Page:The Great Encyclical Letters of Pope Leo XIII.djvu/208



202 CHIEF DUTIES OF CHRISTIANS AS CITIZENS.

The like disposition and the same order should prevail in every Christian State by so much the more that the political prudence of the Pontiff embraces diverse and multiform things; for it is his charge not only to rule the Church, but generally so to regulate the actions of Christian citizens that these may be in apt conformity to their hope of gaining eternal salvation. Whence it is clear that in addition to the complete accordance of thought and deed, the faithful should imitate the practical pohtical wisdom of the ecclesiastical authority. Now the administration of Christian affairs immediately under the Roman Pontiff appertains to the bishops, who, although they attain not to the summit of pontifical power, are nevertheless truly princes in the ecclesiastical hierarchy; and as each one of them administers a particular church, they are "as master-workers ... in the spiritual edifice," * and they have members of the clergy to share their duties and carry out their decisions. Every one has to regulate his mode of conduct according to this constitution of the Church, which it is not in the power of any man to change. Con- sequently, just as in the exercise of their episcopal author- ity the bishops ought to be united with the Apostolic See, so should the members of the clergy and the laity live in close union with their bishops. Among the prelates, indeed, one or other there may be affording scope to

evident that the subject, so far as subject, and the servant, so far as servant, ought neither to control nor govern, but rather to be controlled and governed. Prudence, then, is not the special virtue of the servant, so far as servant, nor of the subject, so far as subject. But because any man, on account of his character of a reasonable being, may have some share in the government according to the degree which reason determines, it is fitting that in such proportion he should possess the virtue of prudence. Whence it manifestly results that prudence exists in the ruler, as it exists in the archi- tect with regard to the building he has to construct, just as is ex- pressed in the sixth Book of Morals, and that it exists in the sub- ject, as it exists in the workman employed in the comstruction." â€” St. Thomas, 2a 2ae, Q. ii. 2, 4, 7, art. 12. 'St. Thomas, Quodlib. 1, xiv.