Page:William John Sparrow-Simpson - Roman Catholic Opposition to Papal Infallibility (1909).djvu/304

 284 The thought that the merciful Lord would not permit His people to be led into error on so serious a subject depends for its value on the solemn question, whether the gifts of God are in any way conditional. If the transmission of grace depends upon conformity to conditions so also does the transmission of truth. If human co-operation is necessary to the achievement of human enlightenment, then the neglect of compliance with these conditions, the refusal of that co-operation, will be attended with serious losses which the merciful Lord must not be expected to prevent. The graver the misgivings created by the coercive methods of the Vatican majority, the more urgent becomes the enquiry, whether their refusal to comply with the true conditions of conciliar freedom would not be punished by the nemesis of a misleading Decree. Newman's misgivings on the Council's integrity cancel his appeal to the thought of the mercifulness of our Lord. This, at any rate, is what many within the Roman Communion undoubtedly felt. They did not believe in the rightfulness of expecting Providence to nullify the perverseness and self-will of an overwhelming majority.

Subtle, attractive, bearing in every line of it the distinctive impress of his wonderful personality, Newman's defence is remarkable rather as a tour de force than for argumentative solidity. Newman's personal assent to the dogma was indisputably complete. He said, indeed, all that it was possible to say. But even his brilliant genius could scarcely efface the effect of his own letter written to Bishop Ullathorne before the dogma was passed.

"Moreover," he wrote, "a letter of mine became public property. That letter … was one of the most confidential I ever wrote in my life. I wrote it to my own Bishop under a deep sense of the responsibility I