to their Bishop that the ideas and hopes of this party, who call themselves the only true Catholics, are not and never can be theirs. The coming Council would do the Church great service if it would suppress the Index of prohibited books. To punish the errors of Catholic writers by placing their names on the Index is neither worthy of the spirit nor the dignity of the Church, and is hurtful to the real interests of the advancement of truth."
This address from the Catholics of Coblentz drew from the dying Montalembert[1] words of impassioned admiration. All his old eloquence and fire for a moment re-appeared. His end, he said, was near. He believed himself possessed of the impartiality which is the privilege of death. His body is already a ruin, but his spirit lives; and he turns with a thrill of joy to the Catholics of Coblentz. Their protest is sound from beginning to end. He could willingly endorse every line of it. His only sorrow is that a similar spirit does not animate the French; akin to that which filled them in the first half of the nineteenth century.
The Bavarian Foreign Minister, Prince Hohenlohe[2] issued enquiries to the Faculties of Theology in the Bavarian Universities. The Professors were requested in particular to explain what criteria existed for the discernment of an infallible decree.
The Faculty of Wurtzburg replied[3] that, so far as the faithful were concerned, it did not much matter whether a definition of faith were formulated by the Pope after consultation with the Bishops (as in 1854) or by an Assembly of Bishops directed by him. It is all the same to the individual believer. If one has to recognise a human authority in matters of faith,
