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54 THE HISTORY OF HERESIES,
gcther to the judgment of the Pope. Eighty-five Bishops, in
1650, wrote to Pope Innocent X., the successor of Urban,
thus (5) :
"
Beatissime Pater, majores causas ad Sedan Apostolicam
referre, solemnus Ecclesia3 mos est quern Fides Patri nun-
quani deficiens perpetuo retineri pro jure suo postulat." They
then lay before the Holy Father the five famous propositions
extracted from the book of Jansenius, and beg the judgment of
the Apostolic See on them.
12. Innocent committed the examination (6) of these propo
sitions to a Congregation of five Cardinals and thirteen Theo
logians, and they considered them for more than two years, and
held thirty-six Conferences during that time, and the Pope him
self assisted at the last ten. Louis de Saint Amour and the
other deputies of the Jansenist party, were frequently heard,
and finally, on the 31st of May, 1653, the Pope, in the Bull
Cum occasione, declared the five propositions which follow here
tical :
"
First Some commandments of God are impossible to just
men, even when they wish and strive to accomplish them accor
ding to their present strength, and grace is wanting to them by
which they may be possible to them. This we condemn as rash,
impious, blasphemous, branded with anathema, and heretical,
and as such we condemn it.
"
Second We never resist interior grace in the state of cor
rupt nature. This we declare heretical, and as such condemn it.
"
Third To render us deserving or otherwise in the state of
corrupt nature, liberty, which excludes constraint,
This we declare heretical, and as such condemn it.
is sufficient.
" Fourth The Semipelagians admitted the necessity of interior
preventing grace for every act in particular, even for the com
mencement of the Faith, and in this they were heretics, inasmuch
as they wished that this grace was such, that the human will
could neither resist it or obey it. We declare this false and
heretical, and as such condemn it.
"
Fifth It is Semipelagianism to say that Jesus Christ died or
shed his blood for all men in general. This we declare false,
rash, scandalous, and, understood in the sense that Christ died
(5) Gotti, loc, cit. c. 118. (6) Tournell. loc. cit.