After these declarations the attitude of the minority was clearly defined, and invincible by any foe from without. Their contention is, that no right exists in the Church to sanction a dogma against the will and belief of an important portion of the Episcopate, and that only by abandoning any claim to such a right can the Council be regarded as really OEcumenical. To be quite consistent, the minority ought to take no further part in the Council till this point, on the decision of which they rightly hold its authority to depend, is settled; for their protest implied the doubt whether they were taking part in a true or only a seeming Council, whether they were acting in union with the Holy Ghost or co-operating to carry out a gigantic and sacrilegious deception. Yet the words expressly stating this doubt, and making the distinct withdrawal of the theory of voting dogmas by majorities a condition of any further participation in the proceedings, were not adopted into any of the Protests. This implied that the signataries would appear in the next General Congregation, that they refrained from a suspicious attitude, and were unwilling to interpret the ambiguous order of business _in malam partem_, until facts compelled them to do so. A conflict which might have such incalculable results was to be avoided, till necessity made it a positive duty; and that was not the case as long as a favourable interpretation of the _regolamento_ continued possible.
Thus the minority committed the strategical blunder of postponing a conflict which they saw to be inevitable, and when they could not know whether any more favourable opportunity for entering on it for the benefit of the Church would occur in the future. There is hardly anything doubtful or open to double interpretation in the order of business, when more closely examined. Every Bishop sees quite clearly that it is specially arranged for overcoming the opposition of the minority, and will be used without scruple for that end.(70) And who knows how many members of the present Opposition, if once the _Curia_ applies its last lever, will have strength to resist to extremities? how many are ready, by humble submission or by resigning their Sees, to quiet their consciences and sacrifice their flocks to error? There are men among them better fitted for the contest against the principle formally enounced in the revised order of business, than for the contest against infallibility. The Bishop of Mayence, _e.g._, passes for one of the strongest and most decided opponents of the _regolamento_, which I mention as a point of great importance at this moment. The resolve of the protesting Bishops, to avoid the threatened conflict at present, can only be justified if another and better opportunity for defending the cause of the Church occurs in the future course of the Council and before any decision is arrived at. Had they been willing, after handing in their protests, to go on quietly joining in the proceedings, without doing anything to give emphasis to the step they had taken, they would in fact have bent under the yoke of the majority. They only needed to keep silent: that implied everything. For it would necessarily be assumed that they had withdrawn or forgotten their protests, and to continue to act upon and submit to the new order of business themselves would imply that they had renounced their resistance to any of its particular details. It was therefore all the more essential for them to let it be clearly known how far their concessions would extend, and what was their final limit. Unless they did this, they would either seem not quite sincere, or would have really accepted the _regolamento_ with its obvious consequences. The Council, the Presidents, the Pope, the expectant Catholic world without, had a right to know their real intentions, and whether they meant to adhere to their declarations. The first voting on the propositions of the _Schema de Fide_ could not fail to decide this point. Thus it became a necessity to put this question of principle in the front at the reopening of the deliberations of the Council.