Page:William John Sparrow-Simpson - Roman Catholic Opposition to Papal Infallibility (1909).djvu/301

 ] question is, Does it come to me with the authority of an Ecumenical Council?

"Now the primâ facie argument is in favour of its having that authority. The Council was legitimately called; it was more largely attended than any Council before it. …

"Were it not then for certain circumstances under which the Council made the definition, I should receive that definition at once.

"Even as it is, if I were called upon to profess it, I should be unable, considering it came from the Holy Father and the competent local authorities, at once to refuse to do so. On the other hand, it cannot be denied that there are reasons for a Catholic, till better informed, to suspend his judgment on its validity.

"We all know that ever since the opening of the Council there has been a strenuous opposition to the definition of the doctrine; and that, at the time when it was actually passed, more than eighty Fathers absented themselves from the Council, and would have nothing to do with its act. But if the fact be so, that the Fathers were not unanimous, is the definition valid? This depends upon the question whether unanimity at least moral is or is not necessary for its validity? As at present advised I think it is. …

"Certainly Pius IV. lays great stress on the unanimity of the Fathers in the Council of Trent. … Far different has been the case now—though the Council is not yet finished. But if I must now at once decide what to think of it, I should consider that all turned on what the dissentient Bishops now do.

"If they separate and go home without acting as a body, if they act only individually or as individuals, and each in his own way, then I should not recognise in their opposition to the majority that force, firmness, and unity of view, which creates a real case of want of moral unanimity in the Council. …"

But it is impossible not to feel that dogmas which men are recommended to accept on such extenuating