Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 69, No. 427, May, 1851Various
General
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 69, No. 427, May, 1851
Various
England -- Periodicals; Scotland -- Periodicals
If such be the interpretations from Scripture, the Fathers and Councils
of the ancient Church are handled according to pleasure. Whatever they
say in opposition to the Papacy is of no authority; and the power of
"correcting them" is assumed. Directions are given for the "Index
Expurgatorius," that passages shall be expunged; nay, the Fathers of
the Church, it is said, should be grateful for the correction--for
the Fathers of the Church are the children of the Pope, and when "the
Pope revises the lucubrations of his children, and corrects them when
it is necessary, he discharges an office gratifying to the writers,
and useful to posterity, and, in good truth, he then performs a work
of mercy to his sons." Neither Scripture nor ancient Church must
stand in the way of the Pope's will. In them the mystery was in a
"seminal state" undeveloped. There is, according to this theory of
development, but one real authentic inspiration, and that in the breast
of the present Pope. Nay, it is asserted, that though the Pope for
the time being should decree that which his successor contradicts and
interdicts, the falsehood was true at the time, and for the time, as is
the new developed truth. Thus--dreadful blasphemy!--God may be false;
but man, one man, must be infallible. To support this infallibility
the development theory is necessary. Now, it is this theory reduced
to practice which at once makes the Papacy dangerous and hard to deal
with. We have no security as to what it shall decree--as to what it
shall establish as Christian doctrine, built upon no really Christian
foundation. It is possible it may retain the name, and forsake
Christianity altogether. We can be sure but of one thing, that it
will never cease to proclaim, and to endeavour to enforce, its own
supremacy. It has two capacities, mutually involved, each brought into
play as occasion serves; and each serving, subtending to the other.
It is both political and spiritual. But times and circumstances, we
are told, are changed. True, but is the Popedom changed? It only wants
the power. Pius V., who pretended to depose our Queen Elizabeth,
and ordered her subjects to rise in rebellion against her, is now
_worshipped as a saint_. Gregory VII., who deposed the Emperor Henry
IV., has still his festival-day; and these words are in the second
Lesson (not taken from Scripture)--"He" (St Gregory) "stood like a
fearless wrestler against the impious attempts of Henry the Emperor,
and deprived him of the communion of the faithful and of his crown,
and released all his subjects from their allegiance to him." Roman
Catholic sovereigns have prohibited the printing this second lesson;
but is it withdrawn? "As far as the Roman Pontiffs are concerned, it is
read in every Church at this day." But, more than this; though formerly
suppressed by the Parliament of France, 1729, it has found its way into
the Paris and Lyons edition of the Roman Breviary of the year 1842. The
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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