Footnotes
- 1.
- Whenever we use here the word “modern,” we do not take it in the sense of “present,”—the Christian view of the world is also a present one, and is still of the utmost importance,—but in the sense of “new” in contrast to the time-honoured and inherited.
- 2.
-
The difference between the Protestant and the Catholic manner of reasoning is stated by the convert, Prof. A. von Ruville, as follows:
“My mind had harboured up to now the characteristically Protestant thought that I, from my superior mental standpoint, was going to probe the Catholic Church, that I was going to pass an infallible judgment on her truth or untruth, and this in spite of my being ready to acknowledge the truth in her. But now I became more and more conscious of the fact that it was the Church who had a right to pass judgment on me, that I had to bow to her opinion, that she immeasurably surpassed me in wisdom. Many details, which I was inclined to criticize, demonstrated this to me, for in every instance I recognized that it was my understanding that was at fault, and that what appeared to me as an imperfection was rooted in the deepest truth. In this way I was gradually brought to the real Catholic standpoint, to accept the doctrines immediately as Truth, because they proceeded from the Church, and then to endeavour to understand them thoroughly, and to reap from them the fullest possible harvest of Truth. Formerly, with regard to Protestant doctrines, I always retained my independence and the sovereignty of my judgment. Why should I not have had my own opinion, when every denomination and every theologian had an individual opinion? How different with the Catholic Church. Before her sublime, never varying wisdom, as it is proclaimed by every simple priest, I bowed my knees in humility. Compared to her experience of two thousand years my ephemeral knowledge was a mere nothing” (Back to Holy Church, by Dr. Albert von Ruville, pp. 30, 31).
- 3.
- Infallible teachings are often also called dogmas. But they are not always dogmas in the strict sense. In the strict sense dogmas are such truths as are contained in divine revelation, and are proclaimed by the infallible teaching authority of the Church to be believed as such by the faithful. In a broader sense those tenets are often called dogmas which are presented by revelation or by the Church as infallible truths. In this sense all teachings of faith clearly found in Holy Scripture are dogmas, even if not declared by the Church. In this sense Protestants, too, believe in revealed dogmas.
- 4.
- “They that have received the faith through the ministry of the Church can never have just cause for changing their faith or calling it into doubt” (Sess. III, ch. 3). The Vatican Council did not thereby mean to say that an exceptional case could not happen where some one, without fault of his own, might fall away from his faith, either on account of insufficient religious instruction, or of natural dullness or exceptional misfortunes in the circumstances of life in which he may be placed. The theologians who worded the decision also say that the Council did not intend to condemn the opinion expressed by many older theologians, that under certain conditions an uneducated Catholic might be led in such way into error as to join another faith without committing a sin. (cf. Granderath, Const. Dog. ss. oec. Concl. Vat. 69).
- 5.
- At a certain Austrian university, where the custom obtains that a member of a faculty of the university, in the regular order of the faculties, publishes during the year a book on some study in its particular branch, the turn came to the theological faculty. One of its members then issued a work on moral theology, of course with the ecclesiastical Imprimatur. Upon this being discovered the senate resolved not to acknowledge the book as a university publication, nor to issue it as such, as is usually the custom. They believed they saw in the Imprimatur a degradation of science and a violation of its freedom—a procedure entirely in accord with the traditional narrow-mindedness and intolerance of liberalism.
- 6.
- A clear understanding of the case of Galileo has been made possible only since the year 1877, when the papers of the trial were published by two men of opposite religious views,—the Catholic-minded historian, de l'Epinois, and the liberal author, K. Gebler, who in 1876 had already published a work on “Galileo Galilei and the Roman Curia,” in the spirit of the anti-clerical tendency of the times. Yet, in spite of his attitude, he was given free permission to copy the papers—a magnanimity by which the Holy See has earned the gratitude and admiration of every fair-minded lover of history. In more recent times, A. Favaro published, in 1890-1907, a work of twenty volumes containing all the papers relating to the trial of Galileo, “Opere di Galileo Galilei, Edizione Nazionale.” He, too, had access to the ecclesiastical archives, which he acknowledges with thanks. It may be said now that the Galileo case has been settled by documentary evidence.
- 7.
- After visiting Thomson at Kreuznach, Helmholtz wrote: “He surpasses all great scientists I have personally met, in acumen, clearness and activity of spirit, so that I felt somewhat dull beside him.” Helmholtz himself (died 1894) has never expressed himself about religion. Absorbed by his scientific work, he seemed to have been indifferent to religion, but according to his biographer his father was a decided theist, and his philosophical views were held in great esteem, and partly subscribed to, by the son. According to Dennert, Helmholtz attended church now and then, and even partook of holy communion. Of decided religious bent of mind was Helmholtz's fellow-countryman, and co-discoverer of the law of energy, Robert Mayer. At the Congress of scientists at Innsbruck, in 1869, Mayer ended his address with the significant words: “Let me in conclusion declare from the bottom of my heart that true philosophy cannot and must not be anything else but propædeutics of the Christian religion.” His letters breathe piety. For a time he had the intention of joining the Catholic Church.
- 8.
- Others take refuge in the fantastic theory of an “All-Animation.” According to it all organisms, including trees, shrubs, grasses, are possessed of a soulful sensation and feeling for the purposes they serve, and for the elaborate actions they undertake: this is the reason for their efficacy, not because a wise Creator had arranged them thus. R. H. Francé exclaims triumphantly: “When the powers that be should ask in their dissatisfaction: ‘Where has God a place in your system?’ we can answer calmly: ‘We do not need the hypothesis of a personal God.’ ” God is superfluous—this is the precious gain which this unscientific explanation is to yield.
- 9.
- Compare Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum XI (1883, vii.).
- 10.
- L. M. Hartmann, Theodor Mommsen (1908), 81. The author of the biography is a Jew. There is a much-circulated story, alleged to come from F. X. Kraus. Mommsen is said to have told Kraus, inasmuch as neither the origin, nor nature, nor the spread of Christianity can be explained by natural causes, and since he, in his capacity of historian, could never acknowledge anything supernatural, therefore the fourth volume will remain unwritten.
- 11.
- Nietzsche, “Thus spoke Zarathustra.”
- 12.
- “Veritati ut possetis acquiescere, humilitate opus erat, quae civitati, vestrae difficillime persuaderi potest” (De civit. Dei, X, 29).
- 13.
- Plato, Phil. 6 c. Similarly Pythagoras, Aristotle, and Cicero.
- 14.
- Dial. c. Tryph. 2.
- 15.
- “But for the retention of names and terms Harnack leaves nothing of the specific nature of Christianity,” admits the Protestant Professor of Theology, W. Walther, in his book, “Harnack's Wesen des Christentums” (1901).
- 16.
- Uhlich, founder of a community of free-thinkers, who died in 1873, thus describes his evolution from rationalism to atheism: “At the beginning I could say: We hold fast to Jesus, to Him who stood too high to be called a mere man. Ten years later I could say: God, virtue, immortality—these three are the eternal foundation of religion. And after ten more years I could issue a declaration wherein God was mentioned no more.” Similar progress in spiritual disintegration has been shown by Liberalism in recent years: first it partially abandoned Christian dogma, without however quite breaking loose from it; in the eighteenth century rationalistic enlightenment tore loose from all revelation, adhering only to natural religion: to-day even this is lost.
- 17.
- Dr. Spencer Jones, an Episcopal clergyman, says in his book, “England and the Holy See”: “For the Episcopal Church the junction with Rome, with its sharply defined dogmas, its supreme ministry, and its firm leadership, is a question of life. More and more the supernatural belief is replaced by individual opinions, a condition which in itself causes faith to disappear. A condition like the present, making it possible that in one and the same congregation the most pronounced contrariety of opinions in respect to most essential tenets, as well as a general confusion of minds, is not only tolerated, but directly welcomed, such a condition cannot endure in the long run.”
- 18.
- A French author, G. Goyau, states with truth: “What makes the (Catholic) Church lovable in the eyes of thinking minds outside of the Church, is just her uncompromising attitude. They see a Church steadfast, permanent, imperturbable. The stumbling block of yore has become for them an isle of safety. They are thankful to Rome for holding before their eyes the Christianity, instead of giving them the choice of several kinds of Christianity, including kinds still unknown, which they undoubtedly themselves may discover, if so inclined. They welcome the Roman Church as the ‘Teacher of Faith’ and ‘Conqueror of Errors,’ and, to quote more of the forcible language of the Protestant de Pressensé: ‘they are disgusted with a Christianity for the lowest bidder, but are impressed by the rigid inflexibility of Catholicism....’ ” (Autour du Catholicisme social. I. 1896).
- 19.
- “The Independent” (New York) of Feb. 2, 1914, reports under the head freedom of teaching the dismissal of a professor from the Presbyterian University at Easton, Pa. After quoting from the charter article VIII, which provides “that persons of every religious denomination shall be capable of being elected Trustees, nor shall any person, either as principal, professor, tutor or pupil be refused admittance into said college, or denied any of the privileges, immunities or advantages thereof, for or on account of his sentiments in matters of religion,” the report goes on to say: “it appears however, from the investigations of the committee, that President Warfield insists that the instruction in philosophy and psychology has to be such, as, in his opinion, accords with the most conservative form of Presbyterian theology.”
- 20.
- Prof. Chr. von Ehrenfels, Sexualethik. Similar passages might be quoted from numerous other books by college-professors.