Fathers of the church an adhesion to specific rules of conduct in all the most intricate situations, which may happen: humbly trusting, that if the exigency should arise, we shall be directed by that divine spirit, which is promised to the Pastors, succes. sors of the Apostles. We therefore pledged ourselves to those general principles, which are now indispensable and essential: not doubting, but your determination and luminous examples, will, under God, be our direction in the disastrous times and events so likely to ensue." Extract of a Letter from the Right Rev. J. O. Plessis*, The "I had the honor of receiving in last September, your Grace's letter of the 28th of May and 5th of June. judgment of the Irish Bishops against Blanchard has not yet appeared here, I propose to procure them from Keating & Co. as well as the other publications relating to the discussion, which he has raised. hey have been * The name of this respectable Prelate brings to mind the circumstances of his appointment to the See of Quebec. narrated to me by persons so worthy of credit, a profess fully to believe them: at the same time I candidly avov, I have no historical document to offer for vouching for the particulars. Were it even a supposed case, it would furnish as practical an elucidation of what a Veto would be, if once vested in the government, as true. There died at Bruxelles, about twenty years ago, a Franciscan Friar of the name of Kildea. He was from the North of Ireland: was a man of talent and information, a handsome person, of pleasing address and engaging manners. Whilst at Prague, where there was an Irish establishment of his order, he became acquainted with many of his countrymen, officers in the German service. He was sure to captivate all his acquaintance; and whether by external recommendation and favor, or by the internal sympathy and esteem of bis community, he was appointed guardian of Nothing, my Lord, conduces more to the honor of the Irish clergy, than the firmness, with which you have rejected the Veto, which would go to ruin the discipline of your respect. able church. If this packet should go by Newfoundland, I will take the liberty of encreasing it, by adding to it my pastoral, which I have just published respecting the detention of our Holy Fa ther the Pope. Every body here has read with interest the resolutions entered into in February last, by the clergy of Ireland, relative to his Holiness." that Convent much earlier in life than is usual to name superiors of religious houses. He obtained the licence of his superiors to come over to` the English Mission. In traversing Germany he wanted not recommendations; amongst other places, where he was honourably and gladly received was the Court of Prince Meclingburgh Strelitz, who gave him letters of very warm recommendation to his Sister, our Queen. On his arrival in London he handed them over to Lord Sydney, then Secretary of State: and was, on the next day, honoured with an audience of her Majesty, who received him with the most gracious affability, but frankly declared her inability to second the warm wishes of her Brother to a person of his cloath in England: but offered to procure for him strong recommendations to some ambassador at the Court of London, in whose retinue he might return to the, continent, and be sure of Ecclesiastical preferment in the state of that ambassador's Sovereign. Father Kildea replied, that he wished to follow up his vocation, by rendering service to his Majesty's subjects. He was told, that prejudices against popery ran so high, that it would be less prudent for his Majesty, however inclined to grant him a private audience. He frequently waited upon, and was always favourably received by Lord Sydney. From want of any better provision he was named Chaplain to the Portugueze Ambassador in South-Street. He had not long done duty in that situation, when the report of the death of the Catholic Bishop of Quebec carried him to his friend Lord Sydney, who gave him every encouragement to hope for the nomination to that vacant See. This was, according to Columbanus, an honest exertion without intrigue. Father Kildea, who was naturally convivial, and never very reserved, did not conceal his expectations from his friends. It came to the knowledge of Dr. Hussey, the late Catholic Bishop of Waterford, who had long been in the confidential intimacy of Lord Sydney. He represented to his Lordship, that, with TRANSLATED FROM AN AUTHENTICATED COPY IN FRENCH. "Pastoral of my Lord Bishop of Quebec, for public prayers. JOSEPH OCTAVE PLESSIS, By the mercy of God, and the grace of the holy apostolical See, Bishop of Quebec, &c. &c. to the clergy and faithful of our diocese, health and benediction. "The last letters, which we have received from Europe, confirming the reports frequently repeated in the public news. papers, leave no room for doubting about the captivity of our Holy Father the Pope, in the fortress of Savona, in Italy. It is after having been unjustly and ignominiously despoiled of his estates, separated, notwithstanding his protestations, from the college of Cardinals and his most confidential servants: after having seen taken from him, under his own eyes, the out derogating from the amiable character of his friend Father Kildea, he seriously submitted to the consideration of his Majesty's Government, that upon the first vacancy of a Catholic Bishoprick, to which any temporalities were annexed, and the nomination or recommendation to which naturally therefore devolved on the Crown, it would be wise and political to be very choice in the nomination, and to shew every tender regard to the wishes, habits, and principles of his Majesty's new Catholic Canadian subjects: that amongst the many amiable and valuable attainments of Father Kildea, the episcopal qualifications described by St. Paul, were not the most prominent. Lord Sydney attended to the advice of Doctor Hussey, and a person of the country respectable for his edifying conduct, knowledge, and evangelical zeal, was recommended by his Majesty, and the above prelate was thereupon confirmed by the Pope. Lord Sydney, who loved a joke, after having allowed, that he was really fond of Father Kildea, and had given him encouragement, laughed and said, he thought he had been doing a good-natured thing to all parties: for he did not doubt, but that Father Kildea, if appointed, would soon have a nursery, and then the See would become hereditary, and they would be eased of any further importunity or trouble about future nominations. archives of the Roman church, and having for a long time wandered from town to town, that the sovereign Pontiff is at last sent back, at least since the last nine months, to this prison, without any human comfort, deprived, as we are as sured, even of the attendance of his servants, and reduced to the same rations with the other prisoners of every description, who participate of his misery. Who, my dearly beloved brethren, could have brought upon the head of the church, a treatme t of this sort? Has he be trayed the interests of religion? Has he abused the authority, which as a sovereign prince he had over his own subjects? or as the first pastor over the faithful? Has he been in the least wanting in any deference and compliance, which Christian princes might expect at his hands? Alas! you know it. His great piety, his moderation, his mildness, his condescension strongly repel any such injurious surmize. He is persecuted for his justice and there my dearly beloved brethren, is what ought to console us, at the view of the sufferings he undergoes. No man is ignorant of the sacrifices, which this worthy Vicar of Jesus Christ has made, to bring back into the fold the sheep, which the French revolution had driven astray. He negociated with the French government, the very moment he fancied he could perceive a hope of re-establishing the ancient worship of a nation heretofore so dear unto the Church. He sent into France a Legate a latere to settle and arrange the principal provisions of the Concordat of 1801. Thither he repaired two years after in person, braving all human dangers and terrors, and appeared in the midst of the unbelievers, who composed the court of the new Monarch, like a lamb in the midst of wolves, having no other policy, than the simplicity of the gospel, stopping the mouths of the most unbridled impious by his meekness and extraordinary modesty, and forcing the apostates themselves to do homage to his eminent virtues. However grateful the head of the French government ought to have been for such a journey without a precedent for several centuries, undertaken at his request, and in part for his interest, he anly repaid this paternal condescension of the Sovereign Pon. tiff with ingratitude and cruelty. Scarcely was he returned to Italy, than he pretended to compel him, not only to shut the ports of his states against all the vessels belonging to the ene. mies of France, but even to declare open hostility to all nations, with which France should think fit to make war. The just horror tror of the common Father of all the Faithful at such a proposition, and his peremptory refusal to accede to it, was the pretext, which the ambitious conqueror made use of to rifle him without mercy, and without any respect for his dignity, which he could not disclaim, though he sought to debase it. The perfidious hand, which had just been overturning the thrones of Naples and Etruria, and was preparing to do the same by those of Spain and Portugal, has dared by a sacri. legious attempt to raise himself also against the chair of St. Peter. The Pope has been stricken out of the list of sovereign princes: his dominions seized upon his person insulted and proscribed. My dearly beloved brethren, the innocence of the just is the torment of the wicked, because it silently. reproaches them with their excesses. Let us not wonder, that they seek to oppress and get rid of him. Circumveniamus justum, quoniam contrarius est operibus nostris, & improperat nobis peccata. (Sap. 2. 12.) I True it is, that the overthrowing of the temporal power of the Pope in no manner affects his authority, as head of the universal church: that the apostolical See is not the work of man: and consequently that man cannot destroy it: that it's divine Foun "der established it upon a solid rock: (Mat. 16, 18) that the Sovereign pontificate, being the centre of Catholic unity, will Fast as long as the church, that is to say, to the consummation of ages: (Mat. 28, 20) in short, that the persecution, which the vicar of Christ suffers in the present moment, his captivity, his sufferings, even his death, should they end in that, far from being in itself a real evil, are, on the contrary, a mark |