An even greater sensation, than that caused by the _Epistle to All Christians_, attended the simultaneous publication of the Bull _Regnum Meum_. It personally was addressed to the very last person in all the world by whom, under ordinary circumstances, a communication from the Vatican might have been expected. Hadrian VII., Bishop, Servant of the servants of God, sent Greeting and Apostolic Benediction to His Well-beloved Son--the Majesty of Victor Emanuel III., King of Italy. "My Kingdom is not of this world" was the text of the Bull, which the Pope began with an unwavering defence of the Divine Revelation, the Church, Peter, and the Power of the Keys. So far, He spoke as a theologian. Then, with lightning swiftness, He assumed the rôle of the historian. His theme was the Forged Decretals or Donation of Constantine, which first were promulgated in a breve which His Holiness's predecessor, Hadrian I., addressed to His Majesty's predecessor (in a certain sense), the Emperor Charlemagne. He recited the well-known facts that these Decretals, though undoubtedly forged, had been forged merely as the intellectual pastime of an exiled archbishop's idle hours, and with no nefarious intent whatever. He shewed how that, during four centuries, no doubt as to their authenticity had been entertained; and how that three more centuries had elapsed before evidence had been collected sufficing to justify their being thrown overboard from the Barque of Peter to lighten the ship. Then, He continued, the Pope was the sovereign of a patrimony of which He held no title-deeds. A right more inexpugnable than prescriptive right was deemed desirable; and Alexander VI. and Julius II. bound the Patrimony to Peter by military conquest. So it remained until the unification of Italy under the House of Savoy, when those territories, formerly known as the States of the Church, were absorbed by the new kingdom. Thus far Hadrian pursued the argument; and then turned to a disquisition on the worldly rights of Christians, the purport of which perhaps most luminously is expressed in the following sentences:-- "We use worldly things till they are wanted by the world: then we will relinquish them without even so much as a backward thought. For we all are clearly marked to get that which we give. Nothing is irrevocable on this orb of earth. Nothing is final: for, after this world is the world to come. Therefore, let us move, let us gladly move, move with the times, really move. God always is merciful."