"Many among us," he wrote,[1] "believe that Ecclesiastical history, the history of the Popes, the history of the Councils, and the Tradition of the Church, are not in harmony with the new doctrine. Therefore we think it most inopportune to define as a dogma of faith an opinion which seems to us a novelty in the Church, destitute of solid foundation in Scripture and Tradition, and contradicted by indisputable evidence."
In his speech which the closure of June prevented from being delivered, but which he printed[2] and circulated, he was more emphatic still.
"I dare to affirm that the opinion as expressed in the Schema is not a doctrine of the faith, and never can become such by any definition even of a Council."
On the 13th of July Archbishop Kenrick voted in the negative, signed the protest of the 17th, and with the body of the opposition fled away. Having thus registered his informal and useless protest he accepted the new Decree. This surrender provoked a letter from Lord Acton asking the Archbishop for the grounds of his submission. History has preserved the pages of Kenrick's reply.[3] He said that "sufficient time seems to have elapsed to allow the Catholic world to decide whether or not the decree of the Council was to be accepted." The greater number of the Bishops, some to the Archbishop's surprise, had already yielded assent. As for himself—
