CHAPTER IV

ROMAN INDEXES, 1758–1899

1. Index of Benedict XIV 1758. 2. Issues of the Roman Index 1763–1899.

=1. Index of Benedict XIV, 1758.=--In 1758, an Index was compiled under the direction of Benedict XIV which is of importance as marking a new departure in the censorship policy of the Church. The accompanying papal brief, which bears date December 23, 1757, states that the Indexes heretofore issued are in various respects incorrect, and that the present work has been prepared in order to place at the service of the faithful trustworthy lists of the books prohibited. In a Bull, issued as far back as July, 1753, the Index Congregation had been charged with the duty of the compilation, and five years had been devoted to the task. The Index was printed at once in two editions, one containing pp. xxxix-268, and the other pp. xxxvi-304. The title-page reads:

_Index Librorum prohibitorum SSmi D.N. Benedicti XIV, Pontificis Maximi, jussu Recognitus atque editus. Romae 1758, ex typographia reverendae Camerae Apostolicae. cum summi Pontificis privilegio._

Both editions contain a copper plate vignette. The papal brief is followed by an introduction by Thomas Augustus Ricchini, Secretary of the Congregation; the Tridentine Rules with the commentaries of Clement VIII and Alexander VII, together with a new note on Rule IV (on the reading of the Scriptures); the Instruction of Clement; the Bull of 1753, and a summary (peculiar to this Index) entitled: _Decreta de libris prohibitis nec in Indice expressis_. Such summaries are in later Indexes entitled _Decreta Generalia_. In the preface to the _Decreta_, it is explained that as, on account of the increasing mass of printed books, it is no longer possible to present all the titles in the lists, it has seemed best to classify these into certain general divisions or categories, and to shape general regulations based upon the subjects treated or on the general character of the literature, which shall serve as guides to the faithful, who with this aid need have no difficulty in determining for a book not specifically catalogued, whether or not it belongs to one of the prohibited classes. In the editor’s introduction, Ricchini says: “In the arrangement of the lists, the family names rather than the forenames of the writers have been followed as far as practicable. In the previous Indexes, the forenames were utilised for the main entry, with occasional cross-references to the family name. We have accepted as family names names that have been adopted by the writers. Theses and disputations stand under the names not of the students but of the instructors. Anonymous works are alphabeted under their titles.” Against the entries of books which were condemned in the Tridentine Index, is noted _Ind. Trid._, and for those condemned under Clement, _Append. Ind. Trid._ For the prohibitions after 1696, the year is specified, and occasionally the Bull itself. In the cases in which the entry includes the place and date of publication, the prohibition applies not to the work as a whole, but only to the particular edition cited; but in the absence of such specification, the condemnation applies to the work in all its issues. The addition of the term _donec corrigatur_ or _donec expurgetur_ indicates that the responsibility for the corrections rests with the Index Congregation. Reusch points out that the lists in this Index, while presenting corrections of many of the errors contained in the Tridentine and Clementine, are themselves by no means either correct or complete. A number of the names of the Clementine lists have been omitted simply through the oversight of the transcribers.

The _Decreta Generalia_ have the sub-heading: “Prohibited books which have been written or published by heretics or which have to do with heresies or with creeds of unbelievers.” This part of the work contains the following subdivisions:

1. The prayers and offices of the heretics.

2. _Apologia_ in which their errors are defended or favoured.

3. Editions of the Scriptures edited or printed by heretics, or containing notes, _scholia_, or commentaries prepared by unbelieving writers.

4. Any portions of the Scriptures put into verse by heretics.

5. Heretical editions of calendars, martyrologies, and necrologies.

6. Poems, narrations, addresses, pictures, or compositions of any kind in which heretical beliefs are commended.

7. Catechisms, A.B.C. primers, commentaries on the Apostles’ Creed or the Ten Commandments, instructions in doctrine.

8. Colloquies, conferences, disputations, synodical proceedings concerning the creeds, edited or printed by heretics.

9. Articles of Faith, confessions, or creeds of heretics.

10. Dictionaries, vocabularies, glossaries, and thesauri compiled or printed by heretics (as examples are specified the works of the class bearing the names of the Stephani, Scapula, and Hoffman); these books may, however, be permitted when they have been purged of heretical passages or of entries that could be utilised against the Catholic faith.

11. Works presenting or defending the creeds of any of the Mohammedan sects.

Certain of the above specifications of classes are entered in the alphabeted lists under the headings: _Apologia_, _Catechesis_, _Colloquium_, _Confessio_, _Disputatio_, etc. The titles of individual works belonging to such classes, titles which had found place in many preceding Indexes, are then omitted. In some instances a specific work is entered as an example or type of the class to be prohibited, as _Apologia Confessionis Augustinae_, with the _addendum_, _et caeterae omnes haereticorum apologiae; vide Decreta_.

Under the heading of “Prohibited Books on Special Subjects,” are classed together works condemned under certain prohibitions of the last half of the 16th century and the first half of the 17th; for instance, works on duelling, and letters or pamphlets in which the so-called laws and rules of duelling are presented. Forbidden also are _Pasquilles_ (broadsides or tractates), printed or written, which make citations from the Scriptures, or which in any fashion “approach too near” to God or to the saints, or to the sacraments or other holy things of the Church.

In certain letters addressed to the Inquisitor-General of Spain, Benedict XIV names a number of writers whose works had, on the ground of special consideration for the authors, been spared from the insertion in the Index, although they had fully deserved such measure of condemnation. Among the books so specified are those of the Pope’s friend, Ludovico Antonio Muratori (1672–1750). When this letter of the Pope with reference to Muratori was made public, the latter wrote to the Pope for some specification of the grounds for the condemnation of his writings. The Pope replied that he had had in view in this reference, not the theological writings of his friend, but the treatise on the civil jurisdiction of the Pope in the papal States. A number of the writings of Muratori came into sharp criticism and were the subject of controversy, but although these were thoroughly investigated and formally denounced in Rome, no one of them finds place in the Index.

In the list of authors is retained the name of Poza for his complete works, in continued antagonism to the approval of these works by the framers of the Spanish Indexes. Another noteworthy entry is that of the _Bibliothèque Janséniste, ou Catalogue Alphabétique des Livres Jansénistes, Quesnellistes, Baganistes ou Suspects de ces Erreurs_ (Decr., September 20, 1749). This is the work that supplies the material for the anti-Jansenist appendix in the latest Spanish Index. Its condemnation here constitutes a fresh instance of the antagonism which continued in regard to literature and in regard to certain points of doctrine as presented in literature, between the Church of Rome and the Church of Spain.

Raynaud, whose work had been prohibited in the preceding Index, had added his protest to that of Poza at the injustice of being condemned unheard. In his _Genitus Columbae_, is printed as a parody on the methods of the censors, a critique on the Apostles’ Creed in every article of which is discovered some latent and insidious heresy. The work was itself, naturally enough, promptly condemned.[29]

This Index of Benedict represents the beginning of what may be called the modern policy of the Catholic Church in regard to the censorship of literary production and the control or supervision of the reading of the faithful. By the middle of the 18th century, the Church authorities were finally prepared to admit the impracticability, with any such commissions or examining bodies as could be maintained, of making an individual examination of each work produced from the printing-press. Such a conclusion might with better wisdom have been arrived at a century earlier. The most direct evidence of the futility of the attempts on the part of the Congregation of the Index, of the Roman Inquisition, and of the local inquisitors to inform themselves intelligently concerning the nature, the orthodoxy, and the probable influence for good or for bad of the increasing mass of books brought into print from year to year, is presented by the Indexes themselves. The work of the compilation of these successive Indexes was placed in the hands of scholarly men, and, in the large majority of cases, of men whose integrity of purpose and devotion to the higher interests of the Church need not be brought into question. These devout and scholarly compilers were, however, willing to put into print, under the authority of an infallible Church, instructions for the reading of believers which the most faithful of Catholics must have found difficulty in obeying with any consistency.

The Index lists are marvels of bibliographical inaccuracy. The names of the authors, frequently misspelled, are entered almost at random, at times under their surnames or locality-names, sometimes in the vernacular, sometimes in the Latin forms. This method, or lack of method, necessarily resulted in duplicate entries, while the copyists, instructed to transfer for printer’s copy for a later Index the titles from an earlier, succeeded not infrequently (possibly in the desire to avoid duplications) in omitting altogether writers and books of unquestioned heresy. More serious, however, than these bibliographical blunders, the responsibility for which rested in part at least with copyists or with compositors, were the errors which were undoubtedly due to editorial ignorance. It was increasingly impossible for the compilers to secure personal knowledge of the contents of more than a very small proportion of the books which were to be passed upon and classed as either safe or pernicious. Descriptions or impressions of current publications such as are available to-day through reviews were, prior at least to the middle of the 18th century, non-existent. The judgment arrived at concerning an unfamiliar book depended in part on the name of the author, and in part on that of the printer or the place of publication. Certain printing offices and certain publishing centres came to be associated in the minds of the Roman censors with heretical opinions. The general policy seems to have been that it was safer to condemn a few books not assuredly either pernicious or heretical, than to run the risk of omitting from the lists any single work which might constitute an influence against the authority of the Church.

The selections were also largely influenced by the doctrinal issues and by the party prejudices that arose between the great Orders of the Church. The direction of the censorship work in Rome, both of the Inquisition and of the Congregation, has, since their institution, remained in the hands of the Dominicans. The natural result was a strong bias of opinion and of action against the writings of the Jesuits and of the Franciscans. When, as occasionally happened, the two latter Orders secured representation on the boards of examiners, opportunity was taken to pay off literary scores against the Dominican writers. Of these three great bodies in the Church, the Jesuits included by far the larger proportion of scholarly workers and were responsible for the larger mass of dogmatic and theological literature. It is the books of the Jesuits, therefore, that furnish the largest number of titles to the lists of prohibited doctrinal works by Catholic writers.

Up to the time of Benedict, the authorities who had directed the work of the compilers had thought it necessary to give consideration to the literature produced by Protestant writers, as far as they could secure knowledge concerning the character of the books, or could secure at least information as to their existence. Such knowledge and information were at best but imperfect and fragmentary. The selections from Protestant writers that appear in the Indexes of Pius IV, Paul IV, and Clement VIII impress one as curiously haphazard. It is difficult to understand under what instructions the work of the compilers was done. The names of the larger heretics of the Reformation period, such as Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, Oecolampadius, find place in the greater number of the Indexes, although even with these larger names there are occasional curious omissions. In no one of these earlier Indexes, however, in which the attempt was made to present a complete list of the doctrinal writings of these leaders of the Reformation, have the compilers been successful in making a list that was either complete or correct. It is possibly on the ground of some consciousness of probable omissions that, after having inserted in the alphabeted lists the titles (more or less correctly worded) of certain books, it was thought safer to make a second entry by the name of the author, followed by the term “_Opera omnia_.” With the second and third groups (considered in the order of their relative importance) of the Protestant doctrinal writers, the selection both of the writers themselves and of their books becomes much more incidental or accidental. In certain instances, the most important controversial production of such an author is left uncondemned, while for some comparatively insignificant tract space is made in the catalogue.

While the selections from writers other than Catholic are devoted in the main to doctrinal and controversial literature, and were probably made up as the result of a general instruction to place on the list of prohibitions all works inimical to the true Faith, the Indexes include also a curious sprinkling of titles of what may be called miscellaneous literature, that is, of books having nothing to do with matters of doctrine, theology, or religion.

The attempt to have some consideration given in the Indexes to the literature of the whole of Europe, caused the compilers to depend for their titles upon catalogues which, in many cases, they could not have had an opportunity of verifying. The Italian editors transcribed for these Roman Indexes titles of books which appeared from year to year in the announcement-lists of the Frankfort Book-Fair. Their opinions or guesses as to the pernicious character of a book so announced could be based only upon the name of the author, if this happened to be a well-known name, or upon the imprint and general character of the publisher whose name indicated of course the place of production. It was the case, however, with the publishing catalogues of Frankfort in the 16th and 17th centuries, as with similar catalogues in later centuries, that a certain proportion of the books announced never came into print at all. Either no sufficient subscriptions were secured, or there was a change in the plans of the publisher, or the author did not secure the necessary resources to ensure the undertaking, or the author died before the completion of his work. As a result, distinction and commemoration were secured in the Index for a number of books which never came into existence.

In the Index of Benedict, while no specific statement to such effect is made, the compilers had evidently been instructed to concentrate their censorship labours upon books which, bearing the names of Catholic writers, and printed, for the most part, within Catholic territory, were likely to have influence with readers among the faithful. The authorities of the Church had finally recognised, after a series of experiments continuing during two centuries, that it was not practicable for a group of Italian priests, working in Rome, to keep themselves adequately informed concerning the productions of the printing-press throughout the civilised world. It was not only a physical impossibility to secure knowledge of the contents of these books, printed no longer in one universal language of literature and scholarship but in all the languages of civilisation; it was even impracticable to obtain and to utilise for Index purposes any fairly complete bibliographies of their titles. From the time of Benedict to the present day, the censorship of the Church has therefore restricted its efforts in the main to the supervision of Catholic literature. It is necessary, however, to use the term “in the main” because the Index of Benedict and the succeeding Indexes, including even the two promulgated by Leo XIII, include, in connection with the long lists of doctrinal works by Catholic writers, a curious sprinkling of books written by Protestants for Protestant communities, the majority of which books have no concern whatsoever with doctrinal matter. It it very difficult to arrive at any understanding of the policy on which these selections, comprising a few dozen volumes out of many thousands, have been arrived at. It does not seem to have been based on the relative importance, as hundreds of productions which secured a world-wide reputation, and the influence of which has been decidedly adverse to the contentions of the Church, have received no attention, while volumes of lesser significance have been found worthy of condemnation.

The lists of the Catholic books have also, under the system pursued by the editors of Benedict and their successors, been largely reduced. The method pursued by the Benedictine compilers of condemning _in toto_ certain classes of literature and all books relating to certain specified subjects, saves the editors from the necessity of presenting long lists of titles. In no other manner, in fact, could the conclusions of the censors of the 18th and 19th centuries in regard to the current productions of the printing-press have been brought within reasonable compass. The Index of Benedict marks the beginning of the modern policy of the Church in the matter of censorship.

Hilgers lays stress on the wise toleration of Benedict, as expressed in these regulations of 1758, in insisting that in all cases of doubt, and

## particularly when the book under examination was a work of a Catholic

of repute, the advantage of the doubt should be given to the author; that the author should, if within reach, be given an opportunity, before the decision concerning his book was reached, of being heard before the examiners; that the examination of any book the subject of which might not be one for general understanding should be committed to “consultors” or “qualificators,” one or more of whom must have expert knowledge of the subject-matter; that the judgment should be based upon, not the view of any one Order or group or school, but upon the whole policy of the Christian Church and with reference purely to the welfare and instruction of believers. Hilgers also commends the wise liberality of Benedict in regard to works of science. He adds: “So valuable for the influence of the people is the example of men of science, that it is not too much to say that even in the work of scientific investigation, it is their duty, irrespective of the regulations of the Church, to secure a dispensation for the reading of prohibited books or doubtful books.”[30]

The Constitution of Benedict, issued under the title _Sollicita ac provida_, was considered to be so wisely framed that Leo XIII, while repealing all the earlier regulations, found it desirable to confirm and to republish this in the Index of 1900.

=2. Issues of the Roman Index, 1763–1899.=--The Index of 1758 constitutes the foundation of all later issues of the Roman Index. A series of appendices were compiled at irregular intervals (from five to ten years) in such form that they could be bound in with the Benedictine Index. At longer intervals (from twenty-five to fifty years), the lists were consolidated into one alphabet and the Index, so printed, constituted a legitimate new edition. The responsibility for the compilation of these additional lists rested with the successive secretaries of the Congregation of the Index. The introduction, written by the secretary to each new appendix, follows pretty closely the wording of that of Ricchini, printed in 1758.

Appendices issued in 1763, 1770, and 1779 were printed in the printing-office of the Holy See. A number of the better printed editions which, according to the title-page, were the work of this office, were, as Reusch points out, actually printed in places other than Rome. Certain of these have been identified with the typography of offices in Parma, Venice, and Florence. The Index issued in 1786 was continued with five appendices; and, in 1806, was reprinted with the six lists in one alphabet. The first Roman Index of the 19th century was issued in 1819, with an introduction from Alex. Aug. Bardani. The second Index of the century was published under Gregory XVI in 1835, and the third under the same Pope in 1841. Both issues contained prefaces by Thomas Ant. Degola. These three Indexes were reprinted in a number of impressions, and the practice had now obtained of recording correctly the place of issue. Italian issues, printed with the papal privilege, were published at Monza, Monreale (in Sicily), and Naples; and an edition printed in Mechlin also carries a papal privilege. Editions for which no such privilege was secured appeared in Paris and in Brussels. Under Pius IX, were published two editions of the Index, one in 1865 and the second in 1877. Under Leo XIII, were also published two, one in 1881 and the second in 1900 (the preface bears date 1899). This latter is at the present date (January, 1907) the latest issue in the papal series. It is described in detail in