ived of them by Victor Emmanuel a few years
ago.

And this is the little slice of land which Victor Emmanuel wrested from
the Holy Father. This is the vineyard which the modern King Achab wrung
from the unoffending Naboth. But the Pontiff answers, like Naboth of old:
"The Lord be merciful to me, and not let me give thee the inheritance of
my fathers."(184)

This is the little ewe-lamb which the modern David has snatched from
Uriah, its legitimate owner. The royal shepherd of Piedmont had already
seized all the other lambs and sheep of his neighbors; but he was not
satisfied till he added to his fold the solitary, tender lamb of the Pope.
Let him take care, however, that the prophecy denounced by Nathan against
David fall not upon himself and his posterity: "Why, therefore, hast thou
despised the word of the Lord, to do evil in My sight? Therefore the sword
shall never depart from thy house, because thou hast despised Me. Behold,
I will raise up evil against thee out of thy own house."(185)

While the patrimony of the Pope was large enough to secure his
independence, it was too small to provoke the fear and jealousy of foreign
powers. The authority of the Roman Pontiffs in the Middle Ages was almost
unbounded. Had they wished then, they could easily have increased their
territory; yet they were content with what Providence placed originally in
their hands.(186)

The sole end of the temporal power has been to secure for the Pope
independence and freedom in the government of the Church. The Holy Father
must be either a sovereign or a subject. There is no medium. If a subject,
he might become either the pliant creature, if God would so permit, of his
royal master, like the schismatic Patriarch of Constantinople, who, as
Gibbon observed, was "a domestic slave under the eye of his master, at
whose nod he passed from the convent to the throne, and from the throne to
the convent." And, indeed, the Oriental schismatic Bishops are as
subservient now as they were then to their temporal rulers. Or, what is
far more probable, the Pope might become a virtual prisoner in his own
house, as the present illustrious Pontiff is at this moment.

The Pope is the representative of Christ on earth. His office requires him
to be in constant communication with prelates in every country in the
world. Should the kingdom of Italy be embroiled in a war with any European
Power--with Germany, for instance--it would be difficult, if not impossible,