Thesis XXVIII

In can. 4 of Trent (if anyone shall say that the Church could not constitute impediments diriment of marriage, or that she has erred in constituting them. A. S.), by the name of the Church are signified not kings and secular princes, but the sacred principate: moreover that canon is dogmatic.

I. Namely, we teach that the Church is not said to be able to do this because some persons who belong to the body of the Church, and these either determined persons, namely kings, or taken indefinitely, whether Priests or Kings, can do it, but because the sacred Principate or body of Pastors who succeed the Apostles, or the Roman Pontiff their head, that is, the ecclesiastical authority which was communicated by Christ to the Apostles and their successors, and it alone, can do this.

The single argument, proposed in many ways, of the Launoian interpretation (supposing indeed what he thinks he has demonstrated, that the right of establishing impediments of marriage, even of Christians, is of itself civil) consists in this, that the Church has never been defined as the assembly of Priests of the first or second order, but as the congregation of the faithful; consequently, without merit, that definition is substituted for the term Church in the canon. Namely the Tridentine Synod would have spoken in a new and unusual manner if, by the name Church, it had understood Priests of the first order or even of the second order. Launoius also adorns this argument with dialectical lights. For he says that the supposition of the name Church is simple when it is taken of the assembly of the faithful, because this is its immediate definition; but that the supposition is personal when certain persons are understood. But a transition cannot be made from simple supposition to personal; therefore.

II. It must be observed that Launoius errs in the definition of the Church. In Tom. V of his works, p. 2 of the epistles, L. 8, there stands epistle 13 to Nicolaus Gatinaeus. In it, by many arguments, he strives to refute the definition of the Church given by Bellarmine, which he says is contrary to the laws of dialectic, and to belong to explaining the state and government of the Church, not to explaining its nature. But he contends from the Scriptures and perpetual Tradition that the Church is to be defined as an assembly of the faithful or of Catholics. As though government and authority in a society were something accidental, not belonging to its intrinsic nature, or as though, in order that the Church of Christ exist, it would be enough that men exist coming together into the same faith, as Protestants will. The Church is indeed an assembly of the faithful, but an assembly of many can be had in many ways; but it belongs to the essence of this assembly of the faithful instituted by Christ that it be united by the apostolic government and authority vicarious of Christ, which flourished first in the Apostles and then in their successors, the Bishops, and especially and most fully in Peter and his successors, the Roman Pontiffs, to whom the sheep of Christ subject constitute that assembly of the faithful which is the Church of Christ. But concerning this matter, in the treatise on the Church.

III. But that the interpretation of Launoius is inept and false is easily demonstrated. And first indeed, the consequence of that argument is denied. For if from the fact that the Church is an assembly of the faithful it does not follow that, by the name Church, Priests, who are a part of the Church, are to be understood in the canon, why will Kings have to be understood, who are neither a necessary part nor an equally noble part? The consequent will be that this power is in the hands of the faithful and therefore that the right of establishing the form of the matrimonial contract belongs to the multitude of the faithful gathered together, and that the same multitude can delegate this its power to others as to its ministers. But why (on this false hypothesis having indeed been made) it would have delegated its power rather to kings, who can be lacking in the Church and who in the Church are simple faithful, and not to Priests, who belong to the Church insofar as it is Church and are a necessary part of it, is not yet clear, and Launoius forgot to declare it. It is indeed supposed that this right is of itself civil and that this has been demonstrated; but besides the fact that it has not been demonstrated, is it permitted, not only to one defending himself but to one arguing, as Launoius does here in the interpretation of this canon, to derive the force of his argument from a hypothesis which the adversaries deny, and, once this hypothesis is set aside, there is no force of the argument?

Then we do not understand why, with this interpretation posited, Launoius grants that those who in can. 12 are called ecclesiastical judges are judges from the priestly order or having authority from it; for if the Church is nothing except the assembly of the faithful, ecclesiastical judges will be judges from the faithful, or any faithful persons whatsoever.

But, these absurdities having been omitted, who does not see that, when the Church is introduced as bearing laws, the name of Church is drawn from the common usage of speaking to stand for the ruling Church, just as the name of kingdom, empire, or state, according to the words of Christ, Matt. XVIII, 17.

IV. And indeed is not the object of the canon at once power and infallibility in the use of this power (could constitute, has not erred in constituting them)? But the subject of power and at the same time of infallibility is only the ruling and teaching Church, not kings or civil powers or the people of the faithful. But what is proscribed in this canon? The error of Luther, who denied to the Church, that is, to the Roman See, the power of establishing diriment impediments; yet he did not deny it to secular princes. "The union of man and woman is of divine right, which holds in whatever way it may have occurred against the laws of men, and the laws of men ought to yield to it without any scruple (De Captiv. Babyl. de Matrimonio)": these men he afterward calls Roman tyrants. Then in the Extemporaneous Response to the articles which our masters extracted from the Babylonian Captivity, to that doctrinal head, "Nothing by any right can be imposed on Christians, whether by man or by Angels, except as much as they will," he himself says: "I said this not about civil laws but about ecclesiastical laws." Therefore the civil power, which was not denied, did not have to be asserted by the Fathers, but the ecclesiastical power proper to priests, which alone was denied.

What of the fact that the same thing is evidently plain from the practical interpretation itself which the Council furnished to its canon? For the Council itself afterwards, by its own authority, constituted new diriment impediments, and tempered certain old ones, and besides established that marriages of children entered into without the consent of parents have validity, even though certain Princes wished otherwise, as the King of the Gauls, and pressed sharply for the opposite decision. Therefore by their own deed the Tridentine Fathers interpreted their canon. For why do the Fathers, who judged that this right belonged to Kings, without these having been heard, and with no account taken of their will or desire, decree absolutely what pleases themselves? Why did kings acquiesce? Moreover, in this whole matter concerning Marriage, the Church to which some authority or power concerning the Sacrament of Marriage is asserted is always the ruling and teaching Church; cf. cann. 7, 8, 12; and the same is understood in those words: celebration of marriage in the face of the Church. For such a celebration is understood, which is made before a qualified witness constituted by the ruling Church herself, and which is public so that the marriage may become known, or of itself can become known, to the ruling Church, which must pass judgment concerning matrimonial causes. For this form of celebration was prescribed because, when an evil had arisen from clandestine marriages, the Church, which does not judge concerning hidden things, cannot meet it. Decr. De Reform. Matrim.

V. We add that this canon is dogmatic. For it treats of the right of the Church and of her infallibility in the exercise of this right; but right and infallibility are the object of dogma and are presupposed by discipline as its cause; therefore they are not disciplinary matters. Moreover, it does not treat of one who is disobedient, but of one who affirms that the Church lacks this power or that she has erred in its use; but by affirmation or negation truth is attacked; therefore the Council treats of establishing truth, which is dogma, not discipline. Cf. the Treatise of Cardinal Gerdil On Marriage, Works, Tom. XV, Rome 1809, P. II, § 5.

But what we have said concerning can. 4 must also be said concerning can. 3, which has itself thus: "If anyone shall say that only those degrees of consanguinity and affinity which are expressed in Leviticus (c. XVIII) can impede marriage to be contracted and dirimently dissolve one contracted, and that the Church cannot dispense in some of them, or constitute that more degrees impede and dirimently dissolve: A. S."

You see, therefore, that we gather the argument not from the fact that the canons are established under penalty of anathema; for who is ignorant that even transgressions of law can be punished by anathema? but from the fact that the object of the canon is doctrine and truth to be asserted and believed.