CATHOLIC  SOCIALISTS.

137
action  of  each  group.  Local  autonomy  with  unity  of  action  in
the  interests  of  the  Church,  such  is  the  principle.  No  one  of  our
associations,  said  the  committee,  is  to  imagine  that  it  can  bring
a  ready-made  solution  of  the  most  difficult  problem  set  before
the  modern  world,  or  to  presume  to  enjoin  upon  others,  as  a
Messianic  revelation,  the  particular  organization  which  it  may
have  thought  the  best.  Each  Christian  Social  association
ought  to  be  allowed  full  freedom  of  action  within  the  sphere
which  it  has  chosen  for  itself  It  is  its  business  to  look  after
the  wants  of  its  members  and  the  local  necessities.  To  impose
the  same  regulations  upon  all  would  be  to  shut  out  the  future,
and  to  cut  the  roots  of  all  independent  growth.  These  associations ­
  will  not  be  the  instruments  which  the  Church  will  employ
to  solve  definitely  the  difficulties  in  the  way  of  the  organization
of  a  better  and  truly  Christian  society.  When  the  hour  shall
have  come,  the  Head  of  Catholicism  will  himself  designate
the  ministers  into  whose  hands  this  duty  may  be  assigned  in
all  confidence.
Ihese  mptical  hopes  please  the  masses.  Moreover,  it
was  a  splendid  idea,  and  one  which  certainly  cannot  injure  the
influence  of  the  clergy,  to  entrust  to  the  Pope  the  economic
transformation  of  society.  The  holy  father  is  here  presented
as  a  new  Messiah,  who  will  fulfil  the  promises  of  the  millennium,
by  precipitating  into  the  abyss  Ricardo,  Malthus,  “the  iron
law  Ramberger,  and  the  whole  of  f.iberal  “  Manchesterdom,"
he  Catholic  Social  party  succeeded  in  gaining,  all  at
adherents  by  adopting  Kolping
  s  Catholic  journeyman  clubs  "  (Katholische  Gescllvcreine).
of  seventy  thousand  members  Peasant  clubs  (Bauernverein,)