r the
Church of Ireland. In a letter to the archbishops and bishops of that
country, he commends their zeal in promoting Catholic education, and
concurs with them in pointing out the dangers of mixed schools. In the
same letter the Holy Father earnestly entreats the venerable pastors of
the Irish Church to pray that the designs of the wicked may not succeed,
that it would please God to bring to naught the machinations of those
misguided men who, by their false teachings, endeavor to corrupt the
people everywhere, and to overthrow, if that were possible, the Catholic
religion. At the same time, it was appointed that the feast of Saint
Patrick, the Patron Saint of Ireland, should be celebrated according to a
higher rite.

(M105) The anti-President Juarez had succeeded in establishing himself at
Vera Cruz, whilst Miramon was recognized by Mexico, after General Zuloago,
as the successor of Santa Anna. Juarez was a revolutionist and persecutor
of the church; Miramon, a conservative and friend of religion. As proof of
the tyranny of the former, may be cited a decree which he published in
July of this year (1859). This decree, which aimed at nothing less than
the destruction of religion, and was, at the same time, a cruel outrage on
the Catholic nation of Mexico, accounts for the earnestness and
determination with which Pius IX., a little later, as has already been
shown, insisted that the Emperor Maximilian should adopt a policy friendly
to the church, and in harmony with the wishes of the great majority of the
Mexican people. Such policy, if only followed in time, would have so
strengthened the hands of Maximilian that, in all probability, he would
have been able to hold his ground when most unchivalrously abandoned by
his faint-hearted ally. No doubt the anti-president claimed that he was a
reformer of the church. And surely, indeed, he was, if it was reform to
suppress all religious societies whatsoever, to rob the clergy of their
property, and that so completely as to reduce them to mendicancy. But let
the decree speak for itself:

Art. 1. All property administered under divers titles, by the regular or
secular clergy, whether real or personal, whatever its name or object, is
henceforth the property of the nation.

Art. 3. There shall be complete independence between affairs of state and
such as are purely ecclesiastical. The government will confine itself to
protecting the public worship of the Catholic religion the sa