Article — Vermeersch, On Forbidden Books
Article 37
If an Author dwelling at Rome should wish to print a book not in the City, but elsewhere, besides the approval of the Cardinal Vicar of the City and of the Master of the Sacred Apostolic Palace, no other is required.
The former law partly abrogated
114. 1. By the former law, by order of Alexander VII, those dwelling in the Pontifical State had to offer their books to be approved by the previous censure of the Cardinal Vicar of the City and of the Master of the Sacred Palace. Now the special obligation, if any remains, is circumscribed to the City alone.
Force of the present article. It imposes an obligation
2. Proceed now: the obligation seems to remain. For although the sentence of the law is in itself ambiguous and can be taken of a mere privilege,1 nevertheless the reason of the former disposition remains in such a way that a correction of that law, which would be inexplicable, does not seem to have to be admitted. The usage of the City agrees, in which the Masters of the Sacred Palace urge their right in this way.2
But the reason of this sanction is drawn from a certain peculiar authority with which books that are considered to have been written under the eyes of the Holy See are vested, so that they seem to have to be fortified by the caution of Roman censure.
And it confers a privilege
3. At the same time, however, the article confers a most equitable privilege, by which these books, even if they are published elsewhere, need have no other approval. Thus the law is not made harsher for the inhabitants of the City, and fitting honor is given to Apostolic censure.
Whom it affects
4. Those properly dwell in the City who there have at least a quasi-domicile.3 Those, however, who actually stay at Rome even for a shorter time will be able, as pilgrims, to share in the privilege of the inhabitants.
1 Cf. Palmieri, in this place; Ojetti, Analecta Eccl., 1898, pp. 383, 384.
2 Cf. Wernz, n. 121, note 104.
3 Quasi-domicile is acquired by real habitation joined with the intention of staying in some place for the greater part of the year. Thus the opinion received in the curia, although some, as Lehmk. II, 775, are content with staying through a notable part of the year: as, for instance, through 4 months. Penn., A. S. S., cited place, n. 74, p. 495, judges that no space of stay is required for the use of that privilege.