INFALLIBILITY

In one sense the universal Church is infallible. It has an infallible guide in the Holy Scriptures. Holy Scripture contains all religious truth. And the Church having the Scriptures is so far infallibly guided. But there is no infallible guide to the interpretation of Scripture. If it were so, then there would be an authority above the Scriptures. Hence the wisdom of our twentieth Article: “The Church hath power to decree rites or ceremonies, and authority in controversies of faith; and yet it is not lawful for the Church to ordain anything that is contrary to God’s word written, neither may it so expound one place of Scripture that it be repugnant to another. Wherefore although the Church be a witne and a keeper of holy writ, yet as it ought not to decree anything against the same, so besides the same ought it not to enforce anything to be believed for nece ity of salvation.” Here the authority of the Church in subordination to Scripture is clearly laid down. To the same effect is our twenty-first Article. “General councils may not be gathered together without the commandment and will of princes. And when they be gathered together, (forasmuch as they be an a embly of men, whereof all be not governed with the spirit and word of God ,) they may err, and sometime have erred, even in things pertaining unto God . Wherefore things ordained by them, as nece ary to salvation, have neither strength nor authority, unle it may be declared that they be taken out of Holy Scripture.”— Beveridge. But although we can have no infallible guide beyond the Scriptures, yet there may be a proper certainty in matters of faith, doctrine, and discipline, without infallibility. This, in his “Importance of the Doctrine of the Holy Trinity,” that great divine, Dr. Water land, shows from the words of Chilling worth. “Though we pretend not to certain means of not erring in interpreting all Scripture, particularly such places as are obscure and ambiguous, yet this, methinks, should be no impediment; but that we may have certain means of not erring in and about the sense of those places which are so plain and clear that they need no interpreters; and in such we say our faith is contained. If you ask me, how I can be sure that I know the true meaning of these places? I ask you again, can you be sure that you understand what I or any man else says? God be thanked that we have sufficient means to be certain enough of the truth of our faith; but the privilege of not being in po ibility of erring, that we challenge not, because we have as little reason as you to do so, and you have none at all. If you ask, seeing we may po ibly err, how can we be a ured we do not? I ask you again, seeing your eyesight may deceive you, how can you be sure you see the sun when you do see it? A pretty sophism! That whosoever po ibly may err, cannot be certain that he doth not err. A judge may po ibly err in judgment; can he, therefore, never have a urance that he hath judged right? A traveller may po ibly mistake his way; must I, therefore, be doubtful whether I am in the right way from my hall to my chamber? Or can our London carrier have no certainty, in the middle of the day, when he is sober and in his wits, that he is in the way to London? These, you see, are right worthy consequences, and yet they are as like to your own, as an egg to an egg, or milk to milk. “Methinks, so subtile a man as you are should easily apprehend a wide difference between authority to do a thing and infallibility in doing it. The former, the doctor, together with the Article of the Church of England, at tri but eth to the Church, nay, to particular Churches, and I subscribe to his opinion; that is, an authority of determining controversies of faith, according to plain and evident Scripture and universal tradition and infallibility, while they proceed according to this rule. As if there should arise an heretic that should call in question Christ’s pa ion and resurrection, the Church has authority to determine this controversy, and infallible direction how to do it, and to excommunicate this man if he should persist in his errors. “The ground of your error here is, your not distinguishing between actual certainty and absolute infallibility. Geometricians are not infallible in their own science; yet they are very certain of what they see demonstrated: and carpenters are not infallible, yet certain of the straightne of those things which agree with their rule and square. So though the Church be not infallibly certain that in all her definitions, whereof some are about disputable and ambiguous matters, she shall proceed according to her rule; yet being certain of the infallibility of her rule, and that in this or that thing she doth manifestly proceed according to it, she may be certain of the truth of some particular decrees, and yet not certain that she shall never decree but what is true. “Though the Church being not infallible, I cannot believe her in everything she says; yet I can and must believe her in everything she proves, either by Scripture, reason, or universal tradition, be it fundamental or not fundamental. Though she may err in some things, yet she does not err in what she proves, though it be not fundamental. Protestants believing Scripture to be the word of God , may be certain enough of the truth and certainty of it. For what if they say the Catholic Church, much more themselves, may po ibly err in some fundamental points, is it therefore consequent they can be certain of none such? What if a wiser man than I may mistake the sense of some obscure place of Aristotle, may I not, therefore, without any arrogance or inconsequence, conceive myself certain that I understand him in some plain places which carry their sense before them? We pretend not at all to any a urance that we cannot err, but only to a sufficient certainty that we do not err, but rightly understand those things that are plain, whether fundamental or not fundamental. That God is, and is a rewarder of them that seek him; that, . These we conceive both true, because the Scripture says so, and truths fundamental, because they are nece ary parts of the gospel, whereof our Saviour says, Qui non cred i der it, damn abitur . “I do heartily acknowledge and believe the articles of our faith to be in themselves truths as certain and infallible as the very common principles of geometry or metaphysics; but that there is required of us a knowledge of them and an adherence to them, as certain as that of sense or science; that such a certainty is required of us under pain of damnation, so that no man can hope to be in a state of salvation but he that finds in himself such a degree of faith, such a strength of adherence; this I have already demonstrated to be a great error, and of dangerous and pernicious consequence. “Though I deny that it is required of us to be certain in the highest degree, infallibly certain, of the truth of the things which we believe, (for this were to know and not believe, neither is it po ible unle our evidence of it, be it natural or supernatural, were of the highest degree,) yet I deny not but we ought to be, and may be, infallibly certain that we are to believe the religion of Christ . For, 1. This is most certain, that we are in all things to do according to wisdom and reason, rather than against it. 2. This is as certain, that wisdom and reason require that we should believe those things which are by many degrees more credible and probable than the contrary. 3. This is as certain, that to every man who considers impartially what great things may be said for the truth of Christianity, and what poor things they are which may be said against it, either for any other religion, or for none at all, it cannot but appear by many degrees more credible, that the Christian religion is true, than the contrary. And from all these premises, this conclusion evidently follows, that it is infallibly certain, that we are firmly to believe the truth of the Christian religion. There is an abundance of arguments exceedingly credible, inducing men to believe the truth of Christianity; I say, so credible, that though they cannot make us evidently see what we believe, yet they evidently convince, that in true wisdom and prudence, the articles of it deserve credit, and ought to be accepted as things revealed by God .”— Water land. Chilling worth. The Roman Church has no authorized doctrine of infallibility, though its existence is practically a umed, and is bound up with the whole catalogue of usurpations. The Council of Trent defined many minute and unimportant matters, yet on that which involved so much, it published no definition at all; neither pronouncing where the gift is lodged, nor under what conditions it is exercised, nor to what subjects it extends; nay, not even a erting that it exists at all. Suarez says that the pope’s infallibility is a question of faith; Bellarmine, that it is not; and Stap let on, that, though the denial of it is scandalous and offensive, it is perhaps not heretical; while Gerson, with a very large and learned school of Roman theologians, rejects the doctrine altogether. And none of these opinions have been censured. Again, if we ask whether, in point of fact, any pope has ever been a heretic, we shall get nothing but inconsistent and contradictory replies. Coster says, that not one has ever taught heresy, or fallen into error; and he makes this an argument for the doctrine itself. Pighius goes further, and says, that the pope is so confirmed in the faith, that he could not fall into error either publicly or privately, even if he would; while, on the other hand, there is a multitude of Roman writers, who fully admit the heresies of Liberius, Vigilius, Honor i us, and the rest; either condemning them absolutely, or extenuating their acts on some special ground. The Council of Pisa, A. D. 1409, in its sentence of deposition against the rivals, pronounces them both heretics. And so previous councils have condemned former popes; yet the question is still in debate. As a matter of doctrine, then, we have a long line of the greatest theologians that the Roman Church has ever produced, denying in explicit terms that any gift of infallibility at all was conveyed to the bishops of Rome by the words of Christ . And on the question of fact we find the very chief defenders of the pope’s prerogatives, admitting that he may deceive men by his example, and lead them into error; and that he may publish decrees, and insert them in the body of canon law, which yet contradict the tradition of the Church and the truth of the gospel. The claim of infallibility, which advances no Scripture proof, except one perverted text; and which is maintained in the face of all these hesitations and contradictions, these disproofs on the one side, and injurious admi ions on the other; can be nothing else but a delusion and a fraud.— S. Robins.