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472 same topics. When he left the desk his place might be taken by some great original thinker or scholar, who would display all the results of his meditations without regard for their tendency, and without considering what effects they might have on the weak. He was obliged often to draw attention to books lacking the Catholic spirit, but indispensable to the deeper student. Here, therefore, the system of secrecy, economy, and accommodation was rendered impossible by the competition of knowledge, in which the most thorough exposition of the truth was sure of the victory, and the system itself became inapplicable as the scientific spirit penetrated ecclesiastical literature in Germany.

In Rome, however, where the influences of competition were not felt, the reasons of the change could not be understood, nor its benefits experienced; and it was thought absurd that the Germans of the nineteenth century should discard weapons which had been found efficacious with the Germans of the sixteenth. While in Rome it was still held that the truths of science need not be told, and ought not to be told, if, in the judgment of Roman theologians, they were of a nature to offend faith, in Germany Catholics vied with Protestants in publishing matter without being diverted by the consideration whether it might serve or injure their cause in controversy, or whether it was adverse or favourable to the views which it was the object of the Index to protect. But though this great antagonism existed, there was no collision. A moderation was exhibited which contrasted remarkably with the aggressive spirit prevailing in France and Italy. Publications were suffered to pass unnoted in Germany which would have been immediately censured if they had come forth beyond the Alps or the Rhine. In this way a certain laxity grew up side by side with an unmeasured distrust, and German theologians and historians escaped censure.

This toleration gains significance from its contrast to the severity with which Rome smote the German philosophers like Hermes and Günther when they erred.