Books: History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science

J >> John William Draper >> History of the Conflict Between Religion and Science

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Acts of the Vatican Council in relation to the infallibility of
the pope, and to Science.--Abstract of decisions arrived at.

Controversy between the Prussian Government and the papacy.--It
is a contest between the State and the Church for
supremacy--Effect of dual government in Europe--Declaration by
the Vatican Council of its position as to Science--The dogmatic
constitution of the Catholic faith.--Its definitions respecting
God, Revelation, Faith, Reason.--The anathemas it
pronounces.--Its denunciation of modern civilization.

The Protestant Evangelical Alliance and its acts.

General review of the foregoing definitions, and acts.--Present
condition of the controversy, and its future prospects.

PREDOMINANCE OF CATHOLICITY. No one who is acquainted with the
present tone of thought in Christendom can hide from himself the
fact that an intellectual, a religious crisis is impending.

In all directions we see the lowering skies, we hear the
mutterings of the coming storm. In Germany, the national party is
arraying itself against the ultramontane; in France, the men of
progress are struggling against the unprogressive, and in their
contest the political supremacy of that great country is wellnigh
neutralized or lost. In Italy, Rome has passed into the hands of
an excommunicated king. The sovereign pontiff, feigning that he
is a prisoner, is fulminating from the Vatican his anathemas,
and, in the midst of the most convincing proofs of his manifold
errors, asserting his own infallibility. A Catholic archbishop
with truth declares that the whole civil society of Europe seems
to be withdrawing itself in its public life from Christianity. In
England and America, religious persons perceive with dismay that
the intellectual basis of faith has been undermined by the spirit
of the age. They prepare for the approaching disaster in the best
manner they can.

The most serious trial through which society can pass is
encountered in the exuviation of its religious restraints. The
history of Greece and the history of Rome exhibit to us in an
impressive manner how great are the perils. But it is not given
to religions to endure forever. They necessarily undergo
transformation with the intellectual development of man. How many
countries are there professing the same religion now that they
did at the birth of Christ?

It is estimated that the entire population of Europe is about
three hundred and one million. Of these, one hundred and
eighty-five million are Roman Catholics, thirty-three million are
Greek Catholics. Of Protestants there are seventy-one million,
separated into many sects. Of Jews, five million; of Mohammedans,
seven million.

Of the religious subdivisions of America an accurate numerical
statement cannot be given. The whole of Christian South America
is Roman Catholic, the same may be said of Central America and of
Mexico, as also of the Spanish and French West India possessions.
In the United States and Canada the Protestant population
predominates. To Australia the same remark applies. In India the
sparse Christian population sinks into insignificance in presence
of two hundred million Mohammedans and other Oriental
denominations. The Roman Catholic Church is the most widely
diffused and the most powerfully organized of all modern
societies. It is far more a political than a religious
combination. Its principle is that all power is in the clergy,
and that for laymen there is only the privilege of obedience. The
republican forms under which the Churches existed in primitive
Christianity have gradually merged into an absolute
centralization, with a man as vice-God at its head. This Church
asserts that the divine commission under which it acts comprises
civil government; that it has a right to use the state for its
own purposes, but that the state has no right to intermeddle with
it; that even in Protestant countries it is not merely a
coordinate government, but the sovereign power. It insists that
the state has no rights over any thing which it declares to be in
its domain, and that Protestantism, being a mere rebellion, has
no rights at all; that even in Protestant communities the
Catholic bishop is the only lawful spiritual pastor.

It is plain, therefore, that of professing Christians the vast
majority are Catholic; and such is the authoritative demand of
the papacy for supremacy, that, in any survey of the present
religious condition of Christendom, regard must be mainly had to
its acts. Its movements are guided by the highest intelligence
and skill. Catholicism obeys the orders of one man, and has
therefore a unity, a compactness, a power, which Protestant
denominations do not possess. Moreover, it derives inestimable
strength from the souvenirs of the great name of Rome.

Unembarrassed by any hesitating sentiment, the papacy has
contemplated the coming intellectual crisis. It has pronounced
its decision, and occupied what seems to it to be the most
advantageous ground.

This definition of position we find in the acts of the late
Vatican Council.

THE OECUMENICAL COUNCIL. Pius IX., by a bull dated June 29, 1868,
convoked an Oecumenical Council, to meet in Rome, on December 8,
1869. Its sessions ended in July, 1870. Among other matters
submitted to its consideration, two stand forth in conspicuous
prominence--they are the assertion of the infallibility of the
Roman pontiff, and the definition of the relations of religion to
science.

But the convocation of the Council was far from meeting with
general approval.

The views of the Oriental Churches were, for the most part,
unfavorable. They affirmed that they saw a desire in the Roman
pontiff to set himself up as the head of Christianity, whereas
they recognized the Lord Jesus Christ alone as the head of the
Church. They believed that the Council would only lead to new
quarrels and scandals. The sentiment of these venerable Churches
is well shown by the incident that, when, in 1867, the Nestorian
Patriarch Simeon had been invited by the Chaldean Patriarch to
return to Roman Catholic unity, he, in his reply, showed that
there was no prospect for harmonious action between the East and
the West: "You invite me to kiss humbly the slipper of the Bishop
of Rome; but is he not, in every respect, a man like yourself--is
his dignity superior to yours? We will never permit to be
introduced into our holy temples of worship images and statues,
which are nothing but abominable and impure idols. What! shall we
attribute to Almighty God a mother, as you dare to do? Away from
us, such blasphemy!"

EXPECTATIONS OF THE PAPACY. Eventually, the patriarchs,
archbishops, and bishops, from all regions of the world, who took
part in this Council, were seven hundred and four.

Rome had seen very plainly that Science was not only rapidly
undermining the dogmas of the papacy, but was gathering great
political power. She recognized that all over Europe there was a
fast-spreading secession among persons of education, and that its
true focus was North Germany.

She looked, therefore, with deep interest on the Prusso-Austrian
War, giving to Austria whatever encouragement she could. The
battle of Sadowa was a bitter disappointment to her.

With satisfaction again she looked upon the breaking out of the
Franco-Prussian War, not doubting that its issue would be
favorable to France, and therefore favorable to her. Here, again,
she was doomed to disappointment at Sedan.

Having now no further hope, for many years to come, from external
war, she resolved to see what could be done by internal
insurrection, and the present movement in the German Empire is
the result of her machinations.

Had Austria or had France succeeded, Protestantism would have
been overthrown along with Prussia.

But, while these military movements were being carried on, a
movement of a different, an intellectual kind, was engaged in.
Its principle was, to restore the worn-out mediaeval doctrines
and practices, carrying them to an extreme, no matter what the
consequences might be.

ENCYCLICAL LETTER AND SYLLABUS. Not only was it asserted that the
papacy has a divine right to participate in the government of all
countries, coordinately with their temporal authorities, but that
the supremacy of Rome in this matter must be recognized; and that
in any question between them the temporal authority must conform
itself to her order.

And, since the endangering of her position had been mainly
brought about by the progress of science, she presumed to define
its boundaries, and prescribe limits to its authority. Still
more, she undertook to denounce modern civilization.

These measures were contemplated soon after the return of his
Holiness from Gaeta in 1848, and were undertaken by the advice of
the Jesuits, who, lingering in the hope that God would work the
impossible, supposed that the papacy, in its old age, might be
reinvigorated. The organ of the Curia proclaimed the absolute
independence of the Church as regards the state; the dependence
of the bishops on the pope; of the diocesan clergy on the
bishops; the obligation of the Protestants to abandon their
atheism, and return to the fold; the absolute condemnation of all
kinds of toleration. In December, 1854, in an assembly of
bishops, the pope had proclaimed the dogma of the immaculate
conception. Ten years subsequently he put forth the celebrated
Encyclical Letter and the Syllabus.

The Encyclical Letter is dated December 8, 1864. It was drawn up
by learned ecclesiastics, and subsequently debated at the
Congregation of the Holy Office, then forwarded to prelates, and
finally gone over by the pope and cardinals.

ENCYCLICAL LETTER AND SYLLABUS. Many of the clergy objected to
its condemnation of modern civilization. Some of the cardinals
were reluctant to concur in it. The Catholic press accepted it,
not, however, without misgivings and regrets. The Protestant
governments put no obstacle in its way; the Catholic were
embarrassed by it. France allowed the publication only of that
portion proclaiming the jubilee; Austria and Italy permitted its
introduction, but withheld their approval. The political press
and legislatures of Catholic countries gave it an unfavorable
reception. Many deplored it as likely to widen the breach between
the Church and modern society. The Italian press regarded it as
determining a war, without truce or armistice, between the papacy
and modern civilization. Even in Spain there were journals that
regretted "the obstinacy and blindness of the court of Rome, in
branding and condemning modern civilization."

It denounces that "most pernicious and insane opinion, that
liberty of conscience and of worship is the right of every man,
and that this right ought, in every well-governed state, to be
proclaimed and asserted by law; and that the will of the people,
manifested by public opinion (as it is called), or by other
means, constitutes a supreme law, independent of all divine and
human rights." It denies the right of parents to educate their
children outside the Catholic Church. It denounces "the
impudence" of those who presume to subordinate the authority of
the Church and of the Apostolic See, "conferred upon it by Christ
our Lord, to the judgment of the civil authority." His Holiness
commends, to the venerable brothers to whom the Encyclical is
addressed, incessant prayer, and, "in order that God may accede
the more easily to our and your prayers, let us employ in all
confidence, as our mediatrix with him, the Virgin Mary, mother of
God, who sits as a queen upon the right hand of her only-begotten
Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, in a golden vestment, clothed around
with various adornments. There is nothing she cannot obtain from
him."

CONVOCATION OF THE COUNCIL. Plainly, the principle now avowed by
the papacy must bring it into collision even with governments
which had heretofore maintained amicable relations with it. Great
dissatisfaction was manifested by Russia, and the incidents that
ensued drew forth from his Holiness an allocution (November,
1866) condemnatory of the course of that government. To this,
Russia replied, by declaring the Concordat of 1867 abrogated.

Undeterred by the result of the battle of Sadowa (July, 1866),
though it was plain that the political condition of Europe was
now profoundly affected, and especially the relations of the
papacy, the pope delivered an allocution (June 27, 1867),
confirming the Encyclical and Syllabus. He announced his
intention of convoking an Oecumenical Council.

Accordingly, as we have already mentioned, in the following year
(June 29, 1868), a bull was issued convoking that Council.
Misunderstandings, however, had now sprung up with Austria. The
Austrian Reichsrath had adopted laws introducing equality of
civil rights for all the inhabitants of the empire, and
restricting the influence of the Church. This produced on the
part of the papal government an expostulation. Acting as Russia
had done, the Austrian Government found it necessary to abrogate
the Concordat of 1855.

In France, as above stated, the publication of the entire
Syllabus was not permitted; but Prussia, desirous of keeping on
good terms with the papacy, did not disallow it. The exacting
disposition of the papacy increased. It was openly declared that
the faithful must now sacrifice to the Church, property, life,
and even their intellectual convictions. The Protestants and the
Greeks were invited to tender their submission.

THE VATICAN COUNCIL. On the appointed day, the Council opened.
Its objects were, to translate the Syllabus into practice, to
establish the dogma of papal infallibility, and define the
relations of religion to science. Every preparation had been made
that the points determined on should be carried. The bishops were
informed that they were coming to Rome not to deliberate, but to
sanction decrees previously made by an infallible pope. No idea
was entertained of any such thing as free discussion. The minutes
of the meetings were not permitted to be inspected; the prelates
of the opposition were hardly allowed to speak. On January 22,
1870, a petition, requesting that the infallibility of the pope
should be defined, was presented; an opposition petition of the
minority was offered. Hereupon, the deliberations of the minority
were forbidden, and their publications prohibited. And, though
the Curia had provided a compact majority, it was found expedient
to issue an order that to carry any proposition it was not
necessary that the vote should be near unanimity, a simple
majority sufficed. The remonstrances of the minority were
altogether unheeded.

As the Council pressed forward to its object, foreign authorities
became alarmed at its reckless determination. A petition drawn up
by the Archbishop of Vienna, and signed by several cardinals and
archbishops, entreated his Holiness not to submit the dogma of
infallibility for consideration, "because the Church has to
sustain at present a struggle unknown in former times, against
men who oppose religion itself as an institution baneful to human
nature, and that it is inopportune to impose upon Catholic
nations, led into temptation by so many machinations, more dogmas
than the Council of Trent proclaimed." It added that "the
definition demanded would furnish fresh arms to the enemies of
religion, to excite against the Catholic Church the resentment of
men avowedly the best." The Austrian prime-minister addressed a
protest to the papal government, warning it against any steps
that might lead to encroachments on the rights of Austria. The
French Government also addressed a note, suggesting that a French
bishop should explain to the Council the condition and the rights
of France. To this the papal government replied that a bishop
could not reconcile the double duties of an ambassador and a
Father of the Council. Hereupon, the French Government, in a very
respectful note, remarked that, to prevent ultra opinions from
becoming dogmas, it reckoned on the moderation of the bishops,
and the prudence of the Holy Father; and, to defend its civil and
political laws against the encroachments of the theocracy, it had
counted on public reason and the patriotism of French Catholics.
In these remonstrances the North-German Confederation joined,
seriously pressing them on the consideration of the papal
government.

On April 23d, Von Arnim, the Prussian embassador, united with
Daru, the French minister, in suggesting to the Curia the
inexpediency of reviving mediaeval ideas. The minority bishops,
thus encouraged, demanded now that the relations of the spiritual
to the secular power should be determined before the pope's
infallibility was discussed, and that it should be settled
whether Christ had conferred on St. Peter and his successors a
power over kings and emperors.

INFALLIBILITY OF THE POPE. No regard was paid to this, not even
delay was consented to. The Jesuits, who were at the bottom of
the movement, carried their measures through the packed assembly
with a high hand. The Council omitted no device to screen itself
from popular criticism. Its proceedings were conducted with the
utmost secrecy; all who took part in them were bound by a solemn
oath to observe silence.

On July 13th, the votes were taken. Of 601 votes, 451 were
affirmative. Under the majority rule, the measure was pronounced
carried, and, five days subsequently, the pope proclaimed the
dogma of his infallibility. It has often been remarked that this
was the day on which the French declared war against Prussia.
Eight days afterward the French troops were withdrawn from Rome.
Perhaps both the statesman and the philosopher will admit that an
infallible pope would be a great harmonizing element, if only
common-sense could acknowledge him.

Hereupon, the King of Italy addressed an autograph letter to the
pope, setting forth in very respectful terms the necessity that
his troops should advance and occupy positions "indispensable to
the security of his Holiness, and the maintenance of order;"
that, while satisfying the national aspirations, the chief of
Catholicity, surrounded by the devotion of the Italian
populations, "might preserve on the banks of the Tiber a glorious
seat, independent of all human sovereignty."

To this his Holiness replied in a brief and caustic letter: "I
give thanks to God, who has permitted your majesty to fill the
last days of my life with bitterness. For the rest, I cannot
grant certain requests, nor conform with certain principles
contained in your letter. Again, I call upon God, and into his
hands commit my cause, which is his cause. I pray God to grant
your majesty many graces, to free you from dangers, and to
dispense to you his mercy which you so much need."

THE ITALIAN GOVERNMENT. The Italian troops met with but little
resistance. They occupied Rome on September 20, 1870. A manifesto
was issued, setting forth the details of a plebiscitum, the vote
to be by ballot, the question, "the unification of Italy." Its
result showed how completely the popular mind in Italy is
emancipated from theology. In the Roman provinces the number of
votes on the lists was 167,548; the number who voted, 135,291;
the number who voted for annexation, 133,681; the number who
voted against it, 1,507; votes annulled, 103. The Parliament of
Italy ratified the vote of the Roman people for annexation by a
vote of 239 to 20. A royal decree now announced the annexation of
the Papal States to the kingdom of Italy, and a manifesto was
issued indicating the details of the arrangement. It declared
that "by these concessions the Italian Government seeks to prove
to Europe that Italy respects the sovereignty of the pope in
conformity with the principle of a free Church in a free state."

AFFAIRS IN PRUSSIA. In the Prusso-Austrian War it had been the
hope of the papacy, to restore the German Empire under Austria,
and make Germany a Catholic nation. In the Franco- German War the
French expected ultramontane sympathies in Germany. No means were
spared to excite Catholic sentiment against the Protestants. No
vilification was spared. They were spoken of as atheists; they
were declared incapable of being honest men; their sects were
pointed out as indicating that their secession was in a state of
dissolution. "The followers of Luther are the most abandoned men
in all Europe." Even the pope himself, presuming that the whole
world had forgotten all history, did not hesitate to say, "Let
the German people understand that no other Church but that of
Rome is the Church of freedom and progress."

Meantime, among the clergy of Germany a party was organized to
remonstrate against, and even resist, the papal usurpation. It
protested against "a man being placed on the throne of God,"
against a vice-God of any kind, nor would it yield its scientific
convictions to ecclesiastical authority. Some did not hesitate to
accuse the pope himself of being a heretic. Against these
insubordinates excommunications began to be fulminated, and at
length it was demanded that certain professors and teachers
should be removed from their offices, and infallibilists
substituted. With this demand the Prussian Government declined to
comply.

The Prussian Government had earnestly desired to remain on
amicable terms with the papacy; it had no wish to enter on a
theological quarrel; but gradually the conviction was forced upon
it that the question was not a religious but a political
one--whether the power of the state should be used against the
state. A teacher in a gymnasium had been excommunicated; the
government, on being required to dismiss him, refused. The Church
authorities denounced this as an attack upon faith. The emperor
sustained his minister. The organ of the infallible party
threatened the emperor with the opposition of all good Catholics,
and told him that, in a contention with the pope, systems of
government can and must change. It was now plain to every one
that the question had become, "Who is to be master in the state,
the government or the Roman Church? It is plainly impossible for
men to live under two governments, one of which declares to be
wrong what the other commands. If the government will not submit
to the Roman Church, the two are enemies." A conflict was thus
forced upon Prussia by Rome--a conflict in which the latter,
impelled by her antagonism to modern civilization, is clearly the
aggressor.

ACTION OF THE PRUSSIAN GOVERNMENT. The government, now
recognizing its antagonist, defended itself by abolishing the
Catholic department in the ministry of Public Worship. This was
about midsummer, 1871. In the following November the Imperial
Parliament passed a law that ecclesiastics abusing their office,
to the disturbance of the public peace, should be criminally
punished. And, guided by the principle that the future belongs to
him to whom the school belongs, a movement arose for the purpose
of separating the schools from the Church.

THE CHURCH A POLITICAL POWER. The Jesuit party was extending and
strengthening an organization all over Germany, based on the
principle that state legislation in ecclesiastical matters is not
binding. Here was an act of open insurrection. Could the
government allow itself to be intimidated? The Bishop of Ermeland
declared that he would not obey the laws of the state if they
touched the Church. The government stopped the payment of his
salary; and, perceiving that there could be no peace so long as
the Jesuits were permitted to remain in the country, their
expulsion was resolved on, and carried into effect. At the close
of 1872 his Holiness delivered an allocution, in which he touched
on the "persecution of the Church in the German Empire," and
asserted that the Church alone has a right to fix the limits
between its domain and that of the state--a dangerous and
inadmissible principle, since under the term morals the Church
comprises all the relations of men to each other, and asserts
that whatever does not assist her oppresses her. Hereupon, a few
days subsequently (January 9, 1873), four laws were brought
forward by the government: 1. Regulating the means by which a
person might sever his connection with the Church; 2. Restricting
the Church in the exercise of ecclesiastical punishments; 3.
Regulating the ecclesiastical power of discipline, forbidding
bodily chastisement, regulating fines and banishments granting
the privilege of an appeal to the Royal Court of Justice for
Ecclesiastical Affairs, the decision of which is final; 4.
Ordaining the preliminary education and appointment of priests.
They must have had a satisfactory education, passed a public
examination conducted by the state, and have a knowledge of
philosophy, history, and German literature. Institutions refusing
to be superintended by the state are to be closed.

These laws demonstrate that Germany is resolved that she will no
longer be dictated to nor embarrassed by a few Italian noble
families; that she will be master of her own house. She sees in
the conflict, not an affair of religion or of conscience, but a
struggle between the sovereignty of state legislation and the
sovereignty of the Church. She treats the papacy not in the
aspect of a religious, but of a political power, and is resolved
that the declaration of the Prussian Constitution shall be
maintained, that "the exercise of religious freedom must not
interfere with the duties of a citizen toward the community and
the state."

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