The Lettre sur le Futur Concile Œcumenique, by the Bishop of Orleans, a translation of which was given in The Catholic World, has already reached its seventh edition. The immense notoriety acquired by this small book in the Catholic world, and the letter of felicitation received by its author from the sovereign pontiff, have made it so generally known as to dispense us from very special mention of it. Bishop Dupanloup thus assigns the council its place in the firmament of truth. "It will be," he says, "a rising, not a setting sun." Addressing himself to the human mind separated from the church, he says, "While you disperse, we unite; while you lose, we retain." And again, "In all this world, only the church and the sun are able to affirm positively that they will arise the next day, and this is what the church does in daring, amid the existing tumult, to announce a council."
Le Concile Œcumenique, son Importance dans le Temps Présent, is the title of a work equally well known in Germany and in France. It is translated from the German, and is from the pen of the Bishop of Mayence, Rt. Rev. Dr. Ketteler. He demonstrates, with his well-known learning and eloquence, than for eighteen centuries the infallible teaching of the church has had no eclipse.
Another work not less remarkable is by Monseigneur Deschamps, Archbishop of Malines, and entitled, L'Infaillibilité et le Concile Général. It discusses the question of the infallibility of the head of the church.
Finally, the Abbé Jaugey, in his Petit Traité Théologique sur le Concile Œcumenique, appears to have addressed himself to the class commonly known as "worldly people." In an easy and pleasant style he explains on this grave subject all that such people desire to know, and at the end of his work groups under five headings the subjects most likely to be passed upon by the council. These are,
First. Speculative truths, or the natural and supernatural orders and their mutual connection.
Second. Moral truths concerning civil society.