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charge of the priesthood. It is true that the apologists for the Holy See have given an emphatic denial of the truth of the assertion that the states of central Italy were exposed to an oppressive system, and that any considerable portion of the pope's subjects regarded the government with an unfriendly eye. Any labored discussion of the latter point is happily rendered quite superfluous by the incontestible result of their free and universal suffrage. It only remains for them to justify their action by proofs of its necessity. The most impartial observers, whether Protestants or enlightened Roman Catholics; with remarkable unanimity, pronounce against the fidelity of the "If papacy to the temporal dominions intrusted to its care. under this theocracy," says Lord Broughton, "there were a tolerably impartial administration of justice, if the lives, the persons, and the properties of the citizens were secured by any contrivance, it would be no great hardship to submit to the anomaly of receiving laws from the altar instead of the throne. But the reverse is notoriously the case; and there is scarcely a single principle of wise regulation acted upon or recognized in the Papal States."*

No grievance is more intolerable than the uncertainties and inconsistencies of the law. Rome possesses no code. With the restoration of Pius VII. came the abolition of the Code Napoleon, so admirable in most of its features. From this clear and simple system the courts of justice were forced to turn away, in order to bury themselves in a chaos of conflicting decrees and decisions, in choosing between which the judges must necessarily be guided chiefly by their own individual preferences. That judges appointed and removable at pleasure by the executive will prove no very strenuous upholders of popular rights, may be easily inferred, and is justified by the facts of recent Roman history. A current proverb in the Eternal City attributes only three days' force to any new law.† Certainly with laws and a judiciary both so pliable, it can be no difficult task to obtain verdicts and sentences agreeable to the party in power, in a country where no trial by jury is known.

"The first principles of criminal jurisprudence seem as much forgotten or unknown as if the French code had never been

* Lord Broughton's Italy, from 1816-54, (London, 1859,) vol. ii, p. 361.
+ Lafon.

the law of the land; a secret process, a trial by one judge and a sentence by another, protracted imprisonment, disproportioned judgments, deferred and disgusting punishments, all tend to defeat the ends of justice, and to create a sympathy with the culprit rather than a reverence for the law."* Among the instances cited in proof of these allegations is that of one of the reputed Carbonari, sentenced to fifteen years' imprisonment for shooting a police officer. Yet the edict itself asserts that "the crime has not been proven on account of the spirit of party prevalent in that province."+

If the defective and corrupt administration, both of government and justice, under which the pontifical states have been suffering, had been even of recent date, its burden might properly have appeared intolerable. But their discontent is the more justifiable, if we find the best authority for concluding that the same crushing weight has rested on the unfortunate sufferers with but little alleviation during entire centuries. The historian Rankè traces with impartial pen the condition of the States of the Church just two hundred years ago. The supreme court of the Rota abounded with the grossest abuses. An advocate, who had practiced in it for twenty-eight years, reckoned that there was not one of the auditors (judges) who did not receive five hundred scudi in presents every Christmas. "No less pernicious were the effects wrought by the recommendation of the court or of the great. There were even instances of the judge apologizing to the parties themselves for the unjust judgments he pronounced against them, declaring that justice was constrained by force." Judgment was inordinately procrastinated, and yet finally displayed every mark of precipitation. Appeals would have been all in vain. These and similar abuses arising in the supreme tribunal spread to all other and inferior courts, not only in the city but in the rest of the ecclesiastical states.

In a paper which has been preserved to our times, Cardinal Sacchetti represented in the most urgent manner to Pope Alexander VII. (in 1663) the oppression of the poor, who had none to help them, by the powerful; the perversion of justice through the intrigues of cardinals, princes, and retainers of the palace, the procrastination for years and tens of years of causes that might be dispatched in two days; the tyranny practiced against those who

* Lord Broughton's Italy, vol. ii, p. 362.

+ Ibid.

ventured to appeal from an inferior functionary to a superior; the impoundings and executions employed in exacting the taxes; cruel expedients, the only use of which was to make the sovereign hated, and his servants wealthy: "Sufferings, most holy father," he exclaims, "worse than those of the Israelites in Egypt. People not conquered by the sword, but which have become subject to the Roman see, either through the donations of princes, or of their own free accord, are more inhumanly treated than the slaves in Syria or in Africa. Who can behold this without tears ?"*

Another cotemporary writer adds the statement that "the people having no longer silver or copper, or linen or bedding, to satisfy the recklessness of the commissaries, will be obliged to sell themselves as slaves to pay the imposts laid by the Camera."+ Arbitrary as are said to have been the exactions of the provisional republican government instituted by the French in 1798, at a period of general commotion, when all the foundations of civil government were undermined, they were apparently but little more ruinous to industry and honest trade than the ordinary administration of the hoary government of the pretended successor of St. Peter in times of domestic tranquillity and peace.

Another grievance, perhaps no less effective in producing a universal discontent with the temporal government of these states, is the chronic disorder of the public finances. Long ago a cardinal compared the financial system of the popes to a wearied steed, constantly driven forward to new exertions by the application of the spur, until he falls down at last utterly exhausted. Unable to bring their expenditures within the resources at their command, the popes accumulated a debt, amounting, at the time of the first French occupation, to seventy millions of scudi, or dollars. This indebtedness was assumed by the French government, and in 1811 discharged by means of the moneys obtained from the sale of the clerical possessions.** Not profiting by its dearly purchased experience, the papal government was no sooner restored than it began again. to contract a new debt, which is now increased annually by about half a million dollars. Of the revenue, which in 1857

Rankè, History of the Popes in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, Book viii, sec. 11. + Ibid.

See Duppa's Subversion of the Papal Government in 1798, (London, 1807,) passim. § Lafon, p. 669. ** Lafon, p. 670.

| Lyman, p. 60.

was $14,566,000, the net proceeds were only $9,716,638, and of this $5,076,018 went to pay the interest on the national debt.*

The civil list, it has often been said, is small. The higher officials receive only very moderate salaries. Nor does a revenue of fourteen million dollars appear an insupportable griev ance in a kingdom of 3,124,758 inhabitants. It must, however, be considered, that much more money is expended in support of the government than would appear from the statistics. The cardinals, for instance, derive their salaries in great part from benefices and fees, which do not come into the public account, but are paid directly to them. Every cardinal must have an income of at least $4,000 from his benefices, and those who do not reach this sum receive $100 a month from the public treasury, commonly known as "the cardinal's pittance." The very large landed estates of the clergy, of relig ious corporations, and of monastic fraternities, themselves exempted from the burden of taxation, largely augment the proportion which is borne by the remainder of the lands. If commerce were active and profitable, if manufactures flourished, the Roman States with their former extent might sustain even the double of the imposts of four years ago. But trade is fettered with so many injurious restrictions that it is quite insig nificant. The imports of 1853 rose only to about $12,000,000, and the exports were a third less. Yet the customs and excises in 1857 were about $8,000,000, of which more than one quarter was consumed in the collection.‡

By no means is the healthy development of the resources of the Papal States more restrained than by the objectionable methods employed for the raising of the revenue. Many of the most essential articles of food are farmed out as monopolies, and enrich private capitalists more than the state. Still more objectionable are the lotteries managed by government, and bringing in three or four hundred thousand dollars as clear gain into the public coffers.

No wonder need then be felt that a large portion of the central states of Italy have with alacrity renounced their allegiance to a government that has testified so little regard for the main* Encyclopedia Britannica, 8th edition; art., Papal States. + Dictionnaire des Cardinaux, Intr.

Encyclopedia Britannica, ibid.

tenance of their civil and religious rights, and for the advancement of their material and intellectual interests. The same conviction of the infidelity of the papacy to its trust moved the inhabitants of Bologna, in 1830, to make an ineffectual attempt to shake off the temporal sway of the newly elected pope, Gregory XVI. Long ages had proved the want of adaptation of a theocracy such as that claimed by the pope to answer the just demands of the people. Education was neglected. Common schools existed for the most part on paper only; though it was claimed by the friends of the government that they were established in every commune able to support them. The eight universities-two of them, those of Bologna and of the Sapienza at Rome, among the very oldest in Europe-were shorn of their ancient independence; and the attempt was made to place them as effectually under priestly control as were already the inferior schools. The laymen saw their small territory burdened with heavy imposts in order to support a host of ecclesiastics,* who, without contributing anything to its support, claimed the exclusive management of the government; while at the same time another class of the population, the Jews, were subjected to studied indignity, and were even refused a place in the census of their native country.

The philanthropist may well be allowed to pray that the extraordinary privileges enjoyed by the inhabitants of the provinces lately annexed to the kingdom of Victor Emanuel may soon be extended to every Italian community, and that the Protestant world may recognize in the present time the most fitting opportunity for giving to Italy the pure word of God which has so long been denied to her.

* 21,415 regular clergy, 16,905 secular clergy—that is, 38,320, or one to every 80 inhabitants; not including 8,000 nuns.

FOURTH SERIES, VOL. XIII.-24

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