No. 10.-CLEMENT XIV.

BY THE REV. J. H. MILLARD, B.A.

CAN a pope be a really pious man? The question seems to savour of bigotry; but when the scandalously immoral lives of some popes is remembered, and the severe temptations with which the papal system surrounds both the head and the heart of its chieftain are duly considered, our wonder ceases that the question should be often asked.

If, since the Reformation, a truly pious man has worn the triple crown, that man was Ganganelli, pope Clement XIV.; and it will be instructive to mark his history and his fate.

Ganganelli had passed his early life in cloisters; there, in security and ease, storing up all kinds of knowledge. His humble birth gave him little hope of advancement among the aristocracy of Rome, and he had, therefore, a long period of leisure, unbroken by the dreams of ambition, for cultivating his mind. And so wisely does he appear to have disciplined every faculty of that mind, that one of his teachers admiringly said, "It was no wonder that Ganganelli loved music, everything in his character was harmony." And his mild temper and generally amiable disposition seemed to justify this praise.

It was this general soundness of intellect that caused him to be elected as successor to Clement XIII.; for the exigencies of the times were very pressing, and a man of unusual powers was absolutely required to save the papacy from ruin.

The Jesuits had made themselves detestable in every country of Europe; and, towards the close of the sixteenth century, the courts of France, Portugal, Spain, and Austria, formally banished them from their respective domains. They did more; they demanded the abolition of the Order, and Clement the Thirteenth's obstinate resistance of this demand had stirred up their hostility to the papacy itself.

The very existence of the papacy seemed to depend on the moderation and readiness to conciliate which the new pontiff might display.

For this purpose had Ganganelli been elected, and his first measure was indicative of altogether a new policy for Rome. The

bull In Cana Domini, which excommunicates all bishops and magistrates who shall venture to propose the gathering of a Universal Council, and which denounces awful anathemas against all kings who shall dare to levy tribute on the clergy, or shall presume to offer opposition to the discipline ordained by the Council of Trent,this terrible bull, which, since the days of Pius V., had been the most potent weapon in the pontific armoury, was always read in public, with special solemnity, on the Thursday of Holy Week. And this offensive bull, pope Clement forbade to be any longer recited.

He

The abolition of the Jesuits, however, was a more difficult achievement. Heartily as Clement disliked their practices, he dreaded to place himself in direct antagonism to this formidable Order of men. knew them to be subtle in their designs, and unscrupulous in their use of means, so that he had not unreasonable fears for even his personal safety. Then, also, he was fearful lest so bold and sweeping a measure should injure the Roman Catholic church, which he sincerely believed, notwithstanding the errors which he confessed she countenanced, to be a true church of Jesus Christ, and the most important of all churches. Thus tossed on a sea of doubts,tormented on the one hand with apprehensions of unknown danger, and teased on the other by incessant complaints from France and Spain, Clement lost all peace of mind, and wished he had never become "Alas!" said the timid and amiable pope. man one day to cardinal Bernis, "Alas! I was not born to occupy a throne."

France and Spain persisted in their demands, and sent Florida Blanca, an acute lawyer, to enforce them. "Wait," said Clement, "till the death of father Ricci, the general of the order." "No, holy father," replied Blanca, "it is by extracting the tooth that the pain is stopped." He proceeded to threaten that Spain would abolish all religious orders whatsoever, if her demands were not complied with. "Alas," said the afflicted pope, "you are seeking the ruin of the Catholic church; schism, and perhaps heresy, are in the secret thoughts of the sovereigns!" Blanca now tried to soothe by more tempting

arguments, and promised that Benevento and Avignon should be the reward of Clement's compliance. "Remember, Sir," said the indignant pontiff, "that a pope governs the Church, but does not traffic in his authority."

The letters of Ganganelli, a selection from which has been translated into English, shew plainly enough that zealous as the above narrative represents him for his own and the Church's rights, he was by no means so bigoted as to deny Christianity to Protestant churches. Writing to a Protestant minister, he says, "We have the same God for our Father, we believe in the same Mediator, we acknowledge as indisputable the doctrines of the Trinity, Incarnation, and Redemption, and we sincerely wish each other to go to heaven. In point of doctrine there are not two ways of arriving there." After so remarkable a display of charity we can forgive his proceeding to say, "There must be on earth a centre of unity, as well as a Head who represents Jesus Christ; without it the Church would be in reality shapeless, unworthy of our homage and attachment." He had been less than a Romanist had he thought otherwise, and it is not the Romanist only who thinks THE CHURCH as worthy of reverence as the Bible, and her authority as forceful as the authority of Christ himself.

But Clement was even better than his creed would seem to shew. He really loved the Bible more than the thing he styled the Church. Writing to one friend, he says, "The Gospels contain the religion of Christ, and are so plain that the meanest capacity can comprehend them." To another, "The first book which I would put at the head of your library is the Gospel." To a priest he says, "Suffer not the piety of the faithful to be nourished by false legends, and kept up by trifling ceremonies. Take care that they recur continually to Jesus Christ as the only Mediator, and that they only honour the saints as belonging to him!"

No wonder that the men who in our days grow rich on "holy coats" and "winking Madonnas," had an intense dislike to Clement XIV. This pope would destroy their trade. Clement did more; he de

stroyed the Order itself. Plucking up courage, he did at last decree the abolition of the Jesuits, and in July, 1773, issued the brief Dominus ac Redemptor, in which, after stating his reasons, he formally announced that "we, therefore, do extirpate and abolish the Society of Jesus, its officers, houses, and institutions."

Revenge quickly followed. Woe to the man-priest, pontiff, peasant, or princewho dares to affront the Jesuits! Clement was suddenly seized with a most mysterious disease. Rising from table one day, he felt an internal shock, succeeded by great cold. From that hour his strength declined; his voice, which had been full and sonorous, was quite lost in a singular hoarseness; an inflammation in his throat compelled him to keep his mouth constantly open; vomitings and feebleness in his limbs rendered him unable to take his usual exercise; and his sleep was incessantly broken by sharp pains.

With this melancholy change in his health came a strange but not unnatural alteration in his character. He grew restless, capricious, passionate. Poniards and cups of poison were continually before his eyes. His sleep was disturbed by horrible phantoms. He thought that the judgments of God were upon him, and, amid sobbings that choked his utterance, would cry, "Mercy! mercy! I was compelled!" For six months this continued; his intellect then suddenly cleared up, and, although conscious that he died the victim of Jesuit malignity, he expired calmly and peacefully, Sept. 22, 1774.

A post-mortem examination furnished abundant evidence that Clement had been destroyed by the deadly Acqua Tofana of Perugia, so well known to those who are familiar with the annals of Italian crime.

Is not the question answered ? Doubtless a Romanist, a monk, may be a pious man; but let him become pope, and either he shall act the hypocrite, shall do mortal violence to his own conscience, shall become the patron and supporter of monstrous lies, deceptions, impostures, profligacy, and vice, or else he shall shortly die. A REALLY PIOUS MAN CANNOT, FOR LONG, BE POPE.

THE OLD CRIPPLE.

When I was a young man, working at my trade as a mason, I met with a severe injury by falling from a scaffolding placed at a height of forty feet from the ground. There I remained stunned and bleeding, on the rubbish, until my companions, by attempting to remove me, restored me to consciousness. I felt as if the ground on which I was laying formed a part of myself; that I could not be lifted from it without being torn asunder; and, with the most piercing cries, I entreated my well-meaning assistants to leave me alone to die. They desisted for the moment, one running for the doctor, another for the litter; others surrounding me with pitying gaze; but, amidst my increasing sense of suffering, the conviction began to dawn on my mind, that the injuries were not mortal; and so, by the time that the doctor and the litter arrived, I resigned myself to their aid, and allowed myself, without further objection, to be carried to the hospital.

There I remained for more than three months, gradually recovering from my bodily injuries, but devoured with an impatience at my condition, and the slowness of my cure, which effectually retarded it. I felt all the restlessness and anxietyof a labourer suddenly thrown out of an employment difficult enough to procure, knowing there were scores of others ready to step into my place; that the job was going on; and that, ten chances to one, I should never set foot on that scaffolding again. The visiting surgeon vainly warned me against indulging in passionate regrets-inculcated the opposite feeling of gratitude demanded by my escape; all in vain. I tossed on my fevered bed, murmured at the slowness of his remedies, and might have thus rendered them altogether ineffectual, had not a sudden change been effected in my disposition by another, at first unwelcome, addition to our patients. He was placed in the ward with me, and insensibly I found my patience rebuked, my repinings hushed for very shame, in the presence of his meek resignation to far greater privations and sufferings. Fresh courage sprang from his example, and soon, thanks to my involuntary physician, I was in a fair road to recover.

And he who had worked the charm, what

was he? A poor, helpless old man, utterly deformed by suffering-his very name unnoticed, or at least never spoken in the place where he now was; he went only by the appellation of No. 12-the number of his bed, which was next to my own. This bed had already been his refuge during three long illnesses, and had at last become a sort of property for the poor fellow, in the eyes of doctors, students, nurse-tenders, in fact, the whole hospital staff. Never did a gentler creature walk on God's earth; walk, alas! for him the world was but an old memory. Many years before, he had totally lost the use of his legs; but, to use his own expression, "this misfortune did not upset him;" he still retained the power of earning his own livelihood, which he derived from copying deeds for a lawyer, at so much per sheet; and if the legs were no longer a support, the hands worked at the stamped parchments as diligently as ever. some months passed by, and then the paralysis attacked his right arm; still undaunted, he taught himself to write with his left; but hardly had the brave heart and hand conquered the difficulty, when the enemy crept on, and disabling his second ally, no more remained for him than to be conveyed once more, though this time as a last resource, to the hospital. There he had the gratification to find his former quarters vacant, and he took possession of his old familiar bed with a satisfaction which seemed to obliterate all regret at being obliged to occupy it again. His first graceful accents smote almost reproachfully on my ear: "Misfortune must have its turn, but every day has a to-morrow."

But

It was, indeed, a lesson to witness the gratitude of this excellent creature. The hospital, so dreary a sojourn to most of its inmates, was a scene of enjoyment to him; everything pleased him, and the poor fellow's admiration of even the most trifling conveniences proved how severe must have been his privations. He never wearied of praising the neatness of the linen, the whiteness of the bread, the quality of the food; and my surprise gave place to the truest pity, when I learned that, for the last twenty years, this respectable old man could only afford himself, out of the profits of his persevering industry, the coarsest

bread, diversified with white cheese or vegetable porridge; and yet, instead of reverting to his privations, in the language of complaint, he converted them into a fund of gratitude, and made the generosity of the nation which had provided such a retreat for the suffering poor, his continual theme. Nor did his thankful spirit confine itself to this. To listen to him, you would believe him an especial object of divine as well as human benevolence-all things worked for his good.

The doctor used to say that No. 12 had a "mania for happiness;" but it was a mania that, in creating esteem for its victim, infused fresh courage into all that came within its range.

I think I still see him, seated on the side of his bed, with his little black silk cap, his spectacles, and the well-worn volume which he never ceased reading. Every morning, the first rays of the sun rested on his bed, always to him a fresh subject of rejoicing and thankfulness to God. Το witness his gratitude, one might have supposed that the sun was rising for him alone.

I need hardly say, that he soon interested himself in my cure, and regularly made enquiries respecting its progress. He always found something cheering to saysomething to inspire patience and hope, himself a living commentary of his words. When I looked at this poor, motionless figure, those distorted limbs, and, crowning all, that smiling countenance, I had not the courage to be angry, or even to complain. At each painful crisis, he would exclaim: "One minute and it will be over-relief will soon follow. Every day has its to-morrow."

I had one good and true friend—a fellowworkman, who used sometimes to spare an hour to visit me, and he took great delight in cultivating an acquaintance with No. 12. As if attracted by a kindred spirit, he never passed his bed without pausing to offer his cordial salutations; and then he would whisper to me:-"He is a saint upon earth; and not content with gaining Paradise himself, must win it for others also. Such people should have monuments erected to them, known and read of all men. In observing such a character we feel ashamed of our own happiness-we feel how comparatively little we deserve it. Is there anything I can do to prove my regard for this good, poor No. 12?"

"Just try among the bookstalls," I replied,

"and find the second volume of that book you see him reading. It is now more than six years since he lost it, and ever since he has been obliged to content himself with the first."

Now I must premise that my worthy friend had a perfect horror of literature, even in its simplest stages. He regarded the art of printing as a satanic invention, filling men's brains with idleness and conceit; and as to writing-in his opinion, a man was never thoroughly committed, until he had recorded his sentiments in black and white for the inspection of his neighbours. His own success in life, which had been tolerable-thanks to his industry and integrity-he attributed altogether to his ignorance of those dangerous arts; and now a cloud swept across his lately beaming face, as he exclaimed:

"What! the good creature is a lover of books? Well, we must admit that even the best have their failings. No matter. Write down the name of this old volume on a slip of paper, and it shall go hard with me, but I give him that gratification."

He did actually return the following week with a well-worn volume, which he presented in triumph to the old invalid. He looked somewhat surprised as he opened it; but our friend proceeded to explain that it was at my suggestion he had procured it in place of the lost one, the old grateful expression at once beamed up in the eyes of No. 12; and, with a voice trembling with emotion, he thanked the hearty giver.

I had my misgivings, however; and the moment our visitor turned his back, I asked to see the book. My old neighbour reddened, stammered, and tried to change the conversation; but, forced behind his last intrenchments, he handed me the little volume. It was an old Royal Almanac. The bookseller, taking advantage of his customer's ignorance, had substituted it for the book he had demanded. I burst into an immoderate fit of laughter; but No. 12 checked me with the only impatient word I ever heard from his lips:

"Do you want our friend to hear you? I would rather never recover the power of this lost arm, than deprive his kind heart of the pleasure of his gift. And what of it? Yesterday I did not care a straw for an almanac; but in a little time it is perhaps the very book I should have desired. Every day has its to-morrow. Besides, I assure you, it is a very improving study; even