To the Patriarchs, Primates, Archbishops, Bishops  and other Local Ordinaries in Peace and Communion with the Apostolic See. 

AD PATRIARCHAS PRIMATES ARCHIEPISCOPOS EPISCOPOS ALIOSQUE LOCORUM ORDINARIOS PACEM ET  COMMUNIONEM CUM APOSTOLICA SEDE HABENTES

VENERABLE Brothers, Health and Apostolic Benediction.

Venerabiles Fratres, 
Salutem et Apostolicam Benedictionem !

THE office divinely committed to Us of feeding the Lord’s flock has especially this duty assigned to it by Christ, namely, to guard with the greatest vigilance the deposit of the faith delivered to the saints, rejecting the profane novelties of words and oppositions of knowledge falsely so called. There has never been a time when this watchfulness of the supreme pastor was not necessary to the Catholic body; for, owing to the efforts of the enemy of the human race, there have never been lacking “men speaking perverse things” (Acts xx. 30), “vain talkers and seducers” (Tit. i. 10), “erring and driving into error” (2 Tim. iii. 13). Still it must be confessed that the number of the enemies of the cross of Christ has in these last days increased exceedingly, who are striving, by arts, entirely new and full of subtlety, to destroy the vital energy of the Church, and, if they can, to overthrow utterly Christ’s kingdom itself. Wherefore We may no longer be silent, lest We should seem to fail in Our most sacred duty, and lest the kindness that, in the hope of wiser counsels, We have hitherto shown them, should be attributed to forgetfulness of Our office.

Pascendi dominici gregis mandatum Nobis divinitus officium id munus in primis a Christo assignatum habet, ut traditae sanctis fidei depositum vigilantissime custodiat, repudiatis profanis vocum novitatibus atque oppositionibus falsi nominis scientiae. Quae quidem supremi providentia pastoris nullo plane non tempore catholico agmini necessaria fuit; etenim, auctore humani generis hoste, numquam defuere viri loquentes perversa (Act. xx. 30), vaniloqui et seductores (Tit. i. 10), errantes et in errorem mittentes (II. Tim. iii. 13). Verumtamen inimicorum crucis Christi, postrema hac aetate, numerum crevisse admodum fatendum est; qui, artibus omnino novis astuque plenis, vitalem Ecclesiae vim elidere, ipsumque, si queant, Christi regnum evertere funditus nituntur. Quare silere Nobis diutius haud licet, ne muneri sanctissimo deesse videamur, et benignitas, qua, spe sanioris consilii, huc usque usi sumus, officii oblivio reputetur.

Gravity of the Situation

2. That We make no delay in this matter is rendered necessary especially by the fact that the partisans of error are to be sought not only among the Church’s open enemies; they lie hid, a thing to be deeply deplored and feared, in her very bosom and heart, and are the more mischievous, the less conspicuously they appear. We allude, Venerable Brethren, to many who belong to the Catholic laity, nay, and this is far more lamentable, to the ranks of the priesthood itself, who, feigning a love for the Church, lacking the firm protection of philosophy and theology, nay more, thoroughly imbued with the poisonous doctrines taught by the enemies of the Church, and lost to all sense of modesty, vaunt themselves as reformers of the Church; and, forming more boldly into line of attack, assail all that is most sacred in the work of Christ, not sparing even the person of the Divine Redeemer, whom, with sacrilegious daring, they reduce to a simple, mere man.

Qua in re ut moram ne interponamus illud in primis exigit, quod fautores errorum iam non inter apertos hostes quaerendi sunt modo; verum, quod dolendum maxime verendumque est, in ipso latent sinu gremioque ecclesiae, eo sane nocentiores, quo minus perspicui. Loquimur, Venerabiles Fratres, de multis e catholicorum laicorum numero, quin, quod longe miserabilius, ex ipso sacerdotum coetu, qui, fucoso quodam Ecclesiae amore, nullo solido philosophiae ac theologiae praesidio, immo adeo veneratis imbuti penitus doctrinis quae ab Ecclesiae osoribus traduntur, Ecclesiae eiusdem renovatores, omni posthabita modestia animi, se iactitant; factoque audacius agmine, quidquid sanctius est in Christi opere impetunt, ipsa haud incolumi divini Reparatoris persona, quam ausu sacrilege, ad purum putumque hominem extenuant.

3. Though they express astonishment themselves, no one can justly be surprised that We number such men among the enemies of the Church, if, leaving out of consideration the internal disposition of soul, of which God alone is the judge, he is acquainted with their tenets, their manner of speech, their conduct. Nor indeed will he err in accounting them the most pernicious of all the adversaries of the Church. For as We have said, they put their designs for her ruin into operation not from without but from within; hence, the danger is present almost in the very veins and heart of the Church, whose injury is the more certain, the more intimate is their knowledge of her. Moreover they lay the axe not to the branches and shoots, but to the very root, that is, to the faith and its deepest fires. And having struck at this root of immortality, they proceed to disseminate poison through the whole tree, so that there is no part of Catholic truth from which they hold their hand, none that they do not strive to corrupt. Further, none is more skilful, none more astute than they, in the employment of a thousand noxious arts; for they double the parts of rationalist and Catholic, and this so craftily that they easily lead the unwary into error; and since audacity is their chief characteristic, there is no conclusion of any kind from which they shrink or which they do not thrust forward with pertinacity and assurance. To this must be added the fact, which indeed is well calculated to deceive souls, that they lead a life of the greatest activity, of assiduous and ardent application to every branch of learning, and that they possess, as a rule, a reputation for the strictest morality.

Homines huiusmodi Ecclesiae Nos hostibus adscribere, etsi mirantur ipsi, nemo tamen mirabitu iure, qui, mente animi seposita cuius penes Deum arbitrium est, illorum doctrinas et loquendi agendique rationes cognorit. Enimvero non is a veritate discedat, qui eos Ecclesiae adversarios quovis alio perniciosiores habeat. Nam non hi extra Ecclesiam, sed intra, ut diximus, de illius pernicie consilia agitant sua : quamobrem in ipsis fere Ecclesiae venis atque in visceribus periculum residet, eo securiore damno quo illi intimius Ecclesiam norunt. Adde quod securim non ad ramos surculosque ponunt; sed adradicem ipsam, fidem nimirum fideique fibras altissimas. Icta autem radice hac immortalitatis, virus per omnem arborem sic propagare pergunt, ut catholicae veritatis nulla sit pars unde manus abstineant, nulla quam corrumpere non elaborent. Porro, mille nocendi artes dum adhibent, nihil illis callidius nihil insidiosius: nam et rationalistam et catholicum promiscue agunt, idque adeo simulatissime, ut incautum quemque facile in errorem pertrahant; cumque temeritate maxime valeant, nullum est consecutionum genus quod horreant aut non obfirmate secureque obtrudant. Accedit praeterea in illis, aptissime ad fallendos animos, genus vitae cum maxime actuosum, assidua ac vehemens ad omnem eruditionem occupatio, moribus plerumque austeris quaesita laus.

Finally, and this almost destroys all hope of cure, their very doctrines have given such a bent to their minds, that they

disdain all authority and brook no restraint;

and relying upon a false conscience,

they attempt to ascribe to a love of truth that which is in reality the result of pride and obstinacy.

Once indeed We had hopes of recalling them to a better sense, and to this end we first of all showed them kindness as Our children, then we treated them with severity, and at last We have had recourse, though with great reluctance, to public reproof. But you know, Venerable Brethren, how fruitless has been Our action. They bowed their head for a moment, but it was soon uplifted more arrogantly than ever. If it were a matter which concerned them alone, We might perhaps have overlooked it: but the security of the Catholic name is at stake. Wherefore, as to maintain it longer would be a crime, We must now break silence, in order to expose before the whole Church in their true colours those men who have assumed this bad disguise.

Equidem speravimus huiusmodi quandoque homines ad meliora revocare: quo in genere suavitate primum tamquam cum filiis, tum vero severitate, demum, quanquam inviti, animadversione publica usi sumus. Nostis tamen,Venerabiles Fratres, quam haec facerimus inaniter: cervicem, ad horam deflexam, mox extulerunt superbius. Iam si illorum solummodo res ageretur, dissimulare forsitan possemus: sed catholici nominis e contra securitas agitur. Quapropter silentium, quod habere diutius piaculum foret, intercipere necesse est; ut personates male homines, quales reapse sunt, universae Ecclesiae demonstremus.

Division of the Encyclical

4. But since the Modernists (as they are commonly and rightly called) employ a very clever artifice, namely, to present their doctrines without order and systematic arrangement into one whole, scattered and disjointed one from another, so as to appear to be in doubt and uncertainty, while they are in reality firm and steadfast, it will be of advantage, Venerable Brethren, to bring their teachings together here into one group, and to point out the connexion between them, and thus to pass to an examination of the sources of the errors, and to prescribe remedies for averting the evil.

Quia vero modernistarum (sic enim iure vulgus audiunt) callidissimum artificium est, ut doctrinas suas non ordine digestas proponant atque in unum collectas, sed sparsas veluti atque invicem seiunctas, ut nimirum ancipites et quasi vagi videantur, cum e contra firmi sint et constantes; praestat, Venerabiles Fratres, doctrinas easdem uno heic conspectu exhibere primum, nexumque indicare quo invicem coalescunt, ut deinde errorum caussas scrutemur, ac remedia ad averruncandam perniciem praescribamus.

ANALYSIS OF MODERNIST TEACHING

5. To proceed in an orderly manner in this recondite subject, it must first of all be noted that every Modernist sustains and comprises within himself many personalities; he is a philosopher, a believer, a theologian, an historian, a critic, an apologist, a reformer. These roles must be clearly distinguished from one another by all who would accurately know their system and thoroughly comprehend the principles and the consequences of their doctrines.

Ut autem in abstrusiore re ordinatim procedamus, illud ante omnia notandum est, modernistarum quemlibet plures agere personas ac veluti in se commiscere; philosophum nimirum, credentem, theologum, historicum, criticum, apologetam, instauratorem: quas singulatim omnes distinguere oportet, qui eorum systema rite cognoscere et doctrinarum antecessiones consequutionesque pervidere velit.

Agnosticism its Philosophical Foundation

6. We begin, then, with the philosopher. Modernists place the foundation of religious philosophy in that doctrine which is usually called Agnosticism. According to this teaching human reason is confined entirely within the field of phenomena, that is to say, to things that are perceptible to the senses, and in the manner in which they are perceptible; it has no right and no power to transgress these limits. Hence it is incapable of lifting itself up to God, and of recognising His existence, even by means of visible things. From this it is inferred that God can never be the direct object of science, and that, as regards history, He must not be considered as an historical subject. Given these premises, all will readily perceive what becomes of Natural Theology, of themotives of credibility, of external revelation. The Modernists simply make away with them altogether; they include them inIntellectualism, which they call a ridiculous and long ago defunct system. Nor does the fact that the Church has formally condemned these portentous errors exercise the slightest restraint upon them. Yet the Vatican Council has defined, “If anyone says that the one true God, our Creator and Lord, cannot be known with certainty by the natural light of human reason by means of the things that are made, let him be anathema” (De Revel., can. I); and also: “If anyone says that it is not possible or not expedient that man be taught, through the medium of divine revelation, about God and the worship to be paid Him, let him be anathema” (Ibid., can. 2); and finally, “If anyone says that divine revelation cannot be made credible by external signs, and that therefore men should be drawn to the faith only by their personal internal experience or by private inspiration, let him be anathema” (De Fide, can. 3). But how the Modernists make the transition from Agnosticism, which is a state of pure nescience, to scientific and historic Atheism, which is a doctrine of positive denial; and consequently, by what legitimate process of reasoning, starting from ignorance as to whether God has in fact intervened in the history of the human race or not, they proceed, in their explanation of this history, to ignore God altogether, as if He really had not intervened, let him answer who can. Yet it is a fixed and established principle among them that both science and history must be atheistic: and within their boundaries there is room for nothing but phenomena; God and all that is divine are utterly excluded. We shall soon see clearly what, according to this most absurd teaching, must be held touching the most sacred Person of Christ, what concerning the mysteries of His life and death, and of His Resurrection and Ascension into heaven.

Iam, ut a philosopho exordiamur, philosophiae religiosae fundamentum in doctrina illa modernistae ponunt, quam vulgo agnosticismum vocant. Vi huius humana ratio phaenomenis omnino includitur, rebus videlicet quae apparent eaque specie qua apparent: earumdem praetergredi terminos nec ius nec potestatem habet. Quare nec ad Deum se erigere potis est, nec illius existentiam, ut ut per ea quae videntur, agnoscere. Hinc infertur, Deum scientiae obiectum directe nullatenus esse posse; ad historiam vero quod attinet, Deum subiectum historicum minime censendum esse. His autem positis, quid de naturali theologia, quid de motivis credibilitatis, quid de externa revelatione fiat, facile quisque perspiciet. Ea nempe modernistae penitus e medio tollunt, et ad intellectualismum amandant; ridendum, inquiunt, systema ac iamdiu emortuum. Neque illos plane retinet quod eiusmodi errorum portenta apertissime damnarit Ecclesia: siquidem Vaticana Synodus sic sanciebat : Si quis dixerit Deum unum et verum, Creatorem et Dominum nostrum, per ea quae facta sunt, naturali rationis humanae lumine certo cognosci non posse, anathema sit (De Revel, can. i.), itemque: Si quis dixerit fieri non posse, aut non expedire, ut per revelationem divinam homo de Deo cultuque ei exhibendo edoceatur, anathema sit (Ibid. can. ii.); ac demum: Si quis dixerit revelationem divinam externis signis credibilem fieri non posse, ideoque sola interna cuiusque experientia aut inspiratione privata homines ad fidem moveri debere, anathema sit (De Fide, can. iii.). Qua vero ratione ex agnosticismo, ad atheismum scientificum atque historicum modernistae transeant, qui contra totus est in inficiatione positus: quo idcirco ratiocinationis iure; ex eo quod ignoretur utrum humanarum gentium historiae intervenerit Deus necne, fiat gressus ad eamdem historiam neglecto omnino Deo explicandam, ac si reapse non intervenerit; novit plane qui possit. Id tamen ratum ipsis fixumque est, atheam debere esse scientiam itemque historiam; in quarum finibus non nisi phaenomenis possit esse locus, exturbato penitus Deo et quidquid divinum est. Qua ex doctrina absurdissima quid de sanctissima Christi persona, quid de Ipsius vitae mortisque mysteriis, quid pariter de anastasi deque in caelum ascensu tenendum sit, mox plane videbimus.

Vital Immanence

7. However, this Agnosticism is only the negative part of the system of the Modernist: the positive side of it consists in what they call vital immanence. This is how they advance from one to the other. Religion, whether natural or supernatural, must, like every other fact, admit of some explanation. But when Natural theology has been destroyed, the road to revelation closed through the rejection of the arguments of credibility, and all external revelation absolutely denied, it is clear that this explanation will be sought in vain outside man himself. It must, therefore, be looked for in man; and since religion is a form of life, the explanation must certainly be found in the life of man. Hence the principle of religious immanence is formulated. Moreover, the first actuation, so to say, of every vital phenomenon, and religion, as has been said, belongs to this category, is due to a certain necessity or impulsion; but it has its origin, speaking more particularly of life, in a movement of the heart, which movement is called a sentiment. Therefore, since God is the object of religion, we must conclude that faith, which is the basis and the foundation of all religion, consists in a sentiment which originates from a need of the divine. This need of the divine, which is experienced only in special and favourable circumstances, cannot, of itself, appertain to the domain of consciousness; it is at first latent within the consciousness, or, to borrow a term from modern philosophy, in the subconsciousness, where also its roots lies hidden and undetected.

Hic tamen agnosticismus, in disciplina modernistarum, non nisi ut pars negans habenda est: positiva, ut aiunt, in immanentia vitaliconstituitur. Harum nempe ad aliam ex altera sic procedunt. Religio, sive ea naturalis est sive supra naturam, ceu quodlibet factum, explicationem aliquam admittat oportet. Explicatio autem, naturali theologia deleta adituque ad revelationem ob reiecta credibilitatis argumenta intercluso, immo etiam revelatione qualibet externa penitus sublata extra hominem inquiritur frustra. Est igitur in ipso homine quaerenda: et quoniam religio vitae quaedam est forma, in vita omnino hominis reperienda est. Ex hoc immanentiae religiosae principium asseritur. Vitalis porro cuiuscumque phaenomeni, cuiusmodi religionem esse iam dictum est, prima veluti motio ex indigentia quapiam seu impulsione est repetenda: primordia vero, si devita pressius loquamur, ponenda sunt in motu quodam cordis, qui sensus dicitur. Eam ob rem, cum religionis obiectum sit Deus, concludendum omnino est, fidem, quae initium est ac fundamentum cuiusvis religionis, in sensu quodam intimo collocari debere, qui ex indigentia divini oriatur. Haec porro divini indigentia, quia nonnisi certis aptisque in complexibus sentitur, pertinere ad conscientiae ambitum ex se non potest; latet autem primo infra conscientiam, seu, ut mutuato vocabulo a moderna philosophia loquuntur, iu subsconscientia, ubi etiam illius radix occulta manet atque indeprehensa.

Should anyone ask how it is that this need of the divine which man experiences within himself grows up into a religion, the Modernists reply thus: Science and history, they say, are confined within two limits, the one external, namely, the visible world, the other internal, which is consciousness. When one or other of these boundaries has been reached, there can be no further progress, for beyond is the unknowable. In presence of this unknowable, whether it is outside man and beyond the visible world of nature, or lies hidden within in the subconsciousness, the need of the divine, according to the principles of Fideism, excites in a soul with a propensity towards religion a certain special sentiment, without any previous advertence of the mind: and this sentiment possesses, implied within itself both as its own object and as its intrinsic cause, the reality of the divine, and in a way unites man with God. It is this sentiment to which Modernists give the name of faith, and this it is which they consider the beginning of religion.

Petet quis forsan, haec divini indigentia, quam homo in se ipse percipiat, quo demum pacto in religionem evadat. Ad haec modernistae: Scientia atque historia, inquiunt, duplici includuntur termino; altero externo, aspectabili nimirum mundo, altero interno, quiest conscientia. Alterutrum ubi attigerint, ultra quo procedant non habent: hos enim praeter fines adest incognoscibile. Coram hoc incognoscibili, sive illud sit extra hominem ultraque aspectabilem naturam rerum, sive intus insubconscientia lateat, indigentia divini in animo ad religionem prono, nullo, secundum fideismi scita, praevertente mentis iudicio, peculiarem quemdam commovet sensum: hic vero divinam ipsam realitatem, tum tamquam obiectum tum tamquam sui caussam intimam, in se implicatam habet atque hominem quodammodo cum Deo coniungit. Est porro hic sensus quem modernistae fidei nomine appellant, estque illis religionis initium.

8. But we have not yet come to the end of their philosophy, or, to speak more accurately, their folly. For Modernism finds in thissentiment not faith only, but with and in faith, as they understand it, revelation, they say, abides. For what more can one require for revelation? Is not that religious sentiment which is perceptible in the consciousness revelation, or at least the beginning of revelation? Nay, is not God Himself, as He manifests Himself to the soul, indistinctly it is true, in this same religious sense, revelation? And they add: Since God is both the object and the cause of faith, this revelation is at the same time of God and fromGod; that is, God is both the revealer and the revealed.

Sed non hic philosophandi, seu rectius delirandi, finis. In eiusmodi enim sensu modernistae non fidem tantum reperiunt; sed, cum fide inque ipsa fide, prout illam intelligunt, revelationi locum esse affirmant. Enimvero ecquid amplius ad revelationem quis postulet? An non revelationem dicemus, aut saltem revelationis exordium, sensum illum religiosum in conscientia apparentem: quin et Deum ipsum, etsi confusius, sese, in eodem religiose sensu, animis manifestantem? Subdunt vero: cum fidei Deus obiectum sit aeque et caussa, revelatio illa et deDeo pariter et a Deo est; habet Deum videlicet revelantem simul ac revelatum.

Hence, Venerable Brethren, springs that ridiculous proposition of the Modernists, that every religion, according to the different aspect under which it is viewed, must be considered as both natural and supernatural. Hence it is that they make consciousness and revelation synonymous. Hence the law, according to which religious consciousness is given as the universal rule, to be put on an equal footing with revelation, and to which all must submit, even the supreme authority of the Church, whether in its teaching capacity, or in that of legislator in the province of sacred liturgy or discipline.

Hinc autem, Venerabiles Fratres, affirmatio illa modernistarum perabsurda, qua religio quae libet, pro diverso adspectu, naturalis una ac supernaturalis dicenda est. Hinc conscientae ac revelationis promiscua significatio. Hinc lex, qua conscientia religiosa ut regula universalis traditur, cum revelatione penitus aequanda, cui subesse omnes oporteat, supremam etiam in Ecclesia potestatum, sive haec doceat sive de sacris disciplinave statuat.

Deformation of Religious History the Consequence

9. However, in all this process, from which, according to the Modernists, faith and revelation spring, one point is to be particularly noted, for it is of capital importance on account of the historico-critical corollaries which are deduced from it. - For the Unknowable they talk of does not present itself to faith as something solitary and isolated; but rather in close conjunction with some phenomenon, which, though it belongs to the realm of science and history yet to some extent oversteps their bounds. Such a phenomenon may be an act of nature containing within itself something mysterious; or it may be a man, whose character, actions and words cannot, apparently, be reconciled with the ordinary laws of history. Then faith, attracted by the Unknowable which is united with the phenomenon, possesses itself of the whole phenomenon, and, as it were, permeates it with its own life. From this two things follow. The first is a sort of transfiguration of the phenomenon, by its elevation above its own true conditions, by which it becomes more adapted to that form of the divine which faith will infuse into it. The second is a kind of disfigurement, which springs from the fact that faith, which has made the phenomenon independent of the circumstances of place and time, attributes to it qualities which it has not; and this is true particularly of the phenomena of the past, and the older they are, the truer it is. From these two principles the Modernists deduce two laws, which, when united with a third which they have already got from agnosticism, constitute the foundation of historical criticism. We will take an illustration from the Person of Christ. In the person of Christ, they say, science and history encounter nothing that is not human. Therefore, in virtue of the first canon deduced from agnosticism, whatever there is in His history suggestive of the divine, must be rejected. Then, according to the second canon, the historical Person of Christ was transfigured by faith; therefore everything that raises it above historical conditions must be removed. Lately, the third canon, which lays down that the person of Christ has been disfigured by faith, requires that everything should be excluded, deeds and words and all else that is not in keeping with His character, circumstances and education, and with the place and time in which He lived. A strange style of reasoning, truly; but it is Modernist criticism.

Attamen in toto hoc processu, unde, ex modernistarum sententia, fides ac revelatio prodeunt, unum est magnopere attendendum, non exigui quidem momenti ob consequutiones historico-criticas, quas inde illi eruunt. Nam Incognoscibile, dequo loquuntur, non se fidei sistit ut nudum quid aut singulare ; sed contra in phaenomeno aliquo arcte inhaerens, quod, quamvis ad campum scientiae aut historiae pertinet, ratione tamen aliqua praetergreditur; sive hoc phaenomenon sit factum aliquod naturae, arcani quidpiam in se continens, sive sit quivis unus ex hominibus, cuius ingenium acta verba cum ordinariis historiae legibus componi haud posse videntur. Tum vero fides, ab Incognoscibili allecta quod cum phaenomeno iungitur, totum ipsum phaenomenon complectitur ac sua vita quodammodo permeat. Ex hoc autum duo consequuntur. Primum, quaedam phaenomeni transfiguratio, per elationem scilicet supra veras illius conditiones, qua aptior fiat materia ad induendam divini formam, quam fides est inductura. Secundum, phaenomeni eiusdem aliquapiam, sic vocare liceat, defiguratio inde nata, quod fides illi, loci temporisque adiunctis exempto, tribuit quaereapse non habet: quod usu venit praecipue, quum de phaenomenis agitur exacti temporis, eoque amplius quo sunt vetustiora. Ex gemino hoc capite binos iterum modernistae eruunt canones; qui, alteri additi iam ex agnosticismo habito, critices historicae fundamenta constituunt. Exemplo res illustrabitur; sitque illud e Christi persona petitum. In persona Christi, aiunt, scientia atque historia nil praeter hominem offendunt. Ergo, vi primi canonis ex agnosticismo deducti, ex eius historia quidquid divinum redolet delendum est. Porro, vi alterius canonis, Christi persona historica transfigurata est a fide: ergo subducendum ab ea quidquid ipsani evehit supra conditiones historicas. Demum, vi tertii canonis, eadem persona Christi a fide defigurata est; ergo removenda sunt ab illa sermones, acta; quidquid, uno verbo, ingenio, statui, educationi eius, loco ac tempori quibus vixit, minime respondet. Mira quidem ratiocinandi ratio: sed haec modernistarum critice.

10. Therefore the religious sentiment, which through the agency of vital immanence emerges from the lurking places of the subconsciousness, is the germ of all religion, and the explanation of everything that has been or ever will be in any religion. Thesentiment, which was at first only rudimentary and almost formless, gradually matured, under the influence of that mysterious principle from which it originated, with the progress of human life, of which, as has been said, it is a form. This, then, is the origin of all religion, even supernatural religion; it is only a development of this religious sentiment. Nor is the Catholic religion an exception; it is quite on a level with the rest; for it was engendered, by the process of vital immanence, in the consciousness of Christ, who was a man of the choicest nature, whose like has never been, nor will be. - Those who hear these audacious, these sacrilegious assertions, are simply shocked! And yet, Venerable Brethren, these are not merely the foolish babblings of infidels. There are many Catholics, yea, and priests too, who say these things openly; and they boast that they are going to reform the Church by these ravings! There is no question now of the old error, by which a sort of right to the supernatural order was claimed for the human nature. We have gone far beyond that: we have reached the point when it is affirmed that our most holy religion, in the man Christ as in us, emanated from nature spontaneously and entirely. Than this there is surely nothing more destructive of the whole supernatural order. Wherefore the Vatican Council most justly decreed: “If anyone says that man cannot be raised by God to a knowledge and perfection which surpasses nature, but that he can and should, by his own efforts and by a constant development, attain finally to the possession of all truth and good, let him be anathema” (De Revel., can. 3).

Religiosus igitur sensus, qui per vitalem immanentiam e latebris subconscientiae erumpit, germen est totius religionis ac ratio pariter omnium, quae in religione quavis fuere aut sunt futura. Rudis quidem initio ac fere informis, eiusmodi sensus paullatim atque influxu arcani illius principii unde ortum habuit, adolevit una cum progressu humanae vitae, cuius, ut diximus, quaedam est forma. Habemus igitur religionis cuiuslibet, etsi supernaturalis, originem: sunt nempe illae religiosi sensus merae explicationes. Nec quis catholicam exceptam putet; immo vero ceteris omnino parem: nam ea in conscientia Christi, electissimae naturae viri, cuiusmodi nemo unus fuit nec erit, vitalis processu immanentiae, non aliter, nata est. Stupent profecto, qui haec audiant, tantam ad asserendum audaciam, tantum sacrilegium! Attamen, Venerabiles Fratres, non haec sunt solum ab incredulis effutita temere. Catholici homines, immo vero e sacerdotibus plures; haec palam edisserunt; talibusque deliramentis Ecclesiam se instauraturos iactant ! Non heic iam deveteri errore agitur, quo naturae humanae supernaturalis ordinis veluti ius tribuebatur. Longius admodum processum est: ut nempe sanctissima religio nostra, in homine Christo aeque ac in nobis, a natura, ex se suaque sponte, edita amrmetur. Hoc autem nil profecto aptius ad omnem supernaturalem ordinem abolendum. Quae a Vaticana Synodo iure summo sancitum fuit: Si quis dixirit hominem ad cognitionem et perfectionem quae naturalem superet, divinitus evehi non posse, sed ex seipso ad omnis tandem veri et boni possessionem iugi profectu pertingere posse et debere, anathema sit. (De Revel., can. iii.)

The Origin of Dogmas

11. So far, Venerable Brethren, there has been no mention of the intellect. Still it also, according to the teaching of the Modernists, has its part in the act of faith. And it is of importance to see how. - In that sentiment of which We have frequently spoken, since sentiment is not knowledge, God indeed presents Himself to man, but in a manner so confused and indistinct that He can hardly be perceived by the believer. It is therefore necessary that a ray of light should be cast upon this sentiment, so that God may be clearly distinguished and set apart from it. This is the task of the intellect, whose office it is to reflect and to analyse, and by means of which man first transforms into mental pictures the vital phenomena which arise within him, and then expresses them in words. Hence the common saying of Modernists: that the religious man must ponder his faith. - The intellect, then, encountering this sentiment directs itself upon it, and produces in it a work resembling that of a painter who restores and gives new life to a picture that has perished with age. The simile is that of one of the leaders of Modernism. The operation of the intellect in this work is a double one: first by a natural and spontaneous act it expresses its concept in a simple, ordinary statement; then, on reflection and deeper consideration, or, as they say, by elaborating its thought, it expresses the idea in secondary propositions, which are derived from the first, but are more perfect and distinct. These secondary propositions, if they finally receive the approval of the supreme magisterium of the Church, constitute dogma.

Huc usque tamen, Venerabiles Fratres, nullum dari vidimus intellectui locum. Habet autem et ipse, ex modernistarum doctrina, suas in actu fidei partes. Quo dein pacto, advertisse praestat. In sensu illo, inquiunt, quem saepius nominavimus, quoniam sensus est non cognitio, Deus quidem se homini sistit; verum confuse adeo ac permixte, ut a subiecto credente vix aut minime distinguatur. Necesse igitur est aliquo eumdem sensum collustrari lumine, ut Deus inde omnino exiliat ac secernatur, Id nempe ad intellectum pertinet, curas est cogitare, et analysim instituere; per quem homo vitalia phaenomena in se exsurgentiain species primum traducit, tum autem verbis sisnificat. Hinc vulgata modernistarum enunciatio: debere religiosum hominem fidem suam cogitare. Mens ergo, illi sensui adveniens, in eumdem se inflectit, inque eo elaborat pictoris instar, qui obsoletam tabulae cuiusdam diagraphen collustret ut nitidius efferat: sic enim fere quidam modernistarum doctor rem explicat. In eiusmodi autem negotio mens dupliciter operatur: primum, naturali, actu et spontaneo, redditque rem sententia quadam simplici ac vulgari; secundo vero reflexe ac penitus, vel, ut aiunt, cogitationem elaborando, eloquiturque cogitata secundariis sententiis derivatis quidem a prima illa simplici, limatioribus tamen ac distinctioribus. Quae secundariae sententiae, si demum a supremo Ecclesiae magisterio sancitae fuerint, constituent dogma.

12. Thus, We have reached one of the principal points in the Modernists’ system, namely the origin and the nature of dogma. For they place the origin of dogma in those primitive and simple formulae, which, under a certain aspect, are necessary to faith; for revelation, to be truly such, requires the clear manifestation of God in the consciousness. But dogma itself they apparently hold, is contained in the secondary formulae.

Sic igitur in modernistarum doctrina ventum est ad caput quoddam praecipuum, videlicet ad originem dogmatis atque ad ipsam dogmatis naturam. Originem enim dogmatis ponunt quidem in primigeniis illis formulis simplicibus, quae, quodam sub respectu, necessariae sunt fidei ; nam revelatio, ut reapse sit, manifestam Dei notitiam in conscientia requirit. Ipsum tamen dogma secundariis proprie contineri formulis affirmare videntur.

To ascertain the nature of dogma, we must first find the relation which exists between the religious formulas and the religious sentiment. This will be readily perceived by him who realises that these formulas have no other purpose than to furnish the believer with a means of giving an account of his faith to himself. These formulas therefore stand midway between the believer and his faith; in their relation to the faith, they are the inadequate expression of its object, and are usually called symbols; in their relation to the believer, they are mere instruments.

Eius porro ut assequamur naturam, ante omnia inquirendum est, quaenam intercedat relatio inter formulas religiosas et religiosum animi sensum. Id autem facile intelliget, qui teneat formularum eiusmodi non alium esse finem, quammodum suppeditare credenti, quo sibi suae fidei rationem reddat. Quamobrem mediae illae sunt inter credentem eiusque fidem; ad fidem autem quod attinet, sunt inadaequatae eius obiectinotae, vulgo symbola vocitant; ad credentem quod spectat, sunt mera instrumenta.

Its Evolution

13. Hence it is quite impossible to maintain that they express absolute truth: for, in so far as they are symbols, they are the images of truth, and so must be adapted to the religious sentiment in its relation to man; and as instruments, they are the vehicles of truth, and must therefore in their turn be adapted to man in his relation to the religious sentiment. But the object of thereligious sentiment, since it embraces that absolute, possesses an infinite variety of aspects of which now one, now another, may present itself. In like manner, he who believes may pass through different phases. Consequently, the formulae too, which we call dogmas, must be subject to these vicissitudes, and are, therefore, liable to change. Thus the way is open to the intrinsic evolutionof dogma. An immense collection of sophisms this, that ruins and destroys all religion.

Quocirca nulla confici ratione potest, eas veritatem absolute continere: nam, quasymbola, imagines sunt veritatis, atque idcirco sensui religioso accommodandae, prout hic ad hominem refertur; qua instrumenta, sunt veritatis vehicula atque ideo accommodanda vicissim homini, prout refertur ad religiosum sensum. Obiectum autem sensus religiosi, utpote quod absolute continetur, infinites habet adspectus, quorum modo hic modo alius apparere potest. Similiter homo, qui credit, aliis atque aliis uti potest conditionibus. Ergo et formulas, quas dogma appellamus, vicissitudini eidem subesse oportet, ac propterea varietati esse obnoxias. Ita vero ad intimam evolutionem dogmatis expeditum est iter. Sophismatum profecto coacervatio infinita, quae religionem omnem pessum dat ac delet!

Dogma is not only able, but ought to evolve and to be changed. This is strongly affirmed by the Modernists, and as clearly flows from their principles. For amongst the chief points of their teaching is this which they deduce from the principle of vital immanence; that religious formulas, to be really religious and not merely theological speculations, ought to be living and to live the life of the religious sentiment. This is not to be understood in the sense that these formulas, especially if merely imaginative, were to be made for the religious sentiment; it has no more to do with their origin than with number or quality; what is necessary is that the religious sentiment, with some modification when necessary, should vitally assimilate them. In other words, it is necessary that the primitive formula be accepted and sanctioned by the heart; and similarly the subsequent work from which spring the secondary formulas must proceed under the guidance of the heart. Hence it comes that these formulas, to be living, should be, and should remain, adapted to the faith and to him who believes. Wherefore if for any reason this adaptation should cease to exist, they lose their first meaning and accordingly must be changed. And since the character and lot of dogmatic formulas is so precarious, there is no room for surprise that Modernists regard them so lightly and in such open disrespect. And so they audaciously charge the Church both with taking the wrong road from inability to distinguish the religious and moral sense of formulas from their surface meaning, and with clinging tenaciously and vainly to meaningless formulas whilst religion is allowed to go to ruin. Blind that they are, and leaders of the blind, inflated with a boastful science, they have reached that pitch of folly where they pervert the eternal concept of truth and the true nature of the religious sentiment; with that new system of theirs they are seen to be under the sway of a blind and unchecked passion for novelty, thinking not at all of finding some solid foundation of truth, but despising the holy and apostolic traditions, they embrace other vain, futile, uncertain doctrines, condemned by the Church, on which, in the height of their vanity, they think they can rest and maintain truth itself.

Evolvi tamen ac mutari dogma non posse solum sed oportere, et modernistae ipsi perfracte affirmant et ex eorum sententiis aperte consequitur. Nam inter praecipua doctrinae capita hoc illi habent, quod ab immanentiae vitalis principio deducunt: formulas religiosas, ut religiosae reapse sint nec solum intellectus commentationes, vitales esse debere vitamque ipsam vivere sensus religiosi. Quod non ita intelligendum est, quasi hae formulae, praesertim si mere imaginativae, sint pro ipso religioso sensu inventae; nihil enim refert admodum earum originis, ut etiam numeri vel qualitatis: sed ita, ut eas religiosus sensus, mutatione aliqua, si opus est, adhibita, vitaliter sibi adiungat. Scilicet, ut aliis dicamus, necesse est ut formula primitiva acceptetur a corde ab eoque sanciatur; itemque sub cordis ductu sit labor, quo secundariae formulae progignuntur. Hinc accidit quod debeant hae formulae, ut vitales sint, ad fidem pariter et ad credentem accommodatae esse ac manere. Quamobrem, si quavis ex causa huiusmodi accommodatio cesset, amittunt illae primigenias notiones ac mutari indigent. Haec porro formularum dogmaticarum cum sit vis ac fortuna instabilis, minim non est illas modernistis tantoesse ludibrio ac despectui; qui nihil e contra loquuntur atque extollunt nisi religiosum sensum vitamque religiosam. Ideo et Ecclesiam audacissime carpunt tamquam devio itinere incedentem, quod ab externa formularum significatione religiosam vim ac moralem minime distinguat, et formulis notione carentibus casso labore ac tenacissime inhaerens, religionem ipsam dilabi permittat. Caeci equidem et duces caecorum, qui superbo scientiae nomine inflati usque eo insaniunt ut aeternam veritatis notionem et germanum religionis sensum pervertant: novo invecto systemate quo, ex proiecta et effrenata novitatum cupiditate, veritas, ubi certo consistit, non quaeritur, sanctisque et apostolicis traditionibus posthabitis, doctrina aliae inanes, futiles, incertae nec ab Ecclesia probatae adsciscunt, quibus veritatem ipsam fulciri ac sustineri vanissimi homines arbitrantur. (Gregor. XVI. Ep. Encycl., “Singulari Nos” 7 kal. Iul. 1834).

The Modernist as Believer:
    Individual Experience and Religious Certitude

14. Thus far, Venerable Brethren, of the Modernist considered as Philosopher. Now if we proceed to consider him as Believer, seeking to know how the Believer, according to Modernism, is differentiated from the Philosopher, it must be observed that although the Philosopher recognises as the object of faith the divine reality, still this reality is not to be found but in the heart of the Believer, as being an object of sentiment and affirmation; and therefore confined within the sphere of phenomena; but as to whether it exists outside that sentiment and affirmation is a matter which in no way concerns this Philosopher. For the Modernist .Believer, on the contrary, it is an established and certain fact that the divine reality does really exist in itself and quite independently of the person who believes in it. If you ask on what foundation this assertion of the Believer rests, they answer: In the experience of the individual. On this head the Modernists differ from the Rationalists only to fall into the opinion of the Protestants and pseudo-mystics. This is their manner of putting the question: In the religious sentiment one must recognise a kind of intuition of the heart which puts man in immediate contact with the very reality of God, and infuses such a persuasion of God’s existence and His action both within and without man as to excel greatly any scientific conviction. They assert, therefore, the existence of a real experience, and one of a kind that surpasses all rational experience. If this experience is denied by some, like the rationalists, it arises from the fact that such persons are unwilling to put themselves in the moral state which is necessary to produce it. It is this experience which, when a person acquires it, makes him properly and truly a believer.

Atque haec, Venerabiles Fratres, de modernista ut philosopho. Iam si, ad credentem progressus, nosse qui velit unde hic in modernistis a philosopho distinguatur, illud advertere necesse est, etsi philosophus realitatem divini ut fidei obiectum admittat, hanc tamen ab illo realitatem non alibi reperiri nisi in credentis animo, ut obiectum sensus est et affirmationis atque ideo phaenomenorum ambitum non excedit: utrum porro in se illa extra sensum existat atque affirmationem huiusmodi, praeterit philosophus ac negligit. E contra modernistae credenti ratum ac certum est, realitatem divini reapse in se ipsam existere nec prorsus a credente pendere. Quod si postules, in quo tandem haec credentis assertio nitatur; reponent: in priva cuiusque hominisexperientia. In qua affirmatione, dum equidem hi a rationalistis dissident, in protestantium tamen ac pseudomysticorum opinionem discedunt. Rem enim sic edisserunt: in sensu religioso quendam esse agnoscendum cordis intuitum; quo homo ipsam, sine medio, Dei realitatem attingit, tantamque de existentia Dei haurit persuasionem deque Dei tum intra tum extra hominem actione, ut persuasionem omnem, quae ex scientia peti possit, longe antecellat. Veram igitur ponunt experientiam, eamque rationali qualibet experientia praestantiorem: quam si quis, ut rationalistae, inficiatur, inde fieri affirmant, quod nolit is in eis se ipse constituere moralibus adiunctis, quae ad experientiam gignendum requirantur. Haec porro experientia, cum quis illum fuerit assequutus, proprie vereque credentem efficit.

How far off we are here from Catholic teaching we have already seen in the decree of the Vatican Council. We shall see later how, with such theories, added to the other errors already mentioned, the way is opened wide for atheism. Here it is well to note at once that, given this doctrine of experience united with the other doctrine of symbolism, every religion, even that of paganism, must be held to be true. What is to prevent such experiences from being met within every religion? In fact that they are to be found is asserted by not a few. And with what right will Modernists deny the truth of an experience affirmed by a follower of Islam? With what right can they claim true experiences for Catholics alone? Indeed Modernists do not deny but actually admit, some confusedly, others in the most open manner, that all religions are true. That they cannot feel otherwise is clear. For on what ground, according to their theories, could falsity be predicated of any religion whatsoever? It must be certainly on one of these two: either on account of the falsity of the religious sentiment or on account of the falsity of the formula pronounced by the mind. Now the religious sentiment, although it may be more perfect or less perfect, is always one and the same; and the intellectual formula, in order to be true, has but to respond to the religious sentiment and to the Believer, whatever be the intellectual capacity of the latter. In the conflict between different religions, the most that Modernists can maintain is that the Catholic has more truth because it is more living and that it deserves with more reason the name of Christian because it corresponds more fully with the origins of Christianity. That these consequences flow from the premises will not seem unnatural to anybody. But what is amazing is that there are Catholics and priests who, We would fain believe, abhor such enormities yet act as if they fully approved of them. For they heap such praise and bestow such public honour on the teachers of these errors as to give rise to the belief that their admiration is not meant merely for the persons, who are perhaps not devoid of a certain merit, but rather for the errors which these persons openly profess and which they do all in their power to propagate.

Quam hic longe absumus a catholicis institutis! Commenta eiusmodi a Vaticana Synodo improbata iam vidimus. His semel admissis una cum erroribus ceteris iam memoratis, quo pacto ad atheismum pateat via, inferius dicemus. Nunc statim advertisse inverit, ex hac experientiae doctrina, coniuncta alteri de symbolismo, religionem quamlibet, ethnicorum minime excepta, ut veram esse habendam. Quidni etenim in religione quavis experientiae huiusmodi occurrant? Occurrisse vero non unus asserit. Quo iure autem modernistae veritatem experientae abnuent, quam turca affirmet; verasque experientias unis catholicis vindicabunt? Neque id reapse modernistae denegant; quin immo, subobscure alii, alii apertissime, religiones omnes contendunt esse veras. Secus autem sentire nec posse, manifestum est. Nam religioni cuipiam quotandem ex capite, secundum illorum praecepta, foret falsitas tribuenda? Certe vel ex fallacia sensus religiosi, vel quod falsiloqua sit formula ab intellectu prolata. Atquisensus religiosus unus semper idemque est, etsi forte quandoque imperfectior: formula autem intellectus, ut vera sit, sufficit utreligiosi sensui hominique credenti respondeat, quidquid de huius perspicuitate ingenii esse queat. Unum, ad summum, in religionum diversarum conflictu, modernistae contendere forte possint, catholicam, utpote vividiorem, plus habere veritatis; itemque christiano nomine digniorem eam esse, ut quae christianismi exordiis respondeat plenius. Has consecutiones omnes ex datis antecedentibus fluere, nemini erit absonum. Illud stupendum commaxime, catholicos dari viros ac sacerdotes, qui etsi, ut autumari malumus, eiusmodi portenta horrent, agunt tamen ac si plene probent. Eas etenim errorum talium magistris tribuunt laudes, eos publice habent honores, ut sibi quisque suadeat facile, illos non homines honorare, aliquo forsan numero non expertes, sed errores potius, quos hi aperte asserunt inque vulgus spargere omni ope nituntur.

Religious Experience and Tradition

15. But this doctrine of experience is also under another aspect entirely contrary to Catholic truth. It is extended and applied to tradition, as hitherto understood by the Church, and destroys it. By the Modernists, tradition is understood as a communication to others, through preaching by means of the intellectual formula, of an original experience. To this formula, in addition to its representative value, they attribute a species of suggestive efficacy which acts both in the person who believes, to stimulate the religious sentiment should it happen to have grown sluggish and to renew the experience once acquired, and in those who do not yet believe, to awake for the first time the religious sentiment in them and to produce the experience. In this way is religious experience propagated among the peoples; and not merely among contemporaries by preaching, but among future generations both by books and by oral transmission from one to another. Sometimes this communication of religious experience takes root and thrives, at other times it withers at once and dies. For the Modernists, to live is a proof of truth, since for them life and truth are one and the same thing. Hence again it is given to us to infer that all existing religions are equally true, for otherwise they would not live.

Est aliud praeterea in hoc doctrinae capite quod catholicae veritati est omnino infestum. Nam istud de experientia praeceptum adtraditionem etiam transfertur, quam Ecclesia huc usque asseruit, eamque prorsus adimit. Enim vero modernistae sic traditionem intelligunt, ut sit originalis experientiae quaedam cum aliis communicatio per praedicationem, ope formulae intellectivae. Cui formulae propterea, praeter vim, ut aiunt, repraesentativam, suggestivam quandam adscribunt virtutem, tum ineo qui credit, adsensum religiosum forte torpentem excitandum, instaurandamque experientiam aliquando habitam, tum in eis qui nondum credunt, ad sensum religiosum primo gignendum et experientiam producendam. Sic autem experientia religiosa late in populos propagatur ; nec tantummodo in eos qui nunc sunt per praedicationem, sed in posteros etiam, tam per libros quam per verborum de aliis in alios replicationem. Haec vero experientiae communicatio radices quandoque agit vigetque; senescit quandoque statim ac moritur. Vigere autem, modernistis argumentum veritatis est: veritatem enim ac vitam promiscue habent. Ex quo inferre denuo licebit: religiones omnes quotquot extant veras esse, nam secus nec viverent.

Faith and Science

16. Having reached this point, Venerable Brethren, we have sufficient material in hand to enable us to see the relations which Modernists establish between faith and science, including history also under the name of science. And in the first place it is to be held that the object of the one is quite extraneous to and separate from the object of the other. For faith occupies itself solely with something which science declares to be unknowable for it. Hence each has a separate field assigned to it: science is entirely concerned with the reality of phenomena, into which faith does not enter at all; faith on the contrary concerns itself with the divine reality which is entirely unknown to science. Thus the conclusion is reached that there can never be any dissension between faith and science, for if each keeps on its own ground they can never meet and therefore never be in contradiction. And if it be objected that in the visible world there are some things which appertain to faith, such as the human life of Christ, the Modernists reply by denying this. For though such things come within the category of phenomena, still in as far as they are lived by faith and in the way already described have been by faith transfigured and disfigured, they have been removed from the world of sense and translated to become material for the divine. Hence should it be further asked whether Christ has wrought real miracles, and made real prophecies, whether He rose truly from the dead and ascended into heaven, the answer of agnostic science will be in the negative and the answer of faith in the affirmative - yet there will not be, on that account, any conflict between them. For it will be denied by the philosopher as philosopher, speaking to philosophers and considering Christ only in His historical reality; and it will be affirmed by the speaker, speaking to believers and considering the life of Christ as lived again by the faith and in the faith.

Re porro huc adducta, Venerabiles Fratres, satis superque habemus ad recte cognoscendum, quem ordinem modernistae statuant inter fidem et scientiam: quo etiam scientiae nomine historia apud illos notatur. Ac primo quidem tenendum est, materiam uni obiectam materiae obiectae alteri externam omnino esse ab eaque seiunctam. Fides enim id unice spectat, quod scientiaincognoscibile sibi esse profitetur. Hinc diversum utrique pensum; scientia versatur in phaenomenis, ubi nullus fidei locus; fides e contra versatur in divinis, quae scientia penitus ignorat. Unde demum conficitur, inter fidem et scientiam nunquam esse posse discidium: si enim suum quaeque locum teneat, occurrere sibi invicem nunquam poterunt, atque ideo nec contradicere. Quibus si qui forte obiiciant, quaedam in aspectabili occurrere natura rerum quae ad fidem etiam pertineant uti humanam Christi vitam; negabunt. Nam, etsi haec phaenomenis accensentur, tamen, quatenus vita fidei imbuuntur, et a fide, quo supra dictum est modo,transfigurata ac defigurata fuerunt, a sensibili mundo sunt abrepta et in divini materiam translata. Quamobrem poscenti ulterius, an Christus vera patrarit miracula vereque futura praesenserit, an vere revixerit atque in caelum conscenderit; scientia agnostica abnuet, fides affirmabit; ex hoc tamen nulla erit inter utramque pugna. Nam abnuet alter ut philosophus philosophos alloquens, Christum scilicet unice contemplatus secundum realitatem historicam: affirmabit alter ut credens cum credentibus loquutus, Christi vitam spectans prout iterum vivitur a fide et in fide.

Faith Subject to Science

17. Yet, it would be a great mistake to suppose that, given these theories, one is authorised to believe that faith and science are independent of one another. On the side of science the independence is indeed complete, but it is quite different with regard to faith, which is subject to science not on one but on three grounds. For in the first place it must be observed that in every religious fact, when you take away the divine reality and the experience of it which the believer possesses, everything else, and especially the religious formulas of it, belongs to the sphere of phenomena and therefore falls under the control of science. Let the believer leave the world if he will, but so long as he remains in it he must continue, whether he like it or not, to be subject to the laws, the observation, the judgments of science and of history. Further, when it is said that God is the object of faith alone, the statement refers only to the divine reality not to the idea of God. The latter also is subject to science which while it philosophises in what is called the logical order soars also to the absolute and the ideal. It is therefore the right of philosophy and of science to form conclusions concerning the idea of God, to direct it in its evolution and to purify it of any extraneous elements which may become confused with it. Finally, man does not suffer a dualism to exist in him, and the believer therefore feels within him an impelling need so to harmonise faith with science, that it may never oppose the general conception which science sets forth concerning the universe.

Ex his tamen fallitur vehementer qui reputet posse opinari, fidem et scientiam alteram sub altera nulla penitus ratione esse subiectam. Nam de scientia quidem recte vereque existimabit; secus autem de fide, quae, non uno tantum sed triplici ex capite, scientiae subiici dicenda est. Primum namque advertere oportet, in facto quovis religiose, detracta divina realitate quamque de illa habet experientiam qui credit, cetera omnia, praesertim vero religiosas formulas, phaenomenorum ambitum minime transgredi, atque ideo cadere sub scientiam. Liceat utique credenti, si volet, de mundo excedere; quamdiu tamen in mundo deget, leges, obtutum, iudicia scientiae atque historiae numquam, velit nolit, effugiet. Praeterea, quamvis dictum est Deum solius fidei esse obiectum, id de divina quidem realitate concedendum est, non tamen de idea Dei. Haec quippe scientiae subest; quae, dum in ordine, ut aiunt, logico philosophatur, quidquid etiam absolutum est attingit atque ideale. Quocirca philosophia seu scientia cognoscendi de idea Dei ius habet, eamque in sui evolutione moderandi et, si quid extrarium invaserit, corrigendi. Hinc modernistarum effatum: evolutionem religiosam cum morali et intellectuali componi debere; videlicet, ut quidam tradit quem magistrum sequuntur, eisdem subdi. Accedit demum quod homo dualitatem in se ipso non patitur, quamobrem credentem quaedam intima urget necessitas fidem cum scientia sic componendi, ut a generali ne discrepet idea, quam scientia exhibet de hoc mundo universo.

Thus it is evident that science is to be entirely independent of faith, while on the other hand, and notwithstanding that they are supposed to be strangers to each other, faith is made subject to science. All this, Venerable Brothers, is in formal opposition with the teachings of Our Predecessor, Pius IX, where he lays it down that: In matters of religion it is the duty of philosophy not to command but to serve, but not to prescribe what is to be believed but to embrace what is to be believed with reasonable obedience, not to scrutinise the depths of the mysteries of God but to venerate them devoutly and humbly.

Sic ergo conficitur, scientiam a fide omnino solutam esse, fidem contra, ut scientiae extranea praedicetur, eidem subesse. Quae omnia, Venerabiles Fratres, contraria prorsus sunt iis quae Pius IX, decessor Noster tradebat, docens (Brev. ad Ep. Wratislav. 15 Iun. 1857): Philosophiae esse, in iis quae ad religionem pertinent, non dominari sed ancillari, non praescribere quid credendum sit, sed rationabili obsequio amplecti, neque altitudinem scrutari mysteriorum Dei, sed illam pie humiliterque revereri.

The Modernists completely invert the parts, and to them may be applied the words of another Predecessor of Ours, Gregory IX., addressed to some theologians of his time: Some among you, inflated like bladders with the spirit of vanity strive by profane novelties to cross the boundaries fixed by the Fathers, twisting the sense of the heavenly pages . . .to the philosophical teaching of the rationals, not for the profit of their hearer but to make a show of science . . . these, seduced by strange and eccentric doctrines, make the head of the tail and force the queen to serve the servant.

Modernistae negotium plane invertunt: quibus idcirco applicari queunt, quae Gregorius IX item decessor Noster de quibusdam suae aetatis theologis scribebat (Ep. ad Magistros theol. paris. non. Iun. 1223); Quidam apud vos, spiritu vanitatis ut uter distenti, positos a Patribus terminos profana transferre satagunt novitate ; coelestis paginae intellectum … ad doctrinam philosophicam rationalium inclinando, ad ostentationem scientiae, non profectum aliquem auditorum. … Ipsi, doctrinis variis et peregrinis abducti, redigunt caput in caudam, et ancillae cogunt famulari reginam.

The Methods of Modernists

18. This becomes still clearer to anybody who studies the conduct of Modernists, which is in perfect harmony with their teachings. In the writings and addresses they seem not unfrequently to advocate now one doctrine now another so that one would be disposed to regard them as vague and doubtful. But there is a reason for this, and it is to be found in their ideas as to the mutual separation of science and faith. Hence in their books you find some things which might well be expressed by a Catholic, but in the next page you find other things which might have been dictated by a rationalist. When they write history they make no mention of the divinity of Christ, but when they are in the pulpit they profess it clearly; again, when they write history they pay no heed to the Fathers and the Councils, but when they catechise the people, they cite them respectfully. In the same way they draw their distinctions between theological and pastoral exegesis and scientific and historical exegesis. So, too, acting on the principle that science in no way depends upon faith, when they treat of philosophy, history, criticism, feeling no horror at treading in the footsteps of Luther, they are wont to display a certain contempt for Catholic doctrines, or the Holy Fathers, for the Ecumenical Councils, for the ecclesiastical magisterium; and should they be rebuked for this, they complain that they are being deprived of their liberty. Lastly, guided by the theory that faith must be subject to science, they continuously and openly criticise the Church because of her sheer obstinacy in refusing to submit and accommodate her dogmas to the opinions of philosophy; while they, on their side, after having blotted out the old theology, endeavour to introduce a new theology which shall follow the vagaries of their philosophers.

Quod profecto apertius patebit intuenti quo pacto modernistae agant, accommodate omnino ad ea quae docent. Multa enim ab eis contrarie videntur scripta vel dicta, ut quis facile illos aestimet ancipites atque incertos. Verumtamen consulte id et considerate accidit: ex opinione scilicet quam habent de fidei atque scientiae seiunctione mutua. Hinc in eorum libris, quaedam offendimus quae catholicus omnino probet; quaedam, aversa pagina, quae rationalistam dictasse autumes. Hinc historiam scribentes, nullam de divinitate Christi mentionem iniiciunt; ad concionem vero in templis eam firmissime profitentur. Item, enarrantes historiam, Concilia et Patres nullo loco habent; catechesim autem si tradunt, illa atque illos cum honore afferunt. Hinc etiam exegesim theologicam et pastoralem a scientifica et historica secernunt. Similiter, ex principio quod scientia a fide nullo pacto pendeat, quum de philosophia, de historia, de critice disserunt, Lutheri sequi vestigia non exhorrentes (Prop. 29 damn, a Leone X. Bull. “Exsurge Domine” 16 maii 1520. Via nobis facia est enervandi auctoritatem Conciliorum et libere contradicendi eorum gestis, et iudicandi eorum decreta, et confidenter confitendi quid quid verum videtur, sive probatum fuerit, sive reprobatum a quocumque Concilio), despicientiam praeceptorum catholicorum, sanctorum Patrum, oecumenicarum synodorum, magisterii ecclesiastici omni modis ostentant; de qua si carpantur, libertatem sibi adimi conqueruntur. Professi demum fidem esse scientiae subiiciendam, Ecclesiam passim aperteque reprehendunt quod sua dogmata philosophiae opinionibus subdere et accommodate obstinatissime renuat; ipsi vero, veteri ad hunc finem theologia sublata, novam invehere contendunt, quae philosophorum delirationibus obsecundet.

The Modernist as Theologian:
     His Principles, Immanence and Symbolism

19. And thus, Venerable Brethren, the road is open for us to study the Modernists in the theological arena - a difficult task, yet one that may be disposed of briefly. The end to be attained is the conciliation of faith with science, always, however, saving the primacy of science over faith. In this branch the Modernist theologian avails himself of exactly the same principles which we have seen employed by the Modernist philosopher, and applies them to the believer: the principles of immanence and symbolism. The process is an extremely simple one. The philosopher has declared: The principle of faith is immanent; the believer has added: This principle is God; and the theologian draws the conclusion: God is immanent in man. Thus we have theological immanence. So too, the philosopher regards as certain that the representations of the object of faith are merely symbolical; the believer has affirmed that the object of faith is God in Himself; and the theologian proceeds to affirm that: The representations of the divine reality are symbolical. And thus we have theological symbolism. Truly enormous errors both, the pernicious character of which will be seen clearly from an examination of their consequences. For, to begin with symbolism, since symbols are but symbols in regard to their objects and only instruments in regard to the believer, it is necessary first of all, according to the teachings of the Modernists, that the believer do not lay too much stress on the formula, but avail himself of it only with the scope of uniting himself to the absolute truth which the formula at once reveals and conceals, that is to say, endeavours to express but without succeeding in doing so. They would also have the believer avail himself of the formulas only in as far as they are useful to him, for they are given to be a help and not a hindrance; with proper regard, however, for the social respect due to formulas which the public magisterium has deemed suitable for expressing the common consciousness until such time as the same magisterium provide otherwise. Concerningimmanence it is not easy to determine what Modernists mean by it, for their own opinions on the subject vary. Some understand it in the sense that God working in man is more intimately present in him than man is in even himself, and this conception, if properly understood, is free from reproach. Others hold that the divine action is one with the action of nature, as the action of the first cause is one with the action of the secondary cause, and this would destroy the supernatural order. Others, finally, explain it in a way which savours of pantheism and this, in truth, is the sense which tallies best with the rest of their doctrines.

Hic iam, Venerabiles Fratres, nobis fit aditus ad modernistas in theologico agone spectandos. Salebrosum quidem opus: sed paucis absolvendum. Agitur nimirum de concilianda fide cum scientia, idque non aliter quam una alteri subiecta. Eo in genere modernista theologus eisdem utitur principiis, quae usui philosopho esse vidimus, illaque ad credentem aptat; principia inquimus immanentia etsymbolismi. Sic autem rem expeditissime perficit. Traditur a philosopho principium fidei esse immanens; a credente additur hoc principium Deum esse; concludit ipse Deus ergo est immanens in homine. Hinc immanentia theologica. Iterum: philosopho certum est repraesentationes obiecti fidei esse tantum symbolicas; credenti pariter certum est fidei obiectum esse Deum in se: theologus igitur colligit: repraesentationes divinae realitatis esse symbolicas. Hinc symbolismus theologicus. Errores profecto maximi: quorum uterque quam sit perniciosus, consequentiis inspectis patebit. Nam, ut de symbolismo statim dicamus, cum symbola talia sint respectu obiecti, respectu autem credentis sint instrumenta; cavendum primum, inquiunt, credenti, ne ipsi formulae ut formula est plus nimio inhaereat, sedilia utendum unice ut absolutae adhaerescat veritati, quamformula retegit simul ac tegit nititurque exprimere quin unquam assequatur. Addunt praeterea, formulas eiusmodi esse acredente adhibendas quatenus ipsum iuverint; ad commodum enim datae sunt non ad impedimentum: incolumi utique honore qui, ex sociali respectu, debetur formulis, quas publicum magisterium aptas ad communem conscientiam exprimendam iudicarit, quamdiu scilicet idem magisterium secus quidpiam non edixerit. De immanentia autem quid reapse modernistae sentiant, difficile est indicare; non enim eadem omnium opinio. Sunt qui in eo collocant, quod Deus agens intime adsit in homine, magis quam ipse sibi homo; quod plane, si recte intelligitur, reprehensionem non habet. Alii in eo ponunt, quod actio Dei una sit cum actione naturae ut causae primae cum causae secundae; quod ordinem supernaturalem reapse delet. Alii demum sic explicant, ut suspicionem efficiant pantheisticae significationis; id autem cum ceteris eorum doctrinis cohaeret aptius.

20. With this principle of immanence is connected another which may be called the principle of divine permanence. It differs from the first in much the same way as the private experience differs from the experience transmitted by tradition. An example will illustrate what is meant, and this example is offered by the Church and the Sacraments. The Church and the Sacraments, they say, are not to be regarded as having been instituted by Christ Himself. This is forbidden by agnosticism, which sees in Christ nothing more than a man whose religious consciousness has been, like that of all men, formed by degrees; it is also forbidden by the law of immanence which rejects what they call external application; it is further forbidden by the law of evolution which requires for the development of the germs a certain time and a certain series of circumstances; it is, finally, forbidden by history, which shows that such in fact has been the course of things. Still it is to be held that both Church and Sacraments have been founded mediately by Christ. But how? In this way: All Christian consciences were, they affirm, in a manner virtually included in the conscience of Christ as the plant is included in the seed. But as the shoots live the life of the seed, so, too, all Christians are to be said to live the life of Christ. But the life of Christ is according to faith, and so, too, is the life of Christians. And since this life produced, in the courses of ages, both the Church and the Sacraments, it is quite right to say that their origin is from Christ and is divine. In the same way they prove that the Scriptures and the dogmas are divine. And thus the Modernistic theology may be said to be complete. No great thing, in truth, but more than enough for the theologian who professes that the conclusions of science must always, and in all things, be respected. The application of these theories to the other points We shall proceed to expound, anybody may easily make for himself.

Huic vero immanentiae pronunciato aliud adiicitur, quod a permanentia divina vocare possumus: quae duo inter se eo fere modo differunt, quo experientia privata ab experientia per traditionem transmissa. Exemplum rem collustrabit: sitque ab Ecclesia et Sacramentis deductum. Ecclesia, inquiunt, et Sacramenta a Christo ipso instituta minime credenda sunt. Cavet id agnosticismus, qui in Christo nil praeter hominem novit, cuius conscientia religiosa, ut ceterorum hominum, sensim efformata est: cavet lex immanentiae, quae externas, ut aiunt, applicationes respuit: cavet item lex evolutionis, quae ut germina evolvantur tempus postulat et quandam adiunctorum sibi succedentium seriem: cavet demum historia, quae talem reapse rei cursum fuisse ostendit. Attamen Ecclesiam et Sacramenta mediate a Christo fuisse instituta retinendum est. Qui vero? Conscientias Christianas omnes in Christi conscientia virtute quodammodo inclusas affirmant, ut in semine planta. Quoniam autem germina vitam semiis vivunt; christiani omnes vitam Christi vivere dicendi sunt. Sed Christi vita, secundum fidem, divina est: ergo et christianorum vita. Si igitur haec vita, decursu aetatum, Ecclesiae et Sacramentis initium dedit: iure omnino dicetur initium huiusmodi esse a Christo ac divinum esse. Sic omnino conficiunt divinas esse etiam Scripturas sacras, divina dogmata. His porro modernistarum theologia ferme absolvitur. Brevis profecto supellex: sed ei perabundans, qui profiteatur, scientiae, quidquid praeceperit, semper esse obtemperandum. Horum ad cetera quae dicemus applicationem quisque facile per se viderit.

Dogma and the Sacraments

21. Thus far We have spoken of the origin and nature of faith. But as faith has many shoots, and chief among them the Church, dogma, worship, the Books which we call “Sacred,” of these also we must know what is taught by the Modernists. To begin with dogma, we have already indicated its origin and nature. Dogma is born of the species of impulse or necessity by virtue of which the believer is constrained to elaborate his religious thought so as to render it clearer for himself and others. This elaboration consists entirely in the process of penetrating and refining the primitive formula, not indeed in itself and according to logical development, but as required by circumstances, or vitally as the Modernists more abstrusely put it. Hence it happens that around the primitive formula secondary formulas gradually continue to be formed, and these subsequently grouped into bodies of doctrine, or into doctrinal constructions as they prefer to call them, and further sanctioned by the public magisterium as responding to the common consciousness, are called dogma. Dogma is to be carefully distinguished from the speculations of theologians which, although not alive with the life of dogma, are not without their utility as serving to harmonise religion with science and remove opposition between the two, in such a way as to throw light from without on religion, and it may be even to prepare the matter for future dogma. Concerning worship there would not be much to be said, were it not that under this head are comprised the Sacraments, concerning which the Modernists fall into the gravest errors. For them the Sacraments are the resultant of a double need - for, as we have seen, everything in their system is explained by inner impulses or necessities. In the present case, the first need is that of giving some sensible manifestation to religion; the second is that of propagating it, which could not be done without some sensible form and consecrating acts, and these are called sacraments. But for the Modernists the Sacraments are mere symbols or signs, though not devoid of a certain efficacy - an efficacy, they tell us, like that of certain phrases vulgarly described as having “caught on,” inasmuch as they have become the vehicle for the diffusion of certain great ideas which strike the public mind. What the phrases are to the ideas, that the Sacraments are to the religious sentiment - that and nothing more. The Modernists would be speaking more clearly were they to affirm that the Sacraments are instituted solely to foster the faith - but this is condemned by the Council of Trent: If anyone say that these sacraments are instituted solely to foster the faith, let him be anathema.

De origine fidei deque eius natura attigimus huc usque. Fidei autem cum multa sint germina, praecipua vero Ecclesia, dogma, sacra et religiones, libri quos sanctos nominamus; de his quoque quid modernistae doceant, inquirendum. Atque ut dogma initium ponamus, huius quae sit origo et natura iam supra indicatum est. Oritur illud ex impulsione quadam seu necessitate, vi cuius qui credit in suis cogitatis elaborat, ut conscientia tam sua quam aliorum illustretur magis. Est hic labor in rimando totus expoliendoque primigeniam mentis formulam, non quidem in se illam secundum logicam explicationem, sed secundum circumstantia, seu, ut minus apte ad intelligendum inquiunt, vitaliter. Inde fit ut, circa illam, secundariae quaedam, ut iam innuimus, sensim enascantur formulae ; quae postea in unum corpus coagmentatae vel in unum doctrinae aedificium, cum a magisterio publico sancitae fuerint utpote communi conscientiae respondentes, dicuntur dogma. Ab hoc secernendae sunt probe theologorum commentationes: quae cetero qui, quamvis vitam dogmatis non vivunt, non omnino, tamen sunt inutiles, tum ad religionem cum scientia componendam et oppositiones inter illas tollendas, tum ad religionem ipsam extrinsecus illustrandam protuendamque; forte etiam utilitati fuerint novo cuidam futuro dogmati materiam praeparando. De cultu sacrorum haud foret multis dicendum, nisi eo quoque nomine Sacramenta venirent; de quibus maximi modernistarum errores. Cultum ex duplici impulsione seu necessitate oriri perhibent; omnia etenim, ut vidimus, in eorum systemate impulsionibus intimis seu necessitatibus gigni asseruntur. Altera est ad sensibile quiddam religioni tribuendum, altera ad eam proferendam, quod fieri utique nequaquam possit sine forma quadam sensibili et consecrantibus actibus; quae Sacramenta dicimus. Sacramenta autem modernistis nuda sunt symbola seu signa; quamvis non vi carentia. Quam vim ut indicent, exemplo ipsi utuntur verborum quorundam; quae vulgo fortunam dicuntur sortita, eo quod virtutem conceperint ad notiones quasdam propagandas, robustas maximeque percellentes animos. Sicut ea verba adnotiones, sic Sacramenta ad sensum religiosum ordinata sunt: nihil praeterea. Clarius profecto dicerent, si Sacramenta unice ad nutriendam fidem instituta affirmarent. Hoc tamen Tridentina Synodus damnavit (Sess. vii., de Sacramentis in genere, can. 5): Si quis dixerit haec sacramenta propter solam fidem nutriendam instituta fuisse anathema sit.

The Holy Scriptures

22. We have already touched upon the nature and origin of the Sacred Books. According to the principles of the Modernists they may be rightly described as a collection of experiences, not indeed of the kind that may come to anybody, but those extraordinary and striking ones which have happened in any religion. And this is precisely what they teach about our books of the Old and New Testament. But to suit their own theories they note with remarkable ingenuity that, although experience is something belonging to the present, still it may derive its material from the past and the future alike, inasmuch as the believer by memory lives the past over again after the manner of the present, and lives the future already by anticipation. This explains how it is that the historical and apocalyptical books are included among the Sacred Writings. God does indeed speak in these books - through the medium of the believer, but only, according to Modernistic theology, by vital immanence and permanence. Do we inquire concerning inspiration? Inspiration, they reply, is distinguished only by its vehemence from that impulse which stimulates the believer to reveal the faith that is in him by words or writing. It is something like what happens in poetical inspiration, of which it has been said: There is God in us, and when he stirreth he sets us afire. And it is precisely in this sense that God is said to be the origin of the inspiration of the Sacred Books. The Modernists affirm, too, that there is nothing in these books which is not inspired. In this respect some might be disposed to consider them as more orthodox than certain other moderns who somewhat restrict inspiration, as, for instance, in what have been put forward as tacit citations. But it is all mere juggling of words. For if we take the Bible, according to the tenets of agnosticism, to be a human work, made by men for men, but allowing the theologian to proclaim that it is divine by immanence, what room is there left in it for inspiration? General inspiration in the Modernist sense it is easy to find, but of inspiration in the Catholic sense there is not a trace.

De librorum etiam sacrorum natura et origina aliquid iam delibavimus. Eos, ad modernistarum scita, definire probe quis possit syllogen experientiarum, non cuique passim advenientium, sed extraordinarium atque insignium, quae in quapiam religion sunt habitae. Sic prorsus modernistae docent de libris nostris tum veteris tum novi testamenti. Ad suas tamen opinions callidissime notant quamvis experientia sit praesentis temporis, posse tamen illam de praeteritis aeque ac de futuris materiam sumere, prout videlicet qui credit vel exacta rursus per recordationem in modum praesentium vivat, vel futura per praeoccupationem. Id autem explicat quomodo historici quoque et apocalyptici in libris sacris censeri queant. Sic igitur in hisce libris Deus quidem loquitur per credentem; sed, uti fert theologia modernistarum per immanentiam solummodo et permanentiam vitalem. Quaeremus, quid tum de inspiratione? Haec, respondent, ab impulsione illa, nisi forte vehementia, nequaquam secernitur, qua credens ad fidem suam verbo scriptove aperiendam adigitur. Simile quid habemus in poetica inspiratione; quare quidam aiebat: Est Deus in nobis, agitante calescimus illo. Hoc modo Deus initium dici debet inspiratione sacrorum librorum. De qua praeterea inspiratione modernistae addunt, nihil omnino esse in sacris libris quod illa careat. Quod quum affirmant, magis eos crederes orthodoxos quam recentiores alios, qui inspirationem aliquantum coangustant, ut, exempli causa, quum tacitas sic dictas citationes invehunt. Sed haec illi verbotenus ac simulate. Nam si Biblia ex agnosticismi praeceptis iudicamus, humanum scilicet opus, ab hominibus pro hominibus exaratum, licet ius theologo detur ea per immanentiam divina praedicandi; qui demum inspiratio coarctari possit ? Generalem utique modernistae sacrorum librorum inspirationem asseverant; catholico tamen sensu nullam admittunt.

The Church

23. A wider field for comment is opened when you come to treat of the vagaries devised by the Modernist school concerning the Church. You must start with the supposition that the Church has its birth in a double need, the need of the individual believer, especially if he has had some original and special experience, to communicate his faith to others, and the need of the mass, when the faith has become common to many, to form itself into a society and to guard, increase, and propagate the common good. What, then, is the Church? It is the product of the collective conscience, that is to say of the society of individual consciences which by virtue of the principle of vital permanence, all depend on one first believer, who for Catholics is Christ. Now every society needs a directing authority to guide its members towards the common end, to conserve prudently the elements of cohesion which in a religious society are doctrine and worship.

Largiorem dicendi segetem offerunt, quae modernistarum schola de Ecclesia imaginatur. Ponunt initio eam ex duplici necessitate oriri, una in credente quavis, in eo praesertim qui primigeniam ac singularem aliquam sit nactus experientiam, ut fidem suam cum aliis communicet: altera, postquam fides communis inter plures evaserit, in collectivitate, ad coalescendum in societatem et ad commune bonum tuendum, augendum, propagandum. Quid igitur Ecclesia? partus est conscientiae collectivae seu consociationis conscientiarum singularium; quaevi permanentiae vitalis, a primo aliquo credente pendeant, videlicet, pro catholicis, a Christo. Porro societas quaepiam moderatrice auctoritate indiget, cuius sit officium consociatos omnes in communem finem dirigere, et compagis elementa tueri prudenter, quae in religioso coetu, doctrina et cultu absolvuntur.

Hence the triple authority in the Catholic Church, disciplinary, dogmatic, liturgical. The nature of this authority is to be gathered from its origin, and its rights and duties from its nature. In past times it was a common error that authority came to the Church from without, that is to say directly from God; and it was then rightly held to be autocratic. But his conception had now grown obsolete. For in the same way as the Church is a vital emanation of the collectivity of consciences, so too authority emanates vitally from the Church itself. Authority therefore, like the Church, has its origin in the religious conscience, and, that being so, is subject to it. Should it disown this dependence it becomes a tyranny. For we are living in an age when the sense of liberty has reached its fullest development, and when the public conscience has in the civil order introduced popular government. Now there are not two consciences in man, any more than there are two lives. It is for the ecclesiastical authority, therefore, to shape itself to democratic forms, unless it wishes to provoke and foment an intestine conflict in the consciences of mankind. The penalty of refusal is disaster. For it is madness to think that the sentiment of liberty, as it is now spread abroad, can surrender. Were it forcibly confined and held in bonds, terrible would be its outburst, sweeping away at once both Church and religion. Such is the situation for the Modernists, and their one great anxiety is, in consequence, to find a way of conciliation between the authority of the Church and the liberty of believers.

Hinc in Ecclesia catholica auctoritas tergemina:disciplinaris, dogmatica, cultualis. Iam auctoritatis huius natura ex origine colligenda est; ex natura vero iura atque officia repetenda. Praeteritis aetatibus vulgaris fuit error quod auctoritas in Ecclesiam extrinsecus accesserit nimirum immediate a Deo; quare autocratica merito habebatur. Sed haec nunc temporis obsolevere. Quo modo Ecclesiae e conscientiarum collectivitate emanasse dicitur, eo pariter auctoritas ab ipsa Ecclesia vitaliter emanat. Auctoritas igitur, sicut Ecclesia, ex conscientia religiosa oritur, atque ideo eidem subest; quam subiectionem si spreverit, in tyrannidem vertitur. Ea porro tempestate nunc vivimus, quum libertatis sensus in fastigium summum excrevit. In civili statu conscientia publica populare regimen invexit. Sed conscientia in homine, aeque atque vita, una est. Nisi ergo in hominum conscientiis intestinum velit excitare bellum ac fovere, auctoritati Ecclesiae officium inest democraticis utendi formis: eo vel magis quod, ni faxit, exitium imminet. Nam amens profecto fuerit, qui in sensu libertatis, qualis nunc viget, regressum posse fieri aliquando autumet. Constrictus vi atque inclusus, fortior se profundet, Ecclesia pariter ac religione deleta. Haec omnia modernistae ratiocinantur; qui propterea toti sunt in indagandis viis ad auctoritatem Ecclesiae cum credentium libertate componendam.

The Relations Between Church and State

24. But it is not with its own members alone that the Church must come to an amicable arrangement - besides its relations with those within, it has others outside. The Church does not occupy the world all by itself; there are other societies in the world, with which it must necessarily have contact and relations. The rights and duties of the Church towards civil societies must, therefore, be determined, and determined, of course, by its own nature as it has been already described. The rules to be applied in this matter are those which have been laid down for science and faith, though in the latter case the question is one of objects while here we have one of ends. In the same way, then, as faith and science are strangers to each other by reason of the diversity of their objects, Church and State are strangers by reason of the diversity of their ends, that of the Church being spiritual while that of the State is temporal. Formerly it was possible to subordinate the temporal to the spiritual and to speak of some questions as mixed, allowing to the Church the position of queen and mistress in all such, because the Church was then regarded as having been instituted immediately by God as the author of the supernatural order. But his doctrine is today repudiated alike by philosophy and history. The State must, therefore, be separated from the Church, and the Catholic from the citizen. Every Catholic, from the fact that he is also a citizen, has the right and the duty to work for the common good in the way he thinks best, without troubling himself about the authority of the Church, without paying any heed to its wishes, its counsels, its orders - nay, even in spite of its reprimands. To trace out and prescribe for the citizen any line of conduct, on any pretext whatsoever, is to be guilty of an abuse of ecclesiastical authority, against which one is bound to act with all one’s might. The principles from which these doctrines spring have been solemnly condemned by our predecessor Pius VI. in his Constitution Auctorem fidei.

Sed enim non intra domesticos tantum parietes habet Ecclesia, quibuscum amice cohaerere illam oporteat; habet et extra. Non una namque ipsa occupat mundum; occupant aeque consociationes aliae, quibuscum commercium ut usus necessario intercedat. Quae iura igitur, quae sint Ecclesiae officia cum civilibus consociationibus determinandum est etiam, nec aliter determinandum nisi ex ipsius Ecclesiae natura, qualem nimirum modernistae nobis descripsere. In hoc autem eisdem plane regulis utuntur, quae supra pro scientia, atque fide sunt allatae. Ibi obiectis sermo erat, heic de finibus. Sicut igitur ratione obiecti fidem ac scientiam extraneas ab invicem vidimus: sic Status et Ecclesia alter ab altera extranea sunt ob fines quos persequuntur, temporalem ille, haec spiritualem. Licuit profecto alias temporale spirituali subiici; licuit de mixtis quaestionibus sermonem interseri, in quibus Ecclesia ut domina ac regina intererat, quia nempe Ecclesia a Deo, sine medio, ut ordinis supernaturalis est auctor, instituta ferebatur. Sed iam haec ac philosophis atque historicis respuuntur. Status ergo ab Ecclesia dissociandus sicut etiam catholicus a cive. Quamobrem catholicus quilibet, quia etiam civis, ius atque officium habet, Ecclesiae auctoritate neglecta, eius optatis consiliis praeceptisque posthabitis, spretis immo reprehensionibus, ea persequendi quae civitatis utilitati conducere arbitretur. Viam ad agendum civi praescribere praetextu quolibet, abusus ecclesiasticae potestatis est, toto nisu reiiciendus. Ea nimirum, Venerabiles Fratres, unde haec omnia dimanant, eadem profecto sunt, quae Pius Vl. decessor Noster, in Constitutione apostolica Auctorem fidei, solemniter damnavit (Prop. 2. Propositio, quae statuit, potestatem a Deo datam Ecclesiae ut communicaretur Pastoribus, qui sunt eius ministri pro salute animarum; sic intellecta, ut a communitate fidelium in Pastores dirivetur ecclesiastici ministerii ac regiminis potestas: haeretica. Prop. 3. Insuper, quae statuit Romanum Pontificem esse caput ministeriale; sic explicata ut Romanus Pontifex non a Christo in persona beati Petri, sed ab Ecclesia potestatem ministerii accipiat, qua velut Petri successor, verus Christi vicarius ac totius Ecclesiae caput pollet in universa Ecclesia: haeretica).

The Magisterium of the Church

25. But it is not enough for the Modernist school that the State should be separated from the Church. For as faith is to be subordinated to science, as far as phenomenal elements are concerned, so too in temporal matters the Church must be subject to the State. They do not say this openly as yet - but they will say it when they wish to be logical on this head. For given the principle that in temporal matters the State possesses absolute mastery, it will follow that when the believer, not fully satisfied with his merely internal acts of religion, proceeds to external acts, such for instance as the administration or reception of the sacraments, these will fall under the control of the State. What will then become of ecclesiastical authority, which can only be exercised by external acts? Obviously it will be completely under the dominion of the State. It is this inevitable consequence which impels many among liberal Protestants to reject all external worship, nay, all external religious community, and makes them advocate what they call, individual religion. If the Modernists have not yet reached this point, they do ask the Church in the meanwhile to be good enough to follow spontaneously where they lead her and adapt herself to the civil forms in vogue. Such are their ideas aboutdisciplinary authority. But far more advanced and far more pernicious are their teachings on doctrinal and dogmatic authority. This is their conception of the magisterium of the Church: No religious society, they say, can be a real unit unless the religious conscience of its members be one, and one also the formula which they adopt. But his double unity requires a kind of common mind whose office is to find and determine the formula that corresponds best with the common conscience, and it must have moreover an authority sufficient to enable it to impose on the community the formula which has been decided upon. From the combination and, as it were fusion of these two elements, the common mind which draws up the formula and the authority which imposes it, arises, according to the Modernists, the notion of the ecclesiastical magisterium. And as this magisterium springs, in its last analysis, from the individual consciences and possesses its mandate of public utility for their benefit, it follows that the ecclesiastical magisterium must be subordinate to them, and should therefore take democratic forms. To prevent individual consciences from revealing freely and openly the impulses they feel, to hinder criticism from impelling dogmas towards their necessary evolutions - this is not a legitimate use but an abuse of a power given for the public utility. So too a due method and measure must be observed in the exercise of authority. To condemn and prescribe a work without the knowledge of the author, without hearing his explanations, without discussion, assuredly savours of tyranny. And thus, here again a way must be found to save the full rights of authority on the one hand and of liberty on the other. In the meanwhile the proper course for the Catholic will be to proclaim publicly his profound respect for authority - and continue to follow his own bent. Their general directions for the Church may be put in this way: Since the end of the Church is entirely spiritual, the religious authority should strip itself of all that external pomp which adorns it in the eyes of the public. And here they forget that while religion is essentially for the soul, it is not exclusively for the soul, and that the honour paid to authority is reflected back on Jesus Christ who instituted it.

Sed modernistarum scholae satis non est debere Statum ab Ecclesiae seiungi. Sicut fidem, quoad elementa, ut inquiunt, phaenomenica scientiae subdi oportet, sic in temporalibus negotiis Ecclesiam subesse Statui. Hoc quidem illi aperte nondum forte asserunt; ratiocinationis tamen vi coguntur admittere. Posito etenim quod in temporalibus rebus Status possit unus, si accidat credentem, intimis religionis actibus haud contentum, in externos exilire, ut puta administrationem susceptionemve Sacramentorum; necesse erit haec sub Status dominium cadere. Ecquid tum de ecclesiastica auctoritate? Cum haec nisi per externos actus non explicetur; Statui, tota quanta est, erit obnoxia. Hac nempe consecutione coacti, multi e protestantibus liberalibus cultum omnem sacrum externum, quin etiam externam quamlibet religiosam consociationem e medio tollunt, religionemque, ut aiunt, individualeminvehere adnituntur. Quod si modernistae nondum ad haec palam progrediuntur, petunt interea ut Ecclesia quo ipsi impellunt sua se sponte inclinet seseque ad civiles formas aptet. Atque haec de auctoritate disciplinari. Nam de doctrinali et dogmatica potestate longe peiora sunt ac perniciosiora quae sentiunt. De magisterio Ecclesiae sic scilicet commentantur. Consociatio religiosa in unum vere coalescere nequaquam potest, nisi una sit consociatorum conscientia, unaque, qua utantur, formula. Utraque autem haec unitas mentem quandam quasi communem expostulat, cuius sit reperire ac determinare formulam, quae communi conscientiae rectius respondeat; cui quidem menti satis auctoritatis inesse oportet ad formulam quam statuerit communitati imponendam. In hac porro coniunctione ac veluti fusione tum mentis formulam eligentis tum potestatis eadem perscribentis, magisterii ecclesiastici notionem modernistae collocant. Cum igitur magisterium ex conscientiis singularibus tandem aliquando nascatur, et publicum officium in earumdem conscientiarum commodum mandatum habeat; consequitur necessario, illud ab eisdem conscientiis pendere, ac proinde ad populares formas esse inflectendum. Quapropter singularium hominum conscientias prohibere quominus impulsiones quas sentiunt palam aperteque profiteantur, et criticae viam praepedire qua dogma ad necessarias evolutiones impellat, potestatis ad utilitatem permissae non usus est sed abusus. Similiter in usu ipso potestatis modus temperatioque sunt adhibenda. Librum quemlibet, auctore inscio, notare ac proscribere, nulla explicatione admissa, nulla disceptatione, tyrannidi profecto est proximum. Quare heic etiam medium est quoddam iter reperiendum, ut auctoritati simul ac libertati integra sint iura. Interea temporis catholico sic est agendum, ut auctoritatis quidem observantissimum se publice profiteatur, suo tamen obsequi ingenio non intermittat. Generatim vero sic de Ecclesia praescribunt: quoniam ecclesiasticae potestatis finis ad spiritualia unice pertinet; externum apparatum omnem esse tollendum, quo illa ad intuentium oculos magnificentius ornatur. In quo illud sane negligitur, religionem, etsi ad animos pertineat, non tamen unice animis concludi; et honorem potestati impensumin Christum institutorem recidere.

The Evolution of Doctrine

26. To finish with this whole question of faith and its shoots, it remains to be seen, Venerable Brethren, what the Modernists have to say about their development. First of all they lay down the general principle that in a living religion everything is subject to change, and must change, and in this way they pass to what may be said to be, among the chief of their doctrines, that ofEvolution. To the laws of evolution everything is subject - dogma, Church, worship, the Books we revere as sacred, even faith itself, and the penalty of disobedience is death. The enunciation of this principle will not astonish anybody who bears in mind what the Modernists have had to say about each of these subjects. Having laid down this law of evolution, the Modernists themselves teach us how it works out. And first with regard to faith. The primitive form of faith, they tell us, was rudimentary and common to all men alike, for it had its origin in human nature and human life. Vital evolution brought with it progress, not by the accretion of new and purely adventitious forms from without, but by an increasing penetration of the religious sentiment in the conscience. This progress was of two kinds: negative, by the elimination of all foreign elements, such, for example, as the sentiment of family or nationality; and positive by the intellectual and moral refining of man, by means of which the idea was enlarged and enlightened while the religious sentiment became more elevated and more intense. For the progress of faith no other causes are to be assigned than those which are adduced to explain its origin. But to them must be added those religious geniuses whom we call prophets, and of whom Christ was the greatest; both because in their lives and their words there was something mysterious which faith attributed to the divinity, and because it fell to their lot to have new and original experiences fully in harmony with the needs of their time. The progress of dogma is due chiefly to the obstacles which faith has to surmount, to the enemies it has to vanquish, to the contradictions it has to repel. Add to this a perpetual striving to penetrate ever more profoundly its own mysteries. Thus, to omit other examples, has it happened in the case of Christ: in Him that divine something which faith admitted in Him expanded in such a way that He was at last held to be God. The chief stimulus of evolution in the domain of worship consists in the need of adapting itself to the uses and customs of peoples, as well as the need of availing itself of the value which certain acts have acquired by long usage. Finally, evolution in the Church itself is fed by the need of accommodating itself to historical conditions and of harmonising itself with existing forms of society. Such is religious evolution in detail. And here, before proceeding further, we would have you note well this whole theory of necessities and needs, for it is at the root of the entire system of the Modernists, and it is upon it that they will erect that famous method of theirs called the historical.

Porro ut totam hanc de fide deque vario eius germine materiam absolvamus, restat, Venerabiles Fratres, ut de utrorumque explicatione postremo loco modernistarum praecepta audiamus. Principium hic generale est : in religione, quae vivat, nihil variabile non esse, atque idcirco variandum. Hinc gressum faciunt ad illud, quod in eorum doctrinis fere caput est, videlicet ad evolutionem. Dogma igitur, ecclesia, sacrorum cultus, libri,quos ut sanctos veremur, quin etiam fides ipsa, nisi inter mortua haec omnia velimus, evolutionis teneri legibus debent. Neque hoc mirum videri queat, si ea prae oculis habeantur, quae sunt de horum singulis a modernistis tradita. Posita igitur evolutionis lege, evolutionis rationem a modernistis ipsis descriptam habemus. Et primo quoad fidem. Primigenia, inquiunt, fidei forma rudis et universis hominibus communis fuit, ut quae ex ipsa hominum natura atque vita oriebatur. Evolutio vitalis progressum dedit; nimirum non novitate formarum extrinsecus accedentium, sed ex perversione in dies auctiore sensus religios in conscientiam. Dupliciter autem progressio ipsa est facta: negative primum, elementum quodvis extraneum, ut puta ex familia vel gente adveniens, eliminando; dehinc positive, intellectiva ac morali hominis expolitione, unde notio divini amplior ac lucidior sensusque religiosus exquisitior evasit. Progredientis vero fidei eaedem sunt causae afferendae, quamquae superius sunt allatae ad eius originem explicandam. Quibus tamen extraordinarios quosdam homines addi oportet (quos nos prophetas appellamus, quorumque omnium praestantissimus est Christus); tum quia illi in vita ac sermonibus arcani quidpiam praese tulerunt, quod fides divinitati tribuebat; tum quia novas nec ante habitas experientias sunt nacti, religiosae cuiusque temporis indigentiae respondentes. Dogmatis autem progressus inde potissimum enascitur, quod fidei impedimenta sint superanda, vincendi hostes, contradictiones refellendae. Adde his nisum quemdam perpetuum ad melius penetranda quae in arcanis fidei continentur. Sic, ut exempla cetera praetereamus, de Christo factum est: in quo divinum illud qualecumque, quod fides admittebat, ita pedetentim et gradatim amplificatum est, ut demum pro Deo haberetur. Ad evolutionem cultus facit praecipue necessitas ad mores traditionesque populorum sese accommodandi; item quorundam virtute actuum fruendi, quam sunt ex usu mutuati. Tandem pro Ecclesia evolutionis causa inde oritur, quod componi egeat cum adiunctis historicis cumque civilis regiminis publice invectis formis. Sic illi de singulis. Hic autem, antequam procedamus, doctrina haec de necessitatibus seu indigentiis (vulgo dei bisognisignificantius appellant) probe ut notetur velimus; etenim, praeterquam omnium quae vidimus, est veluti basis ac fundamentum famosae illius methodi, quam historicam dicunt.

27. Still continuing the consideration of the evolution of doctrine, it is to be noted that Evolution is due no doubt to those stimulants styled needs, but, if left to their action alone, it would run a great risk of bursting the bounds of tradition, and thus, turned aside from its primitive vital principle, would lead to ruin instead of progress. Hence, studying more closely the ideas of the Modernists, evolution is described as resulting from the conflict of two forces, one of them tending towards progress, the other towards conservation. The conserving force in the Church is tradition, and tradition is represented by religious authority, and this both by right and in fact; for by right it is in the very nature of authority to protect tradition, and, in fact, for authority, raised as it is above the contingencies of life, feels hardly, or not at all, the spurs of progress. The progressive force, on the contrary, which responds to the inner needs lies in the individual consciences and ferments there - especially in such of them as are in most intimate contact with life. Note here, Venerable Brethren, the appearance already of that most pernicious doctrine which would make of the laity a factor of progress in the Church. Now it is by a species of compromise between the forces of conservation and of progress, that is to say between authority and individual consciences, that changes and advances take place. The individual consciences of some of them act on the collective conscience, which brings pressure to bear on the depositaries of authority, until the latter consent to a compromise, and, the pact being made, authority sees to its maintenance.

In evolutionis doctrina ut adhuc sistamus, illud praeterea est advertendum quod, etsi indigentiae seu necessitates ad evolutionem impellunt; his tamen unis acta, evolutio transgressa facile traditionis fines atque ideo a primigenio vitali principio avulsa, ad ruinam potius quam ad progressionem traheret. Hinc modernistarum mentem plenius sequuti, evolutionem ex conflictione duarum virium evenire dicemus, quarum altera ad progressionem agit, altera ad conservationem retrahit. Vis conservatrix viget in Ecclesia, contineturque traditione. Eam vero exerit religiosa auctoritas; idque tam iure ipso, est enim in auctoritatis natura traditionem tueri; tam re, auctoritas namque, a commutationibus vitae reducta stimulis ad progressionem pellentibus nihil aut vix urgetur. E contra vis ad progrediendum rapiens atque intimis indigentiis respondens latet ac molitur in privatorum conscientiis, illorum praecipue qui vitam, ut inquiunt, propius atque intimius attingunt. En hic, Venerabiles Fratres, doctrinam illam exitiosissimam efferre caput iam cernimus, quae laicos homines in Ecclesiam subinfert ut progressionis elementa. Ex convento quodam et pacto inter binas hasce vires, conservatricem et progressionis fautricem, inter auctoritatem videlicet et conscientias privatorum, progressus ac mutationes oriuntur. Nam privatorum conscientiae, vel harum quaedam, in conscientiam collectivam agunt; haec vero in habentes auctoritatem, cogitque illos pactiones conflare atque in pacto manere.

With all this in mind, one understands how it is that the Modernists express astonishment when they are reprimanded or punished. What is imputed to them as a fault they regard as a sacred duty. Being in intimate contact with consciences they know better than anybody else, and certainly better than the ecclesiastical authority, what needs exist - nay, they embody them, so to speak, in themselves. Having a voice and a pen they use both publicly, for this is their duty. Let authority rebuke them as much as it pleases - they have their own conscience on their side and an intimate experience which tells them with certainty that what they deserve is not blame but praise. Then they reflect that, after all there is no progress without a battle and no battle without its victim, and victims they are willing to be like the prophets and Christ Himself. They have no bitterness in their hearts against the authority which uses them roughly, for after all it is only doing its duty as authority. Their sole grief is that it remains deaf to their warnings, because delay multiplies the obstacles which impede the progress of souls, but the hour will most surely come when there will be no further chance for tergiversation, for if the laws of evolution may be checked for a while, they cannot be ultimately destroyed. And so they go their way, reprimands and condemnations notwithstanding, masking an incredible audacity under a mock semblance of humility. While they make a show of bowing their heads, their hands and minds are more intent than ever on carrying out their purposes. And this policy they follow willingly and wittingly, both because it is part of their system that authority is to be stimulated but not dethroned, and because it is necessary for them to remain within the ranks of the Church in order that they may gradually transform the collective conscience - thus unconsciously avowing that the common conscience is not with them, and that they have no right to claim to be its interpreters.

Ex his autem pronum est intelligere, cur modernistae mirentur adeo, quum reprehendi se vel puniri sciunt. Quod eis culpae vertitur, ipsi pro officio habent religiose explendo. Necessitates conscientiarum nemo melius novit quam ipsi, eoquod propius illas attingunt, quam ecclesiastica auctoritas. Eas igitur necessitates omnes quasi in se colligunt: unde loquendi publice ac scribendi officio devinciuntur. Carpat eos, si volet, auctoritas; ipsi conscientia officii fulciuntur, intimaque experientia norunt non sibi reprehensiones deberi sed laudes. Utique non ipsos latet progressiones sine certaminibus haud fieri, nec sine victimis certamina: sint ergo ipsi pro victimis, sicut prophetae et Christus. Nec ideo quod male habentur, auctoritati invident: suum illam exsequi munus ultro concedunt. Queruntur tantum quod minime exaudiuntur; sic enim cursus animorum tardatur: hora tamen rumpendi moras certissime veniet nam leges evolutionis coerceri possunt, infringi omnino non possunt. Institute ergo itinere pergunt: pergunt, quamvis redarguti et damnati; incredibilem audaciam fucatae demissionis velamine obducentes. Cervices quidem simulate inflectunt ; manu tamen atque animo quod susceperunt persequuntur audacius. Sic autem volentes omnino prudentesque agunt: tum quia tenent, auctoritatem stimulandam esse non evertendam; tum quia necesse illis est intra Ecclesiae septa manere, ut collectivam conscientiam sensim immutent: quod tamen quum aiunt, fateri se non advertunt conscientiam collectivam ab ipsis dissidere, atque ideo nullo eos iure illius se interpretes venditare.

28. Thus then, Venerable Brethren, for the Modernists, both as authors and propagandists, there is to be nothing stable, nothing immutable in the Church. Nor indeed are they without precursors in their doctrines, for it was of these that Our Predecessor Pius IX wrote: These enemies of divine revelation extol human progress to the skies, and with rash and sacrilegious daring would have it introduced into the Catholic religion as if this religion were not the work of God but of man, or some kind of philosophical discovery susceptible of perfection by human efforts. On the subject of revelation and dogma in particular, the doctrine of the Modernists offers nothing new - we find it condemned in the Syllabus of Pius IX., where it is enunciated in these terms: Divine revelation is imperfect, and therefore subject to continual and indefinite progress, corresponding with the progress of human reason; and condemned still more solemnly in the Vatican Council: The doctrine of the faith which God has revealed has not been proposed to human intelligences to be perfected by them as if it were a philosophical system, but as a divine deposit entrusted to the Spouse of Christ to be faithfully guarded and infallibly interpreted. Hence the sense, too, of the sacred dogmas is that which our Holy Mother the Church has once declared, nor is this sense ever to be abandoned on plea or pretext of a more profound comprehension of the truth. Nor is the development of our knowledge, even concerning the faith, impeded by this pronouncement - on the contrary it is aided and promoted. For the same Council continues: Let intelligence and science and wisdom, therefore, increase and progress abundantly and vigorously in individuals and in the mass, in the believer and in the whole Church, throughout the ages and the centuries - but only in its own kind, that is, according to the same dogma, the same sense, the same acceptation.

Sic igitur, Venerabiles Fratres, modernistis auctoribus atque actoribus, nihil stabile nihil immutabile in Ecclesia esse oportet. Qua equidem in sententia praecursoribus non caruere, illis nimirum, de quibus Pius IX. decessor Noster iam scribebat: Isti divinae revelationis inimici humanum progressum summis laudibus et ferentes, in catholicam religionem temerario plane ac sacrilegio ausu illum inducere vellent, perinde ac si ipsa veligio non Dei, sed homimim opus esset aut philosophicum aliquod inventum, quod humanis modis perfici queat (Encycl.”Qui pluribus” 9 Nov., 1846). De revelatione praesertim ac dogmate nulla doctrinae modernistarum novitas; sed eadem illa est, quam in Pii IX. syllabo reprobatam reperimus, sic enunciatam: Divina revelatio est imperfecta et idcirco subiecta continuo et indefinito progressui, qui humanae rationis progressioni respondeat (Syll. Prop. 5): solemnius vero in Vaticana Synodo per haec verba: Neque enim fidei doctrina, quam Deus revelavit, velut philosophicum inventum proposita est humanis ingeniis perficienda, sed tamquam divinum depositum Christi sponsae tradita, fideliter custodienda et infallibiliter declaranda. Hinc sacrorum quoque dogmatum in sensus perpetuo est retinendus, quem semel declaravit Sancta Mater Ecclesia, nec unquam ab eo sensu altioris intelligentiae specie et nomine recedendum (Const. “Dei Filius,” cap. iv.): quo profecto explicatio nostrarum notionum, etiam circa fidem, tantum abest ut impediatur, ut imo adiuvetur ac provehatur. Quamobrem eadem Vaticana Synodus sequitur: Crescat igitur et multum vehementerque proficiat iam singulorum quam omnium, tam unius hominis quam totius Ecclesiae, aetatum et saeculorum gradibus, intelligentia, scientia, sapientia; sed in suo dumtaxat genere, in eodem scilicet dogmate, eodem sensu eademque sententia (Loc. cit.).

The Modernist as Historian and Critic

29. After having studied the Modernist as philosopher, believer and theologian, it now remains for us to consider him as historian, critic, apologist, reformer.

Sed postquam in modernismi assectatoribus philosophum, credentem, theologum observavimus, iam nunc restat ut pariter historicum, criticum, apologetam, reformatorem spectemus.

30. Some Modernists, devoted to historical studies, seem to be greatly afraid of being taken for philosophers. About philosophy, they tell you, they know nothing whatever - and in this they display remarkable astuteness, for they are particularly anxious not to be suspected of being prejudiced in favour of philosophical theories which would lay them open to the charge of not being objective, to use the word in vogue. And yet the truth is that their history and their criticism are saturated with their philosophy, and that their historico-critical conclusions are the natural fruit of their philosophical principles. This will be patent to anybody who reflects. Their three first laws are contained in those three principles of their philosophy already dealt with: the principle of agnosticism, the principle of the transfiguration of things by faith, and the principle which We have called of disfiguration. Let us see what consequences flow from each of them. Agnosticism tells us that history, like ever other science, deals entirely with phenomena, and the consequence is that God, and every intervention of God in human affairs, is to be relegated to the domain of faith as belonging to it alone. In things where a double element, the divine and the human, mingles, in Christ, for example, or the Church, or the sacraments, or the many other objects of the same kind, a division must be made and the human element assigned to history while the divine will go to faith. Hence we have that distinction, so current among the Modernists, between the Christ of history and the Christ of faith, between the sacraments of history and the sacraments of faith, and so on. Next we find that the human element itself, which the historian has to work on, as it appears in the documents, has been by faith transfigured, that is to say raised above its historical conditions. It becomes necessary, therefore, to eliminate also the accretions which faith has added, to assign them to faith itself and to the history of faith: thus, when treating of Christ, the historian must set aside all that surpasses man in his natural condition, either according to the psychological conception of him, or according to the place and period of his existence. Finally, by virtue of the third principle, even those things which are not outside the sphere of history they pass through the crucible, excluding from history and relegating to faith everything which, in their judgment, is not in harmony with what they call the logic of facts and in character with the persons of whom they are predicated. Thus, they will not allow that Christ ever uttered those things which do not seem to be within the capacity of the multitudes that listened to Him. Hence they delete from His real history and transfer to faith all the allegories found in His discourses. Do you inquire as to the criterion they adopt to enable them to make these divisions? The reply is that they argue from the character of the man, from his condition of life, from his education, from the circumstances under which the facts took place - in short, from criteria which, when one considers them well, are purely subjective. Their method is to put themselves into the position and person of Christ, and then to attribute to Him what they would have done under like circumstances. In this way, absolutely a priori and acting on philosophical principles which they admit they hold but which they affect to ignore, they proclaim that Christ, according to what they call His realhistory, was not God and never did anything divine, and that as man He did and said only what they, judging from the time in which he lived, can admit Him to have said or done.

Modernistarum quidam, qui componendis historiis se dedunt, solliciti magnopere videntur ne credantur philosophi; profitentur quin immo philosophiae se penitus expertes esse. Astute id quam quod maxime: ne scilicet cuipiam sit opinio, eos praeiudicatis imbui philosophiae opinationibus, nec esse propterea, ut aiunt, omnino obiectivos. Verum tamen est, historiam illorum aut criticem meram loqui philosophiam; quaque ab iis inferuntur, ex philosophicis eorum principiis iusta ratiocinatione concludi. Quod equidem facile consideranti patet. Primi tres huiusmodi historicorum aut criticorum canones, ut diximus, eadem illa sunt principia, quae supra ex philosophis attulimus: nimirum agnosticismus, theorema de transfiguratione rerum per fidem, itemque aliud quod de defigurationedici posse visum est iam consecutiones ex singulis notemus. Ex agnosticismo historia, non aliter ac scientia unice de phaenomenis est. Ergo tam Deus quam quilibet in humanis divinus interventus ad fidem reiiciendus est, utpote ad illam pertinens unam. Quapropter si quid occurrat duplici constans elemento, divino atque humano, cuiusmodi sunt Christus, Ecclesia, Sacramenta aliaque id genus multa; sic partiendum erit ac secernendum, ut quod humanum fuerit historiae, quod divinum tribuatur fidei. Ideo vulgata apud modernistas discretio inter Christum historicum et Christum fidei, Ecclesiam historiae et Ecclesiam fidei, Sacramenta historiae et Sacramenta fidei, aliaque similia passim. Deinde hoc ipsum elementum humanum, quod sibi historicum sumere videmus, quale illud in monumentis apparet, a fide per transfigurationem ultra conditiones historicas elatum dicendum est. Adiectiones igitur a fide factas rursus secernere oportet, easque ad fidem ipsam amandare atque ad historiam fidei; sic, quum de Christo agitur, quidquid conditionem hominis superat, sive naturalem, prout a psychologia exhibetur, sive ex loco atque aetate, quibus ille vixit, conflatam. Praeterea, ex tertio philosophiae principio, res etiam, quae historiae ambitum non excedunt, cribro veluti cernunt, eliminantque omnia ac pariter ad fidem amandant quae ipsorum iudicio, in factorum logica, ut inquiunt, non sunt vel personis apta non fuerint. Sic volunt Christum ea non dixisse, quae audientis vulgi captum excedere videntur. Hinc de reali eius historia delent et fidei permittunt allegorias omnes quae in sermonibus eius occurrunt. Quaeremus forsitan qua lege haec segregentur? Ex ingenio hominis, ex conditione qua sit in civitate usus, ex educatione, ex adiunctorum facti cuiusquam complexu: uno verbo, si bene novimus, ex norma, quae tandem aliquando in mere subiectivam recidit. Nituntur scilicet Christi personam ipsi capere et quasi gerere: quidquid vero paribus in adiunctis ipsi fuissent acturi, id omne in Christum transferunt. Sic igitur, ut concludamus, a priori et ex quibusdam philosophiae principiis, quam tenent quidem sed ignorare asserunt, in reali, quam vocant, historia Christum Deum non esse affirmant nec quidquam divini egisse; ut hominem vero ea tantum patrasse aut dixisse, quae ipsi, ad illius se tempora referentes, patrandi aut dicendi ius tribuunt.

Criticism and its Principles

31. And as history receives its conclusions, ready-made, from philosophy, so too criticism takes its own from history. The critic, on the data furnished him by the historian, makes two parts of all his documents. Those that remain after the triple elimination above described go to form the real history; the rest is attributed to the history of the faith or as it is styled, to internal history. For the Modernists distinguish very carefully between these two kinds of history, and it is to be noted that they oppose the history of the faith to real history precisely as real. Thus we have a double Christ: a real Christ, and a Christ, the one of faith, who never really existed; a Christ who has lived at a given time and in a given place, and a Christ who has never lived outside the pious meditations of the believer - the Christ, for instance, whom we find in the Gospel of St. John, which is pure contemplation from beginning to end.

Ut autem historia ab philosophia, sic critice ab historia suas accipit conclusiones. Criticus namque, indicia sequutus ab historico praebita, monumenta partitur bifariam. Quidquid post dictam triplicem obtruncationem superat reali historiae assignat; cetera ad fidei historiam seu internam ablegat. Has enim binas historias accurate distinguunt; et historiam fidei,quod bene notatum volumus, historiae reali ut realis est opponunt. Hinc, ut iam diximus, geminus Christus; realis alter, alter qui nunquam reapse fuit sed ad fidem pertinet: alterqui certo loco certaque vixit aetate, alter qui solummodo in piis commentationibus fidei reperitur: eiusmodi, exempli causa, est Christus, quem Ioannis evangelium exhibet; quod utique, aiunt, totum quantum est commentatio est.

32. But the dominion of philosophy over history does not end here. Given that division, of which We have spoken, of the documents into two parts, the philosopher steps in again with his principle of vital immanence, and shows how everything in the history of the Church is to be explained by vital emanation. And since the cause or condition of every vital emanation whatsoever is to be found in some need, it follows that no fact can ante-date the need which produced it - historically the fact must be posterior to the need. See how the historian works on this principle. He goes over his documents again, whether they be found in the Sacred Books or elsewhere, draws up from them his list of the successive needs of the Church, whether relating to dogma or liturgy or other matters, and then he hands his list over to the critic. The critic takes in hand the documents dealing with the history of faith and distributes them, period by period, so that they correspond exactly with the lists of needs, always guided by the principle that the narration must follow the facts, as the facts follow the needs. It may at times happen that some parts of the Sacred Scriptures, such as the Epistles, themselves constitute the fact created by the need. Even so, the rule holds that the age of any document can only be determined by the age in which each need had manifested itself in the Church. Further, a distinction must be made between the beginning of a fact and its development, for what is born one day requires time for growth. Hence the critic must once more go over his documents, ranged as they are through the different ages, and divide them again into two parts, and divide them into two lots, separating those that regard the first stage of the facts from those that deal with their development, and these he must again arrange according to their periods.

Verum non his philosophiae in historiam dominatus absolvitur. Monumentis, ut diximus, bifariam distributis, adest iterum philosophus cum suo dogmate vitalis immanentiae; atque omniae dicit, quae sunt in ecclesia historia, per vitalem emanationem esse explicanda. Atqui vitalis cuiuscumque emanationis aut caussa aut conditio est in necessitate seu indigentia quapiam ponenda : ergo et factum post necessitatem concipi oportet, et illud historice huic esse posterius. Quid tum historicus? Monumenta iterum, sive quae in libris sacris continentur sive aliunde adducta, scrutatus, indicem ex iis conficit singularum necessitatum, tum ad dogma tum ad cultum sacrorum tum ad alia spectantium, quae in Ecclesiae, altera ex altera, locum habuere. Confectum indicem critico tradit. Hic vero ad monumenta, quae fidei historiae destinantur, manum admovet; illaque per aetates singulas sic disponit, ut dato indici respondeant singula; eius semper praecepti memor, factum necessitate, narrationem facto anteverti. Equidem fieri aliquando possit, quasdam Bibliorum partes, ut puta epistolas, ipsum esse factum a necessitate creatum. Quidquid tamen sit, lex est, monumenti cuiuslibet aetatem non aliter determinandam esse, quam ex aetate exortae in Ecclesia uniuscuiusque necessitatis. Distinguendum praeterea est inter facti cuiuspiam exordium eiusdemque explicationem: quod enim uno die nasci potest, non nisi decursu temporis incrementa suscipit. Hanc ob causam debet criticus monumenta, per aetates, ut diximus, iam distributa bipartiri iterum, altera quae ad originem rei alteraquae ad explicationem pertineant secernens; eaque rursus ordinare per tempora.

33. Then the philosopher must come in again to impose on the historian the obligation of following in all his studies the precepts and laws of evolution. It is next for the historian to scrutinise his documents once more, to examine carefully the circumstances and conditions affecting the Church during the different periods, the conserving force she has put forth, the needs both internal and external that have stimulated her to progress, the obstacles she has had to encounter, in a word everything that helps to determine the manner in which the laws of evolution have been fulfilled in her. This done, he finishes his work by drawing up in its broad lines a history of the development of the facts. The critic follows and fits in the rest of the documents with this sketch; he takes up his pen, and soon the history is made complete. Now we ask here: Who is the author of this history? The historian? The critic? Assuredly, neither of these but the philosopher. From beginning to end everything in it is a priori, and a priori in a way that reeks of heresy. These men are certainly to be pitied, and of them the Apostle might well say: They became vain in their thoughts. . . professing themselves to be wise they became fools (Rom. i. 21, 22); but, at the same time, they excite just indignation when they accuse the Church of torturing the texts, arranging and confusing them after its own fashion, and for the needs of its cause. In this they are accusing the Church of something for which their own conscience plainly reproaches them.

Tum denuo philosopho locus est; qui iniungit historico sua studia sic exercere, uti evolutionis praecepta legesque praescribunt. Ad haec historicus monumenta iterum scrutari; inquirere curiose in adiuncta conditionesque, quibus Ecclesia per singulas aetates sit usa, in eius vim conservatricem, in necessitates tarn internas quam externas quae ad progrediendum impellerent, in impedimenta quae obfuerunt, uno verbo, in ea quacumque quae ad determinandum faxint quo pacto evolutionis leges fuerint servatae. Post haec tandem explicationis historiam, per extrema veluti lineamenta, describit. Succurrit criticus aptatque monumenta reliqua. Ad scriptionem adhibetur manus: historia confecta est. Cui iam, petimus, haec historia inscribenda? Historico ne an critico? Neutri profecto; sed philosopho. Tota ibi per apriorismum res agitur : et quidem per apriorismum haeresibus scatentem. Miseret sane hominum eiusmodi de quibus Apostolus diceret: Evanuerunt in cogitationibus suis. . . . dicentes enim se esse sapientes, stulti facti sunt (Ad Rom, i, 21 et 22); at bilem tamen commovent quum Ecclesiam criminantur monumenta sic permiscere ac temperare ut suae utilitati loquantur. Nimirum affingunt Ecclesiae, quod sua sibi conscientia apertissime improbari sentiunt.

How the Bible is Dealt With

34. The result of this dismembering of the Sacred Books and this partition of them throughout the centuries is naturally that the Scriptures can no longer be attributed to the authors whose names they bear. The Modernists have no hesitation in affirming commonly that these books, and especially the Pentateuch and the first three Gospels, have been gradually formed by additions to a primitive brief narration - by interpolations of theological or allegorical interpretation, by transitions, by joining different passages together. This means, briefly, that in the Sacred Books we must admit a vital evolution, springing from and corresponding with evolution of faith. The traces of this evolution, they tell us, are so visible in the books that one might almost write a history of them. Indeed this history they do actually write, and with such an easy security that one might believe them to have with their own eyes seen the writers at work through the ages amplifying the Sacred Books. To aid them in this they call to their assistance that branch of criticism which they call textual, and labour to show that such a fact or such a phrase is not in its right place, and adducing other arguments of the same kind. They seem, in fact, to have constructed for themselves certain types of narration and discourses, upon which they base their decision as to whether a thing is out of place or not. Judge if you can how men with such a system are fitted for practising this kind of criticism. To hear them talk about their works on the Sacred Books, in which they have been able to discover so much that is defective, one would imagine that before them nobody ever even glanced through the pages of Scripture, whereas the truth is that a whole multitude of Doctors, infinitely superior to them in genius, in erudition, in sanctity, have sifted the Sacred Books in every way, and so far from finding imperfections in them, have thanked God more and more the deeper they have gone into them, for His divine bounty in having vouchsafed to speak thus to men. Unfortunately, these great Doctors did not enjoy the same aids to study that are possessed by the Modernists for their guide and rule, - a philosophy borrowed from the negation of God, and a criterion which consists of themselves.

Ex illa porro monumentorum per aetates partitione ac dispositione sequitur sua sponte non posse libros sacros iis auctoribus tribui, quibus reapse inscribuntur. Quam ob causam modernistae passim non dubitant asserere, illos eosdem libros, Pentateuchum praesertim ac prima tria Evangelia, ex brevi quadam primigenia narratione, crevisse gradatim accessionibus, interpositionibus nempe in modum interpretationis sive theologicae sive allegoricae, vel etiam iniectis ad diversa solummodo inter seiungenda. Nimirum, ut paucis clariusque dicamus, admittenda est vitalis evolutio librorum sacrorum, nata ex evolutione fidei eidemque respondens. Addunt vero, huius evolutionis vestigia adeo esse manifesta, ut illius fere historia describi possit. Quia immo et reapse describunt, tam non dubitanter, ut suis ipsos oculis vidisse crederes scriptores singulos, qui singulis aetatibus ad libros sacros amplificandos admorint manum. Haec autem ut confirment, criticen, quam textualem nominant, adiutricem appellant; nitunturque persuadere hoc vel illud factum aut dictum non suo esse loco, aliasque eiusmodi rationes proferunt. Diceres profecto eos narrationum aut sermonum quosdam quasi typos praestituis se sibi, unde certissime iudicent quid suo quid alieno stet loco. Hac via qui apti esse queant ad decernendum, aestimet qui volet. Verumtamen qui eos audiat de suis exercitationibus circa sacros libros affirmantes, unde tot ibi incongrue notata datum est deprehendere, credet fere nullum ante ipsos hominum eosdem libros volutasse, neque hos infinitam prope modum Doctorum multitudinem quaqua versus rimatam esse, ingenio plane et eruditione et sanctitudine vitae longe illis praestantiorem. Qui equidem Doctores sapientissimi tantum abfuit ut Scripturas sacras ulla ex parte reprehenderent, ut immo, quo illas scrutabantur penitius, eo maiores divino Numini agerent gratias, quod ita cum hominibus loqui dignatum esset. Sed heu! non iis adiumentis Doctores nostri in sacros libros incubuerunt, quibus modernistae! scilicet magistrum et ducem non habuere philosophiam, quae initia duceret a negatione Dei, nec se ipsi iudicandi normam sibi delegerunt.

We believe, then, that We have set forth with sufficient clearness the historical method of the Modernists. The philosopher leads the way, the historian follows, and then in due order come internal and textual criticism. And since it is characteristic of the first cause to communicate its virtue to secondary causes, it is quite clear that the criticism We are concerned with is an agnostic, immanentist, and evolutionist criticism. Hence anybody who embraces it and employs it, makes profession thereby of the errors contained in it, and places himself in opposition to Catholic faith. This being so, one cannot but be greatly surprised by the consideration which is attached to it by certain Catholics. Two causes may be assigned for this: first, the close alliance, independent of all differences of nationality or religion, which the historians and critics of this school have formed among themselves; second, the boundless effrontery of these men. Let one of them but open his mouth and the others applaud him in chorus, proclaiming that science has made another step forward; let an outsider but hint at a desire to inspect the new discovery with his own eyes, and they are on him in a body; deny it - and you are an ignoramus; embrace it and defend it - and there is no praise too warm for you. In this way they win over any who, did they but realise what they are doing, would shrink back with horror. The impudence and the domineering of some, and the thoughtlessness and imprudence of others, have combined to generate a pestilence in the air which penetrates everywhere and spreads the contagion. But let us pass to the apologist.

Iam igitur patere arbitramur, cuiusmodi in re historica modernistarum sit methodus. Praeit philosophus; illum historicus excipit; pone ex ordine legunt critice tum interna tum textualis. Et quia primae causae hoc competit ut virtutem suam cum sequentibus communicet, evidens fit, criticen eiusmodi non quampiam esse criticen, sed vocari iure agnosticam immanentistam, evolutionistam: atque ideo, qui eam profitetur eaque utitur, errores eidem implicitos profiteri et catholicae doctrinae adversari. Quamobrem mirum magnopere videri possit, apud catholicos homines id genus critices adeo hodie valere. Id nempe geminam habet causam : foedus in primis, quo historici criticique huius generis arctissime inter se iunguntur, varietate gentium ac religionum dissensione posthabita: tum vero audacia maxima, qua, quae quisque effutiat, ceteri uno ore extollunt et scientiae progressioni tribuunt; qua, qui novum portentum aestimare per se volet, facto agmine adoriuntur; qui neget, ignorantiae accusent qui amplectitur ac tuetur, laudibus exornent. Inde haud pauci decepti qui, si rem attentius considerarent, horrerent. Ex hoc autem praepotenti errantium dominio, ex hac levium animorum incauta assensione quaedam circumstantiis aeris quasi corruptio gignitur, quae per omnia permeat luemque diffundit. Sed ad apologetam transeamus.

The Modernist as Apologist

35. The Modernist apologist depends in two ways on the philosopher. First, indirectly, inasmuch as his theme is history - history dictated, as we have seen, by the philosopher; and, secondly, directly, inasmuch as he takes both his laws and his principles from the philosopher. Hence that common precept of the Modernist school that the new apologetics must be fed from psychological and historical sources. The Modernist apologists, then, enter the arena by proclaiming to the rationalists that though they are defending religion, they have no intention of employing the data of the sacred books or the histories in current use in the Church, and composed according to old methods, but real history written on modern principles and according to rigorously modern methods. In all this they are not using an argumentum ad hominem, but are stating the simple fact that they hold, that the truth is to be found only in this kind of history. They feel that it is not necessary for them to dwell on their own sincerity in their writings - they are already known to and praised by the rationalists as fighting under the same banner, and they not only plume themselves on these encomiums, which are a kind of salary to them but would only provoke nausea in a real Catholic, but use them as an offset to the reprimands of the Church.

Hic apud modernistas dupliciter a philosopho et ipse pendet. Non directe primum, materiam sibi sumens historiam, philosopho, ut vidimus, praecipiente conscriptam: directe dein, mutuatus ab illo dogmata ac iudicia. Inde illud vulgatum in schola modernistarum praeceptum, debere novam apologesim controversias de religione dirimere historicis inquisitionibus et psychologicis. Quamobrem apologetae modernistae suum opus aggrediuntur rationalistas monendo, se religionem vindicare non sacris libris neve ex historiis vulgo in Ecclesia adhibitis, quae veteri methodo descriptae sint; sed ex historia reali, modernis praeceptionibus modernaque methodo conflata. Idque non quasi ad hominem argumentati asserunt, sed quia reapse hanc tantum historiam vera tradere arbitrantur. De adserenda vero sua in scribendo sinceritate securi sunt: iam apud rationalistas nod sunt, iam, ut sub eodem vexillo stipendia merentes, laudati: de qua laudatione, quam verus catholicus respueret, ipsi sibi gratulantur, eamque reprehensionibus Ecclesiae opponunt.

But let us see how the Modernist conducts his apologetics. The aim he sets before himself is to make the non-believer attain thatexperience of the Catholic religion which, according to the system, is the basis of faith. There are two ways open to him, theobjective and the subjective. The first of them proceeds from agnosticism. It tends to show that religion, and especially the Catholic religion, is endowed with such vitality as to compel every psychologist and historian of good faith to recognise that its history hides some unknown element. To this end it is necessary to prove that this religion, as it exists today, is that which was founded by Jesus Christ; that is to say, that it is the product of the progressive development of the germ which He brought into the world. Hence it is imperative first of all to establish what this germ was, and this the Modernist claims to be able to do by the following formula: Christ announced the coming of the kingdom of God, which was to be realised within a brief lapse of time and of which He was to become the Messiah, the divinely-given agent and ordainer. Then it must be shown how this germ, alwaysimmanent and permanent in the bosom of the Church, has gone on slowly developing in the course of history, adapting itself successively to the different mediums through which it has passed, borrowing from them by vital assimilation all the dogmatic, cultural, ecclesiastical forms that served its purpose; whilst, on the other hand , it surmounted all obstacles, vanquished all enemies, and survived all assaults and all combats. Anybody who well and duly considers this mass of obstacles, adversaries, attacks, combats, and the vitality and fecundity which the Church has shown throughout them all, must admit that if the laws of evolution are visible in her life they fail to explain the whole of her history - the unknown rises forth from it and presents itself before us. Thus do they argue, never suspecting that their determination of the primitive germ is an a priori of agnostic and evolutionist philosophy, and that the formula of it has been gratuitously invented for the sake of buttressing their position.

Sed iam quo pacto apologesim unus aliquis istorum perficiat videamus. Finis, quem sibi assequendum praestituit, hic est: hominem fidei adhuc expertem eo adducere ut eam de catholica religione experientiam assequatur, quae ex modernistarum scitis unicum fidei est fundamentum. Geminum ad hoc patet her: obiectivum alterum, alterum subiectivum. Primum ex agnosticismo procedit; eoque spectat, ut eam in religione, praesertim catholica, vitalem virtutem inesse monstret, quae psychologum quemque itemque historicum bonae mentis suadeat, oportere in illius historia incogniti aliquid celari. Ad hoc, ostendere necessum est, catholicam religionem, quae modo est, eam omnino esse quam Christus fundavit, seu non aliud praeter progredientem eius germinis explicationem, quod Christus invexit. Primo igitur germen illud quale sit, determinandum. Id ipsum porro hac formula exhiberi volunt: Christum adventum regni Dei nunciasse, quod brevi foret constituendum, eiusque ipsum fore Messiam, actorem nempe divinitus datum atque ordinatorem. Post haec demonstrandum, qua ratione id germen, semper immanensin catholica religione ac permanens, sensim ac secundum historiam sese evolverit aptaritque succedentibus adiunctis, ex iis ad sevitaliter trahens quidquid doctrinalium, cultualium, ecclesiasticarum formarum sibi esset utile: interea vero impedimenta si quae occurrerent superans, adversaries profligans, insectationibus quibusvis pugnisque superstes. Postquam autem haec omnia, impedimenta nimirum, adversaries, insectationes, pugnas, itemque vitam foecunditatemque Ecclesiae id genus fuisse monstratum fuerit, ut, quamvis evolutionis leges in eiusdem Ecclesiae historia incolumes appareant, non tamen eidem historiae plene explicandae sint pares; incognitum coram stabit, suaque sponte se offeret. Sic illi. In qua tota ratiocinatione unum tamen non advertunt, determinationem illam germinis primigenii deberi unice apriorismo philosophi agnostici et evolutionistae, et germen ipsum sic gratis ab eis definiri utrorum causae congruat.

36. But while they endeavour by this line of reasoning to secure access for the Catholic religion into souls, these new apologists are quite ready to admit that there are many distasteful things in it. Nay, they admit openly, and with ill-concealed satisfaction, that they have found that even its dogma is not exempt from errors and contradictions. They add also that this is not only excusable but - curiously enough - even right and proper. In the Sacred Books there are many passages referring to science or history where manifest errors are to be found. But the subject of these books is not science or history but religion and morals. In them history and science serve only as a species of covering to enable the religious and moral experiences wrapped up in them to penetrate more readily among the masses. The masses understood science and history as they are expressed in these books, and it is clear that had science and history been expressed in a more perfect form this would have proved rather a hindrance than a help. Then, again, the Sacred Books being essentially religious, are consequently necessarily living. Now life has its own truth and its own logic, belonging as they do to a different order, viz., truth of adaptation and of proportion both with the medium in which it exists and with the end towards which it tends. Finally the Modernists, losing all sense of control, go so far as to proclaim as true and legitimate everything that is explained by life.

Dum tamen catholicam religionem recitatis argumentationibus asserere ac suadere elaborant apologetae novi, dant ultro et concedunt, plura in ea esse quae animos offendant. Quin etiam, non obscura quadam voluptate, in re quoque dogmatica errores contradictionesque reperire se palam dictitant: subdunt tamen, haec non solum admittere excusationem, sed, quod mirum esse oportet, iuste ac legitime esse prolata. Sic etiam, secundum ipsos, in sacris libris, plurima in re scientifica vel historica errore afficiuntur. Sed, inquiunt, non ibi de scientiis agi aut historia, verum de religione tantum ac re morum. Scientiae illic et historia integumenta sunt quaedam, quibus experientiae religiosae et morales obteguntur ut facilius in vulgus propagarentur: quod quidem vulgus cum non aliter intelligeret, perfectior illi scientia aut historia non utilitati sed nocumento fuisset. Ceterum, addunt, libri sacri, quia natura sunt religiosi, vitam necessario vivunt: iam vitae sua quoque est veritas et logica, alia profecto a veritate et logica rationali, quin immo alterius omnino ordinis, veritas scilicet comparationis ac proportionis tum ad medium (sic ipsi dicunt) in quo vivitur, tum ad finem ob quem vivitur, Demum eo usque progrediuntur ut, nulla adhibita temperatione, asserant, quidquid per vitam explicatur, id omne verum esse ac legitimum.

We, Venerable Brethren, for whom there is but one and only truth, and who hold that the Sacred Books, written under the inspiration of the Holy Ghost, have God for their author (Conc. Vat., De Revel., c. 2) declare that this is equivalent to attributing to God Himself the lie of utility or officious lie, and We say with St. Augustine: In an authority so high, admit but one officious lie, and there will not remain a single passage of those apparently difficult to practise or to believe, which on the same most pernicious rule may not be explained as a lie uttered by the author wilfully and to serve a purpose. (Epist. 28). And thus it will come about, the holy Doctor continues, that everybody will believe and refuse to believe what he likes or dislikes. But the Modernists pursue their way gaily. They grant also that certain arguments adduced in the Sacred Books, like those, for example, which are based on the prophecies, have no rational foundation to rest on. But they will defend even these as artifices of preaching, which are justified by life. Do they stop here? No, indeed, for they are ready to admit, nay, to proclaim that Christ Himself manifestly erred in determining the time when the coming of the Kingdom of God was to take place, and they tell us that we must not be surprised at this since even Christ was subject to the laws of life! After this what is to become of the dogmas of the Church? The dogmas brim over with flagrant contradictions, but what matter that since, apart from the fact that vital logic accepts them, they are not repugnant to symbolical truth. Are we not dealing with the infinite, and has not the infinite an infinite variety of aspects? In short, to maintain and defend these theories they do not hesitate to declare that the noblest homage that can be paid to the Infinite is to make it the object of contradictory propositions! But when they justify even contradiction, what is it that they will refuse to justify?

Nos equidem, Venerabiles Fratres, quibus una atque unica est veritas, quique sacros libros sic aestimamus quod Spiritu Sancto inspirante conscripti Deum habent auctorem (Cone. Vat. De Rev., c. 2), hoc idem esse affirmamus ac mendacium utilitatis seu officiosum ipsi Deo tribuere; verbisque Augustini asserimus: Admisso semel in tantum auctoritatis fastigium officioso aliquo mendacio nulla illorum librorum particula remanebit, quae non ut cuique videbitur vel ad mores difficilis vel ad fidem incredibilis, eadem perniciosissima regula ad mentientis auctoris consilium officiumque referatur (Epist. 28). Unde nec quod idem sanctus Doctor adiungit: In eis, scilicet Scripturis, quod vult quisque credet, quod non vult non credet. Sed modernistae apologetae progrediuntur alacres. Concedunt praeterea, in sacris libris eas subinde ratiocinationes occurrere ad doctrinam quampiam probandam, quae nullo rationali fundamento regantur; cuiusmodi sunt quae in prophetiis nituntur. Verum has quoque defendunt quasi artificia quaedam praedicationis, quae a vita legitima fiunt. Quid amplius? Permittunt, immo vero asserunt, Christum ipsum in indicando tempore adventus regni Dei manifeste errasse: neque id mirum, inquiunt, videri debet: nam et ipse vitae legibus tenebatur! Quid post haec de Ecclesia dogmatibus? Scatent haec etiam apertis oppositionibus; sed, praeter quam quod a logica vitali admittuntur, veritati symbolicae non adversantur; in iis quippe de infinito agitur cuius infiniti sunt respectus. Demum, adeo haec omnia probant tuenturque ut profiteri non dubitent, nullum Infinite honorem haberi excellentiorem quam contradicentia de ipso affirmando! Probata vero contradictione, quid non probabitur?

Subjective Arguments

37. But it is not solely by objective arguments that the non-believer may be disposed to faith. There are also subjective ones at the disposal of the Modernists, and for those they return to their doctrine of immanence. They endeavour, in fact, to persuade their non-believer that down in the very deeps of his nature and his life lie the need and the desire for religion, and this not a religion of any kind, but the specific religion known as Catholicism, which, they say, is absolutely postulated by the perfect development of life. And here We cannot but deplore once more, and grievously, that there are Catholics who, while rejecting immanence as a doctrine, employ it as a method of apologetics, and who do this so imprudently that they seem to admit that there is in human nature a true and rigorous necessity with regard to the supernatural order - and not merely a capacity and a suitability for the supernatural, order - and not merely a capacity and a suitability for the supernatural, such as has at all times been emphasized by Catholic apologists. Truth to tell it is only the moderate Modernists who make this appeal to an exigency for the Catholic religion. As for the others, who might be called intergralists, they would show to the non-believer, hidden away in the very depths of his being, the very germ which Christ Himself bore in His conscience, and which He bequeathed to the world. Such, Venerable Brethren, is a summary description of the apologetic method of the Modernists, in perfect harmony, as you may see, with their doctrines - methods and doctrines brimming over with errors, made not for edification but for destruction, not for the formation of Catholics but for the plunging of Catholics into heresy; methods and doctrines that would be fatal to any religion.

Attamen qui nondum credat non obiectivis solum argumentis ad fidem disponi potest, verum etiam subiectivis. Ad quem finem modernistae apologetae ad immanentiae doctrinam revertuntur. Elaborant nempe ut homini persuadeant, in ipso atque in intimis eius naturae ac vitae recessibus celari cuiuspiam religionis desiderium et exigentiam, nec religionis cuiuscumque sed talis omnino qualis catholica est: hanc enim postquam prorsus inquiunt ab explicatione vitae perfecta. Hic autem queri vehementer Nos iterum oportet, non desiderari e catholicis hominibus, qui, quamvis immanentiae doctrinam ut doctrinam reiiciunt, ea tamen pro apologesi utuntur; idque adeo incauti faciunt, ut in natura humana non capacitatem solem et convenientiam videantur admittere ad ordinem supernaturalem, quod quidem apologetae catholici opportunis adhibitis temperationibus demonstrarunt semper, sed germanam verique nominis exigentiam. Ut tamen verius dicamus, haec catholicae religionis exigentia a modernistis invehitur, qui volunt moderatiores audiri. Nam qui integralistae appellari queunt, ii homini nondum credenti ipsum germen in ipso latens, demonstrari volunt, quod in Christi conscientia fuit atque ab eo hominibus transmissum est. Sic igitur, Venerabiles Fratres, apologeticam modernistarum methodum, sommatim descriptam, doctrinis eorum plane congruentem agnoscimus: methodum profecto, uti etiam doctrinas, errorum plenas, non ad aedificandum aptas sed ad destruendum, non ad catholicos efficiendos sed ad catholicos ipsos ad haeresim trahendos, immo etiam ad religionis cuiuscumque omnimodam eversionem !

 The Modernist as Reformer

38. It remains for Us now to say a few words about the Modernist as reformer. From all that has preceded, some idea may be gained of the reforming mania which possesses them: in all Catholicism there is absolutely nothing on which it does not fasten. Reform of philosophy, especially in the seminaries: the scholastic philosophy is to be relegated to the history of philosophy among obsolete systems, and the young men are to be taught modern philosophy which alone is true and suited to the times in which we live. Reform of theology; rational theology is to have modern philosophy for its foundation, and positive theology is to be founded on the history of dogma. As for history, it must be for the future written and taught only according to their modern methods and principles. Dogmas and their evolution are to be harmonised with science and history. In the Catechism no dogmas are to be inserted except those that have been duly reformed and are within the capacity of the people. Regarding worship, the number of external devotions is to be reduced, or at least steps must be taken to prevent their further increase, though, indeed, some of the admirers of symbolism are disposed to be more indulgent on this head. Ecclesiastical government requires to be reformed in all its branches, but especially in its disciplinary and dogmatic parts. Its spirit with the public conscience, which is not wholly for democracy; a share in ecclesiastical government should therefore be given to the lower ranks of the clergy, and even to the laity, and authority should be decentralised. The Roman Congregations, and especially the index and the Holy Office, are to be reformed. The ecclesiastical authority must change its line of conduct in the social and political world; while keeping outside political and social organization, it must adapt itself to those which exist in order to penetrate them with its spirit. With regard to morals, they adopt the principle of the Americanists, that the active virtues are more important than the passive, both in the estimation in which they must be held and in the exercise of them. The clergy are asked to return to their ancient lowliness and poverty, and in their ideas and action to be guided by the principles of Modernism; and there are some who, echoing the teaching of their Protestant masters, would like the suppression of ecclesiastical celibacy. What is there left in the Church which is not to be reformed according to their principles?

Pauca demum superant addenda de modernista ut reformator est. Iam ea, quae huc usque loquuti sumus, abunde manifestant quanto et quam acri innovandi studio hi homines ferantur. Pertinet autem hoc studium ad res omnino omnes quae apud catholicos sunt. Innovari volunt philosophiam in sacris praesertim Seminariis: ita ut, a mandata philosophia scholasticorum ad historiam philosophiae inter cetera quae iam obsoleverunt systemata, adolescentibus moderna tradatur philosophia, quae una vera nostraeque aetati respondens. Ad theologiam innovandam, volunt, quam nos rationalem dicimus, habere fundamentum modernam philosophiam. Positivam vero theologiam, niti maxime postulant in historia dogmatum. Historiam quoque scribi et tradi expetunt ad suam methodum praescriptaque moderna. Dogmata eorumdemque evolutionem cum scientia et historia componenda edicunt. At catechesim quod spectat ea tantum in catecheticis libris notari postulant dogmata, quae innovata fuerint sintque ad vulgi captum. Circa sacrorum cultum, minuendas inquiunt externas religiones prohibendumve ne crescant. Quamvis equidem alii, qui symbolismo magis favent, in hac re indulgentiores se praebeant. Regimen ecclesiae omni sub respectu reformandum clamitant, praecipue tamen sub disciplinari ac dogmatico. Ideo intus forisque cum moderna, ut aiunt, conscientia componendum, quae tota ad democratiam vergit: ideo inferiori clero ipsisque laicis suae in regimine partes tribuendae, et collecta nimirum contractaque in centum auctoritas dispertienda. Romana consilia sacris negotiis gerendis immutari pariter volunt; in primis autem tum quod aSancto Officio tum quod ab Indice appellatur. Item ecclesiastici regiminis actionem in re politica et sociali variandam contendunt, ut simul a civilibus ordinationibus exulet, eisdem tamen se aptet ut suo illas spiritu imbuat. In re morum, illud asciscunt americanistarum scitum, activas virtutes passivi anteponi  oportere, atque illas prae istis exercitatione promoveri. Clerum sic comparatum petunt ut veterem referat demissionem animi et paupertatem; cogitatione insuper et facto cum modernismi praeceptis consentiat. Sunt demum qui, magistris protestantibus dicto lubentissime audientes, sacrum ipsum in sacerdotio coelibatum sublatum desiderent. Quid igitur in Ecclesia intactum relinquunt, quod non ab ipsis nec secundum ipsorum pronunciata sit reformandum ?

Modernism and All the Heresies

39. It may be, Venerable Brethren, that some may think We have dwelt too long on this exposition of the doctrines of the Modernists. But it was necessary, both in order to refute their customary charge that We do not understand their ideas, and to show that their system does not consist in scattered and unconnected theories but in a perfectly organised body, all the parts of which are solidly joined so that it is not possible to admit one without admitting all. For this reason, too, We have had to give this exposition a somewhat didactic form and not to shrink from employing certain uncouth terms in use among the Modernists. And now, can anybody who takes a survey of the whole system be surprised that We should define it as the synthesis of all heresies? Were one to attempt the task of collecting together all the errors that have been broached against the faith and to concentrate the sap and substance of them all into one, he could not better succeed than the Modernists have done. Nay, they have done more than this, for, as we have already intimated, their system means the destruction not of the Catholic religion alone but of all religion. With good reason do the rationalists applaud them, for the most sincere and the frankest among the rationalists warmly welcome the modernists as their most valuable allies.

In tota hac modernistarum doctrina exponenda, Venerabiles Fratres, videbimur forte alicui diutius immorati. Id tamen omnino oportuit, tum ne, ut assolet, de ignoratione rerum suarum ab illis reprehendamur; tum ut pateat, quum de modernismo et quaestio, non de vagis doctrinis agi nulloque inter se nexu coniunctis, verum de uno compactoque veluti corpore, in quo si unum admittas, cetera necessario sequantur. Ideo didactica fere ratione usi sumus, nec barbara aliquando respuimus verba, quae modernistae usurpant. Iam systema universum uno quasi obtutu respicientes, nemo mirabitur si sic illud definimus, ut omnium haereseon conlectum esse affirmemus. Certe si quis hoc sibi proposuisset, omnium quotquot fuerunt circa fidem errores succum veluti ac sanguinem in unum conferre; rem nunquam plenius perfecisset, quam modernistae perfecerunt. Immo vero tanto hi ulterius progressi sunt, ut, non modo catholicam religionem, sed omnem penitus, quod iam innuimus, religionem deleverint. Hinc enim rationalistarum plausus: hinc qui liberius apertiusque inter rationalistas loquuntur, nullos se efficaciores quam modernistas auxiliatores invenisse gratulantur.

For let us return for a moment, Venerable Brethren, to that most disastrous doctrine of agnosticism. By it every avenue that leads the intellect to God is barred, but the Modernists would seek to open others available for sentiment and action. Vain efforts! For, after all, what is sentiment but the reaction of the soul on the action of the intelligence or the senses. Take away the intelligence, and man, already inclined to follow the senses, becomes their slave. Vain, too, from another point of view, for all these fantasias on the religious sentiment will never be able to destroy common sense, and common sense tells us that emotion and everything that leads the heart captive proves a hindrance instead of a help to the discovery of truth. We speak, of course, of truth in itself - as for that other purely subjective truth, the fruit of sentiment and action, if it serves its purpose for the jugglery of words, it is of no use to the man who wants to know above all things whether outside himself there is a God into whose hands he is one day to fall. True, the Modernists do call in experience to eke out their system, but what does this experience add to sentiment? Absolutely nothing beyond a certain intensity and a proportionate deepening of the conviction of the reality of the object. But these two will never make sentiment into anything but sentiment, nor deprive it of its characteristic which is to cause deception when the intelligence is not there to guide it; on the contrary, they but confirm and aggravate this characteristic, for the more intense sentiment is the more it is sentimental. In matters of religious sentiment and religious experience, you know, Venerable Brethren, how necessary is prudence and how necessary, too, the science which directs prudence. You know it from your own dealings with sounds, and especially with souls in whom sentiment predominates; you know it also from your reading of ascetical books - books for which the Modernists have but little esteem, but which testify to a science and a solidity very different from theirs, and to a refinement and subtlety of observation of which the Modernists give no evidence. Is it not really folly, or at least sovereign imprudence, to trust oneself without control to Modernist experiences? Let us for a moment put the question: if experiences have so much value in their eyes, why do they not attach equal weight to the experience that thousands upon thousands of Catholics have that the Modernists are on the wrong road? It is, perchance, that all experiences except those felt by the Modernists are false and deceptive? The vast majority of mankind holds and always will hold firmly that sentiment and experience alone, when not enlightened and guided by reason, do not lead to the knowledge of God. What remains, then, but the annihilation of all religion, - atheism? Certainly it is not the doctrine of symbolism - will save us from this. For if all the intellectual elements, as they call them, of religion are pure symbols, will not the very name of God or of divine personality be also a symbol, and if this be admitted will not the personality of God become a matter of doubt and the way opened to Pantheism? And to Pantheism that other doctrine of thedivine immanence leads directly. For does it, We ask, leave God distinct from man or not? If yes, in what does it differ from Catholic doctrine, and why reject external revelation? If no, we are at once in Pantheism. Now the doctrine of immanence in the Modernist acceptation holds and professes that every phenomenon of conscience proceeds from man as man. The rigorous conclusion from this is the identity of man with God, which means Pantheism. The same conclusion follows from the distinction Modernists make between science and faith. The object of science they say is the reality of the knowable; the object of faith, on the contrary, is the reality of the unknowable. Now what makes the unknowable unknowable is its disproportion with the intelligible - a disproportion which nothing whatever, even in the doctrine of the Modernist, can suppress. Hence the unknowable remains and will eternally remain unknowable to the believer as well as to the man of science. Therefore if any religion at all is possible it can only be the religion of an unknowable reality. And why this religion might not be that universal soul of the universe, of which a rationalist speaks, is something We do see. Certainly this suffices to show superabundantly by how many roads Modernism leads to the annihilation of all religion. The first step in this direction was taken by Protestantism; the second is made by Modernism; the next will plunge headlong into atheism.

Redeamus enimvero tantisper, Venerabiles Fratres, ad exitiosissimam illam agnosticismidoctrinam. Ea scilicet, ex parte intellectus, omnis ad Deum via praecluditur homini, dum aptior sterni putatur ex parte cuiusdam animis ensus et actionis. Sed hoc quam perperam, quis non videat? Sensus enim animi actioni rei respondet, quam intellectus vel externi sensus proposuerint. Demito intellectum; homo externos sensus ad quos iam fertur, proclivius sequetur. Perperam iterum; nam phantasiae quaevis de sensu religioso communem sensum non expugnabunt; communi autem sensu docemur, perturbationem aut occupationem animi quampiam, non adiumento sed impedimento esse potius ad investigationem veri, veri inquimus ut in se est; nam verum illud alterum subiectivum, fructus interni sensus et actionis, si quidem ludendo est aptum, nihil admodum homini confert, cuius scire maximeinterest sic necne extra ipsum Deus, cuius in manus aliquando incidet. Experientiam enimvero tanto operi adiutricem inferunt. Sed quid haec ad sensum illum animi adiiciat ? Nil plane, praeterquam quod vehementiorem faciat; ex qua vehementia fiat proportione, firmior persuasio de veritate obiecti. Iam haec duo profecto non efficiunt ut sensus ille animi desinat esse sensus, neque eius immutant naturam, semper deceptioni obnoxiam, nisi regatur intellectu; immo vero illam confirmant et iuvant, nam sensus quo intensior, eo potiore iure est sensus. Cum vero de religioso sensu hic agamus deque experientia in eo contenta, nostis probe, Venerabiles Fratres, quanta in hac re prudentia sit opus, quanta item doctrina quae ipsam regat prudentiam. Nostis ex animorum usu, quorumdam praecipue in quibus eminet sensus; nostis ex librorum consuetudine, qui de ascesi tractant; qui quamvis modernistis in nullo sunt pretio, doctrinam, tamen longe solidiorem, subtilioremque ad observandum sagacitatem prae se ferunt, quam ipsi sibi arrogant. Equidem Nobis a mentis esse videtur aut saltem imprudentis summopere pro veris, nulla facta investigatione, experientias intimas habere, cuiusmodi modernistae venditant. Cur vero, ut per transcursum dicamus, si harum experientiarum tanta vis est ac firmitas, non eadem tribuatur illi, quam plura catholicorum millia se habere asserunt de devio itinere, quo modernistae incedunt? Haec ne tantum falsa atque fallax? Hominum autem pars maxima hoc firmiter tenet tenebitque semper, sensu solum et experientia, nullo mentis ductu atque lumine, ad Dei notitiam pertingi nunquam posse. Restat ergo iterum atheismus ac religio nulla. Nec modernistae meliora sibi promittant ex asserta symbolismi doctrina. Nam si quaevis intellectualia, ut inquiunt, elementa nihil nisi Dei symbola sunt; ecquid symbolum non sit ipsum Dei nomen aut personalitatis divinae? quod si ita, iam de divina personalitate ambigi poterit, patetque ad pantheismum via. Eodem autem, videlicet ad purum putumque pantheismum, ducit doctrina alia de immanentia divina. Etenim hoc quaerimus: an eiusmodi immanentia Deum ab homine distinguat necne. Si distinguit, quid tum a catholica doctrina differt, aut doctrinam de externa revelatione cur reiicit ? Si non distinguit, pantheismum habemus. Atqui immanentia haec modernistarum vult atque admittit omne conscientiae phaenomenon ab homineut homo est proficisci. Legitima ergo ratiocinatio inde infert unum idemque esse Deum cum homine: ex quo pantheismus. Distinctio demum quam praedicant inter scientiam et fidem, non aliam admittit consecutionem. Obiectum enim scientiae in cognoscibilis realitate ponunt; fidei e contra in incognoscibilis. Iamvero incognoscibile inde omnino constituitur, quod inter obiectam materiam et intellectum nulla adsit proportio. Atqui hic proportionis defectus nunquam, nec in modernistarum doctrina, auferri potest. Ergo incognoscibile credentiaeque ac philosopho incognoscibile semper manebit. Ergo siqua habebitur religio, haec erit realitatis incognoscibilis; quae cur etiam mundi animus esse, nequeat, quem rationalistae quidam admittunt, non videmus profecto. Sed haec modo sufficiant ut abunde pateat quam multiplici itinere doctrina modernistarum ad atheismum trahat et ad religionem omnem abolendam. Equidem protestantium error primus hac via gradum iecit; sequitur modernistarum error; proxime atheismus ingredietur.

THE CAUSE OF MODERNISM

II.

40. To penetrate still deeper into Modernism and to find a suitable remedy for such a deep sore, it behoves Us, Venerable Brethren, to investigate the causes which have engendered it and which foster its growth. That the proximate and immediate cause consists in a perversion of the mind cannot be open to doubt. The remote causes seem to us to be reduced to two: curiosity and pride. Curiosity by itself, if not prudently regulated, suffices to explain all errors. .

Ad penitiorem modernismi notitiam, et ad tanti vulneris remedia aptius quaerenda, iuvat nunc, Venerabiles Fratres, causas aliquantum scrutari unde sit ortum aut nutritum malum. Proximam continentemque causam in errore mentis esse ponendam, dubitationem non habet. Remotas vero binas agnoscimus, curiositatem et superbiam.

Such is the opinion of Our Predecessor, Gregory XVI., who wrote:

A lamentable spectacle is that presented by the aberrations of human reason when it yields to the spirit of novelty, when against the warning of the Apostle it seeks to know beyond what it is meant to know, and when relying too much on itself it thinks it can find the fruit outside the Church wherein truth is found without the slightest shadow of error (Ep. Encycl. Singulari nos, 7 Kal. Jul. 1834)

41. If we pass from the moral to the intellectual causes of Modernism, the first which presents itself, and the chief one, is ignorance. Yes, these very Modernists who pose as Doctors of the Church, who puff out their cheeks when they speak of modern philosophy, and show such contempt for scholasticism, have embraced the one with all its false glamour because their ignorance of the other has left them without the means of being able to recognise confusion of thought, and to refute sophistry. Their whole system, with all its errors, has been born of the alliance between faith and false philosophy.

Quod si a moralibus causis ad eas quae ab intellectu sunt veniamus, prima ac potissima occurret ignorantia. Enimvero modernistae, quotquot sunt, qui doctores in Ecclesia esse ac videri volunt, modernam philosophiam plenis buccis extollentes aspernatique scholasticam, non aliter illam, eius fuco et fallaciis decepti, sunt amplexi, quam quod alteram ignorantes prorsus, omni argumento caruerunt ad notionum confusionem tollendamet ad sophismata refellenda. Ex connubio autem falsae philosophiae cum fide illorum systema, tot tantisque erroribus abundans, ortum habuit.

Methods of Propagandism

42. If only they had displayed less zeal and energy in propagating it! But such is their activity and such their unwearying capacity for work on behalf of their cause, that one cannot but be pained to see them waste such labour in endeavouring to ruin the Church when they might have been of such service to her had their efforts been better employed. Their articles to delude men’s minds are of two kinds, the first to remove obstacles from their path, the second to devise and apply actively and patiently every instrument that can serve their purpose. They recognise that the three chief difficulties for them are scholastic philosophy, the authority of the fathers and tradition, and the magisterium of the Church, and on these they wage unrelenting war. For scholastic philosophy and theology they have only ridicule and contempt. Whether it is ignorance or fear, or both, that inspires this conduct in them, certain it is that the passion for novelty is always united in them with hatred of scholasticism, and there is no surer sign that a man is on the way to Modernism than when he begins to show his dislike for this system. Modernists and their admirers should remember the proposition condemned by Pius IX: The method and principles which have served the doctors of scholasticism when treating of theology no longer correspond with the exigencies of our time or the progress of science (Syll. Prop. 13). They exercise all their ingenuity in diminishing the force and falsifying the character of tradition, so as to rob it of all its weight. But for Catholics the second Council of Nicea will always have the force of law, where it condemns those who dare, after the impious fashion of heretics, to deride the ecclesiastical traditions, to invent novelties of some kind . . . or endeavour by malice or craft to overthrow any one of the legitimate traditions of the Catholic Church; and Catholics will hold for law, also, the profession of the fourth Council of Constantinople: We therefore profess to conserve and guard the rules bequeathed to the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church by the Holy and most illustrious Apostles, by the orthodox Councils, both general and local, and by every one of those divine interpreters the Fathers and Doctors of the Church. Wherefore the Roman Pontiffs, Pius IV. and Pius IX., ordered the insertion in the profession of faith of the following declaration: I most firmly admit and embrace the apostolic and ecclesiastical traditions and other observances and constitutions of the Church. The Modernists pass the same judgment on the most holy Fathers of the Church as they pass on tradition; decreeing, with amazing effrontery that, while personally most worthy of all veneration, they were entirely ignorant of history and criticism, for which they are only excusable on account of the time in which they lived. Finally, the Modernists try in every way to diminish and weaken the authority of the ecclesiastical magisterium itself by sacrilegiously falsifying its origin, character, and rights, and by freely repeating the calumnies of its adversaries. To all the band of Modernists may be applied those words which Our Predecessor wrote with such pain: To bring contempt and odium on the mystic Spouse of Christ, who is the true light, the children of darkness have been wont to cast in her face before the world a stupid calumny, and perverting the meaning and force of things and words, to depict her as the friend of darkness and ignorance, and the enemy of light, science, and progress (Motu-proprio, Ut mysticum, 14 March, 1891). This being so, Venerable Brethren, no wonder the Modernists vent all their gall and hatred on Catholics who sturdily fight the battles of the Church. But of all the insults they heap on them those of ignorance and obstinacy are the favourites. When an adversary rises up against them with an erudition and force that render him redoubtable, they try to make a conspiracy of silence around him to nullify the effects of his attack, while in flagrant contrast with this policy towards Catholics, they load with constant praise the writers who range themselves on their side, hailing their works, excluding novelty in every page, with choruses of applause; for them the scholarship of a writer is in direct proportion to the recklessness of his attacks on antiquity, and of his efforts to undermine tradition and the ecclesiastical magisterium; when one of their number falls under the condemnations of the Church the rest of them, to the horror of good Catholics, gather round him, heap public praise upon him, venerate him almost as a martyr to truth. The young, excited and confused by all this glamour of praise and abuse, some of them afraid of being branded as ignorant, others ambitious to be considered learned, and both classes goaded internally by curiosity and pride, often surrender and give themselves up to Modernism.

Cui propagando utinam minus studii et curarum impenderent! Sed eorum tanta est alacritas, adeo indefessus labor, ut plane pigeat tantas insumi vires ad Ecclesiae perniciem, quae, si recte adhibitae, summo forent adiumento. Germina vero ad fallendos animos utuntur arte; primum enim complanare quae obstant nituntur, tum autem quae prosint studiosissime perquirunt atque impigre patientissimeque adhibent. Tria sunt potissimum quae suis illi conatibus adversari sentiunt: scholastica philosophandi methodus, Patrum auctoritas et traditio, magisterium ecclesiasticum. Contra haec acerrima illorum pugna. Idcirco philosophiam ac theologiam scholasticam derident passim atque contemnunt. Sive id ex ignoratione faciant sive ex metu, sive potius ex utraque causa, certum est studium novarum rerum cum odio scholasticae methodi coniungi semper; nullumque estindicium manifestius quod quis modernismi doctrinis favereincipiat, quam quum incipit scholasticam horrere methodum. Meminerint modernistae ac modernistarum studiosi damnationem, qua Pius IX. censuit reprobandam propositionem quae diceret (Syll. prop. 13): Methodus et principia, quibus antiqui doctores scholastici theologiam excoluerunt, temporum nostrorum necessitatibus scientiarumque progressui minime congruunt. Traditionis vero vim et naturam callidissime pervertere elaborant, ut illius monumentum ac pondus elidant. Stabit tamen semper catholicis auctoritas Nicaenae Synodi II., quae damnavit eos, qui audent … secundum scelestos haereticos ecclesiasticas traditionis spernere et novitatem quamlibet excogitare … aut excogitare parve aut astute ad subvertendum quidquam ex legitimis traditionibus Ecclesiae catholicae. Stabit Synodi Constantinopolitanae IV. professio: Igitur regulas, quae sanctae catholicae et apostolicae Ecclesiae tam a sanctis famosissimis Apostolis, quam ab orthodoxorum universalibus necnon et localibus Conciliis vel etiam a quolibet deiloquo Patre ac magistro Ecclesiae traditae sunt, servare ac custodire profitemur. Unde Romani Pontifices Pius IV. itemque huius nominis IX. in professione fidei haec quoque addi voluerunt: Apostolicas et ecclesiasticas traditiones, reliquasque eiusdem Ecclesiae observationes et constitutiones firmissime admitto et amplector. Nec secus quam de Traditione, iudicant modernistae de sanctissimis Ecclesiae Patribus. Eos temeritate summa traducunt vulgo ut omni quidem cultu dignissimos, ast in re critica et historica ignorantiae summae, quae, nisi ab aetate qua vixerunt, excusationem non habeat. Denique ipsius ecclesiastici magisterii auctoritatem toto studio minuere atque infirmare conantur, tum eius originem, naturam, iura sacrilege pervertendo, tum contra illam adversariorum calumnias libere ingeminando. Valent enim de modernistarum grege, quae moerore summo Decessor Noster scribebat : Ut mysticam Sponsam Christi, qui lux vera est, in contemptum et invidiam vocarent tenebrarum filii consuevere in vulgus eam vecordi calumnia impetere, et, conversa rerum nominumque ratione et vi, compellare obscuritatis amicam, altricem ignorantiae, scientiarum lumini et progressui infensam (Motu pr.”Ut mysticam”14 Martii 1891). Quae cum sint ita, Venerabiles Fratres, mirum non est, si catholicos homines, qui strenue pro Ecclesia decertant, summa malevolentia et livore modernistae impetunt. Nullum est iniuriarum genus, quo illos non lacerent: sed ignorantiae passim pervicaciaeque accusant. Quod si refellentium eruditionem et vim pertimescant: efficaciam derogant coniurato silentio. Quae quidem agendi ratio cum catholicis eo plus habet invidiae, quod, eodem tempore nulloque modo adhibito, perpetuis laudibus evehunt quotquot cum ipsis consentiunt; horum libros nova undique spirantes grandi plausu excipiunt ac suspiciunt; quo quis audentius vetera evertit, traditionem et magisterium ecclesiasticum respuit, eo sapientiorem praedicant; denique, quod quisque bonus horreat, si quem Ecclesia damnatione perculerit, hunc, facto agmine, non solum palam et copiosissime laudant, sed ut veritatis martyrem pene venerantur. Toto hoc, tum laudationum tum improperiorum strepitu, percussae ac turbatae iuniorum mentes, hinc ne ignorantes audiant inde ut sapientes videantur, cogente intus curiositate ac superbia, dant victas saepe manus ac modernismo se dedunt.

43. And here we have already some of the artifices employed by Modernists to exploit their wares. What efforts they make to win new recruits! They seize upon chairs in the seminaries and universities, and gradually make of them chairs of pestilence. From these sacred chairs they scatter, though not always openly, the seeds of their doctrines; they proclaim their teachings without disguise in congresses; they introduce them and make them the vogue in social institutions. Under their own names and under pseudonyms they publish numbers of books, newspapers, reviews, and sometimes one and the same writer adopts a variety of pseudonyms to trap the incautious reader into believing in a whole multitude of Modernist writers - in short they leave nothing untried, in action, discourses, writings, as though there were a frenzy of propaganda upon them. And the results of all this? We have to lament at the sight of many young men once full of promise and capable of rendering great services to the Church, now gone astray. And there is another sight that saddens Us too: that of so many other Catholics, who, while they certainly do not go so far as the former, have yet grown into the habit, as though they had been breathing a poisoned atmosphere, of thinking and speaking and writing with a liberty that ill becomes Catholics. They are to be found among the laity, and in the ranks of the clergy, and they are not wanting even in the last place where one might expect to meet them, in religious institutes. If they treat of biblical questions, it is upon Modernist principles; if they write history, it is to search out with curiosity and to publish openly, on the pretext of telling the whole truth and with a species of ill-concealed satisfaction, everything that looks to them like a stain in the history of the Church. Under the sway of certain a priori rules they destroy as far as they can the pious traditions of the people, and bring ridicule on certain relics highly venerable from their antiquity. They are possessed by the empty desire of being talked about, and they know they would never succeed in this were they to say only what has been always said. It may be that they have persuaded themselves that in all this they are really serving God and the Church - in reality they only offend both, less perhaps by their works themselves than by the spirit in which they write and by the encouragement they are giving to the extravagances of the Modernists.

Sed iam ad artificia haec pertinent, quibus modernistae merces suas vendunt. Quid enim non moliuntur ut asseclarum numerum augeant? In sacris Seminariis, in Universitatibus studiorum magisteria aucupantur, quae sensim in pestilentiae cathedras vertunt. Doctrinas suas, etsi forte implicite, in templis ad concionem dicentes inculcant; apertius in congressibus enunciant; in socialibus institutis intrudunt atque extollunt. Libros, ephemerides, commentaria suo vel alieno nomine edunt. Unus aliquando idemque scriptor multiplici nomine utitur, ut simulata auctorum multitudini incauti decipiantur. Brevi, actione, verbis, proelo nihil non tentant, ut eos febri quadam phreneticos diceres. Haec autem omnia quo fructu? Iuvenes magno numero deflemus, egregiae quidem illos spei, quique Ecclesiae utilitatibus optimam navarent operam, a recto tramite deflexisse. Plurimos etiam dolemus, qui, quamvis non eo processerint, tamen, corrupto quasi acre hausto, laxius admodum cogitare, eloqui, scribere consuescunt quam catholicos decet. Sunt hi de laicorum coetu, sunt etiamde sacerdotum numero; nec, quod minus fuisset expectandum, in ipsis religiosorum familiis desiderantur. Rem biblicam ad modernistarum leges tractant. In conscribendis historiis, specie adserendae veritatis, quidquid Ecclesiae maculam videtur aspergere id, manifesta quadam voluptate, in lucem diligentissime ponunt. Sacras populares traditiones, apriorismo quodam ducti, delere omni ope conantur. Sacros Reliquias vetustate commendatas despectui habent. Vano scilicet desiderio feruntur ut mundus de ipsis loquatur; quod futurum non autumant si ea tantum dicant, quae semper quaeve ab omnibus sunt dicta. Interea suadent forte sibi obsequium se praestare Deo et Ecclesiae: reapse tamen offendunt gravissime, non suo tantum ipsi opere, quantum ex mente qua ducuntur, et quia perutilem operam modernistarum ausibus conferunt.

REMEDIES

III.

44. Against this host of grave errors, and its secret and open advance, Our Predecessor Leo XIII., of happy memory, worked strenuously especially as regards the Bible, both in his words and his acts. But, as we have seen, the Modernists are not easily deterred by such weapons - with an affectation of submission and respect, they proceeded to twist the words of the Pontiff to their own sense, and his acts they described as directed against others than themselves. And the evil has gone on increasing from day to day. We therefore, Venerable Brethren, have determined to adopt at once the most efficacious measures in Our power, and We beg and conjure you to see to it that in this most grave matter nobody will ever be able to say that you have been in the slightest degree wanting in vigilance, zeal or firmness. And what We ask of you and expect of you, We ask and expect also of all other pastors of souls, of all educators and professors of clerics, and in a very special way of the superiors of religious institutions.

Huic tantorum errorum agmini clam aperteque invadenti Leo XIII. decessor Noster fel. rec., praesertim in re biblica, occurrere fortiter dicto actuque conatus est. Sed modernistae, ut iam vidimus, non his facile terrentur armis: observantiam demissionemque animi affectantes summam, verba Pontificis Maximi in suas partes detorserunt, actus in alios quoslibet transtulere. Sic malum robustius in dies factum. Quamobrem, Venerabiles Fratres, moras diutius non interponere decretum est, atque efficaciora moliri. Vos tamen oramus et obsecramus, ne in re tam gravi vigilantiam, diligentiam, fortitudinem vestram desiderari vel minimum patiamini. Quod vero a vobis petimus et expectamus, id ipsum et petimus aeque et expectamus, a ceteris animarum pastoribus, ab educatoribus et magistris sacrae iuventutis, imprimis autem a summis religiosarum familiarum magistris.

I. - The Study of Scholastic Philosophy

45. In the first place, with regard to studies, We will and ordain that scholastic philosophy be made the basis of the sacred sciences. It goes without saying that if anything is met with among the scholastic doctors which may be regarded as an excess of subtlety, or which is altogether destitute of probability, We have no desire whatever to propose it for the imitation of present generations (Leo XIII. Enc. Aeterni Patris). And let it be clearly understood above all things that the scholastic philosophy We prescribe is that which the Angelic Doctor has bequeathed to us, and We, therefore, declare that all the ordinances of Our Predecessor on this subject continue fully in force, and, as far as may be necessary, We do decree anew, and confirm, and ordain that they be by all strictly observed. In seminaries where they may have been neglected let the Bishops impose them and require their observance, and let this apply also to the Superiors of religious institutions. Further let Professors remember that they cannot set St. Thomas aside, especially in metaphysical questions, without grave detriment.

I. Primo igitur ad studia quod attinet, volumus probeque mandamus ut philosophia scholastica studiorum sacrorum fundamentum ponatur. Utique, si quid a doctoribus scholasticis vel nimia subtilitate quaesitum, vel parum considerate traditum; si quidcum exploratis posterioris aevi doctrinis minus cohaerens vel denique quoquo modo non probabile; id nullo pacto in animo est aetati nostrae ad imitandum proponi (Leo XIII., Enc. Aeterni Patris). Quod rei caput est, philosophiam scholasticam quum sequendam praescribimus, eam praecipue intelligimus, quae a sancto Thoma Aquinate est tradita; de qua quidquid a Decessore Nostro sancitum est, id omne vigere volumus, et qua sit opus instauramus et confirmamus, stricteque ab universis servari iubemus. Episcoporum erit, sicubi in Seminariis neglecta haec fuerint, ea ut in posterum custodiantur urgere atque exigere. Eadem religiosorum Ordinum moderatoribus praecipimus. Magistros autem monemus ut rite hoc teneant, Aquinatem deserere, praesertim in re metaphysica, non sine magno detrimento esse.

46. On this philosophical foundation the theological edifice is to be solidly raised. Promote the study of theology, Venerable Brethren, by all means in your power, so that your clerics on leaving the seminaries may admire and love it, and always find their delight in it. For in the vast and varied abundance of studies opening before the mind desirous of truth, everybody knows how the old maxim describes theology as so far in front of all others that every science and art should serve it and be to it as handmaidens(Leo XIII., Lett. ap. In Magna, Dec. 10, 1889). We will add that We deem worthy of praise those who with full respect for tradition, the Holy Fathers, and the ecclesiastical magisterium, undertake, with well-balanced judgment and guided by Catholic principles (which is not always the case), seek to illustrate positive theology by throwing the light of true history upon it. Certainly more attention must be paid to positive theology than in the past, but this must be done without detriment to scholastic theology, and those are to be disapproved as of Modernist tendencies who exalt positive theology in such a way as to seem to despise the scholastic.

Hoc ita posito philosophiae fundamento, theologicum aedificium extruatur diligentissime. Theologiae studium, Venerabiles Fratres, quanta potestis ope provehite, ut clerici e seminariis egredientes praeclara illius existimatione magnoque amore imbuantur, illudque semper pro deliciis habeant. Nam in magna et multiplici disciplinarum copia quae menti veritatis cupidae obiicitur, neminem latet sacram Theologiam ita principem sibi locum vindicare, ut vetus sapientium effatum sit, ceteris scientiis et artibus officium incumbere, ut ei inserviant ac velut ancillarum move famulentur (Leo XIII., Litt. ap. In magna 10 Dec. 1889). Addimus heic, eos etiam Nobis laude dignos videri, qui, incolumi reverentia erga Traditionem et Patres et ecclesiasticum magisterium, sapienti iudicio catholicisque usi normis (quod non aeque omnibus accidit) theologiam positivam, mutuato a veri nominis historia lumine, collustrare studeant. Maior profecto quam ante hac positivae theologiae ratio est habenda; id tamen sic fiat, ut nihil scholastica detrimenti capiat, iique reprehendantur, utpote qui modernistarum rem gerunt, quicumque positivam sic extollunt ut scholasticam theologiam despicere videantur.

47. With regard to profane studies suffice it to recall here what Our Predecessor has admirably said: Apply yourselves energetically to the study of natural sciences: the brilliant discoveries and the bold and useful applications of them made in our times which have won such applause by our contemporaries will be an object of perpetual praise for those that come after us (Leo XIII. Alloc., March 7, 1880). But this do without interfering with sacred studies, as Our Predecessor in these most grave words prescribed: If you carefully search for the cause of those errors you will find that it lies in the fact that in these days when the natural sciences absorb so much study, the more severe and lofty studies have been proportionately neglected - some of them have almost passed into oblivion, some of them are pursued in a half-hearted or superficial way, and, sad to say, now that they are fallen from their old estate, they have been dis figured by perverse doctrines and monstrous errors (loco cit.). We ordain, therefore, that the study of natural science in the seminaries be carried on under this law.

De profanis vero disciplinis satis sit revocare quae Decessor Noster sapientissime dixit: In rerum naturalium consideratione strenue adlaboretis: quo in genere nostrorum temporum ingeniosa inventa et utiliter ansa, sicut iure admirantur aequales, sic posteri perpetua commendatione et laude celebrabunt (Alloc. 7 Martii 1880). Id tamen nullo sacrorum studiorum damno; quod idem Decessor Noster gravissimis hisce verbis prosequutus monuit: Quorum causam errorum, si quis diligentius investigaverit, in eo potissimum sitam esse intelliget, quod nostris hisce temporibus, quanta rerum naturalium studia vehementius fervent, tanto magis severiores altioresque disciplinae defloruerint: quaedam enim fere in oblivione hominum conticescunt; quaedam remisse levitetque tractantur, et quod indignum est, splendore pristinae dignitatis deleto, pravitate sententiarum et immanibus opinionum portentis inficiuntur (Loc. cit.). Ad hanc igitur legem naturalium disciplinarum studia in sacris seminariis temperari praecipimus.

II - Practical Application

48. All these prescriptions and those of Our Predecessor are to be borne in mind whenever there is question of choosing directors and professors for seminaries and Catholic Universities. Anybody who in any way is found to be imbued with Modernism is to be excluded without compunction from these offices, and those who already occupy them are to be withdrawn. The same policy is to be adopted towards those who favour Modernism either by extolling the Modernists or excusing their culpable conduct, by criticising scholasticism, the Holy Father, or by refusing obedience to ecclesiastical authority in any of its depositaries; and towards those who show a love of novelty in history, archaeology, biblical exegesis, and finally towards those who neglect the sacred sciences or appear to prefer to them the profane. In all this question of studies, Venerable Brethren, you cannot be too watchful or too constant, but most of all in the choice of professors, for as a rule the students are modelled after the pattern of their masters. Strong in the consciousness of your duty, act always prudently but vigorously.

II. His omnibus praeceptionibus tum Nostris tum Decessoris Nostri oculos adiici oportet, quum de Seminariorum vel Universitatum catholicarum moderatoribus et magistris eligendis agendum erit. Quicumque modo quopiam modernismo imbuti fuerint, ii, nullo habito rei cuiusvis respectu, tum a regundi tum a docendi munere arceantur; eo si iam funguntur, removeantur: item qui modernismo clam aperteve favent, aut modernistas laudando eorumque culpam excusando, aut Scholasticam et Patres et Magisterium ecclesiasticum carpendo, aut ecclesiasticae potestati, in quocumque ea demum sit, obedientiam detrectando: item qui in historica re, vel archeologica, vel biblica nova student: item qui sacras negligunt disciplinas, aut profanas anteponere videntur. Hoc in negotio, Venerabiles Fratres, praesertim in magistrorum delectu, nimia nunquam erit animadversio et constantia; ad doctorum enim exemplum plerumque componuntur discipuli. Quare, officii conscientia freti, prudenter hac in re at fortiter agitote.

49. Equal diligence and severity are to be used in examining and selecting candidates for Holy Orders. Far, far from the clergy be the love of novelty! God hates the proud and the obstinate. For the future the doctorate of theology and canon law must never be conferred on anybody who has not made the regular course of scholastic philosophy; if conferred it shall be held as null and void. The rules laid down in 1896 by the Sacred Congregation of Bishops and Regulars for the clerics, both secular and regular, of Italy concerning the frequenting of the Universities, We now decree to be extended to all nations. Clerics and priests inscribed in a Catholic Institute or University must not in the future follow in civil Universities those courses for which there are chairs in the Catholic Institutes to which they belong. If this has been permitted anywhere in the past, We ordain that it be not allowed for the future. Let the Bishops who form the Governing Board of such Catholic Institutes or Universities watch with all care that these Our commands be constantly observed.

Pari vigilantia et severitate ii sunt cognoscendi ac deligendi, qui sacris initiari postulent. Procul, procul esto a sacro ordine novitatum amor: superbos et contumaces animos odit Deus! Theologiae ac Juris canonici laurea nullus in posterum donetur, qui statum curriculum in scholastica philosophia antea non elaboraverit. Quod si donetur, inaniter donatus esto. Quae de celebrandis Universitatibus Sacrum Consilium Episcoporum et Religiosorum negotiis praepositum clericis Italiae tum saecularibus tum regularibus praecepit anno MDCCCXCVI; ea ad nationes omnes posthac pertinere decernimus. Clerici et sacerdotes qui catholicae cuipiam Universitati vel Institute item catholico nomen dederint, disciplinas, de quibus magisteria in his fuerint, in civili Universitate ne ediscant. Sicubi id permissum, in posterum ut ne fiat edicimus. Episcopi, qui huiusmodi Universitatibus vel Institutis moderandis praesunt, curent diligentissime ut quae hactenus imperavimus, ea constanter serventur.

III. - Episcopal Vigilance Over Publications

50. It is also the duty of the bishops to prevent writings infected with Modernism or favourable to it from being read when they have been published, and to hinder their publication when they have not. No book or paper or periodical of this kind must ever be permitted to seminarists or university students. The injury to them would be equal to that caused by immoral reading - nay, it would be greater for such writings poison Christian life at its very fount. The same decision is to be taken concerning the writings of some Catholics, who, though not badly disposed themselves but ill-instructed in theological studies and imbued with modern philosophy, strive to make this harmonize with the faith, and, as they say, to turn it to the account of the faith. The name and reputation of these authors cause them to be read without suspicion, and they are, therefore, all the more dangerous in preparing the way for Modernism.

III. Episcoporum pariter officium est modernistarum scripta quaeve modernismum olent provehuntque, si in lucem edita nelegantur cavere, si nondum edita prohibere ne edantur. Item libri omnes, ephemerides, commentaria quaevis huius generis neve adolescentibus in Seminariis neve auditoribus in Universatibus permittantur : non enim minus haec nocitura, quamquae contra mores conscripta ; immo etiam magis quod christianae vitae initia vitiant. Nec secus iudicandum de quorumdam catholicorum scriptionibus, hominum cetero qui non malae mentis, sed qui theologicae disciplinae expertes acrecentiori philosophia imbuti, hanc cum fide componere nituntur et ad fidei, ut inquiunt, utilitates transferre. Hae, quia nullo metu versantur ob auctorum nomen bonamque existimationem, plus periculi afferunt ut sensim ad modernismum quis vergat.

51. To give you some more general directions, Venerable Brethren, in a matter of such moment, We bid you do everything in your power to drive out of your dioceses, even by solemn interdict, any pernicious books that may be in circulation there. The Holy See neglects no means to put down writings of this kind, but the number of them has now grown to such an extent that it is impossible to censure them all. Hence it happens that the medicine sometimes arrives too late, for the disease has taken root during the delay. We will, therefore, that the Bishops, putting aside all fear and the prudence of the flesh, despising the outcries of the wicked, gently by all means but constantly, do each his own share of this work, remembering the injunctions of Leo XIII. in the Apostolic Constitution Officiorum: Let the Ordinaries, acting in this also as Delegates of the Apostolic See, exert themselves to prescribe and to put out of reach of the faithful injurious books or other writings printed or circulated in their dioceses. In this passage the Bishops, it is true, receive a right, but they have also a duty imposed on them. Let no Bishop think that he fulfils this duty by denouncing to us one or two books, while a great many others of the same kind are being published and circulated. Nor are you to be deterred by the fact that a book has obtained the Imprimatur elsewhere, both because this may be merely simulated, and because it may have been granted through carelessness or easiness or excessive confidence in the author as may sometimes happen in religious Orders. Besides, just as the same food does not agree equally with everybody, it may happen that a book harmless in one may, on account of the different circumstances, be hurtful in another. Should a Bishop, therefore, after having taken the advice of prudent persons, deem it right to condemn any of such books in his diocese, We not only give him ample faculty to do so but We impose it upon him as a duty to do so. Of course, it is Our wish that in such action proper regard be used, and sometimes it will suffice to restrict the prohibition to the clergy; but even in such cases it will be obligatory on Catholic booksellers not to put on sale books condemned by the Bishop. And while We are on this subject of booksellers, We wish the Bishops to see to it that they do not, through desire for gain, put on sale unsound books. It is certain that in the catalogues of some of them the books of the Modernists are not unfrequently announced with no small praise. If they refuse obedience let the Bishops have no hesitation in depriving them of the title of Catholic booksellers; so too, and with more reason, if they have the title of Episcopal booksellers, and if they have that of Pontifical, let them be denounced to the Apostolic See. Finally, We remind all of the XXVI. article of the abovementioned Constitution Officiorum: All those who have obtained an apostolic faculty to read and keep forbidden books, are not thereby authorised to read books and periodicals forbidden by the local Ordinaries, unless the apostolic faculty expressly concedes permission to read and keep books condemned by anybody.

Generatim vero, Venerabiles Fratres, ut in re tam gravi praecipiamus, quicumque in vestra uniuscuiusque dioecesi prostant libri ad legendum perniciosi, ii ut exulent fortiter, contendite, solemni etiam interdictione usi. Etsi enim Apostolica Sedes ad huiusmodi scripta e medio tollenda omnem operam impendat; adeo tamen iam numero crevere, ut vix notandis omnibus pares sint vires. Ex quo fit, ut serior quandoque paretur medicina, quum per longiores moras malum invaluit. Volumus igitur ut sacrorum Antistites, omni metu abiecto, prudentia carnis deposita, malorum clamoribus posthabitis, suaviter quidem sed constanter suas quisque partes suscipeant; memores quae Leo XIII. in Constitutione apostolica Officiorum praescribebat: Ordinarii, etiam tamquam Delegati Sedis Apostolicae, libros aliaque scripta noxia in sua dioecesi edita vel diffusa proscribere et e manibus fidelium auferre studeant. Ius quidem his verbis tribuitur sed etiam officium mandatur. Nec quispiam hoc munus officii implevisse autumet, si unum alterumve librum ad Nos detulent, dum alii bene multi dividi passim ac pervulgari sinuntur. Nihil autem vos teneat, Venerabiles Fratres, quod forte libri alicuius auctor ea sit alibi facultate donatus, quam vulgo Imprimatur appellant: tum quia simulata esse possit, tum quia vel negligentius data vel benignitate nimia nimiave fiducia de auctore concepta, quod postremum in Religiosorum forte ordinibus aliquando evenit. Accedit quod, sicut non idem omnibus convenit cibus, ita libriqui altero in loco sint adiaphori, nocentes in altero ob rerum complexus esse queunt. Si igitur Episcopus, audita prudentum sententia, horum etiam librorum aliquem in sua dioecesi notandum censuerit, potestatem ultro facimus immo et officium mandamus. Res utique decenter fiat, prohibitionem, si sufficiat, ad clerum unum coercendo; integro tamen bibliopolarum catholicorum officio libros ab Episcopo notatos minime venales habendi. Et quoniam de his sermo incidit, vigilent Episcopi ne, lucri cupiditate, malam librarii mercentur mercem: certe in aliquarum indicibus modernistarum libri abunde nec parva cum laude proponuntur. Hos, si obedientiam detrectent, Episcopi, monitione praemissa, bibliopolarum catholicorum titulo privare ne dubitent; item potioreque iure si episcopales audiant: qui vero pontificio titulo ornantur, eos ad Sedem Apostolicam deferant. Universis demum in memoriam revocamus, quae memorata apostolica Constitutio Officiorumhabet, articulo xxvi.: Omnes, qui facultatem apostolicam consecuti sunt legendi et retinendi libros prohibitos, nequeunt idea legere et retinere libros quoslibet aut ephemerides ab Ordinariis locorum proscriptas, nisi eis in apostolico indulto expressa facta fuerit potestas legendi ac retinendi libros ab quibuscumque damnatos.

IV. - Censorship

52. But it is not enough to hinder the reading and the sale of bad books - it is also necessary to prevent them from being printed. Hence let the Bishops use the utmost severity in granting permission to print. Under the rules of the Constitution Officiorum, many publications require the authorisation of the Ordinary, and in some dioceses it has been made the custom to have a suitable number of official censors for the examination of writings. We have the highest praise for this institution, and We not only exhort, but We order that it be extended to all dioceses. In all episcopal Curias, therefore, let censors be appointed for the revision of works intended for publication, and let the censors be chosen from both ranks of the clergy - secular and regular - men of age, knowledge and prudence who will know how to follow the golden mean in their judgments. It shall be their office to examine everything which requires permission for publication according to Articles XLI. and XLII. of the above-mentioned Constitution. The Censor shall give his verdict in writing. If it be favourable, the Bishop will give the permission for publication by the wordImprimatur, which must always be preceded by the Nihil obstat and the name of the Censor. In the Curia of Rome official censors shall be appointed just as elsewhere, and the appointment of them shall appertain to the Master of the Sacred Palaces, after they have been proposed to the Cardinal Vicar and accepted by the Sovereign Pontiff. It will also be the office of the Master of the Sacred Palaces to select the censor for each writing. Permission for publication will be granted by him as well as by the Cardinal Vicar or his Vicegerent, and this permission, as above prescribed, must always be preceded by the Nihil obstat and the name of the Censor. Only on very rare and exceptional occasions, and on the prudent decision of the bishop, shall it be possible to omit mention of the Censor. The name of the Censor shall never be made known to the authors until he shall have given a favourable decision, so that he may not have to suffer annoyance either while he is engaged in the examination of a writing or in case he should deny his approval. Censors shall never be chosen from the religious orders until the opinion of the Provincial, or in Rome of the General, has been privately obtained, and the Provincial or the General must give a conscientious account of the character, knowledge and orthodoxy of the candidate. We admonish religious superiors of their solemn duty never to allow anything to be published by any of their subjects without permission from themselves and from the Ordinary. Finally We affirm and declare that the title of Censor has no value and can never be adduced to give credit to the private opinions of the person who holds it.

IV. Nec tamen pravorum librorum satis est lectionem impedire ac venditionem; editionem etiam prohiberi oportet. Ideo edendi facultatem Episcopi severitate summa impertiant. Quoniam vero magno numero ea sunt ex Constitutione Officiorum, quae Ordinarii permissionem ut edantur postulent, nec ipse per se Episcopus praecognoscere universa potest; in quibusdam dioecesibus ad cognitionem faciendam censores ex officio sufficienti numero destinantur. Huiusmodi censorum institutum laudamus quam maxime: illudque ut ad omnes dioeceses propagetur non hortamur modo sed omnino praescribimus. In universis igitur curiis episcopalibus censores ex officio adsint, qui edenda cognoscant: hi autem e gemino clero eligantur, aetate, eruditione, prudentia commendati, quique indoctrinis probandis improbandisque medio tutoque itinere eant. Ad illos scriptorum cognitio deferatur, quae ex articulis XLI. et XLII. memoratae Constitutionis venia ut edantur indigent. Censor sententiam scripto dabit. Ea si faverit. Episcopus potestatem edendi faciet per verbum Imprimatur, cui tamen praeponetur formula Nihil obstat, adscripto censoris nomine. In Curia romana, non secus ac in ceteris omnibus, censores ex officio instituantur. Eos, audito prius Cardinali in Urbe Pontificis Vicario, tum vero annuente ac probante ipso Pontifice Maximo Magister sacri Palatii apostolici designabit. Huius erit ad scripta singula cognoscenda censorem destinare. Editionis facultas ab eodem Magistro dabitur nec non a Cardinali Vicario Pontificis vel Antistite eius vices gerente, praemissa a censore, prout supra diximus, approbationis formula, adiectoque ipsius censoris nomine. Extraordinariis tantum in adiunctis ac per quam raro, prudenti Episcopi arbitrio, censoris mentio intermitti poterit. Auctoribus censoris nomen patebit nunquam, antequam hic faventem sententiam ediderit; ne quid molestiae censori exhibeatur vel dum scripta cognoscit, vel si editionem non probarit. Censores e religiosorum familiis nunquam eligantur, nisi prius moderatoris provinciae vel, si de Urbe agatur, moderatoris generalis secreto sententia audiatur: is autem de eligendi moribus, scientia de doctrinae integritate pro officii conscientia testabitur. Religiosorum moderatores de gravissimo officio monemus nunquam sinendi aliquid a suis subditis typis edi, nisi prius ipsorum et Ordinarii facultas intercesserit. Postremum edicimus et declaramus, censoris titulum, quo quis ornatur, nihil valere prorsus nec unquam posse afferri ad privatas eiusdem opiniones firmandas.

Priests as Editors

53. Having said this much in general, We now ordain in particular a more careful observance of Article XLII. of the above-mentioned Constitution Officiorum. It is forbidden to secular priests, without the previous consent of the Ordinary, to undertake the direction of papers or periodicals. This permission shall be withdrawn from any priest who makes a wrong use of it after having been admonished. With regard to priests who are correspondents or collaborators of periodicals, as it happens not unfrequently that they write matter infected with Modernism for their papers or periodicals, let the Bishops see to it that this is not permitted to happen, and, should they fail in this duty, let the Bishops make due provision with authority delegated by the Supreme Pontiff. Let there be, as far as this is possible, a special Censor for newspapers and periodicals written by Catholics. It shall be his office to read in due time each number after it has been published, and if he find anything dangerous in it let him order that it be corrected. The Bishop shall have the same right even when the Censor has seen nothing objectionable in a publication.

His universe dictis, nominatim servari diligentius praecipimus, quae articulo XLII. Constitutionis Officiorum- in haec verba edicuntur :Vivi e clero seculari prohibentur quominus, absque praevia Ordinariorum venia, diaria vel folia periodica moderanda suscipiant. Qua si qui venia perniciose utantur, ea, moniti primum, priventur. Ad sacerdotes quod attinet, qui correspondentium vel collaboratorumnomine vulgo veniunt, quoniam frequentius evenit eos in ephemeridibus vel commentariis scripta edere modernismi labe infecta; videant Episcopi ne quid hi peccent, si peccarint moneant atque a scribendo prohibeant. Idipsum religiosorum moderatores ut praestent gravissime admonemus: qui si negligentius agant, Ordinarii auctoritate Pontificis Maximi provideant. Ephemerides et commentaria, quae a catholicis scribuntur, quoad fieri possit, censorem designatum habeant. Huius officium erit folia singula vel libellos, postquam sint edita, opportune perlegere: si quid dictum periculose fuerit, id quam primum corrigendum iniungat. Eadem porro Episcopis facultas esto, etsi censor forte faverit.

V. - Congresses

54. We have already mentioned congresses and public gatherings as among the means used by the Modernists to propagate and defend their opinions. In the future Bishops shall not permit Congresses of priests except on very rare occasions. When they do permit them it shall only be on condition that matters appertaining to the Bishops or the Apostolic See be not treated in them, and that no motions or postulates be allowed that would imply a usurpation of sacred authority, and that no mention be made in them of Modernism, presbyterianism, or laicism. At Congresses of this kind, which can only be held after permission in writing has been obtained in due time and for each case, it shall not be lawful for priests of other dioceses to take part without the written permission of their Ordinary. Further no priest must lose sight of the solemn recommendation of Leo XIII.: Let priests hold as sacred the authority of their pastors, let them take it for certain that the sacerdotal ministry, if not exercised under the guidance of the Bishops, can never be either holy, or very fruitful or respectable (Lett. Encyc. Nobilissima Gallorum, 10 Feb., 1884).

V. Congressus publicosque coetus iam supra memoravimus, utpote in quibus suas modernistae opiniones tueri palam ac propagare student. Sacerdotum conventus Episcopi in posterum haberi ne siverint, nisi rarissime. Quod si siverint, ea tantum lege sinent, ut nulla fiat rerum tractatio, quae ad Episcopos Sedemve Apostolicam pertinent ; ut nihil preponatur vel postuletur, quod sacrae potestatis occupationem inferat ; ut quidquid modernismum sapit, quidquid presbyterianismum vel laicismum, de eo penitus sermo conticescat. Coetibus eiusmodi,quos singulatim, scripto, aptaque tempestate permitti oportet, nullus ex alia dioecesi sacerdos intersit, nisi litteris sui Episcopi commendatus. Omnibus autem sacerdotibus animo ne excidant,quae Leo XIII. gravissime commendavit (Litt. Enc. Nobilissima Gallorum, 10 Febr. 1884) : Sancta sit apud sacerdotes Antistitum suorum auctoritas: pro certo habeant sacerdotale munus, nisi sub magisterio Episcoporum exerceatur, neque sanctum, nec satis utile, neque onestum futurum.

VI - Diocesan Watch Committees

55. But of what avail, Venerable Brethren, will be all Our commands and prescriptions if they be not dutifully and firmly carried out? And, in order that this may be done, it has seemed expedient to Us to extend to all dioceses the regulations laid down with great wisdom many years ago by the Bishops of Umbria for theirs.

VI. Sed enim,Venerabiles Fratres, quid iuverit iussa a Nobis praeceptionesque dari, si non haec rite firmiterque serventur? Id ut feliciter pro votis cedat, visum est ad universas dioeceses proferre, quod Umbrorum Episcopi (Act. Consess. Epp. Umbriae, Novembri 1849, Tit. n., art. 6), ante annos plures, pro suis prudentissime decreverunt.

“In order,” they say, “to extirpate the errors already propagated and to prevent their further diffusion, and to remove those teachers of impiety through whom the pernicious effects of such dif fusion are being perpetuated, this sacred Assembly, following the example of St. Charles Borromeo, has decided to establish in each of the dioceses a Council consisting of approved members of both branches of the clergy, which shall be charged the task of noting the existence of errors and the devices by which new ones are introduced and propagated, and to inform the Bishop of the whole so that he may take counsel with them as to the best means for nipping the evil in the bud and preventing it spreading for the ruin of souls or, worse still, gaining strength and growth” (Acts of the Congress of the Bishops of Umbria, Nov. 1849, tit 2, art. 6).

Ad errores sic illi, iam diffusos expellendos atque ad impediendum quominus ulterius divulgentur, aut adhuc extent impietatis magistri per quos perniciosi perpetuenter effectus, qui ex illa divulgatione manarunt, sacer Conventus, sancti Caroli Borromaei vestigiis inhaerens, institui in unaquaque dioecesi decernit probatorum utriusque cleri consilium, cuius sit pervigilare an et quibus artibus novi errores serpant aut disseminentur atque Episcopum de hisce docere, ut collatis consiliis remedia capiat, quibus id mali ipso suo initio extingui possit, ne ad animarum perniciem magis magisque diffundatur vel quod peius est in dies confirmetur et crescat.

We decree, therefore, that in every diocese a council of this kind, which We are pleased to name “the Council of Vigilance,” be instituted without delay. The priests called to form part in it shall be chosen somewhat after the manner above prescribed for the Censors, and they shall meet every two months on an appointed day under the presidency of the Bishop. They shall be bound to secrecy as to their deliberations and decisions, and their function shall be as follows: They shall watch most carefully for every trace and sign of Modernism both in publications and in teaching, and, to preserve from it the clergy and the young, they shall take all prudent, prompt and efficacious measures. Let them combat novelties of words remembering the admonitions of Leo XIII. (Instruct. S.C. NN. EE. EE., 27 Jan., 1902): It is impossible to approve in Catholic publications of a style inspired by unsound novelty which seems to deride the piety of the faithful and dwells on the introduction of a new order of Christian life, on new directions of the Church, on new aspirations of the modern soul, on a new vocation of the clergy, on a new Christian civilisation. Language of this kind is not to be tolerated either in books or from chairs of learning.

Tale igitur Consilium, quod a vigilantia dici placet, in singulis dioecesibus institui quam primum decernimus. Viri, qui in illud adsciscantur, eo fere modo cooptabuntur, quo supra de censoribus statuimus. Altero quoque mense statoque die cum Episcopo convenient: quae tractarint decreverint, ea arcani lege custodiunto. Officii munere haec sibi demandata habeant. Modernismi indicia ac vestigia tam in libris quam in magisteriis pervestigent vigilanter: pro cleri iuventaeque incolumitate prudenter sed prompte et efficaciter praescribant. Vocum novitatem caveant meminerintque Leonis XVI. monita (Instruct.S.C.NN.EE.EE. 27 Ian. 1902). Probari non posse in catholicorum scriptis eam dicendi rationem quae, pravae novitati studens pietatem fidelium ridere videatur loquaturque novum christianae vitae ordinem novas Ecclesiae praeceptiones, nova moderni animi desideria, novam socialem cleri vocationem, novam christianam humanitatem, aliaque idgenus multa. Haec in libris praelectionibusque ne patiantur.

The Councils must not neglect the books treating of the pious traditions of different places or of sacred relics. Let them not permit such questions to be discussed in periodicals destined to stimulate piety, neither with expressions savouring of mockery or contempt, nor by dogmatic pronouncements, especially when, as is often the case, what is stated as a certainty either does not pass the limits of probability or is merely based on prejudiced opinion. Concerning sacred relics, let this be the rule: When Bishops, who alone are judges in such matters, know for certain the a relic is not genuine, let them remove it at once from the veneration of the faithful; if the authentications of a relic happen to have been lost through civil disturbances, or in any other way, let it not be exposed for public veneration until the Bishop has verified it. The argument of prescription or well-founded presumption is to have weight only when devotion to a relic is commendable by reason of its antiquity, according to the sense of the Decree issued in 1896 by the Congregation of Indulgences and Sacred Relics: Ancient relics are to retain the veneration they have always enjoyed except when in individual instances there are clear arguments that they are false or suppositions. In passing judgment on pious traditions be it always borne in mind that in this matter the Church uses the greatest prudence, and that she does not allow traditions of this kind to be narrated in books except with the utmost caution and with the insertion of the declaration imposed by Urban VIII, and even then she does not guarantee the truth of the fact narrated; she simply does but forbid belief in things for which human arguments are not wanting. On this matter the Sacred Congregation of Rites, thirty years ago, decreed as follows:These apparitions and revelations have neither been approved nor condemned by the Holy See, which has simply allowed that they be believed on purely human faith, on the tradition which they relate, corroborated by testimonies and documents worthy of credence (Decree, May 2, 1877). Anybody who follows this rule has no cause for fear. For the devotion based on any apparition, in as far as it regards the fact itself, that is to say in as far as it is relative, always implies the hypothesis of the truth of the fact; while in as far as it is absolute, it must always be based on the truth, seeing that its object is the persons of the saints who are honoured. The same is true of relics. Finally, We entrust to the Councils of Vigilance the duty of overlooking assiduously and diligently social institutions as well as writings on social questions so that they may harbour no trace of Modernism, but obey the prescriptions of the Roman Pontiffs.

Libros negligant, in quibus piae cuiusque loci traditiones aut sacrae Reliquiae tractantur. Neu sinant eiusmodi questione sagitari in ephemeridibus vel in commentariis fovendae pietati destinatis, nec verbis ludibrium aut despectum sapientibus, nec stabilibus sententiis, praesertim, ut fere accidit, si quae affirmantur probabilitatis fines non excedunt vel praeiudicatis nituntur opinionibus. De sacris Reliquiis haec teneantur. Si Episcopi, qui uni in hac re possunt, certo norint Reliquiam esse subditiciam, fidelium cultu removeant. Si Reliquiae cuiuspiam auctoritates, ob civiles forte perturbationes vel alio quovis casu, interierint; ne publice ea proponatur nisi rite ab Episcopo recognita. Praescriptionis argumentum vel fundatae praesumptionis tunc tantum valebit, si cultus antiquitate commendetur; nimirum pro decreto anno MDCCCXCVI. a sacro Consilio indulgentiis sacrisque Reliquiis cognoscendis edito, quo edicitur: Reliquias antiquas conservandas esse in ea veneratione in qua hactenus fuerunt, nisi in casu particulari certa adsint argumenta eas falsas vel supposititias esse. Quum autem de piis traditionibus iudicium fuerit, illud meminisse oportet: Ecclesiam tanta in hac re uti prudentia, ut traditiones eiusmodi ne scripto narrari permittat nisi cautione multa adhibita praemissaque declaratione ab Urbano VIII. sancita; quod etsi rite fiat, non tamen facti veritatem adserit, sed, nisi humana ad credendum argumenta desint, credi modo non prohibet. Sic plane sacrum Consilium legitimis ratibus tuendis, ab hinc annis xxx., edicebat (Deer. 2 Maii 1877): Eiusmodi apparitiones seu revelationes neque approbatas neque damnatas ab Apostolica Sede fuisse, sed tantum permissas tamquam pie credendas fide solum humana, iuxta traditionem quam ferunt, idoneis etiam testimoniis ac monumentis confirmatam. Hoc qui teneant, metu omni vacabit. Nam Apparitionis cuiusvis religio, prout factum ipsum spectat et relativa dicitur, conditionem semper habet implicitam de veritate facti: prout vero absoluta est semper in veritati nititur, fertur enim in personas ipsas Sanctorum qui honorantur. Similiter de Reliquiis affirmandum. Illud demum Consilio vigilantiae demandamus, ut ad socialia instituta itemque ad scripta quaevis de re sociali assidue ac diligenter adiiciant oculos, ne quid in illis modernismi lateat, sed Romanorum Pontificum praeceptionibus respondeant.

VII - Triennial Returns

56. Lest what We have laid down thus far should fall into oblivion, We will and ordain that the Bishops of all dioceses, a year after the publication of these letters and every three years thenceforward, furnish the Holy See with a diligent and sworn report on all the prescriptions contained in them, and on the doctrines that find currency among the clergy, and especially in the seminaries and other Catholic institutions, and We impose the like obligation on the Generals of Religious Orders with regard to those under them.

VII. Haec quae praecepimus ne forte oblivioni dentur, volumus et mandamus ut singularum dioecesum Episcopi, anno exacto ab editione praesentium litterarum, postea vero tertio quoque anno, diligenti ac iurata enarratione referant ad Sedem Apostolicam de his quae hac Nostra Epistola decernuntur, itemque de doctrinis quae in clero vigent, praesertim autem in Seminariis ceterisque catholicis Institutis, iis non exceptis quae Ordinarii auctoritati non subsunt. Idipsum Moderatoribus generalibus ordinum religiosorum pro suis alumnis iniungimus.

57. This, Venerable Brethren, is what we have thought it our duty to write to you for the salvation of all who believe. The adversaries of the Church will doubtless abuse what we have said to refurbish the old calumny by which we are traduced as the enemy of science and of the progress of humanity. In order to oppose a new answer to such accusations, which the history of the Christian religion refutes by never failing arguments, it is Our intention to establish and develop by every means in our power a special Institute in which, through the co-operation of those Catholics who are most eminent for their learning, the progress of science and other realms of knowledge may be promoted under the guidance and teaching of Catholic truth. God grant that we may happily realise our design with the ready assistance of all those who bear a sincere love for the Church of Christ. But of this we will speak on another occasion.

Haec vobis, Venerabiles Fratres, scribenda duximus ad salutem omni credenti. Adversarii vero Ecclesiae his certe abutentur ut veterem calumniam refricent, qua sapientiae atque humanitatis progressioni infesti traducimur. His accusationibus, quas christianae religionis historia perpetuis argumentis refellit, ut novi aliquod opponamus, mens est peculiare Institutum omni ope provehere, in quo, iuvantibus quotquot sunt inter catholicos sapientiae fama insignes, quidquid est scientiarum, quidquid omne genus eruditionis, catholica veritate duce et magistra, promoveatur. Faxit Deus ut proposita feliciter impleamus, suppetitias ferentibus quicumque Ecclesiam Christo sincero amore amplectuntur. Sed de his alias -

58. Meanwhile, Venerable Brethren, fully confident in your zeal and work, we beseech for you with our whole heart and soul the abundance of heavenly light, so that in the midst of this great perturbation of men’s minds from the insidious invasions of error from every side, you may see clearly what you ought to do and may perform the task with all your strength and courage. May Jesus Christ, the author and finisher of our faith, be with you by His power; and may the Immaculate Virgin, the destroyer of all heresies, be with you by her prayers and aid. And We, as a pledge of Our affection and of divine assistance in adversity, grant most affectionately and with all Our heart to you, your clergy and people the Apostolic Benediction.

Interea vobis, Venerabiles Fratres, de quorum opera et studio vehementer confidimus, superni luminis copiam toto animo exoramus ut, in tanto animorum discrimine ex gliscentibus undequaque erroribus, quae vobis agenda sint videatis, et ad implenda quae videritis omni vi ac fortitudine incumbatis. Adsit vobis virtute sua, Iesus Christus, auctor et consummator fidei nostrae; adsit prece atque auxilio Virgo immaculata, cunctarum haeresum interemptrix. Nos vero, pignus caritatis Nostrae divinique in adversis solatii, Apostolicam Benedictionem vobis, cleris populisque vestris amantissime impertimus.

Given at St. Peter’s, Rome, on the 8th day of September, 1907, the fifth year of our Pontificate.

Datum Romae, apud Sanctum Petrum, die VIII. Septembris MCMVII., Pontificatus Nostri Anno quinto.

PIVS PP. X.