We know the Sovereign Pontiff in his official capacity of teacher of the whole church is infallible in declarations regarding faith or morals. But in other matters of policy, of fact, he has no guarantee against error beyond what is afforded him by the use of the means which he has at hand, the information of his advisers, and especially of the Sacred College of Cardinals. Suppose for a moment this means of information is done away with, or made a vehicle of untrue statements. Suppose unworthy men are artfully intruded on the Pope, and act in accordance with instructions received from the rulers of Italy. Imagine Italy at war or on bad terms with the United States or England. A crafty statesman sees an opportunity of putting in a position to aid him in one or the other country an able man, through the influence of some high ecclesiastic, whose good opinion will have great weight with men of standing or with the people. The whole matter is artfully carried out. There is an understanding between the Italian statesman and his American or English friend; both act cautiously and avoid alarming susceptibilities. The affair works well. Persons around the Pope are made to drop a word incidentally in praise of the virtue and ability of the one whom it is intended to raise to power. The Pope in his relations with the bishops of foreign countries, speaking of the prospects of the church in good faith, speaks also to the ecclesiastic of whom we have made mention, and in favorable terms, of the person in question. Who that knows human nature can fail to see the thorough nature of the influence thus used? The crafty originators are the ones to blame, and the harm done is effected in perfect good faith by the unconscious instruments of their design. To show we are not building on our fancy, we turn to the pages of a man whose name all revere--Cardinal Wiseman. In his _Recollections of the Last Four Popes_, he speaks of the character of Pius VII.: "When no longer a monarch, but a captive--when bereft of all advice and sympathy, but pressed on close by those who, themselves probably deceived, thoroughly deceived him, he committed the one error of his life and pontificate, in 1813. For there came to him men 'of the seed of Aaron,' who could not be expected to mislead him, themselves free and moving in the busiest of the world, who showed him, through the loopholes of his prison, that world from which he was shut out, as though agitated on its surface, and to its lowest depths, through his unbendingness; the church torn to schism, and religion weakened to destruction, from what they termed his obstinacy. He who had but prayed and bent his neck to suffering was made to appear in his own eyes a harsh and cruel master, who would rather see all perish than loose his grasp on unrelenting but impotent jurisdiction.