§ 185.5. =Leo XIII.=--After only two days’ conclave the Cardinal-archbishop of Perugia, Joachim Pecci, born in A.D. 1810, was proclaimed on February 20th, 1878, as Leo XIII. In autograph letters he intimated his accession to the German and Russian emperors, but not to the king of Italy, and expressed his wish for a good mutual understanding. To the government of the Swiss Cantons he declared his hope that their ancient friendly relations might be restored. At Easter, 1878, he issued an encyclical to all patriarchs, primates, archbishops, and bishops, in which he required of them that they should earnestly entreat the mediation of the “immaculate queen of heaven” and the intercession of St. Joseph, “the heavenly shield of the church,” and also failed not to make prominent the infallibility of the apostolic chair, and to condemn all the errors condemned by his predecessors, emphasizing the necessity of restoring the temporal power of the pope, and confirming and renewing all the protests of his predecessor Pius IX., of sacred memory, against the overthrow of the Papal States. On the first anniversary of his elevation he proclaimed a universal jubilee, with the promise of a complete indulgence. He still persisted in the prison myth of his predecessor, and like him sent back the profferred contribution of his “jailor.” In the conflicts with foreign powers inherited from Pius, as well as in his own, he has employed generally moderate and conciliatory language.--He has not hesitated to take the first step toward a good understanding with his opponents, for which, while persistently maintaining the ancient principles of the papal chair, he makes certain concessions in regard to subordinate matters, always with the design and expectation of seeing them outweighed on the other side by the conservation of all the other hierarchical pretensions of the curial system. It was, however, only in the middle of A.D. 1885 that it became evident that the pope had determined, without allowing any misunderstanding to arise between himself and his cardinals, to break through the trammels of the irreconcilable zealots in the college. And indeed after the conclusion of the German _Kulturkampf_ (§ 197, 13, 15), brought about by these means, in an allocution with reference thereto addressed to the cardinals in May, 1887, he gave an unexpected expression to his wish and longing in regard to an understanding with the government on the Italian question, which involved an utter renunciation of his predecessor’s dogged _Non possumus_, the attitude hitherto unfalteringly maintained. “Would that peaceful counsels,” says he, “embracing all our peoples should prevail in Italy also, and that at last once that unhappy difference might be overcome without loss of privilege to the holy see!” Such harmony, indeed, is only possible when the pope