Bellarmine's assertion that Martin V. did not accept the decisions of Constance is, according to Bossuet, particularly unfortunate. For Martin V. was, as Cardinal Colonna, present through the sessions of Pisa and of Constance, and influential in passing the Council's claims to be ecumenical and assembled in the Holy Spirit. And yet this Cardinal, without any revocation of this opinion, was elected to the Papal See. Martin's own mind on the authority of General Councils is sufficiently clear. All that Bellarmine found to urge was that Martin said he confirmed what had been done conciliariter; that is, says Bellarmine, in the proper way, as Councils should: which he interpreted to mean, after careful examination into facts—a condition which was not fulfilled at Constance. And, therefore, Martin did not intend to confirm this claim.
Bossuet considered that nothing could exceed the feebleness of the argument. The Roman Pontiffs, says Bossuet, have never spoken of the Council of Constance without veneration; have never passed any adverse criticism upon it. Paul V. had its proceedings published by the Vatican, complete, on a level of authority with the Council of Nicea.[1]
The long struggle of the fifteenth century between two conceptions of Ecclesiastical Authority—that which placed the ultimate decision in the Collective Episcopate, and that which placed it in the solitary Voice—issued, on the whole, to the advantage of the latter. However great the services which the reforming Council rendered to Christendom, and great undoubtedly they were, yet the blunders perpetrated by them, and their ultimate collapse, seriously compromised their rightful claims. The Papacy had learnt lessons it was never likely to forget, and the following period was instinctively a
- ↑ Bossuet, Works, t. xxi. p, 53.
