DEATH OF HIS HOLINESS THE POPE.

Thames Star, Volume VIII, Issue 2808, 13 February 1878, Page 2

DEATH OF HIS HOLINESS THE POPE.

[COHTBIBUTED.]

John Mabta Mastai Fbbbetti was born on the 13th of May, 1792, at Sinigaglia, in the ancient Duchy of TJrbino. The Mastai family, which dates back to the thirteenth century, has always been distinguished for eminent services, and in reward received the title of Count. By a union with the last scion of the noble family of Ferretti, the Counts Mastai blended that honored name with their own. The father of Pius IX., Jerome Mastai Ferretti, was gonfalonier of Sinigaglia; and his uncle, Andrew Mastai, in the Pontificate of Pius VII., won by his heroic fidelity to that Pope, the dory of a confessor of Christ, having suffered a clode imprisonment in the citadel of Mantua. The future Pontiff was, there* fore, from his earliest years, no stranger to the tribulations of the church; and among the earliest prayers which he learned from the lips of his pious mother, the Countess Mastai, was one for the deliverance of Pope Pius VI. At the age of 12 he was placed at the college of Volterra, in Tuscany, and speedily gained by the amenity of his character and the graces of his mind, the good-will of his teachers and schoolmates. His progress was rapid, and the institution long remembered with pride the pupil whose ability struck even the French educational superintendents who visited the College. On leaving it John Maria embraced the career of arms, and: when the Pontifical army was reconstituted he entered the noble guard of Pius; VII. It was his vocation to be in a special manner the defender of the Holy See, as soldier, as Bishop, as Cardinal, and as Pope. The young Count was soon after seized with a malady which the; physicians regarded as incurable, but from; which the Count recovered. Count Mas* tai Ferretti resolved then to consecrate his restored life to the service of God.; As soon as his strength permitted, he repaired lo Bomo to pursue his courts of Divinity. He was ordained priest, and spent his first years of priesthood in the eternal 'city obscurely enough, little known in the busy world, or amid the great and exalted; but blessed and honored by the poor, whom he visited daily at the hospice of Tota Giovanni, to which he had been attached even before he devoted himself to the service of the altar. To give stme idea what was for many years the field of predilection of the future Pope, we may briefly sketch its history. In the last century there lived at Borne a poor mason (s one mason, of course) named Giovanni Borgi, whose holiday recreation it was to risit the hospital of the Holy Ghost, serve the sick, make their beds, and do any other service in his powers. Here he often found children left orphans by the death of their parents. Touched with the condition of these and other poor boys, he invited them to come to his house. With the help of alms, which he solicited, he took them in, dressed them, and instructed them in their religious and civil duties, till such time as he could succeed in placing them as apprentices with worthy tradesfolk. At the death of Giovanni Jtforgi, the high-born priest, Count Mastai Ferretti did not disdain to become the successor of the mason. (To this may be attributed the rumour which has gone forth amongst a certain class of people that Pius the IX. was a Freemason, when in reality he was only the successor in the good works of a stone mason.) He lived among the poor children, the better to know their wants, and a little cell is still shown in Tota Giovanni which was for seven years the abode of .the devoted priest. Monsignor Muri having been appointed by the Holy See Apostolic delegate to the Bepublic of Chili, asked that the Abba Mastai Fer* retti should accompany him, and the Pope readily consented. He labored for several years amongst the Americans. On returning to Home in 1825, Count Masta'i Ferretti was appointed by Leo XII. to the presidency of the hospice of St. Michael, a large establishment on the right bank of the Tiber, facing Mount Aventine, founded by Innocent X., and enlarged by subsequent pontiffs. A few months developed in Mastai rare administrative abilities which were so much appreciated by Leo XII. that he made him Archbishop of Spoleto. Under Gregory XVI. he was, in 1852, transferred from the See of Spoleto to that of Imola, which had so recently seen one of his incumbents raised to the See of Peter. During the insurrection of 1831, a number of the insurgents fled before the Austrians; the Archbishop went out to disarm them, and did indeed disarm them by his charity; and when the chief of police, full of zeal, came with a list of the accomplices in the city, the Archbishop said—" My worthy air, you do not understand your profession or mine. When the wolf would devour the sheep, he does pot forewarn the shepherd !" Oh the 23rd of December, 1839, he was nominated as Cardinal in petto, and proclaimed in Consistory on the 14th of December, 1840. After the death of Gregory the XVI, 1846, Cardinal Mastai Ferretti was elected Pope by a plurality of votes. Four days after he was crowned in St. Peter, on the 21st of June, 1846. On his accession ho distributed alms; he also redeemed the pledges of all the poor in the Mont de Piete, and paid the debts of the :ndi*

gent confined for debt. Gregory XVI. had struggled with the revolutionary element, and held it repressed with a firm hand, liaised suddenly to the throne, Pius, acting from the spontaneous goodness of his character, sought to win the hearts of his people by kindness. On the 16th of July ho issued an amnesty liberating from civil penalties all convicted of political offences during the late reign. This proved, however, disastrous, for the pardoned plunged again into conspiracies to overthrow the power of the Popes. It was then that Pius IX restored the civic-guard established by Gregory XVI. ;_ but only when the other Italian princes had set the example. A circular of the 19th of April, 1847, announced his intention to call to Home one persoa from each province to form a Council of State. When his political views were made known the world was in raptures of admiration for his policy. Mazzici, himself the great enemy of the Papacy, recognised the immense power of the Pope, and hastened to support his cause by a public expression of his admiration for Pius IX. Public meetings were held in England and America to express the admiration felt for the character and policy of Pius; and resolutions, fall of enthusiasm, attested the extent of the sentiment. A monster meeting held in New York in the month of November 1847, presided over by the Mayor of the city and attended by many of the most distinguished citizens, adopted and forwarded an address of congratulation and approval of his policy. Notwithstanding the paternal government of Pius, the rebels did not cca«tc their attacks a£*inst the Vicar of Christ; in fact he would have been assassinated in 1848 only for the French Ambassador, the Duke d'Harcourt, who, on the 24th of November, proceeded to the Quirinal in a state coach, preceded by couriers and torches. After some difficulty he obtained an introduction to the Holy Father. He aided the Pontiff to change his attire and assume the dress of an ordinary clergyman. A faithful servant accompanied him through the corridors of the conclave, and Pius IX., passing down the stairway of the Swiss corridor, issued by a private door and entered a carriage, where the Count de Spaur awaited him. The Duke d'Harcoart remained in the roam alone, reading aloud, as if perming some document for the Pope. This he kept at for two hours; then he came out and announced that the Pope had retired for the night. The Pope was then on his way to Gacta, where he held his little court as at Borne, surrounded by representatives of all European powers, who expressed their sympathy with his trouble and the desire to see him restored to his normal, position. On the 22nd of April, 1869, the French army under General Oudindt sailed for Italy. The van impetuously assailed Borne on the 30th, without awaiting the rest of the army. On the 30th of June the Roman Bepublic posted a decree on the walls abandoning the defence of the city. The slay of Pius IX. at G«c a will not be forgotten in the annals of the universal Church. The Prince was; driven away from his capital and deprived by violence of the administration of his states, but ho did not cease to direct the affairs of hia vast flock. It was from his exile that he addressed an encyclical letter' to the Patriarchs, Primates, Archbishops, and Bishops of the Universe asking them their opinion as to the seasonableness of defining the dogma of the immaculate conception of the blessed Virgin Mary. A number of Bishops were convoked to Rome for the Bth of November, 1854, when the dogma was defined. In 1860 the menacing condition of affairs required that the Pope should put his army on a footing to preserve his states. The organisation of his army was committed to the experience of the French General de Lamoriciere. Catholic Ireland exultingly sent a thousand of her bravest sons, who founded an Irish battalion in the army, and won renown worthy of past glory of the race. In September a Sardinian army of 24,000 entered the Papal State, and notwithstanding the gallantry of General de Lamoriciere, Major O'Beilly and his men, who fought like lions, they were outnumbered, and were obliged to surrender at Ancona, seeing no prospect of succour. The Papal army was gone, the Pope stripped by violence of the Marches, and Umibria was at the mercy of the new scourge of Catholicity. But France at last spoke, and declared that the patrimony of St. . Peter should not be invaded. For a time the Boman States were tranquil, and Pius continued his labors as Pontiff. In 1862 Pius proceeded to Minerva to pronounce the decree for the canonisation of the Japanese martyrs, and on the Bth of Jane that imposing ceremony took place in presence of over 300 prelates, and several thousand people. In 1869 the Primates, Patriarchs, Archbishops, and Bishops were convoked to Borne to attend an (Ecumenical Council to set at rest the question of Papal Infallibility, which had been up to this time an open question, the Church not having ever pronounced on the point; and also to determine the relation of rights between the Church and the civil powers. This last question was not dealt with, owing to the eruption of the Italian troops into Borne in 1870, which also caused the suspension of the labors of the Council. There never was a Pontiff so unfortunate, and at the same time none so revered, so largely loved, so popular even with Protestants as Pius IX. Yet, notwithstanding his great virtues, his popularity, and the number of his subjects, which exceeds 200,003,000, he has been kept a prisoner in his own palace for the last seven ycari*