CHAPTER IV.

SECOND PLENARY COUNCIL OF BALTIMORE-NOTABLE SERMON BY ARCHBISHOP PETER RICHARD. HIS SILVER JUBILEE-VISIT TO ROME-RETURNING, GOES TO DUBLIN AND RECEIVES A PLEASANT GREETING.

more.

In 1866 was held the Second Plenary Council of BaltiIt lasted for a fortnight-from the 7th until the 21st of October. The Archbishop was one of the most notable figures at the gathering. He was the last of the prelates and priests who preached to the assembly, and his discourse, as it appears amongst the official reports given in a special volume devoted to these deliverances, is brief. But it is eminently deserving of an attentive consideration, inasmuch as the reader will find in its propositions the broad lines of thought which found expression at the Vatican Council in an attitude of dissent from the opinions of the majority. It is unnecessary now to treat this subject save in an historical manner. But, regarded merely as the natural development of an internal idea long held and long germinating in the Church, it is proper to examine the trend of reasoning which influenced a few men of the highest intellectual rank no less than spiritual intensity to resist the cry for a declaration of infallibility disconnected with the general episcopal body. It will be noted with what stress. the preacher dwells, toward the close, on the necessity of absolute and unquestioning obedience to the principle of authority as the fundamental principle of the Catholic system.

"Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.'-St. Paul x., 17.

A PRECURSOR SERMON.

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"This statement of the Apostle, as the construction of the sentence implies, is a conclusion from something that had been said before, because, in the same Gospel, it is also said 'Faith is by hearing, and hearing by the Word of Christ.' He had declared in the preceding part of the chapter that those 'who should call on the name of the Lord would be saved,' and then puts a series of questions: 'How, then, shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? Or how shall they believe Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they preach unless they be sent?' Faith, then, comes by hearing, but hearing by the Word of God. The principle announced and embodied in these words is a fundamental fact in the history of revealed religion, and imposing as is the spectacle presented to you during the last two weeks, of Bishops from every part of the country-from its Pacific to its Atlantic shores-assembled in Council; grand as is the scene at which we are now assisting, something more imposing is embodied in the fact of which we are witnesses, that is in the principle that faith, according to the dispensation of God, was provided for by God to man by the ministration of men; and, therefore, I shall divide what I have to say into three propositions. The first proposition is that Godour divine Lord and Saviour Jesus-has established a body of men, whom He sent in His name, to whom He gave the commission to announce His doctrine to His people; that He has perpetuated the existence of that commission, and that at every period, from the commencement of Christianity, the same essential power and duties exist as were first constituted. My next proposition is this: That this commissioned body is perpetuated by the rite of ordination and by the transmission of the right to exercise that power in the transmission of orders. My third is the testimony borne by this

body to the facts which establish the divine mission of Jesus Christ, and to the doctrine which He announced. In treating of this subject, I shall abstain from the consideration of those texts of Scripture which might be adduced to prove it. I shall consider the subject, as it were, on its merits. When I refer to Scripture, it will be for the purpose of stating facts which are never denied, or else on questions requiring me to use the absolute language of Holy Writ.

"First, then, Christ established a body of men perpetually to exist, to teach His doctrine and to administer His sacraments. Presupposing the principle, which common sense dictates, that no man can act for another except by delegated authority, which appears when St. Paul says: 'How, then, can they preach unless they be sent?' I shall confine myself to the statement that Christ sent men-a body of men-to teach perpetually. In the 21st verse of the 20th chapter of the Gospel of St. John we read that our Divine Lord, after His resurrection, appeared to His Apostles and said: 'As the Father has sent Me, so I also send you,' and that this promise was made, that this commission was given, to the Apostles, not as individuals, but as a body, will be acknowledged by every one who recollects that Thomas was not present, for certainly no one would say that he did not therefore receive the Apostolic ministry. We do not know that he received it on any other occasion; and as he was represented in that body, so all representatives of that body, to the most distant ages, receive the commission and the powers of the ministry. But was this power to have its existence continued? The same principle which guides men in the interpretation of delegated power is applicable here. If power be given for special purposes, and no limitation of time be affixed to its continuance, that power subsists until actually recalled,

APOSTOLIC COMMISSION UNLIMITED.

305 or until the object for which it was established has been attained.

"These are principles universally admitted in legislative decrees. What was the object for which Christ gave power to the twelve to teach all nations, to instruct all creatures?—the object even of divine authority. Says the Apostle in the 4th verse of the 2d chapter of the 1st Epistle of St. Paul to Timothy, 'God wishes that all men be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth.' The object, then, was that of perpetuating this authority; and, as long as human society exists on earth, His mercy extends to it, and the commission to carry the tidings of salvation to men must subsist. Is there any limit assigned to this commission? He who gave it still lives -the immortal God, the King of all ages. The proof is drawn from the words of the commission, and, as it was so ably placed before you in the instruction of last Sunday evening, I shall refrain from considering it. Let us consider if any reason exists for supposing that the commission might be changed, was meditated, or might follow, having regard only to the nature and object of the commission and to Him who gave it. It may be said that the authority of the Apostles may not be supposed to exist in those who succeeded them in the ministry, and that when there is a question of special privilege of Apostleship, of universal jurisdiction, appointed in the Church of Christ-when it is a question of individual inspiration, a question of express powers exercised in restoring the sick and lame to health and vigor and the dead to life-were these special privileges to descend to all who, when the Apostles should have passed away, were to follow them in the ministry? But it is a question now only of the purpose of miracles-of the purpose of power to preach the name of Christ and to administer the sacraments-and this descends through

all ages from those who had the power from the first Depositor of power. But you may say that the authority of a delegate rests on the authority of the person who gave it; so that, in the case of the Christian Church, there may be a term to its power, as there was in the Jewish Church. There is no parity whatever between the two instances. In the case of the Jewish Church the law was only typical of future good things, and moreover contained special predictions of a coming Messiah, and commands to hear the prophet whom God promised to raise up, and to obey Him as the Israelites obeyed Moses. There was a term set to the power of the priesthood, and in fulfilling the prophecies and working miracles Jesus Christ showed that whatever were the powers of the Jewish priesthood, He recalled them, and in so doing showed that He who gave these powers cared for and guarded them, lest this divine institution might be abused, as it would in the destruction of the city and sanctuary, and in the dispersion of the people, rendering it impossible to fulfill the law, because it was only at Jerusalem that the rite of sacrifice could subsist. There is no parity whatever between the two Churches, and my argument, I submit, retains its force that the power given to the Apostles resides in that body of which they were the first members. That body subsists, and must always subsist, so long as men remain on the earth. How is this body perpetuated? and who, at the present day, are the inheritors and participators in the apostolical communion? The power of the ministry not descending, as in the Old Law, from father to son, but by the laying on of hands, as is shown from Scripture, in the 6th verse of the 1st chapter of St. Paul's Epistle to Timothy, where the Apostle admonishes him 'to stir up the grace of God by the laying on of hands.' This could not, of itself, communicate the powers of the ministry; it must be by