spread of Protestant teaching. In 1868 permission was granted for the building of a Protestant church at Madrid. The constitution of 1875 admitted the principle of tolerance, only limiting the public manifestation of non-Catholic religion to sanctuaries and cemeteries. Within a dozen years from this date Protestantism in Spain numbered some sixty congregations, with about fifteen thousand members.

The advancement of Protestantism in Italy has not yet begun to bear any true proportion to the dissatisfaction of the Italians with Roman Catholicism. A people which has been accustomed to relegate all religious problems to the priesthood, and to exercise no responsibility for its creed, does not easily rise to the plane of personal thoughtfulness and religious endeavor which are required by the very nature of Protestantism. Thus the evangelical leaven enters but slowly into the minds of the Italians. Protestants are still reckoned at only about twenty thousand. The time of opportunity, however, has been but brief, and would hardly suffice under very favorable conditions for more than foundation work. The Free Church, the Waldenses, and the societies formed by foreign missionary associations are the chief factors in the evangelical force. The first dates from the middle years of the century, and represents a rather extreme opposition to clericalism and ritualism. A work similar to the Old Catholic has its earnest exponents. By one agency or another a wide circulation is being given to the Bible. It is said that in 1890 more copies of the Scriptures were sold in Italy than of any other book.

CHAPTER II.

ROMANISM IN CONTINENTAL EUROPE SINCE THE FALL OF THE FIRST NAPOLEON.

I. MEDIEVAL TENDENCIES IN THE SPHERE OF WORSHIP.

IN

N looking for events which may serve to indicate most clearly the cardinal developments of Romanism since the time of Napoleon I., one naturally fixes upon the declaration, in 1854, of the immaculate conception of the Virgin, the Vatican Council of 1869-70, the Syllabus of 1864, and the abrogation of the Pope's temporal power since the autumn of 1870. The first of these events may be regarded as the leading dogmatic expression of mediæval tendencies in the sphere of worship; the Vatican Council stands for Papal absolutism and infallibility; while the Syllabus and the overthrow of the temporal power have involved much discussion of ecclesiasticopolitical matters, or questions bearing on the relations. of Church and State. These three topics, therefore, furnish the subdivisions of the present chapter.

The declaration of the immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary was a victory of sentimental worship; and it is principally in this aspect that we wish to consider the event. It is fitting, however, to notice briefly the character of that declaration as a dogmatic fiat. It was a sheer fiat, issued in virtual mockery of the grounds,

Scripture and unbroken tradition, which Romish theology professes to require for every dogma.

Where are the scriptural passages which intimate the immaculate conception of the Virgin? Behold a prodigy of eyesight! Pius IX. in his bull Ineffabilis Deus supports the dogma on Genesis iii. 15 and Luke i. 28, and theologians have added sentences from the Song of Solomon. Now the fathers, with all their exegetical aberrations, never twisted these scriptures into a proof of the immaculate conception. Defenders of the dogma may safely be challenged to cite a single authentic writing of the first eight centuries which gives this exposition.1

Where is the warrant for the dogma in the records of tradition? Some of the early fathers, in a time of unbridled allegorizing, may have employed a rather

1It is hardly necessary for the opponent to take exception to spurious productions in this connection, for most of these which are imputed to the fathers do not interpret the Scriptures in favor of the immaculate conception of Mary, except to one who is determined to find that interpretation. It is proper, however, to note that certain homilies attributed to Origen, Decem Homilia in Diversos, are pronounced by eminent Roman Catholic critics to be spurious; also the Letters of Dionysius of Alexandria against Paul of Samosata, the work on the Annunciation attributed to Gregory Thaumaturgus, the Prayers to the Mother of God assigned to Ephrem, and the sermons given under the name of Epiphanius. How much of specifically Romish imagination is necessary in order to discover the doctrine promulgated by Pius IX. in any genuine comment of the fathers on the Scriptures may be learned by consulting the following: Justin Martyr, Dial. cum Tryphone, c. cii.; Irenæus, Contra Hæreses, iii. 22. 4, iii. 23. 7, iv. 40. 3, v. 19. 1 ; Tertullian, De Cultu Fem., i. 6, Adv. Marcionem, ii. 10, De Carne Christi, xvii.; Cyprian, Adv. Judæos, ii. 9; Ambrose, De Fuga Sæculi, vi. n. 43, De Paradiso, x. n. 47; Jerome, Heb. Quæst. in Gen. iii. 15; Augustine, In Psal. xxxv. 18, xlviii. 6, ciii. 6; Origen, In Jer., Hom. xix. 7, In Luc., Hom. vi.; Epiphanius, Hæreses, lxxviii. S$ 18, 19; Chrysostom, In Gen., cap. iii., Hom. xvii. 7.

florid rhetoric in description of the Virgin's office and dignity. In the fourth and the following centuries many writers doubtless bestowed high honors upon Mary. At a time when monasticism was lauded to the skies, and saint worship was being intruded into the place of the classic polytheism, enthusiastic veneration necessarily flowed toward the virgin mother. As virgin she satisfied the monastic ideal; while as mother-Mother of God, to use the orthodox shibboleth of the fifth century she was brought into a divine relation which seemed to exalt her far above all other mortals. What wonder that, under this double aspect, her purity and unique elevation should frequently have been celebrated in warmly colored sentences! It is not the slightest occa sion for surprise to find one and another writer speaking of her as immaculate. But it is to be noted that immaculate is one thing and immaculate conception is another. In no instance were the two words conjoined by the fathers in the sense of the dogma of 1854. The adjective was used to denote either the unsullied virginity of Mary, or a purity resulting from special grace bestowed after conception. Some of the very writers who speak of the immaculate Virgin, or who lavish upon her the most extravagant honors, unmistakably deny her immaculate conception. Fathers of the highest authority are involved in this denial, as well as nearly the whole list of illustrious scholastics, though these same scholastics pushed the veneration of the Virgin across the verge of an ill-disguised idolatry. In consideration of these facts, he who quotes in proof of the recently declared dogma any patristic sentence which indicates only a worshipful attitude toward the Virgin, or an enthusiastic

regard for her purity, simply proclaims his incompetency for an honest and scientific review of history. Apologists, indeed, would have done well had they forborne historical references, and contented themselves with the point of view taken in the fifteenth century by Gerson, who spoke of the doctrine of the immaculate conception as newly revealed. In fact, Duns Scotus, who wrote at the end of the thirteenth and the beginning of the fourteenth century, was the first notable champion of the doctrine, and he based it on speculative, not historical, grounds. It was with no small show of prudence, ac

1 Several of the fathers use language which is so far from predicating entire sinlessness of Mary that it might be understood as not excusing her from such actual sins as over-anxiety, ambition, or lack of faith. Here belong Irenæus, Contra Hær., iii. 16. 7; Origen, In Luc., Hom. xvii. ; Chrysostom, In Joannem, Hom. xxi.; Basil, Epist. cclx. n. 9; Cyril of Alexandria, In Joan., lib. xii. cap. xix. ver. 25. Add to such passages those which implicitly or explicitly reject the immaculate conception, and the result is a complete historic negation of the doctrine. Justin Martyr shows that he had no desire to exempt Mary from original sin by styling Christ "the only spotless and sinless" one (Dial. cum Tryph., cx.). Tertullian indicates the like standpoint in this terse declaration : Solus enim Deus sine peccato, et solus homo sine peccato Christus, quia et Deus Christus (De Anima, xli.). Origen says, Solus vero Dominus noster Jesus Christus, qui peccatum nescit, neque in patre, neque in matre contaminatus est (In Levit., Hom. xii. n. 4). Ambrose writes to the same effect, Solus enim per omnia ex natis de femina sanctus Dominus Jesus, qui terrenæ contagia corruptelæ immaculati partus novitate non senserit et cœlesti majestate depulerit (In Luc., lib. ii. n. 56). Augustine asserts repeatedly, in the most explicit terms, that Christ alone of the race was or could be exempt from original sin: Solus sine peccato natus est, quem sine virili complexu, non concupiscentia carnis, sed obedientia mentis virgo concepit (De Peccat. Merit., i. 57). Solus ergo ille etiam homo factus manens Deus, peccatum nullum habuit unquam, nec sumpsit carnem peccati, quamvis de materna carne peccati: quod enim carnis inde suscepit, id profecto aut suscipiendum mundavit, aut suscipiendo mun