Sect. I.
Papal Power limited by the Gallican Church—Dupin—Fleury—Protestant Controversy—Bossuet—His Assaults on Protestantism—Jansenism—Progress of Arminianism in England—Trinitarian Controversy—Defences of Christianity—Pascal’s Thoughts—Toleration—Boyle—Locke—French Sermons—And English—Other Theological Works.
Decline of papal influence. 1. It has been observed in the last volume that while little or no decline could be perceived in the general church of Rome at the conclusion of that period which we then had before us, yet the papal authority itself had lost a part of that formidable character, which, through the Jesuits, and especially Bellarmin, it had some years before assumed. This was now still more decidedly manifest; the temporal power over kings was not, certainly, renounced, for Rome never retracts anything; nor was it, perhaps, without Italian Jesuits to write in its behalf; but the common consent of nations rejected it so strenuously, that on no occasion has it been brought forward by any accredited or eminent advocate. There was also a growing disposition to control the court of Rome; the treaty of Westphalia was concluded in utter disregard of her protest. But such matters of history do not belong to us, when they do not bear a close relation to the warfare of the pen. Some events there were which have had a remarkable influence on the theological literature of France, and indirectly of the rest of Europe.
Dispute of Louis XIV. with Innocent XI. 2. Louis XIV., more arrogant, in his earlier life, than bigoted, became involved in a contest with Innocent XI., by a piece of his usual despotism and contempt of his subjects’ rights. He extended in 1673 the ancient prerogative, called the regale, by which the king enjoyed the revenues of vacant bishoprics, to all the kingdom, though many Sees had been legally exempt from it. Two bishops appealed to the pope, who interfered in their favour more peremptorily than the times would permit. Innocent, it is but just to say, was maintaining the fair rights of the church, rather than any claim of his own. But the dispute took at length a different form. France was rich in prelates of eminent worth, and among such, as is evident, the Cisalpine theories had never lain dormant since the councils of Constance and Basle. Louis convened the famous assembly of the Gallican clergy in 1682. Bossuet, who is said to have felt some apprehensions lest the spirit of resistance should become one of rebellion, was appointed to open this assembly; and his sermon on that occasion is among his most splendid works. His posture was, indeed, magnificent: he stands forward, not so much the minister of religion as her arbitrator; we see him poise in his hands earth and heaven, and draw that boundary line which neither was to transgress; he speaks the language of reverential love towards the mother church, that of St. Peter, and the fairest of her daughters to which he belongs, conciliating their transient feud; yet, in this majestic tone which he assumes, no arrogance betrays itself, no thought of himself as one endowed with transcendant influence; he speaks for the church, and yet we feel that he raises himself above those for whom he speaks.[724]
[724] This sermon will be found in Œuvres de Bossuet, vol. ix.
Four articles of 1682. 3. Bossuet was finally entrusted with drawing up the four articles, which the assembly, rather at the instigation, perhaps, of Colbert than of its own accord, promulgated as the Gallican creed on the limitations of papal authority. These declare: 1. That kings are subject to no ecclesiastical power in temporals, nor can be deposed directly or indirectly by the chiefs of the church; 2. That the decrees of the council of Constance as to the papal authority are in full force and ought to be observed; 3. That this authority can only be exerted in conformity with the canons received in the Gallican church; 4. That, though the pope has the principal share in determining controversies of faith, and his decrees extend to all churches, they are not absolutely final, unless the consent of the catholic church be superadded. It appears that some bishops would have willingly used stronger language, but Bossuet foresaw the risk of an absolute schism. Even thus the Gallican church approached so nearly to it that, the pope refusing the usual bulls to bishops nominated by the king, according to the concordat, between thirty and forty Sees, at last, were left vacant. No reconciliation was effected till 1693, in the pontificate of Innocent XII. It is to be observed, whether the French writers slur this over or not, that the pope gained the honours of war; the bishops who had sat in the assembly of 1682, writing separately letters which have the appearance of regretting, if not retracting, what they had done. These were, however, worded with intentional equivocation; and as the court of Rome yields to none in suspecting the subterfuges of words, it is plain that it contented itself with an exterior humiliation of its adversaries. The old question of the regale was tacitly abandoned; Louis enjoyed all he had desired, and Rome might justly think herself not bound to fight for the privileges of those who had made her so bad a return.[725]
[725] I have derived most of this account from Bausset’s life of Bossuet, ii. Both the bishop and his biographer shuffle a good deal about the letter of the Gallican prelates in 1693. But when the Roman legions had passed under the yoke at the Caudine forks, they were ready to take up arms again.
Dupin on the ancient discipline. 5. The doctrine of the four articles gained ground perhaps in the church of France through a work of great boldness, and deriving authority from the learning and judgment of its author, Dupin. In the height of the contest, while many were considering how far the Gallican church might dispense with the institution of bishops at Rome, that point in the established system which evidently secured the victory to their antagonist, in the year 1686, he published a treatise on the ancient discipline of the church. It is written in Latin, which he probably chose as less obnoxious than his own language. It may be true, which I cannot affirm or deny, that each position in this work had been advanced before; but the general tone seems undoubtedly more adverse to the papal supremacy than any book which could have come from a man of reputed orthodoxy. It tends, notwithstanding a few necessary admissions, to represent almost all that can be called power or jurisdiction in the see of Rome as acquired, if not abusive, and would leave, in a practical sense, no real pope at all; mere primacy being a trifle, and even the right of interfering by admonition being of no great value, when there was no definite obligation to obey. The principle of Dupin is that the church having reached her perfection in the fourth century, we should endeavour, as far as circumstances will admit, to restore the discipline of that age. But, even in the Gallican church, it has generally been held that he has urged his argument farther than is consistent with a necessary subordination to Rome.[726]
[726] Bibliothèque Universelle, vi., 109. The book is very clear, concise, and learned, so that it is worth reading through by those who would understand such matters. I have not observed that it is much quoted by English writers.
Dupin’s Ecclesiastical Library. 6. In the same year, Dupin published the first volume of a more celebrated work, his Nouvelle Bibliothèque des Auteurs Ecclesiastiques, a complete history of theological literature, at least within the limits of the church, which, in a long series of volumes, he finally brought down to the close of the seventeenth century. It is unquestionably the most standard work of that kind extant, whatever deficiencies may have been found in its execution. The immense erudition requisite for such an undertaking may have rendered it inevitable to take some things at second hand, or to fall into some errors; and we may add other causes less necessary, the youth of the writer in the first volumes, and the rapidity with which they appeared. Integrity, love of truth, and moderation, distinguish this ecclesiastical history, perhaps beyond any other. Dupin is often near the frontier of orthodoxy, but he is careful, even in the eyes of jealous catholics, not quite to overstep it. This work was soon translated into English, and furnished a large part of such knowledge on the subject as our own divines possessed. His free way of speaking, however, on the Roman supremacy and some other points, excited the animadversion of more rigid persons, and among others of Bossuet, who stood on his own vantage-ground, ready to strike on every side. The most impartial critics have been of Dupin’s mind; but Bossuet, like all dogmatic champions Of orthodoxy, never sought truth by an analytical process of investigation, assuming his own possession of it as an axiom in the controversy.[727]