selves in the cause of Christianity, and in ex- council of Nice. Constantine, after having tending the limits of the church, prevent our vanquished them and the Sarmatians, engaged surprise at the number of barbarous and un- great numbers of them to become Christians:* civilised nations, which received the Gospel.* yet a large body continued in their attachment It appears highly probable, from many circum- to their ancient superstition, until the time of stances, that both the Major and the Minor the emperor Valens. This prince permitted Armenia were enlightened with the know- them, indeed, to pass the Danube, and to inledge of the truth, not long after the promulga-habit Dacia, Moesia, and Thrace; but it was tion of Christianity. The Armenian church was not, however, completely formed and established before this century; in the commencement of which, Gregory, the son of Anax, who is commonly called the Enlightener, from his having dispelled the darkness of the Armenian superstitions, converted to Christianity Tiridates, king of Armenia, and all the nobles of his court. In consequence of this, Gregory was consecrated bishop of the Armenians, by Leontius, bishop of Cappadocia; and his ministry was crowned with such success, that the whole province was soon converted to the Chris-pean provinces, an incredible number of pertian faith.t

on condition that they should live in subjection to the Roman laws, and embrace the profession of Christianity; which stipulations were accepted by their king Fritigern. The celebrated Ulphilas, bishop of those Goths who dwelt in Masia, lived in this century, and distinguished himself by his genius and piety. Among other eminent services which he rendered to his country, he invented a set of letters for their peculiar use, and translated the Scriptures into the Gothic language.‡

XXII. There remained still, in the Euro

tionable to their diligence and zeal, and the work of conversion went on but slowly. In Gaul, the great and venerable Martin, bishop of Tours, set about this important work with tolerable success; for, in his various journeys

sons who adhered to the worship of the gods; XX. Toward the middle of this century, a and though the Christian bishops continued certain person, named Frumentius, went from their pious efforts to gain them over to the GosEgypt to Abyssinia or Ethiopia, whose inhabi-pel, yet the success was, by no means, proportants derived the name of Axumitæ from Axuma, the capital city of that country. He made known among this people the Gospel of Christ, and administered the sacrament of baptism to their king, and to several persons of the first distinction at his court. As he was re-among the Gauls, he converted many, every turning into Egypt, he received consecration, as the first bishop of the Axumitæ, or Ethiopians, from Athanasius; and this is the reason why the Ethiopian church has, even to our times, been considered as the daughter of the || Alexandrian, from which it also receives its bishop.‡

The light of the Gospel was introduced into Iberia, a province of Asia (now called Georgia,) in the following manner: a certain woman was carried into that country as a captive, during the reign of Constantine; and by the grandeur of her miracles, and the remarkable sanctity of her life and manners, she made such an impression upon the king and queen, that they abandoned their false gods, embraced the faith of the Gospel, and sent to Constantinople for proper persons to give them and their people a more satisfactory and complete knowledge of the Christian religion.§

where, by the energy of his discourses, and by the power of his miracles, if we may rely upon the testimony of Sulpitius Severus. He destroyed also the temples of the gods, pulled down their statues,§ and on all these accounts merited the high and honourable title of Apostle of the Gauls.

XXIII. There is no doubt that the victories of Constantine, the fear of punishment, and the desire of pleasing this mighty conqueror ||and his imperial successors, were the weighty arguments that moved whole nations, as well as particular persons, to embrace Christianity. None, however, that have any acquaintance with the transactions of this period of time, will attribute the whole progress of Christianity to these causes; for it is undeniably manifest, that the indefatigable zeal of the bishops and other pious men, the innocence and sanctity which shone forth with such lustre in the XXI. A considerable part of the Goths, who lives of many Christians, the translations that had inhabited Thrace, Mosia, and Dacia, had were published of the sacred writings, and the received the knowledge and embraced the doc-intrinsic beauty and excellence of the Christrines of Christianity before this century; and Theophilus, their bishop, was present at the Philast. de hæres. cap. xix. Georg.

* Gaudent. vita Philastrii, sect. 3. Præf. Socrat. Hist. Eccles. lib. i. Cedren. Chronograph.

Narratio de rebus Armeniæ in Franc. Comdefisii Auctario Biblioth. Patrum Græcor. tom. ii. p. 287. Mich. Lequien, Oriens Christianus, tom. i. p. 419, 1356. Jo. Joach. Schrod. Thesaur. linguæ Armenicæ, p. 149.

Athanasius, Apolog. ad Constantium, tom. i. op. part ii. p. 315, edit. Benedict. Socrates et Sozomen, Hist. Eccles. book i. chap. xix. of the former, book ii. ch. xxiv. of the latter. Theodoret. Hist. Eccles. lib. i. cap. xxiii. p. 54. Ludolf, Comment. ad Hist. Ethiopic. p. 281. Hier. Lobo, Voyage d'Abyssinie, tom. ii. p. 13. Justus Fontaninus, Hist. Liter. Aquileiæ, p. 174.

§ Rufinus, Hist. Eccles. lib. i. cap. x. Sozomen, Hist. Eccles. lib. ii. cap. v. Lequien, Oriens Christ. tom. i. p.

1333.

tian religion, made as strong and deep impressions upon some, as worldly views and selfish considerations did upon others.

As to the miracles attributed to Antony, Paul the Hermit, and Martin, I give them up without the least difficulty, and join with those who treat these pretended prodigies with the

* Socrat. Hist. Eccles. lib. i. cap. xviii.

Lequien,

Socrat. Hist. Eccles. lib. iv. cap. xxxiii. Oriens Christ. tom. i. p. 1240. Erie. Benzelius, Præf ad Quatuor Evangelia Gothica, qua Ulphilæ tribuuntur, cap. v. p. 18, published at Oxford, in 1750.

Jo. Jac. Mascovii Historia Germanorum, tom. i. p. 317; tom. ii. not. p. 49. Acta SS. Martii, tom. iii. p. 619. Benzelius, cap. viii.

§ See Sulpit. Severus, Dial. i. de Vita Martini, cap. xiii. xv. xvii. et Dial. ii.

contempt they deserve.* I am also willing to || superstitions by the force of arms, and massagrant, that many events have been rashly cred the Christians, who, in the propagation deemed miraculous, which were the result of of their religion, were not always sufficiently the ordinary laws of nature; and also, that attentive, either to the rules of prudence, or pious frauds were sometimes used, for the pur- the dictates of humanity.* The Christians pose of giving new degrees of weight and dig-who lived beyond the limits of the Roman emnity to the Christian cause. But I cannot, on pire, had a harder fate: Sapor II., king of Perthe other hand, assent to the opinions of those sia, vented his rage against those of his dominwho maintain, that, in this century, miracles ions, in three dreadful persecutions. The first had entirely ceased; and that, at this period, || of these happened in the eighteenth year of the Christian church was not favoured with the reign of that prince; the second, in the any extraordinary or supernatural mark of a thirtieth; and the third in the thirty-first year divine power engaged in its cause.† of the same reign. This last was the most XXIV. The Christians, who lived under the cruel and destructive of the three; it carried Roman government, were not afflicted with off an incredible number of Christians, and any severe calamities from the time of Con- continued during the space of forty years, havstantine, except those which they suffered ing commenced in the year 330, and ceased during the troubles and commotions raised by only in 370. It was not, however, the religion Licinius, and under the transitory reign of Ju- of the Christians, but the ill-grounded suspilian. Their tranquillity, however, was, at dif- cion of their treasonable designs against the ferent times, disturbed in several places.state, that drew upon them this terrible calamAmong others, Athanaric, king of the Goths, ity; for the Magi and the Jews persuaded the persecuted, for some time, with great bitter- Persian monarch, that all the Christians were ness, that part of the Gothic nation which had devoted to the interest of the Roman emperor, embraced Christianity. In the remoter pro-and that Simeon, archbishop of Seleucia and vinces, the Pagans often defended their ancient || of Ctesiphon, sent to Constantinople intelli*.Hier. a Prato, in his Preface to Sulpitius Severus, gence of all that passed in Persia.† disputes warmly in favour of the miracles of Martin, and also of the other prodigies of this century.

† See Eusebius book against Hierocles, chap. iv. and Henry Dodwell's Diss. ii. in Irenæum, sect. 55, p. 195.

See Dr. Middleton's Free Inquiry into the Miraculous Powers which are said to have subsisted in the Christian Church, &c. in which a very different opinion is maintained. See, however, on the other side, the answers of Church and Dodwell to Middleton's Inquiry. See Acta Martyr. sincera, published by Ruinart, and || (in that collection,) Acta S. Sabæ, p. 598.

* See Ambrosius, de Officiis, lib. i. cap. xlii. sect. 17. + See Sozomen. Hist. Eccles. lib. ii. cap. i. xiii. There is a particular and express account of this persecution in the Bibliothec. Oriental. Clement. Vatican. tom. i. p. 6, 16, 181; tom. iii. p. 52; with which it will be proper to compare the preface to the Acta Martyrum Orientalium et Occidentalium, by the learned Assemani, who has published the Persian Martyrology in Syriac, with a Latin translation, and enriched this valuable work with many excellent observations.

PART II.

THE INTERNAL HISTORY OF THE CHURCH.

CHAPTER I.

tinguished by the title of Modern Platonists.

Which contains the History of Learning and It is not therefore surprising, that we find the

Philosophy.

principles of Platonism in all the writings of the Christians. Of these philosophers, however, the number was not so considerable in the west as in the eastern countries. Jamblichus of Chalcis explained, in Syria, the philosophy of Plato, or rather propagated his own particular opinions under that respectable name. He was an obscure and credulous man, and his turn of mind was highly superstitious and chi

I. PHILOLOGY, eloquence, poetry, and history, were the branches of learning particularly cultivated at this time, by those among the Greeks and Latins, who were desirous of acquiring fame. But, though several persons of both nations obtained reputation by their literary pursuits, they came all far short of the summit of fame. The best poets of this pe-merical, as his writings abundantly testify.* riod, such as Ausonius, appear insipid, harsh, and inelegant, when compared with the sublime bards of the Augustan age. The rhetoricians, departing now from the noble simplicity and majesty of the ancients, instructed the youth in the fallacious art of pompous declamation; and the majority of historical writers were more intent upon embellishing their narrations with vain and tawdry ornaments, than upon rendering them interesting by their order, perspicuity, and truth.

His successors were, Ædesius, Maximus, and others, whose follies and puerilities are exposed at length by Eunapius. Hypatia, a female philosopher of distinguished merit and learning, Isidorus, Olympiodorus, Synesius, afterwards a Semi-Christian, with others of inferior reputation, were the principal persons con

* Dr. Mosheim speaks here of only one Jamblichus, though there were three persons who bore that name. It is not easy to determine which of them wrote the

works that have reached our times under the name of deserve so mean a character as our learned historian here Jamblichus; but, whoever it was, he does not certainly

II. Almost all the philosophers of this age were of that sect which we have already dis-gives him. VOL. I.-14

cerned in propagating this new modification of Platonism.

illiterate from ecclesiastical preferments and offices, and it is certain that the greatest part, both of the bishops and presbyters, were men entirely destitute of learning and education. Besides, that savage and illiterate party, who looked upon all sorts of erudition, particularly that of a philosophical kind, as pernicious, and even destructive of true piety and religion, increased both in number and authority. The ascetics, monks, and hermits, augmented the strength of this barbarous faction; and not only the women, but also all who took solemn looks, sordid garments, and a love of solitude, for real piety (and in this number we comprehend the generality of mankind,) were vehemently prepossessed in their favour.

III. As the emperor Julian was passionately attached to this sect (which his writings abundantly prove,) he employed every method to increase its authority and lustre; and, for that purpose, engaged in its cause several men of learning and genius, who vied with each other in exalting its merit and excellence.* But, after his death, a dreadful storm of persecution arose, in the reign of Valentinian, against the Platonists; many of whom, being accused of magical practices, and other heinous crimes, were capitally convicted. During these commotions, Maximus, the master and favourite of Julian, by whose persuasions this emperor had been engaged to renounce Christianity, and to apply himself to the study of magic, was put to death with several others. It is probable, Concerning the Government of the Church, and indeed, that the friendship and intimacy that had subsisted between the apostate emperor the Christian Doctors, during this Century. and these pretended sages were greater crimes, I. CONSTANTINE the Great made no essenin the eye of Valentinian, than either their | tial alterations in the form of government that philosophical system or their magic arts; and took place in the Christian church before his hence it happened, that such of the sect as time; he only corrected it in some particulars, lived at a distance from the court, were not in- and gave it a greater extent. Although he pervolved in the dangers or calamities of this per-mitted the church to remain a body-politic, dissecution.

CHAPTER II.

tinct from that of the state, as it had formerly IV. From the time of Constantine the Great, been, yet he assumed to himself the supreme the Christians applied themselves with greater power over this sacred body, and the right of zeal and diligence to the study of philosophy modelling and governing it in such a manner as and of the liberal arts, than they had formerly should be most conducive to the public good. done. The emperors encouraged this taste for This right he enjoyed without any opposition, the sciences, and left no means unemployed to as none of the bishops presumed to call his auexcite and maintain a spirit of literary emula-thority in question. The people therefore contion among the professors of Christianity. For this purpose, schools were established in many cities: libraries were also erected, and men of learning and genius were nobly recompensed by the honours and advantages that were attached to the culture of the sciences and arts. All this was indispensably necessary to the successful execution of the scheme that was laid for abrogating, by degrees, the worship of the gods; for the ancient religion was maintained, and its credit supported by the erudition and talents which distinguished in so many places the sages of Paganism; and there was just reason to apprehend, that the truth might suffer, if the Christian youth, for want of proper masters and instructers of their own religion, should have recourse, for their education, to the schools of the pagan philosophers and rhe

tinued, as usual, to choose freely their bishops and their teachers. The bishop governed the church, and managed the ecclesiastical affairs of the city or district, where he presided in council with the presbyters, not without a due regard to the suffrages of the whole assembly of the people. The provincial bishops also deliberated together upon those matters which related to the interests of the churches of a whole province, as also concerning religious controversies, the forms and rites of divine service, and other things of like moment. To these minor councils, which were composed of the ecclesiastical deputies of one or more provinces, were afterwards added acumenical councils, consisting of commissioners from all the churches in the Christian world, and which, consequently, represented the church universal. These were established by the authority of the emperor, who assembled the first of these councils at Nice. This prince thought it equitable, that questions of superior importance, and such as intimately concerned the interests of Christianity in general, should be examined and decided in assemblies that represented the whole body of the Christian church; and in this it is highly probable, that his judgment was directed by that of the bishops. There were never, indeed, any councils holden, which could, with strict propriety, be called universal; those, however, whose laws and decrees were approved and admitted by the universal church, or the See Godofred. ad Codicis Theodos. titulos de Profes-greatest part of that sacred body, are commonsoribus et Artibus Liberalibus. Franc. Balduinus in ly called ecumenical or general councils. Constantino M. p. 122. Herm. Conring. Dissert. de Studiis Romæ et Constantinop. at the end of his Antiqui- II. The rights and privileges of the several

toricians.

V. From what has been here said concerning the state of learning among the Christians, let not any reader conclude, that an acquaintance with the sciences had become universal in the church of Christ; for, as yet, there was no law enacted, which excluded the ignorant and

* See the learned Spanheim's Preface to the works of Julian; and that also which he has prefixed to his French translation of Julian's Cæsars, and his Annotations to the latter; see also Bleterie, Vie de l'Empereur Julien, lib. i. p. 26.

Ammian. Marcellin. Hist. lib. xxix. cap. i. p. 556. edit. Valesii. Bleterie, Vie de Julien, p. 30-155, 159,

and Vie de Jovien, tom. i. 194.

tates Academica.

ecclesiastical orders were, however, gradually

authority was not, in all places, equally extensive; being in some considerably ample, and in others confined within narrow limits. To these various ecclesiastical orders, we might add that of the chorepiscopi, or superintendants of the country churches; but this order was, in most places, suppressed by the bishops, with a design to extend their own authority, and enlarge the sphere of their power and jurisdiction.*

IV. The administration of the church was divided, by Constantine himself, into an exter

changed and diminished, from the time that the church began to be torn with divisions, and agitated with those violent dissensions and tumults, to which the elections of bishops, the diversity of religious opinions, and other things of a like nature, too frequently gave rise. In these religious quarrels, the weaker generally fled to the court for protection and succour; and thereby furnished the emperors with opportunities of setting limits to the power of the bishops, of infringing the liberties of the people, and of modifying, in various ways, the an-nal and an internal inspection. The latter, cient customs according to their pleasure.And, indeed, even the bishops themselves, whose opulence and authority were considerably increased since the reign of Constantine, began to introduce innovations into the forms of ecclesiastical discipline, and to change the ancient government of the church. Their first step was an entire exclusion of the people from all part in the administration of ecclesiastical affairs; and, afterwards, they by degrees divested even the presbyters of their ancient privileges, and their primitive authority, that they might have no importunate protesters to control their ambition, or oppose their proceedings; and, principally, that they might either engross to themselves, or distribute as they thought proper, the possessions and revenues of the church. Hence, at the conclusion of this century, there remained no more than a mere shadow of the ancient government of the church. Many of the privileges which had formerly belonged to the presbyters and people, were usurped by the bishops; and many of the rights, which had been formerly vested in the universal church, were transferred to the emperors, and to subordinate officers and magis

trates.

which was committed to bishops and councils, related to religious controversies, the forms of divine worship, the offices of the priests, the vices of the ecclesiastical orders, &c. The external administration of the church, the emperor assumed to himself. This comprehended all those things which relate to the outward state and discipline of the church; it likewise extended to all contests and debates that might arise among the ministers of the church, superior as well as inferior, concerning their possessions, their reputation, their rights and privileges, their offences against the laws, and things of a like nature; but no controversies that related to matters purely religious were cognisable by this external inspection. In consequence of this artful division of the ecclesiastical government, Constantine and his successors called councils, presided in them, appointed the judges of religious controversies, terminated the differences which arose between the bishops and the people, fixed the limits of the ecclesiastical provinces, took cognisance of the civil causes that subsisted between the ministers of the church, and punished the crimes committed against the laws by the ordinary judges appointed for that purpose; leavIII. Constantine, in order to prevent civil ing all causes purely ecclesiastical to the cogcommotions, and to fix his authority upon solid nisance of bishops and councils. But this faand stable foundations, made several changes, mous division of the administration of the not only in the laws of the empire, but also in church was never explained with perspicuity, the form of the Roman government;* and as or determined with a sufficient degree of accuthere were many important reasons, which in- racy and precision; so that, both in this and duced him to suit the administration of the the following centuries, we find many transacchurch to these changes in the civil constitutions that seem absolutely inconsistent with tion, this necessarily introduced, among the bishops, new degrees of eminence and rank. Three prelates had, before this, enjoyed a certain degree of pre-eminence over the rest of the episcopal order, viz. the bishops of Rome, Antioch, and Alexandria; and to these the bishop of Constantinople was added, when the imperial residence was transferred to that city.ment of the church. These four prelates answered to the four Pre- V. In the episcopal order, the bishop of torian præfects created by Constantine; and it || Rome was the first in rank, and was distinis possible that, in this very century, they were guished by a sort of pre-eminence over all distinguished by the Jewish title of patriarchs. other prelates. Prejudices, arising from a great After these, followed the exarchs, who had the variety of causes, contributed to establish this inspection over several provinces, and answer-superiority; but it was chiefly owing to certain ed to the appointment of certain civil officers who bore the same title. In a lower class were the metropolitans, who had only the government of one province; under whom were the archbishops, whose inspection was confined to certain districts. In this gradation, the bishops brought up the rear; the sphere of their

it. We find the emperors, for example, frequently determining matters purely ecclesiastical, which belonged to the internal jurisdiction of the church; and, on the other hand, nothing is more frequent than the decisions of bishops and councils concerning things that relate merely to the external form and govern

circumstances of grandeur and opulence, by which mortals, for the most part, form their ideas of pre-eminence and dignity, and which they generally confound with the reasons of a

*This appears from several passages in the useful work of Lud. Thomassinus, entitled, Disciplina Ecclesiæ vet. et novæ circa Beneficia, tom. i.

Euseb. de vita Constantini, lib. iv. cap. xxiv. p. 536. See the imperial laws both in Justinian's Code, and * See Bos, Histoire de la Monarchie Francoise, tom. in the Theodosian; as also Godofred. ad Codic. Theodos.

1 p. 64. Giannone, Historia di Napoli, vol. i.

tom. vi.

however, be observed, that, even in this century, several of those steps were laid, by which the bishops of Rome mounted afterwards to the summit of ecclesiastical power and despotism. These steps were partly laid by the imprudence of the emperors, partly by the dexterity of the Roman prelates themselves, and partly by the inconsiderate zeal and precipitate judgment of certain bishops.* The fourth canon of the council, holden at Sardis in the year 347, is considered, by the votaries of the Roman pontiff, as the principal step to his sovereignty in the church; but, in my opinion, it ought by no means to be looked upon in this point of view; for, not to insist upon the reasons that prove the authority of this council to be extremely dubious, or upon those which have induced some to regard its laws as grossly corrupted, and others, to consider them as entirely fictitious and spurious,† it will be sufficient to observe the impossibility of proving, by the canon in question, that the bishops of Sardis were of opinion, that, in all cases, an appeal might be made to the bishop of Rome, in quality of supreme judge: but if we suppose, for a moment, that this was their opinion, what would follow? Surely that pretext for assuming a supreme authority, must be very slender, which arises only from the decree of one obscure council.

just and legal authority. The bishop of Rome surpassed all his brethren in the magnificence and splendour of the church over which he presided; in the riches of his revenues and possessions; in the number and variety of his ministers; in his credit with the people; and in his sumptuous and splendid manner of living.* These dazzling marks of human power, these seeming proofs of true greatness and felicity, had such a mighty influence upon the minds of the multitude, that the see of Rome became, in this century, a most seducing object of sacerdotal ambition. Hence it happened, that when a new pontiff was to be elected by the suffrages of the presbyters and the people, the city of Rome was generally agitated with dissensions, tumults, and cabals, whose consequences were often deplorable and fatal. The intrigues and disturbances that prevailed in that city in the year 366, when, upon the death of Liberius, another pontiff was to be chosen in his place, are a sufficient proof of what we have now advanced. Upon this occasion, one faction elected Damasus to that high dignity, while the opposite party chose Ursicinus, a deacon of the vacant church, to succeed Liberius. This double election gave rise to a dangerous schism, and even to a civil war within the city of Rome, which was carried on with the utmost barbarity and fury, and produced the most cruel massacres and desolation. This inhuman contest ended in the victory of Damasus; but whether his cause was more just than that of Ursicinus, is a question not so easy to determine.† To neither, indeed, can we attribute such princi-wark which menaced his growing authority ples as constitute a good Christian, much less that exemplary virtue which should distinguish a Christian bishop.

VII. Constantine the Great, by removing the seat of the empire to Byzantium, and building the city of Constantinople, raised up, in the bishop of this new metropolis, a formidable rival to the Roman pontiff, and a bul

with vigorous opposition; for, as the emperor, in order to render Constantinople a second Rome, enriched it with all the rights and privileges, honours, and ornaments, of the ancient capital of the world; so its bishop, measuring his own dignity and rank by the magnificence of the new city, and by its eminence, as the

dotii et Imperii; Du-Pin, de antiqua Ecclesiæ disciplina; and the very learned and judicious work of Blondel, de la Primaute dans l'Eglise.

VI. Notwithstanding the pomp and splendour that surrounded the Roman see, it is certain that the bishops of that city had not acquired, in this century, that pre-eminence of power and jurisdiction in the church which they afterwards enjoyed. In the ecclesiastical commonwealth, they were, indeed, the most eminent order of citizens; but still they were *The imprudence of the emperor, and the precitizens, as well as their brethren, and subject, cipitation of the bishops, were singularly discovered in like them, to the edicts and laws of the em- the following event, which favoured extremely the rise perors. All religious causes of extraordi- and the ambition of the Roman pontiff. About the year nary importance were examined and deter-pant of the see of Rome to examine and judge other 372, Valentinian enacted a law, empowering the occumined, either by judges appointed by the em- bishops, that religious disputes might not be decided by perors, or in councils assembled for that pur- profane or secular judges. The bishops assembled in pose, while those of inferior moment were council at Rome in 378, not considering the fatal consedecided, in each district, by its respective to themselves and to the church, declared their approquences that must arise, from this imprudent law, both bishop. The ecclesiastical laws were enacted, bation of it in the strongest terms, and recommended either by the emperor, or by councils. None the execution of it in an address to the emperor Gratian. of the bishops acknowledged that they derived Some think, indeed, that this law authorised the Roman prelate to judge only the bishops within the limits their authority from the permission and ap- of his jurisdiction, i, e. those of the suburbicarian propointment of the bishop of Rome, or that they vinees. Others are of opinion, that this power was were created bishops by the favour of the apos-given only for a time, and extended to those bishops tolic see. alone, who were concerned in the present schism. The On the contrary, they all main- latter notion seems probable: but still this privilege was tained, that they were the ambassadors and an excellent instrument in the hands of sacerdotal amministers of Jesus Christ, and that their authority was derived from above. It must, Ammianus Marcellinus gives a striking description of the luxury in which the bishops of Rome lived. See his Hist. lib. xxvii. cap. iii.

† Among the other writers of the papal history, see Bower's History of the Popes, vol. i.

Those who desire a more ample account of this matter, may consult Pet. de Marca, de Concordia Sacer-Il

bition.

among his Miscellaneous Tracts, tom. ii.
† See Mich. Geddes, Diss, de Canonibus Sardicensibus,

The fourth canon of the council of Sardis, supposing it genuine and authentic, related only to the particular case of a bishop's being deposed by the neighbouring prelates, and demanding permission to make his defence. In that case, this canon prohibited the election of a successor to the deposed individual, before the poutiff had examined the cause, and pronounced sentence.