The excommunicated King of Italy, as we have seen, took possession of Rome.
A bitter papal encyclical, strangely contrasting with the courteous politeness of modern state-papers, was issued, November 1, 1870, denouncing the acts of the Piedmontese court, "which had followed the counsel of the sects of perdition." In this his Holiness declares that he is in captivity, and that he will have no agreement with Belial.

He pronounces the greater excommunication, with censures and penalties, against his antagonists, and prays for "the intercession of the immaculate Virgin Mary, mother of God, and that of the blessed apostles Peter and Paul." Of the various Protestant denominations, several had associated themselves, for the purposes of consultation, under the designation of the Evangelical Alliance.

Their last meeting was held in New York, in the autumn of 1873.

Though, in this meeting, were gathered together many pious representatives of the Reformed Churches, European and American, it had not the prestige nor the authority of the Great Council that had just previously closed its sessions in St.Peters, at Rome.

It could not appeal to an unbroken ancestry of far more than a thousand years; it could not speak with the authority of an equal and, indeed, of a superior to emperors and kings.