Incidentally, it was clear that if Catholics as such were kept away from the polls, nobody could say precisely just how many they numbered.

The Vatican constantly asserted that its adherents were in a majority--a claim which, if true, meant that the Kingdom of Italy rested on a very precarious basis.

But other Catholics sincerely deplored the harm which the irreconcilable attitude of the Curia caused to religion.
They regretted to see an affair purely political treated as religious; to have the belief in the Pope's temporal power virtually set up as a part of their creed.

The Lord's work was waiting to be done; yet they who ought to be foremost in it were handicapped.

Other agencies had stepped in ahead of them.