and as knowing also that his Catholics' believed nothing of the sort, and would run into schism rather than submit to the pretended authority of his infallibility, if it happened to run counter to their own private opinions. It is impossible to have clearer proof than this that the Roman communion does not practically believe in its own claim to infallibility. The guide will not venture to strike into one of two doubtful paths until those whom he is conducting have already made their choice, and that because he knows that, though professing to believe in his infallible wisdom, they will not follow him if he should happen not to take the path which they prefer.

There remained, however, one way of accounting for the silence of the Pope and the Council which might save their infallibility; namely, that this particular subject was one on which it had pleased God to make no revelation, and therefore that in the judgment of Pope and Council either view might be innocently held. This view was naturally taken. by the Roman Catholics of the last generation. Bishop Milner, for instance, says 'The Church does not decide the controversy concerning the Conception of the Blessed Virgin, and several other disputed points, because she sees nothing clear and certain concerning them either in the written or unwritten Word, and therefore leaves her children to form their own opinions concerning them.' But Pius IX. made it impossible any longer to give this explanation of the silence of his predecessors.

In process of time the whole controversy died away. Franciscans and Dominicans ceased to accuse each other of heresy or mortal sin, and so then was the time that the infallible tribunal ventured to speak; and in my own time (8th December, 1854) the Pope proclaimed that the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception was true, and moreover that the Church had always held it. Certainly in this case the Church carried the disciplina arcani' to an immoderate extreme, since neither Bellarmine nor Milner, nor many other Roman Catholic divines whom I could name, were aware that the Church had any tradition on the subject. But if she had, how are we to excuse Pope Sixtus, or the Council

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of Trent, who, instead of making known the tradition at the time when the knowledge of it would have done good in healing the violent dissensions which raged between members of the Church, kept silence until people had ceased to feel much interest in the controversy ?

And even then there were those who said it was too soon for the Pope to speak. The Pope did not make his decree without first taking advice, and you will find in the Library the answers he got from the bishops of Christendom. Among these, both some of the most eminent of the French bishops, and our Irish professors at Maynooth, declared, not by any means their disbelief in the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, but their opinion of the inexpedience of defining it by authority. As I have already said, when the interference is not that of superior knowledge, but only that of higher authority, cautious men will consider not only the truth of what they are asked to affirm, but also the prudence of enforcing conformity to it; and so at our own Synod many have voted against putting forth. as the doctrine of the Church what they themselves believed to be true. In this case, those who pronounced the decision of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception to be inopportune, did not say in their own names that it was an addition to the ancient faith of the Church; but they said that Anglican divines would be sure to say so, and would accuse the Roman Church of having broken with her ancient rule, and of now teaching something which had not been taught, semper, ubique et ab omnibus.' Thus an obstacle would be placed in the way of their conversion, and quite gratuitously, since there was at the time no controversy on the subject which there was any need of appeasing.

However much we may believe in the sincerity of those who on this occasion declared that they did not deny the truth of the doctrine, but only the opportuneness of declaring it, it is hard to believe equally in the sincerity of those who some years later raised the question of opportuneness, when it was proposed to define the dogma of the Pope's personal infallibility. Actually to deny a doctrine which an influential Pontiff showed it was his most anxious desire to have

affirmed would be too invidious, and so the lower ground was taken by a great majority; and they fought a half-hearted battle, disputing not the truth of the doctrine, but only the expedience of declaring it. I must say that, to my mind, all this controversy about opportunism shows distrust in the infallibility of their guide. It is always opportune to learn something you did not know before, if you have got hold of a person competent to inform you. What is inopportune is that a man should propound his views without necessity to an audience disinclined to receive them; and the fact that Pope and Councils very often have found it inopportune to make dogmatic definitions is proof enough how little their own Church believed in their power to do so.

I could give other illustrations in plenty of the wise timidity of the infallible authority in declining to solve disputed questions. For instance, at Trent there was another question left unsettled besides that about the Immaculate Conception. A question arose whether bishops have their jurisdiction directly by divine right, or whether they only derive it from the Pope; but after hot disputes it was found expedient to drop the controversy. You will find in Burnet's Commentary on the seventeenth Article a notice of another controversy, which the Pope neglected to determine, though asked to do so. I refer to controversies between the Dominicans and the Jesuits at the very end of the sixteenth century. The matter in dispute belonged to the class of subjects debated between Calvinists and Arminians. The Jesuits, who took what we may call the Arminian side, were accused of Pelagianism by the Dominicans, who followed the Augustinian teaching of their great doctor, Thomas Aquinas. In 1594 the Pope undertook the decision of the question. Here we have the very case to meet which one might suppose the gift of infallibility had been conferred: hot controversy in the Church terminated by a resort of both parties to the infallible authority for guidance. Of course it was not to be expected that the Pope should determine so great a question hastily. He appointed committees of theologians to examine the arguments on both sides, known as the celebrated congregations de auxiliis, the subject of their inquiries being the help

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DE AUXILIIS.'

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I will not weary

of divine grace bestowed by God on man. you with the history of the delays of the investigation: suffice it to say, that after going on some twenty years no result was arrived at. And, politically, this was the wisest course. For if a decision were made, it must of necessity give offence to one or other of two powerful parties—supported, the one by the King of Spain, the other by the King of France; and there was quite a possibility that the rejected party might refuse to submit, and even pronounce the Pope himself heretical. But would there be any such danger if

*It is worth while to add a few words as to the part taken in this controversy by the great Jesuit, Bellarmine. The controversy arose out of the publication by a Jesuit Professor, Molina, of a book which the Dominicans accused of semi-Pelagianism, and the authoritative condemnation of which they were anxious to obtain. Now, though Bellarmine and other leading Jesuits were unwilling to commit themselves to an approval of all Molina's doctrine, they considered that the condemnation of his book would be a great slur on their Order; and though the condemnation appeared more than once to be on the point of issuing, the Jesuits exercised obstruction so vigorously, that their opposition was in the end successful. It is amusing to read in Cardinal Bellarmine's autobiography how he bullied the poor Pope, Clement VIII., whose own opinion was adverse to Molina. 'You are no theologian,' he said, and you must not think that by your own study you can come to understand so very obscure a question.' 'I mean to decide the question,' said the Pope. "Your Holiness will not decide it,' retorted the Cardinal. There is extant a letter, written after the Congregation appointed by the Pope to examine the matter had reported adversely to Molina, and when he was supposed to be about to act on that report, in which Bellarmine urges that the Pope should not act without first calling a council of bishops, or at least summoning learned men from the Universities. If he acted otherwise, though men would be bound to obey his decree, there would be great murmuring and complaints on the part of the Church and the Universities that they had not been properly consulted. That the Pope should attempt to study the question for himself was a very tedious and unsatisfactory method, and not that which had been followed by his predecessors. Did Leo X. trouble himself with study when he condemned the Lutheran heretics? He just confirmed the conclusions arrived at by the Catholic Universities of Cologne and Louvain. Paul IV., Julius III., Pius IV., were no students; yet, with the help of the Council of Trent, they declared most important truths. See, on the other hand, what scrapes John XXII. got into when he endeavoured to promulgate the views concerning the Beatific Vision, to which his own study had led him. See into what danger Sixtus V. brought himself and the whole Church-one of the greatest dangers the Church was ever inwhen he attempted to correct the Bible according to his own knowledge. And the Pope must be careful not to give occasion to anyone to think that he had made up his own mind before the question had been scientifically investigated. Why, he had said things to Bellarmine himself

the parties to the dispute believed in the Pope's infallibility, or if he believed in it himself? If Christ Himself appeared upon earth, we should be glad to obtain from Him an authoritative solution of any of our religious controversies, and we should not dream of stopping His mouth lest his decision should be opposed to our prepossessions. So, though these men profess to believe that the Pope, as a guide to truth, fills the place of Christ on earth, their conduct proves that they do not believe what they say. And the Pope's own conduct shows that he felt himself not in the position of a judge authorized to pronounce a decision to which all parties. must submit, but only in that of the common friend of two angry disputants, in favour of neither of whom he dare plainly declare himself on pain of losing the friendship of the other.

In other words, every time the Pope has thought of making a dogmatic decision, he has had to make a prudential calculation of the danger of provoking a schism; and on the occasion of his last definition a schism, as you know, was actually made. But fear on his part of secession shows mutual want of faith in Roman pretensions. For who would punish himself by seceding from the only authorized channel of divine communications? Who would refuse to believe anything if it was declared to him by God Himself, or by one who, he was quite sure, had authority to speak in God's name? Lord Bacon tells a story of a wise old man who got a great reputation for his success in settling disputes. When privately asked by a friend to explain the secret of his success, he told him it was because he made it a rule to himself never to interfere until the parties had completely talked themselves out, and were glad to get peace on any terms. That was just the way in which the Pope settled the controversy about the Immaculate Conception, by carefully holding his tongue until the dispute was practically over.

which had made him resolve to withdraw, and treat no more of the question. If such a one as he lost courage, who had been studying these subjects for thirty years, what would others do? (Selbstbiographie des Cardinals Bellarmin. Bonn: 1887, p. 260.) There could not be a better illustration how ill the authority of official position fares when it comes into collision with the authority of superior knowledge.