Page:History of Freedom.djvu/456

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

4 12

ESSAYS ON LIBERTY

credulously to his indictment of the Jesuits. Eight years later Theiner \vrote to him that he hoped they would now agree better on that subject than when they discussed it in Rome. "Ich freue mich, dass Sie jetzt erkennen, dass mein Urtheil über die J esuiten und ihr \Virken gerecht war.-Im kommenden Jahr, so Gott will, \verden \vir uns hoffentlich besser verstehen als im J ahr 18 57." He thought the governing body unequal to the task of ruling both Church and State; but it was the State that seemed to him to suffer from the combination. He was anxious about the political future, not about the future of religion. The persuasion that governlnent by priests could not maintain itself in the world as it is, grew in force and definiteness as he meditated at home on the things he had seen and heard. He "'as despondent and apprehensive; but he had no suspicion of \vhat "vas then so near. In the summer of 1 859, as the sequel of Solf<=:rino began to unfold itself, he thought of making his observations kno\vn. In November a friend wrote: " J e ne me dissimule aucune des misères de tout ordre qui vous ont frappé à Rome." For more than a year he remained silent and uncertain, watching the use France \vould make of the irresistible authority acquired by the defeat of Austria and the collapse of government in Central Italy. The "val' of 1 859, portending danger to the temporal power, disclosed divided counsels. The episcopate sup- ported the papal sovereignty, and a voluntary tribute, which in a fe\v years took shape in tens of millions, poured into the treasury of St. Peter. A time follo\ved during which the Papacy endeavoured, by a series of connected measures, to preserve its political authority through the aid of its spiritual. Some of the most enlightened Catholics, Dupanloup and Montalembert, proclaimed a sort of holy war. Some of the most enlightened Protestants, Guizot and Leo, defended the Roman government, as the most legitimate, venerable, and necessary of governments. In Italy there v.rere ecclesiastics like Liverani, Tosti, Capecelatro, who believed with Manzoni that there could