temporal affairs of the Pope's treasury to deal with, and consisted of some eight or nine laymen, though bearing the title of monsignori, consistorial advocates, and the like. Myrmidons if you like, but just as much and as little as, say, the Lords of the Treasury are myrmidons of the Right Hon. Benjamin Disraeli, M.P., or the proctors in Doctors' Commons are myrmidons of Archbishop Tait.

Our enemies, then, should welcome with joy any thing, any act, or policy, or course, which would tend to break up the baleful influence of this great mystery of iniquity, the old Papal conspiracy against the intellectual and moral independence and dignity of man. Nay, it would seem that Papal tyranny so vexes their righteous souls, that persons otherwise utterly objectionable and distasteful to them, priests and bishops of the Church, now become the objects of their tenderest solicitude, and no crocodile that ever shed a tear in the valley of Egypt, could be more affecting than the laments of the "Pall Mall and "Saturday Review" over the misconduct of those erring bishops who basely surrendered the personal and official dignity of the Catholic Episcopate, for which these newspapers are so edifyingly zealous, to the insane requirements of Rome at the Vatican Council. Well then, if it is true, as these amiable persons allege, that Rome never made a greater blunder, never committed herself to a more hopeless contradiction of all her antecedents, or made a more complete breach with ancient history and modern thought, or reduced even her most abject clients to greater straits for any conceivable argument to justify her proceedings, than when she defined the personal infallibility of the Pope,-surely this moment should be one of supreme and calm enjoyment and happiness on the part of her enemies. How far they are from such a condition we need go no further than the next railway newspaper-stall to ascertain. When S. Paul "by persuasion had drawn away a great multitude, not only of Ephesus, but almost of all Asia, saying, they are not Gods which are made by hands," Demetrius the silversmith, who thus spoke, drew the legitimate inference when he said, "not only this our craft is in danger to be set at nought, but also the temple of great Diana shall be reputed for nothing; yea, and her majesty shall begin to be destroyed, whom all Asia and the world worshippeth." Upon this we read, "Having heard these things, they were full of anger, and cried out, saying, Great is Diana of the Ephesians"; and again, "some cried one thing and some another, for the assembly was confused, and the greater part knew not for what cause they had come together." The climax, however, was reached when Alexander addressed them, and "as soon as they perceived him to be a Jew, all, with one voice, for the space of about two hours, cried out Great is Diana of the Ephesians.'

Our antagonists, no doubt, have their views about Scripture.

We submit our own on this passage, which is, that the Ephesians cried out the same thing over and over again for two hours, not because S. Paul's preaching had been a failure, but, on the contrary, because it had been a success; and we leave the application to our critics, especially to the "craftsmen" of Ephesus and elsewhere, whom, to judge by the persistence of their iteration and unanimity of their utterances, it most grieved to hear the Pope and Council define his infallibility in faith and morals.

IV. Lastly, we draw from these considerations one more inference. There is a virtue which seems peculiarly congenial to the English: this is a natural disinclination to push things to their legitimate consequences. We are all saturated with this tendency to compromise and mezzo-termine. Our constitution, bodily, political, social, and religious, our climate, soil, and habits, have it in them, and many of our most ordinary proverbial sayings, such as "Live and let live," "Let us agree to differ," "Six on one side and half a dozen on the other," and many others, bear witness to this habit of thought. Perhaps an instance from the writings, as we are assured, of one of our great Catholic religious writers of the last century may be considered extreme, but is certainly to the point. The good Bishop, it is said, desires his devout reader not to give way to "too much despair"; whence it would follow that a little despair would be a very nice thing, the only caution necessary in its use being the national moderation. Moderation is no doubt an excellent quality; but we confess we are sometimes tempted to paraphrase a well-known dictum, and exclaim, 0 moderation, how many crimes are committed in thy name!" We will not pretend to define either the real or the false variety of that much-praised virtue. We think, however, one may know them by their fruits. True moderation produces the unexaggerated holding and statement of the truth with due regard to time and place; false moderation conceals or explains away what will perhaps give offence. True moderation is the appanage of conscious rectitude and the index of rightful power; sham moderation is the expression of conscious or unconscious error, and the refuge of weakness and incompetency, such as that of the writer and politician who pushed his moderation so far, "qu'à force d'en mettre partout il finissait en en mettant même dans sa sincérité." Indeed no one seems more hopelessly lost to all appeal than the man whose whole claim to regard is based on the prominence of his "moderation." In his mind not only does all truth and virtue lie in the mean, but every mean is truth and virtue, so that if you convince him that the mean between believing an article of faith and rejecting it lies in intelligently doubting it, he holds doubt to be the only true and virtuous attitude of mind. Such were the minds of the Semi-Arians of the fourth century and of the Galli

cans of the seventeenth, such the Via-media school of Anglicans. Often amiable, always obstinate, and usually imbecile, they produce the same effect on one that a man would who, seeing that some people believed that two and two make four, and others that they make five, should resolutely maintain that they made four and a half, because that is the mean between four and five.

If there are two utterances of the Holy See in these later times which pre-eminently bear the stamp of real moderation they are. those which define the Church's belief on the Immaculate Conception and on the Papal Infallibility. The former is as follows:"Declaramus, pronuntiamus, et definimus: Doctrinam quæ tenet Beatissimam Virginem Mariam in primo instanti suæ conceptionis fuisse singulari omnipotentis Dei gratia et privilegio, intuitu meritorum Christi Jesu Salvatoris humani generis, ab omni originalis culpæ labe præservatam immunem, esse a Deo revelatam, atque idcirco ab omnibus fidelibus firmiter constanterque credendum." That is, "We declare, pronounce, and define, that the doctrine which holds that the most B.V. Mary was, in the first instant of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of Almighty God, in virtue of the merits of Christ Jesus, the Saviour of the human race, preserved free from all stain of original sin, is revealed by God, and on that account is to be firmly and constantly believed by all the faithful." It would seem to any competent person that to call this utterance 66 "" extreme or wanting in "moderation" is simply an unintelligible use (or abuse) of language, unless by it is meant what we all hold, that the mode of redemption and sanctification here predicated of our Lord is the most complete possible. Similarly, as regards the doctrine of Papal infallibility, how can the following definition be called extreme, except in the sense that it is an act of extreme condescension of the Almighty to impart any supernatural knowledge of revealed truth to any child of man? In which sense the condescension of the Creation itself, and still more the condescension of the Incarnation, is decidedly extreme, and Calvary most extreme of all-"sic Deus dilexit mundum.' The Constitution says, "Nos traditioni a fidei Christianæ exordio præceptæ inhærendo-sacro approbante Concilio, docemus et divinitus revelatum dogma esse definimus; Romanum Pontificem, cum ex cathedra loquitur, id est, cum omnium Christianorum Pastoris et Doctoris munere fungens, pro suprema sua Apostolica auctoritate doctrinam de fide vel moribus ab universa Ecclesia tenendam definit, per assistentiam divinam, ipsi in Beato Petro promissam, ea infallibilitate pollere, qua divinus Redemptor Ecclesiam suam in definienda doctrina de fide vel moribus instructam esse voluit." That is, "Faithfully adhering to the tradition received from the beginning of the Christian faith-the Sacred Council approvingwe teach and define, that it is a dogma divinely revealed that the

Roman Pontiff, when he speaks ex cathedrâ-that is, when in discharge of the office of Pastor and Doctor of all Christians, by virtue of his supreme Apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the universal Churchby the Divine assistance promised to him in Blessed Peter, is possessed of that infallibility with which the Divine Redeemer willed that His Church should be endowed for defining doctrine regarding faith or morals." On one single person at a time is this gift bestowed, and for one sole object, viz., as the dogmatic Constitution says, for the preservation of the old, not for the publication of new doctrine; "for the Holy Spirit was not promised to the successors of Peter, that by His revelation they might make known new doctrine, but that by His assistance they might inviolably keep and faithfully expound the revelation or deposit of faith delivered through the Apostles." And again, not for any superfluous use, but for one vital to the existence of revealed truth here on earth. Nor even dependent on the sanctity of life of the subject as a condition, but altogether official and divine, is this gift of special illumination to him who sits for the time being in the chair and holds the dignity of Peter, " quæ etiam in indigno hærede," as the great Leo says with sublime humility, "non deficit." In one sense, no result of the Incarnation can be called extreme, because no effect can be excessive if it be proportioned to its cause, and where the cause is superhuman and ineffable and astounding, it would be strange and unaccountable if the results were (as some believe) as human and intelligible and ordinary as the Code Napoleon or Tupper's "Proverbial Philosophy." Suppose sinlessness and infallibility respectively given at all to any child of Adam, what can be less extreme than the Catholic doctrine which limits the one to the single Mother of God made Man

"Our tainted nature's solitary boast"

And the other to him, the "Maggior Piero," on whom, as on the Rock which He thus made him, Christ caused to rest the ark of our salvation. We must, then, look for another reason why our Ephesians have been chanting their oft-repeated cantilena so persistently and long. The reason is indeed obvious, but it has nothing to do with want of moderation, it is because the admission of the one singular prerogative and exception which is affirmed of Mary only, is the exclusion of all others from the gift of sinlessness in other words, the world hates the definition of the Immaculate Conception because it is the implicit condemnation of that rampant naturalism which underlies the whole social philosophy of the age. When the definition was mentioned in our House of Commons, the leading statesman on the Liberal side said, in his jaunty way, Immaculate conception! why, we are all immaculate when we come into the world, and we only want good education to

keep us so." And similarly when the Church defines the Papal infallibility as part of the Divine revelation, the world, which never had a moment's doubt on the subject, cries out with one consent, "Papal infallibility! why, we are all infallible; and not only in faith and morals, and inferior matters of that kind, but what is far more important, in art and science, education and politics, in all that constitutes and promotes the advance and the ultimate perfection by its own forces of human society." What? say they, are we to be taught who know all things? Are we to be set by an old priest who knows less of the world than our very street-boys, we to learn truth and be made the slaves of dogma, who never were in slavery to any one? Let the Pope reconcile himself to modern civilization-that is to us, for we are the source of truth and of life. So we will build more palaces of glass (at least if the present one begins to pay), and familiarize the public mind with the sacredness of human progress, and "bend the knee to protoplast in philosophic awe.' "Great," once more we repeat it, "great is Diana of the Ephesians!" But here steps in our moderate man, and gravely separates the extremes. Know, Roman Pontiff and Vatican Council, and you also learned professors, cultivated lords, and potent princes, that you are both extreme. After all, none of you are infallible, for truth lies in the mean, and I am in the mean, therefore I am truth itself, and truth is infallible. Draw your conclusion, and hold your peace. Meanwhile the shout for Diana goes on, and where the enemy is strongest there the din is greatest. The religious orders, especially the illustrious Society of Jesus, faithful priests and Apostolic bishops are fined, imprisoned, and exiled in the name of liberty wherever Liberals reign and rule unchecked; or else, where, as here, real liberty still exists, a paper war is carried on hour by hour, and much inky wrath is poured out upon us in hundreds of thousands of expostulations. But chief of all the storm rages round that sacred venerable Head, ever triply crowned with authority, and wisdom, and virtue, whose word first raised and whose constancy will here at least conjure it for, if we are not altogether besotted by "nationalism"-no doubt too often the last refuge of self-love, as "patriotism" is proverbially that of disappointed scoundrels-it still seems to us that courage, and honesty, and truth are among our English virtues, and that there are yet true hearts and sturdy heads in this dear land of ours who can appreciate, and one day will learn to love them, even in a Pope, an' though he be infallible.

O for the day when all the good

Shall only war on evil,

And on each other none !