Newman
opened it. 'All is over,' he said, 'I am not allowed to go.' The
envelope contained a letter from the Bishop announcing that,
together with the formal permission for an Oratory at Oxford,
Propaganda had issued a secret instruction to the effect that
Newman himself was by no means to reside there. If he showed
signs of doing so, he was blandly and suavely ('blande
suaviterque' were the words of the Latin instrument) to be
prevented. And now the secret instruction had come into
operation-- blande suaviterque: Dr. Newman's spirit had been
crushed.
His friends made some gallant efforts to retrieve the situation;
but, it was in vain. Father St. John hurried to Rome and the
indignant laity of England, headed by Lord Edward Howard, the
guardian of the young Duke of Norfolk, seized the opportunity of
a particularly virulent anonymous attack upon Newman, to send him
an address in which they expressed their feeling that 'every
blow that touches you inflicts a wound upon the Catholic Church
in this country'. The only result was an outburst of redoubled
fury upon the part of Monsignor Talbot. The address, he declared,
was an insult to the Holy See. 'What is the province of the
laity?' he interjected. 'To hunt, to shoot, to entertain. These
matters they understand, but to meddle with ecclesiastical
matters they have no right at all.
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