As to Greeks and Protestants, Dupanloup points out that what is proposed amounts to telling them, "A ditch now separates us; we are going to make it an abyss.... Two years ago. Dr. Pusey said to me in Orleans, 'There are eight thousand of us in England, daily praying for a union.'" ... When Pitt thought of relaxing laws against Catholics in England and Ireland, he asked several learned bodies what was the real doctrine of the Roman Church on the power of the Pope. "I have under my eyes the replies of the Universities of Paris, Douay, Louvain, Alcala, Salamanca, and Valladolid." They all "answer expressly that neither the Pope nor the Cardinals, nor yet any body or individual in the Roman Church, hold from Jesus Christ any civil authority over England, any power to release the subjects of his Britannic Majesty from their oath of fidelity." Such doctrine was calculated to reassure Pitt, as against the contrary doctrine, professed in celebrated Bulls by more Popes than one. But what if the Pope be declared infallible?
As to Catholic governments, their standing jealousy of the ecclesiastical power would be increased. Had not Boniface VIII taught that the temporal sword also belonged to Peter, and that the spiritual power had a right to institute and judge the temporal? Had not Paul III released all the subjects of Henry VIII from their oath of allegiance, offered England to any one who would conquer it, and given all the goods of the dissident English, real and personal, to the conqueror? Was not that Bull a great misfortune to Christendom? "I am sad—and who would not be sad?—in recalling these great and painful historical facts; but they force us to it—those whose levity and rashness have stirred these burning questions." After the dogma shall have been proclaimed, he contends that from the point of view occupied by governments, "all civil and political rights, like all religious belief, will be in the hand of a single man." The journals which claim to be purest in their Romanism "treat the doctrine, so strongly held by the Catholic sovereigns, as well as others, that each of the two powers is independent in its own sphere, as tainted with atheism."
The following passage in the Bishop's argument suffices to show that there may be more senses of the statement that Catholics do not owe any divided allegiance, than plain English folk ever dreamed of in their philosophy—
We lately read, as quoted with praise in a French paper, the following, which compares those to the Manicheans who deny that the two swords are in the same hand: "Are there two sources of authority and power, two supreme ends for the members of the same society, two different objects in the intention of the Being who orders all and two distinct destinies in one and the same man, who is both member of a Church and of a State? Who does not see the absurdity of such a system? It is the dualism of the Manicheans if not atheism."
We ought to interject the remark that "the two swords in the same hand" is not strict but popular language. The two are in the same power, but only one is in the spiritual hand. Again, the taunt of Manicheism frequently falls from Jesuit pens. Boniface VIII set the example of calling people something like Manicheans, if they believed in any supreme power in princes on a level with that of the Pope.
Coming to the crucial question, What is speaking ex cathedrâ? Bishop Dupanloup shows that the diversity of doctrine on this point is almost endless, and perplexing beyond belief. The lay Professor of Theology in the seminary of the Archdiocese of Westminster, Dr. Ward, formerly an Anglican minister, goes beyond the great majority. They hold that a condition necessary to an infallible utterance is that the Pope shall address the whole Church, but Dr. Ward thinks that this is not necessary. The majority think that the intention of binding the belief of the faithful must be clearly expressed, but Dr. Ward again thinks that it need not be so. Phillips, the German doctor, holds that the Pope need not consult a Council, the Roman Church, the Cardinals, or any one; nor is it necessary that he should maturely deliberate or carefully study the matter by the light of God's written word and of tradition, or even that he should put up a prayer to God before pronouncing sentence. "Without any one of these conditions," says the Bishop, "his decision would not be less valid, authentic, or obligatory on the whole Church, than if he had observed every condition dictated by faith, piety, and good sense." He adds the words of Phillips, that the definition ex cathedrâ may be verbal or written and with or without anathema, but must be given by him to all believing Christians as Vicar of Jesus Christ, in the name of the Apostles Peter and Paul, or in virtue of the authority of the Holy See, or in other similar terms. The Church, he says, according to Phillips, has no right to fix any condition or restriction whatever.
Citing the cases of Popes Stephen VI, Honorius, and Pascal II, Dupanloup shows that heavy facts obstruct the historical path to the new dogma.
He proceeds to point out that the difference between the universal infallibilists and the dogmatical infallibilists is very grave. The former argue that the dogma, if adopted in the sense of the latter, would involve a peril. A Pope infallible in some cases and fallible in others is, they think, a contradiction. If, as a private teacher, the Pope should err in doctrine, might he not impose his error on the Church? If this is not possible, you have either a Pope who thinks one thing and defines another, or a perpetual miracle! And why distinguish, ask the universal infallibilists, when Christ has not distinguished? "That thy faith fail not"—that means the faith of Peter in every sense, personal and pastoral. These theologians contend that a Pope could not, even if he would, fall into an error, public or private.
As to the effect of the change on the episcopate, Dupanloup contends that Councils will be rendered superfluous. Hitherto, the bishops have been judges of the faith, real judges, though in union with the Pope—co-judges, as was said by Benedict XIV. But if the proposed change is made, their judgment before or after will be of little account; as Monsignor Manning has said, the Pope can determine "without the episcopate, and independently of it." The bishops, he proceeds, are now Doctors, not mere echoes. With the Pope they constitute the Teaching Church. After the change they will not be a voice, only an echo.
Drawing a glowing picture of the services of the French bishops to the Papacy, he says—