Chapter IX: The Present State of the Case

We shall see this by considering its foundation. Who, then, first founded the Propaganda? The man who gave the ground upon which it stands, and the palace in which its work is carried on, was not an Italian. His money did not come from Italy. He was a Spaniard, and the representative at Rome of the Sovereign of the Netherlands. He formed the foundation of the whole institution, and all subsequent lands and moneys given to it were to carry out his intentions. His money was taken, and his intentions were solemnly guaranteed by the legitimate Sovereign of Rome at the period. They have been respected for two hundred and sixty years. I ask, can it be right now for the Italian Government to take his money, to sell his lands and houses, to put the proceeds of his funds into its own vinculated, uncertain bonds, and in the process steal the half of the proceeds. This seems to me such a gross perversion of international right, that I believe if Spain was not dominated over by the same sect of Freemasons as rule Italy, she would force the Italian Ministry and King Humbert to disgorge the property left by Monsignor John Baptist Vives for the Propagation of the Catholic Faith.

The injustice of the forced sale of the houses, lands, and rents left by a Spaniard for the extension of the Gospel, in trust to Italy, is only equalled by a like act of injustice done in the case of an Irishman, and a Priest of the City of Dublin, Father Michael Doyle, of the Church of SS. Michael and John, Arran Quay. Believing that his poor country would be benefited by having a certain number of its priests trained in the Urban College, he made an agreement with the authorities in Rome to give them a sum of money amounting to no less than £5,000 sterling, for the perpetual education of Irish-born missionary priests for Ireland. This was in the year 1825. His money was taken, and well invested by the Cardinals of the Propaganda; and since, several most useful and distinguished Irish priests have been educated on the proceeds. Here is surely, if ever there was, an international arrangement lawfully and equitably concluded. But what do the Italians do? They take this dead British subject’s money and the increase which belongs to it. They sell out the property bought for it. They put half the proceeds in their pocket, and the rest they leave in “vinculated” Italian bonds, to be disowned whenever the time comes to reduce or do away with income from that source in Italy.

I am certain that Mr. Gladstone, whose just and generous mind recoils from deceit of any kind, especially in purely commercial matters, would never have said that the Propaganda was an internal institution of Italy subject to Italian laws, if he duly considered the nature of these two cases of John Baptist Vives of Spain, and Father Michael Doyle, of Arran Quay, in the good City of Dublin. I believe he has not heard of them, for I remember Mr. Gladstone to have made a remark in reply, I think, to Mr. O’Donnell, that the general Italian character of the Propaganda, as he called it, could not be effected by a charitable “subscription.” Now, surely no man calls an ordinary commercial agreement a “subscription.” Father Doyle goes to the Cardinal Prefect of the Propaganda and makes a bargain with him for the perpetual education of a certain number of his countrymen—by the way he stipulated that some of them should be his relatives,—and the Cardinal Prefect takes his money. The Sovereign of Rome fiats the contract. That honest Sovereign carries it out to the letter. But the Italians come in who are not honest; they steal one-half of Father Doyle’s money; they put the other half in Italian “vinculations.” The result is that Father Doyle’s countrymen and relations cannot be educated. They—British subjects as they are—are simply robbed. And can it be believed by the generation that thinks nothing of many millions for the relief of a British subject in Khartoum, that when our Government is asked to make a gentle remonstrance to the Freemasons who have stolen Father Doyle’s hard earnings it answers:—“We really cannot interfere. The Italians are our very good friends. And as to the money of Father Doyle, why that was only a ‘subscription!’”

The case of Father Doyle is far from being the only case. To my knowledge, another ecclesiastic, now living, gave £1,000 for the education of a student in the Urban College. He meant most assuredly that his money should be spent for the one purpose he intended. When it comes out that £450 of his thousand has gone into the pocket of King Humbert and Co., and that £550 has been “vinculated” prior to being swallowed in the same way, will his Government in England turn round and tell him, “Oh, you only gave a subscription!” If Mr. Gladstone put his fortune into United States Bonds for the benefit of his family, and that the Government of the United States put half that fortune in its pocket and the rest into “vinculated” bonds of the same value as the vinculated Church bonds of Italy, how would our admirable Premier be pleased if told that his contract was only a “subscription?” It is exactly such “subscriptions” that the Freemasons of Italy have stolen by manipulating the moneys of British subjects. Is England afraid or powerless to demand redress? If so, _Tempora mutantur et nos mutamur in illis_ indeed!

And then, not only such money as that of Vives and Father Doyle, but all the money the Propaganda ever got was given for the benefit of countries which were outside Italy. The magnificent gifts of Cardinal Barberini, whose revenues, by the way, came from Church sources outside, as well as inside of Italy, were given for the benefit of the Eastern nations, whose various rites I have already referred to. Have these poor people not a right to the benefit of his legacy now, as well as at any past period? Does their weakness make the right anything the less? Twenty-three priests are educated for them at the present moment. When the estates which does this blessed work are sold for a song by Italian Freemasons to other Italian Freemasons—Freemasons alone are likely to buy them—and when half the proceeds are pocketted by the men in power, and the other half goes into “vinculated” Italian bonds, how will it fare with the poor Churches of the Orientals, dependent for educated Priests upon the grand charity of the Propaganda? Surely the ruthless horde of barbarians who have laid violent hands upon the States of the Church must be devoid of all shame, of all honour, of all manhood, when they descend to such mean sacrilege. I think a man would prefer, if he were a man, to command a troop of banditti than a Ministry and a Parliament capable of staining themselves with such mean, such cowardly, such heartless theft.

Now, if Melchites and Circassians, Copts and Maronites, are thus pillaged by the spoliation of the Propaganda, so to a far larger extent are the subjects of Her Most Gracious Majesty, Queen Victoria. And how? The funds of the Propaganda were given principally for the benefit of her Catholic subjects in Ireland, in Great Britain, in Canada, in Australia, in the vast extent of India, in the West Indian Islands, in the Army, in the Navy, in the great military stations, and wherever, in fact, she has subjects.

In all this vast expanse of territory, the government and care of the Catholic Church is carried on by the Propaganda. Not only are many of the clergy educated for these countries in its Urban and other subservient Colleges, but the whole education of the Clergy is looked after, the Bishops and Archbishops are selected, the Dioceses are regulated, Orphanages, Convents, Hospitals, Schools, and Institutions of beneficence are created and superintended by it. The whole work of the Catholic Church, in one word, is done through its instrumentality alone, in all the dominions of Her Britannic Majesty.

Now, if the existing funds of this institution are taken, the Catholic subjects of Her Majesty must supply others, and the action of the Italian Government in taking these funds, consequently, puts a heavy burden on the subjects of Her Majesty, which they ought not to be asked to bear, in order simply to put money into the Italian Treasury.

They ought not be asked to bear such a burden, because they have a strict right in justice to the funds of the Propaganda, which, even when they were not given by British subjects or by other than Italian subjects or Princes, were always absolutely given for the intention that the Propaganda may be able to do the work, of which the administration of the Catholic Church in the dominions of Her Majesty forms an integral portion.

It is evident, then, that no matter who gave the funds of the Propaganda, they were given lawfully and justly and according to the existing laws of Italy at the period, for our benefit. We received that benefit uninterruptedly for over two hundred years, and it is monstrous that we should be now deprived of a long existing, acknowledged right, by the violation of a clear international obligation on the part of the Italian Government.

Now to show that what I here state is perfectly just, a striking exemplification was given by one matter connected intimately with the spoliation I speak of. After the final sentence was pronounced by an Italian Masonic Court, the Italian Government proceeded, as a first step, to sell a College dependent upon the Propaganda. It happened, however, that this College did not belong to Copts or Maronites who had no Government to assert their rights, or to Catholic subjects of Her Majesty who might be told about “subscriptions.” It belonged to a people who, when abroad, know that they have a country ready to defend them against whoever may choose to rob them, insult them, or injure them. This College was possessed by the Catholics of a country called the United States of America—a country which happens to be pretty well known to the Italian Government. It is a Republic, supposed to be very Protestant, for it sends missionaries, largely supplied with Bibles and coppers for the “conversion” of poor people in the slums of some large towns in Italy. The Italian Masonic Government, who laugh at the anti-Catholic fanaticism of the English and American nations, thought, therefore, that it could deal with the Catholic subjects of the United States just as it might with the Catholic subjects of England. It considered that the bigotry of the zealous Methodism of New York and Massachusetts would be only too glad to hear that the resources of “Babylon” were being swallowed up by the Freemasons of Italy. Accordingly the walls of Rome were plastered with large placards announcing the sale of the North American College. Now, if the Italians had ever a right to sell any property belonging to the Propaganda, it was this College. It was a free gift on the part of Pius IX., for which no consideration whatever had been asked from the American Catholic people or Bishops. It was given only a few years previously, and had been before a Convent for religious. Moreover, the Pope never gave the fee-simple of the premises to the American Catholics. That remained vested absolutely in the Propaganda. The house was therefore as much the property of the Sacred Congregation as that which it received by legal transfer from Monsignor John Baptist Vives. In attempting its sale, the Italian Government thought rightly that no more favourable point could be seized upon by which to manifest their “right to do wrong” to the property of the Propaganda. The Catholics of America had given “no consideration.” There was no deed of transfer to them. That had been asked and refused by the Pope. The buildings were only a few years previously the property of the Papal Government, which the Freemasons supplanted. It was a test case, indeed. Let us see how it ended?

The moment the Cardinal Archbishop of New York heard that the College of his Catholic fellow-countrymen was about being touched by the Italians, he despatched his zealous and able Coadjutor at once to Washington with a letter to the Government of his country. That Government, Protestant as it was, at once recognised that a right lawfully acquired—though without consideration or subscription, or deed of transfer—of American Catholic citizens was about being violated. Did they talk about “Italian laws” or “subscriptions,” or “Italian internal affairs not concerning outsiders?” Did they seek, subterfuge, evasion, or delay for the purpose of making necessary inquiries? Far from it. Instantly there flashed across the Atlantic to the United States Embassy at the Quirinal, instructions to tell the Italian Government that it would touch the interests which American citizens had acquired in Rome at its peril, and demanding instant cessation of the sale of the North American College. There was no further parley about the matter. The Ministry of King Humbert knew that Uncle Sam had ironclads, and could make his arm felt upon Italian ports and in Italian waters. And what was the consequence? Well! Such American citizens as were then in Rome had the satisfaction of knowing that they had a country. They had the satisfaction of seeing, one hour after the ultimatum of the United States Government was received, a number of employes of the Italian Government running about the streets with ladders and water buckets and carefully rubbing away from the walls every vestige of the placards which announced the sale of the Catholic North American College of the Propaganda. The College remains, and will continue to remain unmolested, for the Americans have a Government not afraid of Italy.

In the face of this fact I assure you that we British subjects then in Rome felt and looked very small indeed. The Propaganda, we knew, belonged to us by rights as sacred certainly, as the portion of it exclusively appertaining to North America belonged to the United States. It was handed over for our benefit by legal deeds of transfer. It was ours. It had absolutely nothing to do with Italy. It had everything to do with us. It was always so considered by the Popes. Outside its own limits it has positively no jurisdiction in Rome or in any part of Italy. Its funds were contributed for us and to us, and to that portion of the world—always outside Italy—committed to its care. Its spoliation was clearly, even if none of our money was in it, a violation of our most justly acquired legitimate rights, unquestioned and in action for generations.

We expected some effort would be made by our rulers for us. We expected some representations, more gentle, perhaps, than those made by the President of the proud Union, but, as we thought, with some reason, not less efficacious, would be made by our Government. We confidently predicted that such would be the case. But we were bitterly disappointed. Our bishops in a body made representations far more energetic and explicit than Cardinal M’Closky or his Coadjutor made to Washington; but nothing came of them. The Catholics of the United States had a country. We felt that we had a country but in name, which for one reason or another treated us as stepchildren or outcasts, or worse and more humiliating still, was impotent to help us in our need.

Yet I believe that this policy of the Ministry would not, if the case were fully understood, be endorsed by our non-Catholic fellow-citizens. I am sure a very large proportion of them would deem the complete inaction of the Government, not wise, or sound policy—certainly not the policy of the British Lion that used to be, in cases of the violation of the rights of British citizens, so potent once. I am sure they will feel for and with us when they come to understand that it is a question of unjustifiable interference with rights lawfully acquired by British subjects in a foreign nation which are interfered with by that nation. I am sure of this from the feeling which would, I know, possess myself, if, for instance, the Government of France, or any other Government, induced any body of my Protestant fellow-countrymen to acquire in France legitimate interests for their religious necessities, and that upon the coming into power in that same country of another form of Government, monarchical or republican, such incoming government should have confiscated the rights so acquired by my fellow-countrymen. If, for instance, the Wesleyans of England established a training-school for health or other reasons, say in the south of France. If they were permitted to do so by the lawful government of that country. If the funds of that institution were recruited from Wesleyans in England, in the United States and all the world over. If the Wesleyans had the free use of that sanatorium for a number of years, and depended upon it for the training of their choice ministers, and for the management of their affairs. If their Moderator happened to be a Frenchman, and needed such an institution for the government of their body. If they could not dispense with it without serious loss and money outlay; and all this because the new Government of France had decided that such establishment should perish. If in pursuance of this law such Government proceeded, as France did actually at the Revolution, to confiscate all religious rights, and amongst the rest the legitimately acquired rights of English Wesleyans, I know that I would expect that the most strenuous efforts of the rulers of England should never cease until France was taught that while she might plunder the interests of Frenchmen as long as Frenchmen let her, she should desist from such a course when the question came of plundering the rights of English citizens lawfully and peacefully acquired. I am certain there is not a Catholic in the land who would not feel aggrieved at the injury thus inflicted on his unoffending fellow-citizens, and who would not move with them until the wrong insolently inflicted in defiance of international rights was redressed.