Page:William John Sparrow-Simpson - Roman Catholic Opposition to Papal Infallibility (1909).djvu/264

 244 Another Bishop declared that the series of three texts commonly quoted on behalf of Papal Infallibility ("Thou art Peter." … "I have prayed for thee" … "Feed My sheep") could not possibly prove that the authority to teach and the privilege of Infallibility were given exclusively to St Peter, for another series of texts exists in which the Apostles collectively with St Peter are made recipients of the same authority ("Go ye therefore … teaching them … I will pray the Father, and He will send you another Comforter … Receive ye the Holy Ghost"). Who will dare to say that the Apostles and their successors received nothing in these words? Who does not see that all power was directly bestowed upon them all? Now, since the Bishops are successors of the Apostles, and receive direct from Christ a definite share in the government of the Church, it is impossible to allow that the entire and absolute authority and power to rule and teach, coupled with the privilege of Infallibility, belong to the Pope alone. Such power must reside in the Pope together with the Episcopate, as the successor of Peter and the Apostles. If the Pope possesses a principal portion of authority, yet it is essentially limited by the rights of the Episcopate, which are equally Divine. Thus it cannot be absolute. We hold it for certain, this Bishop continued, that by no argument from the first five centuries of the Church can the Infallibility of the Pope be established. The early centuries never recognised absolute infallible teaching power in the Pope alone; but in the entire Episcopate, of which he was the head. If nothing is definable which does not conform to the test of universality from the beginning, how can Infallibility of the Pope ever become defined?

Another Bishop asserted that nothing more mischievous than this unfortunate proposition could be conceived;