Martin V., therefore, in the Bull 'Inter cunctos' requires belief, that is, interior assent, to all such condemnations made by the Council of Constance, which therein extended its infallible jurisdiction to all the minor censures, less than that of heresy.
In like manner, again, in the Bull 'Auctorem Fidei' the propositions condemned as heretical are very few, but the propositions condemned as erroneous, scandalous, offensive, schismatical, injurious, are very numerous.
During the last three hundred years, the Pontiffs have condemned a multitude of propositions of which perhaps not twenty were censured with the note of heresy.
Now in every censure the Church proposes to us some truth relating to faith or morals; and whether the matter of such truths be revealed or not revealed, it nevertheless so pertains to faith and morals that the deposit could not be guarded if the Church in such judgments were liable to error.
The Apostle declares that 'the Church is the pillar and ground of the Truth.'[1] On what authority these words can be restricted to revealed truths alone, I do not know. I know of no commentator, ancient or modern, who so restricts them. On the other hand St. Peter Damian, Sixtus V., Ferré, Cardinal de Lugo, Gregory de Valentia, expressly extend these words to all truths necessary to the custody of the deposit.
- ↑ 1 Tim. iii. 15.
notorie hæretici, quidam erronei, alii temerarii et seditiosi, alii piarum aurium offensivi.'—Labbe, Concil. tom. xvi. p. 194.
