preludes of the great Western schism, and of the Council of Constance—the praxis Ecclesiæ is definite and undeniable, and that Gerson was right in saying that any one who had ventured to deny the infallibility of the See and of the Successor of Peter would have been condemned for heresy.
But if for heresy, in what light did the consent of the faithful, and the tradition of the Church, regard the truth denied? The correlative of heresy is faith.
This, then, is what may be regarded as the first period of simple, traditional faith, immemorial and universal, in the stability of the faith of Peter in his See and in his Successor; which, when analysed, is the infallibility of the Vicar of Jesus Christ.[1]
II. Tradition from the Council of Constance to 1682.
We must here close the first period of this sub-
- ↑ It is with no little surprise, shared I believe by those who have read the evidence from the fifteenth to the fifth century given in this chapter, that I read in the book 'Janus,' which has caused no little stir in Germany, the following words:—'For thirteen centuries an incomprehensible silence on this fundamental article (Papal Infallibility) reigned throughout the whole Church and her literature. None of the antient confessions of faith, no Catechism, none of the Patristic writings composed for the instruction of the people, contain a syllable about the Pope, still less any hint that all certainty of faith and of doctrine depends on him.' 'The Pope and the Council, by Janus,' p. 64.—The reader will judge whether an incomprehensible silence reigned on the perpetual stability or indefectibility of the Faith in the See and Successor of Peter, and whether there be any difference between this and the infallibility of the Pontiff. But these confident assertions may mislead thousands.
