Condemnation of sundry familiar-sounding errors…

Exclusive Translation:
Pope Pius IX’s Apostolic Letter Multiplices Inter of 1851

Pope Pius IX was the second-longest-reigning Pope in the history of the Catholic Church.

Born Giovanni Maria Mastai-Ferretti in 1792, he reigned as Pope Pius IX for nearly 32 years, from June 16, 1846 until his death on Feb. 7, 1878. The only Pope who reigned longer than he was St. Peter.

One of the highlights of Pius IX’s long pontificate was the Syllabus of Errors, released on Dec. 8, 1864, along with the encyclical letter Quanta Cura, in which he declared:

But now, as is well known to you, Venerable Brethren, already, scarcely had we been elevated to this Chair of Peter (by the hidden counsel of Divine Providence, certainly by no merit of our own), when, seeing with the greatest grief of Our soul a truly awful storm excited by so many evil opinions, and (seeing also) the most grievous calamities never sufficiently to be deplored which overspread the Christian people from so many errors, according to the duty of Our Apostolic Ministry, and following the illustrious example of Our Predecessors, We raised Our voice, and in many published Encyclical Letters and Allocutions delivered in Consistory, and other Apostolic Letters, we condemned the chief errors of this most unhappy age, and we excited your admirable episcopal vigilance, and we again and again admonished and exhorted all sons of the Catholic Church, to us most dear, that they should altogether abhor and flee from the contagion of so dire a pestilence.