Nebraska Advertiser

CARDINAL MANNING'S VIEW.
"The Individual Has No Right of
Thought or Belief."
New York Times.
The managers of the North American
Review, with that effort of producing
effect that is characteristic of them,
have brought the name of
"Henry Edward Cardinal Manning,
Archbishop of Westminster,
into
juxtaposition with that of Mr. Froude,
in a discussion of what may be broadly
stated as the Catholic question.
The article with which the February
number of that periodical opens is
not, however, a reply to Mr. Froude,
nor does it show any evidence of a
knowledge that his articles or anything
from his pen relating to the subject
are in existence. Neither is the
Cardinal's production aimed at any
practical question, and notwithstanding
his statement in the opening sentence,
that his object is "not speculative
and abstract, but strictly concrete and
practical," its substance is purely
speculative and abstract. And,
besides, there is nothing new in it. It
puts in form once more what has been
repeatedly formulated by authority
quite as high as his, that arrogant
assumption of the Roman Catholic
Church of the divine right to dominate
all human institutions, regardless of
differences of faith among men. It is
pervaded throughout with the tone of
the ecclesiastical autocrat, who
declares that the Church has all truth
and all righteousness in its keeping,
and what is not of it is anathema. The
Cardinal Archbishop favors us with a
disquisition on human society, which,
he says, is natural, and involves
authority and obedience, the authority
being from God. Then he depicts, as
its parallel in the supernatural sphere,
the Church of Rome, wherein is also
authority and obedience, and the
authority is from God. Next he argues
that the organization of the Church
should pervade and control that of
society, not only its private, but in its
public or governmental functions.
Modern society, he admits, has fallen
away from this wedlock, and is
straying to its ruin, while the Church
keeps on, without mutation or
mutability, abating no jot of its rights
or claims. From all this it follows that
what we call progress, the very spirit
and essence of modern civilization, is
enmity to God and offense against His
Church. The individual has no rights
of thought or belief, the people have
no rights of self-direction or
self-government, and cannot, therefore,
delegate any sovereignty. Authority is
from above, and secular rule must be
by divine right, but it should be
informed and controlled by the
spiritual rule, which is also of divine
right, but in a strictly supernatural
sense, and has a living and perpetual
embodiment in the Bishop of Rome,
the Primate of the Holy See. In all
this we find nothing new, nor is there
any fresh application of it to practical
affairs, except in the hint that the
Church must control the education of
all citizens of all countries, in order to
the fulfilment of her exalted mission
as the ruler in affairs spiritual and
affairs temporal. It is a magnificent
assumption, a superb arrogance, but it
is something out of date. In the three
centuries during which human society
has been tearing itself from the
destroying embrace of this succubus of
Rome, the world has moved. It has
raised barriers of science, of reason,
of political freedom, to secure the
ground as it has been conquered, and
the fulminations of the pontiff and his
agents fall upon ears that grow more
and more heedless.
Noticing the prevailing disposition
of the Democratic papers to quote the
action of the electoral commission as
an excuse for the Democratic action
in Maine, the Cincinnati Commercial
bursts out with :