us in the books on which we are bred. A ridicule and hatred of the later Stuarts at home, of Louis XIV abroad: a respect at least for the House of Orange: an insistence on the decline of Spain: all this and the whole mass of English letters train us in special pleading against the Faith. Nor have we, in England at least, any bulk of true history (as yet) to counteract this flood of propaganda.
But before closing these remarks upon the position of Catholics in the English-speaking Protestant countries, one point must be observed in modification: the Catholic, even under such favorable surroundings, has the advantage over his opponents both in definition and in knowledge. He knows much more about the others than the others know about him.
Further the Catholic has a philosophy which applies to all the practice of life and which does not change, while in the world about him there is neither a united philosophy nor even fixity in the moods of the time. This contrast is increasingly noticeable as the dogmas of Protestantism and its social rules dissolve.
The Catholic Church has, then, in that English-speaking world with which the readers (and writer) of this book are principally concerned, such advantages and disadvantages. It is badly cut off from the general Catholic world outside. It is permeated by an anti-Catholic literature, social custom and history. On the other hand it reacts upon that hostile atmosphere and perceives, though dimly, some of its inherent superiorities: notably in clarity of thought and a determined philosophy.
The disabilities of the Faith in such an air are closely connected with that modern cross-religion of Nationalism of which I shall speak in more detail when I come to the main modern opponents of the Church.
The mark of the Catholic situation in all this area of Protestant culture is toleration upon a basis of Nationalism.
Worship the Nation and you may hold what lesser opinions you please. Whether the Catholic body be very small and poor, as in Great Britain, or a strong locally grouped and politically influential, mainly urban, minority as in America (the estimates of this differ—some, I believe, would call it a sixth of the population); whether it be very large indeed as in Australia and Canada, or smaller as in New Zealand, everywhere this mark is apparent.
Therefore the Faith is treated as one among many sects within one nation: and we tend to accept that position. The modern Protestant doctrine, that sects, that is, opinions, have a sacred right to existence "so long as they obey the law," the idea that the State has a right of legislation against which no moral appeal can lie—let alone the legislative power of the Church; the inability of those who think thus to see that toleration and conformity with every law make a contradiction of terms: all these create the social atmosphere in which we live. The particular practice of Catholicism may be continued without hindrance; we may hear Mass. Certain characteristic products of Catholicism may develop unimpeded. For instance, the religious orders enjoy complete freedom in every part of this world, they possess property without limit, and spread and build without restriction. But all is within and beneath civil society.
Again, what is most important, the Catholic educational system is safeguarded in the English-speaking Protestant world. It is safeguarded in different ways and in different degrees in different places. Thus in England it enjoys public revenue. In the United States it does not enjoy that revenue, but it is allowed every opportunity for voluntary extension. But all is under the supreme worship of Caesar.
The truth I here emphasize is unpalatable. Most of us are only half aware (and are becoming less aware with every added decade), that the air we breathe is anti-Catholic; that the history we are taught, the moral ideas behind the legal system we obey, the restrictions imposed on us, the political conceptions embodied in every public act, the general attitude toward foreign countries, are all the products of that Nationalism which their non-Catholic fellow-citizens regard as the sacred emotion. We cannot but be ourselves filled with that emotion. But it is spiritually at issue with the Faith.
So far I have dealt mainly, as being our chief concern, with the situation of the Catholic Church in the English-speaking world as a preparation for judging its reception of both decaying and growing antagonisms.
To appreciate the effect of these as a whole, let us glance at the situation in the countries of ancient Catholic culture, such as France, Spain and Italy, where there reign conditions very different from our own; for that purpose, let us consider the origins; since we shall not fully understand this important dual character attaching to the present political position of the Catholic Church in the world unless we appreciate how it came about through the past.
The great battle of the Reformation ended without victory for either side, legitimate or rebel. The opposing armies arrived at no decision, but retired from the field and divided Europe between them. Nearly three hundred years ago, at the Peace of Westphalia, the main struggle was concluded; even the last act in the tragedy, the English Revolution, is now already nearly two and a half centuries old.
The nations which came out of that conflict with their national traditions saved, and the Church still giving the tone of society, kept all their principal institutions closely bound up with the Catholic Church—notably, of course, their national dynasties; and those national dynasties were for the most part absolute monarchies: that is, Governments in which the whole nation was ruled from one center, supporting the weak against the strong and curbing the influence of riches.
Further, in these nations, the general order of society was based upon the same hierarchic conception as is to be found in the hieratic organization of the Catholic Church. Power came in regular descent, and there was an exact order.
It must further be remembered that all the principal acts of the State were interwoven closely with the official life of the Church.
The union was a much more real and living a thing than the connection to be found between governments and established churches elsewhere.
The bishops were great political figures and of real weight in administration; the king was crowned and anointed in a function essentially Catholic, and dating back for far more than a thousand years; the administration of justice was everywhere in touch with the Catholic doctrine and opinion. The Crucifix stood in the Courts, the morals and social ideas of Catholicism governed their procedure.
Moreover, these Catholic States imposed the official religion, and had the great majority of the people at their back in so imposing it. In the various Italian States, in the Spanish Netherlands (which today we call Belgium), in France and Spain, the principal appointments went only to those of the national religion. The educational system of the country was as deeply impregnated with the same spirit.
It is difficult for a man living under modern English or American conditions to visualize such a state of affairs. Even if modern England were what it most certainly is not, co-extensive with the Established Church of England, and if that Church had a large body of definite doctrine and a mass of uniformed detailed observance as well, then there would be some parallel. In modern conditions in America one can discover no parallel at all.
Well, this state of affairs came to an end actually in France, potentially in other Catholic countries, by the action of the French Revolution.
Long before the French Revolution a wide intellectual movement of skepticism, which was actively hostile to the Church, had run through all Catholic society, particularly in France, but the official structure remained the same until the Revolution.
After the Revolution that structure crashed. There was torn a rent in the hitherto inextricable close web of the Church and political society. The theory was promulgated and acted upon that civil society alone could hold legitimate power and that the Faith was no more than the opinion of individual citizens who, even if they were very numerous, even if they were the bulk of the nation, had no right to make their private religion the note of institutions which
