to do so; also to check
the usurpation of State, when they begin to reach in this direction; and
in the exercise of this prerogative she is not guarded from error. I
have already shown how slow, cautious and gentle, has been her dealing
on the whole with controversies that do relate to faith; much more so
has she been in the kindred but outer domain. Still, to our fallible
reason, it may sometimes appear that she acts hastily and wrongly in
forbidding certain things. She forbids at one epoch what she allows in
another; tacitly withdrawing the former condemnation. This, I repeat,
_is_ a difficulty, and, stated baldly thus, must often perplex even
Catholics.

But let our opponents be as candid as I have been. Let them admit--what
is no more than a fact--that this prerogative of the Church has been
exercised very seldom; and that even on the most of these occasions, the
Church has in the end proved to be in the right, and the supposed martyr
in the wrong. Things are not to be judged simply in themselves, but a
course of events prove them; and there is a season for all matters, and
a season when they are not in order. This right or power is a necessity
to every constituted body of whatever kind. A State, for instance, may
wrongly condemn a man for some offence; but that is no argument against
the State having the right of judging in such matters, even if it must
incur the danger of wrong judgment once more. If this prerogative were
taken from the Church, all outside the simple domain of faith would fall
into a mere chaos. Now, let the man who holds that this would be as it
should be, let him consistently carry out his doctrine into all the
concerns of life, and a hideous chaos would be the result. Has not such
been the result in religious matters outside the Catholic Church? And as
chaos has resulted there from revolt against the constituted authority,
so would it be in society at large, were the theory consistently carried
out. To say that non-infallible exercise of authority should, on account
of occasional error, be resisted and overthrown, is simply suicidal; and
an objection founded on it is no more than an objection founded on the
fact of evil in man's nature, of which it is a necessary part. And into
this bottomless pit of doubt I for one do not purpose to fall.

Let the problem, then, be fully grasped. It is to secure sufficient
liberty and a stable authority. Freedom in itself is a good; but such is
man's fallen