Tractatus de divina traditione et Scriptura

ON THE EXPLICATION OF CATHOLIC DOCTRINE.

Catholic Revelation Was Completed Through Jesus Christ and Through the Holy Spirit in the Apostles.

« Catholic revelation in the fullness of time must be held completed by Christ the Son of God through Himself and through the Holy Spirit in the Apostles, so that not only is the new economy of a more perfect order and ampler revelation of God, devised by sundry ancient and more recent heretics, excluded, but also, in the present economy, no objective increase of the deposit of Catholic faith comprised in the sacred Scriptures and apostolic Tradition is either to have taken place after the Apostles or still to be awaited in the Church militant. »

The revelation made by Christ the Son of God while He visibly conversed with men, and through the Holy Spirit in the Apostles, can be conceived as still to be completed in two ways. In the first way it was understood by the Montanists, the Manichaeans, several sects of the Middle Ages, such as the Fraticelli and the men of the eternal gospel (at least to some extent also Abbot Joachim), the countless sects of more recent times — Anabaptists, Swedenborgians, Irvingites, the men of the future church — or all those who await a new and more abundant outpouring of the Holy Spirit (cf. p. 55). For all these, though in different ways, posited a third, more perfect economy of the Holy Spirit, standing in nearly the same relation to the second economy instituted by Christ the Son of God as this second stands to the first of the Old Testament, or the economy of the Father, as some of them called it. With this manifest heresy excluded, the progress of objective revelation could be conceived in a second way: that the Church of Christ on earth — which those heretics say is either destroyed or to be destroyed — should indeed, according to the divine promises, endure unto the consummation of the age; but that within the Church itself revelation should receive new increases day by day, just as in the Old Testament from the first beginning unto Christ and the Apostles new revelations were continually added to the old.

In the thesis we deny objective progress of revelation after the Apostles in either form. For the Catholic consummation of revelation through Christ and through the Holy Spirit in the Apostles is itself a head of doctrine expressed in the divine Scriptures and in Tradition, and manifested in manifold ways, theoretically and practically, in the apostolic succession and in the whole life of the Church.

I. As to the first point, that the present economy of the Church of Jesus Christ is the last and supreme state of the divine manifestation for this mortal condition of the human race is fully manifest from Christian revelation itself.

1°. In general, in the Scriptures the New Testament founded by Christ is compared with the Old as the perfect and consummate with the imperfect and inchoate, as the firm and immovable with what is to be perfected and transferred into this very state of perfection. For as the ancient Covenant is always exhibited as a beginning under the hope and expectation of a new economy by which it is to be perfected, so the further perfection of the divine manifestation proposed as to be awaited in the New Testament is none other than that faith should pass into vision face to face in the homeland. St Paul expressly sets forth the demonstration of this in the Epistle to the Hebrews.

a) The economy of the Mosaic law (so the Apostle argues) was imperfect and only a leading by the hand to the new and perfect economy of Christ; hence the priesthood under the old covenant was inefficacious and therefore to be abrogated, and consequently that whole economy too, insofar as it was imperfect, was to be abrogated, as is plain from the intimate connection of priesthood with religion as a whole. But there had to succeed it the priesthood of Christ, of a higher order, efficacious, eternal, and never to be abrogated; from which very fact it is established that the economy founded upon this eternal priesthood is eternal too. « If therefore perfection was by the Levitical priesthood ... what further need was there that another priest should rise according to the order of Melchisedech? ... For the priesthood being translated, it is necessary that a translation also be made of the law (of the whole economy) ... There is indeed a setting aside (ἀθεσις, abolitio) of the former commandment because of its weakness and unprofitableness (διὰ τοῦ αὐτῆς ἀσθενεῶς καὶ ἀνωφελῶς, on account of inefficacy); for the law brought nothing to perfection; but there was the bringing in of a better hope, by which we draw nigh to God ... But He (Christ), because He continueth forever, hath an everlasting priesthood. Whereby He is able also to save forever them that come to God by Him » vii. 11ff. b) The Old Testament was a shadow and type of the New; therefore this perfect had to succeed that imperfect. The former had to cease precisely because of its imperfection; therefore no more perfect shall succeed the latter because of its perfection (supreme according to the actual providence of God). « For if that former had been free from fault (εἰ γὰρ ἦν ἀμεμπτος, had it been exempt from imperfection), there would not indeed have been a place sought for a second » viii. 5-13. c) The Apostle expressly declares from the history of the founding of the Old and New Testaments that this second is ultimate and immovable. For thus he interprets the prophecy, « yet once ¹, and I will move heaven and earth » Agg. ii. 7: « And that yet once saith the transferring of moveable things (μεταθεσιν) as of things that are made, that those things may remain which are immoveable. Therefore, receiving an immoveable kingdom, we have grace » xii. 27, 28. The Old Testament is that « which is made void »; the New, that « which remaineth » 2 Cor. iii. 11; cf. Rom. x. 4; Gal. iii. 23ff.; iv. 3, 4.

2°. As the New Testament is compared with the Old as the perfect succeeding the imperfect, so it is itself compared as imperfect with a succeeding perfect never except with the beatific vision: 1 Cor. xiii. 9-13, cf. 2 Cor. v. 7; 1 John iii. 2. Three states therefore correspond to one another and cohere by degrees: the shadow of the Old Testament, the image of the New, the reality of the blessed vision, as the Apostle indicates, Heb. x. 1: « having the shadow of the good things to come, not the very image of the things ». The old economy therefore stands to the Church of Christ on earth as the Church on earth stands to the heavenly Church; and thus the Church of Christ is the mean between the ancient shadow and the consummated possession of the promises. « The first tabernacle is the Synagogue, the second the Church, the third heaven ... The first was in shadow and figure, the second is in figure and in truth, the third in truth alone (var. in the hall of truth). In the first life is shown, in the second it is given, in the third it is possessed » St Bruno of Asti, hom. 34, Rome ed. 1791, vol. II, p. 409 (extant under the name of Eusebius Gallicanus in Bibl. Max., vol. VI, p. 721). Cf. St Ambrose on Ps. 38, n. 25; Dionysius, Ecclesiastical Hierarchy, ch. 5, n. 2.

3°. The same is demonstrated from the constant manner of speaking of Scripture, by which this present economy instituted by Christ is called the fullness of time: Gal. iv. 4; Eph. i. 10; and the revelation in Christ and through Christ is said to have been made in the last days: Heb. i. 1; Acts ii. 17; 1 Pet. i. 20 (cf. St Thomas, 2-2, q. 1, a. 7, ad 4).

II. The fancy of a revelation still to be completed in some third, more perfect economy, of which we spoke, will be excluded a fortiori by all the arguments by which we demonstrate that no new revelation pertaining to the increase of the Catholic deposit is any longer to be awaited even in this perpetual Church of Christ.

1°. Let there be considered the manner of speaking and the doctrine of the Scriptures concerning the consummation of revelation and its promulgation through the Apostles, and concerning the profession and preaching of the faith in their successors unto the consummation of the age.

a) In the last discourse, John xvi. 12-15, Christ the Lord has directly and immediately in view the Apostles personally, and promises them the whole of salutary truth to be revealed through the Holy Spirit — to be revealed, indeed, to them as Apostles, i.e. as His legates, not only for believing and knowing but for preaching and bearing witness. « I have yet many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. But when He, the Spirit of truth, is come, He will teach you all truth ². For He shall not speak of Himself, but whatsoever things He shall hear He shall speak, and the things that are to come He shall show to you. He shall glorify Me, because He shall receive of Mine and shall show it to you. All things whatsoever the Father hath are Mine; therefore I said that He shall receive of Mine and shall show it to you. » α) What we say — that the Apostles personally are directly and immediately in view, not only in the present defect of infirmity but also in the future perfection of receiving the whole truth — is manifest from the parallel opposition in the first two clauses. For those who cannot bear now are personally those very men called to the apostolate; and to this condition in which they now are is opposed the other in which those same men shall be then, when the Spirit of truth shall come ³; to the infirmity by which they cannot bear is opposed the perfection by which those same men are taught all truth ⁴. β) The second thing we said — that to the Apostles thus personally in view there is promised the revelation of the whole of salutary truth — is established from the very express words. Infinite truth with relation outward, namely unto all truth to be revealed to the Church, is considered according to the order of communication in the three Persons of the Holy Trinity: in the Father, from the Father into the Son, from Father and Son into the Holy Spirit, who is therefore both called and is the Spirit of truth in Himself and inwardly by reason of the communication of infinite truth from Father and Son ⁵; the Spirit of truth outwardly, toward the Church, as the communicator of all truth to be revealed ⁶. The substantial Truth itself, therefore, the Holy Trinity, in its eternal counsels has no other truth to be revealed in time as the truth of the Church on earth besides this whole which the Spirit of truth is here said to teach. But this whole truth He is said to teach the Apostles themselves personally in view. Therefore the whole truth which is the truth of the Church on earth was revealed to the Apostles themselves by the Spirit of truth. γ) That this is the truth of the Church — that is, revealed to the Apostles not for themselves alone but for the Church and to be communicated to the Church — is manifest from the very end of Catholic revelation, from the office of the apostolate, from the express mandates of Christ the Founder of the Church. Hence I said that personally the Apostles themselves are directly and immediately in view; for finally indeed, in the doctrine of all truth which they are taught by the Spirit of truth, there is in view the whole Church, to be taught by the Apostles this whole Catholic truth.

At the beginning of this same discourse in which the Lord promises the Apostles the whole of salutary truth (πᾶσαν τὴν ἀληθειαν), He expounded this scope of which we spoke. « I will send you from the Father the Spirit of truth ... He shall give testimony of Me; and you shall give testimony of Me, because you are with Me from the beginning » (the divine-human testimony): John xv. 26, 27. And presently, at the end of the whole discourse, He prays for the sanctification of the Apostles in all that truth, and of all the faithful of all places and times who through the word of the Apostles — according to all that truth, of course — shall believe in Him. « Holy Father ... sanctify them in truth (ἐν τῃ ἀληθείᾳ); Thy word is truth; as Thou didst send Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world ... and not for them only do I pray, but for them also who through their word shall believe (without distinction of time) in Me » John xvii. 17-20. This word of the whole revealed truth to be preached He solemnly commits to the same men after His resurrection. « Going, teach ye all nations ... teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you » (whatsoever, namely, He commanded whether by visibly teaching or by invisibly sending the Spirit of truth, who receives from Him and speaks whatsoever He hears): Matt. xxviii. 20. This « whole truth which the Spirit of truth taught them, » these « all things whatsoever » the Son who is truth « commanded them, » are therefore the Gospel which they are bidden to preach to every creature in the whole world: Mark xvi. 15; and in which Gospel, by the power of the supervening Holy Spirit, they are constituted witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria and even unto the uttermost part of the earth: Acts i. 8. Hence, since what the Apostles received and preached is the whole Gospel, i.e. the whole truth to be announced to the Church, besides it « there is no other Gospel »: Gal. i. 6-9.

b) From these things it is now evident what office the successors of the Apostles shall discharge unto the consummation of the age, and what the objective faith (the object of faith which is believed) shall be in the Church unto the measure of the age of the fullness of Christ (Eph. iv. 13). The whole Gospel, the whole truth of faith was revealed to the Apostles for the Church, and consequently that same whole truth of faith was preached and transmitted by them to the Church. Besides that whole truth preached by the Apostles, therefore, there is given no other truth of the Church of Christ, that is, truth of Catholic faith. Equally widely, therefore, and no further extended can the truth of Catholic faith be understood than the truth of the apostolic preaching.

a) Hence the whole spiritual edifice of the Church — faith with all its divine institutions and virtues — is said to be built up as a holy temple in the Lord, and all the faithful are said to be « built upon the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets, Jesus Christ Himself being the chief cornerstone » Eph. ii. 20. In the order of doctrine and institutions, therefore, the Church has no other foundation than the revelation of the Old Testament through the Prophets and the revelation of the New Testament consummated through the Apostles, whose beginning and end is Jesus Christ. The faithful therefore in all their faith rest upon the foundation of the apostolic preaching (in which, as in its consummation, the prophetic preaching is included). Nor indeed can this be deemed a merely temporary institution, perchance only for the primitive age of the Church. But as long as the foundation upon Christ Jesus the cornerstone — besides whom no man can lay another foundation (1 Cor. iii. 10) — remains essential for the Church of Christ, so long is this connection and foundation upon the cornerstone completed for that same Church of Christ only through « the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets. » Hence the holy city itself, the heavenly Jerusalem, which is built as of precious stones with all the elect of all times transferred from the meritorious stadium of faith to the glorious prize of faith, was symbolically shown to St John « having twelve foundations, and in them the twelve names of the twelve Apostles » Apoc. xxi. 14.

β) Since from what has been demonstrated the apostolate was instituted for the first founding of the Church through the preaching of the whole truth of faith, by this very fact the office of the successors cannot be the revelation of yet another truth; but the preservation and preaching, in its integrity and in its genuine sense, of that « whole truth » received from the Apostles. When therefore to the Apostles, as juridically representing their whole succession unto the consummation of the age, the precept was given: « teach all nations ... teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you, » the imposed office of teaching the whole Catholic truth belongs equally to the perpetual apostolic succession and to the college of the Apostles themselves. But to the Apostles this magisterium belongs as to the first promulgators of the whole Catholic truth to be revealed; and consequently, on account of this totality of truth already promulgated by the Apostles themselves in virtue of their mission, to the successors the magisterium belongs as preachers of that same whole Catholic truth already revealed. The magisterium therefore, instituted by the incarnate Word with that testamentary mandate — « teach ... to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you » — as regards the object of doctrine extends just as widely for the whole apostolic succession as for the apostolic college itself; but in the Apostles it is the magisterium of the first promulgation as regards the whole doctrine to be revealed, in the successors the magisterium of the preaching of that same whole doctrine with revelation already completed (cf. th. V).

Wherefore the successors of the Apostles are everywhere exhibited as witnesses and teachers only of those things which they had received from the Apostles (th. V, n. III). For their office and duty is « to remain in the things which they have learned and which have been committed to them » by the Apostles, « knowing from whom they have learned »; the same things which they « received » from the Apostles « through many witnesses » they are bidden to « commend to faithful men who shall be fit to teach others also »; they are admonished to « hold the form of sound words which they heard from the Apostles in faith, » and to « keep the good deposit by the Holy Ghost » 2 Tim. i. 13, 14; ii. 2; iii. 14. All the faithful likewise are bidden to « contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints » Jude 3; to « walk in Christ, rooted and built up in Him and confirmed in the faith, as also they have learned » Col. ii. 7.

c) What we have hitherto demonstrated is reduced in compendium to these heads. α) To the extraordinary office of the apostolate belongs the first promulgation of the whole truth to be revealed, which they themselves received as revealed immediately from Christ or from the Holy Spirit. β) This charism belongs to the apostolate not only positively; but it is exclusively proper to it by the very fact that by the Spirit of truth they were taught « all truth » for the Church of the New Testament, or the whole truth of Catholic revelation. Whence it comes that the successors ordained by the Apostles themselves are bidden only to guard the deposit and to teach the things which they learned from the Apostles. Hence further γ) the whole Church in its faith and doctrine rests upon, and all the faithful are built upon, the foundation of the Apostles and Prophets; and therefore all the faithful are admonished to admit no other doctrine of faith except that derived from the Apostles. When therefore the faithful are inculcated: « mark them who make dissensions and offences besides the doctrine which you have learned ⁷, » Rom. xvi. 17 — sentences of this kind declare that whatever is proposed as revealed faith to be believed by all the faithful besides and beyond the doctrine handed down by the Apostles is against the doctrine of the Apostles. δ) Although therefore in the apostolic time, when the cited testimonies of the Scriptures were published, Catholic revelation had not yet been concluded, nevertheless no new revelation was to be received into the deposit of faith which had not been either promulgated or confirmed by the Apostles themselves. Hence is understood as belonging to the very magisterium proper to the apostolate what the ancients hand down: that the inspired books themselves — the Gospel of Mark by St Peter, the Gospel of Luke by St Paul — were approved and commended to the Church (Eusebius, H.E. II, ch. 15; III, ch. 4; Jerome, De viris illustr., ch. 7 and 8).

From all these things it is clear what we undertook to demonstrate. Since the extraordinary office of the apostolate was instituted by the divine Saviour for the first founding — completed in its foundation and very essence, namely in the doctrine of faith — of the Church, therefore the promised and sent Spirit of truth completed the revelation of the whole truth of Catholic faith in those first founders and planters themselves. No further Catholic revelation, therefore, is to be awaited in the militant Church of God.

2°. If any doubt could remain concerning the true sense of the adduced testimonies of Scripture considered in themselves, the matter itself is demonstrated from the express doctrine and practical manner of acting of the whole Church.

a) The express doctrine and preaching of the Church which we expounded in thesis VIII and following evidently demonstrates this very unchangeable completion of the whole of Catholic revelation, accomplished through the Holy Spirit in the Apostles, with which we are now dealing.

b) Always and everywhere in the Church the principle held good that the successors of the Apostles are the guardians of the apostolic doctrine, to which nothing can be added and from which nothing can be taken away. « The rule of light is this: keep what thou hast received, neither adding anything nor taking away » St Barnabas, ep., n. 19. « Neither does he who can say much concerning the faith add thereto, nor does he who can say little diminish it » Irenaeus I, ch. 10, n. 2. « True knowledge is the doctrine of the Apostles and the ancient state of the Church » ibid. IV, ch. 33, n. 8. « We have no need of curiosity after Christ our leader, nor of inquiry after the Gospel; when we believe, we desire nothing further to believe; for this we first believe, that there is nothing further which we ought to believe ... First of all I lay this down, that one certain thing was instituted by Christ which the nations must needs believe in every way ... What is to be sought must be sought until it be found, and believed where it is found; and nothing further than to guard what thou hast believed, whilst thou believest moreover this, that nothing else is to be believed and therefore nothing else sought, once thou hast found and believed what was instituted by Him who mandates thee to inquire into nothing else than what He instituted » Tertullian, Praescript., chs. 8, 9. « What Cyprian admonishes (ep. to Pompey) — that we recur to the fount, that is, to apostolic Tradition, and thence direct the channel into our times — is excellent and without doubt to be done » Augustine, On Baptism against the Donatists V, ch. 26. « Nor has faith now begun, but it has come down to us from the Lord through the disciples » Athanasius, encyclical ep. to the Bishops, n. 1 (vol. I, p. 111). « We enjoin upon those who hope in Christ to inquire curiously into nothing beyond the ancient faith » Basil, ep. 175 (vol. III, p. 262). « I cannot sufficiently marvel at so great a ... lust of erring in certain men, that they are not content with the rule of believing handed down once for all and received from antiquity; but daily seek new and ever new things, and are ever agape to add something to religion, to change, to take away — as though the heavenly dogma were not such that once revealed it sufficeth » Vincent of Lérins, n. 26; cf. n. 27. See the rest in th. VIII, pp. 67-72.

β) The universal principle ever held good: that whatever is new does not pertain to faith but to heresy, if it be confounded with the deposit of faith. Hence apostolicity is a necessary character of the doctrine of faith. See th. IX, n. I.

γ) Hence the appellations « apostolic faith » and « faith of the Church » were ever held synonymous: Clement of Alexandria, Strom. VII, p. 763; Pamphilus, Apology for Origen, ch. 1. Namely, as St Irenaeus says, III. 1: « we have learned the disposition of our salvation through no others than those through whom the Gospel came down to us. »

b) Let the manner of acting in the Church be considered. As often as any head of doctrine was defined as pertaining to Catholic faith, that was ever understood to be altogether the same as to have defined that that revealed doctrine came down to us from the Apostles whether in divine Scripture or in unwritten Tradition. « Concerning the faith they (the Nicene Fathers) said by no means “it is decreed”; but “so believes the Catholic Church”; that they might declare their sentence to be not more recent but apostolic » Athanasius, De Synod., n. 6. Cf. the Council of Antioch (Mansi, vol. I, p. 1033); the Council of Ephesus (apud Lirinensis, Commonitor., ch. 42); the Seventh Council (Hardouin IV, pp. 479, 482); Trent, sess. IV. Hence every inquiry was ever reduced to this one thing: whether the doctrine was contained in the Scriptures or in apostolic Tradition; which indeed the acts of all Councils and the history of all definitions of faith evidently demonstrate.

3°. This very principle — that nothing can pertain to revelation to be believed with Catholic faith which is not contained in the Scriptures or in apostolic Tradition — is both supposed by all theologians in their demonstrations and expressly declared by them too, on 3, dist. 25, and on 2-2, q. 1, or in the Treatise on Faith. Consult St Thomas, 1, q. 1, a. 8, ad 2; 2-2, q. 1, a. 7, ad 4; q. 174, a. 6, ad 3; Cano, De locis, bk. V, ch. 5, q. 3, ad ultimum; bk. XII, ch. 3, concl. 3; Bellarmine, De verbo Dei, bk. IV, ch. 9, rules 1 and 2; Gregory de Valencia in 2-2, disp. I, q. 1, punct. 6; Suarez, De fide, disp. II, sect. 6, nn. 15ff.; Cardinal de Lugo, De fide, disp. III, sect. 5, nn. 69ff.; Benedict XIV, On the Canonization of Saints, bk. III, ch. 53, nn. 2, 15.

Corollary. The revelations and prophecies which occurred after the Apostles, still occur and shall occur in the Church, do not pertain to the deposit of Catholic faith committed to the Church to be guarded, preached, and explicated. The reason is that revelations of this kind are not directed to the universal Church but to private persons. They are called private precisely because they are not constituted by God as legates to His Church, as were of old the prophets and the Apostles and the holy men of God inspired to write the divine books; but they receive revelation either for their own private direction or even for the private direction and profit of others. And so of themselves private revelations do not pertain to promoting the explication of the deposit of Catholic faith, for which Christ the Lord instituted the ordinary ministry in the visible head of the Church, as the principle and foundation of the unity of faith, and in the apostolic succession united to the head, under the promise of infallible assistance, but not under direction through new revelations. Hence it is that among the reasons on account of which private revelations may seem suspect, according to Benedict XIV (On the Canonization of Saints, bk. III, ch. 53, n. 8), there is reckoned this one: « if that be said to have been revealed which is still under the judgment of the Church. »

For the rest, it is surely not repugnant that God should reveal to someone the true sense of some truth contained in the objective apostolic revelation and not yet defined by the Church nor sufficiently proposed to all. Whence God could also at times manifest the true sense of a dogma through a private revelation made to the Pontiff or to more or fewer Fathers of a Council; but this would be an extraordinary mode toward the explication of the dogma, wherein the infallibility of the definition and proposition for the faithful would be derived not from such a private revelation but always from the promised ordinary assistance of the Holy Spirit, because this assistance — and not private revelation — was promised by God and is infallibly certain to the universal Church. To such an extraordinary mode of explicating a dogma may perhaps be referred what St Augustine has in On Baptism VII, n. 102 ⁸.

If it is asked with what faith revelations of this kind are to be believed, the answer of the theologians is this. First a distinction is to be made between objective faith, or the material object of faith, and subjective faith, or the habit and act of faith. To divine faith objectively considered pertains whatever has been revealed by God; to objective Catholic faith pertains whatever has been revealed by God to be believed by the universal Church. Hence the object of divine faith is wider than that of Catholic faith. If now it please to distinguish subjective faith too, from its object, into divine and Catholic faith, the name of divine faith does not designate a habit or act specifically diverse; but the same habit and the same act in species is called divine faith insofar as it regards whatever object revealed by God and believed on account of the authority of God revealing; but it is called Catholic faith insofar as it regards an object comprised in the deposit of Catholic revelation. Hence a private revelation made by God can — and at least by him to whom or for whom it is made, must, if evident motives of credibility be present — be believed with divine faith; yet that faith is not called Catholic. This is the more common opinion, and it seems to us true, although those theologians oppose it who think that for the object of divine faith it is required that it be contained in Scripture or apostolic Tradition, or even proposed by the Church to be believed; who consequently judge that private revelations of this kind can never be believed with divine faith, but can only be held by an act of counsel and Christian prudence (see the Salmanticenses, Treatise on Faith, disp. I, dub. 4, §§ 1, 2). I said it can, and at least by him to whom or for whom the revelation was made must, be believed with divine faith, if evident motives of credibility be present. From this necessary condition of evident credibility seems to have arisen that diversity of opinions among theologians which I recalled. Some, namely, seem to deny that private revelations can ever be believed — and much more must be believed — with divine faith, because in them there are never motives of credibility sufficient for such faith. But that God can render even His private revelations evidently credible as divine, no otherwise than those made to the patriarchs and prophets, surely cannot be denied. If God can do this, I do not see by what reasoning it could be established that in act He has never made, or will never make, revelations of this kind so credible — at least for those in whose mind God works by revealing — as unto those saints who (as is handed down concerning St Ignatius) offered themselves prepared even unto the testimony of blood for the truth of things manifested to them by private revelation. But if God in reality manifested Himself as revealer with such motives, surely the obligation of believing on account of the infinite authority of God revealing — i.e. with divine faith — could not be called into doubt. But revelations thus proposed are certainly altogether rare, as is established from the biographies of the saints and from the whole of history; and perhaps a private revelation is never furnished with such external motives of credibility that others can or altogether must believe with faith properly so called divine.

As regards the judgment of the Church by which private revelations of this kind are sometimes approved, it does not tend to this: that the revelations be proposed to the faithful to be believed with divine faith; but that it be declared: a) that in them there is nothing adverse to Catholic faith, good morals, and Christian discipline; b) that there are sufficient indications of truth for revelations of this kind to be believed with human faith piously and prudently and without superstition, and to be read by the faithful unto edification. « In instituting a discourse concerning their approbation, » says Benedict XIV, On the Canonization of Saints, bk. II, ch. 32, n. 11, « it is to be known that that approbation is nothing else than a permission that they be published for the instruction and utility of the faithful after mature examination »; and as Cardinal Torquemada speaks, apud Benedict himself, bk. III, ch. 53, n. 15: « that they may be read in the Church of God in the manner in which the books of many other doctors and the histories and legends of the saints are licensed to be read by the faithful. » c) After such approbation of the Church — or even if, with no judgment yet delivered, there be weighty reasons for genuineness — it is surely not lawful to contemn such revelations (cf. Benedict XIV, ibid., bk. III, ch. 53, n. 15; Vasquez in 3rd Part, vol. II, disp. 117, ch. 6, n. 77).

See St Thomas, 2-2, q. 174, a. 6, ad 3; Cano, bk. XII, ch. 3, concl. 3; de Valencia, vol. III, q. 1, punct. 1, § 5; Suarez, De fide, disp. III, sect. 10; de Lugo, De fide, disp. I, sect. 11; Benedict XIV, On the Canonization of Saints, bk. II, ch. 32, nn. 11, 12; bk. III, ch. 53.

On the way in which the doctrine of faith could at some time be proposed more obscurely, to be afterwards explicated and declared.

« With a distinction first rightly constituted, by which revealed truths differ among themselves both by reason of the material object and by the diverse mode of the apostolic preaching and of Tradition, it must be affirmed that there can be and are in the deposit of objective revelation truths which 1°. were not always and everywhere contained explicitly in the Catholic understanding and in the manifest ecclesiastical preaching; which therefore 2°. at some time could within the very bounds of the Church be called into controversy without the crime of heresy; and so 3°. that some revealed truths can at some time be obscure, yet can never be obscured in such a way that an opposed and negating consensus should prevail against them. »

I. The reason on account of which a thing is believed, and by which the formal object of faith is constituted, is in all revealed truths one, namely the authority of God speaking, or the utterance of God sufficiently proposed; the reason for believing is not, however, drawn from the greater dignity of the truth believed, its inherent necessity and connection with the last end; for all these belong to the properties of the material object, or the thing which is believed, not to the motive and reason on account of which it is believed. Hence the distinction introduced by the Protestants after Hunn and George Calixtus between fundamental and non-fundamental articles, or ἀδιάφοροι, is absurd. For in that distinction it is laid down that consensus in non-fundamental articles is indifferent and not necessary, so that such articles, however proposed, may without loss of the integrity of faith and of ecclesiastical communion be not believed and even denied, on account of their inherent lesser dignity and necessity, provided consensus be preserved in fundamental articles of greater dignity and necessity. These are without doubt false and heretical figments; but it is most true that among the material objects of faith there is a difference, inasmuch as the necessity is not equal for all that they be known explicitly and in themselves by all the faithful, and so be explicitly believed. « Some things are believable, as St Thomas says, of which there is faith in themselves; but some things are believable of which there is not faith in themselves, but only in relation to other things... Those things pertain to faith of themselves which directly order us to eternal life, as are the three persons of omnipotent God, the mystery of the incarnation of Christ, and other things of this kind » 2. 2. q. 1. a. 6. ad 1. cf. a. 8. These therefore are to be known and believed explicitly and in themselves by all, because their knowledge is either of itself absolutely necessary for ordering man using reason to the supernatural end (necessity of means), or at least they so constitute the foundation of the Christian religion that it is the duty of every Christian to know them (necessity of precept). Hence too at every time they were contained in the public profession of the Christian faithful. Many other things are contained in revelation which pertain « to the manifestation of the aforesaid, » as St Thomas says l. c.; to a more perfect and ampler knowledge of revealed truth, namely, intensive and extensive, and to the defense of that same faith, which ampler knowledge is neither of itself and absolutely nor by reason of any precept necessary to all Christians nor morally possible. Hence neither is it necessary that all revealed things be explicitly proposed to all to be believed; but just as with respect to some things implicit faith ¹ suffices, so too does implicit proposition and preaching suffice.

The declared distinction of revealed truths according to the object a) itself is gathered from the Scriptures 1 Cor. II. 2. 6; III. 1. 2. 10; Heb. V. 11, VI. 1; 1 Thess. III. 10. b) The same is demonstrated from the difference always acknowledged in the Church between the simple faith necessary to all and γνῶσιν and Christian wisdom, which not only intensively knows the same truths more expressly and clearly which are known more confusedly by the simple faithful, but also extensively embraces with explicit knowledge more truths which it suffices for others to believe implicitly. Cf. Iren. I. c. 10. n. 3; Clem. Alexand. Strom. V. p. 545; VI. p. 645. 676. 679; VII. p. 731. 755; Orig. contra Cels. III. n. 44. 45; de Princip. Praefat. et l. IV. n. 9; Euseb. Demonstr. Evang. I. c. 8. p. 29; Basil. de Spiritu Sancto c. 27. c) The same distinction is evident from the prudent economy always employed in the instruction of catechumens and of the Christian people. Read the 98th tract of Augustine on John.

II. With this difference of revealed truths supposed, there comes into consideration the diversity which exists in the very mode of the apostolic preaching and of Tradition. From the preceding thesis it is established that nothing belongs to the deposit of the Catholic faith which was not already contained in the preaching and in the instruments handed down to the Church by Christ sojourning on earth and by the Holy Spirit through the Apostles. Yet from the difference of revealed truths explained a little above in this thesis it is understood that it is neither necessary nor to be expected that all truths be contained in one and the same way in the primitive preaching and in the Tradition obtaining at every time. For those things which must be explicitly known and believed by all the faithful were without doubt in every age contained explicitly in the apostolic doctrine and in Tradition, clearly as much as the circumstances of the times demanded, expressly, i.e. by diligent and urgent preaching. On the contrary, among those things which pertain to the explication, understanding, and further declaration of objective faith, there can be some which were contained in the apostolic preaching itself implicitly only, and which therefore were also for at least some time handed down through Tradition as implicit in other explicit doctrines; there can be others proposed in Tradition more obscurely and with a less express and less urgent preaching, until the circumstances of affairs and controversies demand, and the direction of the Holy Spirit through the authentic magisterium effects the explication of the implicit, the declaration and polishing of the obscure, the express and urgent preaching or definition of the less express.

According to this threefold mode St Vincent of Lérins in those most celebrated passages of his Commonitorium declares the diversity with which ecclesiastical preaching and Tradition in the antecedent time stands in comparison with subsequent progress. « Let the religion of souls imitate the course of bodies, which though in process of years they unfold and explicate their numbers, yet remain the same as they were... It is right and consequent that, first and last not disagreeing with each other, we reap from the increments of wheaten instruction the fruit of wheaten dogma too; so that when something from those first seeds of grain is unfolded in course of time, and is now gladdened (nourished) and cultivated, yet nothing of the property of the germ be changed... The Church of Christ, the sedulous and cautious guardian of the dogmas deposited with her, never changes anything in them, never diminishes, never adds... but with all industry studies this one thing: faithfully and wisely treating old things, if there be any things of old inform and begun, to render them accurate and polished; if any already confirmed and defined, to guard them. » These and many other things concerning the explication of implicit things nn. 27-32. Many things he has in the same place concerning the declaration of those things which were obscure. « Let what was before believed more obscurely be understood by thy exposition, O industrious one; let posterity rejoice to have understood what antiquity venerated without understanding; yet teach the same things thou hast learned, so that when thou sayest newly, thou sayest not new things » n. 27. Lastly he treats of the urgent and express preaching of those things which before were handed down less expressly. « What else, finally, has (the Church) ever striven for by the decrees of Councils, but that what before was believed simply should afterwards be believed more diligently; what before was preached more slowly should afterwards be preached more urgently; what before was cultivated more securely should afterwards be cultivated more solicitously? » n. 32.

So therefore must we hold concerning this difference in the mode of Tradition. Since divine dogmas, the deeper they are, are the more fruitful, and have relations well-nigh infinite to the exigencies of all times, and oppositions to the most diverse errors which human infirmity or perversity can devise, it is evident that it neither was done nor morally could have been done that the several dogmas be explicitly proposed and enunciated by the Apostles according to all those respects. And this was the less necessary because, together with the dogma, the charism of truth for applying and explicating the dogma to the necessity of the several ages was also propagated to the successors of the Apostles from the promise and institution of Christ. Hence a) in the apostolic preaching there could be proposed certain universals in which were implicitly contained the particulars to be explicated in progress of time, doubts having arisen, through the magisterium of the Church; thus the doctrine of the necessity of grace for every good work in the way of salvation sufficed, that afterwards against the Semipelagians the same necessity for the beginning of faith be defined. There could be contained complexes from which the constituent elements were to be explicated: Christ is God and man, whence, necessity having arisen, many things concerning each nature could be defined; supreme is the power of Peter as the visible foundation of the Church and the center of unity, whence many rights and duties in particular were to be explicated. b) There could be contained certain things first understood by the faithful more obscurely and only confusedly, which in progress of time were to be applied to particulars and understood more distinctly, of which sort are many predictions concerning future things, e.g. concerning the glorification of the Church still militant on earth, and concerning many other things which, contained in the Apocalypse, will perhaps not be distinctly understood before their fulfillment. There could be contained certain things enunciated more simply, whose stricter declaration in direct opposition to a certain definite form of errors the heresies afterwards arisen rendered necessary; hence the mode of speaking defined by the Fathers and Councils and the ecclesiastical formulae laid down as tokens of faith. c) Lastly, certain dogmas could have been proposed more by practical use and the custom of the Churches than by express doctrine and urgent preaching, whose express preaching or solemn definition would in progress of time become necessary; of which sort luculent examples stand forth in the controversy concerning the power of validly conferring sacraments outside the Church, and in the history of the canon of the sacred books, of which we shall speak afterwards. Cf. Suarez de Fide disp. II. sect. 6. n. 16-18; Lugo de Fide disp. III. sect. 5. n. 70-73; disp. I. sect. 13. §. 1. n. 270-274; §. 3. n. 302-304.

III. From what has been said it is evident that there can be truths objectively comprehended in the deposit of faith which yet were not always proposed in the manifest ecclesiastical preaching sufficiently for the obligation of explicit Catholic faith. That there are in fact some such truths is demonstrated from all those definitions of Councils or Pontiffs which declared as truths of faith those doctrines concerning which before the definition Catholic doctors without loss of faith and communion followed diverse opinions, agreeing moreover in this, that they confessed those doctrines not yet to pertain to the deposit of faith sufficiently manifested and necessarily to be believed. The same is gathered also from this, that even now there are many theological questions by no means defined and knowingly and willingly left unresolved by the Roman Pontiffs and Councils, which yet turn upon the sense of sundry heads of revealed doctrine, in such a way that they seem capable of being solved from the analysis of that same revealed doctrine and so of being defined by the infallible magisterium.

Hence are found among the Fathers distinctions between « the substance of faith (ὑποθεσιν τῆς πίστεως) which is one among all, and questions of profounder understanding » Iren. I. c. 10. n. 2. 3; between those things « which are most manifestly preached in the Churches, which are defined in the ecclesiastical preaching, concerning which there is one opinion of the whole Church, and other things which are still to be inquired into from sacred Scripture and to be investigated by sagacious inquiry, which are not manifestly discerned, which are not distinguished by a sufficiently manifest preaching, which are not evident in the ecclesiastical preaching » Origen. de Princip. in praefatione. There is distinguished in Christian doctrine between « the rule of faith which among us has no questions, and that which, the rule of faith being safe, can come into question » Tertull. Praescrip. c. 13. One thing is « what pertains to the very foundations of faith, and other are those things in which among themselves sometimes even the most learned and best defenders of the Catholic rule, the structure of faith being safe, do not agree, and one says of one thing something better and truer than another » August. contr. Iulian. I. c. 6. n. 22. There is distinguished « error to be borne in questions not diligently digested, not yet confirmed by the full authority of the Church, and error not to be borne, which labors to shake the very firmament of the Church » Id. serm. 294. n. 4. (T. V. p. 832.) cf. de Baptism. I. c. 7. n. 9; VII. c. 53. n. 102. There is distinguished finally « some small portion of our faith less lucidly clear, and that which the Lord willed no one in His Church to be ignorant of » St Leo ep. 30. c. 2. ad Pulcheriam Augustam (ed. Ballerini); ep. 31. c. 4. cf. ep. 60.

If there can be and are contained in objective revelation (Scripture and Tradition) heads of doctrine which have not always and everywhere been sufficiently proposed by ecclesiastical preaching as revealed — or, what is the same, if there are contained truths in the remote rule of faith which have not always and everywhere been sufficiently applied through the proximate rule of faith — by that very fact it is established that there can be and are doctrines in objective revelation which could at some time be called into controversy or even denied by Catholic doctors without loss of faith and communion. For the unity of faith is preserved intact as long as there is no dissent from the proximate rule of faith. An example among very many others is in the error of the rebaptizers. « O wondrous conversion of affairs! the authors of the same opinion are judged Catholics, but the followers heretics; the masters are absolved, the disciples condemned; the writers of the books shall be sons of the kingdom, but hell shall receive their assertors » Vincent. Lirin. n. 11. Cf. August. de Baptism. l. II. n. 6. and elsewhere.

IV. For a clearer understanding of this matter — how it can come about that concerning certain truths comprehended in revelation there is at some time not sufficient certainty even in the Church herself — a threefold, as it were, stage of the explication of certain dogmas is to be considered, as already most lucidly distinguished by the Fathers, and namely by St Augustine. The first stage is when, no controversy as yet pressing nor the question as yet diligently digested, some head of doctrine is held either implicitly in the profession of a more universal proposition (e.g. as before the definition was held the doctrine, how far the all-encompassing holiness of the Mother of God, how far the necessity of supernatural aid of grace extends; cf. Aug. de Praedest. SS. n. 2. 7. 27.); or is held by use and practice rather than by theoretical and distinct proposition and urgent preaching (cf. Aug. de dono Perseverant. n. 63. 65.) ², of which sort thou hast an example in the doctrine concerning baptism conferred by heretics down to the times of Agrippinus at the beginning of the third century, concerning the canon of the sacred Scriptures of the Old Testament down to the waning third or beginning fourth century. The second stage is when such a head of doctrine begins to be called into controversy, and therefore to be examined and inquired into more diligently. Controversy having arisen and enduring, without doubt some fluctuation is induced, and among some a greater obscurity than had existed before the controversy, until gradually by the inquiry itself, under the assistance and direction of the Holy Spirit, the matter is brought to clarity. « For how, says Augustine concerning the commemorated controversy in the time of Cyprian, could this affair, enwrapped in such great clouds of altercations, have been brought to the luculent illustration and confirmation of a plenary Council, unless it had first for a long time through the regions of the world been treated of by many disputations and collations of bishops on either side? » de Baptism. II. n. 5. There follows therefore the third stage, when by the solemn judgment of the authentic magisterium or otherwise, consensus gaining strength, it is now certain concerning the revelation of the dogma, and, the question being sifted, it passes into the explicit Catholic understanding and into the manifest ecclesiastical preaching. But with this manifest consensus and explicit and express preaching posited, neither dissent nor obscuration of the dogma can any longer have place within the bounds of the Church. Hence in the Bull Auctorem fidei the heretical proposition of the Pistoians n. 1. was condemned, in which they affirmed: « that in these last ages there has been spread a general obscuration over truths of greater moment pertaining to religion, and which are the basis of the faith and moral doctrine of Jesus Christ. »

All those three conditions and forms of the questions of which we treat St Augustine commemorates and clearly designates de Baptism. II. 12-14. « Do not therefore oppose to us the authority of Cyprian for the repetition of baptism... For that question of baptism had not yet been diligently treated, but yet the Church held a most salutary custom of correcting in schismatics too and heretics what is depraved, not iterating what is given. Which custom I believe to have come from apostolic Tradition, as many things which are not found in their writings. » Thou hast the first stage, where, no controversy having arisen, Tradition is in custom and practice rather than in express and urgent preaching. There follows the description of the second stage in Augustine. « This most salutary custom, then, through Agrippinus his predecessor, St Cyprian says had as it were begun to be corrected... So great a question thus rushing in, when... a reason was with difficulty rendered, and there preceded the authority of Agrippinus and of some who had consented with him, men failing in this question... plausible reasons rushed into the eyes of the soul and shut the way of searching out the truth... When the wearied (Cyprian) was met by the authority of the preceding Council, which had been held through Agrippinus, he preferred to defend as a discovery the opinion of his predecessors (in the Carthaginian see from Agrippinus on) rather than to labor further in inquiring. » Thou seest in this second state of the question controversies moved and some obscurity induced. But let the issue of the matter be heard. « Afterwards, however, while among many on either side it is treated and inquired into, was not only found (the truth) but was also brought to the authority and strength of a plenary Council ³, after indeed the passion of Cyprian (in the year 258), but before we were born » (in the year 353.). This is the last state of the question now sifted and of the fullest consensus in the Catholic Church, which because the Donatists opposed, they were schismatics and heretics. Nearly the same description of the threefold stage is found in Augustine ibid. l. I. n. 9; l. II. n. 5. 6. 20; l. IV. n. 12.

If from the second stage of inquiry and fluctuation there is passage to the third stage of full consensus, that this very consensus in a doctrine as revealed is a certain and infallible criterion of divine Tradition, and so that a negating consensus can never prevail against that which is objectively contained in revelation, has been demonstrated in the foregoing th. VIII. n. I; Coroll. 1. and 2. to th. IX.

Scholion. Care must be taken lest what we have said concerning certain truths implicit in the apostolic preaching and concerning the necessary further declaration through the ecclesiastical magisterium against the various forms of errors arising in course of time be perversely transferred to the understanding of the Apostles themselves, and the understanding of faith be thought to have been less perfect in the Apostles themselves than in the Fathers and in later doctors, which Günther according to his false notion of Tradition dared to assert. Far different is it that the Apostles did not propose the dogmas under all the forms under which they can be enunciated as directly opposed to manifold errors, and that therefore definitions of those same dogmas in other terms and modes of speaking and with new explications accommodated to the exigencies of the times, with analogous rational ideas too employed, were necessary for later ages ⁴; and different is it that the Apostles themselves knew the dogmas of faith less distinctly according to their whole intimate reason, with infused knowledge (for it is of this, not of knowledge acquired by human studies, that we speak), than subsequent doctors. This second thing Catholic theologians commonly reprobate even as temerarious, says Suarez (de Fide disp. II. sect. 6. n. 10.), or some say even erroneous, as Valentia (T. III. disp. I. q. 1. puncto 6.). Nevertheless as to the explicit understanding of the Apostles, Suarez l. c. n. 18; de Lugo (de Fide disp. III. sect. 5. n. 71. 72.) wisely distinguish between the proper sense itself of the dogma, which the Apostles with infused faith knew explicitly and, as was fitting for the first promulgators of the Christian religion, perfectly, and between the contingent particulars to which that very thing which is proposed in revealed doctrine was in its time to be applied. These particulars — e.g. the several comprehended in the series of the successors of Peter, to whom pertain the words « upon this rock I will build my Church » — and many other things of this kind God in His revelation indeed comprehended distinctly; but the Apostles are to be said to have understood them only confusedly and in general, unless without any reason we feign that all future things were revealed to them.

On the true sense of the Vincentian canon.

« The canon of St Vincent of Lérins (Commonit. n. 3. 4. 38. 41.), by which the characters of Catholic doctrine are assigned as universality, antiquity, and consensus of faith, if 1°. considered in itself, is most true in the affirming sense, that doctrine distinguished by these characters is certainly a dogma of the Catholic faith; yet it is not true in the excluding sense, as though nothing could pertain to the deposit of faith which was not everywhere and by all always explicitly believed. But if 2°. the sense of the rule be sought in the context of the Commonitorium itself, nothing else is exhibited than a twofold note, either of which suffices for discerning the absolute antiquity or apostolicity of doctrine, namely the present consensus of the Church and the consensus of relative antiquity existing before the controversy arose. »

I. The canon of which we treat Lirinensis enunciates in these words. « In the Catholic Church herself too great care must be taken that we hold that which has been believed everywhere, which always, which by all. For this is truly and properly Catholic... But this will so be done only if we follow universality, antiquity, consensus » n. 3. It is a question therefore of heads which are not held and observed in the Church in any way whatever, but which are believed by faith ¹. But a thing can have been believed in two ways, explicitly namely or only implicitly (cf. th. XXIII. n. I.). Whatever is contained in the deposit of objective revelation has without doubt been believed everywhere, always, by all Catholics at least implicitly, nor can anything be contained in the deposit without being so believed; for he would already cease to be Catholic who did not bear a ready mind to believe all things which shall have been sufficiently proposed to him as divinely revealed, or whose habit of faith did not extend to rendering assent to all things comprehended in revelation. But in this sense to have been believed always and everywhere cannot be given as a theological criterion and rule for discerning those things which are contained in revelation; for the objects of faith believed only implicitly are not known in themselves as revealed. But indeed to inquire whether something has been believed everywhere, always, by all at least implicitly is the same as to inquire whether something is contained in objective revelation and Tradition, which is a thing to be inquired into through something else, not a note for finding something else. Although therefore it be true both in the affirming and in the excluding sense that all that pertains to the deposit of faith which has been believed everywhere, always and by all at least implicitly, and that nothing pertains to the deposit which has not been so believed; yet this cannot be the signification of the Vincentian rule.

The proposed criterion therefore cannot be understood except of explicit faith. Now it is established from the foregoing theses that universal consensus in some dogma as a doctrine of faith, at whatever time it exists, is a certain criterion of divinely handed-down doctrine (th. V. n. III; th. VIII. n. I. II; Coroll. I. to th. IX; th. XI. n. II.). Therefore without doubt such a consensus of antiquity, and most splendidly the universal consensus of all ages, demonstrates divine Tradition (th. XIV. XV.). What therefore has been believed everywhere, always, by all cannot but be revealed and divinely handed down.

But from the foregoing it is likewise established that certain heads of doctrine can be contained in the deposit of objective revelation which were not always in the manifest and explicit ecclesiastical preaching, and which therefore, as long as they were not sufficiently proposed, could within the very bounds of the Church be called into controversy without loss of faith and communion (coroll. 2. to th. IX. and th. XXIII.). Therefore some head of doctrine can be contained in objective revelation, and can also in course of time, sufficient explication and proposition having been made, pertain to the truths to be believed with Catholic faith with necessity, which, though always contained in the deposit of revelation, yet was not always, everywhere, and by all explicitly believed or necessarily to be believed. Although therefore the characters enumerated in the canon, if present, evidently demonstrate that the doctrine to which they belong is a dogma of the Catholic faith; yet if they are absent, it is not by that very fact already established that the doctrine is not contained in the deposit of faith, or that doctrine, by the very fact that at some time for defect of sufficient proposition it was not explicitly to be believed, is at no time to be believed. The canon therefore is true in the affirming sense, yet cannot be admitted in the negating and excluding sense.

II. If the canon be considered in its context and together with the explication by which it is declared by Vincent, its sense appears to be the following. a) Absolute antiquity or the apostolicity of doctrine is not proposed as a note by which something else is inquired into; but it is the very thing which is inquired into. b) As notes by which the apostolicity of doctrine is to be known two properties are proposed: universality, which is the present consensus of the Church, and the consensus of antiquity ², of relative antiquity namely, i.e. the consensus which is demonstrated to have existed before the controversy arose. From either of these two notes absolute antiquity is known and inferred. For when, whether through the solemn judgment of the authentic magisterium (of an ecumenical Council or of the Pontiff) or through the unanimous ecclesiastical preaching, the present consensus of universality is clear and manifest, this alone of itself suffices; but if, controversy having now arisen, this consensus were less perspicuous, or were not acknowledged by the adversaries to be refuted, then, says Vincent, appeal must be made to the consensus of antiquity manifest either by solemn judgments or by the conspiring opinions of the Fathers. Lastly, if in polemical disputation the heretics proceed so far as to venerate neither even that authority of the preceding Fathers, he confesses that nothing else remains common to us and to them as a principle but the authority of Scripture. The truth of this our interpretation shines forth from all the contexts of the Vincentian Commonitorium itself.

1°. He bids us hold that « which has been believed everywhere, always, by all, » discerning nothing whether it was so believed explicitly or implicitly (n. 3.). Then he proposes the notes by which we may arrive at knowledge whether something has been so believed everywhere, always, by all, which notes are universality, antiquity, consensus. « But this (that we hold that which has been believed everywhere, always, by all) will so be done, he says, only if we follow universality, antiquity, consensus. » Therefore to have been believed everywhere, always, and by all is the thing to be known through something else, not the note and criterion of knowledge; but the notes are universality, antiquity, consensus.

2°. What Vincent understands by the name of universality he forthwith declares as follows: « but we shall follow universality in this way, if we confess that to be the one true faith which the whole Church throughout the world confesses. » Universality therefore is the consensus of the whole Church, and indeed, inasmuch as it is distinguished from the note of antiquity, the consensus of the Church in this present age in which the question arises. This is manifest from n. 4, where he compares universality as a present consensus, which can be disturbed by some through invented new errors, with antiquity as the consensus of the preceding age, « which now can in no wise be seduced by any fraud of novelty. » Moreover in the same place n. 4. he says that the consensus of universality is to be followed, « lest we be broken off from the integrity of unity into a part of schism, » which he then in n. 5. illustrates by the example of the Catholics in Africa, who « detesting the schism (of Donatus) were associated to all the Churches of the world (consenting, to wit, in the present). »

3°. That by antiquity insofar as it is a note Vincent understands relative antiquity, so that from it absolute antiquity or apostolicity is inferred, is established from his whole manner of disputing. For he always constitutes antiquity in the opinion of preceding Fathers or Councils which had existed before the rise of the heresy to be confuted or of the controversy to be decided. « Likewise in antiquity itself, he says n. 38, to the temerity of one or of very few are first of all to be preferred, if there be any, the general decrees of a universal Council; then next, if that is too little, the consentient opinions of many and great masters » ³ And in n. 39. he wills that to ancient heresies be opposed Councils held already before those heresies arose, or if these too be contemned by those heretics, then at length polemically against them there remain as a common fount the Scriptures.

4°. That either note — whether the consensus of the present universality or the consensus of antiquity — suffices for demonstrating the apostolicity of doctrine, Lirinensis teaches most luminously in all places. « What then shall a Catholic Christian do, he asks n. 4, if some small portion of the Church cut itself off from the communion of the universal faith? » « What indeed, he answers, but prefer the soundness of the whole body to the pestiferous and corrupted member? » But if concerning the present consensus on account of the perturbations arisen there were doubt, the other remains: « then likewise he shall provide, he says, to cleave to antiquity. »

There can therefore be no doubt that this is the genuine sense of St Vincent which we have enunciated in the thesis. But doctrine to which either note is wanting must be deemed at least not yet sufficiently proposed to Catholic faith; doctrine repugnant to either consensus must be deemed a profane novelty.

On the conjoined office of the guardians and teachers of the faith, and on the mode of explication of the deposit.

From what has been said it is inferred, and is confirmed by its own arguments, that the infallible guardians of the faith are also infallible teachers of the faith, so that they explicate what is implicit, define what is ambiguous, in the objective revelation of Scripture and Tradition, propose by more urgent preaching what is less expressly stated, defend what is assailed by errors; in which function, although the human element of inquiry and science has its place, the infallibility of the explication and definition must nevertheless be traced to the promised assistance and direction of the Spirit of truth. False, therefore, is what a recent school has asserted, that in the explication of dogmas the one office of the teaching Church under the assistance of the Holy Spirit is, time and again to pass judgment as to which among several different ways of understanding a dogma is to be held preferable to the rest for any given stage of science. »

I. As has been declared above, the concept of divine Tradition is not exhausted in this, that some sum of formulas of faith be conserved; but the essential note of Tradition is posited in the perpetual infallible conservation of the true sense and true understanding of the deposit of faith and of revealed doctrine (cf. th. XI. n. II.). Now in the deposit of faith there can be and are contained truths which are implicit in others, which at some time are as yet more obscurely and less expressly proposed; whence concerning them controversies can arise even within the bounds of the Church, and the same truths can by some be called into doubt (th. XXIII.). Besides, even dogmas already clearly proposed can by the erring or by heretics be perversely understood and perverted to an alien sense under manifold forms of error. But when controversies of this kind have arisen and errors threaten, the true understanding of doctrine and the integrity of the deposit cannot be infallibly conserved and, for the end which God has set for revelation, duly proposed, unless the guardians of the faith are at the same time infallible teachers of the faith. For in this very thing is posited the true note and function of the authentic doctorate of which we treat: that what was implicit in the deposit they exhibit as now explicit; that what was ambiguous and less expressly stated and not yet sufficiently proposed, they define according to the true sense and propose more expressly; that what is twisted to an alien sense under diverse forms of errors, they defend against errors by defining the true concepts and establishing verbal formulas. The divinely instituted infallible guardians of the deposit cannot therefore be conceived, without by that very fact the same being conceived as divinely instituted infallible teachers, because the custody of the deposit is exercised and perfected by the very functions of the authentic doctorate, so that this twofold office of guardians and teachers of the faith can indeed be distinguished, but cannot in subject and function be separated. Cf. th. XXIII.

Hence Paul, Eph. IV. 11, conjoins the charism of pastors and teachers. Offices which differ in subject and function the Apostle there clearly distinguishes and disjoins, but these two offices he connects no less clearly with a conjunctive particle. « He (Christ) gave some indeed Apostles, some Prophets (τους μεν-τους δε, some-some), others Evangelists, others pastors and teachers » ¹ This sense of the Apostle was excellently declared by St. Jerome (commentar. in h. l.) and Augustine (ep. 149. n. 11. al. 59. ad Paulinum). « Pastors and teachers, whom you especially wished me to distinguish, I think to be the same, as it seemed also to you, so that we should not understand some as pastors, others as teachers; but that, having first named pastors, he subjoined teachers, so that pastors might understand teaching to pertain to their office. For he did not say some pastors, some teachers, whereas he had distinguished the former by the very manner of speech, saying some Apostles, some Prophets, some Evangelists; but this, as one thing, he embraced with two names, some pastors and teachers » Aug. l. c. To the same conclusion comes St. Jerome. « Nor must it be thought that, as in the three former he said some to be Apostles, others Prophets, others Evangelists, so also in pastors and masters he posited diverse offices. For he did not say others pastors and others masters, but others pastors and teachers, so that he who is pastor ought also to be master » Hieron. l. c. From Christ's very institution, therefore, the office of teachers is included in the office of pastors; whence the same Apostle, 1. Cor. XII. 28, in the parallel enumeration seems to have comprehended both under the one name of teachers. « And God indeed hath set some in the Church, first Apostles, secondly Prophets, thirdly teachers. » If anyone should contend, however, that in this latter place the enumeration is only of extraordinary charisms, the parallel would not be adequate, but the name of teachers posited in both places would agree only in a generic, not in a specific, signification.

But whatever you may think of this latter testimony, the inseparable conjunction of the pastorate instituted by Christ and the authentic doctorate is manifest both from the very office of pastors and from the cited words of Eph. IV, and by the Apostle himself in other places the same unity of custody of the deposit and of the doctorate in the sense in which we now speak is sufficiently declared. Against « those who err and lead into error » he commends to Timothy in the first place the custody of the deposit. « But continue thou in those things which thou hast learned and which have been entrusted to thee, knowing of whom thou hast learned them » 2. Tim. III. 14. To this very office of custody of the deposit he subjoins in the continuous context the function of the doctorate, commending to him Scripture as the instrument of doctrine, which namely he should use in the very custody of what he had learned and what had been entrusted to him « for teaching, for reproving, for correcting, for instructing in justice, that the man of God may be perfect, furnished unto every good work » ibid. v. 15-17. The functions of the teacher therefore coincide with the custody of what has been handed down and entrusted. In the same sense he bids the same Timothy « rightly to handle the word of truth » ib. II. 15; he bids him attend « unto reading and unto doctrine, » that he may save both himself and those who hear him, unto which office grace was given him by the imposition of the hands of the presbytery 1. Tim. IV. 13-16. As in these places the doctorate, by which the handed-down word of truth is guarded, is commended in recto; so elsewhere the custody of the deposit is directly enjoined, in which the doctorate is included through the form of sound words. « O Timothy, keep the deposit, avoiding the profane novelties of words ² and oppositions of knowledge falsely so called » 1. Tim. VI. 20. « Hold the form of sound words ³... keep the good deposit through the Holy Spirit, who dwelleth in us » 2. Tim. I. 13. 14.

II. From this unity of the office of guarding the faith and of the doctorate according to the functions declared, or from this very fact, that the office of the guardians of the faith was instituted by Christ in such wise that it is exercised through the functions of the doctorate and cannot without them stand intact, it is evident that the same principle which confers infallibility in the custody of the deposit confers the same infallibility in the functions of the doctorate. Whatever things therefore demonstrate the promised tutelage of Christ and the direction and assistance of the Spirit of truth, that the apostolic succession guard the deposit of faith whole unto the consummation of the world ever infallibly (th. V-XI.), all those same things demonstrate also that this tutelage of Christ and the assistance and direction of the Spirit of truth is the efficient cause through which the guardians of the deposit, under the same conditions under which they are infallible in guarding the faith, are rendered infallible in explicating, in more clearly proposing, in more distinctly defining, and by this very fact in sincerely defending revealed truths.

1°. The words of Christ therefore: « teach ye all nations... and behold I am with you all days even to the consummation of the world, » « I will ask the Father and He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may abide with you for ever, the Spirit of truth; » « but the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit, He will teach you all things and bring all things to your mind, whatsoever I shall have said to you » (th. V.), cannot pertain to the successors of the Apostles as perpetual guardians of the deposit without pertaining to them as teachers of revealed faith according to the functions we have recalled, because by these very functions the custody of the deposit is exercised. Hence the Fathers whom we cited th. VIII. n. I, when they speak of the assistance and operation of the Holy Spirit for the infallible custody of the deposit through the authentic magisterium, have for the most part these functions of the doctorate before their eyes. The reason why it is heretical to gainsay the Church declaring the sense of the Scriptures by common consent, and so the reason of infallibility in the exposition and explication of dogmas, Irenaeus IV. 26. n. 5. refers « to the charisms of the Lord, through which they expound the Scriptures to us without danger, with whom is the succession of the Church from the Apostles. » The efficient cause, that in the universal Church « most zealous speculation does not go into error » in explicating the true sense of dogmas, is in Augustine (in Ps. 9. n. 12.) « the Lord, who Himself inhabits the Church. » The cause of the infallibility of the definitions of dogmas made against heretics in Councils is in Cyril Alex. T. V. P. II. p. 4. 175. « Christ who presides, » and « the Holy Spirit who speaks through the Councils. » That « in the Apostolic See religion has ever been kept immaculate, » is thence, « because the sentence of our Lord Jesus Christ cannot be passed over, saying: thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build My Church » (in the Profession subscribed by the Orientals under Hormisdas, and under Hadrian II. in Conc. VIII.). The reason of the irrefragable authority of the consenting Fathers, who dispersed through differences of times and places discharge the office of teachers, is in Theodoret T. IV. p. 23. and Leontius Galland. XII. p. 682. « the charism of the Holy Spirit, which they received for teaching in one Spirit, » and « the grace of the Holy Spirit, through whom they were taught and agree among themselves. »

2°. Although these things be so, yet this promised and ordinary charism of the Spirit of truth is not through new revelation, as we demonstrated th. XXII; but it is through the assistance and direction of the Holy Spirit in such wise that the human element of inquiry, industry, and acquired doctrine is not excluded, but rather presupposed. As regards this matter we can distinguish three things, the occasion, the preparation, the ultimate conclusion of the explication, of the clearer proposition, of the stricter definition of dogmas.

a) The external occasion is most frequently furnished by controversies arisen, errors, heresies, as the holy Fathers have often observed. For the very custody of the deposit renders necessary the defense of revealed doctrine against errors, from which defense follows the explication, the stricter definition, and the more urgent preaching of the dogma: « by whom the institutions of doctrine proceed, by the same (it befits) that the discordant oppositions of learning be resolved, » says Gratian Augustus (Opp. St. Ambrose T. II. p. 787.). Compare the Fathers of the Council of Chalcedon in the allocution to Marcian Augustus (Hard. II. p. 646. sq.); Athanas. de decret. Nicaen. n. 32; Hilar. Trin. l. II. n. 1. sqq.; Augustine in Ps. 54. n. 22; de dono Persever. c. 20. n. 53; Civ. Dei l. XVI. c. 2. n. 1; Confess. l. VII. c. 19. n. 23. « From heretics the Catholic has been asserted, says Augustine in Ps. l. c., and from those who think ill, they who think well have been approved. For many things lay hidden in the Scriptures; and when the heretics had been cut off, they agitated the Church of God with questions: things which lay hidden were opened, and the will of God was understood. » « Many things indeed pertaining to the Catholic faith, while they are agitated by the cunning restlessness of heretics, that they may be defended against them, are both considered more diligently, and understood more clearly, and preached more urgently; and a question raised by the adversary becomes the occasion of learning » de Civ. Dei l. c.

b) The internal preparation of the explication is various and sufficiently evident. To the human element here belong without doubt, among other things, the acquired science of the sacred disciplines, the study of the Scriptures, of the works of the holy Fathers and generally of ecclesiastical monuments, of the liturgy, rites, ecclesiastical customs, of universal theology in fine, in all which the aid of even merely rational and human disciplines cannot be lacking. All this labor and industry in fine must be considered as subjected and subservient to the authority and vigilance of the authentic magisterium. But this element of preparation, which we call human, is not constituted by science alone; but there are very many other circumstances of things and events, and of the whole Christian life, pertaining to the Christian people and to the universal Church, by which the explication, illustration, and more distinct definition of dogmas can be prepared.

We do not oppose here, therefore, the human to the divine as nature is distinguished from grace; but by the human element we mean as well natural as supernatural disposition and cooperation on the part of men, which the Holy Spirit by His providence and assistance moderates and directs to the explication, definition and defense of the faith. Whence this element which we call human, insofar as it pertains to the preparation of the explication, must ever be considered under the special providence and direction of the Holy Spirit; and so in the very preparation the human can be distinguished from the divine, but cannot be separated. We can, however, consider this preparation in the universal Church, and therefore in the first place in the teaching Church herself and in the authentic magisterium, or we can consider it as it exists in private men and groups, e. g. in schools and theologians or in the Christian people. In the first way it must be called the direct preparation of the explication, under the providence of the Holy Spirit leading into all truth; in the other way it must be called indirect preparation, insofar as it is conjoined with and subserves the authority and action of the teaching Church.

c) By the conclusion of the explication we mean the authentic proposition itself, when now the dogma is proposed to be believed explicitly, clearly, expressly; whether this be done through solemn definition or through the universal consensus of ecclesiastical preaching otherwise prevailing. Now what we have thus far disputed demonstrates that even in this very conclusion of the explication the human element has its parts, since the Church is not ruled by new revelations, but through the assistance and governance of the Holy Spirit is infallibly conserved in the profession of the revelation handed down by the Apostles. This assistance and governance therefore directs the divinely instituted human organs and their labor to the consensus or definition of revealed truth, and assists them in their inquiry in such wise that consensus or definition is never arrived at except according to the genuine sense contained in objective revelation. Whence it pertains to the very direction and providence of the Holy Spirit to effect that sufficient human diligence never be lacking in definitions of faith, as Suarez (de Fide disp. V. sect. 8. n. 11.), Bellarmine (de Rom. Pontif. l. IV. c. 2.) and others rightly observe. The human element can indeed be various in diverse circumstances and diverse ages; but the infallibility of the proposition and definition rests wholly on the promised assistance of the Holy Spirit, and does not depend on the perfection of the human element, of diligence, inquiry, theological science considered in themselves.

Nevertheless what we have said of the human element in the explication of faith remains true. The Church, namely, whether to a universal consensus in preaching or to a formal definition of dogmas which had before been called into controversy, is not led by the Holy Spirit through new revelations and through prophetic inspiration, nor is she led (at least by infallible promise) through psychological miracles. But the human element, whether it be in itself more perfect or more imperfect for diverse times and circumstances, has first the indefectibly promised tutelage of Christ and of the Spirit of truth, lest it ever « go into error » (as Augustine speaks), namely that there never be arrival at a universal consensus of preaching in a dogma of faith which is not revealed truth, nor ever arrival at a definition which is not true. To such a true consensus or true definition secondly the human element itself is led through the supernatural governance of the Holy Spirit, which does not destroy nature but elevates and orders it.

Whence a) for the diversity of the human element the explication of faith can in some ages be more illustrious than in others. b) For the same diversity the formal definitions of faith themselves can in some times be fuller, more distinct, more profound than in others. γ) Nay, it can happen that from the imperfection of the human element (of science, inquiry, cooperation, sanctity) there be no arrival at a definition to which the Holy Spirit, under condition of greater perfection, would have led. δ) But it can never happen, whatever the human elements be, and whatever imperfection of them be supposed, that the very consensus of preaching of which we have spoken, or the very definition arrived at, should not positively contain truth. For to the indefectibility of this consensus and of these judgments of faith for all days even to the consummation of the world has been promised the assistance of Him to whom all power is given in heaven and on earth, and of the Spirit of truth, as incommutably as the indefectibility of the Church has been incommutably promised ⁴.

3°. If we gather into a sum what we have said, the explication of the doctrine of faith through the authentic teachers is understood to consist in about these heads. Either a) by solemn definition or by unanimous prevailing consensus the authentic magisterium proposes the dogma explicitly in itself, which before was proposed as implicit in another; or b) under determinate concepts and in respect directly opposed to certain errors the dogma is declared, and by this very fact determinate ecclesiastical forms of words are established by which such concepts are expressed; or c) what before was more obscure and ambiguous, or consisted more in use and custom than in express preaching, is defined more clearly and expressly. From these in fine, as is clear, follows d) a more distinct understanding both for individuals and for the universal Church; and in all these is contained a more urgent preaching of the now explicit and defined dogma and a stronger defense against heresies.

Here there is, as Albertus M. most briefly said (3. dist. 25. a. 1. ad 1.) « rather the progress of the believer in faith, than of faith in the believer, » i. e. the progress of explicit and distinct cognition of the object of faith, not increase of the object itself in itself. The same is more eloquently declared by Vincent of Lerins in those well-known passages. « Let it be needful, therefore, that both of individuals and of all, both of one man and of the whole Church, in the degrees of ages and centuries, understanding, science, wisdom grow and much and vehemently profit; but in its own kind only, namely in the same dogma, the same sense, the same sentence... whatever in this tillage of the Church of God the faith of the Fathers has sown, it befits the industry of the sons to cultivate and observe the same, the same to flourish and ripen, the same to profit and be perfected. For it is lawful that those ancient dogmas of the heavenly philosophy be in process of time sifted, filed, polished; but it is unlawful that they be changed; unlawful that they be curtailed, that they be mutilated. Let them receive evidence, light, distinction; but they must necessarily retain fullness, integrity, propriety » Commonitor. n. 27-32. cf. Basil. ep. 223. al. 79. num. 3; Augustin. ll. cc.

III. Günther distinguished the historical facts recorded in the Scriptures, and the understanding of these facts. This understanding he called « doctrinal tradition » and « the consciousness of the Church. » Furthermore, he held this same understanding to receive continuous increments by aid of philosophical science, so that it was more imperfect in the Apostles than in the holy Fathers, yet in them by no means perfect, nay quite maimed, for defect of true philosophy, until at length the true philosophy (the Güntherian), now discovered, paved the way by which to arrive at the supreme understanding of the whole revealed doctrine, and so at the conclusion of « doctrinal tradition, » or, as he himself speaks, at that beyond which no further advance can be made. In this progress of science and explication of truth through the course of ages, it belongs to the magisterium of the Church to define, among the various modes of understanding a dogma prevailing at any time, that which at that time is fittest. In this definition the Church under the assistance of the Holy Spirit is infallible; but the defined mode of understanding a dogma is not for that reason simply perfect and true. Nay, with the human intellect progressing in other sciences, in philosophy generally, in psychology, in natural philosophy, even that definition of a dogma long since given by the Church will appear imperfect, and another more perfect will be necessary. Definitions of this kind, therefore, issued by the Church in diverse ages, says Günther, must be acknowledged as containing some truth, but not truth and the true understanding of the dogma simply. Thus the Ephesine definition concerning the unity of the person of Christ contains some truth posited in this, that Christ as man was from the beginning of His existence conjoined to God the Word, but does not contain nor could contain the supreme understanding of the dogma ⁵, because in the fifth century the philosophy of the nineteenth century was lacking; but the Holy Spirit would not supply this defect according to that wise economy by which neither to Moses in the Old Testament was the truth of the Blessed Trinity revealed, and according to that saying of Christ: « you cannot bear it now. » For the same reason the Council of Trent is also called by Günther (in the philosophical Annals which he entitled Lydia 1852. p. 348–350.) « a certain interim, whether a definitive is to succeed it, no one knows. » Propaedeutica T. II. p. 259. sqq.; Aurorae australes et boreales p. 260–264; Lydia 1850. p. 94. sqq.

In this whole theory in the first place the concept of doctrinal Tradition is perverted; then consequently to this perversion of ideas the relation between the understanding of the Apostles and of succeeding teachers is wrongly established; the authority of even the consenting holy Fathers, and generally the authentic doctorate for the explication of dogmas, is either denied or twisted to an alien sense; hence the divinely instituted ministry in apostolic succession for conserving and explicating Tradition is as it were eliminated, and in its place in some manner the cultivators of rational science are substituted; philosophy and natural science, which cannot be but some aid of the human element in the preparation of the explication, is assumed as the chief cause of the whole explication; although the explication be conceded to be infallible through the Holy Spirit, this very thing is not rightly declared. Besides, increase of Tradition itself in itself and objectively considered (from the false notion of Tradition, to be sure) is admitted. Lastly the conclusion of the explication and the value of the definition is conceived altogether perversely. Of this last alone we treat here; for the rest is easily understood as confuted from the preceding theses.

1°. Definitions of faith under that form of words and under those concepts under which they are proposed must be believed with irreformable and immovable faith. For this very thing is effected through the assistance of the Holy Spirit, that in these definitions of the Church there be nothing underlying which is not objectively revealed and immutably true. Although therefore it can happen that a dogma, first directly explicated and defined under one concept in opposition against some certain error (e. g. the distinction of persons in God against the Sabellians, the unity of person in Christ against the Nestorians), afterwards be directly declared and defined under another concept against another error perhaps contrary to the former (e. g. the unity of essence in the three persons against the Arians, the distinction of natures in Christ against the Monophysites); yet it can never happen that the former concept not remain for all time infallibly true and to be believed as dogma revealed by God. So, for example, after it has been defined that the person of Christ is one and that divine, and that Christ as man is not another distinct person than Christ as God, it cannot at any following time be discovered as true and admitted that one person is God the Word and another distinct person Christ as man, in whatever way the two persons be understood as united among themselves. « For the word of faith abides for ever, » as Athanasius says of the Nicene definition (ep. ad Afros n. 2.). Indeed, unless this fundamental principle stand firm, the infallibility of the Church both in teaching and in believing, and the constant truth of all dogmas, will be subverted.

2°. From these very things it follows that the relation between definitions of faith and human science is wholly inverted and opposite to what the Güntherians had conceived. After definition it is unlawful for human science to conform the sense of the dogma to its preconceived rational ideas; but in inverted order the sense proposed in the definition must be the norm of science and understanding. The office of theological science therefore is, a) to strive to conceive the dogma according to the defined form as fittingly as possible; polishing too, if need be, the philosophical notions to the sense of the defined truth. In which way e. g. the notions of person and nature to the sense of the defined dogma concerning the Blessed Trinity and the Incarnation, the notion of generation to the sense of the dogma concerning the procession of the Holy Spirit, were polished by the Catholic teachers not without fruit for rational philosophy itself (see Tract. de Trin. th. XXX. XXXI.). b) The other and chief office of theology then is to demonstrate the truth according to the defined sense from the monuments of revelation, and to guard it against errors and false ways of understanding. c) This very necessary defense, and this study of true understanding, demand that the nexus and harmony of the dogma in its defined sense with other truths whether theological or also rational and natural (as far as the nature of mysteries permits) be inquired into and exhibited manifestly. There holds therefore the axiom of the Fathers, as universally so also in each head, for theological science: faith precedes, that the science of things of faith may follow; science is founded in faith; faith seeks understanding. But understanding and science do not precede, so as to conform the object of faith defined under a certain form to their ideas and genius, nor can the principle indicated by Günther in inverted order be admitted: « I understand that I may believe, » if there be question of another science than the cognition of the motives of credibility (St. Th. 2. 2. q. 1. a. 4. ad 2.).

This very doctrine we have already defined by the ecumenical Vatican Council. « For the doctrine of faith which God has revealed is not proposed as a philosophical invention to be perfected by human ingenuity, but is handed down as a divine deposit to the Spouse of Christ, to be faithfully guarded and infallibly declared. Hence the sense of the sacred dogmas also is to be retained perpetually which holy Mother Church has once declared, nor must there ever be recession from that sense, under the guise and name of higher understanding. » To this definition in ch. IV. of the Constit. Dei Filius answers canon 3: « If anyone shall say that it can happen that to dogmas proposed by the Church a sense must at some time, according to the progress of science, be attributed other than that which the Church has understood and understands; let him be anathema. »

Corollary. As the history of the people of God in the Old Testament from Adam to Christ, and likewise the evangelical and apostolic history, is history of divine revelation; so also from the consummated objective revelation a history of the explication and proposition of dogmas can have place, and certainly has had. Since by a sufficiently common use of speech a dogma of faith is wont to be called not so much revealed truth in itself, as revealed truth insofar as it is sufficiently proposed in the Church, as it can be said e. g. that the revealed truth of the immaculate conception of the Blessed Virgin was not a dogma of faith before the definition, and now is a dogma of faith; therefore the history of the explication and proposition of revealed truths can be called history of dogmas. Although therefore he would err who by this appellation affirmed history i. e. some mutation and progress of objective revelation after the Apostles, and so confounded the history of dogmas with the history of revelation; and although he would err still more gravely who used this name to assert the mutability either of revealed truth in itself or of a dogma already sufficiently proposed: yet there is no reason for anyone to take offense at the name, though of rather recent introduction, of history of dogmas; for the name has besides that preposterous signification another and that a most true one. For who would say that of the Tridentine definitions e. g., or of the proposition of the doctrine concerning the canon of the sacred books, or of the definition lately recalled concerning the immaculate conception of the Blessed Virgin, there is no history? Nevertheless the ambiguity and abuse of the name suffices that, where it can be wrongly understood, it not be used without declaration, and that history of explication rather be said than history of dogmas. Moreover the explication of dogmas, of which we have treated in the thesis, is not the same as dogmatic theology or the theological school; therefore also the history of the explication of dogmas and the history of dogmatic theology are distinguished.

In fine it will be evident to one considering, that the explication and proposition of dogmas and its history cohere with the history of revelation as with its presupposed foundation; are intrinsically connected with the history of theology as with its consequent, and in some measure as with some antecedent element of preparation; are extrinsically coupled with the history of heresies, on which, not as on a cause but as on an occasion, the explication and the mode of explication in some manner depend; it will be evident lastly that this same history of the explication of dogmas constitutes an intimate part of ecclesiastical history.

On the difference between the explication of the deposit of faith before and after the completion of revelation.

« The explication and illustration of revelation up to its completion through Christ and through the Holy Spirit in the Apostles was made by God Himself through new revelations continuously succeeding one another. An instituted comparison, therefore, between the diverse economies, but not between the individual persons in these economies, it must be said that the deposit of faith was the more explicit the nearer to the fullness of time. But what St. Thomas says (2. 2. q. 1. a. 7.), that as to the substance of the articles of faith no increase of them has taken place through the succession of times, but that as to explication the number of articles has grown, is not to be understood in the same sense as when we say that in the Christian Church after the Apostles no objective increase of the deposit, but an explication of the same, can have place. »

I. Without doubt the people of God is one, and in some wider sense one Church of God from the beginning of the human race to the consummation of the world, adhering to God by faith, hope and charity, and attaining to this union with God, and so to eternal salvation, through the merits of Christ the Redeemer, for one state as yet to come, for another state as already present; « for there is no other name under heaven given to men, whereby we must be saved » (Acts IV. 12.). See Gregor. de Valentia Analys. fidei l. VI. c. 2. n. 2. Hence God from the beginning supernaturally revealed Himself, and redemption through Christ (Gen. III. 15.). Now in faith in God and in Christ the Redeemer consists the very (as theologians commonly say) substance of faith, without which the Church of God never existed: « this is eternal life, that they may know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent » (Io. XVII. 3.). Nevertheless the difference is very great between the mode of revelation, the institutions, and the sacraments, as they stood before the advent of Christ, and as they were completed by the incarnate Word in His Church; as the difference is between the promise and preparation and the promised and completed thing itself. Hence the twofold economy of the Old and New Testament is plainly distinct. In the Old economy itself, according to all the things we have enumerated, the difference, though not of the same kind as between the Old and New Testament, is yet great between the peculiar people of God gathered and formed by the ministry of Moses, and the preceding state before Moses, which state for the other nations endured even after the institution of the peculiar people. Hence the other distinction commonly called of the law of nature and the written law, or of the patriarchal economy and the Mosaic economy.

Now if we compare not individual persons but diverse states and economies, it is first clear that the patriarchal revelation, insofar as it was public and to be communicated to others, was conserved or renewed among the Israelites gathered and formed by Moses into a peculiar people of God; but secondly that the same revelation, both as to direct doctrine concerning God and as to other connected truths and as to moral doctrine, but chiefly as to the future Messias, was explicated, illustrated, and more expressly and urgently proposed through Moses, the prophets, and the inspired writers, by new revelations, morally speaking continuously succeeding one another, up to its completion through the advent of the promised and expected Messias. The deposit of revelation was therefore far more explicit and ample in the written law than in the patriarchal economy, and this not by mere explication without new revelations, but by increase of the objective word of God itself.

If each part of the Old economy be considered separately, it is easily clear that there was increase through the succession of times in both. For revelations were not lacking even in the series of the patriarchs, especially from Abraham onward; but chiefly in the Mosaic economy the mission of the prophets and the inspiration of the sacred writers up to the times of the second temple was most illustrious, and from that time, though less discerned by the Jews, yet never in reality ceased ¹. But these new revelations were indeed an increase of the deposit handed down from preceding ages. « Our faith, says St. Thomas, consists principally in two things; first in the knowledge of the true God... secondly in the mystery of the incarnation... If therefore we speak of prophecy, insofar as it is ordered to faith in the Godhead, it grew according to the three distinctions of times, namely before the Law, under the Law, and under grace. For before the Law Abraham and the other Fathers were prophetically instructed in things pertaining to faith in the Godhead. Whence also they are called prophets Ps. CIV. 15... Under the Law, moreover, prophetic revelation was made concerning things pertaining to faith in the Godhead more excellently than before; because now not only special persons or certain families but the whole people had to be instructed concerning this Exod. VI. 2... Afterwards, in the time of grace, the mystery of the Trinity was revealed by the Son of God Himself Matth. XXVIII. 19. In each state, however, the first revelation was the more excellent. The first revelation before the Law was made to Abraham (reckoning the times of the human race as renewed after Noah, and looking to the immediate connection with the people of Israel; as to revelation before the flood the same could be said of Adam which the Angelic Doctor here says of Abraham)... To Isaac a lower revelation was made, as it were founded upon the revelation made to Abraham, whence it was said to him: I am the God of Abraham thy father Gen. XXVI. 24; and likewise to Jacob it was said: I am the God of Abraham thy father and the God of Isaac Gen. XXVIII. 12. And likewise in the state of the Law the first revelation made to Moses was the more excellent, upon which every other revelation of the prophets is founded (as it too is founded upon that made to the preceding patriarchs). So also in the time of grace the whole faith of the Church is founded upon the revelation made to the Apostles concerning the faith of the Unity and Trinity (while the very revelation of Christ and the Holy Spirit through the Apostles is the completion of all preceding revelation). As to faith in the incarnation of Christ, it is manifest that the nearer they were to Christ, whether before or after, the more fully for the most part were they instructed concerning it » St. Th. 2. 2. q. 174. a. 6.

Moreover, lest a difficulty arise concerning nearness to Christ, a) the comparison is to be understood between the threefold state of the economy, not between individual persons; b) it must be noted that the whole New Testament as the last time and the fullness of time is ever equally near to Christ: « and behold I am with you all days even to the consummation of the world ». Hence at least in speaking of the state and the deposit of faith, and prescinding from individual persons, it is indubitable, as St. Gregory the Great eloquently pursues: « This too we must know, that through the increments of times the knowledge of the spiritual Fathers grew. For Moses was more instructed than Abraham, the prophets more than Moses, the Apostles more than the prophets in the knowledge of omnipotent God... because the nearer the world is drawn to its end, the more largely is the approach to eternal knowledge opened to us » in Ezech. l. II. hom. 4. n. 10-12. (al. in Ez. hom. 16.). See Suarez de Fide disp. II. sect. 6; de Lugo de Fide disp. III. sect. 5.

II. St. Thomas 2. 2. q. 1. a. 7. teaches two things, namely that as to the substance of the articles of faith no increase has taken place, and that only as to explication has the number of articles grown. But it is clear both from the very exposition of St. Thomas and from what has hitherto been said by us, that this twofold assertion of the Angelic Doctor is not to be understood in the sense in which we demonstrated above that in the New Testament after the Apostles no increase, but only an explication, of the revealed deposit can have place.

1°. As to the negation of increase of the articles, there must be distinguished the substance of (objective) faith, and the things which accede to the substance and are connected with it. If we consider faith in its completion, Christian faith I mean, its substance is the mystery of the one and triune God and of redemption through the incarnate Word: « the work of the Gospel, the substance of the New Testament, that henceforth the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, three believed, constitute one God... so that now God is known face to face in His proper names and persons, who, though preached of old through the Son and the Holy Spirit, was not understood » Tertull. contr. Prax. c. 31.

Note then that a thing can be believed in two ways, explicitly and in itself, or implicitly in another thing explicitly known. One thing implicit in another can be so again in two ways, in the first way as in a directing principle (a formal principle); thus all things revealed and to be revealed are believed implicitly in the authority of God revealing, and all things at least sufficiently proposed are believed in the faith of the Church. In the other way one truth can be contained in another as in an including principle (a material principle); and this either only objectively and in itself, so that this comprehension can be known by us only through a new revelation; or also logically and as regards us, so that the comprehension is knowable either through analysis and deduction or in another way, e. g. from historical events, without a new revelation (see p. 279. note).

Things which are not contained in revelation otherwise than in a directing principle, or are implicit in an including principle only objectively but not also as regards us, are not in reality revealed to us, although something revealed may exist in which those truths are contained in one or other way as in a principle. But those are revealed in themselves which are contained in an including principle also as regards us, although the comprehension be not yet known.

These things posited, a) there was always something supernaturally known by the faithful in which implicitly were believed all things revealed and to be revealed; namely the formal object of faith, or the authority of God, was known, should it please Him to reveal anything. In the first place, therefore, the virtue or supernatural habit of faith was always of the same kind. For the virtue of faith has its proper species not from the material object which is believed, but from the formal object, on account of which it is believed; it is namely the supernatural virtue by which things revealed by God are believed to be true on account of the authority of God Himself revealing.

b) From the origin of the human race there were some truths explicitly revealed in which at least objectively was implicitly contained the whole substance of our faith, and in which implicitly were contained many other truths which in the progress of time were explicitly revealed. « All the articles (pertaining to faith of themselves, cf. above pp. 278. 279.) are implicitly contained in certain first believables, namely that God be believed to exist and to have providence over the salvation of men, according to Heb. XI. 6: he that cometh to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of them that seek Him. For in the Divine Being are included all things which we believe to exist eternally in God, in which our beatitude consists; in faith in providence are included all things which are temporally dispensed by God for the salvation of men, which are the way to beatitude » St. Th. 2. 2. q. 1. a. 7. There were therefore always some revealed articles of faith which at least implicitly contained the substance of the articles of the whole faith, and in this sense no increase of them took place through the succession of times.

c) But things pertaining to the very substance, the mystery of the Trinity, the incarnation of the Word and the divinity of the Messias, although explicitly known to men specially enlightened by God, were yet not always contained in the public and common revelation so clearly that in the Old Testament all were bound to believe them, or that there would have been no need of illustration through the clear revelation of the New Testament. Many particular truths concerning Christ, concerning the mode and means of sanctification, etc., to say nothing of historical matters, were then revealed in the succession of time so as to have to be said simply not to have been revealed before, since without a new revelation they could not be known as to be believed by faith. Whence it must be said simply that the objective revelation of truths in the Old Testament received increments through the succession of times. And this is the difference in comparison with the New Testament, in which increase of this objective kind, after the completion of the catholic revelation through the Apostles, no longer has place (th. XXII.).

2°. The other proposition of St. Thomas and the rest of the theologians concerned the explication of revelation in the Old Testament. « As to explication the number of articles grew, because certain things were explicitly known by the later which were not explicitly known by the earlier » St. Th. l. c. From the difference between the comprehension of certain truths which objectively were indeed implicit in the not yet completed revelation of the Old Testament, but not so that they could become explicit without a new revelation, and the implicit comprehension of truths which is logical also as regards us in the already completed revelation of the New Testament — from this difference, I say, is understood also the difference between the mode of each explication. The former neither was nor could have been made except by God through revelation of the very truth to be explicated and not yet revealed in itself, whereby continuous new increase accrued to revelation; the latter is nothing but a clearer proposition, through explication of the word of God conserved and handed down in the Church, of a truth long since revealed in itself, which scientific explication is instituted and perfected by human labor and industry also, authoritatively and infallibly through the magisterium of the Church under the assistance of the Holy Spirit, without new revelation.