Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 8.djvu/80

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

INSTALLATION


50


INSTINCT


ciples of the Reformation, the autonomy of the indi- vidual conscience.

(3) The position of liljeral Protestants (i.e. those who are independent of all dogma) may be easily defined. The Bible is just like other texts, neither inspired nor the rule of Faith. Religious belief is quite subjective. So far is it from depending on the dogmatic or even historical authority of a book that it gives to it, itself, its real worth. When religious texts, the Bible included, are in question, historj- — • or, at least, what people generally believe to be his- torical — is largely a product of faith, which has trans- figured the facts. The authors of the Bible may be called inspired, that is, endowed with a superior perception of religious matters; but this religious enthusiasm does not differ essentially from that which animated Homer and Plato. This is the denial of everything supernatural, in the ordinary sense of the word, as well in the Bible as in religion in general. Nevertheless, those who hold this theory defend themselves from the charge of infidelity, especially repudiating the cold Rationalism of the last century, which was made up exclusively of negations. They think that they remain sufiiciently Christian by ad- hering to the "religious sentiment" to which Christ has given the most perfect expression yet known. P'oUowing Kant, Schleiermacher, and Ritschl, they profess a religion freed from all philosophical intel- lectualism and from every historical proof. Facts and formuliB of the past have, in their eyes, onlj' a symbolic and a transient value. Such is the new theology spread by the best-known professors and writers, especially in Germany — historians, exegetes, philologists, or even pastors of souls. We need only mention Hamack, H. J. Holtzmann, Fried. Dehtzsch, Cheyne, Campbell, A. Sabatier, Albert and John Reville. It is to this transformation of Christianity that "Modernism", condemned by the Encyclical "Pascendi Gregis", owes its origin.

In modern Protestantism the Bible has decidedly fallen from the primacy which the Reformation had so loudly conferred upon it. The fall is a fatal one, becoming deeper from day to day; and without rem- edy, since it is the logical consequence of the funda- mental principle put forward by Luther and Calvin. Freedom of examination was destined sooner or later to produce freedom of thought. (Cf. A. Sa- batier, "Les religions d'autorit^ et la religion de I'esprit", 2nd ed., 190-1, pp. 399-i03.)

Catholic Works. — F'rakzelin, Tractatus de divina tradi- tions el scriptura (2nd ed., Rome, 1875), 321—405; Schmid, De inspirationis Bibliorum vi et ratione (Louvain, 1886); Zanec- CHIA, Divina inspiralio Sacree Scripturce (Rome, 1898); Scriptor Sacer (Rome, 190.1); Billot, De inspiratione Sacra Scrivturw (Rome, 1903) ; Ch. Pesch, De inspiratione Sacra: Scriptura (Frei- burg im Br., 1906); hJiOnxsGE in Revue BibliqueiFeLTis. 1895), p. 563; (1896), pp. 199, 496; Cl.a.hke and Lucas in The Tablet (London, 6 Nov., 1897, to 5 Feb., 1898); Hummelacer, Exe- gelisrhes zur Inspirationafrage (Freiburg im Br., 1904); Fonck, Der Kampf urn die Wahrheit der heil. Schrijt seit 25 Jahren (Inns- bruck, 1905); Dausch, Die Schriftinspiration (Freiburg im Br., 1891); HoLZHET, Die Inspiration der heil. Schrift in der An- schauung des Mittelalters (ilunicb, 1895) ; Ch. Pesch. Zur neues- ten Gesckichte der Katholischen Inspirationslehre (Freiburg im Br., 1902).

Protestant Works. — Gacssen, Theopneustie (2nd ed., Paris, 1842), tr. Plenary Inspiration of Holy Scripture; Lee, In- spiration of Holy Scripture (Dul)lin, 1854); Rohnebt. Die In- spiration, der heil. Schrift und ihre Bestreiler (Leipzig, 1889); .Sanday, The Oracles nf God (London, 18911; Farrar. The Bible, Its Meaninil and Supremacy (London, 1897); History of Interpretation (Ixjndon, 1886); A Clerical Symposium on In- spiration (London, 1884); Rabaud, Histoire de la doctrine de I inspiration dans Us pays de langue franfaise depuis la Ri'forme juxqu'a nos jours (Paris, 1883).

Alfred Durand.

Installation (Lat.in.sto//are, to put intoastall).Tliis word, strictly speaking, applies to the solemn induc- tion of a canon into the stall or seat which he is to fjccupy in the choir of a cathedral or collegiate church. It i.s the sj-mbolical act O'nslilulin corporalis) by which a canon is put in po.s.scssion of the fiuictions which he


exercises in the chapter, and by which the chapter admits him. The ceremonies of this installation are regulated by local usage; very often they consist in the assignment of a stall in the choir and a place in the hall in which the meetings of the chapter are held. At the same time the dean invests the new canon with the capitular insignia, puts the biretta on his head, and receives his profession of faith and his oath to observe the statutes of the chapter. The term installation is also applied to the institutio cor- poralis, or putting in possession of any ecclesiastical benefice whatsoever (see Institution, Canonical); or, again, to the solemn entry of a parish priest into his new parish, even when this solemn act takes place after the parish priest has really been put in pos- session of his benefice. The corresponding ceremony for a bishop is known as enthronization (q. v.).

.\yrer, De symbolica canonicorum et canonicarum investitura (Gottingen, 1768); Mayer. Thesaurus novus juris ecclesiastici (Ratisbon, 1791-1794) ; Ferraris, Prompla bibliolheca. s. v. Canonicatus. II (Paris, 1861), 134-138; HiNSCHins, System des katholischen Kirchenrechts, II (BerUn, 1878), 700.

A. Van Hove.

Instinct. — Definitions. — In both popular and scientific literature the term instinct has been given such a variety of meanings that it is not possible to frame for it an adequate definition which would meet with general acceptance. The term usually includes the iclea of a purposive adaptation of an action or series of actions in an organized being, not governed by consciousness of the end to be attained. The diffi- culty is encountered when we attempt to add to this generic concept specific notes which shall differentiate it from reflex activities on the one hand and from intelligent activities on the other. Owing to the limitation of our knowledge of the processes involved, it may not always lie possilile to determine whether a given action should be regarded as reflex or instinctive, but this should not prevent us from drawing, on theo- retical grounds, a clear line of demarcation between these two modes of activity. The reflex is essentially a physiological process. The reflex arc is an estab- hshed neural mechanism which secures a definite and immediate response to a given phj'sical stimulus. The individual may be conscious of the stimulus or of the response or of both, but consciousness does not in any case enter into the reflex as an essential factor. In- stincts, in contradistinction to reflexes, are compara- tively complex. Some WTiters are so impressed with this characteristic of instinct that they are disposed to agree with Herbert Spencer in defining it as an organized series of reflexes, but this definition fails to take into account the fact that consciousness forms an essential link in all instinctive activities. It has been suggested as a distinctive characteristic of in- stinct that it arises from perception, whereas the source of a reflex is never higher than a sensation. Baldwin includes under instinct only reactions of a sensory-motor type. From a neurological point of view, in mammals at least, instinct always involves the cerebral cortex, the seat of consciousness, while the reflex is confined to the lower nerve centres. An obvious difference between reflexes and instincts is to be found in the fact that in the reflex the response to the stimulus is immediate, whereas the culiniiuition of the instinctive activity, in which its purposive char- acter appears, may be delayed for a considerable time.

The chief difliculties in defining instinct are en- countered in differentiating instinctive from intelli- gent activities. If the nuide of origin of instinct and haliit be left out of account, the two processes will lie seen to resemble each other so closely that it is well- nigh impossible to draw any clear line of distinction between them. This circumstance has led to the popular conception of instinct as race habit, a view of the subject which finds support in so eminent an authority as Wilhclm Wundt; but this definition