Infallibility

“ In theory you cannot indulge with consistency in an ultimate doubt. You are forced, willingly or not, at a certain point to assume infallibility. For, otherwise, how could you proceed to judge at all? ”

“ A certitude is directed to this or that particular proposition; it is not a faculty or gift, but a disposition of mind relatively to a definite case which is before me. Infallibility, on the contrary, is just that which certitude is not; it is a faculty or gift, and relates, not to some one truth in particular, but to all possible propositions in a given subject-matter. We ought in strict propriety, to speak, not of infallible acts, but of acts of infallibility. A belief or opinion as little admits of being called infallible, as a deed can correctly be called immortal. A deed is done and over ”

“ The saving remnant that enjoys a wider outlook, and penetrates the mist with which dogma has enveloped the atmosphere, realizes that infallibility is theoretically an idle dream, and practically an artificial fiction: and in so far as others use their eyes and look in forbidden places, they observe that many of the beliefs of men do not fall under the shadow of the pronunciamento, but thrive in the sunshine of common sense. ”

“ Therefore, he defines his own infallibility by the same infallibility. He declares himself to be infallible because he is; the reason why we are bound to believe is identical with the very object of belief, idem per idem. ”

“ And I shall now go on to state what are the real difficulties and burdens to me, as to many other Catholics perhaps, in this doctrine of infallibility; always premising that ten thousand difficulties do not make one doubt. ”

“ Reason, therefore, forces us to affirm that we know something with unerring certainty, that is, that the human intellect is at least to this limited extent exempt from liability to deception or error, and, so far, infallible. The only possible dispute in philosophy or theology relates to the subject and extent of infallibility. What truths are known or knowable with infallible certitude, and where is the infallibility seated which gives this certitude? ”

“ The persuasion that one's own infallibility is a myth leads by easy stages and with somewhat greater satisfaction to a refusal to ascribe infallibility to others. But dicta are not always ticketed as such, and one does not recognize them always at a glance. There is the constant need, as every law student knows, to separate the accidental and the non-essential from the essential and inherent. ”

“ Each man translates it by his own understanding; and each affirms that he has infallible truth. If they would just take this simple proposition, that that which is fallible can not determine the quality of infallibility—that upon these subjects the human mind [Pg 120] is fallible, and therefore can not determine what is the absolute meaning of the communications—they would learn the source of all their errors. Men may be ever so honest, they will differ as a consequence of their constitutional differences. ”

“ The reason is, that they would have others take all their opinions implicitly from their infallibility: if a thing has grounds or evidence of its own to rest upon, so that they are no longer called in like prophets, to vouch for its truth, this is a sufficient excuse for them to discard it, and to look out for new terræ incognitæ to exercise their quackery and second-sight upon. ”

“ He who should believe in the infallibility, and guide himself by the directions, of accredited opinions, and undisputed proverbs, would often, be wofully puzzled by their divergent counsels and contradictory assertions. They often uphold as unfailing truths things that are true but in a majority or even a measureless minority of instances, and that according to extraneous contingencies. ”

“ Perfect discipline requires recognition of infallibility. Infallibility requires the observance of discipline. ”

“ Infallibility is very good so long as it is with us, but when against us it becomes very fallible. Such is clearly the view of Irish Roman Catholics.
[125] The reader should consult what Mr. Findlay has written on this point in his Galatians, chs. ”

“ True, schoolmen discuss some such points; but let me ask his Lordship whether he finds any Catholic who denies or doubts that a General Council, with the Pope at its head, or that the Pope himself, issuing a doctrinal decision which is received by the great body of Catholic Bishops, is secure from error? Most certainly not, and hence he may gather where all Catholics agree in lodging Infallibility."
Milner's view of Catholicism is that if we would know what is of faith, we must ask what is and ever has been the doctrine of the Church. A dogma cannot be something new. ”

“ We know, too, and this other certainty must be pressed home to them, that reason, so far from being infallible, is most exceedingly fallible, persuadable, open to influence on this side and that; but is all the same a faithful servant, able to prove whatsoever notion is received by the will. Once we are convinced of the fallibility of our own reason we are able to detect the fallacies in the reasoning of our opponents and are not liable to be carried away by every wind of doctrine. ”

“ There are some people so naïve in their interpretation of expressed judgments as to suppose that what is told them must be either truth or falsehood, not being able to distinguish a fallacy from a lie. ”

“ To this they all agreed, and search was made; and soon they found Falsehood, whom they instantly tore to pieces, coiled up her bowels into knots, burnt her, and dispersed her ashes to the winds. But even her dust was so malignant that it was carried all over the world; and that is the reason that wherever men exist there Falsehood must be. ”

“ Imagine my bewilderment when I found that a case which is likely to prove weak before one infallible judge may be shifted with little trouble to another, equally infallible, but with views known to be friendly to the cause in question. ”

“ True, the other criteria are, in exceptional circumstances, liable to error; in certain cases when a doubt arises an appeal is taken to the testimony of others: but why? Simply, in order to make sure that one has not labored under one of those derangements to which human misery is subject. We know that what is natural is general; and he who doubts inquires of others, that he may ascertain if he has by some accident been out of his ordinary natural state. ”

“ Whenever in the course of our reasoning we are involved in error, either the conclusion follows from the premisses or it does not. If it does not, the fault must lie in the process of reasoning, and we have then what is called a Logical Fallacy. If, on the other hand, the conclusion does follow from the premisses, the fault must lie in the premisses themselves, and we then have what is called a Material Fallacy. ”

“ That such a fallacy could be imposed upon any human understanding, or that an author could have advanced a position so remote from truth and reason, any other ways than as a declaimer, to shew to what extent he could stretch his imagination, and with what strength he could press his principle, would scarcely have been credible, had not this lady kindly shewn us how far weakness may be deluded, or indolence amused. ”

“ Fallacies of reflection are fallacies of time and cause, and they may be classed as misreflections and myths. The misreflections are a fourth group of illusions and the myths a fourth group of delusions. ”

“ I say that no person is willing in his own mind to receive or to assert a falsehood, to be ignorant, to be in error, to possess that which is not true. This is truly to be called falsehood, this ignorance and error in the mind itself. What is usually called falsehood, or deceit in words, is but a voluntary imitation of what the mind itself suffers in the involuntary possession of that falsehood, an image of later birth, and scarcely, in a strict and complete sense, deserving the name of falsehood.—Lib. ”

“ If such is the fearlessness of truth, and such the cowardice of error, the secrecy of the silent orders commends them less to the confidence which candor inspires, than to the suspicion which secrecy begets. ”

“ For every property, therefore, in facts, or in our mode of considering facts, which leads us to believe that they are habitually conjoined when they are not, or that they are not when in reality they are, there is a corresponding kind of Fallacy; and an enumeration of fallacies would consist in a specification of those properties in facts, and those peculiarities in our mode of considering them, which give rise to this erroneous opinion. ”

“ But when we reason in words of general signification, and fall upon a general inference which is false, though it be commonly called error, it is indeed an absurdity or senseless speech. For error is but a deception in presuming that somewhat is past, or to come, of which, though it were not past, or not to come, yet there was no impossibility discoverable. ”

“ Your Lordship may however judge of the surprize and disappointment I felt when I arrived at the following sentence in the same judgment, "All the cases decide that mere imbecility will not do; that an inability to manage a man's affairs will not do, unless that inability and that incapacity to manage his affairs AMOUNT to evidence that he is of unsound mind, and he must be found to be so." ”

“ The Infallibilists, from the nature of the case, are far clearer and better agreed, both as to end and means, than their adversaries, many of whom do not conceal their predilection for the dogma, though they tremble at the consequences of it. ”

“ As for the separation of truth from falsehood, and the resemblance which truth has with falsehood, and for the distinction between what is consistent and what is absurd, on both sides, a balance ought to be formed in which every thing may be weighed. ”

“ It is for the interest of truth that every thing be viewed in fair and open day light, and it can only be some sinister purpose that is favoured by darkness or concealment of any kind. My sentiments may be fallacious, but if no body were allowed to write against me, how could that fallacy be made to appear? ”

“ In this sense then it may be stated that all error as well as knowledge testifies to reality, and that all our knowledge is certitude based upon reality, and that fallacies would not be possible were there not realities about which inferences are made. ”

“ His chief fallacy lay in the failure to recognize evil as an inherent force in human nature and to acknowledge sect and state, to which he attributed the origin of all error, as inventions of man’s ingenuity. ”

“ How easy, comparatively, to let any want go unsatisfied, rather than that imperious reason which urges its claim with so many good pretences, which tells us truth will always bear investigation, and that if we cannot explain by our small faculties experiences in which the highest mysteries are involved, the experiences must have been fallacious! ”

“ So many judgments have been found fallacious by every individual in the race of men, and fallacious judgments have led to such dire disasters, and have been repeated so often in matters of profound moment, as well as in matters of superficial consequence, that there has grown up a habit of mind by which incongruity of judgments is taken as a signal that danger lurks in the way. ”

“ Here then is either a deficiency in the standard [Pg 16] narrative,—and this deficiency, as already observed, an inexcusable one,—or a redundancy in the subsequent account: a redundancy, the cause of which seems sufficiently obvious: a redundancy—in that account which, being premeditated on the part of the historian, is given by him as being premeditated on the part of the speaker, whom he represents as delivering it: a redundancy,—and that in a word a falsehood: a falsehood, and for what purpose?—for deception: the hero represented by his historian as using endeavours to deceive. ”

“ To expose fallacy or inconsistency, was found to be both an easier process, and a more appreciable display of ingenuity, than the discovery and establishment of truth in such manner as to command assent. ”

“ In the relations of this visible world we find them to have been as rational, and shrewd to detect an historic anomaly, as ourselves. But when once the invisible world was supposed to be opened, and the lawless agency of bad spirits assumed, what measures of probability, of decency, of fitness, or proportion—of that which distinguishes the likely from the palpable absurd—could they have to guide them in the rejection or admission of any particular testimony? ”

“ An examination of this case will present a striking instance of the error into which the strongest minds may be led, whenever they shall depart from the plain, common acceptation of terms, or from well ascertained truths, for the attainment of conclusions, which the subtlest ingenuity is incompetent to sustain. ”

“ The so-called 'fallacy of the senses,' of which the ancient sceptics made so much account, is not fallacy of the senses proper, but rather of the intellect, which interprets wrongly what the senses give. ”

“ Just as an illusion is a false sense perception, so a false inference is called a "fallacy". One great cause of fallacies consists in the confused way in which facts are sometimes presented, resulting in failure to see the relationships clearly. ”

“ If my point has not been gained, and all parties have not been equally satisfied, it has arisen from a fallacy in the plan, not from premeditated carelessness on my part, which alone would be culpable. ”

“ In attempting to establish certain general distinctions which shall mark out from one another the various kinds of Fallacious Evidence, we propose to ourselves an altogether different aim from that of several eminent thinkers, who have given, under the name of Political or other Fallacies, a mere enumeration of a certain number of erroneous opinions ”