THE POPE ON INFALLIBILITY.

Waikato Times, Volume 459, Issue VIII, 27 April 1875, Page 3

THE POPE ON INFALLIBILITY.

In the course of an address, recently delivered by the Holy Father, at the Academy of the Catholic Religion, are the following remarks : — " Among the different subjects "which you will have to treat there is one which seems to me of special importance, and that is to bring to nothing the efforts that are being made to falsify the idea of Pontifical infallibility. Of all these efforts that which seems the fullest of malice consists in attributing to the infallibility of the Pope the right of deposing Sovereigns and of absolving subjects from their allegiance. Without doubt, this right has sometimes been exercised by the Popes in the supreme struggles, but it never has anything in common with their infallibility, and its source was not in infallibility, but in the Pontifical authority. Moreover, jbhe exercise of the -j-Pht in the ages of faith — whei/ men recognised in the Pope, what he really is, the Supreme Judge of Christendom, and acknowledged the advantages of his tribunal for the solution of great questions arising between peoples and their Sovereigns — the exercise of that right spread itself, seconded as it ought to have been by public law and the general agreement of the nationalities, to the gravest interests of the States and their Chiefs. Ihe conditions of the present day are greatly changed, and only malice can confound two things so different : infallibility in regard to revealed principles, and the right which the Popes exercised in virtue of their authority when the welfare of society demanded it. tSurS^emies know this as well as we, and it is easy to see why they call upon this confusion of ideas and put forward hypotheses in which nobody TJeljeyes. They invent these pretexts in order to aniict us and to excite princes against the Church. There are some who wish I should explain and render still more clqar the definition of the Council. I will not do it. It unclear enough in itself, and has no need of further "explanations or commentaries." „

A singular case of jealousy and revenge conies to us from Sicily. A beautiful girl named FlorW, who was the Dslle of a travelling circus, in which she figured as the lion-tamer, Jiad been for some time receiving the attentions of an athlete to the same troupe, By some means she ascertained that he was not faithful to fcer, /but had another lady love. No signs howevexdf her painful discovery were allowed to escape, smiled sweetly upon him, but responded coldly io his ardent addresses. In her own bosom sh^planned a terrible revenge. One evening recently, when the performance had been unusually brilliant after Fiorina had whipped the lions, and forced them to lie afe. her feet, she called her recreant lover aside, and said to him : "Do you still lore me f* " Always," he answered. " Do you know; that I should die if you should devote yourself to another woman V " What^n idea!" replied the $pung man. " But I should first kill you," said Plorina. " And how would you do tfcat ?" " Thus," c/ied the girl, at the same instant pushing him violently into the cage of the lions. They attacked tlie nnfortanate man at once and tore him tfc pieces, Avhile Fiorina urged them on with blows oil her wjiip.