elief than to
strangle both discussion and definition, and to disperse without having
uttered a single word that could reinstate the authorities of the Church
in the respect of men. The future depended less on the outward struggle
between two parties than on the process by which the stronger spirit
within the minority leavened the mass. The opposition was as averse to
the actual dogmatic discussion among themselves as in the Council. They
feared an inquiry which would divide them. At first the bishops who
understood and resolutely contemplated their real mission in the Council
were exceedingly few. Their influence was strengthened by the force of
events, by the incessant pressure of the majority, and by the action of
literary opinion.

Early in December the Archbishop of Mechlin brought out a reply to the
letter of the Bishop of Orleans, who immediately prepared a rejoinder,
but could not obtain permission to print it in Rome. It appeared two
months later at Naples. Whilst the minority were under the shock of this
prohibition, Gratry published at Paris the first of four letters to the
Archbishop of Mechlin, in which the case of Honorius was discussed with
so much perspicuity and effect that the profane public was interested,
and the pamphlets were read with avidity in Rome. They contained no new
research, but they went deep into the causes which divided Catholics.
Gratry showed that the Roman theory is still propped by fables which
were innocent once, but have become deliberate untruths since the excuse
of mediaeval ignorance was dispelled; and he declared that this school of
lies was the cause of the weakness of the Church, and called on
Catholics to look the scandal in the face, and cast out the religious
forgers. His letters did much to clear the ground and to correct the
confusion of ideas among the French. The bishop of St. Brieuc wrote that
the exposure was an excellent service to religion, for the evil had gone
so far that silence would be complicity.[389] Gratry was no sooner
approved by one bishop than he was condemned by a great number of
others. He had brought home to his countrymen the question whether they
could be accomplices of a dishonest system, or would fairly attempt to
root it out.

While Gratry's letters were disturbing the French, Doellinger published
some observations on the petition for infallibility, directing his
attack clearly against the doctrine itself. During the excitement that
ensued, h