society, is a problem for whose perfect
solution we must wait the further development of the ideas of
ecclesiastical and civil society. But to wait for growth of subjective
truth was just what De Lamennais could not do. He saw that past
solutions of the problem had been unsuccessful; that in most cases the
Church was eventually drawn into bondage under the State as its creature
and instrument in the cause of tyranny and oppression; that it was
insensibly permeated with the local and national spirit, differentiated
from Catholic Christendom, and severed from the full influence of its
head, the Vicar of Christ. The independence of the Church he rightly
judged to be the great safeguard of the people against the tyranny of
their temporal rulers. In the face of that world-wide spiritual society,
whose voice was at once the voice of humanity and the voice of God, he
felt that "iniquity would stop its mouth," and injustice be put to
shame. Yet all this seemed to him impossible so long as the Church
depended on the State for temporalities, and because he could devise no
form of association that would be guarantee against all abuses, he
therefore insisted on total, severance, not merely as expedient for the
present pressure, but as a divine and eternal principle.

When, therefore, it seemed to him that Gregory XVI. had condemned
Ultramontanism, it was, to De Lamennais, as though he had condemned the
cause of the Church and of humanity, and thrown the weight of his
authority into that of Gallicanism. Here again we see how his mental
intensity and impatience reduced him to the dilemma which found solution
in his apostasy. Holding as he did to the Papal infallibility in a form
far more extreme than that subsequently approved by the Vatican Council,
he was bound in consistency to accept the Pope's decision as infallible
in respect to its expediency and in all its detail. Thus it seemed to
him that the ideal for which he had lived was shattered by a
self-inflicted blow. The infallible voice of humanity had declared
against the cause of humanity. He found himself compelled, in virtue of
his principles, to choose between two alternatives. Either the cause of
humanity, as he conceived it, was not the cause of God; or else the Pope
was not the Vicar of Christ and the divinely-appointed guardian of that
cause. But of the two denials the former was now to him the least
tolerable. "Catholicism," he said, "was my life, because it was that of