Page:Lesbia Newman - Dalton - 1889.djvu/327

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LESBIA NEWMAN.
311

alone; but remove the slave’s habits, and you remove the danger. The Archbishop of Paris, and those who think with him, do not seem to perceive that they are in this dilemma. Either our attempt to set up woman-worship in place of man-worship will fail, or, if it succeed, experience warrants us in expecting from its results the opposite of those which the Archbishop of Paris apprehends. We shall not have unbottled an evil genius, but, on the contrary, brought a good genius to combat the evil one whose course has been a failure and a disaster throughout. But even if this were not so, even if I were to allow that the spiritual emancipation of Catholic women would let loose an evil genius, there would still, after all, remain the great world of non-Catholics and non-Christians, who surely would be strong enough to neutralise the evil. Such fears are therefore chimerical, and I give my vote for the Definition because I believe it to be the only way to save the Church, which is now beset with real and pressing dangers, not merely threatened by a remote and imaginary one like that. As regards the institution of priestesses, I shall welcome that too, because I see in it a prospect of winning to the fold many thousands of souls stronger and more worth having than those who have deserted us.’

Cardinal Power resumed his seat, and was followed by other prelates, whose orations the reader may be spared. The upshot of the Council was a majority so overwhelming in favour of the Dogma, that the Archbishop of Paris and the few who had sided with him thought it best to avoid being marked men in an invidious cause, by waiving their personal objections. The practical unanimity of the Council being thus established, it only remained for the Pope as its president to promulgate formally a bull embodying the decision arrived at, whereof the following is an idiomatic translation:-—