it to the noetic pentad, or universal form of contemplation, except where all the terms are absolute, and consequently there is no
punctum indifferens, — in divinis tetras, in omnibus aliis pentas,
and the form stands thus
.
Ib.
s. iii. p. 36.
So that it cannot make it divine and necessary to be heartily believed. It may make it lawful, not make it true; that is, it may possibly, by such means, become a law, but not a truth.
This is a sophism which so evident a truth did not need. Apply the reasoning to an act of Parliament previously to the royal sanction. Will it hold good to say, if it was law after the sanction, it was law before? The assertion of the Papal theologians is, that the divine providence may possibly permit even the majority of a legally convened Council to err; but by force of a divine promise cannot permit both a majority and the Pope to err on the same point. The flaw in this is, that the Romish divines rely on a conditional promise unconditionally. To Taylor's next argument the Romish respondent would say, that an exception, grounded on a specific evident necessity, does not invalidate the rule in the absence of any equally evident necessity.