ordant. "_Non esi pax impiis_." Peace could not be born
of unbelief. It could come only through the truth, even as health conquers
disease by the most trying curative process. Napoleon III. was the first
who openly resisted the "encroachments" of Rome, just as if they had
constituted the only danger to his throne. By a decree dated 1st January,
1865, he forbade the publication of the Encyclical and the Syllabus,
whilst he caused to be tried and condemned, as guilty of abuse, the
Archbishop of Besancon and the Bishop of Moulins, because they had read
the Encyclical in their pulpits. The other prelates of France so far
submitted as to avoid printing the obnoxious documents, lest their
printers should be uselessly compromised. Several bishops declared that
the Encyclical was already sufficiently published in their dioceses by the
voice of the press. They thus expressed the idea of the whole episcopate.
Pius IX. highly commended their zeal. "We must go back," he said, "to the
early ages of Christianity, in order to find an episcopal body that could
show such courage."

To persons accustomed to theological studies, it is sufficiently apparent
why each proposition of the "Syllabus" stands condemned. To others, cause
is shown in the consistorial allocutions, Encyclical and other letters
apostolical of the Holy Father, in relation to each proposition. Some
things must be interpreted by the conduct of the Pope himself. For
instance, what is said in regard to the liberty of public worship and of
the press must be read in the light of that reasonable tolerance which the
Popes were accustomed to exercise when they ruled at Rome as sovereign
Princes. There is no liberty without some restraint. The press, in this
respect, is in the same position as individuals. According to the laws of
all civilized lands, when it abuses its liberty and commits crime, it is
visited with severe punishment. The greater liberty which the press
enjoys, and must enjoy, in the present circumstances of the world, by no
means clashes with the condemnation of proposition 79 of the "Syllabus."
The press can no more be free to publish anything whatsoever, however
offensive it may be, than persons are free to perform such acts as
necessarily subject them, even in states where there is the greatest
attainable degree of liberty, to condemnation and punishment. If every
organized community possesses, as it certainly does possess, the right so
to stigmatize an offend