As to what you say at the end of your letter, permit me to remark, that I abandoned no positive doctrine [in which I had been trained], in embracing the Catholic faith; and as to the hope which you very kindly express, that the Lord may guide me into the way of truth, I must tell you that when God led me in a remarkable manner into His Church, which is “the ground and pillar of the truth,” He put me on that way, and that it “is the way,” [14] I have an internal and external assurance which, I know, cannot be had in protestantism.
I remain, my dear Sir,
Yours faithfully,
Henry Waller.
Rev. Edward Hoare.
Ramsgate,
Dec. 22, 1851.
My dear Sir,
I thank you very much for your full communication, and I fear that you will think me very much prejudiced when I state that whatever were the intention of the writer, I still think that the version which I have given is most in accordance with the Latin.
With reference to your criticisms, I have read the constitutions carefully, and I cannot agree with you that the expressions “obligatio ad peccatum”—“peccati”—and “sub pœnâ peccati”—are used indifferently in any other portion of the book, unless it be the extract quoted by you from the 9th part. This appears to me a very important extract, and is the only thing which has at all shaken my opinion. I am, however, exceedingly doubtful whether the translator has given its true meaning, while at the same time I fully admit that his having so translated it is a strong and valid argument in favour of your interpretation.
With reference to your two other points, I certainly think that the words “obligatio peccati” might include either sense; so that the utmost that can be gathered from the heading is that as far as it is concerned the section may bear the harmless sense, but whether it does or not must be decided by the contents.
I had noticed the “ea” before you mentioned it, and you will perhaps be surprised at hearing that it failed to carry conviction to my mind. It does not agree with peccatum, but what does it agree with unless it be with “Constitutiones, &c.”; and if it does, the meaning is not at all altered, as it is the “vis constitutionum” by which the Jesuit is to be drawn “in Iaqueum peccati.”
Then again, if this be the meaning of the passage, it appears to me very strange that it should be placed just after the chapter on obedience, in the middle of the Constitutions, and not at the commencement or close of the book. It certainly is a very extraordinary place for it, if it really describes the obligatory force of the whole code.