austed. It keeps alive
under the appearances by which it is concealed. The inexhaustible volcano
is at work amongst us, not only since 1848, but for three hundred years.
The abjuration of law, and even of all principle of right, is only the
form or expression; the essence of our malady is the denial of God and His
Church. The revolution is apostacy, the disunion of the nation is schism,
its anarchy Atheism. Whoever, like myself, has witnessed the public
negotiations of Germany, knows full well that the political struggle was,
for a long time, and particularly for the last three years, a contest
between the religious confessions. Such evolutions of evil possess a
certain life, although it be only that which leads to dissolution. They
spring one from another, and the new growth is always an improvement on
that by which it was preceded. I say it with sorrow. The strife of
political parties comes at last to be civil war, which, in its turn,
becomes a religious war, and such war soon grows to a war of unbelief
against Faith, of antichrist against Christ. The end is not uncertain.
Christ will be victorious; for it is appointed that the power of hell
shall not prevail." In such a state of things the first duty of German
Catholics is that they be united. It is necessary that the German church
should remain in intimate union with the Holy Apostolic See, relinquishing
all pretension to be a separate National Church.

The aspiration of our author, so warmly expressed in 1850, that the German
Episcopate should, in mind and action, be one body in the nation, acting
and suffering together, appears, in these later days, to have been
realized. It was also his firm conviction that it behooved them to labor
to obtain complete liberty of action for the church, particularly in
forming an exemplary clergy, both in the lesser and greater seminaries, as
well as in those higher institutions, the German universities. Neither
should the laity fail in the fulfilment of all Christian and charitable
duties.

(M25) It is well known that, in ancient times, no countries in the world
were more Catholic than Spain and and Portugal. The great wealth and power
and glory to which they attained was, one would say, a mark of Heaven's
approbation. Wealth, however, is a dangerous possession. In the countries
referred to it induced corruption and degeneracy. Principles of anarchy
came to be disseminated, devolution on revolution followed. The authority
of the