Page:The Great Encyclical Letters of Pope Leo XIII.djvu/131



CHRISTIAN CONSTITUTION OF STATES. 125

to both the issue of events has taught us only too fre- quently.

Doctrines such as these, which cannot be approved by human reason, and most seriously affect the whole civil order, Our predecessors the Roman Pontiffs (well aware of what their apostolic office required of them) have never allowed to pass uncondemned. Thus Gregory XVT. in his EncycUcal Letter Mirari vos, of date August 15, 1832, inveighed \\ith weighty words against the sophisms, which even at his time were being publicly inculcated â€” â€¢ namely, that no preference should be sho^vn for any par- ticular form of worship; that it is right for individuals to form their own personal judgments about religion; that each man's conscience is his sole and all-sufficing guide; and that it is lawful for every man to publish his own views, whatever they may be, and even to conspire against the State. On the question of the separation of Church and State the same Pontiff v/rites as follows: "Nor can We hope for happier results either for rehgion or for the civil government from the wishes of those who desire that the Church be separated from the State, and the concord between the secular and ecclesiastical authority be dissolved. It is clear that these men, who yearn for a shameless hberty, Hve in dread of an agreement which has always been fraught with good, and advantageous alike to sacred and civil interests." To the hke effect, also, as occasion presented itself, did Pius IX. brand publicly many false opinions which were gaining ground, and afterwards ordered them to be condensed in sum- mary form in order that in this sea of error CathoUcs might have a light which they might safely follow.^


 * It will suffice to indicate a few of them :

Prop. xix. The Church is not a true, perfect, and wholly inde- pendent society, possessing its ow7i unchanging rights conferred upon it by its Di\'ine Founder; but it is for the ciAal power to determine what are the rights of the Church, and the limits within which it may use them