which once limited or compensated
it for its subjection.--Formerly the prince was its temporal head, on
condition that he should be its exterior arm, that it should have the
monopoly of education and the censorship of books, that he should use
his strong arm against heretics, schismatics and free-thinkers. Of all
these obligations which kings accepted, the new sovereign frees himself,
and yet, with the Holy See, he holds on to the same prerogatives and,
with the Church, the same rights as his predecessors. He is just as
minutely dictatorial as formerly with regard to the details of
worship. Sometimes he fixes the fees and perquisites of the priests
for administering the sacraments: "This charge is a purely civil and
temporal operation, since it resolves itself into a levy of so many
pence on the citizen. Bishops and priests should not be allowed to
decide here.[5152] The government alone must remain the arbiter
between the priest who receives and the person who pays." Sometimes,
he intervenes in the publication of plenary indulgence: "It is
essential[5153] that indulgences should not be awarded for causes which
might be contrary to public order or to the welfare of the country; the
political magistrate is equally interested in knowing what the authority
is that grants indulgences; if its title to act is legal, to what
persons indulgences are granted, what persons are entrusted with their
distribution, and what persons are to fix the term and duration of
extraordinary prayers."--Thus bound and held by the State, the Church is
simply one of its appendices, for its own free roots by which, in this
close embrace, it still vegetates and keeps erect have all been cut off
short; torn from the soil and grafted on the State, they derive their
sap and their roots from the civil powers. Before 1789, the clergy
formed a distinct order in temporal society and, above all others, a
body possessing property and exempt from taxes, a tax-payer apart which,
represented in periodical assemblies, negotiated every five years
with the King himself, granted him subsidies and, in exchange for this
"disinterested gift," secured for itself concessions or confirmations of
immunities, prerogatives and favors. Today, it is merely a collection
of ordinary individuals and subjects, even less than that--an
administrative staff similar to that of the university, of the
magistrature, of the treasury, and of the woods and forests, even more
closely watched