of it. Protestants have gained, probably, the freedom to prosecute their missions in the East, without hindrance from the civil and political power of the Greek bishops and clergy, and this they will consider a gain, though we consider it none, for we prefer the Greek schism to any form of Protestantism. The non-united Greek church is not a church under excommunication, and none in its communion are to be accounted schismatics, except by their own voluntary act or adhesion to the schis:n. The communion itself, since the council of Florence, is not, unless we are misinformed, schismatic, and only those members of it who personally reject the supremacy of the Holy See incur the guilt of schism. We can easily believe that great numbers in that communion may be saved, as they have the priesthood and the sacraments. We must therefore prefer the Greek church to any of the Protestant establishments. Besides, Protestant missionaries only make those they detach from the Greek church infidels, or men of no religion. The Catholic Church, we presume, has also gained the same freedom that is accorded to Protestants. This is a real gain, and may open the way to the regeneration of the East. If, as we have seen asserted, but are not sure, the sultan has granted freedom to Mussulmans to become Christians, and renegades to return to the Christian faith, some progress has been made. An edict to this effect has indeed been published, granting freedom to the renegade to return to the Christian faith, which before could not be done without incurring the penalty of death, and even to Mussulmans born such to become Christians; but it may be revoked at any moment. What is really wanting to the regeneration of the East, and disposing forever of the eastern question, is the reunion of the eastern schismatics with Rome, and full liberty of propagandism for the Catholic Church. The former effected and the latter conceded, the church would deal with the Turks as she did with the Franks in Gaul, the Goths in Spain, and the Longobards in Italy. She would send her religious among them, and in a brief time convert the majority of them to the Catholic religion. Turkey become Catholic, would become a power able to stand alone, and to resist any advance of Russia towards Constantinople, or the Persian Gulf. What is really wanting to preserve the balance of power is a Catholic East. Under a Mussulman or a non-Catholic East, Russia or any civilized power occupying the position of Russia, must always be menacing to it, and likely to disturb the balance of power.

VOL. XVI-30

And it is here we find our only fault with the admirable work of Mr. Dix, placed at the head of this article. Mr. Dix understands well that Turkey was never within the pale of the international law of Christendom, and that the attempt of the allies to bring her within it is in violation of what has hitherto been the public law of Christian nations, as well as an outrage upon the Christian conscience. He understands well that Christian nations ought not for the purpose of maintaining a balance of power, or for any other purpose, to go to war to sustain and perpetuate the Mussulman power, and that to do so is to complicate, not to settle the eastern question. He properly contends that the allies, if they interposed at all in eastern affairs, should have interposed on the side of the Christians against the Turks, not by any means, as they have done, on the side of the Turks against the Christians. The right to the empire, he justly maintains, is in the Christian population of Turkey, and that true policy as well as justice was to seek the adjustment of the balance of power, by restoring to them the eastern empire. Thus far we agree with him in principle; but he thinks that the East might be regenerated by means either of the Greek schism or his own favorite Anglicanism. But neither will answer, though either is certainly preferable to Mahometanism. Anglicanism has no regenerative power, and it is unable to prevent England herself from lapsing into heathenism and barbarism. The Greek schism, professed by Russia, is precisely that which lost the Greek empire, and deprived the Greek church of the power to convert its barbarian conquerors. Cut off from the centre of unity, and deprived of the means of renewing its life at its central fountain, it was powerless before the Turkish conquerors, and has done nothing for four hundred years towards christianizing them, or even winning their respect for the Christian religion. It is idle, therefore, to suppose that it would have any power to regenerate the East, and maintain in its vigor a new Christian empire, composed, as it would necessarily be, of a multitude of jarring and conflicting races. Neither Anglicanism nor the Greek schism has of itself sufficient vitality to sustain a state, and neither affords any bond of union. The Russian is better than the Turk, but his conquest of the Turk would not settle the eastern question, because he would sustain only a schismatic religion, which would place him in hostility to the West.

It is this fact that a schismatic or non-Catholic religion

will not regenerate the East, and that Russia can give it only a schismatic religion, which constitutes the principal complication in the case. The interposition of the allies in favor of the Christian population of the Ottoman empire, instead of the interposition of Russia, would not have removed the difficulty, for the great mass of that population are schismatics, and cannot furnish the necessary elements of a united and homogeneous Christian state. There is no real redemption of the East possible, till the Greek schism is healed, and the patriarch of Constantinople returns to his duty. The reunion of the schismatics of the Greek rite, which would be soon followed by that of the Armenian rite, and the conversion of the Nestorians and Jacobites, would prepare the way for the reëstablishment of the eastern empire at Constantinople, and the regeneration of all Asia. To this reunion Great Britain is more opposed than even Russia, and we have no reason to suppose that France is very earnest for it. The Holy Father is laboring for it, and if the allies favored it in good faith, and showed that they sympathized with the Christians rather than with the Turks, it could be easily effected. This effected, and the Greek church restored to its vitality, and strengthened by its union with the West, the Turks would be converted, and the beautiful regions they have desolated for four hundred years would once more teem with a rich and flourishing Christian population, and assume their original rank in the Christian world. A new Christian empire would arise, like that of the Franks in the West in the eighth and ninth centuries, which would be a sufficient counterpoise to that of Russia.

Whether this will be effected or not, is more than we are able to say; but this much we will venture to say, that till it is effected the eastern question is not settled. As long as Russia has the sympathy of the Christians of the East, and as long as she can appear to be fighting for the cross against the crescent, she will extend herself in the direction of the Ottoman empire, and threaten the European balance of power. The present peace we apprehend will prove only a truce. Russia believes that it is her mission to drive out the Turks, and restore the cross on St. Sophia; and unless others fulfil that mission, she will continue to prosecute it. She will be right in doing so, for the Turk never has acquired, and never can acquire, by the law of Christendom, so long as he remains a stranger to the Christian faith, the right to hold a Christian people in subjection. As against

the Turk Russia is Christian, and has the right to interpose in behalf of the subjugated Christian population.

As regards the East, the war has, therefore, in our view, settled nothing; and a few years may see the same complication reappear. In the West nothing is settled, except the personal position of the emperor of the French. England has lost Russia as her ally; she had already lost Austria; and she can, in a war with France, count upon no European ally. Austria has also lost Russia as her ally, and will find it no easy matter to sustain herself between France and Prussia. We see not how Austria is to sustain herself in Italy, or what is to prevent Napoleon III. from adopting and carrying out the Italian policy, shadowed forth in his famous letter to Colonel Edgar Ney. She cannot rely on Russia to come to her aid; and that policy so much accords, in so far as it is hostile to Catholicity, with the policy of England, that she can rely just as little on the assistance of Great Britain. If the newspaper reports of conversations held by the plenipotentiaries at the close of the peace conferences, on Italian affairs, are worthy of any confidence, an Italian question is likely soon to arise of far more difficult solution than that of the East. But we are not disposed to credit these reports; and we can hardly believe that Austria consented to assume her attitude towards Russia without being reassured as to her Italian possessions by France and Great Britain.

There are questions enough in regard to the East yet remaining, to make the allies chary of raising Italian questions. Since the foregoing part of this article was written, we have seen the treaty, as published in the newspapers. We see that the government of the Danubian principalities is not settled by the treaty; and there is room for a very pretty quarrel, as to what it shall be. We perceive also, that the hatti-houmayoun, conceding equal civil rights to the Christians of the empire, though communicated to the congress, is not placed under the protection of the five powers, and that these powers disclaim all right to the protectorate of the Christian population, or to interpose between them and the sultan. Thus they have sacrificed the Christians, and left to Russia all the reason for interposing her protection she ever had. The two great questions which led to the war, that of the principalities and that of the Christians of the Ottoman empire, remain in fact open questions, and questions on which the allies themselves are not unlikely to

disagree. Russia will hardly escape being drawn into the quarrel; and we may in a very few years find Turkey flying to her for protection against her present occupants.

But it is idle to speculate on the future. Just at present much depends on the emperor of the French, whose policy or conduct it is never easy to foresee, because he avails himself of events, and never shapes them. He uses men and events, but has not the order of intellect that controls them. We confess we have little confidence in him, and always apprehend more evil than good from any policy he may adopt. We do not oppose his dynasty, for France cannot be a republic, and we prefer the Bonapartes to the Bourbons. But we do not believe it wise for Catholic journalists to eulogize him. Were we a Frenchman in France, we should support the emperor; for there would be there no alternative. As an American, and a Catholic, we believe it would be incompatible with our duty both to our church and to our country to eulogize him. Catholicity is opposed to revolutionism, to anarchy, if you will, to red-republicanism; but she is not the friend of cæsarism, or despotism in any form. She accepts in every country the political order she finds established, and does the best she can with it; but there can be no doubt that the order most agreeable to her wishes, and most consonant to her principles, is the order which is established in this country. To eulogize Louis Napoleon, and to declaim against American democracy in the name of Catholicity, does not become a Catholic journalist in America, and is simply justifying the Knownothing movement. Men placed in responsible situations, in times like these, should weigh well the words they speak. The church is conservative, but she is not a cæsarist.

In conclusion, we must say, the eastern war and the recent peace alike prove to us, that European statesmen take no enlarged views, and act only in reference to temporary questions. Liberal and religions considerations have no weight with them; and they seek only the material interests of the moment. Louis Napoleon is laboring with great success to materialize France, and to destroy the interest of Frenchmen in great moral, social, political, and spiritual questions. If his policy succeeds, we shall in a few years see France as engrossed in material interests, as is England herself, and with just as little sense of religion. The forms of religion and the pomp of worship may be preserved, but religious thought and religious life will have