Page:Petri Privilegium - Manning.djvu/288

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dom of the Œcumenical Council on the subject of the infallibility of the Pontiff; or, if that doctrine be defined, to instigate the civil governments to assume a hostile attitude towards the Holy See. And this comes in the name of liberty, and from those who tell us that the Council will not be free!

I shall take the liberty, without further words, of dismissing the Bavarian Government from our thoughts. But I must declare, with much regret, that this Munich document appears to me to be seditious.

Facts like these give a certain warrant to the assertions and prophecies of politicians and Protestants. They prove that in the Catholic Church there is a school at variance with the doctrinal teaching of the Holy See in matters which are not of faith. But they do not reveal how small that school is. Its centre would seem to be at Munich; it has, both in France and in England, a small number of adherents. They are active, they correspond, and, for the most part, write anonymously. It would be difficult to describe its tenets, for none of its followers seem to be agreed in all points. Some hold the infallibility of the Pope, and some defend the Temporal Power. Nothing appears to be common to all, except an animus of opposition to the acts of the Holy See in matters outside the faith.

In this country, about a year ago, an attempt was made to render impossible, as it was confidently but vainly thought, the definition of the infallibility of the Pontiff by reviving the monotonous controversy about Pope Honorius. Later we were told of I know not