Summa summae S. Thomae, Tomus III

Tradition, so to speak, is doctrine communicated by one to another in writing or by voice. Hence the Apostle, II Thessal., II, 14: Hold fast, he says, the traditions which you have learned, whether by word or by epistle. Taken specifically, however, inasmuch as it is distinguished from Scripture, it is doctrine communicated by one to another by living voice, and it is treated of here insofar as it concerns the faith and morals of the faithful. Hence

I say 1°: Tradition can be defined: « Doctrine pertaining to Christian faith and morals, communicated by living voice by its author. » It is said, « by its author, » because it does not stand against tradition if, once communicated by its author by voice alone, it is afterwards committed to writing by others. Of this kind are the baptism of infants, the perpetual virginity of blessed Mary, the quadragesimal fast preparatory to baptism, the celebration of the feasts of Easter and Pentecost, and many other things.

I say 2°: Tradition, on the part of its origin, is divided into divine, apostolic, and ecclesiastical. Divine is that which was communicated by living voice to posterity by God to the Patriarchs, or by Christ to his disciples, or by the Apostles themselves, the Holy Spirit dictating. Apostolic is that which the Apostles instituted with apostolic authority, as prefects of the Church. Ecclesiastical is that which councils, or supreme Pontiffs, or the holy Fathers introduced.

[On the part of its matter, tradition is divided into dogmatic and moral or ritual. The former is concerned with dogmas, as that the Father is unbegotten, that there are four Gospels and seven sacraments, etc. The latter looks to morals, as that the Lenten fast must be observed and the feast of Easter celebrated, etc. On the part of time, it is divided into temporal, which was instituted only for a time, such as abstinence from blood and from things strangled, the triple immersion in baptism; and perpetual, which was instituted as about to endure forever, such as the baptism of infants, the validity of baptism conferred by heretics.

On the part of the mode by which tradition is propagated, it is divided into written, oral, and practical; for some doctrine can be transmitted to others in writing, or propagated by mouth, or be itself derived by the fathers into their children.]

I say 3°: Divine tradition is a rule of infallible authority and of faith: because it is the word of God, no less than Sacred Scripture; yet Sacred Scripture is a rule of infallible authority and of faith not because it is written, but because it is the word of God. Hence Trid., session IV, chapter 1, declares that it receives and venerates « with equal affection and reverence the divine traditions as well as Sacred Scripture. » From this you will gather that from divine tradition there can be formed a firm and efficacious argument, just as from divine Scripture.

[The same is taught by the Vatican Council, constitution Dei Filius, chapter 2, on Revelation: « This supernatural revelation, according to the faith of the universal Church declared by the holy Tridentine Synod, is contained in the written books and in the unwritten traditions which, received by the Apostles from the mouth of Christ himself, or dictated to the Apostles by the Holy Spirit, and handed on as it were from hand to hand, have come down even to us.]

Apostolic tradition has as much authority as the apostolic decrees have. Ecclesiastical tradition, however, has that authority which ecclesiastical laws have. Hence apostolic and ecclesiastical traditions admit of dispensation, derogation, and abrogation.

You will ask what is the rule for discerning tradition in general, and then for discerning that it is divine.

I answer. 1°. The rule for discerning tradition in general is that which Augustine establishes, book IV of the De Baptismo contra Donatistas, c. 24, n. 31: « What the whole Church holds, and which was not instituted by councils, but has always been retained, is most assuredly believed to have been handed down by no other than apostolic authority. »

[That most famous passage must not be omitted in which Vincent of Lerins expressed the same rule most luminously, Commonit., c. 2 and 3: « In the Catholic Church itself every care must be taken that we hold that which has been believed everywhere, always, and by all. But this is done in truth only if we follow universality, antiquity, and consent. And we shall follow universality in this way, if we confess that one faith alone to be true which the whole Church throughout the world confesses; antiquity truly in this way, if we in no wise depart from those meanings which it is manifest our holy ancestors and fathers proclaimed; and consent likewise in this way, if in antiquity itself we follow the definitions and opinions of all, or certainly of almost all, priests and doctors alike. »]

I answer. 2°: The rule for discerning divine tradition, insofar as it is distinguished from apostolic tradition, is: If the Church holds something as of faith, or holds that something is to be observed which only God can institute, it is divine tradition handed down to us through the Apostles. The reason is, because the Church cannot err. Therefore what she says is of faith, or is to be observed, is so. — I subjoin. Yet nothing is of faith unless it has been delivered immediately by God; nor can that be truly said to be observed which only God can institute, if it has not been instituted by God. Therefore. Such divine traditions are the baptism of infants, the validity of the baptism of heretics, the perpetual virginity of blessed Mary, that the three sacraments, Baptism, Confirmation, and Order, are indelible, etc.

I said: « Handed down to us through the Apostles »; because after the times of the Apostles the Church has no new revelations, but all things to be held by faith were revealed to the Apostles by God, either through Christ speaking, or through the Holy Spirit dictating and teaching all things, according to the promises made to them by Christ, Ioann., XIV and XVI. Therefore when the Church defines something as delivered by God and to be believed by divine faith, she does not create a new article of faith; for that was already of faith, though not explicitly, having been revealed to the Apostles: but she declares that what was not known to be of the faith must now be held to be so, as we have already observed elsewhere.

The other rule for discerning divine tradition is: When the Fathers of the first centuries unanimously hold some unwritten thing as of faith, and condemn its opposite as heretical, it is divine tradition.

The question now concerns principally those divine traditions which the heretics of today contend must not be admitted.

: Besides Sacred Scripture, divine traditions must necessarily be admitted.

Proof. 1° from Scripture. The Apostle, 2 Thess., II, 14, says: Hold fast and keep the traditions which you have learned, whether by word or by epistle, that is, whether by voice or in writing. And he is speaking of divine traditions pertaining to the faith, for he there exhorts the Thessalonians to remain in the faith.

[The Gospels point to the necessity of tradition. Of Christ it is said, Mark, VI, 34, that he began to teach them many things, although not one single head of this abundant teaching was recorded. Luke, XXIV, 27 — to the disciples going to Emmaus, beginning from Moses and all the prophets, he interpreted in all the Scriptures the things that were concerning himself. Yet nothing of this divine exposition was consigned to Scripture. St. John, who outlived all the Evangelists and the sacred writers and could read through their writings, says, John, XXI, 25: There are also many other things which Jesus did, which, if they were written every one, I do not think the world itself could contain the books that would have to be written. Yet many things which Jesus thus taught, and which were not written by the sacred authors, ought not to have perished, since they were necessary for the constitution of the Church, the instruction of men, and the sanctification of souls. Therefore, with tradition rejected, a necessary medium of divine revelation is cast aside, and indeed the perfect one, without which the whole Christian faith cannot be had.

And the Apostles themselves did not write everything they had received from Christ. In the passage cited above, Paul equates doctrine spread by word, that is, by oral tradition, with the doctrine handed down in his epistle. Gal., I, 6, he says: I praise you, brethren, that in all things you are mindful of me, and keep my precepts as I delivered them to you. St. John does not send Christians exclusively to the Gospels, nor to his own writings and those of the other Apostles, but most strongly inculcates tradition as the norm of salvation, 1 John, II, 24: Let that which you have heard from the beginning abide in you. If what you have heard from the beginning shall abide in you, you also shall abide in the Son. Just as it is necessary to abide in the Father and the Son, so it is necessary also to abide in what has been heard from the beginning and was transmitted to others through tradition. He adds there too, at verses 18 and 22, that those who do not so abide are antichrists. — Many other passages could be brought forward.]

Proof. 2° from the Fathers. What authority traditions possessed after the canon of the Scriptures was completed is demonstrated most abundantly from the testimonies of the Fathers, some few of which it will be enough to note. St. Irenaeus, book II contra Haer., c. 2, complains that the heretics of that age, like the more recent innovators, agree neither with the Scriptures nor with tradition: « For when, he says, they are refuted from the Scriptures, they turn to accusing the very Scriptures, as though they were not correct. But when we appeal to them again concerning that tradition which is from the Apostles, which is guarded by the succession of presbyters in the churches, they set themselves against tradition. » Clement of Alexandria, book VII Strom., c. 16: « As if anyone were made a beast out of a man, so has he ceased to be a man of God and faithful to the Lord who kicked against ecclesiastical tradition and leapt down into the opinions of human heresies. » Tertullian, in his work de Praescriptionibus, is wholly given to upholding the dogma of tradition. Epiphanius, Orat. III contra Eunom.: « But tradition also is needed; for not everything can be sought from the Scriptures. Therefore the most holy Apostles left some things in writing, others by tradition. Which Paul himself affirms in these words: As I delivered them to you. » St. Jerome, contra Luciferianos, c. 4: « Even were the authority of Scripture wanting, the consent of the whole world on this side would obtain the force of a precept; for many other things also which are observed in the churches by tradition have usurped to themselves the authority of the written law. » And thus, unanimously, the doctors of the later ages.]

Proof. 3° from facts. There are many things to be believed with divine faith which even the heretics believe, and yet which are not contained expressly in Scripture, but are held by tradition alone, such as that the Father is unbegotten, that little children are to be baptized, that those baptized by heretics are not to be rebaptized, that the Mother of God remained a virgin before and after childbirth, that there are four Gospels and not more, etc. These things, I say, and many others are believed with divine faith in the Church; these the heretics themselves believe; and yet they are not contained in Scripture, but are held from tradition alone; indeed their very principle, which they believe most firmly, that nothing is to be received unless it is expressed in Scripture, is not found in Scripture. Therefore, willing or unwilling, they are compelled to admit traditions.

It is confirmed. Whence do the heretics know that the Scripture which they commend so greatly is sacred and divine? Not from Scripture itself, for it does not say so; and if it did say so, we would not be bound to believe it in this respect any more than in the others, unless it were first established from elsewhere that it is divine; for it is not infallible except because it is divine. Therefore, in order that I may believe it when it asserts itself to be divine, it must first be established for me from elsewhere that it is divine; otherwise I would be bound to believe as divine Scripture every book that asserts itself to be from God, even the Koran itself. Therefore from tradition alone it is known that this, and not another, Scripture is sacred and divine.

[You will object 1°: Traditions are condemned in the Scriptures. Therefore. — It is proved above. Deut., IV, 2, it is said: You shall not add to the word that I speak to you, neither shall you take away from it. Matt., XV, 6: You have made void the commandment of God because of your tradition. Gal., I, 8: Though we, or an angel from heaven, preach unto you besides that which we have preached unto you, let him be anathema. Apoc., XXII, 18: If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues written in this book.

I answer. I deny the antecedent. To the first: Moses forbids anything to be added to the word of God under a perverse interpretation, corrupting, altering, attacking it. But he does not forbid another word of God to be added, whether written or handed down; otherwise all the canonical books written afterwards would have to be rejected. — To the second: Christ condemns merely human traditions, by which teachers of a false name, under the appearance of interpretation, disfigured the law of God, as is sufficiently shown from his own words, Matt., V, 43 and 44: You have heard that it hath been said: Thou shalt love thy neighbor, and shalt hate thine enemy. But I say to you: Love your enemies. These words, And thou shalt hate thine enemy, had been added by those doctors to the text of Lev., XIX, 18, as though following by contrariety. — To the third: praeter, in the words of the Apostle, is taken for contra, as in that passage of the same Apostle, Rom., XVI, 17: Now I beseech you, brethren, to mark them who make dissensions and offenses contrary to the doctrine which you have learned, and avoid them. — To the fourth: the answer is the same; or it must be said that St. John forbids anything to be added to his book as though it were part of it.]

[You will object 2°: Scripture suffices. Therefore. — It is proved above. The Apostle, 2 Tim., III, 15-17, says: « From your infancy you have known the sacred letters, which can instruct you unto salvation, through the faith which is in Christ Jesus. All doctrine divinely inspired is profitable to teach, to reprove, to correct, to instruct in justice: that the man of God may be perfect, instructed unto every good work. » Therefore.

I answer. The letters which Timothy had learned from his infancy were the old Scriptures; for at that time the New Testament was not yet written, or at least not yet complete. But the old letters could instruct Timothy initiatively, not consummatively. The Apostle adds that all doctrine divinely inspired is useful in order that the man of God may be perfect, and he does not say that it is sufficient. Thus piety is useful in order that a man may be a perfect shepherd in the governance of the Church of God, but it does not suffice.

The texts of the holy Fathers invoked against tradition are likewise to be understood, namely of merely human traditions and not legitimate ones.]

[Before we treat of the judicial rules of faith, namely the Church, the supreme Pontiff and the general council, it seems opportune not to pass over entirely the holy Fathers, who are witnesses of the faith, and to whose consensus appeal is made to establish what belongs to ecclesiastical tradition and to settle doctrinal questions

I say: The life of the soul is conferred through faith and baptism. Therefore those are called fathers who confer life of the soul on others, either through baptism or through instruction. Thus the Apostle Paul claimed for himself the name of father, writing to the faithful whom he had spiritually begotten, 1 Cor., IV, 15: You have not many fathers. For in Christ Jesus I begot you through the Gospel. Fathers of the Church, then, are called those who illustrated the whole Church by their writings, strengthening and spreading the faith, and whom the Church herself receives and venerates as such. For preserving tradition pure, no more fitting means is had than the unanimous consensus of the holy Fathers, namely of those holy doctors of the Church who taught not at one and the same time, nor in one and the same place. If even for a moment unbelievers were to use reason, it will be impossible for them to accuse men so great of the slightest fraud, and Catholics will marvel at the providence of God, by which at every time there were raised up distinguished witnesses of the faith who, holding perfectly the dogmas proper to their own age, handed down all things incorrupt to posterity in their writings.

You will ask 1° what conditions are required for an ecclesiastical writer to be called a Father of the Church.

I answer. The following conditions are required: 1° Distinguished doctrine, because by force of their name and office they must teach the whole Church, which holds them as its masters. Moreover, they handed down this doctrine not as their own and personal, but received it from the Apostles or from the successors of the Apostles, as handed on, as it were, from hand to hand, as the Vatican synod says, and diligently guarded it and recorded it in their writings. Hence sometimes several of them are called apostolic Fathers, inasmuch as, living in the apostolic age, they held and preached the doctrine of the Apostles. 2° It is required, not only communion with the Catholic Church down to the end, but also uncommon holiness of life; because, that they may be truly spiritual fathers, they must instruct others in the Christian life and lead them to salvation not only by their writings but also by a splendid example of virtue. If Tertullian and Origen are objected, who are counted among the Fathers although they fell into grave errors, it must be answered that they are not regarded as such except for the time during which, professing Catholic doctrine, they were also conspicuous for holiness. 3° A certain antiquity is required. Formerly certain bishops or priests, not so long deceased, illustrious for learning and sanctity, were soon numbered among the Fathers as soon as it was established throughout the universal Church that their doctrine was orthodox. Today, however, the period of the Fathers is so limited that St. Bernard, who died in the year 1153, is held to be the last of them. Indeed, to several, St. Bonaventure and St. Thomas Aquinas seemed to close the procession of the Fathers; but more commonly it is held that the patristic age was closed before the scholastic age, of which these are the more illustrious doctors. 4° To these is added the approbation of the Church, which takes place either through an ecumenical council, or through the supreme Pontiff, or through the consensus of the Church dispersed throughout the world. 5° Episcopal dignity is not required in a Father; for St. Jerome was a priest, St. Ephrem was a deacon, and St. Prosper of Aquitaine had, more probably, remained in the lay state.

You will ask 2° by what right some ecclesiastical writers have been honored with the title of Doctor.

I answer. Those are held as Doctors whose doctrine is preeminent and specially commended by the Church. Hence it belongs only to the teaching Church, and ordinarily to the supreme Pontiff, to confer this title authentically. The age of Doctors is restricted by no limits, because on account of admirable sanctity and preeminent doctrine men of distinction can at any time be declared Doctors by the Church. Therefore it has happened repeatedly that someone was proclaimed a Doctor of the Church without on that account being a Father, because antiquity was lacking. Already long ago, according to the number of the Evangelists, four great Doctors were recognized both in the Eastern and in the Western Church, namely: in the East, SS. Athanasius, Basil the Great, Gregory Nazianzen and John Chrysostom; in the West, SS. Ambrose, Augustine, Jerome, Gregory the Great. To these there must be added by the same right: SS. Leo the Great, Peter Chrysologus, Isidore of Seville, John Damascene, Anselm, Bernard, Thomas Aquinas and Bonaventure. There were added by Pius IX, SS. Hilary of Poitiers, at the request of the last Council of Bordeaux, Alphonsus Liguori and Francis de Sales. Finally Leo XIII ordered that SS. Peter Damian and both Cyrils, of Alexandria and of Jerusalem, be honored as Doctors in the universal Church.

You will ask 3° with what authority the Fathers and Doctors prevail in the Church.

I answer. by distinguishing. Sometimes the Fathers and Doctors present monuments of tradition, and wrote as witnesses of the doctrine which prevailed in their time; sometimes, indeed, they take upon themselves the role of theologians and doctors, who defend the articles of the faith, illustrate doctrine, and speak from their own resources.

1° When they present themselves as witnesses of the tradition and faith of the Church, and teach in agreement in matters of faith and morals, their authority is infallible. Not, however, is this to be understood as if either separately or together they were infallible; but because they represent the magisterium of the Church, teaching what the Church teaches, which cannot err. For if all the Fathers and Doctors, whenever they agree in some opinion, were to err, the whole Church would err, seeing that she is bound to follow her doctors, and does follow them. Hence, when some doctrine is to be defined, the Fathers who wrote on it are consulted, so that through them it may be established what the Church has always and everywhere held.

2° Otherwise stands the matter when the consensus is not unanimous, or when the authority of individual Fathers is in question, or when the Fathers undertake the office of theologians. For it is certain and evident that neither sanctity nor learning excludes every danger of error, as the case of St. Cyprian concerning baptism conferred by heretics proves, and the opinion of others about the millennial kingdom. Hence the following rules are to be laid down: 1° If different Fathers seem to hold different views, it must be concluded that from their authority the truth of such a doctrine cannot be established. Yet it does not follow from this that the truth cannot be drawn from elsewhere, or that there is no divinely handed-down truth on this point; for it can happen that after a dissension among some doctors, later, once the question had been more fully aired, a perfect consensus followed. 2° The suffrage of several, yet distinguished, Fathers suffices, the others not objecting, to settle the dispute. This appears from the practice of the councils, which were content to have adduced ten or twelve Fathers in proving dogmas and condemning heresies. 3° The utterances of individual Fathers generally indeed carry great authority in matters of faith and morals, above all those of men who excelled the rest in wisdom; nevertheless they are not able to furnish an absolute argument. Hence we are bound neither to believe them free from error nor to follow them in everything; but where weighty reasons persuade, it is permitted, with due reverence, to abandon them and follow the opposite opinion. Imprudently, therefore, would act the man who would take any single one of the holy Fathers as his chosen guide in such a way that whatever he found in him he would proclaim as most certain truths placed beyond all controversy. Justly therefore Alexander VIII condemned, 4 Aug. 1690, this proposition, n. 30: « Where anyone finds a doctrine clearly grounded in Augustine, he can hold and teach it absolutely, without regard to any bull of the Pontiff. » 4° The writings of those carry greater authority who, defending the faith of the Church as leaders against heresy, undertook the especial defense of some dogma of the faith. For as soon as new errors came forth, divine providence raised up Fathers long before predestined, outstanding not only in love of guarding the truth but in acuteness of genius and abundantly illumined by the grace of God, whom therefore it is especially fitting to hear and follow in such and such a question. As examples, let there be, in the matter of grace, St. Augustine; on the incarnation, St. Cyril of Alexandria and St. Leo the Great. 5° The authority of the Fathers does not extend to profane sciences and human arts; because divine revelation does not embrace those disciplines, and in matters of this kind the Fathers for the most part followed profane or pagan authors.]

[Since we are weighing the dogmatic authority of the sacred liturgy, inasmuch as it is an authentic monument of ecclesiastical tradition, attention must be given only to legitimate liturgies, that is, those approved by the Church. For there arose, especially in the last century and at the beginning of the present one, particularly in Gaul, new liturgies substituted either for the Roman liturgy itself, or for the other ancient liturgies which had been declared legitimate by St. Pius V, in the constitution Quod a nobis — either because they were approved by the Apostolic See from their first institution, or because they had been in use for two hundred years. These more recent liturgies, introduced contrary to the law, are stripped by that very fact of all authority. Moreover, since they were, for the most part, drawn up by men more or less hostile to the Roman See, not only must the genuine doctrine of the Church be sought out in them with care; certainly many things were deliberately inserted into them which appear singular or paradoxical, sometimes even false. Hence they are to be regarded as of no account by a theologian who wishes to establish the ancient faith from the formulas of sacred worship. Happily, therefore, those new and illegitimate liturgies, with the approval and encouragement of the Apostolic See, were everywhere abolished by the bishops, and the Roman liturgy restored in the churches of Gaul, so that all, being of one mind toward one another according to Jesus Christ, with one accord glorify God with one mouth. Rom., XV, 5 and 6. Among the liturgies taken separately, those are to be preferred for asserting true doctrine which have been received into the nobler use in the Church. Among the Western churches the Roman liturgy holds first place, then the ancient Gallican and Hispanic liturgy, commonly called Mozarabic, to which must be joined the Ambrosian, which is still retained in the metropolitan church of Milan. Among the Eastern churches the liturgy of James claims the principal place, the most ancient of all, which flourished among most of the Eastern churches and is still observed today in many places. After it come the Greek liturgies which take their names from SS. Cyril, Basil, and Chrysostom, and the Armenian liturgy.

Dico: The authority of the liturgy must be held in the highest esteem, and it must be regarded as an irrefragable witness of tradition and of the faith of the Church.

Proof. 1° from authorities. Pope St. Celestine, writing to the bishops of Gaul against the error of the Pelagians, says in epistle xxi: « Besides these inviolable sanctions of the most blessed and Apostolic See, by which our most pious fathers, casting down the pride of pestilential novelty, taught us to refer to the grace of Christ the beginnings and growths of good will and of approved studies, and perseverance in them unto the end, let us also consider the sacraments of the priestly prayers, which, handed down from the Apostles, are celebrated uniformly throughout the whole world and in every catholic Church, so that the law of praying may establish the law of believing. » What could be more explicit? Augustine, epist. 217¹, to Vitalis, a favorer of Pelagianism, c. 1, n. 2: « Bring forth your disputations against the prayers of the Church; and when you hear the priest of God exhorting the people of God at the altar to pray for unbelievers, that God may convert them to the faith, and for catechumens, that he may inspire in them the desire of regeneration, and for the faithful, that by his gift they may persevere in what they have begun to be: receive those pious voices, and say that you do not do what he exhorts, that is, that God does not pray for unbelievers to make them faithful, on the ground that these benefits are not gifts of divine mercy but offices of human will. » The holy Doctor intends to prove from the liturgical prayers of the Church that the beginning of faith is a gift of God. The same, de Dono perseverantiae, c. 23, n. 63: « Would that those slow of heart and weak, who cannot or who cannot yet understand the Scriptures or their expositions, would so hear, or not hear, our disputations on this question, as to look rather upon their own prayers, which the Church has always had from her beginnings, and will have until this age is brought to its end! » Here he demonstrates equally from the public prayers of the Church that final perseverance is a gratuitous gift of God.

Proof. 2° from the nature and end of the liturgy. For the liturgy is ordered to the public worship to be rendered to God, and to procuring the sanctification of souls through supplications, sacrifice, and the administration of the sacraments. Further, included in divine worship is the honor to be paid to the saints, whom God, sanctified by his grace, has set before us for our example and succor, as is said in the prayer of the feast of St. William. Yet scarcely any dogma of the faith exists among those which the Catholic Church professes to which the liturgical formulas do not bear witness.

1° As to the truths to be believed: in her liturgy the Church openly professes the dogmas of the Trinity, of the divinity of the Word and of the Holy Spirit, of the divinity of Christ, of the truth of the incarnation and of the redemption that followed from it, of the Mother of God, of virginity not only but of integrity in childbirth, of the primacy of St. Peter and of the Roman Pontiff, of the infallibility of the Church, of the preeminence of bishops over priests, of the necessity of grace, of the propagation of original sin, of the unbloody sacrifice, of the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, of transubstantiation, finally of purgatory and of the cult and invocation of the saints.

2° The administration of the sacraments is daily. From it, therefore, public, constant, and universal testimony is derived concerning the number of these same sacraments, their efficacy, their special effects, and the dispositions required for receiving them rightly. But since from the euchologies of the Greek and Eastern churches, and from the rituals and sacramentaries of the Western or Latin churches, we discover that seven sacraments were everywhere conferred at every time, are not Protestants convicted of audacity, indeed of madness, who reduced them to four or three, and finally to two? The same must be said of the grace which all those documents likewise testify is conferred through them, of the effects which are attributed to three of them with respect to character, of the baptism of infants, of the use of exorcisms, with which Augustine was already pressing the Pelagians of his own age, of the purity of conscience required for approaching the sacred communion, of the practice of auricular confession, and other similar matters,

3° As to what concerns religious worship, what the doctrine of the primitive Church was is thence discovered concerning the veneration of the saints, since we see feast days instituted and fasts celebrated for recalling the memories of the saints, some from the very infancy of the Church herself; concerning the veneration of relics and images; concerning lustral water, which Protestants reject and despise; and very many other things which, if they do not touch dogmas, yet avail greatly to deliver the Roman Church from the calumny so often hurled against her of base superstition.

Now when religious worship is under discussion, what is dealt with is that which is received in the universal Church, not, however, the particular rites which have been handed down for use in individual churches, although these can have a partial value, whether for proving their agreement with the universal Church, or for demonstrating the antiquity and nobility of the churches in which they were customarily observed ²

There are also reckoned among the means, whether general or particular, by which the ancient Catholic tradition can be determined: ecclesiastical history, the remains of ancient Christian monuments, epigraphy, and the writings of the earlier and more recent heretics, insofar as they are opposed to Catholic dogma. These things are indeed treated opportunely in the fuller theological works; but they must be passed over by us, as being confined within stricter limits.]