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arguments was the spurious decretals of which I mean to speak in another Lecture.

But, really, investigation into the history of bygone Councils is needless to one who can remember, as I can, the Council of 1870. In everything I have thus far said to discredit the authority of Councils, I am, as my quotations from Cardinal Newman will have told you, in full agreement with modern Roman Catholics, who think that, when they have shown that infallibility does not reside in Councils, they have gone very near to prove that it does rest with the Pope. Now, if a tradesman has taken pains to produce a belief that his rival in business is little better than a bankrupt, it would be thought strange if he tried to get his bills cashed on the strength of having this rival's endorsement; yet this was exactly what Pius IX. tried to do when he attempted to have his claim to infallibility endorsed by the Vatican Council. In the next Lectures we shall examine what the Pope's bill is worth; at present, it is easy to show that the endorsement is worth absolutely nothing. The unfairness of the proceedings at the Vatican Council was such that the defeated party, in disgust, playing on the old name, 'Latrocinium Ephesinum,' called it 'Ludibrium Vaticanum.'

There was no fair representation of bishops. In the first place, the assembly included some three hundred titular bishops-bishops not presiding over any real sees, but holding mere titles of honour given them by the Pope, or else missionary bishops deriving their titles from places where there were few or no Christian congregations. In addition, the German bishops, who constituted the main strength of the minority, complained that they were swamped by the multitude of Italian and Sicilian bishops. The twelve millions of Roman Catholics in Germany proper were represented at the Council by fourteen bishops; the seven hundred thousand inhabitants of the Papal States by sixty-two; three bishops of the minority-Cologne, Paris, and Cambray-represented five million; and these might be outvoted by any four of the seventy Neapolitan and Sicilian bishops. The German theologians compared their learning with that of the bishops of

these highly favoured localities, amongst whom a clean sweep would have been made if it had been a condition of admission to the Council that the bishop should be able to read the New Testament in its original language, or have Greek enough to be able to consult the writings of Greek Fathers or the acts of Greek Councils-a qualification without which, north of the Alps, one does not rank as a theologian. The German visitors, too, compared the activity of religious thought in the country from which they came with that in those regions which provided the predominant element at the Council. It was said, and I believe with truth, that more religious books are printed in England, or Germany, or North America in one year than in Italy in half a century. And to the list of Italian publications the States of the Church contributed hardly anything. In Rome a lottery dream-book might be found in every house, but never a New Testament, and extremely seldom any religious book at all. So that it seemed as if it were a recognized principle, that the more ignorant a people, the greater must be the share of their hierarchy in the government of the Church. Then the minority complained that all regulations as to the transaction of business were in the hands of a committee appointed by the majority, and solely representing them, without the consent of which committee no subject could be discussed; and, indeed, it was complained at first that the bulk of the Council did not know what business was coming on. At the first meeting it was found that, owing to the bad acoustic properties of the hall in which they met, nothing could be heard; and a number of bishops, when asked to give their formal vote, 'Placet' or 'Non placet,' answered, 'Non placet quia nihil intelleximus.' An attempt was made to improve matters in this respect by partitioning off a portion of the room; but bad the state of things always remained. Indeed there must always have been a difficulty in following discussions carried on in Latin-a language which all the bishops did not pronounce in the same way, and which in any case is not so easily caught, if utterance is indistinct, as are the sounds of one's native language. But it would be too much to expect of human attention to follow the speeches which were delivered,

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these being small treatises without any limitation of length, read by their authors without the liveliness of spoken speech, perhaps with indistinct utterance, and in a language with which the hearers were not familiar. An easy remedy for this state of things would have been if the speeches had been printed and circulated among the members of the Council, so that any could study at home what he had heard imperfectly. But here was the advantage of the Pope's holding the Council in his own city. There was no license of printing. A précis of the speaker's arguments was made for the use of an exclusively Infallibilist committee, which was to draw up the decrees of the Council. That précis the speaker was not allowed to correct, or even to see, so that if he were on the wrong side, it might be a mere caricature of his arguments which was submitted to the committee.

Perhaps there was the less fear of doing injustice to the arguments, that, as I already quoted from Cardinal Manning, the Holy Spirit's promised assistance is supposed to be given, not to the arguments, but to the final vote. And, certainly, the practical rule resulting from belief in this principle is, Never trouble yourself about the arguments, but do all in your power to secure a vote.' Now, there are many ways besides arguments by which votes can be secured. The use of bad arguments was, indeed, not neglected; for a paper was circulated, said to have been drawn up by Manning, containing a decree of the Council of Florence, garbled in a way of which I mean to speak on another day. But there were more powerful influences at work than arguments, good or bad. About three hundred of the bishops were the Pope's pensioners, all their expenses being paid by him, and therefore could not be unbiassed judges on a question concerning his prerogatives. The Pope himself had his good-humoured jokes on the numbers who had accepted his hospitality, and declared that, in trying to make him infallibile,' they would make him 'fallire,' that is to say, make him bankrupt. There was no danger of that, however; for, in order to enable him to meet such expenses, a well-timed collection was made, nominally with the object of making him a present in celebration

of the jubilee of his first Mass. Fifteen Cardinals' hats were vacant to reward the obedient; and, no doubt, as always happens, more were influenced by the hope of Papal favours than actually obtained them. The Pope made no secret how much he had his heart set on obtaining a declaration of his infallibility. This alone would weigh very innocently with many bishops who would shrink from displeasing a venerated superior. Two or three bishops, who unexpectedly spoke on the wrong side, received from the Pope the severest of wiggings. 'Lovest thou me?' was his salutation to another

waverer.

Now, what would you think of the merits of the British Parliament as a representative assembly if, in addition to inequalities of representation more gross than any in our unreformed Parliament, the Crown was free to make as many rotten boroughs as it pleased, and to name representatives for them; if it had three hundred members receiving daily pay at its discretion, besides a number of members candidates for promotion; and if the smiles or frowns of the monarch were freely applied to reward or punish? But, at the Council, it was not enough to gain a majority the minority must be reduced to complete insignificance; and this was effected when, as time went on, the summer months arrived, and the heats at Rome became unbearable-at least to a northern constitution. At first the tactics of the minority had appeared to be to lengthen out the proceedings. They made long speeches, some of them speaking out so plainly that two or three times the greatest uproar was excited; and it really appeared as if there was danger that the scene at Trent would be re-enacted, when one bishop pulled out another bishop's beard. became necessary for the majority to introduce what the French call the clôture that is to say, the rule was made that, at the request of ten bishops, it should be put to the vote whether the discussion should go on any longer. And so in the first stage of the Infallibility discussion, a premature

*The word has become more familiar now than it was when this Lecture was written.

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stop was put to the speech-making; and, amongst others, an able speech against Infallibility by the American bishop Kenrick was shelved. It has been since printed as a 'concio habenda at non habita.' But when they got into the summer months, the acclimatized Italian and Sicilian bishops could bear delay with comparative impunity; but the opponents of the dogma, who were natives of a colder climate, were one by one sickening with fever. They begged and implored that the Council might be adjourned; but the Pope and his party understood their advantage too well, and the request was sternly refused. It became evident that if the minority indulged in much speech-making, the operation of reducing their numbers would be effected in a very simple way; and so a vote was arrived at.

But now appeared the mischief of the claim to infallibility. In our Parliament a law may be passed in the teeth of opposition, and the minority must submit and obey the law; but their thoughts and words are free: they can avow still that what has been done is opposed to their judgment. But at a Council, when a vote is arrived at, the minority are required to blot from their mind all the tricks and manœuvres, all the unworthy means by which they know their resistance has been overpowered, and to accept the vote of a majority, no matter how obtained, as the voice of the Spirit of God. The moment the decision is pronounced, they are bound not only to yield a decorous obedience, but from the bottom of their hearts to believe that to be true which the moment before they had been protesting was false, and to publish this belief to the world. No wonder the bishops of the minority shrank from the humiliation of saying 'non placet' one moment, and 'ex animo credo' the next. So, with two exceptions, they all ran away, leaving behind them a protest which was not regarded.

It is plain how the chance of arriving at truth is prejudiced by the claim to infallibility. If no such claim were made, the majority would be forced to weigh the arguments. of the minority, to count the risk of driving them into schism, to take care not to seem before the world to have the worst of the argument. But when infallibility is supposed to rest