Louis Veuillot: The Liberal Illusion [1866]

[Stone]

The Liberal Illusion

Chapter XXIX

The revolutionary sphinx, under the name of the modern mind, propounds a series of riddles with which the liberal Catholics occupy themselves a great deal more than befits the dignity of children of Christ. Not one of them, however, answers the riddle in a way calculated to satisfy either the sphinx, or themselves, or anybody else, and it is a matter of record, that the monster devours soonest just those who flatter themselves on having guessed its meaning best.

Scant is the self-respect and scant the faith that remains in these last! They come, not without arrogance, to ask, in the name of the sphinx and in their own name, how “intolerant” Catholics can get around the “conquests” of the dissenting mind with its rights of man, its liberty of religions, its constitutions grounded on these principles, etc., etc. Nothing could be easier to answer.

To begin with, the dissenting mind invariably starts off with an unwarranted assumption of its own superiority, which we flatly refuse to recognize. Error is never the equal, much less the superior, of truth, neither can it hope to overawe truth, or ever to prevail legitimately against it, and, by consequence, the disciples of error, infidels, unbelievers, atheists, renegades and the like, are never the superiors nor even the legitimate equals of the disciples of Jesus Christ, the one true God. From the standpoint of unalterable right, the perfect society that constitutes the Church of Christ is by no means on a level with the gang that collects around error. We know right well to whom it has been said: Going therefore, teach — a word, we may remark in passing, like the great Increase and multiply, which was spoken at the beginning of things; and these two words are living words despite the ruses and triumphs of death — error has nothing to teach by divine right, neither has it the divine right to increase and multiply. Truth is at liberty to tolerate error, but error is obliged to grant to truth the right of liberty.

In the second place, now that the partisans of error have gotten the upper hand and have enthroned in the world certain sham principles that are the negation of truth and therefore the destruction of order, we leave to them these false principles until they swallow them and die of them, while we hang on to our truths by which we live.

In the third place, when the time comes and men realize that the social edifice must be rebuilt according to eternal standards, be it tomorrow, or be it centuries from now, the Catholics will arrange things to suit said standards. Undeterred by those who prefer to abide in death, they will re-establish certain laws of life. They will restore Jesus to His place on high, and He shall be no longer insulted. They will raise their children to know God and to honor their parents. They will uphold the indissolubility of marriage, and if this fails to meet with the approval of the dissenters, it will not fail to meet with the approval of their children. They will make obligatory the religious observance of Sunday on behalf of the whole of society and for its own good, revoking the permit for free-thinkers and Jews to celebrate, incognito, Monday or Saturday on their own account. Those whom this may annoy will have to put up with the annoyance. Respect will not be refused to the Creator nor repose denied to the creature simply for the sake of humoring certain maniacs, whose frenetic condition causes them stupidly and insolently to block the will of a whole people. However, like our own, their houses will be all the more solid and their fields all the more fertile on that account.

In a word, Catholic society will be Catholic, and the dissenters whom it will tolerate will know its charity, but they will not be allowed to disrupt its unity.

This is the answer that Catholics can, on their part, make to the sphinx; and these are the words that will kill it outright. The sphinx is not invulnerable; against it we have just what is required in the way of weapons. The Archangel did not overcome the Rebel with material weapons, but with this word: Who is like unto God! And Satan fell, struck as by a bolt of lightning.

[Stone]

The Liberal Illusion

Chapter XXX

To sum up, the liberal Catholic party accepts the separation of civil society from the society of Jesus Christ. The separation of the two is in their eyes a good thing and they desire it to be definitive. They believe that as a result the Church will gain peace, and, eventually, even a great triumph. Nevertheless, the prospects of triumph are mentioned to the “intolerant” Catholics alone, and to the latter only in undertones. Let us stick to the peace: can we hope for such a result?

For one thing, this liberal church, a church altogether “of its time,” in order to clear itself of all reasonable suspicion of being obedient to Rome, will have to stop irritating or frightening those generous souls who are resolved, come what may, to cauterize “the Pontifical cancer.” After that, seeing that the Catholics would have thus become indistinguishable from the rest of the world, why should they not enjoy the benefit of contempt! They will be despised, they will live in peace; they can attend to their religion just as they attend to their other affairs: the Siecle will have no more occasion to hurl the epithet “clerical” at the parishioner of St. Sulpice than it would at the emancipated sheep of Pastor Coquerel.37

To be nothing, utterly nothing in order to live at peace with all the world, such a hope might seem to be rather modest! Nevertheless, it is hoping too much. Even were the liberal Catholics to succeed, either by way of seduction or by way of pressure, in suppressing the integral Catholics, I assure them that they will never live to see themselves despised so much as they aspire to be. A few considerations will serve to convince them of the solid reasons for this prediction, and to make them appreciate for themselves the illusion they have come to entertain.

I simply pass over the mad and unheard-of notion of creating an atheistic government, in the absence of atheists from the very society that said government is supposed to conduct. I say nothing either about the hardihood of attempting so completely to alienate peoples from the equity, the meekness and venerableness of the scepter, as Christianly conceived, that such rulers as sainted kings should never be seen again. I waive the disdain certain teachers show for the lessons of history and religion which condemn governmental indifference to good and evil and prove such an attitude to be absolutely preposterous.

The illusion of the liberal Catholics goes further than that. It has the power not only to falsify history, the Bible and religion, to discolor with its false hues human nature itself; it even deprives its victims of their appreciation of the present as it likewise strips them of their knowledge of the past and their foresight of the future. They cease to see what really happens, they no longer hear what is actually said, they no longer know what they themselves have done; they misread their own hearts as they misread everything else.

37. Of the three Pastors Coquerel, who made quite a stir under the Empire, the one of whom Louis veuillot speaks here is evidently Athanasius Coquerel, who in consequence of a defense of the Vie ae Jesus was dismissed with much ado by the Protestant Consistory in 1864.

[Stone]

The Liberal Illusion

Chapter XXXI

If there is one thing evident, it is that the non-Christian liberals, who are one-hundred-percent revolutionary, have no more use for the liberal Catholics than they have for the other Catholics. They expressly say so, they chant it at all times and in all keys; on this subject the Siecle has made repeated declarations, which leave nothing to the imagination and which certainly do not suffer from any lack of echoes.

More Christianity? Would that there were no more question of it at all! That is the Revolution’s cry wherever it is in power. And where in Europe is it not in power? Not a single revolutionary has protested against the ferocious howls of Garibaldi, against the more coldly murderous demands of M. Quinet, urging that Catholicism be “smothered in the mud,” against the moronic impiety of those blind partisans who form associations pledged to refuse the sacraments. To date, on the other hand, no revolutionary nabob has been converted by the platforms, the advances, the tendernesses, and, alas! it has to be confessed, the cringings of the liberal Catholics.

In vain have they disowned their brothers, despised the Bulls, explained away or repudiated the encyclicals: the lengths to which they have gone have won for them patronizing compliments, humiliating encouragements, but no alliances. Up to the present the liberal chapel lacks a gate of entrance, and seems to be nothing more than a gate of exit from the great Church. The eruption of hate still continues in the non-Christian liberal camp: it ignites in the midst of the world a conflagration of fury not only against the Church, but against the very idea of God. The heads of parties that govern contemporary Europe all vie with one another in an effort to break off all union between man and God. Among the schismatics, among the heretics, and lastly among the infidels, however slight the contact they have with civilization, everywhere the Church is being despoiled. The Moslem State seizes upon the goods of the mosques, as the Christian State in its turn confiscates ecclesiastical property; the one thing necessary is that God should not, under any name, under any title, possess a square foot of what He has created.

That is the world in which the liberal Catholics expect to find defenders, upright and staunch guardians of Catholic liberty!

[Stone]

The Liberal Illusion

Chapter XXXII

This is not what their own experience should lead them to expect. We are in a position to speak of that experience; we went through it, too, in the same endeavor and with the same sentiments.

The experience was prolonged; the time seemed as favorable as the present day seems unfavorable. Though we were few in number, our unity made us strong. The constitution then in force made it obligatory to reckon with us; it afforded us certain advantages for which we were grateful, it made us certain promises that we wanted to believe and which were of more concern to us than what it withheld. Who were so desirous as we that the Charter should turn out to be true, who else gave it greater support, who else entertained more sincere and ardent hopes on the strength of it? Though upholding our principles against the revolutionary doctrine, what in point of fact did we reject? What more did we demand than the simple right to oppose liberty with liberty?

We did not form an isolated or unimportant party. We had at our head the princes of the Church, one especially who was as eminent for his character and talent as he was for his position: it was Bishop de Langres, who died as head of the see of Arras, beloved of God and honored of men. Mgr. Parisis studied the question of bringing religion and liberty into accord, with less of an eye to seeing what the Church should retain than what concessions it could make. One draft that met with his approval thus summarizes the platform of the Catholic party: "The Catholics have said “to the princes, to the doctors and to the priests of modern ideas: We accept your dynasties and your charters; we leave to you whatever you have won. We ask of you only one thing, which is of strict right, even in your eyes: liberty. We will contend with you and convince you on the sole ground of liberty. Cease to subject us to your monopolies, your restraints and your prohibitions; allow us to teach as freely as you do; to form associations for the works of God as freely as
you form them for the works of the world; to open up careers for the whole range of beautiful labors, about which all you seem able to do is to impose restrictions or to drive hard bargains. And don’t be afraid of our liberty: it will heal and save yours. Wherever we are not free, no one else is for very long.”38

That is what we demanded. And, without wishing unduly to praise or disparage anyone, our adversaries of that day were more serious, more sincere, more enlightened, more moderate than our adversaries of today. They were the Guizots, the Thiers, the Cousins, the Villemains, the Broglies, the Salvandys, and their leader, King Louis-Philippe. None of these heads of the directorate had any of that irreligious and antichristian fanaticism we have seen so much of since then. Their subsequent attitude gave honorable proof of this. Moreover, they honestly believed in liberty, at least, they had the will to believe.

What did we obtain from their wisdom, their moderation, their sincerity? Alas! the computation is as easy to make as it is painful to tell: we obtained nothing, absolutely nothing, the result that the mathematicians call zero.

A catastrophe occurred; fear proved a more efficacious motive than reason, justice and the Charter. Under the influence of fear, they made some small concessions to us, but with the ill-disguised design of curtailing or abolishing these paltry advantages at the earliest opportunity! The storm blew over. Those of our adversaries who were toppled over by it showed no conspicuous signs of having been chastened by the experience; those who managed to weather it seemed unable to forgive themselves for having been intimidated by the thunder; in general, they all showed themselves more hostile than one would ever have imagined.

Did we ourselves, then, change and take away from the modern ideals the allegiance and practical support we formerly gave them? The liberal Catholics claim as much, but they gratuitously deceive themselves. We said it then, we repeat it now, that the philosophical groundwork of modern constitutions is ruinous, that it exposes society to deadly perils.

We have never said that one could or should resort to violence in order to change this groundwork, nor that one should not avail himself of what is guaranteed by these constitutions in cases where it does not conflict with the laws of God. It is a question of a fact wholly independent of our own volition, a state of things in which we find ourselves, in certain respects, like strangers in a foreign land, conforming to the general laws regulating public life, making use of the general rights of the community, but never entering the temples to offer incense. The author of these pages, if it be in order for him to cite his own case as an illustration, has long made use of the freedom of the press and still insists on enjoying it, without, however, committing himself thereby, or ever having committed himself, to the belief that freedom of the press is an unqualified good.

In short, with reference to modern constitutions, we conduct ourselves in much the same way that a person does with reference to taxes: we pay the taxes while demanding that they be reduced, we obey the constitutions while demanding that they undergo amendment. This effectively disposes of the difficulties urged against us on that score; the liberal Catholics are quite well aware of it.

To expect more of us is to expect too much; if we are supposed to pay taxes without ever being allowed to complain of their being too heavy; if we are supposed to transfer to modern civil constitutions our religious faith, so that we may not question their excellence without running afoul of what are virtually dogmatic definitions; if we are not allowed to look forward to any amendment of them except in the form of a yet more drastic elimination of the whole Christian idea, then what sort of liberty have we in prospect, and what advantage can liberal Catholics expect to reap from that liberty, which will be meted out to them in the same measure as to us?

They willingly swear by the principles of the French Revolution; they call them the immortal principles. It is the shibboleth39 which gives entrance to the camp of great Liberalism. But there is a special manner of pronouncing it, and our Catholics are not quite equal to it; hence, in spite of everything, they are coldly received; even the more progressive among them are kept in quarantine.40 I congratulate them on it. “We read in the Book of Judges (12:5-6) that when the ‘Galaadites, in order to have the proper accent, one must first have the proper understanding of the thing itself and accept it in its proper sense.

If they once understood the thing, they would never, I venture to say, accept it.


38 Author’s note on Mgr. Parisis.

39 Judges, 12:6.

40 Said Louis Cardinal Billot, commenting on this paragraph of Veuillot’s L’illusion liberate: “For our dispute is not upon the question of whether it would not be well to bear patiently what escapes our control, but of whether we ought positively to approve of that social condition which Liberalism introduces, to celebrate with encomiums the liberalistic principles that are at the bottom of this order of things, and by word, teaching and deed, to promote the same, as do those who along with the name Catholic lay claim to the surname Liberal. And they above all are the very ones who will never succeed at all, because they are lame on both feet, and attempting in vain to hit on some compromise, they are neither acknowledged by the children of God as genuine nor accepted by the
children of the Revolution as sincere. They come, indeed, to the camp of he latter with the password of the principles of ’89, but, because they pronounce it badly, they are denied entrance.