Page:William John Sparrow-Simpson - Roman Catholic Opposition to Papal Infallibility (1909).djvu/65

 ] insight to recognise that the Sixth Ecumenical Council thought much more seriously of Honorius's errors than Hefele himself does; especially as controlled by the Vatican Council. After recalling the association of Honorius with Sergius and others, and the exact language of the condemnation, Hefele says:—

Into the significance of this difference of judgment Hefele does not enter. But apart from all enquiry whether the estimate of an Ecumenical Council outweighs that of an individual theologian, apart from the question of the accuracy of their decision, there lie the theological principles which this severity of judgment on a papal utterance involved. Such condemnation obviously assumes a certain conception of the value and authority of papal decisions. Hefele said that "It is in the highest degree startling, even scarcely credible, that an Ecumenical Council should punish with anathema a Pope as a heretic." And on Ultramontane presuppositions so it is. Does not this, together with the evident difficulty which a modern Romanist experiences in bringing himself to accept this Ecumenical decision, betray a singular deviation from the principles of an earlier age? That which seems to-day "in the highest degree startling, even scarcely credible," did it appear in that light to the age in which it was decreed? Did the startled representatives of the Apostles shrink away in silent amazement at their own audacity, abashed