CHAPTER V. THE ‘PROVINCIAL LETTERS.’

at length one of their number, Nicolas Cornet, Syndic of the Faculty of Theology at Paris, collected its essential heresy in the shape of seven propositions. These propositions were afterwards reduced to five; and at length, on the 31st of May 1653, a formal condemnation of them was obtained from the Court of Rome. There was no longer any doubt as to the attitude of the Holy See. All the propositions were declared to be distinctly heretical, and the first and the fifth, moreover, to be blasphemous and impious. This result was not reached without much debate and page 112delay. No sooner had Cornet’s propositions appeared than Arnauld assailed them and all who supported them. A congregation of four cardinals and eleven theological assessors had been appointed to examine them in the end of the year 1651. They had taken, therefore, a year and a half to their work, and the sentence at length issued was intended to bring the long warfare to a close. In point of fact it kindled a fresh fire, and opened, if not a larger, yet a more vital controversy. Arnauld retired willingly before a new writer summoned by himself into the field, and girded with his blessing as he went forth to the encounter.