CATHOLIC  SOCIALISTS.  139
rapidly  increased.  It  was  the  declaration  of  war  against  the
“  laws  of  May  ”  and  the  policy  of  Prince  Bismarck.
The  Bishop  of  Mayence  did  not  abandon  his  work.  He
urged  his  clergy  to  study  unremittingly  the  social  question.
In  1871  he  sent  a  monitorial  circular  to  all  the  priests  of  his
diocese,  directing  them  to  prepare  exact  statistics  as  to  the
condition  of  the  working  men  of  their  respective  parishes.  In
the  general  assembly  of  German  Catholics  which  was  held  at
Mayence,  in  September,  187  r,  under  the  inspiration  of  Monseigneur ­
  von  Ketteler,  the  labour  question  was  considered  at
length.  The  following  are  some  of  the  resolutions  passed  on
the  subject  :—It  is  necessary  to  determine,  by  means  of  a
committee  of  inquiry  composed  of  workmen  and  employers,
the  exact  moral  and  material  condition  of  the  labouring  classes,
in  order  that  the  legislature  may  be  able  to  enact  a  code  of
labour  (Arbatsrecht).  Landed  property,  trade,  and  commerce
enjoy  juridical  protection,  and  yet  the  rights  of  labour  are  not
recognized,  although  labourers  form  ninety  per  cent,  of  the
population.  The  assembly  urgently  calls  for  the  establishment
of  Christian  Social  Associations  for  master-workmen,  factory
hands,  young  men,  women,  and  young  girls,  and  it  reminds  the
well-to-do  classes  that  it  is  their  bounden  duty  to  come  liberally
in  aid  of  these  institutions.  The  assembly  deplores  the  condition
of  labourers’  dwellings,  which  are  a  scandal  for  a  Christian
country,  and  it  insists  energetically  that  societies  should  be
formed  for  the  erection  of  healthy  and  cheap  habitations.  A
proposition  censuring  strikes  was  rejected  by  a  large  majority.
The  foregoing  account  will  suffice  to  show  the  spirit  that
animates  the  Catholic  Socialist  movement  The  work  commenced ­
  by  Monseigneur  von  Ketteler  has  made  considerable
progress  in  these  last  few  years.  The  clergy  have  everywhere
devoted  themselves  to  it  with  ardour,  because  it  affords  a  means
of  gaining  adherents,  in  the  struggles  of  the  Kulturkampf,  to  the
profit  of  the  Church  and  against  the  government.  Among
those  who  march  in  the  first  rank,  may  be  mentioned,  at  the
head  Herr  Schings,  a  rector,  and  Herr  Kronenberg,  a  vicar,  at
Aix-la-Chapelle;  Herr  Laaf,  vicar  at  Essen;  and  Herr  E.  Klein,
the  Dom-capitular  of  Paderborn.  Their  efforts  tended  to  bring