Page:Delineation of Roman Catholicism.djvu/148

 140 INFALLIBILITY. [Boo I. lawgiver, whose decisions it is in the highest degree criminal to oppmm or disobey. We give as follows the sentiments of the Jesuits as we fild them in the Roman Catholic Du Pin, whose extensive knowledge and general honesty entitle him to respect and credit. The following tie/.v was maintained on the 12th of December, 1661, by one of the Jesuits in the college of Clermont, and strenuously supported by that fraternity afterward :--" Jesus Christ has granted to St. Peter and successors, as often as they'speak in the chair, (ez cAedrd,)the same infallibility which he had himself." From whence he concluded, "That there is in the Roman Church an infallible judge of contro- versies, even excluding a general council, as well in questions of right as those of fact." A short time after the author of the thesis published  explanation of these propositions, wherein he declared :--" Chat he did not acknowledge in the pope the same personal /nfni!i- bility which is in Jesus Christ, but only an infallibility of assistance, whereby the vicars of Jesus Christ are rendered infallible in their definitions. $econd//, Upon his having extended this infallibility to questions of fact, that he spoke only of facts joined to questions of faith."" But the popes themselves assert the absolute infallibility of their decisions and decrees; as will fully appear to any one who is conversant with the style and claims of their bulls. Pighiss says: "Longe certius est unlus apostolica: sedis cure concilio domesticorum sacerdotum judicium, quam sine Poutifiee judicium universalis concilli totins orbis terrantm."t "The judgment of the apostolic see, with a council of domestic priests, is far more certain than the judgment of a universal council of the whole earth without the pope." The lev. T. Maguire, an Irish Roman Catholic, in his discussion with Rev. Mr. Pope, says: "The pope at the head of a council regularly convened, in their decrees regarding fa/th, are admitted to be infallible. That is one instance. Also, if the pope, with a few bishops assembled, should issue decrees touching the deposits of faith, and which are subsequendy received by the church dispersed, we account them infallible."$ Again he says: "The pope's infallibility is not a doctrine of mine, nor of any Catholic. There are differences on the subject between the French and Ultramontanists, (Italians,) but they are merely the private opinions of private divines. The church has pronounced no opinion on it. The church only pwnounces on essentials."[ The Rev. Mr. Nolan, an Irish Roman Catholic priest, says: "Some Catholic divines, indeed, maintain that the pope, in his ministerial capacity, speaking ex cedrd, on matters of faith, is infall/ble; and there are others who do not hold this opinion. But all Catholics know and believe that the church is infallible, whether assembled in a general council of her bishops, with the chief pontiff at their head, or when dispersed through- out the world, her bishops receive and assent to the definitions of faith of the chief pastor. Every Catholic knows and believes this." Bishop Hay, in the "Sincere Christian," gives two systems of infalli- bility as the true doctrinds of their church; he then gives two 9ystenm respecting the infallibility of the pope personally, and main- $ _Pghius de Hier., lib. 6. See Barrow on Supremacy, p. 395.
 * Du Pin, Ecc. Hist., cent. 17, p. 147.
 * t Duion with Pope, p. 6. II Idem, p, 49.

 Dim:uion at Carlow, Nov., 184, p. 94. 1 oigitize Goodie

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