Section — Vermeersch, On Forbidden Books
3. On the Signification of Various Words and Clauses
II. Applications or Particular Cases
What are Fabulae amatoriae?
42. B. Fabulae amatoriae. In the new Index this means the same thing as opera romanensia in the former one. For since we are referred back to the same prohibitory decrees, and there is no indication of any mitigation, it is sufficiently clear that this formula was adopted for the sake of a more elegant language, but that no change was made in the matter. Therefore stage plays are not included, nor are "novels" excluded if they are not strictly love stories. It is to be translated: romans, not, as some have written, romans d'amour.
C. What is ex professo, data opera?
43. C. Ex professo, data opera. The clauses ex professo and data opera scarcely differ in use; and by most they are held as sounding the same.1 Yet if you consider the force of the words, Pennacchi rightly understands more by the clause ex professo than by the other, data opera.2
For data opera is the same as "by design,"3 deliberately, studiously. In French you would say: de propos délibéré, de parti pris;4 in Italian: a bella posta, etc.; and opposed to it is the expression: incidentally, by the way (en passant, à l'occasion).
Ex professo further denies the dissimulation of such a plan, so that you act as if professing it, for example, with developed explanation and proposed arguments.5
Therefore these clauses also suppose in the writer a certain direct intention of the thing which the book is judged to do ex professo, data opera.
But in order that the book, and not only the writer in some place, be reputed to do something data opera, ex professo,6 it is necessary that either by its general tendency, or in a notable part, it devote itself to that thing. One chapter will be a notable part, sometimes less, if the chapters are lengthy.
Concerning this notion, cf. Génicot,7 Hollweck,8 Pennacchi,9 Planchard.10
1 For example, Gennari, Monitore, loc. cit., p. 80; Wernz, note 56.
2 Op. cit., n. 59.
3 Forcellini, s.v. Deditus.
4 Planchard, loc. cit., n. 43.
5 Pennacchi, ibid. "Not dissemblingly, openly and data opera, and as if by professing it." Forcellini, s.v. Ex professo.
6 Some pass this over, such as Gennari, Monitore, loc. cit., p. 36; Piat, Nouvelle Revue Théologique, vol. 30, p. 56, when he approves Boudinhon, Canoniste, 1897, p. 214.
7 Op. cit., I, pp. 416-418.
8 Op. cit., pp. 34 and 40, and Die kirchlichen Strafgesetze, where in section 107, 7, c, he translates ex professo: Ihrem Hauptinhalte nach.
9 Acta Sanctae Sedis, loc. cit., pp. 214 and 346.
10 Loc. cit., n. 24.
D. In hatred of the author?
44. D. In odium auctoris. A prohibition made in hatred of the author used to include even future and innocent works.
But today the Holy See now abstains from this kind of prohibition, as is clear from the suppressed universal prohibition of the works of heresiarchs, and from the way in which the clause Opera omnia is explained in the Preface of the Index.
E. Opera omnia
45. E. Opera omnia. This general clause, although it seems graver than the prohibition of a single book, touches all the books of a writer less perfectly than the distributive proscription of individual books.
The force and reason of this clause must now be explained carefully from the Preface itself.
Objective comprehension of the clause
a) As regards the object: it no longer affects all the writings of someone, "but only those works which either deal with religion, or, even if they do not deal with it, nevertheless have been proscribed by some general or special decree" (Preface of the Index).
Therefore, in order that it may appear which books are contained under that censorial mark, their subject matter must be observed. Do they deal with religion? There is none which escapes condemnation. Do they treat a non-theological subject? Only those books are prohibited which are either marked by special decree, or are proscribed by a general decree, for example because they are expressly against morals, etc.
To illustrate this by example, we hold the work, for example, of Zola whose title is Le rêve to be excepted from the clause Opera omnia, by which that most evil writer is marked.
What of works published afterwards
b) As regards time, the prohibition, taken closely, falls only upon works which were available when that general proscription was issued. Nevertheless, as the praised Preface warns, and as we already said in our own dissertation, works published afterwards are to be held as suspect; indeed, they are to be presumed to fall under some General Decree, and therefore they cannot be read or retained unless it is established that they are touched by no decree of that kind.
Yet the known repentance of the author will destroy even this presumption.
Case of a periodical booklet, or of later volumes
c) For a similar reason, the Preface declares that a periodical booklet continued after the decree by which it was proscribed, and later volumes of some work, if any have been published anew after the first or earlier volumes were condemned, are infected by an equal suspicion and presumption.
d) Besides, it is helpful to ask two things, so that the information on the matter may be fuller.
Whether only books are marked by this clause
1. In the clause Opera omnia, can the word Opera be understood of books alone?
Response. We indeed think so, unless they are of such a subject matter that, even in smaller writings, it has aroused the solicitude of the present Constitution. Cf. articles 17, 20, 21. Therefore there are included accounts of new miracles, prophecies; booklets of prayers, of devotion; writings which specially concern religion; indeed, a newspaper or periodical booklet which can morally be said to have been written by the condemned author.
Whether a similar rule has force concerning the prohibition Fabulae amatoriae omnes?
2. Concerning the force of the clause Fabulae amatoriae omnes, by which some writers are marked: does it admit the same restriction as the clause Opera omnia, so that if it is established that some such novel is touched neither by a singular decree nor by a general law, it is not to be considered prohibited?1
Response. This matter can be disputed. Indeed, if a formula of this kind is to be equated with a special decree, it will not be lawful to derogate from it in some case.
Yet because such a clause is rather to be counted among the general clauses, since it proscribes all works of a certain subject matter, we shall incline toward this interpretation: similar exceptions which are not repugnant to the more universal clause Opera omnia can be reconciled with this censorial mark. For Fabulae omnes sounds milder than Opera omnia. But if an innocent work escapes the severity of the latter, would it not be strange for the same work to be touched by the less absolute proscription? Usage, therefore, will bear this benign understanding, unless something deceives us, or unless it seems otherwise to the Holy See.
What is certain is that later works are not comprehended by the decree; nevertheless these, as we were just saying, will come under suspicion.
1 A mark of this kind is branded, for example, on the novels of George Sand and of both Dumas. Yet there is some novel among those which belong to George Sand or to the elder Dumas which does not seem to be comprehended by the general law of Leo XIII. Thus, unless we are mistaken, among the novels of George Sand, La petite fadette and La mare au diable; and of the elder Dumas, Le comte de Monte Christo, Le capitaine Pamphile, Jehanne la Pucelle - of the elder Dumas, I say; for the novels of the son are accustomed to show dogmatic designs (romans à thèses), on account of which they easily incur article 14 of the Constitution Officiorum ac Munerum, by which books "which establish divorce as lawful, or defend errors proscribed by the Holy See," are condemned. Beware, therefore, lest you immediately pronounce a novel innocent because it is not expressly obscene. On that subject one can consult the work of Reverend L. Bethleem, Romans à lire et Romans à proscrire, Cambrai, Masson, 1905.
F. Donec corrigatur?
46. F. Donec corrigatur. Donec corrigatur places a book among the forbidden books until the corrections themselves have been approved by the Holy See. As the Preface of the Index says, this clause regards the mode of the prohibition, but not its effect.