Conspiring against the Roman See can never be joined with other aims. (…) We conspire exclusively against Rome!
Our ultimate goal is that of Voltaire and the French Revolution, namely the complete annihilation of Catholicism and even the uprooting of the Christian idea …
With the passport of hypocrisy, we can conspire as it suits us and gradually draw near to the accomplishment of our goal. (…) What we must strive for and await, as the Jews await the Messiah, is a Pope according to our needs. (…) Little can be done with old Cardinals and Bishops of firm character (…).
You must aim at the youth: you must seduce the young! It is necessary that you attract them in such a way that they suspect nothing – under the banner of secret societies. (…)
Do you wish to bring about revolution in Italy? Seek such a Pope as we have portrayed. Do you wish to place the elect upon the throne of the harlot of Babylon?
Let the clergy march under your banner, in the belief that they are marching beneath the emblem of the Apostolic Keys! (…)
Cast your nets … but cast them into sacristies, seminaries, and convents (…). You will catch friends and lead them to the foot of the Apostolic Throne (…).
Your prey will be a revolution clothed in tiara and cope, marching with cross and banner. A revolution for which a small spark will suffice to set the four corners of the world on fire.
Conspiring against the Roman See can never be joined with other aims. (…) We conspire exclusively against Rome! (…)
It is not the sharp dagger that Catholicism and Monarchy should fear most. But these two pillars of social order may collapse through corruption – so let us labor at it tirelessly. (…) Let us spread every vice among the broad masses.
Let them absorb them with all five senses, even to satiety (…).
Encourage the corruption of hearts, and you will have no more Catholics. Draw the priest away from work, from the altar, and from the practice of virtue.
Let him occupy his thoughts and fill his time with other things. Make of him an idler, a glutton (…), and he will become a man of swollen ambitions and an intriguer (…).
Corruption on a grand scale – this is what we have undertaken. The corruption of the people by the clergy, and of the clergy by us. A corruption which shall at last enable us to bury the Church!
The goal is too beautiful not to tempt men such as we (…). The best dagger with which to strike the Church in the very heart is corruption. To work, then: let us labor until the end is achieved!
(Henri Delassus, “Le probleme de l’heure presente”. Desclee et C. Typographes Editeurs 1904, t. I, ss. 353-403).
Pope Leo XIII, in his 1884 encyclical against Freemasonry, “Humanum genus”, having recognized that mankind is divided into two hostile and opposing camps (the first being the kingdom of God on earth, that is, the true Church of Jesus Christ, and the second the kingdom of Satan), states:
The ultimate purpose of Freemasonry is to persecute Christianity with relentless hatred; nor will they cease until they have brought about the complete destruction of all religious institutions established by the Supreme Pontiff.
The Pope also emphasizes:
The intention to destroy religion and the Church founded by God Himself, to which He also gave the guarantee of immortality (…), is sheer madness and most audacious impiety!
The day after the publication of “Humanum genus”, Freemasonry responded in the Bulletin of the Symbolic Grand Lodge of Scotland in this way:
Freemasonry should do nothing less than thank the Pope for his latest encyclical. Leo XIII, with unquestionable authority and with a great abundance of proofs, has once again demonstrated that there is an unbridgeable gulf between the Church, of which he is the representative, and the Revolution, of which Freemasonry is the right arm.
It is therefore fitting that those who still hesitate should cease to nourish vain illusions. All must grow accustomed to the thought that the time has come to choose between the old order, founded upon Revelation, and the new order, recognizing no other foundation than science and human reason; between the spirit of authority and the spirit of liberty.
(Henri Delassus, “Le probleme de l’heure presente”. Desclee et C. Typographes Editeurs 1904, t. I, s. 29).
Encyclical “Humanum genus”
Their ultimate purpose forces itself into view – namely, the utter overthrow of that whole religious and political order of the world which Christian teaching has produced, and the substitution of a new state of things in accordance with their ideas, of which the foundations and laws shall be drawn from mere naturalism.
To use the words of St. Augustine:
they think, or would have it believed, that Christian teaching is not suited to the good of the State; for they wish the State to be founded not on solid virtue, but on the impunity of vice.
