IV., when he condemned as heretical the proposition that c the Church of the City of Rome may err'?
It would seem to me that if any such obligation exists, or if declarations ex cathedrâ are only certain when the episcopal body has been consulted, then the action of the Pontiffs, from Innocent I. to Pius IX., has been out of course; and their doctrinal judgments fallible always, except when the Episcopate concurred in them; and for that reason almost always uncertain, because, except in a few cases, we cannot be certain, by explicit proof, whether the episcopal body has concurred in those judgments or no.
I know of no Ultramontane opinion with which this theory can be reconciled. The Ultramontane opinion is simply this, that the Pontiff speaking ex cathedrâ, in faith or morals, is infallible. In this there are no shades or moderations. It is simply aye or no. But the opinion we have been examining affirms the Pontiff to be infallible, only when the episcopal body concurs in his judgments. But if the episcopal body have not pronounced or even examined the subject-matter, as, for instance, in the question of the 'Peccatum Philosophicum,' or in the Jansenistic propositions, or in the questions 'De Auxiliis;' I would ask, are then the judgments of the Pontiff either not ex cathedrâ, or if ex cathedrâ, are they not infallible? But if they are not infallible they may be erroneous, and if the Pontiff in such judgments may err once, he might err always, and therefore cannot ever be infallible. I see no means of reconciling this opinion with that of any Ultramontanes, however moderate. They are frontibus adversis pugnantia. With all my heart, I desire to find a mode
K
