More Yet, He Is A Freemason, Which In Italy Means Things
Anathema To The Church, And He Is A Very Prominent Freemason.
With
reference to the State, his official existence, though not inimical, is
through the fusion of the political parties which elected him hardly
less anomalous.
This combination overthrew the late Clerical city
government, and it included Liberals, Republicans, Socialists, and all
the other anti-Clericals. Whatever liberalism or republicanism means,
socialism cannot mean less than the economic solution of regality and
aristocracy in Europe, and in Italy as elsewhere. It does not mean the
old-fashioned revolution; it means simply the effacement of all social
differences by equal industrial obligations. So far as the Socialists
can characterize it, therefore, the actual municipal government of Rome
is as antimonarchical as it is antipapal. But the syndic of Rome is a
man of education, of culture, of intelligence, and he is evidently a man
of consummate tact. He has known how to reconcile the warring elements,
which made peace in his election, to one another and to their outside
antagonists, to the Church and to the State, as well as to himself, in
the course he holds over a very rugged way. His opportunities of
downfall are pretty constant, it will be seen, when it is explained that
if a measure with which he is identified fails in the city council it
becomes his duty to resign, like the prime-minister of England in the
like case with Parliament, But Mr. Nathan, who is as alien in his name
as in his race and religion, and is known orally to the Romans as Signor
Nahtahn, has not yet been obliged to resign.
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