The citizens of the United States, whether Protestant or Catholic, will certainly be astonished when the new dogma comes into full force among them and its consequences are brought to light, suddenly recalling a long series of papal decisions into active life;—when, for instance, the recent Bull (_Apostolicæ Sedis_), with its many and various excommunications reserved to the Pope alone becomes known, and again the decision of the infallible Urban II. that it is no murder to kill an excommunicated man out of zeal for the Church, a decision which to this day stands on record in 200 copies of the canon law. And as a commentary on this the work of the present Jesuit theologian of the Court of Rome, Schrader (_De Unitate Romanâ_), will be put into their hands, from which they will learn that the contents of all papal decrees are infallible, for they always contain some “doctrina veritatis”—whether moral, juridical, or rational—and the Pope is always infallible “in ordine veritatis et doctrinæ.” Yet that is but one flower from the dogmatic garden, into which Archbishop Spalding will introduce the citizens of the United States after infallibility is happily proclaimed. They will then also hear, among other interesting truths, that according to the irrefragable decision of Leo X. every priest is absolutely free by divine and human law from all secular authority, and no layman has any right over him.(97) And they must be reminded, in order to make them more submissive, that in 1493 Pope Alexander VI. gave over their country with all its inhabitants, “in virtue of the plenitude of his apostolic power,” to the kings of Spain in the infallible Bull _Inter cætera_,(98) and then drew the famous line from the North to the South Pole, which included whole provinces of the present United States in his great and generous gift. By virtue of papal infallibility they are subjects of the Spanish Government, and who knows if right and fact may not some day again coincide? “Res clamat ad dominum.” FORTY-FOURTH LETTER.