THE ADDRESS TO MONSIGNOR PERSICO.
THE address of certain English Catholics to Monsignor Persia) reminds us of the extempore prayer that began, —" Strange as it may appear, 0 Lord, thou knoweet yet it is true." It is altogether of the educational and instructive order. Those who have signed it are evidently very much afraid that the Papal Envoy has not seen all that he ought to have seen. They would dearly like to have the drafting of his Report;
and as this is impossible, the next best thing is to tell him, with much parade of respect, the things that he will do well to put into it. " We cannot doubt that the result of your prolonged stay in Ireland will have been " so-and-so. " Your Grace will have noticed and appreciated" something else. A third thing " cannot have failed to strike your Grace painfully ;" but then, "you will, at the same time, have been consoled by observing " a fourth. Nothing, of course, can be less in their thoughts than "making needless appeals or offering uninvited counsels to the Holy See." They are quite sure that the Pope will do what is right. Still, to prevent accidents, they take care to tell him what doing right means. If he wishes to justify their confidence, he most be on his guard against the Dake of Norfolk. This, at least, is what we suppose to be meant by the expression of their firm conviction that no misrepresentations, however conscientiously made, or from however distinguished a quarter they may proceed, will be successful in inducing the Holy Father " to do what the framers of the address wish him not to do. This ingenious formula just eaves them from the outward show of disrespect, while it has the further advan- tage of enabling them to plead—if, after all, the Pope does go wrong—that it was all owing to the bad hands into which he has fallen. We know, of course, that in dealing with questions such as those that arise out of Monsignor Persico's mission, the Pope does not claim to be infallible. But considering the relation in which good Catholics naturally stand towards the Pope, there is some humour in the anxiety shown by Lord Ripon and his friends to teach the Universal Teacher. That the Pope can have anything to tell them about Ireland which they do not know already ; that the judgment of an external, and presumably impartial, arbitrator can possibly go against them ; that a strongly partisan view can by possibility be wrong in any particular,—are contingencies that do not seem to have occurred to them. Possibly Mr. Gladstone has of late made such demands cn their reverence for authority, that the supply has for the time run out.
Much might be said of the surprising statements about Ireland which occur in this document. The " practical unanimity " with which " constitutional methods of agitation" are now accepted by the Irish people, is a text which suggests many comments. We do not care, however, to dwell on this aspect of the address. The signatories are English Home- rulers ; and it is, seemingly, a part of their creed to claim for their Irish colleagues, precisely those virtues in which, to less sympathetic observers, they seem most deficient. Mr. O'Brien's scrupulous obedience to law, Mr. Davitt's careful avoidance of strong language, Mr. Healy's known distaste for legal quibbles, Mr. Harrington's quixotic courtesy to adverse witnesses,—these, no doubt, are the imaginary qualities that adorn Lord Ripon's gallery of Irish worthies. But Ireland is too much with us to make us anxious to mix her up with any subject that admits of separate treatment ; and in this case, the difficulties with which the Pope is confronted in regard to her have an interest apart from that which belongs to the particular controversy. He has not only to de- cide whether his own spiritual subjects or their Protestant rulers are most in the right ; he has to mediate between two sections of English Catholics and between two sections of Irish Catholics. The address speaks only of the deplorable action of " certain lay members of the Catholic Church in England." But if it had suited the signatories to open all their griefs, they might equally have deplored the action of certain lay members of the Catholic Church in Ireland. The line of cleavage on this question is only accidentally connected with religion. In point of numbers, no doubt, there are many more Catholic Home- rulers than Protestant. But they are not Home-rulers because they are Catholics, for many good Catholics are Unionists, while many sound Protestants are Home-rulers. Consequently, if the Pope wishes to intervene in Irish questions, he is forced, as Monsignor Persico's mission shows, to look into the matter for'himself. The cause of Home-rule is not necessarily the cause of the Church.
In ordinary cases, this fact would make the Pope's line clearer. It would mark off the question as one belonging wholly to the region of politics, and from politics, as such, Leo KUL ostentatiously holds aloof. This is very clearly shown by the action of the Nuncio at Paris. In the present state of France, the Pope is under strong inducements to identify himself with the only party that is commonly respectful towards the Church. From the Republic she meets with nothing but hostility. One law after another has been passed for the sole object of weakening her influence in the country, and— partly as a result of this—the Conservatives have made the defence of the Church a main article in their programme. Yet the Nuncio keeps studiously aloof from a political contest in the issue of which, to all appearance, religion has so strong an interest. The place of repentance has never been denied to the Republic. The common Father of Roman Catholic Christendom asks no questions as to the political party to which his French children belong. Why, then, should he not pursue the same course with regard to Ireland I The framers of the address to Monsignor Persico would probably be quite satisfied if he did so. Though they ask the Holy Father not to " withhold his countenance and confidence from his faithful people of Ireland," they would willingly compound for full license to his faithful people of Ireland to do what they please, without coming to him for approbation. Unfortunately for the Pope's peace of mind, he is the guardian of the morals of the Church, as well as of her faith ; and among other manifestations of the " bitter and uncompromising hostility towards Ireland" which the signa- tories of the address attribute to "certain lay members of the Catholic Church in England," is included, no doubt, the con- tention that the " constitutional methods of agitation " now in use in Ireland are distinctly immoral methods. That is a state- ment which it is very difficult for'he Pope to pass over. An appeal to him to say whether the "Plan of Campaign "is not a breach of the commandment against theft, or whether boycotting is con- sistent with Christian charity, cannot be put off with protesta- tions that the Church has no political preferences. These are matters upon which the Pope is bound to speak. Even if his opinion were not asked, it would be his duty to give it, on pain of seeing his spiritual children falling into moral errors from which he might have saved them. On the other hand, these very questions are so closely inter- woven with politics, that it is in the highest degree difficult not to overstep the line which divides the two. No one pretends that the Pope ought to interfere between masters and work- men, or to regulate the methods of carrying out a strike, or to prevent tenants from obtaining reasonable reductions of rent in bad times. To discharge any of these functions, he need be Universal Confessor as well as Universal Teacher ; he would have to know the particulars of each particular case, and to determine for each where lawful freedom ends and im- perative duty begins. The most he can be expected to do is to lay down some general principles which, when stated, will content no one except those who see their way to evade them. He might, indeed, if he were so minded, direct the Irish clergy to confine themselves to their province as confessors, and to express no opinion upon the actions of their people except when they are judging them in the confessional. But to go even this length would be to interfere in an unusual degree with the freedom of a national hierarchy. In Ireland, especially, the Roman Catholic Bishops have always been the recognised leaders of the people, and to deprive them suddenly of their character, even if it could be done, would be to throw the nation into the arms of the revolutionary and anti-religious faction which is daily gaining strength and influence. Nor, unless the clergy yielded a more willing obedience than could fairly be expected of them, is there much chance that the Pope's order would be obeyed except in the letter. The right of issuing pastorals to their flocks could not be denied to Irish Bishops without an implied censure of the severest kind, and an Irish Roman Catholic Bishop must be strangely deficient in the ingenuity supposed to belong to his race and order, if he could not convey all the encouragement his people desired, while avoiding any open infringement of the Papal directions. On the whole, therefore, we must frankly confess our fear that the framers of the address to Monsignor Persian are only too likely to get their way. And if the British Government fears that result as we do, they will certainly do well to make the Duke of Norfolk's formal mission to Rome the beginning of better and more confidential relations between the Government of the United Kingdom and the Holy See.
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