Page:Petri Privilegium - Manning.djvu/55

Rh The boldness or the unconsciousness with which Gallicanism is sometimes put forward as an opinion which Catholics are free to hold without blame, and as a basis on which Churches are to unite under the shelter of Bossuet, and as a standard of Catholic moderation in rebuke of Ultramontane excesses, makes it seasonable to tell its history. Gallicanism is no more than a transient and modern opinion which arose in France, without warrant or antecedents in the antient theological schools of the great French Church: a royal theology, as suddenly developed and as parenthetical as the Thirty-nine Articles; affirmed only by a small number out of the numerous episcopate of France, indignantly rejected by many of them; condemned in succession by three Pontiffs; declared by the Universities of Louvain and Douai to be erroneous; retracted by the Bishops of France; condemned by Spain, Hungary, and other countries, and condemned over again in the bull 'Auctorem Fidei.' To this may be added, that the name of Bossuet escaped censure only out of indulgence, by reason of his great services to the Church; and that even the lawfulness of giving absolution to those who defend the Gallican Articles, has been gravely questioned.

To justify these assertions, I will briefly give the proofs; with the references, which may be easily consulted.

In order to maintain against Innocent XI. the pretended claims of the Regale in matters of ecclesiastical