localities;* of obstacles placed in the way of the re-assembly of councils and synods; † of the authorization requisite prior to the opening of a chapel; of religious communities protected, or suppressed, or authorized under certain reserves;-of certain measures of police, which hold less exclusively to the nature of concordats, such as restrictions put upon the right of heritage and property,— important restrictions, which preclude the church from becoming again proprietress of the soil, and from adding to her rights the weight and the importance which are given by territorial riches."§ It is in vain to remind us of the rule which renders every Papal brief, every nomination, every decretal of a general council, invalid in the case of France, unless inspected by the council of state, and inserted in the Bulletin of the Laws, with the exsequatur of the government.|| For these facts, interesting as they are, do not establish M. Simon's doctrine. Does the French state * Art. org. titre III. art. 45. + Art org. titre 1, art. 4. Art. org, titre III. art. 44. § La Liberté de Conscience pp. 15, 16. || Ibid, p. 16.—Mais ce qui a une importance capitale, c'est la règle qui rend tout bref du pape, toute nomination, tout décret d'un concile, général, caduc pour la France, s'il n'est visé par le conseil d'Etat, et inséré au Bulletin des lois, avec l' exsequatur du gouvernement. Cette règle donne au pouvoir civil autorité sur le dogme même. nominate its bishops? Certainly, it will be replied. But then it must also be shown that such a result necessarily arises to religion out of its connexion with the state, or the fact proves nothing adverse to our principle. Does the result arise normally and necessarily out of the connexion? Because if so, it will present itself universally, as a phenomenon of state-churchism; in a word, wherever a state-church has developed itself, there it will be found to have lost in this particular (its original independence. But, that the nomination of the bishops, or the chief pastors, by the crown, is no necessary sequence arising out of the church's relations with the state, appears from the fact that even in France, according to M. Simon's own showing, this power was not exercised prior to the reign of Francis I.* Nor was this power always excercised in our own country. It was "by statute 25 Henry VIII. c. 20. the ancient right of nomination was in effect restored to the crown." + While, in the Jewish state-church, no such right was ever vested in the crown; on the contrary, the priesthood and leviticate were hereditary. So that here, at least, was a state-religion, in which, the crown. could, in no sense, be said to hold the personnel in control. And So, in like manner, of the other various particulars, wherein the independence of the state-church in * "Ce droit de nomination se concevait à la rigueur sous Francois Ier, qui l'obtint du pape Léon X., et sous ses successeurs orthodoxes." + Blackstone Commentary on the Laws of England, Vol. III. pp. 60, 62. France, is said to have been compromised, it can be shown that they are by no means normal outgrowths from the principle in question. In England, for example, any church may have as many religious processions as it pleases; it may open churches or chapels without any authorization previously obtained from government (l'autorisation préalable); and may organize whatever communities or confraternities, it may think desirable, so that they be not revolutionary or seditious. The liberty of the church, therefore, is limited in none of these particulars. It is said, that in France, "the concordat has remitted the material existence of the clergy into the hands of the government." *. But this is not the case in England. Church property is not national property. The parochial clergy and very many ecclesiastical and eleemosynary foundations hold their lands in frankalmoign-a tenure not in the least feudal, but merely spiritual. In England the church, although a state-church, has both "la force et l'importance que donne la richesse territoriale." And as to "the authority of the state over doctrine," which, it is said, state-churchism places in the hands of the civil power; that is more imaginary than * Le concordat a remis l'existence matérielle du clergé aux mains du gouvernment."- Parisis-Cas de Conscience, p. 110. + Blackstone's Commentary on the Laws of England, (Stephen's Edit.) 1841. Vol. I. pp. 213, 214, 215. "Tenure in frankalmoign, in libera eleemosyna, or free alms, is that, whereby a religious corporation, aggregate or sole, holdeth lands of the donors to them, and their successors for ever. It was an old Saxon tenure, which continued under the Norman and subsequent dynasties. Tenants in frankalmoign were discharged of all other services except the trinoda necessitas; just as the Druids, among the ancient Britons had "omnium rerum immunitatem." real. M. Simon seriously assures us, that were the head of the state to refuse his homologation to the definition of an article of faith, the French clergy would be in the alternative, either of separating from Rome, or else of resigning the benefices which they hold under his protectorate. But, we demand, has such an issue ever occurred under the ordinary régime of protection? Is it not a fact, that all state churches, whenever and wherever established, have, despite this imaginary authority over doctrine, which the church is said to surrender to the state, maintained their own distinctive peculiarities-whether in doctrine, ritual, or polity? Although, according to M. Simon, the church lies open to this source of doctrinal interference, yet, is it not remarkable that in England, no dogmatic nor liturgic revision has ever taken place except through the intervention and with the concurrence of the Anglican clergy; but that, upon the contrary, the established church in these realms, has enjoyed entire exemption from such state interference from generation to generation? Is it not remarkable, that in each country, each church has preserved its individual peculiarities? In Germany and Sweden, for example, the churches have retained through successive centuries the characteristics, impressed upon them in the first instance by the great reformer, Luther? In France, in Spain, and in Austria, the churches have maintained unbroken unity with Rome; while in Russia, no ukase, either senatorial or imperial, has ever yet deprived the state-church of those distinctive marks which are known to pertain to the Greek-religion. In doctrine, as in other particulars, it has retained its identity with the mother-church, from which it was not separated until the reign of the last representative of the house of Rurick, Feodor Ivanovich, when the Patriarch of Constantinople Jeremy II., erected the archbishopric of Moscow into an independent patriarchate-an act approved by the Constantinopolitan church, since it was confirmed by a Byzantine Council held in February, 1593. But even could it be shown, that in the majority of instances, churches have actually lost, in some important particulars, their original independence, by their connexion with the state; yet, such fact would prove nothing adverse to such connexion; unless it could be shown, that it was its proper and natural sequence. That a church by its connexion with some civil government, should, to some degree lose its self-regulative power, is quite possible, if not probable; but the question arises, is not such an issue due entirely to an abuse of the state-church relations? Misdirected legislation in matters of religion furnishes no argument against such legislation when well-directed. In brief, the abuse furnishes no possible argument against the use of the state-church principle. But, M. Jules Simon derives another argument in favour of separation from the inequality of position, in which the régime of protection places the respective churches.* "Si les cultes," he writes, "ne sont pas traités par le pouvoir public avec la plus parfaite égalité, ils ne sont pas libres. L'existence d'un culte privilégié *La Liberté de Conscience, p. 18. |