Page:William John Sparrow-Simpson - Roman Catholic Opposition to Papal Infallibility (1909).djvu/286

 266 maintained to this day. It is not our function to reconstruct the Church after our taste, or to alter the conditions of divine ordaining. Now the Church has never been without its essential elements. But it has never had a definition of Papal Infallibility. Such definition cannot therefore be essential. Nor have men the right to argue that the Church's unity would be firmer if authority were stronger. An institution may be ruined by over-pressure. Excessive concentration may paralyse its functions rather than perfect them.

Then, again, the remedy for the evils of the world is not to be found in Papal Infallibility. This doctrine will not draw to the Church the alienated majority; nor give the Church its rightful place of influence among the nations. The world is sick and perishing, not for want of knowing the truth, but for want of love for it. If it reject the truth now when presented by the collective testimony of the Church, it will not any the more accept it because affirmed by one infallible voice. And what is the value of a proclamation if it is not received? of an anathema where the formulating authority is not acknowledged?

The Archbishop evidently spoke with constraint. His measured, diplomatic utterances suggest the firmness and caution of one desirous not unnecessarily to offend yet resolute to speak his mind. He told the Council that he had delivered his conscience, so far as was allowed him; that if he were to say all he would outrun the limits of discretion. He concluded by proposing, first, to postpone the scheme as having been introduced in a manner unworthy of the Council; secondly, to reconsider more carefully the nature and limits of Infallibility; and, finally, to set aside the subject altogether as fraught with dangerous results to Christendom.