allegiance of Roman Catholics? To this question the words of
Cardinal Antonelli to the Austrian Ambassador might have seemed a
sufficient reply. 'There is a great difference,' said his
Eminence, between theory and practice. No one will ever prevent
the Church from proclaiming the great principles upon which its
Divine fabric is based; but, as regards the application of those
sacred laws, the Church, imitating the example of its Divine
Founder, is inclined to take into consideration the natural
weaknesses of mankind.' And, in any case, it was hard to see how
the system of Faith, which had enabled Pope Gregory XIII to
effect, by the hands of English Catholics, a whole series of
attempts to murder Queen Elizabeth, can have been rendered a much
more dangerous engine of disloyalty by the Definition of 1870.
But such considerations failed to reassure Mr. Gladstone; the
British Public was of a like mind; and 145,000 copies of the
pamphlet were sold within two months. Various replies appeared,
and Manning was not behindhand. His share in the controversy led
to a curious personal encounter.

His conversion had come as a great shock to Mr. Gladstone.
Manning
had breathed no word of its approach to his old and intimate
friend, and when the news reached him, it seemed almost an act of
personal injury. 'I felt,' Mr. Gladstone said, 'as if Manning had
murdered my mother by mistake.' For twelve years the two men did
not meet, after which they occasionally saw each other and
renewed their correspondence. This was the condition of affairs
when Mr. Gladstone published his pamphlet. As soon as it
appeared,
Manning wrote a letter to the New York Herald, contradicting its