with it, and what is contradictory to it, through the agency of the Supreme Pontiff, or of the Pontiff and the rest of the hierarchy. And can anything be more reasonable than the assertion that she is infallible? Protestantism has boasted, and boasts yet, of having emancipated reason, of having brought it to the highest possible degree of culture and development. But when will Protestantism begin to exercise its vaunted reason?
Is it reasonable to suppose that the Theanthropos, the God made man, the infallible wisdom of God, the very intelligibility of the Father, who established the church, that is, united himself, either as to action or substance, with a sacramental element, be it material or personal, in order, among other things, to teach all men in time and space what was absolutely necessary for them to know to attain their ultimate perfection—is it reasonable to suppose, we say, that the Theanthropos should, through his personal agents, teach anything but absolute truth?
Deny the divinity of the Theanthropos, deny that the Theanthropos ever did or could unite his activity with personal agents, deny the essence of the church, and then you would be logical, then you would be consistent, then we could understand you. But to admit that the Theanthropos is God, to admit that he did unite his infinite and divine activity to the sacramental element, to admit that he did so on purpose to teach all men in time and space, and then to affirm that the church is not and cannot be infallible—that is, that the Theanthropos cannot teach infallibly through his personal agents—is such a logic as only the highly cultivated reason of Protestantism can understand. It is above the reach of that reason which is satisfied with a moderate share of culture and refinement,
and cannot claim to soar so high.
We beg the reader to reflect for an instant on this single question: Is it the Theanthropos, or is it not, who teaches through the agency of his personal instruments? To this simple question, a simple answer should be given. Say you answer, It is not. Then you deny that the Theanthropos united his infinite energy to a sacramental element. Then you deny the essence of the church, and, in denying that, you must deny every other union between the infinite and the finite, as we have demonstrated. If you say it is the Theanthropos who teaches through the agency of his personal instruments, then what can be more logical or more consistent than to say that he teaches infallibly? What is there more reasonable than to say that a God-man should know what is truth, and should express his mind so, should embody it in an external means so, as to represent that mind infallibly?
Then, why so much opposition against this plainest attribute of the church? Why so much obloquy, so much sneering, except that the so boasted Protestant reason is nothing but a vile, unmanly prejudice, except that those who boast so much of exercising their reason resemble those innocent and unconscious animals of which Dante speaks:
“As sheep, that step forth from their fold, by one
Or pairs, or three, at once; meanwhile, the rest
Stand fearfully, bending the eye and nose
To ground, and what the foremost does that do
The others, gathering round her if she stops,
Simple and quiet, nor the cause discern”?
—Cary’s Translation.
The next attribute of the church is authority. This, like the rest, flows from her very essence. That essence consists in being the sacramental extension
of Christ incorporating unto himself all human persons in time and space, communicating to them the term of the supernatural moment in its essence and faculties, and aiding them to develop those faculties, and to bring them to their ultimate completion. The church, therefore, as sacramental—that is, outward and sensible extension of the Theanthropos intended for men—is a visible, outward society of human persons with the Theanthropos. Now, what does a visible society require? That the external relations of the associates should be determined and governed by the authority legitimately constituted in the society. For, if those relations were not determined and directed by proper authority in a visible society, it is evident that no order could be expected, and that all the members could not form one moral body, by a proper external communication. The church, therefore, as a visible society, must have authority to determine all the external relations of the members, and to govern and direct them.
This authority or power of establishing the external polity in the church is, of course, essentially residing in the Theanthropos, who communicates it whole and entire to the Supreme Pontiff, and through him to the whole hierarchy and the rest of the active church.