De immutabilitate traditionis contra modernam haeresim evolutionismi
Louis Billot (1846–1931)
First published 1907
Louis Billot's De immutabilitate traditionis contra modernam haeresim evolutionismi, second edition (Rome, 1907). The edition prints the title page, Prooemium, six chapters with their numbered theses, the Index and the Approbatio. The separately titled De inspiratione sacrae Scripturae (1906), bound before it in the same volume, is excluded.
Title Page
Proem
Capitulum I: Chapter One — On the Catholic Concept of Sacred Tradition
Sectio I: § 1. — That the Authentic Organ of Tradition Was Instituted by Jesus Christ in His Church, Namely the Apostolic Hierarchy with Which He Promised to Be Present unto the End of the Ages.
Sectio II: § 2. — That Tradition, Taken in Its True and Catholic Sense, Is the Rule of Faith.
Sectio III: § 3. — That Tradition Is Prior to Scripture as the Rule of Faith, Both in Order of Time and in Order of Knowledge and Comprehension
Sectio IV: § 4. — That from What Has Been Said It Follows That Tradition Has Indeed a Certain Evolution in the Course of Time, but One Joined with Complete Immutability and Consensus in the Same Dogma and the Same Sense
Capitulum II: Chapter Two — On the Cause of Apparent Oppositions in the Testimonies of Tradition
§ 1.
§ 2.
§ 3.
Capitulum III: Chapter Three — On the Vice of the Historical Method in the Crisis of the Monuments of Tradition
Sectio I: § 1. — That the Historical Method, in Opposition to the Method of Immanence, Is the Only Legitimate Method in the Preambles of Faith, When What Must Be Proved Is the Fact of Revelation
Sectio II: § 2. — That the Historical Method, in Opposition to the Theological Method, Is Not Only Wholly Insufficient and Disproportionate but Also Productive of Errors of Every Kind
Capitulum IV: Chapter Four — On the Error of Relative Truth in the Dogmas of Tradition
Sectio I: § 1. — That the Concept of Relative Truth Is Absurd in Itself, and That Apart from the Definition Consecrated by Ancient Philosophy, Namely the Adequation of Intellect and Thing, No Other Notion of Truth Is Admissible.
Sectio II: § 2. — That the Dogmas of Our Religion Are Truly and Properly from Heaven, and Therefore They Would Still Resist the Notion of Relative Truth Even If They Were Not Elsewhere Marked by Contradictory and Mutually Conflicting Notes.
Sectio III: § 3. — That for the Defense of Their Error They Vainly Appeal to Notions or Doctrines Which They Say Were Imported from Profane Schools into Sacred Doctrine, or to Past Adaptations of Theology to Philosophy, Especially Aristotelian Philosophy, Which They Invent.
Capitulum V: Chapter Five — On the Consummation of Ruin through Moral Dogmatism
Sectio I: § 1. — That Moral Dogmatism Vainly Seeks a Means of Restoration on the Side of the Will, to Which It Ineptly Attributes Primacy in the Business of Acquiring and Knowing Religious Truth.
Sectio II: § 2. — That Moral Dogmatism Not Only Does Not Restore the Collapsed Building of Truth by Setting the Will for the Good as Principle and Foundation, but Heaps Ruin upon Ruin
Sectio III: § 3. — That Moral Dogmatism Consummates the Irreparable Destruction of the Truth of Faith by Proclaiming the Purely Practical Value of the Dogmas of Religion
Capitulum VI: Chapter Six — On the Heap of Errors in the System of the Living Faith
§ 1.
§ 2.
§ 3.
§ 4.
§ 5.
Index
Approbation of the Work
Since the little work whose title is: De immutabilitate traditionis contra modernam haeresim evolutionismi, (Secunda editio, aucta et emendata), by the author LUDOVICO BILLOT S. I., has been examined and approved by certain theologians of the same society, we grant the faculty that it be printed.
Rome, 7 June 1907.
ALOISIUS M. CATERINI S. I.
Provincial of the Roman Province.
IMPRIMATUR
Fr. Albertus Lepidi O. P. S. P. A. Magister
IMPRIMATUR
Iosephus Ceppetelli Patr. Const. Vicesg.