Der Papst und das Concil, von Janus. Characteristik und Würdigung. Von Dr. M. Jos. SCHEEBEN. Mainz. 1889.

THE

HE anonymous libel of Janus was not likely long to remain unchallenged. Dr. Scheeben of Mayence, has been one of the first to enter the lists against it. In a pamphlet of thirty-six pages, he examines it under the three heads of its dogmatic character, its controversial tactics, and its historical criticism. As to its dogmatic character, he shows that it is at variance with the Catholic faith in the following particulars :

It denies the supreme authority of general councils under the conditions in which that supreme authority is held as a dogma by the Church. It denies expressly the necessity of the confirmation of councils by the Holy See, and asserts the necessity of the universal consent of the Church to the validity of their decrees. "Neither the dogmatic nor the disciplinary decrees of these councils required Papal confirmation; for their force and authority depended on the consent of the Church as expressed in the Synod, and afterwards in the fact of its being generally received" (p. 78). It represents the council as only witness, not judge, in questions of faith.

It declares that, in the early ages of the Church, the Popes "possessed none of the three powers which are the proper attributes of sovereignty—• neither, the legislative, the administrative, nor the judicial" (p. 78); and that all they possessed later, came to them through the tacit or express concession of the Church, often obtained by force and fraud.

It limits the divine institution of the Popedom to a primacy of honour, reviling as "Papalism" the actual constitution of the Church.

Dr. Scheeben does not expressly notice another dogmatic error of Janus, -the assertion in the Preface (xxii.) that the “previously united Church" is now "split up into three great bodies, divided and at enmity with each other."

Under the head of controversial tactics, he points out how Janus follows the tradition of heresy, in pretending to attack only a party which he declares to be the Church's real danger, whilst in fact attacking the Church herself; just as the Reformers professed only to aim their blows against the Roman court and the schoolmen, or the Jansenists against the Jesuits. He notices that it is in so many words "an appeal," not to the hierarchy or the council, but "to the thinkers among believing Christians" (Preface, p. i.)-a phrase which painfully reminds us of the closing. number of the "Chronicle" of unhappy memory. He points out also the thoroughly heretical animus, with which the doctrine of the Church and the teaching of "Papalists" is misrepresented and placed in the most odious light.

The largest portion of the pamphlet is taken up with the examination of the historical criticism of Janus. The sum of Dr. Scheeben's testimony is thus expressed :-"We must certainly give credit to the book for the fact

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that, as far as we have seen, there is nearly always something in the authorities quoted bearing on the question under discussion. This circumstance shows that the authors have referred to the passages. But it also proves something else. For whilst they are so vehement in reprobating the chroniclers, theologians, and Popes of the middle ages, in spite of their want of the historical sense,' as falsifiers of history in the interests of a view, they stamp themselves as forgers every time that they mutilate or distort the contents of their authorities. And how frequently this is the case may be judged of from the circumstance, that it has turned out so in regard to almost every passage which we have casually, as occasion required, referred to. Other readers of the book have made the same obvervation." We can most fully endorse Dr. Scheeben's judgment from our own experience.

Amongst a number of examples given by Dr. Scheeben, we can only mention here one or two. In the Augsburg "Allgemeine Zeitung," where the book first appeared in the form of letters, were several false statements, shown up in the newspapers, and then dropped out in the permanent work without any explanation or retractation. In the " Pope and the Council," as it now stands, Stephen II. having decided, in a document of doubtful authenticity, that a priest, who in a case of urgency had baptized with wine because water was not procurable, should not be punished for it, Janus relates that this Pope had pronounced ex cathedrâ that such a baptism is valid. He declares that "the inquisitors were delegates of the Pope, and never was a single man borne to the rack or the stake otherwise than by his general or special commission." "The proof," Dr. Scheeben adds, "is naturally not given. . . . . Those who have read Hefele's work on Cardinal Ximenes, and who know how even Protestant historians like Ranke have judged the Inquisition, will find it hard to understand how such mischievous untruth should be written in Germany, not by novelwriters, but by Catholic historians,"

Without a shadow of proof again, Eugenius IV. is charged with untruth in the Bull" De Consilio" of December 15th, 1434; and represented as saying that he had confirmed the decree of the second session of the Council, whereas he repeatedly, and the last time with the Council of Florence, solemnly condemned it. But so many similar untruths are being exposed in various quarters, that it is needless to quote further examples. Such an exposure is no doubt as great a necessity in Germany as in England; and we hope Dr. Scheeben's pamphlet may effectually do its work amongst his countrymen.

A Few Specimens of "Scientific History" from "Janus." By EDWARD STEPHEN KEOGH, Priest of the Oratory of S. Philip Neri. London: Longmans. 1870.

KEOGH'S " specimens of scientific history from Janus " is as damaging as a short critique can well be. We do not expect to find a book, extolled for its extraordinary learning in reviews like the North British and the Academy, convicted of twenty or thirty gross errors in matters of fact quite within the reach of the ordinary inquirer. But F. Keogh has done a great deal more than this. He felt, as he tells us, that it would be endless work to notice all the misstatements with which the book abounds; and he has taken care that the specimens he gives should be a real and adequate test of the character of the book. He does not contest matters of detail. He exposes the falsehood of statements, which Janus makes with ludicrous solemnity and regards as decisive against the principles which he attacks.

It is hard to select examples from a pamphlet which is itself composed of specimens ; still the quotations which we make will suffice to show that we have not exaggerated the force of F. Keogh's criticism. Janus tells us, p. 91, of all the Fathers who interpret the text, Tu es Petrus, “not a single one (the italics are those of Janus) applies it to the Roman bishops as Peter's successors." F. Keogh points out that, if this statement were literally true, it would convey a false impression; since there are patristic passages by the dozen which quote our Lord's words to exalt the prerogatives of S. Peter, while others by the dozen call the Pope the successor of S. Peter and next that S. Augustine, S. Jerome, and a Roman council under Felix II. (485) apply the text in express terms "to the Roman bishops as successors of Peter."

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In a picture which Janus draws of the "ancient constitution of the Church," even if the Pope," he says (p. 80) "had attempted at that time (in the Roman empire) to exercise a formal government over the Church, the thing was a sheer impossibility." "Every church (p. 85) managed its own affairs with perfect freedom and independence." Two facts from a single Pontificate may perhaps induce Janus to modify this view. S. Leo, writing to the Patriarch of Alexandria, "wills" that on great festivals "the oblation of the sacrifice be repeated," to accommodate the increased number of the faithful; and "enacts" (statuit) that in the Patriarchate of Antioch, "none but priests shall presume to preach." After this, nobody will be surprised when Janus makes Gelasius the first to claim for Rome the right of judging every other church; though he may find some difficulty in harmonizing Janus with Socrates, ii. 15:-" When they (Athanasius and the other bishops) had laid their cause before Julius, the Bishop of Rome, he, according to the prerogative of the Roman Church, sent them to the East furnished with very honourable letters, restoring to each of them his See": or with Sozomen, iii. 8 :—“The Bishop of Rome having examined the cause of

each, received them into his communion; and as, on account of the dignity of his See the case of all belonged to him, he restored each of them to his Church."

Opponents like F. Keogh are peculiarly galling to the admirers and associates of Janus, for the simple reason that they are unanswerable. Had he gone into the general question of the infallibility of the Holy See; had he pressed doubtful points, or examined the right of the authors to call themselves Catholics, interest might have been turned aside from the character of the book to questions which cannot be settled within the limits of a pamphlet. As it is, he has done none of these things. He has "fulfilled his task by reference to original authorities, and has not transferred the dispute from the sphere of objective and scientific investigation" (vide preface to Janus). He has written with perfect good taste and admirable self-control. Indirectly he has brought forward many facts, which illustrate the strength of patristic testimony to the primacy and infallibility of the Holy See. But his object was to unmask the pretentious mendacity of Janus, and in this he has succeeded.

The Case of Honorius Reconsidered with reference to Recent Apologies. By PETER LE PAGE RENOUF. London: Longmans.

THIS reply to F. Bottalla and ourselves has reached us at the end of the

quarter (Dec. 7), and it is evidently impossible that we can meet it at all points in our present number. We must either, therefore, confine ourselves to a few general comments, or else choose some one particular for complete treatment. For more than one reason, we prefer the latter alternative; and we will at once give an answer-not so full of course as if we were writing an article, but still (as we consider) absolutely irrefragable-to every single portion of Mr. Renouf's argument, which in any way affects the dogma of Pontifical infallibility. The rest, we need hardly say, is a comparatively small matter, and can well wait till April. We will begin with two preliminary remarks.

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* We must not however delay to correct a stupid mistake of ours, mentioned by Mr. Renouf, occurring however in a note which had no direct bearing on our argument. We cited a sentence of Sergius's letter as "indubitably Monothelistic," which was quoted in reality by that heretical patriarch from S. Gregory Nyssen. We most carelessly understood Sergius's quotation from S. Gregory Nyssen as ending before the sentence which we extracted.

But the substance of our incidental remark is in no way affected by the mistake. It is notorious, that the authors of every fresh heresy have cited incautiously-expressed statements of earlier Fathers, who never dreamed what use would be made of their language. Mr. Renouf will admit, we suppose, that no orthodox Catholic, after the rise of Monothelism, would have expressed himself as S. Gregory Nyssen did on this particular occasion. On the very

1. In July, 1868 (p. 204), we stated that "Mr. Renouf gives various indications of holding a theory fundamentally different from the Gallican:" of ascribing infallibility, not to the Ecclesia Docens, but to the body of the faithful. Mr. Renouf complains generally of our persistent misapprehensions ;* but he has in no way denied this particular allegation, nor expressed any definite doctrine whatever on the "subject" of infallibility. We proceeded to say, that to the best of our belief "no theologian could be found who would not denounce such a tenet as simply heretical"; and even the "Correspondant" (see the last article of our present number) expresses itself in this precise sense. What are we to infer from the fact, that Mr. Renouf has not denied a charge so very distinctly brought?

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2. Mr. Renouf speaks (p. 73 et alibi) of our "overbearing and insulting language towards" him. Now, as we pointed out in July 1868 (p. 200), he ascribes to his various opponents-in fact, as F. Bottalla expressed it, to "some of the most eminent writers whom the Catholic Church has produced "-such offences as these: "simple untruth"; "sheer dishonesty"; "interested and mendacious" testimony; "stupid bigotry"; "contemptible quibbling" and he describes M. Veuillot, in particular, as a fiery, ignorant, and unscrupulous convert." Is it Mr. Renouf's opponents, who "have had recourse to personalities" (p. 3)? Is it in the opposite camp to his, that "theological rancour knows no bounds"? No language of ours towards Mr. Renouf can be compared in severity with his language towards his most distinguished opponents; nor is any of it at all unsuitable--such is our deliberate judgment--in dealing with a gentleman who has so expressed himself.

Now then to our argument. There is but one supposition, on which “the case of Honorius" can constitute any objection to the dogma of Pontifical infallibility viz. the supposition, that Honorius taught heresy or error ex cathedra. We are to show therefore, that Mr. Renouf has not adduced so much as the faintest pretext, for affirming that Honorius did so.

question raised by Monothelism, it is most certain that this Father in several passages speaks with most unmistakable distinctness: but to these passages, Sergius makes no reference. Of the particular sentence quoted in our article, Petavius explains the orthodox meaning (De Incarnatione, l. 8, c. xiii., n. 8: see also c. i., n. 9): but Sergius's whole context repudiates the notion, that he alleged it in any such sense. As intended by him, no sentence in his whole letter is more patently Monothelistic. But we will speak further of this in April.

* Of these, that which he apparently considers most outrageous is one cited by him in a note at p. 94. We really wish our readers would refer to our passage (July 1868, p. 204) after perusing Mr. Renouf's comment. We could desire nothing better.

+ This expression (p. 24, note) had every appearance of being applied to F. Perrone's language. We have great pleasure in mentioning, that Mr. Renouf now explains himself (p. 5, note) not to have intended it in this sense. He gives no explanation of the other "overbearing and insulting" expressions quoted in the text.

We are very sorry however, that we referred to Mr. Renouf's youthful pamphlet ; as he mentions (p. 3, note) that "its authorship was known to very few persons." Our impression, when we quoted it, was entirely different.