Oracular Nonsense.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXX, Issue 2, 9 January 1902, Page 1

Oracular Nonsense.

Sundry scribes on the New Zealand newspapers and on a few of the Home magazines are at present earning their thistles in attempts to forecast the as yet unneeded successor of Leo XIII. Readers of the N.Z. Tablet will know exactly what importance to attach to these idle conjectures. Formerly we had the assurance of the cable fiend that the matter of succession was pre-arranged by the existing Pontiff. That apparently did not leave sufficient room for those dark, mysterious intrigues and underground burrowings which to a duly imaginative and misinformed Protestant represent the inner workings of the papal court, and so we now make the further discovery • that although the Pope's testament is consulted, it does not follow, by any means, that his nominee will be elected.' We have already explained the procedure in connection with a papal election. An elementary knowledge thereof would have saved the manufacturers and retailers of those silly legends from making themselves a laughing-stock. If they cannot give us the honest truth, let them at least serve up a plausible lie.