delegated by him in this matter; and that the excommunicated person, if he should recover, shall afterwards be duly absolved from his excommunication by one authorized to absolve him from it.

We feel convinced that on none of the points so far stated is there any difference of opinion among the teachers of the Church. A question was raised whether those could be absolved from sin who had become Freemasons, if they repented of having taken the forbidden oath, but still retained an outward semblance of membership. This question was set at rest by an answer from the Holy Office at Rome, which decided that such persons could not be absolved while maintaining this semblance of membership.

II.

We will next consider the reasons why Holy Church pronounces so severe a sentence against such societies. Many Catholics care not to ask this question. It is enough for them to learn that the Church has pronounced on any subject; they know that the reasons must be supremely good, since rulers humanly so prudent, and enlightened by a higher wisdom, have so determined. Still there are not wanting motives for examining this point, v. g., that we may be VOL. V.-16