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covering and determining them not possessed by each individual himself.

We replied, 1. Whether the Church, as an aggregate of individuals, does or does not possess faculties for determining the means of salvation, not possessed by each individual himself, has nothing to do with the question. The faculty of the Church to teach does not depend on the fact that the whole is wiser than a part, or that men taken collectively are wiser than men taken individually ; but on the fact that she has the supernatural assistance of the Holy Ghost. This assistance we predicate of her as a whole, in her organic capacity, as a corporate individual, because it is only in that capacity our Lord has promised it to her. The ground of our belief of the Church is, not the numbers aggregated,

bers aggregated, — although that is much, when the question turns on the value of a purely human authority, — but the promise of our Lord to be always supernaturally present with the Church, leading her into all truth, and enabling her to teach infallibly whatsoever he has commanded her. The question is not, whether one man be or be not equal to many men or all men, as a teacher ; but simply, whether our Lord has commissioned the Church to teach, and promised her infallible assistance in teaching. If he has, she, as teacher, must of course be preferred to the individual, to whom no such assistance is promised.

2. The conclusion, that, after the means of salvation are ascertained, the Church cannot be needed, is premature. Salvation belongs to the supernatural order, and natural reason cannot determine what are the necessary means of gaining it. The means, as well as the end itself, can be known only by supernatural revelation ; and till we are supernaturally informed as to what they are, we cannot say whether, after ascertaining them, the Church will or will not be needed. For aught we can say beforehand, these means may be communion with the Church and the graces received only by a faithful attendance on her ministries and the reception of her sacraments.

3. The assumption, that natural reason is competent to decide, from the intrinsic character of a doctrine, whether it be a revealed doctrine or not, is unauthorized. Revealed doctrines, as to their intrinsic truth, pertain to the supernatural order, and therefore lie out of the range of reason.

Natural reason can judge only of matters which lie within the order of nature, and therefore cannot judge of the intrinsic truth of what transcends that order. The fact of revelation is also a super

natural fact, and requires a supernatural witness. Reason of itself cannot say what God will reveal, whether what is alleged to be revealed is revealed or not, or whether it is true or false. It can only determine whether an alleged revealed doctrine does or does not contradict a principle of reason. If it does, it may reject it as false ; if it does not, it by its own light can neither affirm nor deny it. To contend otherwise would be to contend that natural reason can exceed the ability of natural reason, which is a contradiction in terms.

The minister replied by denying, 1. That the truths revealed pertain to the supernatural order; and, 2. By contending that salvation lies within the order of nature. But he soon abandoned these positions, and agreed that both pertained to the supernatural order. The conversation then turned on the question of salvation. We contended, that, since salvation belongs to the supernatural order, it cannot be determined by reason alone whether there be such a thing as salvation ; if there be, what it is, or what are the means of attaining it ; and, therefore, that these three points, if known at all, must be known supernaturally, and all we can know of them is what, and only what, is supernaturally taught us. This, at first, he denied, but finally conceded, and it was agreed, that to salvation supernatural instruction or knowledge is necessary. But salvation, it was agreed, involves not only an end to be known, but an end to be gained, and therefore, if assumed at all, requires action as well as knowledge, — something to be done as well as to be known. But salvation belongs, as an end, or object to be gained, wholly to the supernatural order. Then the action by which it is to be gained must be supernatural ; since no natural act can, in the nature of things, attain to a supernatural end. The act cannot go out of its own order. If it is purely natural, it is restricted to the order of nature. But the end to be reached by the act is in the supernatural order ; consequently the act, if it is to reach its end, must be supernatural. But a supernatural act requires a supernatural actor, or power to act. Consequently, to salvation it is necessary, as appears from reason itself, that we have, 1. supernatural knowledge to disclose the end and the means ; and, 2. supernatural power or ability to act in reference to that end.

The minister, without expressly denying the necessity of supernatural power, contended that knowledge of the end and means is itself the ability to gain the end ; that the knowledge is the supernatural revelation contained in the Scriptures, interpreted by each one for himself; and therefore whoever has the Scriptures, studies them diligently, and understands them according to the best of his ability, has all the knowledge and power necessary to his salvation.

To this we replied, 1. In the natural order, knowledge of the means and end is not necessarily the ability to gain the end, and that it is so in the supernatural order cannot be affirmed on the authority of reason, and can be affirmed on no authority but that of positive revelation ; 2. That the Scriptures contain a supernatural revelation, that they are to be interpreted by each one for himself, that whoever studies them diligently and understands them according to the best of his ability has all the knowledge and power requisite to salvation, are all matters which lie out of the province of reason, and can be affirmed or denied only on the authority of revelation itself. Till you have determined that you have a revelation, and have settled the question as to what it is and what it teaches, you are not at liberty to assume any one of these points.

The minister answered, that he was authorized to assume them by the authority of the Scriptures themselves.

We added, that this is begging the question; and, moreover, 1. As a matter of fact, the Scriptures do not assert either that the knowledge is the power, or that they are to be privately interpreted ; 2. Private interpretation can be proved from them only by private interpretation ; which, as it is merely proving the same by the same, is very bad logic ; 3. The Scriptures, till proved to be the word of God by a supernatural authority, are themselves no supernatural authority for saying they contain a supernatural revelation. Without the Church, you are obliged to take them on, and interpret them by, a merely human authority; and when so taken and interpreted, they are only a human authority ; for their divine inspiration is a fact which lies out of the province of reason, and can be affirmed only by a supernatural authority.

On this last point our conversation was continued, but broke off before it was fully settled. The minister, however, after strenuous efforts to maintain the contrary, finally conceded that he had no authority but natural reason on which to assert the inspiration of the Scriptures, and that their inspiration was a supernatural fact, of which reason was not in itself a competent judge, - thus to our understanding, though it seems not to his, conceding the whole matter in dispute.

Such is the substance of the conversation to which the letter NEW SERIES. - VOL. I. NO. I.

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refers. Salvation, it was mutually agreed, is eternal life, and belongs wholly to the supernatural order; and our argument was, then it must be unattainable without a supernatural knowledge and a supernatural ability, because man naturally cannot know the supernatural, or perform a supernatural act. The minister saw very clearly, that, if he conceded these points, we should by one or two moves more compel him either to give up salva. tion, or to admit the necessity of the Church as the supernatural teacher, and of the assistance of grace as the supernatural power; and then, perhaps, of the Sacraments, as the channels of grace. In his letter he undertakes to escape the difficulty by proving that man must have the natural ability to know and do the supernatural, or else not be receptive of supernatural assistance, either in knowing or doing. gument rests on the assumption, that the capacity to receive is the ability to do. Reduced to form, it is, — Whatever man has the natural capacity to receive he must have the natural ability to know and do. But he has the natural capacity to receive the supernatural, or else no supernatural assistance — without supposing an infinite series of supernatural assistances, which is absurd - could ever be granted him.

Therefore, he must have the natural ability to know and do the supernatural.

“ Human beings,” he says, “ have no other than human faculties, and man cannot, under any circumstances, receive that for which he has not a receptive capacity.” But he must receive the supernatural or not be saved. “In salvation

« there are at least three things distinct, - the subject, the object, and the instrumentality; or, the Saviour, the saved, and the instrumental action of the Saviour on the saved." This is not correctly expressed. The saved, or one to be saved, is the subject, the salvation is the object, and the instrumentality is the means the Saviour furnishes the subject for gaining the object, and is, properly speaking, himself, who is at once the salvation and its medium. Thus corrected, the minister's sense is, the salvation and the Saviour are both supernatural, but the subject is natural, and, prior to salvation, is at a distance from the Saviour. The two cannot be brought together, and the subject be saved, without the supernatural being brought into contact with the natural, and acting upon it. Therefore, -“ Salvation is possible only on condition that the natural may receive, may know and do, the supernatural.” It is clear from this that the minister assumes that the natural

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capacity to be assisted by the supernatural is the natural ability to know and do the supernatural, which implies that the capacity to receive is identically the ability to do.

But this is not sound philosophy. The simple receptive capacity is very distinguishable from the ability to know and do. A man may have the capacity to receive a thousand pounds with which to pay his honest debts, and yet, before receiving them, no ability to pay a single cent. A man undertakes to raise a weight which exceeds his ability, and asks you to help him. “No, my good man. You either have the capacity to receive assistance, or you have not. If you have not, I cannot assist you ; if you have, you have the ability to do, without my assistance, all you can do with it. and therefore do not need it.” The poor man, we apprehend, would respect your philosophy as little as your neighbourly feeling.

The minister's argument sins, in the first instance, by a bad major; in the second instance, by a conclusion too broad for the premises. All he establishes in his premises is, that the supernatural must come in contact with, and act upon, the natural ; from which all he is entitled to conclude is simply the capacity of the natural to be affected or acted upon by the supernatural. The capacity to receive an action is not, as we have seen, precisely the ability to perform an action ; there is a difference

; between striking and being struck. Consequently, from the capacity of the natural to be affected or acted upon by the supernatural, it cannot be logically concluded that the natural has the ability, without the supernatural, to know and do the supernatural. That the natural has the capacity to receive the the action, or to be acted upon by the supernatural, we grant, if the reception be taken passively, not actively. The active reception of the supernatural is itself supernatural, and the ability to receive it actively is included in the donum or supernatural gift, — is part of the supernatural assistance itself. The minister must prove, in order to prove any thing to his purpose, that the supernatural cannot reach the natural, unless there be, on the part of the natural, prior to its reception, the ability to recognize it as supernatural, and to receive it by a supernatural act, which he cannot prove, and which the nature of the case does not necessitate ; since all that is requisite on the part of the natural, in order to render man capable of being supernaturally assisted, is the naked capacity io be acted on by grace. The moment the grace reaches him, it becomes itself immediately, by its own virtue, a supernatural assistance,

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