physical power, the peace and tranquillity of society will be disturbed to the very foundation by each man's conflict with his neighbours. On the other hand, if there be more than one body thus pre-eminent in strength, peace and tranquillity will be hardly less disturbed by the conflict of such bodies with each other. Civil war, if prolonged for any length of time, is nothing less than an inchoate relapse into anarchy; and the same thing may truly be said of protracted invasion, so far as regards the particular region occupied by invaders.

2. A state of barbarism and anarchy is so manifestly and so very deeply injurious to men's best and highest interests, that no other proof is needed to show the Divine origin and sanction of civil government. Apart from the evils of anarchy in the intellectual and material order,* its moral results are most disastrous. Consider, e.g., how the Church's action is paralysed in proportion as civil tranquillity is disturbed. The orderly and regular training of children, nay, all systematic instruction of the flock, is rendered impossible. Approach to the sacraments, which our corrupt nature makes sufficiently distasteful in itself, encounters a fresh and tremendous obstacle in the prevalent turbulence. Self-will and hatred of restraint, those evil passions which poison the very principle of religious obedience, grow up with unrestrained violence.+ That interior recollectedness, which is the one atmosphere wherein grace raises the soul towards perfection, becomes a thousandfold more difficult, from the unceasing alarms and agitations of the period.

3. This one authority having so much physical power at its command as to render permanent resistance hopeless, is, of course, the civil government. It may be vested absolutely in one prince; or a number of persons may have an integral share in its administration. In the latter case, there must be certain defined relations between those who have a share in it, according to which the supreme authority is exercised; and the sum of all these various relations is the political constitution. In these islands, e. g., every member of parliament, nay, in strictness, every voter, possesses an integral share in the

* The temporal evils of anarchy are admirably stated in the introduction to S. Thomas's work "De Regimine Principum," and also by Molina, “ De Jure et Justitia," tract 2, d. 22, à n. 8. For the latter quotation we are indebted to Dr. Murray's most valuable Treatise on Education, in the second volume of his "Annual Miscellany."

+ Quamvis juris prudentia justitiam civilem non excedat, utpote quæ manum tantùm per se cohibeat, attamen ea maximè prodest ut justitia, moralis et spiritualis, quæ cor ipsum attingit, perficiatur.--Giunchi, “ De Intellectu," n. 67.

government-greater or less, of this or that kind, as the case may be. And here occurs one very obvious truth, which it is of extreme importance to remember. Whatever be the true principles on which the ruler, when absolute, should conduct his legislation and administration, these are the very same principles on which each individual ruler should exercise his political functions, in cases where the government is mixed. Or, to put it more specifically: if it be laudable that a Catholic absolute prince shall direct his legislation to his country's spiritual welfare, it must be laudable, in the same sense and in the same degree, that a Catholic member of the British Parliament shall give such votes as may best promote the spiritual well-being of the British empire. In the following pages, then, whenever we use the words "ruler," "civil governor," "prince,”-it must be understood that we include under that name every one possessing any share in the civil government of any state, so far as regards the exercise of his political functions.

4. From what has been said, it follows that the immediate end for which God has instituted civil government is the protection of person and property; or, as theologians sometimes express it, the preservation of exterior peace. A man, or body of men, who should give no protection to person or property, would have no claim to the very title of civil government. A civil government which should in some small degree preserve exterior peace, but should not have sufficient power to do so with reasonable completeness, is, as it were, an infant and immature government. A civil government which has power sufficient for that purpose but fails to use it, is ipso facto tyrannical and unjust. The preservation of exterior peace is a duty appertaining characteristically to the civil government; appertaining to it in a certain special sense, in which no other duties can possibly appertain to it.

It will be asked how this statement can be reconciled with our doctrine that the State's highest and most admirable function is to promote moral and spiritual good. The inquiry is most reasonable; and before concluding our article, we will give to it a definite and, we think, most satisfactory reply. Here we make but one remark. We have seen that the immediate end for which God instituted government is the preservation of exterior peace; but it by no means follows from this, that the ultimate end contemplated by God, even in its primary institution, is solely or chiefly the promotion of temporal good. Exterior peace is in itself, no doubt, a temporal good; but it is most vitally important, as we have already seen, for a country's spiritual advancement. Since, therefore, God regards spiritual good as immeasurably preferable to temporal, it follows that

His primary institution of civil government is chiefly, though of course not exclusively, for an ultimate spiritual end.

So much for preliminaries. In commencing our argument, we must bear in mind what we have already said on the necessity of avoiding Scylla no less than Charybdis. We will begin, therefore, by enumerating those methods of promoting spiritual good which (by consent of every Catholic) are beyond the State's competence; and in each case we will also give a reason for such incompetence.

The civil governor has no authority whatever of spiritual legislation. Under this term we include two things. Part of our meaning is, that he has no authority of ecclesiastical legislation. He has no authority to command what vestments or ceremonies shall be used at mass; or under what conditions priests shall be ordained; or who shall have power to hear confessions; &c., &c. The meaning and the ground of this statement are so obvious that another word would be superfluous.

But further, he has no authority of what we may call directly moral and religious legislation. Here it is necessary that our readers shall clearly understand the distinction which we intend between that directly moral and religious legislation which is beyond the civil governor's authority, and that indirectly moral and religious legislation which we maintain to be his highest and most admirable function. As this is one of those distinctions which are far better understood by example than by definition, we will give our examples first and our definitions afterwards.

Let us make, therefore, the supposition that the civil governor issues a law requiring me to say so many prayers at such periods, or to fast so often in the week, all for my soul's good; and let us further suppose that some theorist were to start up and maintain that I am bound in conscience to obey such a law. In proportion as I practically feel the sacredness of that charge with which God has entrusted me, the care of my own moral and spiritual culture; in proportion as I feel the absolute necessity, in order to that culture, of preserving the individuality of my own inward development free from all intrusive circumscription, -in that proportion should I protest most earnestly and emphatically against this atrocious theory. What! shall the sacred and intimate relations which exist between my Creator and myself be invaded by a meddling and intrusive government? Shall I be coerced as to my very prayers and meditations by an authority which thus takes on itself the most awfully responsible of duties, and does not so much as claim any special light or discernment for its due performance? Other tyrannies may cause,

and, in fact, have caused, much greater suffering than this; but none surely, was ever in principle so monstrous and outrageous.

It is most true, indeed, that the Catholic Church does claim the very authority which is here in question. And we fully admit that no one duly penetrated with such considerations as the above could legitimately submit to that authority, except for the Church's distinctive claims. No right-minded person, we say, could possibly submit to the Church's legislation on such subjects, were he not thoroughly convinced (as every Catholic, of course, is thoroughly convinced) that she has received a direct commission from God to enact such laws, and that she is accordingly guided by Divine light and grace, in a most special degree, towards the fulfilment of her office. And experience most amply bears out what the Catholic antecedently expects. For nothing is more remarkable than the singular moderation with which the Church has ever exercised her office of directly moral and religious legislation, and the ample scope given within her communion for every variety of individual development. On this head none can speak with greater feeling and emphasis, than those who have escaped from the crushing tyranny of some sect into the happy liberty of God's favoured children.*

Next, for our example of indirectly moral and religious legislation. Let us suppose that the government imposes on me a tax for the advancement of some purely spiritual end; an end, moreover, if you please, with which I am entirely out of sympathy. It is by no means enough to say that those objections which exist against the former kind of legislation, do not hold equally against this: they do not hold against it in the very slightest degree. I may grumble heartily, indeed, at having to pay such a tax; but it no more tends to interfere, ever so slightly, with my private religious practices and habits, than if the tax were levied for some unwise and expensive war against France or Russia. Nay, and it is just as probable that I may thoroughly dislike the secular as the spiritual purpose to which the public money is applied.

When we say, then, that the civil governor has no power of directly moral and religious legislation, we mean that he has no power of commanding religious or ascetical exercises

*Nothing contained in the text forbids us from thinking, and we do think, that under certain circumstances, and in a certain state of society, the civil governor may properly and usefully punish the transgressors of ecclesiastical laws. But we would earnestly maintain that such power should never be exercised except at the Church's solicitation, and, as it were, under her very

eye.

as such. Or, putting the matter more accurately, we may express it thus. He has no power of commanding interior acts either directly or indirectly;* nor yet of commanding such external acts as do not conduce to his end (whether that end be spiritual or temporal), except in virtue of the interior acts which should accompany them. Suppose, e.g., that the State enjoined the recitation (even in private) of certain prayers, or the observance of certain fasts, in order to obtain from God the most purely temporal good. Such legislation is directed to a purely temporal end; and yet every Catholic would at once feel that it is absolutely null and void. And this very fact, indeed, gives a certain indication that, according to Catholic instincts, the distinction between the two provinces of ecclesiastical and civil legislation turns rather on the intrinsic character of the thing commanded, than on the end to which the legislation is directed.†

Such, then, is the kind of legislation, which, by consent of all Catholics, is totally beyond the province of civil government. By "indirectly moral and religious legislation " is meant the making laws which do not partake at all of the above character; but which, nevertheless, are framed, directly and expressly, for promoting the moral and spiritual good of a community, or of some portion thereof. That this latter kind. of legislation is most fully within the State's province, and is, indeed, its most admirable function, is the main thesis of our article.

In regard, then, to the ground on which we base the State's incompetence for directly moral and religious legislation, two things should be observed. Firstly, we do not at all

*It is, perhaps, the more common opinion of theologians that the Church has not the power of directly commanding interior acts; but all teach that indirectly she may command most important ones. Thus, in commanding annual confession, she indirectly commands the eliciting, at least once a year, true attrition for sin. See Suarez, "De Legibus," 1. 4, c 12, 13. See also the 14th proposition condemned by Alexander VII., with Viva's comment. It is, perhaps, hardly worth while to mention that, in one (rather forced) sense, it may be said that the State can command indirectly interior acts; viz., that if it issues a just law and one not purely penal, certain interior acts become thereby morally evil; such e.g. as the intention of violating this law. See Suarez, "De Legibus " 1. 3, c. 13, n. 9. We have exactly given Suarez' doctrine ; but his expression is somewhat different. He says that civil laws can command interior acts indirectly, viz., in the sense above explained; but that ecclesiastical laws can command them also concomitantly, viz., as accompanying the external acts which she directly commands.

+ Licet potestas politica et ejus lex dicantur temporales ratione objecti, quia versantur circa temporalia et externa, tamen in se res sunt spirituales. -Bellarmine, "De Laicis," c. 11, n. 16.