ion his verdict; "nobody is allowed to appeal to the future
oecumenical council;"[5220] He has not only "a priority by right,
an office of inspection and of direction; he holds again priority
of jurisdiction, a full and supreme power of jurisdiction over the
universal Church,... ", "the total plenitude of this supreme power," not
indirectly and extraordinarily, but "directly and ordinarily, over all
churches and over each one of them, over all pastors and all believers,
over each believer and each of the pastors."--Read this in the Latin:
each word, through its ancient root and through its historic vegetation,
contributes to strengthening the despotic and Roman sense of the text;
the language of the people which invented and practiced dictatorship had
to be employed for the affirmation of dictatorship with that precision
and that copiousness, with that excess of energy and of conviction.

II. The Bishops and their new Situation.

The bishop in his diocese.--Change of situation and role.
--Depreciation of other local authorities.--Diminution of
other ecclesiastical authorities.--Decline of the chapter
and the jurisdiction.--The bishop alone dispenses rigors and
favors.--Use of displacement.--Second-class clergy subject
to military discipline.--Why it submits to this.

The change brought about in the condition and role of the bishop was
not less grave. Along with the court noblesse and great ecclesiastical
property, we see the prelate of the old regime disappearing by degrees,
the younger son of a noble family, promoted by favor and very young,
endowed with a large income and much more a man of the world than of
the Church. In 1789, out of 134 bishops or archbishops, only 5 were of
plebeian origin; in 1889, out of 90 bishops or archbishops there are
only 4 of them nobles;[5221] previous to the Revolution, the titular of
an Episcopal see enjoyed, on the average, a revenue of 100,000 francs;
at the present day, he receives only a salary of from 10,000 to 15,000
francs.[5222] In place of the grand seignior, an amiable and magnificent
host, given to display and to entertaining the best company, keeping
an open table in his diocese when he happens to be there, but generally
absent, an habitue of Paris or a courtier at Versailles, we see another
stepping forward to take his seat He is bearing the same title, is
a personage whose habits and origins are different, a resident
administrator, mu