THE CRISIS IN MALTA

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 11, 12 July 1930, Page 11

THE CRISIS IN MALTA

(To the Editor.)

Sir,—l regret that phrase which you lightly put, in the pillory, and I apologise. I got only the early edition of /Thursday's 'Tost," and so missed the letter. When a week had passed 1 thought the phrase had sent the letter to the W.P.8., and I said that I deserved it. Mr. Editor, will you shake hands and box on? j Your editorial conveyed' the idea of Papal interference in past ages, and repeated to-day in Malta. X accept your explanation of Papal power at.its eliiua>:, Inn.fail i>) «.•<.■■ fliat this gives "two historical parallels" to the Maltese question. 1 showed 11 ij •'inordinate desire to minimise the powers of the Papacy," but my roiiditrs of history shows that the Popes fairly adjudicated between European disputants. Papal powers "at their climax." Not in 1077, by any means.: The eleventh century is sad reading for'-lovers o£ the Papacy. Hy 1050 it had touched its low-. I cst level, C'resoi-y .Vll..was hp Colossus to '•bestride1 the "narrow world;" It was not fear of him, but of the princes who hadcondemned Kir- 'at . Tribur, Land' before whom he had to appearat Augsburg, tha^ sent Henry'to Canossa; ■ The status :of the Papacy in the Holy Koman Empire was very loosely denned before the time of that eminent" jurist, Innocent 111. Precedent and custom made the Emperor the "Protector of the Papacy," and Innocent til.-showed that as such he must bo approved by the Pope and crowned by him, and that an Emper6r, ex-communicate or heretical, was deemed unqualified. ' . ■ ■• ■ , Gregory knew he had no real triumph at Canossa. This "pentitent" was later to drive Gregory from Home, hold the city, set. up an anti-Pope, and Gregory was to be an exile till his death in 10S5. It w.i.s out of disaster and failure that Ore- | gory was to liaxe a'posthumous triuni[i!i, j iimi that was the independence of the Holy I See. Stephen, in "Ecclesiastical State* men," says: "lie found the Papacy dependent on the Empire. . . . He found ithe Emperor the virtual patron of the Holy Sice: he wrested that power from his hands. . . . He foimd the higher ecclesiastics, in servitude to the'temperal sovereigns: he delivered them from that yoke. . . . He found the patronage of the ! Church the mere desecrated spoil and merchandise of princes: he reduced it within the dominion of the .Supreme Pontiff/ ..-

i The Pope never had.any worlds to give away. Quite a library has grown around the decisions of Alexander VI.- You dismiss it in a sentence. I prefer the studied summing up of Pastor' and Hergenrother. The former,.who rivals Ranke as a historian of the Papacy,- sums up thus:— "The line of demarcation fixed by Alexander VI., whicli was pushed 270 leagues further to ' the West" by the Treaty of Tordesillas on 7th June, 1494, formed the basis of all negotiations and agreements between the two great colonising powers in regard to the partition of the New World. The peaceful settlement of a number o£ thorny boundary questions between Spain and Portugal was entirely due to Papal decision"." He quotes from the first decision: '". . . provided such lauds are not occupied by a Christian Power." There is something of grandiloquence in.- the decisions of Alexander V 1.,. and Hergenr,otb.er is at pains to explain terms used in them and that of Calixtus 111. giving the African western colonies to Portugal. ''The word 'grant' here signifies nothing-more than the confirmation of a title legitimately acquired." Prescott looks, upon it all as marking the spheres of exploration for the two nations, and while he calls it "a stretch of Papal ; ambition," ' a statement to be modified by historians, he adds that ''though ,-often ridiculed" it was justified by a happy outcome.- Ranke does not mention the incident at all; .He does not take, your view that it shows. Papa! "powers at their climax." The Malta question is the present question. You nsk why not give Father Carta his passport.and let him go.- Ask Strict land that question; it is the one the Holy See is asking him. The signing of that passport will restore to the . Franciscan Superior General his right to discipline uny ot his Maltese friars. —1 am, etc., I \ ' : '' 'OMEGA. JUib .Inly. "We arc glad to shake hands with: a correspondent who has taken our retort in such good part, but to '"box on" in the sense whicli he attaches to the term would take us two far and too long. A. discussion of the minutiae of medieval history would be beyond our province and quite foreign to (lie purpose of the general re-, iWcnee which has opened the floodgates of "Omega's" eloquence. He .assigns the presence of Henry IV. •at Canossa to a j period when the powers of the ; Papacy ] were at a low ebb. For our us:e of the incident we have the express authority of the "Encyclopaedia Britaunica":— Xo historical incident, it' says, has more profoundly impressed the imagina- j tion of the Western World. It marked the highest point reached by papal authority, and presents'a vivid'picture of the awe inspired firing the Middle Ages by the supernatural powers supposed to ,be .wielded by the church. ' j Regarding flit; division of the NewWorld between Spain and Portugal ".Omega" says: — Quito a library has grown around the decisions of Alexander V.I. You dismiss it in a sentence. As a matter of fact. wo. refei:i:dd our correspondent to a single sentence in Alex-1 antler's Bull which, by showing exactly what he purported to do, completely disposes o£ (ho contention that he was mere-1 ly acting as an ordinary arbitrator or referee1. The Bull is summarised by T. W. Fulton in "Tlie Sovereignty of the Sea,'" p. 100, as follows: — All islands or lands discovered to thu west of this line by the Spaniards, and which lfrnl not been in the possession of .-mi- Christian Power before the preced-Sjp'.nii.-ih Crown: and all territory discoviug Christmas, were to belong "to the orcd to the cast of it-were to belong to PorhiKal. The Pope, moreover, grunted a monopoly of commerce within those immense regions to the respective Crowns, so that other nations could not trade, thither without licence from the Spanish or Portuguese Sovereigns. Whether .or not the second of ..these sentences is a fair paraphrase will appear'if', we quote the text of Article S of. the Bull: prohibet aliis accessum ad illas insulas. pro mevcibus habendis nbsque Regis licetitia. Aii ordinary arbitration between A and B cannot affect the rights of C or p or anybody else, but this Article applies to the whole world. As to the Maltese question, which, as o»r correspondent says,, is "the present question," wo regret that ho has falleji into a trap which we quite innocently laid for him. Yon ask why not give Father Carta bis passport and let him go. Ask Strickland that question; it is the one the Holy Sec is asking him. But the Holy See asked nothing of the kind. The suggestion about Father Carta's passport was merely a little joke of our own which "Omega" pays us the very high compliment of attributing in all seriousness to the Holy See. It is not the Holy Bet', but -Lord Strickland, that would like to get rid of Father Carta. It was Father Cavta's desire to get rid of .somebody else Unit started the trouble. A foreigner himself, ho ordered Father Mieallef, n Maltese: friar and British subject, to leave the island, lml. the Maltese Government blocked him by refusing Hie condemned man a passport. "Omega", has confused the parts. The gross carelessness with which ho has misread pur article of- the ;27th. ! .liii M.', and our footnote of the 3rd inst., I does not inspire confidence, in his researches and speculations on the history of several centuries ago.—Ed.... ' .-