“In his pastoral letter _Diuturnum illud_ His Holiness Leo XIII has expressly declared that the faithful may dispense with obedience to civil power if the latter issue orders that openly disregard natural and divine rights. ‘If a man,’ he has said in this admirable letter, ‘finds himself forced to infringe either the law of God or the law of man, he should follow the precepts of Jesus Christ, and reply like the apostles, “It is better to obey God than man.” To act thus is not to merit the reproach of disobedience, for as soon as the will of a ruler is in opposition to the will and law of God he exceeds his power, justice is corrupted, and henceforth his authority is impotent because, in so far as it is unjust, it ceases to exist.’ “Believe me it is not without deep and protracted meditation that I have encouraged the religious bodies under my control to make the necessary resistance. I have weighed the temporal loss that may, perhaps, result, and such consideration has not stopped me. When we reply to your tax-gatherers, ‘_Non possumus_,’ you will attempt to overcome our resistance by force. But how will you achieve your end? Will you lay hands upon our recognized bodies? Dare you? Upon our non-recognized bodies? Can you? Will you show a pitiful courage and sell our goods and the objects dedicated to divine worship? And if it is indeed true that neither the poverty of the former nor the sacred nature of the latter will preserve them from your rapacity, you must learn, and the wives and children of those who aid and abet you must learn, that those who enter upon such a course run the risk of excommunication, the terrible effects of which strike fear into even the most hardened sinners. And all those who consent to buy anything proceeding from any such unlawful sale expose themselves to the same penalty. “And if we are robbed of our belongings, hunted from our dwellings, the injury will not be to us, but to you, who will be covered with the shame of unprecedented scandal. You can retaliate most cruelly upon us, but no threat can frighten us; we fear neither prison nor chains. The manacled hands of priests and confessors have delivered the Church ere now. Come what may, we shall pay nothing, we may not, we cannot. _Non possumus._