Page:William John Sparrow-Simpson - Roman Catholic Opposition to Papal Infallibility (1909).djvu/382

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Fessler again speaks of "the form … which the Pope usually adopts when he delivers a solemn definition de fide." And yet the result of his application of the tests of an infallible utterance is that he "finds only a few."

To be still more precise. There is no unanimity as to occasions when an infallible decree was given. Many writers on Infallibility give no list at all. Those who attempt it differ widely, but agree in regarding them as excessively few. The Secretary of the Vatican Council tells us that he found only a few, but he did not tell us which they are. This is perfectly intelligible. He wrote in the same year in which the Decree was made, and certainly there had been no time to investigate or apply the tests with any assurance of accuracy; and it was most prudent and commendable not to attempt the dangerous task of committing himself to a definite list which might sooner or later have been overthrown. As Newman said: "Those which are by some persons affirmed or assumed to be such, do not always turn out what they are said to be." More recent writers have felt themselves justified by lapse of time in indicating which the infallible utterances are. Whether on Roman principles the time has really come for indicating them with any confidence may be open to question. The varieties in the lists would seem to suggest a negative. They appear to vary from eight