that, in a certain sense, there was but one will and one operation of will in Christ. 3 11. The doctrine of the Monothelites, thus condemned and exploded by the council of Constantinople, found a place of refuge among the Mardaites, a people who inhabited the mountains of Libanus and Antilibanus; and who about the conclusion of this century received from John Maro, their first bishop, the name of Maronites which they still retain. No one of the ancients indeed has mentioned this man as the person who brought the Libaniots to embrace Monotheletism; but there are strong reasons for believing that it was this John, whose surname of Maro passed over to the people of whom he was bishop. This however is demonstrable from the testimony of William of Tyre and of other unexceptionable witnesses, that the Maronites were for a long time Monothelites in sentiment, and that it was not till the twelfth century, when they became reconciled with the Romish church in the year 1182, that they abandoned the error of one will in Christ. The most learned of the modern Maronites have very studiously endeavoured to wipe off this reproach from their nation, and have advanced many arguments to prove that their ancestors were always obedient to the see of Rome, and never embraced the sentiments either of the Monophysites or of the Monothelites. But they cannot persuade the learned to believe so; for these 10. But these positions were not explained in precisely the same manner by all who were called Monothelites. Some of them, as may be fully proved, intended no more than that the two wills in Christ, the human and the divine, were always harmonious, and in this sense one; or that the human will always accorded with the divine will, and was therefore always holy, upright, and good. And in this opinion there is nothing censurable. But others, approaching nearer to the Monophysites, supposed that the two wills in Christ, that is, the two powers of willing, in consequence of the personal union (as it is called) of the two natures, were amalgamated and became one will; yet they still admitted that the two wills could be, and should be, discriminated in our conceptions. The greatest part of the sect and those possessing the greatest acumen, supposed that the will of Christ's human soul was the instrument of his divine will, yet when moved and prompted to act, it operated and put forth volitions in connexion with the divine will. From this supposition, the position so obstinately maintained by the Monothelites was unavoidable, that in Christ there was but one will and one operation of will; for the operation of an instrument and of him who uses it, is not twofold but one. Setting aside therefore the suspicion of Eutychianism and other things connected with that question, the point in controversy was, whether the human will of Christ sometimes acted from its own impulse, or whether it was always moved by the instigation of the divine nature. This controversy is a striking illus-whom he extols for his holiness and his virtues; but he tration of the fallacious and hazardous nature of every religious peace which is made to rest on ambiguous phraseology. The friends of the council of Chalcedon endeavoured to ensnare the Monophysites by means of a proposition of dubious interpretation; and they thus imprudently involved the church and the state in long protracted controversies. By into action they operated as if they were but one. See Walch, Hist. der Ketzer. vol. ix. p. 392. &c. where he names (in Anm. i. p. 593) Sergius, Honorius, and the Ecthesis, as giving these views.- Mur. 2 According to Walch, Hist. der Ketzer vol. ix. p. 594, &c. the subordination of the human will to the divine in Christ was explained by some to be altogether voluntary, or a consequence of the pious resignation and the faith of the man Christ Jesus; but others supposed that it resulted from the nature of the union by which the human nature became the instrument by which the divine nature worked; and they illustrated the subject by the subjection of man's bodily members to the empire of his mind or soul.-Mur. 3 The surname of Maro was given to this monk be cause he had lived in the celebrated monastery of St. Maro on the river Orontes, before he took up his residence lar account is given of him by Asseman, Bibhoth. Oriental. Clement. Vatic. tom. i. p. 496. [Gabriel Sionita, De Urbibus et Moribus Oriental. cap. viii. derives the name of Maronites from an abbot Maron, among the Mardaites on Mount Lebanon. A particu will acknowledge no heretical Maro.- Schl. [Gieseler in his Text-book by Cunningham, vol. i. p. 373, note 5, thinks the history of the Maronites has been obscured by identifying that people with the Mardaites; and re Mardes in the Mémoires de l'Acad. des Inscript. tome fers us to Duperron, Recherches sur les migrations des 1. p. 1, "showing that the Mardaites or Mards, a warlike nation of Armenia, were placed as a garrison on Mount Libanus by Constantine Pogonatus, A.D. 676 (Theophanes p. 295), but withdrawn A.D. 685 by Jus tinian II. ibid. p. 302)."-Mur. 4 The passage of William of Tyre is in his Hist. rerum in partibus Transmar. gestar. lib. xxxii. cap. Phenicir, inhabiting the cliffs of Lebanon near the city viii. and is this:-"A Syrian nation in the province of Biblos, while enjoying temporal peace, experienced a great change in its state. For having followed the errors of ene Maro, a heresiarch, for nearly 500 years, and so as to be called after him Maronites, and to be separated from the church of the faithful and maintain a separate worship, through divine influence returning now to a sound mind they put on resolution and joined themselves to Aimericus, the patriarch of Antioch."The Alexandrian patriarch Eutychius, whose Annals Pocock has translated from the Arabic, likewise mentions a monk Marun, "who asserted that Christ cur Lord had two natures and one will, one operation and person, and corrupted the faith of men; and whose followers, holding the same sentiments with him, were called Maronites, deriving their name from his name Maro-Schi. maintain that their testimonies are fictitious the greatest part of its canons to be exceland of no validity.' lent." 12. Neither the sixth [general] council, which condemned the Monothelites, nor the fifth, which had been held in the preceding century, enacted any canons concerning discipline and rites; therefore a new assembly of bishops was held by order of Justinian II. in the year 692, at Constantinople, in a tower of the palace which was called Trullus. This council, from the place of meeting, was called Concilium Trullanum, and from another circumstance, Quinisextum, because the Greeks considered its decrees as necessary to the perfection of the acts of the fifth and sixth councils. We have one hundred and two canons sanctioned by this assembly, on various subjects pertaining to the external part of worship, the government of the church, and the conduct of Christians. But as six of these canons are opposed to the Romish opinions and customs, therefore the Roman pontiffs refused to approve the council as a whole or to rank it among the general councils, although they have deemed The cause of the Maronites has been pleaded by Abrah. Echelensis, Gabriel Sionita, and others of the Maronite nation; but by none of them more fully than by Nairon, both in his Dissert. de Origine, Nomine et Religione Maronitarum, Rome, 1679, 8vo; and in his Euoplia fidei Catholicæ ex Syrorum et Chaldæorum Monumentis, Rome, 1694, 8vo. Yet Nairon induced none to believe his positions except Pagi (in his Critica Bareniana, ad ann. 694), and De la Rocque, in whose Voyage de Syrie et de Montliban, tome ii. p. 28-129, there is a long Dissertation concerning the origin of the Maronites. Even Asseman, who being a Maronite spared no pains to vindicate the character of his nation (Biblioth. Orient. Clement. Vatic. tom. i. p. 496) yet does not deny that much of what has been written by Nairon or authority. See Morin, De Ordinat. Sacris, p. 380, and others in behalf of the Maronites, is without weight &c.; Simon, Histoire Critique des Chrétiens Orientaux, chap. xiii. p. 146; Renaudot, Hist. Patriar. Alexand. p. 149, and Præfat. ad Liturgias Orientales; Le Brun, Explication de la Messe, tome ii. p. 626, &c. Paris, 1726, 8vo. The arguments on both sides are stated, and the reader is left to form his own judgment, by Le Quien, Oriens Christianus, tom. iii. p. 10, &c. [See also Walch, Hist. der Ketzer. vol. ix. p. 474–488.— Mur. patriarchs of Constantinople, Jerusalem, Alexandria, 2 See Pagi, Breviarium Pontific. Koman. tom. i. p. 486; Lupus, Diss. de Concilio Trullano, in his Notes and Dissertations on Councils, Opp. tom. iii. p. 168, &c. The Romans reject the fifth canon which approves of the eighty-five Apostolic Canons commonly attributed to Clement-the thirteenth canon, which allows priests to live in wedlock-the fifty-fifth canon, which condemns fasting on Saturdays, a custom allowed of in the Latin church-the sixty-seventh canon, which earnestly enjoins abstinence from blood and from things strangled-the eighty-second canon, which prohibits the painting of Christ in the image of a lamb and the eighty-sixth canon, concerning the equality of the bishops of Rome and Constantinople. [The eastern Antioch, and Justiniana, with more than 200 bishops, The Roman pontiff had n attended this council. proper legate there. Yet his ordinary representatives at the imperial court sat in the council, and subscribed in his subscription that he represented the patriarch of its decisions; and Basil, the archbishop of Crete, says Rome and all the bishops under him. The emperor attended the council in person and subscribed its decrees. In the original, a space was left for the subscription of the Roman pontiff; but when it was sent to Rome by the emperor, and Pope Sergius was called on to subscribe, he showed such a refractory spirit as nearly cost him his liberty. The reason was, he found the above mentioned canons to be contrary to the principles and usages of his church. For the same reason the admirers of the Romish bishop to this day, are not agreed whether the whole council, or only the canons which have the misfortune to displease them, should be rejected; notwithstanding at an early period Pope Adrian approved of it. On the other hand this council was recognised by the Greeks as a valid one, and classed among the general councils. See Walch, Hist. der Kirchentor am. p. 441.-Schl. END OF BOOK II CENTURY EIGHTH. PART I. HISTORY OF THE OUTWARD STATE OF THE CHURCH. 478. [Mosheim in his Hist. Tartarorum Eccles. p. 13, Dailamites, formed them into churches, and ordained tianity was firmly and permanently esta blished in those countries for several centuries, although it was sometimes disturbed by the Mohammedans; and that the bishops of these countries were always subject to the authority of the Nestorian pontiff. 2. In Europe most of the German nations were still involved in the darkness of superstition; the only exception being the tribes on the Rhine-namely, the Bavarians, who are known to have received a knowledge of Christianity under Theodoric, the son of Clovis the Great, and the Eastern Franks [or Franconians] with a few others. dictine monk of noble birth who afterwards 1 Thomas Margensis, Hist. Monast. lib. iii. in Asseman, Biblio. Orient. Fatic. tom. iii. par. i. p. 491. See also Ibid. tom. iii. par. ii. cap. ix. sec. 5, p. &c. relying chiefly on the preceding authorities, states that Timotheus, who was patriarch of the Nestorians from A.D. 777 to A.D. 820, planned the mission to these nations inhabiting the shores of the Caspian sea; and selected for its execution one Subchal Jesu, a learned monk of the Nestorian monastery of Beth-Aben in Assyria, well skilled in the Syriac, Arabic, and Persian languages: ordained him bishop and sent him forth. Subchal made numerous converts among the Gela and elders over them. This active missionary also travelled farther East, and spread the Gospel extensively in Tartary, Chathai, and China; but on his return from his mission to visit Timotheus and the monks of his convent, he was murdered by the Barbarians. Timotheus now ordained Kardagus and Jabalaha, two other monks of Beth-Aben, and sent them with fifteen assistant monks into the same countries. These also were successful missionaries; and with the consent of Timo-churches till A.D. 1000, when the famous Christian theus, the two bishops ordained seven of their companions to be bishops of the East, namely, Thomas who went into India, David metropolitan of China, and Zacchæus, Semus, Ephraim, Simeon, and Ananias. Thomas Margensis relates that Timotheus directed the two ordaining bishops first to ordain a third, and to supply the place of a third bishop at his ordination. by placing a copy of the Gospels on the seat near the right hand. Afterwards they would have the canonical "umber of three bishops to ordain the others. These new bishops dispersed themselves widely over the countries of the East, and founded many churches in India, Chathai, and China. But after the death of Timotheus, A.D. 820, we learn nothing more respecting these prince, called Presbyter John, came upon the stage.Mur. 2 All that could be said of this celebrated man has been collected by Gudenius, in his Diss. de S. Boni fabio Germanorum Apostolo, Helmst. 1722, 4to. Yet we may add Fabricius, Biblio. Lat. medii ævi, tom. i. p. 709; Histoire Litt. de la France, tome iv. p. 92 Mabillon, Annales Benedictini, and others. [The church histories of Fleury, Schroeckh, and scl midt, gave ample accounts of Boniface. Miner (Church |