It is asked again how, if the church is infallible, can individuals be fallible; and if individuals are fallible, and do not unfrequently err, how can the church be infallible? How from any possible number of fallibles get an infallible? The answer is in principle the same. The church is infallible, for he who assumed human nature, and whose body she is, is her personality, for she is individualized in the individual human nature he assumed; but the individual is not in himself infallible, for he retains his own personality with all its limitations and imperfections. The infallibility is in Christ, and proceeds from him to the regenerated race, not to the individual member in his individuality. Our Lord assumed human nature without its human personality, though human nature individualized; but individuals assimilated to Christ through the church retain their proper human personality, and are infallible only in the church, only so far as they think and speak her thoughts, and believe what she believes and teaches. The pope himself is not personally infallible, but at most only when speaking ex cathedra, in union with the mind of the church, and declaring her faith. Hence some theologians maintain that the papal definitions themselves are reformable till expressly or tacitly accepted by the universal church, though we do not agree with them; for we regard the pope as the vicar of Christ in teaching as well as in governing, and, therefore, as expressing, when speaking officially, the infallible faith of the universal church. For us, in the language of St. Ambrose, ubi Petrus, ibi ecclesia. Whenever the church speaks, she speaks the words of her Lord, and is infallible and authoritative; whenever the individual speaks in his own individuality, he is fallible, and his words, as his, have no authority. The church can then be infallible and individuals fallible. Consequently, any arguments drawn from the errors and misdeeds of individuals have no weight against the church.
If non-Catholics would pay attention to this, they would write fewer books, publish fewer essays, and preach fewer sermons, against the church, for they have hitherto alleged little or nothing against her but the errors and bad conduct of churchmen. When they wish for examples of the purest and most heroic sanctity, they are obliged to seek them in her communion, and the most anti-Catholic among them feel that they may assert without proof any doctrine they happen to like, if the church has taught and teaches it. It is remarkable with what confidence and mental relish they assert particular doctrines for which they feel that they have her authority. Is it because a secret conviction of her infallibility lurks in the minds of all who are Catholic by their reminiscences? and would they not be far less enraged against what they call "the seductions of Rome," if it were not so, if they did not feel themselves constantly tempted to return to her communion? They resist her influence, in fact, only by a constant effort, by main strength.
But it is time to bring our remarks to a close. We have opened a vast subject, one to which we could do scant justice in a magazine article, even if we were otherwise able, as we are not, to treat it not altogether unworthily. No mortal can speak worthily of the church of Christ, in which the power, the wisdom, the justice, the love, and the mercy of God, of the indivisible and ever Blessed Trinity, in all their infinitude are, so to speak, embodied and displayed. Even God himself cannot do more or better than he has done in the church, for he gives in her himself, and more than himself even he cannot give. How great, how glorious, how awful is the church! How great, how exceeding great, the loving-kindness of God, who permits us to call her our mother, to draw life from her breasts, and to rest on her bosom! We love the church, who is to us the sum of all things good and holy, and we grieve daily over those who know her not; we grieve when her own children seem to treat her with levity or indifference; we are pained to the heart when we hear men, who have souls to save, for whom Christ died, and whom she longs to clasp to her loving bosom, railing against her, calling her "the mystery of iniquity," and her chief pontiff "the man of sin." We seem to see our Lord crucified afresh on Calvary, and to hear her sweet voice pleading, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."
Magas; or, Long Ago.
A Tale Of The Early Times.
Chapter IV.
Four years are past since the incidents above related took place. The scene is neither at Athens nor at Corinth, but at Nauplia. [Footnote 73] Here, suddenly, a new school had been opened by a lady, which attracts a vast concourse of disciples. The lady is young, eloquent, beautiful, and the favor she meets with is almost unbounded. Powerful protectors are around her; and philosophy and science bow to her, though they hardly as yet determine to what school the doctrines she propounds belong. Among those who are attracted by her fame is a lady, just arrived from Athens to be enrolled among the followers of the new Aspasia, or Leontium as she is more generally called. Lotis is herself no mean or obscure daughter of those muses which this new professor has worshipped to such advantage. But Lotis is disappointed in her expectations; the entrance to the academy is guarded with such jealous care, that admission is not easy; in vain she sends her name as daughter of a citizen of Athens of some distinction in the philosophic world; strangers, and above all those from Athens, are carefully excluded. Yet the city continues to derive new lustre from this new propounder of exalted themes; and those who were fortunate enough to gain admission to her lectures, rang with applauses of the lucid doctrines taught; they compared her eloquence to that of Plato, her music to that of Amphion; and contended that, while all other sects were tending to the destruction of ancient truth, this lady demonstrated its existence in every nation, and brought it home to the heart and feelings. Lotis heard of nothing throughout the city but praises of the new exponent of wisdom who had travelled throughout the earth, and had learnt to harmonize the teachings of all philosophies.
[Footnote 73: The Napoli di Romania.]