THE EFFECT OF MR. GLADSTONE’S PAMPHLET.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXX, Issue 4332, 6 February 1875, Page 2 (Supplement)

THE EFFECT OF MR. GLADSTONE’S PAMPHLET.

(Pall Hall Gazette, November 14.) In one respect at least Mr. Gladstone's pamphlet has had a success which even its author could hardly have anticipated. Considered as an apple of discord, it has done its work most effectively. The “ fellow citizens ” among the Eoman Catholic laity to whom Mr. Gladstone addressed his expostulation have responded to it with remarkable freedom of speech, and in a manner which clearly shows the variance between themselves and their spiritual leaders. Lord Camoys, who writes this morning in The Times, goes even beyond Lord Acton in repudiating the claims of the Papacy to “divide Ilia civil allegiance.” In fact, he agrees with everything which Ml’. Gladstone has said on the subject with a single reservation as to the propriety of describing the reign of Queen Mary as “bloody.” He admits that there is “ a change in the obligations of Roman Catholics to the civil power in consequence of the publication of the Vatican decrees and as to the practical dangers which may arise from this change, he admits or seems to admit, that they have a real existence. The Pope, indeed, is not likely to excommunicate Queen Victoria, but “there is no telling what edict might be issued by the author of the syllabus.” , Assuming an edict were now issued tending to “ weaken or destroy allegiance,” the effect of the late promulgation of the dogma of Infallibility would be that a Catholic must “ either withhold his allegiance on the one hand, or risk his salvation on the other.” Lord Camoys, however, leaves no doubt as to what his own choice would be. He would throw—indeed he has already thrown—the dogma of Infallibility overboard, and adhere to his civil allegiance. “ For myself I will say that history, common-sense, and my early instruction forbid me to accept the astounding and novel. . . doctrine of the personal infallibility of the Pope, though limited, as asserted, to the large domain of faith and morals." The division, then, between the Archbishop of Westminster and a portion at least of his flock is thus seen to be complete. He maintains that the claims of the Papacy have never divided the civil allegiance of Roman Catholics either before or since the promulgation of the Vatican decrees. Lord Acton holds that the civil allegiance of Eoman Catholics has been divided from time immemorial, and Lord Camoys that it has been divided since 1870, by the claims of the Papacy ; while both alike agree in declaring that they maintain their own civil allegiance entire only by the utter repudiation of Papal claims. recognising Lord Acton and Lord Camoys as the spokesmen of a large body of the Eoman Catholic laity, will regard this division between them and the Catholic hierarchy with unmixed satisfaction. ' There are some perhaps who have a right so to regard it; but whether Mr. Gladstone, as a statesman and late Prime Minister of England, ought to rank himself among these is a very different question indeed, air. Gladstone is not a professional Protestant controversialist or anti-Catholic lecturer, but a Minister who has had and may again have to govern a mixed population of Protestants and Roman Catholics; and when such a man comes forward to set Roman Catholics at loggerheads among themselves, and to force them to proclaim their internal dissensions to the world, we ought to examine closely the grounds on which it is proposed to justify the step. FrimA facie, at least, it is not the part of a statesman to fling a firebrand among one of the religious communities forming part of the people among whom lie may again have to govern, and, that being so, it is right to consider how such a departure from the ordinary policy of Government is to be defended. Obviously it can be defended upon one assumption, and one only, that it constitutes the only means of averting an imminent political danger. That, we are aware, was in fact the express fundamental assumption upon which, Mr. Gladstone’s pamphlet proceeded; but where is there the slightest evidence that that assumption accords with the facts ? So far from there being any evidence of this, such evidence as there is, is directly to the contrary. Mr. Gladstone’s challenge to the English Catholics was, in fact, one which could only he justified by remaining unanswered ; and every new reply, of the type of Lord Acton’s and Lord Camoys’s, renders the question more inexcusable. If, when Mr. Gladstone pointed out that tbo - principles professed by Roman Catholics were fatal to complete loyalty, and asserted that there was great danger of their acting on those principles, they had remained silent, it would have been open to contend, perhaps with some plausibility, that the danger he foreboded was a real one, and that the silence of the English Catholics proved it to be so. This, of course, would have been an unfair inference, as it was not to be expected that the lay members of any religious body would engage in an untimely and •unnecessary conflict with their spiritual superiors. But since some at least of' the English Catholics have not remained silent, but, on the contrary, have openly repudiated the principles which supposed to have held, that circumstance has proved the danger which alarmed Mr. Gladstone to be imaginary. Lord Acton, Lord Camoys, and the Catholic laymen who hold similar views, must always have thought what Mr. Gladstone has now compelled them to openly avow, and so long as they thought it there could not be the slightest fear that the extravagant claims of the Papacy would have imperilled the loyalty of Mr. Gladstone’s “Catholic' fellow-citizens.” All that he has done, therefore, has been to effect in an irregular way a sort of revival of tests against the Roman Catholics. He lias tendered them a kind of informal oath of abjuration of the Papal supremacy “,in this realm of England.” If they had shrunk from taking it, he might have said that their reluctance to do so proved the necessity of the tost. But they have taken the oath, and the only result, therefore, Ims been needlessly to humiliate them.