Page:William John Sparrow-Simpson - Roman Catholic Opposition to Papal Infallibility (1909).djvu/115

Bossuet attached very little importance to objections about the practical inconvenience of Papal Fallibility.^[1] To his mind it was perfectly futile to argue that, if we must wait for the consent of the Church to a pontifical decree, we should be leaving the minds of the faithful in suspense. He considers that the true remedy is not to extend the papal power, but to exercise more faith in the Holy Spirit and the Catholic Church. It is no disparagement to the Pope if the Church be placed above him.^[2]

Similarly, the à priori argument that submission of the intellect must be due when the Pope defines a doctrine, otherwise faith would vacillate; and that such submissions can only be justified when the authority cannot err; leaves Bossuet unmoved, except to protest against the underlying assumption that unqualified submission is due.

Bossuet's survey of history from the Apostolic Age to his own time, Scripture, Fathers, Councils, Theologians, confirmed him in the truth of the principles of the Church in France. The ultimate and therefore irreversible decision in faith depended on the Collective Episcopate, and on that only; as voicing the belief of the Universal Church.

 

"What benefit to the Church," he exclaims in a striking passage, "can exist in that doubtful authority, which the Church has not yet affirmed, of a Pope's ex cathedra decisions? We live in the seventeenth century of the Catholic Church, and not yet are orthodox and saintly men agreed about that Infallibility. To say nothing of the Councils of Constance and of Basle, saintly and learned men are opposed to it. And if many private individuals clamour greatly, and pour forth imprudent censures against them, yet neither the Catholic Church nor Rome itself passes any condemna-

1. Bossuet, i. p. 112.
2. Ibid. i. p. 113.