MODERATES: The name given to a party in the Established Church of Scotland during the eighteenth century, because of its alleged laxity in dootrine. Their principal members were Hugh Blair and William Robertson (qq.v.). In general they preached morals rather than doctrines. Opposition to them resulted in the formation of the Secession and Relief Synods, and finally in the Free Church. See Presbyterians, I.

MODERATOR: The title given to the presiding officer of Presbyterian courts (session, presbytery, synod, general assembly). Perpetual moderators for presbyteries were proposed at the introduction of episcopacy into Scotland.

MODERNISM: The name applied to a movement loosely defined but widely extended in the Roman communion, intended, as the name indicates, to bring that communion into contact with methods of thought as developed chiefly by modern philosophic and critical scholarship. The word "modernist" first appears in English in Dean Swift's writings. In its Latin form it was used in late scholastic writers. Contrasted with the other nineteenth-century anti-official movements in Roman communion, it has two characteristic marks: (1) It is international. This can not be said of either Guntherism or Herrmanism, both of which are markedly German. Its international character is much more striking than was the case in the Old-Catholic movement (see Old Catholics). Modernism has representatives in America, England, France, Italy, Germany, and even in Spain. (2) It is especially difficult to summarize in a series of principles abstractly stated the standpoint of the modernistic school. When Pope Pius X. did this in his encyclical and syllabus of 1907, the modernists united in protesting that not only were they misrepresented by these particular propositions supposed to have been extracted from their writings, but they were equally unanimous in objecting that no such series of formulas could adequately represent what they stood for. The modernist movement may therefore be said to represent a temperaments) or intellectual attitude rather than a series of propositions. It is plain that the opposition between the modernists and the official position of theRomanChurch was made acute by the attempt of Pins X. to carry out concretely and in detail the principle theoretically set forth by Leo XIII. when he laid down the philosophic and theological system of St. Thomas. Aquinas as the norm of church teaching. This direction had been disregarded in practise by many Roman Catholic professors in Italy, France, and Germany. Reviews, dissertations, and books were published, all showing that the scholastic system was being quietly passed over and relegated to the background. Roman Catholic scholars were using in their investigations the methods of research followed by. modern scholarship in general. In addition to the introduction of modern systems of philosophy and theology, many Roman Catholics, were devoting themselves to Biblical criticism along non-traditional lines. In both these respects, the antagonism between the new methods and new teaching and the traditions of the Roman system on its intellectual aide became acute. Loisy (q.v.), the most eminent of French Biblical critics, who is his methods practically agreed with Wellbausen, Schmiedel, and Vas Manen, was excommunicated. The papal encyclical is largely directed against his position. For in addition to being a critic, Loisy also in several works attempted a synthesis dealing with the history of dogma and the principles of religious psychology. The case of Father Tyrrell (q.v.), a member of the Jesuit order, who was unquestionably the leader of the modernistic movement in England, is somewhat different, for his variation from the official teaching can not be so definitely determined as is the case of Loisy. Father Tyrrell's books, published with the official sanction, were of a popular religious character, and although they were obviously incompatible with the strict scholastic system, they were published with the official sanction of the church authorities, and the immediate cause of the excommunication of Father Tyrrell was a personal letter, afterward printed under the title of The much Abused Letter, written to an Italian professor to urge him to remain in the Roman communion even if many items in the teaching and practise of the Church seemed contrary to his convictions and distasteful to his feelings. It was plain here that Father Tyrrell's point of view was not that of his correspondent; apparently, therefore, Tyrrell's condemnation was brought upon him because he spoke in s slighting way of the administration of the Church, and failed to hold that scholasticism was absolutely involved in the Roman Catholic system of belief. It has been noted that Father Minocchi, the Italian Biblical scholar, was admonished because he ventured in the field of Biblical criticism to speak of the mythical character of the narrative in the first chapters of Genesis. Indeed, in the recant campaign against modernism it has often been hard to decide exactly upon what principle the official condemnations were made. Individual priests were disciplined in France and Italy, after the papal encyclical had been published, who were not known to have written or spoken anything resembling the tenets condemned in the papal documents. The leaders of the Christian Democratic movement in France and Italy have been especially singled out for this treatment. There is apparently a kind of unofficial political and social modernism as distasteful to the authorities at Rome as the critical and philosophical type. Papal pronounce-

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ments have taken no account specifically of this development, but the social modernist appears to be in an even more precarious position than the philosophical modernists. Laberthonniere who, as the editor of the Annuals do la ph4oaophie chr&enne, has been especially active in substituting a newly modeled Christian system of philosophy in place of scholasticism, and his review, though it has been a clearing-house for many French modernistic writers, has escaped excommunication. But several of the French clergy who edited Christian Democratic newspapers favorable to the republic and loyally accepting disestablishment have been disciplined.

Modernism has had few victims in Germany and Austria, not because the movement has not many sympathizers there, but largely because the critics of the traditional system of the Roman Catholic Church are professors in Roman Catholic universities where they have the protection of the State. There have been some cases of attempted interference on the part of the authorities at Rome, but it appears as if the Roman Catholic bishops in Germany are buffers between the scholars of the Church and those Roman Catholics who have professorial chairs. The Roman Catholics in Germany have been more stirred by the case of Hermann Schell (q.v.), a Roman Catholic professor at Wamburg, who was disciplined from Rome because of his non-acholastie system of theology; but his case occurred several years before the encyclical was published and before the modernistic agitation commenced. Indeed, the genesis of the present policy of the Roman Church may be studied in these separate cases of official condemnation, some going back almost ten years, where what is now called modernism is foreshadowed vaguely both as regards the teaching held and the condemnations issued from Rome. In this connection there deserve to be mentioned the condemnation of Father Zahm, an American Roman Catholic professor, who was excommunicated because of his reinterpretation of several theoretical dogmas in the light of modern evolutionary science; the condemnation of Father Duggan, the English Roman Catholic parish priest who published a widely circulated work on the reunion of Christendom ten years ago; and the long discussion over the condemnation of the so-called Americanism in the Roman Church, which grew out of the biography of Father Hecker, which was translated into French and has had a wide influence on the French school of modernism. See Ultramontanism.

W. L. Bevan.

Bibliography: The encyclical of Pius %_ Latin and English, is in Am. Cath.,Quarterly Review, Oct, 1907; std English in Programme Modernism, below; s defense of the socyclical by Canon J. Moyes is in The Nineteenth Century, Des., 1907. An excellent and informins brochure, by L. H. Jordan, Modernism in Italy; its Origin, its Incentive, its Leaders and its Aims, Oxford and New York, 1909, is broader than its title indicates end besides is invaluable for its bibliography. Consult: What we Want. An open Letter to Plus Y. from a Group of Priests. Tronal. from the Italian . . by d . L. LiUay, London, 1907: E. Barbier, Lee Danwerates ehrfLord of the World, New York, 1908 (pictures the downfall of modernism and the return of Christendom to the pope," the lord of the world "); Berliner internationals WochaxucArijt, Nov, 1907-Fab., 19M (a symposium): J. Oodryes, The Doctrine of Modernism and its Refutation, Philadelphia, 1908: P. Kneib, Wesen and Bcdeutung der Bnsyklika paoen den Modernismus, Mainz, 1908; J. Lebreton, L'Eneyeiique et la thEoIopie modeneiste, Paris, 1908; E. T. O'Dwyer, Cardinal Newman and the Encyclical Paacesdi Domini pngie, New York 1908; The Programme of Modernism: a Reply to do Encyclical 0,1 Plus %. with the Teal of do Encyclical in an Enpliall Version, tmns& from do Italian by Father 0. Tyrrell, with Introduction by A. L. Lillcy, New York, 1908; H. B. Swete, in The Guardia". Jan. 28, 1908; C. Besuredon, Ls Maderniams, ou les bases do la foi, Paris. 1908; J. Houodeau, Prapmatiame et modernieme, ib. 1908; P. Kneib, Weaen and Bedeutung der Ensyklika geTen don Efodernismus. Mainz, 1908: K. Babel, (3exAiehte den kothdiscAew Efodernismna in Amerika, Deutschland, England, Fmnkraich, and Italian, Tübingen, 1908; A. L. Lilly, Modernism; a Record and a Review, New York, 1908; P. Sabatier, Modernism. London. 1908: idem. Les bfoderniates. Notes d'hist. religieuse contemporaine, Paris. 1909: Delmont_ modernism e6 modernsMes en Italic, en Allarnapns, on Anpdderre, et an France, xb. 1909; Msumue. Lee Modsr. nixes. ib. 1909: O. Weill, Histoire du catholieiame lib" an Franca, ib. 1909.