25 SEPTEMBER 1869, Page 11

THE PHILOSOPHY OF CATHOLIC INFALIJBILITY.

THESE vigorous protests of the Treves Catholics and M. de Monts,'embed and Pere Hyacinthe, and virtually, one may say, of the Fulda memorialists also, against the policy of the Ultramontaue party and the foregone conclusions of the (Ecu- menical Council, suggest to us Protestants some very curious and subtle problems as to the intellectual foundations of the Catholic view,—the Liberal Catholic view. There is a practical mode of ascertaining the centre of gravity of a plane surface with which every one who has the most superficial knowledge of physics is acquainted :—Suspending the surface by any one corner, you draw a vertical line from the point of suspension in which the centre of gravity must certainly lie, because the only force which prevents the fall of the body is that applied to the surface at the point of suspension, and the directions of this force and of gravity must therefore be in the same line and opposite directions. Altering the point of suspension to any other point in the surface, the same reasoning shows that the centre of gravity must be at some point in the new vertical. But as it was also at some point in the former vertical, it must be where these two lines cross each other, and thus the centre of gravity is determined at the point of intersection. Surely the same method of reasoning ought to be applicable by true Catholics to determine what we may call the true centre of infallibility ? All Roman Catholics admit that the Church is infallible, at least On matters of faith, but all do not agree as to where the centre of infallibility lies. Almost all, however, believe that the Church, speaking through an (Ecumeni- cal Council properly summoned, is infallible on matters of faith, and this, if there be infallibility at all, seems plausible enough ; for as the gravitating force of our falling nature, i. e., of heresy, has been practically neutralized, neutralized on the issue of so many theological controversies, by formal decisions of such Councils, the centre of infallibility, if there be any such centre, must lie in the line of authority exercised by such Councils ; and if in any case these lines of authority turn out to be different in themselves, but to have a common point of intersection, it will follow pretty certainly that this point of intersection is the actual centre of the Church's authority. Thus, it has always been assumed that General Councils speak infallibly the mind of the Church, which is itself infallible on theological matters :—and if, therefore, the Council of December should decide that the Pope -speaking ex cathedra, but without a Council, is not infallible, it will be for ever certain that the true centre of infallibility does not lie in the Head of the Church, but elsewhere. But if it should decide that even without the concurrence of a Council, the Pope speaking ex cathedra is infallible, it will be impossible to reconcile this decision with the prior assumption of the infallibility of a Creneral Council on which it is based, except by inferring that the Pope's decision and the decision of a General Council are concur- rent indices of theological truth, and, of course, being equally infallible, are infallibly identical. Thus, the Holy Father must -always have been at least one focus, if not the only centre, of infallible judgment,—and this, even though it be conceded that the discussions and votes of the General Councils may some- times have been the proximate means of bringing out the infallible judgment clearly before his own mind. In any case, it seems clear that no Roman Catholic—however liberal or however reactionary—can afford to dispute any deliberate deci- sion of the approaching (Ecumenical Council without cutting away his own ground from under his feet. If this Council should err, why the Council of Nicwa, or of Ephesus, or of Constanti- nople might equally have erred. To admit this would be not merely to deny the authority of a particular dogma, but of the whole series of dogmas sanctioned in a similar manner. If this Council should be asserted to have decided wrongly on Papal Infallibility, or the Assumption of the Virgin, or Tolerance of Heresy, or any other matter, why the dogma of the Consubstan- tiality of the Son is no longer infallible, but at best only true in the sense in which the Copernican theory or the theorems of Euclid are true ; and for the person who makes such an assertion, there- fore, the whole theory of the Roman Church will be gone for ever.

But what puzzles us is, that good Catholics of the Liberal school —Pere Hyacinthe, for example, who has just resigned his post as Superior of the barefooted Carmelites at Paris—do not seem to ac- quiesce in this view. That Pere Hyacinthe should protest against the supposed wishes of Rome in reference to the coming Council, we can well understand. While it still remains an indeterminate and un- determined matter where the centre of Infallibility resides, it is clear that every priest, or, for that matter, every layman, of the Roman

Church, who believes he has the assistance of the Holy Ghost, is not only entitled to contribute his quotum to the right determina- tion of the matters likely to be debated, but is bound to do so. The infallible judgment can only be arrived at by the operation of the Holy Spirit on the various consciences and intellects which make up the Roman Church, and by the Providential over- ruling of inferior motives ; and if anyone, believing that he is under divine guidance, withholds his contribution to the decision, he is simply trying to thwart in detail the Providence which he regards as certain to overcome not only the obstacles which be himself, but those which every unfaithful member of the Church, opposes to the evolution of the Truth. But what we do not understand aboutPere Hyacinthe's letter is his assumption that the Council may go wrong altogether—unless, indeed, he be no longer a Catholic, and has given up the view that the decisions of General Councils them- selves are infallible, from Nicxa onwards,—and of this we have no hint. He says, "I appeal to the Council which assembles to seek remedies for our evils, and to apply those remedies with as much force as mildness. But if fears, which I do not toed to share, should be realised; if the august assembly should not have greater freedom in its deliberations than it has already had in its prepar- ations; if, in a word, it should be deprived of the characteristics which essentially belong to an (Ecumenical Council, I would appeal to God and to man for the summoning of another, truly united in the Holy Spirit, not in the spirit of parties, really representing the Universal Church, not the silence of some and the oppression of others."

This is equivalent to saying that the moral pressure now exerted by Rome,—physical violence such as that freely used at the first Council of Ephesus is now impossible,—may vitiate the whole machinery by which the Church's infallible judgment is declared. But if this be so, what may not have vitiated it in times past? If Pere Hyacinthe has so little faith in the Providence which watches over (Ecumenical Councils that he can conceive its divine vigilance utterly thwarted by the eagerness and zeal of the Papal party, and by the impure motives which it may be in the power of that party to apply, what can the decision of any CE eumenical Council have been worth? Does he acquiesce in the condemnation of Nestorius by the Council of Ephesus ? If he does, he cannot be very fastidious as to the secondary means employed by Providence to obtain a promulgation of infallible truth. If he does not, he can scarcely be in any sense a Catholic, thus to repudiate one of the most important links in the chain of Catholic orthodoxy. Surely if mixtures of impure motive in the historic causes of (Ecumenical decisions are to vitiate those decisions, the Catholic Church will have no infallible decisions left at all. Has there ever been a single Council, or a single discussion of Catholic dogma at such Council, without a large mixture of earthly passions and self- interested motives ? To recur to our old illustration, if Pio Nono and his party have power, by any unfair pressure of theirs, to deprive the Council of the Vatican of the true character- istics of an (Ecumenical Council, what can be said for the army of "mariners and slaves" disembarked at Ephesus by St. Cyril "to support," as Gibbon says, "with blows and clamours a metaphysical argument "! Without disputing the machinations of which the Ultramontane or any other party may be guilty to procure the decisions they desire, we cannot conceive how a true Catholic who believes that any Council has given infallible judgments, can make such machinations an excuse for repudiating any decision to be arrived at. Take it how you will, the organiza- tion of a great Episcopal deliberative Council consisting of elements drawn together from all parts of the earth, must be full of political valves and worldly pulses of all sorts, which it is simply and absolutely impossible to eliminate. The only tenable theory for a Catholic is that these political and mundane influences will be so overruled and moulded by the Holy Spirit as to yield a true result. No- body supposes that what is called the Providential over-ruling of a private destiny is accomplished solely by the conscious submis- sion of the subject of it to the Spirit of God. It is supposed to be accomplished by a thousand blind acts, each one of which may be the result of all sorts of mixed or even low motives, but which are so linked together and combined by Providence as to bring out the best final result. The same must be said of the guidance given to deliberations and votes of an (Ecumenical Council, if any theory of infallibility is to be maintained at all. Pere Hyacinthe seems to us to suggest a doctrine fatal to the whole conception of an infallible Church, when he hints that unless its deliberations are quite free—i.e., clear of moral compulsion, for of effective physical compulsion in this age of the Church there is little chance —the decrees of the Council will be worthless.

We can only interpret such remonstrances as M. de Montalem-

bert's, and those of the Treves memorialists, and of Pere Hyacinthe, in two ways. They may simply express the wish of these Catho- lics to use their influence strongly in one direction beforehand,— without prejudice to their ready submission in case that influence should be used in vain, and their adversaries should triumph. If so, we do not see that their conduct can be fairly challenged, though their words would seem to go beyond this view of their actions. While the result is still indeterminate, it is quite open to them to think that the Holy Ghost, as Pere Hyacinthe clearly inti- mates for his own case, is using them as its medium of expression rather than their adversaries. But, on the other hand, this language may mean, what it seems to mean at least in Pere Hyacinthe's case, that if the decision is adverse to their views, they will not believe it the decision of the Holy Spirit at all. In that case, as far as we can understand the rationale of infallibility, those who hold this, reject the infallibility of the Church altogether, and are, in fact, Protestants. The letter of the late Superior of the barefooted Carmelites in Paris seems to us hardly intelligible on any other interpretation. He has evidently more confidence in the witness of God within him than in the elaborate political machinery of any (Ecumenical Council for declaring truth. He is, we think, right. But he is not right on any conceivable Roman Catholic theory. He is really asserting the absolute right of his own conscience, in all moral matters, to override authoritative pro- mulgations of Catholic opinion. It is a noble assertion. But it is sheer Protestantism. Formally, if not substantially, Pere Hyacinthe seems to us already a heretic,—a chooser of his own line, instead of a servant of the Church. May not the Council of the Vatican yet lead to a new and extensive Schism ?