JAMSENIUS
288
JANSENIUS
portant convent. When he died, in 1643, Doctor An-
toine Arnauld quite naturally succeeded him in the
direction of the movement which he had created. The
new leader lost no time in assert in^ himself in start-
ling fashion by the publication of his book "On P>e-
quent Communion", which would have been more
correctly entitled "Against Frequent Communion",
but which, as it was written with skill and a great dis-
play of erudition, did not a little towards strengthen-
ing the party.
Although the Sorbonne had accepted the Bull "In eminenti", and the Archbishop of Paris had, in 1644, proscribed the work of Jansenius, it continued to be spread and recommended, on the pretext that au- thority had not rej ected a single well-determined thesis. It was then (1649) that Cornet, syntiic of the Sor- bonne, took the initiative in a more radical mea.sure; he extracteil five proposit ions from the much-discussed work, two from the book "On Frequent Communion ", and submitted them to the judgment of the faculty. This body, prevented by the Parlement from pursuing the examination it had begun, referred the aiTair to the general assembly of the clergy in 1650. The greater number considered it more fitting that Rome should pronounce, and eighty-five bishops wrote in this sense to Innocent X, transmitting to him the first five propo- sitions. Eleven other bishops addressed to the sovereign pontifTaprotestagainstthe idea of bringing the matter to trial elsewhere than in France. They demanded in any case the institution of a special tribunal, as in the "De auxiliis" aiTair, and the opening of a debate in which the theologians of both sides should be allowed to submit their arguments. The decision of Innocent X was what might have been expected : he acceded to the request of the majority, keeping in view as far as pos.sible the wishes of the minority. A commission was appointed, consisting of five cardinals and thirteen consultors, some of whom were known to favour ac- quittal. Its laborious examination lasted two years: it held thirty-six long sessions, of which the last ten were presided over by the pope in person. The " Au- gustinus" which, as has been said, had friends on the bench, was defended with skill and tenacity. Finally, its advocates presented a table of three columns, m which they distinguished as many interpretations of the five propositions: a Calvinistic interpretation, re- jected as heretical; a Pelagian or Semipelagian in- terpretation, identified by them with the traditional doctrine, also to be cast aside; and lastly, their inter- pretation, the idea of St. Augustine himself, which could not but be approved. This plea, skilful as it was, could not avert the solemn condemnation, by the Bull "Cum occasione" (31 May, 1653), of the five propositions, which were as follows: (1) Some of God's commandments are impossible to just men who wish and strive (to keep them) , considermg the powers they actually have; the grace by which these precepts may become possible is also wanting; (2) In the state of fallen nature no one ever resists interior grace; (3) To merit, or demerit, in the state of fallen nature we must be free from all external constraint, but not from in- terior necessity; (4) The Semipelagians admitted the necessity of interior preventing grace for all acts, even for the beginning of faith; but tney fell into heresy in pretending that this grace is such that man may either follow or resist it; (5) To say that Christ died or shed His blood for all men, is Semipelagianism. These five propositions were rejected as heretical, the first four absolutely, the fifth if understood in the sense that ('hrist died only for the predestined. All are implic- itly contained in the second, and through it, all are connecteti with the above-mentioned erroneous concep- tion of the slate of innocence and the original fall. If it be true that fallen man never resists interior grace (second proposition), it follows that a just man who violates a commandment of (iod did not have the grace to observe it, that he therefore transgresses it
through inability to fulfil it (first proposition). If,
however, he has sinned and thus demerited, it is clear
that, to demerit, the liberty of indifference is not requi-
site, and what is said of demerit must also be said of its
correlative, merit (third proposition). On the other
hand, if grace is often wanting to the just, since they
fall, it is wanting still more to sinners; it is therefore
impossible to maintain that the death of Jesus Christ
assured to every man the graces necessary for salva-
tion (fifth proposition). If this be so, the Semipe-
lagians were in error in admitting the universal
distribution of a grace which may be resisted (fourth
proposition).
III. Resistance op the Jansenists. — Well r» ceived by the Sorbonne and the General Assembly ol the Clergy, the Bull "Cum occasione" was promul- gated with the royal sanction. This should have opened the eyes of the partisans of Jansenius. They were given the alternative of finally renouncing their errors, or of openly resisting the supreme authority. They were thrown for the moment into embar- rassment and hesitation, from which Arnauld extri- cated them by a subtilty: they must, he said, accept the condemnation of the five propositions, and reject them, as did the pope; only, these propositions were not contained in the book of the Bishop of Ypres, or if they were found therein, it was in another sense than in the pontifical document; the idea of Jansenius was the same as that of St. Augustine, which the Church neither could, nor wished to, censure. This interpretation was not tenable; it was contrary to the text of the Bull, no less than to the minutes of the discussions which had preceded it, and throughout which these propositions were considered and presented as expressing the sense of the " Augustinus". In March, 1564, thirty-eight bishops rejected the interpretation, and communicated their decision to the sovereign pontiff, who thanked and congratulated them. The Jansenists persisted none the less in an attitude opposed alike to frankness and to logic. The occasion soon arrived for them to support this with a complete theory. The Due de Liancourt, one of the protectors of the party, was re- fused absolution until he should change his sentiments and accept purely and simply the condemnation of the "Augustinus". Arnauld took up his pen and in two successive letters protested against any such exaction. Ecclesiastical judgments, he said, are not all of equal value, and do not entail the same obligations; where there is question of the truth or falsity of a doctrine, of its revealed origin or its heterodoxy, the Church in vir- tue of its Divine mission is qualified to decide; it is a matter of right; but if the doubt bears upon the pres- ence of this doctrine in a book, it is a question of purely human fact, which as such does not fall under the juris- diction of the supernatural teaching authority insti- tuted in the Church by Jesus Christ. In the former case, the Churcli having pronounced sentence, we have no choice but to conform our belief to its decision; in the latter, its word should not be openly contradicted, it claims from us the homage of a respectful silence, but not that of an interior assent. Such is the famous distinction between right and fact, which was hence- forth to lie the basis of their resistance, and through which the recalcitrants preteniled to remain Catholics, united to the visible body of Christ despite all their obstinacy. This distinction is both logically and his- torically the denial of the doctrinal power of the Church. F'or how is it possible to teach and defend revealed doctrine if its affirmation or denial cannot be discerned in a book or a writing, whatever its form or its extent? In fact, from the beginning, councils and popes have approved and impo.sed as orthodo.x certain formulas and certain works, and from the beginning have proscribed others as being tainted with heresy or error.
The expedient contrived by Arnauld was so op- posed to both fact and reason that a number of Jan-
