counted in their number several persons highly eminent for their learning and piety. Among others, Priscillian, a layman, distinguished by his birth, fortune and eloquence, and after wards bishop of Abila, was infected with this odious doctrine, and became its most zealous and ardent defender. Hence he was accused by several bishops, and, by a rescript obtained from the emperor Gratian, he was banished with his followers from Spain;* but he was restored, some time after, by an edict of the same prince, to his country and his functions. His sufferings did not end here; for he was accused a second time, in 384,† before Maximus, who had procured the assassination of Gratian, and made himself master of Gaul; and, by the order of that prince, he was put to death at Treves with some of his associates. The agents, however, by whose barbarous zeal this sentence was obtained, were justly regarded with the utmost abhorrence by the bishops of Gaul and Italy; for Christians had not yet learned, that giving over heretics to be punished by the magistrates, was either an act of piety or justice.§ [No: this abominable doctrine was reserved for those times, when religion was to become an instrument of despotism, or a pretext for the exercise of pride, malevolence, and vengeance.]

The death of Priscillian was less pernicious to the progress of his opinions, than might naturally have been expected. His doctrine not only survived him, but was propagated through the greatest part of Spain and Gaul; and even so far down as the sixth century, the followers of this unhappy man gave much trouble to the bishops and clergy in those provinces.

ence between their doctrine, and that of the Manicheans, was not very considerable. For "they denied the reality of Christ's birth and incarnation; maintained, that the visible universe was not the production of the Supreme Deity, but of some dæmon, or malignant principle; adopted the doctrine of æons, or emanations from the divine nature; considered human bodies as prisons formed by the author of evil, to enslave celestial minds; condemned marriage, and disbelieved the resurrection of the body." Their rules of life and manners were rigid and severe; and the accounts which many have given of their lasciviousness and intemperance deserve not the least credit, as they are totally destitute of evidence and authority. That the Priscillianists were guilty of dissimulation upon some occasions, and deceived their adversaries by cunning stratagems, is true; but that they held it as a maxim, that lying and perjury were lawful, is a most notorious falsehood, without even the least shadow of probability, however commonly this odious doctrine has been laid to their charge. In the heat of controversy, the eye of passion and of prejudice is too apt to confound the principles and opinions of men with their practice.

*

XXIII. To what we have here said concerning those sects which made a noise in the world, it will not be improper to add some account of those of a less considerable kind.

Audæus, a man of remarkable virtue, being excommunicated in Syria, on account of the freedom and importunity with which he censured the corrupt and licentious manners of the clergy, formed an assembly of those who were attached to him, and became, by his own XXII. No ancient writer has given an accu- appointment, their bishop. Banished into rate account of the doctrine of the Priscil- Scythia by the emperor, he went among the lianists. Many authors, on the contrary, by Goths, where his sect flourished, and augmenttheir injudicious representations of it, have ed considerably. The ancient writers are not highly disfigured it, and added new degrees of agreed about the time in which we are to date abscurity to a system which was before suffi- the origin of this sect. With respect to its reciently dark and perplexed. It appears, how-ligious institutions, we know that they differed ever, from authentic records, that the differ

*This banishment was the effect of a sentence

pronounced against Priscillian, and some of his followers, by a synod convened at Saragossa in 380; in consequence of which, Idacius and Ithacius, two cruel and persecuting ecclesiastics, obtained from Gratian the rescript abovementioned. See Sulpit. Sever. Hist. Sacr. lib. ii. cap.

xlvii.

Upon the death of Gratian, who had favoured Priscillian toward the latter end of his reign, Ithacius presented to Maximus a petition against him; whereupon this prince appointed a council to be holden at Bourdeaux, from which Priscillian appealed to the prince himself. Sulp. Sever. lib. ii. cap. xlix. p. 287.

It may be interesting to the reader to hear the character of the first person that introduced civil persecution into the Christian church. "He was a man abandoned to the most corrupt indolence, and without the least tincture of true piety. He was talkative, audacious, impudent, luxurious, and a slave to his belly. He accused as heretics, and as protectors of Priscillian, all those whose lives were consecrated to the pursuit of piety and knowledge, or distinguished by acts of mortification and abstinence," &c. Such is the character which Sulpitius Severus, who had an extreme aversion to the sentiments of Priscillian, gives us of Ithacius, bishop of Sossuba, by whose means he was put to death.

in some points from those observed by other Christians; and, particularly, that the followers of Audæus celebrated Easter, or the Paschal feast, with the Jews, in repugnance to the express decree of the council of Nice. With respect to their doctrine, several errors have been imputed to them, and this, among others, that they attributed to the Deity a human form.

XXIV. The Grecian and Oriental writers place, in this century, the rise of the sect of the Messalians, or Euchites, whose doctrine and discipline were, indeed, much more an

* See Simon de Vries, Dissert. Critica de Priscillianistis, printed at Utrecht, in 1745. The only defect in this dissertation is the implicit manner in which the author follows Beausobre's History of the Manicheans, taking every thing for granted which is affirmed in that work. See also Franc. Girvesii Historia Priscillianistarum Chronologica, published at Rome in 1750. We find, moreover, in the twenty-seventh volume of the Opuscula Scientifica of Angelus Calogera, a treatise entitled Bachiarius Illustratus, seu de Priscilliana Hææresi Dissertatio; but this dissertation seems rather intended to clear up the affair of Bachiarius, than to give a full account of the Priscillianists and their doctrine.

See Sulp. Sever. Hist. Sacr. edit. Leips. 1709, where Martin, the truly apostolical bishop of Tours, says to Epiphanius, Hæres. lxx. p. 811.-Augustin. de Maximus, "novum esse et inauditum nefas ut causam Hæres. cap. 1.-Theodoret. Fabul. Hæret. lib. iv. cap. ecclesiæ judex seculi judicaret." See also Dial. iii. deix.-J. Joach. Schroder, Dissertat. de Audæanis, pubvita Martini, cap. xi. p. 495. lished in Voigt's Bibliotheca Historiæ Hæresiolog. tom. i.

VOL. I.-17

by contemplation and prayer. The external air of piety and devotion, which accompanied this sect, imposed upon many, while the Greeks, on the other hand, opposed it with vehemence in all succeeding ages.

It is proper to observe here, that the title of Massalians or Euchites had a very extensive application among the Greeks and the Orientals, for they gave it to all those who endeavoured to raise the soul to God by recalling and withdrawing it from terrestrial and sensible objects, however these enthusiasts might differ from each other in their opinions upon other subjects.

cient, and subsisted, even before the birth of Christ, in Syria, Egypt, and other eastern countries, but who do not seem to have been formed into a religious body before the latter part of the century of which we now write. These fanatics, who lived after the monkish fashion, and withdrew from all commerce and society with their fellow creatures, seem to have derived their name from their habit of continual prayer. "They imagined that the mind of every man was inhabited by an evil dæmon, whom it was impossible to expel by any other means than by constant prayer and singing of hymns; and that, when this malignant spirit was cast out, the pure mind return- XXV. Toward the conclusion of this centued to God, and was again united to the divine ry, two opposite sects involved Arabia and the essence from which it had been separated." adjacent countries in the troubles and tumults To this leading tenet they added many other of a new controversy. These jarring factions enormous opinions, which bear a manifest re-went by the names of Antidico-Marianites and semblance to the Manichean doctrine, and are evidently drawn from the same source whence | the Manicheans derived their errors, even from the tenets of the Oriental philosophy.* In a word, the Euchites were a sort of Mystics, who imagined, according to the Oriental notion, that two souls resided in man, the one good, and the other evil; and who were zealous in hastening the return of the good spirit to God,

Epiphanius, Hæres. lxxx. p. 1067.-Theodoret. Hæret. Fabul. lib. iv. cap. x. p. 672.-Timotheus, Presbyter, de receptione Hæreticor. published in the third

volume of Cotelerius' Monumenta Eccles. Græcæ.Jac. Tollii Insignia Itineris Italici, p. 110.-Assemani Bibliotheca Orientalis Vaticana, tom. i. et iii,

Collyridians. The former maintained, that the Virgin Mary did not always preserve her immaculate state, but received the embraces of her husband Joseph after the birth of Christ. The latter, on the contrary, (who were singularly favoured by the female sex,) running into the opposite extreme, worshipped the Blessed Virgin as a goddess, and judged it necessary to appease her anger, and seek her favour and protection, by libations, sacrifices, oblations of cakes (collyrida,) and the like services.*

Other sects might be mentioned here; but they are too obscure and inconsiderable to deserve notice.

* See Epiphan. Hæres. lxxviii. lxxix.

THE FIFTH CENTURY.

PART I.

THE EXTERNAL HISTORY OF THE CHURCH.

they ruled with an absolute independence, in particularly from the dominion exercised by their respective governments; and, as appears Theodoric in Italy, they left nothing to the eastern emperors but a mere shadow of power and authority.*

II. These constant wars, and the inexpressible calamities with which they were attended, were undoubtedly detrimental to the cause and progress of Christianity. It must, however, be acknowledged that the Christian emperors, especially those who ruled in the east, were active and assiduous in extirpating the remains of the ancient superstitions. Theodosius the younger, distinguished himself in this pious and noble work, and many remarkable monuments of his zeal are still preserved;† such as the laws which enjoined either the destruction of the heathen temples, or the dedication of them to Christ and his saints; the edicts, by which he abrogated the sacrilegious rites and ceremonies of Paganism, and removed from all offices and employments in the state such as persisted in their attachment to the absurdities of Polytheism.

I. In order to arrive at a true knowledge of the causes to which we are to attribute the outward state of the church, and the events which happened to it during the fifth century, we must keep in view the civil history of this period. It is, therefore, proper to observe, that, in the beginning of this century, the Roman empire was divided into two sovereignties; one of which comprehended the eastern provinces, the other those of the west. Arcadius, the emperor of the east, reigned at Constantinople; and Honorius, who governed the western provinces, chose Ravenna for the place of his residence. The latter prince, remarkable only for the sweetness of his temper and the goodness of his heart, neglected the great affairs of the empire; and, inattentive to the weighty duties of his station, held the reins of government with an unsteady hand. The Goths, taking advantage of this criminal indolence, made incursions into Italy, laid waste its fairest provinces, and sometimes carried their de- This spirit of reformation appeared with less solations as far as Rome, which they ravaged vigour in the western empire. There the feasts and plundered in the most dreadful manner. of Saturn and Pan, the combats of the gladiaThese calamities, which fell upon the western tors, and other rites that were instituted in part of the empire from the Gothic depreda-honour of the pagan deities, were celebrated tions, were followed by others still more dreadful under the succeeding emperors. A fierce and warlike people, issuing from Germany, overspread Italy, Gaul, and Spain, the noblest of all the European provinces, and erected new kingdoms in these fertile countries; and Odoacer, at last, at the head of the Heruli, having conquered Augustulus, in 476, gave the mortal blow to the western empire, and reduced all Italy under his dominion. About sixteen years after this, Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, made war upon these barbarian invaders, at the request of Zeno, emperor of the east; conquered Odoacer in several battles; and obtained, as the fruit of his victories, a kingdom for the Ostrogoths in Italy, which subsisted under various turns of fortune from the year 493 to

552.*

These new monarchs of the west pretended to acknowledge the supremacy of the emperors who resided at Constantinople, and gave some faint external marks of a disposition to reign in subordination to them; but, in reality,

*See, for a fuller illustration of this branch of history, the learned work of M. de Bos, entitled, Histoire Critique de la Monarchie Francoise, tom. i. p. 258 as also Mascow's History of the Germans.

with the utmost freedom and impunity; and persons of the highest rank and authority publicly professed the religion of their idolatrous ancestors. This liberty was, however, from time to time, reduced within narrower limits; and all those public sports and festivals, which were more peculiarly incompatible with the genius and sanctity of the Christian religion, were every where abolished.§

III. The limits of the church continued to extend themselves, and gained ground daily upon the idolatrous nations, both in the eastern and western empires. In the east, the inhabi

p. 280.-Muratori, Antiq. Ital. tom. ii. p. 578, 832.* Car. du Fresne, Dissert. xxiii. ad Histor. Ludovici S. Giannone, Historia di Napoli, tom. i. p. 207.-Vita Theodorici Ostrogothorum Regis, a Johanne Cochleo, printed in 1699, with the observations of Peringskiold.

See the Theodosian code, tom. vi. p. 327.

See the Saturnalia of Macrobius, lib. i.-Scipio Maffei delli Anfiteatri, lib. i. p. 56.-Pierre le Brun, Hist. Critique des Pratiques superstitieuses, tom. i. p. 237; and, Theodosii M. et Arcadii, which is to be found in Latin, above all, Montfaucon's Diss. de Moribus Tempore in the eleventh volume of the works of St. Chrysostom, and in French, in the twentieth volume of the Memoires de l'Academie des Inscriptions et des Belles Lettres, p. 197.

Anastasius prohibited, toward the conclusion of this century, the combats with the wild beasts, and other shows. Asseman. Biblioth. Orient. Vatic. tom. i. p. 246.

to the success which crowned the arms of those who professed it; and, therefore, when they saw the Romans in possession of an empire much more extensive than that of any other people, they concluded that Christ, their God, was of all others the most worthy of religious

V. It was the same principle, as well as the same views, that engaged Clovis,* king of the Salii, a nation of the Franks, to embrace Christianity. This prince, whose signal valour was accompanied with barbarity, arrogance, and injustice, founded the kingdom of the Franks in Gaul, after having made himself master of a great part of that country, and meditated with remarkable eagerness, and avi

tants of the mountains Libanus and Anti-Libanus, being dreadfully infested with wild beasts, implored the assistance and counsels of the famous Simeon the Stylite, of whom we shall have occasion to speak hereafter. Simeon gave them for answer, that the only effectual method of removing this calamity was, to aban-homage. don the superstitious worship of their ancestors, and substitute the Christian religion in its place. The docility of this people, joined to the extremities to which they were reduced, engaged them to follow the counsels of this holy man. They embraced Christianity, and, in consequence of their conversion, they had the pleasure of seeing their savage enemies abandon their habitations, if we may believe the writers who affirm the truth of this pro-dity the conquest of the whole. His converdigy. The same Simeon, by his influence and authority, introduced the Christian worship into a certain district of the Arabians: some allege, that this also was effected by a miracle, which to me appears more than doubtful.* To these instances of the progress of the Gospel, we may add the conversion of a considerable number of Jews in the isle of Crete: finding themselves grossly deluded by the impious pretensions of an impostor, called Moses Cretensis, who gave himself out for the Messiah, they opened their eyes upon the truth, and spontaneously embraced the Christian religion. IV. The German nations, who rent in pieces the Roman empire in the west, were not all converted to Christianity at the same time. Some of them had embraced the truth before the time of their incursion; and such, among others, was the case of the Goths. Others, after having erected their little kingdoms in the empire, embraced the Gospel, that they might thus live with more security amidst a people, who, in general, professed the Christian religion. It is, however, uncertain (and likely to continue so) at what time, and by whose ministry, the Vandals, Sueves, and Alans, were converted to Christianity. With respect to the Burgundians, who inhabited the banks of the Rhine, and thence passed into Gaul, we are informed, by Socrates,§ that they embraced the Gospel of their own accord, from a notion that Christ, or the God of the Romans, who had been represented to them as a most powerful being, would defend them against the rapines and incursions of the Huns. They afterwards sided with the Arian party, to which also the Vandals, Sueves, and Goths, were zealously attached. All these fierce and warlike nations considered a religion as excellent, in proportion

* Vide idem Opus, tom. i. p. 246.

sion to the Christian religion is dated from the battle he fought with the Alemans, in 496, at a village called Tolbiacum;† in which, when the Franks began to give ground, and their affairs seemed desperate. he implored the assistance of Christ (whom his queen Clotildis, daughter of the king of the Burgundians, had often represented to him, in vain, as the Son of the true God,) and solemnly engaged himself, by a vow, to worship him as his God, if he would render him victorious over his enemies. Victory decided in favour of the Franks; and Clovis, faithful to his engagement, received baptism at Rheims, toward the conclusion of the same year, after having been instructed by Remigius, bishop of that city, in the doctrines of Christianity.§ The example of the king had such a powerful effect upon the minds of his subjects, that three thousand of them immediately followed it, and were baptized with him. Many are of opinion, that the desire of extending his dominions principally contributed to render Clovis faithful to his engagement, though some influence may also be allowed to the zeal and exhortations of his queen Clotildis. Be that as it will, nothing is more certain than that his profession of Christianity was, in effect, of great use to him, both in confirming and enlarging his empire.

The miracles, which are said to have been wrought at the baptism of Clovis, are unworthy of the smallest degree of credit. Among others, the principal prodigy, that of the phial full of oil said to have been brought from heaven by a milk-white dove during the ceremony of baptism, is a fiction, or rather, perhaps, an imposture; a pretended miracle contrived by artifice and fraud.|| Pious frauds of this na

⭑ Beside the name of Clovis, this prince was also called Clodovæus, Hludovicus, Ludovicus, and Ludicin. Tolbiacum is thought to be the present Zulpick, which is about twelve miles from Cologne.

We shall give the relation of Socrates, concerning this impostor, in the words of the learned and estimable author of the Remarks on Ecclesiastical History. "In the time of Theodosius the younger, an impostor arose, called Moses Cretensis. He pretended to be a second Moses, sent to deliver the Jews who dwelt in Crete, and promised to divide the sea, and give them a safe passage through it. They assembled together, with their wives and children, and followed him to a promontory. He there commanded them to cast themselves into the sea. Many of them obeyed, and perished in the waters; and many were taken up and saved by fisher-Franks, that should not have happened." men. Upon this, the deluded Jews would have torn the impostor to pieces; but he escaped them, and was seen no more." See Jortin's Remarks, vol. iii.

See Gregory of Tours, Historia Francorum, lib. ii. cap. xxx. xxxi.-Count Bunau's Historia Imperii Romano-Germanici, tom. i. p. 588.-Du Bos' Histoire Critique de la Monarchie Francoise, tom. ii. p. 340.

Socrates, Hist. Eccles. lib. vii. cap. xxxviii. p. 383.
Socrat. lib. vii. cap. xxx. p. 371.

The epitomiser of the history of the Franks tells us, that Remigius having preached to Clovis, and those who had been baptised with him, a sermon on the passion of our Saviour, the king, in hearing him, could not forbear crying out, "If I had been there with my

The truth of this miracle has been denied by the learned John James Chiflet, in his book De Ampulla Rhemensi, printed at Antwerp, in 1651; and it has been affirmed by Vertot, in the Memoires de l'Academie des Inscriptions et des Belles Lettres, tom. iv. p. 350. After

ture were very frequently practised in Gaul and in Spain at this time, in order to captivate, with more facility, the minds of a rude and barbarous people, who were scarcely suscepti- || ble of a rational conviction.

The conversion of Clovis is looked upon by the learned as the origin of the titles of most Christian King, and Eldest Son of the Church, which have been so long attributed to the kings of France; for, if we except this prince, all the kings of those barbarous nations, who seized the Roman provinces, were either yet involved in the darkness of Paganism, or infected with the Arian heresy.

VI. Celestine, the Roman pontiff, sent Palladius into Ireland, to propagate the Christian religion among the rude inhabitants of that island. This first missiont was not attended with much fruit; nor did the success of Palladius bear any proportion to his laborious and pious endeavours. After his death, the same pontiff employed, in this mission, Succathus, a native of Scotland, whose name he changed into that of Patrick, and who arrived among the Irish in 432. The success of his ministry, and the number and importance of his pious exploits, stand upon record as undoubted proofs, not only of his resolution and patience, but also of his dexterity and address. Having attacked, with much more success than his predecessor, the errors and superstitions of that uncivilized people, and brought great numbers of them over to the Christian religion, he founded, in 472, the archbishopric of Armagh,

which has ever since remained the metropolitan see of the Irish nation. Hence this famous missionary, though not the first who brought among that people the light of the Gospel, has yet been justly entitled the Apostle of the Irish, and the father of the Hibernian church, and is still generally acknowledged and revered in that honourable character.

VII. The causes and circumstances by which these different nations were engaged to abandon the superstition of their ancestors, and to embrace the religion of Jesus, may be easily deduced from the facts we have related in the history of their conversion. It would, indeed, be an instance of the blindest and most perverse partiality, not to acknowledge, that the labours and zeal of great and eminent men contributed to this happy purpose, and were the means by which the darkness of many was turned into light. But, on the other hand, they must be very inattentive and superficial observers of things, who do not perceive that the fear of punishment, the prospect of honours and advantages, and the desire of obtaining succour against their enemies from the countenance of the Christians, or the miraculous influences of their religion, were the prevailing motives that induced the greatest part to renounce the service of their impotent gods.

How far these conversions were due to real miracles attending the ministry of the early preachers, is a matter extremely difficult to be determined; for, though I am persuaded that those pious men, who, in the midst of many dangers, and in the face of obstacles seemingly invincible, endeavoured to spread the light of Christianity among the barbarous nations, were sometimes accompanied with the more peculiar presence and succours of the Most High,* yet

a mature consideration of what has been alleged on both sides of the question, I can scarcely venture to deny the fact: I am therefore of opinion, that, in order to confirm and fix the wavering faith of this barbarian prince, Remigius had prepared his measures before-hand, and trained a pigeon, by great application and dexterity, in am equally convinced, that the greatest part such a manner, that, during the baptism of Clovis, it de- of the prodigies, recorded in the histories of scended from the roof of the church with a phial of oil. this age, are liable to the strongest suspicions Among the records of this century, we find accounts of of falsehood or imposture. The simplicity and many such miracles. There is one circumstance, which obliges me to differ from Dr. Mosheim upon this ignorance of the generality in those times furpoint, and to look upon the story of the famous phial nished the most favourable occasion for the exrather as a mere fiction, than as a pious fraud, or pre-ercise of fraud, and the impudence of impostended miracle brought about by artifice; and that circumstance is, that Gregory of Tours, from whom we tors, in contriving false miracles, was artfully have a full account of the conversion and baptism of proportioned to the credulity of the vulgar,f Clovis, and who, from his proximity to this time, may while the sagacious and the wise, who perceivalmost be called a contemporary writer, has not made the ed these cheats, were overawed into silence by least mention of this famous miracle. This omission, in a writer whom the Roman catholics themselves consider the dangers that threatened their lives and foras an over-credulous historian, amounts to a proof, that, tunes, if they should expose the artifice. Thus in his time, this fable was not yet invented. *See Gab. Daniel et De Camps, Dissert. de Titulo does it generally happen in human life, that, Regis Christianissimi, in the Journal des Scavans for the When danger attends the discovery and proyear 1720, p. 243, 336, 404, 448.-Memoires de l'Acade-fession of the truth, the prudent are silent, the mie des Inscriptions, tom. xx. p. 466. multitude believe, and impostors triumph.

From the fragments of the lives of some Irish bishops who are said to have converted many of their countrymen in the fourth century, archbishop Usher concludes, that Palladius was not the first bishop of Ireland (see his Antiquities of the British Church;) but it has been evidently proved, among others by Bollandus, that these fragments are of no earlier date than the twelfth century, and are besides, for the most part, fabulous. Dr. Mosheim's opinion is farther confirmed by the authority of Prosper, which is decisive in this matter.

See the Acta Sanctor. tom. ii. Martii, p. 517, tom. iii. Februar. p. 131, 179; and the Hibernia Sacra of Sir James Ware, printed at Dublin in 1717. The latter published at London, in 1656, the Works of St. Patrick. Accounts of the synods, that were holden by this eminent missionary, are to be found in Wilkins' Concilia Magnæ Brit. et Hiberniæ, tom. i. With respect to the famous cave, called the Purgatory of St. Patrick, the reader may

consult Le Brun, Histoire Critique des Pratiques superstitieuses, tom. iv. p. 34.

* There is a remarkable passage, relating to the miracles of this century, in the dialogue of Æneas Gazæus concerning the immortality of the soul, entitled Theo. phrastus. See the controversy concerning the time when miracles ceased in the church, that was carried on about the middle of the eighteenth century, on occasion of Dr. Middleton's Free Inquiry.

t This is ingenuously confessed by the Benedictine monks in their Literary History of France, tom. ii. f. 33, and happily expressed by Lívy, Hist. lib. xxiv. cap. x. sect. 6. "Prodigia multa nuntiata sunt, quæ quo magis credebant simplices et religiosi homines, eo plura nuntiabantur."

iii.

Sulpitius Severus, Dial. i. p. 438. Ep. i. p. 457. Dial ii. P.

cap.

487.