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of his infallible guide on every subject capable of verification, but he implies that he is ready to accept those instructions if no verification be possible. This is much the same as if we were to say to a traveller who had told us some marvellous tales, I cannot believe what you have told us about France, Portugal, and North America, because I have been there, and I know that what you have told us is a pack of lies; but I will believe with all my heart everything you have said about China and Japan, because I have never been in these countries, and therefore cannot contradict you. Mr. Mivart ought to remember that there are other sciences besides those in which he himself takes an interest; such as the science of history, and especially of the history of dogma. Let him take the word of those who have studied these matters, that on many of the questions on which Roman Catholics differ from Protestants, the teaching of the Church of Rome is as opposed to the testimony of facts as the old theory which Galileo overturned. Had we not a parallel case to Galileo's the other day when an expert, von Döllinger, was excommunicated because he would not accept a conclusion which the voice of history condemns? Whenever Mr. Mivart sees his way to give the human mind not a partial but complete freedom, the dispute with him concerning the infallibility of the Church is at an end.

The Rev. Sydney F. Smith has published in The Month (March 1890), what purports to be an answer to lectures XI-XIV, but which is really an abandonment of the whole case. In these lectures I had contrasted the professed doctrine of the Roman Church about Papal Infallibility with the actual working of the Roman System. Mr. Smith admits that I have correctly described that actual working; but he contends that the supposed inconsistency only arises from my having made a 'heedless misconception' of their doctrine. With regard to the practice of his Church, having given a summary of what I had stated might have been expected from a Church conscious of possessing the gift of Infallibility, he proceeds: 'It is obvious that nothing of all this has taken place; and what do we find in its place? On the part of the flock,

doctrinal differences of opinion (on points not yet covered by formal definition) still continuing to exist, and to grow fervid, and recourse had to the oracle only by the side which anticipates a judgment in its own favour, the other side meanwhile, vehemently deprecating the reference, and even warning the Pope of the danger to the faith which may result from condemnation of the views it advocates; on the other hand, the supreme authority itself "shrinking with the greatest timidity from exercising the gift of Infallibility on any question which had not already settled itself without its help." And then he states the difficulty he has got to explain If there were any reality about this professed belief in Papal Infallibility, could there be co-existent with it this reluctance to see it exercised? If the Pope believed in it, would he delay to use a power incapable of misuse, till the opportunity for its useful exercise was gone by? If the faithful believed in it, would they not court and welcome decisions which would prove adverse to any previous convictions of the applicants, only by furnishing the consolatory assurance that these convictions had been misleading, and by substituting the truth in their place?'

Mr. Smith then proceeds to correct my misconception of the doctrine of his Church about Infallibility, which, he contends, when rightly understood is quite consistent with her practice. He says that I assume that they attribute the Infallibility which they recognize in the Pope to Inspiration, whereas they hold that it is due not to Inspiration, but to Assistentia. I wish to avoid all merely verbal controversy, and therefore I only remark in passing that I do not use the word Inspiration in the same sense as he, and that I should give the name Inspiration to what he calls Assistentia. The latter word I have not been in the habit of using at all, not recognizing it as either Latin or English; but it appears I am singular in this respect, for Mr. Smith assures us that it is of common use in the circle of literature to which a Protestant student's reading is confined. However, I take the words. as Mr. Smith uses them. He gives the following explanation of them: Inspiration directly communicates the thoughts of God to the inspired subject, and impels him to deliver them

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to mankind. Assistentia, at its name implies, stands by him like a guide, and whilst allowing him the exercise of his natural faculties, guards him against error by providentially influencing the setting forth of the evidence before his mind. and causing him to see the propositions under consideration in their true light. The one is an impulse; the other is an aid. Inspiration has the necessary effect of causing the book written, or the judgment delivered, to be the book or judgment of God. Assistentia leaves them in their previous quality of human composition, while it guarantees their declarations against error, by the Divine aid which it administers.'

Now, having received this explanation, I have to declare that I was guilty of no misconception. I never supposed that Roman theory regarded the gift of Papal Infallibility to be of the kind which Mr. Smith ascribes to Inspiration; but the amusing thing is, that it would have been far better for his argument if he had been able to say that my mistake was in ascribing the gift to Assistentia, whereas, according to Roman theory, it was due to Inspiration. For I am amazed that he had not acuteness to perceive that the effect of the distinction on which he insists is simply to abandon an easy answer to my criticisms, and to leave himself completely without defence. If the pronouncing a decision on a controversy was solely the result of a divinely communicated impulse, and a thing in which the Pope's natural powers had no part, it were surely idle to blame him for silence and non-interference. He could say that he could only speak such words as God might be pleased to put into his mouth, and that he was bound to be silent until a Divine inspiration was communicated to him. But if the initiative rests with himself; that is to say, if the order of proceeding is, that he must first use his natural powers and ordinary means of informing his judgment, and then has a guarantee that when he publishes the result of his investigations in an ex cathedra decision, he will be divinely secured from error, what but want of faith in the reality of this guarantee can account for his not so using his natural powers, when a decision is urgently needed for the appeasing of controversies within his Church?

S

Of course I admit (as I have already done, p. 184), that the Pope is bound to exercise so great a trust with caution and deliberation, and that he is justified or rather required, to postpone a decision, until he has taken due means to inform his judgment. But still there ought to be some limit to such delay. It was about 400 years from the time that the disputes about the Immaculate Conception became violent, to the time when the Papal decision was pronounced. This seems carrying deliberation to an extreme. I have heard of Chancery suits which lasted till the whole property in dispute had been dissipated in costs. In this case, a decision on a controversy does not come until the controversy has died a natural death.

The Pope has less excuse for unreasonable delay, because, though it is, no doubt, his duty to use all proper human means to guide his judgment, the guarantee of infallibility does not depend on his having actually done so. It is not merely that his people would not be justified in rejecting his decision, on the plea that he had neglected to consult with learned divines, but the decision would really be infallibly correct, whether or no. Take the most important decisions of all, those made by the Pope in Council, and it is held that, though the parties to the decision may have been misled by bad arguments and deceived by forged documents, infallibility attaches to the decision all the same. Why, then, should the Pope hesitate, when the peace of the Church requires that controversies should be put to rest. It occurs to every one of us to have occasionally to make important and difficult decisions, and though we have no gift of infallibility, we do not abstain from acting. We use all human means to inform our judgment, we implore the Divine guidance, and then act boldly in humble faith that our prayers will not be unanswered. Why, then, should the Pope, if he really believed himself to have a guarantee that his decisions would by special Divine guidance be absolutely secured from error, show more timidity and indecision than has been exhibited by the most hesitating of Lord Chancellors ?

I have already stated one principal reason; it has been be

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cause even if he had faith in his own guaranteed infallibility, he had no confidence that his people had, and so had to consider the dangers of a schism that might result from an unacceptable decision. Mr. Smith owns that distress at an ex cathedra decision, and unwillingness to accept it, is very inconsistent on the part of a 'Catholic,' and very wrong; but he says that human nature is weak." So it is, and in this case belief in the Pope's Infallibility must be weak, very weak, if not non-existent. But, then, Mr. Smith urges that this attitude of mind is not general among 'Catholics,' as testified by the comparative smallness of the schism caused by permanent non-acceptance of the late Vatican decrees. Yes, but it was because it was anticipated that the schism would be small, even smaller than it actually proved to be, that the Pope ventured to have those decrees passed. But in former days, especially since the precaution had not then been taken of limiting a bishop's powers, so that the Pope might be able, by refusing to renew his faculties, to reduce a refractory bishop to obedience, there is no doubt that a main cause of inducing the Pope to suspend his decisions, was the fear that his decisions would not be accepted. The reason expressly given for not meddling with the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception at Trent, was 'lest it should cause a schism among Catholics.'

Mr. Smith argues that it was quite justifiable to inspire this fear in the mind of the Holy Father. No doubt, the moment an ex cathedra judgment is pronounced, a good 'Catholic' is bound to accept it, and thenceforth, ex animo, to believe that the doctrine defined in it is true. But until the judgment has been pronounced, he is quite free to believe, with equal firmness, that the doctrine proposed to be defined is false. He will then naturally persuade himself that a doctrine which he thinks he knows to be false can never receive the seal of Papal sanction. Providence will in some way interfere to prevent the judgment from being pronounced. If he can succeed (by such bullying, for example, as Bellarmine practised towards Pope Clement VIII.) in producing in the Pope's mind a belief that the pronouncing of a judgment. would cause great evils to the Church, he may regard him