But, is there any real danger of such a disastrous consummation? We answer, that the mere coexistence of the theory of Ecclesiastical Development with the infidel speculations on the doctrine of Human Progress is of itself an ominous symptom; and, further, that the mutual interchange of complimentary acknowledgments between the Infidel and Popish parties is another, especially when both are found to coincide in some of the main grounds of their opposition to Scripture as the supreme rule of faith, and when the homage which the advocates of Development render to the theory of progress is responded to by glowing eulogiums from the infidel camp on the genius of Catholicism as the masterpiece of human policy. But there are other grounds of apprehension, arising more directly out of the very nature of the theory of Development itself. That theory has been described by Dr. Brownson--himself a convert to Catholicism--as the product of "a _school_ formed, at first, outside of the Church, but now brought within her communion," and compared, in regard to its dangerousness, with the speculations of Hermes and Lamennais.[94] And a still more competent judge--Professor Sedgwick, of Cambridge[95]--has characterized it as "a monstrous compound of Popery and Pantheism," according to which "the Catholic faith is not a religion revealed to us in the Sacred Books we call canonical, and in the works of the Fathers which are supposed to contain the oral traditions of the Apostles and their followers; but a new Pantheistic element is to be fastened on the faith of men,--a principle of Development which may overshadow both the _verbum Dei scriptum_ and the _verbum Dei non scriptum_ of the Romish Church, and change both the form and substance of primitive Christianity." It is only justice to Mr. Newman to say that he appears to have been aware of this possible objection to his theory, and that he makes an attempt to obviate it. Speaking of the difficulty which the Church experienced in keeping "Paganism out of her pale," he adverts to "the _hazard which attended on the development_ of the Catholic ritual,--such as the honors publicly assigned to saints and martyrs, the formal veneration of their relics, and the usages and observances which followed." And he asks: "What was to hinder the rise of a sort of refined Pantheism, and the overthrow of Dogmatism _pari passu_ with the multiplication of heavenly intercessors and patrons? If what is called in reproach 'Saint-worship' resembled the Polytheism which it supplanted, or was a corruption, how did Dogmatism survive? Dogmatism is a religious profession of its own reality as contrasted with other systems; but Polytheists are liberals, and hold that one religion is as good as another. Yet the theological system was developing and strengthening, as well as the monastic rule, all the while the ritual was assimilating itself, as Protestants say, to the Paganism of former ages."[96]