would be very inconvenient to answer. "After all,"-the justly indignant people whom they have led might say,— this private judgment you preached was only a pretext, a bait to catch gudgeons. You never meant it; you only meant that we must submit our judgments to yours! Is it true that you monopolize all the learning, all the wisdom, all the judgment, in the world? What guaranty can you give us, fallible men as you confess yourselves, that you yourselves are not deceived,-nay, that you are incapable of deceiving us? You deceived us, when you promised us the right of private judgment. What reason have we to suppose you do not deceive us in other things also?" Such questions might be put, and, if put, it is obvious that it would be very incon

venient to answer them.

The first method is disproved; the second is abandoned; only the third remains. This, that of a single individual duly commissioned by Almighty God to announce the fact of inspiration to the world, the professor does not attempt to defend as true, or as one which he does or can hold; but he maintains, that, on Catholic principles, it is probable, and therefore Dr. Lynch is entitled only to a probable conclusion, --not sufficient for his purpose, because he must conclude with absolute certainty. The professor concludes, that, on Catholic principles, this hypothesis is probable, from the fact, that, on Catholic principles, it is a probable opinion that the pope is infallible. But his arguiment involves a transition from one genus to another, and therefore concludes nothing. The single individual asserted in the hypothesis is commissioned in his individual capacity to announce the fact, and it is in this capacity that he is to do it. But such a commissioned individual is not the pope, or sovereign pontiff. No Catholic holds the pope in his individual capacity to be infallible. He is infallible, as we hold, and as we presume Dr. Lynch also holds; but only in his capacity of supreme head of the church, in which sense he is included in the fourth hypothesis, as joined to the body of individuals asserted, inseparable from it, and essential to it. Concede, then, the infallibility of the sovereign pontiff, nothing is conceded in favor of the third method; for in the sense in which he is infallible he is the church, or essentially included in the fourth method; since the head is not without the body, nor the body without the head.

The third method, then, is not the method. Then no one of the first three. Then the fourth is; because some method

of proof does exist, and it can be no other. Mr. Thornwell, therefore, has not refuted Dr. Lynch's argument. If he has not refuted it, against him, it stands good. Then the method of proof is the body supposed. But this body has authority to make an unerring decision on the subject of inspiration, that is, to declare unerringly what is or is not the word of God, therefore infallible in declaring the word of God. But this body is composed of the pastors of the Catholic Church. Therefore the pastors of the church are infallible in declaring the word of God, the proposition Dr. Lynch undertook to prove. It would seem from this, that the learned and logical professor's shouts of victory were decidedly premature. It is clear, also, since we are not considering what is or is not possible in the abstract, but in hac providentia, that the whole controversy turns between the first method and the fourth; for the private spirit is not admissible, and the professor does not defend the second, and cannot, and would not if he could, defend the third. It is, then, either private judgment or the Catholic Church. So the professor virtually concedes or maintains. What, therefore, he further adduces in his Fourth Letter, namely, that it is as easy to prove the inspiration of the Scriptures as the infallibility of the church, cannot be entertained. There does exist some adequate proof; this is conceded. It evidently cannot be the method of private judgment; for it is absolutely impossible for a field slave, for instance, ignorant of letters, and with no time or ability to learn, to be able to decide for himself, on his own examination, whether Tobias or Ecclesiasticus is or is not an inspired composition. But, if not private judgment, it must be the infallible church, and therefore the church and its infallibility follow from the necessity of the case. This necessity overrides every possible objection. Bring as many objections as you please, and we dismiss them, as proving, if any thing, too much, and therefore nothing. Quod nimis probat, nihil probat.

Thus far we have confined ourselves, after stating the question, to showing that the professor has not refuted Dr. Lynch's argument for the infallibility of the church. This has been perfectly gratuitous on our part, for the burden of proof is on the professor. But having vindicated Dr. Lynch's argument for the infallibility of the church, we are now able to conclude it against Mr. Thornwell from the necessity of the case, the strongest argument that it is possible to use. Infallibility overrides all objections; and conse

quently, the professor, let him do his best, cannot prove the fallibility of the church. Here, then, we well might rest; but we find our author rather an amusing companion, and we should be sorry to part company with him so soon. We hope, therefore, to be able, in an early number, to consider the direct proofs of the fallibility of the church, which he has attempted to bring. In the meantime, we recommend him, since he must hold his logical reputation dear, to make himself acquainted with Catholicity, before attempting again to write against it, and review also his logic, before he again asks his opponent to reason in syllogisms.

ARTICLE II.

MR. THORNWELL begins his argument against the churchr (Letter IV.) by asserting, in substance, that we are unable to prove her infallibility, or if able, only by a process which supersedes the necessity of an infallible church to deter mine what is or is not the word of God. "It is just as easy," he says, "to prove the inspiration of the Scriptures as the infallibility of any church." The evidence for both "is of precisely the same nature." The infallibility of the church" the inspiration of Rome," as he improperly expresses it turns upon a promise which is said to have been made nearly two thousand years ago; the inspiration of the New Testament turns upon facts which are said to have transpired at the same time. Both the promise and the facts are to be found, if found at all, in this very New Testament." You must prove its credibility, or you cannot prove the promise; and if you prove its credibility, you prove the facts. Therefore, "you cannot make out the historical proofs of papal infallibility without making out at the same time the historical proofs of Scriptural inspiration." Consequently, if you contend that the proofs are insufficient for the inspiration, you deny their sufficiency for the infallibility, and then cannot assert your infallible church; if you say they are sufficient for the infallibility, you concede their sufficiency for the inspiration, and then do not need your infallible church to determine what is or is not the word of God. (pp. 57-65.)

But Dr. Lynch proves, as we have seen in our former article, and as is sufficiently evident without proof to every one of ordinary reflection, that it is morally impossible to determine, with absolute certainty, what Scriptures are or

are not inspired, except by the infallible church. To assert, after this, that the infallible church itself is provable only by proving Scriptural inspiration, is only asserting, in other words, that no adequate proof of what is or is not inspired Scripture exists. But some adequate method does exist, as Dr. Lynch proves, and Mr. Thornwell concedes. This method, if not private judgment, is the infallible church, as he also virtually concedes; for private illumination is not a method of proof, since, if a fact, it is not a fact that can be adduced in evidence; and the other two methods supposed, namely, the judgment of the learned, and the single individual commissioned by Almighty God to announce the fact of inspiration to the world, he either abandons or cannot assert. The method, then, is either the infallible church, or private judgment. It cannot be private judg ment, if the objections urged against it be conceded. To attempt, without answering these objections, to show that equal objections bear against the church, is, for the purposes of the argument at least, to concede them, and therefore to prove, if any thing, that no adequate method of proof exists, which is not allowable. As long, then, as private judgment remains unrelieved of the objections which declare it an impossible and therefore an unsupposable method, the argument proves too much for the professor as well as for us, and consequently nothing.

This answers sufficiently Mr. Thornwell's reasoning, as far as it is intended to bear against Dr. Lynch's argument for infallibility from the necessity of the case. But we have a higher purpose in view than the simple vindication of Dr. Lynch, or the formal refutation of Professor Thornwell, and will therefore waive this reply and meet the reasoning on its intrinsic merits. Mr. Thornwell's conclusion rests on two assumptions:-1. That in order to establish the infallibility of the church, Catholics are obliged to establish the credibility of the New Testament; and 2. That the credibility of the New Testament, when established, is all that is needed to establish Scriptural inspiration, that is, to settle the question what Scriptures are and what are not inspired. Both of these assumptions we deny.

1. In order to establish the infallibility of the church, it is not necessary to establish the credibility of the New Testament. All that is needed to establish the infallibility is the miraculous origin of the church. If she had a miraculous origin, she was founded by Almighty God; for none

but God can work a miracle. If founded by Almighty God, she is his church and speaks by his authority; therefore infallibly; for God can authorize only infallible truth. In order to make out the miraculous origin of the church, we are not obliged to recur to the New Testament at all; we can do it, and are accustomed to do it, when arguing with avowed unbelievers, without any reference to the authority of the Scriptures, either as inspired or as simple historical documents. We do it by taking the church as we find her to-day, existing as an historical fact, and tracing her up, step by step, through the succession of ages, till we ascend to her original Founder. The extraordinary nature of her claims, uniformly put forth, and steadily acted upon from the first; her various institutions, professing to embody facts, which could not in the nature of things have sprung from no facts, or from facts pertaining exclusively to the natural order; the external history which runs parallel to hers; the relation held to her from the beginning by the Jewish and pagan worlds, and by the various heresies in each succeeding age from the Gnostics down to the followers of the Mormon prophet;-all these combined prove in the most incontestable manner her supernatural character, and triumphantly establish the fact that her Founder must have had miraculous powers, and she a miraculous origin.

Undoubtedly, the infallibility of the church turns, in the argument, upon a promise made nearly two thousand years ago; but it is not true that the promise must necessarily be found only in the New Testament. A promise may be expressed in acts as well as in words, in the fact as well as in its record. The promise we rely upon is expressed in the miraculous origin of the church, and is concluded from it on the principle, that the effect may be concluded from the cause, if the cause be known. In the natural order, God, in giving to a being a certain nature, promises that being all that it needs to attain the end of that nature. So in the supernatural order, in creating a supernatural being, he promises it all the powers, assistance, means, and conditions necessary to enable it to discharge its supernatural functions, or to gain the supernatural end to which he appoints it. In supernaturally founding the church to teach his word, he therefore promises her infallibility in teaching it; because the function of teaching the word of God cannot be discharged without it.

2. But even if we were obliged-as we are not and can