stir up the government to censure it. Peter de Marca, just then translated from the Archbishopric of Toulouse to Paris, declared that the opinion which affirms the infallibility of the Roman Pontiff, speaking ex cathedrâ, is 'the general and received opinion, approved by the Church of Rome and by the schools of Christendom.' He adds: 'This opinion is the only one which is taught and embraced in Italy, Spain, and the other provinces of Christendom.' and that 'the opinion which is called the opinion of the Doctors of Paris is placed in the rank of those which are only tolerated.'[1] This was before 1682 and the Pontifical condemnation of the Four Articles. Again, he says: 'Finally, it would be to open the door to a great schism to endeavour to overturn these theses, so long as they are understood in accordance with the common opinion; because not only such an opposition tends to ruin openly the constitutions published against Jansenius, but even to dispute publicly and with authority against the power of the Popes as infallible Judges, when speaking ex cathedrâ, in matter of faith, which is conceded to them by the consent of all the Universities, except the ancient Sorbonne.' In the same document he goes on to use the words quoted in the Pastoral of 1867: 'The great majority of the doctors [in France], not only in theology, but also in law, follow the common opinion, which has foundations very hard to destroy, as has been already said, and they laugh at the opinion of the Old Sorbonne.'[2]
