Correspondence
[Rambler, May 1859.]
Sir,—It is not quite easy to acquiesce in a proposition of which we are sometimes reminded, when we are tempted to grumble at the slovenly, disgraceful way in which things go on in certain Catholic countries. I am alluding to Italy. We are told in answer, that temporal prosperity is not a “Note” of the Church; but, left to ourselves, I think we should have decided that it was; and so Bellarmine, I think, determines it. Such a doctrine certainly does come home to our common sense. Religion may preach poverty to the saint, but it teaches worldly success and the comforts of life to the faithful at large. It is the foster-parent, if not the natural mother, of industry, thriftiness, order, honesty, and equitable dealing; and these virtues are the infallible antecedents of making money, gaining a character, and rising in society. I cannot see the flaw in this argument; and when Protestants urge it, I cannot answer them.
Nor do I think that Catholics, and especially our rulers who formally represent the Holy See, like to give up the argument. They set forth Rome as the mother of modern civilisation: they make Italy, and truly, the centre in times past from which literature, the fine arts, philosophy, physical science, commerce, and terrestrial discovery proceeded. But we must take things as they are, not as they were. Greece once was the source of intellectual and social progress, and Greece is so no more; Egypt was so once, and Egypt is so no more. How do we account for this national decay in the case of Greece and Egypt? We answer, that the cause of the political greatness of those countries has ceased. If, then, in like manner, Italy once was great, and now is not, a hard logician will press us with this dilemma—either religion is extinct there now, or religion was not the cause of her greatness then.
The Protestant likes to secure both horns at once; and he infers from the past and present state of Italy, both that religion is at present extinct there, and that it was not the cause of her past greatness.
I, on the contrary, think it reasonable to take neither horn; they are too sharp to be either of them true. I think each conclusion is half of it true. The more exact conclusion I believe to be this,—on the one hand, that religion is the providentially intended, not the necessary nor the only cause of national prosperity; and, on the other, that religion is not indeed extinct in Italy, but still in a most unsatisfactory state. And therefore the contemptible figure which that famous country cuts at present in the eyes of Protestants arises from the circumstance, that religion must not be merely existing or vegetating in a country, but be in a really vigorous state, if it is to develop itself in temporal prosperity. Faith is not enough for the presence of this Note of the Church; there must be some modicum of hope and of charity in a population too. Italy, viewed as a whole, and in her influential and ruling classes and places, seems to me to be in a state of spiritual decadence, and therefore of intellectual.
What has brought the length and breadth of that fair land into such a state? It is not the fault of the existing generation; it is not the fault of one age; but it must certainly be the fault of the governments. I cannot escape this conclusion. The state of the country is such, that there is a chronic expectation or apprehension among all classes of insurrection and revolution. Is the administration, then, bad? if so, that is at once the fault of the governments. But no; it is not that the people are really discontented; it is that foreign incendiaries are able to make the Italians blaze up at will. Then, I say, they must be mere children: and why are they so provokingly childish, except from the fault of the governments? I repeat, I cannot escape this conclusion. The governments may not be worse than the people; but they must be as bad; and then, observe, it is their duty to improve the people, not the duty of the people to improve the governments. Thus we lose a Note of the Church.
You must not mistake me to be a zealot for constitutions, much less for the British lion, as if his presence were a panacea. What we should all mean by a state well governed is, not one in which monarchy is limited, not one in which there is a president and chambers, but one in which there are good laws vigorously and impartially enforced; this is the great duty of governments. If, then, the present disturbed state of Italy be in matter of fact a proof of its being badly governed, what we mean by that is just this, that the administration is bad, that its people are not under the impartial and vigorous sway of laws suited to their geographical, national, and social characteristics. And this is what it wants, and nothing but this, to reverse its miserable state. Questions about autocracy, aristocracy, democracy, are nothing to the purpose.
How the aforesaid status, if revolutionism can be a status,—how this condition of things has come about, is too deep a problem perhaps for any of us. So far is pretty clear, that, if not the cause, at least the sustaining power and the sanction, of this serious mischief is Austria. I acknowledge with joy the change of sentiment and policy which has lately taken place in that august court. I am even tempted to believe that a providence more than ordinary protects the throne of the Cæsars, so wonderful have been its fortunes in these latter centuries. Let us hope that the warnings which its adherents have had lately will open their eyes to the dangers of their repressive, suppressive, oppressive system of government. But still, at present the fact is as I have stated it; viz. for the last forty years Austrian influence has been supreme through the Italian peninsula, and a melancholy failure has been the end of it. Its present state is simply a disgrace to the protecting power. What could France have done worse? Would there have been more infidelity, blasphemy, and profligacy; would there have been more of the hideous frantic rebellion against the Almighty which the Jew of Verona depicts to us; would there have been more deadness in priests and people, more relaxation and disorder in convents in this year 1859,—if France, and not Austria, had held Lombardy all these years by possession, Tuscany and the Duchies by relationship or special treaty, Naples by sympathy and good offices, and Rome by the ties of ancient alliance? I am as jealous as any one can be of the British Government in matters of religion; but I doubt much whether the Western powers, as they are now termed, would have done near so much harm to the religion of Italy in the last forty years, by letting the wild winds of heaven dance over it, as the Austrians have caused, by excluding from it light and air, shutting and barring the gates, and making it a prison or a charnel-house, in which thought turns putrid and breeds infection by want of circulation, instead of being reared up to the atmosphere of heroic elevation and Divine philosophy.
Italian society is honeycombed with secret societies, as if with the red ants of Africa. Why do they not spread in England or in Germany? how is it that London or St. Petersburg can admit their central committees without harm to themselves, while they act so fatally upon Italy? “Those wicked societies,” says the Archbishop of Dublin lately, “which ever sap the first principles of social order and the foundations of civil life, have found their echo in Turin, Paris, Westminster, and St. Petersburg; and all their deadly hostilities and fierce invectives are directed against the temporal sovereignty of Rome. And whilst they assail the temporal rule of the Holy Father, they vainly hope that the powers of hell shall lead captive the Spouse of Christ.” How true are the words of the most reverend prelate! Yet that they should be true is a most severe reflection on those who have allowed such a state of things to grow up; and who are they but the soldiers and diplomatists of Austria?
I see that the Dublin of this month blames Austria in terms little less severe than my own; though the writer speaks severely of France too, which he has a right to do. “Down to the last few years,” he says, “the government of Austria was at once anti-papal and despotic; and of all who suffered from its despotism, none suffered so deeply as the Popes.” 1
I am, sir, your obedient servant,
O. H.
Note
Les Annales, 1849, par M. 1’Abbé Petit, p. 123.
Footnotes
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We are very glad to hear it generally reported that the retirement from the Dublin, after years of patient service, of some of those distinguished and able men whose zeal has been the means of raising it to so honourable a place in contemporary literature, is to be compensated by a set of fresh writers, whose known talent is the guarantee to the public that the Review will not in years to come fall below the standard of the highest successes of its past career.—Ed. ↩