THE
VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
BY
REV, SAIUEL EDGAR, D, D,
OP IRELAND.
WITH AN APPENDIX
BY BET. JOHN N. MclEOD, D.l), OF NEW YOKE.
Tot nunc fides existere, quot voluntates : et tot nob is doctrinas esse, quot mores. Fides
Bcribuntur, ut volumus, aut ita, ut votumus, intelliguntur. Aatiuas atque menstruas, de Deo,
fides decerniinus. HILARY. 308.
Verum non esse, quod variat. JEROM, 1, 1426.
Acta priorum Pontificura sequentes aut infringerenf, aut omnino tollerent. PLAT. 126.
SECOND AMERICAN EDITION;
RETISED, CORRECTED, AND ENLARGED BY THE AUTHOR.
REV. 0. SPARRY, EDITOR.
NEW YORK:
HOLMAN & GRAY, PRINTERS, 90 FULTON STREET
1848.
Entered according to the Act of Congress, in the year 1848,
BY REV. CHARLES SPARKY,
in the Clerk's Office of the Southern District of New York.
HOLMAN & GRAY, BTEBEOTYPEBS,
90 Fulton Street.
TO
HIS GRACE
THE LORD ARCHBISHOP OF ARMAGH,
PRIMATE AND METROPOLITAN OF ALL IRELAND,
THIS WORK IS
WITH PROFOUND GRATITUDE AND RESPECT,
DEDICATED,
BY HIS OBLIGED AND OBEDIENT SERVANT,
THE AUTHOR.
PREFACE.
THE Popish and Protestant controversy, in the present age, has,
in these kingdoms, been agitated with ardor and ability. The
debate, in the end of the last century, seemed to slumber. The
polemics of each party, satisfied with the unrestricted enjoyment
of their own opinions, appeared, for a time, to drop the pen of
discussion, dismiss the weapons of hostility, and leave men,
according to their several predilections, to the undisputed pos-
session of Popery or Protestantism. But stillness frequently
ushers in the tempest. The calm, amid the serenity of sea and
sky, is often the harbinger of the storm. This diversity, in late
years, has been exemplified in the controversial world. The
polemical pen, which, in the British dominions, had slept in inac-
tivity, has resumed its labours, and the clerical voice, which had
been engaged in the sober delivery of sermons, has, in the passing
day, been strained to the loud accents of controversial theology.
Ireland, in a particular manner, has become the field of noisy
disputation. The clergy in advocacy of Popery or Protestant-
ism, have displayed all their learning and eloquence. A society
for promoting the principles of the Reformation, has been estab-
lished through England, Ireland, and Scotland; and this asso-
ciation has awakened a conflicting reaction, and blown into
vivid combustion all the elements of papal opposition.
These discussions commenced with the Reformation. Con-
tests of a similar kind, indeed, had preceded that revolution,
and may be traced to the introduction of Christianity. The u>
spired heralds of the Gospel raised the voice, and wielded the
pen against Judaism and infidelity. Popery carried on a per-
petual war against Nestorianism, Monophysitism, and Bother
oriental speculations. The papacy, in European nations, ar-
rayed itself against Waldensianism ; and opposed power and
persecution to truth and reason. The inquisition erected the
dungeon and the gibbet, for the support of error and supersti-
tion, and for the extinction of light and liberty. Wickliff and
his followers in England wielded reason and revelation against
superstition and persecution, till they were nearly exterminated
by the sword, the flames, and the gibbet.
Protestantism, at the era of the Reformation, began its attack
on popery in more auspicious circumstances and on a wider
VI PREFACE.
field of action. Philosophy and literature, which had been dif-
fused through the nations by the art of printing, the progress of
society, and the march of intellect, facilitated the grand project.
The European kingdoms, therefore, in one simultaneous move-
ment, seemed to awaken from their apathy. The scintillations
of reformation, which flashed in Germany and Switzerland,
radiated from the Mediterranean to the Northern Ocean, and
from the bay of Biscay to the Black Sea; and Europeans,
aroused by its influence, hailed the bright light, shook off their
gloomy errors, and rising in moral and intellectual strength,
burst the fetters of superstition.
Luther and Melancthon in Germany, supported Protestant-
ism, in verbal and written discussions, against Tetzel, Eckius,
Prierio, Cajetan, and Miltitz. Luther, in apostolical fearless-
ness, which never trembled at danger or shrank from difficulty,
assailed the papacy with zeal and inflexibility. His shafts,
though sometimes unpolished, were always pointed ; and his
sarcasms, suited to his age and language, might, in a few in-
stances, degenerate into coarseness or even scurrility. Melanc-
thon, in all his engagements, evinced ability, learning, candour,
mildness, and moderation. His erudition occupied a vast
range ; and the mighty mass of literary attainments was directed
by taste and inspired by genius. Their united advocacy re-
pelled error, dislodged the enemy from his deepest entrenchments,
and established Lutheranism through the circles of Germany.
The light soon communicated to Denmark, Sweden, and Nor-
way. Gustavus, king of Sweden, countenanced a disputation
between Olaus and Gallius, and the result, which was the
triumph of Protestantism, tended to the extension of the Reform-
ation.
Zuinglius, Bucer, Calvin, and Beza, attacked the Romish
superstition in France and Switzerland. The attack was met
with great resolution by the patrons of popery. This opposi-
tion, however, neither dispirited the friends of reformation nor
prevented their success. Many, on the Continent deserted the
ranks of error ; and the shock soon reached the British islands.
England and Scotland, as well as many in Ireland, threw off
the yoke of superstition and embraced the liberty of the Gospel.
Many, however, prostituted learning and ability, in defending
the old superstition; none of whom made a more distinguished
figure than Baronius, Bellarmine, and Bossuet. Baronius com-
piled the annals of the papacy ; and, in the relation, interwove
his errors and sophistry. His Annals, comprising avast collec-
tion, are full of error and misrepresentation, and void of all can-
dour or even honesty. Bellarmine possessed far more candour
PREFACE. VU
than Baronius. He stated the reasons and objections of the
reformed with fidelity. His integrity, in this respect, exposed
him to the censure of several theologians of his own communion.
His merit, as a writer, consisted in perspicuity of style and
copiousness of argument, which discovered a fertile and excur-
sive imagination.
Bossuet, in his Exposition, affected plainness and simplicity ;
and endeavoured to evade objections by ingenuity of statement.
He labored to divest Romanism of its hatefuhiess, by concealing,
as much as possible, its defects, softening its harshness, and sub-
stituting, in many instances, an imposing but supposititious form
and beauty. The expositor, by these means, approximated
Popery to Protestantism. ' The ten-horned monster,' says
Gibbon, ' is, at his magic touch, transformed into the milk-white
hind, which must be loved as soon as she is seen-' The school,
in which Bossuet studied, favoured the design. The French
communion, to which he belonged, presents Romanism in a
more engaging attitude than the Italian system, which exhibits
Popery, as it appears in Baronius and Bellarmine, in all its
native deformity.
Few have made a better defence for a bad cause, than Chal-
lenor and Gother. Challenor assumes a tone of pity for his
adversary, and represents the patrons of Protestantism as ob-
jects of compassion. He appears all kindness and candour.
But the snake is hid in the grass ; and the canker-worm of bit-
terness lurks under the fairest professions of commiseration and
benevolence. His statements, in general, are misrepresenta-
tions, and his quotations, especially from the fathers, are irrele-
vant and futile. . His work, nevertheless, contains nearly all
that can be said for a bad system.
Gother speaks in the lofty accents of indignation and defi-
ance. Swelling into an air of conscious superiority, he arro-
gates the attitude of truth and certainty. Popery, he repre-
sents as rejected only when misunderstood ; and insinuates, in
undissembled remonstrance and reprehension, the disingenuous-
ness of the patrons of Protestantism. He imitates Bossuet, in
attempting to remove objections by dexterity of statement, and
by dismissing the Ultraism of the Italian school and of genuine
Romanism. His manner, however, is striking, and his columns
of representation and misrepresentation, possess advantage and
originality.
England, on this, as on every other topic of theology, pro-
duced many distinguished authors. Jewel, Cartwright, Stinmg-
fleet, and Barrow, among a crowd of others, appear eminent for
their learning and industry. Jewel's reply to Harding, though
Vlll PREFACE.
published shortly after the Reformation, is a most triumphant
refutation of Popish errors. Cartwright appeared in the arena,
as the victorious adversary of the Rhemish translators and an-
notators. StiUingfleet, in his numerous works, has written on
nearly all the topics of distinction between the Romish and Re-
formed ; and on each, has displayed vast stores of erudition, and
amazing powers of discrimination. Barrow assailed the papal
supremacy ; while the depth of his learning, and the extent of
his genius, enabled him to exhaust the subject. He has col-
lected and arranged almost all that has been said on the ques-
tion of the Roman pontiff's ecclesiastical sovereignty.
Ireland, in her Usher, boasts of a champion, who, in this con-
troversy, was in himself an host. He had read all the Fathers,
and could draw at will, on these depots of antiquity. He pos-
sessed the deepest acquaintance with sacred literature and ec-
clesiastical history. The mass of his collections has, since his
day, supplied the pen of many a needy, but thankless plagiary.
His age was an era of discussion ; and, in his occasional works,
he pointed his polemical artillery against the various errors of
Popery. All these errors are, in a compendious review, dis-
sected and exposed, in his answer to an Irish Jesuit, which
may be considered as a condensation of all his arguments
against the Romish superstition. The reply was his heavy
artillery, which, like a skilful general, he brought forward
against his most formidable enemy, whilst the superiority of
his tactics and position enabled him to sweep the field.
The passing century has produced many firm disputants, on
each side of the question. The popish cause in England, has
been sustained, but with a feeble hand, by Milner, Butler, and
the notorious Cobbett. These, again, have been opposed by
Southey, Phillpotts, Townsend, and M'Gavin. Milner's End
of Controversy, affected in title and weak in argument, is one
of the silliest productions that ever gained popularity. He
affects citing the Fathers, whom he either never read, or design-
edly misrepresents. His chief resources, indeed, are misstate-
ment and misquotation. His logic consists in bold assertion
and noisy bravado. His publication, which was to end contro-
versy, has been answered by Grier, Digby, and, in many occa-
sional animadversions, by M'Gavin.
Butler, imitating the insinuating and imposing manner of
Bossuet, affects plainness and simplicity ; and represents the
repulsive and mis-shapen form of Romanism in the most enga-
ging point of view. He replied to Southey's Book of the
Church. Phillpotts, again, in a letter, and Townsend, in his
Accusations of History, answered Butler, who, in return,
PREFACE. IX
addressed his Vindication to Townsend, in reply to the Accusa-
tions of the latter. The defects of these authors, in general, is
the want of facts and authorities, though, in many respects,
they discover research and ability.
Cobbett's History of the Reformation is one continued tissue
of undisguised falsehood, collected, not from the records of time,
but from the copious stores of his own invention. Truth itself,
indeed, if found accidentally in the pages of Cobbett, loses its
character ; and, like a good man seen in bad company, becomes
suspected. His calumny, (for his fabrications deserve no bet-
ter name,) has been exposed, with admirable precision, by
M'Gavin of Glasgow in his Vindication of the Reformation.
The Scottish Vindicator's treatment of the English Fabricator
is truly amusing. He handles, turns, anatomizes, and exposes
the slippery changeling, with a facility which astonishes, and
with an effect which always entertains. All the English au-
thor's accustomed transformations cannot enable him to elude
the unmerciful grasp of the Scotchman, who seizes him in all
his varying shapes, pursues him through all his mazy windings,
and exhibits his deformity in all its loathsomeness, till he be-
comes the object of derision and disgust. M'Gavin's dissection
of the calumniator shews, in a striking point of view, the supe-
riority of sense and honesty over misrepresentation and effront-
ery. This author, in his Protestant, seems, indeed, not to have
been deeply read in the Fathers or in Christian antiquity ; but
he possesses sense and discrimination, which triumphed over
the sophisms and misconstructions of the adversary.
Ireland, at the present day, has, on these topics, produced its
full quota of controversy. The field has been taken, for Ro-
manism, by Doyle, Kinsella, Maguire, and a few others of the
same class. The Popish prelacy, who were questioned before
the Parliamentary Committees in London, displayed superior
tact and information. Their answers exhibited great talents
for evasion. 'Grotty, Anglade, Slevin, Mac Hale, Kenny, Hig-
gins, Kelly, Curtis, Murray, and Laffan, evinced at least equal
cleverness at Maynooth, 1 before the commissioners of Irish edu-
cation. These are certainly most accomplished sophists, and
practised in the arts of Jesuitism. The Maynooth examination
was conducted with great ability, and the answers which were
elicited, excel in the evasion of difficulty, the advocacy of error,
and the glossing of absurdity.
The battle for Protestantism has been fought, with more or
less success, by Ouseley, Digby, Grier, Jackson, Pope, Phelan,
Elrington, Stuart, and a few other champions of the Reforma-
tion. Stuart's work is entitled to particular attention. The
X PREFACE.
author is a learned layman, who has directed the energies of a
powerful mind to subjects of theology. The literary produc-
tions of Newton, Locke, Milton, and Addison in favour of re-
vealed religion, were enhanced in their value from their authors,
who belonged to the laity. The clergy, on topics of divinity,
are supposed, in some degree, to be influenced by interest or
prepossession. The laity, on the Contrary, are reckoned to ap-
proach these discussions, with minds unfettered by considera-
tions of a professional or mercenary kind. The Protestant lay-
man is entitled to all the regard which this circumstance can
confer. But Stuart's work possesses merit, far superior to any
thing of an adventitious description. The author's disquisitions
embrace all the questions of controversy, which have been
agitated between the Romish and Reformed. The statements
are clear, and the arguments conclusive. The facts, which he
interweaves in the work, are numerous, and his references are
correct. The author introduces many of the transactions, which
are recorded in ecclesiastical history and which have appeared
on the public theatre of the world : while his observations on
men and their actions are distinguished by that freedom, which
always characterizes an original and independent thinker.
The works on the Romish and Reformed controversy, which
are numerous and executed with ability, might be supposed to
supersede any further attempt. The number and excellence of
former publications on this subject may, in the opinion of many,
render any future production unnecessary. The authors, in-
deed, who have opposed the superstition of Romanism, have
been many and their labours triumphant. But the ' Variations
of Popery' differs, in several respects, from preceding works.
The author's plan, so far as he knows, has not been anticipated,
and will, in the execution, display considerable novelty of design.
The attack, in this essay, is directed against the pretended
unity, antiquity, and immutability of Romanism. These have
long been the enemy's proud, but empty boast. Catholicism,
according to its abettors, is as old as the year of our redemp-
tion; was derived from the Messiah, published by the Apostles,
taught by the Fathers, and is professed, in the popish commu-
nion of the present day, without addition, diminution, or change.
The design of this work is to shew the groundlessness of such a
claim. The subject is the diversity of doctors, popes, and coun-
cils among themselves ; with their variations from the apostles
and fathers ; and these fluctuations are illustrated by the history
of the superstitions which have destroyed the simplicity, and
deformed the beauty of genuine Christianity.
The variety of opinions, which have been entertained by
PREFACE. XI
Romish theologians, constitutes one principal topic of detail.
Papists have differed in the interpretation of Scripture and in
tne dogmas of religion, as widely as any Protestants. Doctors,
pontiffs, and synods have maintained jarring statements, and,
in consequence, exchanged reciprocal anathemas. The spiritual
artillery, on these occasions, was always brought forward, and
carried, not indeed death, but damnation into the adverse ranks.
The bayonet, in the end, was often employed to preach the
Gospel, enforce the truth, or, at least, to decide the victory.
The chief of these contests are related in the Variations of
Popery : but the wranglings of obscure theologians, and the
lighter shades of difference among authors of celebrity, are
omitted as tedious and uninteresting. The detail, if every
minute variation were recounted, would be endless. The his-
torian, indeed, of all the doctrinal and moral alterations of mis-
named Catholicism would write, not a light octavo, but many
ponderous folios ; which would require much unnecessary time,
labour, expense, and patience. The work, which is now offered
to the world, will, it is presumed, be sufficient in quantity,
whatever may be its quality, to gratify the curiosity of the
reader, and answer the end of its publication.
Popish variations from the Apostles and Fathers also claim
a place in this work. The Romish system is shewn to possess
neither Scriptural nor Traditional authority. This, in one re-
spect, will evince the disagreement of Papists with each other.
These claim the inspired and ecclesiastical writers of antiquity,
and appeal to their works, which, in the Romish account, are,
in doctrine, popish, and not protestant. The sacred canon is,
by the opponents of protestantism, acknowledged, and, which
is no easy task, is to be interpreted according to the unanimous
consent of the F athers. A display of their variations from these
standards, which papists recognize, will, in one way, evince
their disagreement among themselves, and, at the same time,
overthrow their pretensions to antiquity.
The history of papal superstitions traces the introduction of
these innovations into Christendom. The annals of these opin-
ions, teaching their recession from primeval simplicity, will also
shew the time and occasion of their adoption. The steps which
led to their reception are carefully marked ; and these additions
to early Christianity will appear to be the inventions of men.
Their commencement was small and their growth gradual.
The Alpine snow-ball, which rolls down the mountain, is at
first trifling; but accumulates as it sweeps the lofty range of
steeps, till, at length, the mighty mass, resistless in its course,
appals the spectator, mocks opposition, and overwhelms in ruin
Xll PREFACE.
' *'
the vineyard, the village, or the city. Superstition, in like
manner, unperceived in the beginning, augments in its progress.
The fancy, the fears, or the interests of men supply continual
accessions, till the frowning monster affrights the mind and op-
presses the conscience. Such was the rise and progress of
Romanism. A religion, boasting unchangeableness, received
continual accretions of superstition and absurdity, till it became
a heterogeneous composition of Gentilism and Christianity,
united to many abominations, unknown in the annals of my-
thology and paganism. The history of these innovations will
expose their novelty, and discover their aberrations from the
original simplicity of the Gospel.
Popery, in its growth from infancy to maturity, occupied all
the lengthened period from the age of the Apostles till the last
Lateran Council. This includes the long lapse of time from
Paul of Tarsus to Leo the Tenth. Paul saw the incipient
workings of ' the Mystery of Iniquity.' The twilight then be-
gan, which advanced in slow progress, to midnight darkness.
Superstition, which is so congenial with the human mind, was
added to superstition, and absurdity to absurdity. Filtrr col-
lected. The Roman hierarchs, amidst alternate success and
defeat, struggled hard for civil and ecclesiastical sovereignty.
Leo, Gregory, Innocent, and Boniface, in their several days,
advanced the papacy, on the ruins of episcopacy and royalty,
bishops and kings. These celebrated pontiffs augmented the
papal authority, and encroached on prelatic and regal power.
Leo the Tenth, in the sixteenth century, saw the mighty plan
completed. The Lateran Assembly, under his presidency,
conferred on the pope a full authority over all councils, which,
in consequence of this synodal decision, he was vested with the
arbitrary power of convoking, transferring, and dissolving at
pleasure. 1 This concession subjected synodal aristocracy to
pontifical despotism ; and, in consequence, extinguished all
episcopal freedom. The same convention embodied, in its acts,
the bull of Boniface the Eighth against Philip the French king. 2
This transaction subjugated royal prerogative and popular privi-
lege to pontifical tyranny. The synod had only to advance
another step, and the work of wickedness was consummated.
This was soon effected. The infallible bishops addressed the
infallible pontiff as God. 3 The successor of the Galilean fish-
erman was represented as a Terrestrial Deity ; while he re-
ceived with complacency and without reluctance, the appella-
i Du Pin, 3. 148. Crabb, 3. 696. * rj u Pin 3. 148.
3 Deus in Terris. Bin. 9. 54.
PREFACE. X1U
tion of blasphemy. Leo then fulfilled the prediction of Paul,
and 'as God shewed himself that he was God.' 'The man of
sin, the son of perdition,' whom the Lord shall consume with
the spirit of his mouth and shall destroy with the brightness of
his coming was revealed.' Popery, appalling the nations with
its lurid terrors, stood confessed in all its horrid frightfulness
and deformity.
But the age, that witnessed the maturity of Romanism, be-
held its declension. Leo, who presided in the Lateran council,
saw the advances of Luther, Zuinglius, and Calvin, who ush-
ered in the Reformation. The God of the Lateran lost the half
of his dominions by the friar of Wittemberg, the canton of
Zurich, and the pastor of Geneva. Leo lived to curse Luther,
and view whole nations rejecting the usurped authority of the
papacy. Mystic Babylon must, in this manner, continue to
fall, till at last it shrink and disappear before the light of the
Gospel, the energy of truth, and the predictions of heaven.
This work is designed to employ against popery, the argu-
ment which the celebrated Bossuet wielded with ingenuity, but
without success against protestantism. The reformers disa-
greed in a few unimportant points of divinity. Their disagree-
ment, however, was rather in discipline than in faith or morality.
These dissensions the slippery Bossuet collected ; and what
was wanting in fact, he supplied from the fountain of his own
teeming imagination. The discordancy, partly real but chiefly
fanciful, the bishop represented as inconsistent with truth and
demonstrative of falsehood. The Variations of Popery are in-
tended to retort Bossuet' s argument. The striking diversity,
exhibited in Romanism, presents a wide field for retaliation and
will supply copious reprisals. The author of this production,
however, would, unlike the Romish advocate, adhere to facts
and avoid the Jesuitical bishop's misrepresentations.
Bossuet' s design, in his famous work, is Difficult to ascertain.
He was a man of discernment. He must therefore have known,
that the weapon, which he wielded against the reformation,
might be made to recoil with tremendous effect on his own sys-
tem. His acquaintance with ecclesiastical history might have
informed him, that the variations of popery were a thousand
times more numerous than those of protestantism. His argu-
ment, therefore, is much stronger against himself than against
his adversary. This, one would think, might have taught the
polemic, for his own sake, to spare his controversial details.
_ Bossuet' s ^argument is, in another respect, more injurious 'to
himself than to the enemy. The Romish communion claims
infallibility. The reformed prefer no such ridiculous preten-
XIV PREFACE.
sion : and might, therefore, differ in circumstantials and agree
in fundamentals, might err and return to the truth. These
might vary and survive the shock. The imputation of disso-
nancy to such is, in a great measure, a harmless allegation.
But error, or change in a communion, claiming inerrability and
unchangeability, is fatal. Its numerous vacillations, indeed, in
every age, destroy all its pretensions to unity and immutability.
The authorities in this work are, with a few exceptions, the
Fathers and Romish authors. Protestant historians and theo-
logians are seldom quoted, and only in matters of minor import-
ance. Popish professors will, with more readiness, credit
popish doctors ; and these are easily supplied. Many annalists
of this denomination have, even on subjects connected with the
honour of the papacy, shewn a candour which is highly praise-
worthy. These with laudable ingenuousness, have related
facts ; while others, indeed, with shameful prevarication, have
dealt in fiction. The communion which produced a Baronius,
a Bellarmine, a Maimbourg, and a Binius, can boast of a Du
Pin, a Giannone, a Thuanus, a Paolo, and a Guicciardini.
One popish author is, in this performance, confuted from
another. Theologian, in this manner, is opposed to theologian,
pope to pope, and council to council. A Launoy and a Du Pin
supply materials for a refutation of a Baronius and a Bellar-
mine. A Paolo will often correct the errors of a Pallavincino ;
and a Du Pin, in many instances, rectify the mistakes of a
Binius. Eugenius condemned and excommunicated what
Nicholas approved and confirmed. Clement and Benedict, in
fine style and with great devotion, anathematized Boniface,
Innocent, and Gregory. The councils of Pisa, Constance, and
Basil committed direct acts of hostility on those of Lyons, Flor-
ence, and the Lateran. The French and Italian schools, in
the war of opinion and theology, conflict in determined and
diametrical opposition. The Jesuit and the Molinist view the
Jansenist and the Dominican as professed enemies. The facil-
ity, indeed, with which any one popish divine may be confuted
from another, exhibits, in a striking point of view, the diversity
of Romanism. A protestant, skilled in popish doctors and
synods, may safely undertake the refutation of any papist from
writers and councils of his adversary's own communion.
This work makes no pretence to conceal the deformity of
Romanism. The author disdains to dissemble his sentiments.
Interested for the good of his fellow-men of every persuasion,
he is unacquainted with the art of disguising absurdity, for the
low purpose of flattering its partizans or obtaining the praise of
modern liberalism. He knows the woe pronounced against such
PREFACE. XV
as * put darkness for light, and light for darkness ;' and say,
' peace ! peace ! when there is no peace.' He intends, in the
following pages, an unmitigated and unrelenting exposure of
antichristian abominations. He would, like an experienced
surgeon, examine every ailment, probe every wound, and lay
open, without shrinking or hesitation, every festering sore. He
would expose the moral disorder, in all its hateful and haggard
frightfulness, to the full gaze of a disgusted world. This he
would do, not to give pain or gratify the malignity of men ; but
to heal the wound, cure the disease, prevent the spread of the
distemper or infection, and restore the sufferer to health,
strength, and activity. He would teach the patient the malig-
nancy of his complaint, and warn the spectator to flee for fear
of contagion. The medicine, he would, like the skilful physi-
cian, suit to the symptoms, and apply caustic, when a lotion
would be ineffectual. Ridicule may be used, when, through
the perverseness of man or the inveteracy of the malady, reason
has been found to fail.
Grateful for the favourable reception given to the first editions
of this work (which were published in 1831 8) the author again
offers it to the candid acceptance of the public, carefully revised,
enlarged, and corrected throughout. He feels some confidence,
indeed, in the materials of which it is composed. He travelled
a long, but delightful journey, through whole files of authorities
in ancient and modern languages ; in which, during his progress,
he pillaged the pages and rifled the annals of Romish and Re-
formed controversy. These, he knows, have supplied a vast
mass of matter, which he has endeavoured to condense. But
the elements of information are valueless, and will be neglected,
if void of order or beauty. A body without a soul wants attrac-
tion. The richest colours without symmetry and expression,
offend the eye of taste. The fairest form, if destitute of anima-
tion, is unengaging. A book, in like manner, especially in
mojdern days, will fail to interest the mind, if unaccompanied
with the fascinations of life, grace, and elegance. Ideas require
to be arranged and animated, in order to form a useful or invit-
ing composition ; as spirit must be infused into the passive clay,
to produce a living, moving, breathing, and intellectual man.
The author is aware of the difference between a learned and
a popular book. He invites criticism. Should the public con-
tinue to smile and encourage his essay, he will rejoice in its
favour : but if otherwise, he will acquiesce in its decision.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTION : THE UNITY OF PROTESTANTISM.
Harmony of the Reformed Confessions of Faith Consubstantiation of Luther-
anism Popish Diversity on Transubstantiation Disciplinarian Variety Secta-
rianism Foolery of Romanism Beata Clara Nativity Flagellism Convul-
sionarianism Festival of the Ass Decision of a Roman Synod Antiquity of
Protestantism Protestant Name Protestant Theology Protestant Churches
The Waldensian The Greek The Nestorian The Monophysite The Arme-
nian The Syrian. .
CHAP. II: POPES.
Difficulty of the Pontifical Succession Historical Variations Electoral Variations
Schisms in the Papacy Liberius and Felix Silverius and Vigilius Formo-
sus, Sergius, and Stephen Benedict, Sylvester, John, and Gregory Great
Western Schism Basilian and Florentine Schism Doctrinal Variations Victor
Stephen Liberius, Zozimus, and Honorius Vigilius John Moral Variations
State of the Papacy Theodora and Marozia John Boniface Gregory
Boniface John Sixtus Alexander Julius Leo Perjured Pontiffs.
CHAP. Ill : COUNCILS.
Three Systems Italian System reckons the General Councils at eighteen Tem-
porary rejection of the second, third, fourth, fifth, seventh, and twelfth General
Councils Cisalpine or French School rejects the Councils of Lyons, Florence,
Lateran, and Trent Adopts those of Pisa, Constance, Basil, and the second of
Pisa System of a third party Universality of General Councils Its Conditions
Legality of General Councils Its Conditions Convocation, Presidency, and
Confirmation Members Unanimity Freedom.
2
XVin CONTENTS.
CHAP. IV : SUPREMACY.
Four Variations Pope's Presidency His Sovereignty or Despotism His supposed
Equality with God His alleged Superiority to God Scriptural Proof Tradi-
tional Evidence Original state of the Roman Church 'Causes of its Primacy
Eminence of the City False Decretals Missions Opposition from Asia, Africa,
France, Spain, England, and Ireland Universal Bishop Usurpations of Nicho-
las John, Gregory, Innocent, and Boniface.
CHAP. V : INFALLIBILITY.
Pontifical Infallibility Its Object, Form, and Uncertainty Synodal Infallibility-
Pontifical and Synodal Infallibility Ecclesiastical Infallibility Its Absurdity-
Its Impossibility.
CHAP. VI : DEPOSITION OF KINGS.
French System Italian System Original State of the Christian Commonwealth
Pontifical Royalty Attempts at Deposition of Kings Gregory and Leo Zach-
ary and Childeric Continental Depositions Gregory, Clement, Boniface, and
Julius dethrone Henry, Lewis, Philip, and Lewis British Depositions Adrian
transfers Ireland to Henry Innocent, Paul, and Pius, pronounce sentence of
Degradation against John, Henry, and Elizabeth Synodal Depositions Councils
of the Lateran, Lyons, Vienna, Pisa, Constance, Basil, Lateran, and Trent
Modern Opinions Eflects of the Reformation.
CHAP. VII : PERSECUTION.
Pretensions of the Papacy Three Periods First Period ; Religious Liberty
Second Period ; Persecution of -Paganism Persecution of Heresy Persecuting
Kings, Saints, Theologians* Popes, and Councils Crusades against the Albigen-
ses Inquisition Third Period ; Persecuting Doctors, Popes, Councils, and Kings
Persecutions in Germany, Netherlands, Spain, France, and England Diversity
of Systems Popish Disavowal of Persecution Modern Opinions.
CHAP. VIII : INVALIDATION OF OATHS.
Violation of Faith Theologians, Popes, and Councils Pontifical Maxims Ponti
fical Actions Councils of Rome and Diamper Councils of the Lateran, Lyons,
Pisa, Constance, and Basil. Era and Influence of the Reformation.
CHAP. IX: ARIANISM.
Trinitarianism of Antiquity Origin of the Arian System Alexandrian and Bithy-
nian Councils Nicene and Tyrian Councils Semi-Arianism Antiochian and
Roman Councils Sardican, Arlesian, Milan, and Sirmian Councils Liberius
Felix Armenian, Seleucian, and Byzantine Councils State of Chrristendom
Variety of Confessions.
CONTENTS. XIX
CHAP. X: EUTYCHIANISM.
Butychianism a verbal Heresy Its prior Existence Byzantine Council Ephesian
Council Ohalcedonian Council State of Monophysitism after the Council of
Chalcedon Zeno's Henoticon Variety of Opinions on that edict Jacobitism
Distracted state of Christendom.
CHAP. XI : MONOTHELITISM.
Its General Reception Supported by the Roman Emperor, and by the Antiochian,
Alexandrian, Byzantine, and Roman Patriarchs Its degradation from Catholi-
cism to Heresy The Ecthesis or Exposition The Emperor and the Greeks
against the Pope and the Latins The Type or Formulary Second Battle be-
tween the Greeks and the Latins Second Triumph of Monothelitism Sixth
General Council Total Overthrow of Monothelitism Its partial Revival Its
universal and final Extinction.
CHAP. XII : PELAG-IANISM.
Its Author and Dissemination Patronized by the Asians Opposed by the Africans
Condemned by Innocent Approved by Zozimus Anathematized by Zozimus
Denounced by the Asians Censured by the General Council of Ephesus De-
clension of Pelagianism Controversy in the ninth Century Gottescalcus
against Rabanus The Councils of Mentz and Quiercy against the Councils of Va-
lence and Langres Modern Controversy Council of Trent Rhemish Annota-
tions Dominicans against the Molinist Congregation of Helps The Jesuits
against the Jansenists Controversy on Quesnel's Moral Reflections.
CHAP. XIII : TRANSUBSTANTIATION.
Variety of Opinions Scriptural and Traditional Arguments Elements accounted
Signs, Figures, and Emblems Retained their own Substance Nourished the
Human Body Similar Change in Baptism and Regeneration Causes which facili-
tated the Introduction of Transubstantiation History of Transubstantiation
Paschasius Berengarius Diversity of Opinions Diversity of Proofs Absurdity
of Transubstantiation Creation of the Creator Its Cannibalism.
CHAP. XIV : COMMUNION IN ONE KIND.
Its Contrariety to Scriptural Institution Concessions Arguments Its Contra-
riety to the Usage of the Early and Middle Ages Concessions Its Contrariety
to the Custom of the Oriental Christians Origin of Half-Communion Councils
of Constance and Basil Inconsistency of the Constantian and Basilian Canons
Inconsistency of the Basilian Assembly with its own Enactments in granting the
Cup to the Moravians and Bohemians Council of Trent Opposition to the Tren-
tine Canons in France, Germany, Bohemia, Poland, and Hungary.
CHAP. XV : EXTREME UNCTION.
Variations on its Effects Disagreement on its Institution The Scriptural and
Popish Unction vary in their Administrator, Sign, Form, Subject, and End
Recovery of Health, the Scriptural end of Anointing the sick Traditional
Evidence History of extreme Unction.
2*
XX CONTENTS.
CHAP. XVI : IMAGE WORSHIP.
Three Systems One allows the use of Images The Second patronizes their In-
ferior or Honorary Worship The Third prefers the same Adoration to the
Representation as to the Original Image-Worship a Variation from Scriptural
Authority A Variation from Ecclesiastical Antiquity Miraculous Proofs Ad-
missions Introduction of Images into the Church Their Worship Iconoclasm
Byzantine Council Second Nicene Council Western System Caroline
Books-^-Frankfordian Council Parisian Council Eastern Variations Final
Establishment of Idolatry by Theodora.
CHAP. XVII : PURGATORY.
Its Situation and Punishment Destitute of Scriptural authority Admissions
Scriptural Arguments Destitute of Traditional Authority Admissions Prayer
for the Dead Pagan, Jewish, and Mahometan Purgatory Its Introduction into
the Christian Community Its slow Progress Completed by the Schoolmen
Florentine Council Trentine Council.
CHAP. XVIII : CELIBACY OP THE CLERGY.
Variety of Systems Jewish Theocracy Christian Establishment Ancient Tradi-
tionIntroduction of Clerical Celibacy Reasons Greeks Latins Effects of
Sacerdotal Celibacy Domesticism, Concubinage, and Matrimony Second Period
of Celibacy Opposition to Gregory Toleration of Fornication Preference of
Fornication to Matrimony among the Clergy Permission of Adultery or Bigamy
to the Laity View of Priestly Profligacy in England, Spain, Germany, Switzer-
land, France, Italy, and Peru Councils of Lyons, Constance, and Basil.
FATHERS AND POPISH AUTHORS
QUOTED IN THIS WORK.
AUTHOB.
ABBO -
WOBK.
Sermones
VOL. PLACE.
- 1 Paris
DATS.
1723
Aimon
Tractatus
- 1 Paris
1723
Alexander -
Historia -
- 25 Paris
1683
Ambrosius -
Opera
- 5 Paris
1661
Amour
Journal
- 1 London
1664
Andilly
Vies de Saints -
- 1 Paris
1664
Anastasius -
De Vitis Pontificum
1 Venice
1729
Anglade
Maynooth Report
- 1 London
1827
Antonius
De Concilio
- 1 Venice
1828
Aquinas, (Thomas)
Summa
- 3 Lyons
1567
Arsdekin
Theologia
- 3 Antwerp
1682
Athanasius -
Opera
- 3 Paris
1698
Augustine -
Opera
- 10 Venice
1731
Avocat
Dictionnaire
- 2 Paris
1760
Barclay
De Potestate
- 1
1609
Basil -
Opera
- 3 Paris
1721
Bausset
Life of Fenelon
- 2 London
1810
Bede -
Opera
- 8 Colonia
1612
Bellarmine -
Disputationes
- 3 Lyons
1587
Bentivolio -
Historia
- 1
Benedict
Histoire
- 2 Paris
1691
Bernard
Opera
- 1 Paris
1632
Bertram
De Corpore
- 1 London
1688
Binius
Concilia
- 9 Paris
1636
Bossuet
Exposition
- 1 London
1685
Bossuet
Variations
- 4 Paris
1747
Bossuet
Opuscules
- 3 Louvain
1764
Bisciola
Epitome
- 1 Louvain
1680
Boileau
Historia
- 1 Paris
1700
Bruys
Historic
- 5 Hague
1732
Cajetan
Opuscula
- 3 Lyons
1567
Calmet
Dissertations
- 3 Paris
1720
Calmet
Commentaire
- 24 Paris
1715
Canisius
Thesaurus
- 4 Antwerp
1726
Carranza
Concilia
- 1 Paris
1678
Caron -
Remonstrantia
- 1
1665
Chrysostom
Opera
- 13 Paris
1724
Cedrenus
Compendium
- 2 Venice
1729
Challenor -
Catholic Christian
- 1 London
1782
Chardin
Travels
- 1 London
1686
Clemens
Opera
- 2 Oxford
1715
Coquille
Discours
- 1 Paris
1617
Cosmas
Topographia
- 1 Paris
1707
Cossart
Concilia
- 6 Lucca
1748
XX11
FATHERS AND POPISH AUTHORS.
AUTHOR.
Cotelerius -
Coyne
Grotty
Crabbe
Cyprian
Cyril, (Jerusal.)
Cyril, (Alex.)
Dachery
Davila
Daniel
Durand
Dens
Doyle
Du Cange -
Du Pin
DuPin
Dellon
Durandus -
Eadmerus -
Ephraim
Epiphanius
Erasmus
Estius
Etherius
Eusebius -
Evagrius
Faber
Fabulottus -
Fauchet
Fleury
Fordun
Gabutius
Gaufridus -
Gelasius
Gibert
Gocelin
Godeau
Giannone -
Gother
Gildas
Gregory
Guicciardini
Heinricius -
Herman
Higgins
Hilary
Hotman
Houbigant -
Hoveden
WOBK.
Patres Apostolici
Catalogue -
Maynooth Report
Concilia
Opera
Opera
Opera -
Spicilegium
Histoire
Histoire
Speculum -
Theologia -
Parliamentary Report
Glossarium -
Dissertationes
History
History
De Corpore
Vita Oswaldi
Opera
Opera
Opera
Commentaria
Adv. Alepand.
Historia
Historia
Disputationes
De Potestate
Traite
Catechism -
Historia
Vita Pii V. -
Histoire
Adv. Euty. -
Corpus
Historia
Histoire
History
Papist represented
Historia
Opera
La Historia -
Annales
Chronicon -
Maynooth Report
Opera
Traite
Biblia -
Annales
VOL. PLACE. DATE.
2 Amsterdam 1724
1 Dublin 1735
1 London 1827
3 Colonia 1551
1 Oxford 1682
1 Oxford 1703
7 Paris 1638
4 Paris 1723
1 Rouen 1664
10 Paris 1729
3 Venice 1578
8 Dublin 1832
1 London 1827
6 Paris 1733
1 Paris 1686
3 Dublin 1724
1 London 1688
1 Paris 1648
1 London 1623
1 Colonia 1603
2 Colonia 1684
10 Lyons 1703
2 London 1653
1 Antwerp 1725
1 Paris 1659
1 Cambridge 1720
2 Paris 1723
1 Venice 1728
1 Paris 1639
1 Dublin 1765
1 Oxford 1691
1 Rome 1605
2 Aix 1694
1 Basil 1556
3 Lyons 1737
1 London 1691
6 Paris 1680
2 London 1729
1 London 1685
1 Oxford 1691
4 Paris 1705
2 Venice 1755
1 Antwerp 1725
1 Antwerp 1725
1 London 1827
1 Paris 1631
1 Paris 1594
4 Paris 1753
1 London 1596
FATHERS AND POPISH AUTHORS.
XX1U
AUTHOB.
Hugo -
Irenasus
Isodorus
Jacobatius
Jerom -
Jonas -
Jovius -
Juenin -
Justin -
Labbeus
Lactantius
Limiers
Llorente
Launoy
Lanfranc
Le Bruyn
Liberatus
Lopez
Lyra -
Mabillon
Mageoghegan
Maldonat
Me Hale
Maimbourg -
Maimbourg -
Mariana
Mendoza
Mezeray
Milletot
Milner
Montfaucon -
Moreri
Mumford
Malmsbury -
Malmsbury -
More -
Nangis
O'Leary
Origen
Origen
Orleans
Osbern
Panormitan -
Panormitan -
Paolo -
Paris -
Pascal -
Paulinus
Petivius
WORK.
De Corpore
Contra Hsereses
De Ordine
De Concilio
Opera
De Institutione
Historia
Institutiones
Opera
Concilia
Opera
Histoire
History
Epistolae
Opera
Voyages
Breviarium
Epitome
Biblia
Annales
Histoire
C ommentarium
Maynooth Report
Traite
Histoire
Histoire
De Concilio
Histoire
Traite
End of Controversy
Bibliotheca
Dictionnaire
Scripturist
De Pontificibus
De Gestis
Opera
Chronicon
Works
Commentaria
Hexapla
Histoire
Vita Odonis
Decretalia
Concilia
Histoire
Historia - "
Odluvres
Opera
Rationarium
VOL. PLACE.
DATE.
1 Paris 1648
1 Paris 1710
1 Paris 1723
1 Venice 1728
5 Paris 1706
1 Paris 1723
2 Paris 1553
5 Bassano 1773
1 Paris 1636
23 Venice 1728
1 Cambridge 1685
10 Amsterdam 1718
1 London 1818
5 Paris 1675
1 Paris 1648
5 Paris 1725
1 Paris 1648
1 Antwerp 1622
6 Venice 1588
6 Paris 1713
3 Paris 1758
1 Mentz 1596
1 London 1827
1 Paris 1686
1 Paris 1684
5 Paris 1726
1 Venice 1728
6 Amsterdam 1688
1 Paris 1639
1 Philadelphial820
1 Paris 1715
8 Amsterdam 1720
1 Dublin 1767
1 Oxford 1691
1 London 1596
1 Louvain 1516
1 Paris 1723
1 Dublin 1781
2 Paris 1679
2 Paris 1713
2 Hague 1729
1 London 1691
4 Lyons 1550
1 Lyons 1551
2 London 1736
1 Zurich 1589
5 Paris 1819
1 Verona 1736
2 Lyons 1745
XXIV
FATHERS AND POPISH AUTHORS.
AT7THOB.
Pithou
Photius
Platina
Polydorus
Procopius
Prosper
Q,uesnel
Ranulph
Ratramn
Ratherius
Renaudot
Rhemists
Rivers
Sclater
Sclater
Slevin
Socrates
Spondanus
Theodolf
Theodoret
Theophanes
Theophylact
Tertullian
Thomassin
Thuanus
Thevenot
Trivettus
Ulderic
Varillas
Vertot
Victor
Vignier
Velly
Ward
Walsh
Zonaras
WORK. V01.. PLACE.
Corpus Juris - - 1 Paris
DATE.
1687
Bibliotheca
1 G-eneva
1612
De Vitis Pontificum
1 Colonia
1551
Historia -
1 Basil
1534
Opera -
1 Venice
1729
Opera ...
2 Venice
1744
Le Nouveau Testament
4 Brussels
1702
Polychronicon
1 Oxford
1691
Contra G-raec. Opp.
1 Paris
1723
Epistolse -
1 Paris
1723
Collectio ...
2 Paris
1716
New Testament - ->
1 Manchester
1813
Manuel -
1 Dublin
1816
Consensus -
1 London
1686
Nubes Testium
1 London
1686
Maynooth Report
1 London
1827
Historia ...
1 Paris
1668
Epitome -
1 Mentz
1618
Fragmenta ...
1 Paris
1723
Opera ...
4 Paris
1612
Chronographia
1 Venice
1729
Commentarii
2 Paris
1635
Opera ...
1 Paris
1689
Discipline - - -
2 Paris
1679
Historia ...
7 London
1773
Voyages -
5 Amsterdam
1727
Chronicon -
1 Paris
1723
Consuetudines
1 Paris
1723
Histoire
2 Cologne
1684
Origine ...
1 Hague
1737
Chronicon -
1 Antwerp
1725
Bibliothe'que
3 Paris
1587
Histoire - - - 20 Paris
1701
Speculum -
1 London
1688
History -
1
1674
Annales -
2 Venice
1729
Apologie -
3 Antwerp
1792
Breviarium Romanum -
1 Venice
1729
Catech. Tridentin
1 Paris
1568
Codex Justinian
2 Lyons
1571
Codex Theodosianus -
6 Lyons
1665
Clementinas
1 Paris
1612
De Primatu
1 London
1769
Extravagantes
1 Paris
1612
Hist. Du Wicklif
1 Lyons
1682
Memoirs "sur la Predestin
1 Amsterdam
1689
Missale Romanum
1 Campid
1767
Officia Propria
1 Dublin
1792
Processionale Romanum
1 Paris
1676
INTRODUCTION.
CHAPTER I.
THE UNITY OF PROTESTANTISM.
HARMONY OP THE REFORMED CONFESSIONS OF FAITH CONSUBSTANTIAT1ON OF
LUTHERANISM POPISH DIVERSITY ON TRANSUBSTANTIATION DISCIPLINARIAN
VARIETY - SECTARIANISM FOOLERY OF ROMANISM - BEATA - CLARA - NATIVITY -
FLAGELLISM CONVULSIONARIANISM FESTIVAL OF THE ASS DECISION OF A ROMAN
SYNOD ANTIQUITY OF PROTESTANTISM PROTESTANT NAME PROTESTANT THE-
OLOGYPROTESTANT CHURCHES - THE WALDENSIAN - THE GREEK THE NESTO-
, - THE MONOPHYSIAN - THE ARMENIAN - THE SYRIAN.
THE unity and antiquity of Romanism, have, by its partizans,
been often contrasted with, the diversity and novelty of Protest-
antism. These topics supply the votary of papal superstition
with fond occasions of exultation, triumph, and bravado. Ro-
manism, according to its friends, is unchangeable as truth, and
old as Christianity. Protestantism, according to its enemies,
is fluctuating as falsehood, and modern as the Reformation.
The Bishop of Meaux has detailed the pretended " Variations
of Protestantism," and collected, with invidious industry, all
its real or imaginary alterations. The religion of the Reforma-
tion, in the statements of this author, is characterized by muta-
bility. Protestantism, in his account, separated, in its infancy,
into jarring systems, and appeared, in the nations of its nativity,
in many diversified forms. But this discordancy, it will be
found, is the offspring of misrepresentation. The Reformers,
in their doctrinal sentiments, exhibited a wonderful agreement.
Then- unanimity, indeed, was amazing ; and showed, that these
distinguished theologians, renouncing the vain commandments
of men, and the muddy streams of tradition, had all imbibed
the same spirit, and drunk from the same fountain.
The doctrinal unity of the Reformed appears from their Con-
fessions of F aith. These were published at the commencement
of the Reformation ; and all, in different phraseology, contain,
in the main, the same truths. Twelve of these public Exposi-
tions of belief were issued in the several European nations.
These were the Augsburg, Tetrapolitan, Polish, Saxon,.Bohe-
mian, Wittemberg, Palatine, Helvetian, French, Dutch, English,
and Scottish confessions. All these are printed, in Latin, in
Chouet's Collection ; and have been abridged and criticised by
26 INTRODUCTION.
Sleidan, Seckendorf, Brandt, Bossuet, Maimbourg, Moreri, and
Du Pin, according to their diversified prepossessions and designs.
The Augsburg or Augustan Confession is the production of
Melancthon, and was reviewed and approved by Luther. The
Elector of Saxony, 'attended by a few of the German Princes,
presented it in 1530 to the Emperor of Germany at the Diet
of Augsburg. This confessional manifesto, which was read in
the Augustan Congress, received its name from the place of its
presentation ; and became the standard of Lutheranism, through
Germany, D enmark, Sweden, and Norway. The work has been
criticised with the pen of prejudice by Maimbourg, and abridged
with impartiality by Seckendorf, Sleidan, Paolo, Moreri, and
Du Pin. 1
The Tetrapolitan,like the Augustan Confession, was, in 1530,
presented to his Imperial Majesty, at the Diet of Augsburg,
by a Deputation from Strasbourg, Constance, Memmingen, and
Lindau. The ambassadors on this occasion, represented these
four cities, and, from this circumstance, this public document
took its appellation. This compendium was compiled by Bucer
and Capito, and approved by the Senate of Strasbourg. The
compilation has been epitomised, with his usual fairness, byDu
Pin, from whom it extorted a nattering eulogy. This writing,
says the Sorbonnist, is composed with much subtlety and address.
Every article is supported by scriptural authority, and expressed
in a manner calculated to impose on the reader. 2
The Bohemian, the Saxon, the Wittemberg, the Polish, and
the Palatine, soon followed the Augustan Confession. The Bo-
hemian or Waldensian Formulary was compiled from older
records, and presented, in 1535, to theEmperorFerdinand,by
the nobility of Bohemia. The Saxon, in 1551, was issued in
the Synod of Wittemberg, approved by the Protestant Clergy
of Saxony, Misnia, and Pomerania, sanctioned by the Princes
of Brandenburg and Mansfelt, and presented, the same year, to
the Council of Trent. The Wittemberg, composed by Brent,
was published in 1552. The Polish was formed in the General
Synod of Sendomir, in 1570, and recognized through Poland,
Lithuania, and Samogitia. Frederic the Third, the Elector
Palatine, in 1576, issued aFormulary, in which he conveyed an
exposition of his own faith. 3
The Helvetian Confession was issued in 1536, at Basil, in a
i Mez.- 4. 566. Chouet, 3. Boss. 1. 98. Sleid. 1. 284. Secken. 152. Paolo,
1. 89. Du Pin, 3. 207. Moreri, 2. 561.
3 Chouet, 215. Du Pin, 3. 207, 209. Boss. 1. 98. Sleid. 1. 285. Secken. 198.
3 Chouet, 4. 140, 201. Alex. 17. 405. Bossuet, 1. 410. Du Pin, 3. 659.
Moreri, 2. 562.
INTRODUCTION. 27
convention of the Reformed Ministry and Magistracy of Swit-
zerland, and received, with common consent, through the Can-
tons of the nation. This form of belief was afterwards signed by
a second assembly, held the same year in the same city. This,
enlarged and improved, was again published in 1566, and
extorted an unwilling eulogy even from the bishop of Meaux.
The Swiss Confession, according to this author, excels all other
compendiums of the same kind which he had seen in plainness
and precision- The theologians of Basil, therefore, on this
memorable occasion, not only promulgated their creed, but,
wonderful to tell, made even Bossuet once at least in his life tell
the truth. 1
The confessions of France, Holland, England, and Scotland
soon followed that of Switzerland. The F rench Formulary was
drawn up in a national synod at Paris in 1559. Beza, in 1561,
presented it to Charles the Ninth, in the colloquy of Poissy.
This public document was confirmed in the national council of
Rochelle, and signed by the Queen of Navarre, by her son
Henry the Fourth, by Conde, Nassau, Coligny, and the synod,
and recognized by the reformed of the French nation. Chouet
has given it in Latin, and Laval in French. The Dutch or
Belgic, written in French in 1561, and in Dutch and Latin in
1581, was confirmed inaNational Synod in 1579. The English
was edited in the Synod of London in 1562, and printed by the
authority of the Queen in 1571. This form of belief, published
for the purpose of removing dissension and promoting harmony,
was approved by the dignified and inferior clergy and subscribed
by her Majesty Queen Elizabeth. That Formula is faithfully
abridgedby Du Pin. Several Confessions appeared in Scotland
in different times. Knox, in 1560, composed one, which was
ratified by parliament. This, however, and others, were only
provisional and temporary, and sunk into neglect, on the appear-
ance of the Formulary compiled at Westminster, which, in 1647,
was approved by the General Assembly, and in 1649, and 1690,
was ratified by the Scottish parliament at Edinburgh, and after-
ward avowed by the people. 2
The approbation of each confession was not limited to the
nation, for which, in a particular manner, it was intended. The
Reformed of the several European kingdoms evinced their mutual
concord and communion, by a reciprocal subscription to these
forms of faith. The Saxon C reed was approved by the Reformed
of Strasbourg and Poland : and the Bohemian or Waldensian by
1 Chouet, 3, 4. Du Pin, 3. 219, 656. Boss. 1. 110. and 2. 61. Moreri, 2. 562.
2 Cbouet, 4, 99, 125. Laval, 1. 117. Du Pin, 3. 656, 661. Aymon, 1. 145, 300,
98111. Thuan. 2. 54. Moreri, 2. 562.
28 INTRODUCTION.
Luther, Melancthon, Bucer ; by the academy of Wittemberg, by
the Lutherans and Zuinglians, and indeed by all the friends
of Protestantism. 1 The Polish was recommended by the Wal-
densians and Lutherans. The Dutch was subscribed by the
French National Synod of Figeac ; .and the French by the
reformed of the Netherlands. The Swiss, united to each other
in mind and communion, declared themselves undivided from
the reformed of other nations of Christendom ; and their con-
fession was signed by the Protestants of Germany, Hungary,
Poland, France, Belgium, England, and Scotland.
These confessional systems comprised all the topics of theo-
logy. Faith and morality were discussed with precision and
perspicuity. God, the Trinity, predestination, creation, provi-
dence, sin, duty, redemption, regeneration, justification, adop-
tion, sanctification, baptism, communion, death, resurrection,
and iinmortality, all these subjects and many others were com-
prehended in these publications. The truth and duty of reli-
gion were, in these concise expositions, explained in a clear and
satisfactory manner.
These doctrinal compilations represented the theology of a
vast population. Protestantism pervaded Norway, Sweden,
Denmark, Prussia, Poland, Germany, Transylvania, Hungary,
Switzerland, France, Holland, England, Ireland, and Scotland :
and visited the continents of Asia, Africa, and America. The
extensive territory, in this manner, from the Atlantic to the
Euxine, and from the Icy Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea,
witnessed the light of the Reformation, which, propagated at
succeeding times by missionary zeal, reached the African and
Asian continents, and crossing the interposing ocean, illuminated
the transatlantic shores in a world unknown to the ancients.
The harmony of these declarations of belief is truly surpris-
ing, and constitutes an extraordinary event in the history of man.
The annals of religion and philosophy .supply no other example
of such agreement. The several nations, let it be recollected,
acted, on these occasions, in an independent manner, without
concert or collusion. The one had no power or authority to
control the other. The clergy and laity, besides, were numer-
ous and scattered over a wide territory. The transaction, in
its whole progress, manifested the finger of Heaven, and the
overruling providence of God. The Reformed, indeed, had
the one common standard of revelation. Directed by this cri-
terion, the early patrons of Protestantism formed their faith,
1 Lutherus hanc Valdensium Bohemorum confessionem approbavit. Eamdem
laudrarant Melancton et Bucerius. Alex. 17. 406. Chouet, 3, 4, 12. DuPin. 3.
253. Boss. 1. XV. Aymon, 1. 145, 157, 300.
INTRODUCTION. 29
which, except on one point, to evidence human weakness, ex-
hibited a perfect unanimity. The Zuinglian and Lutheran
Confessions, says Paolo, differed in reality, only on the sacra-
ment. 1 All these comprehensive abridgments showed, in varied
diction, an astonishing unity, in the main, on all doctrinal ques-
tions, though they might differ on discipline and ceremony.
The absurdity of consubstantiation, indeed, for some time,
deformed Lutheranism. This opinion, the Saxon Reformer,
during his whole life, retained with obstinacy. His pertinacity
on this subject, kindled the sacramentarian controversy, which
awakened a series of noisy, useless disputation. These discus-
sions afforded Bossuet a subject of empty triumph. Had it not
been for this topic, on which he has rung every possible change,
and which constitutes the staple commodity of his " variations,"
the good bishop would often have been at a woful loss.
Luther's hostility to Zuinglianism, however, has been often
much overrated. This appears from the conference between
the Lutherans and Zuinglians at Marpurg in 1529. Luther
appeared, on this occasion, accompanied by Melancthon, Jonas,
Osiander, Brent, and Agricola; and Zuinglius by Bucer,
Oecolompadius, and Heedio. Many other persons of merit and
erudition attended. The Lutherans and Zuinglians both agreed
in the belief of a real presence in the sacrament ; but differed
whether this presence was corporal or spiritual. Mutual good
will and friendly feeling, however, prevailed, especially on the
part of the Zuinglians. This is admitted by Maimbourg, Du
Pin, Paolo, and Luther. The Zuinglians, according to Maim-
bourg, Du Pin, Sleidan, and Seckendorf, begged, with the most
earnest entreaty, that a schism should not be continued on ac-
count of one question. The Zuinglians, according to Luther,
were mild and conciliating even beyond expectation. An ac-
commodation, said the Reformer, is not hopeless ; and though a
fraternal and formal union is not effected, there exists a peace-
ful and amiable concord. 2 All agreed to exercise Christian
charity, till God should supply additional light on the subject
of disputation and direct to the means of establishing unanimity.
The Conference, besides, were unanimous on all other points of
divinity. All, say Du Pin and Paolo, were agreed on all topics
but the communion. 3 A confession was issued on the subjects
of the Trinity, the incarnation, faith, baptism, justification, sanc-
tification, tradition, original sin, vicarious righteousness, good
1 Qui ne different de 1'autre, que dans 1'article de 1'eucharistie. Paolo, 1. 81.
8 Eat, tamen placida, arnica concordia. Seckendorf, 1. 136, 138.
3 Etant d'accord sur tousles autres-chefs. Paolo, 1. 82. They differed upon none
of the articles, but that of the Lord's supper. Du Pin, 3. 205. Sleidan, VI.
30 INTRODUCTION.
works, the civil magistracy, and future judgment, and sub-
scribed with the utmost harmony by Luther, Zuinglius, and the
other theologians.
The Zuinglian communion never accounted the Lutheran
peculiarity a sufficient reason for schism or disaffection. This,
they professed on many occasions. The French Reformed, in
the National Synod of Charenton, acknowledged, in express
terms, the purity of the Lutheran faith and worship. This as-
sembly, in 1631, declared, says Aymon, the Lutheran commu-
nion sound in the fundamentals of religion, and free from super-
stition and idolatry. A meeting of the two denominations in
1661 at Cassel, professed their reciprocal esteem ; and, though
a formal union was not constituted, expressed their mutual wil-
lingness for co-operation and cordiality. The Lutherans and
Calvinists of Hungary, Transylvania, and Poland, in 1570, in
the synod of Sendomir, acknowledged the orthodoxy of each
other's faith, and formed a treaty of friendship and unity. 1
The mutual friendship entertained by the Reformed of Ger-
many, France, and Switzerland, terminated among those of
Hungary, Transylvania, and Poland, in a formal ecclesiastical
union. This was gloriously effected at Sendomir in 1570. A
synod of Hungarian, Transylvanian, and Polish Calvinists and
Lutherans met at thafcity, acknowledged the conformity of
their mutual faith to truth and revelation, formed themselves
into one body, and resolved on reciprocal co-operation against
the partizans of Romanism and sectarianism. Agreed in doc-
trine, the synod, in the genuine spirit of religious liberty, left
each church to the enjoyment of its own discipline and forms.
This noble and happy compact was confirmed' in the synod of
Posen held in the same year ; and in those of Cracow, Petro-
cow, and Breslaw in 1573, 1578, and 1583. Two branches of
the Reformed, who had differed in one non-essential, concur-
red, in this manner, to form one ecclesiastical communion, and
to bury in eternal oblivion, all the conflicting elements of faction
and animosity. 2
The formal junction, which bigotry had prevented, was, in
1817, effected through Prussia and Germany. The Calvinists
modified the severity of predestination, and the Lutherans
renounced the absurdity of consubstantiation ; and both denomi-
nations, after a candid explanation, could see no remaining
ground of schism. The two, in consequence, united into one
body. Lutheranism and Calvinism, through the Prussian and
German dominions were amalgamated, and both distinctions
1 Aymon, 2. 501. Da Pin, 3. 699. 2 Thuan. 2. 778.
INTRODUCTION. 31
resolved into one. The two have formed one ecclesiastical
community, and are called Evangelical Christians. The king
of Prussia, on the occasion, showed great activity in promoting
the compilation of a Liturgy, calculated to gratify the commu-
nity and afford universal satisfaction. The professors of
Lutheranism and Calvinism, in this manner, harmonized, and
one burst of benevolence and liberality extinguished the disaf-
fection of three hundred years.
The Bishop of Meaux has taken occasion from these muta-
tions to triumph over Protestantism. But he ought to have
known the changes of Romanism on this topic, and have feared
to provoke retaliation. The friends of Popery have entertained
diversified opinions on transubstantiation, which they have not
accounted as essential in their system. A few instances of
these fluctuations may be adduced. Gregory, Pius, Du Pin,
and the Sorbonne, rejected, or were willing to modify, their
darling doctrine of Transubstantiation.
Gregory the Seventh, presiding in 1078 with all his infalli-
bility, in a Roman Synod of one hundred and fifty bishops,
prescribed a form of belief on this question, which rejected, or,
at least, did not mention the corporal presence. He allowed
Berengarius to profess, that the bread of the altar after conse-
cration was the true body, and the wine, the true blood of our
Lord. 1 Transubstantiation and the corporal presence are here
excluded. Any Protestant would sign the declaration. The
Zuinglians, at the conference of Marpurg, admitted the pres-
ence of the true body and blood of Jesus in the sacrament, and
their reception by those who approach the communion. 2 The
same is taught in the Reformed Confessions of Switzerland,
France, Strasbourg, Holland, and England. Those of Swit-
zerland and France call the sacramental bread and wine his
body and blood, which feed and strengthen the communicant. 3
Those of Strasbourg, Holland, and England represent the con-
secrated elements as his true body and blood, which are present
in the institution and become our nourishment. 4 The doctrinal
exposition of Pope Gregory and the Roman council would have
satisfied any of the Reformed denominations. All these ad-
mitted all that was enjoined by the Holy, Roman, Apostolic
> l Profitebatur, panem altaris, post consecrationem, esse verum corpus Christi, et
vinum esse verum sanguinem. Cossart, 2. 28. Mabillon, 5. 125.
2 Nequenegarevolunt, verum corpus et sanguinem Christi adesse. Seckend. 138.
3 Appellari corpus et sanguinem Domini. Hel. Con. in Chouet, 67. Nos pascit et
nutrit carne sua et sanguine. Gal. Con. in Chouet, 109, 110.
_ 4 Verum suum corpus, verumque suum sanguinem. Argen. Con. in Chouet,
240. Vero Christi corpore et sanguine alimur. Christum ipsum sic nobis praesen-
tem exhiberi. Aug. Con. in Chouet, 119, 120. Nos fide recipere verum corpus, et
verum sanguinem Christi. Bel. Con. in Chouet, 182.
32 INTRODUCTION 1 .
Synod, headed by his infallibility. Mabillon acknowledges the
Berengarian creed's ambiguity and insufficiency. 1 The con-
temporary patrons of the corporal presence held the same opin-
ion as Mabillon, and insisted on the substitution of an unequiv-
ocal and explicit confession, and the insertion of the epithet
'substantial.' This accordingly was effected next year. A
new creed was issued, acknowledging a substantial change in
the sacramental elements after consecration. 2
Pius the Fourth followed the footsteps of Gregory. This
Pontiff in 1560, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth, offered to con-
firm the English Book of Common Prayer, containing the
Thirty-nine articles and the Litany, if the British Sovereign
would acknowledge the Pontifical supremacy and the British
nation join the Romish Communion. 3 The English Articles
reject Transubstantiation. The religion of England under Eliza-
beth, Mageoghegan would insinuate, though without reason,
was composed of Lutheranism and Calvinism ; but certainly
contained nothing of Transubstantiation. Pius wrote a letter
to the Queen, which, in the most friendly style, professed an
anxiety for her eternal welfare, and the establishment of her
royal dignity. This epistle, with the overtures for union, was
transmitted by Parpalio the Pope's nuncio. Martinengo was
commissioned by his Holiness the same year, to negociate a
similar treaty. But the terms were refused by the Queen and
the nation. Martinengo was not even allowed to land in Britain,
but was stopped in the Netherlands. 4
Du Pin and the Sorbonne copied the example of Gregory
and Pius, and proposed at least to modify the doctrine of Tran-
substantiation. Wake in London and Du Pin in Paris com-
menced an epistolary correspondence, on the subject of a union
between the English and the French church. The French
doctor proposed to the English bishop to omit the word Tran-
substantiation, and profess a real change of the bread and wine
into the Lord's body and blood. This modification, which would
satisfy many Protestants, was a new modelling of the Trentme
council's definition. The proposal was conveyed in Du Pin's
1 Sub his veri corporis et sanguinis verbis sequivocalatere non immerito credere-
tor. Mabil. 5. 125. Berengarius brevem fidei suse fonnulam, sed insufficientem
ediderat. Mabillon. 5. 139.
3 Berengarius explicatiorem fidei fonnulam subscribere coactus est. Vox sub-
Btantialiter ultimas Berengarianae fidei profession! inserts est. Mabil. 5. 139.
3 Qu'il confirmeroit le bvere de laPnere Commune. Le livre de la Priere Com-
mune est une espece de Rituel ou Breviare, qui contient les trente-neuf articles de
la religion pretendue refonnee, avec la formule des prieres. Mageoghegan, 3. 379,
380, 381. Cart. 3. 393. Heylin, 303. Strype. 1. 228.
4 Trasitus negatus. Alexander, 23. 230. Ne hujus quidem sedis ad ipsam, hac
de causa, nuncios in Angliam trajicere permiserit. Mageogh. 3. 412.
INTRODUCTION. 33
Commonitorium. The plan, however, was not merely the act
of Du Pin. The conditions of a coalition were read, and, after
due consideration, approved by the Sorbonnian faculty, so cele-
brated for its erudition, wisdom, and Catholicism. 1 These
Roman hierarchs and a French university were willing, on
certain terms, to compromise or modify Transubstantiation ; and
the patrons of Popery, in consequence, need not exult or won-
der, if Lutherans, Zuinglians, and Calvinists evinced a disposi-
tion to unite, while their opinions on Consubstantiation disagreed,
and much less, when their minds, after long consideration, came
to correspond.
The unity of the reformed, it may be observed, was restricted
to faith and morality. Considerable diversity existed in disci-
pline and ceremonies. 2 But these, all admit, are unessential, and,
in many instances, unimportant. Discipline, it is confessed,
differs among the Romish as well as among the Reformed.
The Disciplinarian Canons of Trent were rejected in France
and in part of Ireland ; while they are admitted even in Spain
only so far as consistent with regal authority. Almost every
celebrated schoolman in the Romish Communion became the
founder of a particular denomination, distinguished by a pecu-
liarity of regulation and government. The Augustinians, Fran-
ciscans, Dominicans, Jansenists, Jesuits, Benedictines, were all
characterized by different rites, discipline, and ceremonies.
Sectarianism, indeed, has prevailed since the rise of Protest-
antism. Many denominations appeared after the Reformation.
Arianism, Swedenborgianism, Flagellism, Southcottianism, and
other errors have erected their portentous and fantastic heads.
The clamor of Arianism, the nonsense of Swedenborgianism,
and the ravings of Southcottianism, have blended in mingled
discord and in full cry.
But ah 1 these or similar kinds of schism and heresy appeared,
in all their enormity, many ages before the Reformation.
Division arose in the church from its origin, in the days of apos-
tolic truth and purity. Irenseus, who flourished in the second
century, attacked the errors of his day, and his work on this
subject fills a full volume in folio. These errors, in the days of
Epiphanius, in the fourth century, had increased to eighty, and, in
the time of Philaster, to an hundred and fifty. Their number
continued to augment with the progress of time ; and their
systems equalled those of the moderns in extravagance. Schism
and heresy prevailed to a more alarming extent, before than
2 P a n? in ' 9 OTnmoni | :oriuin > Maclaine's Mosh. App. III. Biog; Diet. 30. 473.
In diversis ecclesiis quaedam deprehenditur yarietas in loquutiombus, et modo
expositions, doctrinsB, in ritibus item vel caeremoniis. Chouet. 12.
3
34 INTRODUCTION.
since the establishment of Protestantism in its present form.
Later are but a revival of former errors and delusions, which
flourished at a distant period, and, preserved from oblivion by
the historian, swell the folios of ecclesiastical antiquity.
These illusions, however, the Reformers never countenanced,
but, on the contrary, opposed. Luther and Calvin withstood
the many deviations from truth and propriety, which appeared
in their day, and which since that period have, in various forms,
infested Christendom. The Saxon reformer exerted all his
authority against the error and fury of Anabaptism in Ger-
many ; and was imitated in his opposition to turbulence by the
Swiss, French, English, and Scottish Reformers, Zuinglius,
Calvin, Cranmer, and Knox.
The Romish priesthood and people, on the contrary, have,
in every age, fostered fanaticism and absurdity. Every foolery
of sectarianism, which, though unconnected with Protestantism,
arose since the Reformation, and disgraced religion, has nestled
in the bosom of Popery, and been cherished by its priesthood
and people. Arianism, an affiliated branch of Socinianism,
claims the honor of antiquity, and was patronized by Liberius,
and by the councils of Sirmium, Selucia, and Ariminum. The
extravagance of Montanism, as Tertullian relates, was patron-
ized by the contemporary Pope and rivalled the fanaticism of
Swedenborgianism. 1 The Pontiff, says Godeau, gave Mon-
tanus letters of peace, which showed that he had been admitted
to his communion. 2 His Holiness, says Rhenan, Montanlzed.
Victor, says Br'uys, approved the prophesying of Montanus,
PrisciUa, and Maximilla. The mania of Joanna Southcott in
modern times is eclipsed by the dreams of Beata, Clara, and
Nativity.
Beata of Cuenza in Spain was born in the end of the eigh-
teenth century in poverty and obscurity. But she aspired, not-
withstanding, to the character and celebrity of a Roman saint :
and for effecting her purpose, she invented a most extraordinary
fiction, which, she said, was revealed to her by the Son of God.
Her body, she declared, as was indicated to her by special reve-
lation, was transubstantiated into the substance of oar Lord's
body. Beata's blasphemy created no less discussion in Spain
than Joanna's in England. The Spanish priests and Monks
divided on the absurdity. Some maintained its possibility, and
some its impossibility : and the one party wondered at the
i Socrat. IV. 21, 22. Theod. II. 39, 40. Spon. 173. II. Du Pin, 347. Bruy. 1
112. Tertul. 501.
8 Le Pape lul avoit donnfe lettres pacifiques, qui montroient qu'i] 1'avoit admia
en sa communion. Godeau. 1. 436. Bruy. 1. 40.
INTRODUCTION. 35
other's unbelief. A few, indeed, it appears, were the accom-
plices of her imposture. But many were the dupes of their own
credulity. Beata's visionary votaries, believing her flesh and
blood transformed into the substance of the Messiah, proceeded,
in their folly and impiety, to adore the impostor. Her sacer-
dotal and lay partizans conducted her in procession, and with
lighted tapers to the churches and through the streets ; while
these shameful exhibitions were accompanied with prostration
and burning of incense before the new-made goddess, as before
the consecrated host. 1 The woman, indeed, was as good a divi-
nity as sacramental pastry. Beata's claim, in all its ridiculous
inconsistency, was as rational in itself, and supported by as
strong evidence as the tale of Transubstantiation. The clergy
and laity of Spain, basking in the sunshine of infallibility and
illuminated with all its dazzling splendor, were no less liable to
deception than a few fanatics in England, guided by their own
unlettered and infatuated minds.
Clara at Madrid, less assuming than Beata, aspired only to
the name and distinction of a prophetess ; and her claims, Eke
those of many other impostors, soon obtained general credit.
Her sanctity and her miracles became the general topics of con-
versation. Pretending to a paralytic affection, and unable to
leave her bed, the prophetess was visited by the most distin-
guished citizens of the Spanish capital, who accounted them-
selves honoured in being admitted into her presence. The sick
implored her mediation with God, for the cure of their disor-
ders ; and grave and learned judges supplicated light to direct
them in their legal decisions, from the holy prophetess. Clara
uttered her responses in the true Delphic style, like a Priestess
of Apollo, placed on the Tripod and under the afflatus of the
God, or like a seer, who beheld futurity through the visions of
inspiration. She was destined, she announced, by a special call
of the spirit, to become a capuchin nun; but wanted the health
and ^strength necessary for living in a cloistered community.
His infallibility, Pope Pius the Seventh, in a special brief, per-
mitted her to make her profession before Don Athanasius, Arch
bishop of Toledo. The Vicar-General of God granted the holy
prophetic nun a dispensation from a cloistered life and a se-
questered community. Miss Clara, in this manner, was acknow-
ledged by the head of the Romish church, while Miss Southcott
was disowned by every Protestant community. An altar, by
tije permission of his infallibility, was erected opposite her bed.
Mass was often said in her bed-room, and the sacrament left in
1 Llorente, 558.
3*
36 INTRODUCTION.
her chamber as in a sacred repository. Clara communicated
every day, and pretended to her followers that she took no food
but the consecrated bread. This delusion lasted for several
years. But the inquisition at last, on the strength of some
information, interfered in 1802, in its usual rude manner, and
spoiled the play. 1 The punishments, however, contrary to
custom, were mM. This was, perhaps, the only act of justice
which the holy office ever attempted, and the only good of
which its agents were ever guilty.
The Revelations of sister Nativity, with all their ridiculous
folly, have been recommended in glowing and unqualified lan-
guage by Rayment, Hodson, Bruning, and Milner. This
prophetess, if she had little brains, had, it seems, clear eyes and
good ears. She saw, on one occasion, in the hands of the offici-
ating priest at the consecration of the wafer, a little child, living
and clothed with light. The child, eager to be received, or in
other words eaten, spoke, with an infantile voice, and desired
to be swallowed. She had the pleasure of seeing, at another
time, an infant in the host, with extended arms and bleeding at
every limb. All nature, on the day of the procession, she per-
ceived sensible of a present deity and manifesting joy. The
flowers, on that auspicious day, blew with brighter beauty, and
the anthems of angels mixed with the hosannas of men. The
very dust becoming animated, danced in the sepulchre of the
saint with exultation, and in the cemetery of the sinner shud-
dered with terror.
The French prophetess also amused her leisure hours in the
nunnery, with the agreeable exercise of self-flagellation. The
use of the disciplining whip, unknown, say Du Pin and Boileau,
to all antiquity, began in the end of the eleventh century. The
novelty was eagerly embraced by a community which boasts of
its unchangeability. The inhuman absurdity has been advo-
cated by Baronius, Spondanus, Pullus, Gerson, and the Roman
Breviary. Baronius, the great champion of Romanism, followed
by Spondanus, calls flagellation 'a laudable usage.' 2 This
satisfaction, Cardinal Pullus admits, is rough, but, in proportion
to its severity, is, he has discovered, ' the more acceptable to
God.' 3 Gerson, in the council of Constance in 1417, though
he condemned the absurdity in its grosser forms, recommended
the custom, when under the control of a superior, and executed
by another with moderation, and without ostentation or effiision
1 Llorente, 559.
3 Hie laudabilis usus, ut poBnitentiEe causa, fideles verberibus seipsos afficerent
flagellis. Spoil. 1056. III.
3 Satisfactio aspera, tamen, et tanto Deo gratior. Pull, in Boileau. 227.
37
of blood. 1 Self-flagellation* indeed, is sanctioned by the Popish
church. The Roman Breviary, published by the authority of
Pius Clement, and Urban, has recommended the absurdity by
its approbation. This publication details and eulogizes the
flagellations practised by the Roman saints. These encomiums
on the disciplinarian whip, are read on the festivals of these
canonized flagellators. The work containing these commenda-
tions, is authorized by three Pontiffs, and received with the
utmost unanimity by the whole communion. The usage, there-
fore, in all its ridiculousness, possesses the sanction of infal-
libility.
This improved species of penance was adopted by the friendly
monks, of the age of the crusades, who, with a lusty arm, be- ,
laboured the luckless backs of the penitential criminals, men and
women, even of the highest rank in society. The nobility,
gentry, and peasantry, the emperor, the king, the lord, the lady,
the servant, and the soldier, as well as the cardinal, the metro-
politan, the bishop, the priest, the monk, and the nun, all joined
in the painful and disgusting extravagance. 2 Cardinal Damian
in 1056, brought it into fashion, and Dominic, Pardolf, Anthelm,
Maria, Margaret, Hedwig, Hildegard, and Cecald, who have
all, men and women, been canonized, followed Damian's exam-
ple, and lacerated their backs for the good of their souls.
The Roman Breviary, already mentioned, edited by three
Popes, commends many of its saints for their happy and fre-
quent application of the whip to their naked backs. Self-
flagellation, according to Pontifical authority, became, in their
hands, the sanctified means of superior holiness. This roll con-
tains the celebrated names of Xavier, Canutus, Francisca, Regu-
latus, Bernard, Franciscus, Teresia, and Bertrand. Xavier, the
Indian apostle, wielded against his own flesh, ' an iron whip,,
which, at every blow, was followed with copious streams of
blood.' Canutus, the Danish sovereign, ' chastised his body
with hair-cloth, and flagellation. Francisca copied the holy-
pattern. Her saintship 'took continual pains to reduce her
body to submission by frequent self-flagellation.' Regulatus, by
the skilful application of the sanguinary lash, subjected the
flesh to the spirit.' Bernardin, Franciscus, and Bertrand, fol-
lowing the useful example, operated with a thong on the back
for the good of the soul. Teresia merits particular and honouiv
able mention, for applying with laudable attention, these Chris-
. Flagellatio fiat, judicio superioris, et sine scandalo, et ostentations, et sine san-
ginne. Gerson, in Labb. 16. 1161.
Nonmodoviri, sed et nobiles mulieres verberibus seipsos afficerent. Spon.
1056. III. Boileau, 180, 307. Labb. 16. 1161. Du Pin, 2. 265. M. Paris, 90.
38 INTRODUCTION.
tian means of holy torment. ' She often applied the bloody
lash ' This, however, did not satisfy her saintship. She also,
in addition, * rolled herself ori thorns ;' and by this means, says
the Breviary, the Holy Nun, blasphemous to tell, 'was accus-
tomed to converse with God.' Her carcass, however, it seems,
enjoys, since her death, the benefit of these macerations ; and,
' circumfused in a fragrant fluid, remains, till the present day, the
undecayed object of worship.' 1 The church, that retains such
senseless and ridiculous absurdity, in a publication, reviewed
by Pius, Clement, and Urban, may cease to reproach Protest-
antism with the acts of a few mistaken fanatics or moon-struck
maniacs, who, whatever name they may assume, are disowned
by every reformed denomination in Christendom.
Dominic, Hedwig, and Margaret, merit particular attention in
the annals of flagellation. Dominic of the iron cuirass seems to
have been the great patron and example of this discipline. He
showed himself no mercy, and whipped, on one occasion, till his
face, livid and gory, could not be recognized. This scourging
was accompanied with psalm-singing. 2 The music of the voice
and the cracking of the whip mingled, during the operation, in
delightful variety.
Dominic, in the use of the whip, had the honour of making
several improvements, which, in magnitude and utility, may be
reckoned with those of Copernicus, Flamsteed, Newton, and La
Place. He taught flagellators to lash with both hands, and,
consequently, to do double execution. 3 The skilful operator,
by this means could, in a given time, peel twice as much super-
abundant skin from his back, and discharge twice as much
useless blood from his veins. He obliged the world also with
the invention of knotted scourges. This discovery also facili-
tated the flaying of the shoulders, and enabled a skilful hand to
mangle the flesh in fine style for the good of the soul.
Hedwig, and Margaret, though of the softer sex, rivalled
Dominic in this noble art. Hedwig was Duchess of Silesia and
Great Poland* She often walked during the frost and cold, till
she might be traced by the blood dropping from her feet on the
1 Xavier ferreis in se flagellis ita saevit, ut saepe copioso cruore difflueret. Brev.
Rom. 604.
Canutes corpus suum jejuniis, ciliciis, et flagellis castigavit. Brev. Rom. 648.
Francisca corpus suum crebris flagellis in servitutem redigere jugiter satagebat.
Brev. Rom. 710.
Regulatus flagellis carnem intra subjectionem spiritus continebit. Brev. 787.
Bernardinus flagellis delicatuin corpus affligens. Brev. Rom. 801.
Teresia asperrimis flagellis saepe cruciaret. Aliquando inter spinas volutaret sic
Deum alloqui solita. Ejus corpus usque ad hanc diem incorruptum, odorato liquore
circumfusum, colitur. Brev. Rom. 1043.
2 Psaltaria integra recitabantur. Boileau, c. 7.
3 Se utraque manu aflatim diverberasse. Boileau, 185.
INTRODUCTION. 39
snow. She wore next her skin, a hair-cloth that mangled her
flesh,' which she would not allow to be washed. Her women
had, 'by force, 1 to remove the clotted blood, which flowed from
the torn veins. The Duchess invented or adopted an effectual,
but rather rough means of sanctification. She purified her soul
by the tears which she shed, and her body by the blows which
she inflicted with a knotted lash. 2
Margaret, daughter to the King of Hungary, wore a hair-
cloth and an iron girdle. She underwent not only the usual
number of stripes, but made the nuns inflict on her an extraor-
dinary quantity, which caused such an effusion of blood from
her flesh as horror-struck the weeping executioners. Her devo-
tion still augmenting during the holy week, she lacerated her
whole body with the blows of a whip. 3
Edmond, Matthew, and Bernardin, used their disciplinarian
thongs on particular occasions. Edmond, who is a saint and
was Archbishop of Canterbury, was solicited to unchastity by
a Parisian lady. The saint directed the lady to his study, and
whether from a taste for natural beauty, or more probably, to
facilitate his intended flagellation, proceeded, without ceremony,
to undress his enamoured dulcinea, to which, being unac-
quainted with his design, the unsuspecting fair submitted with
great Christian resignation. He then began to ply her naked
body with a whip. 4 The operation, though it did not in all
probability, excite very pleasing sensations, tended, it appears,'
to allay her passion.
Friar Matthew's adventure had a similar beginning and end.
A noble nymph, young, fair, and fascinating, disrobed her lovely
person, for the purpose, probably, of unveiling her native charms ;
and in this captivating dress or rather undress, paid a nocturnal
visit to her swain after he was in bed. 5 But this Adonis was
insensible and unkind. A lash of Spanish cords, administered
front and rear to her naked beauty, vindicated the Friar's purity
and expelled from his apartment ' the love-sick shepherdess.'
Bernardin was tempted in the same way and preserved by the
same means. A citizen of Sienna invited him to her house ;
and, as soon as he entered, shut the door. She then, in un-
equivocal language, declared the object of her invitation. Ber-
nardin, says the story, according to divine suggestion, desired
1 Ses femmes 1'en retirassent par force. Andilly, 769.
2 Andilly, 770. 3 Andilly, 795.
4 Virgis cecidit, et nudatum corpus cruentis vibicibus conscribillavit. Boileau, 217.
5 Noctu quadam, spoliata suis vestibus, ad eum in sponda jacentem accesserat.
Boileau, 217. Sulcos sanguinolentos, in juvenilibus femoribus, clunibus, ac scapu-
hs diduxit. Boileau, 218.
40 INTRODUCTION.
the woman to undress. 1 Flagellators, indeed, on those occasions,
generally chose to exhibit in the costume of Adam and Eve, and,
by this means, contrived to add indecency to folly. 2 The lady,
accordingly, on the intimation of his will and misunderstanding
his design, immediately complied. But she was soon disagree-
ably undeceived. Contrary to her expectations, and probably
to her desire, he began to apply his whip, which he used with
great freedom, till she was tired of his company and civility.
This flagellation was not peculiar to men and women. Satan,
it seems, enjoyed his own share of the amusement. This, on one
occasion, says Tisen and after him Boileau, was bestowed on
his infernal majesty by Saint Juliana. 3 Her sister nuns, on
this emergency, heard a dreadful noise in Juliana's apartment.
This, on examination, was found to proceed from her conflict
with Beelzebub. Her saintship engaged his devilship in a
pitched battle in her own chamber. But Satan, for once, was
overmatched and foiled. The saintess seized the demon in her
hands, and thrashed him with all her might. Juliana then threw
Belial on the earth, trampled him with her feet, and lacerated
him with sarcasms. Satan, if accounts may be credited, has
sometimes taken the liberty of whipping saints. Coleta, for in-
stance was, according to the Roman Breviary, often compli-
mented in this way. Her saintship frequently felt the effects of
the infernal lash. But Juliana, for once, repaid Satan with
interest for all his former impoliteness and incivility. The
sainted heroine, it appears, fought with her tongue as well as
with her fists and feet. 4 This weapon she had at command,
and she embraced the opportunity of treating the Devil to a
few specimens of her eloquence.
Dunstan, the English saint, showed still greater severity than
Juliana. The Devil at one time assumed the form of a bear, and
attacked the saint. Satan, in commencing hostilities, gaped and
showed his teeth i but, it appears, could not bite. He contrived,
however, to seize Dunstan's pastoral staff in his paws, and
attempted to drag this ensign of office to himself. But this,
Dunstan was not disposed tamely to resign. He chose rather
to retain the weapon, and to use it as an instrument of war
against his diabolical assailant. He accordingly applied it to
Belial's back with such dexterity and effect, that the enemy was
soon put to flight. The conqueror, also, like a skilful general,
1 Ut se yestibus nudaret: nee mulier distulit. Boileau, 216. Sarius, 272.
2 Nudatis corporibus, et omni stamine spoliatis, palam et in conspectu hominum
ee flagellare. Boileau, 222. s Tisen, 60. Boileau, 270.
* Daemonem, quern manibus comprehensum, quanti poterat caedebat. In terram
deinde prostratum, pedibus obterebat, lacerabat sarcasmis. Boileau, 270. Brev.
Kom. 700.
INTRODUCTION. 41
resolvin^ to secure the victory, pursued the routed adversary,
and thrashed with might and main. The saint, in this manner,
continued his military operations till he broke the cudgel in
three pieces on the vanquished Devil. 1
Dunstan, on another occasion, discovered, saint as ne was,
still less mercy. Satan, or some other Devil, had the assurance
to put his head through the window of Dunstan's cell, for the
purpose of tempting the saint. But the demon's intrusion cost
him his nose, which, it seems, was of an enormous length. His
saintship heated a pair of pincers in the fire, and actuated with
holy rage, seized Beelzebub's nose in the red-hot forceps. The
saint then pulled in, and Belial, if it were he, pulled out, till the
nose gave way : and Satan, who, during the comfortable opera-
tion, yeUed like a fury and alarmed the whole neighborhood,
escaped with the loss of his olfactory organ. The Devil, though
the prominence of his face had formerly been nearly as large as
if he had been at Sterne's promontory of noses, has been dis-
tinguished ever since by the flatness of his nasal emunctories. 2
This story is gravely told by Osbern, Ranulph, and other popish
-historians.
Middleton, during his visit to Rome, witnessed a procession
in which the wretched votaries of superstition marched with
whips in their hands, and lashed their naked backs till blood
streamed from the wounds. A similar exhibition is presented
at the annual return of the lent season. Men of all conditions
assembled at a certain place, where whips, ready for the work,
are given to the operators. The lights are extinguished. An
alarm bell announces the moment for commencement. The vic-
tims of superstition and priestcraft then ply the thong, and flay
their unfortunate shoulders. Nothing is heard during the tra-
gedy, but the groans of the self-tormentors, mingled with the
cracking of w r hips and the clanking of chains, forming, if not a
very harmonious, at least a- very striking and noisy concert. The
comfortable operation, producing of course an agreeable ex-
coriation, continues nearly an hour, accompanied with the vocal
and instrumental symphony of groans, whips and chains.
These flagellating exhibitions were perhaps surpassed by the
convulsionarian scenes, displayed in Paris about the year 1759.
These frightful displays of fanaticism and inhumanity have
Translatus in specium ursi consimilem hianti rictu orantem aggreditur. Fugi-
entum belluam dirissime caedit, etc. Osbern, 105.
Laryelem faciem tenaculis includit. et totis viribus renitens. monstrum intror-
smn trahit. Osbern, 96.
Dunstanus, forcipibus suis ignitis, nasum dsemonis comprehendit et terniit, donee
cpmone ululante factum hoc convicaneis innotesceret. Ranulph. vi. p. 270. Lo
Sueur, 4. 157.
42 INTRODUCTION.
been recorded by Baron Grimm with the greatest exactness,
from reports taken on the spot by Condamine arid Ca.stel.
These shocking and degrading transactions, countenanced by
several of the Roman clergy, were continued for upwards of
twenty years in the capital of his Most Christian Majesty. The
convulsionaries were Popish fanatics, who pretended to extra-
ordinary visitations of the Spirit. During these visitations, the
enthusiasts of this school fell into convulsions, or, at their own
request, suffered crucifixion or some other punishment. 1
Rachel and Felicite, two pupils of the sisterhood, were ac-
tresses in the tragedy. These two maniacs suffered crucifixion,
for the purpose, they said, of exhibiting a lively image of the
Saviour's passion. Each was nailed to a wooden cross through
the hands and feet, and remained in this situation for more than
three hours. During this time, the sisters slumbered in a
beatific ecstacy, uttered abundance of infantile nonsense, and
addressed the spectators in lisping accents and all the silly baby-
ism of the nursery. The nails at length were drawn ; and the
sisters, after their wounds were washed and bandaged, sat
down to a repast in the apartment, and pretended that the ope-
ration was attended with no pain, but with transporting plea-
sure. They both indeed had, with wonderful self-command,
suppressed all audible indications of torment by groans or
murmurs. Visible marks, however, betrayed their inward
misery. Their agony, especially at the drawing of the nails,
appeared by various contortions, writhings, and other unequiv-
ocal tokens of internal distress.
A second exhibition consisted in the crucifixion of Fanny
and Mary. Condamine, who was a spectator, on the occasion,
took his description from life. Fanny suffered with the great-
est heroism. She remained three hours nailed to the cross, and
was shifted^ during this period, into a great variety of postures.
But Mary wanted faith or fortitude. She shuddered at the fas-
tening of the nails, and, in less than an hour, shouted for relief.
She was, accordingly, taken from the cross, and carried out of
the chamber in a state of insensibility.
This tragedy was succeeded by a comedy. Sister Frances
announced that God had commanded her on that day to burn
the gown off her back, for the spiritual edification of herself and
the spectators. Fire, accordingly, was, after a great deal of
grimacing, set to her skirts. But her saintship, instead of ex-
periencing consolation and delight, screamed with terror and
yelled like a fury. Water, therefore, was poured on her petti-
1 Middleton, 3. 100. Edinburgh Review for September 1814.
I INTRODUCTION. 43
coats, and her ladyship, half-roasted and half-drowned, and
utterly ashamed of the exhibition, was carried into another
apartment.
The melody of this flagellating and convulsionarian worship,
indeed, to vulgar ears, appears something harsh ; and the devo-
tion might, to common understandings, seem not very high in
the scale of rationality. But the music, in the one instance,
was as harmonious, and the worship, in the other, as reasonable
as in the Feast of the Ass, celebrated, for some time, in the
Gallican church, at Beauvais in Burgundy. The friends of
this ceremony had, by their superior discernment, discovered
that an ass was the conveyance of Joseph and Mary, when
they fled for an asylum from Herod into Egypt. An institution,
therefore, was appointed for the commemoration of the flight
and deliverance, and the solemnity was a pattern of rationality
and devotion. 1
A handsome girl, richly attired, represented Mary, who, from
some flattering portraits of her ladyship, was accounted a Jew-
ish beauty. The girl, bedizened with finery, was placed on an
ass covered with a cloth of gold and superbly caparisoned.
The ass, accompanied with a vast concourse of clergy and laity,
was led from the cathedral to the parish church of St. Stephen.
The girl, who represented the mother of God, seated on the
ass, was conducted in solemn procession into the sanctuary
itself, and placed with the gospels near the altar. High mass
began with great pomp ; and the ass, who was a devout wor-
shipper on the occasion, was taught to kneel, as in duty bound,
at certain intervals, while a hymn, no less rational than pious,
was sung in his praise. The holy hymn, recorded by Du
Cange, is a model for elegance and devotion. The following is
a translation of four stanzas of the sacred ode in the Miltonian
style ; though no version can equal the sublimity and sense of
the inimitable original.
The Ass he came from Eastern climes,
Heigh-ho, my assy,
He's fair and fit for the pack at all times.
Sing, Father Ass, and you shall get grass,
And straw and hay too in plenty.
The Ass is slow and lazy too ;
Heigh-ho, my assy,
Bat the whip and the spur will make him go.
Sing, Father Ass, and you shall have grass,
And straw and hay too in plenty.
* * i * J
The Ass was born and bred with long ears;
Heigh-ho my assy,
1 Du Cange, 3. 426. Velly, 2. 537.
44 INTRODUCTION*
And yet he the Lord of asses appears,
Grin, Father Ass, and you shall get grass,
And straw and hay too in plenty.
The Ass excels the hind at a leap,
Heigh-ho, my assy,
And faster than hound or hare can trot.
Bray, Father Ass, and you shall have grass,
And straw and hay too in plenty. 1 /
The worship concluded with a braying-match between the
clergy and laity in honour of the ass. The officiating priest
turned to the people, and in a fine treble voice and with great
devotion, brayed three times like an ass, whose fair representa-
tive he was ; while the people, imitating his example in thanking
God, brayed three times in concert. Shades of Montanus,
Southcott, and Swedenborg, hide your diminished heads!
Attempt not to vie with the extravagancy of Romanism. Your
wildest ravings, your loudest nonsense, your most eccentric
aberrations have been outrivalled by an infallible church.
The ridiculousness of the asinine ceremony was equalled, if
not surpassed, by the decision of a Roman Synod. His Infalli-
bility, Boniface the Fourth, presided on the occasion. The acts
of the council were published from a manuscript in the Vatican,
by Holstenius, and have been inserted in the works of Du Pin
and Labbe. The holy Roman Council condemned an opinion,
which, it appears, had prevailed in England, that monks, because
dead to the world, are incapable of receiving ordination or per-
forming the sacerdotal or episcopal functions. The sacred synod,
under the immediate superintendency of his Holiness, proved
by the soundest logic, that monks are angels, and therefore
proper ministers of the Gospel. The synodal dialectics supply
a beautiful specimen of syllogistic reasoning. An angel, in
Greek, said his Infallibility and the learned Fathers, is in the
L atin language, called a messenger. But monks are angels, and
therefore monks are messengers. Monks are demonstrated to
be angels, by a very simple and satisfactory process. All
animals with six wings are angels. But monks have six wings,
1 Orientis partibus, Hezi, Sire Asnes, etc.
Adventavit asinus * * * *
Pulcher et fortissimus, Ecce magnis auribus
Sarcinis aptissimus. Subjugalis filius
Hez, Sire Asnes, car chantez, Asinus egregius
Belle bouche rechignez Asinorum Dominus.
Vous aurez du foin assez, Hez, Sire Asnes, etc.
Et de 1'avoine a plantez. g a l tu vmc i t hinnulos,
Lentus erat pedibus, Damas et capreolos.
Nisi foret baculns, Super dromedaries,
Et eum in clunibus Velox Madianeos.
Pungcret aculeus. Hez, Sire Asnes, etc.
Du Cange, 3. 426, 427.
INTRODUCTION. 45
and therefore monks are angels. The minor of this syllogism
is evinced in a most conclusive manner. The cowl forms two,
the arms two, and the extremeties two wings. Monks, therefore,
have six wings, and, consequently are angels, which was to be
demonstrated. 1 The annals of fanaticism and folly, through the
whole range of Protestant Christendom, afforded no equal exam-
ple of unqualified senselessness and absurdity.
Du Phi and Brays suspect the document of forgery. The
reasons of their suspicion are its nonsense, frivolity, barbarism,
and illogical argument. 2 These, however, to persons acquainted
with Roman Councils, are rather proofs of its genuineness.
Sense, found in an ancient synodal monument, would go a
great way to prove its supposititiousness. The unwieldy col-
lection of councils, if the nonsense were subtracted^, would, in
a great measure, disappear from the view, and present a wide
and unmeaning blank. The ponderous folios of Crabbe, Bin-
ius, Labbe and Cossart, under which the shelf now groans,
would, if the sense only were retained, contract their ample
dimensions and shrink into the pamphlet or the primer.
These observations show the unity of Protestantism, as well
as the folly of Popery. But the antiquity of Romanism has,
by its partisans, been contrasted with the novelty of Protestant-
ism, Popery, in the language of its advocates, is the offspring
of antiquity ; but Protestantism, the child of the Reformation.
The one originated with the first heralds of the Gospel ; but
the other with Luther and Calvin.
Antiquity, however, in the abstract, is no criterion of truth.
Superstition is nearly as old as religion, and originated in the
remotest period of time, in the darkness and profanity of the
antediluvian world. Indian Braminism existed long antece-
dent to Italian Popery. Christianity was preceded by Judaism
and Paganism, and the Christian revelation by the Grecian and
Roman mythology.
The truths of the Gospel, however, must, it is granted, have
been known and professed from its original promulgation ; and
the Christian church has existed from the commencement of
the Christian era. The Gospel was proclaimed and a church
planted by their Divine Author. The apostolic heralds, com-
misioned by His immediate authority, disseminated evangelical
truth and enlarged the Christian society! This system con-
tinued for some time in all its original purity, unmixed with the
Ut cherubim, monachi sex alis velantur : duse in capitio, quo caput tegitur.
U P vero quod brachiis extenditur duas alas esse dicimus ; et illud quo corpus con-
R r QCO w ' 8ac erdotales igitur monachi atque canonici angeli vocantur. Labb,
"' ld58 ' Be <*a, 718. 2 Du Pin, 2. 7. Bruy. 1. 410.
46 INTRODUCTION.
muddy influx of human folly and superstition. The friends of
Protestantism, therefore should be prepared to show that their
religion is no novelty ; but existed from the origination of Chris-
tianity, and before the Papacy or the Reformation.
Protestantism comprises three things. These are the Name,
the Faith, and the Church, or, in other terms, the Appellation,
the Profession, and the People. The name, all admit, is, in
this acceptation, a novelty, which originated in the sixteenth
century and as late as the days of Luther. The patrons of the
Reformation in Germany protested, in 1529, against the unjust
decision of the Diet of Spires, and in consequence, were called
Protestants. 1 An old institution, therefore, came to be distin-
guished by a new appellation. Protestantism, in its modern
and ecclesiastical application, began to signify Christianity.
But changing a sign does not change the signification.
Britain, according to the ancient appellation, is now called
England, without any change in the territory. The ancients
called that Hibernia which the moderns call Ireland. France
was formerly named Gaul, and Columbia lately Terra Firma;
whilst these divisions of the European and American continents,
notwithstanding their new designations, remain the same.
Boniface the Third was not transubstantiated into another man,
when, according to Baronius, he assumed the new appellation
of Universal Bishop. The modern Popes, on their elevation to
the papal chair, change their names ; but, as all confess, retain
thei^ identity. Catholicism, according to the primitive designa-
tion, began in this manner to be denominated Protestantism,
for the purpose of distinguishing the simplicity of Christianity
from the superstition of Romanism.
But the name, in itself, is unimportant. The sign is nothing
compared with the signification. The antiquity of the PROTEST-
ANT FAITH is easily shown. The theology of the Reformed is
found in the Bible, in the fathers, in the primitive creeds, and
in the early councils. Protestantism is contained in the word
of God. The sacred volume is the great repository of the Re-
formed faith. The religion, therefore, which is written with
sun-beams in the New Testament, the earliest monument of
Christianity, the great treasury of revealed truth, cannot with
any propriety, be denominated a novelty.
The truths of Revelation and the theology of Protestantism,
are contained in the early fathers. These authors indeed, ac-
cording to the usual reckoning, include a vast range. The ec-
clesiastical writers, from Clemens to Bernard, from the Bishop
1 Alex. 4. 566. Mageog. 2. 243.
INTRODUCTION. 47
of Rome to the Monk of Clairvaux, comprising a period of
eleven hundred years, have been denominated Fathers. Their
works, immediately after the council of Nice, began to be in-
fected'with popery. Each succeeding author, in each following
ao-e, added to the gathering mass of error. Superstition accu-
mulated. The filth and mud of Romanism collected, till the
system of delusion, or " the Man of Sin," in all his dimensions,
was completed. The post-Nicene Fathers, therefore, may, with
safety and without regret, be consigned to the Vatican, to rust
or rot with the lumber and legends of a thousand years.
But the ante-Nicene Fathers exhibit a view of Protestantism,
in all its grand distinctions and in all its prominent traits.
These, too, it must be observed, were uninspired and fallible,
and therefore, display no unerring standard of truth. Many
things contained in their works are exploded both by the Rom-
ish and Reformed, such as the Millenium, the administration of
the Lord's Supper to infants, and the subterranean repository
of souls from death till the resurrection. The errors and igno-
rance of the Fathers have been acknowledged by Erasmus and
Du Pin, the friends of Romanism. The ancient commentators,
says Erasmus, such as Origen, Basil, Gregory, Athanasius,
Cyril, Chrysostom, Jerome, and Augustine, ' were men subject
to failings, ignorant in some things and mistaken in others.' Du
Pin makes a similar concession. 1 Some errors, says the Parisian
Doctor, were frequent in the first ages, which have since been
rejected. The ancients, he grants, varied in terms and in cir-
cumstantials, though they agreed in essentials. The errors,
however, of the ante-Nicene fathers, which were many, were
not the errors of Romanism. The ecclesiastical productions of
three hundred years after the commencement of the Christian
era, teach, in the main, the principles of Protestantism.
The Reformed also recognized the three pristine creeds. The
Apostolic, the Nicene, and the Athanasian formularies of belief
were adopted by the patrons of Protestantism, and have been
distinguished by their general reception in Christendom. The
confessions of Irenaeus, Origen, Tertullian, Cyprian, Gregory,
and Lucian, as well as those of Jerusalem, Aquileia, and Antioch,
which still remain, though less known, are equally orthodox.
All these agree, in substance, with the confessions issued imme-
diately after the Reformation, and believed by all genuine
Protestants to the present day.
The doctrinal definitions of the first six general councils,
1 Homines erant, quffidam ignorabant, in nonnullis hallucinati svuit. Erasra. 5.
133. Du Pin, 1.587.
48 INTRODUCTION.
which were held at Nice, Ephesus, Chalcedon, and Constanti-
nople, have been adopted into the Reformed theology. The
Nicene, and Byzantine councils declared the divinity of the Son
and Spirit, in opposition to Arianism and Macedonianism. The
Ephesian, Chalcedonian, and Byzantine synods taught the unity
of the Son's person and the duality of his nature and will, in
contradistinction to Nestorianism, Eutychianism, and Monothe-
litism. All these promulgated the principles of Protestantism,
and are lasting monuments of its antiquity.
A person being asked where Protestantism was before the
Reformation, replied by asking in turn, where the inquirer's
face was that morning before it was washed. The reply was
just. Dirt could constitute no part of the human countenance ;
and washing, which would remove the filth, could neither
change the lineaments of the human visage nor destroy its
identity. The features by the cleansing application, instead of
alteration, would only resume their natural appearance. The
superstition of Romanism, in like manner, formed no part of
Christianity ; and the Reformation, which expunged the filth of
adulteration, neither new modelled the form, nor curtailed the
substance of the native and genuine system. The pollutions
of many ages, indeed, were dismissed ; but the primitive con-
stitution remained. The heterogeneous and foreign accretions,
which might be confounded but not amalgamated with the pri-
mary elements, were exploded : and deformity and misrepre-
sentation gave place to simplicity and truth.
Popery may be compared to a field of wheat overrun with
weeds. The weeds, in this case, are only obnoxious intruders
which injure the useful grain. The wheat may remain and
advance to maturity with accelerated vegetation, when the
weeds, which impede its growth, are eradicated. The super-
stition of Romanism, in the same manner, like an exotic and
ruining weed, deformed the Gospel and counteracted its utility.
The Reformers, therefore, zealous for the honour of religion and
truth, and actuated with the love of God and man, proceeded
with skill and resolution, to separate Popish inventions from
divine revelation, and exhibited the latter to the admiring world
in all its striking attraction and symmetry.
But nothing, perhaps, presents a more striking image of
Popery than a person labouring under a dreadful disorder;
while the same person, restored to vigorous health, will arfbrd a
lively emblem of Protestantism. The malady, let it be sup-
posed, has deranged the whole animal economy. Appetite and
strength fail, and are succeeded by languor and debility. The
disease, which works within, appears in all its disgusting effects
INTRODUCTION. 49
on the exterior, and produces emaciation, paleness, swelling,
liberation, tumour, and abscess. The whole frame, in Conse-
quence, exhibits a mass of deformity. The patient, in this
state, affords a striking picture of Popery. But a physician, in
the mean time, exerts his professional skill. Medical applica-
tions arrest the progress of disease, and renovate the functions
of the whole human system. Every protuberance, excrescence,
suppuration, and pain is removed by an unsparing application
of the lancet, regimen, medicine, and aliment. The blood, in
reviving streams,, begins to flow with its usual velocity, and the
pulse, in healthy movements, to beat with its accustomed regu-
larity. Debility and decay give place to vigour, bloom, and
beauty. The healthy subject, in this state, presents a portrait
of Protestantism; and the Reformers acted the part of the
physician. Religion, by their skilful exertions, was divested of
the adventitious and accumulated superadditions of a thousand
year's, and restored to its native purity, nourishing in health,
invigorated with strength, and adorned with beauty. A patient,
however, does not, on the return of health, become another per-
son or lose his identity : neither does Christianity, when reduced
to its original state, change its nature or become a novelty.
The faithful existed, at the earliest period, as well as the
faith ; and the people as well as the profession. The churches
unconnected with the Romish and rejecting the most obnoxious
abominations of Popery, or professing, in all the grand leading
truths, the principles of Protestantism, were, from the primitive
times, numerous and flourishing. These were the Waldensians,
the Greeks, the Nestorians, the Monophysites, the Armenians,
and the Syrians.
Western or European Christendom was the theatre of Wal-
densianism. The patrons of this system were distinguished by
various appellations. But the principal branches of this stock,
were Waldensianism, Albigensianism, and Wickliffism. These,
however, though called by several names, had one common
origin and one common faith the faith of Protestantism.
Albigensianism, indeed, has often been accused of Manichean-
ism and Arianism. Calumny of this kind has been very com-
mon from the Popish pen of misrepresentation against this
persecuted denomination of Christians. But the imputation is
unfounded, and has been refuted by Perrin, Basnage, Usher,
Peyran, and Moreri. Moreri, though attached to Romanism,
has vindicated the Albigensian theology from this slander with
generosity and effect. 1 This charge, according to Moreri, may
1 Moreri, 1. 234.
50 INTRODUCTION.
be refuted from the silence of original records ; the admission of
Popish historians ; and the testimony of Albigensian confessions.
The original monuments, such as the Chronicle of Tolosa,
the testimony of Bernard, Guido, and the Councils of Tours and
Lavaur, in 1163 and 1213, contain no trace of this allegation.
The Tolosan Chronicle contains an account of the processes
against the Albigensians signed by the Inquisitors, and, in many
instances, by the Bishops ; but no mention is made of Albigensian
Manicheanism or of Arianism. A similar silence is preserved by
Bernard and Guido, as well as by the synods of Tolosa, Tours,
and Lavaur, that brought several accusations against this people. 1
The same appears from Popish admissions. The Albigen-
sians, according to jEneas Sylvius, Alexander, and Thuanus,
were a branch of the Waldensians, who, all admit, were un-
tainted with the Manichean or Arian heresy. 2 The Albigensians,
says Alexander, ' did not err on the Trinity,' and, therefore,
were not Arians. 3 Bruys, Henry, Osca, and Arnold, 'who
were the chiefs of this denomination, were never accused of
these errors. Moreri, on this subject, quotes the admissions of
Mabillon, Tillet, Serras, Vignier, Guaguin, and Marca, in vin-
dication of these injured people. 4 All these testify that the
Albigensians differ little in doctrine from the Waldensians and
the Reformed, who, all confess, were free from Arianism.
- This calumny is repelled by the Albigensian Confessions.
Several of these remain. One is preserved in Leger. The
Treatise on Antichrist, written in 1120 before the days of
Waldo, contains an outline of the Albigensian theology. Gra-
verol also possessed an ancient manuscript, which detailed the
persecutions of the Inquisition against the professors of Albi-
gensianism. The Confession of Osca, who belonged to this
denomination, is still extant, and contains an outline of Protest-
antism. The Albigensians, who were accused before the coun-
cil of Lombez, made, in the synod, a public profession of their
faith. AH these records reject the Manichean and Arian errors,
and include, in the essentials, the faith of the Reformation.
The accused, at Lombez, professed their belief in one God in
J Bened. 14. Labb. 12. 1284. et 13. 841. Du Pin, 2, 32.
2 Ab ecclesia Oatholica recedentes, impiam Waldensium sectam atque insanam
amplexi sunt. Aen. Sylv. c. 35. Albigenses Waldensium esse progeniem. Alex.
20.268. Pauperes Lugdunenses, Albigei dicti sunt. Thuan. 1. 222. Du Pin, 1.318.
3 Non hi circa Trinitatis fidem erraverint. Alexan. 20. 269. Mabil. 3. 456.
4 Ils etoient dans les memes sentimens que les Reformez. Leurs sentimens
etoient les memes que ceux, qui ont etc renouvellez par Wiclef et par Luther.
Moreri, 1. 235.
Ills n'y avoient pas grande difference de doctrine entre les Albigeois et Vaudois.
Vignier, 3. 233.
INTRODUCTION. 51
three persons, the Father, Son, and Spirit; and therefore dis-
claimed Arianism, as well as Manicheanism. 1
A few Manicheans and Arians, indeed, who lived among the
Albigensians, united, as appears from Laurentius and Guido,
with the latter denomination to oppose their common persecu-
tors. These, though differing among themselves, conspired
against the Roman community, and, in consequence, were con-
founded by the Inquisitors. The common enemy, therefore,
ascribed the errors of the one to the other. Laurentius wrote
during the hottest persecutions of the Albigensians, whom he
distinguished from the Manicheans and Arians. Guido was a
Dominican persecutor, and wrote in the Tolosan Chronicle. 2
The antiquity of the Waldensians is admitted by their ene-
mies, and is beyond all question. Waldensianism, says Rai-
nerus the Dominican, is the ancientest heresy ; and existed,
according to some, from the time of Silvester, and, according to
others, from the days of the apostles.' 3 This is the reluctant
testimony of an Inquisitor in the thirteenth century. He grants
that Waldensianism preceded every other heresy.
The Waldensians, say Rainerus, Seysel, and Alexander,
dated their own origin and the defection of the Romish Com-
munion from the Papacy of Silvester.* Leo, who flourished in
the reign of Constantino, they regard as their founder. Roman-
ism, at this period, ceased to be Christianity, and the inhabi-
tants of the valleys left the unholy communion. These simple
shepherds lived, for a long series of years, in the sequestered re-
cesses of the Alpine retreats, opposed to Popish superstition
and error.
The Waldensians, as they were ancient, were also numerous. 5
Vignier, from other historians, gives a high idea of their popu-
lousness. The Waldensians, says this author, multiplied won-
derfully in France, as well as in other countries of Christendom.
They had many patrons in Germany, France, Italy, and espe-
cially in Lombardy, notwithstanding the Papal exertions for
their extirpation.
This sect, says Nangis, were infinite in number ; appeared,
1 Pour T essentiel, leur doctrine etoit conforme a celle des Vaudois et des Protes-
tans. Osca a laisse une confession de foi, dont les articles accordent avec la doc-
trine des Reformez. Moreri, 1. 234, 235- Du Pin, 325. Labb. 13. 384.
2 Moreri, 1. 234.
3 Aliqui enim dicunt, quod duravit a tempore Sylvestri; aliqui a. tempore Apos-
tolorum. Rainerus, 3. 4.
* Romanaecclesia non est ecclesia Jesu Christi, sed ecclesiamalignantium, eamque
eub Sylvestro deficisse. Alex. 17. 368. Seysel, 9. Moreri. 8. 47.
5 Les Vaudois se trouverent merveilleusement multipliez, tant en France qu'en
autres contr^es de la Chretiente. Ils avoient grand nombre des complicees et adhe-
rans, tant en 1' Allemagne, qu'en France et Italie, specialement en la Lombardie.
Vignier, 3. 283, 393.
4*
52 INTRODUCTION.
says Rainerus, in nearly every country ; multiplied, says San-
derus, through all lands ; infected, says Caesarius, a thousand
cities, and spread their contagion, says Ciaconius, through al-
most the whole Latin world. Scarcely any region, says Gret-
zer, remained free and untainted from this pestilence. 1 The
Waldensians, says Popliner, spread, not only through France,
but also through nearly all the European coasts, and appeared
in Gaul, Spain, England, Scotland, Italy, Germany, Bohemia,
Saxony, Poland, and Lithuania. 2 Matthew Paris represents
this people as spread through Bulgaria, Croatia, Dalmatia,
Spain, and Germany. Their number, according to Benedict,
was prodigious in France, England, Piedmont, Sicily, Calabria,
Poland, Bohemia, Saxony, Pomerania, Germany, Livonia, Sar-
matia, Constantinople, Philadelphia, and Bulgaria. 3
Thuanus and Moreri represent the Waldensians, as dispersed
through Germany, Poland, Livonia, Italy, Apulia, Calabria, and
Provence. 4 Persecuted by the Inquisition, this simple people
fled into England, Switzerland, Germany, France, Bohemia,
Poland, and Piedmont, and became, says Newburg, like the
sand of the sea, without number in Gaul, Spain, Italy, and
Germany. 5
The Diocese of Passau, it was computed, contained forty
Waldensian schools and eighty thousand Waldensian popula-
tion. 6 The Albigensian errors, according to Daniel, infected all
Languedoc and corrupted the nobility and the populace. 7 The
Romish temples, according to Bernard, were left without people,
the people without pastors, and the pastors without respect. 8
The number of the Albigensians appears from the army which
1 Infinitus erat numerus. Nangis, An. 1207. Dachery, 3. 22.
Fere enim nulla est terra, in qua laa.ec secta non sit. Eain. c. 4. Per omnes
terras multiplieati sunt. Sanderus, VII. Infecerunt usque ad mille civitates. Csesar.
V. 21. Totum fere Latinum orbern infecisse. Ciacon. 525.
Vix aliqua regie, ab hac peste, immunia et intacta, remansit. Gretz. c. 1.
2 Non per Gafiiam solum totam sed etiam per omnes pene Buropae oras. Poplin.
3 Albigenses in finibus Bulgarornm, Croatiae, et Dalmatiae. M. Paris, 306.
Albigenses in partibus Hispamae etillis regionibus, invaluerunt. M. Paris, 381.
Ils se disperserent dans les vallees de Piemont, dans la Sicile, la Calabi-e, Pouille et
la Boheme. L'AUemagne, qui n'en etoit pas moins remplie. Bened. 2. 243 248.
4 Pars in Germaniam et Sarmatiam, et inde in Livoniam usque ad extremum sep-
tentrionem transmigravit. Pars in Italiam profecta in Apulia et Calabria consedit.
Pars denique in Provincia nostralocis incultis et asperis latuit. Thuan. XXVII. 8.
VI. 16. Ils s'en retira un bon nombre en Angleterre, en Suisse, en Boheme, en
Pologne, et dans les vallees de Piemont. Moreri, 8. 48.
5 In latissimis Galliae, Hispamae, Italiae, Germaniaeque provinciis turn multi
hac peste infecti esse dicuntur, ut secundum prophetam, multiplieati esse, super
numerum areuae videantar. Labb. 13. 285. Newburg. II. 13.
6 Computatae sunt scholae in diocaesi Passaviensi, 40. Eain. c. 3^
7 Les erreurs avoient infecte tout le Languedoc, et autant corrompu 1'esprit de
Noblesse, que celui du peuple. Daniel, 3, 510.
8 Basilicae sine plebe, plebes sine sacerdote. Bernard. Ep. 240.
INTRODUCTION. 53
they equipped against the crusaders. Benedict reckons the
Albio-ensian army against Count Montfort at 100,000 men. 1
The & French, according to the same historians, sent 300,000
warriors, who, under the holy banners of the cross, went to
combat the heretics of Languedoc. Waldensian bravery, even
according to his partial relation, withstood for near two hundred
years, the vigilance of pontiffs, the piety of bishops, the zeal of
monarchs, and the magnanimity of warriors ; and injured the
church in the west, as much as the infidels in the east. The
heterodox army of the Albigensians, adds the historian, had
nearly on one occasion, overwhelmed the holy warriors of the
cross. Any other hero but Montfort, if Benedict may be
believed, would have despaired of success and abandoned his
conquests. The church could oppose to the storm only prayers,
tears, and groans ; while the Albigensians, in triumphant anti-
cipation, hoped to establish heresy on the ruins of Romanism.
Waldensianism was, in anticipation, a system of the purest
Protestantism, many ages before the Reformation. This, in its
fullest sense, has, with the utmost candour, been acknowledged
by many cotemporary and succeeding historians who were
attached to Romanism. The conformity of the Waldensian
with the Reformed faith may be shown from Popish statements
and admissions, and from Waldensian confessions.
The following statements are taken from the unexceptionable
authority of Sylvius, Petavius, Gaufridus, Serrus, Marca,
Thuanus, More, Vignier, and Alexander. 2 The Waldensians,
accordingto Sylvius, afterward Pius the Second, in his History of
Bohemia, rejected the papacy, purgatory, image-worship, sacra-
1 n se forma une armee de cent mille homines. Bened. 1. 6, 228, 100, 214.
2 Purgatorium ignem nullum inveniri : vanum esse orare pro mortals : Dei et
Sanctorum imagines delendas ; confinnationem etextremamunctionem inter eccle-
siae Sacramenta minime contineri : auricularem confessionem nugacem esse. Sylv.
c. 35. Non esse obediendum Pontifici Romano : Indulgentias nihil valere : non
extare Purgatorium : sanctos non attendere precibus nostris : festa et jejunia indicta
non esse servanda et alia. Petavis, 2. 225. Us declament centre 1'eglise, contre
ses ceremonies, contre ses dogmes. Hs tournent sa hierarchie en derision. Us
disent, que le purgatoire eat une fable, que lapriere pourlesmorts est une illusion,
que 1'invocation des saints, que le culte de leurs images est une foiblesse. Gaufrid 2.
458. Ils rejettoient le culte des images, le purgatoire, merite des oeuvres, les indulg-
ences, les pelerinages, les vo3ux, 1'invocation des saints, et le celibat des pretres. Mo-
reri, 1. 235. Ecclesiam Romanam, Babylonicam meretricem esse : monasticam vitam
ecclesise sentinam ac Plutonium esse : vana illius vota : ignem purgatorium, solemne
sacrum, templorum encaenia, cultum sanctorum, ac pro mortals propitiatorium
Satanse commenta esse. Thuan. 1. 221. Auricularem confessionem prorsus tollunt.
Docent imagines esse tollendas ab ecclesia. Indulgentias contemnunt. Docent, &c.
More, 387. Ils nioyent la transubstantiation et le purgatoire, disans que les pri-
eres^et suffrages des vivans ne servent de rien aux trespassez. N' attribuoyent
aussi aucune authorite au Pape ; meprisans toutes les traditions de 1' eglise, meme-
ment 1' institution des fetes et des jeunes. comme aussi de 1' extreme onction.
Viguier, 3. 283.
54 INTRODUCTION.
mental confession, extreme unction, invocation of saints, prayer
for the dead, and the use of oil and chrism in baptism. Peta-
vius represents the Christians of the valleys as opposed to the
papal supremacy, indulgences, purgatory, fast, festivals, and
saint-invocation. The Waldensians, says Gaufridus in his his-
tory of Provence, disseminated their poison till the origin ofLuther-
anism, and derided the Romish hierarchy, dogmas, rituals, pur-
gatory, saint-invocation, image-worship, and prayer for the dead.
Serrus and Marca, quoted by Moreri, mention the Waldensian
rejection of the supremacy, transubstantiation, purgatory, indul-
gences, pilgrimages, festivals, tradition, image-worship, decre-
tals of the church, intercession of saints, merit of works, and
celibacy of the clergy. Thuanus details their disclaiming of
the- Romish church, pontiff, festivals, mass, monkery, purgatory,
worship of saints, and prayer for the dead : and More and Vig-
nier deliver a similar statement on the subject of Waldensian
theology.
The following is an outline of Alexander's impartial state-
ment, which the learned Sorbonnist supports by the testimony
of the original historians, Rainerus, Seysel, Bernard, PilichdorfF,
and Ebrardus de Bethunia. * The text of the Sacred Scriptures
is to be received, in opposition to traditions and comments.
The Pope is the head of all errors. The sacraments are only
two, Baptism and the Lord's Supper. Baptism is not abso-
lutely necessary for salvation. Transubstantiation or the
corporal presence is unscriptural. Penance, matrimony, con-
firmation, extreme unction, and holy orders are no sacraments.
The church erred, when it enjoined the celibacy of the clergy.
Dispensations, indulgences, relics, canonizations, vigils, fasts,
festivals, purgatory, altars, consecrations, incensing, processions,
exorcisms, holy water, sacerdotal vestments, annual confession,
modern miracles, sacred burial, and saint-invocation, all these
the Waldensians despised and rejected. Remission of sin is
obtained through the merits of Jesus. No sin is venial, but all
are mortal. The Virgin Mary herself is not to be worshipped.
The Waldensians had just thoughts of God and Jesus, and,
therefore, in Alexander's opinion, were Trinitarians. Rainerus
himself clears them of the blasphemy of Manicheanism and
Arianism. Christian pastors, are to be ordained by the impo-
sition of hands ; and elders, besides, should be chosen to govern
the people.' * The Parisian doctor's portrait of Waldensianism
presents a picture of Protestantism taken from life.
1 Solum Scripturae sacrae textum recipiebant. Traditiones, expositiones patnun,
decreta, et decretales rejiciebant. Papa est omnium errorumcaput. Duo tantum
sacramenta se credere profitentur, baptismum et eucharistiam. Baptismum, ipsos
INTRODUCTION. 55
The admissions of Romish historians, bear testimony to the
conformity of Waldensianism and Albigensianism, with Protest-
antism. This conformity has been admitted among others, by
Gratius, Popliner, Alexander, Mezeray, Gaufridus, Moreri,
Tillet, Serrus, Evenswyn, and Marca. The Waldensians, says
Gratius, ' differed little from the Reformed in any thing.' Pop-
liner admits ' their near approximation to the Protestant faith.'
Alexander acknowledges the same conformity, and Luther's
approbation of the Waldensian confession, at the commence-
ment of the Reformation. ' The Henrieians and Waldensians,'
says Mezeray, ' held nearly the same dogmas as the Calvinists.'
According to Gaufridus, ' the Lutherans and Calvinists praised
the learning, disinterestedness, and morality of the Walden-
sians, and consulted them as oracles on points of religion,'
Moreri, Tillet, Serrus, Evenswyn, and Marca, grant ' the agree-
ment of the Waldensian faith, in all the principal articles with
the Reformed theology.' l
The Waldensian Confessions, issued on several occasions,
show the conformity of their principles to Protestantism. The
Waldensians, who, to avoid persecution, had removed into Bo-
hemia and Moravia, published their Confession in 1504. This
formulary of belief was presented to King Ladislaus, in vindi-
cation of their character from the slanderous accusations of the
Papists and Calixtines. The same people published another
Confession in 1535. This was compiled from older documents,
and presented by the Bohemian nobility to the Emperor Ferdi-
nand. This celebrated production, as Alexander states, ' was
prefaced and approved by Luther, and praised by Bucer and
non existimasse absolute nee essarium ad salntem. Waldenses transubstantiationera
non admittebant. Confessionem annuam rejiciebant. Poenitentiam exsacramen-
torum numero expungebant. Matrimonium, sacrameiitum esse negabant. Ecclesiarn
errasse dicebant, cum caelibatum clericis indixit. Sacramentum unctionis extremae
rejiciunt. Infirtnum adhortabantur, ut certain fiduciam et securitatem remissionis
peccatorum per merita Christi haberet. Sacramentum ordinis rejiciebant. Dispen-
sationes ecclesiae et indulgentias respuebant. Sanctorum invocationem impugnabant
reliquiae, translationes, canoni?ationes, vigilias, festivitates sanctorum contemnebant.
Miraculia nullam adhibebant fidem. Electoa Dei, immo, ipsam Christi genetricem
honorandos negabant. Purgatorium negabant. Ecclesias, altaria, eorum consecra-
tiones, ornatum et supellectilem, sacerdotalia indumenta, luminaria, thurificationes,
aquam benedictam, processiones, aliosque sacros ritus rejiciebant et deridebant.
Sacramsepulturam nihili faciebant. Exorcismos impugnabant. Ecclesiasticajejunia,
quasi idolatriam et superstitionem redolentia aversabantur. Nullum veniale pec-
catum, sed omnia mortalia. Waldenses puros de Deo et Christo recte sensisse.
Eainerus ipsos a Manicbaeorum et Arianorum blasphemiis absolvit. Waldenses
pastpres habebant; ad praedicandi munus, impositione manuum admittebantur.
Seniores praetereaad regendum populum eligebant. Alex. 17. 370 388.
1 Non multum alicubi dissentiunt ab iis. Gratius in Fascicul. 85. Doctrinam
suam ab eo quam btfdie Protestantes amplectuntur parum difierentum dissenrina-
runt. Popliner, 1.7.
56 INTRODUCTION.
Melancthon. 1 Oecolompadius, Beza, and BuUinger, also recog-
nized these people, though despised and persecuted, as a con-
stituent part of the great Christian Commonwealth. The
Lutherans and Zuinglians, in this manner, acknowledged the
Waldensians as Christians, and their faith as the truth of the
Gospel. The Waldensians also published a Confession in the
reign of Francis the First. This, in 1544, was followed by
another, which, in 1551, was transmitted to the French King
"and read in the Parisian Parliament. All these are in strict
harmony with the Reformed Theology ; and all breathe the
spirit and teach the truths of Christianity. 2 This same people,
as late as in 1819, in a Confession found among the manu-
scripts of Peyran, declared their adherence to the doctrines of
the churches of England, Netherlands, Germany, Prussia, Swit-
zerland, Poland, and Hungary ; and entreated these commu-
nions and others settled in America, to regard them, though few
and destitute, as members of the same ecclesiastical body.
The sanctity of Waldensian morality corresponded with the
purity of the Waldensian faith. The piety, benevolence, inno-
cence, and holiness of this people have challenged the esteem
and extorted the approbation of friend and foe, of the protes-
tant, the papist, and even the inquisitor. Many partizans of
popery have concurred with the patrons of protestantism in their
eulogy. The following character of this people is taken from
Rainerus, Seysel, Lewis, Hagec, Alexander, Labbe, Gaufrid,
and Thuanus.
Rainerus, quoted by Alexander, admits ' their show of piety
and integrity before men.' This is pretty well for a Dominican
Inquisitor, who discovered, however, that Waldensian piety
was mere dissimulation. But Rainerus also acknowledges
' their sobriety, modesty, chastity, and temperance, with their
aversion to taverns, balls, vanity, anger, scurrility, detraction,
levity, swearing, and falsehood. He grants their attention, men
1 Quod nunc, quoque, Calvinistae nostri faciunt. Alex. 17. 375.
Lutherus bane Valdensium Bohemorum Confessioriem approbavit. Alex. 17. 401.
HenericiensetVaudoistenoientapeupreslesmemes dogmesque les Calvinistes.
Mezeray, 2. 577. Les Lutheriens et les Calvinistes commencerent alouer leur mani-
ere de vivre : leur disinteresement, leurs lumieres. On commenca a les consulter
comme des oracles sur les points de la religion. Gaufrid. 2. 458.
Leur doctrine est conforme a celle des reformez, dans les principaux articles.
Moreri, 8, 48. Tillet croit qu'ils etoient dans les memes sentimens que les Refor-
mez. Serres declare que leurs sentimens etoient les memes que ceux qui ont ete
renouvellez par Wiclif et par Luther. Moreri, 1. 235.
Evenswyn dit que les Albigeois etoient dans les memes sentimens que les Refor-
mez. Marca parle des Albigeois a peu pres de la meme maniere que les Reformez.
Moreri, 1. 235.
Praefatus est honorifice Lutherus. Alex. 17. 405, 406.
3 Du Pin, 3, 250. Thuan. 2. 82. Benedict, 260.
INTRODUCTION. 57
and women, young and old, night and day, to learr. jng or
teaching; and he had seen a Waldensian rustic, who. repeated
Job, word for word, and many who perfectly knew the whole
of the New Testament.' *
Seysel acknowledged ' their purity of life, which excelled
that of other Christians.' Lewis, the French King, asserted
'their superiority, both to himself and to his other subjects,
who were professors of Catholicism.' Hagec admits 'their
simplicity of habits and their show of piety,' under which, how-
ever, his penetration enabled him exclusively to discover ' their
miscreancy.' His eyes must have been very clear to discern
miscreancy through such distinguished simplicity and piety.
Alexander pourtrays ' their disposition to love their enemies, to
live, if possible, in peace with all men, and, atthe same time, to
avoid revenge, judicial litigation, love of the world, and the
company of the wicked.' Alexander, also vindicates the Wal-
densians from the calumny of Ebrard and Emeric, who had
accused them of avarice, lewdness, and un chastity. Labbe,
like Rainerus and Hagec, allows the Waldensians ' a pretended
show of piety.' The Jesuit, of course, must, like the inquisitor
and the historian, have been a notable discerner of hearts.
Gaufridus mentions ' their industry, which, in a superior manner
cultivated the lands and increased the national revenue.'
Thuanus records 'their detestation of perjury, imprecations,
scurrility, litigation, sedition, gluttony, drunkenness, whoredom,
divination, sacrilege, theft, and usury.' He mentions their
chastity, which they accounted a particular honour, their culti-
vation of manners, their knowledge of letters, their expertness
in writing, and their skill in French. A boy could scarcely be
found among them, but, if questioned on his religion, could,
with readiness, give a reason for his faith. Tribute, they paid
with the utmost punctuality ; and if prevented for a time by
civil war, they discharged this debt on the return of peace.' 2
1 Magnam habet speciem pietatis, eo quod coram hominibus juste vivunt. Sunt
in moribus, compositi et modestL Casti etiam sunt, maxime Leonistce, temperati
in cibo et potu. Ad tabernas non eunt, nee ad choreas, nee ad alias vanitates. Ab
ira se cohibent. Cavent a scurrilitate, detractione, verbonim levitate, mendacio,
et juramento. Omnes, viri et foeminse, parvi et magni, die noctugue decent vel
discunt. Vidi quondam rusticum, qui Job recitavit, de verbo ad verbum; et
plures, qui totum Novum Testamentum perfecte sciverunt. Rain. c. 4, 7, 9.
Alex. 17, 38, 390, 393.
2 Puriorem quam caeteri Christian! vitam agunt. Seysel, 92. Alex. 17. 387.
Me et ceetero populo meo Catholico, meliores illi viri sunt. Gamer. 419. Us
savoient cacher leur mechancete sous des habits fort simples, et sous une grande
apparence de piete. Hagec, 550. Lenfan. 1. 10.
Has conversations externae regulas proponebant. Mundum non diligere, malo-
rum consortium fagere, pacem habere cum omnibus, quantum fieri potest, non
contendere in judicio, non ulcisci injurias, inimicos amare. Alex. 17. 399.
58 INTRODUCTION.
The Waldensians, notwithstanding the sanguinary persecu-
tions of Romanism, still exist, and still are persecuted in their
native valleys. A population of twenty thousand always remain,
and exhibit, to an admiring world, all the grandeur of truth and
all the beauty of holiness. Their relics still show what they
have been, and they continue unaltered amid the revolution of
ages. The world has changed around this sacred society ; while
its principles and practice, through' all the vicissitudes of time,
live immutably the same.- The Waldensian church, though
despised by the Roman hierarchy, illuminated, in this manner,
the dark ages ; and appears, in a more enlightened period, the
clearest drop in the ocean of truth, and shines the brightest
constellation in the firmament of holiness ; sparkles the richest
gem in the diadem of Immanuel, and blooms the fairest flower
in the garelen of God.
Romanism, renounced, in this manner, in the West by the
Waldenses, was opposed in the East by the Greeks, Nestorians,
Jacobites, Armenians, and Syrians. The Greeks occupy
European Turkey and the Mediterranean Islands; and are
dispersed, though in fewer numbers, through Mesopotamia,
Syria, Cilicia, Palestine, Georgia and Mingrelia. The religion
of the Greek Church is also the religion of European and
Asiatic Russia, comprehending a territory more extensive than
the empire of Alexander or Tamerlane. The Greeks, as they
possess an extensive country, comprehend a numerous people.
The patriarch of Constantinople, says Allatius, quoted by
Thomassin, governed, in the eleventh century, sixty-five Metro-
politans and more than six hundred bishops. 1
The Greeks, indeed, agree not with modern Protestants in
all things. Some of the Orientals had drunk more and some
less from the muddy Fountain of human invention, according 1o
the period of their connexion with the Romish communion.
The Greeks continued longest in conjunction with the Latins ;
and in consequence, have imbibed most corruption. The assimi-
lation indeed between the Greek and Latin communions is, in
many points, close and striking. The Greeks, however, concur to
a man, in opposing Papal usurpation and tyranny ; in denying that
the Romish is the true church ; and in condemning the dogmas of
Popinarum frequentationem prohibebaut. Alex. 17.389. Praetenta specie pieta-
tis. Labbeus, 13. 285. Ils s'appliquerent a cultiverlaterre avec tant d'industrie,
que les Seigneurs en augmenterent considerablement leurs revenus. Gaufride, 2.
458. Omnem a se ac suis coetibus iniquitatem eliminate Ulicitas dejerationes,
perjuria, diras, imprecationes, contuinelias, rixas, eeditiones, &c. Thuan. 2. 85,
89, 91.
3 Le Patriarche de Constantinople dominoit encore & soixante-cinq Metropoli-
tains, et a plus de six cens evesques. Tho. Part IV. 2. 17. Allat. I. 24.
INTRODUCTION. 59
purgatory, supererogation, half-communion, human merit, cle-
rical celibacy, prayers for the dead, and restricting the circula-
tion of the Bible. The Greeks excommunicate the Roman
pontiff and all the Latin episcopacy, as the abettors of schism
and heresy. Prateolus, Fisher, More, Renaudot, Guido, Inno-
cent, BeUarmine, and Aquinas confess the Grecian disbelief in
purgatory and in the utility of supplications for the dead. Their
rejection of confirmation and extreme unction is testified by-
Simon ; while their belief in the divine obligation of communi-
cating in both kinds is declared by Simon, Prateolus, and More.
Thevenot and Le Bruges testify the Greek proscription of pur-
gatory, the pontifical supremacy, and communion in one kind. 1
The Greeks have shewed great resolution in opposing papal
despotism. Thomassin complains of their peculiar unwilling-
ness, beyond all the other Orientals, to acknowledge the ponti-
fical supremacy. Matthew Paris deprecates their open or con-
cealed hostility, on all occasions, to Romanism, and their blas-
phemy against its sacraments. Baldwin, the Grecian Emperor,
honored the Latins with the name, not of men, but of dogs ;
and this seems to have been their common appellation for all the
partisans of popery. The Greeks, says the Lateran Council,
detest the Latins, rebaptize those whom they admit to their
communion, and wash the altars on which the Romish clergy
celebrate mass, and which, in their mind, had been polluted
with the defilement of the popish sacrament. 2
The Mingrelians, who belong to the Greek church, appear
1 Ils ne reconnoisent point absolument la primaute de Pape. Us nient que
1' eglise Romaine soit la veritable eglise. Ils excomrnunient le Pape, et tous les
eveques Latins, comme Heretiques et schismatiques. SIMON c. 1. Graeci omnes
Latinos, excommunicates reputant. Canisius, 4. 433.
Docent nullum pu.rgatoriu.in. Prateol. VII. Graecis ad hunc usque diem, non
est creditum purgatorium esse. Fisher, Art. 1 8. Docent esse nullum purgatorium
locum. More, 199. Nee tertium ilium locum, quern pursfatorium appellamus
agnoscunt. Renaudot, 2. 105. Idem tribuitur Graecis a Guido/ie. Bell. 1. 1370.
Locum purgationis hujusmodi dicunt (Graeci) non foisse. Innocent, 4. Ep. ad
Otton. Du Fresne, 5. 931. Credibile est, Graecos de hac haeresi saltern suspectos
fuisse ; nam B. THOMAS, in opusculo contra Graecos, refellit etism hnnc errorem.
Bell. 1. 2. Docent etiam nihil prodesse defunctis orationes. More, 200. Ils ne
re^oivent point la confirmation ni 1' Extreme onction. SIMON, c. 1. Esse necessa-
rio sub utraque specie, panis scilicet et viui, communicandum. More, 199.
Les Grecs n 'admittent point de purgatoire. Us ne reconnoisent point le Pape
pour chef de 1' eglise. Ils coinmuuieut sous les deux especes. Ils rejevtent le
purgatoire. Le Bruyn, 1. 338, 339, c. 13.
3 Routes cesEglises Chrestiemies, exceptela Greque, on paru extremement dis-
posees a reconnoitre la primaute du Saint Siege. Thorn. I. 5.
Graeci, in malitia sua, perseverant, qui ubique, aut latenter aut aperte, ecclesiae
Romanae contradicunt. Omnia sacramenta nostra blasphemant. M. Paris, 426.
Vocabant eos canes. Cossart, 3. 21. Graeci cceperunt abominaii Latinos.
Labb. 13. 938. Altaria sua, supra quae Latini celebraveruut divina, abluere con
sueyerunt. Canis. 4. 433. Les Grecs ont une grande aversion pour 1' eglise Ro
maine. Us ont la messe des Remains en grande aversion. Le Bruyn, 1. 327. c. 13.
60 INTRODUCTION.
to disbelieve transubstantiation. Sir John Chardin, while on
his travels in Mingrelia, asked a priest, if the sacramental
bread and wine became the body and blood of our Lord. The
priest, on the occasion, laughed, as if the question had been
intended in raillery. The simple Mingrelian, in the exercise
of common sense, could not understand how the Mediator
between God and man could be compressed into a loaf, or why
he should descend from heaven to earth. 1
The Nestorians overspread Asiatic Turkey, Arabia, Persia,
Tartary, .India, and China. Their number and extent will
appear from the statements of Cosmas, Vitricius, Canisius,
Polo, Paris, Godeau, and Thomassin. Cosmas, in Montfau-
con, represented the Nestorian churches, in the sixth century,
as infinite or unnumbered. Vitricius records the numerical
superiority of the Nestorians and Jacobites over the Greeks
and Romans. Canisius, from an old author^ gives a similar
statement. Polo, the Venetian, who remained seventeen years
in Tartary, and was employed by the Cham on many impor-
tant commissions, testifies the dissemination of Nestorianism
through Tartary, China, and the empire of the Mogols. Mat-
thew Paris relates the spread of the Nestorian heresy through
India, the kingdom of Prester John, and the nations lying
nearer the East. Godeau mentions the extension of Nesto-
rianism through the East, and its penetration into the extremity
of India, where it remains to the present day. Thomassin
attests its diffusion through India v Persia, and Tartary, and its
multiplication in the North and East, nearly to infinity. 2
The Jacobites or Monophysites are divided into the Asiatics
and Africans. The Asiatics are diffused through Syria, Meso-
potamia, and Armenia ; and the Africans through Egypt, Nu-
bia, and Abyssinia. The vast number of this denomination,
and the extensive territory which they have occupied, may
be shown from the relations of Vitricius, Paris, Canisius, and
Thomassin.
Vitricius records the dissemination of the Monophysite con-
tagion through more than forty kingdoms. The Patriarch of
1 Chardin, 1. 100.
2 Ecclesiae Infinitae sunt. Montfaucon, 2. 179. Orientalem regionem, pro
magna parte, infecit. Canisius, 4. 433. Qui cum Jacobinis, plures esse dicuntur,
quam Latini et Graeci. Vitvicius 1. 76. Les Nestoriens avoieut plusieurs eglises
dans la Tartarie, dans le pais des Mogols, et dans la Chine. Thorn. 1. 4. Part 4.
Nestoriana haeresis per Indiam Majorem, et regnum sacerdotis Johannis, et per
regna magis proxiuia orienti dilatatur. M. Paris, 425. Us se repaudit dans tout
1'Orient, et penetra jusqu' aux extremitez des Indes. Godeau, 3. 354. Ilss'enten-
dirent jusques dans les Indes, la Perse, et la Tartarie. Thorn. 2. 20. Part IV. Us
s'y multiplierent presque a 1'infiui vers 1'orient et le Nord. Thorn. 1. 375. Bayle,
3. 2079.
INTRODUCTION. 61
the Jacobites, says Matthew Paris, superintends the Chaldeans,
Medians, Persians, Armenians, Indians, ^Ethiopians, Lybians,
Nubians, and Egyptians. These, mingled with the Saracens
or fixed in their own settlements through Asia, Africa, and the
East, occupy more than forty kingdoms, containing an innu-
merable Christian population. Canisius, from the manuscript
of an anonymous historian, has transmitted a similar account.
The Jacobites, according to Thomassin, spread, under the
empire of the Saracens, through all Asia and Africa. The
patriarch of Antioch presides over the Metropolitans of Jeru-
salem, Mosul, Damascus, Edessa, and Cyprus. The patriarch
of Alexandria and Abyssinia presides over Egypt, Ethiopia,
and Nubia. 1 Abyssinia boasts a Christian empire and estab-
lishment. Jowett, the missionary, found in Siout, an Egyptian
city, about 5000 Coptic Christians.
The Jacobites reject the supremacy, purgatory, transubstan-
tiation, half-communion, auricular confession, extreme unction,
the Latin Liturgy, and the seven sacraments. The usurped
authority of the Roman Hierarch, they view with contempt.
Their communion in both kinds, as well as their rejection of
confirmation and extreme unction, are testified by Dresser and
Godeau. Canisius, from an old author, in his Lections, and
Moreri show the Jacoban disbelief of purgatory. The Mono-
physan Missal, cited by Geddes, disclaims transubstantiation.
According to this document, ' the bread and the wine are dis-
tinct from our Lord in nature, but the same in power and effi-
cacy. His body is broken, but only by faith.' An Abyssinian
or Monophysan priest expressly declared against transubstan-
tiation to Bruce. ' The Priest,' says this author, ' declared to
me with great earnestness, that he never did believe that the
elements in the Eucharist were converted into the real body
and blood of Christ. He said, however, that he believed this
to be the Roman Catholic faith, but it never was his, and that
he conceived the bread was bread and the wine was wine even
after consecration.' Vitricius 'attests their rejection of auricular
confession. Their disuse of the Latin Liturgy is well known ;
and their renunciation of confirmation, confession, and extreme
unction, shows their opinion of the seven sacraments. 2
1 Patriarcha Jacobitarum praeest Ghaldaeis, Medis, Persia, et Armeniis. Septua-
ginta provincias ei obediunt, in quibus habitant innumerabiles Christiani. Hmc
subdita eat Minor India, Aethiopia, Lybia, cum Aegypto. Occupaverunt Nubiam
et omnes regiones usque in Indiam, plusquam auadraginta regna. Paris, 425, 426.
Jacobini majorem partem Aaise inhabitant. Conterminata Aegypto, magnam
partem Aethopise et plures regiones usque in Indiam Citeriorem, plura regna pos-
sident. Canisiua, 4. 433. Cette secte s'entendit dans toute 1'Asie et 1'Afrique.
Thom. 2. 20. Vitricius, 1. 75. Renaudot, 1. 375, 438, 440.
oacramentum integrum, tam clerici quam laici, accipiunt. Dress. 525.
62 INTRODUCTION.
The Nestorians were said to divide the person of the Son,
and the Jacobites to confound his natures. But this contro-
versy, as the ablest and most candid theologians and historians
admit, was a dispute about words. This is the opinion of the
Protestant historians, Mosheim, Bay-le, Basnage, La Croze,
Jalonsky, and Buchanan. Many Romish a.s well as Reformed
critics entertained the same opinion. This was the judgment
of Simon, Bruys, Assemanni, Tournefbrt, Gelasius, Thomassin,
and Godeau. Nestorianism, says Simon, is only a nominal
heresy, and the controversy originated in a mutual misunder-
standing. Bruys, Assemanni, Tournefort, and Gelasius speak
to the same purpose. Thomassin calls the Jacobites, Arme-
nians, Copts, and Abyssinians, Demi-Eutychians, who rejected
the extravagant imaginations of the original Monophysites.
Modern relations, says this author, show that the Jacobites
confounded not the godhead and manhood of the Messiah, but
represented these as forming one person, without confusion, in
the Son, as soul and body in man. The Abyssinians, who are
a branch ,of the Monophysites, disbelieve, says Godeau, any
commixture .of Deity and humanity in the Son of God. ]
The Armenians are scattered through Armenia, Cappadocia,
Cilicia, Syria, Persia, India, Cyprus, Poland, Turkey, Tran-
sylvania, ^ungary, and Russia. Julfa, in the suburbs of Ispa-
han, is, say Renaudot and Chardin, entirely inhabited by this
denomination. This colony amounted to 30,000 persons.
Abbas, the Persian monarch, contemporary with Elizabeth of
England, invited, says Walsh, the Armenians to settle in his
dominions, where he gave them every protection. Twenty
thousand families were placed in the province of Guilam.
Forty thousand reside in India, and carry on a great part of
the inland trade. Two hundred thousand of them remain in
Constantinople, in the adjoining villages, and on the Bosphorus. 2
The Armenian merchants are distinguished for their industry,
frugality, activity, and opulence. Fixing their settlements in
every principal city and emporium of Asia, the Arminians, says
Ils communient sous les deux especes. Ils ne pratiquent ni la confirmation, ni
1' extreme unction. Godeau, 1. 275.
De Purgatorio nil credunt. Canis. 4. 434. Les Jacobites ne croyent pas le pur-
gatoire. Moreri, 8. 429.
Christe, sicut in pane et vino naturae sunt a te distinctae, in virtute et potentia
idem sunt tecum. Corpus frangimus, sed tantum per fidem. Gedd. 169.
Confessiones peccatorum suorum, non sacerdotibus, sed soli Deo latenter faciunt.
Vitricius, 1. 76. Bruce V. 12.
1 Bayle, 2077. Simon, c. 9. Bruys, 1. 207. Assem. 291. Tourn. 2. 297. Gel.
de duob. Thorn. 2. 21. Godeau, I. 275.
2 Abbas Magnus Armenorum Julfae prope Ispahanam, coloniam constituit, etc.
Eenaud. 2. 376. Chard. 2. 97.
INTRODUCTION. 63
Buchanan, are the general merchants of the East, and in con-
stant motion between Canton and Constantinople. Calcutta,
Madras, and Bombay have each an Armenian church. Tour-
nefort extols their civility, politeness, probity, sense, wealth,
industry, and enterprising disposition. Godeau reckons the
Armenian families, under one of the Armenian patriarchs, at
more than 1500. The Armenian patriarch of Antioch, says
Otho, superintends more than a thousand bishops, and is, in
consequence, called Universal. He governs, says Vitricius,
twenty provinces and fourteen metropolitans, with their suffra-
gans, who occupy, according to Thomassin, many churches
through all the East, in Mesopotamia, Persia, Caramania, and
Armenia. 1
This denomination, beyond all the Christians in Central Asia,
have repelled Mahometan and Romish superstitions. True to
their ancient faith, they have nobly resisted the oppression of
Islamism, and the allurements of popery. Preserving the Bible,
their faith, says Buchanan, is a transcript of biblical purity.
The Armenians condemn the Supremacy, Transubstantiation,
Purgatory, Image-worship, Clerical Celibacy, the Seven Sacra-
ments, the Latin Liturgy, the power of the Sacraments to confer
grace, the observance of Vigils and Festivals, and the with-
holding of the Bible from the laity. Their re-baptism of papists
who join their communion, as mentioned by Godeau and More,
is a sufficient evidence of the opinion which they entertain of
the Supremacy and of Romanism. The uncatholicism and
falsehood of popery besides, is, says More, one of their pro-
fessed dogmas. Their disbelief of the real presence in the
Communion, except in sign and similitude, is acknowledged by
Godeau, Guido, and More. Their denial of purgatory and
prayers for the dead is admitted by Godeau, More, and Cani-
sius ; while Nicetas, Baronius, and Spondanus proclaim the
Armenian renunciation of image-worship. The Armenians,
according to Godeau, ordain only married men to the priest-
hood, and detract from the^ Sacraments the power of con-
ferring grace. Thevenot attests their rejection of purgatory
and the pope, as well as their great enmity to all the professors
of Romanism. 2
1 Les families, qui sont sous sa jurisdiction excedent le nombre de quinze cens
mille. Godeau, 1. 273. Le patriarche des Armeniens etoit appelte Catholique
ou Universel, parcequ'il avoit plus de mille eveques sous sa juridiction. Thomas-
sin, 1. 4. Labbeus, 12. 1572. Habet sub se viginti provincias Antiochenus
Patriarcha, quarum quatuordecim Metropolitanos habebant, cum sibi suffraganeis
Episcopis, Vitricius, c. 23. Us occupent presentement plusieurs eglises dans
tout V orient, dans la Mesopotamie, la Perse, la Caramanie, et dans les deux
Armenies. Thorn. I. 4. part 4. Spon. 1145. IV.
8 Us rebaptizent les Catholiques Romains qui viennent a leui communion.
64 INTRODUCTION.
The Syrian Christians who agree in faith with the Reformed,
inhabit India, where Travancore and Malabar constitute theii
chief settlements. These had occupied Western India from
the earliest ages, and had never heard of Romanism or the
Papacy till Vasco De Gama arrived at Cochin in the beginning
of the sixteenth century. The infernal spirit of Popery and
persecution then invaded this ancient church, and disturbed
the tranquillity of 1200 years. 1 The Syrians on the sea-coast
yielded, for a time, to the storm. But the inland inhabitants,
in support of their ancient religion, braved ah 1 the terrors of the
inquisition with unshaken resolution.
The Syrians constitute a numerous church. Godeau reckons
the Syrian population of Comorin, Coutan, Cranganor, Malabar,
and Negapatam at 16,000 families, or 70,000 individuals. 2 But
the multitude is greater towards the west, the north, and the
city of Cochin.
The antiquity of the Syrian church reaches beyond that of
Nestorianism, Jacobitism, or Armenianism, and this appears
in the purity and simplicity of their theology. Godeau admits
their reading of the New Testament in the Syrian tongue in
their churches ; and their rejection of extreme unction, image-
worship, and clerical celibacy. The Syrians, says Moreri as
well as Thomas, quoted by Renaudot, neither believe purga-
torial fire nor pray for the dead. These Indian Christians, says
Renaudot, celebrate the communion in Syriac, and reckon, says
Canisius, all the Latins excommunicated. 3
But the Synod of Diamper, in which Menez, Archbishop of
Godeau, 1. 273. Eebaptizant eos, qui jam simul baptisma susceperuntinecclesia
Romana. More, 62. Apud Latinos, non esse veram et catholicam ecclesiam
affix-mans. More, 62. Ils nient la presence reelle du corps de Jesus Christ en
1'eucharistie. Godeau, 1. 272. Non credunt quod sit sub spec iebus pauis et vini,
vere et realiter verum corpus et sanguis Christi, sed tantum in similitudine et signo.
Guido, c. 22. Negant illi verum Christi corpus realiter in Sacramento Eucharistiae
sub panis, et sanguinem sub vini speciebus contineri. More, 62 Ils rejettent le
purgatoire, et la priere des morts. Godeau, 1. 273. Nullum esse purgatorium
locum. More, 63. De purgatorio nil credunt. Canisius, 4. 434. Sacras imagines
non adorabant. Spond. 863. V. Ils n'admittent au sacerdoce que les homines
mariez. Godeau, 1. 273. Ils oteut aux sacremens la vertu de conferer la grace.
Godeau, 1. 273. Ab omnibus sacramentis, virtutem conferendi gratiam tollunt.
More, 62. Negant in nuptiis contrahendis aliquod esse sacramentum. More, 63.
Armeni in vulgar! sermone Divinas Scripturas pronunciant. Vigilias et festa sanc-
torum non sanctificant. Canisius, 4. 434.
Les Armeniens n'admittent point de purgatoire. Ils ne reconnoissent point le
Pape. Ils sont universellement grands ennemis de tous ceux qui professent la foi
Catholique Romaine. Thevenot, 3. 396.
1 Coss. 6. 83.
3 On faisoit monter a quinze ou seize mille families, ou a soixante et dix mille
personnes. II y en avoit une plus grande multitude, &c. Godeau, 1. 270.
3 Us n'avoit en usage le sacrement de 1'Extreme-Onction, ni des images des
saints. Leurs pretres pouvoient se marier une fois. Le Nouveau Testament se
INTRODUCTION. 65
Goa presided, affords unexceptionable evidence of the oppo-
sition of the Syrian church to Popery, and of its agreement,
in every essential, with Protestantism. The acts of this synod
are inserted in Cossart's collection, and supply the following
statements. ' The Babylonian patriarch is independent of the
Roman pontiff, and the Syrian church of the Papal communion.
The Son of God conferred no authority on Peter above, his
apostolic fellows. The Romish communion has renounced the
faith and fallen into heresy. The Popish theology is a system
of falsehood, which was propagated through Christendom, by
the arms and enactments of the Roman emperors.
Transubstantiation is an absurdity. The body of Jesus is
not in the host, and is only in heaven. The bread and wine
are the emblems of his body and blood, from which they differ
as a picture from the original. The Sacramental elements are
the Lord, not in reality but in appearance, not in substance
but in efficacy. When Meriez elevated the host, the Syrians
shut their eyes lest they should see the object of idolatry.
' Images are not to be venerated. These hateful and filthy
idols are to be excluded from the churches and houses of the
faithful.' When Menez exhibited an image of the Virgin Mary,
the people cried, ' away with this abomination. We are
Christians, and do not worship idols.'
' Matrimony, confirmation, and extreme unction are no sacra-
ments. The Syrians had no knowledge of confirmation ; and
regarded it, when proposed by the Metropolitan of Goa, not
only as superfluous and unnecessary, but as an insult. The
Syrian clergy administered no extreme unction, and were igno-
rant of its supposed institution, use, and efficacy. The Syrian
laity practised no auricular confession. The Syro-Indian
church used no holy oil, either in baptism or in any other cere-
mony. Menez, the Popish metropolitan, ordered baptism to be
administered according to the Roman ritual ; a certain token
that the chrism, exorcism, spittle, and other ridiculous super-
stitions of Romanism in the administration of this sacrament
had been unknown in this ancient communion. Sacerdotal
celibacy was no institution of Syrian discipline. The clergy
married, and sometimes even widows.' Such is the Synod of
lisoit clans Jeur eglises en langue Syriaque. Godea. 1. 270. Les Chrestiens de S.
Thomas n'avoient point entendu parlei- du Purgatoire, ni du sacrifice ofi'ert pour
en retirer les ames, avant le Synode de Diainper, en 1599. Moreri, 7. 397. Illoa
Purgatorium igneni non agnoscere. Neque illos orare pro mortais. Thomas.
VII. 15. Renaudot, 2. 105. Syri Syriace sacra celebrant. Renaud. 1. 374.
Syriani omnes Latinos excommunicates reputant. Canisius, 4. 433.
5
66 INTRODUCTION.
Diamper's representation of the distinctions which discriminated
Syrianism from Popery. 1
Buchanan and Kerr visited this Christian community, and
have transmitted accounts of its people and profession. Their
knowledge of the Syrian clergy and laity was obtained by per-
sonal acquaintance, and their delineations possess all the merit
of pictures taken from life. Buchanan held long conversations
with the Syrian clergy, and found, after mature examination,
the conformity of their faith with the reformed. He acknow-
ledged the antiquity of Syrianism, and its identity, in all its
tenets, with Protestantism. India., from time immemorial, con-
tained a church which was unknown to the rest of Christendom,
but which held the same theology that had been professed in
the European nations by the Waldensians, and which, in the
sixteenth century, was promulgated by Luther and Calvin, and
is received, at the present day, by a great part of the Old and
New World.
The European, Asiatic, and African denominations that dis-
sented from Popery were four times more numerous than the
partisans of Romanism, when, prior to the Reformation, the
Papacy shone in all its glory. Popery, instead of universality,
which it its vain but empty boast, was never embraced by more
than a fifth part of Christendom. The West and especially the
East were crowded by the opponents of the Romish despotism
and absurdity. Superstition and error, indeed, except among
the Waldenses, prevailed through the European nations, and
reigned in the realms of Papacy with uncontrolled sway.
1 Unam esse legem Sancti Thomse, aliam vero Divi P.etri, quse tamen constitue-
bant duas ecclesias distinctas, et alteram ab alters independentem, nee pastorem
unius debere pastori alterius obedire. Patriarcham Babylonicum subjectum^non
esse Eomano Pontifici. Potestatem a Christo Petro relictam in ecclesiam nibil
omnino differre ab ea quam sacerdotibus aliis contulit: quamobrem Petri succes-
Bores non excedere in jurisdictions episcopos alios. Ecclesiam Eomanam a fide
excidisse; Romanormn basreticam falsa.ru, 3t arrnorum vi, necnon Decretis Impera-
torum, quoad majorem Orbis partem introductam. Cossart, 6, 29, 36, 37, 39, 40.
Sacram Eucharistiam esse tantum imaginem Christi, et ab eo distingui non secus
ac imago ab homine vero ; nee in ilia esse Christi corpus, quod solum in ccelo ex-
jstit. In Eucharistia tantummodo Christi virtutem, non autem verum corpus et
sanguinem contineri. Cossart, 6. 39, 40.
Imagines venerandas non esse, utpote idola turpia, et immunda. Imagines ulte-
rius idola esse impie docetur, nee venerandas in ecclesiis. Cossart, 6. 40, 47.
Matriraonium non esse sacramentum, sed nee esse posse. Hactenus confirma-
tionis usu notitiaque populus Christianus hujus Dioeceseos caruerit. Rem super-
fluam, nee necessariam, hactenus ignotam, et non visam dicerent. Hactenus in
hoc episcopatu nullus fuerit usus sacramento Extremse Unctionis. Nulla de so,
ejusque effectu, et efficacia, nee de ipsius institutione, notitia habita fuit. Prsecep-
tum mrjusmodi (confessionis) non fuit adhuc ita in usu, in hoc episcopatu. Sacri
Olei usus in sacramentis hue usque in hac episcopali sede, aut nullus fuit, ant
Ecclesise Catholics ritibus minime consentaneus. Presbyteri matrimonia con-
trahebant. Neque ulla habebatur ratio, an virgo esset, an vidua, an prima uxor
esset, an secunda, an etiam tertia. Cossart, 6. 36, 65, 72, 73, 83, 101, 112, 127.
INTRODUCTION. 67
Darkness, within its dominions, covered the earth and gross
darkness the people. But the Waldenses, who were nume-
rous, held up, in the Western world, a steady light which shone
through the surrounding obscurity, and illuminated, with its
warming beams, the minds of many. The oriental Christians,
more numerous than the Waldenses and divided and disputing
about minor matters of words and ceremony, opposed, with
firmness and unanimity, the tyranny and corruptions of Ro-
manism. AH these, overspreading the Eastern and Western
world and resisting the usurpations of pontifical despotism, far
outnumbered the sons of European superstition and Popery.
THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
CHAPTER H.
POPES.
THE DIFFICULTY OF THK PONTIFICAL SUCCESSION HISTORICAL VARIATIONS
ELECTORAL VARIATIONS SCHISMS IN THE PAPACY LIBERIUS AND FELIX
SILVERIUS AND VIGILIUS FORMOSU8, SEHGIUS, AND STEPHEN BENEDICT, SIL-
VESTER, JOHN AND GREGORY GREAT WESTERN SCHISM BASILIAN AND FLOREN-
TINE SCHISM DOCTRINAL VARIATIONS VICTOR STEPHEN LIBERIUS, ZOZIMU8,
AND HONORIUS VIGILIUS JOHN MORAL VARIATIONS STATS OF THE PAPACY
THEODORA AND MAROZIA JOHN BONIFACE GREGORY BONIFACE JOHN SIXTUB
ALEXANDER JULIUS LEO PERJURED PONTIFFS.
THE pontifical succession is attended with more difficulty than
the quadrature of the circle or the longitude at sea. The one
presents greater perplexity to the annalist and the divine, than
the others to the geometrician and the navigator. The quadra-
ture and the longitude, in the advanced state of mathematics,
admit an approximation. But the papal succession mocks
investigation, eludes research, and bids proud defiance to all
inquiry.
The difficulty on this topic arises from the variations of the
historians and electors, and from the faith and morality of the
Roman pontiffs. Historians, for a century, differed in their
records of the papacy; and the electors, in thirty instances,
disagreed in their choice of an ecclesiastical sovereign. Many
of the Popes embraced heresy and perpetrated immorality ; and
these considerations render the problem of their legitimate
succession an historical and moral impossibility.
History has preserved a profound silence on the subject of
the first Roman Bishop. This honour, indeed, if such it be,
has by Romish partisans been conferred on the apostle Peter.
But the patrons of this opinion cannot, from any good authority,
show that the apostle was ever in the Roman capital, and still
less that he was ever a Roman hierarch. The evidence of his
visit to that city is not historical but traditional. History, for
a century after the alleged event, presents on this topic an uni-
versal blank, which is supplied from the very suspicious testi-
mony of tradition.
POPES. 69
A single hint on this subject is not afforded by Peter himself,
nor by his inspired companions, Luke, James, Jude, Pan., and
John. Pope Peter in his epistolary productions, mentions
nothing of his Roman residency, episcopacy, or supremacy.
Paul wrote a letter to the Romans ; and, from the Roman city
addressed the Galatians, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians,
Timothy, and Philemon. He sends salutations to various Ro-
man friends, such as Priscilla, Aquila, Epenetus, -Mary, Andro-
nicus, Julia, and Amplias : but forgets Simon the supposed
Roman hierarch. Writing from Rome to the Colossians, he
mentions Tychicus, Onesimus, Aristarchus, Marcus, Justus,
Epaphras, Luke, and Demas, who had afforded him consolation ;
but, strange to tell, neglects the sovereign pontiff. Addressing
Timothy from the Roman city, Paul of Tarsus remembers
Eubulus, Pudens, Linus, and Claudia; but overlooks the Ro-
man bishop. No man, except Luke, stood with Paul at his
first answer or at the nearer approach of dissolution. 1 . His apos-
tolic holiness could not then have been in his own diocese, and
should have been prosecuted for non-residence. His Infallibility,
perhaps, like some of his successors, had made an excursion,
for amusement, to Avignon. Luke also is silent on this theme.
John, who published his gospel after the other Evangelists, and
his Revelation at the close of the first century, maintains, on
this agitated subject, a profound and provoking silence.
The omission is continued by the Apostolic men, Clemens,
Barnabas, Hermas, Ignatius, and Polycarp. Not one of all these
deigns to mention a matter of such stupendous importance to
Christendom. Clemens, in particular, might have been ex-
pected to record such an event. He was a Roman bishop, and
interested in a peculiar manner, in the dignity of the Roman
See. An apostolic predecessor, besides, would have reflected
honour on his successor in the hierarchy. He mentions his
pretended predecessor indeed ; but omits any allusion to his
journey to Rome, or his occupation of the pontifical throne.
The fiction of Peter's visit to the metropolis of the world
began to obtain credit about the end of the second century.
Irenseus, trusting to the prattlement of Papias or to common
report, recorded the tradition ; and was afterwards folio wed by
Tertullian, Hippolytus, Origen, Cyprian, Epiphanius, Athan-
asius, Ephraim, Lactantius, Jerome, Chrysostom, Arnobius,
Prudentius, Theodoret, Orosius, Prosper, Cyril, Eusebius,
Optatus, Sozomen, and Augustine. 2 The tradition, however,
seemed doubtful to Eusebius. He introduces it as something
reported, but not certain. The relation, to the father of eccle-
1 Horn. XVI. Ooloss. IV. 2 Tim. IV.
2 Iren. III. 3. Maimb. 22. Bruy. 1. 10. Spon. 44. X. Bell. H. 3. Euseb. II. 25.
70 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY:
siastical history, was a mere hearsay. Bede, on this subject,
uses a similar expression, which corroborates this interpretation
of the Greek historian. Peter, according to the British annal-
ist, having founded the Roman church, is SAID to have conse-
crated his successor. 1
The evidence of the tale may be reduced to small compass.
Irenseus is the first author of any credibility who mentions the
report. The Apostle, according to Baronius, Binius, and Labbe,
came to Rome in the reign of Claudius, in the year 45 ; and
Irenseus, at the close of the second century, relates the sup-
posed transaction. 2 A hundred and fifty years, therefore,
elapsed, from the occurrence of the alleged event till the time
of its record. The cotemporary and succeeding authors for a
century and a half, such as Luke, Paul, John, Clemens, Bar-
nabas, Hermas, Ignatius, and Polycarp, who detail Peter's
biography, and who were interested in the supposed fact, say
nothing of the tradition. The intervening historians between
Peter and Irenasus are on this topic silent as the grave. The
belief of such a story requires Popish prejudice and infatu-
ation.
Simon, however, even if he were at the Roman city, could
not have been the Roman bishop. The Episcopacy, in its
proper sense, is, as Chrysostom, Giannon, and Du Pin have
observed, incompatible with the Apostleship. A bishop's
authority, say Chrysostom and Giannon, ' is limited to a city
or nation ; but an apostle's commission extends to the whole
world.' 3 The Apostles, says the Parisian Sorbonnist, 'peram-
bulated the principal parts of the earth, and were confined to
no place or city. 4 This constituted one distinction between the
Apostolic and Episcopal functions. The Apostles founded
and organized churches, and then consigned their superin-
tendency to fixed and ordinary pastors. The one formed an
army of conquest for the formation of ecclesiastical kingdoms,
and the other an army of possession for the purpose of occu-
pation and government.
This statement corresponds with the details of Irenaeus,
Ruffinus, Eusebius, and the author of the Apostolic consti-
tutions, who lived near the scene of action and the fountain of
tradition. These represent Linus as the first Roman bishop,
who, succeeded by Anacletus and Clemens, exercised the
Roman prelacy ; while Peter and Paul executed the Christian
apostleship. Peter and Paul, says Irenoeus, having founded
1 Fundata Eomae ecclesia, successorem consecrasse perhibetur. Beda, V. 4.
2 Bin. 1. 24. Labb. 1. 64. a liojvfa, ti%ov ov-tot,. Chrysostom, 11. 83.
4 Apostoli praecipuas orbis partes peragrarunt, nulli aut nrbi ant loco addicti.
Du Pin, 15. Qui les obligeoit d'aller par toute la terre annoncer une nourelle loi.
An. Eccl. 22. Giannon, I. 2.
POPES. 71
the Roman church, committed its episcopacy to Linus,, who
was succeeded by Anacletus and Clemens. 1 Linus, Cletus,
and Clemens, says Ruffinus, in the Clementin Recognitions
edited by Cotelerius, ' were Roman bishops during Peter's life,
that he might fulfil his apostolic commission.' 2 According to
Eusebius, ' Linus was the first Roman bishop, who was fol-
lowed in succession by Anacletus and Clemens.' 3 The apos-
tolic constitutions refer ' the ordination of Linus, the first Roman
bishop, to Paul, and the ordination of Clemens, the second in
succession after the death of Linus, to Peter.' 4 Linus, there-
fore, to the exclusion of Peter, was the first Roman bishop ;
and Clemens, Cletus, or Anacletus succeeded during the apos-
tolic age as the ordinary overseers of the church ; while Paul
and Peter accomplished their extraordinary mission.
The episcopacy of Linus, Anacletus, and Clemens was
incompatible with that of Simon in the same city. Had he
been bishop, the consecration of another during his life would
have been a violation of the ecclesiastical canons of antiquity.
The ancients, to a man, deprecated the idea of two prelatic
superintendents in one city. Gibert has collected seven canons
of this kind, issued by Clemens, Hilary, and Pascal, and by
the councils of Nicea, Chalons, and the Lateran. The Lateran
Fathers, in their fourth canon, compared a city with two
bishops to a monster with two heads. The Nicene and Lateran
synods were general, and therefore, according to both the
Italian and French schools, were vested with infallibility. No
instance indeed can, in all antiquity, be produced, of two
bishops ruling in conjunction in the same city. 5
The reasoning of the Romish advocates on this question is
remarkable only for its silliness. Bellarmine's arguments on
this topic are like to those of a person, who, in the manner of
Swift, wished, in solemn irony, to ridicule the whole story.
He is so weak, one can hardly think him serious. A suppo-
sition which, if true, should be supported by evidence the most
indisputable, is as destitute of historical testimony as the visions
of fancy, the tales of romance, or the fictions of fairy-land.
A specimen of Bellarmine's reasoning may amuse the reader.
Babylon, from which Peter wrote, was, Bellarmine as well as
3 Apostoli Lino episcopatum administrandse ecclesise tradideront. Iren. III. 3.
2 Linus et Cletus fuerunt quidem ante Clementem Episcopi in urbe Roma, sed
superstate Petro, ut illi episcopates curam gererent, ipse vero apostolatus impleret
officium. Cotel. I. 492.
3 AH/OS Ss o rtptotfoj r,v, xat fis-t' OWT'WV, Avsyxtoftfof. Euseb. III. 21. et v. 6.
4 Romanorum Ecclesise primus quidem Linus, a Paulo; secundus autem a me
Petro post mortem Lini ordinatus fuit Clemens. Con. Ap. VII. 46. Cotel. 1. 387.
Labb. 1. 63.
5 Ne in civitate duo sint Episcopi. Labb. 2. 38. Duo, in nha civitate uno tern-
pore, nee ordinenturnec tolerantur episcopi. Labb. 7. 397, et 13. 946. Gibert 2. 7.
72 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Maimbourg gravely affirms, the Roman capital : and in sup-
port of his opinion he cites Jerome and Bede, who seem, on
this subject, to have possessed about as much sense as BeHar-
mine. Paul found Christians at Rome on his arrival at that
city ; and the learned Jesuit could not, for his life, discover
how this could have been the case had Peter not been at the
capital of the world. 1 Peter's victory at Rome over Simon the
magician, the Cardinal alleges, proves his point ; and indeed
the Apostle's conflict with the magician, and his Roman epis-
copacy, are attended with equal probability. Both rest on the
same authority of tradition. But the ridiculousness of the
magician's exploits, who rose in the air by the power of sorcery,
and fell by the prayer of Peter, and broke his leg, overthrows
its probability. The airy and ridiculous fabrication of the
necromancer's achievements falls, like their fabled author, and
buries in its ruins, the silly fiction of the Apostle's Roman
episcopacy.
But the whole accounts of this event are as discordant as
they are silly. The partisans of this opinion differ in the time
of the Apostolic pontiff's arrival and stay in the Roman capital,
Jerome, Eusebius, Binius, Orosius, Labbeus, Spondanus,
Onuphrius, Nauclerus, Petavius, Bede, Brays, Baronius. and
Valesius send Peter to Rome in the reign of Claudius. These,
however, disagree in the year ; the second, third, fourth, thir-
teenth, and fourteenth years of the E mperor's reign being assigned
by different authors for the era of this important event. Simon,
says Jerome, having preached to the Jews of Pontus, Galatia,
Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia, proceeded to Rome in the
second year of Claudius, and held the sacerdotal chair twenty-
five years. Lactantius, Origen, Balusius, and Pagius fix his
arrival at the Roman metropolis to the reign of Nero. But these
too differ as to the year. The length of Peter's episcopacy is
also disputed. Twenty-three, twenty-five, twenty-seven, and
twenty-nine years have been reckoned by various chronologers
for its duration. 2 This discordance of opinion is the natural
consequence of deficiency of evidence. Contemporary histo-
rians, indeed, say no more of the Apostle Peter's journey to
Rome than of Baron Munchausen's excursion to the moon.
Many fictions of the same kind have been imposed on men,
and obtained a temporary belief. Geoffrey of Monmouth's
story of the Trojan Brutus is well known. The English Ar-
thur, and the French Roland were accounted real heroes, and
. * Quis hos Christianos fecerit, si Petrus non fuit Bomas ? Bell. 1. 551. Maimb.
20. Acts 28. 15. Peter 5. 13. Alex. 1. 511.
3 Jerome, 4, 107. Euseb. II. 15. Petav. 2, 130. Beda, 17. Bruy. 1. 7. Lactan.
c. 2. Bin. 1. 24. Labb. 1. 64. Maimb. 16.
POPES. 73
presented a popular theme for the poet, the novelist, and the
historian. The whole story of the Apostle' s Roman ep; scop acy
seems to have originated with the garrulous Papias, and to
have been founded on equal authority with these legends. The
Popedoms of Peter and Joan display wonderful similarity.
Joan's accession remained unmentioned for two hundred years
after her death, when the fiction, says Florimond, was attested
by Mariana. The reign of the Popess was afterwards related
by thirty Romish authors, and circulated through all Christen-
dom without contradiction, for five hundred years, till the era
of the Reformation. The Popedoms of Peter and Joan, in
the view of every unprejudiced mind, possess equal credibility.
. The earliest ecclesiastical historians, differing, in this man-
ner, on the subject of the first Pope, show the utmost discord-
ance on the topic of his successors. Irenoeus, Eusebius, Epi-
phanius, Jerome, Theodoret, Optatus, Augustine, and the apos-
tolic constitutions place Linus immediately after Peter. Ter-
tullian, Jerome, and the Latins, in general, place Clemens
immediately after the apostle. Jerome, however, in sheer
inconsistency, gives this honour, in his catalogue of ecclesiastical
authors, to Linus. Cossart could not determine whether Linus,
Clemens or some other was the second Roman Pontiff. He
also admits the uncertainty of the Pontifical succession.
Clemens, according to Tertullian, was ordained by Peter. 1
Linus, according to the apostolic constitutions was ordained by
Paul. Linus, however, at the present day, is, by Greeks and
Latins, accounted the second Roman Pontiff.
The succession of the Roman hierarchs, exclusive of Peter,
in the first century, according to Augustine, Optatus, Damasus,
and the apostolic constitutions, was Linus, Clemens, and Ana-
cletus ; but, according to Irenseus, Eusebius, Jerome, and Alex-
ander, was Linus, Anacletus, and Clemens. The arrangement
of Epiphanius, Nicephorus, Ruffinus, and Prosper, is, Linus,
Cletus, and Clemens: whilst that of Anastasius, Platina, More,
Binius, Crabbe, Labbe and Cossart, is Linus, Cletus, Clemens,
and Anacletus. Cletus, who is inserted by others, is omitted
by Augustine, Optatus, Damasus and the apostolic constitutions.
Baronius, Bellarmine, Pa.gius, Godeau, and Petavius reckon
Cletus and Anacletus two different pontiffs. Cotelerius, Fleury,
Baillet, and Alexander account these two names for the same
person. Brays and Cossart confess, that whether Cletus and
Anacletus were identical or distinct, is doubtful or unknown. 2
1 Iren. III. 3. Euseb. III. 21. Epiphan. II. XXVII. Jerom, 4 107. 126. Theod.
m Tim. 4. Optatus, II. Aug. Ep. 161. Con. Ap. VII. 46. Tertul. 213.
2 Alex. 1. 545. Cotel. 1. 387. Bin. 1. 30. Nicep. II. Prosp. 1. 410. Anastast.
in Pet. Crabb. I. 30. Coss. 1. 6. Bell. II. 5. Godeau, 1. 389.
74 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
The variations of historians in this manner, have introduced
confusion into the annals of the Roman pontiffs. Petavius con-
fesses their doubtfulness till the time of Victor, and Bruys, the
impossibility of discovering the fact. The most eagle-eyed
writers, says Cossart, cannot, amid the darkness of these ages,
elicit a shadow of truth or certainty in the Papal succession. 1
This diversity appears, indeed, in the history of the Popedom,
during the early, the middle, and the modern ages. The par-
tisans of Romanism boast of an uninterrupted and unbroken
succession in the sovereign Pontiffs and in the Holy See. But
this is all empty bravado. The fond conceit shuns the light ;
and vanishes, on examination, like the dream of the morning.
Each historian, ancient and modern, has his own catalogue of
Popes, and scarcely two agree. The rolls of the Pontiffs,
supplied by the annalists of the papacy, are more numerous
than all the denominations which have affected the appellation
of Protestantism. Such are a few of the historical variations
on this topic, and the consequent disorder and uncertainty.
Electoral variations have produced similar difficulty. The
electors, differing in their objects as the historians in their de-
tails, have caused many schisms in the papacy. These, Baro-
nius reckons at twenty-six. Onuphrius mentions thirty, which
is the common estimation. A detailed account of all these
would be tedious. Some are more and some less important,
and, therefore, in proportion to their moment, claim a mere
allusion or a circumstantial history. The following observations
will refer to the second, seventh, thirteenth, nineteenth, twenty-
ninth, and thirtieth schisms.
The second schism in the papacy began in the ecclesiastical
reigns of Liberius and Felix, and lasted about three years.
Liberius, who was lawful bishop, and who, for a time, opposed
Arianism, was banished in 355 to Berea, by the Emperor Con-
stantius. . Felix, in the meantime, was, by the Arian faction,
elected in the room of Liberius, and ordained by Epictetus,
Basil, and Acasius. Liberius, afterwards, weary of exile,
signed the Arian creed, and was recalled from banishment,
and restored to the Popedom. His return was followed by
sanguinary battles between the two contending factions. The
clergy were murdered in the very churches. Felix, however,
with his party, was at length overthrown, and forced to yield.
1 Fluxa et dubia, quse de summis pontificibus ad Victorem usque traduntur.
Petav. 2. 130. II est impossible de decouvrir la verite. Bray. 1. 27. Nee in
tanta sasculorum caligine, oculatissimi quique scriptores quidquam indicare potue-
rint, ex quo veritatis umbra saltern aliqua appareat. Nee certi quidquam statui
posse arbitror de illorum ordine et successione. Cossart, 1. 1.
SCHISMS IN THE PAPACY. 75
He retired to his estate on the road to Ponto, where, at the end
of seven years, he died. 1
The several claims of these two Arians to the papacy have
caused great diversity of opinion between the ancients and the
moderns. Liberius, though guilty of Arianism, was supported
by legitimacy of election and ordination. Felix, on the con-
trary, was obtruded in an irregular manner by the Arian party.
Godeau represents his ordination' as surpassing all belief, and
compares the ceremony on the occasion to ' the abomination of
Antichrist.' 2 Felix had sworn to resist the intrusion of another
bishop during the life of Liberius. His holiness, therefore, in
accepting the Popedom, was guilty of perjury. His Infalli-
bility, according to Socrates and Jerome, was an Arian ; and,
according to Theodoret, Ruffinus, Baronius, Spondanus, Go-
deau, Alexander, and Moreri, communicated with the Arians,
and condemned Athanasius. All the ancients, among whom
are Jerome, Optatus, Augustine, Athanasius, and Prosper, fol-
lowed, in modern days, by Panvinius, Bona, Moreri, Lupus,
and Fleury, reject his claim to the Papacy. Athanasius calls
his holiness ' a monster, raised to the Roman hierarchy, by the
malice of Antichrist.' 3
These two Arians, nevertheless, are, at the present day, Ro-
man saints. Their names are on the roll of canonization ; and
the legality and validity of their Popedom are maintained by
the papal community. The Arian Liberius is the object of
Romish worship. The devout papist, according to the Roman
missal and breviary, on this saint's festival, addresses his Arian
Infallibility as ' the light of the holy church, and the lover of
the Divine law, whom God loved and clothed with the robe of
glory,' while supplication is made for ' pardon of all sin, through
his merits and intercession.' 4 Similar blasphemy and idolatry
are addressed to Felix, who, in the days of antiquity, was ac-
counted an Arian, a perjurer, an antichristian monster and
abomination, shunned by all the Roman people like contagion ;
but who is now reckoned a saint and a martyr.
His saintship, however, had nearly lost his seat in heaven in
1582, when the KEYS, for the purpose of reforming the Roman
Calendar, were transferred from Peter to Baronius. Doubts
were entertained of the perjured Arian's title to heaven. Gre-
gory the Thirteenth, however, judging it uncourteous to
1 Socrat. IV. 5. Jerome, 4. 124. Platina, 44.
3 Une image de I'abomination cle 1' Antichrist. Godeau, 2. 266.
3 Athan. ad Sol. Labb. 2. 991. Spon. 357. XVII. et 355. X. Socrat. II. 37.
Ruffin. 1. Theod. II. 17. Bray. 1. 123. Alex. 7. 20. Moreri, 4. 42.
4 Ejus intercedentibus meritis ab omnibus nos absolve peccatis. Miss. Rom
P. XIV. Brev. Rom. P. XXXV.
76 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
uncanonize his holiness, and turn him out of heaven without a
fair trial, appointed Baronius as counsel for the prosecution,
and Santorio for the defence. Santorio," unable to answer the
arguments of Baronius, prayed to his client the departed Pon-
tiff for assistance. The timely interposition of a miracle,
accordingly, came to the aid of his feeble advocacy. Felix
was just going to descend, like a falling star, from heaven, when
a marble coffin was discovered in the Basilic of Cosmas and
Damian, with this inscription : ' The body of Saint Felix, who
condemned Constantius.' This phenomenon, which Moreri
calls a fable, and Bruys a cheat, silenced, as might be ex-
pected, all opposition. TE DEUM was sung for the triumph of
truth; and the perjured Arian Vicar-General of God, was
declared worthy the honours of martyrdom, canonization and
worship. 1
The seventh schism distinguished the spiritual reigns of Sil-
verius and VigUius. Silverius, in 536, was elected by simony.
He bribed Theodatus, who, says Anastasius, threatened to put
all who should oppose him to the sword. 2 His election, Godeau
admits, was owing to the power of the Gothic king, rather than
to the authority of the Roman clergy. His ordination, in con-
sequence, was the effect of fear and violence. 3
The election and ordination of Silverius, therefore, according
to a Bull of Julius and a canon of the Lateran Council, was
illegal and invalid. Julius the Second pronounced the nullity
of an election effected by simony, and declared the candidate
an apostate, a thief, a robber, a heresiarch, a magician, a pagan,
and a publican. The elected, in this case, might be prosecuted
for heresy, and deposed by the secular arm ; while the electors
were to be deprived of their possessions and dignity. The
Lateran Council, in which Nicholas the Second presided, de-
creed the invalidity of an election obtained by simony, the
favour of the powerful, or the cabals of the people or soldiery.
Possession of the Papacy, procured in this way, exposed the
intruder, as a felon, to deposition by the clergy and laity. 4
These regulations abrogated the claims of Silverius to the
Pontifical throne.
Silverius, who obtained the Popedom by simony, was, in a
short time, supplanted by Vigilius, who also gained the same
dignity by similar means. His stratagems were aided by the
machinations of Theodora and Belisarius. Theodora the Em-
press was friendly to Monophysitism, and hostile to the council
1 Spon. 357. XVIII. Labb. 2. 993. ' 3 Gladio puniretur. Anastasius, 21.
3 Ordmato Silveiio sab vi et metu. Anastasius, 21.
4 Is non Apostolic us, sed Apostaticus, liceatque cardinalibus, clericis, laicis, ilium
ut praedonem anathematizare. Oaranza, 51. Platina, 146.
SCHISMS IN THE PAPACY. 77
of Chalcedon. Her aim was the degradation of Mennas, the
Byzantine patriarch, who adhered to the Chaleedonian faith ;
and the restoration of Anthimus, Theodosius, and Severus,
who had been deposed for their attachment to the Monophysite
heresy. Theodora applied to Silverius for 'the execution of her
design, and was refused. She then turned her attention to
Vigilius, and offered him seven hundred pieces of gold and the
Papacy, to effect her intention. The offer was accepted. The
Empress then suborned Belisarius, at Rome, to expel the
refractory Silverius, and raise the complying Vigilius to the
Papal chair. The General, influenced by the Empress and
aided by his wife Antonia, obeyed. He scrupled, indeed, at
first ; but on reflection, like a prudent casuist, complied. Two
hundred pieces of gold, which he received from Vigilius, had,
in ah 1 probability, a happy effect in reconciling his conscience,
such as it was, to his work. False witnesses were suborned
against Silverius. These accused the Pontiff of a design to
betray the city to the Goths. He was banished, in consequence,
to Palmaria, where, according to Liberatus, he died of hunger,
but, according to Procopius, by assassination. The degrada-
tion of Silverius was followed by the promotion of Vigilius,
who assumed the Pontifical authority. The enactments of
Julius and the Lateran Council condemn Vigilius as well as
Silverius. 1
The election and ordination of Vigilius were invalid, prior
to the death of Silve'rius. Two Pontiffs, according to the
canons, could not, at the same time, occupy the Papal chair.
Ordination into a full See, besides, was condemned by the
Nicean Council. Baronius, Binius, and Maimbourg, indeed,
pretend that Vigilius, on the dissolution of his competitor, re-
signed, and was again elected. 2 Nothing of the kind, how-
ever, is mentioned by any cotemporary historian. No monu-
ment of his abdication, says Alexander, is extant. 3 The
annalist and the collector of councils, therefore, must have got
the news by inspiration. Procopius, on the contrary, dates the
election of Vigilius immediately after the banishment of Sil-
verius, and Liberatus, on the next day. Du Pin and Pagius,
accordingly, with their usual candour, reject the tale of re-
election, and found the title of Vigilius on his general reception
in Christendom. 4
The simony of the two rivals betrays the canonical illegiti-
macy of their election. The occupation of the Episcopal chair
1 Godeau, 4. 204. Bin. 4. 141. Bruy. 1. 315. Platina, 68. Procop. 1. 25.
2 Baron. 540. IV. Bin. 4. 142. Maimb. 66.
3 Quod si Vigilius abdicavit, ex nullo monumento habetur. Alex. 12. 32.
4 Procopius, 281. Libera. c. 22. Du Pin, 1. 452. Bray. 1. 330.
78 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEEY :
by his predecessor, besides, destroyed the title of Vigilius.
His moral character, also, if villany could affect his claims,
placed another obstacle in his way. His history forms an un-
interrupted tissue of enormity and abomination. He was
guilty of murder, covetousness, perfidy, prostitution of religion
for selfish ends, and mockery of both God and man. He
killed his secretary with the blow of a club. He whipped his
nephew to death, and was accessory to the assassination of
Silverius. His conduct with Theodora, Belisarius, Justinian,
and the fifth general council, showed him to be a miser and a
traitor, regardless of religion and honour, of God and man. 1
The thirteenth schism disgraced the Papacy of Formosus
and Sergius. Formosus, in 893, gained the Pontifical throne
by bribery. His infallibility, therefore, by the Bulls of Nicho-
las and Julius, forfeited all claim to the ecclesiastical supremacy.
He was Bishop of Porto, and therefore was incapacitated,
according to the canons, to become Bishop of Rome. He had
sworn to John the Eighth, by whom he had been excommuni-
cated and banished, never to revisit the Roman metropolis.
His holiness, therefore, was guilty of perjury. The hierarch,
contrary to another canon, had recourse, in his extremity, when
the Sergian party opposed his election, to the aid of Arnolf,
the Gothic king. His Majesty's authority, however, though
uncanonical, wa.s successful. Sergius, his rival, whose claims
were supported by a Roman faction, was expelled by royal
power ; and Formosus retained possession of the Papal sove-
reignty till the day of his death. 2
But an extraordinary scene was exhibited by his successor.
Stephen, who succeeded in 896, raged with unexampled fury
against the memory and remains of Formosus. Solon, a hea-
then legislator, enacted a law to forbid the Athenians to speak
evil of the dead. But the vicar-general of God outraged, in
this respect, the laws of earth and heaven. Stephen unearthed
the mouldering body of Formosus, which, robed in Pontifical
ornaments, he placed before a Roman Council that he had
assembled. He then asked the lifeless - pontiff, why, being
bishop of Porto, he had, contrary to the canons, usurped the
Roman See. The body probably made no unnecessary reply.
The pontiff then stripped the bloated corpse, and amputated
its head and fingers. The disinterred and mutilated carcass,
despoiled of its dress and mangled in a shocking manner, he
threw without any funeral honours or solemnity into the Tiber.
He rescinded his acts, and declared his ordinations irregular
1 Platiua, 68.
8 Alex. 15. 82. Bruys, 2. 186. Baron. 897. 1.
SCHISMS IN THE PAPACY. 79
I
and invalid. 1 Such was the atrocity perpetrated by the
viceroy of heaven, and approved and sanctioned by a holy
Roman council.
Stephen's sentence, however, was afterwards repealed by his
successor. John the Tenth, on his accession, assembled a
synod of seventy-four bishops at Ravenna, condemned the acts
of Stephen, and re-established the ordinations of Formosus.
But John's decisions again were destined to proclaim the vari-
ations of Popery, and display the mutability of earthly things.
Sergius the Third, on his promotion to the Roman Hierarchy,
called a council, rescinded the acts of John, and once more
annulled the ordinations of Formosus. 2
Vengeance soon overtook Stephen, the violator of the sepul-
chre and the dead. His miscreancy met with condign punish-
ment. The Romans, unable to bear his ruffianism, expelled
his holiness from the hierarchy. He was then immured in a
dungeon, loaded with chains, and finally strangled. He
entered, says Baronius, like a thief, and died as he deserved
by the rope. ' This father and teacher of ah 1 Christians,' was,
says Bruys, ignorant as he was wicked. This head of the
church and vicar-general of God was unacquainted with the
first elements of learning. 3
Omitting the intermediate distractions in the Papacy, the
nineteenth schism deformed the ecclesiastical reigns of Bene-
dict, Silvester, and John. Benedict was son to Alberic Count
of Tuscany ; and, in 1033, was raised to the pontifical throne
in the tenth or, some say, in the twelfth year of his age. His
promotion was the effect of simony, and his life was a scene of
pollution. His days were spent in debauchery. He dealt,
says Benno, in sorcery, and sacrificed to Demons. 4
Such was the miscreant, who, for ten years, was, according
to the popish system, the head of the church, the judge of con-
troversy, and, in deciding on questions of faith, the organ of in-
spiration. A Roman faction, however, in 1044, headed by the
Consul Ptolemy, expelled Benedict and substituted Silvester.
But Silvester's reign lasted only a short time. The Tuscan
faction, in three months, expelled Silvester and restored Bene-
dict. Benedict again soon resigned in favour of John. He was
induced to retire, to avoid the public odium caused by hismis-
1 Luitp. 1. 8. Spon. 897. II. Bray. 2. 193. Platina, 126. Petav. J. 407.
Bin. 7. 162.
Stephanus, Fonnosum post obitum mense effosum, et in sella positum, crimina-
tum, et quasi couvictum, degradavit, etpercrurade ecclesia pertractum in Tiberinx
projici praecepit. Hermann, Anno 896. Canisius, 3. 256.
2 Platina, 127, 128. Luitprand, I. 7.
3 Spon. 900. II. Baron. 900. V. Bruys, 2, 194.
* Spon. 1033. II. Du Pin, 2. 206. Bruy. 2. 327. Bin. 7. 221.
80 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
creancy, and to enjoy a freer indulgence in licentiousness and
sensuality. Led by this view, the vicar-general of God sold
the papacy for 1500 pounds to John. 1 Benedict then departed,
with the price of the papal chair, to private life, to continue his
debauchery. Silvester, in the mean time, resolved to re-assert
his right to the pontifical throne, and took possession of the
Vatican. Benedict, weary of privacy, renewed his claim, and
seized, by dint of arms, on the Lateran. These -three ruffians,
therefore, Silvester, John, and Benedict, on this unexampled
occasion, occupied Saint Mary's, the Vatican, and the Lateran;
and fixed their head quarters in the principal Basilics of the
Roman capital. ' A three-headed BEAST,' says Binius and
Labbe, ' rising from the gates of hell, infested in a woful
manner the holy chair.' 2 A three-headed monster, therefore,
emerging from the portals of the infernal pit, constituted a link
in the sacred unbroken chain of the pontifical succession.
The conduct of Benedict, Silvester, and John exhibited, on
the occasion, an extraordinary spectacle. Their mutual agree-
ment and concessions were not the least striking traits in the
picture. These wretches resolved not to interrupt their plea-
sures by unnecessary contention. No attempt was made at
reciprocal expulsion. These earthly Gods forbore to waste
the precious hours of sensuality in vain jangling, and, in the
utmost harmony, divided the ecclesiastical revenues, which
they spent in revelry and intoxication.
Gratian, in the mean time, a man of rank and authority,
added another feature to the ridiculousness of the spectacle.
His design was to deliver the church from this three-headed
monster. The end might be praiseworthy ; but the means was
something like that attempted by Simon the magician. The
argument which he used on the occasion was in the form of
money. 3 He purchased the papacy, with all the appurtenances
thereunto belonging, be the same more or less, from the pro-
prietors, Benedict, Silvester, and John. Benedict, probably on
account of his greater interest in the property, received the
greatest compensation. He stipulated for the ecclesiastical
revenues of England, to expend in every enormity. Gratian's
money, which, according to Platina, was in these times a ready
1 Vendidit Papatum complici sno, acceptis, ab eo, libris mille quingentis. Benno,
in Hildeb. Moyennant une somme de quinze livres de deniers, il ceda le Pontificat
a Jean. Bruy. 2. 331. Spon. 1044. I. II. Le siege de Rome devenu la proie de
1' avarice et de 1' ambition, etoit donn6 au plus offrant. Giannon, VII. 5. An.
Eccl. 345.
2 Triceps Bestia, ab inferorum portis emergens, sanctissimam Petri cathedram
miserrime infestavit. Bin. 7. 221. Labb. 11. 1280.
8 Bis a sede sancta cedere, pectmia persuasit. Spon. 1048. I. Platina, 142.
Bruy. 2. 332. Bin. 7. 227. Labb. 11. 1303.
GBEAT WESTERN SCHISM. 81
passport to the papacy, delivered the Holy See from the
usurpers. Gratian himself succeeded, under the appellation
of Gregory the Sixth. The patrons of Romanism may deter-
mine which of those three ruffians, Benedict, Silvester-, or John,
preserved the pontifical succession, and was on earth the vice-
roy of heaven.
The great western schism, which constituted the twenty-
ninth division in the popedom, troubled the ecclesiastical reigns
of Urban, Boniface, Innocent, Gregory, Clement, and Benedict.
This contest began in 1378, and distracted Christendom for
half a century with atrocity and revolution. 1 The papal court
having continued at Avignon for seventy years, was restored
to Rome by Gregory the Eleventh. The conclave proceeding
at his death, in 1378, to a new election, a mob of thirty thou-
sand, fearing, should a Frenchman be chosen, that he would
remove to Avignon, threatened the cardinals with death, if they
did not select an Italian. The sixteen electors, twelve French
and four Italian, intimidated by such a formidable sedition,
returned Urban the Sixth, a Neapolitan, or some say, a Pisan.
But retiring to Fundi as a place of safety, the sacred college
appointed Clement the Seventh to the popedom.? Clement, at
Avignon, was succeeded by Benedict; and Urban, at Rome,
by Boniface, Innocent, and Gregory.
Urban and Clement divided Christendom. The church
could not determine which of the two was its head, the vicar
general of God, and the plenipotentiary of heaven. The rival
pontiffs therefore received, in nearly equal proportions, the
obedience of the European kingdoms. Scotland, France, Spain,"
Arragon, Castile, Lorrain, Naples, Navarre, Sicily, Cyprus, and
Savoy acknowledged Clement ; while Urban was recognized
by Italy, Portugal, Germany* England, Belgium, Hungary,
Bohemia, Poland, Russia, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway.
A few states remained neutral ; and some, for a time, obeyed
his Roman holiness, and afterwards, according to the dictation
of policy, conscience, whim, or passion, shifted to his French
infallibility. 3 Hainault asserted its neutrality. Arragon at first
hesitated, but soon recognized Urban ; and afterwards, when
the pontiff disputed the sovereign's pretensions to Sicily, affected
neutrality, and finally declared without any ceremony in favour
of Clement. Spain and Naples, at the commencement of the
schism, supported the Italian hierarch ; but afterward, in the
fluctuation of caprice or folly, veered round to the French
1 Ce schisme dura plus de 50 ana. Morery, 3. 454.
3 Platina, 233. Alex. 24. 439. Daniel, 5. 244. Giannon, XXIII. 4.
3 Nonnullis interdum variantibus, et neutralitatem amplexantibus. Alex. 20. 254.
6
82 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
pontiff. Joanna, the Neapolitan queen, received Clement with
particular honours. His holiness, on the occasion, had his
sacred foot well kissed. The queen began the AUGUST CERE-
MONY : and her majesty's holy .example was followed with
great elegance and edification by the Neapolitan barons, knights,
ladies, and gentlemen, such as Margaret, Agnes, Otho, Robertus,
and Durazzo. Urban, in return, as a token of his pontifical
friendship, deposed Joanna from her royalty, despoiled her of
her kingdom, and recommended her soul to the devil. 1 Two
powerful and contending factions, in this manner, divided the
papacy, and distracted the Latin communion.
The schism spread dissension, animosity, demoralization,
and war through the European nations ; and especially through
Italy, France, Spain, and Germany. Kings and clergy formed
ecclesiastical factions, according to the dictates of faith or fancy.
The pontiffs pursued their several interests, often without policy,
and always without principle. The pontifical conscience eva-
porated in ambition and malignity. The kings, in general,
dictated the belief of the priesthood and laity, who followed
the faith or faction, the principles or party of their sovereign.
Christendom, in consequence, was demoralized. Paper and
ink, says Niem, would fail to recount the cabals and iniquity
of the rival pontiffs, who were hardened in obduracy, and full
of the machinations of Satan. High and low, prince and peo-
ple, abjured all shame and fear of God. The belligerents, who
waged the war, carried it on by unchristian machinations, which
disgraced reason and man. The arms used on the occasion
were excommunication, anathemas, deposition, perjury, pre-
varication, duplicity, proscription, saints, miracles, revelations,
dreams, visions, the rack, the stiletto, and the dagger. 2
Urban and his electors had the honour of opening the cam-
paign. These commenced hostilities with a free use of their
spiritual artillery. The cardinals declared the nullity of Urban's
appointment, and enjoined his speedy abdication. But his
infallibility had no relish for either the declaration or the injunc-
tion ; and resolved to retain his dignity. The sacred college,
in their extremity, had recourse to excommunication. The
ecclesiastical artillery was well served on the occasion, and
launched their anathemas with singular precision ; but, never-
theless, without effect. His holiness, in addition to these exe-
crations, was, by his own electors, found guilty of apostacy,
usurpation, intrusion, dissemination of heresy, and enmity to
religion and truth. 3
1 Labb. 15. 940. Bruy. 3, 535, 539, 557. Du Pin, 2. 509. COBS. 3. 632, 638.
3 Bray. 3. 651. Daniel, 5. 238. 3 Bruy. 3. 529. Daniel, 5. 207. 308.
GREAT WESTERN SCHISM. 83
His infallibility soon returned these compliments. The
plenipotentiary, of heaven was gifted with a signal facility in
hurling excommunications, and fulminated his anathemas with
singular practical skill. He was enabled, in consequence, to
repay the conclave's congratulation with due interest. He
anathematized his electors, whom he called sons of perdition
and heresy, a nursery of scandal and treachery, who were
guilty of apostacy, conspiracy, treason, blasphemy, rapine,
sacrilege, contumacy, pride, and calumny. Their cold remains
after death, his infallibility, by a judicial sentence, deprived of
Christian burial. The persons who should consign their life-
less bodies to the grave with funeral honours, he also excom-
municated, till with the hands which administered the sepulchral
solemnity, they should unearth the mouldering flesh, and cast
each accursed and putrifying carcass from the consecrated soil
of the hallowed tomb. 1
Seven of his cardinals, whom he suspected of a conspiracy
against his life, he punished with a more cruel sentence. The
accused were men of merit and of a literary character ; whilst
the accusation was unsupported by any evidence. But his
holiness,- outraging reason and common sense, pretended to a
special revelation of their guilt. He also, in defiance of mercy
and justice, put the alleged conspirators to the rack to extort a
confession. The tortures which they endured were beyond
description ; but no guilt was acknowledged. The unfeeling
pontiff, in hardened insensibility, amidst the groans of the
agonizing sufferers, counted his beads in cold blood, and en-
couraged the executioners in the work of torment. His
nephew, unreproved, laughed aloud at sight of the horrid
spectacle. These unhappy men afterwards suffered death.
The pontiff slew Aquilla in his flight from Nocera and the
Neapolitan army, and left the unburied body for the flesh to
moulder without a grave, and the bones to whiten in the sun.
Five of the cardinals, according to common report, he thrust
into sacks, and threw into the sea. Two, says Callenicio, were
beheaded with an axe. The headless bodies were fried in an
oven, and then reduced to powder. This, kept in bags, was
carried before Urban to terrify others from a similar con-
spiracy. 2
The holy pontiffs next encountered each other in the war of
excommunication. Urban and Clement, says ' Alexander,
* hurled mutual execrations and anathemas.' These vicegerents
1 Labb. 15. 942, 944. Giannon, XXIII. 4.
2 Labb. 15. 941. Bruy. 3. 547. Giannon, XXIV. 1.
2 Mutuas diras, execrationes, et anathematum fulmina, ab Urbano et Clemente.
vibrata. Alex. 20. "254. Bray. 3: 515.
6*
84 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
of God cursed one another indeed with sincere devotion. His
holiness at Rome hailed his holiness at Avignon with direful
imprecations : and the Christian and polite salutation was
returned with equal piety and fervor. The thunder of ana-
themas, almost without interruption, continued, in redoubled
volleys and reciprocal peals, to roar between the Tiber and the
Rhone. The rival vice-gods, in the language of Pope Paul,
unsatisfied with mutual excommunications, proceeded with
distinguished ability to draw foil-length portraits of each other.
Each denominated his fellow a son of Belial ; and described,
with graphic skill, his antichristianity, schism, heresy, thievery,
despotism, and treachery. These heads of the church might
have spared their execrations, but they certainly did themselves
justice in the representations of their moral characters. The
delineations, sketched by the pencil . of truth, possess all the
merit of pictures taken from life.
Urban having, in this manner, excommunicated his com-
petitor, proceeded to the excommunication of several kings
who withstood his authority. He anathematized Clement and
all his adherents, which included the sovereigns of the oppo-
sition. He bestowed a particular share of his maledictions on
John, Lewis, Joanna, and Charles of Castile, Anjou, and Naples.
He declared John a son of iniquity, and guilty of apostacy,
treason, conspiracy, schism, and heresy. He then pronounced
his deposition and deprivation of his dignity and kingdom, ab-
solved his vassals from their oath of fidelity, and forbade
all, on pain of personal excommunication and national inter-
dict, to admit the degraded Prince into any city or country.
He pronounced a similar sentence against Lewis, on whom
Clement had bestowed the crown of Naples. He declared
this sovereign accursed, guilty of schism and heresy, and
published a crusado, granting plenary indulgence to all who
would arm against his majesty. 1
Joanna, Queen of Naples, received a full proportion of the
hierarch's maledictions. His holiness declared her Majesty
accursed and deposed, guilty of treason and heresy, and pro-
hibited all obedience of this Princess, under the penalty of ex-
communication of person and interdict of the community. He
next freed her vassals from their fealty, transferred her king-
dom to Charles, and her soul to Satan.
Charles, on whom Urban had bestowed the kingdom of
Naples, soon met a similar destiny. This Prince had been the
Pontiff's chief patron and friend. The king's friendship, how-
ever, the hierarch, in a short time, requited with anathemas
1 Bruy. 3. 539, 541. Giannon, XXIII. 5. et XXIV. 1,
GREAT WESTERN SCHISM. 85
and degradation. The attachment, indeed, between Charles
and Urban was the mercenary combination of two ruffians for
mutual self-interest, against the unoffending Neapolitan Queen,
whom the miscreants betrayed and murdered. But a quarrel
between the two assassins, as might be expected, soon ensued.
The Pontiff, then, in requital of former kindness, erected a cross,
lighted tapers, interdicted the kingdom, cursed the king, and
consigned his Majesty, soul and body, to the devil. This
effusion of pontifical gratitude was followed with dreadful re-
prisals. Charles tormented the clergy who acknowledged
Urban as pope, and offered ten thousand florins of gold for his
head, dead or alive. He led an army against Urban, and be-
sieged him, amid the inroads of famine and fear, in the castle
of Nocera. Four times a day the terrified Pope from his
window, cursed the hostile army with ' bell, book, and candle-
light.' He bestowed absolution on all who should maim any
of the enemy ; and on all who would come to his aid, he con-
ferred the crusading indulgence granted to those who marched
to the Holy Land. Urban, in a wonderful manner, escaped,
and Charles was afterwards assassinated in Hungary. The
holy Pontiff rejoiced in the violent death of the Neapolitan king.
The blood-stained instrument of murder, which was presented
to his infallibility, red with the enemy's gore, excited in the
vicar-general of God a fiendish smile. 1
These are a few specimens of Urban' s ability in the Pontifi-
cal accomplishment of cursing. Urban, in this art, which is a
matter of great importance in a good Pope, seems to have ex-
celled Clement. Both indeed showed splendid talents in this
edifying department, which is an essential qualification in a
plenipotentiary of heaven. But Urban, in this part of a Pope's
duty, eclipsed his rival and carried this practical science to
perfection.
These mutual maledictions, with which the competitors
attempted to maintain their several pretentious, were support-
ed in the rear by another species of ecclesiastical artillery ;
such as miracles, visions, dreams, and revelations. Each faction
was supplied with these in copious profusion. Peter and
Catharine appeared for Urban. Peter was a Franciscan and
famed for sanctity, miracles, and celestial visions ; Catharine
of Sienna, a Dominican virgin, who has been raised to the
honours of saintship, appeared for his Roman infallibility. She
supported her patron with all the influence of her sanctity, and
wrote a bad letter to the French king in his favour. Vincent
and Peter declared for Clement. Vincent, a Dominican, besides
1 Bray. 3. 550. 553.
86 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY:
heavenly visions, and miraculous powers, had, according to ac-
counts, proselyted multitudes of the Jews and Waldenses.
But Vincent, in the end, deserted his French holiness, and
called him, in saintly language, a schismatic and a heretic.
Peter, the cardinal of Luxemburg, who adhered to Clement,
was in equal odour of sanctity and superior to all in the manu-
facturing of miracles. F orty-two dead men, at one cast, revived
at his tomb. Many others, of each sex and of the same sancti-
fied class, supported each party. ' Many holy men and women,'
said Urban's advocate in the council of Modena in 1380, ' had
revelations for his Roman holiness.' His French infallibility's
party was also prolific in prophets, prophetesses, and wonders.
All these, in favour of their several patrons, saw visions, uttered
revelations, wrought miracles, and dreamed dreams. 1
The evils which the schism had long inflicted on Christendom,
at length induced men to think of some remedy. The distrac-
tions extended through all the European nations, and were at-
tended with dreadful effects. The charities of life, in the un-
social divisions, were discarded, and men's minds wound up
to fury and madness. Society seemed to be unhinged. War,
excited by the rival pontiffs and their several partizans, desola-
ted the kingdoms of the Latin communion, and especially
France and Italy. Treachery, cabal, massacre, assassination,
robbery and piracy reigned through the nations. These evils,
in loud appeal, called for the extinction of the schism in which
these disorders had originated.
The end indeed was the wish of all. The European king-
doms were unanimous for the termination of division and the
return of tranquillity. The means for effecting the end were
the only subject of disputation. The difficulty consisted in the
discovery of a remedy. Three ways were proposed for the ex-
tinction of the schism. These were cession, arbitration, and a
general council. Cession consisted in the voluntary resigna-
tion of the rivals for the election of another, who should be ac-
knowledged .by all Christendom. Arbitration consisted in as-
certaining by competent judges, which of the two competitors
was the true vicar-general of God. A general council would,
by a judical sentence, depose both, and elect a third whose
claim would obtain universal recognition. The difficulty of
assembling a general council, and the utter impossibility of de-
ciding by arbitration on the claims of the reigning Pontiffs,
militated, in the general opinion, against each of these means.
Cession therefore was at first the commonly adopted remedy.
1 Alex. 20. 255. et 24. 476, 479. Mez. 3. 235. Bray. 3. 516. Daniel, 5. 237.
Cossart, 3. 632. Andill. 861.
GREAT WESTERN SCHISM. 87
Resignation and degradation were the only plans, which, in
fact, were attempted. These means, which alone were at-
tended with moral possibility, were adopted by the French
church and the Pisan and Constantian council.
The French favoured the method of cession. This plan
was suggested by the Parisian university, which, in that age,
had obtained a high character for learning and Catholicism.
This faculty proposed the renunciation of the French and Ro-
man hierarchs ; and, in this proposal, confessed the difficulty
of discrimination. The Sorbonne, supported by the Gallican
church, unable to decide between Benedict and Gregory,
required both to resign. The design, after some discussion,
was seconded by the king, the nobility, the clergy, and the
people. The method of abdication was also approved and
supported by the Dukes of Berry, Orleans, and Burgundy,
who governed the nation during the indisposition of the king.
A majority of the European kingdoms concurred with the
French nation. A few, indeed, such as Portugal and the
northern nations, refused their co-operation. But the abdication
of the contending pontiffs was recommended by England, Bo-
hemia, Hungary, Navarre, Arragon, Castile, and Sicily. 1
This attempt, however, was defeated by the selfish obstinacy
of the two competitors. These, to frustrate the scheme, used
all kinds of chicanery, practised perjury, and issued anathemas
and execrations. Speech, said a French wit, was given, hot
to discover, but to conceal our sentiments. This observation
was exemplified in Innocent, Gregory, and Benedict. These
viceroys of heaven had sworn to relinquish their several claims,
for the good of the church and the tra.nquillization of Christen-
dom. But the pontifical perjurers violated their oaths to retain
their power, and wounded conscience, if they had any, to gra-
tify ambition. 2 The church, therefore, had, for several years,
two jarring heads, and God two perjured vicars-general. All
descriptions of falsehood these impostors added to perjury.
Their ambition and selfishness caused their perpetration of any
enormity, and their submission to any baseness, which might
enable them, for a few months, to hold their precarious
authority.
The subtraction of obedience from Benedict by the French
was the consequence of his shuffling and obstinacy. This
measure, which, like that of cession, was suggested by the
Parisian university, consisted in the rejection of his infallibility's
authority. The King, at the instance of the Sorbonne faculty,
1 Dan. 5. 337. 381. Du Pin, 2. 512.
2 Labb. 15. 1003, 1080, 1081. Coss. 3. 695. Daniel, 5. 431.
88 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
called an assembly of the bishops, abbots, and universities ol
the kingdom ; and the meeting was also attended by the Dukes
of Berry, Orleans, Burgundy, and Bourbon. The council,
indeed, on this occasion were divided. The Duke of Orleans,
the university of Toulouse, and the bishops of Tours and Le
Puy, were against subtraction. The majority, however, recom-
mended the proposed measure ; and a total rejection of pon-
tifical authority was published. Benedict's cardinals, also,
except Boniface and Pampeluna, approved the decision of the
French assembly, and advised the French sovereign to declare
the pontiff from his disregard of his oath, guilty of schism and
heresy. 1
The French nation, however, in 1403, in the vacillation of
its councils, repealed the neutrality and restored obedience.
The neutrality had lasted five years, from its commencement
in 1398. Its abrogation was chiefly owing to the agency and
cabals of the Duke of Orleans, who was opposed, but without
success, by the Dukes of Berry and Burgundy. The/ cardinals
also were reconciled to Benedict, and the re-establishment of
his authority was advocated by the universities of Orleans,
Angers, Montpellier, and Toulouse. The King, cajoled by the
artifice of Orleans, ordered the recognition of obedience. 2
But this recognition was temporary. The French, remark-
able for their fickleness, enjoyed, on this occasion, all the charms
of variety. An assembly of the French prelacy declared again
in favour of neutrality ; and his majesty, in 1408, commanded
the nation to disown the authority of both Benedict and Gre-
gory. The example of France was followed by Germany,
.Bohemia, Hungary, and indeed by the majority of the European
nations. Benedict, in the mean time, issued a bull of excom-
munication against all who countenanced the neutrality, whether
cardinal or king, interdicted the nation, and absolved the sub-
jects from the oath of fidelity. A copy of this precious mani-
festo the pontiff transmitted to the king, who treated it with
merited contempt. 3
Benedict and Gregory, in the midst of these scenes of ani-
mosity, retired in 1408 from Avignon and Rome, to Arragon
and Aquileia, where, having convened councils, these rival
vice-gods encountered each other, as usual, with cursing and
anathemas. His Italian infallibility, in the synod of Aquileia,
condemned, as illegal, the election of Clement and Benedict,
and sanctioned, as canonical, that of Urban, Boniface, and
1 Du Pin, 2. 512. Daniel, 5. 378. Labb. 15. 1072.
2 Boss. 2. 100. Daniel, 5. 405, 406. Bruy. 3. 620. Coss. 3. 771.
s Daniel, 5. 444. Giannon. XXIV. 6. Cossart, 3. 771.
GREAT WESTERN SCHISM. 89
Innocent. He then condemned and annulled all Benedict's
ordinations and promotions. His French infallibility, in the
council of Arragori, reversed the picture. Having forbidden
all obedience, and dissolved all obligations to his rival, he
annulled his ordinations and promotions. Gregory convicted
Benedict of schism, heresy, contumacy, and perjury. Benedict
convicted Gregory of dishonesty, baseness, impiety, abomina-
tion, audacity, temerity, blasphemy, schism, and heresj 7 . 1
The perverse and unrelenting obstinacy of the two pontiffs
caused the desertion of their respective cardinals.^ These,
weary of such prevarication, fled to the city of Pisa, to concert
some plan for the extermination of the schism and the restora-
tion of unity. The convocation of a general council appeared
the only remedy. The Italian and French cardinals, therefore,
now united, wrote circular letters to the kings and prelacy of
Christendom, summoning an oecumenical assembly, for the
extirpation of division and the establishment of union. 2
The Pisan council, in 1409, unable to ascertain whether
Gregory or Benedict was the canonical head of the church,
proceeded by deposition and election. The holy fathers, inca-
pable of determining the right or title, used says Maimbourg,
' not their knowledge but their power ;' and having dismissed
Gregory and Benedict, appointed Alexander. Gregory and
Benedict were summoned to appear, and, on refusal, were, in
the third session, convicted of contumacy. ThePisans, repre-
senting the universal church, and vested with supreme authority,
proceeded without ceremony, in the nineteenth session, to the
work of degradation. 3 Their definitive sentence against the
French and Italian viceroys of heaven is a curiosity, and
worthy of eternal remembrance.
The Pisans began with characterizing themselves as holy
and general, representing the universal church ; and then de-
clared his French and Italian holiness guilty of schism, heresy,
error, perjury, incorrigibleness, contumacy, pertinacity, iniquity,
violation of vows, scandalization of the holy, universal church
of God, and unworthy of all power and dignity. The charac-
ter of these plenipotentiaries of heaven, if not very good, is
certainly pretty extensive. The sacred synod then deprived
Gregory and Benedict of the papacy, and forbade all Christians,
on pain of excommunication, notwithstanding any oath of fidelity,
to obey the ex-pontiffs, or lend them counsel or favour. 4
The papacy being vacated by the sentence of deposition, the
1 Cossart, 3. 381, 382. Du Piu. 2. 6. Labb. 15. 1107.
2 Giann. XXIV. 6. Bray. 3. 655. Da Pin. 2. 515.
3 Labb. 15. 1123, 1229. Du Pin. 3. 3, 5.
* Dacheiy 1. 847. Bruy. 3. 671. Labb. 15. 1J31, 1139.
90 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
next step was to elect a supreme pontiff. This task, the coun-
cil, in the nineteenth session, performed by the French and
Italian cardinals, formed into one sacred college. The conclave,
with cordial unanimity, elected the Cardinal of Milan, who
assumed the appellation of Alexander the Fifth. He presided
in the ensuing session, and ratified the acts of the cardinals and
general council.
The Pisan council, however, notwithstanding its alleged uni-
versality, did not extinguish the schism. The decision of the
synod, and election of the conclave only furnished a third
claimant for the pontifical chair. The universality and authority
oi the Pisan assembly were, by many, rejected ; and Christen-
dom was divided between Gregory, Benedict, and Alexander.
Gregory was obeyed by Germany, Naples, and Hungary ;
while Benedict was recognized by Scotland, Spain, Armagnac,
and Foix. Alexander was acknowledged, as supreme spiritual
director, by the other European nations. The schism, there-
fore, still continued. The Latin communion was divided
between three ecclesiastical chiefs, who continued to distract
the western church. The inefficiency of the Pisan attempt
required the convocation of another general council, whose
energy might be better directed and more successful. 1 This
remedy was, in 1414, supplied by the assembly of Constance.
The Constantian council, like the Pisan, proceeded by depo-
sition and election; and confessed, in consequence, like its
predecessor, its inability to discriminate between the compara-
tive right and claims of the two competitors. John the Twenty-
third had succeeded to Alexander the Fifth. The rival pontiffs
were, at that time, Gregory, Benedict, and John. Gregory
and Benedict, though obeyed by Scotland, Spain, Hungary,
Naples, and Germany, were under the sentence of synodical
deposition. John, on the contrary, was recognized, even by
the Constantian council, as the lawful ecclesiastical sovereign
of Christendom.
The Constantians, though they admitted the legitimacy of
John's election, and the legality of his title, required him to
resign for the good of the church and the extinction of schism.
The pontiff, knowing the power and resolution of the council,
professed compliance ; and, in the second session, confirmed
his declaration, in case of Gregory's and Benedict's cession,
with an oath. This obligation, however, he endeavored to
evade. Degradation from his ecclesiastical elevation presented
a dreadful mortification to his ambition, and he fled, in conse-
quence, from Constance, with the fond, but disappointed
i Giarmon, XXIV. 6. Labb. 16. 495. Bray. 4. 7. Bossuet, 2. 101.
GREAT WESTERN SCHISM. 91
expectation of escaping his destiny. Gregory and Benedict
were also guilty of violating their oath. 1 The church, there-
fore, at this time, had three perjured heads, and the Messiah
three perjured vicars-general.
The council, seeing no other alternative, resolved to depose
John for immorality. The character, indeed, of this plenipo-
tentiary of heaven was a stain on reason, a blot on Christianity,
and a disgrace to man. The sacred synod, in the twelfth ses-
sion, convicted his holiness of schism, heresy, incorrigibleness,
simony, impiety, immodesty, unchastity, fornication, adultery,
incest, sodomy, rape, piracy, lying, robbery, murder, perjury,
and infidelity. The holy fathers then pronounced sentence of
deposition, and absolved the faithful from their oath of fealty. 2
Gregory, seeing the necessity, abdicated. His infallibility,
in defiance of his oath, and though deposed by the Pisan coun-
cil, had retained the pontifical dignity ; but was in the end, and
in old age, forced to make this concession. Malatesta, Lord
of Rimini, in Gregory's name renounced the papacy, with all
its honours and dignity.
John and Gregory, notwithstanding their frightful character,
as sketched by the Pisan and Constantian synods, were raised
to the cardinal dignity. The two councils had blazoned their
immorality in strong and appalling colours, and pronounced
both unworthy of any dignity. Martin, however, promoted
John to the cardinalship. The Constantian fathers, in the
seventeenth session, and in the true spirit of inconsistency,
placed Gregory next to the Roman pontiff, and advanced him
to the episcopal, legatine, and cardinal dignity, with all its
emoluments and authority. Benedict, though importuned by
the council of Constance and the king of the Romans to resign,
resolved to retain the pontifical dignity, and retired, with this
determination, to Paniscola, a 'strong castle on the sea-coast of
Valentia. The old dotard, however, was deserted by all the
European states ; but, till his death, continued, twice a day,
to, excommunicate the' rebel nations that had abandoned his
righteous cause. The council, in the mean time, pronounced
his sentence of deposition, and convicted him of schism, heresy,
error, pertinacity, incorrigibility, and perjury, and declared him
unworthy of all rank or title. 3 Martin was raised to the pa-
pacy ; and his elevation terminated a schism, which, for half a
century, had divided and demoralized the nations of Western
Christendom.
The pontifical succession, it is clear, was, during this schism,
1 Labb. 16. 142, 148. Du Pin. 3. 10.
" Labb. 16. 178, 222. Coss. 4. 90, 110. Du Pin. 3. 14.
3 Labb. 16. 277, 681, 715, Cossart, 3. 881. et 4. 81. Du Pin. 3. 15, 19.
92 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
interrupted. The links of the chain were lost, or so confused,
that human ingenuity can never find their place, nor human
penetration discover their arrangement. Their disentanglement
may defy all the art of man and all the sophistry of Jesuitism.
The election of Urban or Clement must have been uncanonical,
and his papacy unlawful : and the successors of the unlawful
pontiff must have shared in his illegality. Clement and Bene-
dict commanded the obedience of nearly the half of Western
Christendom ; while the remainder obeyed Urban, Boniface,
Innocent, and Gregory. One division must have recognized
the authority of a usurper and an impostor.
The church dispersed could not ascertain the true vicar-
general of Jesus, and hence its divisions. All the erudition of
the Parisian university and the Spanish nation was unavailing.
The French and Spanish doctors, in the assemblies of Paris
and Medina, in 1381, examined the several claims of the com-
petitors with erudition and ability. The question was treated
by the canonists and theologians of Spain, France, and Italy,
with freedom and impartiality. But Spanish, French, and
Italian ingenuity on this subject was useless. The Pisan and
Constantian councils, in all their holiness and infallibility, were,
says Daniel, equally nonplused. These, notwithstanding their
pretensions to divine direction, could depose, but ' could not
discriminate ; and were forced to use, not their information or
wisdom, but their power and authority. 1 The inspired fathers
could, in their own opinion, depose all the claimants, but could
not ascertain the right or title of any. This conduct was a
plain confession of their inability to discover the canonical head
of the church and vicar-general of God. Moderns, in this part
of ecclesiastical history, are at an equal loss with the cotem-
porary authors and councils.
The impracticability of ascertaining the rightful pontiff has
been admitted by the ablest critics and theologians of Romanism,
such as Gerson, Antoninus, Bellarmine, Andilly, Maimbourg,
Alexander, Mezeray, Daniel, and Moreri. 2 Gerson admits
1 Alexander, 24. 466, 467. Daniel, 5. 227.
2 Est varietas opiaionum Doctorum, et inter doctissimos et probatissimos ex
utraque parte. Gerson, in Alex. 24. 474. Peritissimos viros in sacra pagina et
jure canonico habuit utraque pars, ac etiam religiossimos viros, et etiam miraculis
fulgentes : nee unquam sic potuit quaestio ilia decidi. Antonin. c. II. Alex. 24.
477. Nee poterit facile praedicari quis eorum verus et legitimus esset Pontifex,
cum non decesseut singulis doctissimi patroui. Bell. IV. 14. L'affaire etant obscure
et difficile d'ellememe, n'a point encore etc decidije. Andilly, 860. Pour cette
impossibility morale, ou 1'ou etoit demeler les vrais Papes d'avec les Anti-Papes.
Maimb. I. Bruy. 3. 515. Adeo obscura erant et dubia contendentium jura, ut
post multas virorum doctissimorum dissertationes plurimosque tractatus editos,
cognoscinon posset quis esset verus et legitimus Pontifex. Alex. 24. 444. Onn'a
jamais p6 vuider ce demele. Mez. 3. 235. De tres savans homines, et des saints
GREAT WESTERN SCHISM. 93
' the reasonableness of doubt, and the variety of opinions among
the most learned and approved doctors on the several claims
of the rival pontiffs.' Antoninus acknowledges ' the unsettled
state of the controversy, notwithstanding each party's shining
miracles, and the advocacy of pious men, deeply skilled in
Sacred Writ and in canon law.' Bellarmine mentions ' the
learned patrons which supported the several competitors, and
the difficulty of determining the true and lawful pontiff*.'
Andilly agrees with Gerson, Antoninus, and Bellarmine. He
grants ' the obscurity and difficulty of the question, which has
not yet been decided.' Maimbourg, on the Western schism,
states ' the moral impossibility of ascertaining the rightful pope,
and relates the support which each faction received from
civilians, theologians, arid universities, and even from saints,
and miracles.' Alexander, after an impartial and profound ex-
amination, comes to the same conclusion. He shows the im-
practicability of ascertaining the true and legitimate pontiff',
' notwithstanding the dissertations and books published on the
subject by the most learned men.' Each party, in the state-
ment of Mezeray, ' had the advocacy of distinguished person-
ages, saints, revelations, and miracles ; and all these could not
decide the contest.' Daniel and Moreri confess, on this topic,
' the jarring and contradictory opinion of saints, as well as of
lawyers, theologians, and doctors, and the unwillingness or in-
ability of the church, assembled afterwards in the council of
Constance, to discriminate among the several competitors the
true vicar-general of God and ecclesiastical sovereign of
Christendom.' Similar concessions have been made by
Giannon, Bruys, Panormitan, Balusius, Zabarella, Surius,
Turrecrema, and a long train of other divines and critics.
The Basilian and Florentine schism, which was the thirtieth
in the papacy, troubled the spiritual reign of Eugenius and
Felix. This contest presented the edifying spectacle of two
po])es clothed in supremacy, and two councils vested with in-
fallibility, hurling mutual anathemas and excommunications.
Martin, who had been chosen by the Constantian Convention,
had departed, and been succeeded by Condalmerio, who as-
sumed the name of Eugenius, The council of Basil deposed
Eugenius and substituted Felix. Eugenius assembled the
meme furent partages la dessus. L' eglise assemblee, dans le concile de Constance,
ne vpulfit point 1'examiner. Daniel, 5. 227. Le droit des deux partis ne f fit
jamais bien eclairci, et il y a en des deux cotes de tres savans jurisconsultes, de
celebres theologiens, et de grands Docteurs. Moreri. 7. 172. Les deux papes
avoient chacun des partisans illustres par letir science et par leur p*et6. Moreri r
3. 454.
94 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
council of Florence, and excommunicated Felix and the
council of Basil.
The council of Basil met anno 1431. The holy fathers, in
the second session, decreed the superiority of a general council
to a pope, and the obligation of all, even the Roman pontiff,
under pain of condign punishment, to obey the synodal
authority in questions of faith, extirpation of schism, and re-
formation of the church.
The idea of synodal superiority arid moral reformation con-
veyed horror, in general, to all popes, and in particular to
Eugenius. His holiness, in consequence, issued against the
council two bulls of dissolution, and annulled all its enactments.
The bulls, however, contained no terror for the council. The
Basilians, supported by the Emperor Sigismond, entreated
Eugenius to repeal his proclamations ; and threatened, in case
of refusal, to pronounce his holiness guilty of contumacy.
The pontiff, therefore, was under the direful necessity of re-
voking his bulls of dissolution, and declaring the legality of the
council; and, at the same time, its title, in its commencement
and continuation, to his approbation. 1
His infallibility's approbation, however, which was extorted,
was soon recalled. New dissensions arose between the pope
and the council. The reformation, which the Basilians had
effected and which they still contemplated, was, to this head
of the church, altogether intolerable. His holiness, therefore,
in 1438, translated the council to Ferrara, with the immediate
intention to gainsay the Basilian assembly. The Basilians, in
return, accused Eugenius of simony, perjury, abuse of authori-
ty, wasting the ecclesiastical patrimony, ruining the city of
Palestrina, and hostility to their enactments. The Fathers then
annulled the translation of the council to Ferrara, cited his.
holiness to appear at Basil in sixty days, and on his refusal,
pronounced Him guilty of contumacy. 2
Sentence of contumacy was only a prelude to sentence of
deposition. Eugenius proceeded in hostility to the Basilians,
who, therefore, by a formal enactment in 1439, deprived him
of the papacy. The sentence against God's vicar-general by
the church's representatives is a curiosity. The general council,
representing the universal church, in its thirty-fourth session,
found this plenipotentiary of heaven guilty of contumacy, per-
tinacity, disobedience, simony, incorrigibility, perjury, schism,
heresy, and error ; and, in consequence, unworthy of all title,
rank, honor, and dignity. The sacred Synod then deposed
1 Labb. 17. 236. Bray. 4. 104, 105. Du Pin, 3. 22, 24.
2 Alex. 23. 39. Bruy. 4. 115. Du Pin, 3. 27.
BASILIAN AND FLORENTINE SCHISM. 95
Cbndalrnerio from the papacy, abrogated all his constitutions
and ordinations, absolved the faithful from their obedience,
oaths, obligations, and fidelity ; and prohibited the obedience
of all, even bishops, patriarchs, cardinals, emperors and kings,
under privation of all honour and possessions. 1
The Basilians, having cashiered one vice-god, appointed
another. The person selected for this dignity was Amadeus,
duke of Savoy. This prince had governed his hereditary
realms for forty years. The ability which, during this revolving
period, he had' displayed, rendered him the delight of his peo-
ple, and the admiration of the age. He was accounted a
Solomon for "wisdom, and made arbiter of differences among
kings, who consulted him on the most important affairs. He
possessed a philosophical cast of mind, a love of repose, and
a contempt for worldly grandeur. Weary of a throne, which,
to so many, is the object of ambition, and disgusted probably
with the bustle and tumult of life, Amadeus resigned the ducal
administration to his sons, and resolved to embrace the seclusion
of a hermit. He chose for the place of his retreat the beautiful
villa of Ripaille, on the banks of the lake of Geneva. This
solitude possessed the advantage of air, water, wood, meadow,
vineyards, and all that could contribute to rural beauty. Ama-
deus, in this sequestered spot, built a hermitage and enclosed
a park, which he supplied with deer. Accompanied in his
retreat by a few domestics, and supporting his aged limbs on
a crooked and knotty staff, he spent his days far from the noise
and busy scenes of the world, in innocence and piety. A de-
putation arrived at this retirement, conveying the triple crown
and other trappings of the papacy. The ducal hermit accepted,
with reluctance and tears, and after much entreaty, the insignia
of power and authority. Western Christendom, amidst the
unity of Romanism, had then two universal bishops, and two
universal councils. 2 Eugenius and Felix, with the Florentine
and Basilian synods, divided the Latin communion, except a
few states which assumed an attitude of neutrality.
The two rival pontiff's and councils soon began the work of
mutual excommunication. Eugenius hailed Felix, on his pro-
motion to the pontifical throne, with imprecation and obloquy.
He welcomed his brother, says Poggio his secretary, to his new
dignity with the appellations of Mahomet, heretic, schismatic,
antipope, Cerberus, the golden calf, the abomination of deso-
lation erected in the temple of God, a monster that had risen
to trouble the church and destroy the faith, and who, willing
1 Bray. 4. 126. Du Pin, 3. 39. Dan. 6, 167. Boss. 2. 167.
2 Labb. 17. 395. Dan. 6. 168. Boss. 2. 177. Alex. 25. 540. Sylv. c. XLIII.
96 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
not merely to overthrow a single state but unhinge the whole
universe, had resigned humanity, assumed the manners of a
wild beast, and crowned the iniquity of his past life by the
most frightful impiety. 1 His infallibility, among other accom-
plishments, discovered in this salutation a superior genius for
elegance of diction and delicacy of sentiment. Luther, so
celebrated for this talent in his answers to Leo and Henry, the
Roman pontiff and the English king, was in this refinement,
when compared with his holiness, a mere ninny.
Eugenius congratulated the council of Basil with similar
compliments and benedictions. This assembly he called block-
heads, fools, madmen, barbarians, wild beasts, malignants,
wretches, persecutors, miscreants, schismatics, heretics, vaga-
bonds, runagates, apostates, rebels, monsters, criminals, a con-
spiracy, an innovation, a deformity, a conventicle distinguished
only for its temerity, sacrilege, audacity, machinations, impiety,
tyranny, ignorance, irregularity, fury, madness, and the dis-
semination of falsehood, error, scandal, poison, pestilence, deso-
lation, unrighteousness, and iniquity. 2
Having sketched the character of the holy fathers with so
much precision, his infallibility proceeded next, with equal pro-
fessional skill, to annul their acts, and pronounce their sentence.
This duty he performed in fine style in the council of Florence
and with its full approbation. He condemned the Basilian
proposition respecting the superiority of a council to a pope,
and rescinded all the Basilian declarations and enactments.
Their doom, pronounced by the pontiff in full council, soon
followed. His infallibility, the viceroy of heaven, in the dis-.
charge of his pastoral duty, and actuated with zeal for God,
and to expel a pernicious pestilence and an accursed impiety
from the church, despoiled the Basilian doctors, bishops, arch-
bishops, and cardinals of all honour, office, benefice, and dig-
nity ; excommunicated and anathematized the whole assembly,
with their patrons and adherents of every rank and condition,
civil and ecclesiastical, and consigned that ' gang of all the
devils in the universe, by wholesale, to receive their portion in
condign punishment and in eternal judgment with Korah, Da-
than, and Abiram.' 3 The pontifical and synodical denuncia-
tions extended to the Basilian ma.gistracy, consuls, sheriffs,
governors, officials, and citizens. These, if they failed in thirty
iBruy. 4. 130. Coss. 5. 232. Labb. 18. 841, 914, 1394. Poggio. 101, 155.
2 Labb. 18. 914. 12021335. Poggio. 156.
3 Affirmat totius orbis dsemonia ad Latrocinium Basileense confluxisse, ut, ad
complendam iniquitatem, abominationem desolationis in Dei ecclesia ponunt.
Declarat omnes qui Basilise remanserint, cum Core, D.atan et Abiron, seterno
judicio ease perdendos. Labb. 13. 1884.
BASILIAN AND FLORENTINE SCHISM. 97
days to expel the council from the city, Eugenius subjected to
interdict and confiscation of goods. Their forfeited property
might, by pontifical authority, be seized by the faithful or by
any person who could take possession. This edifying sentence
his infallibility pronounced in the plenitude of apostolic power,
and subjected all who should attempt any infringement on his
declaration, constitution, condemnation, and reprobation, to the
indignation of Almighty God and of the blessed apostles Peter
and Paul. 1 This was the act of the general, apostolic, holy,
Florentine council, and issued with due solemnity in a public
synodal session.
Nicholas the Fifth, who succeeded Eugenius, continued, on
his accession, to follow his predecessor's footsteps, and con-
firmed his sentence against Amadeus of Savoy and the council
of Basil. Nicholas denominated Eugenius the supreme head
of the church and vicar-general of Jesus. But Felix, whom
he excommunicated with all his adherents, he designated the
patron of schism, heresy, and iniquity. The dukedom of Savoy,
his holiness, by apostolic authority, transferred to Charles the
French king, to bring the population back to the sheepfbld.
This plenipotentiary of heaven then proclaimed a crusade
against the duke and his subjects. He admonished the French
king to assume the sign of the cross, and to act in this enter-
prize with energy. He exhorted the faithful to join the French
army ; and for their encouragement, his holiness, supported by
the mercy of the Omnipotent God, and the authority of the
blessed apostles Peter and Paul, granted the crusading army a
full pardon of all their sins, and, at the resurrection of the just,
the enjoyment of eternal life. 2
Felrx and the Basilians, however, did not take all this kind-
ness for nothing. The holy fathers, with their pontiff at their
head, returned the Florentine benedictions with spirit and piety.
Their spiritual artillery hurled back the imprecations, and re-
paid their competitor's anathemas. The Basilians, with devout
cordiality, nullified the Florentine council, and rescinded all its
acts. 3 The Basilian congress indeed cursed, as usual, in a
masterly style. But Felix, through some defect of intellect or
education, was miserably defective in this pontifical accom-
plishment. His genius, in the noble art of launching execra-
tions, was far inferior to that of Eugenius and Nicholas, who,
from nature or cultivation, possessed splendid talents for the
papal duty of cursing. He did well afterwards to resign the
1 Du Pin, 3. 28. Bray. 4. 130. Labb. 18. 915, 12051384.
3 Labb. 19. 47. Coss. 5. 261.
3 Labb. 18. 1365. Bruy. 4. 130. Du Pin. 3. 42. - '*
7 .:
98 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY:
office, for which his inability for clothing imprecations in suit-
able language rendered him unfit. The council were to blame
for choosing a head, who, in this capacity, showed such woful
inadequacy. Few of these vice-gods, however, for the honour
of the holy See, were incompetent in this useful attainment.
Felix, in latter days, seems to have been the only one, who, in
this respect, disgraced his dignity.
The schism in the prelacy and popedom communicated to
the nations. These were divided into three fractions, according
to their declaration for Eugenius, Felix, or neutrality. The
two popes and synods, though branded with mutual excom-
munication, had their several obediences among the people.
The majority of the European kingdoms declared for Eugenius.
He was patronized by Italy, Spain, Portugal, and Scotland.
France and England acknowledged the council of Basil ; and
yet, in sheer inconsistency, rejected Felix and adhered to Eu-
genius. Scotland, except a few lords, not only declared for
Eugenius, but its prelacy, assembled in a national council, ex-
communicated Felix. Arragon, through interested motives,
declared in 1441 for Felix, and afterwards, in 1443, veered
round to Eugenius. 1
Felix, however, commanded a respectable minority. He
was recognized by Switzerland, Hungary, Austria, Bavaria,
Strasburgh, Calabria, Piedmont, and Savoy. His authority
was acknowledged by many universities of France, Germany,
and Poland ; such as those of Paris, Vienna, Erfurt, Colonia,
and Cracow. The Carthusians and Franciscans also rallied
round the standard of Felix. 2
Germany, forming a third party, disclaimed both the com-
petitors, and maintained, amid these dissentions, an armed
neutrality. Its suspension of obedience commenced in 1438,
and lasted eight years. During this period, its priesthood and
people contrived, in some way or other, to do without a pope. 3
The Germans, on this occasion, anticipated, on the subject of
pontifical authority, their revolt under Luther, which ushered
in the Reformation.
This schism, however, which had distracted western Christen-
dom for about ten years, terminated in 1449. This was effected
by the resignation of Felix, at the earnest entreaty of kings,
councils, and people. Amadeus, unlike Urban, Boniface, Inno-
cent, Gregory, Clement, and Benedict, who were rivals in the
great western schism, abdicated with promptitude and facility. 4
1 Labb. 18. 1396. Daniel, 6. 224. Cossart, 5. 38.
3 Labb. 18. 1397, 1398, 1403.
3 Alex. 23. 45. Labb. 18. 1368, 1373. Platina, 173.
* Dti Pin, 3. 43. Dan. 6. 226.
BASILIAN AND FLORANTINE SCHISM. 99
He had accepted the dignity with reluctance, and he renounced
it without regret.
Prior to his demission, however, the popes and the councils
of the two obediences annulled their mutual sentences of con-
demnation. Nicholas, in the plenitude of apostolic power, and
in a bull which he addressed to all the faithful, rescinded, in
due form, all the suspensions, interdicts, privations, and ana-
themas, which had been issued against Felix and the council
of Basil ; while, at the same time, he approved and confirmed
all their ordinations, promotions, elections, provisions, collations,
confirmations, consecrations, absolutions, and dispensations.
He abrogated all that was said or written against Felix and the
Basilian convention. This bull overthrows the ultramontan
system, which maintains the illegitimacy of the Basilian synod
from the deposition of Eugenius. Nicholas confirmed it in the
amplest manner. Felix then revoked all the Basilian pro-
ceedings against Eugenius, Nicholas, and the Florentine coun-
cil; arid, though appointed legate, vicar, first cardinal, and
second to the sovereign pontiff, retired again to his retreat at
Ripaille, on the banks of the Leman Lake ; and there, till his
death in 1450, enjoyed a life of ease and piety. 1
The Basilian and Florentine schism presented an odd pros-
pect of papal unity. Two popes and two synods exchanged
reciprocal anathemas ; and afterwards, in a short time, sanc-
tioned all their several acts with the broad seal of mutual appro-
bation and authority. Felix, whom Eugenius had designated
Antichrist, Mahomet, Cerberus, a schismatic, a heretic, the
golden calf, and the abomination of desolation, Nicholas, in
the friendliest style, and kindest manner, called chief cardinal,
and dearest brother. 2 The council of Basil, which Eugenius had
represented as an assembly of madmen, barbarians, wild beasts,
heretics, miscreants, monsters, and a pandemonium, Nicholas,
without any hesitation and in the amplest manner, approved
and confirmed. Two general councils condemned each other for
schism and heresy, and afterwards exchanged mutual compli-
ments and approbation. The French and Italian schools still
continue their enmity. The French detest the Florentine con-
vention and applaud the Basilian assembly; whilst the Italians
denounce the conventicle of Basil and eulogize the council of
Florence,
The Basilian and Florentine contest displays all the elements
of discord, which distinguish the great western schism. Pope,
j
1 Labb. 19,. 50. Coss. 5- 247. Lenfant; 2. 210. Bruy, 4. 159. Alex. 23, 53.
2 Carissimum fratrem nostrum Amadeum, primum Cardinalem. Alex. 25, 258.
Coss. 5- 274,
7*
100 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
in both, opposed pope. Two viceroys of heaven clashed in
mutual excommunications. Western Christendom, on both
occasions, was rent into contending factions. Nations, severed
from nation, refused reciprocal communion, and acknowledged
two jarring ecclesiastical sovereigns.
But the latter schism contained also a new element of dissen-
sion, unknown to the former. An universal council, as a speci-
men of Romish unity, opposed an universal council, and both
fulminated mutual execrations. Each assembly in its own and
in its party's opinion, and, according to many at the present
day, represented the whole church ; and, nevertheless, in the
bitterest enmity, and in unequivocal language, thundered re-
ciprocal sentences of heresy and reprobation.
But doctrinal, as well as historical and electoral variations,
troubled the papacy, Historians, for a century, differed in
their records of the popedom, while electors, in many cases,
disagreed in their choice of a sovereign. Several of the pontiffs
also varied from the faith of the majority. All the heads of the
church, who patronized heresy, need not be enumerated. A
few of the most distinguished, however, may be mentioned ;
such as Victor, Stephen, Zosimus, Honorius, Vigilius, and
John.
Victor, or, according to Bellarmine, Zephyrinus, patronized
Montanism. His infallibility approved the prophecies of Mon-
tanus, Priscilla, and Maximilla, admitted these fanatics to his
communion, and granted the impostors letters of peace or re-
commendation to the churches of Asia and Phrygia. The
pontiff, deceived by appearances, gave Montanus, says Godeau,
' pacific letters, which shews that he had admitted the prophet
to his communion.' According to Rhenanus, ' his holiness
Montanized.' He sanctioned the blasphemy of these enthu-
siasts by the seal of his infallibility. Montanism, when coun-
tenanced by the pontiff, had been condemned by the church.
Victor's recommendation of the heresy, therefore, was without
excuse. The pope afterward revoked his letters of peace ; and
in so doing, varied from himself, as he had, in granting them,
differed from the church. Praxeas, says Tertullian, remon-
strated against the conduct of Victor, who, in consequence,
was forced to recant. 1 The hierarch's approbation and recan-
tation were equal proofs of his infallibility and consistency.
Stephen erred on the subject of baptism. His holiness, fol-
lowed by the Spaniards, French, and Italians, maintained the
validity of baptism administered by any heretical denomination.
1 BelL IV. 8. Tertull. 501. Du Pin, 346. Godeau, I. 436. Spon. 173. 11.
Bruy. 1. 40.
DOCTRINAL VARIATIONS. 101
His infallibility's language, according to Cyprian, Firinilian, -
and the plain signification of the words, taught the efficacy of
the baptismal ceremony in any form, even without the name
of the Trinity. 1 The cotemporary partizans of heresy, indeed,
except the Novatians, who were out of the question, rejected
the deity of the Son and the Spirit, and, therefore, in this insti-
tution, omitted the names of these two divine persons. Their
forms, in the celebration of this sacrament, were, as appears
from Irenaeus, distinguished for their ridiculousness and absurd-
ity. Persons, however, who had been baptized in any heretical
communion did not, according to Stephen's system, need a
repetition of the ceremony.
Cyprian, the Carthaginian metropolitan, who led the Africans,
Numidians, Phrygians, Cappadocians, Galatians, Cilicians,
Pontians, and Egyptians, held the opposite opinion. He main-
tained the invalidity of heretical baptism, and rebaptized all,
who, renouncing any heresy, assumed the profession of Catho-
licism. Cyprian's system was supported, by tradition and
several councils, and had obtained through Africa and Asia.
The decisions of Stephen and Cyprian are in direct opposition,
and both contrary to modern Catholicism. 2
The pontiff and the saint maintained their respective errors
with animosity and sarcasm. The pontiff called the saint anti-
christ, a false apostle, and a deceitful workman. To a depu-
tation sent on this subject from Africa he refused admission into
his presence, or even the rights of common hospitality ; and
excommmunicated both the Africans and Orientals. His inflexi-
bility was returned with interest by Cyprian and Firmilian.
Cyprian accused his holiness of error, apostacy, schism, heresy,
pride, impertinence, ignorance, inconsistency, indiscretion,
falsehood, obstinacy, presumption, stupidity, senselessness,
perversity, obduracy, blasphemy, impatience, perfidy, indocility,
and contumacy. 3 Such was a Roman saint's character of a
Roman pontiff and the vicar-general of God.
Firmilian' s portrait of his infallibility is unflattering as that
of Cyprian. The prominent traits in Firmilian' s picture of his
holiness are inhumanity, insolence, audacity, dissension, discord,
folly, pride, ridiculousness, ignorance, contumacy, error, schism,
and heresy. He even represented the head of the church as
an apostate, worse than all heretics, in supporting error and
1 Cyprian, 210. Bin. 1. 177. Buseb. VII. 2.
s Les Remains vouloient qu'il fut bon, par quelque Heretique qu'il fut confere :
et les Afriquains soutenoient, qu'il 6toit nul s'il etoit confers hors de 1'eglise, par
les heretiques. Iln'y a rien de plus oppose, que ces deux decrets. Maimb. 88, 90,
97. Du Pin, 347. Cyprian, Bp. LXXIV.
3 Cyprian, 2J 0215.
102 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY C
obscuring the light of ecclesiastical truth, who, in attempting to
excommunicate others, had separated -himself from the whole
Christian community. 1 These two moral painters, between
them, certainly did great justice to his infallibility's character,
and sketched the features as large as life.
Stephen and Cyprian, as well as their several factions, were,
after all, both in an error. The validity of baptism, according
to the Romish system, depends not on the administrator, but
on the matter and form. The administrator may be a heretic
or a schismatic, a clergyman, a layman, or a woman, if the
element of water and the name of the Trinity be used. Cy-
prian and Stephen, the saint and the pontiff, differed from one
another, and according to the present popish faith, from the
truth. The church, in the clashing systems of the Carthaginian
metropolitan and the Roman hierarch, varied on this topic
from the church which has been established sin9e their day.
Cyprian's opinion, though supported by Athanasius, Cyril,
Dionysius, Optatus, and Basil, with the Asiatic and African
communions, was, in 314, condemned by the council of Aries.
Stephen's opinion, which supported the efficacy of any baptism,
even without the name of the Trinity, was, in 325, condemned,
in the nineteenth canon of the general council of Nice. 2
Liberius, Zosimus, and Honorius patronized Arianism,
Pelagianism, and Monothelitism. Liberius excommunicated
Athanasius, and signed an Arian confession of faith. Zosimus
countenanced Pelagianism, Honorius professed Monothelitism,
and was condemned for this heresy in the sixth general council.
These three pontiffs, however, will occur in a future part of
this work, when their errors will be more fully developed.
Vigilius, the next topic of animadversion, was the prince of
changelings. The celebrated Vicar of Bray seems to have
been only a copy, taken from the original the notorious bishop
of Rome. This pontifical shuttlecock, during his supremacy,
shifted his ground no less than six times. His infallibility, ac-
cording to Liberatus, began his .popedom by issuing a declaration
in favour of Monophysitism. This confession was intended
to satisfy the Empress Theodora, who favoured this heresy.
His holiness anathematized the Chalcedonian faith and its
patrons, and embraced the Eutychianism of Anthemus, Severus,
and Theodosius. This system, however, his infallibility, in
the vicissitudes of inconsistency, soon retracted, and shifted
round, like the veering vane, to the definition of Chalcedon.
The pontiff, in 539, in a communication to the Emperor
1 Cyprian, Ep. 75. Bruy. 1. 65.
3 Challenor. 5. Labb. 1. 1452. et 2. 42. Maimb. 98. 99. Bin. 1. 20.
DOCTRINAL VARIATIONS. 103
Justinian and the patriarch Mennas, disclaimed Eutychianism,
and excommunicated all its partizans. 1
His avowal of Jacobitism, indeed, was during the life of his
rival Silverius, when, instead of being lawful pastor, Vigilius,
according to Bellarmine, Baronius, and Godeau, was only an
illeo-al intruder, who had obtained the ecclesiastical sovereignty
by violence and simony. 2 The usurper, however, even then
held the whole administration of the papacy ; and, after the
death of his competitor, made four different and jarring con-
fessions of faith on the subject of the three chapters, which
contained the writings of Ibas, Theodoret, and Theodorus.
Vigilius, in 547, opposed Justinian's edict, which condemned
the works of these three authors. 3 The emperor, in 545, had
issued a constitution, in which he anathematized Ibas, Theo-
doret, and Theodorus, and condemned their productions, on
account of their execrable heresy and blasphemy. The impe-
rial proclamation was subscribed by Mennas, Zoilos, Ephraim,
and Peter, patriarchs of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch,
and Jerusalem ; and by the oriental suffragans, who followed
the footsteps of their superiors. His holiness, however, on his
arrival in the imperial city, in 547, refused to sign the imperial
edict. He. declared the condemnation of the three chapters
derogatory to the council of Chalcedon, and, in consequence,
excommunicated the Grecian clergy, and anathematized all who
condemned Ibas, Theodoret, and Theodorus.
His infallibility's hostility to the royal manifesto, however,
was temporary. His holiness, in 548, published a bull, which
he called his judgment, and which condemned, in the strongest
and most express terms, the works of Ibas, Theodoret, and
Theodorus. These productions, according to this decision, con-
tained many things contrary to the right faith, and tending to
the establishment of impiety and Nestorianism. Vigilius, there-
fore, anathematized the publications, the authors, and their
abettors. Alexander and Godeau, on this occasion, acknow-
ledged the inconsistency of his infallibility's judgment with his
former decision. 4 Godeau's observation is worthy of remark.
The pontiff's compliance with the emperor, says the historian,
' was a prudent accommodation to the malignity of the times.' 5
1 Liberat. c. XXII. Godeau, 4. 203, 208. Vigil. Ep. IV. V.
2 Bell. IV. 11. Godeau, 4. 206. Binn. 4. 400.
3 Damnation! primum obstitit. Alex. 12 33. Godeau, 4. 229. Theoph. 152.
4 Ilia postmodum indicate damnavit. Alexand. 12. 33. Maimb. 67. Labb. 6.
23, 177.
CPetoit uu jugement contraire au premier, qu'il avoit si fortement sontemi centre
PEmpereur, et centre lea eveques Orientaux. Godeau, 4. 233.
6 Prudent accommodement a la malignite du temps. Godeau, 4. 233.
104 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
The badness of the times, in the good bishop's mind, justified
the Pope's discretion and versatility.
The Latin clergy, however, had a different opinion of the
pontifical judgment. These, to a man, forsook Vigilius : Dacius,
Sebastian, Rusticus, and Facundus, with the Illyrians, Dal-
matians, and Africans, viewed the decision as the subversion of
the Chalcedonian faith, and the establishment of Eutychianism
on the ruins of Catholicism. Facundus openly taxed his holi-
ness with prevarication and perfidy. 1
His infallibility, ever changing, issued, in 553, in a council
of sixteen bishops and three deacons, a constitution which over-
threw his judgment. Vigilius, in this constitution, disapproved
of sixty extracts from Theodoras, in the bad acceptation in
which they had been taken ; but prohibited the condemnation
of his person. He could not, he said, by his own sentence,
condemn Theodorus nor allow him to be condemned by any.
The pontiff, at the same time, declared the Catholicism of the
works, and forbade all anathematizing of the persons of Theo-
doret and Ibas. His supremacy ordained and decreed, that
nothing should be done or attempted to the injury or detraction
of Theodoret, who signed, without hesitation, the Chalcedonian
definition, and consented with ready devotion to Leo's letter.
He decided and commanded, that the judgment of the Chalce-
donian fathers, who declared the orthodoxy of Ibas, should
remain, without addition or diminution. All this was in direct
contradiction, as the fifth general council shewed, to his judg-
ment, in which he had condemned the heresy of the three
chapters, and anathematized the persons of their authors and
advocates. This constitution, however, notwithstanding its in-
consistency with his former declaration, the pontiff sanctioned
by his apostolic authority, and interdicted all of every ecclesias-
tical dignity, from writing, speaking, publishing, or teaching
any thing against his pontifical decision. 2
The sixth and last detour of Vigilius was his confirmation of
the fifth general council, which condemned and anathematized
Ibas, Theodoret, Theodorus, and their works, for impiety, wick-
edness, blasphemy, madness, heresy, and Nestorianism. The
following is a specimen of the infallible assembly's condemna-
tion of the three chapters and their authors, which the holy
fathers, as usual, bellowed in loud vociferation. 'Anathema to
Theodorus. Satan composed his confession. TheEphesian
council anathematized its author. Theodorus renounced the
gospel. Anathema to all who do not anathematzie Theodorus.
1 Godeau, 4. 231. Bruy. in Vigil.
8 Labb. 5. 13501360. Maimb. 68.
DOCTRINAL VARIATIONS. 105
Theodoret's works contain blasphemy and impiety against the
right faith and the Ephesian council. The epistle of Ibas is, in
all things, contrary to the Chalcedonian definition and the true
faith. The epistle contains heresy. The whole epistle is blas-
phemy. Whosoever does not anathematize it is a heretic. Ana-
thema to Theodorus, Nestorius, and Ibas.' All this, notwith-
standing his constitution in behalf of Ibas, Theodoret, and
Theodorus, his infallibility approved and confirmed. 1
His holiness did not stop with a simple confirmation of the
fifth general council. He, also, like the Ecumenical Synod,
vented a noisy torrent of obloquy against the departed souls of
Ibas, Theodoret and Theodorus, when their flesh was resolved
into dust and their bones were mouldering in the tomb. He
condemned and anathematized Theodoret and Theodorus,whose
works, according to his infallibility, contained impiety and many
things against the right faith and the Ephesian council. 2 A
similar sentence, he pronounced against Ibas, his works, and all
who believed or defended their impiety.
The papacy of Vigilius presents a scene of fluctuation un-
known in the annals of Protestantism. The vicar-general of
God, the head of the church, and the father and teacher of all
Christians shifted his ground six times. He sanctioned Euty-
chianism and afterwards retracted. He withstood Justinian's
edict, and, in his celebrated judgment, afterwards recanted. The
changeling pontiff, in his constitution, shielded Ibas, Theodoret,
and Theodorus, and afterwards confirmed the general council,
which condemned these authors for blasphemy and heresy. His
infallibility's condemnation of the three chapters was opposed
by the whole Latin communion. The Africans, lUyrians, Dal-
matians, and many other churches withdrew from his commu-
nion, and accused him of overthrowing the council of Chalcedon
and establishing Monophysitism. A general council of the
Grecian prelacy, in the mean time, condemned the Pope's
constitution and the declaration of the Latin clergy ; and this
council's sentence, amid the universal distraction of Christendom,
was established by Pope Vigilius, and afterwards by Pelagius,
Gregory, Nicholas, and Leo. 3
John the twenty-second was another of these pontiffs,
who was distinguished for patronizing heresy. 'This father
and teacher of all Christians' denied the admission of disem-
bodied souls into the beatific vision of God, during their inter-
mediate state between death and the resurrection. The spirits
of the just, indeed, he believed, entered at death on the enjoy-
1 Labb. 6. 66, 130, 197, 199, 310. Godeau, 4. 265, 268.
2 Labb. 6. 241, 244. Bruy. 1. 228.
3 Godeau, 4. 233. Bruy. 1. 327.
106 THE VABIATIONS OF POPERY:
ment of happiness and the contemplation of the Son's glorified
humanity. But the vision of Jehovah and the perfection of
felicity, according to this head of the church, are deferred till the
day of general judgment. 1
This dogma his supremacy taught by sermons, letters, and
legations. He preached the heresy in public, according to Balu-
sius, Raynal, and Maimbourg, in three sermons in succession, and
caused it to be maintained by cardinals, prelates, and doctors. 2
He transmitted letters in all directions, especially through the
French nation, in support of his theory. He sent two theolo-
gians on a mission to the Parisian faculty, to effect the pro-
selytism of that literary seminary to his system. John, says
Adrian the Sixth, quoted by Launoy, 'publicly taught and
declared his innovation, and enjoined its, belief on all men.' 3
Nangis has transmitted a similar statement. He endeavoured,
in this manner, says Du Pin, ' to spread his error, and dissemi-
nate a universal heresy through the whole church.' 4
His infallibility's speculation, however, soon met decided hos-
tility. The citizens of Avignon, indeed, in which John resided,
maintained a profound silence. This, in some, arose from fear,
and, in some, from favour. A few believed and countenanced
the innovation. Many disbelieved ; but, at the same time, con-
cealed their disapprobation through terror of the pontiff's power
and tyranny. The king and the Parisian university, however,
were not to be affrighted. Philip, in 1333, assembled the
faculty, who canvassed the controversy and condemned his
infaUibility's faith as a falsehood and a heresy. These doctors
defined, that the souls of the faithful come at death, to the
naked, clear, beatific, intuitive, and immediate vision of the
essence of the divine and blessed Trinity. Many doctors con-
curred with the Parisians in opposition to the pontiff. Gobelin
calledhis infallibility an old dotard. AHiaco denominated John's
theory an error ; while Gerson characterized it as a falsehood.
Philip, the French monarch, proclaimed its condemnation by
the sound of a trumpet. 5
The statements and reasons of the university and of other
divines were unavailing. His infallibility was proof against
Parisian dialectics. But the French king was an abler logician,
and his reasoning, in consequence, possessed more efficiency.
1 Du Pin, 352. Alex. 22. 451. Maimb. 130.
2 II I'enseigua publiquement. II la precha lui-meme. II obligea, par son exemple,
les Cardinaux, les prelats de sa cour, et lea docteurs, a la soutenir. Maimb. 131.
3 Publice docuit, declaravit, et ab omnibus teneri mandavit. Launoy, 1. 534
* Joannes Papa XXII. errorem de beatitudine animse, quarn ipse diu tenuerat,
publice prsedicaverat. Nangis, Ann. 1334. Dachery, 3. 97.
5 Bruy. 3. 420, 422. Cossart, 4. 434. Maimb. 132. Gobelin, c. LXXI.
MORAL VARIATIONS. 107
The royal argument, on the occasion, was composed of fire. His
most Christian majesty threatened, if the pontiff did not retract,
to roast his Supremacy in the flames. 1 This tangible and sen-
sible argument, always conclusive and convincing, was calcu-
lated for the meridian of his infallibility's intellect. This
luminous application therefore, soon connected the premises
with the conclusion, brightened John's ideas, and convinced him,
in a short time, of his error. The clearness of the threatened
fire communicated light to his infallibility's understanding. His
holiness, though enamoured of heresy, was not, it appears, am-
bitious of martyrdom. He chose to retract, therefore, rather
than be burned alive. His infallibility, accordingly, just before
he expired, read his recantation and declared his orthodoxy,
on the subject of the beatific vision and the enjoyment of the
deity.
Bellarmine and Labbe deny John's heterodoxy. 2 These en-
deavour to excuse the pontiff, but by different means. Bellar-
mine grounds his vindication on the silence of the church on this
topic, when John published his opinion. No synodical or
authoritative definition, declaring the soul's enjoyment of the
beatific vision before the resurrection, preceded the papal de-
cision, which therefore was no heresy. Heresy then is no heresy,
according to the cardinal, but truth, prior to the sentence of
the church. John's opinion, Bellarmine admits, is now hetero-
doxy ; but, on its original promulgation, was orthodoxy. Truth,
it seems, can, by an ecclesiastical definition, be transubstantiated
into error, and Catholicism into heresy, even in an unchangeable
church distinguished for its unity. The popish communion can
effect the transubstantiation of doctrinal propositions, as well
as of the sacramental elements. John's faith, says Labbe,
was taught by Irena3us, Lactantius, and other orthodox fathers. 3
This is a noble excuse indeed, and calculated to display, in a
strong light, the unity of Romanism. The faith of primitive
saints and orthodox fathers is, it seems, become heresy. Labbe
attempts to acquit John by arraigning ' Irenseus and Lac-
tantius. The legitimate conclusion from the premises is, that
Irenseus, Lactantius, and John, were all three infected with error,
Moral, as well as historical, electoral, and doctrinal variations
diversified and disfigured the popedom. Sanctity characterized
the early Roman bishops, and degeneracy their successors.
Linus, Anacletus, Clemens,' and many of a. later period were
distinguished by piety, benevolence, holiness, and humility.
1 Rex rogum ip'si intentans ne revocarit errorem. Alex. 22. 461.
3 Bell. 1. 780. Labb. 15. 147. Alex. 22. 456.
3 Labb. 15. 147. Cassant, 4. 437.
108 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
Some deviations and defects might appear, marking the infirmity
and the imperfection of man. The Roman pastors, however,
who, during the earlier days of Christianity, did not, in moral
character, aspire to excellence, aimed at decency ; and few, for
a long series of years, sunk below mediocrity.
But the Roman hierarchs of the middle and succeeding ages
exhibited a melancholy change. Their lives displayed all the
variations of impiety, malevolence, inhumanity, ambition,
debauchery, gluttony, sensuality, deism, and atheism. Gregory
the Great seems to have led the way in the career of villainy.
This celebrated pontiff has been characterized as worse than his
predecessors and better than his successors, or, in other terms,
as the last good and the first bad pope. The flood-gates of
moral pollution appear, in the tenth century, to have been set
wide open, and inundations of all impurity poured on the Chris-
tian world through the channel of the Roman hierarchy. Awful
and melancholy indeed is the picture of the popedom at this
era, drawn, as it has been, by its warmest friends ; such as
Platina, Petavius, Luitprand, Genebrard, Baronius, Hermann,
Barclay, Binius, Giannone, Vignier, Labbe, and Du Pin.
Platina calls these Pontiffs monsters. Fifty popes, says Gene-
brard, in 150 years, from John the Eighth till Leo the Ninth,
entirely degenerated from the sanctity" of their ancestors, and
were apostatical rather than apostolical. 1 Thirty pontiffs
resigned in the tenth century : and the successor, in each
instance, seemed demoralized even beyond his predecessor.
Baronius, in his Annals of the Tenth Century, seems to labour
for language to express the base degeneracy of the popes and
the frightful deformity of the popedom. Many shocking mon-
sters, says the annalist, intruded, into the pontifical chair, who
were guilty of robbery, assassination, simony, dissipation,
tyranny, sacrilege, perjury, and all kinds of miscreancy. Can-
didates, destitute of every requisite qualification, were promoted
to the papal chair ; while all the caucus and traditions of anti-
quity were contemned and outraged. The church, says Gian-
none, was then in a shocking disorder, in a chaos of iniquity.
Some says Barclay, crept into the popedom by stealth ; while
others broke in by violence, and defiled the holy chair with the
filthiest immorality. 2
/ 1 Per annos fere 150. Pontifices circiter quinquaginta a loanne scilicet VIII,
usque ad Leonem IX, virtute majorum prorsus defecerint, apostatici potius quam
apostolici, Geneb. IV. Platina, 128. Du Pin, 2. 156. Bruy. 2. 208.
3 Plurima horrenda in earn monstra intruserant. Spon. 900. I. et 908. III.
L'eglise etoi plongee dans un cahos d'impietes. An. Eccl. 344. Giannon,
VII. 5.
Sanctissimarn Cathedram moiibus inquinatissimis foedavisse. Barclay, 36. c. 4.
On ne voyoit alors des Papes, mais des monstres. An. Eccl. 345. Giannon, VII, 5.
PROFLIGACY OF JOHN THE TWELFTH. 109
The electors and the elected, during this period, appear, as
might be expected, to have been kindred spirits. The electors
were neither the clergy nor people, but two courtezans, Theodora
and Marozia, mother and daughter, women distinguished by their
beauty, and at the same time, though of senatorial family,
notorious for their prostitution. These polluted patrons of
licentiousness, according to their pleasure, passion, whim, or
caprice, elected popes, collated bishops, disposed of diocesses,
and indeed assumed, in a great measure, the whole administra-
tion of the church. The Roman See, become the prey of
avarice and ambition, was given to the highest bidder. 1
These vile harlots, according to folly or fancy, obtruded their
filthy gallants or spurious offspring on the pontifical throne.
Theodora, having conceived a violent but base passion for John
the Tenth, raised her gallant to the papacy. The pontiff, like
his patron, was an example of sensuality; and was afterwards,
in 924, at the instigation of Marozia, deposed, and, in all pro-
bability, strangled by Wido, Marquis of Tuscany. Marozia was
mistress to Sergius the Third, who treated the dead body of
Formosus with such indignity. She brought her pontifical
paramour a son ; and this hopeful scion of illegitimacy and the
popedom was, by his precious mother, promoted to the vice-
gerency of heaven. His conduct was worthy of his genealogy.
He was thrown, however, into prison by Alberic, Marozia's son
by Adelbert, where he died of grief, or, some say, by assassina-
tion. 2 The person who can believe in the validity of such
elections, and the authority of such pontiffs, must possess an
extraordinary supply of faith, or rather of credulity.
A person desirous of painting scenes of atrocity and filth,
might, in the history of the popedom, find ample materials of
gratification. A mass of moral impurity might be collected
from the Roman hierarchy, sufficient to crowd the pages of
folios, and glut all the demons of pollution and malevolence.
But delineations of this kind afford no pleasing task. The facts,
therefore, on this topic shall be supplied with a sparing hand.
A few specimens, however, are necessary, and shall be selected
from the biography of John, Boniface, Gregory, Sixtus, Alex-
ander, Julius, and Leo.
John the Twelfth ascended the papal throne in 955, in the
eighteenth year of his age. His youthful days were charac-
terized by barbarity and pollution. He surpassed all his prede-
1 Le siege de Rome etoit donnfe au plus oSerant. Giannon. VII. 5. An. Eccl. 345.
2 Spon. 929. I. et 933. I. Giannon, VII. 5. 6. Luitprand, II. 13. Petavius, I.
418. L 'infame Theodora fit elire pour Pape, le. plus declare de ses amans, qui
tut appelle Jean X. Baronius ecrit, qu' alors Rome etoit sans Pape. An. Eccl.
345. Giannon, VII. 5.
110 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
cessors, says Platina, in debauchery. His holiness, in a Roman
synod, before Otho the Great, was found guilty of blasphemy,
perjury, profanation, impiety, simony, sacrilege, adultery, incest,
constupration, and murder. He swore allegiance to Otho, and
afterwards revolted to his enemy. Ordination, which he often
bartered for money, he conferred on a deacon in a stable, and
on a boy ten years old by constituting him a bishop. He killed
John, a sub-deacon, by emasculation, Benedict by putting out
his eyes, and, in the wantonness of cruelty, amputated the nose
of one cardinal, and the hand of another. He drank a health
to the devil, invoked Jupiter and Venus, lived in public adul-
tery with the Roman matrons, and committed incest with Ste-
phania, his father's concubine. The Lateran palace, formerly
the habitation of purity, he converted into a sink of infamy and
prostitution. Fear of violation from Peter's successor deterred
female pilgrims, maids, matrons, and widows, from visiting
Peter's tomb. His infallibility, when summoned to attend the
synod to answer for these charges, refused ; but excommunicated
the council in the name of Almighty God. The clergy and
laity, however, declared his guilt, and prayed, if the accusations
were unfounded, that they might be accursed, and placed on
the left hand at the day of judgment. The pontifical villain
was deposed by the Roman council. But he afterward re-
gained the Holy See ; and, being caught in adultery, was
killed, says Luitprand, by the devil, or, more probably, by the
injured husband. John, says Bellarmine, ' was nearly the wick-
edest of the popes.' 1 Some of the vice-gods, therefore, the
cardinal suggests, surpassed his holiness in miscreancy.
Boniface the Seventh, who seized the papal chair in 974,
murdered his predecessor and successor. Historians represent
him as the basest and wickedest of mankind. Baronius calls
him a thief, a miscreant, and a murderer, who is to be reckoned,
not among the Roman pontiffs, but among the notorious robbers
of the age. Gerbert and Vignier characterize this vice-god as
a monster, who surpassed ah 1 mankind in miscreancy. 2 Prompted
by Boniface, Crescentius strangled Benedict the Sixth, Boni-
face's predecessor, and placed Boniface on the papal chair.
But the Roman citizens, provoked with the pontiff's atrocity,
deposed him from his dignity, and expelled him from the city.
1 Ordinationes episcoporum faceret pretio. Benediction lumine privasse, et
mox mortuum ease. Joannem virilibus amputatis occidisse.
Viduam Roenarii et Stephanam patris concubinam et Annatn viduam cum nepte
sua abusum esse : et sanctum palatium lupanar et prostibulum feoisse. Labb. ii.
881. A Diabolo est percussus, Labb. ii. 873. Platina, 132. Beliarmin. ii. 20.
2 Sacrilegus prado sedem Apostolicum invasit Bonifacius, annumerandus inter
famosos latrones. Spon. 974. I. et 985. Bray. 2. 265, 271. Boniface, monstre
horrible, surmontant tons les humains en mechancetez. Vignier, 2. 608.
CHARACTER OF GREGORY THE SEVENTH. Ill
The exiled pontiff, however, was not, it appears, ambitious of
travelling in the train of poverty. The treasury of the Vatican
was rifled by this apostolical robber, and its sacred ornaments
and vessels conveyed by his holy hands to Constantinople.
Benedict the Seventh was, by universal suffrage, substituted in
-his stead. He held the papacy nine years, in opposition to
Boniface, and was succeeded by John the Fourteenth. Boni-
face, in the mean time, having sold . the spoils of the Vatican,
and amassed a vast sum of money, returned to Rome. This
treasure he expended in the bribery of his partizans, who, by
main violence, replaced the ruffian, in 985, on the pontifical
throne. John, who had succeeded during his absence, he im-
prisoned in the castle of Angelo, where, in four months after,
h6 died of starvation and misery. But even the death of his
rival could not satiate the vengeance of Boniface. John's cold,
pale, stiffened, emaciated corpse was placed at the door of the
castle, and there, in all its ghastly and haggard frightfulness,
exposed to the public gaze. But the murderer did not long
survive this insult on the dead. He died suddenly, and his
naked carcass, mangled and lacerated by his former partizans,
to whom he had become odious, was, with the utmost indignity,
dragged through the streets.
Gregory the Seventh, who obtained the papacy in 1073, was
another pontifical patron of iniquity. He was elected on the
day of his predecessor's funeral, by the populace and soldiery,
through force and bribery, without the concurrence of the em-
peror or the clergy. * Desiderius, abbot of Monte Cassino, on
this head, accused Hildebrand to his face of precipitation. He
obtained the supremacy, in the general opinion, by gross
simony. 1 He had the hypocrisy or hardihood, nevertheless,
to pretend that the dignity was obtruded on him against his
will.
Benno has sketched the character of this pontiff in strong
colours. This cardinal accused his holiness of simony, sacri-
lege, epicurism, magic, sorcery, treason, impiety, and murder.
The Italians of Lombardy drew nearly as frightful a portrait of
his supremacy. These represented his holiness as having
gained the pontifical dignity by simony, and stained it by
assassination and adultery.
The councils of Worms and Brescia depicted his character
with great precision. The council of Worms, comprehending
ibrty-six of the German prelacy, met in 1076, and preferred
numerous imputations against Gregory. This synod found his
holiness guilty of usurpation, simony, apostacy, treason, schism;
1 Du Pin, 2. 210, 215. Bruy. 2. 427.
112 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
heresy, chicanery, dissimulation, fornication, adultery, and per-
jury. His infallibility, according to this assembly, debased
sacred theology by innovation, and scandalized Christendom by
his intimacy with the Princess Matilda. His holiness, in the
sentence of the German prelacy, preferred harlots to women
of character, and adultery and incest to chaste and holy
matrimony. 1
The council of Brescia, in 1078, pqurtrayed his supremacy
with equal freedom. This assembly, composed of thirty. bishops,
and many princes from Italy, France, and Germany, called
Gregory a fornicator, an impostor, an assassin, a violator of the
canons, a disseminator of discord, a disturber of the Christian
commonwealth, and a pestilential patron of all madness, who
had sown scandal among friends, dissension among the peaceful,
and separation among the married. The Brescian fathers, then
declared his holiness guilty of bribery, usurpation, simony,
sacrilege, ferocity, vain-glory, ambition, impiety, obstinacy,
perverseness, sorcery, divination, necromancy, schism, heresy,
Berengarianism, infidelity, assassination, and perjury. The
sacred synod having, in this manner, done justice to his charac-
ter, deposed Gregory from his dignity by the authority of
Almighty God. 2
The fathers of Worms and Brescia supported the Emperor
Henry against Pope Gregory. Their condemnation of the
pontiff therefore has, by Labbe, Alexander, and Binius, been
reckoned the effect of personal hostility, and, on this account,
unworthy of credit. Their sentence, indeed, is no great evi-
dence of their friendship for his holiness. But these two
councils were, in this respect, in the same situation with the
other synods who have condemned any of the Roman hierarchs.
The Roman synod that condemned John the Twelfth, the
Parisian assembly that convicted Boniface, the Pisan and Con-
stantian councils that degraded Gregory, Benedict, and John,
all these were placed in similar circumstances, and actuated
by similar motives. But their sentences are not, therefore, to
be accounted the mere ebullitions of calumny. Gregory's sen-
tence of deposition against Henry was, according to the parti-
zans of popery in the present day, an unlawful act, and beyond
the limits of pontifical authority. The fathers of Worms and
Brescia, therefore, had a right to withstand Gregory in his
assumption and exercise of illegal and unconstitutional power.
Boniface equalled, if he did not surpass Gregory, in all the
arts of villany. These arts he practised on his predecessor
1 Labb. 12. 517, Cossart, 2. 11, 48. Bray. 2. 471. Alex. 18. 398.
2 Labb. 12. 646. Alexander, 18. 402.
CHARACTER OF GREGORY THE SEVENTH. 113
Celestin, a silly old dotard, who, prior to Boniface, placed on
the pontifical throne, and clothed with infallibility, governed
Christendom. He had been a visionary monk, who, in his
mountain cave, mistook his own dreams for inspiration, and
the whistling of the winds for the accents of divine revelation,
and spent his useless days in vain contemplation and in the un-
relenting maceration of his body. He considered his body, says
Alliaco, as a domestic enemy. He would descend into a pit
during the cold and snow, and remain till his clothes would be
frozen. He wore a knotted hair-cloth which mangled his flesh,
till it sometimes corrupted and produced worms. This vision-
ary, in his fanaticism, was transferred from a mountain cavern
of Apulia to the holy chair of Saint Peter ; and his election,
says Alexander, ' was the effect of divine afflatus.' 1
Cardinal Cajetan, afterwards Boniface the Eighth, was, in
the mean time, ambitious of the popedom. He formed a plan,
in consequence, to induce Celestin to resign, that he might be
substituted in his stead. Knowing Celestin's superstition, he
spoke through a tube during the stiUness of the night to the
pontiff, and enjoined him to resign the papacy. The voice of
the impostor Celestin mistook for the warning of an angel, and,
in obedience to the command, renounced his authority. His
reasons for abdication are a curiosity. He resigned on account
of debility of body, defect of information, and the malignity
of the people. Boniface, who in 1294 was chosen in his place,
imprisoned the old man with such circumstances of severity
as caused his death. 2
The character of Boniface was placed in a striking point of
view by Nogaret and Du Plesis. The pontiff had offended
Philip the Fair, King of France, by his bulls of deposition
issued against that monarch. His majesty, in consequence,
called two conventions of the three estates of the French
nation. Nogaret and Du Plesis, in these meetings, accused
Boniface of usurpation, simony, ambition, avarice, church-
robbery, extortion, tyranny, impiety, abomination, blasphemy,
heresy, infidelity, murder, and the sin for which Sodom was
consumed. His infallibility represented the gospel as a medley
of truth and falsehood, and denied the doctrine of transub-
stantiation, the Trinity, the incarnation, and the immortality of
the soul. The soul of man, his holiness affirmed, was the same
as a beast's ; and he believed no more in the Virgin Mary than
in an ass, nor in her son than in the foal of an ass. 3
1 Clestimis simplex erat. Eberhard, An. 1290. Bruy. 3. 302. Andilly, 806.
Alex. 20. 140. Canisius, 4. 223.
2 Bray. 3. 307. Mariana, 3. 256.
3 Les homnes ont les memes aines, que les betes. L'Evangile enseigne plusieors
8
114 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY!
These accusations were not mere hearsay, but supported on
authentic and unquestionable evidence. Fourteen witnesses,
men of credibility, deposed to their truth. Nogaret and Du
Plesis offered to prove all these allegations before a general
council. But Benedict and Clement, successors to Boniface,
shrunk from the task of vindicating their predecessor, or, con-
scious of his guilt, spun out the time of the trial by various
interruptions, without coming to any conclusion. 1
The simplicity of Celestin and the subtlety of Boniface made
both unhappy. Superstition made Celestin a self-tormentor ;
while his silliness, united indeed with superstition, rendered him
the easy victim of Boniface. The 'understanding and infidelity
of Boniface were just sufficient to pull destruction on his own
head. The ambition of Boniface was as fatal to its possessor, as
the submission of Celestin. Boniface, on his disappointment,
died, gnawing his fingers, and knocking his head against the
wall like one in desperation. He entered the papacy, it has
been said, like a fox, reigned like a lion, and died like a dog.
John the Twenty-third seems, if possible, to have exceeded
ah 1 his predecessors in enormity. This pontiff moved in an exten-
sive field of action, and discovered, during his whole career, the
deepest depravity. The atrocity of his life was ascertained
and published by the general council of Constance, after a
tedious trial and the examination of many witnesses. Thirty-
seven were examined on only one part of the imputations.
Many of these were bishops and doctors in law and theology,
and all were men of probity and intelligence. His holiness,
therefore, was convicted on the best authority, and indeed con-
fessed his own criminality.
The allegations against his infallibility were of two kinds.
One respected faith and the other morality. His infallibility,
in the former, was convicted of schism, heresy, deism, infidelity,
heathenism, and profanity. He fostered schism, by refusing to
resign the popedom for the sake of unity. He rejected all the
veritez, et plusieurs mensonges. La doctrine de la Trinite est fausse, 1'enfantement
d'une vierge est impossible, 1'incarnation du fils de Dieu ridicule aussi bien que la
transabstantiation. Je ne crois plus en elle qu'en une anesse, ni a son Fils, qu' au
poulain d'une anesse. Bruy. 3. 346. Du Puy, 529. Alex. 22. 319, 327. Boss.
1.278.
Papse Bonifacio multa imposuerunt enormia, puta, hseresim, simoniam, et homo-
cidia, Trivets An. 1303. Dachery, 228.
Rex Francorem ossa Bonifacii petiit ad conburandum, tanquam hseretici. Trivet.
Ann, 1306. Dachery, 3,231. Eberhard, Anno. 1303. Canisius, 4. 228.
1 Daniel, 4. 456. Du Pin, 2. 494.
Audiens Rex Francise Philippus apluribusfide dignispersonis,PapamBonifacium
detestandis infectum criminibus diversisque haeresibus irretitum. Nangis, Ann.
1303. Dachery, 3. 56.
Nogaretus abjecta crimina ediem innovavit, eaque legitime probare se offerens.
Nangis, Ann. 1309. Dachery, 3, 62. Daniel. 4. 456.
THE CHARACTER OF JOHN THE TWENTY-THIRD. 115
truths of the gospel and all the doctrines of Christianity. He
denied the immortality of the : soul, the resurrection of the body,
and the responsibility of man. The human spirit, according to
this head of the church, is, like that of the brute creation,
extinguished at death. Agreeable to his belief or rather unbe-
lief, he disregarded all the institutions of revealed religion.
These principles, he held with the utmost pertinacity. Accord-
ino- to the language of the Constantian assembly, his infalli-
bility, actuated by the devil, pertinaciously said, asserted, dog-
matized, and maintained before sundry bishops and other men
of integrity, that man, like the irrational animals, became at
death extinct both in soul and body. 1
The other imputations respected morality. The list of alle-
gations contained seventy particulars. But twenty were sup-
pressed for the honour of the apostolic see. John, says Labbe,
* was convicted of forty crimes.' 2 The Constantian fathers,
found his holiness guilty of simony, piracy, exaction, barbarity,
robbery, massacre, murder, lying, perjury, fornication, adultery,
incest, constupration,and sodomy ; and characterized his suprem-
acy as the oppressor of the poor, the persecutor of the just,
the pillar of iniquity, the column of simony, the slave of sensu-
ality, the alien of virtue, the dregs of apostacy, the inventor of
malevolence, the mirror of infamy, and, to finish the climax, an
incarnated devil. The accusation, says Niem, ' contained all
mortal sins and an infinity of abominations.'
His simony, according to the council, appeared in the way
in which he obtained the cardinalship, the popedom, and sold
indulgences. He gained the cardinal and pontifical dignity by
bribery and violence. He extorted vast sums by the traffic of
indulgences in several cities, such as Utrecht, Mechlin, and
Antwerp. He practised piracy with a high hand, during the
war between Ladislas and Lewis, for the kingdom of Naples.
His exactions, on many occasions, were attended with massacre
arid inhumanity. His treatment of the citizens of Bologna und
Rome will supply a specimen of his cruelty and extortions.
He exercised legatine authority for some time in Bologna,
and nearly depopulated the city by barbarity, injustice, tyranny,
rapine, dilapidation, and murder. He oppressed Rome and
dissipated the patrimony of Peter. He augmented former
imposts and invented new ones, and then abandoned the capital
to be pillaged and sacked by the enemy. His desertion exposed
the women to the brutality of the soldiery, and the men to
spoliation, imprisonment, assassination, and galley-slavery. He
1 Labb. 16. 178. Bruys, 4. 41. Du Pin, 3. 13. Crabb. 2. 1050. Bin. 7. 1036.
8 CriminibTis quadraginta convictus. Labb. 15. 1378, et 16, 154.
8*
116 THE- VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
poisoned Alexander his predecessor, and Daniel who was his
physician. His conduct, through life, evinced incorrigibility,
pertinacity, obduracy, lying, treachery, falsehood, perjury, and
a diabolical spirit. 1
His youth was spent in defilement and impudicity. He passed
his nights in debauchery and his days in sleep. He violated
married women and deflowered holy nuns. Three hundred of
these devoted virgins were the unwilling victims of his licen-
tiousness. He was guilty of incest with three maiden sisters
and with his brother's wife. He gratified his unnatural lust on
a mother and her son ; while the father with difficulty escaped.
He perpetrated the sin of sodom on many youths, of which one,
contracting in consequence a mortal malady, died, the martyr
of poUution and iniquity. 2
Such was the pontiff who, according to the Florentine coun-
cil, was 'the vicar-general of God, the head of the church, and
the father and teacher of all Christians.' His holiness, it would
appear, was indeed the father of a great many, though perhaps
his offspring were not all Christians. The council of Constance
indeed deposed John from the papacy. But pope Martin after-
ward raised him to the cardinalship, and treated him with the
same honour and respect as the rest of the sacred college. His
remains, after death, were honourably interred in John's church.
John, with all his miscreancy, was elevated to a dignity second
only to the pontifical supremacy. Jerome and Huss, notwith-
standing their sanctity, were, by an unerring council, tried
without justice and burned without mercy.
Sixtus the Fourth, who was elected in 1471, walked in the
footsteps of his predecessors, Gregory, Boniface, and John.
This pontiff has, with reason, been accused of murder and
debauchery. He conspired for the assassination of Julian and
Laurentius, two of the Medicean family. He engaged Pazzi,
who was chief of the faction, which, in Florence, was hostile to
the Medici, in the stratagem. Pazzi was supported in the
diabolical attempt by Riario, Montesecco, Salvian, and Poggio.
The conspirators, who were many, attacked Julian and Lauren-
tius during mass on Sunday. Julian was killed. Laurentius
fled wounded to the vestry, where he was saved from the fury
of the assassins. The Medicean faction, in the mean time,
1 Labb. 16. 154, 158, 184. Bruy. 4. 3. Lenfant, 1. 281.
2 Multos Juvenes destruxit in posterioribus, quorum unus in fluxu sanguinis
decessit. Violavit tres virgines sorores, et cognovit matrein, etfilium, et pater vix
evasit. Hard. 4. 228. Lenfan. 1. 290. II etoit clairement prouve, qu'il avoit
joui de la Mere et du Fils, et que le Pere avoit eu de la peine a echapper & ses
criminels desirs. Bruy. 4. 49. Labb. 16. 163. Bin. 7. 1035.
CHARACTER OP JOHN THE TWENTY-THIRD. 117
mustered and assailed the conspirators, on whom they took an
ample and summary vengeance. 1
Sixtus patronized debauchery as well as murder. His holi-
ness, for this worthy purpose, established brothels extraordinary
in Rome. His infallibility, in consequence, became head, not
only of the church, but also of the stews. He presided with
ability and applause in two important departments, and was the
vicar-general of God and of Venus. These seminaries of pollu-
tion, it seems, brought a great accession to the ecclesiastical
revenue. The goddesses,who were worshipped in these temples,
paid a weekly tax from the wages of iniquity to the viceroy of
heaven. The sacred treasury, by this means, received from this
apostolic tribute an annual augmentation of 20,000 ducats. THis
supremacy himself, was, it seems, a regular and steady customer
in his new commercial establishments. He nightly worshipped,
with great zeal and devotion, in these pontifical fanes which
he had erected to the Cytherean goddess. 2 Part of the tribute,
therefore, from these schools of the Grecian divinity, his holi-
ness, as was right, expended on the premises.
Alexander the Sixth, in the common opinion, surpassed all
his predecessors in atrocity. This monster, whom humanity
disowns, seems to have excelled all his rivals in the arena of
villainy, and outstripped every competitor on the stadium of mis-
creancy. Sannazarius compared Alexander to Nero, Caligula,
and Heliogabalus : and Pope, in his celebrated Essay on Man,
likened Borgia, which was the family name, to Cataline. This
pontiff, according to cotemporary historians, was actuated, to
measureless excess, with vanity, ambition, cruelty, covetousness,
rapacity, and sensuality, and void of all faith, honour, sincerity,
truth, fidelity, decency, religion, shame, modesty, and compunc-
tion. " 'His debauchery, perfidy, ambition, malice, inhumanity,
and irreligion,' says Daniel, ' made him the execration of all
Europe.' Rome, under his administration and by his example,
became the sink of filthiness, the head-quarters of atrocity, and
the hot-bed of prostitution, murder, and robbery. 3
Hypocrisy formed one trait in his early character. His
youth, indeed, evinced to men of discernment symptoms of
baseness and degeneracy. But he possessed, in a high degree,
1 Bayle, 2598. Bray. 4. 241. Moreri, 8. 304.
2 Agrippa, c. LXIV. Bray. 4. 260. Bayle, 3. 2602.
3 Sannazarius ilium cum Caligulis confert, cum Neronibus et Heliogabalis.
Sann. II. Montfaucon, Monum. 4. 85.
Les debordemens publics, les perfidies, 1'ambition demesuree, 1'avarice insatia-
ble, la cruaute, 1'irreligion en avoient fait 1'obiet de 1' execration detoute 1'Europe.
Daniel, 7. 84.
Mulieribus maxime addictus. Nee noctu tutum per iirbem iter, nee interdiu ex-
tra urbem. Roma jam carnificia facta erat. Alex. 23. 113.
118 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY :
the art of concealment from common observation. His dissimu-
lation appeared, in a particular manner, on his appointment
to the cardinalship. He walked with downcast eyes, affected
devotion and humility, and preached repentance and sanctity.
He imposed, by these arts, on the populace, who compared
him to Job, Moses, and Solomon.
But depravity lurked under this specious display ; and broke
out, in secret, in sensuality, and incest. He formed an illicit
connexion with a widow who resided at Rome, and with her
two daughters. His passions, irregular and brutal, could find
gratification only in enormity. His licentiousness, after the
widow's death, drove him to the incestuous enjoyment of her
daughter, the notorious and infamous Vannoza. She became
his mistress after her mother's decease. His holiness, in the
pursuit of variety and the perpetration of atrocity, afterward
formed a criminal connexion with his own daughter, the witty,
the learned, the gay, and the abandoned Lucretia. She was
mistress to her own father and brother. Pontanus, in con-
^equence, represented Lucretia as Alexander's daughter, wife,
and daughter-in-law. 1 Peter's palace, in this manner, became
a scene of debauchery and abomination.
Simony and assassination were as prominent in Alexander's
character as incest and debauchery. He purchased the papacy,
and afterward, for remuneration and to glut his rapacity, he
sold its offices and preferments. He first bought, it has been
said, and then sold, the keys, the altar, and the Saviour. He
murdered the majority of the cardinals who raised him to the
popedom, and seized their estates. He had a family of spurious
sons and daughters, and for the aggrandizement of these chil-
dren of illegitimacy, he exposed to sale all things sacred and
profane, and violated and outraged all the laws of God and
man. 2
His death was the consequence of an attempt to poison the
rich cardinals for the sake of their possessions. Alexander and
Borgia, father and son, actuated with this design, invited the
Sacred College to a sumptuous banquet, near the fountain in
the delightful garden of Belvidere. Poisoned wine was pre-
pared for the unsuspecting guests. But the poisoned cup was,
by mistake, handed to the father-sand soil, who drunk without
knowing their danger. Borgia's constitution, for a time, over-
came the virulence of the poison. But Alexander soon died
by the stratagem he had prepared for the murder of his friends. 3
1 Alexandri filia, nupta, nurus. Pontanus in Bruy. 4. 280.
2 Moreri, 1. 270. 3 Labb. 19. 523. Mont. Monum. 4. 84.
PROFLIGATE CONDUCT OF ALEXANDER THE SIXTH. 119
Julius the Second succeeded Alexander in the papacy and
in iniquity. His holiness was guilty of simony, chicanery, per-
iury, thievery, empoisonment, assassination, drunkenness, im-
pudicity, and sodomy. He bribed the cardinals to raise him
to the popedom ; and employed, on the occasion, all kinds of
falsehood and trickery. He swore to convoke a general council,
and violated his oath. 1
His infallibility's drunkenness- was proverbial. He was
4 mighty to drink wine.' He practised incontinency as well as
inebriation, and the effects of this crime shattered his consti-
tution. One of his historians represents his holiness as all
corroded with the disease which, in the judgment of God, often
a.ttends this kind of filthiness. The atrocity for which Sodom
was consumed with fire from heaven is also reckoned among
his deeds of pollution and excess. 2
His ingratitude and enmity to the French nation formed one
dark feature in his character. The French king protected him
against Alexander who sought his ruin. The French nation
was his asylum in the time of danger and in the day of distress.
This friendship he afterwards repaid with detestation, because
Lewis patronized the convocation of a general council. Julius
offered rewards to any person who would kill a Frenchman.
One of these rewards was of an extraordinary, or rather among
the popes of an ordinary kind. He granted a pardon of all
sins to any person who would murder only an individual of the
French nation. The vicegerent of heaven conferred the for-
giveness of all sin, as a compensation for perpetrating the
shocking crime of assassination. 3
Leo the Tenth, in 1513, succeeded Julius in the popedom
and in enormity. This pontiff has been accused of atheism,
and of calling the Gospel, in the presence of cardinal Bembo,
a fable. Mirandula, who mentions a pope that denied God, is,
by some, supposed to have referred to Leo. His holiness, says
Jovius, was reckoned guilty of sodomy with his chamberlains.
These reports, however, are uncertain. But Leo, beyond all
question, was addicted to pleasure, luxury, idleness, ambition,
unchastity, and sensuality beyond all bounds of decency ; and
spent whole days in the company of musicians and buffoons. 4
Seventeen of the Roman pontiffs were perjurers. These
were Felix, Formosus, John, Gregory, Pascal, Clement, John,
1 Alex. 23. 118. Bruy. 4. 371. Caranza, 602.
2 Tout ronge deverole. Bruy. 4. 371. Zuing. 140. Duobus nobilissimi generis
adolescentibus stuprum intulerit. Wolf. 2. 21.
3 Hotman, 110.
4 Non caruit etiam infamia, quod parum honeste nomiullos e cubiculariis ada-
mare. JOY. 192. Bruy. 4. 417. Guiccia. XIV.
120 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Boniface, Innocent, Gregory, Benedict, John, Eugenius, Paul,
Innocent, Julius, and Paul. Felix and the rest of the Roman
clergy swore to acknowledge no other pontiff during the life of
Liberius, whom the emperor had banished. The clergy, not-
withstanding, immediately after, while Liberius survived,
elected Felix to that dignity, which, without hesitation, he
accepted. 1 A perjured Roman bishop then presided among
the perjured Roman clergy.
Formosus was deposed and excommunicated by Pope John,
who made him swear never again to enter his bishopric or the
Roman city. Pope Martin, in the way of his profession, and
with great facility, dissolved the oath and restored Formosus to
his dignity. The obligation having, in this manner, undergone
a chymical analysis in the pontifical laboratory, Formosus re-
tnrned with a good conscience and with great propriety to his
episcopal seat, and, in the end, to the Roman See. 2 John the
Twelfth, in 957, swore fealty to Otho on the body of Peter.
This solemn obligation, his holiness afterward violated and
revolted to Adalbert the Emperor's enemy. 3 Gregory the
Seventh took an oath, inconsistent with the acceptance of the
Pontifical dignity with which he was afterward vested. The
council of Worms, in consequence, in 1076, declared his holi-
ness guilty of perjury. Gregory, besides, made Rodolph of
Germany break the oath of fidelity which he had taken to the
Emperor Henry. 4
Pascal the Second, in 1111, granted to Henry an oath, the
right of investiture, and promised never to excommunicate the
Emperor. Pascal, afterward in a synod of the Lateran, excom-
municated Henry. His holiness excused his conduct and
pacified his conscience by an extraordinary specimen of
casuistry. I forswore, said his infallibility, the excommunica-
tion of his majesty by myself, but not by a council. Bravo !
Pope Pascal. Clement the Fifth, in 1307, engaged on oath to
Philip the Fair, to condemn the memory and burn the bones
of Boniface the Eighth. This obligation, his holiness violated.
John the Twenty-second, in 1316, swore to Cardinal Napoleon,
to mount neither horse nor mule till he had established the
holy See at Rome. His holiness, however, established his
apostolic court, not at Rome, but at Avignon. He satisfied
his conscience by sailing instead of riding, and substituted a
1 Clerici juraverunt quod nullum alium susceperunt. Plurixni perjuraverunt,
Crabb. 1. 347. Du Pin, 1. 190. Prosper, 292.
s Alex. 15. 88. .Bruy. 1. 187. Luitp. VI. 6.
3 II oublia bientot le serment de fidelite. Bray. 2. 242. Joannes Pontifex,
immemor juramenti prsestiti, Adelberto se conjuiixit. Labb. 11. 872.
* Du Pin, 2. 214. Labb. 12. 616. Giannon, X. 5.
PERJURED PONTIFFS. L21
ship for a land conveyance. John's casuistry was nearly as
good as Pascal's. 1
Boniface, Innocent, Gregory, Benedict, and John engaged
on oath to resign the Papacy ; but, on being required to fulfil
the obligation, these viceroys of heaven refused. The oaths,
on the occasion, were of the most solemnkind. Innocent swore
on the holy Evangelists ; and Gregory, in the name of God,
Lady Mary, the Apostles, and all the celestial court. Benedict
swore on the gospels and the wood of the cross. The oaths
were attended with dreadful imprecations. The attempt of these
vice-gods to evade the accomplishment of their engagements,
presents a scene of equivocation and chicanery, which is un-
equalled perhaps in the annals of the world. Benedict, said
the Parisian University, endeavoured to escape by a forced in-
terpretation, contrary to the intention of the obligation. Gregory
and Benedict, says Giannone, swore and then shuffled about
the performance, and, according to Alexander, resolved to re-
tain their dignity contrary to the sanctity of a solemn oath.
Gregory and Benedict, however, on this occasion, discovered
some candor. Gregory, said the council of Pisa, contrary to
his obligation, declared publicly and frequently, that the way
of cession was unjust and diabolical, and, in this, he agreed
with Benedict. Gregory, Benedict, and John were, in the
councils of Pisa and Constance, condemned for perjury. 2
Eugenius the Fourth, in 1439, was condemned in the council
of Basil for perjury. Paul the Second, as well as Innocent the
Eighth, bound himself by oath, to certain regulations, and
afterwards disregarded his engagement. Julius the Second
took an oath on the gospels, binding himself to caU a general
council ; but afterward deterred the fulfilment of the treaty.
The breach of his obligation occasioned the convocation of the
second council of Pisa. Paul the Fourth, in 1556, before the
seventh month of his Papacy, created seven cardinals, though
he had sworn in the conclave before his election, to add only
four to the sacred college for two years after his accession.
Seventeen popes, it appears, at the least, were foresworn. 3 The
1 Bray. 2. 580. et 3. 360, 390. Du Pin, 2. 281.
2 Dixit Gregorius publice et frequenter, quod via cessionis erat mala, injusta, et
diabolica, contra juramenta, congruens in his cum Benedicto. Labbl 15. 1202.
Du Pin, 3. 16. Juramentis per Joannem Papam super hoc factis deviativum.
Labb. 16. 142. Contra eorum juramenta et vota. Labb. 15. 1131. Giannon, XXIV.
6. Bray. 3. 600. Platina, 246. In dignitate retinenda, contra juramenti solemnis
religionem. Alex. 24. 441.
Continuata perjuriorum serie, non magis postrema quam priora ejus promissa
servavit. Labb. 15. 1331.
3 Synodo, juramentum violatum occasionem dedit. Alexander, 33. 118. Jules
oublia bientot ses sermens. Mariana, 5. 718. Boss. 3. 81. Carranza, 602. Paolo,
2. 27. Bray. 4. 223, 619. Choisi, 8. 275.
122 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
church, therefore, had seventeen perjured heads, and God,
seventeen perjured vicars-general. .
These heretical and abandoned pontiffs, according to many
eminent partizans of Romanism, were not true heads of the
church or vicars of Jesus. This was the opinion of Jacobatius,
Leo, Mirandula, Baronius, Du Pin, Giannone and Geoffry.
Jacobatius declares ' the election of a heretic for a pope to be
null.' 1 Pope Leo the Great, writing to Julian, excludes all
who deny the faith from the pale of the church. These, says
the Roman hierarch, as 'they reject the doctrines of the gospel,
are no members of the ecclesiastical body.' The partizan of
heresy, therefore, unfit, according to Leo, for being a member,
is much more incapable of being the head. Mirandula men-
tions one Roman pontiff who, in the excess of infidelity, disbe-
lieved the immortality of the soul ; and another, who, excelling
in absurdity, denied the existence of God. These, the noble
author maintains, ' could be no popes.' The ruffians who were
raised to the Papacy by Theodora and Marozia, Baronius de-
clares, ' were no popes, but monsters ;' and the church, on
these occasions, was, according to the Cardinal, ' without any
earthly head.' Boniface the Seventh, who, says Baronius, ' was
a thief, a miscreant, and a murderer, is to be ranked, not among
the popes, but among -the notorious robbers of the age.' Du
Pin and Giannone, the popish Sorbonnist and Civilian, quote
and approve the sentence of Baronius the Roman Cardinal.
The pope, says GeofFry, ' if he depart from the faith, is no
pastor.' 2 The spiritual reign of these sovereign ruffians must
have created several interruptions in the popedom, and de-
stroyed many necessary links in the boasted chain of the
pontifical succession. The ^concatenated series of the Roman
hierarchs, therefore, with the unbroken continuity of the
sacerdotal authority, is, in the admission even of Romish doc-
tors, a celebrated nonentity.
1 Papa heereticus, tanquam separates ab ecclesia, non est papa, et electio de eo
facta erit nulla. Jacob. III. p. 107.
2 Bell. II. 30. Canus, IV. 2. Bin. 3. 7. Miran. th. 4. Turrecrema, IV. 20.
"Spon. 900. I. et 985. II. Du Pin, 2. 156. Giannon, VII. 6.
Baronius 6crit, qu'alors Rome etoit sans Pape. On ne voyoit alors plus des
Papes, mais des monstres. Giannon, VII. 5.
Si exorbitaverit a fide, jam non est pastor. Geof. Ep. 194. Apol. 385.
CHAPTER III.
COUNCILS.
THREE STSTEMS ITALIAN SYSTEM BECKONS THE GENERAL COUNCILS AT EIGHTEEN
TEMPORART REJECTION OF THE SECOND, THIRD, FOURTH, FIFTH, SEVENTH, AND
TWELFTH GENERAL COUNCILS CISALPINE OR FRENCH SCHOOL REJECTS THE
COUNCILS OF LYONS, FLORENCE, LATERAN, AND TRENT ADOPTS THOSE OF PISA,
CONSTANCE, BASIL, AND THE SECOND OF PISA SYSTEM OF A THIRD PARTY
UNIVERSALITY OF GENERAL COUNCILS ITS CONDITIONS LEGALITY OF GENERAL
COUNCILS ITS CONDITIONS CONVOCATION, PRESIDENCY, AND CONFIRMATION
MEMBERS UNANIMITY FREEDOM.
THE general councils'in ecclesiastical history are as uncertain
as the Roman pontiffs. The succession of the popes and the
enumeration of the synods are attended with similar difficulty,
and have occasioned similar diversity of opinion. Gibert ad-
mits ' the uncertainty of the western oecumenical councils.'
Moreri grants ' the disagreement of authors in their enumeration.
One reckons more and another less ; whilst some account these
universal and approved, which others regard as provincial, na-
tional, or condemned.' 1 A full detail of popish variety indeed
would, on this topic, fill folios. This, however, is unnecessary.
A statement of each individual's peculiar notions, on this, or
indeed on any other subject, would be tedious and useless.
The opinions entertained on this question, not merely by a few
persons, but by an influential party, are worthy of observation ;
and these only, in the following pa,ges, shall be detailed.
Three jarring and numerous factions have, on the subject of
general councils, divided and agitated the Romish communion.
One party reckons the general councils at eighteen. A second
faction counts the same number, but adopts different councils.
These reject the councils of Lyons, Florence, Lateran, and
Trent ; and adopt, in their stead, those of Pisa, Constance,
Basil, and the second of Pisa. A third division omits the
1 Numerus Conciliorum Generalium, in Occidente habitorum, est incertuB.
Gibert, 1. 76. Tons les auteurs ne conviennent pas du nombre des conciles gene-
raux ; les uns en comptent plus, les autres moins. Les uns en reconnoissent de
gen&raux. approuvez, que les autres regardent ou comme non generaux, ou comme
non approuvez. Moreri, 3. 539.
124 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
whole or a part of the councils which intervened between the
eighth and sixteenth of these general conventions. The whole
of these are omitted by Clement, Abrahamus, and Pole, and a
part by Sixtus, Carranza, Silvius, and the council of Constance.
One party in the popish communion reckons the general
councils at eighteen. Of these, five met respectively at Ephesus,
Chalcedon, Vienna, Florence, and Trent ; two convened at
Nicsea, two at Lyons, four at Constantinople, and five at the
Lateran. The patrons of this enumeration are, in general, the
Italian faction, headed by the pope, and maintaining his temporal
as well as his spiritual authority. Baronius and BeUarmine in
particular, have patronized this scheme with learning and
ability, but with a total disregard of all honour and honesty.
Bellarmine, besides the eighteen which are approved, reckons
eight general councils which are reprobated, and six which are
partly admitted and partly rejected. One, which is the Pisan
strange to tell is neither adopted nor proscribed. Bellarmine's
distinctions and decisions indeed are badly calculated to establish
the authority of councils. His hair-breadth distinctions and
arbitrary decisions, on the contrary, tend only to overthrow all
confidence in his determinations and in universal councils. 1
All the eighteen, however, were not accounted valid or
unerring on their first publication. Six, marked now with the
seal of approbation and infallibility, were, for a long series of
time, in whole or in part, rejected by a part or by the whole
of Christendom. These are the second, third, fourth, fifth,
seventh, and twelfth general councils. The canons of the
second, according to Alexander and Thomassin, were not re-
ceived by the Latins till the Lateran council in 1215, a period
of 834 years after their promulgation. Its faith indeed, in
opposition to Macedonianism, corresponded with that of the
westerns, and was, in consequence, admitted by Damasus,
Gelasius, and Gregory. Its creed, however, was recognized
only on the authority of divine revelation and ancient faith.
Leo rejected its canons. Simplicius and Felix, enumerating
the councils which they acknowledged, mention only those of
Nicaea, Ephesus, and Chalcedon. Gregory the Great declared
that the Roman church possessed neither the acts nor canons
of the Byzantine assembly, though his infallibility, in glorious
inconsistency, elsewhere affirmed that he esteemed the four
oecumenical councils of Nicaga, Ephesus, Constantinople, and
Chalcedon as the four gospels. 2
1 Bellar. I. 57.
2 Alex. 7. 235. 9.155. Thorn. 2. 15. Pithou, 29. Crabb.I. 991. Godeau. 4.
498. Moreri, 3, 592.
IN THE RECEPTION OF COUNCILS. 125
The Ephesian synod was anathematized, and, for several
years, rejected by the orientals. Its universality, during its
celebration, consisted in a few Asians and Egyptians. These
being assembled, the sainted Cyril, who presided, and who,
actuated by prejudice and temerity, precipitated the first ses-
sion, condemned Nestorius, before the arrival of the westerns
or orientals, and contrary to all justice or even decency. Sixty-
eight bishops, and Count Candidian, who represented the
emperor, protested against Cyril's conduct, and absented them-
selves from his cabal. The remainder, reduced to 160, con-
stituted a hopeful universality, a dashing general council, and
a blessed representation of the church. Candidian, who
wielded the civil and military authority, reasoned when he
should have punished the sainted ruffian and his lawless myr-
midons. Cyril's faction, however, contemptible as it was, in
the course of one day, tried, and deposed Nestorius, patriarch
of Constantinople. 1
John, patriarch of Antioch, celebrated for his wisdom and
piety, arrived five days after the condemnation of Nestorius,
accompanied by twenty-six suffragans. His arrival was fol-
lowed by one of the most distinguished cursing-matches of
antiquity. The sacred bishops, on occasions of this kind, had
immediate recourse to cursing, which uniformly gave ease to
their conscience and vent to their zeal. The holy men, for
comfort, displayed their devotion in a litany of execrations.
Their ardent piety and benevolence, struggling for utterance,
burst in ebullitions of anathemas. Cyril and Nestorius, prior
to the meeting of the council, had, in the spirit of their MASTER,
exchanged mutual imprecations. The saint, in an Alexandrian
synod, in 430, had launched twelve anathemas at the heretic ;
and the heretic, inclined to make some return, thanked the saint
in kind, and with a corresponding number of these inverted
blessings. John and Cyril, now at Ephesus, engaged in similar
warfare. John and his partizans, amounting to fifty, posted at
the Ephesian inn, and informed by Candidian of the transactions
of the adverse party, congratulated Cyril, Memnon, and their
accomplices with deposition and excommunication. Nestorius,
says Godeau, ' instead of recognizing the hand of God in the
thunderbolts of the council, continued, with redoubled fury to
rebel against the divine majesty.' This honour Cyril and his
faction, entrenched in Mary's church, repaid with cordiality and
devotion. 2 The spiritual artillery continued, for some time, to
1 Socrat. VII. 34. Evag. I. 3. 4. Liberatus, c. IV. Spon. 430. V. Crabb. 1.
534. Godeau. 3. 292, 302, 308.
3 Labb. 3. 946, 971. Crabb. 1. 534, Godeau, 3. 301. Libera. c. VI.
126 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
fulminate mutual anathemas ; and these reciprocal benedictions
were the only tokens of esteem- which the sacred synods, in
their mutual salutations, condescended to interchange.
The Greeks called the second Ephesian council a gang of
felons, and the designation would, with equal propriety, have
characterized the former assembly, which, if possible, excelled
its successor in all the arts of villany. The character of Cyril
and the council have been portrayed, in strong colours, by the
orientals, Candidian, Isidorus, and Gennadius. The orientals
called Cyril's decision tyranny and heretical perfidy. Can-
didian represented the Ephesian transactions as contrary to all
order and regularity. Isidorus accused Cyril of rashness, and
the Ephesians of seeking revenge instead of promoting truth
or piety. Gennadius declared Cyril guilty of blasphemy;
while Dionysius, who wrote in 527, and whose collection had
the greatest authority in the west, entirely omits the Ephesian
council. 1
The contest was, at last, determined by the emperor. The
faith, which, with animosity but without decision, had been
debated by the ecclesiastical body, was, at length, adjusted by
the civil authority. The unity of the mediator's person was,
properly speaking, established, not by the church but by the
state. The appeal was, not to the Pope, but to the emperor ;
and the synodal decision was reviewed, not by Celestin but by
Theodosius. The sovereign and his courtiers, after a protracted
and varying negociation, reinstated Cyril and banished Nesto-
rius. The orientals, however, persevered for several years in
opposition. But the oriental diocese, in the end, was reduced
to submission, and the church to unity ; not indeed by ecclesi-
astical authority, but by imperial power. 2
The Latins proscribed the twenty-eighth canon of the Chal-
cedonian council, which conferred the same honour on the
Byzantine patriarch as on the Roman pontiff. Leo and after
him Simplicius opposed it with all their might, but without any
success, and confirmed only the faith of the council. Its
authority, in consequence, has been rejected by the Latins :
though Pelagius, Gregory, Pascal, and Boniface acknowledged
the first four councils. 3
The second Byzantine or fifth general council,under Justinian,
was, for some time, rejected by Pope Vigilius, by the Africans,
1 Crabb. 1. 552. Bray. 1. 214. Du Pin, 1. 645. laid. 1. 310. Du Pin, 1. 407,
424. Facun. II. 4. Giaun. III. 6.
2 Evag. I. 5. Libera. c. VI. Labo. 3. 574. Godeau, 3.310.
3 Nullum unquam potuerunt nostrum obtinere consensum. Leo, Ep. 53. Li-
berate, c. XIII. Sine consensuPapseetlegatorumejus. Canisius, 4, 69. Carranza,
267. Pithou, 14.
IN THE RECEPTION OP COUNCILS. 127
and by many in Illyria, Italy, Liguria, Tuscany, Istria, France,
Spain, and Ireland. The emperor convened this congress
against the three chapters, a momentous subject, composed by
Theodoret, Ibas, and Theodoras. Vigilius, with sixteen bishops
and three deacons from Italy, Africa, and the east, was in Con-
stantinople during the several sessions of the council, and
though invited, refused to attend. But the synod, notwith-
standing, proceeded in its task. His infallibility, supported by
his partizans, opposed the emperor and council, but in vain,
with all his pontifical power and authority. He formed his
bishops and deacons into a separate synod, issued a constitution
defending, though in qualified terms, the three chapters and
their authors, and interdicting by the authority of the holy,
apostolic see, all further discussion on the subject. The coun-
cil, in reply, pronounced anathemas against the persons and
defenders of Ibas, Theodoret, and Theodorus. His holiness,
therefore, being a partizan of these authors, who were con-
demned by the council, was anathematized for abetting heresy.
Vigilius refused to sanction the decision of the synod, and Jus-
tinian, without any ceremony, banished his holiness. The
pontiff's expatriation brightened his understanding, and enabled
him to see the subject in a new point of view. His infallibility,
through the happy effect of exile in illuminating his intellect,
felt it his duty to approve what he had formerly condemned. 1
Heresy, by the magic touch of imperial power, was, by a speedy
transformation, converted into Catholicism, and error, by the
same process, transubstantiated into orthodoxy.
The Italians, Tuscans, Ligurians, Istrians, French, Spanish,
Illyrians, and Africans, who had the effrontery to gainsay the
will of the emperor, were, like the vicar-general of God, con-
verted by the sword of Justinian. Reparatus the Carthaginian
bishop was dismissed, and Primasius, by imperial authority,
was substituted, and the Africans, in general, submitted. The
Italian clergy who opposed, were banished. The French
yielded to the storm. But the Ligurians, and Istrians, who
were under the dominion of the Lombards, and, in consequence,
feared no persecution from the emperor, avowed a bolder and
more protracted opposition. The schism, from its commence
ment till the end, lasted near a century. 2
The seventh general council, which assembled at Nicaea, in
favour of image-worship, was disclaimed for more than a cen-
tury. Irene's son Constantino, in the, east, on obtaining a
shadow of power, proceeded, saysPlatina, to repeal the synodal
1 Alex. 12. 31, Maimb. 42. Crabb, 2. 91.
2 Godeau, 4. 159, 446. Bruy. 1. 343.
128 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEEY :
and imperial laws which countenanced emblematic worship.
Leo, Michael, and Theophilus followed Constantine's example,
with determined resolution and signal effect. Two councils,
one in 814 and the other in 821, decided against the Nicene
assembly. The Nicene acts remained in a state of proscription
among the Greeks, till the final establishment of idolatry by
the Empress Theodora. 1
The Nicene decisions were disclaimed by the western emperor
and the Latin church. The Caroline books, with the Parisian
and Frankfortian councils, showed the minds of the Latins in
unequivocal terms. The council of Frankfort exhibited a repre-
sentation of the western clergy from England, Italy, France,
and Germany ; and amounted in all to three hundred. Ac-
cording to Alexander, 'the French did not, in former times,
reckon the second Nicene among the general councils.' The
Frankfortians, say Aventin, Hincmar, and Regina, rescinded
the decisions of the false Grecian Synod in favour of image-
worship. Ivo and Aimon also proscribed this convention.
Nicholas and Adrian, who lived, the one seventy-five and the
other eighty years after the Nicene assembly, reckon only six
general councils. 2 The Nicene congress, therefore, was ex-
cluded by these pontiffs. The cabal of Nicsea, for it deserves
no better name, was, in this manner, accounted, for a series of
years, a mere Grecian synod and of no general authority. But
its merits, it seems, grew with its age, and, in process of time,
the patrons of Romanism and idolatry began to invest the con-
temptible junto with the attributes of universality, holiness, and
infallibility.
The canons of the twelfth general council, which met at the
Lateran palace in 1215, lay, for 322 years, neglected and un-
known. This celebrated ecclesiastical congress has, in latter
days, occasioned a wonderful diversity of opinion. The
councils of Oxford, Constance, and Trent maintained its uni-
versality and authority. Bellarmine supported its ecumenicity,
accounted its rejection a heresy, and called Barclay, who re-
flected on its third canon, a pagan and a publican. Perron,
Possevin, and Alexander entertained a high opinion of it. But
this flattering picture is reversed by Paris, Nauclerus, Platina,
Godefrid, Antony, Severin, Du Pin, and Barclay. The
Platin. 107. Crabb. 2. 457. Bin. 6. 232. Theod. Ep. XV.
2 Nicaena Secunda Synodus olim a Gallis inter oecumenicos non fuit. Alex. 25.
630. In Frankfordiensi concilio scita Grsecorum de adorandis imagmibus rescissa
sunt. Aven. 337. Pseudo-synodus Grsecorum destructa est. Hincm. c. XX.
Mabillon, 2. 495. Pithou, 18. Omnium sanctorum atque venerandorum sex con-
ciliorum autoritate. Labb. 9. 1309. Nihil audemus prsedicare, quod possit
Nicaeno concilio, et quinque caeterorum conciliorum regulis obviare. Adrian, II.
in Du Pin, 395.
IN THE RECEPTION OP COUNCILS. 129
council, according to these historians and critics, did nothing ;
and ended in laughter and mockery. Its canons, in all their
worth or worthlessness, rested, for more than three centuries,
in a state of dormancy, unknown to pontiff, cardinal, bishop,
critic, or historian ; and Christendom certainly would have been
at no loss, had they slept till eternity. The canons, such as
they are, were not, as might have been expected, printed at last
from a manuscript in the Vatican or from the Pope's own
library ; but extracted, in the year 1537 by Cochlaeus, a Lu-
theran, from a German library, and transmitted to Colonia for
insertion in Crabb's collection of the councils, though they are
not mentioned in Merlin's edition of 1535. 1 The document, in
this manner, lay concealed for ages ; and Christendom was de-
frauded of its precious instruction till after the reformation,
when its dazzling truths, through the research of a Protestant
theologian, burst, in ah 1 their splendour and infallibility, on an
admiring and enlightened world. The inquisition, in particular,
must have felt a great want of its third canon, which teaches
the most approved and efficient means of persecution and ex-
tirpation of heresy ; though, to do the inquisitors justice, they
could rack the suspected in the secret ceU, and burn the
heretical at a public act of faith, in a Christian spirit and with
an edifying effect, without the direction of the infallible Lateran
council.
Such is the scheme of the Italian faction and their partizans
on general councils, and such the diversity of opinion on this
subject. A second party rejects the councils of Lyons,
Florence, Lateran, and Trent. These, in general, are the
French school, who disclaim pontifical infallibility and deposi-
tion of kings.
The French reject the council of Lyons, which is the
thirteenth in the plan of the Italian school. The patrons of
pontifical despotism and regal deposition extol this assembly to
the sky. Their opponents, on the contrary, load it with
ridicule and contempt. Paris, Albert, Tritnemius, Platina,
and Palmerius deny its universality ; and the same idea was
entertained by Launoy, Du Pin, and Widrington. Nicolin,
Silvius, Sixtus, and Carranza, in their collections, have omitted
it as unworthy of general or public attention. Onuphrius, says
Du Pin, ' seems to have been the first who invested this assem-
bly with universality.' 2
1 Aldx. 21. 500, 595. Platina, in Inn. III. Du Pin, 572. Walsh, 65, Paris,
262. Doyle, 503.
2 Launoy, ad Raym. Platin. in Inn. IV. Giannon, XVII. 3. Du Pin. 551
Caron, 82.'
9
130 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
The French also reject the Florentine council, which they
call a conventicle, neither general nor lawful. Such have been
the representations of Alexander, Du Pin, and Moreri. 1 The
French and Italians differed on this subject in the council of
Trent. The Italians asserted its universality ; while the French
refused this title to an assembly, which, they said, was cele-
brated by a few Italians and four Grecians. The Florentians
raised the pontiff above a council, and, in consequence, offended
the Gallicans, who place the supremacy in an universal and
lawful synod. The assembly of Florence, besides, was contem-
porary with that of Basil, which, in the French account, was
general ; and two general councils, it is plain, could not coexist
in Christendom.
The fifth council of the Lateran, in 1512, under Julius and
Leo, is, in a particular manner, obnoxious to the French nation.
Its authority was opposed by the French king, clergy, and par-
liament. The French, according to Gibert and Moreri, never
accounted the Lateran assembly general. Lewis the Twelfth,
indeed, who had patronized the synod of Pisa in opposition to
that of the Lateran, submitted, in 1513, to the latter convention,
which, in accordance with his majesty's will, annulled the
pragmatic sanction and substituted the concordat. But the
French people continued determined and steady. The parlia-
ment, indeed, were compelled to register the concordat-; but
with reiterated protestations that they acted by the express
command of the monarch, and neither authorised nor approved
its publication. The Parisian university, in particular, distin-
guished for its learning and independence, opposed Lewis, Leo,
the council, and the concordat. This faculty took sufficient
liberty with the pontiff and his convention, accused him of
acting for the destruction of Catholicism, the divine laws, and
the sacred canons ; and boldly appealed from the papal and
synodal enactments to a wiser pope, and to a free and lawful
council. The appeal, in 1517, was printed and posted in the
cross ways and in the most public places of the city. The
French king, also, in 1612, abandoned the council of the
Lateran, which the French, in the most decided manner, con-
tinued to disclaim. 2
The Council of Trent was not only rejected in France, but
also in Spain, Flanders, Naples, part of Ireland, and really
though not formally in Germany. Its doctrinal decisions,
1 Florentimim nee legitimum, nee generale, agnoscitur. Alex. 25, 415. Floren-
tinnm, nee oecumenicum nee generale. rejicitur. Du Pin, 421. On n'y met point
an rang des conciles generaux, le cinquieme concile de Latran nicelui de Florence.
Moreri, 3. 539. Daniel, 6. J53. Paolo, VII.
3 Gibert, 1. 106. Moreri, 3. 558. Du Pin. 430. Bruy. 4. 400.
IN THE RECEPTION OF COUNCILS. 131
indeed, embodied the prior faith of these kingdoms , and,
therefore, was not opposed. The theology, however, inculcated
at Trent, was recognized, not on the authority of that assembly,
but on the authority of antiquity and former reception. The
council was utterly exploded by the French, on account of its
canons of discipline and reformation. The French, says Peta-
vius and Moreri, respected the faith of this assembly, but
disclaimed its discipline. The cardinal of Lorraine, who
attended at Trent, was, on his return, reprehended by the_king,
clergy, and the parliament, for consenting to many things pre-
judicial to the French nation. The discord and intrigues of the
Trentine theologians became the subject of jest, satire, ridicule,
and merriment. The prelatical convention of Trent, it was
said, in proverbial but profane wit, excelled the apostolic council
of Jerusalem. The ancient assembly required the aid of the
Holy Ghost ; while the modern synod was independent of such
assistance, and could determine by human wisdom and arbitrary
dictation. 1
Its publication was opposed by many persons and arguments.
The Parisian parliament notified twenty-three of its reforming
and disciplinarian canons, which became the topic of public
animadversion ; and which, it was alleged, were repugnant to
the regal authority, the common law, and the public good;
The canons, it was maintained, which countenanced the excom-
munication and deposition of kings, the ecclesiastical punishment
of laymen by fine and imprisonment, and the superiority of the
pope above a general council, tended to extend the spiritual
authority of the church, and to dimmish the civil power of the
state. Many attempts were made to effect its reception in the
French dominions, but in vain. The Roman hierarchs directed
all their energy to this end ; and engaged, on one occasion, the
interest of the emperor of Germany, the king of Spain, and
the duke of Savt>y. The Parisian faculty, also, in those days
of its degeneracy, used their influence in favour of the Roman
court. The united influence of the pope, the emperor, the
king, the duke, and the Sorbonne, in 1614, procured the con-
sent of the French nobility and clergy, but the project was
frustrated by the firmness of the Commons. The 'French
nation, in consequence, to the present day, disclaim the authority
of the general, infallible, holy, Roman council of Trent. 2
The council of Trent underwent similar treatment in the
kingdom of Spain. Philip, indeed, the king of the Spanish
1 Canones in Gallia de dogmate venerantur, de disciplina vero respuuntur
Petavius, 2. 249. Le concile de Trente n'y est point recu pour la discipline
Moreri, 3. 539. Paolo, 2. 685. Gibert, 1. 148.
" Paolo, 2. 693. Thuan. CV. 21. Dan. 9. 321.
9*
132 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
nation, displayed, on the occasion, a splendid specimen of
policy. The Spanish monarch wished to gratify the Roman
pontiff, and, at the same time, reject the Trentine council. The
sovereign, therefore, made a show of publishing it, and never-
theless found means of security against its obnoxious canons
of discipline and of reformation. These he was determined
to repel, but with wary circumspection. He convened the
Spanish clergy in 1564, in the synods of Salamanca, Toledo,
Saragossa, Seville, and "Valentia ; and sent deputies to preside
in these conventions. All, in consequence, was carried, in
these synods, according to the dictation of the king's council.
The result was, that in Spain, the land of Catholicism, whose
sovereigns were the most obsequious servants of the Roman
pontiff, the universal, holy, Roman synod was acknowledged
only so far as was consistent with the prerogatives of the king,
the privileges of the people, and the laws of the nation. 1
Similar decisions were/enacted in the Netherlands. Margaret,
duchess of Parma, was, at this time, governess of these provinces.
She consulted the magistracy, clergy, and royal council, who
represented the Trentine canons of reformation as unfriendly to
the privileges and usages of the Belgian dominions. These
counsellors also feared popular commotions, if the council were
published without any restriction. Its publication, therefore,
was accompanied with a declaration, that its reception would
be allowed to effect no innovation in the laws and customs of
the provinces. The duke of Alba, the Neapolitan viceroy in
1594, published the council in the Neapolitan dominions of
Spain, with similar provisions against all innovation. 2
The Trentine discipline is also excluded from part of Ireland.
Its faith, says Doyle, in his parliamentary evidence, is admitted
through the whole island, but not its discipline. Its canons on
matrimony, for example, have obtained only a partial reception.
The provincial bishops assembled for the purpose of delibera-
ting whether the Trentine discipline would be useful. Those
who concluded in favour of its utility published a declaration
to that effect in each chapel ; and the annunciation gave it
validity in the bounds of their jurisdiction. Those who decided
against its utility, omitted its publication ; and the Trentine
canons, were excluded from the limits of their ecclesiastical
authority. 3 The holy council, in this manner, was subjected to a
partial exclusion even from the Island of Saints. The Emerald
Isle itself enjoys only in part the sacred canons, which the Irish
prelacy, in some provinces, accounted and declared useless.
1 Giannon, XXXIII. 3. Paolo, 2. 685. Slevin, 226.
3 Van Espen, c. II. Giannon, xxxiii. 3. Paolo, 2. 686. Gibert, 1. 146.
* Doyle, 385.
RECEPTION" OF THE COUNCIL OF TRENT. 133
The friends of the reformation in Germany detested the faith
of Trent, and the friends of' Romanism disliked its discipline.
The Emperor, indeed, allowed it a formal reception in his do-
minions. But the admission, clogged as it was with many-
restrictions, was rather nominal than real. Its recognition was
by no means uniform ; and those who acknowledged its authority
interpreted its canons as they pleased; 1
The French, in this manner, dismissing the councils of Lyons,
Florence, Lateran, and Trent, adopt those of Pis'a, Constance,
Basil, and the second of Pisa. The French, says Moreri,
' recognize, as general, the councils of Pisa, Constance, and
Basil.' 2 The Pisan assembly in 1409 has occasioned a variety
of opinions. Some have denied its universality. Its name is
not found among the eighteen approved by the Italians ; and its
authority has been rejected by Cajetan, Antoninus, Sanderus,
and Raynald. Antoninus endeavours to throw contempt on this
assembly by calling it an unlawful conventicle. The statement
of Petavius, respecting this congress is amusing. The Pisan
assembly, says this author, was, as it were, a general council. 3
Bellarmine characterizes it as neither approved nor condemned. 4
This champion of Romanism and his partizans cannot decide,
whether this equivocal convention should be stamped with the
seal of infallibility or marked with the signature of reprobation.
Its decisions are consigned, according to this celebrated polemic
and his minions, to float on the ocean of uncertainty, and to be .
treated with esteem or contempt at the suggestion of caprice or
partiality. The unfortunate synod, which no person, in Bellar-
mine's system, is either to own or disown, is left, like a peaceful
and insulated state, without any alliance, either offensive or
defensive, among belligerent powers, to defend its own frontiers
or to maintain an armed neutrality. Bellarmine, however;, had
reasons for his moderation or indecision. The Pisans deposed
Gregory and Benedict for heresy arid schism, and/elected Alex-
ander, who has been recognized as the rightful pontiff and a
necessary link in the unbroken chain of the pontifical succession.
Bellarmine, had he approved the Pisan assembly, would, con-
trary to his principles, have admitted the supremacy of a general
council and its authority to degrade a Roman pontiff. Had the
cardinal disapproved, he would have acknowledged the inva-
lidity of Alexander's election, and dismissed God's vicar-general
1 Paolo, 2, 697.
2 En France, on reconnoit pour generaux, les Conciles de Constance, de Pise,
et de Bale. Moreri, 3, 539.
3 Pisanum, tanquam Generale convocatum cardinalibus. Pectavius, 2. 249.
Caietan c. XI. Antonius, c. V. Sanderus, VIII.
* Generale nee approbatum, nee reprobatum, videtur esse Concilium Pisanum.
BeU. I. 8.
134 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY C
from the series of the pontifical succession. The Jesuit, there-
fore, like an honest man, had recourse to an expedient and left
the Pisans to their liberty.
The French, however, dissenting from Bellarminism, claim
the Pisan assembly as their ally : and acknowledge its univer-
sality and authority, which have been advocated by Du Pin,
Moreri, Alexander, and other historians. These authors record
its convocation from all Christendom, and confirmation by pope
Alexander. 1
The universality of the Constantian council is maintained in
the French school. A variety of conflicting opinions, indeed,
has been entertained on the ecumenicity of this assembly.
Bosius and Cotton would allow it neither a total or partial
generality. Cardinal Cantarin excluded it from his compendium
of councils, and pope Sixtus from his paintings and inscriptions
in the Vatican. The Florentian and Lateran conventions
reprobated its definition of the superiority of a council above
a pope. Its authority is disregarded in Spain, Portugal, and
the nations under their control. The Italians in the council of
Trent, represented it as in part approved and in part con-
demned ; and the Italian system on this subject has been
adopted by BeUarmine, Canus, Cajetan, and Duval. Baptista,
in the Trentine assembly, extolled the Constantian, says Paolo,
above all other councils. The French, in the same synod,
declared it general in all its sessions from beginning to end ; and
this declaration has been repeated by Lorrain, Launoy, Alex-
ander, Moreri, Carranza, and Du Pin. The Constantian council,
says Alexander, ' represented the universal church, and among
the French is accounted general in all its parts.' Pope Martin
confirmed it, and, by his sanction, sealed it with infallibility. 2
The French school also recognized the Basilian council as
general. The Basilians have met with much opposition and
much support, with many enemies and many friends. Popes
and councils, supported by many critics and theologians, such
as BeUarmine, Turrecrema, Cajetan, Sanderus, Raynald,
Bzovius, and Duval, declaimed with fury against its authority,
and execrated its decisions. Eugenius the Fourth assailed it
with red hot anathemas, and cursed its assembled fathers, in
colonel Bath's elegant style, with ' great dignity of expression
and emphasis of judgment.' The sacred synod, though exe-
crated, were loth to be in debt, and made a suitable return.
The holy fathers declared his infallibility guilty of contumacy,
i Du Pin, 403. Moreri, 3. 539. Alex. 24, 551.
8 Apud Gallos, Constantiense Concilium, in omnibus suis partibus, oecumenicum
habetur. Alex. 25. 415. Du Pin, 421. Bell. 1. 7. Paolo, VI. et VII.
RECEPTION OF THE COUNCILS OF PISA AND CONSTANCE. 135
pertinacity, rebellion, mcorrigibility, disobedience, simony,
schism, heresy, desertion from the faith, violation of the canons,
scandalization of the church, and unworthy of any title, rank,
honour, or dignity. Leo the Tenth called this assembly, in
contempt, a conventicle. Its name, says Paolo, was detested
at Trent, as schismatical and destitute of universality and
authority. 1
The council, nevertheless, execrated as it was by popes and
councils, and exploded by divines, was confirmed by Nicholas
the Fifth, and received through the extensive territory and
numerous churches of France and Germany. The sanction
of Nicholas, it seems, notwithstanding the course of cursing it
endured from Eugenius, vested it with infallibility. The French
contemplate it with peculiar esteem, arid regard its rival of
Florence as a conventicle. The Sorbonnists, such as Richerius,
Du Pin, Launoy, and Alexander, have, with argument and
eloquence, maintained its cecumenieity, and their approval has
been repeated by Moreri and even Carranza. 2
The French also acknowledge the second of Pisa, in opposi-
tion to the fifth of the Lateran. Julius the Second delighted in
war, practised cruelty on the cardinals, excommunicated Lewis
the French king, and absolved his subjects from the oath of
fidelity. A few of the cardinals, in consequence, separated
from the pontiff; and, patronized by Maximilian, the German
emperor, and Lewis, the French monarch, summoned a council,
in 1511, at Pisa. Julius, in opposition, opened a council, in
1512, at the Lateran. These two conventions, as might be
expected, did not treat each other with excess of politeness.
Julius characterized the Pisans as a scandal, a pestilence, a
convention of the devil, a congregation of wretches, an assembly
of malignants, whose head was Satan the father of falsehood
and schism ; and found the sacred synod guilty of obstinacy,
rebellion, conspiracy, audacity, treason, temerity, abomination,
sacrilege, senselessness, fraudulence, dissimulation, contumacy >
sedition, schism, and heresy. His infallibility having, with
such graphic precision, drawn their character, proceeded,
without any ceremony, to pronounce their sentence of excom-
munication. Unsatisfied with his sentence against the refractory
convention, the vicar-general of God interdicted Pisa, Milan,
and Lyons, where the synod was allowed to meet. 3
The Pisans, overflowing with gratitude, and ready at com-
pliment and benediction, retaliated in fine style. The holy
1 Alex 25. 427. Crab. 3. 966. Moreri, 2. 100. Bell. III. 16. Paolo, VI. and
VII. L'Bglise Gallicane on tenu. ce concile pour oecumenique. Milletot, 572.
2 Du Pin, 405. Alex. 25. 408. Bruys, 4. 400. Daniel, 6. 153. Carranza, 579.
3 Labb. 19. 570. 572577. Coss. 5. 356, 357. 360.
136 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
fathers declared the vicar-general of Jesus guilty of contumacy,
schism, incorrigibility, obduracy, perjury, and indeed all villany.
The sacred synod, to these compliments, added a benediction
couched in very flattering language. This consisted in sus-
pending the viceroy of heaven from the administration of the
popedom, and prohibiting all obedience of the clergy and laity
of Christendom. This sentence, in all its rigour, was actually
enforced through the French nation. Lewis commanded his
subjects, both clergy and laity, to withdraw all submission.
But the martial Julius, in the mean time, who had excom-
municated Lewis, died, and the sensual Leo succeeded. Lewis,
therefore, in 1513, withdrew his support from the Pisans, and
submitted to the authority of Leo and the Laterans. Maximi-
lian also discountenanced the Pisan convention, which, in con-
sequence, disbanded. But this variation of the French sovereign
was not lasting. The French monarchs afterwards returned
to the council of Pisa. Its acts, in 1612, were published from
the library of his most Christian majesty, and its authority, in
opposition to that of the Lateran, which had always been
obnoxious to the French parliament and clergy, was again
acknowledged. 1
Such on the subject of councils, is the variation between the
French and Italian schools. The French reject four councils,
those of Lyons, Florence, Lateran, and Trent, which the Italians
admit ; and admit four, those of Pisa, Constance, Basil, and the
second of Pisa, which the others reject.
A third party in the Romish Church reject the whole or a
part of the councils, which, in the Italian system, occur from the
eighth at Constantinople to the sixteenth at Florence. Ah 1 these
were retrenched by Abrahamus, Clement, and Pole. The edi-
tion of the Florentian synod, published by Abrahamus, reckons
it the eighth general council. The editor, therefore, expunges
the Byzantine council and the seven following. The extermi-
nation of the eighth, says Launoy, was in accordance with several
Greeks and Latins. 2 The edition of Abrahamus was approved
by Clement the Seventh, who stamped it with the seal of his
infallibility. Baronius, nevertheless, followed by Binius and
Labbe, has found the editor guilty of audacity, ignorance,
temerity, and falsehood. 3 Pole, in the synod of Lambeth, in
1 Inveterate nella simonia et ne' costumi infami et perduto. Guicciardin, i. 275.
Endurcy en simonie et en erreurs infames et damnables, il ne pouvoit etre capa-
ble de gouverner la Papaute. It etoit notoirement incorrigible au scandale universel
de toute la Chrestienite vignier. 3. 867. Mariana, 5. 767. Morori, 3. 558. et 5.
72. Alex. 25. 27. Brays, 4. 461.
2 Fuisse Graecos et Latinos, qui octavam synodum e numero generalium syno-
dorum expunxerint. Launoy, 4. 224. et 5. 233.
3 Magna interpretis temeritate, et audacia, sicut et imperitia factum est. Bin. 7.
1038. Labb. 10. 996. Wilkin, 4. 122, 126.
THE RECEPTION OF COUNCILS. 137
1556, adopted the same enumeration, and. denominated' the
Florentian assembly the eighth general council. 1 This was
transacted in an English synod, and, therefore, was the general
opinion of the English clergy in the reign of Queen -'Mary. Pole,
notwithstanding, in noble inconsistency, recognized the ecume-
nicity of the fourth and fifth of the Lateran, and the second of
Lyons. This system proscribed the eight general councils
which met a.t Constantinople, Lateran, Lyons, and Vienna.
Cardinal Cantarin's account differs little from tha,t of Abra-
hamus, Clement, and Pole. The cardinal, in 1562, in his
summary of councils, addressed to Paul the third, reckons the
Byzantine the eighth, and the Florentian the ninth general
council. He therefore omits two of Lyons, four of the Lat-
eran, and those of Vienna, Pisa, Constance, and Basil ; and
excludes ten which have been owned by the French and Italian
schools.
Sixtus, Carranza, Silvius, and the Constantian synod omit
part of the councils, which intervened between the eighth and
sixteenth. Sixtus the fifth, in 1588, erected paintings and in-
scriptions of the general councils in the Vatican. These omit
the first and second of the Lateran, which, destitute of canons,
have no paintings or inscriptions in the Vatican. 2 These two,
therefore, are discarded by a celebrated pontiff at the head-
quarters of Romanism. Carranza and Silvius omit the first,
second, and third of the Lateran as void of ..authority, or un-
worthy of attention. Bellarmine admits the mutilation of their
acts and the imperfection of their history. The ecclesiastical
annals, according to Gibert* have recorded only the definitions
of the council of Vienna, the constitutions of the first and second
of Lyons, and the canons of the four former of the Lateran.
The Constantian assembly, reckoning in all only eleven, men-
tions but three, which assembled at the Lateran, Lyons, and
Vienna, between the Byzantine and Florentian conventions.
The Constantians, therefore, exclude the five which met at the
Lateran, Lyons, and Pisa. The pontiff elect, according to the
Constantian assembly in its thirty-ninth session, was, in the
presence of the electors, required to profess his faith in these
eleven general councils, and especially in the eight which
assembled at Nicasa, Constantinople, Ephesus, and Chalcedon. 3
Had the Constantians, who omitted five, exterminated the
whole of these councils from the'annals of time, the holy fathers
1 In Octava General! Synodo Florentiae sub Eugenio. Labb. 20. 1018. 1021.
2 On n'a point les canons de ces deux conciles, et ils n'ont point de tableau, ni
^inscription dans le Vatican. Moreri 3, 539.
3 Gibert, 1. 98. Crabb. 2. i. 55. Alex. 21. 505. Sancta octo universalia
concilia immutilata servare, Labb. 16. 703, 1046.
138 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERT :
would have conferred a distinguished favour on the world, and
merited the lasting thanks of mankind.
The critics and historians of Romanism, varying in this man-
ner in the enumeration of the general councils, vary also about
their universality. Some condition or peculiarity should distin-
guish a general from a diocesan, a provincial, or a national
synod. This characteristic distinction, however, has never been
ascertained. The attempt, indeed, has been made by Bellar-
mine, Binius, Carranza, Jacobatius, Holden, Lupus, Arsdekin,
Fabulottus, Panormitan, Bosius, and Martinon. But their
requisitions differ from each other and from the facts of the
councils. The theory of each is at variance with the rest or
inapplicable to the councils, the universality of which is ad-
mitted.
One party, would leave the decision to the pope. These
reckon it the prerogative of the Roman pontiff to determine on
the universality and sufficiency of a general council. This
condition has been advocated by Panormitan, Martinon, and
Jacobatius. 1 But its application to the acknowledged general
councils would cause the partial or total, the temporary or per-
manent explosion of six, which have been admitted into the
Italian or French system. The popes, for along lapse of time,
rejected all the canons of the second at Constantinople, and
have never recognized the twenty-eighth canon of Chalcedon.
Vigilius, for some time, withstood the fifth ecumenical synod,
and his acquiescence was, at last, extorted by banishment.
The council of Pisa, Constance, and Basil, applauded by the
French school, deposed Gregory, Benedict, John, and
Eugenius.
A second class, to constitute a synodal universality, require
the attendance of the pope, patriarchs, and metropolitans,
together with subsequent general reception. 2 This requisition
has been advocated by Bosius and Paolo, and is in discordancy
with the system of Martinon and Jacobatius, as well as that of
BeUarmine, Binius, Carranza, Canus, Gibert, Lupus, Fabu-
lottus. Its application would exclude many of the oecumenical
synods. The Roman hierarch attended the second and fifth
neither in person nor by proxy. The patriarchs were present
in neither the third, fourth, nor seventh, nor in any of the ten
western councils. The Ephesian and Chalcedonian synods
1 Pontificis est declarare, an congregatio generalis sufBcienter. Martinon, Disput.
V. 7. Maimb. c. VII. Anton, c. V. XXXI. Posset numerus episcopormn, cum
quibus tenendum est concilium relinqui arbitrio Papae. Jacobatius, II.
Concilium generale necessario non potest, quando Papa tali concilio prseest. Pa-
normitan, 2. 53.
2 Dico adesse oportere Sedem Apostolicam, omnes ecclesise orthodoxos
Patriarchas. Bosius, V. 8. Paol. Eig. Sov. c. IV.
UNIVERSALITY OF GENERAL COUNCILS. 139
condemned Nestorianism and Eutychianism without the pa-
triarchs of Antioch or Alexandria. The pretended vicars of
the patriarchs of Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem in the
second of Nicaea, were impostors. During the ten general
councils which assembled in the west, the eastern patriarchs
were accounted guilty of heresy, or at least of schism. Sub-
sequent reception would extend universality to several diocesan,
provincial, and national councils, such as those of Ancyra,
Neocsesarea, Laodicea, and Gangra. 1
A third faction prescribe, as the condition of universality,
the convocation of all, the rejection of none, and the actual
attendance of some from ah 1 the great nations of Christendom.
The presence of the patriarchs, in person or by delegations,
may be useful ; but, as they are now heretical, or at least
schismatical, is not necessary. This system has been patronized
by Bellarmine, Binius, Carranza, Canus, Gibert, Lupus, Ars-
dekin, Jacobatius, and has obtained general adoption. 2 These
requisitions, nevertheless, varying from those of other critics,
vary also from the constitution of all the acknowledged councils.
Bellarmine's prescription, exploding all the preceding, would,
in its practical application, exterminate, with one sweeping
reprobation, ah 1 the Grecian, Latin, and French oecumenical
synods.
The eight Grecian conventions, from the Nicene to the
Byzantine, met, as Alexander, Moreri, and Du Pin have observed,
in the east, and the ten Latin, from the Lateran to the Trentine,
in the west. The eastern councils were, with very few excep-
tions, celebrated by the Greeks, and the western by the Latins.
In the chief part of the general councils, celebrated in the east,
there were present, says Alexender, only two or three westerns.
The second, third, and fifth of the eastern synods, which met
at Constantinople and Ephesus, were wholly unattended with
any westerns. The first council of Constantinople, say
Thomassin and Alexander, was entirely Grecian, and became
general only by future reception ; and its reception was confined
to its faith, exclusive of its discipline. Vigilius, with some
Latins, was in Constantinople at the celebration of the fifth,
and refused notwithstanding to attend. The Ephesian council
had effected the condemnation of Nestorianism, which was its
chief or only business, before the arrival of the Latins, and
was, in consequence, restricted to the Asians and Egyptians. 3
1 Lupus. 306. Bell. I. 17. Carranza, 4. Theod. Stud. Ep. 1.
2 Satis est, ut sit omnibus provinces intimatum, omnibusque liber sit ad illud ac-
cessus. Fabulottus. c. V. Majore parte Cliristianarurn provinciarum, aliqui ad-
veniant. Carranza, 4. Bell, 1. 17. Arsdekin, 1. 160.
3 In plerisque conciliis cecumenicis in Oriente celebratis, duos aut tres duntaxat
140 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Two or three, indeed, delegated by the Roman hierarch, were
present in the first, fourth, sixth, seventh, and eighth general
councils. Vitus, Vicentius, and Hosius appeared in the council
of Nicaea ; while Petrus and Vicedomus sat, with legatine
authority, in the second of that city. Three represented the
pontiff, and three the westerns, in the fourth and sixth at Chal-
cedon and Constantinople. The eighth constituted a blessed
representation of the universal church. The first session con-
sisted of sixteen or seventeen bishops, who, of course, were,
in their synodal capacity, clothed with infallibility. The second
received an augmentation of ten, who begged pardon for having
supported Photius, and were admitted. The third session
consisted of twenty-three, and the fourth of twenty-one bishops.
The fifth was fewer in number. The sixth, seventh, and eighth
amounted to the wonderful multitude of thirty-seven. The
ninth rose to sixty, and the tenth numbered one hundred, whp
subscribed the synodal decision. 1 Such were the eight Grecian
synods, which are, therefore, fairly dismissed by the application
of Bellarmine's condition of universality.
Bellarmine's terms would dismiss the ten western as well as
the eight eastern councils. The former, as Moreri and Du Pin
have shown, were limited to the Latins, to the exclusion of the
Greeks. The first of Lyons consisted of about one hundred
and forty bishops from France and England, without any from
Spain, Portugal, Germany, or Italy. The French, in the council
of Trent, mocked at the Florentian convention, which, they
said, was celebrated by only a few Italians and four Grecians.
The fifth of the Lateran consisted of about eighty, and nearly
all from Italy. The far famed assembly of Trent, when it con-
ferred canonicity 'on the Apocrypha and authenticity on the
Vulgate, consisted only of five cardinals and forty-eight bishops,
without one from Germany. These, few in number, were
below mediocrity in theological and literary attainments. Some
were lawyers, and perhaps learned in their profession ; but mere
sciolists in divinity. The majority were courtiers, and gentle-
men of titular dignity, and from small cities. 2 These could
not be said to represent one in a thousand in Christendom.
During the lapse of eight months, the council, reckoning even
the presidents and princes, did not exceed sixty-four.
The councils of the French school, like those of the Italian,
cannot bear the test of Bellarmine's requisitions. These, like
episcopos occidentalis ecclesias adfuisse. Alexan. 25. 632. Moreri, 3. 539. Du
Pin, 2. 388. Pithou, 29. In secuudo et tertio coucilio generaii, nullus fuit episco-
pus occidentalis. Fabul. c. V. Thomassin, 1. 6. Crabb, 2. 91. Maimbourg, 68.
Godeau, 4. 498. J Bin. 1 . 321. Du Pin, cen. V. et cen. IX. c. IX.
2 Par les seals eveques d' Occident. Moreri, 3, 539. Du Pin, 2. 388, 430.
Paolo, II. VII. Giann. XVII. 3. Lauuoy, 1. 376.
ON THE LEGALITY OF COUNCILS. 141
the others, were composed of Europeans. The Pisans, though
they amounted to more than two hundred, were collected chiefly
from Italy, France, Germany, and England. The Constantians
and Basilians, though more numerous, were westerns and Latins.
The second of Pisa was principally collected from the French
dominions, and could, therefore, have no just claim to univer-
sality or a convocation from all Christendom. 1
Theologians and critics, disagreeing in this manner about the
universality of general councils, differ also respecting their
legality. A synod, to be general or valid, '.must be lawful ; and
the conditions of the latter as well as of the former, have occa-
sioned a striking variety of opinion. The partizans of popery
differ concerning a general council's convocation, presidency,
confirmation, members, freedom, and unanimity.
The Italians, patronized by many theologians and pontiffs,
make the pope's convocation, presidency, and confirmation,
necessary terms of synodal legality. These account no council
lawful without these requisitions. All others, say the Transal-
pines, are conventicles. The sovereign pontiff, according to
Jacobatius, Carranza, and Antonius, can call a general council,
which depends on him for its authority. His sanction only can
confer validity. A synod, says pope Nicholas, without pon-
tifical authority, is invalid. The assembling of a general council,
says Pelagius the second, is the sole prerogative of the Roman
See. Nicholas and Pelagius, in these statements, have been
followed by Jacobatius and Antonius. 2
This system, taught in the Italian school and maintained with
positivity and arrogance, has been assailed by the French critics,
who spurn the papal claim, and have, beyond all question,
evinced its groundlessness in point of fact in the eight eastern
councils. According to Du Pin and Moreri, c the eight former
councils were convoked by the emperors.' Gibert states that
' all the oriental general councils were assembled by the imperial
authority :' and this statement has been repeated by Mezeray,
Alexander, Maimbourg, Paoli, Almain, Gerson, AUiaco, and
Launoy. 3
1 Du Pin, 403. Moreri, 7. 244. Crabb. 3. 549.
8 Congregare concilium est proprium Romani Pontifici. Jacob. III. Ad solum
Romanum Pontificem, geuerale concilium convocare pertinet. Carranza, 3. Non
potest concilium rite congregari nisi authoritate Romani Pontificis. Anton, c. V.
Synodus absque authoritate Romani Pontificis, non valet. Nicholas, I. Carranza, 511.
Genef ales synodis non posse convocari, nisi authoritate Apostolicae sedis. Pelagius,
II. Carranza, 329. v
3 Octo priora concilia ab Imperatoribus convocata esse constat. Dn Pin. 337.
Les premiers ont ete autrefois, .iusqu' au huitieme general, toujours convoque par
les Empereurs. Moreri, 3. 539. Omnia concilia generalia Orientalia ab Impera
loribus coacta fuerunt. Gibert, 1. 76, 77.
142 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Launoy has shown the imperial convocation of the oriental
councils by an array of evidence, sufficient, one would conclude,
to convince scepticism and silence all opposition. The convo-
cation of the Nicene council by Constantine, is, according to this
author, attested by Eusebius, Epiphanius, Ruffinus, Socrates,
Theodoret, Sozomen, Gelasius, Justinian, Isidorus, Gregory,
Mansuetus, Zonaras, Reparatus, Robertus, Vicentius, Nicepho-
rus, Antoninus, Sabellicus, Platina, Pighius, Prateolus, Gene-t.
brard, and Sigonius. Theodosius called the Byzantine synod,
as appears from Theodoret, Socrates, Sozomen, Gelasius,
Vigilius, Justinian, Isidorus, Simeon, Zonaras, Robertus, Nice-
phorus, Sigonius, andPetavius. The assembling of the Ephe-
sian council by Theodosius and Valentinian, is attested by
Theodosius, Basil, Cyril, Theodoret, John, Socrates, Justinian,
Valentinian, Sigibert, Nicephorus, and the council itself.
Marcian, according to Valentinian, Leo, Theodoret, Prosper,
Liberatus, Evagrius, Justinian, Vigilius, Mansuetus, Sigibert,
Nicephorus, Gobelin, Mariana, and the synod itself, convened
the council of Chalcedon : and Justinian summoned the Con-
stantinopolitan assembly, say Justinian, Evagrius, Mansuetus,
Nicephorus, Mariana, and Petavius. The emperor Constantine
the Fourth convoked the sixth general synod, according to
Agatha, Beda, Paulus, Frecolf, Hincmar, Ado, Anastasius,
Regino, Lambert, Cedrenus, Zonaras, Gobelin, Hartmann,
Nauclerus, Petavius, the Roman breviary, and the acts of the
council. The empress Irene, in conjunction with Constantine,
assembled the second Nicene convention, as is related by
Tarasius, Adrian, Anastasius, Paulus, Platina, Hartmann,
Bergomas, and the acts of the council. The emperor Basil's
convocation of the eighth oecumenical assembly is testified by
Adrian, Ignatius, Cedrenus, and Zonaras. The council of Pisa
was convened by cardinals. 1
The presidency of the Roman pontiff in a general council is,
according to Du Pin, ' a matter, not of necessity but of con-
venience., He did not preside in the three first general councils.'
Cusan ascribes ' the presidency, not to the pontiffs but to the
emperors.' The sovereigns, says Paolo, ' who called these
Nous ne trouvons point de concile cecumenique jusqu' au neu vieme siecle, qui
n'ait ete assemble par leur autorite. Mezeray, 5. 466. Maimbourg, 42.
Nicsena Synodus convocata est a Constantino. Alex. 7. 122. et 8. 82. Hoc con-
cilium oecumenicum fuit a Theodosio seniore convocatum, inconsulto Damaso, Ro-
mano Pontifice. Alexander, 9. 79. Synodus oscumenica Ephesina convocata est
a Theodosio. Alex. 2. 218- Marcianus Synodum IV. convocavit. Alexand. 2.
305. Constantinus Synodum Sextam convocavit. Alexand. 13. 287. Septima
Synodus a Constantino et Irene Augustis convocata est. Alexand. 14. 523.
1 Launoy ad Ludov. 4. 22. et ad Voell. 4. 108. et ad Bray. 4. 191. et adMalat. 4.
207, 223. Daniel, 5. 444.
PRESIDENCY OF COUNCILS. 143
1
synods, presided in person or by representation, and proposed
the matter, prescribed the form, and regulated the discussions
of such conventions.' The sovereign pontiff, according to
Mariana, Gibert, Maimbourg, and Godeau,did not appear either
in person or by proxy, in the second, fifth, or Pisan assembly.
Timotheus and Eutychius, says Alexander, presided in the
Bvzantine conventions under the emperors Theodosius and
Justinian. Photius attributes the presidency of the seventh
general council to Tarasius. 1
The first councils, says Du Pin, ' were not confirmed by the
popes.' The pontiffs, on the contrary, opposed the canons of
the second and fourth, which conferred rank and jurisdiction
on the Byzantine patriarch. Vigilius withstood the fifth with
all his pontifical authority. Petavius's representation of this
hierarch's versatility is a curiosity. His infallibility, says this
historian, ' proscribed, and then confirmed the fifth universal
council. He afterward again disclaimed, and finally declared
its legitimacy.' 2
The general conventions, from that of the Lateran to that of
Trent, were held in the west, and enjoyed the distinguished
honour of pontifical convocation, presidency, and ratification.
This period embraced the ten Latin universal councils. The
Roman empire was then divided into many smaller states,
whose sovereigns, actuated with petty ambition and engaged in
mutual opposition and rivalry, could not agree about ecclesias-
tical conventions. The pope, in this- emergency, assumed the
prerogative of convocation and presidency. He convened the
clergy and arrogated the power, which had been exercised by
the emperor, and which, in the hands of the hierarch, became
an engine of pontifical aggrandisement .and despotism. 3
A variety of opinions have been entertained, with respect to
the persons who should form a general council. A few would
admit laymen ; while many would exclude all but the clergy.
Some would restrict decisive suffrage to the prelacy, and others
would extend it to the priesthood. The former was the usage
of antiquity. The latter obtained in some of the councils in
1 Tribus primis conciliis generalibus non praefuit. Du Pin, 337. Cusan, III. 16.
II n'ait pas preside au premier Concile de Constantinople, lies tres-certain qu'il
ne convoqua pas le cinqueime, et n'y presida point. Maimb. 42. Huic concilio
praefuit Timotheus. Alexand. 7. 234. Concilio Quinto Oecumenico prfenrit
Eutychius. Alexand. 12. 574, Paolo, 1. 213, Mariana, 1. 521. Gibert, 1. 66,
58. Godeau, 4. 274. Photius, 57.
2 Prima Concilia a Pontificibus confirmata minime sunt. Du Pin, 337. Gibert.
1. 102. Sedes Apostolica nunc usque contradicit, quod a synodo firmatum est.
Liberatus, c. _ XIII. Illam primum respuit Vigilius, delude assensione firmavit,
postea repudiavit iterum. Denique legitimam esse professus est. Petavius, 2!
lo/
3 Gibert, 1. 70. Paolo, 1. 215. Moreri, 3. 539.
144 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERT !
more modern days. Panormitan would restrict membership in
a general council to the pope and prelacy, to the exclusion of
the laity. 1 . .
Varying in this way about the number of councils, the Romish
doctors vary also respecting the manner of synodal decision.
Some would decide by a majority ; while others would require
unanimity as a condition of legitimacy. One faction, patronized
by Bellarmine, account a majority, if sanctioned by pontifical
ratification, sufficient for conferring validity. A second party,
countenanced by Du Pin, Canus, Salmeron, Cusan, and Panor-
mitan, would demand unanimity, for bestowing legitimation
on a council and validity on its decisions. 2
The requisition of unanimity would, in fact, explode the
majority of all the eighteen general councils. A few indeed
have been unanimous, but many divided. The Nicene, By-
zantine, Ephesian, and Chalcedonian synods contained factions
that favoured Arianism, Macedonianism, Nestorianism, Euty-
chianism, and Monothelitism. Mighty controversy, say both
Eusebius and Socrates, arose at Nicsea, and was maintained
with pertinacity. But these sons of heresy were, in general,
exterminated by deposition, banishment,, murder, or some othei
way of legal ratiocination and evangelical discipline. 3 The
patrons of idolatry in the second assembly of Nicasa, anticipated
all opposition to their intended enactments by rejecting all who
would not execrate the patrons of Iconoclasm.
The ten western councils were under the control of the
Roman pontiff. His power, combined with ignorance and the
inquisition, succeeded in a great measure, in silencing opposition
and commanding unanimity. But occasional symptoms of
rebellion against the vicar-general of God appeared, notwith-
standing general submission, even in western Christendom. No
assembly, civil or ecclesiastical, ever showed less unity than
the council of Trent. Theologian opposed theologian, and
bishop withstood bishop, in persevering impertinence and con-
tention. The dominican fought with the franciscan in an endless
and provoking war of rancour and nonsense. The French
and Spanish encountered the Italians, with inferior numbers,
indeed, but with far superior reason and eloquence. All this
appears in the details of Paolo, Du Pin, and even Pallavicino.
The Trentine contest and decision on original sin may be given
5 Grotty, 83. Alex. 10. 341. Lenfan. 1. 107. Anton, c. V. Du Pin, 3. 9.
Synodus generalis constituitur.a papa et episcopis, et sic nihil die it de laicia
Panorm. 142.
s II faut qu'elle passe du consentement unanime. Da Pin, Doct. ch. 1. 3.
Nego, cum de fide agitur, sequi plurimorum judicium oportere. Canus, VI. 5.
Apol. 1. 103105. 3 Eusebius, III. 13. Socrates, 1. 8.
PRESIDENCY OF COUNCILS. 143
synods, presided in person or by representation, and proposed
the matter, prescribed the form, and regulated the discussions
of such conventions.' The sovereign pontiff, according to
Mariana, Gibert, Maimbourg, and Godeau,did not appear either
in person or by proxy, in the second, fifth, or Pisa n assembly.
Timotheus and Eutycbius, says Alexander, presided in the
Byzantine conventions under the emperors Theodosius and
Justinian. Photius attributes the presidency of the seventh
general council to Tarasius. 1
The first councils, says Du Pin, ' were not confirmed by the
popes.' The pontiffs, on the contrary, opposed the canons of
the second and fourth, which conferred rank and jurisdiction
on the Byzantine patriarch. Vigilius withstood the fifth with
all his pontifical authority. Petavius's representation of this
hierarch's versatility is a curiosity. His infallibility, says this
historian, ' proscribed, and then confirmed the fifth universal
council. He afterward again disclaimed, and finally declared,
its legitimacy.' 2
The general conventions, from that of the Lateran to that of
Trent, were held in the west, and enjoyed the distinguished
honour of pontifical convocation, presidency, and ratification.
This period embraced the ten Latin universal councils. The
Roman empire was then divided into many smaller states,
whose sovereigns, actuated with petty ambition and engaged in
mutual opposition and rivalry, could not agree about ecclesias-
tical conventions. The pope, in this emergency, assumed the
prerogative of convocation and presidency. He convened the
clergy and arrogated the power, which had been exercised by
the emperor, and which, in the hands of the hierarch, became
un engine of pontifical aggrandisement and despotism. 3
A variety of opinions have been entertained, with respect to
the persons who should form a general council. A Jew would
admit laymen ; while many would exclude all but the clergy.
Some would restrict decisive suffrage to the prelacy, and others
would extend it to the priesthood. The former was the usage
of antiquity. The latter obtained in some of the councils in
1 Tribus primis conciliis generalibus non prseiuit. Du Pin, 337. Cusan, III. 16.
II n'ait pas preside au premier Concile de Constantinople, II es tres-certain qu'il
ne convoqua pas le cinqueime, et n'y presida point. Maimb. 42. Huic concilio
rffifiit Timotheus. Alexand. 7. . 234. Concilio Quinto Oecumenico praeiuit
. . . . .
Eutychius. Alexand. 12. 574, Paolo, 1. 213, Mariana, 1. 521. Gibert, 1. 66,
38. Godeau, 4. 274. Photius, 57.
s Prima Concilia a Pontificibus confirmata minime sunt. Du Pin, 337. Gibert,
1.^ 102. Sedes Apostolica nunc usque contradicit, quod a synodo firmatum est.
Liberates, c. ^XIII. Illam primum respuit Vigilius, deinde assensione firmavit,
postea repudiavit iterum. Denique legitimam esse professus est. Petavius, 2.
137. .
Gibert, 1. 70. Paolo, 1. 215. Mdreri, 3. 539.
144 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY!
more modern days. Panormitan would restrict membership in
a general council to the pope and prelacy, to the exclusion of
the laity. 1
Varying in this way about the number of councils, the Romish
doctors vary also respecting the manner of synodal decision.
Some would decide by a majority ; while others would require
unanimity as a condition of legitimacy. One faction, patronized
by Bellarmine, account a majority, if sanctioned by pontifical
ratification, sufficient for conferring validity. A second party,
countenanced by Du Pin, Canus, Salmeron, Cusan, and Panor-
mitan, would demand unanimity, for bestowing legitimation
on a council and validity on its decisions. 2
The requisition of unanimity would, in fact, explode the
majority of all the eighteen general councils. A few indeed
have been unanimous, but many divided. The Nicene, By-
zantine, Ephesian, and Chalcedonian synods contained factions
that favoured Arianism, Macedonianism, Nestorianism, Euty-
chianism, and Monoth elitism. Mighty controversy, say both
Eusebius and Socrates, arose at Nicsea, and was maintained
with pertinacity. But these sons of heresy were, in general,
exterminated by deposition, banishment, murder, or some other
way of legal ratiocination and evangelical discipline. 3 The
patrons of idolatry in the second assembly of Nicsea, anticipated
all opposition to their intended enactments by rejecting all who
would not execrate the patrons of Iconoclasm.
The ten western councils were under the control of the
Roman pontiff. His power, combined with ignorance and' the
inquisition, succeeded in a great measure, in silencing opposition
and commanding unanimity. But occasional symptoms of
rebellion against the vicar-general of God appeared, notwith-
standing general submission, even in western Christendom. No
assembly, civil or ecclesiastical, ever showed less unity than
the council of Trent. Theologian opposed theologian, and
bishop withstood bishop, in persevering impertinence and con-
tention. The dominican fought with the franciscan in an endless
and provoking war of rancour and nonsense. The French
and Spanish encountered the Italians, with inferior numbers,
indeed, but with far superior reason and eloquence. All this
appears in the details of Paolo, Du Pin, and even Pallavicino.
The Trentine contest and decision on original sin may be given
'Grotty, 83. Alex. 10. 341. Lenfan. 1. 107. Anton, c. V. Du Pin, 3. 9.
Bynodus generalis constituitur a papa et episcopis, et sic nihil dicit de laicii
Panorm. 142.
9 H faut qu'elle passe da consentement unanime. Du Pin, Doct. ch. 1. 3.
Nego, cum de fide agitur, sequi plurimomm judicium oportere. Canus, VI. 5
Apol. 1. 103105. EuBebius, III. 13. Socrates, 1. 8.
WANT OF UNANIMITY IN COUNCILS. 145
as a specimen of Trentine contention and senseless animosity.
The bishops, learned in general in the law, but unskilled in
divinity, were utterly confounded by the distinctions, scholas-
ticism, and puzzling diversity of opinion which prevailed among
the theologians. The composition of the canons was over-
whelmed with inextricable difficulty. The persons employed
iii this task could not comprize every opinion, or avoid the
hazard of creating a schism. 1 The discord of the Trentine
fathers became, in the French nation, the subject of witticism
and mockery.
The contentions of the French synod of Melun, preparatory
to that of Trent, afforded a striking prelude and specimen of the
noisy and numerous altercations which were afterwards dis-
played in the latter assembly. The French king convened the
Parisian doctors at Melun, for the purpose of arranging the
dogmas of faith, which, on the assembling of the general coun-
cil, were to be proposed for discussion. The Parisians, how-
ever, could agree on nothing. These, adhering to a church
which boasts of exclusive unity, squabbled and contended on
the topics of the sacraments, the Concordat, the Pragmatic
sanction, and the Constantian and Basilian councils, without
meaning or end. Each, however, without being disconcerted
by their discord, would have his own opinion made an article
of faith. The king, in consequence, had to dissolve the council
without coming to any conclusion. 2 A scene of equal dissension
is not to be found in all the annals of protestantism.
Freedom of discussion and suffrage is, according to unanimous
consent, a necessary condition of synodal legitimacy. Authors*
the most adverse in other things, agree in the requisition of
liberty. This, in an ecclesiastical assembly, was the demand
of the ancients, such as Hilary, Athanasius, Basil, Facundus,
as well as of the moderns, such as Richerius, Canus, and Duval.
No council, says Facundus, was ever known, under compul-
sion, to subscribe any thing but falsehood. 3 Freedom of speech
was one of the conditions of a general ecclesiastical assembly
required by the council of Basil. This freedom, it has been
admitted, is destroyed, not only by deposition and banishment,
1 Les eveques embarassez par une si grande variete'd'opinions, ne savoient quel
jugement porter. H y avoit une si grande variete de sentimens des theologiens,
ils ne croyoient pas qu'il fut possible, ni de definir la chose ni de condamner quelqu'
une de ces opinions, sans conrirle risque de causer qnelque schisme. Paolo",' 1; 281.
Les disputes se reveillerent avec tant de force, qne les legats eurent beaucoup de
peine a les appaiser. Paolo, 2. 282. ^ Du Pin, 3. 426.
a Us etoient aussi partagez sur Particle des sacremens. Chacon vonlolt faire pas-
er son opinion pour un dogme de foi. Ils ne parent convenir d'autre chose.
Paolo, 1. 177, 178.
3 Nimquam coactum concilium, nisi falsitati, subscripsit. Facundus, XII. 3.
Gibert, 1. 74. Amb. in Luc. 6.
10
146 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
but also by threats, bribery, gifts, favour, faction, simony, party,
money, and influence. The favour of the emperor was, by
Ambrosius, considered subversive of synodal liberty. Thraldom
or servility may arise from any thing that may bias the mind or
influence the vote.
The application of this requisition would explode all the
general councils that ever met in Christendom. All these were
swayed by hope, fear, reward, or punishment, or influenced,
more or less, by faction or favour, menace or money. The
eighteen councils were controlled by the Roman emperor or the
Roman pontiff. The eight oecumenical councils celebrated in
the east were influenced by imperial power. The emperors,
in person or by representation, presided as judges in the Grecian
conventions, and moulded them into any form they pleased. 1
None of these ecclesiastical meetings was ever known to resist
the will of its sovereign, but adhered, with undeviatirig uni-
formity, to the duty of unlimited and unqualified submission.
Constantino's management of the Nicene assembly, the most
respectable of all that have been called general, is recorded by
Eusebius and Socrates. He gained some, say these historians,
by reason and some by supplication. Some he praised and
some he blamed ; and, by these means, succeeded, with a few
exceptions, in effecting an unanimity. 2 Such are the effects of
imperial arguments. A few, however, preferred their conscience
or their system to royal favour, and were banished or deposed
for error and contumacy. Arius, Eusebius, and Theognis,
having for some time felt the blessed effects of these logical and
scriptural arguments, subscribed and were restored. Maris,
Theognis, and Eusebius, says Philostorgius, declared in self-
condemnation, that, influenced by terror, they had signed
heterodoxy.
The easterns and westerns were as accommodating to the
Arian Constantius as to the Trinitarian Constantino. Con-
stantius, forsaking the Trinitarian system, adopted Arianism ;
and the Greeks and Latins, whether united or separated,
complied with the imperial humour, and signed, like dutiful sub-
jects, the Arian and Semi-Arian confessions of Sirmium,
Seleucia, Milan, and Ariminum. The oriental and occidental
prelacy, united at Sirmium in one of the most numerous councils
that ever met, subscribed, in compliance with their sovereign,
in Arian creed, which, as Du Pmv has shown, was signed by
his infallibility Pope Liberius. The Greeks, consisting of
1 Ces sortes d'assemblfees farent dirigfees par l<?s Princes. Paolo, 1. 213.
2 IloWtyj a,u^tXoyMj tfiwffi'a/MWfs. Busebins, de vita Constantini, III. 13. Tovj
ftev ffr/tTteiSttv, tovs 8s xa.i tyoourtw -to Xoyqj : tfovj 8s sv teyovfay
Socrat. 1. 8. Philostorgius, 1. 10. . . .
WANT OF FREEDOM IN COUNCILS. 147
Arians and Semi-Arians, assembled at .Seleucia, framed, after
a long and bitter altercation, x an Arian and Semi-Arian con-
fession. These two the holy bishops referred, not to Liberius
but to Constantius, not to the pontiff' but to the emperor, for his
approbation and sanction. The emperor, rejecting both, pro-
duced one of an Arian stamp, which had been composed at
Nicea and subscribed at Ariminum; and this, the sacred synod
with the most obliging condescension unanimously adopted.
The Latins, at Milan and Ariminum, followed the footsteps of
the Greeks. The world, says Jerome on this occasion, groaned
and wondered at its Arianism ; and all in compliance with its
sovereign. 1
The annals of image worship, as weU as the history of Arian^
ism, show the control which the Roman emperors exercised
over the consciences and the faith of their subjects, clergy and
laity. The emperor Constantine, the enemy of idolatry and
the patron of iconoclasm, called a numerous synod at Constan-
tinople ; and the bishops, adopting the faith of their prince,
anathematized all those who adored the works of the pencil or
chisel. But the empress Irene, the votary of images and super-
stition, assembled the second Nicene council, which is the
seventh general, and the holy fathers, proselyted by imperial
arguments, cursed, in long and loud execrations, all the sons
and daughters of iconoclasm. The western emperor, in hos-
tility to image worship, called, at Frankfort, a council of three
hundred bishops, who represented the whole western church,
and who overthrew the Nioene enactment in favour of idolatry. 2
The imperial power in the oriental synods prevailed against
the pontifical authority. The emperor's influence was para-
mount to the pontiff's. The pope, in several councils, sum-
moned all his energy and influence in opposition to the emperor,
but without success. Papal imbecility, compared with imperial
power, appeared in the second, third, fourth, and fifth general
councils. The second and fourth councils elevated the Byzantine
patriarch to a pitch of honour and jurisdiction, offensive, in a
high degree, to the Roman pontiff. The second conferred on
the Constantinopolitan chief an honorary primacy, next to the
Roman hierarch ; and the fourth, in its twenty-eighth canon,
granted equality of honour, and added the jurisdiction of Asia,
Pontus, and Thracia. These honours, bestowed on a rival,
the pope, as might be expected, resisted with all his might and
authority. Lucentius, the pope's vicar at Chalcedon on this
1 Bin. 1. 479. Du Pin, in Lib. Hil. in Syn. Jerom. in Cbron.
* Theoph. 285. Zonaras, 2. 85. Bruy. 1. 554: Crabb. 2. 599. Bruy, I. 584.
Carrauza, 490. Mabfflon, 2. 289.
10*
148 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY :
occasion, complained, in open court, of faction and compulsion.
The bishops, said he, in the sixteenth session, ' are circum-
vented and forced to subscribe canons, to which they have not
consented.' But pontifical exertion was vain, when opposed
to imperial power. Lucentius protested. 1 But the obnoxious
canon, nevertheless, was inserted in the code of the church,
and obtained validity through Christendom.
The Ephesian synod affords another proof of the prevalence
of the emperor and the weakness of the pontiff. This assem-
bly, indeed, shows the happy effects both of pecuniary and
imperial dialectics. The council of Ephesus, according to Ibas,
was corrupted by the gold of Cyril. The saint, says the bishop,
' gained the ears of aU by the poison which blinds the eyes of
the wise.' 2 John and Cyril, indeed, headed two rival and jar-
ring cabals. Each issued its creed, and appealed, not to the
Roman pontiff but to the Roman emperor, for the orthodoxy
of its faith. His infallibility, on the occasion, was not even
consulted. Theodosius, at first, seemed favourable to the Nes-
torian faction. He afterward veered round to Cyril's party ;
and the change, it appears, was owing to the efficacy of pecu-
niary logic. Cyril, says Acacius, bribed Scholasticus a cour-
tier, who influenced the mind of Theodosius. The emperor,
not the pontiff, confirmed the synodal decision and stamped
the faith of Cyril with the seal of orthodoxy. 3
Justinian, in like, manner, in the fifth general council, pre-
vailed against Vigilius. This assembly, indeed, enjoyed no
freedom, and showed no deference to the pontiff. Liberatus,
Lupus, and Eustathius have adduced weighty imputations
against its validity. According to Liberatus, the council, whose
subject of discussion was the silly productions of Ibas, Theo-
doret, and Theodoras, was convened by the machinations of
Theodoras of Caesarea, and was swayed by his influence with
Justinian and Theodora, the emperor and empress. The
episcopal courtier was an enthusiastic admirer of Origen, and a
concealed partizan of Monophysitism. The fanciful theologian
was his darling author, and the heretical theology was his de-
voted system. He was, in consequence, an enemy to Theodo-
rus of Mopsuestia, who had written against Origen, and to the
council of Chalcedon, which had approved his works, contained
in the celebrated three chapters, the mighty topic of imperial
animadversion and synodal reprehension. The Caesarean dig-
1 Qua circumventions cum sanctis episcopis gestum sit, ut non conscriptis canon-
ibus Bubscribere sint coacti. Crabb. 1. 938. Lucentius fut reduit a faire une
protestation contre ce qui s' etoit fait en cela. Godea. 3. 500, 503.
* Aures omnium veneno obcaecanti oculos sapientium obtinuit. Labb. 6. 131.
* Godeau, 3. 310. Labb. 3. 574. Liberatus, c. VI. Evag. 1 f . Lupus, c. XLI.
WANT OF FEEEDOM IN COUNCILS. 149
nitary, however, notwithstanding his heterodoxy, found means
of ingratiating himself with the emperor and empress. He in-
sinuated himself into the royal favour and ruled the royal councils.
This influence he used for the discredit of the Chalcedonian
synod and the condemnation of the Mopsuestian critic. He
persuaded Justinian to issue an edict against the writings of Ibas,
Theodoret, and Theodoras, which had been sanctioned at
Chalcedon. These writers, Pontius, an African bishop, in a
letter to Vigilius, represents as the authors whom the holy synod
of Chalcedon had received. 1 The emperor, also, actuated by
his counsellor's suggestions^ called an ecumenical council for
the confirmation of his edict, and the condemnation of the ob-
noxious publications. This assembly, according to Liberatus
a contemporary historian, acknowledged the charms of the im-
perial gold, and submission to the imperial will. The emperor,
says the Carthaginian deacon, ' prevailed on the occasion, by
bribery and banishment. He enriched those who promoted his
designs, and banished all who resisted.' 2
The allegations of Liberatus have been repeated by Lupus
and Eustathius. According to Lupus, 'Justinian became a
Dioclesian, and the Grecian prelacy became the tools of his im-
perial despotism.' 3 * All things,' says Eustathius, * were effected
by violence.' Certain it is, however these things be determined,
that the Roman pontiff opposed the Roman emperor and the
universal council in all its sessions.
But the sovereign and the fathers proceeded in the synodal
decisions, without hesitation or delay. Vigilius refused to sign
the sentence of the council. But his majesty compelled his in-
fallibility, unwilling as he was, to confirm decisions which his
holiness hated, and to sanction enactments, against which, in
the most solemn manner, he had protested. A convention,
assembled in this manner by stratagem, disputing about nothing,
corrupted by the emperor, repealing the decision of a former
general council, and acting in unrelenting hostility to the vicar-
general of God, constituted the fifth general, unerring, holy
Roman council.
The eight eastern councils, in this manner, were subject to
the control of the Roman emperor ; and the western, in the
same way, were swayed by the authority of the Roman pontiff.
The pope became as arbitrary and despotic among the Latins,
1 Les auteurs, que le saint concile de Chalcedoine avoit reeus. Godeau, 4. 230.
2 Consent ientes episcopi in Trium damnationem Capitulc rum muneribns dita-
bantur, vel non consentieutes, deposit!; in exilium inissi sunt. Liberatus, c.
XXIV. Crabb. 2. 121.
3 In liac syuodb, Justinianus Dioclet.in.nnm indicerat: ejus affectibus serviebant
omnes Graecoruni episcopi. Lupus, 1. 737. Bruy. 1. 330.
150 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY ! '
as the emperor had been among the Greeks. This servility
of the Westerns has been delineated with the pencil of truth,
by Gibert, Giannone, Du Pin, and Richerius. 1 - According to
Gibert, ' the pontiffs, in these conventions, did as they pleased.'
The Roman hierarchs, says Du Pin, ' established, in the twelfth
century, their sovereignty in the Roman city, and their inde-
pendence on the Roman emperor ; and even assumed the right
of conferring the imperial crown. Their power over the state
and the magistracy, was attended with additional authority and
jurisdiction over the church and clergy. Councils were con-
vened by their summons, and the synodal constitutions were
their productions. The popes were the authors of the eccle-
siastical canons, to which the prelacy only gave their assent.
The assembly merely sanctioned the will of the hierarch.' The
councils, in the twelfth century, were, according to Giannone,
* called by the pontiff, who, in these meetings, made such regu-
lations as were conducive to his own grandeur, while the as-
sembled bishops only consented.'
Richerius writes in the same strain as Du Pin, Gibert, and
Giannone. Synodal liberty, according to this a,uthor, ' departed
with the elevation of Gregory the Seventh to the papacy. This
patron of ecclesiastical despotism, contrary to the custom of
more than a thousand years, compelled the clergy of Christen-
dom to swear fidelity to the Roman See : and this stretch of
papal power, in a short time, introduced spiritual slavery. The
pontiffs, according to the same historian, continued, from the
accession of Gregory till the council of Constance, embracing a
period of 340 years, to assume the authority of framing canons
J. */ ' / O
and definitions at the Vatican, and then summoned servile synods
to sanction their arbitrary and oppressive dictations.'
A similar statement, in reference to the oath of fidelity to the
pope, is given by Gibert and Pithou in their editions of the
canon-law. In Gibert's statements ' bishops should swear fideli-
ty to the pope,' and in Pithou's ' all who, in the present day,
receive any dignity from the pope, take an oath of fidelity to
his holiness.' 2 Pius the Fourth, in the Confession of Faith
which, in 1564, he annexed to the Council of Trent, exacts an
oath of the same kind. According to this bull, issued by the
pope and received by the prelacy, all the beneficed clergy in
the Romish communion, ' promise and swear obedience to the
1 Pontificem in iis fecisse quidquid libuit. Gibert, 1. 100* Du Pin, Gen. XII.
c. XX. Giannon, XIV. 3. Rich. c. 38.
2 Episcopi Papae debent jusjurandum. Gibert, 3. 206. Hodie omnes accipientea
dignitatem a Papa sibi jurat. Pithou, 107.
Romano Pontifici veram obedientiam spondeo ac juro. Labb. 20. 222. Barclay,
11. c. 2.
WANT OF FREEDOM IN COUNCILS. 151
Roman pontiff. ' This obligation, it is plain, is inconsistent with
freedom or independence.
This servility and compulsion appeared in all the ten Latin
councils, and in none more than in the council of Trent. The
Trentines were under the control of the Roman court. His
holiness filled the council with hungry and pensioned Italians,
who voted as he pleased. The Italians, in this assembly,
amounted to one hundred and eighty-seven ; while those of
other nations mustered only eighty. The French, Spanish, and
Germans, indeed, endeavored to maintain the freedom of the
assembly ; but were overwhelmed by numbers. The French
and Spanish, however, both confessed the thraldom of the
synod. The cardinal of Lorraine complained of papal influ-
ence. Lausac, the French ambassador, declared that the
Roman court was master in the council and opposed the
reformation. Claudius, a French Trentine theologian, said, in
a letter to Espensasus, 'you would die with grief, if you should
see the villany which is here perpetrated for the purpose of
evading a reformation. 1 The Spanish declared that the council
contained more than forty, who received monthly pensions from
the Roman court. Richerius as well as Paolo admits the utter
absence of all liberty in the Council of Trent
1 Prae dolore, mortuus es, si ea vidisses quae ad eludendam reformationem,
infanda pitrantur. Claud. Ep. ad Espen. Paolo. II. V. VI. A la tenue d'tin
cile libra, celui de Trente ne 1'etant pas. Faol. 1. 216. et 2. 416.
CHAPTER IV.
SUPREMACY.
FOUR VARIATIONS POPE'S PRESIDENCY HIS SOVEREIGNTY OR DESPOTISM HIS
SUPPOSED EQUALITY WITH GOD HIS ALLEGED SUPERIORITY .TO GOD SCRIP-
TURAL PROOF TRADITIONAL EVIDENCE ORIGINAL STATE OF THE ROMAN CHURCH
CAUSES OF ITS PRIMACY EMINENCE OF THE CITY FALSE DECRETALS MISSIONS
OPPOSITION FROM ASIA, AFRICA, FRANCE, SPAIN, ENGLAND, AND IRELAND UNI-
VERSAL BISHOP USURPATIONS OF NICHOLAS, JOHN, GREGORY, INNOCENT, AND
BONIFACE.
THE Supremacy is, by the patrons of Romanism, uniformly
ascribed to the pope. This title the partisans of popery use to
represent the Roman hierarch's superiority in the church. But
the authority attached to this dignity, remains to the present
day undecided. Opinions on this topic have floated at freedom ,
unfixed by any acknowledged standard, and uncontrolled by
any recognized decision. The Romish doctors, in consequence,
have, on the pontificial supremacy, roved at random through
all the gradations and forms of diversified and conflicting
systems.
These systems are many, and, as might be expected, are
distinguished in many instances by trifling and evanescent
shades of discrimination. A full enumeration would be end-
less, and, at the same time, is useless. The chief variations on
this topic may be reduced to four. One confers a mere presi-
dency ; and the second an unlimited sovereignty on the Roman
pontiff. The third makes the pope equal and the fourth
superior, to God.
One variety restricts the Roman pontiff to a mere presidency,
similar to the moderator's in the Scottish assembly, or the pro-
locutor's in the English convocation. The first among his
equals, he is not the church's master, but its minister. Such are
the statements of Du Pin, Rigaltius,Filaster,Gibert, and Paolo. 1
1 Petrura inter Apostolos primum locum obtinuisse: Du Pin, 313. Primum
esee Romanum Pontificem. Du Pin, 333.
Non imperium, non dominatum, non potentatum, sed primum Locum. Du Pin,
314. Le Pape lui-meme n'est que le premier entre les pretres. Lenfant, 1. 107.
VARIATIONS IN THE PAPAL SUPREMACY. 153
The pontiff, says Du Pin, ' like Peter among the apostles, oli|
tains the first place. The pontiff has no power over the church,
but the church, on the contrary, over the pontiff.' The Roman '
hierarch, says Rigaltius, quoted by Du Pin, * possesses not
jurisdiction, dominion or sovereignty, but the first place.' Car
dinal Pilaster, in the council of Constance, and without any
opposition, reckoned ' the pope only the first among the priests.
The pope, says Gibert, 'is only the first of the bishops.' The
Roman hierarch, according to Paolo, ' is chief, not in authority,
but in order, as the president of an assembly.' This presidency,
therefore, Du Pin, observes, is only a primacy of order and
unity ; which indeed, is necessary for the efficiency and co-
operation of every society.
This primacy authorizes a general superintendence, allows
the possessor to watch over the faith and morality of the whole
community, and to enforce the observance of the ecclesiastical
canons. The power, however, is executive, not legislative;
and extends, not to the enactment, but merely to the enforce-
ment of laws. The Pontiff's doctrinal definitions and moral
instructions, are, on account of his dignity, entitled to attention ,
but depend on their general reception for their validity. The
pontifical primacy, or, as some say, monarchy, is, according to
this system, limited by prelatical aristocracy. The episcopacy,
in other words, restricts the popedom. The Roman pontiff is
inferior to a general council, by which he may, for heresy or
immorality, be tried and deposed, and which does not necessarily
require his summons, presidency, or confirmation ; though these
may, on some occasions, be a matter of convenience. The
patrons of this system deprecate the papal claims to infallibility ;
and view with detestation, all the Roman hierarch's pretensions
to the deposition of kings, the transferring of kingdoms, and the
absolution of subjects from the oath of fidelity. 1
The French have patronized this system on the subject of the
papal primacy. The Gallican church maintains this plan of
moderation and freedom, and disclaims the ultraism and ser-
vility of the Italian school. The same views have been enter-
tained by the university of Paris, followed by those of Angiers,
Orleans, Bononia, Louvain, Herford, Cracow, and Colonia.
The Sorbonne, in several instances, pronounced the contrary
Aliud non sit Papa quam episcoporum primus. Gibert, 3. 336.
Inter sequales episcopos, primum gradum obtineat, primus inter pares. De
Prim. 206.
Le Pape est ministre de 1'eglise; il n'en est pas le maltre. Apol. 2. 82.
1 Us le croyent soumis aux conciles Generanx. Moreri, 1. 40. Du Pin, 335.
Arsdekin, 1. 113. Hotman, 321.
154 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
opinion a heresy. 1 ' The same scheme has been supported by
many distinguished theologians, such as Gerson, Cusan, Tos-
tatus, Aliaco, Vittoria, Richerius, Soto, Dionysius, Launoy,
Driedo, Pluen, Filaster, Vigorius, Marca, and Du Pin ; and
these, again, have been followed by the Roman pontiffs, Pius,
Julius, Siricius, Zozimus, Celestine, Sixtus, Gregory, Eugenius,
Innocent, and Adrian. 2
A similar subordination of the papal power was patronized
by the councils of Pisa, Constance, and Basil. The Pisans de-
clared the superiority of a general council over the Roman
pontiff; degraded Benedict and Gregory and elected Alexan-
der. 3 The Constantians, treading in the footsteps of the Pisans,
defined, in the fourth session, the subjection of a pope to a
council, and denounced condign punishment on all persons, of
every state and dignity, even the papal, who should disobey
the synodal enactments. 4 The Basilians, in their second session,
renewed the decision of Constance with its penalty against all
transgressors. The council of Basil, besides, in its thirty-third
session, declared the superiority of a general council to a
Roman hierarch, and its incapability of being dissolved, pro-
rogued, or transferred against its consent, to be truths of the
Catholic faith. Pertinacity in the denial of these truths, the
holy unerring Fathers pronounced a heresy. The inferiority
of a pope to an universal synod, and his incompetency to order
its dissolution, adjournment, or translation are, according to an
infallible council, doctrines of Catholicism, and respect not
discipline but the faith. 5
A second variety allows the pope an unlimited sovereignty.
The abettors of this system, overstepping the bounds of mode-
ration, would exalt the primacy into a despotism. The pope-
dom, according to these speculators, is a monarchy, unlimited
by democracy or aristocracy, by the laity or the clergy. The
Roman pontiff's power is civil as well as ecclesiastical, extend-
ing both to the church and the state ; and legislative as well
as executive, comprehending in its measureless range both the
making and enforcing of laws. He is clothed with uncontrolled
authority over the church, the clergy, councils, and kings. He
1 Qui decent contrarium, haereticos ease censet. Du Pin, 421. L'eglise Gal-
licane ont approuve le decret de la superiority des conciles sur lea Papes.
Milletot, 572.
2 Launoy, 1. 295, 314. Du Pin, 442. Fabulottus, c. 2.
3 Concilium generale universam reprsesentans ecclesiam esse superius Papa. Du
Pin, 404.
4 Cui quilibet cujnscumque status vel dignitatis, etiam si papalis existat, obire
tenetur. Labb. 10.73. Summum pontificem subesse conciliis generalibus. Gibert,
2. 7. Cossart, 4. 113.
B Est veritas fidei Catholicae. Veritatibus duabus praedictis pertinaciter repug-
nans est censendus haereticus. Labb. 17. 236, 390. H merite d'etre cense hereto-
que. Bruy, 4. 126. Du Pin, 3. 38. Hotman, 321, 322.
SUPREMACY OF THE POPE. 155
has a right, both in a legislative and executive capacity, to
wovern the universal church, and to ordain, judge, suspend, and
depose bishops, metropolitans, and patriarchs through Christen-
dom. These receive their authority from the pope, as he re-
ceives his from God. He possesses a superiority over general
councils, which, for legitimation and validity, require pontifical
convocation, presidency, and ratification. He is the supreme
judge of controversy, and, in this capacity, receives appeals
from the whole church. He is vested with temporal as well as
spiritual authority ; and may depose sovereigns, transfer king-
doms, and absolve subjects from the oath of fealty. His chief
prerogative is infallibility. The Roman pontiff, unlike other
frail mortals, is, at least in his official sentences, which he pro-
nounces from the chair, exempted from all possibility of error
or mistake. 1
Such is the monstrous system of the Italian school on the
papal supremacy. The Transalpine faction, who are depend-
ant and servile minions of the Roman court, clothe the pontiff
with all this superhuman power and authority. This party has
been supported in these views by Jesuits, canonists, theologians,
popes, and councils. The votaries of Jesuitism, dispersed
through the world, have advocated the unlimited authority of the
popedom, with their accustomed erudition and sophistry. The
canonists, such as Gratian and Pithou, have, in general, been
friends to the plentitude of pontifical jurisdiction and despotism.
These have been supported by an host of theologians and school-
men, such as Baronius, Bellarmine, Binius, Turrecrema, San-
derus, Perron, Pighius, Carranza, Fabulottus, Lainez, Jacoba-
tius, Arsdekin, Antonius, Canus, Cajetan, Aquinas, Turrianno,
Lupus, Campeggio, and Bonaventura.
The Roman hierarchs, as might be expected, have, in
general, maintained the papal power. Celestine, Gelasius, Leo,
Nicholas, Gregory, Urban, Pascal, Boniface, Clement, and
Paul supported their overgrown tyranny with peculiar resolution
and energy. Gregory the Seventh subjected, not only the
church but the state, and monopolized both civil and ecclesias-
tical power. Boniface the Eighth taught the necessity of sub-
mission to the pontiff for the attainment of salvation. Paul the
Fourth seems to have been a model of pontifical ambition, arro-
gance, haughtiness, and tyranny. His infallibility contemned
1 Du Pin, 333. Bell. I V. 1, 15, et . 6. Gibert, 3. 36, 487. Cajetan, c.< I.
Bxtrav. 52, 101. . Labb. 18. 1428. Fabul. c. H.
Sub ratione regminis monarchic!. Dens, 2. 147. In Papa residet suprema
potestas. Faber, 2. 384. _ ,
Ecclesiam Christus instituerit instar regni, in qua unus. cseteris imperit. Labb.
20. 670.
Papa est Domiaas temporalis totius orbis. Barclay, 17
156 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY C
the authority of councils and kings. The papal power he
maintained, was unbounded and above all synods ; and this,
he called an article of faith; and the contrary, he denomi-
nated a heresy. 1 His holiness declared himself the successor
of one who had deposed emperors and kings, and superior to
princes, whom he would not acknowledge as his companions,
but use as his footstool. This vain glory, these empty boasts,
his infallibility enforced with the stamp of his foot and the
thunder of his apfistolic voice.
The Italian system, on the supremacy, was patronized also
by the councils of Florence, Lateran, and Trent. Eugenius,
in the Florentine Convention and with its approbation, declared,
in the thirteenth session, the superiority of the pope to a.
council, whose enactments he was authorized by his apostolic
prerogative to change or repeal. The pontifical dissolution or
translation of a council, he declared, is no heresy, notwithstanding
the contrary sentence of the Basilian assembly, whose acts, he
affirmed, were unjust and foolish, and contrary to the laws of
God and man. The Florentines vested his infallibility with the
vicegerency of God, and authority to teach all Christians, and
the supremacy over the whole world. 2
The fifth council of the Lateran clothed Leo with equal
power. This convention decreed the superiority of the Roman
pontiff over all councils, and his fall power and right of synodal
convocation, translation, and dissolution. This assembly also
renewed the bull of Boniface, which declared the subjection of
all Christians to the Roman pontiff necessary for salvation. 3
The council of Trent, on this subject, was not so explicit as
those of Florence and the Lateran. The French and Spanish,
in this synod, withstood the Italians, and prevented the free
expression of Ultramontane servility. The council, however,
in its fourteenth session, ascribed to the pope 'the supreme
power in the universal church.' 4 The pontiff, said Cardillusto
the Trentine fathers, without any disclaimer, ' holds, as a mor-
tal God, the place of Christ on earth, and cannot be judged by
1 C'etoit un article de foi, et que de dire le contraire etoit une heresie. Paolo,
2. 27. Labb. 19. 968.
2 Constat synodum pontifici esse inferiorem. Labb. 18. 1320. Papa est super
potestatem ecclesiae universalis et cottcilii generalis. Cajetan, 1. 10.
Dissolutionem sive translationem concilii haeresim non pertinere. Labb. 18.
1321. Romanum Pontificem in universum orbem tenere primatum, et verum
Christ! vicarium, existere. Labb. 18. 526. 1152. Gibert, 1. 93.
3 Solum Romanum Pontificem, tanquam auctoritatem super omnia concilia
habentem, tarn conciliorum dicendorum, transferendorum, dissolvendorum plenum
jus et potestatem habere. Labb. 19. 967. Bruys, 4. 806. Du Pin 430.
4 Pro suprema potestate sibi in ecclesia universa tradita. Labb. 20. 96. Gibert,
1.181. Dens, 8. 232.
Is Christi vicem gerit in terris, tanquam mortalis Deus : neque a concilio general!
Pontifex judicari potest. Cardil. in Labb. 20. 671, 1177. "
SUPPOSED EQUALITY OF THE POPE WITH GOD. 157
a general council.' This avowal is inconsistent with Cisalpine
liberality and independence.
The French, therefore, in this manner, oppose the Italians
on the topic of papal supremacy. These two schools are,
on this question, at open war. Theologian withstands theolo-
gian. Gerson, Alliaco, Richerius, Launoy, Almain, Paolo,
Marca, Du Pin, Carron, and Walsh, encounter Baronius,
Bellarmine, Binius, Carranza, Turiano, Turrecrema, Arsdekin,
Cajetan, Aquinas, and Bonaventura. The universities of Paris,
Angiers, Orleans, Toulouse, Bononia, Louvain, Cracow,
Cologne, and Herford may be pitted against the schoolmen,
the Jesuits, and the Roman court. Pope charges pope, in
dreadful affray. Damasus, Felix, Siricius, Celestine, and Pius
lead their phalanx against the squadrons of Leo, Gregory,
Urban, Nicholas, Pascal Paul, and Sixtus. General councils
stand in array against general councils. The Pisans, Constan-
tians, and Basilians wage ware against the Florentines, Laterans,
and Trentines ; and hurl mutual anathemas from their spiritual
artillery.
A third variety would raise the pope to an equality with God.
The Italian school, one would expect, conifers a power on the
Roman hierarch calculated to satisfy the highest ambition. But
the Transalpine system does not terminate the progression. A
third description of flatterers have proceeded to greater ex-
travagancy, and vested his holiness with ampler prerogatives.
These, in the exorbitance of papal adulation, have insulted
reason, outraged common sense^ and ascended, in their impious,
progress, through all the gradations of blasphemy. Pretended
Christians have ascribed that Divinity to the Roman pontiff, which
the Pagans attributed to the Roman emperors. Domitian, ad-
dressing his subjects in his proclamation, signed himself their
* Lord God.' Caligula arrogated the name of ' the Greatest and
Best God;' while Sapor, the Persian monarch, affected, with
more modesty, to be only * the Brother of the Sun and Moon.' 1
This blasphemy has been imitated by the minions of his Roman
^fallibility. The pope, says the gloss of the canon law, < is not
a man.' This awkward compliment is intended to place his
holiness above humanity. According to Turrecrema and Bar
clay, ' some DOCTORLINGS wish, in their adulation, to equal the
pontiff to God.' These, says Gerson, quoted by Carron and
Giannone, ' esteem the pope a God, who has all power in heaven
and earth.' The sainted Bernard affirms that, ' none, except
God, is like the pope, either in heaven or on earth.' 2
1 Suetonius, 322, 555.
9 Papa non eat homo. Sext. Decret. L. I. Tit. VI. c. 18.
Doctorculi volant adalando eos quasi sequiparare Deo. Barclay, 219. Turrecren,
158 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
The name and the works of God have been appropriated to
the pope, by theologians, canonists, popes, and councils.
Gratian, Pithou, Durand, Jacobatius, Musso, Gibert, Gregory,
Nicholas, Innocent, the canon law, and the Lateran council have
complimented his holiness with the name of deity, or bestowed
on him the vicegerency of heaven. Pithou, Gibert, Durand,
Jacobatius, Musso, and Gratian, on the authority of the canon
law, style the pontiff the Almighty's vicegerent, 'who occupies
the place, not of a mere man, but of the true God.' According
to Gregory the Second, ' The whole Western Nati.ons reckoned
Peter a terrestrial God,' and the Roman pontiff, of course,
succeeds to the title and the estate. This blasphemy, Gratian
copied into the canon law. ' The emperor Coristantine,' says
Nicholas the First, ' conferred the appellation of God on the
pope, who, therefore, being God, cannot be judged by man.'
According to- Innocent the Third, ' the pope holds the place of
the true God.' The canon law, in the gloss, denominates the
Roman hierarch, ' our Lord God.' The canonists, in general,
reckon the pope the one God, who hath all power, human and
divine, in heaven and in earth. Marcellus in the Lateran
council and with its full approbation, called Julius, ' God on
earth.' 1 This was the act of a general council, and, therefore,
in the popish account, is the decision of infallibility.
The works as well as the name of God have been ascribed
to the pope, by Innocent, Jacobatius, Durand, Decius, Lainez,
the canon law, and the Lateran council. ' The pope and the
Lord,' in the statement of Innocent, Jacobatius and Decius,
' form the same tribunal, so that, sin excepted, the pope can do
nearly all that God can do.' Jacobatius, in his modesty, uses
the qualifying expression nearly, which Decius, with more ef-
frontery, rejects as unnecessary. The pontiff, say Jacobatius
and Durand, 'possesses aplentitude of power, and none dare
say to him, any. more than to God, Lord, what dost thou ? He
can change the nature of things, and make nothing out of some-
thing and something out of nothing.' These are not the mere
Q. II. Estiment Papam tmicum Deum esse qui habet potestatem omnem in coelo
etinterrA. Carron, 34. Giannon, X. 12. Praeter Deum, non est similis ei nee
in coelo, nee in terra. Bernard, 1725. 2. Thess. II. 4.
1 Papa vicem non puri hominis, sed veri Dei, gerens in terra. Jacob. VII.
Barclay, 222. Pithou, 29. Decret. I. Tit. VII. c. III. Papa locum Dei tenet in
terris. Gibert, 2. 9. Durand. 1. 51. Omnia Occidentis regna, velut Deum terres-
trem habent. Labb. 8. 666. Bray. 2. 100. Constantino Deum appellatum, cum
nee posse Deum ab hominibus judicari maxdfestum est. Labb. 9. 1572. Dominus
Dens noster Papa. Extrav. Tit. XIV. c. IV, Walsh, p. IX. Deus in terris.
Labb. 19. 731. Bin. 9. 54.
Canonists dicunt, Papam esse unum Deum, qui habet potestatem omnem ia
coelo et in terra. Potestatem omnem et Divinam et humanam Papae tribuunt
Barclay,^, 4, 930.
ALLEGED SUPERIORITY OF TELE POPE TO GOD. 159
imaginations of Jacobatius, Durand, and Decius ; but are found,
in all their absurdity, in the canon law, which attributes to the
pope, the irresponsibility of the Creator, the divine power of
performing the works of God, and making something out of
nothing. The pope, according to Lainez at the council of
Trent, ' has the power of dispensing with all laws, and the same
authority as the Lord.' This, exclaimed Hugo, ' is a scandal
and impiety which equals a mortal to the immortal, and a man
to God.' An archbishop, in the last Lateran synod, called
Julius ' prince of the world:' and another orator styled Leo,.
' the possessor of all power in heaven and in earth, who presi-
ded over all the kingdoms of the globe.' This blasphemy, the
holy, unerring, Roman council heard without any disapproba-
tion, and the pontiff with unmingled complacency. The man
of sin then ' sat in the temple of God, and showed himself that
he was God.' ' Some popes,' says Coquille, * have allowed
themselves to be called omnipotent.' 1
A fourth variety, on this subject, makes the Pope superior to
God. Equality with the Almighty, it might have been expected
would have satiated the ambition of the pontiff and satisfied the
sycophancy of his minions. But this was not the giddiest step
in the scale of blasphemy. The superiority of the pope over
the Creator, has 'been boldly and unblushingly maintained by
pontiffs, theologians, canonists, and councils.
According to Cardinal Zabarella, 'the pontiffs; in their arro-
gance, assumed the accomplishment of all they pleased, even un-
lawful things, and thus raised their power above the law of
God.' The canon law declares that, ' the Pope, in the pleni-
tude of his power, is above right, can change the substantial
nature of things, and transform unlawful into lawful.' 2 Bellar-
mine's statement is of a similar kind. The Cardinal affirms
that, ' the Pope can transubstantiate sin into duty, and duty
into sin.' He can, says the canon law, dispense with right.'
Stephen, archbishop of Petraca, in his senseless parasitism
and blasphemy, declared, in the council of the Lateran, that
1 Papa et Christus faciunt idem consistorium, ita quod, excepto peccato, potest
Papa fere omnia facere, quae potest Deus. Jacob. III. Papae nullus audeat discere,
Domine, cur ita facis ? Extrav. Tit. IV. c. II. Sicut Deo dici non potest, cur ita
facis ? Ita nee in iss, quae sunt juris positivi, Papse potest dici cur hoc facis ?
Jacob. III. De aliquo facit nibil, rautando etiam rei naturam. De nihilo, aliquid
facit. Durand, 1. 50. Extrav. De Tran. c. 1. q. 6. Cpram te, hoc est, coram
totius orbis principe. Labb. 19. 700. Tibi data est, omnis potestas, in coelo etin
terra. Super omnia regna mundi sedens. Labb. 19. 920, 927. Du Pin. 3. 602.
2. Thess. II. 4. Aucuns ont endure d'etre appellez omnipotens. Coquille, 408.
3 Pontifices multa sibi arrogaverunt, et, omnia se posse existiment, et quidquid
iiberit, etiam illicita ; sicque supra Dei prseceptum potestatem illam extendisse.
Zabarel. de Schism. Thuan. 6. 397. Habet plenitudinem potestaritis, et supra
jus est. Gibert, 2, 103. Immutat substantialem rei naturam puta faciendo do
ulegitimo, legitimum. Durand, 1. 50.
160 , THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY C
Leo possessed ' power above all powers, both in heaven and in
earth.' 1 The son of perdition then * exalted himself above all
that is called God.' This brazen blasphemy passed in a general
council, and is, therefore, in all its revolting absurdity, stamped
with the seal of Roman infallibility.
But the chief prerogative of the Roman hierarch seems to
be his power of creating the Creator. 2 Pascal and Urban
plumed themselves on this attribute, which, according to their
own account, raised them above ah 1 subjection to earthly
sovereigns. This, however, is a communicable perfection, and,
in consequence, is become common to all the sacerdotal confra-
ternity. His holiness keeps a transfer office at the Vatican, in
which he can make over this prerogative to all his deputies
through Christendom. These, in consequence, can make and
eat, create and swallow, whole thousands of pastry-gods every
day. But these deities, in the opinion of their makers, aret)er-
haps not new gods, but merely new editions of the old one.
Those who would restrict his infallibility to a presidency, and
those who would exalt his dignity to a sovereignty, contending
with one another, have also to contend with such as maintain
his equality or superiority to God. The two latter descriptions,
indeed, seem to be divided by a thin partition. Having elevated
a sinful mortal to an equality with Jehovah, the remaining task
of conferring a superiority was easy. But both vary from the
French and Italian schools, as well as from reason and common
sense.
Such are a few of the opinions, which speculators have enter-
tained of the pope's jurisdiction and authority. These opinions
have not been confined to empty speculation ; but have, as far as
possible, been realized in action on the wide theatre of Christen-
dom, and before the public gaze of an astonished world. The
Roman hierarchy has, in reality, passed through all the grada-
tions of humility, pride, power, despotism, and blasphemy.
The friends of Romanism differ as much in the proof of the
supremacy as in its extent and signification. The pontiffs and
their minions, about the begining of the fifth century, fabricated
an extraordinary story about Pope Peter's Roman episcopacy
and ecclesiastical supremacy ; and his transmission of all this
honour and jurisdiction to his pontifical successors. The tale,
if arranged with judgment and written with elegance, would
1 Si Papa erraret prsecipiendo villa, vel probibendo virtutes, teneretur ecclesia
credere vitia ease bona, et virtutes, malas. Bellamun, IV. 5. Possumus supra JOB
diapensare. Decret. Greg. III. 8. IV. Extrav. Comm. 208. Potestas supra omnea
potestates tarn cceli, quam teme. Labb. 19. 924.
8 Deum cuncta creantem creent. Hoveden, 268. Labb. 12. 960. E16v6i a
cet honneur supreme de crer le Createur. Bruy. 2. 535.
ALLEGED SUPERIORITY OF THE POPE TO GOD. 161
make an entertaining religious novel ; but as destitute of evi-
dence as Roderic Random, Tristram Shandy, or the Seven
Champions of Christendom. The fiction too has been composed
by bungling and tasteless authors. The plot is far inferior to
that of Don Quixote or Tom Jones. The characters, emblazoned
with ridiculous and legendary miracles, the offspring of credu-
lity and tradition, bear no resemblance to probability ; whilst
the language, in which it has been uniformly couched, is un-
polished and repulsive.
The machinery is such as might be expected in a romance
of the dark ages. Simon a magician is introduced, accompanied
with Helen a goddess, who had been taken from the Tyrian
brothels, and who had been transformed from a courtezan into
a divinity. This man had, by the arts of necromancy, obtained
an infamous notoriety : and the apostle, it would appear, was
conducted to Rome for the purpose of withstanding the en-
chanter. The new pope was opposed to the old conjurer.
Simon, before the emperor Nero and the whole city, flew into
t the air. But Peter kneeling invoked Jesus ; and the devil, ki
/consequence, who had aided the magician's flight, struck with
terror at the sacred name, let his emissary fall and break his
leg. 1 One stone, in the Roman capital, retains, to the present
day, the print of Peter's knee where he prayed, and another,
the blood of Simon where he fell !
The hero of this theological romance is the alleged pope
Peter. His supremacy is the basis of the whole superstructure.
This ecclesiastical sovereign is the main-spring which puts into
motion the entire machinery ; and the busy actors in the scene,
accordingly, have endeavoured, as well as they cany to support
the illusion with some kind of evidence. The proof, such as it
is, these doctors extort from the phraseology of the Messiah
by the sacred historian Matthew. 2
, say these theologians, built, according to the state-
Matthew, his cta|||h on Peter, whom, by this charter,
he constituted his pleni^^^ary on earth. His authority do
_ T * * ^I'l^sal'll*^* TT * " f\* (PSGC^frSSS*! f*
volves in succession on alPthe Roman pontiffigajgp, of course,
on Liberius, Zosimus, Honorius, Vigilius, Jo^^^^Kiface, and
Alexander, who have been immortalized by villany.
Matthew's relation is conveyed in metaphorical language, and
has given rise to a variety of interpretations. Different exposi-
tors, even among Romish critic^jexplain the ROCK, mentioned
by the inspired historian, ii^^^^^nses. The diversity of
*.! * r- -i :- v nft3^S^fSStSk- TV TV ^ i- 7
these opinions is freely ad^^^fepLaunoy, Du Pin, Cahnet,
and Maldonat. All these c^^^^ftivariety of opinions ca thig
Cyril, 88. Catech. VI. a Matth. xvi. 18.
11
162 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
passage of Revelation. 1 Launoy, followed by Du Pin, Calmet,
and Maimbourg, distinguish the interpretations on this part of
sacred writ into four classes, according as they make the foun-
dation to be Peter ; the Apostles ; Peter's confession ; or Jesus
himself. Each class boasts the authority of popes, saints, and
other commentators.
One class refers the rock or foundation, mentioned by the in-
spired historian, to Peter. These support their opinion by
seventeen fathers or theologians who entertained this interpre-
tation ; among whom were Origen, Tertullian, Cyprian, Hilary,
Ambrosius, Jerome, Augustine, Cyril, Basil, Epiphanius, Gre-
gory, and Theophylact. These, in modern times, were followed
fey Baronius, Calmet, Binius, Maldonat, and Alexander. Pope
Leo the First patronized the same opinion. Fontidinius and
Cardillus, in the council of Trent, advocated this explanation,
without any contradiction ; and, therefore, it appears, expressed
the mind of that assembly. 2
A second class interpret the rock or foundation to signiiy the
APOSTLES. This exposition has been embraced by theologian^-,
saints, and councils. It was adopted by Origen, Theodor ( et,
Tarasius, Etherius, Theophylact, and Pascasius. The same
was admitted by Du Pin, Calmet, Alexander, Cusan, Launoy,
and Maldonat, as well as by the saints Cyprian, Jerome,
Hilary, Cyril, Ambrosius, Chrysostom, and Augustine. 3
This signification of the word was also sanctioned by the
genera] councils of Constance and Basil. Gerson delivered a
statement to this purpose in the general council of Constance,
in a speech made by its authority, and published by its com-
mand. "Ehe same was taught in the general council of Basil,
by its president Julian, in his celebrated speech delivered
before the unerring assembly in the name of the Catholic
Church, for the purpose of proselyting the Bohem
normitan, in this synod, followed Julian in the sami
T- '
stating that ' Jesus gave no greatei||pwer to Peter,
1 Ab interpEgfil^fetet sanctis patribus vmf||3J>omtur. Du Pin, 304. Les diver-
: sitez dans les|fe|p||f|H;,les sens de ce passage. ** Calmet, 18. 364. Maijpbourg, c. v.
De Prim. ,
2 Launoyi^ia^^|^p*IMi'Pin, Djss. IV. Maldon. in Matt. xiv. De Launoi 17
patres sea ecclesitsticos 'auc tores laudat huic interpretation! consentientes. De
ifriizatn, 10.
Princeps Apostolorum Petre, cujus humeris hanc molem ecclesiae Christus impo-
suit. ^ontid. in Labb. 20, 658. .5%
Cujus fundamentum Petras' estvjf. Sj^ei^auic.Petrum, tanquam supra firmam pe-
ta-am, Christus aedificavit ecclesia^rii^.SfG t ardill. in Labb. 20. 668, 671.
3 Launoy. 2. 11. ; Du -Pin, -Q^^p^3M|i1^bn. in Matt. xvi. Apostoli omnes,
aequo jure, fuerint ecclesije fdndamej|^^^le^:. 1. 283.
Nifail dictum est ad Petram^^tl^^^^^^is dictum non sit. Cusan, II. 3.
Tous les Apotres en sont lea fonlie^ieiis. Cabnet, 18. 363. Eph. ii. 20. Rev
xxl 14. .
ALLEGED SUPERIORITY OF THE POPE TO GOD. 163
other apostles.' Neither pope nor council, on any of these oc-
casions, remonstrated or shewed any opposition. The infallible
fathers acquiesced in silent consent, and, in this way, according
to Launoy, Dens, and other popish doctors, conveyed their
approbation. 1
A third class interpret the rock or foundation to signify
Peter's faith or confession. This signification, according to
Launoy, Du Pin, BeUarmine, Maimbourg, Calmet, and Maido-
nat, has been maintained by theologians, saints, popes, and coun-
cils. Launoy and Du Pin reckon forty-four fathers and popish
authors who held this opinion : and the roll might be enlarged
to any extent. Amongst these were Eusebius, Beda, Theodoret,
Damascen, Theophylact, Odo, Ragusa, Alphonsus, Pole, Jonas,
Eckius, and Erasmus. A long train of saints might be added,
such as Hilary, Ambrosius, Gregory, Chrysostom, Cyril,
Augustine, and Aquinas. The popes are Leo, Felix, Hormisdas,
Gregory, Nicholas, John, Stephen, Innocent, Urban, Alexan-
der, and the two Hadrians. These facts have been admitted
even by Bellarmine and Maimbourg, as well as by Calmet and
Maldonat. Anno 825, Jonas, bishop of Orleans, ascribed this
explanation to nearly all ecclesiastical writers : and none, said
the celebrated Eckius so late as 1525, deny this interpretation.
Erasmus not only accounted Peter's faith or profession the
foundation, ' but wondered that any person would wrest the
passage to signify the Roman pontiff.' 2
1 In apostolorum et prophetarum doclrinis iundata est. Gerson in Labb. 16.
1315.
In Apocalypsi dicitur, murum civitatis descendentis de Coelo, quae est ecclesia,
habere ftmdamenta duodecem apostolorum et Agni. Orat. Prsesed. in Labb. 17. 696.
Nee in hoc, majorem potestatem dedit Petro quam caeteris apostolis simul.
Panorm. in Casaant, 4. 1405.
Cum a synodo admittatur, pro synodi doctrina haberi merito potest et debet.
Launoy, 2. 30.
Sufficit consensus tacitus. Facere, in hoc caeu, eat consentire. Dens., 2. 129.
2 Launoy, 2. 18. Du Pin, 305. Calmet et Maldon. in Matt. xvi. 18. Maim-
bourg, c. 6.
Idem alterius istius interpretationis patronos 44 patres aut scriptores ecclesiasticos
laudat. Du Pin, 2.
Bellarminus, ut expositionem tertiam, hanc yeterum patrum testimoniis posse,
iateatur. Launoy, 2, 51. ^^fw&B^s.
II y en a d'autres, qui les ont entendue^^^^^;elebre confession. Maim-
Hanc confessionem, porta? inferninon I. Serm. II. Super ista
confessione ;edificabo ecclesiam meam. ad Zenon. Labb. 5. 166.
Apostoli fidem secuti sunt. Horm; in petra ecclesise, hoc est, in
confessione Beati Petri. Greg. I. in Labb. 678/2?^^
Super solidam fidem apostolorum principis. Nich. I. ad Mich, super solidam
confessionis petram, suam Dominus fabricavjt ecclesiam. John viii. ad Petrum.
Ecclesia ftindata super firmam petram apostoli, videlicet Petri confessionem.
Steph. vi. Ep. 2. Super hanc petTam > sedifica.bo ecclesiam : petram utique firmi-
tatem fidei. Jnno. II. ad Epis. Supra petram fideifundavit. Urban III. ad Arch-
Promeruit confiteri fidem, super qnam fundatur ecclesia. Hadrian I. ad Con.
11*
162 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
passage of Revelation. 1 Launoy, followed by Du Pin, Calmet,
and Maimbourg, distinguish the interpretations on this part of
sacred writ into four classes, according as they make the foun-
dation to be Peter ; the Apostles ; Peter's confession ; or Jesus
himself. Each class boasts the authority of popes, saints, and
other commentators.
One class refers the rock or foundation, mentioned by the in-
spired historian, to Peter. These support their opinion by
seventeen fathers or theologians who entertained this interpre-
tation ; among whom were Origen, Tertullian, Cyprian, Hilary,
Ambrosius, Jerome, Augustine, Cyril, Basil, Epiphanius, Gre-
gory, and Theophylact. These, in modern times, were followed
by Baronius, Calmet, Binius, Maldonat, and Alexander. Pope
Leo the First patronized the same opinion. Fontidinius and
Cardillus, in the council of Trent, advocated this explanation,
without any contradiction ; and, therefore, it appears, expressed
the mind of that assembly. 2
A second class interpret the rock or foundation to signify the
APOSTLES. This exposition has been embraced by theologians,
saints, and councils. It was adopted by Origen, Theodoret,
Tarasius, Etherius, Theophylact, and Pascasius. The same
was admitted by Du Pin, Calmet, Alexander, Cusan, Launoy,
and Maldonat, as well as by the saints Cyprian, Jerome,
Hilary, Cyril, Ambrosius, Chrysostom, and Augustine. 3
This signification of the word was also sanctioned by the
general councils of Constance and Basil. Gerson delivered a
statement to this purpose in the general council of Constance,
in a speech made by its authority, and published by its com-
mand. The same was taught in the general council of Basil,
by its president Julia.n, in his celebrated speech delivered
before the unerring assembly in the name of the Catholic
Church, for the purpose of proselyting the Bohemians. Pa-
normitan, in this synod, followed Julian in the same strain,
stating that 'Jesus gave no greater power to Peter, than to the
1 Ab interpretibus et sanctis patribus varie exponitur. Du Pin, 304. Les diver-
sitez dans les peres sur lea sens de ce passage. Calmet, 18. 364. Maimbourg, c. v.
De Prim. I, 5.
2 Launoy, ad Voel. Du Pin, Diss. IV. Maldon. in Matt. xiv. De Launoi 17
patres seu ecclesiasticos auctores laudat huic interpretationi consentientes. D
iTiuzatu, 10.
Princeps Apostolorum Petre, cujus humeiis hanc molem ecclesite Cm-istus impo-
suit, ^oiitid. in Labb. 20. 658.
Cujus fundamentum Petrus est. Super mine Petrum, tanquam supra firmani pe-
tram, Christus aedificavit ecclesiam suam. Cardill. in Labb. 20. 668, 671.
3 Launoy. 2. 11. Du Pin, Diss. IV. Maldon. in Matt. xvi. Apostoli omnes,
sequojure, fuerint ecclesiae iiindamenta. Alex. 1. 283.
Nihil dictum est ad Petrum, quod etiam aliis dictum non sit. Cusan, II. 3.
Tous les Apotres en sont lea fondemens. Calmet, 18. 363. Eph. ii. 20. Rev
Kxi. 14.
ALLEGED STIPE RIORIT1" OF THE POPE TO GOD. 163
other apostles.' Neither pope nor council, on any of these oc-
casions, remonstrated or shewed any opposition. The infallible
lathers acquiesced in silent consent, and, in this way, according
to Launoy, Dens, and other popish doctors, conveyed their
approbation. 1
A third class interpret the rock or foundation to signify
Peter's faith or confession. This signification, according to
Launoy, Du Pin, Bellarmine, Maimbourg, Calmet, and Maldo-
nat, has been maintained by theologians, saints, popes, and coun-
cils. Launoy and Du Pin reckon forty-four fathers and popish
authors who held this opinion : and the roll might be enlarged
to any extent. Amongst these were Eusebius, Beda, Theodoret,
Damascen, Theophylact, Odo, Ragusa, Alphonsus, Pole, Jonas,
Eckius, and Erasmus. A long train of saints might be added,
such as Hilary, Ambrosius, Gregory, Chrysostom, Cyril,
Augustine, and Aquinas. The popes are Leo, Felix, Hormisdas,
Gregory, Nicholas, John, Stephen, Innocent, Urban, Alexan-
der, and the two Hadrians. These facts have been admitted
even by Bellarmine and Maimbourg, as well as by Calmet and
Maldonat. Anno 825, Jonas, bishop of Orleans, ascribed this
explanation to nearly all ecclesiastical writers : and none, said
the celebrated Eckius so late as 1525, deny this interpretation.
Erasmus not only accounted Peter's faith or profession the
foundation, ' but wondered that any person would wrest the
passage to signify the Roman pontiff,' 2
I In apostolorum et prophetarum doclrinis fundata est. Gerson in Labb. 16.
1315.
In Apocalypsi dicitur, mumm civitatis descendentis de Coelo, quse est ecclesia,
habere fundamenta duodecem apostolorum et Agni. Orat. Praised, in Labb. 17. 696.
Nee in hoc, majorem potestatem dedit Petro quam casteris apostolis simul.
Panortn. in Cassant, 4. 1405.
Cum a synodo admittatur, pro synodi doctrina haberi merito potest et debet-
Launoy, 2. 30.
Sufficit consensus tacitus. Facere, inboc casu, est consentire. Dens, 2. 129.
" Launoy, 2. 18. Da Pin, 305. Calmet et Maldon. in Matt. xvi. 18. Maim-
bourg, c. 6.
Idem alterius istius interpretationis patronos 44 patres aut scriptores ecclesiasticos
laudat. Du Pin, 2.
Bellarminus, ut expositionem tertiam, hanc veterum patrum testimoniis posse,
lateatur. Launoy, 2, 51.
II y en a d'autres, qui les ont entendues de cette celebre confession. Maim-
bourg, c. 6.
Hanc confessionem, portac inferni non tenebunt. Leo I. Serm. II. Super ista
confessione jedificabo ecclesiam meam. Felix. III. Ep. adZenon. Labb. 5. 166.
Apostoli fidem secuti sunt. Horm. in Comm. In petra ecclesiaj, hoc est, in
conrcssione Beati Fetri. Greg. I. in Labb. 6. 872.
Super solidam fidem apostolorum principis. Nich. I. ad Mich, super solidam
confessionis petram, suam Dominus fabricavit ecclesiam. John viii. ad Petrum.
Ecclesia fundata super firmam petram apostoli, videlicet Petri confessionem.
Steph. vi. Ep. 2. Super hanc petram a?dificabo ecclesiam : petram utique firmi-
tatem fidei. Inno. II. ad Epis. Supra petram fideifundav.it. Urban III. ad Arch.
Promeruit confiteri fidem, super quam fundatur ecclesia. Hadrian. I. ad Con.
11*
164 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY !
Peter's faith or confession is the foundation, also, according
to the general councils of Nicea, Constantinople, Constance,
Basil, and the Lateran. Pope Hadrian, in a letter to the
empress Irene, read and received with acclamation in the
second general councils of Nicea, gave this interpretation. The
same pontiff's letter to Tarasius, containing a similar statement,
was read in this synod, and admitted with equal approbation.
A similar reception attended the letters of Germanus, concur-
ring with Hadrian, in this unerring assembly. All the bishops
approved. The eighth general council of Constantinople ac-
cepted pope Nicholas' Epistle to Photius, which avowed the
same opinion. The Constantian theologians, in their censure
of Wickliffism, read and sanctioned in the council of Constance,
likewise explained the expression to denote ' the rock of faith.'
The council of Basil, through Julian and Ragusa,its advocates
against the Bohemian heresy, was equally express in maintaining
this exposition, which had been avowed at Nicea,, Constantino-
ple, and Constance. The foundation or rock, in these famed
orations, ' is faith, on which the Creator built the church, and
which sustains the superstructure.' The council of the Lateran
concurred with that of Basil. Peter, said Archbishop Ste-
phanus, addressing Pope Leo in the tenth session of the fifth
general council of the Lateran, ' confessed the Catholic Apos-
tolic faith, ordained by the eternal father and the eternal son
for the foundation of the church.' The holy pontiff and the
holy fathers, in silent approbation, admitted the unquestioned
truth, which, sanctioned by the five general councils of Nicea,
Constantinople, Constance, Basil, and the Lateran, was, there-
fore, on five several occasions, emblazoned with the insignia of
infallibility. 1
In confessionis petra. Hadrian IV. ad Fred. Labb. 8. 747. Cyril. 2. 593.
Hilary, 77.
Ad annum DCCCXXV. Jonas expositionem tertiam traditoribus ecclesiae pcene
omnibus tribuit. Launoy, 2. 51.
Ad annum MDXXV. Eckius earn a nemine negari pugnat. Launoy, 2, 51.
Miror esse, qui locum mine detorqueant ad Romanum Pontificem. Erasm. 6. 88, 92.
1 Promeruit confiteri fidem.g^upra quam fundatur ecclesia. Fides nostra est
petra super quam Christa8*a^ii||avBt suam ecclesiam. Germ, ad Thorn. Labb. 8.
747, 770, 951, 1193, 34, 35.
Christus supra soliditM||a|| 53pL||suam sanctam dignatus est stabilire ecclesiam.
Nich. Photio. Labb.
Illam ipse solus ChriBtpp|p|j|vit, et super petram fidei mox nascentis erexit.
Theol. Constan. in Labb. ^^^8^70. Canisius, 4. 765.
Fides est fundamentuni in domo moa. Hoc autem fidei fundamentum firmiter
sustentet aedificium. Super hanc petram, videlicet fidei, sedificabo ecclesiam
meam. Labb. 17, 686, 692, 693. Crabb. 3. 294.
Christus rogavit pro fide, quam ipse confessus fuerat, etgupra quam ipse Christus
fundavit suam ecclesiam. Rag. in Labb. 17. 896.
Fidem Catholicam et apostoucam ab oeterno Patre pro reterno Filio ordiu itam ad
fondamentum ecclesiae, confessus est. Orat. Steph. in Labb. 19. 921.
ALLEGED SUPERIORITY OF THE POPE TO GOD. 165
A fourth class make Christ himself the rock or foundation.
This explanation also has been patronized by theologians,
saints, popes, and councils. Launoy enumerates sixteen fathers
or popish doctors of this descripton ; and the list might be
vastly increased. Among the fathers and doctors are Origen,
Eusebius, Theodoret, Beda, Paulinus, Dungal, Etherius, Raban,
Tarasius, Anselm, Theophylact, Lombard, Ragusa, Lyra, Pole,
and Vatablus. The saints are Cyprian, Cyril, Jerome,
Augustine, and Aquinas, as well as many more that might be
mentioned. The popes are Celestine, Innocent, Pius, Alexan-
der, Hadrian, Nicholas, and Leo : and to these might be added
many other Roman pontiffs. 1
The rock or foundation, say also the general councils of
Nicea, Constantinople, Basil, and Trent, was the Lord. This
was expressed in Pope Hadrian's letter to Tarasius, which
was read and received in the second Nicean council: and
in the speech of Epiphanius to the same assembly. The
same was declared in a letter of Pope Nicholas to Michael,
which was read without any declamation "in the eighth general
council that met at Constantinople. The Basilian council con-
curred with those of Nicea and Constantinople. This assembly,
through Julian and Ragusa, its advocates for Catholicism
against the Bohemian heresy, also sanctioned this interpreta-
tion. The general council of Trent followed in the same path.
Fragus in this synod, declared without any disclamation, that
* the church was builded on the living stone, the firm and divine
rock.' 2 This interpretation, therefore, giving the honour to the
Messiah, was, in four general councils, marked with the seal
of synodal infallibility.
Augustine's language on this question is, in several places,
very strong and emphatical. He makes a distinction between
1 Laun. ad veoll. Da Pin, 305. Theophylact, 2. 186. Lyra, 5. 52. Canisius,
2.298.
De Launoi sexdecim numeratpatres seu ecclesiasticos auctores sic htmc textum
exponentes. De Prim 2.
Christus qui est petra. Cyprian. Bp. 63. Avtfoj v oSsjistooj. Cyril, 2. 612.
Fundamentum unus est Domines. .Teroin. c. 7. Petra Christus est. Jerom. 3. 1430
Aug. Ret. I. 21. Christas est ecclesise fundamentum. Aquin. 2. 6. Ant. 6.
De seipsa veritate dicente, super hanc petram. Celest. III. ad Lin. Labb. 13. 702.
Petra erat Christus. Inn. Serm. II. Super firmam petram, quse erat Christus.
Pius. II. de Gest. Launoy, 2. 45. Labb. 8. 770, et 10. 529. De Prim. 14. In
ftmdamento quod est Christus. Leo 9. ad Mich. Labb. 11. 1323.
2 Christus fundamentum est. Had. I. ad Taras. Labb. 8. 770. 1268. Afirmi-
tate petra, qusB Christus est. Nicolai Bpistola ad Michaelem Imp. in Labb. 10. 529.
Christus Jesus hujus Eedificii basis et fundamentum fieri dignatus est. Fundata
est hsec sacrosancta mea domus super petram Christ! vivam. Julian in Labb. 17.
692, 693. Crabb. 3. 293, 294. Petra significabat Christum. Joannes de Eagus. in
Labb. 17. 821. Cauisius, 4. 469.
Super vivum saxum firmamnue et Diviaara petram constructa. Orat. Fra? Labb.
20 332.
164 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Peter's faith or confession is the foundation, also, according
to the general councils of Nicea, Constantinople, Constance,
Basil, and the Lateran. Pope Hadrian, in a letter to the
empress Irene, read and received with acclamation in the
second general councils of Nicea, gave this interpretation. The
same pontiff's letter to Tarasius, containing a similar statement,
was read in this synod, and admitted with equal approbation.
A similar reception attended the letters of Germanus, concur-
ring with Hadrian, in this unerring assembly. All the bishops
approved. The eighth general council of Constantinople ac-
cepted pope Nicholas' Epistle to Photius, which avowed the
same opinion. The Constantian theologians, in their censure
of Wickliffism, read and sanctioned in the council of Constance,
likewise explained the expression to denote ' the rock of faith.'
The council of Basil, through Julian and Ragusa, its advocates
against the Bohemian heresy, was equally express in maintaining
this exposition, which had been avowed at Nicea, Constantino-
ple, and Constance. The foundation or rock, in these famed
orations, ' is faith, on which the Creator built the church, and
which sustains the superstructure.' The council of the Lateran
concurred with that of Basil. Peter, said Archbishop Ste-
phanus, addressing Pope Leo in the tenth session of the fifth
general council of the Lateran, ' confessed the Catholic Apos-
tolic faith, ordained by the eternal father and the eternal son
for the foundation of the church.' The holy pontiff and the
holy fathers, in silent approbation, admitted the unquestioned
truth, which, sanctioned by the five general councils of Nicea,
Constantinople, Constance, Basil, and the Lateran, was, there-
fore, on five several occasions, emblazoned with the insignia of
infallibility. 1
In confessionis petra. Hadrian IV. ad Fred. Labb. 8. 747. Cyril. 2. 593.
Hilary, 77.
Ad annum DCCCXXV. Jonas expositionem tertiam traditoribus ecclesiae poene
omnibus tribuit. Launoy, 2. 51.
Ad annum MDXXV. Eckius earn a nemine negari pugnat. Launoy, 2, 51.
Miror esse, qui locum hunc detorqueant ad Romaimm Pontificem. Erasm. 6. 88, 92.
1 Promeruit confiteri fidem, supra quam fundatur ecclesia. Fides nostra est
petra super quam Christus a3dificavit suam ecclesiam. Germ, ad Thorn. Labb. 8.
747, 770, 951, 1193, 1303. Du Pin, 2, 34, 35.
Christus supra soliditatem fidei suam sanctam dignatus est stabilire ecclesiam.
Nich. Photio. Labb. 10. 539.
Illam ipse solus Christus fundavit, et super petram fidei mox nascentis erexit.
Theol. Constan. in Labb. 16, 868, 870. Canisius, 4. 765.
Fides est fundameiitum in domo moa. Hoc autem fidei fundamentum firmiter
sustentet a?dificium. Super hanc petram, videlicet fidei, ajdificabo ecclesiam
meam. Labb. 17, 686, 692, 693. Crabb. 3. 294.
Christus rogavit pro fide, quam ipse confessus fuerat, et supra quam ipse Christus
fundavit suam ecclesiam. Kag. in Labb. 17. 896.
Fidem Catholicam et apostolicam ab reterno Patre pro reterno Filio ordiuitamad
fundamentum eccleaia?, confessus est. Orat. Steph. in Labb. 19. 921.
ALLEGED SUPERIORITY OF THE POPE TO GOD. 165
A fourth class make Christ himself the rock or foundation.
This explanation also has been patronized by theologians,
saints, popes, and councils. Launoy enumerates sixteen fathers
or popish doctors of this descripton ; and the list might be
vastly increased. Among the fathers and doctors are Origen,
Eusebius, Theodoret, Beda, Paulinus, Dungal, Etherius, Raban.
Tarasius, Anselm, Theophylact, Lombard, Ragusa, Lyra, Pole,
and Vatablus. The saints are Cyprian, Cyril, Jerome.
Augustine, and Aquinas, as well as many more that might be
mentioned. The popes are Celestine, Innocent, Pius, Alexan-
der, Hadrian, Nicholas, and Leo: and to these might be added
many other Roman pontiffs. 1
The rock or foundation, say also the general councils of
Nicea, Constantinople, Basil, and Trent, was the Lord. This
was expressed in Pope Hadrian's letter to Tarasius, which
was read and received in the second Nicean council : and
in the speech of Epiphanius to the same assembly. The
same was declared in a letter of Pope Nicholas to Michael,
which was read without any declamation "in the eighth general
council that met at Constantinople. The Basilian council con-
curred with those of Nicea and Constantinople. This assembly,
through Julian and Ragusa, its advocates for Catholicism
against the Bohemian heresy, also sanctioned this interpreta-
tion. The general council of Trent followed in the same path.
Fragus in this synod, declared without any disclamation, that
' the church was builded on the living stone, the firm and divine
rock.' 2 This interpretation, therefore, giving the honour to the
Messiah, was, in four general councils, marked with the seal
of synodal infallibility.
Augustine's language on this question is, in several places,
very strong and emphatical. He makes a distinction between
1 Laun. ad veoll. Du Pin, 305. Theophylact, 2. 18G. Lyra, 5. 52. Canisius,
2. 298.
De Launoi sexdecim numeral patres seu ecclesiasticos auctores sic hunc textum
exponentes. Ue Prim 2.
Christus qui est peti-a. Cyprian. Ep. 63. Avto$ u>v 6 Qspshws . Cyril, 2. 612.
Fundamentum unus est Domines. .Terom. c. 7. Petra Christns est. Jerdm. 3. 1430
Aug. Ret. I. 21. Christus est ecclesi;c fimdamentum. Aquin. 2. C. Ant. 6.
De seipsa veritate dicente, super hauc petram. Celest. III. ad Lin. Labb. 13. 702.
Petra erat Christus. Inn. Serm. II. Super firraam petram, qme erat Christus.
Pius. II. de Gest. Launoy, 2. 45 Labb. 8. 770, et 10. 529. De Prim. 14. In
iuudamento quod est Christus. Leo 9. ad Mich. Labb. 11. 1323.
2 Christus fundamental! est. Had. I. ad Tarns. Labb. S. 770. 1268. A firmi-
tatepetra, quae Christus est. Nicolai Epistola ad Michnelem Imp. in Labb. 10. 529.
Christus Jesus hujus icdincii basis et fundaniontum fieri dignatus est. Fundata
est h;cc sacrosancta moa damns super petram Christi vivam. Julian in Labb. 17.
892. 693. Crabb. 3. 293, 294. Petra significabat Christum. Joannes do Ragus. in
Labb. 17. 821. Canisius, 4. 469.
Super vivum saxum firraamnue et Divinara petram conslnicta. Orat. Fraf Labb.
20 332.
166 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY .
the word, which in the English version, is translated Peter, and
that which is rendered Rock. The two terms, indeed, both
in the original and in the vulgate, in the Greek and in the
Latin, are different in form and signification. Augustine, ac-
cordingly, as Erasmus has remarked, applies the word rock,
not to Peter, but to Christ. Jesus, observes the saint, ' said
not, thou art the rock, but thou art Peter. The rock was Christ,
whom Peter confessed.' 1 Maldonat characterizes this distinc-
tion by the epithet, silly and ridiculous. But the distinction,
whether silly or solid, is the work, not of a Protestant commen-
tator, but of a Roman saint.
The interpretation of the third class was adopted by Luther.
The Saxon reformer, therefore, notwithstanding his heresy,
was supported in his opinion by saints, popes, and general
councils. Calvin embraced the interpretation of the fourth
class. His opinion, therefore, like Luther's, was patronized by
the highest authority in the Romish communion. Luther and
Calvin therefore, if they were mistaken, erred, even in popish,
estimation, in good company ; and their explanations flow in
the same channel with the stream of antiquity.
These four expositions, seemingly at variance, may all, say
Launoy and Du Pin, be shown to agree. The two former are
the same in sense, and so are the two latter. The meaning of
both the foregoing, signifying the apostles, is, in no respect in-
consistent with the acceptation of both the ensuing, when as-
sumed to denote the Lord. Account the apostles the sub-
ordinate, and the Lord the supreme foundation, and the whole
train of doctors, saints, pontiffs, and councils, however they
may appear to differ, will, in reality, immediately be reconciled. .'
The first and second interpretations, say Launoy and Du Pin,
are the same in sense. The two, differing in appearance rather
than in reality, may easily be reconciled. The commentators,
who represent Simon as the foundation, do not exclude his
apostolic companions. None of the ancients characterized Peter
as the only foundation. Those who ascribe to him this honour,
never in a single instance, attribute it exclusive to him alone,
but refer it, in common, to the whole apostolic college. Both
explanations, accordingly, were patronized by Origen, Cyprian,
Jerome, and Augustine. Cyprian, at an early period, declared
that 'our Lord conferred equal power on all the apostles, who,
in this respect, were certainly the same as Peter ;' and the
1 Non enim dictum est illi, tu es petra, sed tu es Petrus. Petra autem erat
Christus quern confessus Simon. Aug. Ret. I. 21. Non supra petram quod tu es.
Bed supra petram quam confessus es. August. Serm. 270.
Augustinus hsec verba super hanc petram ipsi accommodat Ohristo, non Petro,
Erasm. 6. 88.
ALLEGED SUPERIORITY OF THE POPE TO GOD. 167
saint has been followed in more modern times by Panormitan,
Alexander, Launoy, Du Pin, Maldonat. Cusan, and Calmet.
The cardinals also, who convoked the council of Pisa, and a
long train of other popish doctors, have taken the same view of
the subject. 1
This seems to be the scriptural statement. The church, says
Paul, is ' built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets.'
The twelve foundations of the new Jerusalem, accordingly had,
says John, 'the names of the twelve apostles.' This, in the
metaphorical and prophetic language of Revelation, is an
emblem of the extraordinary commission which these mission-
aries executed as the primary heralds of the gospel. All the
sacred college, therefore, are represented as the foundation of
the new Jerusalem, which, in their master's name, and as his
spiritual kingdom, was, by their united exertions, to be reared.
The apostles, says Du Pin, were called the foundation, on ac-
count of their promulgation of the gospel and their government
of the church.
The third and fourth interpretations, as well as the first and
second, are the same in sense. The two, though they differ in
expression, agree, like the other two, in signification. The
Lord and Peter's faith or confession are identical : for the ob-
ject of Peter's faith was the Lord, whom the apostle confessed.
Such is the deduction of reason, and such the conclusion of
candid professors of Popery, of Launoy, Du Pin, and many
others of the same description. 2 Many saints, popes, and coun-
cils, as the preceding statements show, acknowledged both foun
dations, plainly manifesting their conviction of their identity.
These observations, in clear terms, show the identity of the
two former, as well as of the two latter interpretations. But
the identical meaning of both the preceding, signifying the
apostles, and of both the following, denoting the Lord, are in
no respect inconsistent or contradictory. The one is ministerial
and subordinate, and the other sovereign and supreme. This
is a distinction, not merely of protestant origin, but warranted
by popish authority. Dens, the treasury of Romanism, the
darling of the popish prelacy in Ireland, adopts, on this question,
a similar distinction. The celebrated Gerson, in a speech
1 Expositiones primse et secundae Patris sibi ipsis eonciliantur facile. Launoy,
2. 46.
Apostolis omnibus parem potestatem tribuat. Cyprian, 107.
Apostoli mines, aequojure, fuerunt ecclesiae fundam^nta. Alex. 1. 283.
Hsec non secus apostolis cseteris ac Petro data sunt. Du Pin, 308. Maldon. 'n
Matt. xvi. 18.
Tous les Apotres en sont les fpndemens. Calmet. 18. 363. Labb. 15. 1159.
2 Tertia et quarta expositio reipsa conveniunt. Launoy, 2. 53.
Ab ista expositione, non multum abluunt, ii qui Petrum interpretantur Christum,
quern Petrus erat confessus. Du Pin, 305. De Prim. 5.
168 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
delivered in the council of Constance, and armed with all its
unerring authority, discriminated, on this topic, in the same
manner. Many doctors, saints, popes, and councils, as appears
from the preceding statements, have admitted both foundations,
but certainly, in accordance with the foregoing discrimination, in
a different sense, accounting the one subordinate, and the other
supreme, Pope Leo the Ninth represents the church as built
on the rock, which is Emmanuel, as well as on Peter or Cephas.
Fossus, Archbishop of Reginum, in the council of Trent, and
countenanced with at least its tacit consent, referred the rock
or foundation to Christ, to faith, and to Peter, The pontiff
and the prelate, on this occasion, must have intended to distin-
guish between the apostolic and mediatorial foundations. All
these authors, therefore, as Launoy remarks, may, in this man-
ner, be reconciled with themselves, as well as with reason and
revelation. 1 . .
The donation of the KEYS, mentioned by Matthew, and addu-
ced in proof of the supremacy by Baronius, Bellarmine, Binius,
and their party, affords another topic of diversified opinion
among the friends of Romanism. This argument, if it deserve
the name, forms one of the most pitiful sophisms that ever dis-
graced the pages of controversy. The keys, conveying the
power of binding and loosing, of remitting and retaining sin,
were, according to the ancients and many moderns, given to
all the apostles and to all Christians who belong to the ecclesi-
astical community. This has been shown, beyond all question/
by the warmest friends of the Papacy, such asDu Pin, Calmet,
Maldonat, and Alexander. The proof of the donation of the
keys to the whole apostolic college and to the whole Christian
commonwealth, has been collected by Du Pin and Maldonat.
The Sorbonist and the Jesuit declare the unanimity of the
ancients on this opinion. 2 Du Pin, for the exposition, instances
the saints Cyprian, Jerome, Ambrosius, Augustin, Leo, Ful-
gentius, and the fathers Tertullian, Optatus, Gaudentius,
Theophylact, Eucharius, Beda, Raban, Hincmar, and Odo
1 Solus Christus est quidem fundamentum essentials et primarium. Petrus est
fundamentum secundarium in Christo fundatum. Dens, 2. 149.
Ad ttmim caput primarium Christum, et vicarium summum Pontificem. Gerson
in Labb. 16. 1315.
Ecclesia super petrain, id est Christum, et super Petrum vel Cepham asdificata.
Le,-> ad Mich. Labb. 11. 1323.
Ad Christum et ad fidem, quam Petrus confessus est, refertur, ut nisi ad Petrum
ipsum referri etiam intelligas, diminute credes et prope nihil. FOBS, in Labb. 20.
529
Si auctores illi omnes inter se componantur, ut antea, componi facile possunt.
Launoy, 2. 51.
2 Antiqui, unanimi consensu, tradunt, claves istas, in persona Petri, toti, ecclesiaj
datas. Du Pin, 308. Omnes veteres auctores docent, dicentes, claves omnibus
datas fuisse. Maldonat, 340. '
ALLEGED SUPERIORITY OP THE POPE TO GOD 169,
IVIaldonat specifies, for the same interpretation, the names of
Chrysostom, Ambrosius, Origen, and Theophylaet. Calmet,
for this opinion, enumerates Cyprian, Augustin, Origen, and
Theophylaet ; while Alexander mentions Origen, Hilary, Am-
brosius, and Augustin. 1 The system, therefore, which is now
deprecated by the Italian school of Romanism, was patronized
by the whole sainthood, from Cyprian to Fulgentius and
Chrysostom.
The ancients, indeed, with the utmost harmony and without
one murmur of dissent, ascribe the reception of the keys to the
universal church. A single sentence to the contrary could not
be extorted from all the ponderous volumes and all the diversi-
fied monuments of Christian antiquity. Many learned moderns-
in the Romish communion have entertained the same senti-
ments, such as Lyra, Du Pin, Calmet, Maldonat, Pithou, Alex-
ander, Moreri, Faber, Pole, and even the Rhemists. 2 The
same opinion has been advocated by Gerson, Cusari, and
Launoy. The gift of the keys, therefore, being common, could
confer on an individual no peculiar jurisdiction or authority.
Bellarmine and his numerous partizans have endeavoured to
torture a third argument from the admonition. "Feed my
sheep." This, say these theologians, is an evidence of Simon's
universal pastorship. But this reason, if possible, surpasses
the former, in superlative silliness and impertinence. Similar
admonitions, in the book of inspiration, are addressed to all the
pastors, ordinary and extraordinary, of the Christian common-
wealth. Jesus, Paul, and Peter concur in enjoining this duty. 5
Simon indeed was a distinguished herald of the gospel ; and
1 Oaeteri apostoli, quod fuit Petrus, pari consortio prasditi honoris et potestatis.
Tertul. in Scorp. Cuncti claves Regni Ccelorum accipiant. Jerom. adv. Jov. Quod
Petro dicitur, caeteris Apostolis dicituiy tibi dabo claves. Ambros. in Ps. xviii.
Ecclesiae claves regni ccelorum datse" sunt. August, de Agon. c. xxx. Cunctia
ecclesiae rectoribus forma praeponitur. Leo, Serm. III. Deus, in persona beati
Petri, ecclesise ligandi ac solvendi tribuit potestatem. Fulgentius de Fide. c. III.
Apostoli ccelorum claves sortiti sunt. Hilary, 688.
2 Potestas data Petro, intelligitar dari aliis. Lyra, b. 52. Falluntur, qui soli
Petro datas claves ess autumant. Du Pin, 308. On ne peut pas dire, que Saint
.Pierre ait recu les clefs du ciel a 1'ex.clusion des autres Apostres. Calmet, 18, 368.
Non nego caeterosApostolossuasetiam claves habuisse. Maldonat, 340. Petrus,
quando claves accepit, ecclesiam sanctam significavit. Pithou, Caus. 24. Qu. I.
'Caeteris Apostolis datse sunt claves. Alexander, 1. 331.
Les passages, si 1'on consulte 1' explication qu'en donnent les peres, B' addressent
:a tous les apotres et a toute 1' eglise. Moreri, 7. 40.
Auctoritas hffic non est concessa personee soli Petri, sedipsi ecclesiae. Faber
2. 385.
Hsec, quse Petro dicuntur, ad caeteros pastores omnes pertineant. Polus, in
Labb. 20, 961.
On a toujours fait profession en France de croire que les clefs ont et6 donnees a
1' eglise. Apol. 2. 82.
3 Matt. ii. 8, 19. Mark xvi. 15. Luke xxiv. 47. John xxi. 16. Acts xx. 28^
1. Peter v. 2. DuPin, Diss. IV.
170 THE VABIAIIONS OF POPE&Y:
successful, to an extraordinary extent, in proclaiming salvation
to the Jews. Paul, however, was inferior to none in the evan-
gelical transcendency of exertion and success. This statement
is corroborated by the authority of Ambrosius, Chrysostom,
Augustin, and Basil, who are quoted for this purpose by Du Pin. 1
The evangelists, therefore, make no mention of the supre-
macy, and the other sacred penmen are guilty of the same omis-
sion. Nothing of the kind is to be found in the works of Luke,
Paul, James, Peter, Jude, or John. Luke mentions the elec-
tion of Matthias and the deacons, the mission to Samaria, and
the council of Jerusalem. 2 Pope Peter, however, in none of
these, claimed or exercised any superiority. The apostolic
pontiff, on no occasion, issued a single bull or launched a soli-
tary anathema.
Paul, in his fourteen epistolary productions, supplies no proof
of the supremacy ; but the contrary. He declares, in unquali-
fied language, his own equality, and disclaims the imputation of
inferiority. He reproved Cephas in strong terms, for tempo-
rizing dissimulation in his treatment of the Christian converts
from Judaism and Gentilism. He addressed a long letter to the
Roman Christians. He transmitted salutations from many infe-
rior names, but neglected the Roman pontiff who reigned in the
Roman capitol. The Christian missionary, with all his erudi-
tion, seems not to have known his holiness, who, it would ap-
pear, had no name in the apostolic vocabulary. He mentions
the civil governor ; but neglects the sacerdotal viceroy. He is
mindful of the emperor ; but unmindful of the pope. 3 This was
very uncourteous. The pupil of Gamaliel might have imbibed
some Rabbinical learning, and the citizen of Tarsus might have
acquired some Grecian literature. But he must have been
wofully defective in politeness. Paul, however did not, after
all, speak evil of this dignity. His apostleship only forgot to
say any thing of his spiritual majesty, who then wielded through
Christendom, all the vicegerency of ecclesiastical omnipotence.
Pope Peter has obliged the world with two ecclesiastical pub-
lications. The sovereign pontiff, in these official annunciations,
might have been expected to mention his vice-regal authority,
if it were only for the purpose of enforcing his commands. But
the viceroy of heaven preserves, on this topic, a vexatious and
provoking silence. He discovers not one solitary or cheering
1 Suscepit Petrus, sed et nobiscum eas suscepit. Amb. de Dign. II. 2.
Etp^fo* rtpo$ exatS'tov ftftav- Chrysostom, 7. 749.
Nonipso Petro, sed in corpora suo, ait, pasce oves meas. Angus, de Agon. c. xxx
Ilatft #015 f^e^rjf rtoififei: xai StSacfxaXot j, -tip usqv rfaps^ovi'oj slaixftcw. Basil 2.
579.
* Acts i. 26. : vi. 1 6. : xv. 122.
a 2 Corin. xi. 5. Gal. ii. 11. 2 Corin. xii. 11.
SILENCE OF TRADITION CONCERNING THE J.A PAL SUPREMACY. 171
hint of any such dignity. The Galilean fisherman exercises no
prerogative of the modern papacy in commanding the Apostles,
issuing bulls, enacting laws, judging controversy, deciding ap-
peals, summoning councils, transferring kingdoms, wielding the
civil and spiritual swords, and dissolving the oath of fealty
to princes.
James, Jude, and John say nothing that can be pressed into
the service of the pontifical supremacy. The silence of these,
as well as the other inspired penmen, on an event, which, if true,
is of the last importance, must seal its condemnation. The
papacy, if a divine institution, would, from its magnitude, be
written with sunbeams in Divine Revelation. This, if any thing,
required perspicuity and detail. But an insinuation of the kind
is not to be found in the whole volume of inspiration. The
pope and the popedom, both in name and reality, in sign and
signification, in expression and implication, are utterly excluded
from all the Book of God, all the pandects of Divine legislation,
and ah 1 the monuments of ecclesiastical antiquity. The Deity
in His word, utterly neglects the promulgation of the papal
polity. The Heavenly Majesty, reversing the example of earthly
kings, who notify their viceroys by special commissions, deigns
not, in his gospel, to mention his vicar-general. The inspired
penmen detail the propagation and settlement of the ecclesias-
tical kingdom, the qualifications and mission of its governors,
and the prevention and remedy of error and schism. But the
ecclesiastical sovereign is consigned to silence and oblivion.
The vast, misshapen, unwielded, overgrown, menacing mass of
superstition and despotism is passed, without mention, in the
scriptural records, except in the tremendous denunciations of
scriptural prophecy foretelling the future rise and final destruc
tion of " the man of sin, whom the Lord shall consume with
the spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the brightness of
his coming."
Innocent the Third indeed discovered the popedom in the
Book of Genesis. According to his infallibility, the firmament
mentioned by the Jewish legislator signifies the church. The
greater light, according to the same unerring commentator, de-
notes the pontifical authority ; and the less, represents the royal
power. 1 The prince therefore derives and exercises this juris-
diction from the pontiff, as the moon borrows and reflects the
light o*' the sun. This, no doubt, was very sensible in his in-
fallibility, and makes the thing very clear. The Roman
hierarchy indeed may be as plainly found in Genesis as in any
1 Fecit Deus duo magna luminaria, id est, duas instituit dignitates, quae sunt
pontificalia auctoritas et regalia potestas. Gibert, 1. 11. Decret. Greg. I. 38. VI,
Faifcet,193.
172 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY:
other book of the Bible. The same kind of exposition would
enable an ingenious mind to find any thing in any book. The
popedom, by the same kind of alchymy, might be found in
Ovid, or a system of divinity in Homer or Virgil. But the
system, which requires the extorted evidence obtained by
straining, wresting, torturing, and mangling scriptural language
carries in itself its own condemnation.
Tradition, on Pope Peter's supremacy, is silent as scripture.
The ancients, on this subject, vary from the modern friends of
Romanism. Du Pin, Bellarmine, and Alexander among many
others, have, with extensive erudition and research, investigated
this controversy ; and the Sorbonist, the Jesuit, and the
Dominican, notwithstanding all their learning and labour, have
failed in attempting to find the supremacy of his apostolic holi-
ness in the monuments of traditional antiquity. 1 Du Pin, with
his usual candour, admits the silence of the most ancient
fathers, such as Justin, Irenaeus, and Clemens of Alexandria. 2
These, in no instance, condescend to mention the pontifical
dignity of the sacerdotal viceroy, who with spiritual sovereignty,
first governed Christendom. The Sorbonist begins his quota-
tions in proof of Peter's prerogative with Origen, who flourished
about the middle of the third century. But the Greek original,
he grants, is lost, and the L atin translation of Ruffinus abounds
with interpolations. He mentions Cyprian and Eusebius, whose
testimony he rejects for interpolation or inadequacy. His first
authority, on which he rests any dependence, is Optatus, who
wrote about the year 370. Bellarmine's first authority, if
Origen, Cyprian, and Eusebius, whom Du Pin rejects, be
omitted, is Basil the cotemporary of Optatus. Alexander begins
with Cyril, who was later than either Optatus or Basil. A period
of 370 years had run its ample round, and its annals, scrutinized
by three learned doctors, could not supply a single document,
witnessing the vicegerency of his apostolic holiness. This, to
every unprejudiced mind, must be a clear evidence of its non-
existence. No person, free from prepossession, can believe that
an ecclesiastical monarchy existed so many years in Christen-
dom, and, at the same time, remained unnoticed by so many
ecclesiastical authors, and, in consequence, unnotified to pos-
terity by any hint or declaration.
Admitting the authenticity of Origen's attestation, 240 years
trom the commencement of the Christian era remain, notwith-
standing, on this topic an historical blank. No vestige of this
spiritual sovereignty can be discovered in Clemens Romanus,
1 Da Pin, 313, Bell, I. 25. Alexander, 1. 283.
3 De Petri primatu, nihil apud Justinum, Irenseum, Clementem, Alexandrinum,
et alios antiquissimoB. Da Pin, 313.
PAPAL SUPREMACY UNKNOWN TO ANTIQUITY. 173
Hermas, Barnabas, Ignatius, Polycarp, Justin, Irenaeus,
Clemens Alexandrinus, Athenagoras, Tatian, Theophilus, or
Tertullian. The most extraordinary monarchy, that evei
astonished the world, continued, according to the popish state-
ment, during a long series of time, to exist in the view and to
regulate the minds of its devoted subjects, and passed, never-
theless, without leaving a single monument of antiquity to
perpetuate its memory. The subjects of the papacy seem to
have paid little attention to their sovereign. But his apostolic
infallibility should not have endured such disrespectful treat-
ment. His holiness or his successors, during this interval,
should have roared from the Vatican and aroused Christendom
from its lethargy. The viceroy of God should have fulminated
his anathemas as in modern times, and taught men the sin and
danger of neglecting his universal sovereignty.
Bellarmine's system, void of all evidence prior to Basil, is un-
sustained by competent authority even after the era of the
Grecian saint. The inadequacy of later testimony for the fish-
erman's supremacy is as striking as its former utter want of it.
Bellarmine's quotations from Basil to Bernard evince nothing.
These citations, as they are late, are also useless. The ancients,
indeed, from towards the end of the fourth century, embellished
their works and flattered the Apostle with many sounding names
and tides; such as prince, head, foundation, leader, president,
governor, master, guardian, captain, and, to crown all, the
divine Dionysius called Peter ' the vertical summit of theolo-
gians.' 1 These; Bellarmme and Alexander applied to Cephas,
and, in consequence, infer hfs supremacy.
The conclusion, however, is illogical. The argument would
prove too much, and therefore proves nothing. The fallacy
consists in reckoning peculiar what is common. Similar or
even superior eulogiums, for example, have, by some writers,
been bestowed on James, John, and Paul. The Clementine
recognitions call, ' James the Prince of Bishops,' and Hesychius
styles him ' the Head of the Apostles, and the Chief Captain of
the New Jerusalem.' John, according to Chrysostom, was
* the Pillar of all the Churches in the world, and had the keys
of heaven.' 2 Paul is represented as equal to Peter by Bernard,
Ambrosius, and Leo. Bernard styles ' Peter and Paul princes
1 Divinus Dionysius verticalem theologorum summitatem magnum Petrum no-
minavit. Barlaam, 374.
Bell. 1. 25. Du Pin, 314. Alex. 1. 283. Leo, Serm. 3. Jerom, 4. 101. Ber-
nard, 220. Optatus, II.
2 Jacobum episcoporum principem orabat. Clem. Recog. 1. 68. Cotel. 1. 509.
Tov tfjjj vsaf lepavaa&ru, ao^tO'tpa.'fnyav, tfwa owttxWoXcatM'ov sfap^or. PhotduB*
Codex, 275. p. 1525.
'O orriAoj -tov xata tfjjv oixwpsvrjv Exxtyatav 6 tfaj xteej e%av t ov ovpavov
ChrysoBtom, 8. 2. Horn. I.
174 THE VARIATIONS OF POEER5T *
of the Apostles.' According to Ambrosius. * Paul was not in-
ferior to Peter.' Paul and Peter, says Pope Leo, were equal
in their election, labour, and end. 1 Paul's superiority to Peter
is maintained by Origen, Chrysostom, and Gregory. -Origen
terms ' Paul the greatest of the Apostles.' According to Chry-
sostom, ' Paul had no equal.' ' Paul,' says Gregory, ' was the
head of the nations, and obtained the principality of the whole
church.' 2 These are higher compliments than any which the
fathers have given to Peter. Sounding titles, therefore, if the} r
iTvply the supremacy of Peter, must, in stronger language,
imply the supremacy of James, John, and Paul. These turgid
expressions characterized the bloated style of later authors.
The earlier fathers affected no such tinsel or finery. Clemens,
Justin, Irenaeus, and Tertullian speak of Simon as of the other
Apostles, with the respect due to his dignity ; but with modera-
tion and simplicity.
The supremacy of the Roman bishop, as well as that of the
Galilean fisherman, was unknown to antiquity. Some of the
fathers indeed have, in the language of exaggeration, bestowed
many sounding titles on the Roman patriarch, and pompous
3ulogiums on the Roman church. Irenaeus styles the Roman
See, ' the more powerful principality.' Cyprian calls the
Roman ' the principal church.' These and many other en-
comiums of a similar kind have been collected by Bellarmine,
Du Pin, and Alexander. 3 All these, however, are unmeaning
and unmerited compliments, conveyed in the language of exag-
geration and flattery. The ancients, in the same inflated style,
have complimented other bishops and other churches in higher
strains of hyperbolical and nauseous adulation.
Gregory, Basil, Constantine, and Paulus, in all the fulsome
exaggeration and pomposity of diction, bestowed the supremacy
on Cyprian, Athanasius, Miletius, Constantine, and Irene.
Cyprian, says Gregory Nazianzen, ' presided not only over the
Carthaginian and African church, on which he reflected splen-
dour ; but over all the nations of the West, and nearly over all
the East, and North, and South.' Gregory and Basil confer
an universal, ecclesiastical legislation and supremacy on
Athanasius the Alexandrian patriarch. ' Athanasius,' says Gre-
gory quoted by Alexander, 'prescribed laws to the whole
world.' ' The Alexandrian patriarch, says Basil, ' bestowed the
1 Apostolorum principes eunt Petrus et Paulus. Bernard, 220. Nee Paulus
inferior Petro, Amb. II. Illos etelectio pares et labor similes, et finis fecit asquales.
Leo r Serm. 8.
3 Paulus Apostolornm maximus. Origen, Horn. 3. KaiU Hmihov [isv ouS$ tf*c
Chrysostom, 11. 200. Caput effectus est nationum, quia obtinuit totius ecclesisa
principatum. Gregory, IV. 5.
Iren. HI. 3. Cyprian, Ep. 55. Bell. II. 15. Du .Tin, 314. Alex. 1.294.
SUPREMACY ASCRIBED TO OTHER SEES, BESIDES ROME. 175
.same care on all, as on the particular church that was entrusted
to his inspection by our common Lord.' Basil who, with such
^kindness, had promoted Athanasius to a general episcopacy, con-
fers, with equal condescension, the same honour on Miletius,
patriarch of Antioch. ' Miletius,' according to the Roman saint,
* presided over the whole church.' Constantine appropriated
the government of the church and the superintendence of the
faith to himself. ' God,' said the emperor, ' hath appointed me
to the chief command in the church, and to maintain the purity
and integrity of the faith.' This assumption of ecclesiastical
authority was addressed to the Roman pontiff without oppo-
sition, and afterward read in the sixth general council with uni-
versal approbation. The imperial theology, therefore, was
stamped with the broad seal of synodal and pontifical infalli-
bility. Paulus, the Byzantine patriarch, when dying, when the
parting spirit is supposed to catch a brighter ray from heaven,
ascribed the jurisdiction of the whole ecclesiastical community
to the empress Irene. ' The grand flock of Jesus,' said the
departing patriarch, ' is attached to the imperial dignity,' 1 His
dying speech, which committed the superintendency of the
Christian commonwealth to a woman, was received with general
applause, and has been transmitted to posterity as a specimen
of Catholicism and piety.
The ecclesiastical supremacy, in the same kind of swollen
diction, has been attributed to the Sees of Caesarea, Antioch,
mdria, and Constantinople, by Gregory, Basil, Chrysos-
Tustinian, and the Council of Chalcedon. 2 Gregory ^as-
l the presidency to Csesarea. According to the saint of
azianzum, ' the whole Christian republic looked to the Gsesar-
ean church as the circumscribed circle to the centre.' Basil and
Chrysostom bestow the supremacy on Antioch. Basil repre-
sents the Antiochean church as calculated, 'like: a head, -to
supply health to the whole body.' Chrysostom's language is
stsjtsptov, a%s8ov SE ttyj Eoocfc awtqs vojov *E xcupopfov
Leges etiam rursus|atbi terrarum prsescribit. Greg, in Alexand. 1. 384.
rtaatav itov fxxtetitav* Basil, 1. 161. Ep. 69. To
xtojauts aytov rtposcpgawu. Basil, 3. 160. Ep. 67.
liter nos imperare. Constituti sumus servare fidem sanctam,
T vu t D\ cio
L/abb. 7. b!4, bio.
troupeau de Jesus Christ est attache a votre dignite Iinperiale,
' *
fxvxtos rtsptypaf o^tsroj. Gregory, Ep. 22. Qentep
Ut srtt, opjyyH> "t^v vytEtow'f Basil 3. 160. Toufo
rtposSpia. Chrysostom, 2. 176. Horn. XVII. Orbia oculum, ad quam
extrema terrse undique conveniunt, et a qua velut communi fidei ,emporio incipi-
unt^epNazianzen, Orat. XXXII. H sv VLavO'etwtwovitatet sxxfyOM ttaauv tov
>3&Mv to-ti xsfya'kri* J 8t i n - Cod. 1. 129. Dkecesis Exarcham,,,adeat, vel Impe-
rialia urbis Constantinopolis thronum, et apud cum litiget. Labb. 4. 1686.
174 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY'
of the Apostles.' According to Ambrosius. ' Paul was not in-
ferior to Peter.' Paul and Peter, says Pope Leo, were equal
in their election, labour, and end. 1 Paul's superiority to Peter
is maintained by Origen, Chrysostom, and Gregory. -Origen
terms ' Paul the greatest of the Apostles.' According to Chry-
sostom, ' Paul had no equal.' ' Paul,' says Gregory, ' was the
head of the nations, and obtained the principality of the whole
church.' 2 These are higher compliments than any which the
fathers have given to Peter. Sounding titles, therefore, if they
j'7<.p!y the supremacy of Peter, must, in stronger language,
imply the supremacy of James, John, and Paul. These turgid
expressions characterized the bloated style of later authors.
The earlier fathers affected no such tinsel or finery. Clemens,
Justin, Ireneeus, and Tertullian speak of Simon as of the other
Apostles, with the respect due to his dignity ; but with modera-
tion and simplicity.
The supremacy of the Roman bishop, as well as that of tin;
Galilean fisherman, was unknown to antiquity. Some of th
fathers indeed have, in the language of exaggeration, bestowed
many sounding titles on the Roman patriarch, and pompous
2ulogiums on the Roman church. Irenoeus styles the Roman
See, ' the more powerful principality.' Cyprian calls the
Roman ' the principal church.' These and maiYy other en-
comiums of a similar kind have been collected by BeHarmine,
Du Pin, and Alexander. 3 All these, however, are unmeaning
and unmerited compliments, conveyed in the language of exag-
geration and flattery. The ancients, in the same inflated style,
have complimented other bishops and other churches in higher
strains of hyperbolical and nauseous adulation.
Gregory, Basil, Constantine, and Paulus, in all the fulsome
exaggeration and pomposity of diction, bestowed the supremacy
on Cyprian, Athanasius, Miletius, Constantine, and Irene.
Cyprian, says Gregory Nazianzen, ' presided not only over the
Carthaginian and African church, on which he reflected splen-
dour ; but over all the nations of the West, and nearly over all
the East, and North, and South.' Gregory and Basil confer
an universal, ecclesiastical legislation and supremacy on
Athanasius the Alexandrian patriarch. ' Athanasius,' says Gre-
gory quoted by Alexander, 'prescribed laws to the whole
world.' ' The Alexandrian patriarch, says Basil, 'bestowed the
1 Apostolorum principes sunt Petrus et Paulus. Bernard, 220. Nee Paulus
inferior Petro. Amb. II. Illos et el ectio pares et labor similes, et finis fecit aequales.
Leo, Serm. 8.
2 Paulus Apostolorum maximus. Origen, Horn. 3. Katfa ttavhov /nfv ov$ci$ ggtt.
Chrysostom, 11. 200. Caput effectus est nationum, quia obtinuit totius eccU'.sice
principatum. Gregory, IV. 5.
* Iren. III. 3. Cyprian, Ep. 55. Bell. II. 15. Da Pin, 314. Alex. 1. 294.
SUPREMACY ASCRIBED TO OTHER SEES, BESIDES ROME. 175
jsame care on all, as on the particular church that was entrusted
to his inspection by our common Lord.' Basil who, with such
kindness, had promoted Athanasius to a general episcopacy, con-
fers, with equal condescension, the same honour on Miletius,
patriarch of Antioch. ' Miletius,' according to the Roman saint,
' presided over the whole church.' Constantine appropriated
the government of the church and the superintendence of the
faith to himself. ' God,' said- the emperor, ' hath appointed me
to the chief command in the church, and to maintain the purity
and integrity of the faith.' This assumption of ecclesiastical
authority was addressed to the Roman pontiff without oppo-
sition, and afterward read in the sixth general council with uni-
versal approbation. The imperial theology, therefore, was
stamped with the broad seal of synodal and pontifical infalli-
bility. Paulus, the Byzantine patriarch, when dying, when the
parting spirit is supposed to catch a brighter ray from heaven,
ascribed the jurisdiction of the whole ecclesiastical community
to the empress Irene. ' The grand flock of Jesus,' said the
departing patriarch, ' is attached to the imperial dignity,' 1 His
dying speech, which committed the superintendency of the
Christian commonwealth to a woman, was received with general
applause, and has been transmitted to posterity as a specimen
of Catholicism and piety.
The ecclesiastical supremacy, in the same kind of swollen
diction, has been attributed to the Sees of Csesarea, Antioch,
Alexandria, and Constantinople, by Gregory, Basil, Chrysos-
tom, Justinian, and the Council of Chalcedon. 2 Gregory as-
cribed the presidency to Ca3.sarea. According to the saint of
Nazianzum, ' the whole Christian republic looked to the Csesar-
ean church as the circumscribed circle to the centre.' Basil and
Chrysostom bestow the supremacy on Antioch. Basil repre-
sents the Antiochean church as calculated, ' like a head, to
supply health to the whole body.' Chrysostom's language is
Hpoxa9f 'fat ttagqs #175 sdrtspiov, o%t$ov 8a -ftjs faaaf* a/vttjf vo-tow -t xac jSopsou
X^lscoj. Gregory, Orat, 18.
Leges etiam rursus orbi terrarum praescribit. Greg, in Alexand. 1. 384.
-A?O. * tj fjifii,[i.va 601 ytaauv T'UV sxx\s(Stuv. Basil, 1. 161. Bp. 69. To T'ot)
tfcwr'oj aofia'tos -tys Exxhqaias o-vtov ftposatavM' Basil, 3. 160. Ep. 67.
Jussit Deus principaliter nos imperare. Constituti sumus servare fidem sane tarn,
et immaculatam. Labb. 7. 614, 618.
Le eoin de grand troupeau de Jesus Christ est attache a votre dignite Imperiale,
Andilly, 413.
2 Qj xsvt'pw XDscTioj rtsptypcKjJOHtEj'Oj. Gregory, Ep. 22. Sitfrtf p xj^aXi^v sppa>/j.tvijv
rtavT't I'M tfw/tart srtt ^opj^ysiv trjv vytsiav. Basil 3. 160. Toutfo rtotew? a|tw/h
f OVT'O rtpofSpta. Chrysostom, 2. 176. Horn. XVII. Orbis oculum, ad quam
extrema terrte undique conveniunt, et a qua velut communi fidei emporio incipi-
unt. Nazianzen, Orat. XXXII. H sv Kwvcft'avf wovrtotet, sxxtyota rtaauv -fuv
oXXwv salt, xefyahT;. Justin. Cod. 1. 129. Dkecesis Exarcham adeat, vel Jmpe-
rialis urbis Constantinopolia thronum, et apud cum litiget. Labb. 4. 1686.
176 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
still more emphatical. ' Antioch,' says the Byzantine patriarch,
* is beyond every other city the dearest to the Son of God.
This metropolis bestowed the designation which is beyond even
the city of Romulus, and which confers the primacy or presi-
dency.' Gregory, Justinian, and the council of Chalcedon con-
ferred the ecclesiastical sovereignty on the Constantinopolitan
See. Gregory called this city ' the eye of the world, and the
emporium of the common faith.' According to the emperor
Justinian, ' the Constantinopolitan church was the head of all
others.' Justinian was an emperor, a legislator, a philosopher,
and a theologian, and renowned for learning and wisdom. His
information and opportunity must have secured him from mis-
taking and his integrity and veracity from misrepresenting the
opinions entertained, in his day, on this topic. The council of
Chalcedon, in its ninth canon, granted a general right of receiv-
ing and deciding appeals to the Byzantine See. A suffragan,
according to the Chalcedonian decision, ' might appeal from the
Metropolitan to the Exarch, and from the Exarch, for a final
sentence, to the Constantinopolitan patriarch.'
The Chalcedonian canon so annoyed Nicholas the First that
ne had recourse, in his distress, to an extraordinary or rather
to an ordinary remedy. His holiness explained the canon by
writing nonsense ; and in this ingenious manner and by this
simple process, removed the difficulty. Diocese, said Nicholas,
is, by a figure of speech, used for dioceses, and the diocesan
Exarch, in this canon, signifies the Roman pontiff. l His 4ftfi!l~
libility's explanation is very sensible, and must have beenigtery
satisfactory to himself and his friends. ^Ipy*
The Roman Church in its early days, unlike the same society
in the time of Nicholas, was characterized by humility. All its
members, according to the primeval records, could meet in one
house. The whole society, on the first day of the week, assem-
bled in the same place, and communicated at one table. ' Cor-
nelius the Roman bishop read all public lettpi,' says Cyprian,
* to his numerous and holy flock.' 2 On the^^ath of Anterus,
* all the brethern met in the church to eleiffla successor, and
the whole people, with promptitude and unanimit^^Sitelared
the eligibility of Fabian.' 3
The pastor's superintendency extended from to
the lowest concerns of the fol^Jrom the rich and thejjpree to the
inmate of indigence and the si|fpct of slavery. Hewas entirely
1 Quantum si perhibuisset Dioeceseon. Labb. 9. 1331.
3 Sciam sanctissimae atque amplissimae plebi legere te semper literas nostraft.
Cyprian, Ep. 59. p. 139. ;||
3 ASthtyuv owtcw'T'ttv . . . tjtt tijs fxxtysiaf avyx'tfZfHrtqutvav, Tov itwta, too*
. . . jtpoOvfua, rtaay xat, fiia ^vzy afetov eitifiorjtjai. Euseb. VI. 29.
PAPAL SUPREMACY ASSERTED BY FALSE DECRETALS. 177
unacquainted with the ambition which actuated the soul of a
Leo or a Gregory. The bull of a modern pontiff would, to his
unaspiring mind, have been unintelligible. Possessing no civil
authority, and exposed to imperial contempt, his jurisdiction
was confined, to the boundary of his own flock. An humble and
holy pastor, in this manner, administered to a humble and holy
people.
But the Roman church outlived its humility. The Apostolic
See emerged from obscurity, raised its head into notoriety, and
displayed all the madness and extravagance of ambition in the
pursuit of dominion and power. The Roman hierarchs varied
from poverty to emolument, from obscurity to eminence, and
passed through all the gradations of presidence, primacy, super-
intendence, supremacy, and despotism.
The primacy of the Roman bishop, so far from being a divine
institution, originated in the superiority of the city in which he
presided. The episcopacy was, in rank, assimilated to the
magistracy of the Roman empire. The metropolitan, the
exarch, and the patriarch corresponded with the president, the
vicar, and the prefect. The church, in this manner, was, in its
divisions, adjusted to the state. The church, says Optatus,
4 was formed in the empire, and not the empire in the church,
and, therefore, assumed the same polity.' The conformity of
the sacerdotal with the civil goverment has been clearly shown
by Du Pin and many others, such as Giannone, Mezeray, and
Thomassin. 1
A bishop, therefore, obtained a rank in the hierarchy in pro-
portion to the city in which he ruled. Antioch, Alexandria,
and Rome, in the East, South, and West, surpassed all the
other cities in the empire. Antioch was the third city in the
state, and its bishop ranked in the third place in the church*
Alexandria was the second city, and its patriarch obtained the
second rank in the prelacy. Rome was the metropolis, and its
pontiff accordingly enjoyed the primacy. The Roman church,
says Du Pin, gained the precedence, ' because Rome was the
chief city.' Giannone also ascribes the rank of the Roman
patriarch- to the same cause. 'The ecclesiastical,' says he,
formed itself on the civil goverment, and the Roman city may
boast of being chief in refigion, as formerly in the empire and
the universe. The innovation was so natural that any other .
event would have been a kind .of miracle.' 2
The dependence of the bishop's dignity on the eminency of
1 Ad cujus formam ecclesia, constituta est. Da Pin, 23. L'eglise est etablie
dans 1'empire. Giannon, II. 8. Mezeray, 5, 464. Thomassin 1. 12. An. Eccl. 56. .
3 Quia Romana urbs erat prima. Da Pin, 335. Parce qu'il avoit son siege dans
la Capitale de 1'univera. Giannnn, III. 6. Une espece de miracle. Giannon II.
8. An. Eccl 56 142.
12
178 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
the city appeared, in striking colours, in the original obscurity
and future greatness of the Byzantine hierarch. This bishop
had been suffragan to the metropolitan of Heraclea and exarch
of Thracia. But the suffragan, when Constantinople became
the imperial city, became a patriarch. The second general
council, in its third canon, raised the Constantinopolitan See
above those of Antioch and Alexandria, and placed it next to
that of Rome, because Constantinople was new Rome and the
royal city. The patriarch, in consequence, usurped the juris-
diction of Asia, Pontus, and Thracia. The fourth general
council, in its twenty-eighth canon, conferred equal ecclesiasti-
cal privileges on the Byzantine and Roman Sees. 1
The usurpation of the papal hierarch was aided, with singular
efficiency, by the publication of the false decretals. This col-
lection, about the year 800, was ushered into the world as the
work of the early pontiffs. All the authority assumed by mo-
dern popes was, in this forgery, ascribed to their predecessors
in the days of primitive Christianity. A Linus and a Clemens
\vere, by this author, represented as claiming the supremacy
and wielding the power afterward arrogated by a Boniface or
an Innocent. 2 Any pontiff, however arbitrary or ambitious,
could, from this store, plead a precedent for any act of usurpa-
tion or despotism.
This fabrication, which promoted pontifical domination,
displays in a strong light the variations of Romanism. The for-
gery was countenanced by the sovereign pontiffs, and urged by
Nicholas the First against the French prelacy. 3 Its genuine-
ness and authenticity, indeed, from the ninth century till the
reformation, were generally admitted ; and its authority sus-
tained, during this period of superstition and credulity, the
mighty fabric of the pontifical supremacy. An age, enveloped
in. darkness and monkery, and void of letters and philosophy,
was incapable of detecting the imposture, though executed with
a,- vulgar and bungling hand. Turrianb and Binius, even in
modern times, have maintained its authenticity. The dawn of
the reformation, however, exposed the cheat, in all its clumsy
and misshapen deformity. 'Its anachronisms and contradictions
betrayed the silly and stupid fiction. Its forgery has been
admitted by Bellarmine, Baronius, Erasmus, Petavius, Thomas-
sin, Pagius, Giannone, Perron, Fleury, Marca, Du Pin, and
1 Eo quod sit ipsa nova Roma. Crabb. 1. 411, 930. Labb. 2. 1125. Godeaiij
4. 497. Recte judicantes, urbem quae etimperio et senatuhonoratasit, etsequali
bus cum antiquissima regina Roma privileges fruatur etiam in rebus eccjesiasticis
Labb. 4. 1694. Thomassin, 1. 19. Coquelle, 406.
* Du Pin, 132. et 2. 486. Giannon^ V. &.
3 Has statim epistolas. Summi Pontifices avide arripueront. Du Fin, 139
Adnitente Nicolao I, et cateris Romania Pontificibus. Labb. 1. 79.
REJECTION OF PAPAL SUPREMACY IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES. 179
Labbeus. Du Pin calls the collection a medley. Labbeus
calls it ' a deformity, which can be disguised by no art or
colouring.' 1 The forgery remains a lasting monument of the
barbarism and superstition of the period of its reception and
authority. '
The domination of the papacy was, also, promoted by mis-
sions to the kingdoms of Paganism. The vast wealth and
rich domains of the Roman See, both in Italy and the adjacent
islands, enabled the pontiff to support missions on an extensive
scale through the European kingdoms, for the purpose of pro-
selytism. These exertions displayed the Roman hierarch's
zeal, and their success promoted his aggrandizement. The
churches, established in this way, acknowledged a dependence
on the see by which they had been planted.
Romanism, from the ninth till the fourteenth century, was
extended over Germany, Hungary, Bulgaria, Bohemia, Den-
mark, Sweden, Norway, Finland, Livonia, Prussia, and the
Orkney Islands. A few of the missionaries sent to these nations
were actuated by piety, accompanied indeed with weakness
and superstition. These visited the abodes of idolatry and
polytheism in the midst of danger and privation, to communi-
cate the light of the gospel. But many of these nations were
proselyted by missions of a different description. Violence and
compulsion were often substituted for persuasion and Chris-
tianity. The Pagans of Poland, Prussia, and Livonia were
dragooned into popery by military dialectics. The martial
apostles, who invaded these nations under the standard of the
cross, were attached only to their own interest, and the Roman
pontiff's domination and tyranny. 2 The popedom was en-
larged by the accession of the northern nations, which, con-
verted by Latin missions, submitted to papal jurisdiction, and
swelled the glory of the Romish communion.
The papal yoke, received in this manner by the proselyted
nations of the north, was rejected with resolution by the Asiatic,
African, and European kingdoms who had professed Chria-
tianity. The Asians despised Victor's denunciations on tiii;
subject of the paschal solemnity. The Africans contemnepl
Stephen's excommunication, on the topic of heretical baptism.
The prelacy of Africa, amounting to 225 bishops, forbade, in
418, on pain of excommunication, all appeals beyond the seau 3
This canon they renewed in 426 ; while Faustinus, who repre-
1 Adeo defonnes Videntur, ut nulls arte, nulla cerassa, aut purpurisso fucari
possint. Labb. 2. 78. Bellarmiu, II. 14. Alex. 2. 218.
* Alex. 14. 321. Gibbon, c. LV. Giannon, iii. 6. Bruy. 2. 259.
3 Ad transmarina qui pntaverit appellandum, a nullo inter Africam in cornmiinj-
onemsoscipiatar; Crabb.L 517. Du Pin. 143. Socrates, V. 22. Euaeb;V.2f.
12*
180 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
sented the pope in the council, blustered, vapoured, threatened,
and stormed, but all in vain. The bishops contemned his fury,
issued their canons, and, with steady unanimity, repelled papal
aggression.
The usurpations of the popedom were also long withstood by
several of the European nations, such as France, Spain, Eng-
land, and Ireland. These continued, for ages, to repress
Roman despotism with vigor and effect. Gaul or France op-
posed pontifical encroachment, and maintained metropolitical
authority with the utmost resolution. The synod of Lyons, .in
567, directed all dissentions among the clergy to be terminated
in a provincial council. Gregory the Fourth, in the beginning
of the ninth century, pretended to excommunicate the French
prelacy, who, inclined to retaliation, threatened to excojn-
municate Gregory. Hincmar, the celebrated French bishop
and statesman, wrote, in 865, the famous epistle, in which he
exploded the novelty of the Decretals and advocated the canons
of Nicea and Sardica. The French, says Du Pin, maintained,
in the tenth century, the ancient discipline and interdicted
appeals. The Metropolitans preserved their rights inviolated,
" till beyond the twelfth century." 1 This, Du Pin shows from
the works of Alcuin, the council of Laodicea, and the Epistles
of Nicholas, John, Stephen, Gregory, and Urban.
Spain remained free of pontifical domination till the beginning
of the ninth century. The Spanish prelacy and nobility, under
the protection of the king and independent of foreign control,
continued, prior to the Moorish conquest, to conduct the ad-
ministration of the Spanish church. Provincial councils, says
Du Pin, in the end of the sixth century, judged the Spanish
prelacy without any appeal. Arnolf, Bishop of Orleans, even
at the close of the tenth century, declared, in the council of
Rheims, without contradiction, that the Spanish church dis-
claimed the authority of the Roman pontiff. 2
Britain continued independent of papal authority, till the
end of the sixth century. The English, dissenting from the
Romish institutions and communion, disclaimed the papal
supremacy. Baronius himself, practised in all the arts of
evasion and chicanery, admits, on this occasion, a long and
dreadful schism. The British, says Bede, differed from the
Roman Christians in the celebration of baptism, the paschal
solemnity, " and in many other things." The points of dif-
ference, according to the Anglo-Saxon historian, were not few,
but many. Augustine gave the same statement as Bede. The
1 Ad duodecimum useque saeculum et amplius. Du Pin, 66. 130, 133. et2. 191.
s In Hispania quoque vigebat, etiam sab Gregorio, vetus ilia disciplina, ut causae
Bpiscoporum synodi Provincialis judicio finirentur. Du Pin, 131, et 2. 176
PAPAL SUPREMACY REJECTED IN BRITAIN AND IRELAND. 181
English, says the Roman missionary, " acted, in many respects,
contrary to the Roman usage." 1
Bede's report has been corroborated by Goscelin, Ranulph,
and Malmsbury. The Britons, says Goscelin, "differed in their
ecclesiastical ritual from the common observance of all other
churches ; while, formed in hostile array, and opposing the
request and admonition of Augustine, they pronounced theii
own usages, superior even to those of pontifical authority." 2
Ranulph's statement is of a similar description. Augustine,
observes this historian, " admonished the British clergy .to
correct some errors, and promised, if they would concur with
him in evangelizing the English, he would patiently tolerate
their other mistakes. This offer, however, these refractory
spirits wholly contemned." 3
Malmsbury' s language is still stronger than Ranulph's.
These islanders, says this annalist, " preferred their own to
the Roman traditions, and to some other tenets of Catholicism ;
and presisted in their opinions with pertinacity. The time of
observing the paschal festival formed one principal point of
controversy between the Roman missionary and the British
clergy. The Britons, as well as the Scots, who on this topic,
differed from the Roman traditions, obstinately refused to admit
the Roman usage. In this, they manifested the utmost in-
flexibility. When the English afterward, in the synod of
Whitby, in 664, determined, in conformity with foreign pre-
scription, to change the day of celebration, the Scottish
clergy left England. On this occasion, Colman, bishop of the
Northumbrians, seeing, says Bede, "his doctrine slighted and
his sect despised, returned to Scotland." 4
The Britons, in consequence, disclaimed the supremacy of
Gregory and the episcopacy of Augustine, whom the pontiff
had commissioned as a missionary and archbishop in England.
Augustine, on this topic, conferred with Dinoth, accompanied
by seven British bishops and several Bangorian monks, at
Augustine's oak on the frontiers of the Anglo-Saxons. Augus-
tine, on this occasion, recommended an acknowledgment of the
papal supremacy. Dinoth, speaking for the English, ' pro-
fessed himself^ his fellows, and the nation, attached to all
1 In multis quidem nostrse consuetudini contraria geritis. Beda, II. 2. Perplura
ecclesiastics castitati et paci contraria gerunt. Beda, 203. Spon. 604. VIII.
2 Non solum repugnant, verum etiam suos usus omnibus prseerninentiores Sancti
Papae Elutherii auctoritate pronunciant. Goscelin, c. 24. Wharton, 2. 65.
3 Monuit eos ut quEcdam erronea corrigent. Ipsi omnino spernerent. Kanulph.
V.Ann. 601.
4 Siiis potius quam Romanis obsecundarent traditionilms et plnra quidem ali
catholica. Pertinacem controversiam ferebant. Malmsbury, V. P. 349.
Colman, videns spretam suam doctrinara, sectam'iue essc despectam, in Scottians
regressus est. Beda. III. 26.
182 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY!
Christians, by the bonds of love and charity. This subjection,
he said, the British were ready to pay to the pontiff and to
every Christian; but were unacquainted with any other sub-
mission, which they owed to the person whom Augustine called
the pope.' 1 Dinoth and his companions, though men of learn-
ing in their day, seem to have known nothing of the Roman
hierarch. The English bishops, at the end of the sixth cen-
tury, had never heard of God's vicar-general on earth ; and
what was nearly as bad, cared no more about his infallibility,
after his name had been mentioned, than about any other man.
Dinoth also informed Augustine, that the British church was
governed by the bishop of Caerleon, and, therefore, had no
need of the Roman missionary's service or superintendency.
The obstinate people refused the archbishop ready provided for
them by his Roman holiness. Augustine reasoned and remon-
strated, but in vain. His auditors, who, according to Bede,
preferred their own traditions to the universal church, were
deaf to entreaty and reproof.
Ireland maintained its independency still longer than Eng-
land. This nation rejected the papal supremacy and indeed
all foreign domination, till its conquest by Henry at the end of
the twelfth century. The Scottish and Irish communions, Ba-
ronius admits, were involved in the same schism. Bede accuses
the Irish of fostering hatred to Romanism, and of entertaining
a heterodox profession. Laurentius, Justus, and Mellitus in
614, in their epistolary communication to the Irish clergy and
laity, indentified the Hibernian with the British church. Dagan,
an Irish bishop, refused to eat, sit in company, or remain under
the roof with the Roman bishops. 1
Ireland, for many ages, was a school of learning for the Eu-
ropean nations ; and she maintained her independency, and
repressed the incursions of foreign control during the days of
her literary glory. But the Danish army invaded the kingdom,
slew her sons, wasted her fields, and demolished her colleges.
Darkness, literary and moral, succeeded, and prepared the way
for Romanism. The dissensions of the native sovereigns aug-
mented the misery of the distracted nation, and facilitated the
progress of popery. King Henry, patronized by Pope Adrian,
1 Aliam obedientiam quam hanc non scio debitam ei quern vos nominates Papani
Sed obedientiam hanc sumus nos parati dare et solvere ei et cuique Christiano
Beda, 716. Bruys, 1. 371. Mabillon, 1. 279, 280.
2 Bomanam consuetudinem odio habuerunt. Beda, 702. Professionem minus
ecclesiasticam in multis esse cognovit. Beda, II. 4. Spon 604. VIII.
Daganus episcopus ad nos veniens, non splum cibum nobiscum, sed nee in
eodem hospitio, quo vescebamur, sumere voluit. Beda, 83, 702
Ecclesise Komanse de singulis domibus annuatim unius denarii pensare. Tri*
vettns, An. 1155. Dachery, 3. 151.
TITLE OF UNIVERSAL BISHOP CONFERRED BY PHOCAS. 185
completed the system of pontifical subjugation. The vicar-
general of God transferred the whole island to the monarch
of England for many pious ends ; and especially for the pay-
ment of an annual tax of one penny from each family to th<*
holy Roman see.
The usurpations of the papacy, therefore, were effected by
gradual innovation. Several nations, in defiance of pontifical
claims and ambition, maintained thek freedom for many ages.
The progress of Roman encroachments, was, for many years,
very slow, though supported by the energy of Leo, Gregory,
Nicholas, John, Innocent and Boniface. Leo the Great,
indeed, seems to have felt all the activity of genius and am-
bition : and he attempted in consequence, by many skilful and
rapid movements, to enlarge the circle of his power. He
pointed his spiritual artillery against the Gallican church ; but
was repelled with resolution and success. Has ecclesiastical
tactics, though well concerted, were in the main unsuccessful ;
and papal usurpation made little progress through any part of
Christendom, till the accession of Gregory in the end of the
sixth century.
The sainted Gregory was distinguished, not by his learning
or integrity, but by his ambition and activity. His works are
void of literary taste, and his life was a tissue of superstition,
priestcraft, monkery, intolerance, formality, and dissimulation.
He maintained a continual correspondence with kings ; and as
occasion dictated, employed, with temporising versatility, the
language of devotion or flattery. His great aim was to repress
the Byzantine patriarch, and to exalt the Roman pontiff!
During Gregory's reign, the Constantinopolitan patriarch, actu-
ated by a silly vanity and countenanced by the Emperor Mau-
ricius, assumed the title of universal bishop. This appellation,
noisy and empty, was unattended by any new accession of
power. But the sounding distinction, unmeaning as it was in
itself, and suitable, as the emperor seems to have thought it,
to the bishop of the imperial city, awoke Gregory's jealousy
and hostility. His holiness, accordingly, pronounced the
dignity, vain-glorious, proud, profane, impious, execrable,
heretical, blasphemous, diabolical, and antichristian: and
endeavoured, with unremitting activity, to rouse all the powers
of the earth for its extinction. His saintship, had the spirit of
prophecy been among the number of his accomplishments,
would, in all probability, have spoken with more caution about
a tide afterward arrogated by his successors. The usurper of
this appellation, according to Gregory, was the harbinger and
herald of Antichrist. His infallibility, of course, in designating
184 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
the pope antichrist, had the honour of anticipating Luther neat
a thousand years.
Mauricius refused to take the title of universal bishop from
the Byzantine patriarch. But the emperor's reign soon termi-
nated in the rebellion of Phocas, a centurion who assassinated
the royal family and seized the imperial throne. The usurper,
on this occasion, was a monster of inhumanity. Some tyrants
have been cruel from policy. But Phocas seems to have been
actuated with unalloyed disinterested malignity, unconnected
with any end except the gratification of a malevolent and infer-
nal mind. He massacred five of his predecessor's sons before
the eyes of the father, whom he reserved to the last that he
might be a spectator of his family's destruction. The youngest
boy's nurse endeavoured to substitute her own child in the place
of the emperor's. Mauricius, however, discovered and pre-
vented the design, and delivered the royal infant to the execu-
tioner. This noble action extorted tears from the eyes of all
the other spectators, but made no impression on the tyrant.
The assassination of the emperor's brother and the chief patri-
cians followed. The empress Constantina and the princesses
were next, by the most solemn oaths and promises of safety,
allured from their asylum in a church, and fell the helpless
victims of relentless fiiry. Phocas was deformed in body as
well as in mind. His aspect inspired terror ; and he was void
of genius, learning, truth, honour, or humanity, and the slave
of drunkenness, impudicity, licentiousness, and cruelty. 1
This demon of inhumanity, however, became the object of
his infallibility's unqualified flattery, for the promotion of pro-
jects of ambition and despotism. His holiness hailed, the
miscreant's accession, in strains suited only to the advent of the
Messiah. The hierarch celebrated the piety and benignity of
the assassin, and welcomed the successful rebellion of the
usurper as the joy of heaven and earth. 2 His saintship, in fond
anticipation, grasped the title of universal bishop as the reward
of his prostituted adulation and blasphemy. But death arrested
his career, and prevented the transfer of the disputed and envied
honour. Gregory's ambition and ability, however, succeeded
in extending the limits and advancing the authority of the pope-
dom. Claims, hitherto disputed or half-preferred, assumed
under his superintendence a more definite form ; while nations,
too ignorant to compare precedents or examine principles,
yielded to his reputation and ability.
Gregory's successors, for nearly one hundred and fifty years*
seems to have obtained no material accessions of ecclesiastical
1 Spon. 602. VI. Godeau, 5. 43. Bray. 1. 402, 400.
2 Pontifex Phocam crudelissimum multis laudibus extulit. Du Pin. 279.
USURPATION OF THE POPES. 186
power. The infernal Phocas, indeed, according to many
historians, wrested the title of universal bishop from the Byzan-
tine patriarch, and entailed it in perpetuity on the Roman pon-
tiff. 1 Some modern publications annex considerable importance
to this transaction, and even date the papal supremacy from
this epoch. But this, as many reasons show, was no leading
fact, much less a marked era in the history of the papacy. The
truth of the narration is very questionable. The contemporary
historians are silent on this topic. The relation rests on the
sole credit of Baronius, who, on account of his rnodernness as
well as his partiality, is no authority. Pelagius and Gregory
had disclaimed the title, which, for some centuries, was not
retained by the successors of Boniface. The Roman pontiff,
says Gratian, ' is not universal,' though some refer its assump-
tion to the ninth century. 2 But the account, even if true, is
unimportant. The application, intended merely as complimen-
tal and honorary, was not new nor accompanied with any fresh
accessions of authority. The title had been given to Pope Leo
the Great, by the council of Chalcedon, and to the Byzantine
patriarchs by the emperors Leo and Justinian. Leo bad called
Stephen Universal, and Justinian, at a latter date, had, in the
same style, mentioned Mennas, Epiphanias, and Anthemius.
The patriarchs of Constantinople, before, as well as after Boni-
face, were called universal bishops. Phocas, indeed, rescinded
the dignity. But the title was afterwards restored by Hera-
clius the sucessor of Phocas, and retained with the utmost
pertinacity. 3
But Phocas, if he did not bestow the title of universal bishop
on the Roman pontiff, conferred something, which, if belief may
be attached to Anastasius, Bede, and Paul the Deacon, was
equivalent or even superior. The primacy, claimed by the
eastern patriarch, this emperor, according to these historians,
transferred to the western pontiff. 4 The primacy, however,
obtained in this manner, could have no pretensions to be of
ecclesiastical or divine origin ; but on the contrary, like all the
honours of the papacy, was of civil and human authority.
1 Nomen universalis episcopi decere Romanam tantummodo ecclesiam. Spon.
606, 11.
2 Nee etiam Romanus Pontifex universalis est appellandus. Gratian, 303 Anon.
180.
3 Godeau, 4, 500. Thorn. I. 2. Du Pin. 328. Giannon, III. 6.
4 Hie obtinuit apud Phocam principem, ut sedes Apostolica beati Petri Apostoli,
caput esse omnium ecclesiarum, id est, ecclesia Romana, quia ecclesia Constanti-
nopolitana primam se omnium acclesiarum scribebat. Anastasius, 24. in Bon. 3.
Hie, rogante Papa Bonifacio, statuit, sedem Romanse et Apostolicse ecclesise caput
esse omnium ecclesiarum, quia ecclesia Constantinopolitana primam se omnium
ecclesiarum scribebat. Beda in Chron. 29. Paul Diacon, 4, 47,
Apud Phocam obtinuit, ut Romse ecclesia omnium caput eccleiiarum decernere-
tur. Hermann Ann. 60S. Canasius, 3, 231. Fordun. III. 32.
186 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY I
Nicholas and John, in the ninth century, laid the foundation,
and Gregory, in the eleventh, raised the superstructure. The
latter completed the outline, which the two former had begun.
The skeleton, which Nicholas and John had organized, Gregory
clothed with flesh, supplied with blood, and inspired with life
and activity. Innocent the Third seemed, if possible, to
out-rival Gregory in the career of usurpation and tyranny.
Unwearied application, extensive knowledge of ecclesiastical
law, and vigilant observation of passing events, sustained this
pontiff's fearless activity; and he obtained the three great
objects of his pursuit, sacerdotal sovereignty, regal monarchy,
and dominion over kings. Boniface the Eighth walked in
Innocent's steps, and endeavored to surpass his predecessor in
the paths of despotism. During the period which elapsed from
Innocent till Boniface, the sun of pontifical glory shone in all its
meridian splendour. The thirteenth century constituted the
noonday of papal domination. Rome, mistress of the world,
inspired all the terrors of her ancient name, thundering anathe-
mas, interdicting nations, and usurping authority over councils
and kings. Christendom, through all its extended realms of
mental and moral darkness, trembled while the pontiff fulmi-
nated excommunications. Monarchs quaked on their thrones
at the terror of papal deposition, and crouched before his
spiritual power like the meanest slaves. The clergy considered
ins holiness as the fountain of their subordinate authority, and
the way to future promotion. The people immersed in gross
ignorance and superstition, viewed his supremacy as a ter-
restrial deity, who wielded the temporal and eternal destinies
of man. The wealth of nations flowed into the sacred treasury,
and enabled the successor of the Galilean fisherman and head
of the Christian commonwealth, to rival the splendour of
eastern pomp and grandeur.
CHAPTER V.
INFALLIBILITY.
PONTIFICAL INFALLIBILITY ITS OBJECT, FORMJ AND UNCERTAINTY- SYNODAE,
INFALLIBILITY PONTIFICAL AND SYNODAL INFALLIBILITY ECCLESIASTICAL
INFALLIBILITY ITS ABSURDITY ITS IMPOSSIBILITY.
THE infallibility of the church, like the supremacy of the pope,
presents an inviting theme to the votary of papal superstition.
A genuine son of Romanism expatiates on this topic with great
pride and volubility. But the boasted unity of pretended
Catholicism has on this, as on every other question, diverged
into a heterogeneous medley of jarring opinions and contending
systems. The ablest advocates of infallibility cannot tell in
whom this prerogative is placed. Its seat, in consequence, has,
even among its friends, become the subject of tedious as well as
useless discussion.
All indeed seem to agree in ascribing infallibility to the
church. But this agreement in word is no proof of unity in
opinion. Its advocates differ in the interpretation of the term ;
and apply to the expression no less than four different signifi-
cations. Four conflicting factions, in consequence, exist on
this subject in the Romish communion. One party place
infallibility in the church virtual or the Roman pontiff. A
second faction seat inerrability in the church representative or
a general council. A third class, ascribe this prerogative to a
union of the church, virtual and representative, or, in other
terms, to a general council headed by the Roman pontiff. A
fourth division, rejecting the other systems, persist in attributing
exemption from error only to the church, collective or dispersed,
embracing the whole body of professors, clergy and laity.
One party place infallibility in the church virtual, or Roman
pontiff. 1 This may be called the Italian system. The Italian
clergy, placed under the influence of the pope, concur with
abject submission in this opinion. These receive the official
VPer ecclesiam intelligimus pontificem Romanum. Gretser. c. 10. Papavir ;
tualiter est tota ecclesia. Herv. c. XXIII, Jacobatius, I. p. 63.
188 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
definitions of the supreme hierarch on faith and morals as the
divine oracles of infallibility.
This system, in all its absurdity, has been patronized by
theologians, popes, and councils. Many Romish doctors have
entertained this opinion, such as Baronius, Bellarmine, Binius,
Carranza, Pighius, Turrecrema, Canus, Pole, Duval, Lainez,
Aquinas, Cajetan, Pole, Fabulottus, and Palavicino. Several
pontiffs, as might be expected, have been found in the same
ranks ; such as Pascal, Pius, Leo, Pelagius, Boniface, and
Gregory. 1 These, and many others who have joined the same
Jtandard, form a numerous and influential faction in the bosom
of the papacy. Bellarmine, Duval, and Arsdekin, indeed,
have represented this as the common sentiment entertained by
all popish theologians of distinction. 2
This system seems also to have been embraced by the councils
of Florence, Lateran, and Trent. These conventions conferred
on the pontiff an authority, above all councils. The pontifical,
therefore, is superior to synodal authority, and according to the
Florentine and Lateran decisions, must possess infallibility.
The Lateran synod, besides, renewed and approved the bull of
Boniface the Eighth, which declared subjection to the Roman
pontiff necessary to all for salvation. ' The pope.' said Cardillus
in the council of Trent, without contradiction, ' is so supplied
with the divine aid and light of the Holy Spirit, that he cannot
err to a degree of scandal, in defining faith or enacting general
laws.' 3 These councils were general, and accounted a repre-
sentation of the whole church. The belief of pontifical
exemption from error, therefore, was not confined to a mere
party, but extended to the whole communion.
The infallibility of the Roman pontiff, maintained in this
manner by theologians, popes, and councils, has also been
rejected by similar authority. Doctors, pontiffs, synods, and
indeed all antiquity, have denied the inerrability of his Roman
holiness. The absurdity has been disclaimed by Gerson,
Launoy, Almain, Richerius, Alliaco, Victoria, Tostatus, Lyra,
Alphonsus, Marca, Du Pin, Bossuet, and many other Romish
divines. Many popes also have disowned this prerogative, such
as Damasus, Celestin, Pius, Gelasius, Innocent, Eugenius,
i Bell. IV. 2. Fabul. c. 8. Caron, c. 18. Du Pin, 336. Labb. 18. 1427,
Maimbourg, 56.
2 Hsec doctrina cdmmunis est inter omnes note theologos. Arsdekin, 1. 118.
s Arsdekin, 1, 114, 118. DuPin, 3. 148. Crabb, 3. 697. Labb. 19. 968.
Romanutn pontificem, neque in rebus fidei definiendis neque etiam in condendis
legibus generalibus, usquam sic errane posse, ut scandalo sit aliis. Nam in bis rebus
perpetuo illi adest Spiritus Sancti patrocinium lumenque Divinum, quo ejus mens
copiose adomodum iUustrata, velut manu ducatur. Cardill. in Labb. 20. 1177 .
PONTIFICAL INFALLIBILITY. 189
Adrian, and Paul. 1 The French likewise explode this claim.
These superhuman pretenisons have been also rejected by the
general councils of Pisa, Constance, and Basil.
The assertors of pontifical infallibility, outraging common
sense and varying r'rom others, have also, on this subject,
differed among themselves. F ew indeed have had the effrontery
to represent even the pope, as unerring in all his decisions. His
holiness, according to BeUarmine and Dens, may, in a personal
and private capacity, be subject to mistake, and, according to
Costerus, be guilty of heresy and infidelity. The Transalpines
accordingly, have disagreed among themselves on the object,
form, and certainty of infallibility.
The object of infallibility has been one topic of disputation
among the partizans of the Italian school. These contend
whether this prerogative of his holiness be restricted to faith or
extended to fact. The majority seem to confine this attribute
of the pontiff to faith, and admit his liability to error in fact.
Bellarmine and his partizans seem to limit inerrability to the
former, and leave the latter to the contingency of human
ignorance and imbecility. One party, however, though a small
one, in the Romish communion, would cover even the varying
form of discipline with the shield of infallibility.
The Jesuits in general, would extend infallibility both to
questions of right and of fact. These patrons of syncophancy
and absurdity, in their celebrated thesis of Clermont, acknow-
ledged an unerring judge of controversy in both these respects.
This judge, according to Jesuitical adulation, is the pope, who,
seeing with the eye of the church and enlightened with divine
illumination, is unerring as the Son of God, who imparts the
infallibility which he possesses. 2 We tremble while we write
such shocking blasphemy. John, Boniface, and Alexander,
monsters of iniquity, were, according to this statement, inspired
by God and infallible as Emmanuel. Talon, the French
advocate general, protesting against this insult, on reason and
common sense, stigmatized it as impiety and blasphemy.
This blasphemy, however, was not confined to the cringing,
unprincipled Jesuits. Leo, in the Lateran council in the
1 Certain est quod pontifex possit errare etiam in iis, quae tangunt fidem. Adrian,
6. De min. Art. 3. Maimbourg, 138. Non dubito, quin ego et decessores mei
en-are aliquando potuerimus. Paul, 4 in Maimb. 139. DuPin, 364. Caron, c. 18.
Launoy, 1, 145. Galli aliique modern! ipsius infallibilitatem impugnant. Dens, i.
5. Papa solas potest errare et ease haereticus. Panormitan, Q..1. N. 21. P. 140.
3 Papam non minus infaUibilem in materia facti vel juris esse quam fuerit Jesu*
Ghristus. Caron. 60. Walsh, p. 9. Nullum errorem cadere posse in doctrinam,
quam Pontifex authoritate summa definit et proponit universae ecclesise, sive ilia
juris sive facti quaestionem contineat. Arsdekin, 1, 124.
Papam, nee dicto nee facto, errare posse credebant. Barclay, 35. c. 4.
190 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERy :
eleventh session, recognized the same principle in all its
hatefulness and deformity. He declared his ability to ' supply
the defects both of right and fact, from his certain knowledge
and from the plenitude of his apostolic power.' 1 The declaration
was made with the full approbation of the holy Roman synod,
which represented the universal church. Its belief, therefore,
should, in the papal communion be an article of faith and its
rejection a heresy. The Jansenists, on this topic, opposed the
Jesuits, and betrayed, by their disputations, the boasted unity
of Catholicism.
The Italian school also vary with respect to the form of
infallibihty. This party indeed confess the pope's liability to
error and deception, like other men, in a private or personal
capacity, and limit his infallibility to his official decisons, or
when he speaks from the chair. But the friends of official
infallibility, agreeing in word, have disagreed about the inter-
pretation of the term. One variety, on this topic, represents
his holiness, as speaking with official authority when he decides
in council. This explanation has been patronized by Viguerius,
Bagot, and Monilian. But these, it is plain, betray their own
cause, by transferring infallibility from the pope to his council.
A second variety limit his judicial sentences to the determina-
tions which he delivers according to Scripture and. tradition.
This interpretation has been countenanced by C allot and
Tiirrecrema. But these, like the former, miss their aim, and
ascribe infallibility, not to the pope, but to Scripture and tradi-
tion. The difficulty still remains, to know when his holiness
speaks in accordance with these standards. A third variety,
supported by Canus and his partizans, reckon these official
instructions, such as are uttered after mature and diligent
examination. 2 But all the wisdom of Canus, and his friends,
and perhaps a subsidy, would be necessary to distinguish
between the pontiff's deliberate and hasty determinations.
The fourth and commonest variety, on this topic, is that of
Bellarmine, Duval, Raynald, Dens, and Cajetan. His holiness,
according to these doctors, utters his oracles from the chair
when, in a public capacity, he teaches the whole church con-
cerning faith and morality. 3 But a difficulty still remains to
determine when ihis is the case ; and this difficulty has divided
the advocates of this folly into several factions. The pontiff,
1 Tarn juris quam facti defectus supplentes, ex certa nostra scientia, et de Apos
tolicse potestatis plenitudine. Labb. 19. 968.
*Launoy, ad Metay. Du Pin, 340. Maimb. 55. Launpy, 3. 29, 40.
3 Censetur loqui ex cathedra quando loquitur ex plenitudine potestatis, praescribeng
tmiversali ecclesia? aliquid tanquam' dogma fide credendum vel in moribus obser-
randnm. Dens, 1. 159. Da Pin, 341. Launoy, 3. 24. Maimbourg, 56.
PONTIFICAL INFALLIBILITY. 191
.gay some, teaches the whole church, when he enacts laws
and say others, when he issues rescripts. The pontiff, says
Tannerus and Compton, instructs the whole ecclesiastical
community, when his bull has, for some time, been affixed to
the apostolic chancery. This, which Du Pin calls the height of
folly, is indeed the concentrated spirit of sublimated nonsense.
Maimbourg requires public and solemn prayer^ with the con-
sultation of many councils and universities.
The certainty or uncertainty of pontifical exemption from
error has, in the Romish communion, been a subject of dis-
agreement and disputation. While the Ultramontane contends
for its truth, and the Cisalpine for its falsehood, a numerous and
influential party maintain its utter uncertainty, and represent
it as a question, not of faith, but of opinion. The class-book
of Maynooth stoutly advocates the probability of both systems. 1
The sage writer's penetrating eye could, at a glance, discern
the probability of two contradictory propositions. The author
must have been a man of genius. Anglade, Slevin* and
Kenny, at the Maynooth examination, declared, on oath,
their indecision on this inquiry. The learned doctors could
not tell whether their visible head be the organ of truth or the
channel of error, even in his official decisions and on points of
faith. A communion, which boasts of infallibility, cannot
determine whether the sovereign pontiff, the plenipotentiary
of heaven, and ' the father and teacher of all Christians,' be.
even when speaking from the chair, the oracle of Catholicism
or of heresy.
A second faction seat inerrabiHty in the church representa-
tive or a general council. An ecumenical synod, according to
this class, is the sovereign tribunal, which all ranks of men,
even the Roman pontiff himself, are bound to obey. An
assembly of this kind, guided by the Holy Spirit, is superior to
the pope, and supreme judge of controversy. The pontiff, in
case of disobedience, is subject to deposition by the same
authority. 2
This is the system of the French or Cisalpine school. The
GaUican church has distinguished .itself, in every age, by its
opposition to pontifical usurpation and tyranny. The pontiff's
authority, in consequence, never obtained the same prevalence
in France as in several other nations of Christendom^ and hi*
infallibility is one of those claims which the French school
never acknowledged. His liability to error, even on questions
of faith, has accordingly been maintained by the ablest French
1 Utramque sententiam esse probabilem. Anglade, 180, 181. Slevin, 201, 208:
Kenney, 37.
*Du Fin, 3, 283. Gibert, 2. 7. Crabb. 2. 1018. Carranza, 565.
192 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
divines, such as Launoy, Gerson, Almain, Richerius, Maim-
bourg, Marca, Bossuet, and Du Pin. These doctors have been
supported by many French universities, such as Paris, Angiers,
Tolouse, and Orleans, which have been followed by those of
Louvain, Herford, Cologne, Cracow, and Vienna. Many
pontiffs, also, such as Damasus, Celestine, Felix, Adrian,
Gelasius, Leo, Innocent, and Eugenius, admitting their own
liability to error, have referred infallibility to a general council. 1
The general councils of Pisa, Constance, and Basil, enacted
a similiar decision. These proceeded, without any ceremony,
to the demolition of pontifical supremacy and inerrability. All
this is contained in the superiority of a council to the pope, as
established by these synods, as well as by their deposition of
Benedict, Gregory, John, and Eugenius. These pontiffs, the
fathers of Pisa, Constance, and Basil found guilty of contu-
macy, incorrigibility, simony, perjury, schism, and heresy, and
founded synodal authority on the ruins of papal presumption
and despotism. The Basilians, in express terms, declared the
pope's fallibility, and, in many instances, his actual heresy.
Some of the supreme pontiffs, said these legislators, ' have
fallen into heresy and error. The pope may and often does
err. History and experience show, that the pope, though the
head and chief, has often been guilty of error.' 2 These quo-
tations are plain and expressive of the council's sentiments on
the Roman hierarch's pretended exemption from the common
weakness of humanity.
The French, in this manner, are opposed to the Italian
school. Theologian is opposed to theologian, pope to pope,
university to university, and council to council. The council
of the Lateran, in a particular manner, contradicts the council
of Basil. Leo, in the former assembly and with its entire
approbation, declared his certain knowledge both of right and
fact. The latter congress, in the plainest language, admitted
the pope's fallibility and actual heresy. 3
A third class ascribe infallibility to a union of the church
virtual and representative, or to a general council headed by
the Roman pontiff. These, in general, require pontifical con-
vocation, presidency, and confirmation to confer on a council
legality and validity. A pope or synod, according to this
theory, may, when disconnected, fall into error; but, when
1 Hanc esse ecclesiae Gallicanae certain et indubitabilem doctrinam. Aradekin,
1.117. Affirmativam tuentur Galli. Dens, 2. 156. Launoy, 145. Du Pin, 362,'
364. Maimbourg, c. 15. Carqn, c. 18.
'NonnuUi summi Pontifices, in haereses et errores lapsi leguntnr. Errante
Fontifice, sicut saepe contingit, et contingere potest. Crabb, 3. 12, 146. 148
Bin. 8. 22. Carranza, 580. Du Pin, 361, 404.
3 labb. 19. 968. Crabb. 3. 148.
PONTIFICAL AND SYNODAL INFALLIBILTT. 193
united, become unerring. A council, under the direction and
superintendence of the pontiff, is, say these speculators, raised
above mistake on subjects of faith and morality. 1
This class is opposed by both the former. The system con-
tradicts the assumption of pontifical and synodal infallibility
and the sentiments of the French and Italian schools. Its par-
tizans differ not only from the Cisalpine theologians, Launoy,
Gerson, Almain, Bossuet, and Du Pin, but also from the
Ultramontane Doctors, Baronius, Bellarmine, Binius, Carranza,
and Cajetan ; and are exposed to the fire of the councils of
Florence and Lateran, as well as of Pisa, Constance, and Basil.
This party, varying from the French and Italian schools,
vary from their own theory and from the acknowledged facts
of the general councils. The Romish communion admits
the authority of several synods, undistinguished by pontifical
summons and ratification. The eight oriental councils, as
Launoy, Du Pin, Gibert, and Caron, have clearly shown, were
summoned sometimes against the pontifPs will and always with-
out his authority. The pope, in the first, second, third, and
fifth general councils, at Niceea, Ephesus, and Constantinople,
presided neither in person nor by representation; while the
second, Ephesian synod, says Mirandula having a lawful call
and legantine presence of the Roman bishop, prostituted its
authority nevertheless to the subversion of the faith. Several
general councils were not sanctioned, but, on the contrary, re-
sisted by pontifical power. This was the case with the third
canon of the second general council, which declared the Byzan-
tine next in rank and dignity to the Roman see. The twenty-
eighth canon of the fourth general council at Chalcedon, which
raised the Constantinopolitan patriarch to an equality with the
Roman pontiff, met with similar opposition. But the Chal-
cedonian fathers disregarded the Roman bishop's expostulations
and hostility. The fifth general council decided against
Vigilius, and, in addition, complimented his holiness with an
anathema and the imputation of heresy. The sixth ecumenical
synod condemned Honorius, and its acts were confirmed by-
the emperior and afterwards by Leo. The Basilian assembly
was ridiculed by Leo the Tenth, and both cursed and confirm-
ed by Eugenius. His holiness, of course, between malediction
and ratification, showed ample attention to the fathers of Basil.
The French clergy reject the councils of Lyons, Florence,
and the Lateran, though sanctioned by Innocent, Eugenius,
and Leo. The Italian clergy, on the contrary, and the par-
tizans of pontifical sovereignty, have proscribed the councils
1 Maimbourg, c. 6. Bell. IV. 2. Caron, c. J8. Kenney. 398.
13
194 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
of Pisa, Constance, and Basil, thoLgh ratified by Alexander,
Martin, and Nicholas.
A fourth division in the Romish communion, rejecting the
other systems, persist in attributing exemption from error only
to the church collective or dispersed, embracing the general
body of Christian professors. These, disclaiming pontifical
and synodal infallibility as well as both united, patronize
ecclesiastical inerrability. The partizans of this theory, how-
ever, are few, compared with the other factions. The system,
notwithstanding, can boast of several patrons of celebrity, such
as Panormitan, Mirandula, and Alliaco. 1 Panormitan, the
famous canonist, was one of the advocates of this theory.
Councils, according to this author, may err and have erred.
The universal church, he adds, 'comprehends the assembly of
all the faithful ; and this is the church which is vested with
infallibility.' Mirandula adopted the opinion of Panormitan.
He represents the second council of Ephesus as general and
lawful, which, nevertheless, 'betrayed the faith.' Alliaco's
statement on this head in the council of Constance, is remark-
able. He observed that ' a general council, according to
celebrated doctors, may err, not only in fact, but also in right,
and, what is more, in the faith.' He delivered the statement
as the opinion of many. The declaration, besides, was made
in an assembly containing about a thousand of the clergy, and
constituting a representation of the whole church, with general
approbation and consent.
This party, dissenting from pontifical and synodal infallibility,
differ also among themselves and are subdivided into two
sections. One subdivision places illiability to error in the clergy
dispersed through Christendom. The laity, according to this
speculation, have nothing to do but obey the clergy and be
safe. The other subdivision reckons the laity among the
participators of infallibility. Clergy and laity, according to this
supposition, form one sacred society, which, though dispersed
through Christendom, and subject to mistake in an individual
capacity, is, in a collective sense, raised above the possibility
oi" error in the faith.
Such is the diversity of opinions in the Romish communion,
on a theory, which has disgraced man and insulted human
reason. . These observations shall now be concluded with a
digression on the absurdity and on the impossibility of this
1 Tota ecclesia urrare non potest. Panormitan, a. 1, N. 21. P. 140. Ecclesia
universalis non potest errare. Panormitan de Jud. No. 4.
Nihilominus in eversionem fidei agitatum. Mirandula, Th. 4.
Secundum magnos Doctores, generale concilium potest errare, non solum in
fiicto, sed etiam in jure, et quod majus est, in fide. Hard. 2. 201. Lenfant, 1. 172.
ABSURDITY OF ECCLESIASTICAL INFALLIBILITY. 195
infallibility. Its absurdity may be shown from the intellectual
weakness of ma-n, and the moral deformity which has disfigured!
the Roman pontiffs, the general councils, and the papal
communion.
The intellectual weakness of man shows, in the clearest light,
the absurdity of the claim. Human reason, weak in its opera-
tions and deceived by passion, selfishness, ignorance, and pre-
possession, is open to the inroads of error. Facts testify its
fallibility. The annals of the world proclaim, in loud and
unequivocal accents, the certainty of this humbling truth.
The history of Romanism, and its diversity of opinions not-
withstanding its boasted unity, teach the same fact. The man
who first claimed or afterwards assumed the superhuman at-
tribute, must have possessed an impregnable effrontery. Lia-
bility to error, indeed, with respect to each individual in
ordinary situations, is universally admitted. But a whole is
equal to its parts. Fallible individuals, therefore, though
united in one convention or society, can never form an infallible
council or an infallible church.
The absurdity of this arrogant claim may be shown from the
moral deformity, which, from age to age, has disfigured the
Roman pontiffs, the general councils, and the Papal communion.
The moral character of the popes proclaims a loud negation
against their infallibility. Many of these hierarchs carried
miscreancy to an unenvied perfection, and excelled, in this
respect, all men recorded in the annals of time. A John, a
Benedict, and an Alexander seem to have been born to show
how far human nature could proceed in degeneracy, and, in
this department, outshine a Nero, a Domitian, and a Caligula.
Several popes in the tenth century owed their dignity to
Marozia and Theodora, two celebrated courtezans, who raised
their gallants to the pontifical throne and vested them with
pontifical infallibility. 1 Fifty of these viceroys of heaven,
according to Genebrard, degenerated, for one hundred and
fifty years, from the integrity of their ancestors and were
apostatical rather than apostolical. Genebrard, Platina, Stella,
and even Baronius, call them monsters, portends, thieves,
robbers, assassins, magicians, murderers, barbarians, and
perjurers. No less than seventeen of God's vicars-general
were guilty of perjury. Papal ambition, usurpation, perse-
cution, domination, excommunications, interdicts, and deposition
of kings have filled the earth with war and desolation.
1 Intruderentur in sedem Petri eornm amasii Psendo-Pontifices. Baron. 912.
VIII. Spon. 900. 1. Genebrard, IV.
On ne voyoit alors plus des Papes, mais des monstres. Baronius ecrit qu' alora
Rome etoit sans Pape. Giannon, VII. 5. An. Bccl. 345.
13*
196 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
The genera] councils, like the Roman pontiffs, were a stigma
on religion and man. Many of these conventions, in point of
respectability, were inferior to a modern cock-fight or bull-baiting.
Gregory Naziarizen, who is a Roman saint, has described these
scenes with the pencil of truth and with the hand of a master.
I never, says the Grecian bishop, saw a synod which had a
happy termination. These conventions, instead of diminishing,
uniformly augment the evil which they were intended to remedy.
Passion, jealousy, envy, prepossession, and the ambition of
victory, prevail and surpass all description. Zeal is actuated
rather by malignancy to the criminal than aversion to the crime.
He compares the dissension and wrangling exhibited in the
councils, to the quarrels of geese and cranes, gabbling and
contending in confosion, and represents such disputation and
vain jangling as calculated to demoralize the spectator, rather
than to correct or reform. 1 This portrait, which is taken from
life, exhibits, in graphic delineation and in true colours, the
genuine features of all the general, infallible, apostolic, holy
Roman councils.
The generals synods of Constantinople, Nicaea, Lyons,
Constance, and Basil are, in a particular manner, worthy of
observation. These conventions were composed of the lowest
rabble, and patronized the vilest abominations. The Byzantine
assembly, which was the second general council, has been
described by Nazianzen. This convention the saint character-
izes as ' a cabal of wretches fit for the house of correction ;
fellows newly taken from the plough, the spade, the oar, and
the army.' Such is the Roman saint's sketch of a holy,
apostolic, unerring council. 2
The second Nicene council approved of perjury and fornica-
tion. The unerring synod, in loud acclamation, approved of a
disgusting and filthy tale, taken from the ' spiritual meadow '
and sanctioning these sins. A monk, according to the story,
had been haunted with the spirit of fornication from early life
till hoary age. The lascivious propensity, which is all that
could be meant by the demon of sensuality, had seized the
solitary in the fervor of youth, and continued its temptations
even in the decline of years. One day, when the spirit, or
more probably the flesh had made an extraordinary attact on
the anchoret, he begged the foul fiend to depart, as he was
now arrived at the years of longevity, when such allurements,
t] yspcweoi;
, ev6a fio9og. Gregory 2. 82. Carm. X. Ep. 56. Du Pin, 1. 658.
Alii ab aratris venerant adus'ti a sole: alii a ligone vel bident totum diem non
qniescente : alii remos exercitusve reliqnerant, redolentes adhuc sentinam vel corpus
foedatum cicatricibushabentes:. . .... Flagriones, et pistrinis, digni. Greg. Quer
Ep. Labb. 2. 1158. Du Pin, 1. 259.
IMPOSSIBILITY OF INFALLIBILITY. 197
through attendant debility, should cease. The devil, appearing
in his proper form, promised a cessation of arms, if the hermit
would swear to tell no person what he was going to say. 1 The ,.
monk, without hesitation, obeyed the devil, and bound himself
by oath to secrecy. The devil administered and the monk
swore. He swore by the Most High never to divulge what
Belial would tell. The solitary, it appears, was sufficiently
complaisant with Belzebub, who, in return, promised to
withdraw his temptations, if the monk would .quit worshipping
a statute of Lady Mary carrying her son in her arms. ,
The tempted, it seems, did not reject the temptation with
becoming resolution. He requested time for consideration ;
and next day, notwithstanding his oath, discovered all to the
Abbot Theodoras, who lived in Pharan. The holy Abbot indeed
called the oath a delusion ; but notwithstanding his sanctity,
approved of the confession, and, in consequence of the perjury.
The devil, perhaps, in the popish divinity, is a heretic, which
would warrant the violation of faith with his infernal majesty.
The Abbot's approbation, however, some may think, was a
sufficient stretch of politeness in the holy Theodoras and not
very flattering to veracity. The following is as little flattering to
chastity. * You should rather visit all the brothels in the city,'
said the holy abbot to the holy monk, ' than omit worshipping
Immanuel and his mother in their images.' 2 Theodoras was
an excellent casuist, and knew how to solve a case of conscience.
Satan afterward appeared to the monk, accused him of perjury,
and pronounced his doom at the day of judgment. The devil
seems to have felt a greater horror of perjury than the monk ;
and preached better morality than Theodoras or the holy
general council. The anchoret, in his reply to the fiend, admitted
that he had perjured himself; but declared that he had not
abjured his God.
Such is the tale as related in the sacred synod from * the
spiritual meadow.' The holy fathers, with unanimous consent,
approved ; and by their approbation, showed the refinement of
their taste and sanctioned perjury and debauchery. John, the
oriental vicar, declared perjury better than the destruction of
images. John must have been an excellent moral philosopher
and Christian divine, and a worthy member of an unerring
council. The monk's oath, however, did not imply the
alternative of forswearing himself or renouncing image worship.
1 Jura mihi, quod ea qua? tibi dicam nernini significabis, et non amplius tecutn
pugnabo. Crabb. 2. 520. Bin. 5. 642.
2 Expedit tibi potius, ut non dimittas in civitate ista lupinar, in quod non introeas,
quam ut recuses adorare Dominum et Deum nostrum lesum Christum, cum propria
matre eua in imagine. Labb. 8. 902.
198 THE VABIATIONS OF POPERY:
He might have kept the solemn obligation, and, at the same
time, enjoyed his orthodox idolatry. He was only sworn to
secrecy with respect to the demon's communication. The
engagement was solemn. The officer indeed, who administered
the oath, was the devil. But the solitary swore by the Highest ;
and the validity of an oath, all agree, arises not from the
administrator, but from the deity in whose name it is taken.
His discovery to Theodoras, therefore, though applauded by the
infallible synod, was a flagrant violation of the ninth precept of
the moral law.
The approval of debauchery was, in this case, accompanied
with that of perjury. Theodoras' sermon, recommended by the
sacred synod, encouraged the monk, rather than dismiss his idol,
which in all probability was a parcel of fusty baggage, to launch
into the troubled waters of "prostitution, and, with crowded
canvass and swelling sail, to sweep the wide ocean of licentious-
ness. The picture of sensuality, presented in the abbot's holy
advice, seems to have tickled the fancy and feeling of the holy
fathers, who appear to have been actuated with the same spirit
in the council as the monk in the cell. The old sensualists
gloated over the scene of voluptousness, which the Theodorian
theology had presented to the view. The aged libertines,
enamoured of the tale, caused it to be repeated in the fifth
session, for the laudable purpose of once more glutting their
libidinous appetite, and prompting their imagination with its
filthiness.
The Caroline books, the production of the French king and
prelacy, deprecated the story as an unprecedented absurdity
and a pestilential evil. Du Pin, actuated with the sentiments
of a man and a Christian, condemns the synod, deprecates the
whole transaction, and even refuses to translate the abbot of
Pharan's holy homily. The infallible council sanctioned a
breach of the seventh commandment, at least in comparison
with the abandonment of emblematic adoration. The Nicseans,
nevertheless, boasted of their inspiration. The sacred synod,
amid all its atrocity, pretended to the immediate influence of
heaven. The divine afflatus, forsooth, passed through these
skins of pollution, and made the consecrated ruffians the
channels of supernatural communications to man. The source
of their inspiration, if the holy fathers felt such an impulse, is
easy to tell. The spirit which influenced the secreted monk
seems to have been busy with the worthy bishops, and to have
stimulated their imaginations to the enjoyment of the dirty story,
and the approbation of its foul criminality.
The holy infallible council of Lyons has been delineated in a
portrait taken from life, by Matthew Paris, a cotemporary
IMPOSSIBILITY OF INFALLIBILITY. 199
nistorian. Pope Innocent retiring from the general council of
Lyons in which he had presided, Cardinal Hugo made a
farewell speech for his holiness and the whole court to the
citizens, who had assembled on the occasion to witness his
^fallibility's departure. ' Friends' said the orator, 'we have
effected a work of great utility and charity, in this city. When
we came to Lyons we found three or four brothels in it, and we
have left at our departure only one. But this extends without
interruption, from the eastern to the western gate of the city.' 1
The clergy, who should be patterns of purity, seem on this
occasion, when attending an unerring council, to have been the
agents of demoralization through the city in which they assembled.
The cardinal, speaking in the name of his holiness, gloried in his
shame, and talked of the abomination of .himself and his
companions in a strain of railery and unblushing effrontery.
The constantine council was characterized by Baptiza, one of
its own members. His prptrait is frightful. The clergy, he
declared, ' were nearly all under the power of the devil, and
mocked ah 1 religion by external devotion and Pharisean hypo-
crisy. The prelacy, actuated only by malice, iniquity, pride,,
vanity, ignorance, lasciviousness, avarice, pomp, simony, and
dissimulation, had exterminated Catholicism and extinguished
piety.' 2
The character of the holy bishops, indeed, appear from their
company. More than seven hundred PUBLIC WOMEN, according
to Dachery's account, attended the sacred synod. The Vienna
manuscript reckons the number of these female attendants,
whom it calls vagrant prostitutes, at 1500. 3 This was a fair
supply for the thousand holy fathers who constituted the Con-
stantian assembly. These courtesans, says Brays, were, in ap-
pearance, intended to exercise the chastity of the clergy. Their
company, no doubt, contribute) to the entertainment of the
learned divines and introduced great variety into their amuse-
ments.
The council -of Basil taught the theory of filthiness, as that of
Constance had exhibited the practice. Carlerius, the champion
of Catholicism in the Basilian assembly against Nicholas the
Bohemian heretic, advocated the propriety of tolerating stews in
a city. 4 This hopeful and holy thesis the hero of the faith sup-
1 Tria vel quatuor prostibula invenimus. Unum solum relinquimus. Verum
ipsum durat continatum ab oriental! porta civitatis usque ad occidentalem. M.
Paris. 792.
2 Presque tout le clerge est sous la puissance du diable. Dans lea prelate, il n'y
a que malice, iniquite, negligence, ignorance, vanite, orgueil, avarice, simonie, las-
civete, pompe, hypocrisie. Baptiza, in Lenfan. 2. 95.
3 Sept cens dix huit femmes publiques. Bruy. 4. 39. XVC meretrices vagabnn-
dae. Labb. 16. 1435, 1436.
*Haec pestis maneat in urbibus. Canisius, 4. 457
200 THE VARIATIONS Of POPERY .
pdrted by the authority of the sainted Augustine and Aquinas.
Remove prostitutes, says Augustine as cited by Carlerius, and
you will disturb all things with licentiousness.' Human govern-
ment, says Aquinas, quoted by the same orator, ' should imitate
the divine. But God, according to the saint, permits some
evils in the universe, and therefore, so should man.' 1 His
saintship's logic is nearly as good as his morality. Simple
fornication, therefore, concludes Carlerius, is to be permitted
to avoid a greater evil.
This severe moralist, however, would exclude these courtezans
from the interior of the city, and confine them to the suburbs,
to serve as sewers to carry away the filth. He would even, in
his rigour, forbid these professional ladies the use of robes, orna-
ments, silver, gold, jewels, fringes, lace, flounces, and furbelows.
This useful and pure speculation, the sacred synod heard with
silent approbation. The holy fathers, in their superior sense
and sanctity, could easily perceive the utility and reasonable-
ness of the scheme, and could not, in politeness, object to the
arguments which their champion wielded with such triumphant
effect against the advocate of heresy.
The councils of Nicea, Vienna, and the Lateran, patronized
the hateful and degrading doctrine of materialism. Angels and
souls, the Nicseans represented as corporeal. The angels of
heaven and the souls of men, if the Nicsean doctors are to be
credited, possess bodies, though of a refined, thin, subtile, and
attenuated description. These angelical and mental forms, the
learned metaphysicians admitted, were composed of a substance
less gross indeed than the human flesh or nerve, and less firm
than the human bone or sinew ; but nevertheless material,
tangible and visible. The council of Vienna improved on that
of Nicaea. The holy infallible fathers of Vienna declared the
soul not only of the same substance, but also essentially and in
itself of the true and perfect form of the body. The rational and
intellectual mind, therefore, in this system, possesses a material
and corporeal shape, limbs, features, feet and hands, and has
circumference, diameter, length, breadth, and thickness. This
definition the sacred synod issued, to teach all men the true
faith. This doctrine, according to the same authority, is
Catholicism and the contrary is heresy. The Lateran council,
in its eighth session, follow the Viennese definition, and decreed
that the human spirit, truly, essentially, and in itself, exists in
the form of the human frame. 2 Three holy universal councils,
1 Aufer meretricibus de rebus humanis, turbaveris omnia libidinibus. Labb. 17
986. Dens permittit aliqua mala fieri in universe. Aquinas, II. 10. XI.
2 Catholica ecclesia sic sentit esse quosdam intelligibiles, sed non omnino corporis
expertes et invisibles, verum tenui corpore prxditos. In loco existunt et circinn-
IMMORALITY OF THE ROMISH CHURCH. 201
in this manner, patronized the materialism which was afterward
obtruded on the world by a Priestley, a Voltaire and a Hume.
The Romish communion was as demoralized as the Roman
pontiffs or the general councils. During the six hundred years
that preceded the reformation, the papal communion, clergy
and laity, were in the account of their own historians, sunk into
the lowest depths of vice and abomination. A rapid view of
this period, from the tenth till the sixteenth century, sketched
by the warmest partizans of the papacy, will show the truth and
justice of this imputation.
The tenth century has been portrayed by the pencil of
SabeUicus, Stella, Baronius, Giannone, and Du Pin. Stupor
and forgetfulness of morals invaded the minds of men. All
virtue fled from the pontiff and the people. This whole period
was characterized by obduracy and an inundation of overflow-
ing wickedness. The Romish church was filthy and deformed,
and the abomination of desolation was erected in the temple of
God. Holiness had escaped from? the world, and God seemed
to have forgotten his church, which was overwhelmed in a
chaos of impiet} 7 ". 1
The eleventh century has been described by Gulielmus, Paris,
Spondanus and Baronius. Gulielmus, portrays the scene in
dark and frightful colours. 'Faith was not found on earth.
All flesh had corrupted their way. Justice, equity, virtue,
sobriety, and the fear of God perished, and were succeeded by
violence, fraud, stratagem, malevolence, circumvention, luxury,
drunkenness, and debauchery. All kinds of abomination and
incest were committed without shame or punishment.' The
colours used by Paris are equally black and shocking. ' The
nobility,' says the English historian, ' were the slaves of gluttony
and sensuah'ty. All, in common, passed their days and nights
in protracted drunkenness. Men provoked surfeit by voracious-
ness, and vomit by ebriety.' The outlines of Spondanus and
Baronius correspond with those of Gulielmus and Paris. ' Piety
and holiness,' these historians confess, ' had fled from the earth,
whilst irregularity and iniquity among all, and, in an especial
manner, among the clergy every where reigned. The sacra-
ments, in many parts of Christendom, ceased to be dispensed.
ferentiam habent. Nemo, vel angelos, vel animos dixerit incorporeos. Carranza,
478. Labb. 8. 1446.
Anima rationalis non sit forma corporis human! per se et essentialiter, tanquam
haereticus sit censendus. Carranza, 560. Du Pin, 2. 545.
Ula humani corpoi'is existat. Gairanza, 604. Labb. 19. 812. Bin. 8. 928.
l Stupor et amentia quaedam oblivioque morum invaserant hominum animos.
Sabellicus, II. Quis non putarit Deum oblitum ecfclesiae suae. Spon. 908. III.
Contingent abominationem desolationis in templo. Baron, 900. I. L. eglise etoit
dans un etat pitoyable, de figuree pan les plus grands desordres, et plongee dans un
chaos d'impietes. Giannon,VIl. 5. Du Phi, 2, 156. Bray. 2. 316.
802 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
The few men of piety, from the prospect of atrocity, thought
that the reign of Antichrist had commenced, and that the world
was hastening to its end.' 1
The twelfth and thirteenth ages were similar in their morals^
and have been described by Morlaix, Honorius, and Bernard.
According to the two former, ' Piety and religion seemed to
bid adieu to man ; and for these were substituted treachery,
fraud, impurity, rapine, schism, quarrels, war and assassination.
The throne of the beast seemed to be fixed among the clergy,
who neglected God, stained the priesthood with impurity,
demoralized the people with their hypocrisy, denied the Lord
by their works, and rejected the revelation which God gave for
the salvation of man.' 2
. But Bernard's sketch of this period is the fullest and most
hideous. The saint, addressing the clergy, and witnessing what
he saw, loads the canvass with the darkest colours. 'The clergy,'
said the monk of Clairvaux, ' are called pastors, but in reality
are plunderers, who, unsatisfied with the fleece, thirst for the
blood of the flock ; and merit the appellation not of shepherds
but of traitors, who do not feed but slay and devour the sheep.
The Saviour's reproach, scourges, nails, spear, and cross, all
these, his ministers, who serve Antichrist, melt in the furnace
of covetousness and expend on the acquisition of filthy gain,
differing from Judas only in the magnitude of the sum for which
they sell their master. The degenerate ecclesiastics, prompted
by avarice, dare for gain, even to barter assassination, adultery,
incest, fornication, sacrilege, and perjury. Their extortions,
they lavish on pomp and folly. These patrons of humility
appear at home amid royal furniture, and exhibit abroad in
meretricious finery and theatrical dress. Sumptuous food,
splendid cups, overflowing cellars, drunken banquets, accom-
panied with the lyre and the violin, are the means by which
these ministers of the cross evince their self denial and
indifference to the world.' s
1 Fides deficerit, et Domini timor erat de midio sublatus. Perierat de rebus,
justilia et aequitate subacta, violentia dominibatur in populis. Fraus, dolus, et cir-
cumventiolate involverant universa. Fides non inveniebatur super terrain. Omnis
caro corruperat viam suam. Bell. Sacr. 1. 8.
Optimates guise et veneri servientes, in cubiculis, et inter uxorios complexus.
Potabatur ab omnibus in commune, et tarn dies quani noctes, in hoc studio pro-
ductae aunt. In cibis urgebant crapulam, in potibus vomicam irritabant. Paris 5,
1001, Spon. 1001. II Bray. 2. 316.
2 La fraude, I'impur6te, les rapines, les schismes, les querelles, les guerres, les
trahisons, les homicides sont en vogue. Adieu la piete et la religion. Morlaix, in
Bruy. 2. 547.
Tourne toi vers le clerge, tu y verra la tente de la Bete. Us negligent le service
Divin. Ils souillent le sacerdoce par leurs impuretez, seduisent le peuple par
leurs hypocrisie, renient Dieu par leurs oeuvres. Honor, in Bruy. 2. 547.
3 Dicemini pastores, cum sitis raptores. Sititis enim sanguinem. Non aunt
IMMORALITY OF THE ROMISH CHURCH. 203
Bernard's picture of the priesthood is certainly not compli-
mentary ; and his character of the laity is of the same unflatter-
ing description. According to this saint, ' the putrid contagion
had, in his day, crept through the whole body of the church,
and the malady was inward and could not be healed. The
actions of the prelacy in secret were too gross for expression,'
and the saint, therefore, left the midnight miscreancy in its
native and congenial darkness. 1
The moral traits of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries
have been delineated by the bold but faithful pens of Alliaco,
Petrarch, Mariana, JEgidius, Mirandula, and Fordun. 2 AUiaco's
description is very striking and significant. 'The church,'
said the cardinal, * is come to such a state, that it is worthy of
being governed only by reprobates.' Petrarch, without any
hesitation, calls Rome, ' Babylon, the Great Whore, the school
of error, and the temple of heresy.' The court of Avignon,
he pronounced ' the sink and sewer of all vice, and the house
of hardship and misery ;' while he lamented, in general, 'the
derelection of all piety, charity, faith, shame, sanctity, integrity,
justice, honesty, candor, humanity, and fear of God.'
Every enormity, according to Mariana, ' had passed into a
custom and law, and was committed without fear. Shame and
modesty were banished, while, by a monstrous irregularity, the
most dreadful outrages, perfidy, and treason were better
recompensed than the brightest virtue. The wickedness of
the pontiff descended to the people.' 3
The account of jEgidius is equally striking. Licentiousness
reigned. All kinds of atrocity, like an impetuous torrent,
inundated the church, and like a pestilence, infected nearly all
its members. Irregularity, ignorance, ambition, unchastity,
libertinism, and impurity triumphed ; while the plains of Italy
were drenched in blood and strewed with the dead. Violence,
rapine, adultery, incest, and all the pestilence of viHany,
confounded all things sacred and profane.' 4
pastores, sed traiitores. Ministri Christi sunt, et serviunt Antichristq. Vendunt
homicidia, adulteria, fornicationes, sacrilegia, perjuria. Bernard, 1725 1728.
I Serpit hodie putrida tabes per omne corpus ecclesiae. Intestina et insanabilis
est plaga ecclesiae. Quae enim in occulto fiunt ab episcopis, turpe est dicere. Ber-
nard, 1728.
z Ad hunc statum yenisse ecclesiam, ut non sit digna regi> nisi per reprobos.
Alliaco in Hard. 1. 424. Lenfan. 2. 276.
II appelle, sans detour, la ville de Rome, la grande Paillarde, Babylone, 1'Bcole
de 1'erreur, le Temple de 1'Heresie. II n'y a nulle piet6 nolle charite, nulle foi,
nolle crainte de Dieo. La 1'amoor, pudeor, la candeur, en sont bannies. Petrarcha,
in Bray. 3. 470.
3 Les plus grands crimes etoient presqoe poossez en contnme .et en loi. On lea
commetoit sans crainte. La honte et la pudeor etoient, bannies, et par nn deregle-
ment
recom
204 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Mirandula's picture, to the following effect, is equally hideoqs.
* Men abandoned religion, shame, modesty, and justice. Piety
degenerated into superstition. All ranks sinned with open
effrontery. Virtue was often accounted vice, and vice honored
for virtue. The sacred temples were governed by pimps and
Ganymedes, stained with the sin of Sodom. Parents encouraged
their sons in the vile pollution. The retreats, formerly sacred
to unspotted virgins, were converted into brothels, and the
haunts of obscenity and abomination. Money, intended for
sacred purposes, was lavished on the filthiest pleasures, while
the perpetrators of the defilement, instead of being ashamed,
floried in the profanation.' Fordun, in his sketch of the
mrteenth century, has loaded the canvass with the same dark
colors. 1 'Inferiors,' say the historians, 'devoted themselves
to malediction and perjury, to rioting and drunkenness, to
fornication and adultery, and to other shocking crimes. Su-
periors studied, night and day, to oppress their underlings in
every possible manner, to seize their possessions, and to devise
new imposts and exactions.'
The sixteenth century has been depicted by Antonius. He
addressed the fathers and senators assembled at Trent, while
he delineated, in such black colors, the hideous protrait of the
passing day. The orator, on the occasion, stated, while he
lamented, the general ' depravation of manners, the turpitude
of vice, the contempt of the sacraments, the solicitude of earthly
things, and the forgetfulness of celestial good and of all Chris-
tian piety. Each succeeding day witnessed a deterioration in
devotion, divine grace, Christian virtue, and other spiritual
attainments. No age had ever seen more tribunals and less
justice ; more senators and less care of the commonwealth ;
more indigence and less charity ; or greater riches and fewer
alms. This neglect of justice and alms was attended with
public adultery, rape, rapine, exaction, taxation, oppression,
drunkenness, gluttony, pomp of dress, superfluity of expense,
contamination of luxury, and effusion of Christian blood.
Women displayed lasciviousness and effrontery ; youth, dis-
aacra profanaque miscere omnia. Labb. 19. 670. Bruy. 4. 365. Mariana, 5. 770.
1 Sacras aedes et templa lenonibus et catamitis commissa. Virginibus olim dicata,
plerisque in urbibus septa in meretricias fornices et obscoenalatibula fuisse conversa.
Spurcissimis voluptatibus et impendeant, et impendisse glorientur. Mirandula, in
Sosco. 6. 68. La plupart des prelats n'ont presque plus ni religion, ni pudeur, ni
modestie. La justice eat changee en brigandage, la piete a presque degenere en
superstition ; du vice on fait une vertu. Mirand. in Bruy. 4. 397.
Inferiores jam vacant maledictionibus et perjuriis, comessionibus et ebrietatibus,
fornicationibus et adulteriis, ac aliis horrenis peccatis. Superiores vero student,
nocte et die, circumvenire subditos suos omnibus modis quibus possunt, ut auferant
eorum bona et inducant novas subtilitates, adinventiones, et exactiones. Fordun,
XIV. 39.
IMMORALITY OF THE ROMISH CHURCH. 205
order and insubordination ; and age, impiety, and folly : while
never had there, in all ranks, appeared less honor, virtue,
modesty, and fear of God, or more licentiousness, abuse, and
exorbitance of sensuality. The pastor was without vigilance,
the preacher without works, the law without subjection, the
people without obedience, the monk without devotion, the rich
without humility, the female without compassion, the young
without discipline, and every Christian without religion. The
wicked were exalted and the good depressed. Virtue was
despised, and vice, in its stead, reigned in the world. Usury,
fraud, adultery, fornication, enmity, revenge, and blasphemy,
enjoyed distinction; while worldly and perverse men, being
encouraged and congratulated in their wickedness, boasted of
their villany. 1
The conclusion from these statements, has been drawn by
Gerson, Madruccio, Cervino, Pole, and Monte. Gerson, in the
council of Constance, represented, ' as ridiculous, the preten-
sions of a man to bind and to loose in heaven and in earth, who
is guilty of simony, falsehood, exaction, pride, and fornication,'
and, in one word, worse than a demon. A person of such a
character, according to this authority, is unfit to exercise disci-
pline : and much less therefore entitled to the attribute of
infallibility. ' The Holy Spirit,' said Cardinal Mandruccie in
the council of Trent, * will not dwell in men who are vessels of
impurity ; and from such, therefore, no right judgment can be
expected on questions of faith.' His speech, which was pre-
meditated, met with no opposition from any in the assembly.
1 Depravatos hominum mores, vitiorum omnium turpitudinem, sacramentorum
despectus, solam curam terrenorum et caelestium bonorum ; tbtiusque Christianas
pietatis oblivionem consideremus. In Divinis gratiis, in Christianis virtutibus, et
devotione, et cseteris spiritualibus bonis, in dies tnagis semper deficere, et ad deteri-
ora prolabi videantur. Nam ubi unquam tot fuerunt in saeculo, tribunalia, et minor
justitia? Ubi unquam tot senatores et magistrates, et minor cura reipublicae ? Ubi
major pauperum multitude, et minor divitum pietas ? et ubi majores divitiae, et
pauciores fuerunt eleemosynae 1 Labb. 20. 1217 1219.
Taceo publica adnlteria, stupra, rapinas. Praetereo tantam Ohristianae sanguinis
effusionem, indebitas exactiones, vectagalia, gratis supuraddita, et innumeras hujus-
cemodi oppressiones. Prsemitto etiam superbam vestium pompam, supervacaneos
ultra statut dicentium sumptus, ebrietates, crapulas, et enormes luxuriae foeditates,
quales a soeculo non mere. Quia nuuquam foemineus sexus lascivior et inverecun-
dior, nunquam juventus effranatior et indisciplinatior ; et nunquam indevotior et
insipientior senectus, atque, in summa, nunquam minor fuit in omnibus Dei timor,
honestas, virtus, et modestia, et nunquam major in omni statu, carnis libertas.
abusio, et exorbitantia. Nam qaas major in mundo, exorbitantia, et abusio excog-
itari potest quam pastor sine vigilantia, pra?dicator sine operibus, judex sine aequi-
tate, leges sine observantia, populus sine obedientia, religiosus sine devotione, dives
sine verecundia, mulier sine misericordia, juvenis sine disciplina, senex sine pruden-
tia, et Gbristianus quisque sine religione. Boni opprimuritur, et impii exaltantur,
virtutes despiciuntur, et yitia, pro eis, in mundo regnant. Usurs, fraudes, adulte-
ria, fornicationes, inimicitiae, yindictae, blasphemiae, et id genus reliqua, nota sunt;
in quibus mundani et perversi homines, non solum excusantur, sed laetantur, com
malefecerint, et exultant in rebus pessimis. Labb. 20. 1219 J223.
206 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Cervino, Pole, and Monte, presiding in the same synod with
legantine authority, declared that the clergy, if they persevered
in sin, ' would in vain call on the Holy Spirit.' 1 The idea,
indeed, that such popes, councils, or church should be influ-
enced by the Spirit of God, and exempted by this means from
error, is an outrageous insult on all common sense.
No valid reason could be given why God, in his goodness to
man, should confer doctrinal and withhold moral infallibility.
Impeccability in duty is as valuable in itself, and as necessary
for the perfection of the human character, as inerrability in faith.
Holiness, in scriptural language, is enjoined on man with as
unmitigated rigour as truth. Criminality, in manners, is, in
Revelation, represented as equally hateful to God and detri-
mental to man, as mistake in judgment. The Deity is " of
purer eyes than to behold iniquity ;" and " without holiness no
man shall see the Lord." 2 Moral apostacy is, indeed, in many
cases, more culpable than doctrinal error. The one is sometimes
invincible ; while the other is always voluntary. But no
individual or society is gifted with impeccability, or has reason
to claim infallibility. God does not keep man, either in a
personal or collective capacity, from error in practice ; and only
presumption, therefore, will conclude, that he keeps any from
misapprehension in belief or theory.
The moral impossibility of infallibility, without individual
inspiration and the special interposition of heaven in each case,
is as clear as its improbability or absurdity. God, by his extra-
ordinary interference extended to each person, could, no doubt,
preserve all men from error, and convey with undeviating cer-
tainty, a knowledge of the truth. His power of bestowing this
perfection appeared in the Jewish prophets and Christian
apostles. These communicated the will of God to men, under
tfie Old and New Testament,, without any liability to mistake.
The Holy Spirit, in these instances, acted in a supernatural
manner on each individual's mind ; which, in consequence,
became the certain channel of Divine truth, to the Jewish
theocracy, and the Christian commonwealth.
But infallibility, though it may be conferred in an extraordi-
nary or miraculous way by God to man, cannot be transferred
by ordinary or common means from man to man. God could
inspire men with a certain knowledge of his will ; but these
1 N'est ce pas nne chose bien ridicule, qu' un homme simoniaque, avare, men-
tear, exacteur, foraicateur, superbe, fastueux, pire en tin mot qu' un Demon, pre-
tende avoir la puissance de lier et de delier dans le ciel et BUT la terre. Gerson in
Lenfan. 2. 288. Le Saint Esprit ne pouvoit habiter en nos vases, s'ils n'etoient
purifez. Mandruccio, in Faol. 1. 227. Frustra invocamus Spiritum Sanctum.
Labb. 20. 13.
sRabak. i. 13. Heb.zii. 14.
MORAL IMPOSSIBILITY OF INFALLIBILITY. 207
a^ain could not inspire others with a certainty of understanding
their oracles without any possibility of misapprehension. A
person who is himself uninspired may misinterpret the dictates
of inspiration. This liability to misapprehension was exempli-
fied in both the Jewish and Christian revelations. Many Jews
misunderstood the Jewish prophets. The misapplication of
scriptural truth, at the advent of the Messiah, was so gross that
they rejected his person and authority. The Christian apostles,
prior to the effusion of the Spirit, mistook on several occasions,
the clear language of Immanuel ; and these apostolical heralds
of the gospel, though afterwards guided into " all truth," have
been misapprehended in many instances by the various denom-
inations of Christendom.
Papal bulls and synodal canons, like the Jewish and Chris-
tian revelations, are liable to misconception by uninspired or
fallible interpreters. Suppose infallibility to reside in the Pope.
Suppose the pontiff, through divine illumination, to deliver the
truth with unerring certainty, and, contrary to custom, with the
utmost perspicuity. Admit that the pontifical bulls, spoken
from the chair, are the fruits of divine influence and the decla-
rations of heaven. Each of the clergy and laity, notwithstand-
ing, even according to the popish system, is fallible. The
patrons of infallibility, in a collective capacity, grant that the
several individuals, taken separately, may err. Some of the
clergy, therefore, may misunderstand and therefore misinterpret
the Romish bulls to the people. But suppose each of the clergy,
in his separate capacity, to understand and explain the pontiff's
communications with the utmost precision and with certain
exemption from error ; the laity, nevertheless, if uninspired or
fallible, may misapprehend the explanation of the clergy, and,
in consequence, embrace heresy. The papal instructions,
therefore, though true in themselves, may be perverted in their
transmission through a fallible medium to the people.
Or suppose infallibility to reside in a council, and the synodal
canons to declare the truth with the utmost certainty and
without any possibility of mistake. The canons, when circula-
ted through Christendom, are liable to misapprehension from
some of the clergy or laity, if each is not inspired or infallible
in his interpretation. An individual, who, according to popish
principles, is not unerring, cannot be certain he has interpreted
any synodal decision in its proper and right sense. A clergyman,
if he mistake the meaning, will lead his flock astray. A
layman, if fallible in apprehension, may misconceive the signi-
fication of any instruction issued either by synodal or papal
authority. Each individual, in short, must be an infallible ju<f
208 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY
of controversy, or, from misapprehension, he maybe deceived,
and there is an end to the infallibility of the church.
Many instances of the clergy as well as of the laity, mistaking
the meaning of synodal definitions, might be adduced. Exam-
ples of this kind are afforded by the councils of Chalcedon and
Trent, two of the most celebrated synods in the annals of the
church. The council of Chalcedon, according to the general
explanation, taught the belief of only two substances or natures,
the human and the divine, in the Son of God. The fifteenth
council of Toledo, notwithstanding, enumerated three substances
in Immanuel, and quoted the Chalcedonian definition for its
authority. 1 The Spanish clergy, therefore, and through them
the Spanish people, put a wrong construction, according to the
usual interpretation, on the general council of Chalcedon.
Contradictory explanations were also imposed on some of the
Trentine canons, the last infallible assembly that blessed the
world with its orthodoxy or cursed it with its nonsense. Soto,
a Dominican, and Vega, a Franciscan, interpreted the decisions
of the sixth session on original sin, grace, and justification,
according to their several peculiar systems. Soto published
three books on nature and grace, and Vega fifteen books on the
same subject. Each of these productions was printed in 1548,
and intended as a commentary on the canons of Trent. Their
varying and often contradictory statements are both founded,
the authors pretend, on the definitions of the universal council.
This contrariety of opinion was not confined to Soto and Vega-
The Trentine fathers were divided into several factions on the
exposition of their own decisions. 2
The same synod affords another example of the same kind.
The council, in the sixth session, declared that ministerial
intention, actual or virtual, is necessary to confer validity on a
sacrament. This sentence, Contarinus opposed in the synod
with warmth ; and a year after, notwithstanding the perspicuity
of the synodal definition, wrote a book to show that the Tren-
tine assembly was of his opinion, and that their canon should
be understood in his sense. 3
Pontifical as well as synodal definitions have been misunder-
stood and subjected to contradictory interpretations. The bull
Unigenitus, issued by Clement the Eleventh, affords an instance
1 Ecce tres in una Christ! persona substantias, secundum Chalcedonense con-
cilium. Labb. 8. 13.
9 Ces deux theologiens non settlement differassent de sentiment dans presque
tous les articles, mais que dans plusieurs meme, ils enseignassent une doctrine evi-
demment contraire. Paolo, 1. 430. Du Pin, 3. 446. Mem. Sur Predestin 172.
Les autres en ont par!6 avec la meme diversite. Paolo. 1. 340.
3 Un ecrit pour prouver que le concfle avoit et6 de eon avis. Paolo, 1. 389.
Morery, 2. 207.
MORAL IMPOSSIBILITY OF INFALLIBILITY. 209
of this kind. The French and Italians, the Jesuits and the
Jansenists explained the papal constitution according to their
several humours and prepossessions. The accommodating
document, according to some, was pointed against the Thomists.
but, according to others, against the abettors of Calvinism.
Many maintained its obscurity, or candidly admitted their
inability to understand this puzzle. The astonished pontiff', in
the meantime, wondered at the people's blindness or perversity.
Men, he was satisfied, must have lost their reason or shut their
eyes, to become insensible to the dazzling light, which, clear as
noonday, radiated from the bright emanation of his brain. 1
Popes and councils, in this manner, may be misrepresented, and
their definitions, even if true in themselves as the dictates of
heaven, are no infallible security against error in men who are
liable to mistake their meaning. Each of the clergy and laity
would require preternatural aid, to understand their instructions
with certainty. Every individual, subject to error, may annex
heterodox significations to the dictations of the sovereign
pontiffs and general councils, as well as to the inspired volume.
Very different opinions, accordingly, have been torture^ from
the synodical canons and the sacred penmen. Sound doctrine.,
both written and verbal, may be perverted by erroneous
interpretation. Water, though clear in the fountain, may
contract impurity as it flows through muddy channels to the
reservoir. Truth in like manner, may be misrepresented or
misunderstood in its transmission, in various way sand through
diversified mediums", to the minds of men. The friend of
protestantism, because fallible, may misinterpret revelation, and
therefore is liable to mistake. The professor of Romanism,
who is also fallible, may, it is plain, misunderstand the church
and therefore fall into error. Infallibility, therefore, or the
preservation of all, clergy and laity, from error, would require
a continued miracle and personal inspiration, extended to every
re and to every individual in the Christian commonwealth.
J La Bulle souffre les explanations les plus opposees. Apol. 2. 264.
A 1'egard de la bulle de Clement XI. les uns 1'entendent d' une fa^on et les aatrefc
ie V autre. On la tire comme on peat poor la faire plier a ses sentimens, etc
-* ; *8oit plus claire quo la jour. Apol. 1. 259
14
CHAPTER VI.
DEPOSITION OF KINGS.
fRENCH SYSTEM ITALIAN" SYSTEM ORIGINAL STATE OF THE CHRISTIAN COM-
MONWEALTHPONTIFICAL ROYALTY ATTEMPTS AT DEPOSITION OF KINGS
GREGORY AND LEO ZACHARY AND CHILDERIC CONTINENTAL DEPOSITIONS-
GREGORY, CLEMENT, BONIFACE, AND JULIUS DETHRONE HENRY, LEWIS, PHILIP,
AND LEWIS BRITISH DEPOSITIONS ADRIAN TRANSFERS IRELAND TO HENRY
INNOCENT, PAUL, AND PIUS, PRONOUNCE SENTENCE OF DEGRADATION AGAINST
JOHN, HENRY, AND ELIZABETH SYNODAL DEPOSITIONS COUNCILS OF THE LATE-
RAN, LYONS, VIENNA, PISA, CONSTANCE, BASIL, LATERAN, AND TRENT MODERN
OPINIONS EFFECTS OF THE REFORMATION.
THE ^French and Italian schools vary on the civil power of the
Roman pontiff, as well as on his spiritual authority. The
French deny his political or regal jurisdiction, except, perhaps
in the ecclesiastical states of Italy, over which, in consequence
of Pepin's donation, he has obtained dominion. Pontifical
deposition of kings and domination through the nations of
Christendom, the Cisalpines to a man hold in detestation. 1
This system has been supported with great learning and
ability by the French theologians ; such as Gerson, Launoy,
Almain, Marca, Maimbourg, Bossuet, and Du Pin. The
Parisian parliament and university distinguished this view of
the subject by their persevering and powerful advocacy. The
Parisian senate, in 1610, proscribed Bellarmine's Treatise
against Barclay, on the temporal power of the pope. The
whole French clergy, in 1682, assembled at Paris, and recog-
nized this as the belief of the Gallican church; and their
decision has been embraced by the moderate and rational
friends of Romanism through the several nations of Chris-
tendom. 2
The Italians, and all who abet their slavish system, counte-
nance the pope's political power, even beyond the papal regalia,
and support his assumed authority over emperors and kings.
1 Bell. i. 81 1. Maimb, 260. Da Pin, 433.
* Gibert, 2. 513. Maimb. c. 30. Anglad. 156. Thnan. 5. 241. Grotty, 70.
Ita habet declaratio cleri Gallicani, Anno 1682, quam sequuntur plnres exteri.
Dons 2, 164.
ITALIAN SYSTEM. 211
The Roman hierarch, according to this theory, presides by divine
right in the state as well as in the church. He possesses autho-
rity to transfer kingdoms, dethrone sovereigns for heresy, and
absolve their subjects from the oath of fidelity. 1
The partizans of the Italian school are divided into two fac-
tions. One party allows the pope no direct power over the
state or over kings. He is not, according to this theory, the
lord of the whole world. He possesses no jurisdiction over the
realms of paganism or infidelity. But he is vested with an
indirect power over the temporal monarchs and the political
institutions of Christendom. The supreme pontiff can, for the
good of the church and the salvation of souls, enact and repeal
civil laws, erect kingdoms, transfer thrones, depose emperors
and kings, and rescind, by divine right and spiritual authority,
the obligations of vassals to their sovereigns. This, Bellarmine
represents as the common opinion of all the friends of Roman-
ism. This system has been advocated by Baronius, Bellarmine,
Binius, Carranza, Perron, Turrecrema, Pighius, Walden, San-
derus, Cajetan, and Vittoria. Many pontiffs, also, since the
days of Gregory the Seventh, as well as several provincial and
general councils, have patronized the same absurdity. 2
A second faction vest the pontiff with still ampler prerogatives
and greater power. These characterize the pope as the lord pf
the whole world, who presides, with divine and uncontrolled
authority, over all. the nations of Christendom and infidelity.
His power, according to this system, is direct in civil as well
as ecclesiastical affairs. He wields, at once, the temporal and
spiritual swords. He is clothed with civil and ecclesiastical
sovereignty, which places him above all earthly monarchs,
whom he is authorised, in his unerring judgment and unlimited
power, to degrade from their dignity and to remove from their
dominions. This scheme has, with brazen effrontery, been
maintained by many doctors and pontiffs, and, in general, by
the Canonists and Jesuits. The last council of the Lateran,
also, in some of its declarations and enactments, seem to have
favoured the same monstrous theory. 3
Christendom, on this topic, has witnessed four variations, and
fluctuated through as many diversified periods. One period
embraced a protracted lapse of about 700 years, from the era of
our redemption till the accession of Gregory the Second. Chris-
1 Bell. v. 1. Daniel, 4. 402. Maimb. 260. Dens, 2. 164.
3 Bellarmin, V. 1. Maimbourg, c. 26. Caron, 31.
3 Bell. 1.820. DuPin, 2, 523. Labb. 19, 726, Bin. 9. 112.
^Omnem vim regiam omniumque rerum, qaas in terns aunt, potestatem et domi
nium datum esse Romano Pontifici jure Divino. Barclay, 7.
Canonist dicunt, papam directe dominium temporale totiua orbis a Cjiriato
ccepisse. Barclay, 95.
14*
212 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
tians, during this time, all professed and practised unconditional
loyalty. A period of dissension and rivalry, between the mitre
and the diadem, between royalty and the papacy, then suc-
ceeded, continued nearly four hundred years, from Gregory the
Second till Gregory the Seventh, and terminated in the defeat
of regal sovereignty and the triumph of pontifical domination.
The supremacy of the popedom and the debasement of kingly
majesty, according to Lessius, an ultra advocate of Romanism,
next ensued, and continued for a period of near five hundred
years after Gregory, till the dawn of the Reformation, when
the meridian splendour of papal glory began to decline. The
fourth period, from the rise of Protestantism till the present
day, comprehends about three hundred years, during which the
pontifical pretensions have gradually receded, and the regal
claims have revived. The first and third periods were distin-
guished for their unanimity : the former for the monarchy of
kings, and the latter for the sovereignty of pontiffs. The
second and fourth were days of contention between the church
and the state, between the authority of popes, and the power of
kings.
The church, for seven hundred years after its establishment,
was distinguished for its loyalty and submission to the civil
magistracy. The Christian commonwealth for more than three
hundred years, from Jesus to Constantine, existed in poverty
and without power or ostentation. Joseph and Jesus were
humble artizans of Nazareth. The Son of Man, who came to
pour contempt on human glory, had not where to lay his head.
The original heralds of the gospel, apostles, evangelists, and
pastors, were, like their master, void of worldly rank or influ-
ence. The voluntary oblations of the faithful were chiefly
divided among this humble ministry, and the poor, the sick, the
distressed, the aged, the stranger, the prisoner, the orphan, and
the widow. The Christian society, indeed, during the reign of
the heathen emperors, might, by concealment and connivance,
possess some landed property. But these possessions were
trifling and precarious ; and, at the same time, liable to be seized
by a rapacious magistracy. 1 The Roman Bishop, partici-
pating in the general indigence, and destitute of civil authority
or worldly power, was subject to persecution 'and obscurity.
The situation of the church, at the accession of Constantine,
1 Giannon, II. 8. Maimb. c. 27. John xvii. 16. Luke xii. 14. Rom. xiii. I.
II y avoit plus de sept cent ans, que la seule puissance spirituelle des clefs faisoit
reverer la majestfe du saint siege. Vertot, 1.
Jusque au regne da Grand Constantin, les successeurs de St. Pierre n'en avoient
herite que ses chaines et des persecutions, souvent tenninees par le martyre.
Vertot, 2.
ORIGINAL STATE OF THE CHRISTIAN COMMONWEALTH. 23 3
underwent an important change. The emperor, by the edict of
Milan, gave legal security to the temporal possessions of the
Christian republic. The Christians recovered their land forfeited
under Dioclesian, and obtained a title to all the property which
they had enjoyed by the connivance of the Roman magistracy.
A second edict, in 321, granted a liberty of bequeathing pro-
perty to the church ; while the emperor showed an example of
liberality, and lavished wealth on the clergy with an unsparing
hand.
The imperial munificence attracted many imitators, whose
donations, during life and especially at the hour of death, flowed
into the ecclesiastical treasury in copious streams. The women,
in particular, displayed on the occasion the utmost profusion,
The Roman matrons rivalled each other in this pecuniary
devotion. The clergy, indeed, in this respect, prevailed so
much with female credulity, that Valentinian was obliged to
enact a law, forbidding monks or ecclesiastics to accept any
donation or legacy from maids, matrons, orphans, or widows.
Womanish simplicity, the emperor wished to prevent from
being deluded by priestly policy.
The northern barbarians, who, had overrun the Roman
empire, might indeed, be less enlightened ; but they were even
more lavish in their generosity. The adoration of Hessus, Odin,
and Terasius, these rough warriors left in the fastnesses and
forests of the north ; but they retained, in a great measure, their
barbarianism and superstition. The credulity and veneration
of these hardy veterans for the hierarchy, seemed to invite
imposture. Rapacious, but lavish; dissolute, but devotional,
these proselyted sons of heathenism, poured torrents of wealth
into the channels of the church.
The Roman Bishops, from Constantine to Pepin, enjoyed an
exuberance of this liberality. The grandeur and opulence of
the church in the imperial city, in a few years after Christianitv
obtained a legal establishment, became truly astonishing. Am-
mianus, a pagan, an impartial and a contemporary historian, has
described the pontiff's affluence and ostentation. The hierarch
enjoyed the stateliest chariots, the gayest attire, and the finest
entertainments. He surpassed kings in splendour and magnifi-
cence. His luxury, pride, vanity, and sensuality formed a
contrast to the provincial bishops, who approved themselves to
the eternal God by their temperance, frugality, simplicity,
plainness, and modesty. 1 Christianity, at this time, had been
established by law only about fifty years. The Roman See, in
1 Ammianus, XXVII, 3. Thomasin, III. 1. Giannon, IV. 12.
Lea Papes, depuis 1' empire du Grand Constuntin, avoient aquas une grande con-
sideration dans Rome et dans toute 1' Italie. Vertot 10.
214 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
that period, had emerged from obscurity, mounted to earthly
grandeur, and obtained afterwards in the seventh century, an
ample patrimony through Italy, France, and Africa.
But ambition is never satisfied; and his infallibility, sur-
rounded with wealth and grandeur, affected royalty, and aspired
to be numbered among kings. This dignity was bestowed on
these viceroys of heaven by the French monarchs Pepin and
Carolus. The Lombards, taking advantage of the seditions in
Italy, occasioned by the imperial edicts of Leo and Constantine
against image- worship, seized the Grecian provinces subject to
the exarch of Ravenna. Astolf, king of Lombardy, elated with
these new accessions to his dominions, formed the project of
subduing the Roman city, its territory, and indeed all Italy.
The city was summoned to acknowledge his sovereignty, and
the sword of destruction was unsheathed to exact the penalty of
disobedience. The Romans, in this emergency, solicited the
interposition of Pepin, whose hand, in war or in friendship, was
never lifted in vain. Actuated by the call of religion, policy,
gratitude, and glory, the French monarch mustered an army,
scaled the Alps, descended on the plains of Italy, marched on
the capital, defeated the enemy, and compelled Astolf in 754,
in a solemn treaty, to surrender Ravenna, Pentapolis, and the
Roman dukedom, to the Roman pontiff and his sacerdotal
successors. 1
Astolf, however, on the departure of Pepin, retracted his
engagement. Stephen again applied to Pepin; and personi-
fying Peter himself, assured the French king, that dead in
body, he was alive in spirit, and summoned the monarch to
obey the founder and guardian of the Roman see. The virgin,
the angels, the saints, the martyrs, and all the host of heaven,
if credit may be attached to his holiness, urged the request and
would reward the obligation. Victory and paradise, he prom-
ised, would crown the enterprise ; while damnation would be
the penalty of suffering his tomb, his temple, and his people,
to fall into the possession of the enemy. These arguments, in
the eighth century, could not fail. Pepin again crossed the
Alps, and obliged Astolf to fulfil the violated treaty. Carolus,
the son of Pepin, afterward confirmed the grant of his prede-
cessor, consisting of Ravenna, Pentapolis, or the March of
Ancona, and the Roman dukedom ; and, according to the
general opinion, added the duchy of Spoleto, completing, by
this cession, the present circle of the ecclesiastical states, and
forming an extensive territory in the midland region of Italy. 2
1 Labb. 8. 368, 370. Anastasius, 44. Giannon, V. 1. Vertot, 30, 41.
2 Bruy I. 562. Giannon, V. 4. et VI. 1. Labb. 8. 376. Vertot, 78.
Si vous voulez sauver vos Ames et vos corps du feu eternel, vous aurez ensuite la
pie eternelle. Vertot, 54.
PONTIFICAL ROYALTY
This splendid donation raised the pontiff to royalty. The
world, for the -first time, saw a bishop vested with the preroga-
tives of a prince and ranked; among the sovereigns of the earth.
His holiness added a temporal to a spiritual kingdom. The
hierarch, in this manner, united principality to priesthood, the
crown to the mitre, and the sceptre to the keys. The vicegerent
of Jesus, who declared his kingdom not of this world and refused
a diadem, grasped with avidity at regal honors and temporal
dominion. Satan, said Passavan with equal truth and severity,
tendered this earth and all its glory to Immanuel ; butmetwitH
a peremptory rejection. The Devil afterward made the same
overture to the pope, who accepted the offer with thanks, and
with the annexed condition of worshipping the prince of dark-
ness. The observation unites all the keenness of sarcasm, and
the energy of truth. 1
The Roman hierarchs, however, during these seven revolving
ages, professed unqualified submission to the Roman emperors;
and, though often persecuted, attempted neither anathemas uqr
deposition. Gelasius, Gregory, Agatho, and Leo, manifested
obedience and even servility to the imperial authority. The
persecuting emperors, for three hundred years after the era of
redemption, experienced nothing but passive obedience from
the Christian priesthood and people. Liberius and Damasiis
launched no anathemas against the Arian Constantius and
Valens. Felix and Gelasius fulminated no excommunications
against Zeno, who discountenanced Catholicism and favoured
heresy. Julian, notwithstanding his apostacy, escaped pontifical
degradation. Vitalian even honoured Constans, the patron of
error, who banished Martin and tortured Maximus. Gregory
little indeed to his credit, eulogized Phocas, the assassin of
Mauricius and his helpless family. 2 The Gothic kings, not-
withstanding their stratagems and invasion of the ecclesiastical
patrimony, reigned without molestation in Italy.
The second period of papal pretension, which entered with
Gregory the Second in the beginning of the eighth century,
introduced dissension and rivalry between the Roman emperors
and the Roman pontiffs, which lasted above three hundred years.
The Popes advanced to the deposition of kings with slow and
gradual, but firm and steady steps. Their first essay, in this
hazardous enterprise, showed their usual caution. The wary
hierarchs, began the career of ambition by using their spiritual
authority, in the encouragement of subjects to rebel against their
sovereigns. The prudent chiefs stimulated others to the depo-
iDu Pin, 279, 468. Caron. 114. Maimbourg, c. 29.
z Lee Papes obeissoient alors a des rois, ou infideles on Aliens Vertot, 3
216 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY I
sition of civil governors ; but attempted nothing, in this perilous
project, in their own name. Specimens of this kind, were
afforded by Gregory and Zachary in France and Italy.
Gregory encouraged the Italians to rebel against Leo. The
eastern emperor, in 726, issued an edict in favour of Iconoclasm.
The Roman pontiff, in return, proceeded, according to the Greek
historians Theophanes, Cedrenus, Zonaras, Nicephorus, and
Glycas, to excommunicate his Grecian majesty. The Greeks
have been followed by the Transalpine Latins, Baronius, Bellar
mine, Sigonius, Perron, and Allatius. Gregory's excommuni-
cation of Leo, however, has, with reason, been rejected by the
critics of the French school, Launoy, Alexander, Marea, Bossuet,
Giannon, Caron, and Du Pin. The event is unmentioned or
opposed by Gregory, John Damascen, Paulus, Diaconius,
Anastasius, and other Latin historians. The hierarch, however,
fomented a revolt amongst the Romans, Venetians, Lombards,
and other Italians. Subjects, his holiness taught, could not
in conscience contribute taxes to a heretical prince. The people
in consequence, rose in arms for the protection of the pontiff
and the faith, disclaimed all fealty to the emperor, and refused
to pay tribute. 1 Italy, in this manner, was, by papal treason
severed from the eastern emperor.
Gregory's success encouraged Zachary. Childeric, the French
king, was, in 751, deposed for inefficiency, and Pepin, mayor of
the palace, crowned for his activity and achievements ; and
through the casuistry of Zachary, who occupied the Roman see,
which was esteemed, in the eighth century, the seminary of all
virtue and sanctity. The ultra partizans of Romanism main-
tain that the diadem was transferred from Childeric to Pepin
by the pontiff's supremacy, and not by his casuistry. Eginhard,
indeed, says Childeric was dethroned by the command of
Zachary, and Pepin crowned by his authority. 2 Similar ex-
pressions have been used by Regino, Aimon, Marian, Sigebert.
Otho, jEmilius, and Ado. Launoy, Caron, and Du Pin think
that this phraseology signifies only the papal advice and recom-
mendation. The Roman pontiff's authority, however, influ-
enced the French nation, and decided the destiny of the French
king, who was hurled from the throne and immured in a monas-
try. The Pope, also, dissolved the oath of fidelity, which Pepin
and the French nation had taken to Childeric, and which, for
the gratification of ambition, they had violated. 3
1 Us ne pouvoient en conscience payer des tributes a un prince heretique. Ver-
tot, 13. Giannon, II. 4. Bruy. I 520. Labb. 8. 163. Mezeray, 1. 198. Giannon,
V.I. Oaron, 32. Du Pin, 508.
2 Per auctoritatem Komani Pontificis. Eginhard, in Carol. Papa mandavilr
Pipino. Regino, II. Mezeray, I. 209. Airnon, IV. 61.
s Zachariaa omnes Francigenas a jaramento fidelitatis absolvit. Caron, c. IX.
Du Pin, 513.
ATTEMPTS OF POPES TO DEPOSE KINGS. 217
The third period, in the annals of papal deposition of empe-
rors and kings, began with Gregory the Seventh, and lasted till
the declension of the papacy at the commencement of the re-
formation. This protracted series of about five hundred years
was marked by pontifical sovereignty and regal debasement.
During this time, the Roman vicegerents of heaven, shining in
meridian splendour and appearing in all their glory, continued,
according to the dictates of interest or passion, to dethrone
sovereigns, transfer kingdoms, and control the governments of
the world. Each vicar-general of God in succession, with
hardly any exception, proceeded, on his accession to the chair
of the Galilean fisherman, to hurl his anathemas, issue his
interdicts, and degrade kings. The history of these transactions
would fill folios. A few continental examples may be supplied
from the annals of Gregory, Clement, Boniface, and Julius, who
deposed Henry, Lewis, Philip, and Lewis. A few British in-
stances may be selected from the history of Adrian, Innocent,
Paul, and Pius, in their treatment of Henry, John, Henry, and
Elizabeth.
Gregory and Clement deposed Henry and Lewis, two Ger-
man emperors ; and Boniface and Julius degraded Philip and
Lewis, two F rench kings. Gregory the Seventh, who succeeded
to the papal throne in 3073, was, according to Otho, Panvinius>
and the Leodian clergy, the first Pope, who, in the fury of am-
bition, attempted the degradation of civil potentates. I have
often, says Otho, ' read the deeds of the Roman emperors, and
never found any, prior to Henry, whom papal usurpation de-
prived of his kingdom or dignity.' Henry, says Panvinius,
* was the first whom pontifical ambition divested of his kingdom
or empire.' Hildebrand, according to the Leodian clergy,
'first h'fted the sacerdotal lance against the royal diadem.' 1
Similar statements have been made by Benno, Waltram,
Trithemius, Gotofred, Cuspinian, Masson, Helmold, and
Giannon.
Gregory had not only the honour of commencement in this
field, but also of bringing the system to perfection. His infal-
libility excelled his predecessors and eclipsed all his successors
in the noble art, which he had the glory to invent. His holi-
ness pointed his sarcasms against the institution of regal gov-
ernment, as well as against its royal administration. The
dignity itself, his infallibility declared, ' was the invention of
laymen who were unacquainted with God. Monarchy, which
he represented as a stratagem of Satan and ushered into the
1 Hildebrandus primus levavit sacerdotalem lanceam contra diadema regis. Crabb.
2. 814. Du Pin, 476. Oaron, 90. Mffletot, 524.
218 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
world by infernal agency, reigns over men, his holiness dis-
covered, in blind ambition and intolerable presumption and in
the perpetration of rapine, pride, perfidy, homicide, and every
atrocity. Kings, who are void of religion, Gregory characteri-
zed as * the body and members of the Devil.' 1 . Sovereigns,
accordingly, he treated as his vassals. The necks of all, he
alleged, should submit to the clergy, and much more to the
hierarch, whom the supreme Divinity had appointed to preside
over the clergy. He degraded Basilas the Polish king, and
Nicephorus the Grecian emperor. The viceroy of Heaven, in
the wantonness of ambition and fury, menanced the French
and English sovereigns, and, indeed, all the European poten-
tates with degradation.
But Gregory's treatment of Henry, the emperor, affords the
most striking display of his tyranny. This denunciation was
issued in two Roman councils, and presents the most frightful
combination of dissimulation, blasphemy, arrogance, folly, super
stition, and fury that ever outraged reason or insulted man.
The papacy he represented as forced on his acceptance, and
received with sighs and tears ; though ambition, it is well
known, was the ruling passion of his soul. He forced his way,
in the general opinion, to the papal throne through murder and
perfidy, and certainly by hasty and hypocritical machinations.
Henry and his partizans, he denominated ' wild beasts and
members of the Devil.' Assuming the authority of Almighty
God even in an act of enormity, this plenipotentiary of heaven
proceeded ' for the honour and protection of the church, to
depose Henry from the government of Germany and Italy, in
the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.' The sentence
was accompanied with shocking execrations. His holiness,
* relying on the divine mercy, cursed the emperor by the autho-
rity of the Almighty, with whom he joined Jesus, Peter, Paul,
and Lady Mary the mother of God.' Henry's subjects, Greg-
ory absolved from the oath of fidelity, and transferred his
dominions to Rodolphus, to whom he granted the pardon of all
sin, and apostolic benediction in time and eternity. A Roman
council of one hundred and ten bishops, in which Gregory
presided, urged their head, by their importunity, to pass this
sentence, which was afterwards confirmed by Victor, Urban,
Pascal, Gelasius, and Calixtus in the synods of Beneventum,
Placentia, Rome, Colonia, arid Rheims. 2
1 Dignitas a stecularibus etiam Deum ignorantibus inventa. Mundi principe dia
bolo videlicet agitante. Labb. 12. 409. Membra stint Dsemonum. Illi Diaboli
corpus sunt. Labb. 12. 501. Membra diaboli consurrexere, et manus suas in me
eonjectere. Platin. 152. Daniel, 3, 106.
* Labb. 12, 599. 600, 639. Platina,, 152. Giannon, X. 5. Alex. 18, 295, 338.
DEPOSITIONS OF CONTINENTAL SOVEREIGNS. 219
His infallibility's curse, however, did not consume Henry, nor
did his blessing preserve Rodolphus. His apostolic benediction,
which he pronounced on Rodolphus, was of little use in time,
whatever it might effect in eternity. The usurper fell in battle
against the emperor. 1 Holding up his hand, which had been
wounded in the engagement, to his captains, ' you see,' said the
dying warrior, ' this hand with which I swore allegiance to
Henry. But Gregory induced me to break my oath and usurp
an unmerited honour. I have received this mortal wound in
the hand, with which I violated my obligation.' That martyr
of ambition, treason, perjury, and pontifical domination made
this confession and expired.
Many of the Italian, German, and French prelacy in the
mean time, supported Henry against Gregory. The emperor,
mustered a party, and summoned the councils of Worms, Mentz,
and Brescia against the pontiff. The council of Worms accused
his holiness of perjury, innovation, and too great familiarity
with the Countess Matilda. The synod of Brescia deposed the
head of the church, for simony, perjury, sacrilege, obstinacy,
perverseness, scandal, sorcery, necromancy, infidelity, heresy,
and Berengarianism. 2 Henry, in this manner, enjoyed the
sweets of evangelical retaliation, and returned, according to the
old law, a tooth for a tooth, or deposition for deposition,
Clement deposed the Emperor Lewis, as Gregory had de-
graded the Emperor Henry. Lewis indeed was excommunicated
by the pontiffs John, Benedict, and Clement. The emperor,
on his election, had, not submitted to be crowned by the pope,
or plastered with the hierarch's holy oil. John the Twenty-
second, therefore, according to custom, excommunicated Lewis.
The pope fulminated red-hot anathemas and execrations against
the emperor, as a patron of schism and heresy. Benedict con-
firmed John's sentence, and divested Lewis of the imperial
dignity, which, according to his infallibility, devolved on the
pontiff as the viceroy of heaven. Clement the Sixth degraded
Lewis in 1344, and ordered the election of another emperor. 3
Lewis, however, though excommunicated and cursed, protes-
ted against the papal sentence, and appealed to a general coun-
cil. He declared that the imperial dignity, with which he was
vested by election, depended on God and not on the pontiff,
who possessed no authority in temporals. He even retorted
John's deposition, and raised Nicholas, in opposition, to the
pontifical throne. The emperor, in his hostility to the refrac-
tory pontiffs, was supported by the German electors. His
1 Hehnold, c. 29. Albert ad Ann. 1080. Giannon, X. 5. Cwiuille, 415.
* Oaron. 126. Du Pin, 2, 216, 217. Giannon, X. 5.
3 Labb. 15. 148, 419. Du Pin, 552. Dan. 4. 55. Caron. 3C
220 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
majesty also consulted the universities of Germany, France, and
Italy, especially those of Bononia and Paris, on the lawfulness
and validity of the papal denunciations. These all agreed that
the acts and enactments of John against Lewis were contrary
to Christian simplicity and divine philosophy. 1
Boniface and Julius deposed Philip and Lewis, French kings,
as Gregory and Clement had degraded Henry and Lewis.
German emperors. Boniface was a man of profound capacity,
and of extensive information in the civil and canon law. Am-
bition was the ruling passion of his soul ; and seemed, in him,"
to be without any bounds or limits. He hurled his anathemas
in every direction against all who opposed the mad projects of
his measureless ambition. Philip the Fair, the French king,
who withstood his usurpations, was, in consequence, visited by
the papal denunciations. Boniface, in proper form and with
due solemnity, excommunicated the king, interdicted his king-
dom, freed his subjects from their allegiance, and declared the
government of the French nation to have devolved on the
Roman pontiff. 2
The French king and nation, however, refused to acquiesce
in the pontiff's decision or submit to his temporal authority.
Boniface declared that Philip was subject to the holy see in
temporals as well as in spirituals ; and that the contrary was
heresy. Philip replied, that he was subject to none in tempo-
rals ; and that the contrary was madness. The prince, on this
occasion, addressed the pontiff, not as his holiness, but as his
foolishness. The Parisian parliament burnt the papal bulls.
The French, consisting of the nobility, the clergy, and the mag-
istracy convened by the king, rejected his claims and confirmed
their civil and ecclesiastical immunity. The vicar-general of
God was assailed in turn, and found guilty of simony, murder,
usury, incest, adultery, heresy, and atheism. The majesty of
the Church, says Mariana, ' was, by an unprecedented atrocity,
violated in the person of the pope.' 3 His infallibility, mad-
dened by the outrage, died of grief and desperation.
Julius excommunicated Lewis, as Boniface had anathemati-
zed Philip. His supremacy, in 1510 and in due and proper
form, deposed the king, interdicted the nation, rescinded the
people's oath of fealty, and transferred the kingdom to any
successful invader. He anathematized the Gallican clergy, the
1 Acta et dogmata Joannis adversus Caesarem, Christianas simplicitati et Divinai
philosophise repugnare. Aventinus, VII. Caron, 44. Du Pin, 2, 502.
3 Labb. 14. 1222. Dan. 4. 380. Marian. 3. 306. Du Pm, 560. Mezeray, 2,
778.
3 Par un attentat inoui, lamajestfe de 1'eglise fat viol<s en la personne du Pape
Boniface VIII. Mariana, 3, 304. Da Pin, 2, 490.
DEPOSITIONS OF CONTINENTAL SOVEREIGNS. 221
?
council of Pisa, Milan, and Lyons, and all the sovereigns who
should aid the French monarch. Lewis, though a man of
honour and piety, the plenipotentiary of heaven accursed in
dreadful anathemas aiid imprecations. The king of Navarre,
the French sovereign's ally, his holiness honoured with similar
compliments and benedictions, and his kingdoms with equal
tokens of pontifical charity and benevolence. 1
Lewis withstood Julius, as Philip had resisted Boniface. He
convoked a general assembly of the French clergy at Tours,
which established the nullity of unjust excommunications, the
right of repelling pontifical usurpation, and the lawfulness of
withdrawing obedience, in case of aggression, from the Roman
see. Patronized by his most Christian majesty, the council of
Pisa, afterwards translated to Milan and Lyons, convicted his
holiness of perjury, schism, incorrigibility, and obduracy, and
suspended him from the administration of the papacy; and his
suspension, in the French nation, was authorised by the French
king and government. 2
These are a few specimens of continental depositions. But
the Roman pontiffs also extended their usurpations to the
British islands, and assumed the sovereignty of England and
Ireland. Adrian transferred Ireland to Henry ; while Innocent,
-'aul, and Pius deposed John, Henry, and Elizabeth.
Adrian the Fourth, who arrogated the power of transferring
kingdoms, was a striking example of the vicissitudes of human
life, and the presumption of many who rise from penury to
power. Bora in England, and the child of indigence and obscu-
rity, he was subject, in early life, to all the hardships which
march in the train of poverty. He li ved in an English abbey,
spent his juvenile days in drudgery, and subsisted, during his
youth, on alms supplied by the cold hand of charity. Elevated
in the revolution of human affairs, to the pontifical dignity, he
displayed all the arrogance which often attends a sudden tran-
sition from meanness to celebrity. He compelled the Emperor
Frederic Barbarossa to officiate as his equerry. His imperial
majesty, in the sight of all his army, had the honour of holding
the stirrup for his pontifical holiness. 3 His infallibility, also, as
the viceroy of heaven, bestowed Ireland on Henry the Second,
king of England. Henry's petition on the occasion and Adrian's
grant are the two completest specimens of hypocrisy and the
two foulest perversions of religion, to cloke ambition and
1 Labb. 19. 536. Daniel, 7. 5. Marian, 5, 710, 711, 749, 787.
s Du Pin, 284. Caron. 184. Labb. 19, 558. Daniel, 7, 214.
3 Morery, 1. 130. II fat resolv6 quo Frederic feroit la fraction d'eeuycr
aupr&8 du Pape. Brays, 3. 21.
222 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEttY :
avarice, the love of power and money, that the annals oi
nations afford.
Henry, in 1155, despatched messengers to Adrian, requesting
his infallibility's permission to invade Ireland. His design, the
English sovereign pretended, was to exterminate the seeds of
immorality, and turn the brutal Irish, who were Christians only
in name, to the faith and to the way of truth. 1 Adrian's reply
was complaisant, and fraud with the grossest dissimulation and
ambition. He pronounced his apostolic benediction on Henry,
whom he styled his dearest son, who, on account of his resolu-
tion to conquer Ireland, would c'^ ^ain glory on earth and felicity
in heaven. F--"- -nd heaven, m the apostolic manifesto, were
to be the recompense of bloodshed and usurpation. The reduc-
tion of Ireland and the murder of its inhabitants, his holiness
represented as the means of enlarging the bounds of the church,
teaching the truths of Christianity to a barbarous and unlettered
people, and eradicating the tares of vice from the garden of
God. All this, in his infallibility's statement, would tend to
the honour of God and the salvation of souls. His holiness,
anxious in this manner for the salvation of men, was also mind-
ful of another important consideration. He had the recollec-
tion to stipulate for peter-pence, which was an annual tax from
each family. 2 This fruit of Henry's military mission, which
Adrian repeats in his apostolic bull, seems to have been conge-
nial with his infallibility's devotion, and gratifying, in a par-
ticular manner, to his pontifical piety. The pontiff, like a holy
humble successor of the Galilean fisherman, reminds the Englisk
monarch of his right to bestow Ireland on Henry. This island,
his infallibility discovered, and all others which have been
enlightened by the sun of righteousness and shown evidence of
their Christianity, belong to the Roman pontiff. Adrian,
who, it appears, had a respectable domain, considered Henry's
application for apostolic sanction to his expedition, as an earnest
of victory. Adrian's bull was confirmed by Alexander the
Third. The Irish clergy also met at Waterford, submitted to
the papal dictation, and took an oath of fidelity to Henry and
his successors.
Mageoghegan and Caron, the friends of Romanism, have
both condemned the bull of Adrian, which transferred Ireland
* to Henry. 3 Adrian's sentence, says Mageoghegan, 'violated
1 Homines illos bestiales ad fidem et viam reducers veritatis. Paris, 91.
2 De singalis domibus, annaam unius denarii Beato Petro velle solvere pensionem.
Labb. 13. 14, 15. Mageogh. 1. 439, et 2. 12. Spon. 1152. III.
Ut . . . quEB ad honorem Dei et sqlutem pertinent animarum taliter ordinentur,
at a Deo sempitemae mercedis Jructum consequi nierearis. Trivettus Ann. 1155.
joPnebeiy, 3. 151.
* Mageogh. 1. 440. Caron, c. 13.
ADRIAN TRANSFERS IRELAND TO HENRY H. 223
the rights of nations and the most sacred laws of men, under
ithe specious pretext of religion and reformation. Ireland was
blotted from the map of nations and consigned to the loss of
freedom, without a tribunal and without a crime.' The historian
represents Henry, who undertook to reform the brutal Irish,
{ as a man of perfidy, superstition, selfishness, and debauchery,
and void of gratitude, goodness, and religion.' Adrian's bull,
says Caron, ' proclaims the author a tyrant and a transgressor
of the law of nations and equity.'
Innocent divested John of England, as Adrian had vested
Henry with Ireland. Innocent the Third, says Orleans, might
boast of striking nearly all the crowned heads with anathemas.
The Roman pontiff opened the campaign against the British
sovereign by a national interdict. This, which he published in
1208, presents to the eye of superstition an awful spectacle. All
the institutions of religion were suspended, except Baptism,
Confession, and the Viaticum in the last extremity. The
churches were closed. The images of the saints were laid on
the ground, and the bells ceased to toll. The dead, borne from
the towns, were, without ceremony or funeral solemnity, depo
sited in pits or buried, like dogs, in the highways. 1
The interdict being found ineffectual, John, in 1209, was
excommunicated. All were forbidden to hold any communica-
tion with the king at table, in council, or even in conversation.
His deposition followed in 1212. Innocent, in a consistory of
the sacred college, and in accordance with their unanimous
advice, declared John's dethronement, the recision of his people's
oath of allegiance, and the transfer of the kingdom to Philip the
French monarch. The English sovereign was denounced as the
public enemy of God. 2 The French king was encouraged to
take possession of the English realm. IJis holiness exhorted
all Christians in the British and French States to rally round- the
standard of Philip ; and offered a pardon of all sin as an; induce-
ment to engage in the holy .expedition. He granted the sol
diery of the pious enterprise the same remission as thepilgrims
who visited the sacred sepulchre, or the crusaders who marched
for the recovery of the holy land. The British nobility and
people were invited to rebellion ; and 'the English barons
rejoiced in being freed from the obligation of fidelity. 5 ' 3 : Philip's
piety and ambition were kindled by the prospect of obtaining
1 Corpora quoque defanctorum de civitatibus et villis efferebantur, : et more
canum, in biviis et fossatis sine orationibus etsacerdotumministerio sepeliebantur.
M. Paris, 217. Polyd. Virg. 271. Orleans, 1. 118.
2 Tanquam Dei publicum hostem persequantur. Poly. 'Virgil. ;XV. .Orleans,
3 Les Seigneurs ravis de se voir absoos 'de leur serment de fideKte. Dan.9.
452, 554.
224 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
the expiation of sin, and the possession of a kingdom. He
mustered an army, equipped a fleet of one hundred sail, and
only waited a favouring gale to swell the canvass and waft his
army to the British shores.
The thunder of the Vatican, the disaffection of the English,
and especially the armament of the French king, alarmed the
British sovereign and shook his resolution. He submitted to
all the despotic demands of the pontiff. British independence
struck to Roman tyranny. John, in an assembly of the English
nobility and clergy, took the crown from his head, delivered it,
in token of subjection, to Pandolphus the pope's Nuncio, from
whom the king condescended to receive this emblem of
royality. 1 . The monarch confirmed his submission with an oath.
These transactions completed the degradation of majesty. This
important day witnessed the debasement of the British sove-
reign, and the vassalage of the British nation. Pandolphus, in
consequence, who was vested with legatine authority, counter-
manded Philip's expedition. Philip had only been the tool of
Innocent's despotism ; and his agency, when John submitted,
became unnecessary.
Paul the Third, in 1535, issued sentence of deposition against
Henry the Eighth, in retaliation for the British sovereign's
rejection of the pontifical authority. Henry, indeed, according
to Mageoghegan and Du Pin, * was guilty, not of heresy, but
merely of schism. He changed nothing in the faith. His
majesty, without any discrimination, persecuted the partizans
of popery and protestantism. The Reformation indeed, in
England, had not appeared under Henry. This Revolution was
reserved for the following reign.' 2 But Henry withdrew from
the papal jurisdiction, and, in consequence, was exposed to
papal execration. Paul excommunicated and deposed Henry,
interdicted the nation, and absolved his subjects from their oath
of allegiance. He transferred the kingdom to any successful
invader, and prohibited all communication with the English
monarch. He deprived the king of Christian burial, and con
signed the sovereign, and his friends, accomplices, and adherents
to anathemas, maledictions, and everlasting destruction. ' Paul,'
says Paolo, .* excommunicated, anathematized, cursed, and con-
demned Henry to eternal damnation.' 3 He stigmatized his
* Diadema eapiti ademptura Pandolpho legato tradit, nunquam id ipse apt
hseredes accepturi, nisi a Pontifice Romano. Polydorus Virgilius, 273. M. Paris,
227. Daniel 3. 556. Orleans,!. 121. Concedimus Deo et nostro Papae Inno
centio ejusque successoribus totum regnum Anglite et totum regnum Hibernise,
pro redemptione peccatorum nostrorum. Trivettus, Am. 1213. Dachery, 3. 183.
3 La reforme ne s'etoit pas encore montree a decouvert sous Henri VIII. Cette
revolution etoit reservee au regne suivant. Le Roi n'etoit que schismatique.
Mageoghegan, 2. 310. Nihil quidem in fide mutans. Du Pin, 568.
3 Eos anathematis, maledictionis, et damnationis seterns mucrone
DEPOSITIONS OF HENRY VIII. AND QUEEN ELIZABETH. 225
posterity by Queen Anna, with illegitimacy and incapacity of
succession to the crown ; while he delivered his partizans to
slavery.
The English clergy, his holiness commanded to leave the
kingdom, and admonished the nobility to arm in rebellion
against the king. He annulled every treaty between Henry
and other princes. He enjoined the clergy to publish the
excommunication ; and, with the standard of the cross, to ring
the bells on the occasion, and then extinguish the candles.
All who opposed, according to his infallibility, * incurred the
indignation of Almighty God, and the blessed Apostles Peter
and Paul.'
Pius deposed Elizabeth, as Innocent and Paul had degraded
John and Henry. His holiness, in 1570, ' anathematized her
majesty as a professor and patron of heresy, despoiled the
English queen of all dominion and dignity, and freed the British
nation from all subjection and fidelity.' His infallibility's im-
precations, according to Gabutius, took effect on the British
sovereign. ' The queen of England,' says the historian of Pius
the Fifth, ' exchanged, in 1603, an impious life for eternal
death.' 1
The Roman pontiff also intrigued for the temporal destruction
of the English queen, whom he had excommunicated. This,
he attempted by rebellion and invasion, and through the agency
of Rodolpho and the Spanish king. Rodolpho, a Florentine
merchant who resided at London, employed, in his zeal for
Romanism, a variety of stratagems for exciting an insurrection
in England. Many partizans of popery and some nominal
friends of protestantism, actuated by ambition or a desire of
innovation, entered into the conspiracy. This, according to
Gabutius, ' was an evidence of their piety.' The majority of
the nobility, headed by the Duke of Norfolk, engaged, through
the activity of Rodolpho, in this combination for an insurrec-
tion. 2 The rebels were to be supported by a Spanish army of
Cherub. 2. 704. II avoit excommunie, anathematise, maudit, condamne a la
damnation externello. Paol. 1. 166. Labb. 19. 1203. Mageogh. 2. 310. Da
Pin, 568. Alex. 93. 174. Paulus, III. Henricum regno ac dominiis omnibus
privatum denunciat, and loca omnia, in quibus rex merit, ecclesiastico subjicit
interdicto. Henrici vassallos and subditos a juramento fidelitatis absolvit. Alex.
24. 420.
.* Ipsam Angloe regno omnique alio dominio dignitate, privflegio, privatum de-
claravit, omnesque ac singulos ejus subditos a juramento fidelitatis absolvit, latos
in eoa qui illius legibus and mandatis parerent anathemate t quam constitutionem,
Gregorius XIII, and Sixtus V. innovarunt and confirmarunt. Alex. 24. 435.
Mageogh. 3. 412, 413. Impiam vitam cum sempiterna morte commutaverit.
Gabutius, 102. Mageogh. 3. 409. Thuan. 2. 770.
3 Incolaram animos ad Elisabethae perditionem, rebellione facta, commoveret/
Anglorum in Elisabetham pie conspirantium stadia foveret. Bodulfus negotium en^
perduxit, ut pars major optimatum in Elisabetham conspiraret. Gabut. 103.
15
226 , THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
10,000 men from the Netherlands, under the command ..of the
Duke of Alva. But the vigilance of Cecil, Elizabeth's Secretary,
frustrated the machinations of Rodolpho and Alva.
The designs of Pius were afterward pursued by Gregory,
Sixtus, and Clement. Gregory the Thirteenth, in 1580, sent
his apostolic benediction to the Irish rebels, who, according to
his infallibility, were, in the war with the English, fighting
against the friends of heresy and the enemies of God. The
pontiff accompanied this benediction to the Irish army with a
plenary pardon of, all sins, as to the crusaders who marched for
the recovery of the Holy Land. He supported his benediction
and remission with a levy of 2000 men raised in the Ecclesiasti-
cal states. Sixtus the Fifth also fulminated anathemas and
deposition against Elizabeth ; and urged Spain to second his
maledictions by military expeditions to Ireland. Clement the
Eighth, in 1600, loaded Oviedo and La Cerda, whom Philip the
Spanish king had despatched to Ireland, with crusading indul-
gences to all who would arm in defence of the faith. 1
The Spanish .king, induced by the Roman pontiff, sent two
expeditions to Ireland, under Lerda and Aquilla, with arms,
ammunition, men, and money. The university of Salamanca,
in the mean time, as well as that of Valladolid, celebrated for
learning and Catholicism, deliberated, in 1603, on the lawful-
ness of the war waged by the Irish against the English. The
Salamancan theologians, after mature consideration, decided in
favour of its legality, and of supporting the army of the faith
under the command of O'Neal, prince of Tyrone, against the
queen of England. The learned doctors, at the same time,
determined against the lawfulness of resisting O'Neal, who was
the defender of C atholicism against heresy, The warriors of the
faith, according to the Spanish university, were sowing righte-
ousness and would reap an eternal recompense : while those
who supported the English committed a mortal sin, and would
suffer, if they persisted, the reward of iniquity. This sentence-
proceeded on the principle, which the Salamancans assumed as
certain, that the Roman pontiff had a right to use the se^ulax
arm against the deserters of the faith and the impugners of
Catholicism. 2 The university of Valladolid agreed with that of
Salamanca; and both, on the occasion, differed from their
modern reply in 1778 to Pitt the British statesman.
The Roman pontiffs, in these and various other instances,
1 Mageogh. 3. 437,, 542, 549. Thuan. 4. 531.
2 Magno cum merito et spe maxima retribationis seternae. Mageogh. 3. 595.
.Stafford, 285. Tanquam certum est accipiendum, posse Eomanum Pontificem
fidei desertores, et eos, qui Catholicam religionem oppugnant, armia compellere.
Mageogb. 3. 595. Slevin, 193.
DETHRONEMENT OF KINGS TAUGHT BY THE POPES. 227
shewed, in practical illustration, their assumption of temporal
authority. But these viceroys of heaven also taught what they
practised ; and inculcated the theory in their bulls, as well as
the execution in fact. The partizans of the French system
indeed have, with the assistance of shuffling and sophistry,
endeavoured to explain this principle out of the pontifical
decretals. Doctor Slevin, in the Maynooth examination, has,
on this topic, exhibited a world of quibbling, chicanery, and
Jesuitism. The learned doctor, with admirable dexterity, plays
the artillery of misrepresentation and hair-breadth distinctions.
He maintains that no pope, speaking from the chair, ever pro-
posed this doctrine to the church, to be believed as revealed and
held as an article of faith. Doctor Higgins, on the same occa-
sion, and with more candour and dogmatism than Slevin,
asserted, that no pontiff defined for the belief of the faithful,
that the pontifical power of dethroning kings was founded on
divine right. 1 These misrepresentations and evasions, how-
ever, will vanish before a plain unvarnished statement of facts.
These facts may be supplied from the bulls and definitions of
Gregory, Boniface, Paul, Pius, and Sixtus.
Gregory taught the principle of the dethronement of kings,
with as much decision and in as unequivocal a manner as he
wielded the exercise. His infallibility, in a Roman council in
1076, decreed, that the power of binding and loosing in heaven
and earth, which extended to temporals as well as to spirituals,
and by which he deposed the emperor Henry, was given to the
pontiff by God. Gregory, in consequence, degraded his imperial
majesty in the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The
sentence, he pronounced in council, and therefore in an official
capacity. He acted, he declared, by the authority of God, and
therefore by divine right. 2
Gregory afterwards vindicated his conduct in a letter to
Herman, who requested information on this subject. The act,
he said, * was warranted by many certain scriptural proofs,' and
quoted, as a specimen, the words of Jesus conferring the power
of the keys. He represented, ' the Holy Fathers as agreeing
in his favour with one spirit and with one voice.' The contrary
opinion his holiness called madness, fatuity, impudence, and
idolatry. Those who opposed, he styled wild beasts, the body
of Satan, and members of the devil and antichrist. 3 Philip the
1 Slavin, 189. Higgins, 275.
* Labb. 12. 498, 499, 600, 637, 638, 63& Duran,. 1. 46.
3 Hujus rei, tarn multa etcertissima documents in Bacrarom scripturarum paginis
reperiuntur. Greg, ad Herm. Matt xvi. 16.
Sancti patres in ho.c conaentieptes, et ijuasi nno spiritu, et una voce concor-
dantes. Labb. 12. 498. iOohtra^lprom uumniam, qui nefando ore garrrant. Pro
magna fattntate. Scelw idololajrig? ijaowrunt. Labb. 12. 380, 497, 498.
228 THE VARIATIONS OF POPURY :
French moB.arch, whose soul and kingdom, Gregory affirmed,
were in the pontiff's power, his holiness denominated a ravening
wolf, an iniquitous tyrant, and the enemy of God, religion, and
the holy church.' 1
Boniface followed the footsteps of Gregory. The Roman
pontiff, says Boniface in his bull against Philip, ' wields, accord-
ing to the words of the Gospel, two swords, the spiritual and
the temporal. He who denies that the temporal sword is in
the power of the pope, misunderstands the words of our Lord.'
His infallibility applies to the pope, the language of Jeremiah,
" I have set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms."
This power, continues his holiness, ' is not human, but rather
divine, and was conferred by divine authority on Peter for him-
self and his successors. He, therefore, who resists this power,
resists the institution of God. The subjection of all men to the
Roman pontiff is wholly necessary for salvation. All this the
pontiff declared, asserted, pronounced, and defined. 2
Gibert, Maimbourg, and Caron admit that the pontiff, in these
words, defines the pope's temporal power from the chair, and
proposes it, as an article of faith, to the whole church. Accord-
ing to Gibert, ' Boniface defined that the earthly is subject to
the spiritual power, so that the former may, by the latter, be
constituted and overthrown.' ' Boniface,' says Maimbourg,
* proposed the pontifical sovereignty over all earthly kingdoms,
in temporals as well as in spirituals, to all as an article of faith
necessary for salvation.' * Boniface,' according to Caron, 'de-
fined from the chair, that the French king was subject to the
Roman pontiff in temporals as in spirituals.' Durand, accord-
ingly, states, agreeably to the canon law, that ' the pontiff by
the commission of God, wields both the temporal and spiritual
swords.' 3
Paul and Pius, in their bulls against Henry and Elizabeth,
represented themselves as * the vicegerents of God, who gave
Hac fera bestia. Plat, in Greg. Illi diaboli corpus mint, Membra diaboli, Mem-
bra sunt Antichrist!. Labb. 12. 501, 637.
1 In ejus potestate eat, tuum regnum et anima tua. JLupus rapax, tyrannus
iniquus. Dei et religionis, sanctse ecclesise inimicus. Greg, ad Phil.
8 In hac ejus potestate, duos esse Gladios, spiritualem videlicet et temporalem,
evangelicis dictis instruimur. Uterque, ergo, est in potestate ecclesise. Qui in
potestate Petri temporalem gladium esse negat, male verbum attendit Domini:
constitui te hodie super gentes et regna. Ore Divino Petro data, sibique, suisque
Buccessoribus. Quicunque, igitur, huic potestati a Deo sic ordinatae resistit, Dei
ordinationi resistit. Extrav. Comm. I. 8. 1.
3 Bonifacius VIII. definit, terrenam potestatem spiritual! ita subdi, ut ilia possit
ab ista institui et destitui. Gibert, 2. 513.
Boniface propose a tons les fidelles, comme on article de foi, dont la creance est
necessaire a salut. Maimburg, 129. -
Definit hie Pontifex ex Cathedra. Caron. c. II. Papa utrumque gladium habet,
cilicet, temporalem et spiritualem, ex commissione Dei. Duran. 1. 51
PAPAL POWER OF DEPOSING MADE AN ARTICLE OF FAITH. 229
the pontiffs the sovereignty above kings, and set them, in the
language of Jeremiah, " over the nations and over the kingdoms,
to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down,
to build and to plant." Sixtus, also, in his bull against Henry
of Navarre, boasted of ' the immense power of the eternal king,
conferred on Peter and his successors, who in consequence
could, not by human but divine institution, cast from their
thrones the most powerful monarchs as the ministers of aspiring
Lucifer.' 1 These are a few specimens of the temporal authority
which the Roman viceroys of heaven assumed over earthly
kings.
These insults on royalty were not the mere acts of the Roman,
pontiffs. Pontifical deposition of kings was sanctioned by eight
general, holy, apostolic, Roman councils. These were the
councils of the Lateran, Lyons, Vienna, Pisa, Constance, Basil,
Lateran, and Trent.
The fourth council of the Lateran, in its third canon, enacted
formal regulations for the dethronement of refractory kings.
The offending sovereign, according to these regulations, ' is first
to be excommunicated by his metropolitan and suffragans ; and,
if he should afterward persist in his contumacy for a year, the
Roman pontiff, the vicegerent of God, is empowered to degrade
the obstinate monarch, absolve his subjects from their fealty,
and transfer his dominions to any adventurer, who may invade
his territory and become the champion of Catholicism.' 2 This
assembly consisted of about 1300 members. The Greek and
the Roman emperors attended, and many other sovereigns in
person or by their ambassadors. All these potentates, in the
true spirit of servility and superstition, consented, under certain
conditions, to degradation by his Roman supremacy. This
enactment was indeed the debasement of majesty.
The general council of Lyons pronounced sentence of depo-
sition against Frederic the Second. This emperor was the object
of many papal denunciations, and was cursed by Honorius,
Gregory, and Innocent. Honorius anathematized and deposed
Frederic, and freed his subjects from their oath of fidelity.
Gregory the Ninth, says Heinricius and Du Pin, ' proclaimed
a holy war against Frederic, and cursed him with all possible
1 Cherub. 2. 704. Jerem.-I. 10. Mageogh. 3. 409. Thuan. 4. 301.
Sixtus dixit, se supremam in omnesregesetprmcipesuniversae terra, cimctosqtia
populos, gentes, et nationes, non Immana sed Divina institutione sibi traditam
potestatem obtinere. Barclay, 101. c. 13. Regna et priiicipatus, cui et quando
voluerit, dare vel auferre possit. Barclay, 7.
3 VassaloB ab ejus fidelitate demmeiet absolutes, et terrain exponat catholicis
occupandam, qui earn possideant. Binius, 8. 807. Labb. 13. 833. Alex. 21.
539. Du Pin, 571.
230 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
solemnity.' 1 ' His holiness,' says Paris, ' consigned his majesty
to the devil for destruction.' 2 His infallibility's sentence, indeed,
is a beautiful and perfect specimen of pontifical execration. His
holiness, seven times in succession and nearly in ' a breath,
excommunicated and anathematized his imperial majesty, in
the name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost,' and absolved
his subjects from their oath of fidelity. The emperor however,
did not take all the hierarch's kindness and compliments for
nothing. His majesty, in return and in the overflowings of
gratitude to his benefactor, called his holiness, ' Balaam, Anti-
christ, the Prince of darkness, and the great dragon that
deceives the nations.' 3
Innocent the Fourth, in 1245, in the general council of Lyons,
repeated this sentence of degradation. His infallibility's denun-
ciation, on the occasion, was a master-piece of abuse and impre-
cation. The pontiff compared the emperor, ' to Pharaoh and to a
serpent, and accused his majesty of iniquity, sacrilege, treachery,
profaneness, perjury, assassination, adultery, schism, heresy, and
church-robbery.' Having in these polite and flattering terms
characterized his sovereign as an emissary of Satan, his holiness
proceeded, without hesitation and in the language of blasphemy,
to represent himself, as 'the vicegerent of God, to whom, in
the person of Peter, was committed the power of binding and
loosing, and who therefore possessed authority over emperors
and kings.' The emperor's dethronement being pronounced by
the viceroy of heaven, was, according to his infallibility, ' from
God himself.' 4 His denunciations, hurling Frederic from all
honour and dignity, his supremacy thundered in full council,
and with such vociferation and fury, that he filled the whole
audience with astonishment and dismay. The emperor's vassals,
absolved from all fealty, his holiness prohibited, by apostolic
authority and on pain of excommunication, to obey Frederic, or
to lend the fallen monarch any aid or favour.
This sentence was pronounced ' in full synod, after mature
and diligent deliberation, and with the consent of the holy coun-
cil.' 5 Du Pin, indeed, forgetful of his usual candour, has recourse
1 Cum quanta potest solemnitate devovet. Du Pin, 547. Giannon, XVII, 1.
Paris, 470. Heinricius, Ann. 1227. Canisius, 4. 181.
2 Dominus Papa Satanae dederit in Perditionem. M. Paris, 542. Omnes qui ei
fidelitatis juramento tenentur, decernendo ab observatione juramenti hujusmodi
absoliitos. Heinricius, Anno 1227. Canisius, 4. 183.
3 C'est le grand Dragon, qui seduit 1'Univers 1'Antechrist, un autre Balaam, et
un Prince de Tenebres. Bruy. 3. 192.
4 Ipsum velut hostem ecclesiae privandi imperio condemnavit. Trivettus, Ann.
1245. Dacbery, 3. 193.
A deo, ne regnet vel imperet, est abjectus. Paris, 651. Labb. 14. 48, 67.
Bin. 8. 852. Alex. 21. 733. Ipsum.
5 Cum sacrosancto concilio, deliberatione prsehabita matura et diligenti. Paris,
651. Labb. 14. 51
SYNODAL DEPOSITIONS OF SOVEREIGNS. 231
on this occasion to Jesuitism ; and represents the pontifical
sentence as hasty, and the sole act of Innocent. This is a gross
misstatement. Thaddeus, the emperor's advocate, was allowed
to plead his cause, and the sentence was deferred for several
days for the purpose of affording his majesty an opportunity of
personal attendance. The prelacy, in the synodal denunciation ,
concurred with the pontiff. ' The pope and the bishops, sitting
in council, lighted tapers, and thundered, says Paris, in frightful
Eliminations against the emperor.' 1 Frederic, therefore, had
the honour to be not only dethroned, but also excommunicated
and cursed with candle light in a universal, infallible, holy,
Roman council. This testimony of Paris is corroborated by
Martin and Nangis. 2 The sentence on the atrocious Frederic
was, says Nangis, pronounced after ' diligent previous delibera-
tion with the assembled prelacy.' Innocent, says Pope Martin,
' denounced the notorious Frederic at Lyons with the approba-
tion of the council.'
The general council of Lyons issued another canon of a
similar kind, but of a more general application. ' Any prince
or other person, civil or ecclesiastical, who becomes principal or
accessary to the assassination of a Christian, or who defends or
conceals the assassins,' incurs, according to this assembly in its
canon on homicide, 'the sentence of excommunication and
deposition from all honour and dignity.' 3 This canon is not,
like the sentence against Frederic, restricted to an individual ;
but extends to all sovereigns who are guilty of a certain crime.
The Pope decreed this enactment in proper form, and with the
approbation of the holy general council.
The general council of Vienna, in 1311, under the presidency
of Clement, declared that ' the emperor was bound to the Pope,
from whom he received unction and coronation, by an oath of
fealty.' This, in other words, was to proclaim the emperor the
subject or vassal of the papacy. Former emperors, according
to the assembly of Vienna, had submitted to this obligation,
which still, according to the same infallible authority, * retained
its validity.' 4 His holiness, on the occasion, also reminded his
majesty of the superiority which the pontiff, beyond all doubt,
1 Dominus Papa et prselati, assidentes concilio, candelis accensis, in indicium
imperatorem Fredericum terribiliter fulgurarunt. Paris, 652. Giann. XVII. 3.
2 Diligent! deliberatione pnehabita cum pralatis ibidem congregatis super nefan-
dis Frederici. Nangis, Ann. 1045. Dachery, 3. 35.
Innocentius, memoratum Fi-edericum in concilio Lugdunensi, eodem approbante,
concilio denunciavit. Dachery, 3. 684.
3 Sacri approbatione concilii, statuimus, ut depositionis incurrat sententiam
Labb. 14. 80. Sex. Decret. V. 4. 1. Pithou, 334.
4 Declaramus ilia juramenta prredicta fidelitatis existere. Clem. L. II. Tit. 9
Pithou, 356. Bin. 8. 909.
232 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
ossessed in the empire, and which, in the person of Peter, he
ad received from the King of Kings. ' The grandest emperors
and kings,' Clement declared, 'owed subjection to the eccle-
siastical power which was derived from God.' 1
The general council of Pisa, in its fifteenth session, forbade
all Christians of every order and dignity, even emperors and
kings, to obey Benedict or Gregory, or to afford these degraded
pontiffs council or favour. All who disobeyed this injunction,
though clothed with regal or imperial authority, the Pisans
sentenced to excommunication and the other punishments
awarded by the divine precepts and sacred canons. 2
The general council of Constance, in its fourteenth session,
condemned all, whether emperors or kings, who should annoy
the synod or violate its canons, to perpetual infamy, the ban of
the empire, and the spoliation of all regal and imperial autho-
rity. The same infallible assembly, in its seventeenth session,
excommunicated and deposed all persons, whether clergy or
laity, bishops or cardinals, princes or kings, who should throw
any obstacle or molestation in the way of the emperor Sigis-
mond in his journey to Arragon, to confer with king Ferdinand
for the extinction of schism in the church. This enactment
roused the indignation even of the Jesuit Maimbourg, who
styled it an insult on all sovereigns, especially the French king,
through whose dominions Sigismond had to pass. Du Pin on
this topic, instead of his accustomed candour, musters an array
of shuffling and misrepresentation ; and these, indeed, on this
occasion, his cause required. The Constantian convention, in
its twentieth session, granted a monitory of excommunication
and interdict against Frederic duke of Austria, if he would not
restore the dominions which he had taken from the Bishop of
Trent. The sentence extended to his heirs, his accomplices,
the loss of his feudal dominions, which he held from the church
or the state, and the absolution of his vassals from the oath of
fidelity. The Constantian congress, in its thirty-ninth session,
interdicted the obedience of all Christians to Benedict, and
sentenced the refractory, whether bishops or cardinals, empe-
rors or kings, to deposition and the punishment of persons guilty
of schism and heresy. 3
The general council of Basil imitated the examples of the
Pisan and Constantine synods. This assembly, in its fortieth
1 Le Eoi des Fois a donne une telle puissance a son eglise, que le Eoianme lui
jtppartient, qu'elle pent elever les plus grands Princes, et que les Empereurs et les
Rots doivent lui obeir et la servir. Bruy. 3, 373. Giannon, XI. 1.
? Labb. 15. 1219. Lenfan. 1. 278. Du Pin, 3. 5.
| Lnbb. 16. 23C, 280, 303, 681. Lenfant. 1. 389, 439, 502. Bin. 8. 1077, 11 15
Maijnb. 247. Du Pin, 3. 14, 15, 16.
SYNODAL DEPOSITIONS OF SOVEREIGNS. 233
session, commanded all the faithful, even emperors and kings,
to obey Felix, the newly-elected pontiff, under pain of excpm-
munication, suspension, interdict, and deprivation of all regal
and imperial authority. 1
The council of the Lateran, in 1512, taught the same theory.
Cajetan, in this assembly and without any opposition, declared
that the Pope had two swords ; one common to his supremacy
and other earthly princes, and another peculiar to himself. Leo,
afterward, in the certainty of pontifical knowledge and the
plenitude of apostolic power, sanctioned the constitution of
Boniface, teaching the subordination of the temporal to the
spiritual power, and the necessity of all men's subjection to the
Roman pontiff for salvation. 2 This, in all its extravagancy,
the infallible council, in its eleventh session, approved and
confirmed.
The council of Trent finishes the long array. This celebrated
assembly, in its twenty-fifth session, excommunicated the king
or other temporal sovereign who permits a duel in his dominions.
The excommunication is accompanied with the loss of the city
or place which had been the scene of combat. 8 The territory,
if ecclesiastical, is to be resumed by the church, and if feudal,
to revert to the direct lord. The duellists and their seconds
are, in the same canon, condemned to perpetual infamy, spolia-
tion of goods, and, if they fall in fight, to privation of Christian
burial. The spectators, though otherwise unconcerned, are
excommunicated and sentenced to eternal malediction. 4 The
same synod, in its twenty-fourth session, anathematised the
temporal lords of every rank and condition, who compel their
vassals or any other persons to marry. Eight infallible councils,
in this manner, sanctioned a principle, incompatible with politi-
cal government, fraught with war and perjury, and calculated
to unhinge and disorganize all civil society.
All the beneficed clergy in the Romish communion are,
according to the bull of Pius the Fourth, sworn to all these
councils and canons. The following is contained in their oath.
' I receive and profess all that the sacred canons and general
councils have delivered, defined, and declared ; and I shall
endeavour, to the utmost of my power, to cause the same to be
held, taught, and preached. This I promise, vow, and swear,
so help me God and these Holy Gospels.' 5 Any person who
1 Labb. 17, 41. Crabb. 3. 120.
2 Labb. 19. 726. Bin. 9. 153. Labb. 19. 968.
3 SynoduB regem excomnitmicat et privat ea civitate ac loco, in quo duelli com-
mittendi copiam fecerit. Thuan. 5. 241. Du Pin, 3. 645. Paolo, VIII.
* Spectatores excommunicationis ac perpetuae maledictionis vinculo tencantur.
Labb. 20. 192.
5 Omuia a eacris canonibus et oecumenicis conciliis tradita, definita, et declarata.
234 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY I
should infringe or contradict this declaration, will, and com-
mandment, incurs, according to his infallibility, the indignation
of Almighty God and the blessed apostles Peter and Paul.
The reformation introduced the fourth era on this subject of
the deposing power. Protestantism, from its infancy, avowed
its hostility to this principle in all its forms. A struggle, there-
fore, on this topic, has existed for three hundred years between
the spirit of Protestantism, and the ambition of the Papacy.
The Roman pontiffs, for a long period after the check which
the reformation gave their usurpation, continued to prefer their
claims, and to indulge, with fond and lingering attachment, in
dreams of former greatness. These patrons of spiritual domi-
nation persisted in fulminating their anathemas with great
resolution, indeed, but little terror. The denunciations which
had been hurled with more efficiency by a Gregory and a
Boniface, were wielded, but without effect, by a Paul, a Pius,
and a Sixtus.
Paul, Pius, and Sixtus, even after the commencement of the
reformation, thundered deposition against Henry and Elizabeth
of England and Henry of Navarre. Paul the Fifth, in 1567,
issued the bull IN COENA. This, says Giannone, overthrows
the sovereignty of kings, subverts regal sovereignty, and sub-
jects political government to the power of the papacy. His
infallibility in this publication excommunicated by wholesale,
all monarchs who countenanced heresy, as well as all who,
without special licence from the apostolic see, exact, in their
own dominions, new taxes and customs. The excommunica-
tion which, according to his Supremacy's directions, is published
every year, extends to all the Protestant sovereigns in the
world. His holiness also enacted ecclesiastical laws against
civil government, which, if carried into full execution, would
overturn all regal authority and transfer all causes to episcopal
jurisdiction. 1 This bull, his holiness ordered to be published
on holy Thursday and to become the law of all Christendom.
Paul the Fifth, in 1609, issued a bull, forbidding the English
who were attached to Romanism to take the oath of allegiance,
which had been prescribed by the king and contained a dis-
avowal of the deposing maxim. The oath, according to his in-
fallibility, comprehended many things inimical to the faith and
to salvation. Bellarmine, on the occasion, subsidized the pon-
tiff, and, in support of his theory, quoted Basil, Gregory, Leo,
indubitanter recipio atqne profiteer. Illis quorum cura ad me, in munere meo,
spectabit, teneri, docen, et pradicari, quantum in me erit, curaturum, ego idem
spondeo, voveo, ac juro. Sic me Deus adjuvet, et haec sancta Dei evangelia-
Labb. 20. 222.
Giannon, XXXIII. 4. Maimb. 83.
PAPAL BULL AGAINST OATH OF ALLEGIANCE TO JAMES I. 235
Alan, Cajetan, Sixtus, Mendoza, Sanderus and Pedrezza. The
king wrote an apology for the oath ; and the Pope called the
royal publication heretical, and subjected its reader, to excom-
munication. But his infallibility's anathemas were vain. 1
Many took the prescribed oath; and the Parisian university,
in defiance of pontifical denunciations, declared it lawful.
I*aul the Fifth also canonized Gregory the Seventh, and in-
serted an office in the Roman breviary for the day of his festi-
val. This eulogizes Gregory's dethronement of Henry, as. an
act of piety and heroism. The following are extracts from the
work of blasphemy. ' Gregory shone like the sun in the house
of God. He deprived Henry of his kingdom, and freed his
vassals from their fealty. All the earth is full of his doctrine.
He has departed to heaven. Enable us, by his example and
advocacy, to overcome all adversity. May he intercede for the
sins of all the people.' 2 Alexander the Seventh introduced this
office, in all its senselessness and impiety, into the Roman
basilics. Clement the Eleventh, in 1704, recommended it to
the Cistercians, and, in 1710, to the Benedictines. The impiety
was approved by Benedict the Thirteenth, and retains its
place in the Roman breviary, though rejected by most Euro-
pean nations. 3
Pius the Seventh, so late as 1809, excommunicated and ana-
thematized Bonaparte. His holiness, in the nineteenth century,
proceeded, though in captivity, to pronounce against the empe-
ror, sentence of excommunication, and all the punishments in-
flicted by the sacred canons, the apostolic constitutions, and
the general councils. His anathemas, which were pointless as
Priam's dart, Pius hurled from his spiritual artillery against
Napoleon, on account of his military occupation of the ecclesi-
astical states. 4
No pope or council has ever disclaimed the power of de-
throning kings, though time and experience have suggested
caution in its use. This fact, Crotty, Anglade, and Slevin ad-
mitted in their examination at Maynooth. 5 Many of the pon-
tiffs, knowing the mutility of avowing the claim, have wisely
allowed it to sleep in oblivion and inactivity, till occasion may
1 Thuan. CXXXVIII. 12. Da Pin, 570. Thuan. 6. 425.
9 Da nobis ejus exemplo et intercessione omnia adversantia fortiter superare.
Sicut sol effulsit in demo Dei. Henricum regno privavit atque subditos populoe
fide ei data liberavit. Migravit in coslum. Omnis terra doctrina ejus repleta est.
Ipse intercedat pro peccatis omnium Populorum. Bruy, 2. 491 493. Crotty, 85.
Bre. Rom. 6, 7. Officia Propria, 7577.
3 Cons. Miscel. 35. 197, 244.
4 Pie VII. lanca une bulle 1' excommunication contre lea auteurs, fauteure, et
executeurs des violences exercees contre le saint-siege. Graviere, 471.
6 Crotty, 84. Anglade, 182. Slevin, 200.
THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
awake its slumbering energy. But no express renunciation of
this prerogative has ever issued from the Vatican. The councils
also, like the pontiffs, have, in no instance since the eleventh
century, disavowed the assumed right of degrading monarch s.
Another fact is worthy of observation. The congregation of the
Index has never condemned the works of Bellarmine, Baronius,
Perron, Lessius and other authors, who have supported this
claim of the papacy with devoted advocacy. The expurgato-
rian index has given no quarter to the patrons of heresy, whose
literary works have been mangled, mutilated, and condemned.
But the society, which, in cases of schism and protestantism,
has proceeded with inquisitorial zeal, has uniformly treated the
abettors of the deposing power with unusual forbearance and
courtesy.
The authority of the Roman pontiff to dethrone sovereigns,
however, since the days of Luther and Calvin, has declined.
The general opinion, says Anglade, even in popish Christendom,
except the papal states, is against this principle. 1 The usur-
pation has been denied or deprecated by some of the boldest
partizans of Catholicism. Two reasons, however, which
sufficiently account for this fact, may be assigned for the disa-
vowal. One reason arises from the utter want of power to
enforce the claim. According to Aquinas, ; the church, in its
infancy, tolerated the faithful to obey Julian, through want of
power to repress earthly princes.' The loyalty of the pristine
ecclesiastical community, clergy and laity, saints, confessors,
and martyrs, the angelic doctor resolves into weakness.
Bellarmine, following Aquinas, ' represents inability, as the
reason, which prevented the Christians from deposing Nero,
Dioclesian, Julian, and Valens.' 2
The Christian commonwealth, in its early state, soared far
above all such meanness and hypocrisy. But the Popish
community, for near 300 years, have acted on the prudent but
unprincipled maxims of Aquinas and Bellarmine. The Refor-
mation detached nearly half the European nations from the
domination of the Romish superstition, and, by this means,
enfeebled its power. Protestantism, in strength, soon became
a formidable rival of popery ; and the two religions, the Romish
and the Reformed, now divide Christendom in nearly equal
proportions. The defection of so many states has, in a great
measure, rendered Rome's spiritual artillery useless, and spoiled
1 Anglade, 158.
a Ecclesiam, in sua novitate, nondum habebat potestatem terrenes principe*
compescendi, et ideo toleravit fideles Juliano Apostates obedire. Aquin. II. 12.
II. P. 51. Si Christian! olim non deposuerunt Neronem et Diocletianum, et
Julianum, et Valentem, id fait quia deerant vires temporales Christianis. Bell. V. 7
EFFECTS OF THE REFORMATION ON THE DEPOSING POWER. 237
her anathemas of nearly all their terrrors. Kings have become
wiser, and learned to contemn ecclesiastical denunciations.
Rome, therefore, according to her usual policy, has ceased to
claim an authority which she can no longer exercise with suc-
cess. But raise her to her former elevation, and, ancient
ambition returning with reviving power, she would reassume
the attitude, in which she once launched the thunders of excom-
munication, affrighted monarchs, interdicted nations, and
wielded all the destinies of man.
A second reason for the renunciation of this maxim arises
from the effects of the reformation on public opinion. These
effects are not to be estimated merely by their influence on
those who have embraced the protestant communion ; but on
those also, who, though they disclaim the name, have imbibed
something of its spirit. Many, at the present day, remaining
still in the bosom of the Romish communion, have been rea-
soned or ridiculed out of some of its loftiest pretensions. Senti-
ments, in consequence, may, on this subject, be now uttered
with safety, which would formerly have been attended with
danger. Answers from Alcala, Valladolid, and Salamanca,
similai to those returned in our day to the celebrated questions
of Pitt, would, in the sixteenth century, have thrown the doors
of the Spanish inquisition wide open for the reception of their
authors. The light of the reformation exposed the misshapen
fabric of papal superstition, in all its frightful deformity, to the
gaze of the world ; whilst the champions of protestantism
pointed their heaviest artillery against the mighty mass, and
carried destruction into its frowning battlements, which
threatened the subversion of political government and the dis-
organization of civil society. Its defenders, in consequence,
abandoned these holds, which they found untenable by all their
spiritual tactics and artillery.
The king-deposing power of the papacy, however, is never
likely to return. The days of its glory, in all probability, have,
on this usurped claim, for ever departed. Kings, in general,
even in the times of literary and religious darkness, resisted
this usurpation ; and often, especially in France, with decided
success. Monarchs, even in the middle ages, frequently con-
temned the thunder of excommunication fulminated from the
Vatican. Those, therefore, who successfully contended for
their rights in a period of gross superstition, will hardly permit
a resumption of pontifical usurpation when philosophy and
the Reformation have poured a flood of light over Christen*
dom. Prophecy, on the contrary, teaches, in clear terms, that
Rome will fall under the detestation and fury of regal autho-
rity. Kings, in the strong language of Revelation, " shall hate
238 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
her, and shall make her desolate and naked, and shall eat her
flesh and burn her with fire." The sovereigns of the earth, it
would appear, will be made instrumental in overthrowing the
ecclesiastical despotism, the fulminations of whose spiritual
artillery often shook the thrones of the world and made
monarchs tremble.
CHAPTER VII.
PERSECUTION.
PRETENSIONS OF THE PAPACY THRKE PERIODS FIRST PERIOD: RELIGIOUS LIBER-
TY SECOND PERIOD; PERSECUTION OF PAGANISM PERSECUTION OF HERESY-
PERSECUTING KINGS, SAINTS, THEOLOGIANS, POPES, AND COUNCILS CRUSADES
AGAINST THE ALBIGENSES INQUISITION THIRD PERIOD ; PERSECUTING DOCTORS,
POPES, COUNCILS, AND KINGS PERSECUTIONS IN GERMANY, NETHERLANDS, SPAIN,
FRANCE, AND ENGLAND DIVERSITY OF SYSTEMS POPISH DISAVOWAL OF PER-
SECUTION MODERN OPINIONS.
THE popedom, raised to the supremacy in church and state,
challenged a controlling power over the partisans of heresy,
schism and apostacy, as well as over kings. The sovereign
pontiffs, in the madness of ambition and despotism, afiected the
dominion over all mankind, and called the arm of the civil
magistracy to their aid, to enforce their pretensions. Schis-
matics and heretics, accordingly, though separated from the
Romish communion, are reckoned subject to its authority, as
rebels and deserters are amenable to the civil and military laws
of their country. The traitor may be punished by the state for
his perfidy ; and the apostate, in like manner, may, from the
church, undergo excommunication and anathemas. 1 He may
even, according to Aquinas, Dens, and the university of Sala-
manca, followed by that of Valladolid, be compelled by arms
to return to the profession of Catholicism. 2 This assumption
of power and authority has given rise, as might be expected,
to long and sanguinary persecutions.
Christendom, on the subject of persecution, has witnessed
three distinct periods. One commenced with the era of Re-
demption, and ended at the accession of Constantino, the first
1 Neque illi magis ad ecclesiam spectant, quam transfagae ad exercitnm perti-
neant, a quo defecerunt. Non negandum tamen qnin in ecclesiae potestate Bint.
Cat. Trid. 54. Slevin, 216, 217. Kenney, 399. Ecclesia in eos, jurisdictionem
habet. Dens, 2, 80.
3 Fosse Romanum Pontificem fidei desertores, armis compellere. Mageog. 3.
395. Hasretici snnt etiam corporaliter compellendi. Aquin. 2, 42. Hseretici
etint compellendi, ut fidem teneant. Aquinas, II. 10. VIII.
Cogi poBBunt, etiam poenis corporalibiu, at revertantur ad fidem. Dens, 2 80 :
240 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
Christian emperor. During this period, Christians disavowed
all persecution both in theory and action. The second period
extended from Constantino till the. Reformation. This long
lapse of years was more or less characterized by continual In-
tolerance and persecution, The third period occupies the time
which has intervened between the Reformation and the present
day. This interval has been diversified by many jarring
opinions on the topic of persecution, the rights of conscience,
and religious liberty.
The world saw more than three ages pass, from the era of
Christianity till the accession of Constantino, before its profes-
sors disgraced their religion by the persecution of heathenism
or heresy. Intolerance is a manifest innovation on the usage
of antiquity, and one of the variations of Romanism. The
ancients, Du Pin remarks, ' inflicted no ecclesiastical punish
ment but excommunication, and never employed the civil
authority against the abettors of heresy and rebellion.' Du
Pin has been followed by Giannon, Mariana, Moreri, and Du
Hamel. 1
The Messiah, the apostles, and the fathers for several ages,
opposed, in word and deed, all compulsion and persecution.
The Son of man came not to destroy but to save the lives of
men. This he stated to his apostles, when, in mistaken zeal,
they wished, like Elias, to command fire from heaven to con-
sume the Samaritans, who, actuated by the spirit of party,
"were hostile to the Jews. His empire, he declared, is spirit-
ual ; and is not, like Paganism, Popery, or Islamism, to be
established or enlarged by the roar of artillery, the din of bat-
tle, or the horrors of war. When Peter struck Malchus, Jesus
healed the wound, and condemned, in emphatical language,
the use of the sword in the defence of his kingdom. 2
No two characters, indeed, ever displayed a more striking
contrast than the Messiah and an inquisitor. The Messiah was
clothed in mercy. The inquisitor was drenched in blood
The tear of compassion stained the cheek of the divine Saviour.
The storm of vengeance infuriated the face of the inquisitorial
tormentor. The Son of God on earth was always persecuted;
but never retaliated. His ardent petitions, on the contrary,
ascended to heaven, supplicating pity for his enemies' weak-
ness and pardon for their sins.
The apostles walked in the footsteps of their divine master.
1 Inauditum certe est apud antiques quemquam alia quam excommunicationia
ant depositionis poena fiiisse ab ecclesia mulctatum. Du Pin, 448. Multis annis,
ecclesia civili authoritate adversus haereticos et rebelles minime usa est. Du Pin
449. Giannon, XV. 4. Mariana, 4. 365. Moreri, 5, 129. Du Hamel, 691.
9 Matt. xxvi. 51, 52. Mark ziv. 47. Luke ix. 56, and xxii. 51. John xviii.
10. 36.
RELIGIOUS LIBERTY OF THE FIRST THREE CENTURIES. 241
The inspired heralds of the gospel recommended their message
by holiness and miracles, accompanied with the influence of
divine energy. Persecution from the powers of earth and hell,
from demons and men, was their predicted destiny. But
these messengers of peace, when execrated, blessed, and when
persecuted, showed no wish for retaliation ; but, in submission
to their master's precept, returned good for evil.
The fathers, for several ages, copied the example of their
Lord and the apostles. The ancients, Du Pin observes,
taught with unanimous consent the unlawfulness of compulsion
and punishment in religion.' ] The sentiments of Origen, Ter-
tullian, Cyprian, Lactantius, and Bernard on this topic are
worthy of transcription and imitation. Christians, says Origen,
' should not use the sword.' Religion, according to Tertullian,
' does not compel religion.' According to Cyprian, ' the king
of Zion alone has authority to break the earthen vessels ; nor
can any claim the power which the Father hath given to the Son.'
Lactantius, in the following statement, is still more full and ex-
plicit, * Coercion and injury are unnecessary, for religion can-
not be forced. Barbarity and piety are far different ; nor can
truth be conjoined with violence or justice with cruelty. Reli-
gion is to be defended, not by killing, but by dying ; not by
inhumanity, but by patience.' Bernard, at a later date, enjoins,
in similar language, the same toleration. ' Faith is conveyed
by persuasion, not by constraint. The patrons of heresy are
to be assailed, not by arms, but by arguments. Attack them,
but with the word, not with the sword.' 2 Du Pin has shown
that the ideas of Origen, Tertullian, Cyprian, Lactantius, and
Bernard were entertained by Gregory, Athanasius, Chrysos-
tom, Augustine, Damian, and Anselm.
The second period, from Constantine till the Reformation,
was characterized, more or less, by uninterupted persecution
and constraint, as the former was by toleration and liberty.
This emperor's proselytism to Christianity, in the beginning of
the fourth century, commenced a new era in the Christian
commonwealth. The church, in his reign, obtained a new
1 Sancti Patres, unanimi consensu decent ecclesiam carere omni gladio material!
ad homines cogendos et puniendoa. Da Pin, 450.
2 Adversus. nemiaem, Gladio uti debemus. Origen, in Matt. xxvi. 25. Nee reli-
gionis est cogere religionem. Tertul. ad Scap. 69. Fictilia vasa confringere
Domino soli concessum est cni et virga ferrea data est. Nee quisquam sibi, qnod
Boli filio Pater tribuit, vindicate potest. Cyprian, 100. Bp. 54. Non est opus vi
et injuria quia religio cogi non potest. Longe diversa sunt carnificina et pietas;
riec potest ant veritas cum vi, aut justitia cum crudelitate conjung_i. Defendenda
enim religio est non occidendo sed moriendo, non ssevitia, sed patientia. Lactan.
V. 19. Fides suadenda, non imponenda. Bernard, 766. Haeretici capiantur,
dico non armis, sed argumentis. Aggredere eos sed verbo, non ferro. Bernard,
885. Serm. 64.
16
242 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
establishment : and the civil power began to sanction the
ecclesiastical authority. The magistracy learned to act in
unison with the clergy. The emperor, however, was not a
persecutor of Paganism. He extended to Heathenism the tol-
eration which he withheld from heresy. The prudent monarch,
unwilling to alarm Pagan suspicion, advanced with slow and
cautious steps to undermine the irregular and decayed fabric
of gentilism. He condemned indeed the arts of divination,
silenced the oracles of Polytheism which had been convicted
of fraud and falsehood, and demolished the temples of Phoenicia,
which, in the face of day, displayed all the abominations of
prostitution to the honour of Venus. But he tolerated the
priests, the immolations, and the worship of the Grecian and
tloman gods of antiquity. 1
Constans and Constantius imitated the example of Constan-
tine. Facts and monuments still remain, to attest the public
exercise of idolatry during their whole reign. Many temples
were respected or at least spared : and the patrons of Pagan-
ism, by permission or connivance, enjoyed, notwithstanding the
Imperial laws, the luxury of sacrifices, processions, and festi-
vals. The emperors continued to bestow the honours of the
army and the state on Christians and Heathens : whilst wealth
and honour, in many instances, patronized the declining
institutions of Polytheism. 2
Julian's reign was characterized by apostacy, and Jovian' s
brevity. Valentinian was the friend of toleration. The perse-
cution of Paganism commenced in the reign of Gratian, and
continued through the reigns of Theodosius, Arcadius, and
Honorius. Gratian and Theodosius were influenced by Ambro-
sius Archbishop of Milan : and the clergy, in general, misap-
plied the laws of the Jewish theocracy and the transactions of
the Jewish annals, for the unchristian and base purpose of
awakening the demon of persecution against the mouldering
remains of Grecian and Roman superstition. Gratian abolished
the pretensions of the Pagan pontiff, the honours of the priests
and vestals, transferred their revenues to the use of the church,
the state, and the army, and dissolved the ancient fabric of
Polytheism, which had dishonoured humanity for the length-
ened period of eleven hundred years.
Theodosius finished the work of destruction which Gratian
had begun. He issued edicts of proscription against eastern
and western gentilism. Cynegius, Jovius, and Gaudentius were
commissioned to close the temples, destroy the instruments of
1 Moreri, 5, 129. Euseb. Vit. Con. II. 56, 60. Gibbon, c. 21. 22.
Cod. Theod. XVI. Tit. 5. Gibbon, c. 28.
PERSECUTION OF PAGANISM. 243
^dolatry, and confiscate the consecrated property. Heavy fines
were imposed on the use of frankincense and libations. The
temples of the gods were afterwards demolished. The fairest
structures of antiquity, the splendid and beautiful monuments
of Grecian architecture were, by mistaken and barbarian zeal,
levelled with the dust. The saintified .Martin of Tours in
Gaul, marched at the head of its tattered monks to the demoli-
tion of the fanes, the idols, and the consecrated groves of his
extensive diocese. Martin's example was followed by Mar-
cellus of Syria, whom Theodorus calls divine, and by Theophi-
lus patriarch of Alexandria. A few of these grand edifices
however, were spared by the venality or the taste of the civil
or ecclesiastical governors. The Carthaginian temple of the
celestial Venus was converted into a Christian church ; and a
similar consecration rescued from ruin the majestic dome of the
Roman pantheon. 1
Gentilism, by these means, was, in the reign of Arcadius
and Honorius, expelled from the Roman territory. Theodo-
sius, who was distinguished by his zeal for the extermination
of Polytheism, questioned whether, in his time, a single Pagan
remained in the empire. Its ruin affords perhaps the only
example in the annals of time of the total extirpation of an
ancient and popular superstition, and presents, in this point of
view, a singular event in the history of the human mind. 2
But the friend of Christianity and his species must, in many
instances, lament the means by which the end was effected.
Paganism was indeed an unwieldly and hideous system of
abomination and folly : and its destruction, by lawful means,
must have been the wish of every friend of God and man.
But the means, in this case, often dishonoured the end.
Coercion, in general, was substituted for conviction, and terror
for the gospel. One blushes to read of a Symmachus and a
Libanius, two heathen orators, pleading for reason and persua-
sion in the propagation of religion ; whilst a Theodosius and
an Ambrosius, a Christian emperor and a Christian bishop,
urge violence and constraint. The whole scene opens a
melancholy but striking prospect of human nature. The
Christians, while few and powerless, deprecated the unhal-
lowed weapons of persecution wielded with such fury by the
Pagans. But the situation of the two is no sooner reversed,
than the heathens, who were the former partizans of intoler-
ance, recommend forbearance ; and the Christians, the former
advocates of toleration, assume the unholy arms of proscrip-
tion.
1 Theoph. 49. Codex Theod. 6. 266274. Giannon III. 6. Gorleau, 3. 361.
2 Bisciola, 318. Cod. Theod. 6. 277283.
244 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
The hostility of the secular arm under the Emperors was not
restricted to Gentilism. Heresy, as well as heathenism, became
the object of imperial persecution. Constantine, till he was
perverted by the tuition of the clergy, seems to have possessed
correct views of religious liberty and the rights of conscience.
The imperial edict of Milan, conceived in the genuine spirit of
liberality, was the great charter of toleration, which conferred
the privilege of choosing his own religion on each individual of
the Roman world. The beauty of this fair picture, however,
as usual, was fading and transitory. Its mild features were
soon dashed with traits of harshness and severity. The empe-
ror, influenced by his ecclesiastical tutors, imbibed the maxims
of illiberality, and learned to punish men for consulting their
own reason in the concerns of their own souls.
Sovereigns, according to the sacerdotal theology of the day,
acted in a two-fold capacity ; as Christians and as governors.
Considered as Christians, kings, in their personal character,
should believe the truth as well as practise duty, which, as
governors and in their official relation, they should enforce on
their subjects. Offences against man, according to these clerical
casuists, were less criminal than against God. Theft and
murder, of course, were less heinous than schism and heresy.
The edicts of emperors, in consequence, came to be substituted
for the gospel of God. Error, according to these theologians,
was to be remedied by proscription ; which, according to com-
mon sense, may produce hypocrisy, but can never enlighten
the understanding or subdue the heart. Constantine, therefore,
in conformity with this new or rather old plan of instruction
and proselytism, issued two penal laws against heresy j and
was followed, in the hopeful project, by Valentinian, Gratian,
Theodosius, Arcadius, and Honorius. Theodosius published
fifteen, Arcadius twelve, and Honorius no less than eighteen
of these inhuman and Antichristian statues. These are recorded
in the Theodosian and Justinian codes, to the eternal infamy
of their priestly and imperial authors. 1
The chief victims of persecution, during this period, were the
Arians, Manicheans, Priscillianists, and Paulicians. Valenti-
nian, Gratian, and Theodosius overwhelmed Arianismwith de-
struction, and clothed Trinitarianism with triumph. The
Arians, however, under Constantius and Valens, Roman empe-
rors, and Genseric and Hunneric, Vandal kings, retaliated, in
their turn, in dreadful inhumanity and vengeance. Valenti-
nian fined the Manichean doctors and interdicted the Mani-
chean assemblies. Theodosius exposed them to infanry and
Theoph. 42, 45, 46. Codex Theod. XVI. Tit. 5. p. 104190.
PERSECUTION OF HERESY. 245
deprived them of the rights of citizens. Constantine, Gratian,
Maximus, and Honorius harassed and ruined the factions of
Donatism, Priscillianism, and Pelagianism. The Paulicians
were persecuted in the most dreadful manner, during the
reigns of Constans, Constantine, Justinian, Leo, Michael, and
Theodora. Ammianus, a heathen historian, and Chrysostom.
a Roman saint, compare tl|e mutual enmity of Christians at
this tune, to the fury of wild beasts. 1
Heresy, during this period, was punished with more or less
severity, according to the offender's supposed crirninality or
obstinacy. The penalty was banishment, fine, confiscation,
infamy, disqualification of buying and selling, or incapacity of
civil and military honour. The Roman code contained no law,
sentencing persons guilty of heresy to death. Capital punish-
ments, indeed, in some instances, were inflicted. This was the
case with the unhappy Priscillian and some of his partisans,
who were prosecuted by the inquisitorial Ithacius and sentenced
by the usurping Maximus. But Maximus, on this occasion,
exercised an illegal authority as he had usurped the imperial
power. The unlawful and unhallowed transaction displayed the
baseness of the prosecutor and the tyranny of the emperor.
The few that suffered capital punishment for sectarianism were,
in general, also guilty or supposed to be guilty of treason or
rebellion. 2
The Roman laws, on the topic of persecution, continued in
this state till the year 800, and in the eastern empire till its
dissolution in 1453 by the Ottomans. An important change
happened about the commencement of the ninth century. This
consisted of the great eastern schism. The Greek and Latin
churches were rent asunder and ceased to be governed by
mutual laws. A new era, on the subject of heresy and its
punishment, began at this time in the west, and lasted till the
year 1100 of our redemption, comprehending a lapse of 300
years. This period was distinguished by superstition, ignorance ,
insurrection, revolution, and confusion. Sectarianism, in the
European nations, seemed, for three centuries, to be nearly
extinguished. Egyptian darkness reigned and triumphed over
learning and morality. The world sunk into a literary leth-
argy : and, in the language of some historians, slept the sleep
of orthodoxy. Learning, philosophy, religion error, and secta-
rianism reposed in inactivity, or fled from the view, amidst the
1 Codex Theod. 6. 113, 115, 120, 123. Godeau, 3. 9, 67. Cod. Theod. 6. 5,
10, 130, 146. Codex Justin. I. p. 71, 75, 88. Nullas infestas hominibus bestias,
ut sunt sibi ferales plorique Christianiorum. Ammian. XXII. 5. Koflarfsp OqpM
Stsffrxaijisv. Chrysos. 10. 632. Horn. 27.
2 Giannon, XV. 4. Sulp. Sev. II. 49. Codex. Theod. 6. 160, 161.
246 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
wide and debasing dominion of ignorance, immorality, and
superstition, which superseded the use of the inquisitor and
crusader. 1
The revival of sectarianism followed the revival of Letters.
Many denominations of this kind appeared, in the beginning of
the twelfth century, among the European nations, such as
the Paulicians, Catharians, Henricians, Waldenses, and Albi-
genses. The Waldenses and Jdbigenses were the most,
numerous and rational, and therefore the most formidable to the
Papacy. All these concurred in hostility to Romanism, as a
system of error and superstition. The usurpation and despo-
tism of the Popedom were the chief objects of their enmity and
opposition. The despotism and immorality of the clergy
exposed them to the indignation of sectarian zeal. Philosophy
in its first dawn, learning in its feeblest glimmerings, discovered
the deformity and shook the domination of the Papacy. The
revival of literature, however, was not the only cause of opposi-
tion to Romanism. Many reasons concurred. The reign of
superstition ; the trafic of indulgences ; the dissensions between
the emperors and the pontiffs ; the wars, which, for two hun-
dred years, had desolated the Christian world ; the luxury of
the bishops and inferior clergy ; all these tended to arouse the
hostility of men against the overgrown system of ecclesiastical
tyranny. 2
This hostility against the principles of Popery produced a
reaction and enmity against the partizans of sectarianism.
Rome plied all her spiritual artillery, and vented her rage in
excommunication and massacre. Heresy or rather truth and
holiness were assailed by kings, theologians, popes, councils,
crusaders, and inquisitors.
Princes wielded the secular arm againstthe abettors of heresy.
Frederic the German emperor, and Lewis the French king, as
well as many other sovereigns, enacted persecuting laws against
the Waldenses and Albigenses. Frederic, in 1224, promul-
gated four edicts of this kind from Padua. His majesty, in his
imperial politeness, began with calling the Albigenses vipers,
snakes, serpents, wolves, angels of wickedness, and sons of
perfidy, who were descended from the author of iniquity and
falsehood, and insulted God and the church. Pretending to
the authority of God for his inhumanity, he execrated all the
patrons of apostacy from Catholicism, and sentenced heretics
of every sect and denomination alive to the flames, their prop-
erty to confiscation, and their posterity, unless they became
persecutors, to infamy. The suspected, unless they took an
1 Moreri, 5. 129. Giannon, XV. 4. Velly, 3. 431.
2 Giannon, xv. 4.
PERSECUTION OP HERESY. 247
oath of exculpation, were accounted guilty. Princes were
admonished to purify their dominions from heretical perversity ;
and, if they refused, their land might without hesitation be
seized by the champions of Catholicism. 1 This was the first
law that made heresy a capital offence. The emperor also
patronized the inquisition, and protected its agents of torture
and malevolence.
Lewis, in 1228, issued similar enactments. He published
laws for the extirpation of heresy, and enjoined their execution
on the barons and bailiffs. He rendered the patrons and pro-
tectors of error incapable of giving testimony, making a will, or
succeeding to any honour or emolument. The sainted monarch
encouraged the work of death, and in the language of Pope
Innocent, diffused through the crusading army ' the natural and
hereditary piety of the French kings.' He forced Raymond,
Count of Toulouse, to undertake the extermination of heresy
from his dominions, without sparing vassal or friend. Alfonso,
king of Arragon, and several others copied the example of
Frederic and Lewis. 2
The emperors were sworn to exterminate heretics. The
emperor Henry, according to Clement, in the council of Vienna
took an oath, obliging his majesty to eradicate the professors
and protectors of heterodoxy. A similar obligation was im-
posed on the emperor of Germany, even after the dawn of the
Reformation. He was bound by a solemn oath to extirpate,
even at the hazard of his life and dominions, all whom the
pontiff condemned. 3
Saints and pontiffs, in these deeds of inhumanity, imitated
emperors and kings. Lewis, who enacted such statutes of
cruelty, was a saint as well as a sovereign. Aquinas was
actuated with the same demon of malevolence, and breathed
the same spirit of barbarity. ' Heretics,' the angelic doctor
declares, ' may not only be excommunicated but justly killed.
Such, the church consigns to the secular arm, to be extermina-
ted from the world by death.' 4 Dominic, Osma, Arnold,
1 Hi sunt lupi rapaces. Hi stint angeli pessimi. Hi sunt filii pravitatum, a patre
nequitiae et fraudis authore. Hi colubri, hi serpentes, qui latenter videntur inser-
pere. Debits ultionis in eos gladium exeramus : decernimus, ut vivi in conspectu
nominum comburantur. Labb. 14. 25, 26. Du Pin, 2, 486.
2 Labb. 13. 1231. Velly, 4. 134. Gibert, 1. 15.
3 Omnem haeresim, scbisma, et haereticos quoslibet fautores, receptatores, et de-
fensores ipsorum exterminaret. Clem. II. Tit. 9. Bruy. 3. 373.
Les Princes, et encore plus les Empereurs, qui en font des sermens si solemnels,
etant etroitement obligez sous peine des censures d'extirper ceux, que les papea
ont condamnez, et d'y employer iusqu' ft leurs etats et memo leur vie. Paol. 1
103.
4 Hfflretici possunt non solum excommunicari, sed et juste occidi .Ecclesia
reKnquit eum iudici saeculari mundo extenninandum per mortem. Aquinas. II
11. III. p. 48
248 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
Conrad, Rainer, Guy, Castelnau, Guido, Rodolf, and a long
train of saints and doctors might be named, who, for support-
ing the work of murder and extermination, were raised to the
honours of canonization.
The pontiffs, like the kings and saints, encouraged, with all
their influence, the system of persecution and cruelty. Urban,
Alexander, Lucius, Innocent, Clement, Honorius, and Martin
gained an infamous notoriety for their ruthless and unre-
lenting enactments against the partizans of Albigensianism,
Waldensianism, and Wickliffism. Urban the Second, in 1090,
decided that the person, who, inflamed with zeal for Catholi-
cism, should slay any of the excommunicated, was not guilty of
murder. 1 The assassination of a man under the sentence of
excommunication, his infallibility accounted only a venial
crime. His holiness must have excelled in the knowledge of
casuistry. His morality, however, Bruys characterized by the
epithets diabolical and infernal. 2 Lucius the Third fulminated
red-hot anathemas against the Waldenses, as well as against
their protectors and patrons, and consigned them to the secular
arm, to undergo condign vengeance in proportion to their
criminalitv. Innocent the Fourth sanctioned the enactments
*/
of Frederic, which sentenced the partizans of error and apostacy
to be burned alive. He commanded the house in which an
Albigensian had been sheltered to be razed from the founda-
tion. All these viceroys of heaven concurred in consigning ,tc
infamy any who should give the apostate from the faith either
counsel or favor ; and in driving the magistracy to execute the
sanguinary statutes, by interdicts and excommunication. The
crusaders against the Albigenses enjoyed the same indulgences
as those who marched to the holy land. Supported by the
mercy of Omnipotent God and the blessed apostles Peter and
Paul, Innocent granted these holy warriors a full pardon of all
sin, and eternal salvation in heaven. 3
Provincial and national councils breathed the same spirit of
persecution, as kings and pontiffs. These were many. But
the most sanguinary of them met at Toledo, Oxford, Avignon,
Tours, Lavaur, Montpellier, Narbonne, Albi, and Tolosa.
Anno 630, the national council of Toledo, in its third canon,
promulgated an enactment for the expulsion of all Jews from
Spain, and for the permission of none in the kingdom but the
1 Non enim eos homicidas arbitramur, quos adversns excommunicates, Zelo Ca-
tholicse matris ardentes, aliquis eorum trucidasse contingent. Pithou, 324.
2 Bruy. 2. 508.
3 Plenam peccaminum veniam indulgemns, et in retributione justorum salutis
teternae pollicemur augmentum. Labb. 14. 64. Bened. 1. 73. et 2. 232. Bruy.
3. 13. Du Pin, 2. 335. Labb. 13. 643. et 14. 23.
PERSECUTION OF THE WALDENSES AND OTHERS. 249
professors of Romanism. 1 This holy assembly made the king,
on his accession, swear to tolerate no heretical subjects in the
Spanish dominions, The sovereign who should violate this
oath, and all his accomplices, would, according to the sacred
synod, ' be accursed in the sight of the everlasting God, and
become the fuel of eternal fire.' This sentence, the holy
fathers represented ' as pleasing to God.' Spain, at an early
date, began those proscriptions, which she has continued to the
present day.
The council of Oxford, in 1160, condemned more than thirty
of the Waldenses who had emigrated from Gascony to Eng-
land, and consigned these unhappy sufferers to the secular arm.
Henry the Second ordered them, man and woman, to be pub-
licly whipped, branded on the cheek with a red-hot iron, and
driven half-naked out of the city : while all were forbid to
grant these wretched people hospitality or consolation. None
therefore showed the condemned the least pity. The winter
raged in all its severity, and the Waldenses in consequence
perished of cold and hunger. 2
The councils of Tours, Lavaur, Albi, Narbonne, Beziers,
and Tolosa issued various enactments of outlawry and ex
, termination against the Albigenses and Waldenses. These,
according to the sentence of those sacred synods, were excom-
municated every Sunday and festival ; while, to add solemnity
and horror to the scene, the bells were rung and the candles
extinguished. An inquisitorial deputation of the clergy and
laity was commissioned for the detection of heresy and its
partisans. The barons and the magistracy were sworn to
exterminate heretical pollution from their lands. The barons
who through fear or favor should neglect the work of destruc-
tion, forfeited their estates, which were transferred to the active
and ruthless agents of extirpation. The magistracy, who
were remiss, were stripped of their office and property. 3
All were forbidden to hold any commerce in buying or
selling with these sectarians, that, deprived of the consolations
1 Hanc promulgamus Deo placituram sententiam. Inter reliqua sacraments,
pollicitus merit, nullum non catholicum permittere in suo regno degere. Teme-
rator hujus extiterit promissi sit anathema, marantha, in conspectu sempiterni Dei,
et pabulum efficiatur ignis seterni. Carranza, 376. Crabb. 2. 211. Godea. 5. 157.
3 Praecepit hffiretica? infamias characterem frontibus eorum inuri; et spectante
populo, virgis coercitos, urbe expelli, districte prohibens, ne quis eos vel hospitio
recipere, vel aliquo solatio confovere, praesumeret. Algoris intolerantia (hyems
quippe erat), nemine vel exiguum imsericordiae impendente, misere interiernnt.
Labb. 13. 287, 288. Neubrig. II. 13. Spelman, 2. 60.
3 Excommunicentur in ecclesiis, pulsatis campanis et extinctis candelis. Labb.
4. 158. Dominos locorum de illis detegendis solicitos ease, et iDorum latibula des-
truere ; fautores haereticorum terras suae jactura et aliis poenis plecti. Baillivum,
qui exterminandis haereticis operam non dederit, bonis suis et magistrate, exni~
Alex. 20. 1667. Du Pin, 2. 415 Labb. 13. 1237. Marian. 2. 707
250 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
of humanity, they might, according to the council of Tours,
* be compelled to renounce their error.' No person was allowed
to afford them succour or protection. The house, in which
the Albigensian sheltered his head, was, as if contaminated
with his presence, to be demolished and the ground confiscated.
The grave itself could not defend the heretical tenants of its
cold domains from the fury of the inquisitor. The body or the
bones of the Albigenses that slept in the dust were to be disin-
terred, and the mouldering remains committed, in impotent
and unavailing vengeance, to the flames. 1
The council of Tolosa, in 1229, waged war on this occasion
against the Bible as well as against heresy. The sacred synod
strictly forbade the laity to possess the Books of the Old and
New Testament in the vernacular idiom. A layman, in the
language of the holy fathers, might perhaps keep a Psalm-book,
a breviary, or the hours of holy Mary ; but no Bible. 2 This,
Velly admits, was the first prohibition of the kind. Twelve
revolving ages from the commencement of Christianity had
rolled their ample course over the world, and no assembly of
men had dared to interdict the book of God. But a synod, in
a communion boasting unchangeability, arrogated at length the
authority of repealing the enactment of heaven and the practice
of twelve hundred years.
These provincial synods were sanctioned by general coun-
cils ; which therefore were blessed with infallibility. These
comprehended four of the Lateran, and those of Constance and
Sienna. Anno 1139, the second council of the Lateran, in its
twenty-third canon, excommunicated and condemned the
heretics of the day who affected a show of piety. These, the
infallible assembly commanded the civil powers to suppress ;
and consigned their protectors also to the same condemnation. 3
The Third general council of the Lateran issued a canon of
a similar kind ; but of greater rigour and severity. This
unerring assembly, in its twenty-seventh canon, and supported
by the mercy of God and the authority of Peter and Paul,
.excommunicated on Sundays and festivals, the Cathari of
1 Nee in venditione aut emptione aliqua cum eis omnino commercium habeatur,
ut solatio saltern humanitatis amisso ab errore vitae suae resipiscere compellantur.
Labb. 13. 303. Bened. I. 47, 52. Domum in qua fuerit inventus haereticus dirui,
et fundnm confiscari. Alex. 20. 667. Haeretici exhumentur et eorairi cadavera
eive ossa publice comburantur. Labb. 14. 160. Alex. 2. 679.
2 Ne laid libros veteris aut novi testament! permittantur. Ne sacros libros in
linguam vulgarem translates habeant, arctissime prohibet Synodus. Labb. 13.
1239. Alex. 20. 668. Mez. 2. 810. Aucun laique n'aura chez lui les livres de
1'ancien et du noveau Testament. Velly, 4. 133.
3 Eos qui religiositatis speciem simulantes, tanquam hasreticos ab ecclesia Dei
pellimus, et damnamus, et per potestates exteras coerced praecipimus. Defeiisores
quoque ipsorum ejusdem damnationis vinculo innodamus. Bin. 8. 596.
PERSECUTING COUNCILS. ' 251
Gascouy, Albi, and Tolosa : and the sentence extended to all
their protectors, who admitted those sons of error into their
houses or lands, or to any kind of traffic or commerce. Their
possessions were' consigned to confiscation and themselves to
slavery ; while any who had made a treaty or contract with
them, were acquitted of their engagement. 1 Crusaders were
armed against these adherents of heresy ; and the holy war-
riors were encouraged in the work of extermination and death
by indulgences and the assurance of eternal felicity. But no
oblation was to be offered for the souls of the heretics, and
their dead were refused Christian burial on consecrated
ground.
The fourth general council of the Lateran, in 1:245 , surpas-
sed all its predecessors in severity. These persecuting con-
ventions seem to have risen above each other by a regular
gradation of inhumanity. The third excelled the second on
the scale of cruelty ; and both again were exceeded by the
fourth, which indeed seems to have brought the system of
persecution to perfection. This infallible assembly pronounced
excommunication, anathemas, and condemnation against all
heretics of every denomination, with their protectors ; and
consigned all such to the secular arm for due punishment. 2
The property of these sons of apostacy, if laymen, was, accor-
ding to the holy fathers, to be confiscated, and, if clergymen,
to be conferred on the church. The suspected, unless they
proved their innocence, were to be accounted guilty, and
avoided by all till they afforded condign satisfaction. Kings
were to be solicited, and, if necessary, compelled by ecclesias-
tical censures, to exterminate all heretics from their dominions.
The sovereign, who should refuse, was to be excommunicated
by the metropolitan and suffragans : and, if he should prove
refractory for a year, the Roman pontiff", the vicar-general of
God, was empowered to transfer his kingdom to some cham-
pion of Catholicism and absolve his vassals from their fealty.
The populace were encouraged to engage in crusading
expeditions for the extinction of heterodoxy. The ad-
venturers in these holy wars enjoyed the same indulgences
and the same honours as the soldiery that marched to
1 Eos et defensores eonim et receptores anathemati decernimus. snbjacere. Sub
anathemate prohibemus, ne quis eos in domibus, vel in terra sua tenere vel fovere,
vel negotiationem cum eis exercere prsesumat. Confiscentur eorum bona et Ube-
rum sit principibns hujusmodi homines subjicere servituti. Labb. 13. 430. Bin
8.662. ,
2 Excommunicatnus et anathematizamus omnem haeresim, condemnantes univer-
ses basreticos, quibuscumque nominibus censeantur. Labb. 13. 934. Synodus
hsreticos omnes diris devovit, et damnatos, ssecularibus potestatibus tradi jussit,
animadversione debita puniendos. Alex. 20. 312. Bray. 3. 148. Gibert, 1. 16.
252 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
the Holy Land. The prelacy were enjoined to bind the
people of their vicinity by oath to inform, if they knew any
guilty or suspected of heresy. Any, who should refuse to
swear, were to be considered as guilty : and the bishops, if
remiss in the execution of their task, were threatened with
canonical vengeance.
The general council of Constance, in 1418, sanctioned the
canons of the Lateran. The holy and infallible assembly, in its
forty-fifth session, presented a shocking scene of blasphemy and
barbarity. Pope Martin, presiding in the sacred synod and
clothed with all its authority, addressed the bishops and inquisi-
tors of heretical perversity, on whom he bestowed his apos-
tolic benediction. The eradication of error and the establish-
ment of Catholicism, Martin represented as the chief care of
himself and the council. His infallibility, in his pontifical
politeness, characterized Wickliff, Huss, and Jerome, as pestilent
and deceitful heresiarchs, who, excited with truculent rage,
infested the Christian fold, and, in his supremacy's beautiful
style, made the sheep putrify with the filth of falsehood. The
partizans of heresy through Bohemia, Moravia, and other king-
doms, his holiness described as actuated with the pride of Luci-
fer, the fury of wolves, and the deceitfulness of demons. The
pontiff, then, supported by the council, proceeded, for the glory
of God, the stability of Romanism, and the preservation of
Christianity, to excommunicate these advocates of error, with
their pestilent matrons and protectors, and to consign them to
the secular arm and the severest vengeance. He commanded
Icings to punish them according to the Lateran council. The
above mentioned inhuman enactments of the Lateran, therefore,
were to be brought into requisition against the Bohemians and
Moravians. These, according to the holy synod, were to be
despoiled of all property, Christian burial, and the consolations
of humanity. 1
The general council of Sienna, in 1423, which was afterward
continued at Basil, published persecuting enactments of a simi-
lar kind. The holy synod assembled in the Holy Ghost, and
representing the universal church, acknowledged the spread of
heresy in different parts of the world through the remissness of
the inquisitors, and to the offence of God, the injury of Catho-
licism, and the perdition of souls. The sacred convention then
1 Haeresiarchae, Luciferina superbia et rabie lupina evecti, daemonum fraudibus
illusi. Oves Christ! Catholicas haeresiarchse ipsi successive infecerunt, et in ster-
core mendaciorum fecerunt putrescere. Credentes et adhaerentes eisdem, tan-
quam haereticos indicetis et velut haereticos secular! Curiae relinquatis. Bin. 8.
1120. Secundum tenorem Lateranensis Concilii expellant, nee eosdem domiciliri
tenere, contractus inire, negotiationes exercere, aut humanitatis solatia cum Christi
tideiibua habere pennittant. Bin. 8. 1121. Crab. 2. 1166.
PERSECUTING COUNCILS. 253
commanded the inquisitors, in every place, to extirpate every
heresy, especially those of Wickliff, Huss, and Jerome. Princes
were admonished by the mercy of God to exterminate error,
if they would escape divine vengeance. The holy fathers and
the viceroy of heaven conspired, in this manner, to sanction
murder in the name of the God of mercy : and granted plenary
indulgences to all who should banish those sons of heterodoxy
or provide arms for their destruction. 3 These enactments were
published every Sabbath, while the bells were rung and the
candles lighted and extinguished.
The fifth general council of the Lateran, in 1514, enacted
laws, marked, if possible, with augmented barbarity. Dissem-
bling Christians of every kind and nation, heretics polluted wij *
any contamination of error were, by this infallible gang of
ruffians, dismissed from the assembly of the faithful, and con-
signed to the inquisition, that the convicted might undergo due
punishment, and the relapsed suffer without any hope of
pardon. 2
The general council of Trent was the last of these infallible
conventions that sanctioned persecutions. This assembly, in
its second session, ' enjoined the extermination of heretics by
the sword, the fire, the rope, and all other means, when it
could be done with safety.' The sacred synod again, in the
last session, admonished ' all princes to exert their influence to
prevent the abettors of heresy from misinterpreting or violating
the ecclesiastical decrees, and to oblige these objectors, as well
as all their other subjects, to accept and to observe the synodal
canons with devotion and fidelity.' This was clearly an
appeal to the secular arm, for the purpose of forcing acquies-
cence and submission. The natural consequence of such
compulsion was persecution. The holy fathers, having, in this
laudable manner, taught temporal sovereigns their duty, con-
cluded with a discharge of their spiritual artillery v and
pronounced an 'anathema on all heretics.' 3 The unerring
1 Volens haec sancta synodus remedium adhibere, statuit et mandat omnibus et
sinjplis inquisitoribus haereticae pravitatis, ut solicite intendant inquisitioni et
extirpation! bacterium quarumcumque. Omnes Christianas religionis principes ac
dominos tarn ecclesiasticos quam saeculares hortatur, invitat, et monet per viscera
misericordiae Dei, ad extirpationem tanti per ecclesiam praedamnati erroris omni
celeritate, si Divinam ultionem et poenas juris evitare voluerunt. Labb. 17. 97,
98. Bray. 4. 72.
2 Omnes ficti Christiani, ac de fide male sentientes, cujuscumque generis aut
nationis faerint, necnon haeretici seu aliqua haeresis labe polluti, a Ohristi fidelium
coetu penitns eliminentur, et quocnmque loco expellantur, ac debita animadver-
sione puniantur, statuimus. Crabb. 3, 646. Bin. 2. 112. Labb. 19. 844.
3 On devoit les destruire par le fer, le feu, la erode, ou tout autre moyen. Paolo,
IV. p. 604.
Ut principes omnes, quot facit in 'domino moneat ad operam suam ita praestan-
dam, ut qua? ab ea decceta. aunt, ab haereticis depravari aut violari non permittant;
252 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
the Holy Land. The prelacy were enjoined to bind tho
people of their vicinity by oath to inform, if they knew anv
guilty or suspected of heresy. Any, who should refuse to
swear, were to be considered as guilty : and the bishops, if
remiss in the execution of their task, were threatened with
canonical vengeance.
The general council of Constance, in 141S, sanctioned the
canons of the Lateran. The holy and infallible assembly, in its
forty-fifth session, presented a shocking scene of blasphemy and
barbarity. Pope Martin, presiding in the sacred synod and
clothed with all its authority, addressed the bishops and inquisi-
tors of heretical perversity, on whom he bestowed his apos-
tolic benediction. The eradication of error and the establish-
ment of Catholicism, Martin represented as the chief care of
himself and the council. His infallibility, in his pontificnl
politeness, characterized Wickliff, Huss, and Jerome, as pestilciu
and deceitful heresiarchs, who, excited with truculent rage,
infested the Christian fold, and, in his supremacy's beautiful
style, made the sheep putriiy with the filth of falsehood. The
partizans of heresy through Bohemia, Moravia, and other king-
doms, his holiness described as actuated with the pride of Luci-
fer, the any of wolves, and the clcceitfulness of demons. Th<
pontiff', then, supported by the council, proceeded, for the glory
of God, the stability of Romanism, and the preservation of
Christianitv, to excommunicate these advocates of error, wit);
their pestilent natrons and protectors, and to consign them to
the secular arm and the severest vengeance. He commanded
kings to punish them nccording to the Lateran council. Tlu-
above mentioned inhuman enactments of the Lateran. therefore,
were to be brought into requisition against the Bohemians and
Moravians. These, according to the holy synod, were to br
despoiled of all property, Christian burial, and the consolations
of humanity. 1
The general council of Sienna, in 1423, which was afterward
continued at Basil, published persecuting enactments of a simi-
lar kind. The holy synod assembled in the Holy Ghost, and
representing the universal church, acknowledged the sprend of
heresy in different parts of the world through the remissness of
the inquisitors, and to the offence of God, the injury of Catho-
licism, and the perdition of souls. The sacred convention then
1 Haeresiarch.-r, Lueiferina superbia et rabie lupina evecti, d:rmonuin fraudibm
illnsi. Oves Chrisli Calliolicas haeresiarchiu ipsi successive iiifecernnt, et in stei'-
cnre niendaciorum fecenmt putrescere. Crcdontcs et adhacrcntes eisdem, tar.-
qviam haiTfticos indiceti? et velut hnereticos seculan Curiae reliiiqnatis. Bin. 3-
1120. Secmidum teiioreoi Lateranensis Concilii expellarit, nee eosdern domieiii:i
Tenere. cuntractus inire. negotiiitiones exevcere, nut Immaviitatis solatia cum Chrif"' ; :
videlibus habe.re permittant. 13iu. 8. 1121. Crab. 2. 116G.
PERSECUTING COUNCILS. tiOo
commanded the inquisitors, in every place, to extirpate every
heresy, especially those of WicklifF, Huss, and Jerome. Princes
were admonished by the mercy of God to exterminate error,
if they would escape divine vengeance. The holy fathers and
the viceroy of heaven conspired, in this manner, to sanction
murder in the name of the God of mercy : and granted plenary
indulgences to all who should banish those sons of heterodoxy
or provide arms for their destruction. 1 These enactments were
published every Sabbath, while the bells were rung and the
candles lighted and extinguished.
The firth general council of the Lateran, in 1514, enacted
laws, marked, if possible, with augmented barbarity. Dissem-
bling Christians of every kind and nation, heretics polluted witfe
r i i r iri i $&>-'
any contamination of error were, by this mianible gang or
ruffians, dismissed from the assembly of the faithful, and con-
signed to the inquisition, that the convicted might undergo due
punishment, and the relapsed suffer without any hope of
pardon. 2
The general council of Trent was the last of these infallible
conventions that sanctioned persecutions. This assembly, in
its second session, 'enjoined the extermination of heretics by
the sword, the fire, the rope, and all other means, when il
could be done with safety.' The sacred synod again, in the
last session, admonished ' all princes to exert their influence to
prevent the abettors of heresy from misinterpreting or violating
the ecclesiastical decrees, and to oblige these objectors, as well
as all their other subjects, to accept and to observe the synodal
canons with devotion and fidelity.' This was clearly an
appeal to the secular arm, for the purpose of forcing acquies-
cence and submission. The natural consequence of sucli
compulsion was persecution. The holy fathers, having, in this
laudable manner, taught temporal sovereigns their duty, con-
cluded with a discharge of their spiritual artillery, and
pronounced an 'anathema on all heretics.' 3 The unerring
! Volens haec sancta synodus remedium adhibere, statuit et mandat omnibus et
singulis inquisitoribus haereticie pravitatis, ut solicite intenclant inquisition! et
extirpation! haeresium quarumcumque. Omnes Christianae religionis principes ac
ilominos tarn ecclesiasticos quam saeculares hortatur, iuvitat, et monet per viscera
misericordiae Dei, ad extirpationem tanti per ecclesiam praedamuati erroris omni
celeritate, si Divinam ultionern et poenas juris evitare voluerunt. Labb. 17. 97,
98. Bray. 4. 72.
Omnes iicti Christian!, ac de fide male sentientes, cujuscumque generis aut
natiouis fuerint, necnon haeretici seu aliqua haeresis iabe polluti, a Christ! fidelium
coetu peuitus eliminentnr, et quocnmque loco expellantur, ac debita animadver-
sioue puniaiitur, statuimns. Crabb. 3, 646. Bin. 2. 112. Labb. 1,9. 814.
3 On devoit lea destruire par le fer, le feu. la erode, ou tout autre moyen. Paolo.
IV. p. 604. F
Ut principes omnes, qnot facit in domino moneat ad operam suam ita praestan-
dani, ut quaj ab a* decreta sunt, ab baereticis depravari aut violari uou permittant ;
254 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
council, actuated according to their own account, by the Holy
Ghost, terminated their protracted deliberations, not with
blessing mankind, but with cursing all who should claim
religious liberty, assert the rights of conscience, or presume to
differ from the absurdity of their synodal decisions.
The principle of persecution, therefore, being sanctioned,
not only by theologians, popes, and provincial synods, but also
by general councils, is a necessary and integral part of
Romanism. The Romish communion has, by its representa-
tives, declared its right to compel men to renounce heterodoxy
and embrace Catholicism, and to consign the obstinate to the
civil power to be banished, tortured, or killed.
The modern pretenders to liberality in the Popish commu-
nion have, in general, endeavoured to solve this difficulty by
dividing the work of persecution between the civil and ecclesi-
astical powers. This was the solution of Grotty, Slevin, and
Higgins at the Maynooth examination. 1 The canons of the
Lateran, these doctors pretend, were the acts of both church
and state. These councils were conventions of princes as
well as of priests, of kings as well as of clergy. Their enact-
ments therefore were authorized by the temporal as well as by
the spiritual authority.
But the laity never voted in councils. The prelacy, accord-
ingly, Grotty admits, had the sole right of suffrage, and these
canons, in all their barbarity, were suggested by the episco-
pacy, by whom they were recommended to princes and kings.
The clergy even urged the laity to these deeds of carnage by
interdicts and excommunication.
The solution, even on the supposition of concurrence or
collusion between the church and state, is a beautiful specimen
of Shandean dialectics. Tristram invented a plan of evading
sin by a division similar to the logic of Grotty, Slevin, and
Higgins. The process was simple and easy. Two ladies
'between them contrived to repeat a word, the pronunciation of
which by one would have entrenched a little on politeness and
morality. Each lady, therefore, rehearsed only half of the
obnoxious term, and, of course, preserved a clear conscience
and committed no offence against propriety or purity. Our
learned Popish doctors, in like manner, and by equally con-
clusive reasoning, have, by a similar participation, been
enabled to transubstantiate sin into duty, and excuse murder
and massacre.
The authority of the Lateran, Constantian, and Siennan
ed ab Ms et omnibus devote recipiantur et fideliter observantur. Labb. 20. 195
Anathema curie tis haereticis. Besp. Anathema, Anathema, Labb. 20. 197.
Crotty, 82, 87. Slevin, 241. Higgins, 269.
CRUSADE AGAINST THE ALBIGENSES. 255
canons may be shown in another way. Popish Christendom,
.without a single murmur of opposition, acquiesced in these
decisions, and in their accomplishment in the massacre of the
Albigenses. None, among either the clergy or laity, remon-
strated or reclaimed. But a Papal bull, received by open or
tacit assent and by a majority of the Popish clergy, forms a
dogma of faith. This, at Maynooth, was, in the clearest lan-
guage, stated by Grotty, Brown, and Higgins. 1 Many pontiffs,
such as Urban, Innocent, Clement, and Honorius, issued such
decretals of persecution. These, without the objection of a
soEtary clergyman or layman, were approved and executed
without justice or mercy on the adherents of heresy. These
principles, therefore, obtained the sanction of the whole Romish
church, and have been marked with the sign manual of infalli-
bility.
All the Popish beneficed clergy through Christendom pro-
fess, on oath, to receive these persecuting canons and councils.
They swear on the holy evangelists and in the most solemn
manner, ' to hold and teach all that the sacred canons and
general councils have delivered, defined, and declared.' 2 The
rejection of these enactments would amount to a violation of
this obligation. Any person, who should infringe or contra-
dict this declaration, will, and commandment, incurs, according
to the bull of Pius the Fourth, the indignation of Almighty God
and the blessed apostles Peter and Paul.
The legislation of kings, pontiffs, and councils was no idle
speculation or untried theory. The regal, papal, and synodal
enactments were called into active operation : and their prae- v
tical accomplishment had been written in characters of blood *
in the annals of the papacy and the inquisition.
Pope Innocent first sent a missionary expedition against the
Albigenses. His holiness, for this purpose, commissioned:
Rainer, Guy, Arnold, Guido, Osma, Castelnau, Rodolf, and
Dominic. These, in the execution of their mission, preached
Popery and wrought miracles. Dominic, in particular, though
distinguished for cruelty, excelled in the manufacture of these
1 lying wonders.' But the miracles and sermons, or rather the
imposition and balderdash, of these apostles of superstition and
barbarity, excited only the derision and scorn of these 'sons of
heresy and error.' The obdurate people, says Benedict,
' shewed no desire for conversion ; but, on the contrary, treated
their instructors with contempt and reproach.' 'An infinite
1 Grotty, 78. Brown, 154. Higgins, 274.
2 Omnia a sacris canonibus et cecumenicis conciliis tradita, definita, et declarata,
indubitanter recipio atque profiteer. Ego idem spondee, voveo, ac joro. Sic me
Deus adjuvet. Labb. 20. 222.
256 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
number,' says Nangis, 'obstinately adhered to their error.'
According to Mariana, ' The Albigenses increased every day
and, in their stupidity, rejoiced in their own blindness.' The
gospel of Castelnau, Rainer, and Arnold, Velly grants, ' met
with no attention ;' and, therefore, according to Giannon's
admission, ' made no impression.' 1
His infallibility, Pope Innocent the Third, finding the ineffi-
ciency of his gospel as preached by Dominic, proclaimed, by
his bulls, a crusade against the Albigenses. Supported by
divine aid, his holiness, in the name of the Lord of Hosts,
granted all who should march against the Albigensian pestilence,
the pardon of sin, the glory of martyrdom, and the possession
of heaven. The pontiff, by special favour and indulgence, gave
the hero of the cross, if he fell in battle, an immediate passport,
by a short way, to heaven, without ever touching on purgatory. 2
These rewards assembled half a million of HOLY WARRIORS,
composed of bishops, soldiers, canons, and people, from Italy,
France, and Germany, ready to riot in blood for the honour of
God, the good of society, the defence of Romanism, and the
extinction of heresy.
This army was led by the Earl of Montfort, whom ambition
and hypocrisy marked for the hero of a holy war. The arch-
bishop of Narbonne, at an early period, painted Montfort's
ambition, stratagems, malice, violence, and duplicity. But the
contemporary historians ascribed his exploits to zeal and piety ;
while Raymond, Count of Thoulouse, who was Montfbrt's rival,
and protector of the Albigenses, was, on the contrary, charac-
terized as a member of the Devil, the son of perdition, the
eldest born of Satan, the enemy of the cross, the defender of
heresy, and the oppressor of Catholicism. 3
This holy war, during its campaigns, exhibited a great diver-
sity of battles and sieges. The storming of Beziers and Lavaur
will supply a specimen of the spirit and achievements of the
crusading army.
The city of Beziers was taken by storm in 1209, and the
1 Les deux legats travaillerent quelque annees avec beaucoup de zele, et peu
de fruit. Sans qu'il parut que lea heretiques fussent touchez d'aucun desir de
conversion. Benedict, 1, 51, 52. Mariana, 2, 686. Alii, quorum infinitus erat
numerus, suo pertinaciter inbaerebant errori. Nangis, Ann. 1007. Dachery, 3.
22. Tous les trois se mirent a faire des sermons, qui ne furent point ecoutes.
Velly, 3, 436. Giannon, XV. 4.
2 Nos per indulgentias innovatas Crucesignatos et fideles alios excitamus, at ad
extirpandam pestem hanc, Divinb freti auxilio, procedant in nomine Domini Sab-
eaoth. Alex. 20. 307. Velly, 3, 439. Thaan. VI. 16. Benedici, 1. 79.
Innocentius III. sacram adversus baereticos militiam indixit. Alex. 20. 290.
3 L'archeveque de Narbonne depeint les demarches, les men6es, les violences,
1'ambition, et la malice de ce general de la croisade. Velly, 3, 444. Vrai mem
bre du diable, fils de perdition, fils aine de Satan, ennemi de la croix. Velly, 3
437. Mariana, 2. 687.
MASSACRES OF THE ALBIGENSES. 257
citizens put to the sword without distinction of condition, age,
sex, or even religion. When the Crusaders and Albigenses
were so mixed that they could not be discriminated, Arnold,
the Papal missionary, commanded the soldiery to ' kill all and
God would know his own.' 1 Seven hundred were slain in the
church. -Daniel reckons the killed at thirty thousand. Meze-
ray and Velly as well as some of the original historians, estimate
the number who were massacred at sixty thousand. The blood
of the human victims, who fled to the churches for safety and
were murdered by the HOLY WARRIORS, drenched the altars,
and flowed in crimson torrents through the streets.
Lavaur was taken by storm in 1211. Aimeric the governor
was hanged on a gibbet, and Girarda his lady was thrown into
a well and overwhelmed with stones. Eighty gentlemen, who
had been made prisoners, were slaughtered like sheep in cold
blood. All the citizens were mangled without discrimination
in promiscuous carnage. Four hundred were burned alive, to
the extreme delight of the crusaders. 2 One shudders, says
Velly in his history of these transactions, while he relates such
horrors.
Languedoc, a country flourishing and cultivated, was wasted
by these desolators. Its plains became a desert ; while its cities
were burned and its inhabitants swept away with fire and
sword. An hundred thousand Albigenses fell, it is said, in
one day : and their bodies were heaped together and burned.
Detachments of soldiery were, for three months, despatched in
every direction to demolish houses, destroy vineyards, and ruin
the hopes of the husbandman. The females were defiled. The
march of the HOLY WARRIORS was marked by the flames of
burning houses, the screams of violated women, and the groans
of murdered men. 3 The war, with all its sanguinary accom-
paniments, lasted twenty years, and the Albigenses, during
this time, were not the only sufferers. Three hundred thou-
sand crusaders fell on the plains of Languedoc, and fattened
the soil with their blood.
1 Tuez les tons, Dieu connoit ceux qui sont a lui. Soixante mille habitant?
passerent par le fil de 1'epee. Velly, 3. 441. II y fiat tue plus de soixante mille
persunnes. Mezeray, 2. 619. Promiscua caedes civium facta eat. Thuan. 1. 222.
Urba capta, casdes promiscue facta. Alex. 20. 291. Benedict, 1. 104. Daniel,
3.518. Nangis, Ann, 1209. Dachery, 3. 23
2 Quatre-vingt gentils homines prisonniers fureut egorges de sang froid. Quatre
cents heretiques furent brul6s vifs avec vine joye extreme de la part des cruises.
Velly, 3. 454. Benedict. 1. 163. Daniel. 3. 527. Alex. 20. 292. Nangis, Ann.
1210.
3 En violant filles et femmes. Bray. 3. 141. En nn seal jour, on egorgea cent
mille de ces heretiques. Brays, 3. 139. Daniel, 3. 511. Velly, 4. 121, 135.
On promit indulgence et absolution pleniere a ceux qui tueroient des Vaudois.
Moren, 8. 48.
17
258 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY :
All this barbarity was perpetrated in the name of religion 1
The carnage was celebrated as the triumph of the church, the
honour of the Papacy, and the glory of Catholicism. The
pope proclaimed the HOLY WAR in the name of the Lord. The
army of the cross exulted in the massacre of Lavaur, and the
clergy sung a hymn to the Creator for the glorious victory. 1
The assassins thanked the God of mercy for the work of de-
struction and bloodshed. The soldiery, in the morning, at-
tended high mass, and then proceeded, during the day, to
waste the country and murder its population. The assassina-
tion of sixty thousand citizens of Beziers was accounted, says
Mariana, 'the visible judgment of heaven.' According to
Benedict, ' the heresy of Albigensianism drew down the
wrath of God on the country of Languedoc.'
The Crusaders were accompanied with another engine of
horror and inhumanity. This was no less than the INFERNAL
INQUISITION. The inventor of this inquisition, according to
Benedict, was Dominic, who was also the first Inquisitor Gene-
ral. This historian, indeed, seems doubtful whether the be-
nevolent and Christian idea suggested itself first to Dominic or
to Innocent, to the saint or to the pontiff. But Dominic first
mentioned it to Arnold. The saint also established, as agents
of this tribunal, a confraternity of knights whom he called the
MILITIA OF jEsus. 2 These demons of destruction, these fiends
of blood, the blasphemer had the effrontery to represent as the
warriors of the Captain of Salvation. Gregory the Ninth, in
more appropriate language, styled the knights the MILITIA OF
DOMINIC. These, in Italy, were called the knights of the inqui-
sition, and in Spain the familiars of the holy office.
Benedict is quite out of temper with some historians, who
would rob Dominic of the glory of being the first inquisitor, and
who bestow that honour on Rodolf, Castelnau, and Arnold.
The invention of the holy office, and the title of Inquisitor-
general, in this author's opinion, crowns his hero with immortal
renown. 3 The historian of Waldensianism therefore, has eter-
nalized his patron's name, by combining it with an institution
erected for human destruction, associated with scenes of blood,
and calculated to awaken horror in every mind which retains
a single sentiment of humanity.
Dominic, it must be granted, was well qualified for his office.
He possessed all that impregnable cruelty, which enabled his
mind to soar above every feeling of compassion, and to extract
1 Le clerge chantoit avec beaucoup de devotion 1'hymne Veni Creator. Velly
3. 454, 121. Alex. 20. 307. Mariana, 2. 687. Benedict, 2. 139.
3 II norama les Freres de la Milice de Jesus. Bened. 2. 131.
3 Bened. 2. 131. Giannon, XXXII. 5.
CRUELTIES OF THE INQUISITION. 259.
pleasure from scenes of torture and misery. The torments of
men or, at least, of heretics were his enjoyment. The saint, in
satanic and unsated malignity, enjoyed the spectacle of his
victim's bleeding veins, dislocated joints, torn nerves, and
lacerated limbs, quivering and convulsed with agony.
Proofs of his inhumanity appeared, in many instances, in the
noly war and in the holy office, During the crusade against
the Albigenses, though a pretended missionary, he encour-
aged the holy warriors of the cross in the work of massacre
and murder. He marched at the head of the army with a
crucifix in his hand ; and animated the soldiery to deeds of
death and destruction. 1 This was the way of disseminating
Dominic's gospel. The cross which should be the emblem of
peace and mercy, became, in perverted application, the signal
of war and bloodshed ; and the professed apostle of Christianity
preached salvation by the sword and the inquisition.
The holy office as well as the holy war showed Dominic's
cruelty. The inquisition, indeed, during his superintendence,
had no legal tribunal ; and the engines of torment were not
brought to the perfection exhibited in modern days of Spanish
inquisitorial glory. But Dominic, notwithstanding, could, even
with this bungling machinery and without a chartered estab-
lishment, gratify his feelings of benevolence in all their refine-
ment and delicacy. Dislocating the joints of the refractory
Albigensian, as practised in the Tolosan Inquisition, afforded
the saint a classical and Christian amusement. This kind opera-
tion, he performed by * suspending his victim by a cord, affixed
to his arms that were brought behind his back, which, being
raised by a wheel, lifted off the ground the suspected Walden-
sian, man or woman, who refused to confess ' till forced by the
violence of torture.' 2 Innocent commissioned Dominic to pun-
ish, not only by confiscation and banishment, but also with
death; and, in the execution of his task, he stimulated the
magistracy and populace to massacre the harmless professors
of Waldensianism. * His saintship, by words and MIRACLES,
convicted a hundred and eighty Albigenses, who were at one
time committed to the flames.' 3
Such was the man or monster, who, to the present day, is 3.
full-length saint in the Roman Calendar. The miscreant is an
1 Dominique animoit les soldats, le Crucifix a la main Dominique marchoit a
la tete de 1'armee, avec un crucifix a la main. Bened. 1. 248, 249. Les Catholi-
ques animes par les exhortations de S. Dominique. Marian. 2. 689.
^In chorda levatus aliquantulum. Negans se quicquam de haeresi confessunj
nisi per violeritiam tormeutorum. Limborch, IV. 29.
- 3 Fuerunt aliquando simul exnsti CLXXX haeretici Albigenses, cum an tea e'
verbis et miraculis eos S. Dominiciis convicisset. Bell, de Laic. III. 22. Velly
3: 435 Giannon, XV. 4.
17* *
260 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY '.
object of worship in the popish communion. The Roman bre-
viary lauds-' his merits and doctrines which enlightened the
church, his ingenuity and virtue which overthrew the Tolosan
heretics, and his many miracles which extended even to the
raising of the dead.' The Roman missal, having eulogized his
merits, prays for ' temporal aid through his intercession.' 1 The
holy infallible church, in this manner, perfers adoration to the
canonized Dominic, who was the first Inquisitor-General, and
one of the greatest ruffians that ever disgraced humanity.
The inquisition was first established in Languedoc. The
council of Thoulouse, in 1229, appointed a priest and three
laj'men to search for the partizans of heresy. The synod of
Alby, in 1254, commissioned a clergyman and a layman to
engage in the same odious task : and this commencement con-
stituted this infernal institution in its infancy. The tribunal
afterward received various alterations and fresh accessions of
power, till, at length, it was authorized in Spain, Portugal, and
Goa to try the suspected, not only for heresy, but also for
blasphemy, magic, sorcery, witchcraft, infidelity, and Judaism,
and to punish the convicted with infamy, imprisonment, galley-
wlavery, banishment, outlawry, confiscation of property, and
consignment to the flames in an ACT of FAITH. 2
The holy office admitted all kinds of evidence. Suspicion
alone would subject its object to a long course of imprisonment
in a dungeon, far from all intercourse with friends or society.
A malefactor or a child was allowed to be a witness. A son
might depose against his father, or a wife against her husband.
The accuser and the accusation were equally unknown to the
accused, who was urged by the most treacherous means to dis-
cover on himself. His feelings, in the mean time, were horrified
by a vast apparatus of crosses, imprecations, exorcisms, con-
jurations, and flaming piles of wood, ready to consume "the
guilty. 3
The RACK, in defect of evidence, was applied. The accused,
whether man or woman, was, in defiance of all decency, stripped
naked. The arms, to which a small hard cord was fastened,
were turned behind the back. The cord, by the action of a
pulley, raised the sufferer off his feet and held him suspended
in the air. The victim of barbarity was, several times, let fall,
and raised with a jerk, which dislocated all the joints of his
arms j whilst the cord, by which he was suspended, entered the
1 Deus, qui ecclesiam tuam beati Dominici confessoris tni illuminare dignatus e
mentis et doctrinis, concede ut ejus intercessione, temporalibus non destituatur
auxiliis. Miss. Rom. 463. Brev. Rom. 906.
Labb. 13. 1236. etl4. 153. Velly, 4. 132 Dellon. c. 2. Mariana. 4. 362.
8 Mariana, 4. 362, 363. Moreri, 5. 130. Dellon, c. 13. Giannon, XXXII. 5.
CRUELTIES OF THE INQUISITION. 261
flesh and lacerated the tortured nerves. Heavy weights were
frequently, in this case, appended to the feet, and when the
prisoner was raised from the earth by the arms, strained the
whole frame, and caused a general luxation of the shattered
system. The cord was sometimes twisted round the naked
arm and legs, till it penetrated to the bone through the ruptured
flesh and bleeding veins. 1
This application of the rack, without evidence, caused many
to be tortured who had never committed the sin of heresy. A.
young lady, who was incarcerated in the dungeon of the inqui-
sition at the same time with the celebrated Bohorquia, will
supply an instance of this kind. This victim of inquisitorial
brutality, notwithstanding her admitted attachment to Roman-
ism, endured the rack till all the members of her body were
rent asunder by the infernal machinery of the holy office. An
interval of some days succeeded, till she began, notwithstanding
such inhumanity, to recover. She was then taken back to the
infliction of similar barbarity. Small cords were twisted round
her naked arms, legs, and thighs, till they cut through the flesh
to the bone ; and blood, in copious torrents, streamed from the
lacerated veins. Eight days after, she died of her wounds, and
was translated from the dungeons of the inquisition to the glory
of heaven.
The celebrated Orobio endured the rack for the sin of
Judaism. His description of the transaction is frightful. The
place of execution was a subterranean vault lighted with a dim
lamp. His hands and feet were bound round with cords,
which were drawn by an engine made for the purpose, till they
divided the flesh to the excoriated bone. His hands and feet
swelled, and blood burst, in copious effusion, from his nails as
well as from his wounded limbs. He was then set at liberty,
and left Spain the scene of persecution and misery. 2
The convicted were sentenced to an ACT of FAITH. The
ecclesiastical authority transferred the condemned to the secular
arm, and the clergy in the mean time, in mockery of mercy,
supplicated the magistracy in a hypocritical prayer, to shew com-
passion to the intended victim of barbarity. But the magistracy,
who, through pity, should have deferred the execution, would
by the relentless clergy, have been compelled by excommuni-
cation to proceed in the work of death. The heretic, dressed
in a yellow coat variegated with pictures of dogs, serpents,
flames, and devils, was then led to the place of execution, tied
to the stake, and committed, amid the joyful acclamations of
the populace, to the flames. Such has been the death of
1 Limborcb, iv. 29. s Moreri, 6. 7. Limborch, 323.
262 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
myriads. Torquemada, on being made Inquisitor-general,
burned alive, to signalize his promotion to the holy office, no
less than two thousand of these ' sons of heresy.' 1
The inquisition, in all its horrors, was founded and fostered
by the whole Romish church or popish hierarchy. Several
popish kingdoms indeed deprecated and expelled this enemy
of religion and man. The only places in which this tribunal,
prior to the reformation, obtained a permanent establishment,
were Languedoc, and in modern times Spain, Portugal, and
Goa. The holy office, with all its apparatus of inquisitors,
qualificators, families, jailors, dungeons, racks, and other
engines of torture, was driven, with indignation and ignominy,
out of the Netherlands, Hungary, France, Germany, Poland,
and even Italy. The Neapolitans and Romans expelled the
inhuman nuisance with determined resolution. Spain itself,
notwithstanding its red-hot persecutions, witnessed a scene of
a similar kind. The citizens of Cordova, on one occasion,
rose in insurrection against this infernal tribunal, stormed the
palace of the inquisition, pillaged its apartments, and im-
prisoned the jailor. 2
All this opposition, however, was the work, not of the priest-
hood, but of the people. The populace dreaded its horrors,
deprecated its cruelty, and therefore prevented its establish-
ment. The clergy, on the contrary, have, with all their
influence, encouraged the institution in all its inhumanity. The
pope and the prelacy, who, in the Romish system, are the
ihu~ch and possess infallibility, have, with the utmost unan-
iiiJty, declared in favor of the holy office. No Roman pontiff
or popish council has ever condemned this foul blot on pre-
tended Catholicism, this gross insult on reason and man.
The inquisition, beyond all other institutions that ever
appeared in the world, evidences the deepest malignancy of
human nature. Nothing, in all the annals of time, ever exhib-
ited so appalling and hateful a view of fallen and degenerate
man, demoralized to the lowest ebb of perversity by Romanism
and the popedom. No tribunal, equally regardless of justice
and humanity, ever raised its frightful form in all the dominions
of Heathenism or Mahometanism, Judaism or Christianity.
The misanthropist, in the contemplation of the holy office,
may find continual and unfailing fuel for his malevolence. He
may see, in its victim, the wretchedest sufferer that ever
drained the cup of misery ; and in the inquisitor, the hatefullest
1 On le faisoit publiquement bruler vive. Mariana, 4. 362, 365. Dellon. c. 28.
Mbreri, 5. 130.
2 Mariana, 5. 535, 572. Giannon, XXXII. 5. Thuan. 1. 788. Paolo. 1. 444. at
2. 57, 566.
PERSECUTING ROMISH DOCTORS AND POPES. 263
object, Satan not exempted, that ever defiled or disgraced the
creation of God. No person, in a future world, would own an
inquisitor, who dies in the spirit of his profession, but the devil,
and no place would receive him but hell.
Such is a faint view of the persecutions which distracted
Christendom, from the accession of Constantino till the era of
the Reformation. The third period occupies the time which
intervened between the Reformation and the present day. This
long series of years displays great variety. Its commencement
was marked by persecution, which was afterwards repressed
by the diffusion of letters, the light of Revelation, and the
influence of Protestantism.
The- popish clergy and kings wielded the civil and ecclesias-
tical power against the Reformation, during its rise and pro-
gress. The whole Romish hierarchy, through the agency of
theologians, popes, and councils, laboured in the work of perse-
cution. The theologians and historians, who have prostituted
their pen for the unworthy purpose, have been many. From
this multitude may be selected Benedict, Mariana, Bellarmine,
Bens, the college of Rheims, and the universities of Salamanca
and Valladolid.
Benedict the Dominican, in his history of the Albigenses,
approves of all the inhumanity of the holy office and the holy
wars. The inquisitor and the crusader are the themes of his
unqualified applause. Mariana the Jesuit, in his history of
Spain, has, like Benedict, eulogized persecutions and the inqui-
sition ; though these, he admits, * are innovations on Chris-
tianity.' The historian recommends 'fire and sword, when
mild means are unavailing and useless. A wise severity, in
such cases, is the sovereign remedy.' 1
Bellarmine's statements, as well as those of Dens, on this
subject, are distinguished by their ridiculousness and barbarity.
He urges, in the strongest terms, the eradication of heretics,
when it can be effected with safety. Freedom of faith, in his
system, tends to the injury of the individual and of society ; and
the abettors of heterodoxy therefore are, for the honour of reli-
gion, to be delivered to the secular arm and consigned to the
flames. The cardinal would burn the body for the good of the
soul. The prudent Jesuit, however, would allow even the
advocates of heresy to live, when, owing to their strength and
number, an appeal to arms would be attended with danger to
the friends of orthodoxy. The apostles, he contends, * abstained
from calling in the secular arm only because there were, in their
1 II faut recourir au fer et au feu dans les maux, ,pu les rem&des lents eont itra
tiles. Un sage seyerite est le remede souverain. Mariana, 2. 686.
264 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
day, no Christian princes.' This, in all its horrors, he represents
as the common sentiment of all the patrons of Catholicism. 1
His arguments, in favor of his S3 r stem, are a burlesque on reason
and common sense. Dens, patronized by the Romish clergy in
Ireland, follows Bellarmine. He would punish notorious abet-
tors of heresy with confiscation of property, exile, imprisonment,
death, and deprivation of Christian burial. * Such falsifiers of
the faith and troublers of the community/ says, the precious
Divine, 'justly suffer death in the same manner as those who
counterfeit money and disturb the state.' This, he argues, from
the Divine command to slay the Jewish false prophets, and
from the condemnation of Huss in the council of Constance.
The college of Rheims commended the same remedy,
These doctors, in their annotations, maintain that the good
should tolerate the wicked, when, in consequence of the latter's
strength, punishment would be attended with danger. But
heresy or any other evil, when its destruction could be effected
with safety, should, according to this precious exposition, be
suppressed and its authors exterminated. Such is the instruc-
tion, conveyed in a popular commentary on the gospel of peace
and good will to man. The university of Salamanca followed
" e college of Rheims. The doctors of this seminary, in 1603,
maintained 'the Roman pontiff's right to compel, by arms,
the sons of apostacy and the opponents of Catholicism.' The
theory taught at Salamanca, was also inculcated by the pro-
fessors of Valladolid. 2
These are a few specimens of the popish divines, who have
abetted the extirpation of heresy by violence and the inquisi-
tion. The list might be augmented to almost any extent.
Immense indeed is the number of Romish doctors, who, in the
advocacy of persecution, 'have wearied eloquence and ex-
hausted learning.'
Pontiffs, as well as theologians, have enjoined persecution.
This practical lesson has, for a thousand years, been uniformly
taught in the school of the popedom. The viceroys of heaven
have, for this long succession of ages, acted on the same
satanic system. From these pontifical persecutors, since the
1 Libertas credendi perniciosa est. Libros haereticorum jure interdici et exuri.
Bell. De Laic. III. 18. HUBS asseruit, non licere haereticum incorrigibilem traders
secular! potestati et permittere comburendutn. Contrarium docent omnes Cathol-
ici. Bell. III. 20. Ecclesia, zelo salutis animarum, eos *persequitur. Sunt
proculdubio extirpandi. Bellarmin. 1. 1363.
Haeretici notorii privantur sepulturA ecclesiastic a. Bona eortrm temporalia aunt
ipso jure confiscata. Exilio, carcere, &c. merito afficiuntur. Falsarii pecuniffl
rel alii rempublicam turbantes, justa morte puniuntur : ergo etiam haeretici, qui
mint falsarii fidei et rempublicam graviter perturbant. Dens, 2. 88, 89.
* Rheim. Testam. in Matth. XIII. 29. Mageogh. 3. 595.
PERSECUTION OF PROTESTANTS BY CHARLES V, 265
reformation, may, as a specimen, be selected the names of
Leo, Adrian, Paul, and Pius.
Leo, in a bull issued in 1520, ordered all to shun Luther and
his adherents. His holiness commanded sovereigns to chase
the abettors of Lutheranism out of their dominions. Adrian,
in 1522, deprecated the spread of Lutheranism, and admon-
ished princes and people against the toleration of this abomina-
tion ; and, if mild methods should be unavailing, to employ fire
and faggot. 1
Paul the Fourth distinguished himself by his recommenda-
tion of the 'inquisition for the extermination of heresy. This
tribunal, his infallibility accounted the sheet-anchor of the
papacy, and the chief battery for the overthrow of heresy.
The pontiff reckoned the gospel, with all its divine institutions,
as nothing, compared with the holy office for the defence of the
holy see. Paul was right. The gospel may support the
church, but the inquisition is the proper instrument to protect
Ihe popedom. The inquisition, accordingly, was the darling
theme of his supremacy's thoughts. He conferred additional
authority on the sacred institution, and recommended it to the
cardinals and his successors with his parting breath. 2 When^"
the cold hand of death was pressing on his lips, and the soul
just going to appear before its God, he enjoined the use
of the inquisition, and expired, recommending murder anof )
inhumanity. (
These enactments of doctors and pontiffs were supported by"
the canons of councils. The council of Lyons, in 1527, com-
manded the suffragans to make diligent inquiry after the
disseminators of heresy, and to appeal, when necessary, to the
secular arm. Anno 1528, the council of Sens enjoined oh
princes the extermination of heretics, in imitation of Constan-
tine, Valentinian, and Theodosius. 3
The general council of Trent, in the same manner, patron-
ized persecution. Ciaconia, a Dominican, preached before
this assembly on the parable of the tares. The preacher, on
this occasion, broached the maxim afterward adopted by
Bellarmine and the Rhemish annotators. He urged ' that the
adherents of heresy should be tolerated, when their extermina-
tion would be attended with danger ; but when their extirpation
1 Labb. 19. 1050, 1068. Dn Pin, 3. 170. Se servir de remedes plus violens, et
d'employer le feu. Paolo, 1. 48.
3 n donna toutes sea pensees aux affaires de 1'inqnisition, qu' il disoit etre la
meilleure batterie, qu'on put opposer a 1'heresie, et la principals defense iu Saint
Siege. Paolo, 2. 45, 51. Bruys, 4. 636. Sanctissimum inquisitionis officiuni. quo
uno sacrae sedis auctoritatem niti affinnabat, commendatum haberent. Thuan.
XXIII. 15. Sacrse inquisitionis tribunal! majorem auctoiitatem dedit. Alex. 23. 216
3 Labb. 19. 1127. 1180. Du Pin, 3. 257.
266 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
can oe effected with safety, they should be destroyed by fire
the sword, the gallows, and all other means.' All this,
Ciaconia declared, the sacred synod itself had inculcated in
its second session : and the Dominican's sermon and declaration
were heard in the infallible assembly without objection or con-
tradiction. The sacred synod again, in their last session,
admonished ' all princes to exert their influence to prevent
abettors of heresy from misinterpreting or violating the
ecclesiastical decrees, and to oblige these objectors, as well : as
all their other subjects, to accept and to observe the synodal
canons with devotion and fidelity.' 1 This was clearly an
appeal to the secular arm, for the purpose of forcing acquies-
cence and submission : and the natural consequence of such
compulsion was persecution.
The canon law and the Roman ritual extend the spirit of
persecution even to the dead. The canon law excommunicates
any, who, with his knowledge, bestows Christian burial on
heretics. The Roman ritual, also, published by the command
of Paul the Fifth, and in general use through the popish com-
munion, * refuses sepulchral honours to heretics and schismatics.'
The offender, in this case, to obtain absolution and be freed
from excommunication, must, with his own hands and in a
public manner, raise the interred from the hallowed sepulchre. 2
He must, to be uncursed, unearth the mouldering remains of
the corpse, and violate, by an act of horror, the sanctuary of
the tomb.
The enactments of popes and councils were sanctioned and
enforced by emperors and kings. Charles the Fifth, emperor
of Germany and king of Spain and the Netherlands, persecuted
the friends of the reformation through his extensive dominions.
His majesty in 1521, supported by the electors in the Diet of
Worms, declared it his duty, for the glory of God, the honour
of the papacy, and the dignity of the nation, to protect the
faith and extinguish heresy ; and in consequence proscribed
Luther, his followers, and books, and condemned all, who, in
any manner, should aid or defend the Saxon reformer or read
his works, to the confiscation of their property, the ban of the
empire, and the penalty of high-treason. 3
1 On devoit les detruire par le fer, le feu, la corde, ou tout autre moyen. Paolo,
IV p. 604.
Le concile ensuite exhortait tous les princes a ne_ point souffrir que ses decrets
fussent violez par les heretiques, mais a les obliger aussi bien que tous leurs autres
sujets a les observer. Paolo, 2. 660.
2 Quicunque haereticos scienter prsesumpserint ecclesiasticae tradere sepulturae,
axcomtnunicationis sententiae se noverint subjacere. Nee absolutions beneficium
mereantur, nisi propiis manibus publice extumulent. Sex. Decret. V. 2. p. 550.
Negatur ecclesiastica sepultura hajreticis, et eorum fautoribus, schismaticis. Ritual.
Bom. 167. 3 Paolo, 1. 30. Sleidan, III. Du Pin, 3. 176.
MASSACRES OF THE FRENCH PROTESTANTS. 267
The emperor's edicts against the Lutherans in the Nether-
lands were fraught with still greater severity. Men who
favoured Lutheranism were to be beheaded, and women to be
buried alive, or, if obstinate, to be committed to the flames.
This law, however, was suspended. But inquisitorial and
military executions rioted in the work of death in all its shocking
forms. The duke of Alva boasted of having caused, in six
weeks, the execution of eighteen thousand for the crime of
protestantism. Paolo reckons the number, who, in the Neth-
erlands, were, in a few years, massacred on account of their
religion, at fifty thousand ; while Grotius raises the list of the
Belgic martyrs to a hundred thousand. 1
Charles began the work of persecution in Spain, and with his
latest breath recommended its completion to his son Philip II.
The dying advice of the father was not lost on the son. He
executed the infernal plan in all its barbarity, without shewing
a single symptom of compunction or mercy. His majesty,
on his arrival in Spain, commenced the work of destruction.
He kindled the fires of persecution at Valladolid and Seville,
and consigned the professors of protestantism without discrimi-
nation or pity to the flames. Among the victims of his fury,
on this occasion, were the celebrated Pontius, Gonsalvus,
Vsenia, Viroesia, Cornelia, Bohorquia, jEgidio, Losado, AreUan,
and Arias. Thirty-eight of the Spanish nobility were, in
his presence, bound to the stake and burned. 2 Philip was
a spectator of these shocking scenes, and gratified his royal
and refined taste with these spectacles of horror. The inqui-
sition, since his day, has, by relentless severity, 'succeeded
in banishing protestantism from the peninsula of Spain and
Portugal.
Francis and Henry, the French kings, imitated the example
of Charles and Philip. Francis enacted laws against the French
Protestants ; and ordered the judges, under severe penalties, to
enforce them with rigor. These laws were renewed and new
ones issued by Henry. His most Christian Majesty, in 1549,
entered Paris, made a solemn procession, declared his detesta-
tion of protestantism and attachment to popery, avowed his
resolution to banish the friends of the reformation from his
dominions and to protect Catholicism and the ecclesiastical
hierarchy. He caused many Lutherans to suffer martyrdom in
1 Poena in viros capitis, in foeminas defossionis in terram, sin pertinaces fiierint
exustionis. Thuan. 1. 229. Brand. II. Dans les Pais Bas, le nomi>re de ceux, que
1'on avoit pendus. decapitez, brulez, et enterrez vifs, montat a cinquante mitte
hommes. Paolo, 2. 52. Carnificata hominum non minus centum millia. Grotius,
Annal. 12. Brand. IV. X. Du Pin, 3. 656.
2 Spectante ipso Philippo, XXXVIII ex prseeipua regionis nobilitate palis alligati
ac creraati sunt. Thuan. XXIII. 14. Du Pin, 3. 655.
268 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Paris, and lent his royal assistance in person at the execution. 1
Henry, like Philip, had, on this occasion, an opportunity of
indulging the refinement and delicacy of his taste, in viewing
the expiring struggles of his heretical subjects in the pangs of
dissolution.
Instances of French persecution appeared in the massacres
of Merindol, Orange, and Paris. The massacre of Merindol,
planned by the king of France and the parliament of Aix, was
executed by the president Oppeda. The president was com-
missioned to slay the population, burn the towns, and demolish
the castles of the Waldenses.
Oppeda, thirsting for blood, executed his commission with
infernal barbarity. The appalling butchery has been related
by the popish historians, Gaufridus, Moreri, Paolo, and Thuanus
with precision and impartiality. 2 The president slaughtered
more than three thousand Waldenses, who, from age to age,
have been the object of papal enmity. Man, woman, and child
fell in indiscriminate and relentless carnage. Thousands were
massacred. Twenty-four towns were ruined and the county
left a deserted Waste.
The massacre was so appalling that it excited the horror
even of Gaufridus, the Roman historian of these horrid transac-
tions. The men, women, and children, in general, at the ap-
proach of the hostile army, fled to the adjoining woods and
mountains. Old men and women were mixed with boys and
girls. Many of the weeping mothers carried their infants in
cradles or in their arms ; while the woods and mountains
re-echoed their groans and lamentations. These were pursued
- and immolated by the sword of popish persecution, which
never knew pity.
A few remained in the towns and met a similar destiny.
Sixty men and thirty women surrendered in Capraria, on con-
dition that their lives should be spared : and, notwithstanding
plighted faith, they were taken to a meadow and murdered in
cold blood. Five hundred women were thrown into a barn,
which was then set on fire ; and when any leaped from the
windows, they were received on the points of spears or hal-
berts. The rest were consumed in the flames or suffocated
with the smoke.
The women were subjected to the most brutal insults. Girls
1 Ce Prince fit executer plusieurs Lutheriens a Paris, aux supplices desquels il
voulut assister lui-meme. II vouloit exterminer de tout son royaume les nouveaux
heretiques. Paolo, 1. 484. Thuan. VI. 4. 10.
3 Gaufrid, XII. Moreri, 6. 46. Thuan. VI. 16. Les troupes passerent au fil de
1* epee tous ceux qui n' avoient pu s'enfuir, et etoient restez exposez a la merci
du soldat, sans distinction d' age, de qualite, ni de sexe. On y massacra plus da
4000 personnes. Paolo, 1. 190.
MASSACRES OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW. 269
were snatched from the arms of their mothers, violated and
afterward treated with the most shocking inhumanity. Mothers
saw their children murdered before their face, and were then,
though fainting with grief and horror, violated by the soldiery.
The champions of the faith forced the dying women, whose
offspring had been sacrificed in their presence. Cruelty suc-
ceeded violation. Some were precipitated from high rocks;
while others were put to the sword or dragged naked through
the streets. 1
The massacre was not merely the work of Oppeda and the
soldiery ; but approved by the French king and parliament ;
and afterward by the popedom, and ah 1 , in general, who were
attached to Romanism. Francis and the city of Paris heard
the news of the massacre with joy, and congratulated Oppeda
on the victory. The parliament of Aix also, actuated, like the
French monarch and nobility, with enmity against Waldensian-
ism, approved of the carnage, and felicitated the president on
the triumph.
The rejoicing, on the occasion, was not confined to the
French sovereign and people. The pope and his court exulted.
The satisfaction which was felt at the extirpation of Walden-
sianism was, says Gaufrid, in proportion to the scandal caused
by that heresy in the church, by which the historian means the
popedom. The friends of the papacy, therefore, according to
the same author, ' reckoned the fire and sword well employed,
which extinguished Waldensianism, and forgot nothing that
could immortalize the name of Oppeda. Paul the Fourth
made the president Count Palatine and Knight of Saint John ;
while the partisans of Romanism styled the monster, 'the
defender of the faith, the protector of the faithful, and the hero
of Christianity.' 2
The massacre of Orange, in 1562, was attended with the
same horrors, as that of Merindol. This was perpetrated
against the protestants, as the other had been against the
Waldensians. Its horrifying transactions have been related
with impartiality by the popish historians Varillas, Bruys, and
Thuanus. 3 The Italian army, sent by pope Pius the Fourth,
1 Foeminae a furentibus violate, et satiata libidine tarn crudeliter habitae, at
pleraeque, sive ex animi moerore, sive fame et cruciatibus perierint. Thuan. 1.
227. Cruaute alia jusqu' & violer des femmes mourantes, et d'autres, a la vene
desquelles on avoit egorge leurs enfans. Gaufride, 2. 480.
Les troupes apres avoir rempli tout les pais de crimes et de debauches. Paolo,
1. 190.
2 Tons ceux de la cour feliciterent le premier President de sa victoire. Borne et
la Cour du Pape y prirent leur part. Ceux-la tronverent le fer et le feu bien m
ploy_es. Gaufrid. 2. 481. Ils le traiterent de deffenseur de la foi, de heros do
'Cbristianisme, et protectenr des fidcles. Ganfrid. 2. 494.
3 Varillau, III. Bray. 4. 654. Thuanus, XXXI. 11.
270 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
was commanded by Serbellon, and slew man, woman, and
child in indiscriminate carnage. Infants, and even the sick,
were assassinated in cold blood. Children were snatched
f rom the embraces of their mothers, and killed with the blows
>f bludgeons.
The work of death was carried on by various modes of
torture and brutality. Some were killed with the sword, and
some precipitated from the rock on which the city was built.
Some were hanged and others roasted over a slow fire. Many
were thrown on the points of hooks and daggers. The sol-
diery mutilated the citizens in such a shameful manner as
modesty forbids to name. 1 Women with child were suspended
on posts and gates, and their bowels let out with knives. The
blood, in the meantime, flowed in torrents through the streets.
Many of the boys were forced to become Ganymedes, and
to commit the sin of Sodom. The women, old and young,
were violated ; the ladies of rank and accomplishments were
abandoned to the will of the ruffian soldiery ; and afterward
exposed to the public laughter, with horns and stakes thrust
into the body in such a manner as decency refuses to describe. 2
The massacre of Paris, in 1572, on Bartholomew's day,
equalled those of Merindol and Orange in barbarity, and ex-
celled both in extent. The facts have been detailed with great
impartiality by Bossuet, Daniel, Davila, Thuanus, and Meze-
ray. 3 The queen laid this plan, which had been two years
preconcerted, for the extinction of heresy. The execution was
entrusted to the Duke of Guise, who was distinguished by his
inhumanity and hatred of the Reformation. The duke, on the
occasion, was aided by the soldiery, the populace, and the
king. The military and the people attached to Romanism
thirsted for the blood of the Hugonots. His most Christian
majesty, Charles the Ninth, attacked, in person, his unresisting
subjects with a gun, and 'shouted with all his might, KILL,
KILL.' 4 One man, if he deserve the name, boasted of having,
in one night, killed a hundred and fifty, and another of having
slain four hundred.
1 Us prirent plaisir a couper les parties secretes. Varillas, 1. 203.
3 Pueri multi item rapti, et ad nefandam libidinem satiandam ad miseram cap-
tivitatem abducti. Thuan. 2. 228.
Les dames farent exposees nues a la risee publique, avec des cornes enfonc6es
dans les parties, que la pudeur defend de nommer. Varillas, 1. 203. Productis
mulierum cadaveribus, et in eorum pudenda bourn cornibus, et saxis, ac stipitibus
ad ludibrium injectis. Thuan. 2. 228. Exudante passim per urbem cruore.
Thuan. 31. 11.
3 Bossuet, Abreg. XVII. Daniel, 8. 727740. Mezeray, 5. 151162. Davila,
V. Mezeray, 5. 151162.
4 II dechargea sur les CalviniBtes. Sully, 1. 34.
Le Roi tiroit sur eux lui-meme avec de longues arquebuses, et crioit, de tonte
sa force, 'tuez, tuez.' Dan. 8. 731. Mezeray, 5. 155. Davila, V.
MASSACRES OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW. 271
The tocsin, at midnight, tolled the signal of destruction./ The
spared neither old nor young, man" nor woman. The
carnage lasted seven days./ Mezeray reckons the killed, in
Paris, during this time, at 5000, Bossuet at more than 6000,
and Davila at 10,000, among whom were five or sin hundred
gentlemen./ The Seine was .covered with the dead which floated
on its surface, and the city was one great butchery and flowed
with human blood. The court was heaped with the slain, on
which the king and queen gazed, not with horror, but with
delight. Her majesty unblushingly feasted her eyes on the
spectacle of thousands of men, exposed ^aculitri:, and lying
wounded and frightful in the pale livery of death. 1 The king
went to see the body of Admiral Coligny, which was dragged
by the populace through the streets ; and remarked in unfeel-
ing witticism, that the ' smell of a dead enemy was agreeable.,
The tragedy was not confined to Paris, but expended, in^
general, through thp. ."Erench nation*y Special messengers wereT
on~tnV preceding day, despatched in all directions, ordering a
general massacre of the Hugonots. ^The carnage, in conse-
quence, was made through nearly all the provinces, and espe-
cially in Meaux, Troyes, Orleans, Nevers, Lyons, Toulouse,
Bordeaux, and Rouen. Twenty-five or thirty thousand accord-
ing to Bossuet and Mezeray, perished in different places.
Davila estimates the slain at 40,000, and Sully at 70,000.
Many were thrown into the rivers, which, floated the corpses
on the waves, carried horror and infection to all the country,
which they watered with their streams.
The reason of "this waste of life was enmity to heresy or
protestantism. A few indeed suggested the pretence of a con-
spiracy. But this, even Bossuet grants, every person knew to
be a mere pretence. The populace, tutored by the priesthood,
accounted themselves, in shedding heretical blood, ' the agents
of Divine justice,' and engaged ' in doing God service.' 2 The
king accompanied with the queen and princes of the blood, and
all the French court, went to the Parliament, and acknowledged
that all these sanguinary transactions were done by his autho-
rity. ' The parliament publicly eulogised the king's wisdom,'
which had effected the effusion of so much heretical blood. His
1 Tout le quartier ruisseloit de sang. La cour etoit pleine de corps morts, que
)e Roi et la Reine regardoient, non seulement sans horreur, mais avec plaisir. Tout
les rues de la ville n'etoient plus que boucheries. Bossuet, 4. 537. On exposa
leurs corps tout nuds a la porte du Louvre, la Eeine mere etant ek. une fenestre,
qui repaisoit ses yeux de cet horrible spectacle. Mezeray, 5. 157. Davila, V.
Thuan. II. 8.
Frequentes e gynceceo foeminae, nequaquam crudeli spectaculo eas absterrente,
curiosis oculis nudorum corpora inverecunde intuebantur. Thuan. 3. 131.
2 Les Catholiques se regarderent comme les executeurs de la justice de Died.
Daniel, 8 738. Thuan. 3. 149.
270 TPIE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
was commanded by Sorbcllon, and slc\v man, woman, arid
child in indiscriminate carnage. Infants, and even the .sick,
were assassinated in cold blood. Children were snatched
*rom the embraces of their mothers, and killed with the blows
tf bludgeons.
The work oi death was earned on by various modes of
torture and. brutality. Some were killed with the sword, and
.some precipitated from the rock on which {he city was built.
^Some were hanged and others roasted over a slow (ire. Many
were thrown on the points of hooks and daggers. The sol-
diery mutilated the citizens in such a shameful manner as
modesty forbids to name?. 1 Women with child Avert; suspended
on posts and gates, and their bowels let out \vith knives. The.
bloocL in the meantime, flowed in torrents through ihe streets.
Many of the boys were forced to become Ganymede,-, and
* <:oimru '- the SUI ^' Sodom. The women, old and votinu,
were violated ; the ladies ot rank and nccomplishmeuts were
abandoned to the wilt of the ruffian soldierv; and afterward
exposed to the public laughter, with horns and stakes thru si
into the body in such a manner as decency refuses to describe. 2
The massacre of .Paris, in l->72, on Bartholomew's dav.
equalled, those of Mcrindol and Orange in barbarity, and. ex-
celled both in extent. The facts have been detailed with groat,
impartiality by Bossuet, Daniel, Davila, Tlmanus, and Me/.o~
ray. 3 The queen laid this plan, which had been two years
oreconcerted, for the, extinction oi heresv. The execution was
* ' ./
entrusted to the Duke of Guise, Avho was distinguished bv his
inhumanity and hatred of the Reformation. The duke, on the
occasion, was aided by the soldiery, the populace, and the
king. The military and the people attached to Romanism
thirsted for the blood of the Hugonots. His most Christian
majesty, Charles the Ninth, attacked, in person, his unresisting
subjects with a gun, and 'shouted with nil his might, KILL.
KILL.'' 3 One man, if he deserve the name, boasted of having,
in one night, killed a hundred and fifty, and another of having
slam four hundred.
* 11s priro.nt, pimsir a couper les parties secretes. Varillas, 1. 203.
' Piiori muitl item rapli, et :i<l nefandam llliiilincni sutiiiiulnin ml miseram caji-
dvitatem abducli. Tliuan. 2. 228.
Los diiiries furent CXJIDSI-CS nnes a la risoe jmblique, avec dcs corner eiiioncf-rH
dans les parties, (jiie la ])iuleur (leteiid (k- noininer. A'arilliis, 1. 203. J'nulnoti*
innlieriiuj cadavenUns. ct, in corum pudouda. bmun rornilms. et saxis. ac sti[iitibns
ad ludiliriani iniectis. Thuan. 2. 228. Exiulnntu passim JUT urbeiii cruoi-e.
Thuan. 31. 11.
* Bossuet. Abrt'sir. XVII. Daniel, 8. 727740. Mozovay. 5. 151 102. DavilH.
V. Mezeniy, 5. 151 102.
* J.I tkvhnr^e.a sur les Calvinistes. Sully, 1. 34.
Le Rui tiroit Biircnx lui-meine avec do ion.'.'ucs arquebuses, et. crioit, de touto
na force, Uuez, tuez.' Dan. 8. 731. Mezeray, 5. 155. Davila, V.
MAfiSACJ.li:.S OF ST. BARTHOLOMEW. 271.
The tocsin, at midnight, tolled the signal of destruction. /The &\
assailants spared neither old "nor young, man nor woman. The
carnage lasted seven days. / Mezeray reckons the killed, in
Paris, dnrin.tr this time, at 5000, Bossuet at more than GOOO,
and Dav'ila at. 1.0,000. among whom were five or six hundred
gentle men. |f The Seine wa.s covered with the dead which floated
on it- : surface, and the city was one great butchery and flowed
with Iranian blood. The court was heaped, with the slain, on
which the king and queen gazed, not. with horror, but with
delight.. Her maicstv imbluslnnglv feasted her eyes on the
i . L.' .. "- ~ *
spectacle of thousands of men, exposed gaatoet, a.nd lying
wounded and frightful in the pale livery of death. 1 The king
went to see the body of Admiral Cohgny, which was dragged
by the. populace through the streets ; and remarked in unfeel-
ing witticism, that the- " smell of a. dead enemy was agreeable.,
The tragedy was not confined to Paris. .,_ but extc:n^d^m
general, through, the J'lr.iaii'h^iitiorjj^^Spt'CHii messengers wen?,
on the precedinu' (.lav. despatched in all directions, ordering a
general massacre of the Ilngonots. / The carnage, in conse-
quence, was made: through nearly ail the provinces, a.nd espe-
cially in Mvanx, Troves, Orleans, Nevers, Lyons, Toulouse,
Bordeaux, a.nd [{mien. Twenty-live or thirty thousand accord-
a +J
ing to Bossuet and Alezeray, perished in different places.
jJavila, estimates the slain ai 10.000, and Sully at 70,000.
.Many wire thrown into the rivers, which., floated the corpses
on the waves, carried horror and infection to all the country,
which, they wale red with their streams.
The reason of this waste of life 'was enmity to heresy or
protestauiisin. A few indeed suggested the 'pretence of a con-
spiracy. But tins, even Bossuet .Grants, every person knew to
be a mere pretence. The populace, tutored by the priesthood,
accounted themselves, in shedding heretical blood, 'the agents
of Divine justice,' and engaged ' in doing God service '- The
king accompanied with the queen and princes of the blood, and
all the French court, went to the Parliament, and acknowledged
that all these sanguinary transactions were, done by his autho-
rity. ' The parliament publicly eulogised the king's wisdom,"
which had effected the effusion of so much heretical blood. His
; Tout ! quartier ruisseloi! do sniijr. La com- etoit pleiue <le corps niorts, quc
je Roi (>t la Heine resfardoknt. nou seuiemeiit sans horreur, rrinis avec plaisir. Tout,
les ni(v. <le la. ville n'otoient Tilns que \ioucherios. Bossuet, 4. 537. On exposa
lours corps rout nuds a la porte d.u Louvre, la Rfine mere etant i\ une feuostre,
<jui repai~(jit scs yeux do cet horrible spectacle. M/.-zcray, 5. 157. Davila, V.
Thuan. II. 8.
Frequent^ e ir\na-ceo ioeniiiiaj, Tiequaqiiam cmdeli spectnculo ens alisterrente,
curiosis oculis iiudorum corpora iuvorecunde inlucbantur. Thunn. 3. 131.
- Les CatUoliquc-s se regai-dorcnt coinrae les executeurs de la justice cle Dieu.
Dsmiel, 8 738. Thuan. 3". 149.
272 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
majesty also went to mass, and returned solemn thanks to God
for the glorious victory obtained over' heresy. He ordered
medals to be coined to perpetuate its memory. A medal ac-
cordinglv was struck for the purpose with this inscription, PIE TV
EXCITED JUSTICE. 1 Piety, forsooth, propelled to murder,
and the immolation of forty thousand people was a^act of jus-
tice. Piety and justice, it seems, aroused to deeds of cruelty,
the idea of which afterwards, says Sully, caused even the inhu-
man perpetrator Charles, in spite of himself, to shudder.
The carnage, sanctioned in this manner by the French king,
parliament, aiid people, was also approved by the pope and the
Roman court. Rome ' from her hatred of heresy, received the
news with unspeakable joy. The pope went in procession to
the church of Saint Lewis, to render thanks to God for the
happy victory.' His Legate in France felicitated his most
Christianjnajesty in the pontiff's name, ' and praised the exploit,
"""*' so long meditated""ahd so^appily executed, for the good of
religion.' The massacre, says Mezeray, ' was extolled b'e'fore
the king as the triumph 6T the church.' 2
Spain rejoiced also in me tragedy as the defeat of protestant-
ism. This nation has ever shown itself the friend of the
papacy, and the deadly enemy of the Reformation : and this
spirit, on this occasion, appeared in the joy manifested by the
Spanish people for the murder of the French Hugoriots.
England, like Germany, France, Spain, and the Netherlands,
was the scene of persecution and martyrdom. Philip and
Mary, who exercised the royal authority in the British nation,
issued a commission for ' the burning of heretics.' The queen,
in this manifesto, ' professed her resolution to support justice
and Catholicism, and to eradicate error and heresy: and
ordered her heretical subjects, therefore, to be committed
before the people to the flames.' This, her majesty alleged,
would shew her detestation of heterodoxy, and serve as an
example to other Christians, to shun the contagion of heresy. 3
Orleans acknowledges Mary's rigour, and her execution of
1 Pietas excitavit jnstitiam. II fit frapper un medaille a 1'occasion de la Saint
Barthelemi. Daniel, 8 786. Apres avoir oui solemnellement la messe pour
remercier Dieu dela belle victoire obtenue sur 1'heresie, et commaude de fabri-
quer des me'dailles pour en conserverlamemoire. Mezeray, 5. 160. II fremissoit
malgre lui, au recit de mille traits de cruaute. Sully, 1. 33.
2 La haine de 1' heresie les fit recevoir agreablement a Rome. On se rejouit
anssi en Espagne. Bossuet, 4 545. La Cour de Rome et le Conseil d' Espagne
eurent une joye indicible de la Saint Bartelemy. Le Pape alia en procession a
1'eglise de Saint Louis, rendre graces a Dieu d'un si heureux succes, et 1'on fit le
panegyrique de cette action sous le nom de Triomphe de 1' Eglise. Mezeray, 5.
162. Sully, 1. 27.
3 HtBreticos juxta legem, ignis incendio comburi debere ; praecipimus, qnod
prafatos coram populo igni committi, et in eodetm igne realiter comburi iciaB.
Wilkin, 4. 177.
POPISH PERSECUTIONS IN ENGLAND.
many on account of their protestantism. In this, he discovers,
the queen followed her own genius rather than the spirit of the
church, by which he means the popedorn. This historian,
nevertheless, represents Mary as ' worthy of eternal remem-
brance for her zeal.' 1 Such is his character of a woman who
was a modern Theodora, and never obliged the world but
when she died. Her death was the only favour she ever con-
ferred on her unfortunate and persecuted subjects.
Popish persecution raged, in this manner, from the com-
mencement of the Reformation till its establishment. The
flow of this overwhelming tide began at the accession of
Constantine to the throne of the Roman empire : and, having
prevailed for a long period, gradually ebbed after the era of
protestantism. The popedom, on this topic, was compelled,
though with reluctance and inconsistency, to vary its profession
and practice. A change was effected in an unchangeable
communion. Some symptoms of the old disease indeed still
appear. The spirit, like , latent heat, is inactive rather than
extinguished. But the general cry is for liberality or even
latitudinarianism. The shout, even among the advocates of
Romanism, is in favor of religious liberty, unfettered con-
science, and universal toleration. The inquisition of Spain
and Portugal, with all its apparatus of racks, wheels, and
gibbets, has lost its efficacy, and its palace at Goa is in ruins.
The bright sun of India enlightens its late dungeons, which
are now inhabited, not by the victim of popish persecution, but
by ' the owl, the dragon, and the wild beast of the desert.'
This change has, in some measure, been influenced by the
diffusion of literature and the Reformation. The darkness of
the middle ages has fled before the light of modern science :
and with it, in part, has disappeared priestcraft' and supersti-
tion. Philosophy has improved, and its light continues to gain
on the empire of darkness. Protestantism has circulated the
Book of God, and shed its radiancy over a benighted world.
The advances of literature and revelation have been unfavour-
able to the reign of intolerance and the inquisition.
But the chief causes of this change in the papacy are the
preponderance of protestantism and the policy of popery. The
Reformation, in its liberalizing principles, is established over a
great part of Christendom. Its friends have become nearly
equal to its opponents in number, and far superior in intelli-
gence and activity. Rome, therefore, though she has not ex-
pressly disavowed her former claims, has according, to her
1 Reine digne d'une memoire etemelle, per son zele. On en fit, en effet, mount
un grand nombra Orleans, VIE. P 174, 175.
18
272 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
majesty also went to mass, and returned solemn thanks to God
for t.he glorious victory obtained over heresy. He ordered
medals to be coined to perpetuate its memory. A medal ac-
cordinolv was struck for the purpose with this inscription, PIETY
EXCITED JUSTICE. 1 Piety, forsooth, propelled to murder,
and the immolation of forty thousand people was an\aet of jus-
tice 1 . Piety and justice, it. seems, aroused to deeds of cruelty.
the idea, of which afterwards, says Sully, caused even the inhu-
man perpetrator Charles, in spite of himself, to shudder.
The carnage, sanctioned in this manner bv the French king,
parliament, and: people, was also approved by the pope and the
Roman court. Rome ' irom her hatred of heresy, received the
news with unspeakable joy. The pope went in procession to
the church of Saint Lewis, to render thanks to God for the
happy victory.' His Legate in France felicitated his most.
Christian majesty in the pontiff's name, ' and praised the exploit,
so long meditated and sof|l|appily executed, lor the good of
religion. 5 Tin; massacre, says Mezcray, 'was extolled before
the kinn as the triumph of the church.' 2
' '' * V>
Spain rejoiced also in the tragedy as the defeat of protestant-
ism. This nation has ever shown itself the friend of the
papacy, and the deadly enemy of the Reformation: and this
spirit, on this occasion, appeared in the joy manifested by the
Spanish people for the murder of the French Hugonots.
England, like Germany, France, Spain, and the Netherlands,
was the scene of persecution and martyrdom. Philip and
Mary, who exercised the royal authority in the British nation,
issued a commission for ' (he burning of heretics.' The queen,
in this manifesto, ' professed her resolution to support justice
and Catholicism, and to eradicate error and heresy : and
ordered her heretical subjects, therefore, to be committed
before the people to the flames.' This, her majesty alleged,
would shew her detestation of heterodoxy, and serve; as an
example to other Christians, to shun the contagion of heresy. 3
Orleans acknowledges Mary's rigour, and her execution of
<~J e/ * J
1 Pi etas excitavit jnstitiam. II fit frapper un niedaille a 1'ocension de la Saint
Bartheleim. Daniel, 8 78G. Apres avoir oui solenineliement l;i rnesse pour
remercier Dicu de la belle victoire obteime stir I'lierosio, et commando do fabri-
i]ji<?r des mc'dailles ponr on eonserverla raemoiro. Me/eray. f>. 100. 11 frmnissoit
mnlizre lui. nn recit de millf> traits do cruauto. Sully, 1. 33.
Is.i haine de !' horesie Ics fit rocevoir si^rrablt-mont a Rome. Dn so
anssi en Esjuigno. Bfissuet. 4 545. La Cour de Rome el lu Conseil d' Espagne
euront un jf>yo indiciblo do la Saint Bnrl.elerny. Li? Tape ,i!la en pi'oi't.'ssion &
1'cfilisc de Saint Louis, rendro irrace.s u Dieu d'un si heim;ux succes, ot 1'on fit lo
p;uioirvrii|n} do ootto action sous le nom de Triomphe do 1' Egli.se. Mezeray, 5.
162. '"'Sully, 1. 27.
3 II:rnnic;;s juxta lo"-em, ignis incendio comburi debore : pj-.-j.-cifjimiis, f]nod
pra'fatos (.-.onun populo ijjui committi, ot in uudeui i^ne realitor combun
Wilkin, 4. 177.
POPISH PERSECUTIONS IN ENGLAND. 273
many on account of their protestantism. In this, he discovers,
the queen followed her own genius rather than the spirit of the
church, by which he means the popedom. This historian,
nevertheless, represents Mary as ' worthy of eternal remem-
brance for her zeal.' * Such is his character of a woman who
was a modern Theodora, and never obliged the world but
when she died. Her death was the only favour she- ever con-
ferred on her unfortunate and persecuted subjects.
Popish persecution raged, in this manner, from the com-
mencement of the Reformation till its establishment. The
flow of this overwhelming tide began at the accession of
Constantino to the throne of the Roman empire : and, having
prevailed for a long period, gradually ebbed after the era of
protestantism. The popedom, on this topic, was compelled,
though with reluctance and inconsistency, to vary its profession
and practice. A change was effected in an unchangeable,
communion. Some symptoms of the old disease indeed still
appear. The spirit, like latent heat, is inactive rather than
extinguished. But the general crv is for liberality or even
* - 'J +s +/
latitudinarianism. The shout, even among the advocates of
Romanism, is in favor of religious liberty, unlettered con-
science, and universal toleration. The inquisition of Spain
and Portugal, with all its apparatus of racks, wheels, and
gibbets, has lost its efficacy, and its palace at Goa is in ruins.
The bright sun of India enlightens its late dungeons, which
are now inhabited, not by the victim of popish persecution, but
by ' the owl, the dragon, and the wild beast of the desert.'
This change has, in some measure, been influenced by the
diffusion of literature and the Reformation. The darkness of
the middle ages has fled before the light of modern science :
and with it, in part, has disappeared priestcraft and supersti-
tion. Philosophy has improved, arid its light continues to gain
on the empire of darkness. Protestantism has circulated the
Book of God, and shed its radiancy over a benighted world.
The advances of literature and revelation have been unfavour-
able to the reign of intolerance and the inquisition.
But the chief causes of this change in the papacy are the
preponderance of protestantism and the policy of popery. The
Reformation, in its liberalizing principles, is established over a
great part of Christendom. Its friends have become nearly
equal to its opponents in number, and far superior in intelli-
gence and activity. Rome, therefore, though she has not ex-
pressly disavowed her former claims, has according to her
1 Reine digiie d'une memoire cternolle, per son zele, On en fit. en effet, mourir
un grand nouibre. Orleans, VIII. P 17 i, 175.
18
274 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
ancient policy, allowed these lofty pretensions to slumber for a
time in inactivity, and yielded, though with reluctant and
awkward submission, to the progress of science, the light of
revelation, and the strength of protestantism.
A late discovery has shewn the deceitfulness of all popish
pretences to liberality, both on the continent and in Ireland.
Dens, a doctor of Louvain, published a system of theology in
1758, and in some of the succeeding years. This work, fraught
with the most revolting principles of persecution, awards to the
patrons of heresy, confiscation of goods, banishment from the
country, confinement in prison, infliction of death, and depri-
vation of Christian burial. Falsifiers of the Faith, like forgers
of money and disturbers of the state, this author would, accord-
ing to the sainted Thomas, consign to death as the proper and
merited penalty of their offence. This, he argues from the
sentence of the Jewish false prophets, and from the condemna-
tion of Huss in the general council of Constance. 1
This production in all its horror and deformity, was dedi-
cated to Cardinal Philippus, and recommended to Christendom
by the approbation of the University of Louvain, which
vouched for its * orthodox faith and its Christian morality.' It
was ushered into the world with the permission of superiors,
and the full sanction of episcopal authority. Its circulation on
the continent was, even in the nineteenth century, impeded by
no Romish reclamation, nor by the appalling terrors of the
expurgatorian index. The popish clergy and people, in silent
consent or avowed approbation, acknowledged, in whole and
in part, its Catholicism and morality. 2
The University of Louvain, on this occasion, exhibited a
beautiful specimen of Jesuitism. A few years after its appro-
bation of Dens' Theology, Pitt, the British statesman, asked
this same university, as well as those of Salamanca and
Valladolid, whether persecution were a principle of Romanism.
The astonished doctors, insulted at the question, and burning
with ardour to obliterate the foul stain, branded the insinuation
with a loud and deep negation. The former, in this case,
copied the example of the latter. The divines of Salamanca
and Valladolid, questioned on the same subject in 1603, in
1 An haeretici recte puniuntur morte ? Kespondet S. Thomas affirmative : quia
falsarii pecunias vel alii rempublicam turbantes juste morte puniuntur : ergo etiam
haeretici qui sunt falsarii fidei et rempublicam graviter perturbant.
Confirmatur ex eo quod Dens in veteri lege jusserit occidi falsos Prophetas.
Idem probatur ex condemnatione articuli 14, Joan. Huss in Concilio Constants
ensi. Dens, 2. 88, 89.
Haeretici notorii privantur sepultura ecclesiastica. Bona. &c. Dens, 2. 88.
3 Dens, 4. 3. Eas reperi nihil continere a tide orthodoxa et moribus Christianis
elieaum. Dens, 5. 1. Home's Protest. Mem. 95, 96.
PERSECUTING PRINCIPLES OP DENS* THEOLOGY. 275
reference to the war waged by the Irish against the English in
the reign of queen Elizabeth, patronized the principle of perse-
cution, which, in their answer to Pitt, they proscribed. 1 Such,
on the European continent, were the candour and consistency
of the popish clergy, who, in this manner, adapted their move-
ments, like skilful generals, to the evolutions of the enemy, and
suited their tactics to the emergency of the occasion.
This complete body of theology, unconfined to the continent,
was, in a special manner, extended to Ireland. The popish
prelacy, in 1808, met, says Coyne and Wise, in Dublin, and
unanimously agreed that this book was the best work, and
safest guide in theology for the Irish clergy. Coyne, in conse-
quence, was ordered to publish a large edition, for circulation
among the prelacy and priesthood of the kingdom.' 2
The work was dedicated to Doctor Murray, Titular Arch-
bishop of Dublin. The same prelate also sanctioned an addi-
tional volume, which was afterwards annexed to the performance
with his approbation. Murray, Doyle, Keating, and Kinsella
made it the conference book for the Romish clergy of Leinster.
The popish ordo or directory, for five successive years, had its
questions for conference arranged as they occurred in Dens,
and were, of course, to be decided by his high authority. The
Romish episcopacy, in this way, made this author theii
standard of theology to direct the Irish prelacy and priesthood
in casuistry and speculation. 3 Dens, therefore, possesses, with
them, the same authority on popish theology as Blackstone
with us, on the British Constitution, or the Bible on the princi-
ples of protestantism.
Accompanied with such powerful recommendations, the
work, as might be expected, obtained extensive circulation.
The college of Maynooth, indeed, did not raise Dens to a
text-book. This honour was reserved for Bailly. But this
seminary received Dens as a work of reference. His theology
lay in the library, ready, at any time, for consultation. Doctor
Murphy's academy in Cork had fifty or sixty copies for the
use of the seminary and the diocesan clergy. 4 The precious
production, indeed, has found its way into the nands of almost
every priest in the kingdom, and forms the holy fountain from
which he draws the pure waters of the sanctuary.
The days of persecution, notwithstanding, will, in all proba-
1 Tanquam certum est accipiendnm, posse Komanum Pontific em fidei desertores,
et eos qui Catholicam religionem oppugnant, armis compellere. Mageogh. 3. 595.
Slevin, 193.
8 Coyne, Catal. 6, 7. Wyse, Hist. Cath. Ass. App. N. 7. Home's Protest.
Mem. 95.
3 Reverendissimo in Deo, Patri ac Domino, Danieli Murray, &c. Dens, I. 1.
Coyne, 7. Home, 95, 96. * Home, 95, 96.
18*
276 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
bility, never return to dishonor Christianity and curse mankind.
The inquisition, with all its engines of torment and destruction,
may rest for ever in inactivity. The Inquisitor may exercise
his malevolence, and vent his ferocity in long and deep execra-
tions against the growing light of philosophy and the reforma-
tion ; but will never more regale his ears with the groans of
the tortured victim, or feast his eyes in witnessing an Act of
Faith. The popedom may regret its departed power. The
Roman pontiff and hierarchy may indulge in dreams of future
greatness, prefer vain prayers for the restoration of persecution,
or, in bitter lamentation, weep over the ashes of the inquisition.
But these hopes, supplications, and tears, in all likelihood, will,
for ever, be unavailing. Rome's spiritual artillery is, in a great
measure, become useless ; and the secular arm no longer, as
formerly, enforces ecclesiastical denunciations, or consigns the
abettors of heresy to the flames.
CHAPTER VHI.
INVALIDATION OF OATHS.
VIOLATION OP FAITH THEOLOGIANS, POPES, AND COUNCILS PONTIFICAL MAXIM*
FONTIFICAL ACTIONS COUNCILS OF ROME AND DIAMPER COUNCILS OF T
LATERAN, LYONS, PISA, CONSTANCE, AND BASIL. ERA AND INFLUENCE OF THE
REFORMATION.
THE Roman pontiffs, unsatisfied with the sovereignty over
kings and heretics, aimed, with measureless ambition, at loftier
pretensions and more extensive domination. These vice-gods
extended their usurpation into the moral world and invaded
the empire of heaven. The power of dissolving the obligation
of vows, promises, oaths, and indeed all engagements, especially
those injurious to the church and those made with the patrons
of heresy, was, in daring blasphemy, arrogated by those vice-
gerents of God. This involves the shocking maxim, that faith,
contrary to ecclesiastical utility, may be violated with heretics.
The popedom, in challenging and exercising this authority, has
disturbed the relations which the Deity established in His ra-
tional creation, and grasped at claims which tend to unhinge
civil society and disorganize the moral world.
Christendom, on this topic, has witnessed three variations.
The early Christians disclaimed, in loud indignation, the idea of
perfidy. Fidelity to contracts constituted a distinguished trait
in the Christianity of antiquity. A second era commenced
with the, dark ages. Faithlessness, accompanied with all its
foul train, entered on the extinction of literature and philosophy,
and became one of the filthy elements of Romish superstition.
The abomination, under the patronage of the papacy, flourished
till the rise of protestantism. The reformation formed a third
era, and poured a flood of light, which detected the demon of
insincerity and exposed it to the detestation of the world.
Fidelity to all engagements constituted one grand character-
istic of primeval Christianity. Violation of oaths and promises
is, beyond all question, an innovation on the Christianity of
antiquity, and forms one of the variations of Romanism. The
attachment to truth and the faithfulness to compacts, evinced
278 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
by the ancient Christians, were proverbial. The Christian
profession, in the days of antiquity, was marked by a lofty
sincerity, which disdained all falsehood, dissimulation, subter-
fuge, and chicanery. Death, say Justin and Tertullian, would
have been more welcome than the violation of a solemn promise.
A Roman bishop, in those days of purity, would have met an
application for absolution from an oath with holy indignation ;
and the humblest of his flock, who should have been supposed
capable of desiring such a dispensation, would have viewed
the imputation as an insult on his understanding and profession.
But the period of purity passed, and the days of degeneracy,
at the era of the dark ages, entered. The mystery of iniquity,
in process of time, and as Paul of Tarsus had foretold, began
to work. Christianity, by adulteration, degenerated into
Romanism, and the popedom became the hot-bed of all abomi-
nation. Dispensations for violating the sanctity of oaths
formed perhaps the most frightful feature in the moral deformity
of popery. This shocking maxim was, for many ages, sanc-
tioned by theologians, canonists, popes, councils, and the whole
Romish communion.
The theologians and canonists, who have inculcated this
frightful maxim, are many. A few may be selected as a
specimen. Such were Bailly, Dens, Cajetan, Aquinas, Ber-
nard, the Parisian university, and the French clergy.
Bailly, in the class-book used in the Maynooth seminary,
ascribes to ' the church a power of dispensing in vows and
oaths.' ] This the author attempts to shew from the words of
Revelation, which confer the prerogative of the keys in binding
and loosing, and which, he concludes, being general, signify
not only the power of absolving from sin, but also from promises
and oaths. The moral theologian, in this manner, abuses the
inspired language for the vilest purpose, and represents his
shocking assumption as taught in the Bible and as an article of
faith. The church, in this hopeful proposition, means the
Roman pontiff, whom the canon law characterizes as the inter-
preter of an oath.
Dens, in his theology, the modern standard of Catholicism in
Ireland, authorizes this maxim, 2 The dispensation of a vow,
1 Existit in ecclesia potestas dispensandi in votis et juramentis. Bailly, 2. 140.
Maynooth Report, 283.
Declaratio juramenti seu interpretatio, cum de ipso dubitatur, pertinet ad
Papam. Gibert, 3. 512. ...
2 Superior, tanquam vicarius Dei, vice et nomine Dei, remittit hoznini debitum
promissionis factae. Dens, 4. 134, 135.
Debet respondere se nescire earn, et, si opus est, idem juramento confirmare.
Tails confessarius interrogatur ut homo, et respondet ut homo. Jain autem non
cit ut homo illam veritatem, quamvis sciat ut Deus. Dens, 6. 219.
VIOLATION OP FAITH TAUGHT BY ROMISH DOCTORS. 279
says this criterion of truth, 'is its relaxation by a lawful su
perior in the place of God, from a just cause. The superior,
as the vicar of God in the place of God, remits to a man the
debt of a plighted promise. God's acceptance, by this dispen-
sation, ceases: for it is dispensed in God's name.' The
precious divine, in this manner, puts man in the stead of God,
and enables a creature to dissolve the obligation of a vow.
A confessor, the same doctor avers, ' should assert his igno-
rance of the truths which he knows only by sacramental con-
fession, and confirm his assertion, if necessary, by oath. Such
facts he is to conceal, though the life or safety of a man or the
destruction of the state, depended on the disclosure.' The
reason, in this case, is as extraordinary as the doctrine. ' The
confessor is questioned and answers as a man. This truth,
however, he knows not as man, but as God ;' and, therefore,
which was to be proved he is not guilty of falsehood or
perjury.
Cajetan teaches the same maxim. According to the cardi-
nal, ' the sentence of excommunication for apostacy from the
faith is no sooner pronounced against a king, than, in fact, his
subjects are freed from his dominion and oath. 1
Aquinas, though a Saint, and worshipped in the popish com-
munion on the bended knee, maintains the same shocking
principle. He recommends the same Satanic maxim to sub-
jects, whose sovereign becomes an advocate of heresy. Ac-
cording to his angelic saintship, " when a king is excommuni-
cated for apostacy, his vassals are, in fact, immediately freed
from his dominion and from their oath of fealty : for a heretic
cannot govern the faithful." Such a prince is to be deprived of
authority, and his subjects freed from the obligation of allegi-
ance. This is the doctrine of a man adored by the patrons of
Romanism for his sanctity. He enjoined the breach of faith
and the violation of a sworn engagement: and is cited for
authority on this point by Dens, the idol of the popish prelacy
in Ireland. 2
Bernard, the celebrated Glossator on the canon-law, advances
the same principle. A debtor, says the canonist of Parma,
" though sworn to pay, may refuse the claim of a creditor who
falls into heresy or under excommunication." According to
the same authority, " the debtor's oath implies the tacit condi-
1 Quam cito aliquis per sententiam denunciator excommunicatus propter apos-
tasiam a fide, ipso facto ejas subditi snnt absoluti adominio et juramento. Cajetan
in Aquin. 2. 50.
* Quam cito^aliquis per sententiam denunciator excommunicatus, propter apos-
tasiam a fide, ipso facto, ejns subditi a. dominio et juramento fidelitatis ejus liberati
cant, quod subditis fidelibus dominari non possit. Aquinas, 2. 50.
280 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
lion that the creditor, to be entitled to payment, should remain
in a state in which communication with him would be lawful." 1
The Parisian University, in 1589, consisting of sixty doctors,
declared the French entirely freed from their oath of allegiance
to their king, Henry the Third, and authorized to take arms
against their sovereign, on account of his opposition to Catholi-
cism. 2
The French clergy, in 1577, even after the reformation,
taught the same infernal maxim. The Hugonots " insisted on
the faith which the French nation had plighted in a solemn
treaty. The Romish theologians, on the contrary, rejected the
plea, and contended in their sermons and public writings, that
a prince is not bound to keep faith with the partizans of
heresy." These advocates of treachery and perjury pleaded
on the occasion, the precedent of the Constantian council,
which, in opposition to a safe-conduct, had sacrificed Huss and
Jerome to the demon of popery. 3
This atrocious maxim was taught by popes, as well as by
theologians. A numerous train of pontiffs might be named,
who, in word and in deed, disseminated this principle. These
viceroys of heaven, indeed, for many ages, engaged, with
hardly an exception, in violating faith both in theory and in
practice. From this mass may, for the sake of exemplifying
the theory, be selected Gregory, Urban, Paul, Alexander,
Clement, Benedict, and Innocent.
Gregory, in 1080, asserted his authority to dissolve the oath
of fealty. 4 His infallibility supported his assertion by proofs,
or pretended proofs, from scripture and tradition. This au-
thority, his holiness alleged, was conveyed in the power of the
keys, consisting in binding and loosing, and confirmed by the
unanimous consent of the fathers. The contrary opinion he
represented as madness and idolatry.
Urban, in 1090, followed the example of Gregory. Subjects,
he declared, ' are by no authority bound to observe the fealty
which they swear to a Christian prince, who withstands God
1 Licet non solvat, non incidit in poenanvet in eodem modo, si per juramentum :
in ilia obligatione et juramento tacite subintelligetur, si talis permanserit, cuicom-
manicure lieeat. Greg. 9. Decret. L. 5. Tit. 7. c. 16. Maynootb Report, 261.
3 Populum jurejurando. solutum esse. Thuan. 4. 690. Lea Francois etoient
effectivement delie du.serment de fidelite. Maimburg, 2.99. Daniel, 2. 349.
3 Protestantes fidem datam urgerent. Contra theologi nostri disputabant. et jam
aperto capite, in concionibus et evulgatis scriptis, ad fidem sectariis servandam
non obligare principem contendebant. Thuan. 3. 524.
4 Contra illoram insaniam, qui, nefando ore, garriunt, auctoritatem sancta^ et
Apostolicae sedis non patuisse quemquam a Sacramento fidelitatia eius absolvere
Labb. 12. 380, 439, 497
VIOLATIONS OF OATHS TAUGHT AND PRACTISED BY POPES. 281
and the saints and contemns their precepts.' 1 The pontiff ac-
cordingly prohibited Count Hugo's soldiery, though under the
obligation of an oath, to obey their sovereign.
Gregory, the Ninth, in 1229, followed the footsteps of his
predecessors. According to his infallibility, ' none should keep
faith with the person who opposes God and the saints." 2 Gre-
gory, on this account, declared the emperor Frederic's vassals
freed from their oath of fidelity.
Urban the Sixth imitated Gregory the Ninth. This pontiff
in 1378, declared that * engagements of any kind-, even when
confirmed by oath with persons guilty of schism or heresy,
though made before their apostacy, are in themselves unlawful
and void.' 3
Paul the Fourth, in 1555, absolved himself from an oath
which he had taken in the Conclave. His holiness had sworn
to make only four cardinals ; but violated his obligation. His
supremacy declared, that the pontiff could not be bound, or his
authority limited, even by an oath. The contrary, he charac-
terized, ' as a manifest heresy.' 4
Paul the Fifth canonized Gregory the Seventh, and inserted
an office in the Roman breviary, praising his holiness for free-
ing the emperor Henry's subjects from the oath of fidelity.?*
His absolution, as well as the deposition of the emperor, the
pontiff represents as an act of piety and heroism. Paul's enact-
ment, in this transaction, was sanctioned by Alexander, Cle-
ment, and Benedict.
Innocent the Tenth declared that ' the Roman pontiff could
invalidate civil contracts, promises, or oaths, made by the friends
of Catholicism with the patrons of heresy.' 6 A denial of this
proposition, his infallibility styled heresy ; and those who re-
jected the idea of papal dispensation, incurred, according to his
holiness, the penalty prescribed by the sacred canons and
apostolic constitutions against those who impugn the pontifical
authority in questions of faith.
The Roman pontiffs taught this diabolical doctrine, not only
by precept but also by example. The practice of annulling
1 Fidelitatem quam Christiano principi jurant, Deo ejusqne sanctis adversanti, et
eorum prsecepta calcanti, nullo cobibentur auctoritate persolvere. Pithou. 260.
Decret. caus. 15. Quaest. 6.
3 Personne ne doit garder fidelite celui, qui s'oppose a Dieu et a aes saints.
Bruy, 3. 183.
3 Conventiones factae cum hujusmodi haereticis . seu schismaticis, postqnam tale*
effecti erant, sunt temeraviae, illicitae, et ipso jure nullae, (etsi forte ante ipsorum
lapsum in schisma sen hasresim initae) etiam si forent juramento vel fide data
firmatae. Eymer, 7. 352.
4 Le contraire etoit une heresie manifesto. Paolo, 2..S7.
6 Subditos populos fide ei data liberavit. Bruy. 2. 492. Grotty, 85.
6 Contractus civiles, promissa, vel juramenta catholicorum cum hseretici* CO
quod hseretici sint, per pontificem euervari posaint. Caron, 14.
282 THE VARIATIONS OF* POPERY :
oaths and breaking faith was exemplified by Zachary, Gregory
Innocent, Honorius, Clement, Urban, Eugenius, Clement,
Paul, and Pius, as the theory had been taught by Gregory,
Urban, Paul, Alexander, Clement, Benedict, and Innocent.
Pope Zachary, in 745, annulled the French nation's oath of
fealty to king Childeric, and Stephen, Zachary's successor,
afterward dissolved Pepin's allegiance to the French
monarch. 1
Gregory, in 1078, < absolved all from their fidelity, who were
bound by oath to persons excommunicated.' This sweeping
and infernal sentence, his holiness, according to his own ac-
count, pronounced ' in accordance with the statutes of his sacred
predecessors and in virtue of his. apostolic authority.' 2
Innocent, in 1215, ' freed all that were bound to those who
had fallen into heresy from all fealty, homage, and obedience.' 8
His infallibility's dispensation extended to the dissolution of
obligation and security of all kinds.
Honorius, in 1220, freed the king of Hungary from all obli-
gations in some alienations of his kingdom, which his majesty
had made and which he had sworn to fulfil. These, it appears,
were prejudicial to the state and dishonourable to the sovereign.
His holiness, however, soon contrived a remedy, which was
distinguished by its facility and efficiency. The vicar-general
of God, in the fulness of apostolic authority, ' demolished the
royal oath, and commanded the revocation of these alienations.' 4
Clement, in 1306, emancipated Edward, king of England,
from a solemn oath in confirmation of the great charter. ' The
English monarch had taken this obligation in 1258 on the
holy evangelists,' and the ceremony was performed with an
affecting solemnity and awful imprecations of perdition in case
of violation or infringement. The Roman viceroy of heaven
however, soon removed these uneasy bonds, and furnished his
British majesty with a ready licence for the breach of faith and
the commission of perjury. The pontiff published a bull,
* granting the king absolution from his oath.' 5 The absolution,
1 Zacharias omnes Francigenas a juramento fidelitatis absolvit. Labb. 12. 500.
Pithou, 260. Pepinus a Stephano pape a fidelitatis sacramento absolvitur. Otho,
V. 23. Bossuet, 1. 49. ,
8 Eos qui excommunicatis fidelitate aut sacramento constrict! sunt, Apostolica
auctoritate a sacramento absolvimus. Pithou, 260. Caus. 15. Q. 6.
8 Absolutes se noverint a debito fidelitatis, hominii, et totius obsequii, quicunqne
lapsis manifesto in hsereism, aliquo pacto, quacunque firmitate vallato, tenebantur
adstricti. Pithou, 241. L. 5. T. 7.
4 Nos eidem regi dirigimus scripta nostra, ut alienationes prsedictas, non obstante
juramento, studeat revocare. Greg. 9. L. 2. Tit. 24. c. 33. Pithou. 111.
6 Henri et Edouard jurerent 1'observation sur les evangiles. Orleans, 5. 163.
Le Pape lui donnoit 1'absolution du serment. Bruy. 3. 358. Collier, 1. 400.
Eex coactus est praestare sacramentum. Trivettus, Ann. 1258. Obtinebat rex
a Domino papa absolutionem a juramento. Trivettus, Ann. 1306. Dachery, 3.
196,230.
VIOLATIONS OF OATHS TAUGHT AND PRACTISED BY POPES. 283
for greater comfort, was supported in the rear by an excommu-
nication pronounced against all who should observe such an
oath.
Urban imitated Clement. This plenipotentiary of heaven,
in 1367, in the administration of his spiritual vicegerency, trans-
mitted absolution to some Frenchmen, who had been taken
prisoners by a gang of marauders who invested the French na-
tion, and had sworn all whom they released, to remit a sum of
money as the price of their liberation. 1 His holiness, however,
having heard of the transaction, not only repealed the treaty ;
but with the whole weight of his pontifical authority, ' dissolved
the oath and interdicted the payment of the ransom.'
Eugenius the Fourth reaped laurels in this field, and outshone
many of his rivals in the skilful management of the oath-annul-
ling process. His holiness, who wielded his prerogative in this
way toward Piccinino and in nullifying the Bohemian compacts,
was followed in this latter transaction, by Pope Pius. Eu-
genius, in 1444, also induced Ladislaus king of Hungary, to
break his treaty with the sultan Amurath, though confirmed
by the solemn oaths of the king and the sultan on the gospel
and the koran. His holiness, on this occasion, introduced a
variety into the system established for the encouragement of
perjury, by executing his plan by proxy. Julian, clothed with
legatine authority, mustered all his eloquence to effect the
design ; and represented, in strong colours, the criminality of
observing a treaty, so prejudicial to the public safety and so
inimical to the holy faith. The pontiff's vicegerent, in solemn
mockery, dispensed with the oath, which, being sworn with
infidels, was, like those with heretics, a mere nullity. * I
absolve you,' said the representative of the representative of
God, ' from perjury, and I sanctify your arms. Follow rny
footsteps in the path of glory and salvation. Dismiss your
scrupulosity, and devolve on my head the sin and the punish-
ment.' The sultan, it is said, displayed a copy of the violated
treaty, the monument of papal perfidy, in the front of battle,
implored the protection of the God of truth, and called aloud
on the prophet Jesus to avenge the mockery of his religion and
authority. The faith of Istamism excelled the casuistry of
popery. ' The perjurers, whom Moreri calls Christians, * falsi-
fied their oath,' took arms against the Turks, and were defeated
on the plains of Varna. 2
1 Le Pape envoia aux prisonniere 1'absolution du serment. Daniel, 5. 145.
2 Les Chretiens sollicitez par Julien, Legat du Pape Eugene IV. fausserent lenr
foi. Moreri, 1. 390. Sismond. 9. 196. Ganisius, 4. 462. Lenfant, 2. lj>4. Le
Cardinal 1' en dispensoit par Pauthprite du siege Apdstolique. Amurath B' escria
^u milieu du combat, Christ, Christ, voy ton peuple desloyal qui a faulc& sa fov.
Vigorien, 3. 692. : "
284 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY!
Clement, in 1526, absolved Francis II, the French king from
a treaty which he had formed in Spain. 1 The emperor of
Germany had taken his Christian majesty a prisoner in the
battle of Pavia, and carried him to Madrid. The conditions of
his engagement, which were disadvantageous, Francis confirmed
by an oath. This engagement, however, the pontiff, by his
apostolic power, soon dissolved, for the purpose of gaining the
French king as an ally in a holy confederacy, which his infal-
libility had organized against the German emperor. The
convention, though ratified by a solemn oath, soon yielded to
apostolic power, and, more especially, as its annihilation con-
duced to ecclesiastical utility.
Pope Paul III. in 1535, ' forbade all sovereigns, on pain of
excommunication, to lend any aid, under pretext of any obli-
gation or oath, to Henry VIII. king of England.' His holiness
also ' absolved all princes from all such promises and engage-
ments.' 2 Pius IV. treated Elizabeth as Paul had treated
Henry. * His holiness annulled the oath of allegiance, which
had been sworn to her majesty, by her subjects.' This consti-
tution Gregory XIII. and Sixtus V. renewed and confirmed. 3
Henry and Elizabeth had patronized schism or heresy, and
therefore forfeited all claim to enjoy the conditions of plighted
faith.
Councils, as well as pontiffs, encouraged this principle of
faithlessness. Some of these synods were provincial and some
general. Among the provincial councils, which countenanced
or practised this maxim were those of Rome, Lateran, and
Diamper.
A Roman Council, in 1036, absolved Edward the Confessor,
king of England, from a vow which he had made to visit the
city of Rome and the tombs of the holy apostles. The fulfil-
ment of his engagement, it seems, was inconvenient to his
sainted majesty, and contrary to the wish of the British nation.
But Leo the Ninth and a Roman council soon supplied a
remedy. His holiness presided in this assembly, which eulo-
gized Edward's piety, and in a few moments and with great
facility, disannulled his majesty's troublesome vow. 4
Gregory VII. in 1076, in a Roman synod, absolved all Chris-
tians from their oath of fealty to the Emperor Henry, who, in
his infallibility's elegant language, had become a member of the
1 Le Pape delivers le roi da serment qu'il avoit pretfe en Espagne. Paol. 1. 63.
3 Henrici vassalos et subditos a juramento fidelitatis absolvit. Cum Henrico.
confcederationes, coatractus, pacta, et conventa omnia, quovis modo stabilita, irrita
facit et nulla. Alex. 24. 420.
3 Omnes ac singulos ejns subditos a juramento fidelitatis absolvit, late in eos, qni
illius legibus ac mandate parerent, anathemate. Alexander, 23. 425. Bnjy. 4 502.
4 Sa Saintete, qui y president, lui donna resolution de son voeu. AnUillv. 58.
VIOLATIONS OF OATHS BY POPISH COUNCILS. 2B5
devil, and an enemy to the vicar-general of God; 1 - He also
interdicted all persons from obeying Henry, as king, notwith-
standing their oath. This sentence the pontiff, with the appro-
bation of the council, pronounced as the plenipotentiary of
heaven, ' who possessed the power of binding and loosing, in
the name of Almighty God, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost.*
A council of the Lateran, in 1112, freed Pascal the Roman
pontiff from an oath which he had sworn on the consecrated
host, on the subject of investitures and excommunication. This
obligation, in all its terrors, the holy assembly, with the utmost
unanimity, ' condemned and annulled.' 2 This decision, the
sacred synod, in their own statement, ' pronounced by canonical
authority and by the judgment of the Holy Spirit.' These
patrons of perjury, in the annunciation of this infernal sentence,
pretended, in the language of blasphemy, to the inspiration of
heaven.
Gregory the Ninth, in 1228, convened a Roman council,
consisting of the bishops of Lombardy, Tuscany, and Apulia,
and, with the approbation of this assembly, absolved, from their
oath, all who had sworn fealty to Frederic the Roman Emperor.
The sacred synod issued this sentence, because, according to
its own statement, no person is obliged to keep faith with a
Christian prince when he gainsays God and the saints. 3 The
pontiff, on this occasion, declared, in council, that * he pro-
ceeded against the emperor, as against one who was guilty of
heresy and who despised the keys of the church.' The synodal
decision contains a direct and unmitigated avowal of the dia-
bolical maxim, that no faith should be kept with persons guilty
of heresy or of rebellion against the popedom.
The synod of Diamper, in India, issued a decision of the
same kind. This assembly, in 1599, under the presidency of
Menez, invalidated the oaths that those Indian Christians had
taken against changing Syrianism for Popery^ or receiving their
clergy from the Roman pontiff instead of the Babylonian
patriarch. Such obligations, the holy council pronounced
pestilential and void, and the keeping of them an impiety and
temerity. 4 The sacred synod, in this manner, could, by a
skilful use of their spiritual artillery, exterminate obligations
and oaths by wholesale.
The encouragement to faithlessness and perjury^ was not
^; >; " .
';" *-
l 'Onmes Christianos a vinculo juramenti absolve. Labb. 12. 600
5 Judicio Sancti Spiritns damnamus. Irritum esse judicamus, atque omnino
castranras. Labb. 12. 1165. Bray. 2. 580. Platina, in Pascal.
3 On u'est point oblige de garder la foi, que 1'on a jure a un prince Chrestien,
quand il s'oppose & Dieu et a ses saints. Brny. 3. 179. Labb. 13. 114, 1223.
4 Declarat Synodus juramenta hujusmodi nulla prorsus et irrita. Cossart, 6, 51,
286 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
confined to provincial synods, but extended to universal coun-
cils. Six of these general ecclesiastical conventions patronized,
in word or deed, by precept or example, violation of engage-
ments and breach of trust. These were the universal councils
of the Lateran, Lyons, Pisa, Constance, and Basil.
The third general council of the Lateran, superintended by
Alexander and clothed with infallibility, taught this principle in
word and deed. The unerring fathers, in the sixteenth canon,
styled * an oath contrary to ecclesiastical utility, not an oath,
Dut perjury.' 1 The pontiffs, whose province it is to explain
oaths and vows, always confounded ecclesiastical utility with
pontifical aggrandizement. Obligations, therefore, which mili-
tated against the interest or grandeur of the papacy, soon has-
tened to their dissolution. The Lateran convention, in its
twenty-seventh canon, exemplified its own theory, and disen-
gaged, from their oath of fidelity, the vassals of the barons and
lords who embraced or protected the heresy of Albigensianism. 8
These princes patronized heresy, and their subjects, therefore,
were not bound to keep faith with such sovereigns, or to yield
them fealty or obedience. This language is unequivocal, and
supersedes, by its perspicuity and precision, the necessity of
any comment.
The fourth general council of the Lateran, in 1215, issued
an enactment of the same kind. This infallible assembly, in
its third canon, ' freed the subjects of such sovereigns as
embraced heresy from their fealty.' 3 The temporal lord, who
refused to purify his dominions from heretical pollution, not only
forfeited the allegiance of his vassals, but his title to his estate,
which, in consequence, might be seized by any orthodox ad-
venturer. Heresy, therefore, according to this unerring con-
gress, rescinds the obligation of fidelity, cancels the right of
property, and warrants the violation of faith.
The general council of Lyons absolved the Emperor Frederic's
vassals from their oath of fealty. 4 The synod in their own way,
convicted the emperor of schism, heresy, and church-robbery.
His criminality, therefore, according to the unerring council,
warranted a breach of faith, and a dissolution of the subject's
oath of obedience. Innocent, who presided on the occasion,
represented himself as the viceroy of heaven, on whom God,
1 Non juramenta, sed perjuria potius snnt dicenda, quae contra utilitatem ecclesi-
asticam attentantur. Pith. 110. Labb. 13. 426. Gibert, 3. 504.
8 Relaxatos se noverint a debito fidelitatis et hominii, et totius obsequii. Labb.
13.431.
3 Vassalos ab ejus fidelitate denonciet absolutes. Bin. 8. 807. Labb. 13. 934.
4 Omnes qui ei juramento fidelitatis tenentur adstricti a juramento hujusmodi
perpetuo absolventes. Labb. 14. 52. Binn. 8. 852. Paris, 651, 652. Giannon,
XVIII. 3.
VIOLATIONS OF OATHS BY POPISH COUNCILS. 287
in the person of the Galilean fisherman, had conferred the keys
of his kingdom, and vested with the power of binding and
loosing. The council concurred with the pontiff. The pope
and the prelacy, says Paris, ' lighted tapers and thundered, in
frightful fulminations, against his imperial majesty.' The testi-
mony of Paris is corroborated by Nangis and pope Martin. 1
The general council of Pisa imitated those of the Lateran
and Lyons. This assembly, in its fifteenth session, released
all Christians from their oath of fidelity to Benedict and
Gregory, and forbade all men, notwithstanding any obligation,
to obey the rival pontiffs, whom the holy fathers, by a sum-
mary process, convicted of perjury, contumacy, incorrigibility,
schism, and heresy. 2 The sacred synod, in this instance,
assumed the power of dissolving sworn engagements, and of
warranting all Christendom to break faith with two viceroys
of heaven, who, according to the synodal sentence, were guilty
of schism and heresy.
The general council of Constance, on this topic, outstripped
all competition, and gained an infamous celebrity, in recom-
mending and exemplifying treachery, the demolition of oaths,
and unfaithfulness to engagements. The holy assembly having
convicted John, though a lawful pope, of simony, schism,
heresy, infidelity, murder, perjury, fornication, adultery, rape,
incest, sodomy, and a few other trifling frailties of a similar
kind, deposed his holiness, and emancipated all Christians from
their oath of obedience to his supremacy. 3 His infallibility, in
the mean time, notwithstanding his simony, schism, heresy,
perjury, murder, incest, and sodomy, exercised his prerogative
of dissolving oaths as well as the council. The holy fathers
had sworn to conceal from the pontiff their plans for his
degradation. The trusty prelacy, however, notwithstanding
their obligation to secrecy, revealed all, during the night, to his
holiness. John, by this means, had the satisfaction of discov-
ering the machinations of his judges, and of inducing the
infallible bishops to perjury. The pontiff, however, by his
sovereign authority, and by the power of the keys, soon dis-
annulled these obligations, and delivered the perjured traitors,
who composed the sacred synod, from their oath of secrecy. 4
1 Diligent! deliberatione prshabita cum prgelatis ibidem congregatis super nefan-
dis Frederic!. Nangis, Ann. 1045. Dachery, 3. 35.
Innocentius, memoratum Fredericum in concilio Lugdunensi, eodem approbante
concilio denunciavit. Dachery, 3. 684.
s Nonobstante quocunque fidelitatis juramento. Labb. 15. 1138. Alex. 24, 573.
Dachery, 1. 847.
3 Universes et singulos Christianos ab ejus obedientia, fidelitate, et juramento,
absolutes declarans. Alex. 24. 620.
4 Les degageant par son autorite sonveraine des sermons, qu'ils avoient faits de
ne rien reveler Bruy. 4. 40. Labb. 16. 233
288 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY I
The pontiff shewed the council, that he could demolish oath&
as well as his faithless accusers, who ' represented the whole
church and had met in the spirit of God.'
The Constantians, in the twentieth session, freed the vassals
of Frederic, Duke of Austria, from their oath of fealty. The
thirty-seventh session was distinguished by disentangling all
Christians from their oath of fidelity, however taken, to Pope
Benedict, and forbidding any to obey him on pain of the pen-
alty annexed to schism and heresy. 1 The sacred synod, in its
forty-first session, annulled and execrated all conventions and
oaths, which might militate agains.t the freedom and efficiency
of the pending election.
This council's treatment of Huss and Jerome constituted the
most revolting instance of its treachery. The martyrdom of
these celebrated friends, indeed, was one of the most glaring,
undisguised, and disgusting specimens of perfidy ever ex-
hibited to the gaze of an astonished world or recorded for the
execration of posterity. John Huss was summoned to the
city of Constance on a charge of heresy. His safety, during
his journey, his stay, and his RETURN, was guaranteed by a
safe-conduct from the Emperor Sigismund, addressed to all
civil and ecclesiastical governors in ..his dominions. Huss
obeyed the summons. Plighted faith, However, could, in those
days, confer no security on a man accused of heresy. Huss
Was tried and condemned by an ecclesiastical tribunal, which,
in its holy zeal, ' devoted his soul to the infernal devils,' and
- delivered his body to the secular arm ; which, notwithstanding
the imperial promise of protection and in defiance of all justice
and humanity, committed the victim of its own perfidy to the
flames.' 2 This harbinger of theyeformation suffered martyr-
dom with the emperor's safe-conduct in his hand. He died as
he had lived, like a Christian hero. He endured the punish-
ment with unparalleled magnanimity, and, in the triumph of
faith and the extacy of divine love, 'sung hymns to God,'
Vhile the mouldering flesh was consumed from his bones, till
the immortal spirit ascended from the funeral pile and soared
to heaven. 3
Jerome, also, trepanned by the mockery of a safe-conduct
fiom the faithless synod, shared the same destiny. This man,
1 Gmnes Christianos ab ejus obedientia atque juramentis absolvit. Coss. 4. 81.
Labb. 16. 309, 681, 714.
2 Animam Inam devovemns diabolis infernis. Lenfan. 1. 409.
3 HUB monta sur le bucher, avec une grande intrepidite, et il mourut en chan-
taut des Pseaumes. Moreri, 4. 221.
Aucun philosophe n'avoit endure la mort avec tine resolution si determinee. II
pratiqua le dehors de tons les actes que suggere la devotion la plus solide. Sa fer-
vour redoubloit lors qu'il apperceut le.flambeau. Hist, du Wiclef. 2, 127. 128.
VIOLATIONS OF OATHS BY POPISH COUNCILS. 289
distinguished for his friendship and eloquence, came to Con-
stance, for the generous purpose of supporting his early
companion, and died with heroism, in the fire which had con-
sumed his friend. Huss and Jerome, says JEneas Sylvius,
afterward Pope Pius the Second, * discovered no symptom of
weakness, went to punishment as to a festival, and sung hymns
in the midst of the flames and without interruption till the last
sigh.' 1
Doctor Murray, Titular Archbishop of Dublin, has, in his
examination before the British Commons, endeavoured, by his
usual misrepresentations and sophistry, to exculpate Sigismund
and the synod from the imputation of faithlessness. The
task was Herculean, but the bishop's arguments are silly.
Murray, like Phaeton, failed in a bold attempt. The imperial
safe-conduct, says the doctor, following Becanus, Maimburg,
and Alexander, was only a passport, like those granted to
travellers on the European continent, to hinder interruption
or molestation on the way : but, by no means, to prevent the
execution of justice, in case of a legal conviction. The arch-
bishop's statement is as faithless as the emperor's safe-conduct
or the synod's sentence. The emperor's promised protection
to Huss, ' extended, not only to his going and stay, but also
to his RETURN.' The return of this victim of treachery was
intercepted by the faggot and the stake, trying obstacles, indeed,
but good enough for a heretic. The emperor's safe-conduct,
says the Popish author of the history of Wickliffism, ' was, in
its terms, clear, general, absolute, and without reserve.' 2
The council was accessory to the emperor's treachery. The
safe-conduct, indeed, was not binding on the Constantian .
clergy. These were not a party to the agreement, and pos-
sessed, at least a canonical and admitted power of pronouncing
on the theology of the accused. An ecclesiastical court was
the proper tribunal for deciding an ecclesiastical question.
The Constantian fathers, therefore, according to the opinion of
the age, might, with propriety, have tried the Catholicism of
Huss, and, on evidence, declared 1 him guilty of heresy and
obstinacy. But this did not satisfy the holy synod, v/ho advised
1 Us alloient au supplice comme a un festin. II ne leur echappa jamais aucnne
parole, qui marquat la moindre foiblesse. Au milieu des flammes, ils chanterent
des hymnes jusques au dernier eoupir. Moreri, 4. 232. Sylv. c. 36.
Qui les avoient accompagnez leur avoient oui chanter jusqu' au dernier leur vie
lea louanges de Dieu. Hist. Du Wiclif. 2.
3 Transire, stare, morari, et redire libere permittatis. Alexander, 25, 258, 260.
De le laisser -ibrement et surement passer, demeurer, s'arreter, et retourner.
Moreri, 4. 232. Du Fin, 3. 92. Les termes etoient evidens, generaux, dbsolns, et
Bans aucune reserve. Histoire da Wicklifianisme. 98. Maimb. 215. Com. Rep
629.
19
290 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
and sanctioned Sigismund' s breach of faith, and, by this mearis,
became partakers in his perfidy.
But Huss, says Murray, suffered in Constance, a free city,
over the laws of which Sigismund had no control. The empe-
ror, he concludes, could not have prevented the Constantian
Act of Faith. This is another shameful misrepresentation.
The bishop, in his statement, breaks faith with history as much
as the emperor did with Huss. The emperor made no attempt
to oppose the synod. His majesty, on the contrary, protested,
that rather than support the Heresiarch in his error and obsti-
nacy, he would kindle the fire with his own hands. The sen-
: tence, accordingly, was executed by imperial authority. The
. council consigned the prisoner to the emperor, and the emperor
to the Duke of Bavaria, who delivered him to the executioner. 1
Sigismund, it appears, possessed power ; but instead of using
it for the protection of Huss, he exerted it for his punishment.
He could not, indeed, have annulled the prisoner's sentence of
heresy; but he could have granted him life and liberty, till the
expiration of his safe-conduct, as Charles V. did to Luther.
But the council's sanction of the oath annulling and faith-
violating system depends, by no means, on the contents of the
emperor's safe-conduct or his treatment of Huss. Murray, if
he even could have vindicated Sigismund, would have effected
.just nothing with respect to the council, The holy ruffians, at
Constance, avowed the shocking maxim with fearlessness and
without disguise, both by their deputation to the emperor and
by their declarations in council.
The deputation sent to the emperor, for the purpose of con-
certing a plan for the safety and convenience of the council's
future deliberations, maintained this principle. These gave his
majesty to understand, that the council had authority to disen-
gage him from a legal promise, when pledged to a person guilty
of heresy. This is attested by Dachery, an eye-witness, in his
German history of the Constantian council. The deputation,
says this historian, ' in a long speech, persuaded the emperor,
that by decretal authority, he should not keep faith with a man
accused of heresy.' 2 Nauclerus, who lived shortly after the
council, testifies nearly the same thing. The emperor himself
entertained this opinion of the deputation's sentiments. His
majesty, addressing Huss at his last examination, declared ' that
some thought he had no right to afford any protection to a man
Lenfan. 1. 82, 318. Du Pin, 3. 94. Bray. 4. 66. Hist, du Wicklif. 126.
Caesar, quasi tenore decretalium, Husso fidem datam praestare non teneretur
multis verbia persuasus, Husso et Bohemia Salvi Conductus fidem fregit. Lenfant
1. 82.
VIOLATIONS OF OATHS BY POPISH COUNCILS. 291
convicted or even suspected of heresy.' 1 The deputation, on
this occasion, must have known and represented the opinion
of the synod, which acquiesced, without any contradiction, in
this statement, and which, had the emperor been mistaken,
should have corrected the error, Huss was a victim to the
malevolent passions of the council, and the superstition and
perfidy of the emperor.
The faith-violating maxim was avowed, not only by the de-
putation, but also by the council. The infallible assembly,
boldly, roundly, and expressly declared, that ' no faith or pro-
mise, prejudicial to Catholicism, was to be kept with John Huss
by natural, divine, or human law.' 2 Prejudicial to Catholicism,
in this case, could signify no infraction on the faith of the
church; but merely the permission of a man convicted of
heresy, to escape with his life. Faith, therefore, according to
the council, should be violated rather than allow a heretic to
live. The synod of Basil, however, and the. diet of Worms
thought otherwise, when they suffered the Bohemians and
Luther, under the protection of a safe-conduct, to withdraw
from the council and the diet, and returned in safety to their
own country.
The sacred synod, unsatisfied with this frightful declaration,
issued, in its nineteenth session, another enactment of a similar
kind, but expressed in more general terms and capable .of more
extensive application. According to these patrons of perfidy,
' no safe-conduct, disadvantageous to the faith or jurisdiction
of the church, though granted by emperor or king, and ratified
by the most solemn obligations, can be any protection to per-
sons convicted of heresy. Persons, suspected of defection
from the faith, may be tried by the proper ecclesiastical judges,
and, if convicted and persisting in error, may be punished,
though they attended the tribunal relying on a safe-conduct,
and otherwise would not have appeared.' 3 This declaration,
it is plain, contains a formal sanction of the atrocious principle.
Alexander, followed by Murray, Crotty. and Higgins,
endeavours to vindicate the council and the emperor, by
distributing the condemnation and execution of Huss between
the synodal and royal authority. 4 The council, in the exercise
of its ecclesiastical jurisdiction, convicted the accused of heresy,
1 Nonnulli dioant, nos de jure ei non posse patrocinari, qui aut haereticus, ant de
haeresi aliqua suspectus. Hard. 4. 397. Lenfant, 1. 492.
3 Nee aliqua sibi fides, aut promissio de jure natural!, Divino, aut humano, fuent
in praejudicium Catholics; fidei observanda. Labbeus, 16. 292.
3 Salvo dicto conductu non obstante, liceat judici competent! ecclesiastico de
ejusmodi personarum erroribus inquirere, et alias contra eos debite procedere,
eoademque punire. Labbeus, 16. 301. Alex. 25 255. Crabb. 2. 1111.
4 Alex. 25. 256. Murray, 660. Crotty. 88. Higgins, 271.
19*
292 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEKY:
and the emperor, according to the laws of the state, executed
the sentence. Both, therefore, were clear of all imputation of
perfidy.
This is a beautiful specimen of Shandian logic and casuis-
try. The learned doctors had studied dialectics in the above-
mentioned celebrated school. An action, according to Tris-
trim, which, when committed entirely by one, is sinful, does,
when divided between two, and perpetrated partly by one,
and partly by the other, become sinless. Two ladies, accord-
ingly, an abbess and Margarita, wished to name a word of two
syllables, the pronunciation of which by one person would
have been a crime. The abbess, therefore, repeated the first,
and Margarita, by her direction, the last syllable ; and by this
means, both evaded all criminality. 1 Alexander, Murray,
Crotty, and Higgins, in like manner, partition the breach of
faith between the council and the emperor, the church and
state, the ecclesiastical and civil law, and by this simple and
easy process, exculpate both from all blame or violation of
faith. Breach of trust, it seems, loses, in this way, its im-
morality, and is transformed into duty. Some people, however,
unacquainted with the new system of Shandian dialectics, may
suppose that this learned distinction, instead of excrimmating
each, only rendered both guilty.
The faithlessness of the council and the emperor has been
admitted by Sigismund, the French clergy, the Diet of Worms,
and the infallible councils of Basil and Trent. Sigismund, on
one occasion, seemed sensible of his own infamy. His majesty
accordingly blushed in the council, when Huss appealed to
the imperial pledge of protection. I came to this city, said the
accused, to the assembled Fathers, * relying on the public faith
of the emperor, who is now present;' and, whilst he uttered
these words, ' he looked steadfastly in the face of Sigismund,
who, feeling the truth of the reproach, blushed for his own
baseness.' 2 Conscious guilt and shame crimsoned his coun-
tenance, and betrayed the inward emotions of his self-con-
demned soul. His blush was an extorted and unwilling
acknowledgment of his perfidy. The emperor, it is plain,
notwithstanding modern advocacy, thought himself guilty.
The French clergy, according to De Thou, urged the Con-
stantian decision as a precedent for a similar act of treachery. 3
The French, according to Gibert, afterward, in temporizing
1 Tristram Shan. c. 25.
* II regarda fixement Sigismond, qui ne put s'empecher de rougir. Lenfan. 1.
403.
3 Allato in earn rem Cofteilii .Constantiensis decreto. Tbuanus, 3. 524. Gibert;
1. 106.
VIOLATIONS OP OATHS BY POPISH COUNCILS.
inconsistency, deprecated the infringement of the imperial
safeguard, by which capital punishment was inflicted on a
man, to whom had been promised safety and impunity. The
French, in these instances, varied indeed with the times on
the subject of breaking trust, and exemplified the fluctuations
which occur even in an infallible communion. The French
clergy, however, in both cases, both in their urgency and
deprecation, concurred in ascribing perfidy to the Constantian
congress.
The Diet of Worms, or, at least, a party in that assembly,
pleaded the precedent of synodal and imperial treachery 'at the
Constantian assembly, in favour of breaking faith with Luther. 1
This showed their opinion of the council. Charles V. however,
possessed more integrity than Sigismund, ' and was resolved
not to blush with his predecessor.' 2 The Elector Palatine
supported the emperor ; and their united authority defeated the
intended design of treachery.
The councils of Basil and Trent, in the safe-conducts
granted to the Bohemians and Germans, admitted the same
fact. The Basilians, in their safe-conduct to the Bohemians,
disclaimed all intention of fallacy or deception, open or con-
cealed, prejudicial to the public faith, founded on any authority,
power, right, law, canon, or council, especially those of Con-
stance or Sienna. The Trentine safe-conduct to the German
Protestants is to the same effect. 3 Both these documents,
proceeding from general councils, reject, for themselves, the
Constantian precedent of treachery, and, in so doing, grant its
existence.
The general council of Basil copied the bad example, issued
at the Lateran, at Lyons, Pisa, and Constance. This unerring
assembly, in its fourth session, invalidated all oaths and obliga-
tions, which might prevent any person from coming to the
council. 4 Attendance, at Basil, it was alleged, would tend to
ecclesiastical utility, and to this end, even at the expense of
perjury, every sacred and sworn engagement had to yield.
The sacred synod, in its thirty-fourth session, deposed Eugenius
for sirnony, perjury, schism, and heresy, and absolved all
1 Qui approuvant ce qui c'etoit fait i Constance, disoient qu'cm ne devoit point
lui garder la foi. Paolo, 1.28.
2 Je ne veux pas rougir avec Sigismond, mon predecesseur. Lenfant. 1. 404.
3 Promittentes sine fraude et quolibet dolo, quod nolumus uti aliqua authoritate,
vel pote>tia, jure, statute, vel privilegio legum vel canonum et quorumcumqne
conciliorum, specialiter Constantieusis in aliquod prayjiKHcium salvo conductui.
Bin. 8. 25. et 9. 398. Crabb. 3. 17. Labb. 17. 244. et 20. 120.
* Ne quis, preetextu cujuscunque juramenri, vel oblisrationis, aut promissionis, se
ab accessu ad concilium "dispensatum cxistimnret. Ales. 25, 321. Crabb. 3. 19.
294 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
Christians from their sworn obedience to his Supremacy.-
The pontiff was guilty of heterodoxy, and, therefore, unworthy
of good faith, and became a proper object of treachery. The
holy fathers, in the thirty-seventh session, condemned and
annulled all compacts and oaths, which might obstruct the
election of a sovereign pontiff. 2 This was clever, and like
men determined to do business.
This maxim, in this manner, prior to the reformation, ob-
tained general reception in the popish communion. The Roman
hierarchs, as the viceroys of heaven, continued, according to
interest or fancy, and especially with persons convicted or sus-
pected of schism or apostacy, to invalidate oaths or vows of
all descriptions. General councils arrogated the same autho-
rity, and practised the same infernal principle. Universal
harmony, without a breath of opposition, prevailed on this topic
through papal Christendom. This abomination, therefore, in
all its frightful deformity, constituted an integral part of
popery.
The reformation, on this subject, commenced a new era.
The deformity of the papal system remained, in a great mea-
sure, unnoticed amid the starless night of the dark ages, and
even in the dim twilight which dawned on the world at the re-
vival of letters. The hideous spectre, associated with kindred
horrors and concealed in congenial obscurity, escaped for a long
time, the execration of man. Bat the light of the reformation
exposed the monster in all its frightfulness. The Bible began
to shed its lustre through the world. The beams of the Sun
of Righteousness, reflected from the book of God, poured a
flood of moral radiance over the earth. Man opened his eyes,
and the foul spirits of darkness fled. Intellectual light shed its
rays through the mental gloom of the votary of Popery, as well
as the patron of Protestantism.
The "abettors of Romanism, in the general diffusion of scrip-
tural information and rational philosophy, felt ashamed of
ancient absurdity ; and have, in consequence, disowned or
modified several tenets of their religion, which were embraced,
with unshaken fidelity, by their orthodox ancestors. The six
universities of Louvain, Douay, Paris, Alcala, Valladolid, and
Salamanca, which, in their reply to Pitt's questions, disowned
the king-deposing power, disavowed also the oath-annulling
and faith violating maxim. The Romish Committee of Ireland,
in 1792, in the name of all their popish countrymen, represen-
1 Omnes Christicolas ab ipsius obedeentia, fidelitate, ac juramentis absolvit.
Labb. 17. 391. Crabb. 3. 107.
2 Promissiones, obligationes, juramenta, in adversum hnjus electionis, damnat
reprobat, et annullat. Crabb. 3. 109. Labb. 17. 395.
VIOLATIONS OF OATHS BY POPISH COUNCILS. 295
ted the latter principle, as worthy of unqualified reprobation
and destructive of all morality and religion. The Irish bishops,
Murray, Doyle, and Kelly, in their examination before the
British Commons in 1826, disclaimed all such sentiments with
becoming and utter indignation, which was followed at the
Maynooth examination by the deprecation of Grotty, Slevin.
and M'Hale. 1 This, at the present day, seems to be the avowal
of all, even those of the Romish communion, except perhaps a
few apostles of Jesuitism.
This change is an edifying specimen of the boasted immuta-
bility of Romanism, and one of the triumphs of the Reformation,
by which it was produced. The universal renunciation of the
hateful maxim is a trophy of the great revolution, which Doyle,
in a late publication, has denominated the grand apostacy.
1 Com. Report, .175, 227, 243, 659. Grotty, 89. Slevin, 258. M'Hale, 288
OLeary, 77,85.
CHAPTER IX.
ABIANISM.
TEINITARIANISM OF ANTIQUITY ORIGIN OF THE ARIAN SYSTEM ALEXANDRIA*
AND BITHYNIAN COUNCILS NICENE AND TYRIAN COUNCILS SEMI-ARIANISH
ANTIOCHIAN AND ROMAN COUNCILS SARDICAN, ARLESIAN, MILAN, AND SIRMIAN
COUNCILS LIBERIUS FELIX ARMENIAN, SELEUCIAN, AND BYZANTINE COUNCILS
STATE OF CHRISTENDOM VARIETY OF CONFESSIONS.
TRINITARIANISM, though without system or settled phraseology,
was the faith of Christian antiquity. This doctrine indeed
was not confined to Judaism or Christianity ; but may, in a
disfigured and uncouth semblance, be discovered in the annals
of gentilism and philosophy. The Persian, Egyptian, Grecian,
Roman, and Scandinavian mythology exhibits some faint traces,
some distorted features of this mystery, conveyed, no doubt,
through the defective and muddy channels of tradition. The
same, in a mis-shapen form, appears in the Orphic theology,
aud in the Zoroastrian, Pythagorean, and Platonic philosophy.
The system which tradition in broken hints and caricatured
representation insinuated, was declared, in plain language, by
revelation, and received, in full confidence, by Christian faith.
The early Christians, however, unpractised in speculation,
were satisfied with acknowledging the essential unity and per-
sonal distinctions of the Supreme Being. The manner of the
identity and personality, the unity and distinction of Father,
Son, and Spirit, had, in a great measure, escaped the vain re-
search of refinement and presumption. Philosophy, during the
lapse of three ages after the introduction of Christianity, had
not, to any considerable extent, dared, on this subject, to theo-
rize or define. The confidence of man, in those days of sim-
plicity, had not attempted to obtrude on the arcana of heaven.
The relations of paternal, filial, and processional deity escaped,
in this manner, the eye of vain curiosity, and remained, in con-
sequence, undefined, undisputed, and unexplained. No deter-
mined or dictatorial expressions being prescribed by synodal or
imperial authority, the unfettered freedom of antiquity ascribed
to the several divine persons in the Godhead, all the perfections
ORIGIN OF THE ARIAN SYSTEM. 297
of Deity. This liberty, indeed, was unfriendly to precision of
language : and many phrases, accordingly, were used by the
ancients on this subject, which are unmarked with accuracy.
The hostility of heresiarchs first taught the necessity of dis-
crimination and exactness of diction, on this as on other topics
of theology.
Arius, about the year 317, was, on this question, the first
innovator on the faith of antiquity, whose error obtained exten-
sive circulation or was attended with important consequences.
Artemon, Paul, Ebion, and a few other speculators, indeed,
had, on this topic, broached some novel opinions. These,
however, were local and soon checked. But Arianism, like
contagion, spread through Christendom : and was malignant in
its nature and lasting in its consequences.
This heresy originated in Alexandria. The patriarch of that
city, whose name was Alexander, discoursing, perhaps with
ostentation on the trinity, ascribed consubstantiality and equality
to the Son. Arius, actuated, says Theodoret, with envy and
ambition, opposed this theory. Epiphanius represents Arius,
in this attempt, as influenced by Satan and inspired by the
afflatus of the Devil. Alexander's theology seemed to Arius,
to destroy the unity of God and the distinction of Father and
Son. 1
Epiphanius has drawn a masterly and striking portrait of
Arius. His stature was tall and his aspect melancholy. His
whole person, like the wily serpent, seemed formed for decep-
tion. His dress was simple and pleasing; whilst his address
and conversation, on the first interview, were mild and winning.
His prepossessing manner was calculated to captivate the mind,
by the fascinations of gentleness and insinuation. Sozomen
and Socrates represent Arius as an able dialectician, and a
formidable champion in the thorny field of controversy. 2
His opinions, on the topic of the trinity, differed widely from
the generality of his fellow-Christians. The Son, according to
his view, was a created being, formed in time out of nothing
by the plastic power of the Almighty. Emmanuel, in this
system, does not possess eternity. A time was in which he did
not exist. He was, according to this statement, unlike the
Father in substance, subject to mutability, and liable to pain. 3
TheHeresiarch's impiety prevented not his success in prose-
lytism, which he obtained, in a great measure, by his extraor
dinary zeal and activity. His system was soon embraced by
1 Epiph. 1. 728. Socrates, I. 6. Theodoret, I. 2. Alex. 7. 87.
Epiph. 1. 729. Socrates, I. 5. Sozomen, 1. 15. Alex. 7. 86. Godeau, 2. 101
3 Theodor. I. 2. Sozomen, I. 15. Socrat. I. 6. Augustin, 8. 621. Alex. 7. 38.
Godeau, 2. 121.
298 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
two Egyptian bishops, seven presbyters, twelve deacons, and,
what is more extraordinary, by 700 devoted virgins. He
boasted, at one time, of being followed by all the oriental
clergy, except Philogonos, Hellenicus, and Macarius, of
Antioch, Tripoli, and Jerusalem. 1
The patriarch of Alexandria, in the mean time, having ad-
monished the innovator and found him obstinate, convened a
council in 320, consisting of about 100 Egyptian and Lybian
bishops, who condemned Arianism, expelled its author, with
the clergy and laity of his faction, from the church and from
the city. Arius went to Palestine, where some, says Epiph-
anius, received, and some rejected his system. 2 His party,
however, soon became formidable. The Arians, accordingly,
assembled a synod, and exhibited a noble display of their unity
with the Egyptians. The former in the council of Bithynia,
reversed all that had been done at Alexandria. Arius was
declared orthodox and admitted to their communion. Circular
letters were transmitted to the several bishops of the church,
for the purpose of inducing them to follow the Bithynian
example, and of enjoining the same on the patriarch of Alex-
andria.
The Tyrian, some time after, counteracted the Nicerie coun-
cil, as the Bithynian had the Alexandrian. The council of
Nicsea, the first general council, convoked by the emperor
Constantine, was assembled to settle the Trinitarian controver-
sy, and was the most celebrated ecclesiastical congress of
antiquity. The clergy were summoned from the several parts
of Christendom, and about 318 attended. Hosius, in the
general opinion, was honoured with the presidency. The
assembled fathers, for the establishment of Trinitarianism and
the extermination of Arianism, declared the CONSUBSTANTIALITY
of the Son. This celebrated term, indeed, had, about sixty
years before, been rejected by the synod of Antioch and by
Dionysius of Alexandria, in opposition to Sabellianism. Diony-
sius, however, had rejected it merely because unscriptural ;
but afterward used it in an epistle to the Roman hierarch.
The Antiochian fathers omitted it, because it seemed, in the
perverted explanation of the Paulicians, to favour Sabellianism,
and militate against the distinct personality of the Son. The
word, however, came into use soon after the apostolic age.
Tertullian, arguing against Praxeas, employs an expression of
the same import. The term, according to Ruffinus, was found
vi the works of Origen. 3 The Arians, only three in number,
i Epiph. II. 69. P. 729. Sozomen, I. 15. Godea. 2. 120.
Epiph. I. 72.9. Euset. III. 6, 7. Sozomen, I. 15. Alex. 7. 91.
3 Epiph. 1. 735. Socrat. 1. 8. Tertullian, 502. c. 4. Alex. 7. 122. Juenin, 3. 60.
NICENE AND TYRIAN COUNCILS. 299
who refused subscription, were, according to the unchristian
custom of the age, anathematized and banished.
The Tyrian synod, though only provincial, endeavoured to
counteract the supreme authority of the general Nicene coun-
cil. This assembly, which was convened by the emperor in
335, consisted of about sixty of the eastern episcopacy.
Athanasius, who was compelled to appear as a criminal,
accused of the foulest but most unfounded imputations, attended
with about forty Egyptians. Dionysius, with the imperial
guards, was commissioned to prevent commotion or disorder.
The Arian faction was led by Eusebius of Caesarea, with
passion and tyranny. The whole scene combined the noisy
fury of a mob, and the appalling horrors of an inquisition.
Athanasius, notwithstanding, with admirable dexterity, exposed
the injustice of the council and vindicated his own innocence.
The champion of Trinitarianism, however, would have been
murdered by the bravoes of Arianism, had not the soldiery
rescued the intended victim from assassination. He embarked
in a ship and escaped their holy vengeance. 1 But the sacred
synod, in his absence, did not forget to pronounce sentence of
excommunication and banishment.
The Antitrinitarians, soon after the Nicene council, split into
several factions, distinguished by different names. The Arians
and Semi-Arians, however, predominated. The Arians fol-
lowed the system of their founder, and continued to maintain
the DISSIMILARITY of the Son. The Semi-Arians, approxima-
ting to the Nicenians, asserted his SIMILARITY. 2 Arianism,
indeed, in the multiplicity of its several forms, occupies all the
immense space between Socinianism, which holds the Son's
mere humanity, and Trinitarianism, which maintains his true
deity. This intermediate distance seems to have been rilled
by the Antitrinitarian systems of the fourth century, as they
ascribed more or less perfection to the second person of the
Godhead. The Arians and Semi-Arians, however, wrangling
about the similarity and dissimilarity, showed the utmost
opposition and hatred to each other, as well as to the Nicenians,
who contended for the consubstantiality.
The Semi-Arians and Trinitarians soon came to action, in
the Antiochian and Roman synods. Julius, the Roman pontiff,
assembled a Roman council of fifty Italian bishops, in which
Athanasius was acquitted and admitted to communion. The
Greeks, in the mean time, assembled at Antioch, and opened
1 Socrat. 1. 28-34. Sozom. II. 25-28. Theod. I. 30. Alex. 7< 132. Godeau,
2. 182.
Epiph. II. 73. P. 485. Alex. 7. 95.
300 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY C
a battery against the enemy. 1 These, amounting to ninety,
degraded Athanasius, and issued three Semi-Arian creeds,
which differing in other particulars, concurred in rejecting the
eonsubstantiality.
The council of Sardica in 347, declared for Athanasius and
Trinitarianism, and was opposed by that of Philippopolis in
Thracia. The Sardican assembly consisted of about 300 of
the Latins, and the other of about seventy of the Greeks.
The hostile councils encountered each other with their spiritual
artillery, and hurled the thunders of mutual excommunication.
The Latins at Sardica cursed and degraded the Arians with
great devotion. The Greeks at Phihppopolis, retorting the
imprecations with equal piety, condemned the consubstantiality,
and excommunicated Athanasius the Alexandrian patriarch,
Julius the Roman pontiff, and their whole party. Athanasius,
in this manner, stigmatised in the east as a sinner, was revered
in the west as a saint. Accounted the patron of heresy among
the Greeks, he was reckoned, among the Latins, the champion
of Catholicism. Having devoted each other to Satan with
mutual satisfaction, the pious episcopacy proceeded to the
secondary task of enacting forms of faith. The western pre-
lacy were content with the Nicene confession. The oriental
clergy published an ambiguous creed faintly tinged with Semi-
Arianism. 2
The Sardican council was the last stand which the Latins,
during the reign of Constantius, made for Athanasius and
Trinitarianism. The Greeks, who were mostly Arians, were
joined by the Latins, and both in concert, in the councils of
Aries, Milan, Sirmium, Ariminum, Seleucia, and Constantino-
ple, condemned Athanasius and supported Arianism.
The Synod of Aries, in 353, . commenced hostilities against
Consubstantiality and its Alexandrian champion. Constantius
had long, with the utmost anxiety, wished the western prelacy
to condemn the Alexandrian metropolitan. But the emperor,
on account of his enemy's popularity, and the reviving freedom
of the Roman government, proceeded with caution and diffi-
culty. The Latins met at Aries, where Marcellus and Vincent,
who, from their capacity and experience, were expected to
maintain the dignity of their legation, represented the Roman
hierarch. Valens and Ursacius, who were veterans in faction,
led the Arian and Imperial party ; and succeeded by the
superiority of their tactics and the influence of their sovereign,
in procuring the condemnation of Athanasius. 8
1 Socrat. 11. 7. Bin. 1. 519. Alex. 7. 151. Godeau, 2. 20.
2 Theod. 11. 8. Socrat. 11. 20. Bin. 1. 558. Alex. 7 153: Bruys, 1. 112.
3 Bin. 1. 589. Labb. 2. 823. Bruys, 1. 115.
COUNCILS OF SARDICA, ARLBS, AND MILAN. 301
The Synod of Aries was, in 355, succeeded by that of
Milan, and attended with similar consequences. This conven-
tion, summoned by Constantius, consisted of about 300 of the
western and a few of the oriental clergy. The assembly,
which, in number appears to have equalled the Nicene council,
seemed, at first, to favour the Nicene faith and its intrepid
defender. Dionysius, Eusebius, Lucifer, and Hilary made a
vigorous, though an unsuccessful stand. But the integrity of
the bishops was gradually undermined by the sophistry of the
Arians and the solicitation of the emperor, who gratified his
revenge at the expense of his dignity, and exposed his own
passions while he influenced those of the clergy. Reason and
truth were silenced by the clamours of a venal majority. The
Arians were admitted to communion, and the hero of trinita-
riamsm was, with all due solemnity, condemned by the formal
judgment of western as well as eastern Christendom.
The decisions of Aries and Milan were corroborated by
those of Sirmium. The Sirmian assembly, convoked by the
emperor and celebrated in the annals of antiquity, consisted,
says Sozomen, 1 of both Greeks and Latins ; and, therefore, in
the usual acceptation of the term, was a general council. The
westerns, according to Binius, amounted to more than three
hundred, and the easterns, in all probability, were equally
numerous. The fathers of Sirmium must have been about
double those of Nicsea. 2 The assembly seems to have had sev-
eral sessions at considerable intervals, and its chronology has
been adjusted by Petavius and Valesius.
The Sirmians emitted three forms of faith. The first, in
351, omits the consubstantiality, bat contains no express decla-
ration against the divinity of the Son. This exposition,
which Athanasius accounted Arian, Gelasius, Hilary, and
Facundus reckoned Trinitarian. 3 The eastern and westepn
champions of the faith differed, in this manner, on the orthodoxy
of a creed, issued by a numerous council and confirmed by a
Roman pontiff. Athanasius condemned, as heresy, a confes-
sion which Hilary, supported in the rear by his infallibility
Pope Gelasius, approved as Catholicism. This was an admi-
rable display of unity. The second formulary of Sirmium, in
357, contains pure Arianism. The consubstantiality and
similarity, in this celebrated confession, are rejected, and the
Son, in honour and gl~>ry, represented as inferior to the Father
- 1 Soz. IV. 9. Socrat. 2. 36 Bin. 1. 289. Labb. 2. 827.
2 Socrat. IT. 30. Sozomen, IV. 6. Bin. 1. 593, 594, 595.
3 Hilarius illam formulam non improbat, imo censet Catholicam. Sect ab Atha-
sasio rejickur tanquam opus, quo Arinna impietas, implicite saltern, contineretttr
Juenin, 3.70. Alex. 7, 170. Labb. 2. 846. Godeau, 2. 282.
302 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
who alone possesses the attributes of eternity, invisibility, and
immortality. The third, which was afterward adopted in the
Armenian synod, is Semi-Arian. Rejecting the con substanti-
ality, as unscriptural, it asserts the similarity of the Son.
The second Sirmian confession was confirmed by Pope Libe-
rius. Baronius, Alexander, Binius, and Juenin indeed have
laboured hard to show that the creed which Liberius signed, was
not the second, but the first of Sirmium, which, according to
Hilary, was orthodox. 1 But the unanimous testimony of history
is against this opinion. Du Pin has stated the transactions, on
this occasion, with his usual candour and accuracy. The Ro-
man bishop, according to this author, subscribed the second of
Sirmium, which was Arian, while an exile at Berea, and the
first of the same city, which was Semi-Arian, afterwards at the
place in which it was issued. ' All antiquity, with one consent,
admits the certainty of this Pontiff's subscription to an Arian
creed, and speaks of his fall as an apostacy from the faith.' 2 Du
Pin's statement and the Arianism of the Sirmian confession,
which Liberius signed, has been attested by Liberius, Hilary,
Athanasius, Jerom, Philostorgius, Damasus, Anastasius, and
Sozomen.
Liberius himself, in his epistle to his oriental clergy, declared,
that he signed, at Berea, the confession which was presented
to him by Demophilus, a decided and zealous partizan of Ari-
anism. Demophilus, the Roman pontiff writes, ' explained the
Sirmian faith, which Liberius, with a willing mind, afterward
subscribed.' He avers, in the same production, that ' he agreed
with the oriental bishops,' who were notoriously Arian, ' in all
things.' 3
The sainted Hilary calls Liberius a prevaricator, designates
the confession issued at Sirmium, proposed by Demophilus, and
signed by the pontiff, ' the Arian perfidy,' and launches ' three
anathemas against his holiness and his companions, who were
all heretics.' 4 Hilary's account shows, in the clearest terms,
that it was not the first Sirmian formulary which Liberius
signed. This, Hilary accounted orthodox, and therefore would
not denominate it a perfidy.
Athanasius confirms the relation of Hilary and the apostacy
of Liberius, ' who, through fear of death, subscribed.' Jerome
i Spon. 357. XIII. Alex. 7. 117. Bin. 1. 576.
3 Omnes antiqui, uno ore, de lapsu Liberii, velut de apostasia a fide loquuntur.
Du Pin, 347.
3 Videtis in omnibus me vobis consentaneum esse. Hanc ego libenti ammo, sua-
cepi. Bin. 1. 582. ^ Hilary, Fragm. 426. Juenin, 3. 75. Maimburg, 103.
4 Haec eat perfidia Ariana. Anathema, tibi a me dictum, Liberi, et sociis tuis,
Iterum tibi anathema et tertio prevaricator, Liberi. Hilary, in Fragm. 426, 427.
Maimburg, 104.
POPE LIBERI17S AN ARIAN. 303
of sainted memory has, in his catalogue and chronicon, related
the same fact. Fortunatian, says the saint, ' urged, and sub-
dued, and constrained Liberius to the subscription of heresy.'
Liberius, says the same author, ' weary of banishment, signed
neretical depravity.' I^iberius according to , Philostorgius,
* subscribed against Athanasius and the ConsubstantiaHty.'
This pontiff, says Damasus in his pontifical, and Anastasius in
his history, ' consented to the heretic Constantius.' The
emperor, says Sozomen, * forced Liberius to deny the consub-
stantiality.' 1
Liberius, Hilary, Athanasius, Jerome, Philostorgius, Da-
masus, and Anastasius, in this statement, have, in more modern
times, been followed by Platina, Auxilius, Eusebius, Cusan,
Areolus, Mezeray, Bruys, Petavius, Avocat, Gerson, Vignier,
Marian, Alvarius, Bede, Sabellicus, Gerson, Regino, Alphon-
sus, Caron, Tostatus, Godeau, Du Pin, and Maimbourg.
Liberius, says Platina, ' agreed in all things with the heretics
or Arians.' Auxilius, Eusebius, Cusan, Areolus, Mezeray,
Bruys, Petavius, Avocat, Gerson, Vignier, Marian, and Alvarius
represent Liberius, as subscribing or consenting to an Arian
confession. Bede, the English historian in his martyrology,
characterizes this pontiff, like the Emperor Constantius, as a
partizan of Arianism. Liberius, according to Sabellicus, Gerson,
Regino, Alphonsus, Caron and Tostatus, was an Arian. This
pontiff, says Godeau, ' subscribed the Sirmian confession and
concurred with the oriential clergy, who were the patrons of
heresy. His condemnation of Athanasius, at this time, was the
condemnation of Catholicism.' Du Pin bears testimony of this
pontiff's apostacy, in signing the second confession of Sirmium.
The Roman hierarch, says this author in his History and Dis-
sertations, subscribed both to Arianism and Semi- Arianism ;
while all the ancients, with the utmost unanimity, testify his de-
fection from Trmitarianism. Maimbourg, though a Jesuit, admits
the pontiff's solemn approbation of Arianism, and his fall into
the abyss of heresy. 2
>fw nittftnvfivov Owvarfov, wteypo^-s*'. Athanasins, ad Sol. Solicita-
vlt ac fregit et ad subscriptionem hseresios compulit. Jerom. 4. 124. Libe-
rius taedio victus exilii et in haeretica pravitate subscribens. Jerom in Chron.
Aiptpiov xata -too opoisaiov xa& (tqv xat xafa yc -fov AOcwaaiov vrCayp&tyu*
Philos. IV. 3. Liberius consensit Constantio hseretico. Anastasius, 11. Bin. 1. 576
E/Jw&ET'o wwto ofio?ioyt>>' [it] SWOA * Hatfpc tov viov o/toHgtov. Sozomen, IV. 5.
2 In rebus omnibus sensit cum hsereticis. Pontifex cum Arianis sentiebat. P.la-
tina in Liber. Quis nesciat quod Liberius, proh dolor, Arianae haeresi subscrip-
Berit. Auxilius, 1. 25. Alex. 9. 17.
Doleret Liberium Papam Arianae perfidiae consensisse. Euseb. in Brev. Rom
Lannoy, 1. 126.
Liberius consensit errori Arianorum. Cusan, II. 5. Caroa, 87.
Liberius in illam pravitatem Bubscripsissit. Areolns in Caron, 96.
304 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
His supremacy's fall from Trinitarianism, indeed, is attested
by all antiquity and by all the moderns, who have any preten-
sions to candour or honesty. The relation has been denied
only by a few men, such as Baronius and Bellarmine, whose
days were spent in the worthy task of concealing or pervert-
ing the truth. These, utterly destitute of historical authority,
have endeavoured to puzzle the subject by misrepresentation
and chicanery. Baronius maintains the orthodoxy of the
Sirmian confession signed by the Roman pontiff. The annalist,
on this topic, has the honour to differ from the saints and his-
torians of antiquity, such as Hilary, Athanasius, Jerome,
Damasus, and Sozomen. His infallibility, according to Bel-
larmine, encouraged Arianism only in external action ; while
his mind, ' that noble seat of thought,' remained the unspotted
citadel of genuine Catholicism. This was very clear and
sensible in the Jesuit, who seems to have been nearly as good
at distinctions as Walter Shandy.
The pontiff's vindicators, such as Baronius, Bellarmine, Binius,
Juenin, Faber, Dens, and Bossuet, who deny his Arianism,
admit his condemnation of Athanasius, his communion with the
Arians, and his omission of the consubstantiality. These
errors, which are acknowledged, amount, in reality, to a pro-
fession of Arianism and an immolation of the truth. The cause
of Athanasius, says Maimbourg, 'was inseparable from the
faith which he defended ' The condemnation of the Trinita-
Liberius etaut tombe en heresie. Mezeray, 561
Concile de Sirmium aiant dress6 une profession de foi en faveur de 1'arianisme
Libere y souscrivit. Bruys, 1. 118.
Liberius subscripsit Arianorum fidei profession!. Fetavius, 2. 134.
Liberius cut la foiblesse de souserire & nne formule de fai dressee a Sirmieh
avec beaucoup d'artifice par les Aliens. Avocat, 2. 67.
Legimus Liberium Arianse pravitati subscripsisse. Gerson in Cossant, 3. 1156.
Liberius souscrivit a la doctrine des Ariens. Vignier, 3. 879.
Liberius taedio victus exilii, in haeretica privitate subscribens, Marian, in Crabb
1. 347. Liberius Papa Arianse perfidiae consensit. Alvarus, II. 10.
Sub Constantio Imperatore Ariano machinante, Liberio praesule similiter hser*t*
co. Beda, 3. 326. Marty. 19. Calend. Sept.
Arianus, ut quidam scribunt, est factus. Sabell. Enn. 7. L. 8.
Libere souscrivit I'Arianisme. Gerson in Lenfan. Pisa, 1. 286.
Liberius reversus ab exilio, haereticis favet. Begin. 1.
De Liberio Pape, constat fuisse Arianum. Alphonsus, I. 4. Caron. 96.
Vere Arianus fuit. Garon. c. 18.
Quilibet homo potest errare in fide, tJt effici haereticus : sicut de mnltis summfe.
Pontificibus legimus ut de Liberio. Tostatus, in Laun. ad Metay. 16.
On ne peut nier qu'ils ne fussent heretiques. Godeau, 2. 286.
Liberius fidei formulae haereticse subscripsit. Da Pin, 347.
Liberius approava solennellement I'Arianisme tomber dans 1'abime de l*heren*>
tiaimburg, c. 10.
COUNCILS OF ARIMINUM AND SELEUCIA. 305
rian chief, according to Godeau and Moreri, ' was tantamount
to the condemnation of Catholicism.' 1
The Papal church, therefore, in its representation at Sir-
naium, through the oriental and occidental communion, was, in
this manner, guilty of general a.postacy. Its head and its mem-
bers, or the Roman pontiff and his clergy, conspired, through
eastern and western Christendom, against Catholicism, and fell
into heresy. The defection extended to the Greeks and Latins,
and was sanctioned by the pope. No fact, in all antid t uity, is
better attested than this event, in which all the cotemporary
historians concur, without a single discord to interrupt the
general harmony.
The world, on this occasion, was blessed with two cotem-
porary Arian Pontiffs. During the expatriation of Liberius,
Felix was raised to the papacy, and remains to the present day
a saint and a martyr of Romanism. This Hierarch notwith-
standing, was, without any lawful election, ordained by Arian
bishops, communicated with the Arian party, embraced, say
Socrates and Jerome, the Arian heresy, and violated a solemn
oath, which, with the rest of the Roman clergy, he had taken,
to acknowledge no other bishop while Liberius lived. Atha-
nasius, the champion of Trinitarianism, was so ungenteel as to
style this saint, * a monster, raised to the Papacy by the malice
of Antichrist.' 2 The church, at this time, had two Arian heads,
and God had two heretical vicars-general. One viceroy of
heaven was guilty of Arianism, and the other, both of Arianism
and perjury. Baronius and Bellarmine should have informed
Christendom, which of these vice-gods, or whether both, pos-
sessed the attribute of infallibility.
The councils of Ariminum, Seleucia, and Constantinople fol-
lowed the defection of Liberius, and displayed, in a striking
point of view, the versatility of the Papal communion and the
triumph of the Arian heresy. Constantius had designed to call
a general council, for. the great, but impracticable purpose of
effecting unanimity of faith through all the precincts of eastern
and western Christendom ; and Arianism, in the emperor's
intention, was to be the standard. of uniformity. His majesty,
however, was diverted, probably by the intrigues of the Arians,
from the resolution of convening the Greeks and Latins in one
assembly. Two councils, therefore, one in the east and the
1 On ne pent nier que condamner Athanase, ne fat condemnerla foi Catholique.
Godeau, 5. 286. Moreri, 5. 154. Maimburg, IV. Bellarmin, IV. 9. Bin. 1. 593.
Verum est Liberium cum Arianis communicasse et subscripsisse damnation!
Athanasii. Dens, 2. 163.
^ Liberius rejetta la communion d' Athanase, communia avec les Ariens, et suscri-
vit une confession de foi, on la foi de Nicee etoit supprimee. Bossuet, Opus. 2. 545
2 Athan. ad Sol. Theod. II. 17. Socrat. II. 37. Sozemen, IV. 11.
20
#06 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
other in the west, were appointed to meet at the same time.
The westerns were instructed to meet at Ariminum and the
easterns at Seleucia. The Ariminian council, which met in
359, consisted of 400, or, as some say, 600 western bishops,
from Italy, Africa, Spain, Gaul, Britain, and Illyricum. 3 The
Arian party, in this convention, was small, amounting only to
about 80 ; but was led by Valens and Ursacius, who trained
under the Eusebian banners in the ecclesiastical wars of the
east, had been practised in faction and popular discussion,
which gave them a superiority over the undisciplined eccles-
iastical soldiery of the west.
The council, at first, assumed a high tone of orthodoxy. The
consubstantiality was retained, the Nicene faith confirmed, and
the Arian heresy condemned with the usual anathemas. The
Ariminians, unsatisfied with the condemnation of Arianism,
proceeded next to point their spiritual artillery against his par-
tizans. 2 These were sacrificed to the interests of the Nicene
theology, and hurled from their episcopal thrones, as an immo-
lation to the offended genius of Trintarianism.
But the end of this assembly disgraced the beginning. Ursa-
cius and Valens, experienced in wordy war and skilled in syno-
dal tactics, rallied their flying forces, and charged the victorious
enemy with menace and sophistry. These veterans summoned
to their aid, the authority of the emperor and the control of the
Prefect, who was commissioned to banish the refractory, if they
did not exceed fifteen. The chicanery of the Semi-Arian faction
embarrassed, confounded, and, at last, deceived the ignorance
or simplicity of the Latin prelacy, who, by fraud and intimida-
tion, yielded to the enemy, and surrendered the palladium of
the Nicenian faith. The authority of Constantius, the influence
of Taurus, the stratagems of Ursacius and Valens, the dread
of banishment, the distress of hunger and cold, extorted the
reluctant subscription of the Ariminian Fathers to a Semi-Arian
form of faith, which established the similarity of the Son, but
suppressed the consubstantiality. The suppression, however,
did not satisfy the Semi-Arian party. An addition was sub-
joined, declaring ' the son unlike other creatures.' This plainly
implied that the Son is a created being, though of a superior
order and of a peculiar kind. The western clergy, in this
manner were bubbled out of their religion. All, says Prosper,
< condemned, through treachery, the ancient faith, and sub-
Scribed the perfidy of Ariminum.' 3 The crafty dexterity of
i Theod. II. 18. Epiph. 1. 870. Hilary, 428. Alex. 7. 180. Godeau, 2. 296.
* Theod. II. 16. Labbeus, 2. 896, 912. Paolo, 2. 106. Juenin, 3. 71.
3 Synodus apud Ariminum et Seleuciam Isaurise facta, in qua antiqua patrum
fides decem primo legatoram dehinc omnium proditione damnata eat. Prosper, 1*
423. Socrat. II. 37. Sozomen, IV. 19.
COUNCILS oipAKIMINUM AND SBLBUCIA. 305
rian chief, according to Godeau and Moreri, * was tantamount
to the condemnation of Catholicism.' 1
The Papal church, therefore, in its representation at Sir-
mium, through the oriental and occidental communion, was, in
this manner, guilty of general apostaey. Its head and its mem-
bers, or the Roman pontiff and his clergy, conspired, through
eastern and western Christendom, against Catholicism, and fell
into heresy. The defection extended to the Greeks and Latins,
and was sanctioned by the pope. No fact, in all antiquity, is
better attested than this event, in which all the cotemporary
historians concur, without a single discord to interrupt the
general harmony.
The world, on this occasion, was blessed with two cotem-
porary Arian Pontiffs. During the expatriation of Liberius,
Felix was raised to the papacy, and remains to the present day
a saint and a martyr of Romanism. This Hierarch notwith-
standing, was, without any lawful election, ordained by Arian
bishops, communicated with the Arian party, embraced, say
Socrates and Jerome, the Arian heresy, and violated a solemn
oath, which, with the rest of the Roman clergy, he had taken,
to acknowledge no other bishop while Liberius lived. Atha-
nasius, the champion of Trmitarianism, was so ungenteel as to
style this saint, ' a monster, raised to the Papacy by the malice
of Antichrist.' 2 The church, at this time, had two Arian heads,
and God had two heretical vicars-general. One viceroy of
heaven was guilty of Arianism, and the other, both of Arianism
and perjury. Baronius and Bellarmine should have informed
Christendom, which of these vice-gods, or whether both, pos-
sessed the attribute of in fallibility'.
The councils of Arirmnum, Seleucia, and Constantinople fol-
lowed the defection of Liberius, and displayed, in a striking
point of view, the versatility of the Papal communion and the
triumph of the Arian heresy. Constantius had designed to call
a general council, for the great, but impracticable purpose of
effecting unanimity of faith through all the precincts of eastern
and western Christendom ; and Arianism, in the emperor's
intention, was to be the standard of uniformity. His majesty,
however, was diverted, probably by the intrigues of the Arians,
from the resolution of convening the Greeks and Latins in one
assembly. Two councils, therefore, one in the east and the
1 On lie pent nier que condamner Athanase, ne fat condemner la foi Catholique.
Godeau, 5. 286. Moreri, 5. 154. Maimburg, IV. Bellarmin, IV. 9. Bin. 1. 593.
Veram est Liberium cum Arianis communicasse et subscripsisse damnation!
AthanaBii. Dens, 2. 163.
Liberins rejetta la communion d' Athanase, communia avec les Aliens, et sus.cri-
vit une confession de foi, ou la foi de Nicee etoit supprimfee. Bossuet. Opus. 2. 545.
2 Athan. ad Sol. Theod. II. 17. Socrat. II. 37. Sozemen, IV. 11.
20
306 THE -, VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
other in the west, .were appointed to meet at the same time.
The westerns were instructed to meet at Ariminum and the
easterns at Seleucia. The Ariminian council, which met in
359, consisted of 400, or, as some say, 600 western bishops,
from Italy, Africa, Spain, Gaul, Britain, and Illyricum. 3 The
Arian party, in this convention, was small, amounting only to
about 80 ; but was led by Valens and Ursacius, who trained
under the Eusebian banners in the ecclesiastical wars of the
east, had been pra.ctised in faction .and popular discussion,
which gave -them a superiority over the undisciplined eccles-
iastical soldiery of the west.
The council, at first, assumed a high tone of orthodoxy. The
consubstantiality was retained, the Nicene faith confirmed, and
the Arian heresy condemned with the usual anathemas. The
Ariminians, unsatisfied with the condemnation of Arianism,
proceeded next to point their spiritual artillery against his par-
tizans. 2 These were sacrificed to the interests of the Nicene
theology, and hurled from their episcopal thrones* as an immo-
lation to the offended genius of Trintarianism.
But the end of this assembly disgraced the beginning. Ursa-
cius and Valens, experienced in wordy war and skilled in syno-
dal tactics, rallied their flying forces, and charged the victorious
enemy with menace and sophistry. These veterans summoned
to their aid, the authority of the emperor and the control of the
Prefect, who was commissioned to banish the refractory, if they
did not exceed fifteen. The chicanery of the Semi-Arian faction
embarrassed, confounded, and, at last, deceived the ignorance
or simplicity of the Latin prelacy, who, by fraud and intimida.-
tion, yielded to the enemy, and surrendered the palladium of
the Nicenian faith. The authority of Constantius, the influence
of Taurus, the stratagems of Ursacius and Valens, the dread
of banishment, the distress of hunger and cold, extorted the
reluctant subscription of the Ariminian Fathers to a Semi-Arian
form of faith, which established the similarity of the Son, but
suppressed the consubstantiality. The suppression, however,
did not satisfy the Semi-Arian party. An addition was sub-
joined, declaring ' the son unlike other creatures.' This plainly
implied that the Son is a created being, though of a superior
order and of a peculiar kind. The western clergy, in this
manner were bubbled out of their religion. All, says Prosper,
' condemned, through treachery, the ancient faith, and sub-
scribed the perfidy of Ariminum.' 3 The crafty dexterity of
1 Theod. II. 18. Epiph. 1. 870. Hilary, 428. Alex. 7. 180. Godeau, 2. 296.
2 Theod. II. 16. Labbeus, 2. 896, 912. Paolo, 2. 106. Juenin, 3. 71.
3 Synodus apud Ariminum et Seleuciam Isauriae facta, in qua antiqua patrum
fides decem primo legatorum dehinc omnium proditione damnata est. Prosper, 1.
423. Socrat. II. 37. Sozomen, IV. 19.
VARIETY OF CONFESSIONS. 307
the Semi-Arians gulled the silly simplicity or gross ignorance
of the Trinitarians, who, according to their own story, soon
repented. Arianism, said the French chancellor at Poissy,
was established by the general council of Ariminum.
The eastern clergy, in the mean time, met at Seleucia, and
exhibited a scene of confusion, fury, tumult, animosity, and
nonsense, calculated to excite the scorn of the infidel and the
pity of the wise. Nazianzen calls this assembly ' the tower
of Babel and the council of Caiaphas.' An hundred and sixty
bishops attended. The Semi-Arians amounted to about one
hundred and five, the Arians to forty, and the Trinitarians to
fifteen, Leonas, the Quaestor, attended, as the Emperor's deputy,
to prevent tumult. The Arians and Semi-Arians commenced
furious debates on the Son's similarity, dissimilarity, and con-
substantiality. Dissension and animosity arose to such a height,
that Leonas withdrew, telling the noisy ecclesiastics, that his
presence was not necessary to enable them to wrangle and scold.
The Semi-Arian creed of Antioch, however, was, on the motion
of Sylvan, recognized and subscribed ; and the Arians withdrew
from the assembly. The Arians and a deputation from the
Semi-Arians afterwards appeared at court, to plead their cause
before the emperor, Avho obliged both to sign the last Sirmian
confession, which, dropping the consubstantiality, established
the similarity of the Son in all things. 1
The Byzantine synod, which met in 360, confirmed the last
Sirmian confession. This assembly consisted of fifty bishops
of Bythinia, who were the abettors of Arianism. All these,
though Arians, adopted the Sirmian formulary, which sanc-
tioned 'the similarity of the son in all things.' This, these
dissemblers did to flatter the emperor, who patronized .this
system. All other forms of belief were condemned, the Acts
of the Seleucian synod repealed, and the chief patrons of the
Semi-Arian heresy deposed. 2
The Arians, supported by the emperor, continued the perse-
cution of the Nicene faith, till the world, in general, became
Arian. The contagion of heresy, like a desolating pestilence,
spread through the wide extent of eastern and western Chris-
tendom. The melancholy tale has, among others, been attested
by Sozomen, Jerome, Basil, Augustine, Vincentius, Prosper,
Beda, Baronius, and Labbeus. 3
1 Godeau, 2. 302. Nazianzen, Or. 21. Labbeus, 2. 915. Sozomen, IV. 22.
Socrat. II. 39, 40. Alex. 7. 185.
a Socrat. II. 41. Labbeus, 3. 72. Juenin, 3. 72.
3 ESoxst, -tots Sea tfov tov jSoKJi.tetoj ^oj3ov, ava-tc/hq xat> 8vaif ofiotypovew jttpt "to
Soy/ta. Sozomen, IV. 16. Ingemuit totus orbis, et Arianurn se ease miratus est.
Jerom. adv. Lucif. 4. 300. IBt^-v ojuywv wyav. Nazian. Or. 21. Ei$a rtoyvotfw
20*
308 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
* The east and west,' says Sozomen, ' seemed, through fear
of Constantius, to agree in faith.' Arianism, all know, was the
faith produced by dread of the emperor. ' The whole world,'
says the sainted Jerome, ' groaned and wondered to find itself
become Arian.' Gregory's relation is still more circumstantial
and melancholy. All, says this celebrated author, ' except a
very few whom obscurity protected, or whose resolution, through
divine strength, was proof against temptation and danger, tem-
porised, yielded to the emperor, and betrayed the faith.' Some,
he adds, ' were chiefs of the impiety, and some were circum-
vented by threats, gain, ignorance, or flattery. The rightful
guardians of the faith, actuated by hope or fear, became its
persecutors. Few were found, who did not sign with their
hands what they condemned in their hearts ; while many, who
had been accounted invincible, were overcome. The faithful,
without distinction, were degraded and banished.' The sub-
scription of the Byzantine confession was an indispensable
qualification for obtaining and retaining the episcopal dignity.
Basil, on the occasion, uses still stronger language than Gre-
gory. He represents the church as reduced to that * complete
desperation, which he calls its dissolution.' According to Au-
gustine, ' the church, as it were, perished from the earth.
Nearly all the world fell from the apostolic faith. Among six
hundred and fifty bishops, were found scarcely seven, who
obeyed God rather than the emperor, and who would neither
condemn Athanasius nor deny the Trinity. The Latins, ac-
cording to Vincentius, ' yielded almost all to force or fraud, and
the poison of Arianism contaminated, not merely a few, but
nearly the whole world.'
' Nearly all the churches in the whole world,' says Prosper,
' were, in the name of peace and the emperor, polluted with
the communion of the Arians.' The councils of Ariminum and
Seleucia, which embraced the eastern and western prelacy, all,
p2oju,0a. rtuvt&tj 'topjv't&t, rtapa sxxtyata. Basil, ep. 82. ad Athan. 3. 173.
Tanquam perient ecclesia de orbe terrarum. August. Ep. 93. L'eglise etoit
perie. Apol. 1. 100. Dilapso a fide Apostolorum oznni pene mundo. De sex-
centis et quinquaginta, ut fertur, episcopis vix septern invent! sunt, quibus cariora
essent Dei praecepta quam regis, videlicet ut nee in Athanasii damnationem con-
venirent, nee Trinitatis confessionem negarent. Augustin, contra Jul. 10. 919.
Arianoram venenum non jam portiunculam quandam, sed pene orbem totum con-
taminaverat, adeo ut prope cunctis Latini sermonis episcopis, partim vi, partim
fraude, caligo quffidam mentibus offunderetur. Vincent. Com. 644. Omnes pene
ecclesiae, toto orbe sub nomine pacis et regis, Arianorum consortio polluuntur.
Prosper, Chron. 1. 423. Ariana vesania, dorrupto orbe toto, hanc etiam insulam
veneno sui infecit erroris. Non solum oi-bis totius, sed et insularum ecclesiis
aspersit. Beda, 1. 8. Fere omnes episcopi in fraudem sunt indncti, ut Occiden-
tales Ariminensi illi formulae, ita Orientales subscriberent. Baron, in Bisciola,
230. Omnes pene totius orbis antistites metu exilii et tormentorum per vim,
induxerunt. Labbeus, 2. 912.
ECCLESIASTICAL DISSENSIONS. 309
through treachery, condemned the ancient faith. The Arimi-
nian confession, the saint denominated 'the Ariminian perfidy.'
The Arian madness, says the English historian Bede, ' cor-
rupted the whole continent, opened a way for the pestilence
beyond the ocean, and shed its poison on the British and other
western islands.'
Baronius calls Arianism, in this age, ' the fallacy, into which
were led almost all the eastern and western clergy, who sub-
scribed the Ariminian confession.' Labbeus, in his statement,
concurs with Baronius. He represents ' all the prelacy of the
whole world, except a few, as yielding, on this occasion, to the
fear of exile or torment.'
Arianism, in this manner, was sanctioned by the Papal
church, virtual, representative, and dispersed, or, in other
words, by the Roman pontiff, a general council, and the col-
lective clergy of Christendom. Pope Liberius confirmed an
Arian creed, issued by the general council of Sirmium. The
synods of Ariminum and Seleueia, comprehending both the
Greeks and the Latins, copied the example of Sirmium. The
Cpnstantinopolitan confession, which was the same as the
Ariminian and Sirmian, which were both Semi- Arian, was cir-
culated through the east and west, and signed by the clergy
dispersed through the Roman empire. The Romish church
professes to receive the doctrines, approved, in general, by the
Episcopacy, assembled in council or scattered through the
world. Arianism was established in both these ways, and the
Romish communion therefore became Arian in its head and in
its members, or, in other words, in the pope and in the clergy.
The boasted unity of Romanism was gloriously displayed,
by the diversified councils and confessions of the fourth cen-
tury. Popery, on that as on every other occasion, eclipsed
Protestantism in the manufacture of creeds. Forty-five coun-
cils, says Jortin, were held in the fourth century.* 1 Of these,
thirteen were against Arianism, fifteen for that heresy, and
seventeen for Semi-Arianism. The roads were crowded with
bishops thronging to synods, and the travelling expenses, which
were defrayed by the emperor, exhausted the public funds.
These exhibitions became the sneer of the heathen, who were
amused to behold men, who, from infancy, had been educated
in Christianity, and appointed to instruct others in that religion,
hastening, in this manner, to distant places and conventions for
the purpose of ascertaining their belief.
Socrates reckons nine Arian creeds, which, in significan
language, he calls a labyrinth. The Sirmian confession, which
1 Jortin, 3. 106. Ammian. XXV. Athan. de Syn.
310 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
contained one of the nine, was signed by the Roman pontiff,
and the majority of these innovations was subscribed by the
western as well as by the eastern prelacy. Fleury makes the
Arian confessions sixteen, and Tillemont eighteen. Petavius
reckons the public creeds at eleven. Fourteen forms of faith,
says Juenin, were published in fourteen years, by those who
rejected the Nicene theology. 1 Eight of these are mentioned
by Socrates, and the rest by Athanasius, . Hilary, and
Epiphanius.
Hilary seems to have been the severest satirist, in this age,
on the variations of Popery. Our faith, says the Roman saint,
' varies as our wills, and our creeds are diversified as our man-
ners. Confessions are formed and interpreted according to
fancy. We publish annual and monthly creeds concerning God.
We repent and defend our decisions, and pronounce anathemas
on those whom we have defended. Our mutual dissensions
have caused our mutual ruin.' 2 Hilary was surely an ungrate-
ful son of canonization.
Gregory Nazianzen, who equalled Hilary in sanctity and
surpassed him in moderation and genius, treats the jarring pre-
lacy of his day with similar freedom and severity. The Byzan-
tine patriarch lamented the misery of the Christian community,
which, torn with divisions, contended about the most useless
and trivial questions. He compared the contentions of the
clergy in synods, ' to the noisy and discordant cackling of geese
and cranes.' 3 He resigned his dignity and retired from the city
and council of Constantinople, through nn aversion to the alter-
cations and enmity of the ecclesiastics who, by their discord,
had dishonoured their profession, and ' changed the kingdom
of heaven into an image of chaos.'
1 Socrat. II. 41. Spon. 359. VIII. Fleury, XIV. Bisciola, 320. Tillem, 6.
477. Juenin, 3.72. Petav. VI. 4. Epiph. H. 73.
2 Tot nuuc fides existere, quot voluntates ; et tot nobis doctrinas esse, quot
mores. Fides scribmitur, ut volumus, aut ita ut volumes, intelliguntur. Incerto
doctrinarum vento vagamur. Annuas atque menstruas de Deo Fides deceruimus.
Decretis pcenitemus, defendinius, defenses, anatliematizamus. Mordentes invicem,
jam absumpti sumus ab invicem. Hilary, ad Constan. 308.
3 Greg. Or. 1. Carm. X. Orat. 32.
CHAPTER X.
EUTYCHIANISM.
E0TVCHIANISM A VERBAL HERESY ITS PRIOR EXISTENCE BYZANTINE COUNCIL
EPHES1AN COUNCIL CHALCEDONIAN COUNCIL STATE OF MONOPHYSITISM AFTER
THE COUNCIL OF CHALCEDON ZENo's HENOTICON VARIETY OF OPINIONS ON
THAT EDICT JACOBINISM DISTRACTED STATE OF CHRISTENDOM.
THE Son of God, in the theology of Christian antiquity, united,
in one person, both deity and humanity. The Christians, in
the days of simplicity and prior to the introduction of refine-
ment and speculation, accounted the Mediator perfect God and
perfect man. His divinity was acknowledged in opposition to
Arianism ; and his humanity, consisting in a real body and a
rational soul, in contradiction to Gnosticism and Apollinarian-
ism, Godhead and manhood, according to the same faith and
contrary to the alleged error of Nestorianism, subsisted in the
unity of his person. The simplicity of the faithful, in the early
ages, was satisfied with the plain untheorized fac~t, without
vainly attempting to investigate the manner of the union be-
tween the divinity and humanity.
All human knowledge may be resolved into a few facts, evi-
denced by human or divine testimony. Reason, in a few in-
stances, may discover their causes and consequences, which
again are known to man only as facts. The manner, inscru-
table to man, is removed beyond the ken of the human mind,
and cognizable only by the boundlessness of divine omniscience.
An acorn is evolved into an oa.k. But the mode of accomplish-
ment is unknown to man. The human eye cannot trace the
operation through all its curious and wonderful transformations
in the mazy labyrinth of nature, and in the dark laboratory and
hidden recesses of vegetation. The soul, unacquainted with
the manner of its union with the body and the mutual action of
matter and mind, may decline philosophizing on the incarnation
of the Son and the union of Godhead and manhood in Im-
manuel. The ancients therefore showed their wisdom in
avoiding speculation on a truth, the certainty of which, to their
great joy, they had learned from revelation.
312 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY C
But the days of simplicity passed and the age of speculation
arrived. Men, under the mask of devotion, differed and
fought about what they did not understand. The Eutychian
controversy, which exemplified these observations and which
was the occasion of shocking animosity, began in the year 448.
Eutyches, from whom this party took its name, was Abbot or
Superior of a Byzantine convent of 300 monks, in which he
had remained for seventy years. This recluse seems, in his
cell, to have spent a life of sanctity ; and he boasted of having
grown hoary in combatting error and defending the truth.
His understanding and literary attainments have been repre-
sented as below mediocrity. Leo, the Roman hierarch, calls
Eutyches an old senseless dotard. Petavius reflects on his
stupidity. 1 But these aspersions seem to have been the off-
spring of prepossession and enmity. The supposed Heresiarch,
if a judgment may be formed from the records of history,
showed no imbecility of mind either in word or action. He
displayed, on the contrary, before the Byzantine and Chalce-
donian councils, a fund of sense and modesty, which might
have awakened the envy of his persecutors. He resolved
indeed to rest his faith only on the Bible, as a firmer founda-
tion than the fathers. 2 This was unpardonable, and evinced
shocking and incurable stupidity.
This celebrated innovator, however, as he had been some-
times accounted, seemed to confound the natures of the Son, as
Nestorius had appeared to divide his person. He was accused
of denying our Lord's humanity, as Arius had denied his
divinity, and of renewing the errors of Gnosticism and Apol-
linarianisin. He believed, said some of his opponents, that the
humanity was absorbed by the divinity as a drop is over-
whelmed in the ocean. Godeau, unsatisfied with accusing the
Heresiarch with other errors, has, by a curious process of
reasoning, endeavoured to add Nestorianism, though this, in
general, was accounted the opposite heresy. These statements,
however, he rejected with indignation. He used language,
indeed, which, from its inaccuracy, seemed to imply that the
Son of God, after his incarnation, possessed but one nature ;
and that he was not consubstantial with man in his humanity,
as he was consubstantial with God in his deity. Eutychian-
ism, as refined and explained by Fullo and Xenias, was de-
nominated Monophysitism. These, though they maintained the
1 Qui sui nominis haeresim condidit. Victor, 321.
Leo. ad Flav. et ad Fast. Labb. 4. 790, 1214. Bin. 3. 10, 104. Godeau, 3.
10, 405, 418. Petav. I. 14. Alex. 10. 321.
2 Solas scripturas sectari, tanquam finniores Patrum expositionibus. Alex. 10.
325.
EUTYCHIANISM A VERBAL HERESY. 313
unity of the Son's nature, admitted that this unity was two-fold
and compounded, and rejected the idea of change or confusion
of his divinity and humanity. 1 This denomination, from Jacob
or.Zanzal, its restorer, the grandeur of whose views surpassed
the obscurity of his station, was called Jacobites.
Eutychianism was only a nominal or verbal heresy. The
controversy, through all its stages and in all its fury, was a
mere logomacy, a miserable quibbling on the meaning of a word.
Its author, though he said that Jesus before the hypostatical
union, possessed two natures, and after it only one, admitted,
at the ,same lime, that he was perfect God and perfect man
without confusion of the godhead and manhood; and anathe-
matized the partizans of Manicheanism and Apollinarianism.
Dioscorus, in the council of Chalcedon, anathematized all who
admitted transmutation or commixion of divinity and humanity. 2
These supposed innovators, therefore, were only guilty of
confounding the words >nature and person ; and offended against
the propriety of language rather than against the truth of Chris-
tianity. The diction of Catholicism, indeed, on this topic, far
excels the phraseology of Monophysitism in precision and sim-
plicity. But the disputation turned only on the terms of ex-
pression. This, at the present day, is the general opinion of
Protestant critics, such as Basnage, La Croze, Mosheim, and
Buchanan. Many Romish theologians also, all indeed who
possess candour and moderation have entertained the same view.
Gelasius, Thomassiu, Tournefort, Simon, Petavius, Asseman,
Bruys, Alphonsus, and Vasquesius, all the partizans of Roman-
ism have declared in favor of this opinion. 3 The Jacobites or
Monophysites, says Gelasius and after him Thomassinj are far
from believing, that the godhead, in the Son, is blended or con-
founded with the manhood. Deity and humanity, says these
authors, according to the Monophysite system, form one nature
and person in Jesus as soul and body in man, while each retains
its proper distinctions. The Armenians, who are a branch of
the Jacobites, disclaim, says Tournefort, the imputation of con-
founding the divine and human nature, which are distinct, and
a.scribe the misunderstanding between themselves and the other
Christian denominations to the poverty of their language. Eu-
tychiaiiism, says Simon, uses indeed too strong language. But
the distinction arose from the various acceptations of the terms
1 Evagrius, I. 9. Theoph. 69. Zonaras, 2. 34. Crabb. 1. 644. Godeau, 3. 406.
2 Confitebatur perfectum Deum esse et perfectum hominem. Bin. 3. 104. Go-
deau, 3. 432. Dioscorus dixit, neque confusionem dicimus, neque divisionem,
neque couversionem. Bin. 3. 93. Lab,b. 4. 954.
3 Gelasius de Duab. Thomassin, I. 4. Tournefort, 2, 297. Simon, c. 9. Pe-
tav. I. 14. Asseman, 2, 297. Bruy. 1. 230. Alex. 11. 297, 300. Thorn. 2. 21.
Du Pin, 694.
314 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY.
nature and person, and might easily be reconciled with Catho-
licism. The Monophysite expression, according to Petavius,
may be understood in an orthodox sense. Alphonsus, Vasque-
sius, and Asseman, have delivered similar statements. Euty-
ches, says Brays, differed from the orthodox only in his man-
ner of expression, and was condemned only because he was
misunderstood. Gregory, the Monophysite metropolitan, who
was also a theologian, philosopher, poet, physician, and histo-
rian, accounted the Jacobite a mere verbal controversy.
Gregory's view of this supposed heresy appears from the
Ityzantine conference between the Severians and Hypatius
under Justinian ; and again, in a still clearer light, from the
confession of faith, which the Armenian patriarch sent to the
emperor Manuel.
Monophysitism, however, whether real or verbal, was no
novelty. Similar expressions, as Theorian, Eutyches, Diosco-
rus, Eustathius,,Damascen, the Orientals, and Severians showed,
had been used by Athanasius, Cyril, Gregory, Dionysius, and
Nazianzen, who are Roman saints ; and by Felix and Julius,
who were Roman pontiffs. 1 Athanasius and Cyril, said Theo-
rian, the advocate of Catholicism in 1169, used the expression
' one incarnated nature of the Word.' Eutyches, in the council
of Chalcedon, said, ' I have read the works of Cyril, Athana-
sius, and other fathers, who ascribed two natures to the Son
before the union, but after it only one.' Writing to Leo, he
represented Julius saying, that divinity and humanity in Im-
manuel after the incarnation^ formed, like soul and body in man,
but one nature. The comparison of soul and body, on this
question, seems to have been a favorite among the ancients.
Nazianzen used it in nearly the same diction as Julius. Dios-
corus, in the council of Chalcedon, said, ' I have the repeated
attestations of Athanasius, Gregory, and Cyril tor only one na-
ture in Jesus after the union, and these kept, not in a negligent
or careless manner, but in books. Eustathius, bishop of Bery-
tus, on this topic, displayed signal confidence and resolution.
1 Unam naturam senncrais iucamatain. Cossart, 2. 580, 581. Du Pin, 1. 659.
Eutyches dixit, ego legi scripta beati Oyrilli, et sanctorum patrum, et sancti
Athanasii, quoniara ex duabus quidem naturis dixterunt ante adunationem, post
adunationem, non jam duas naturis, sed unatn naturam dixerunt. Bin. 3. 124
Labb. 6. 436. Alex. 10. 371. Liberates, c. 11.
Naturae quidem duaj, Dens et homo, quemadmodum et anima et corpus, Nazian.
ad Cledon. Bin. 3. 182. Labb. 4. 954.
Verisimile est, non esse CyriUi. Bell. III. 4. Damas. III. 6.
Beato Cyrillo et beato Athanasio Alexandrinse civitatis episcopis, Felice etiam et
Julio Romanae ecclesiae, Gregorio quin etiam et Dionysio, unam naturam Dei Verbi
decernentibus post unitionem, hos omnes transgressi illi, post unitionem prsesump-
serunt duas naturas prsedicare. Labb. 5. 912. Bin. 3. 93, 94, 97. Du Pin, 1. 694.
EUTYCHIANISM A VERBAL HERESY. 315
Cyril, said the bold Monophysite, declared in favor of * one in-
carnated nature,' and confirmed his declaration by the testi-
mony of Athanashis. The Judges were going to speak, when
Eustathius interrupted them, and, passing into the middle of
the assembly, said, ' if I am mistaken, behold Cyril's book.
Anathematize Cyril, and I am anathematized.' One incarnated
nature, indeed, says Du Pin, was a favorite and frequent
phrase with Cyril.
Damascen also, quoted by Bellarmine, ascribed language of
the same kind to Athanasius, Cyril, and Nazianzen. This
author, though an adherent of Romanism, admitted the use of
Monophysite expressions in the above-named Grecian saints.
Bellarmine, indeed, with respect to Cyril, hints a suspicion of
forgery. The Cardinal, however, does not aver a certainty of
falsification even in Cyril's works. He insinuates only a like-
lihood of interpolation in this author; and, at the same time,
acknowledges the genuineness of the language attributed to
Athanasius and Nazianzen.
The Orientals, Asians, Pontians, and Thracians at Chalcedon,
represented Eutyches and Dioscorus as agreeing with Athana-
sius and Cyril in the belief of ' one incarnated nature of the
Word.' The Severians, in the Byzantine conference in 533
under Justinian, convicted Athanasius, Cyril, Felix, Julius,
Gregory, and Dionysius of Monophysitism from their own
works in the face of Hypatius, who, on that occasion, was the
advocate of Catholicism. These, according to their own
writings, declared in favor of one nature in the Son after the
union.
The antiquity or orthodoxy of Eutychianism, however, real
or pretended, failed to protect the system from condemnation,
or its supposed author from curses and excommunication.
Eusebius of Doryleeum, who had been admitted into intimacy
and friendship with the alleged Heresiarch, and in consequence
had become acquainted with his opinions or expressions, ex-
postulated and endeavoured to show him, says Godeau, his
error and impiety. But these expostulations were useless and
unavailing. He then arraigned him for heresy in a council at
Constantinople, in which Flavian, patriarch of that city, presided.
The Eutychian error, nominal as it was, excited the holy synod's
zeal against heresy. The pious bishops, on its author's decla-
ration of his opinion, rose in tumultuous uproar and cursed in
full chorus. Their devotion evaporated in noisy and repeated
anathemas against the shocking blasphemy and its impious au-
thor. The holy fathers, rising to assist their cursing and bellow-
ing powers, twice, says Liberatus, imprecated anathemas on
316 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEBY:
the Heresiarch. 1 The sacred synod rose to their feet, to
enable therhselves, in an erect posture, to do justice to their
devotion and to their lungs in uttering their pious ejaculations.
Eutyches was declared guilty of heresy and blasphemy ; and
the sacred synod, in the excess of Christian charity and com
passion, sighed and wept for his total apostacy. The holy
men, in one breath, cursed, and sighed, and wept, and excom-
municated. Their tune, it seems, exhibited sufficient variety.
Sighs of pity mingled with yells of execration. The melody,
which must have resembled the harmony of the spheres, could
not fail to gratify all who had an ear for music. The holy
council, after a reasonable expenditure of sighs, tears, lamen-
tations, and anathemas, deprived the impious heresiarch of the
sacerdotal dignity, ecclesiastical communion, and the govern-
ment of his monastery. He was anathematized for holding the
faith of the pontifical Felix and Julius, as well as of the sainted
Cyril, Gregory, Athanasius, and Nazianzen.
The Ephesian council, in 449, completely reversed the Con-
stantinopoh'tan decision. The second council of Ephesus was
convened by the Emperor Theodosius, who favoured Monophy-
sitism ; and, according to the summons, consisted often Metro-
politans, and ten suffragans from the six oriental dioceses of
Egypt, Thracia, Pontus, Antioch, Asia, and Illyricum. A few
others were admitted by special favour. Barsumas the Syrian
was invited to represent the monks. Julian and Hilary sat as
vicars of Leo the Roman hierarch. The whole assembly, in
consequence, numbered about 150. Dioscorus, the Alexandrian
patriarch, presided. Elpidius and Eulogius, as protectors and
guardians of the convention, were commissioned by Theodosius
to prevent uproar and confusion, and to induce the assembly
to act with proper deliberation. 2
This synod, from its total disregard of all justice and equity,
has been called the Ephesian latrocinium or gang of felons.
The application, indeed, has not been misplaced. The Ephe-
sian cabal affords as distinguished a display of ruffianism as
ever disgraced humanity. Villany, however, was not peculiar
to this ecclesiastical convention. Many others possessed equal
merit of the same kind, and are equally entitled to the same
honourable distinction.
The battle and bloodshed, which afterwards ensued, did not
commence during the preceding transactions of the assembly.
The campaign did not open while faith was the topic of discus-
1 Exurgens sancta synodus clamavit, dicens, anathema ipsi. Liberatus, c. 11.
Theoph. 69. Zonaras, XIII. 23. Alex. 10. 322. Godea. 3. 407. Bin. 3. 125.
i Evag. 1. 9, 10. Bin. 3. 5. Alex. 10. 253. 346. Godea. 3. 415. Moreri, 3. 209.
BYZANTINE DECREE REVERSED BY THE EPHESIAN COUNCIL. 317
sion. The utmost unanimity prevailed on the subject of Mono-
physitism ; and Dioscorus, on this question, found all intimida-
tion and compulsion unnecessary. The sacred synod joined,
with one consent and in holy fervour, in cursing the enemies
of Eutychianism and the heresy of two natures : and piously
praying that Eusebius, who had opposed their system, might
be hewn asunder, burnt alive, and, as he would divide, be
divided. Dioscorus desired those who could not roar, to hold
up their hands in anathematizing the heresy of Flavian. All,
as one man, yelled anathemas, and in loud execration and fury,
vented their imprecations, that those who should divide the Son
of God might be torn and massacred. 1 Dioscorus, even in the
council of Chalcedon, proclaimed, without hesitation or dismay,
the unanimity of the Ephesian assembly. The orientals, indeed,
at Chalcedon, disclaimed, through fear, these exclamations
which the Egyptians, with more consistency and resolution,
even then avowed. These things, exclaimed the Egyptians,
' we then said and now say.' Eutyches, in the Ephesian synod,
was declared orthodox, reinstated in the sacerdotal dignity, and
restored to ecclesiastical communion ; while his firmness and
intrepidity, in support of the faith, were extolled in the highest
strains of fulsome flattery. All this was transacted with accla-
mation and unanimity, and without force or intimidation. No
objections were made even by Flavian, Julian, or Hilary. The
Byzantine patriarch and the Roman legates viewed, with tacit
or avowed consent, the establishment of Eutychianism and its
author's restoration to the priesthood and ecclesiastical com-
munion.
But the scene changed, when Dioscorus attempted to depose
Flavian. Discord then succeeded to harmony, and compulsion
to freedom. Many of the bishops, and especially those of
Thracia, Pontus, and Asia, could not, wthout regret, witness
the degradation of the Byzantine patriarch ; and ventured, with
the utmost submission, to supplicate Dioscorus in favour of
Flavian. Julian and Hilary, say Victor and Theodoret, op-
posed the sentence of deposition with unshaken resolution. But
Dioscorus, in reply to these supplications and expostulations,
appealed to Elipidius and Eulogius. The doors, by their com-
mand, were opened, and the Proconsul of Asia" entered, sur-
rounded with a detachment of 300 soldiery armed with clubs
and swords, followed by a crowd of monks, inaccessible to
1 Sic sapit omnis synodus. Hsec universalis synodus sic sapit. Sancta synodus
dixit, si quis dicit duo, sit anathema. Bin. 3. 121. Labb. 4. 931, 1012, 1018.
In duo separate eos qui dicunt duas natnras. Qui dicunt duas, dividite, inter-
ficite, ejicite. Alex. 11. 294.
Dioscorus dixit, consentimus his et nos omnes 1 Sancta synodus dixit, consenti-
mus. Bin. 3. 123. Godeau, 3. 435
318 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
reason or mercy, and accoutred with bludgeons, the usual wea-
pons of such militia. Hostilities soon commenced. Terror
and confusion reigned. The trembling bishops, unambitious
of martyrdom, .hid behind the altar, crept under the benches,
and, concealed in corners, seemed to envy the mouse the shel-
ter of the wall. A few who refused to sign a blank paper,
afterward filled with Flavian's condemnation, were inhumanly
beaten. 1 These arguments, though perhaps not satisfactory,
were tangible and convincing to the holy fathers, who, Julian
and Hilary excepted, all subscribed.
Flavian, however, as might be- expected, continued to object
to his own condemnation, and, in consequence, was reviled
and trampled. Dioscorus distinguished himself, according to
Zonaras, Theophanes, Evagrius, and Binius, in cruelty to the
aged patriarch. The president, on the occasion, shewed great
science, and played his hands and feet with a precision, which,
even in the days of modern improvement, would have delighted
any amateur of the fancy. Dioscorus, says Zonaras, leaped,
like a wild ass, on Flavian, and kicked the holy man's breast
with his heels and struck his jaws with his fist. 2 Theophanes
delivers a similar account, and describes the holy patriarch's
dexterity in the belligerent application of his hands and feet.
Flavian, sa} r s Evagrius, was beaten and assassinated, in a
wretched manner, by Dioscorus. This, no doubt, was close
reasoning, and afforded a specimen of warm and masterly dis-
cussion. The disputants certainly used hard arguments,
though perhaps not strictly scriptural. Dioscorus, says Binius,
from a bishop became a hangman, and thumped with both feet
and fists. 3 Barsumas, who commanded the Syrian monks, was
also very active in effecting the assassination of Flavian. He
urged his men or rather monsters to murder. Kill, said the
barbarian to his myrmidons, kill Flavian. Blows and kicks,
knuckles and fists were, in this manner, applied with address
and effect to the Byzantine patriarch by these holy men. His
death, three days after, was the natural consequence. The
Roman vicars, however, though they had betrayed the faith,
made a noble stand for Flavian. These, in the face of danger,
protested against the injustice of his sentence ; and mindful,
says Godeau, of the pontiff whom they represented, defied the
fury of Dioscorus, contemned the insolence of Barsumas, and
braved the terrors of death.
1 Liberat. c. 12. Bin. 3. 60. Labb. 6. 438. Godea. 3. 435
2 OK* -r 1 !.? o/ypwj ovo$ uvaQofiuv 6 Aioaxopo;, Xa| -to atspva avs&ofjs -tov ev<SJ3ov(
fxsivov ttfSpoj, xat -Ttv% ttut'OD xtti'a xoppjfs tfvit'ttav. Zonar. 2. 34. Theoph. 69.
Bvag. II. 2.
3 Dioscoras factus ex episcopo carnifex, pugnis calcibusque contendit. Bin. 3.
6, 317. Labb. 4. 1413. Alex. 10. 355. Godea. 3. 434, 435.
VALIDITY OF THE EPHESIAN COUNCIL. 319
The Ephesian council, though rejected by Baronius and Bel-
larmine, was general, lawful, and, on the doctrinal question, free
and unanimous. Its meeting was called and its decisions con-
firmed, as usual, by the emperor. The summons was more
general and the attendance more numerous than those of many
other general councils, such as the fourth of Constantinople and
the fifth of the Lateran. The Ephesian fathers, indeed, except
Julian and Hilary, were easterns. But the same was the case
with the second, third, fourth, and fifth general councils,' ex-
cept a few Egyptians at Ephesus, and two Africans and.: one
Persian at Chalcedon. The second, third, and fifth wanted the
Pope's legates, who sat at the second of Ephesus. Its deeisiotis x
were sanctioned by Theodosius, who, by an edict, subjected all
of the contrary system to banishment and their books to the
flames. The Roman pontiff indeed did not confirm its acts.
But this can be no reason for its rejection by those, who^ like
the French clergy and the synod of Pisa, Constance, a.nd Basil,
reckon a council above a Pope. Damasus, besides, rejected
the third canon of Constantinople, and Leo, the twenty-eighth
of Chalcedon ; while Vigilius confirmed the fifth general council
only by compulsion. The condemnation of Flavian, indeed,
which was a question of discipline, was exacted by the tyranny
of Dioscorus. But the decision in favor of Eutychianism,
which was a point of faith, passed with freedom, unanimity,
and deafening acclamation. Less liberty, if possible, was
allowed in the preceding Ephesian convention, which, notwith-
standing, remains, till this day, a general, apostolic, holy infal-
lible council. Mirandula, an advocate of Romanism, admits
the legality and, at the same time, the heresy of the second
Ephesian congress. 1
The Greek and Latin emperors, with the Alexandrian patri-
arch and Roman pontiff, were, after the council of Ephesus, v
placed in open hostility. Theodosius and Dioscorus, in the
east, supported Monophysitism with imperial and patriarchal
authority. Valentinian and Leo, in the west, patronised the
theology, which, on account of its final success, and establish-
ment, had been denominated Catholicism. The Roman and
Alexandrian patriarchs, in genius, piety, and determination,
were well matched. Both possessed splendid ability, pretended
religion, and fearless resolution. Leo, at one time, had charac-
terised Dioscorus as a man adorned with true faith and holiness ;
while Theodoret represented the patriarch as a person, who,
fixing his affections on heaven, despised all worldly grandeur. 2
i Mirandul. Th. 4. Godeau, 3. 436.
5 OvSs -fuv Qpovuv I'D u^oj /SJiajtjtj, xat> toif fccoi; i/Ojttotj oxofamfoe.?, cov rj fyifaaxq
rwr ovpavav -triv Baffttauw. Theod. 9. 935. Ep. 60. Leo ad Dioscor.
320 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.*
Leo, however, whatever may have been the case with Theodoret,
began to alter his mind, and sung to another tune, as soon as
his vicars, having escaped from threatened destruction, an-
nounced the decision of Ephesus. Hilary and Julian arrived
to tell the melancholy tale of the tyranny of Dioscorus and the
martyrdom of Flavian. Leo, on hearing the tragic intelligence,
immediately summoned a Roman synod, and, supported by a
faithful troop of suffragans, disannulled the Ephesian enact-
ments, and launched a red-hot anathema, which winged its fiery
course across the Mediterranean, and rebounded from the head
of Dioscorus at Alexandria. But Dioscorus was no trembler.
He was not a. man to be intimidated by the fulminations of
Leo's spiritual artillery. He soon returned the compliment.
He convened his suffragans in an Alexandrian council, and
hurled the thunders of excommunication, with interest and
without fear, against his infallibility. 1 But Leo was not to be
frightened by the empty flash of an anathema. He had, with-
out shrinking, encountered the hostility of Genseric and Attila,
and was not to be dismayed by the spiritual artillery of Dios-
corus. These ecclesiastical engines indeed possess one advan-
tage. Their explosions, though they may sometimes stun, never
slay. These campaigns maybe followed with the loss of char-
acter, but are not attended with the loss of life.
Leo, feeling the inefficiency of excommunication, petitioned
Theodosius, heretic as he was, to assemble a general council.
The western emperor Valentinian, and the two empresses Pla-
cidia and Eudoxia with sighs and tears, joined in the request.
But Theodosius was a Eutychian, and therefore satisfied with
the faith of Ephesus. The heretical and hardened emperor, in
consequence, rejected the application, regardless of the suppli-
cations of Valentinian and Leo, as well as the sighs which rose
from the orthodox hearts, and the tears which fell from the fair
eyes of Placidia and Eudoxia. He had even the obduracy, in
a letter to Placidia, to call the blessed Flavian the prince of
contention.' He represented the Byzantine patriarch, in a let-
^er to Valentinian, as guilty of innovation, and suffering due
punishment ; and the church, in consequence of his removal, as
enjoying peace and flourishing in truth and tranquillity. Theo-
dosius, prior to the Ephesian synod, had begged Flavian to be
satisfied with the Nicene faith, without perplexing his mind
with hairbreadth distinctions, which no person could understand
or explavpi' This was a good advice ; and Flavian, had he
1 Dioscorus, ponens in coelum os suum, excommunicationem in sanctum Leonem
Papam dictavit. Labb. 9. 1328. Bin. 3. 6. Liberat. c. 12. Bisciola, 401.
Theod. Ep. 125. Godea. 3. 440, 442.
THE COUNCIL OF CHALCEDON CONVENED. 321
enjoyed the liberty of thinking for himself, would have followed
it. 1 But the mild patriarch was influenced by more ardent
spirits, who were unacquainted with moderation and drove
every thing to extremity.
But Theodosius, in the mean time, died, and Marcian, who
was attached to Leo and his system, succeeded. This emperor,
urged by the pontiff, convened the general council of Chalcedon.
This grand assenibly contained, say historians, six hundred and
thirty bishops. All these, however, six only excepted, were
Greeks. Pascasinus, Lucentius, and Boniface represented Leo
the Roman hierarch. Twenty laymen of consular or senatorial
dignity, as royal commissioners, represented the emperor. The
gospels, which the good bishops neither understood nor regarded,
were, with affected ostentation, placed on a lofty throne in the
centre. 2
The Chalcedonian resembled the Ephesian council in confu-
sion, noise, tumult, and a total want of all liberty. Its acts,
like its predecessor's, were scenes of uproar and vociferation,
which degraced the Christian religion and degraded the episco-
pal dignity. A bear-garden, a cock-pit, or a noisy bedlam
would afford a modern some faint idea of the general, infallible,
apostolic, holy, Roman, council of Chalcedon. Nothing was
heard, on any particular occasion of excitement, but vocifera-
tion, anathemas, execration, cursing, and imprecation, bellowed
by the several factions or by the whole synod in mutual or
contending fury. A specimen of these denunciations and
insults was displayed in the first session, when Theodoret, who
was accounted friendly to Nestorianism, and Dioscorus, who
had caused the assassination of Flavian, entered the assembly.
The Egyptians, Illyrians, and Palestinians shouted till the roof
reechoed, ' put out Theodoret. Put out the master of Nestorius. '
Out with the enemy of God and the blasphemer of His Son.
Put out the Jew. Long life to the Emperor and Empress.'
The Orientals, Asians, Pontians, and Thracians replied with
equal uproar, ' put out Dioscorus. Put out the assassin. Put
out the Manichean. Out with the enemy of heaven and the
adversary of the faith.' 3
The Imperial commissioners, on these occasions, had to inter-
fere for the purpose of keeping the peace. These, in strong
terms, represented such acclamations as unbecoming the episco-
pal dignity and useless to each party. Du Pin admitSj,.that the
authority of the commissioners was necessary to pi-o'&nt the
1 Bin. 3. 6. 29. Liberates, c. 12. Labb. 6. 439.
2 Evag. II. 4. Crabb. 1. 740. Bin. 3. 49. Labb. 4. 1358.
3 Evag. II. 18. Crabb. I. 743. Bin. 3. 55. Labb. 4. 886. <3odea. 3. 461.
21 ; $'
322 THE 'VARIATIONS OF POPERY '.
infallible council from degenerating into a confused and noisy.
mob. The judges, says Alexander, repressed the tumultuary
clamours by their prudence and authority. 1 The pontifical
and especially the imperial authority destroyed all freedom of
suffrage. Marcian influenced the decisions of Chalcedon, with
more decency indeed, but with no less certainty than Dioscorus
did those of Ephesus.
The Chalcedonian council, as a proof of its unity, passed
three distinct creeds on the subject of Monophysitism ; and all
by acclamation. Leo's letter, which he had addressed to Fla-
vian, was passed in the second session. The Roman hierarch
had transmitted an epistle, on the pending question, to the
Byzantine patriarch. This epistolary communication, which
has been styled the column of orthodoxy, had discussed this
topic, it has been said with judgment and precision. This being
recited in the synod, the assembled fathers approved in loud
acclamations. The Illyria,ns and Palestinians indeed paused,
and seemed for a time to doubt. Their scrupulosity, however,
was soon removed, and all began to vociferate, " This is the
faith of the fathers. This is the faith of the apostles. This is
the faith of the orthodox. This we all believe. Anathema to
the person who disbelieves. Peter speaks by Leo. The
apostles thus taught. Cyril thus taught. Cyril for ever. This
is the true faith. Leo teaches piety and truth, and those who
gainsay are Eutychians." 2 The infallible fathers, however, if
we may judge from their conduct in the fifth session, in which
they thundered acclamations in favor of a Monophysan confes-
sion, misunderstood his Roman infallibility.
A second confession or definition was passed with reiterated
acclamations in the fifth session. This definition, which had
been composed with careful deliberation by Anatolius, and
declared that the Son of God was composed of two natures,
(which implied that he possessed the divinity and humanity,
prior, though not posterior, to the union or incarnation,) was
unqualified Monophysitism, expressed perhaps with some lati-
tude or ambiguity. The definition implied that godhead and
manhood were, to speak in chemical language, the two distinct
elements of which, at the instant of conjunction, a new substance
or nature was formed. Two elements, in the laboratory of the
chemist, will form a composition by the amalgamation of their
constituent principles. The Eutychians and Chalcedonians
seem to v Kave entertained an idea, that the humanity and divi-
1 Tumultuarios clamores auctoritate et prudentia sua jadices compescueruat.
Alex. 10. 368.
a Epistolam Leonis tanquam columnam orthodoxae fidei susceperunt. Canisius,
4. 69. Evag. II. 4* Bin. 3. 221. Crabb. 1. 880. Godeau, 3. 479.
MONOPHYSITISM .OF THE COUNCIL OF GHALCEDON. 323
nity of the Son, were, in some way of this kind, incorporated
at the moment of his incarnation. This notion was expressed,"
in plain language, in the Chalcedonian definition. The idea is
rank Monophysitism. Eutyches or Dioscorus would have sub-
scribed the formulary. 1
AH the Chalcedonians, nevertheless, the three Romans and a
few orientals excepted, were unanimous in its favour, and sup-
ported it with vociferation. 2 ' The definition pleases all. This
is the faith of the fathers. He who thinks otherwise is a here-
tic. Anathema to him who forms a different opinion. Put out
the Nestorians. The definition pleases all. Holy Mary is the
mother of God.' The emperor, however, by his commissioners,
and the pontiff, by his vicars, opposed the council. These,
insisted, that the Son should be said to exist ' IN two natures.*
Pascasinus, Lucentius, and Boniface, who represented his holi-
ness, determined if this were opposed, to return to the Roman
city and there convene a Roman council for the establishment
of the true faith ; and in this determination, they were seconded,
with the utmost pertinacity, by the Imperial commissioners.
The council, notwithstanding, shewed a firm resolution against
any supplement to a form of belief, which, in their mind, was
perfect. ' The definition,' the bishops vociferated, ' pleases all..
The difinition is orthodox. Put out the Nestorians. Expel
the enemies of God. Yesterday the definition pleased all. Let
the definition be subscribed before the gospels and no fraud
practised against the faith. Whoever subscribes not is a heretic.
The Holy Spirit dictated the definition. Let it be signed forth-
with. Put out the heretics. Put out the Nestorians. Let the
definition be confirmed or we will depart. Whoever will .not
subscribe may depart. Those who oppose may go to Rome.'
But the commissioners were determined. The emperor's,
sovereign will must be obeyed ; and the council, after a tempo-
rary resistance, yielded at length to the legatine obstinacy and
especially to the imperial power.
Ma,ny considerations shew the Monophysitism of this Chal-
cedonian definition and of the Chalcedonian Council. The
omission of the definition, in the acts 6f the council, throws a
suspicion on its orthodoxy 1 . The formulary is omitted in Eva-
gnus, Liberatus, Binius, Crabb, and Labbe. The judges of
the council, in an indirect manner, mention its contents, merely
for the purpose of denouncing its heterodoxy. The design was,
1 Eutyches dixit nnionem ex duabus natiiris. Alex. 10. 330. Evag. II. 18.
Crabb, 1. 879. Bin. 3. 334.
3 Gomes' episcopi, praeter Romanes et aliqnos Orientates, clamaverunt, ' Defihi-
tio omnibus placet.' Bin. 3. 334. Labb. 4. 1446, 1150. Godeau, 3. 480.
21*
324 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
no doubt, to keep it- out of sight ; a plain indication of its sup-
posed heresy.
A comparison of this confession with those of Eutyches and
Dioscorus at Constantinople, Ephesus, and Chalcedon, will
evince their indentity. This of Chalcedon declared, that Jesus
was * of two natures.' 1 . This was the precise creed of Eutyches
and Dioscorus. Eutyches, in the Byzantine council, professed
his belief, that Christ was ' of two natures.' 2 Dioscorus avowed
a similar profession at Ephesus and repeated it at Chalcedon. 3
These Cbalcedonian and Eutychian confessions contained the
same faith in the same language. Leo's, and the last of Chal-
cedon taught, on the contrary, that our Lord existed ' IN two
natures.' 4
The opposition of the Senators, Romans, and Orientals,
shewed their conviction of its Eutychianism. These wielded
the Pontifical and Imperial power, and opposed the definition
with obstinacy. Pascasinus, Lucentius, and Boniface, who
represented Leo, resolved to leave Chalcedon, return to Italy,
and celebrate a western council for the establishment of the
true faith, if this Chalcedonian creed should .be confirmed.
This resolution was countenanced by the commissioners, who
represented the Emperor; and a few Orientals echoed the
declaration. 5 This determination, in strong colours, portrays
their opinion of the confession, which they resisted with such
warmth and resolution. These would have submitted, had the
definition in their mind, contained Catholicism.
Godeau and Alexander, two modern zealots for Romanism,
admit the ambiguity and inadequacy of this Chalcedonian defini-
tion. The definition, says Godeau, ' did not, in sufficiently
express terms, condemn the Eutychian heresy.' According to
Alexander, many additions were necessary for the overthrow
of Eutychianism. The accomplishment of this end required a
creed, teaching our Lord's existence, not only of, but ' IN two
natures, without confusion, change or division. 6 Godeau, there-
fore, acknowledged the ambiguity of the definition, and Alex-
ander its inadequacy.
1 O MJ'OJ tx Svo fyvasuv e%t>* Evag. II. 18. Ex daabus habet naturis. Crabb.
1.880.
2 Ex Svo $u<jov. Theoph. 69. Eutyches dixit etiam ex duabus naturis. Bin
3. 120.
3 Confiteor ex duabus naturis fuisse Dominum. Bin. 3. 123. Labb. 4. 1018.
4 Ex Svo Qvatow, Evag. II. 4. At uv Svo $i;crj teyst, twtu, ev Xfrffi'w. Labb.
4. 1452. Bin. 3. 130.
s Bin. 3. 336. Labb. 4. 1450. Godeau, 3. 480.
6 Bllo ne condemnoit pas assez expressement 1'heresie naissante d'Eutyches.
Godeau, 3. 479.
Multa deesse ad profligandam haeresim Eutychianam. Ad id enim satis non
esae,ut Christus ex duabus naturas diceretur; sed necesse ut in duabus naturis
eubsidero diceretur. Alex. 10. 376.
CONDUCT OF THE COUNCIL OF CHALCEDON. 325
The Monophysitism of the Chalcedonian Council, the Ro-
mans and a few Orientals excepted, appears from the obstinacy
with which they insisted on the definition, in defiance of Impe-
rial and Pontifical authority. The Chalcedonians, on this occa-
sion, manifested more determination than the clergy, at any
other time, evinced against the emperor and the pontiff. The
prelatical suffrages, in general, were the ready echoes of the
imperial and pontifical will. The Greeks obeyed his majesty,
and the Latins seldom disobeyed his holiness. But the assem-
bled prelacy, on this momentous occasion, displayed an aston-
ishing firmness and constancy. Their'determination once with-
stood the imperial commissioners, and four times the Roman
vicars. These reasoned and remonstrated; and those resisted
and vociferated. The opposition was uttered in yells, which
would have terrified ordinary minds, and commanded obedience
on ordinary occasions. The dissension, says Alexander, was
great, and the shouts tumultuary. All, says Godeau, cried that
* whosoever should refuse to sign the definition was a heretic.' 1
All this obstinacy and outcry were in favour of a creed, which
would have been subscribed by Eutyches, Dioscorus, Mongos,
Philoxenus, Fullo, and Zanzel.
The Monophysitism of the council also may be evinced from
its reasons for the condemnation of Dioscorus. The Alexan-
drian Patriarch, said Antolius in full synod and without any to
gainsay, ' was not condemned for any error of faith, but for
excommunicating Leo, and refusing, when summoned, to attend
the council.' The same fact is stated by Evagrius and Pope
Nicholas. Justinian, also, according to Valesius in his annota-
tions on Theodorus, declared that Dioscorus was not condemn-
ed for any deviation from the faith. 2 The patriarch indeed
was charged with a few practical foibles, such as tyranny,
extortion, fornication, adultery, murder, and ravishment. He
was convicted of burning houses, lavishing the alms of the
faithful on strumpets and buffoons, and admitting the fair Pari-
sophia, in broad day, into the patriarchal bath and palace. 3
But none accused him of heterodoxy. Heresy was not among
the reasons assigned by the council for his deposition and ban-
ishment. His faith, therefore, was unsuspected of error, and
consonant with the common theology. These considerations
shew the faith of the Chalcedonians, and the opinion entertained
of their definition.
1 Tous crierent. que quiconque refuserent de la signer etoit beretique. Godeau,
3. 479.
2 Propter fidem non est damnatus Dioscorus. Bin. 6. 505. Dioscorus non ob
ttllum in fide errorem damnatus fuit. Valesius, 3. "330.
3 Bin. 3. 7, 247, 335. Labb. 4. 1447. Alex. 10. 356. Bvag. II. 18.
v326 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
The Chalcedonian council, at length, were forced by the
emperor to sign a third formulary of faith. The former confes-
sion had to be resigned, in obedience to his majesty's sovereign
command. The emperor in the early days of the church, as
the pope at a later period, influenced, at pleasure, the decisions
of holy infallible councils. Theodosius, with facility, sustained
Monopbysitism at Ephesus. Marcian, with equal ease, estab-
lished Catholicism at Chalcedon. He ordered eighteen bishops,
selected from the East, Asia, Pontus, Thracia, and Illyria, to
meet in the oratory of Euphemia, and compose a confession
which might obtain universal approbation. These, accordingly,
assembled at the place appointed, and, with becoming submission
and easy versatility, produced a creed, according to Marcian's
imperial directions and Leo's pontifical epistle. This formulary
embodied the Nicene, Constantinopolitan, and Ephesian faith,
with the letters of Cyril and Leo, and declared that the Son of
God, existing 'IN two natures,' without confusion or division,
was in His Deity, consubstantial with God, and in His humanity,
consubstantial with man. 1 The infallible fathers, for the third
time, yelled approbation.
This confession was of imperial and pontifical dictation. The
emperor, not the council, at the suggestion of the pope, pre-
scribed the formulary. All this indeed, Alexander, attached as
he was to Romanism, has confessed. This form of belief, says
this author, ' was enjoined by the emperor.' 2 Christians there-
fore, at the present day, profess, on this topic, a royal creed.
Popish and Protestant Christendom has received a form of faith,
which, though true, is imperial, and for which, the Romish and
Reformed are indebted to Marcian.
The abettors of Romanism would be ready to exult, if, in
the annals of the Reformation, they could find an instance of
vacillation equal to that of Chalcedon. The history would be
related in all the parade of language. But all the councils of
Protestantism afford no exemplification of such versatility and
fluctuation. Bossuet, in all the records of history, and, which
is more, in all the treasury of his own imagination, could dis-
cover no equal discordancy, during all the transactions which
attended the Reformation, in its origin, progress, and estab-
lishment.
But flexibility, in the council, failed to produce unanimity in
the church. The infallibility of the Chalcedonian assembly was
mocked, and its apostolical or rather imperial faith contemned.
1 Tpse sit perfectus Deus et perfectus homo in duabus naturis, sine confusione et
divisione. Canisius, 1. 69. Liberates, c. 12. Bin. 3. 336, 340. Crabb. 1. 885.
Labb. 4. 1447. Du Pin, I. 674.
s Jusau tandem Imperatoris. Alex. 10. 376.
CONDUCT . OF THE : COUNCIL OP CHALCEDON. 327
The African, Asiatic, and European Monophysite disclaimed
the definition of the emperor and the pontiff'; and their oppo-
sition, did not, as usual, evaporate in frothy anathemas, but
terminated in battle and carnage. The Chalcedonian prelacy,
according to Liberatus, were, when they returned to their sees,
torn by an unprecedented schism. 1 The Egyptians, Thracians,
and Palestinians followed Dioscorusj while the Orientals,
Pontians, and Asiatics adhered to Flavian. Romanism was
disgraced by a train of revolutions and massacres, such as never
dishonoured the Reformation. Schism and heresy extended to
all Christendom, and embraced, in wide amplitude, Greeks
and Latins, emperors, clergy, and populace.
Six emperors reigned after the council of Chalcedon, and
during the rage of the Monophysan controversy. These were
Marcian, Leo, Zeno, Basiliscus, Anastasius, and Justin ; and
were divided between the Eutychian and Chalcedonian faith.
Marcian, Leo, and Justin patronized Chalcedonianism ; while
Zeno, Basiliscus, and Anastasius, in the general opinion, coun-
tenanced Eutychianism. Marcian convoked the council of
Chalcedon, presided in its deliberations, and supported its
theology with devoted fidelity and imperial power ; but by the
unhallowed instrumentality of violence and persecution. Leo,
Marcian's successor, maintained the same system by the same
unholy weapons. 2
Zeno, Basiliscus, and Anastasius have been reckoned, perhaps
with some unfairness, among the partizans of heresy. Zeno,
during his whole reign, feigned a regard for CathoEcism and
proclaimed himself its protector. But some of his actions seemed
to favour Monophysitism ; and his name, in consequence, has,
by the partial pen of prejudice and popery, been entered in the
black roll of heretics who attempted the subversion of orthodoxy.
He issued the Henoticon, protected Acacius, and restored the
exiled Mongos and Fullo to the patriarchal thrones of Alexan-
dria and Antioch. These were crimes never to be forgiven by
the narrow mind of bigotry. The transactions provoked the
high indignation of Facundus, Baronius, Alexander, Petavius,
and Godeau. 3 Baronius represents Zeno as the patron of
heresy and perfidy, and the enemy of Catholicism and
Christianity.
Basiliscus, for the sake of unity and consistency, both
denounced and patronized the Synod of Chalcedon and its
theology. His majesty, prompted by JElurus, issued, on his
1 Scissio facta est inter eos. qualis ante nunquam contigerat. Liberatus, c. 12.
Labb. 6. 438. .
2 Evag. II. 8. Alex. 10. 398.
3 Facun. XII. 4. Spon. 482. 111. Alex. 10. 421. Petav. 1. 320. Godeau, 3. 356.
328 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
accession, a circular letter, wnich approved the councils of
Nicsea, Constantinople, and Ephesus, and condemned and
anathematized that of Chalcedon, as the occasion of massacre
and bloodshed. This precious manifesto was signed by Fullo,
Paul, and Anastasius of Antioch, Ephesus, and Jerusalem;
and supported, in the rear, by about five hundred of the Asiatic
prelacy. The emperor, in these transactions, was influenced
by the empress Zenodia. But his majesty, varying in this
manner from Catholicism, varied, in a short time, from himself,
and veered round to orthodoxy. He attempted, by compulsion,
to obtain the approbation of Acacius. But Acacius opposed
him, being supported by a multitude of monks and women,
who pursued the emperor with maledictions. This movement,
in a few moments, converted Basiliscus to the true faith. He
issued, in consequence, an anticircular edict, rejecting the
former, confirming the council of Chalcedon, and anathematizing
Eutyches and all other heresiarchs. His versatility, however,
was unavailing. Zeno drove the usurper from the imperial
authority, and banished him to Cappadocia, where he died of
hunger and cold. 1
Anastasius succeeded Zeno in 491, and was excommunicated
by Symrnachus for heresy. The emperor, however, notwith-
standing the anathema, seems, according to Evagrius, neither
to have patronized nor opposed Catholicism. He loved peace
and withstood novelty. He protected all his subjects, who
were content to worship according to their conscience, without
molestation to their fellow-christians. But he repressed inno-
vators, who fostered dissension. He expelled, in consequence,
Euphemius, Flavian, and Elias, bishops of Constantinople,
Antioch, and Jerusalem ; and this incurred the wrath of the
pope and Vitalian. The latter, followed by an army of Huns
and barbarians, declared himself the champion of the faith.
Actuated with this resolution, the warrior, in the name of the
Prince of Peace, depopulated Thracia, exterminated 65,000
men, and, in bloodshed, established the council of Chalcedon
and the faith of Leo. 2
A diversity, similar to this of the emperors, was manifested
by the clergy, the populace, and the monks. Dioscorus, in
Alexandria, was succeeded by Proterios, the friend of Catholi-
cism. But the throne of the new patriarch had to be supported
by two thousand armed soldiery ; and the Alexandrian populace,
on the death of Marcian, assassinated Proterios in the baptistery,
1 Evag. 111. 5, 7. Liberat. c. 16. Theoph. 84. Zonaras, 2. 41 . Bisciola, 420.
Alex. 10. 418, 420. Godeau, 3. 619. Victor, 324.
2 Evag. 111. 35. Liberat. c. 16. Theoph. 107. Alex. 10. 25. Labb. 4. 477.
CONDUCT OF THE COUNCIL OF CHAICEDON. 329
regardless of the sacred temple and the pascal solemnity. The
waters of baptism and of the sanctuary were crimsoned with
his blood. The mangled body, in all its frightfulness, was,
amid insults and mockery, exhibited in the Tetraphylon : and
then, covered with wounds, was, in fiendish derision, dragged
through the city. The assassins, says Evagrius, shocking to
tell, beat the senseless limbs, devoured the reeking entrails,
committed the torn carcass to the flames, and its ashes to the
winds. 1 The barbarians, though stained with blood, burned,
through fear of pollution, the chair of the patriarch, and washed
the altar on which he had sacrificed with sea-water, as if it had
been defiled with his touch or his ministry.
jElurus, the partizan of Monophysitism, was substituted for
Proterios. He was banished to Cherson, or some say, to Oasis,
by Leo ; butwas afterward restored by Basiliscus. He, at last,
poisoned himself, being, says the charitable Godeau, ' unworthy
of a more honourable executioner.' The one party, after his
death, elected Mongos, and the other, Timothy, to the patri-
archal dignity. Zeno, however, obliged Mongos, who was the
partizan of Eutychianism, to yield. But the triumph of the
Chalcedonian party was transitory. Mongos, on the death of
Timothy, was, by an edict of Zeno and the favour of Acacius,
appointed his successor. 2
Palestine in the mean time, became the scene of similar
outrage and revolution. Juvenal, the patriarch of Jerusalem,
was deposed, and Theodosius, a Monophysite, ordained in his
place. The new patriarch occupied Jerusalem with an army
of felons and outlaws, who in the name of religion and under
the mask of zeal, pillaged and murdered. The sepulchre of
Immanuel was defiled with blood ; and the gates of the city,
which had witnessed these massacres, were, in tumultuary
rebellion, guarded against the army of the emperor. These,
notwithstanding their inhumanity and rebellion, were counte-
nanced by Eudoxia, wife to Theodosius. 3 The empress used
or rather abused her royal authority, in support of these san-
guinary zealots for the Monophysite theology.
Antioch was occupied by the rival patriarchs Calendion and
Fullo. Calendion maintained the Chalcedonian faith, and Fullo
the Eutychian theory. Fullo, besides, in unpardonable impiety,
added a supplement of his own invention, to the Trisagion,
which, in those days of superstition and credulity, was regarded
1 More canum, interiora ejus degustarunt, reliquumque corpus igni, cineres
vento, tradiderunt. Spon. 457, IV. Evag. II. 8. Liberat. c. 15. Alex. 10. 394.
Godeau, 3, 556. Victor, 322.
2 Liberat. c. 16. Bisciola, 420. Godeau, 3. 623. Labb. 5. 215. Moreri, 8. 136.
3 Evag. II. 5. Theoph. 73. Alex. 10. 416. Moreri, 8. 90. Victor, 322.
330 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
as the sacred hymn, sung by the holy angels and seraphs that
surround the throne of God. Zeno, at first, patronized Calen-
dion and banished Fullo. But Calendion, in the end, was sus-
pected of favouring the revolt of Illus and Leontius ; and the
emperor therefore banished the patriarch to Oasis, and outraged
Christianity, says Godeau, by establishing Fullo. 1
The bishops and monks varied like the patriarchs and empe-
rors. Many, says Godeau, ' followed the faith of the court
rather than that of the Gospel ; and displayed a baseness,
unworthy of men who should have been the columns of the
truth!' Five hundred bishops signed the encyclical manifesto
of Basiliscus; and, according to their own declaration, 'with
willingness and alacrity.' These, again, on the dethronement
of Basiliscus and the restoration of Zeno, deprecated the whole
transaction, alleged imperial compulsion as a palliation for their
crime, and begged pardon of Acacius for their offence. 2
These rival factions fulminated against each other mutual
and unwearied excommunications. The lightning of anathemas
continued, in uninterrupted coruscations, to flash through the
African, Asiatic, and European nations, and to radiate from
East to West. The spiritual artillery was admirably served,
and, in continued explosions, carried, not death indeed, but
damnation in every direction. Proterios, Timothy, Juvenal,
and Calendion cursed jElurus, Mongos, Theodosius, and Fullo :
while JElurus, Mongos, Theodosius, and Fullo, in grateful re-
ciprocation, cursed Proterios, Timothy, Juvenal, and Calendion.
Acacius cursed the patriarchs of Alexandria, Jerusalem, and
Antioch who were not slow in repaying the compliment. Felix,
the Roman pontiff, cursed all by wholesale. Intrenched in the
Vatican, the vicar-general of God continued, from bis ecclesias-
tical battery, to thunder excommunications against Mongos,
Fullo, and Acacius. 3
Fullo, who abetted Monophysitism and corrupted the Trisa-
gion, seems to have been the chief object of these inverted
benedictions. Quinian, in a Sacred Synod, aimed no less than
twelve anathemas at Fullo's devoted head. The example was
followed by Acacius. The patriarch of Antioch, it seems,
had in 483, taken the liberty of writing an epistle full of blas-
phemy to the patriarch of Constantinople. The blasphemy
caused Acacius, holy man, to shudder. He assembled a
council, therefore, and in full synod, condemned, says Labbe,
the mad error of the mad patriarch. But the Roman pontiff,
1 Theoph. .92. Evas. III. 8. Godeau, 3. 649. Labb. 5. 271.
2 Evas. III. 5, 9. Liberates, c. 16. Alex. 10. 418. Godeau, 3. 620.
s Evag. III. 5, 6. Theoph. 104. Godea. 3. 649. Spon. 457, 484. IV. Alex.
10. 420.
MONOPHYSITISM AFTER THE COUNCIL OF CHALCEDON. 331
as -was right, excelled even the Byzantine patriarch in a suitable
name and in an appropriate sentence, for the impugner of the
Chalcedonian faith and the corrupter of the sacred hymn.
Felix denominated Fullo the first-born of the devil, and, in a
holy Roman Council, condemned him as a patron of Arianism,
Sabellianism, impiety, heathenism, and idolatry. 1
But the hardest, or at least the most signal cursing-match,
on the occasion, was between Felix and Acacius. The Byzan-
tine hierarch, indeed, had committed nothing to merit the
honour of excommunication. He disclaimed, on all occasions,
the heresy of Eutychianism. He opposed the Monophysan
emperor Basiliscus and his circular edict, with vigour and
success. He assembled a Constantinopolitan synod, and con-
demned ^Elurus, Fullo, John, and Paul, who were the Mono-
physite bishops of Alexandria, Antioch, Apamea, and Ephesus.
He issued a synodal reprobation of Fullo' s addition to the
Trisagion, which, in the opinion of Acacius, was the song of
the Cherubim in Heaven. He patronized no heresy; and,
which should have recommended him to mercy, he was as
ignorant and superstitious even as his Roman infallibility. But
he signed the Henoticon for the sake of peace, and communi-
cated with Fullo without a formal recognition of the council of
Chalcedon. These were the ostensible reasons of the pontiff's
detestation and anathemas. He urged the equality of the
Byzantine with the Roman See ; and, of course, rejected the
pontifical supremacy. 2 This was the real reason and the
unpardonable sin, for which Felix honoured Acacius with
anathemas and degradation.
His infallibility's denunciations, however, were, at Con-
stantinople, a subject of sheer mockery. Acacius, knowing
the ridiculousness of the attempt, received the intelligence of
his deposition with perfect contempt; and, nothing loath,
returned the compliment in kind with promptitude and devo-
tion. The patriarch, like another Dioscorus, excommunicated
his infallibility, and struck his name out of the Diptycs or
sacred roll of registry. He then, in his usual manner, and in
defiance of Felix, continued his ministry and retained his
dignity till the day of his death. 3
Acacius was supported against Felix by Zeno, and all the
1 Insanns ille insani Fullonis error condemnatns fuit. Labb. 5. 229, 230. Petrus
primogemtus Diaboli filius. Labb. 5. 166. Le Foulon qu'il appelle le fils premier
ne du Diable. Godeau, 3. 650. Bisciola, 424.
3 Cedere non debere Romanae Ecclesise. Labb. 5. 246. Evag. .III. 5, 6.
Liberat. c. 17. Spon. 484. IV. Bruy. 1. 255. Alex. 10, 420.
3 Ipse excommunicavit Summum Pontificem. Cossart, 3. 22. Qai vicem repen-
dens, Felicis nomen erasit e diptychis. Petav. 1. 330. Ad mortem, patrocinante
imperatore, remansit sacrificans. Liberat. 3. 18. ''-
332 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY!
oriental clergy. The emperor, knowing the illegality and
injustice of the sentence, held over the patriarch the protecting
shield of his royal authority. The Greek clergy, on the same
account, contemned the Latin or Roman anathemas, and com-
municated with the Byzantine patriarch. Felix, besides, was,
on this occasion, unfortunate in his own agents. Misenus and
Vitalis, whom he had commissioned as his envoys to Constanti-
nople against Acacius, joined in communion with the patriarch ;
and heard, without disapprobation, the name of Mongos
repeated from the sacred registry. Titus, who was afterward
despatched on a similar errand, copied the example of Vitalis
and Misenus. 1 These, in consequence, put Felix to the task of
issuing their excommunication, which, however, his infallibility,
from his facility in this duty, seems to have thought no trouble.
The Roman pontiffs had hitherto patronised the Chalcedo-
nian faith, and rejected, with resolution and perseverance, the
Monophysite system. Leo had supported the council of
Chalcedon, with all his talents and influence. Felix had
exhausted himself in cursing all its enemies. But the hierarchs
of the apostolic see were soon destined to alter their system,
and exemplify the changeableness of all earthly things.
Vigilius, who was a Roman pontiff, and Martin who was a
Roman saint, deserted the council of Chalcedon and went over
to the camp of the enemy.
Vigilius, in 537, was raised to the pontifical throne by the
Empress Theodora, on condition that, on his promotion, he
would profess Eutychianism, and concur in restoring Anathe-
mus to the patriarchal chair of Constantinople. The new
pontiff was faithful to this engagement in the profession of
heresy. He condemned the Chalcedonian faith, and declared
in favor of Monophysitism. His confession, addressed on this
occasion to Theodora and other partizans of heterodoxy, has
been preserved by Liberatus. 2 He rejected the dogma of two
natures in the Son of God, and repealed the celebrated epistle
of Leo. His infallibility then proceeded, in due form and
without delay or equivocation, to pronounce an anathema
against any person who should confess two forms in the Medi-
ator. This was like a man determined to do business. His
holiness, in consequence, had the honour of cursing his several
predecessors and successors, the holy council of Chalcedon,
1 Bvag. III. 21. Spon. 484. ii. Bin. 3. 614. Labb. 5. 246.
2 Vigilius suam fidem scripsit ; duas in Ghristo damnavit naturas ; et resolvens
tomtim Papae Leonis sic dixit, non duas Christum confitemur naturas ; sed ex dua-
bus naturis compositum unum filium. Qui dixit in Christo duas formas, anathema
sit. Liberat. c. 22. Anathema dicebat iis qui confitentur duas in Christo natoras.
Bellarmin, 1. 160. Alex. 10. 429.
*
MONOPHYSITISM AFTER. THE COUNCIL OF CHALCEDON. 333
and the majority of the past, present, and future Christian,
world.
Baronius and Binius have endeavoured to prove this docu-
ment, preserved in Liberatus, a forgery. Godeau doubts its
genuineness. But their arguments, which scarcely deserve the
name, have been confuted by Bellarmine, Du Pin, and Alexan-
der. Liberatus, Victor, and Facundus, cotemporary authors
vouch for its authenticity. Bellarmine admits the heresy of
Vigilius ; but consoles himself under the distress occasioned by
such an event, with the real or fancied dissimulation of its
author, and the illegality of his claim, during the life of his pre-
decessor and rival Silverius, to the papacy. His infallibility's
approbation of heresy, according to the cardinal, was all exter-
nal profession, while, in his soul, he was the devoted friend of
Catholicism. Alexander calls Vigilius ' a hidden traitor.' 1 The
cardinal and the sorbonnist, it seems, possessed a faculty of dis-
cerning the heart, and discovered the superiority of hypocrisy to
heresy. Vigilius, besides, say these authors, could be no true
pope prior to the death of Silverius, as two could not reign at
the same time. The church, however, has often been blessed
with several cotemporary heads, and the Messiah, supplied, on
the same occasion, with several vicars-general. Vigilius, what-
ever might have been his right when he issued his hopeful con-
fession, was, in fact, the sovereign pontiff, and was never again
elected or ordained. He occupied the pontifical chair and
exercised the pontifical authority, in the administration of
ecclesiastical affairs, throughout papal Christendom.
The sainted Martin, in 649, followed the footsteps of Vigilius,
and, in conjunction with the Lateran synod, decided in favour
of Eutychianism. This assembly, in which his holiness presided
amounted to one hundred and fifty members, who all, in the
fifth canon and with the greatest unanimity, ' condemned every
person, who, according to the holy fathers, does not, in truth
and propriety, confess one incarnated nature of God the
Word.' 2 The sentence would have satisfied Dioscorus, Mongos,
or Fullo. Bellarmine represents the condemnation, pronounced
by the holy synod, as equivalent to an anathema. Vigilius'
decision seems to have been personal. Martin's was synodal.
The one was signed only by the author ; while the other was
subscribed by one hundred and fifty of the Italian prelacy.
1 Dico Vigilium damnasse Catholicam fidem solum exterior! professione, neque
anirao haereticus fait. Bellarinin, 1. 760. Occultus proditor. Alex. 10. 429.
Bin. 4. 400. Godeau, 4. 203.
2 Si quis secundum sanctos patres non confitetur, propri& et secundum veritatem,
unam naturam Dei Verbi incarnatam, condemnatus sit. Bin. 4. 733. Crabb. :2.
234. Labb. 7. 360. Bellarmin, III. 4.
334 TEDS VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
But Martin, who is a saint, had, like Vigilius, who was little
better than a sinner, the distinguished honour of anathematizing
every professor of orthodoxy.
The council of the Lateran presents a complete contrast to
that of Chalcedon. The definition of Chalcedon was suggested
by the pope to an orthodox emperor, lay whom it was forced, in
the midst of noisy opposition, on a reluctant synod. The canon
of the Lateran was issued b}*- the pope, in a willing council, in
opposition to a heterodox emperor. Marcian patronized Leo
and the Chalcedonians. Constans withstood Martin and the
Laterans. The one assembly defined a duality of natures in the
Son of God. The other declared in favour of his simple unity.
This distracted state of the church induced Zeno, prompted,
some say, by Acacius, to publish the celebrated Henoticon or
edict of union. The emperor's design, in this undertaking,
was pacific. He intended to conciliate the partizans of Mono-
physitism and Catholicism, and supply an exposition of belief,
which each jarring faction, without compromising its principles,
might sign. The means, at first sight, seemed calculated to
obtain the end. The Henoticon, preserved by Evagrius and
Liberatus, was addressed to the Alexandrian, Egyptian, Lybian,
and Pentapolitan clergy and laity. This royal edict, having,
in the introduction, lamented the dissensions, which had occa-
sioned the massacres and bloodshed, which had contaminated
earth and air, confirmed the inspired and unstained faith of the
Nicene, Constantinopolitan, andEphesian councils, in opposition
to Arianism, Macedonianism, and Nestorianism. The Mediator,
according to the imperial theology, and, in agreement with the
Chalcedonian definition without mentioning its authority, is
consubstantial with God in His deity, and with man in His
humanity ; but, at the same time, is not two, but one incarnated
God the Word. 1 This last expression, which, it must be con-
fessed, is a little suspicious, has given great offence to Baronius,
Godeau, and Petavius, with a shoal of other Romish critics and
theologians.
But the conclusion of the royal manifesto conveys the fright-
fullest sounds of terror to the ear of superstition. Zeno spared*
Dioscorus from a regard to the Alexandrians j but anathema-
tized all who, at Chalcedon or elsewhere, might have dissented
from the imperial confession. His Majesty, though a layman,
dared, in this manner, to enact a formulary of faith, and excom-
municate all the prelacy who dared to refuse subscription.
The Henoticon experienced the destiny of all similar attempts,
1 Eva <tvy%o.vtw xai ov 810. Evag. III. 14. Incarnate uno de Trinitate Deo
Verbo. Liberatus. c. 18. Alex. 10. 421. Spond. 482. iii.
HENOTICON OF THE EMPEROR ZERO. 33&
and only augmented the evil which it was designed to remedy.-
A pacificator is seldom a favourite with man. The royal edict,
supported by imperial power, enjoyed, however, a partial and
temporary success, and was signed by Acacius, Mongos, Fullo,
and indeed by all possessed of moderation. The Byzantine
patriarch and his clergy acknowledged the edict of pacification :
and all those who had professed Monophysitism, whether
ecclesiastics or laymen, were received into communion. The
Alexandrian patriarch convened a general assembly of the clergy
and laity, in which the Henoticon was read and recognized.
The pastor, then, like a good shepherd, exhorted the flock,
united in one faith and baptism, to mutual peace and charity.
The easterns, Calendion excepted, followed the footsteps of the
Byzantines and Alexandrians. Fullo of Antioch and even
Martyrias of Jerusalem, famed for his sanctity, subscribed the
pacific formulary and joined in reciprocal communion. The
Henoticon, in this manner, was, under Anastasius in 503, wel-
comed by the oriental prelacy, who, to a man, agreed to live
in forbearance and tranquillity.
But the Henoticon met with very different treatment in occi-
dental Christendom. The west, on this topic, varied from the
east. Felix, the Roman hierarch, rejected the overture of
pacification and carried every thing to an extremity. Binius
has drawn a striking picture of the pontiff's opposition. His
holiness proscribed and execrated the Henoticon of the most
impious Zeno, who, though a layman, presumed to denounce
the council of Chalcedon, enact a rule of faith, prescribe a law
to the church, and, stealing the keys of ecclesiastical authority,
hurl the anathemas of the hierarchy against all who disclaimed
his usurpation and tyranny. 1 The edict his infallibility de-
nominated an impiety ; and he pronounced sentence against all
who subscribed it. The western clergy as well as laity, seem,
on this question, to have joined the Roman pontiff. The
western hierarch, in this manner, engaged in hostility against
the eastern patriarchs, and the Latin against the Grecian
clergy.
The critics and theologians of Romanism differ as to the or-
thodoxy of the Henoticon. The royal manifesto has been re-
presented as rank heresy by an array of popish doctors and
critics, such as Baronius, Spondanus, Bisciola, Petavius, Binius,
Labbe, Moreri, Godeau, and Victor. Baronius characterizes
the Henoticon as a tacit repeal of the council of Chalcedon, and
1 Proscripsit et execratus est impiissimi Zenonis Henoticon. Hoc impiissimum
sacrilegi Imperatoris edictum impietatis seminarium non tantum proscripsit, verum
etiam subscribentes anathematis sententia condemnavit. Bin. 3. 594. Labb. 5.
141. Spon. 483. III.
336 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY :
i
in this is followed by Spondanus, Bisciola, Petavius^. and Mo-
reri. Binius, quoted and approved by Labbe", calls the
imperial edict of pacification an impiety. The proclamation
of Zeno put Godeau into a dreadful passion. The impious
edict, says this historian, not only anathematized the definition
of Chalcedon, the last criterion of truth ; but condemned Euty-
chianism only to conceal its approbation of heresy. 1
This array of doctors has been confronted by others, among
whom are Asseman, Pagius, and Alexander, supported, in the
rear by the schoolmen. These acquit the Henoticon of heresy.
Asseman and Pagius represent it as free from error, while,
according to Alexander, it is free from heresy and gives no sup-
port to Eutychianism. 2 The schoolmen, with all their subtlety
and distinctions, could find no blemish in this celebrated docu-
ment. An annotator on Evagrius came to the same conclusion.
Some, in this manner, accuse, and some acquit the Henoticon
of heresy. These, therefore, call Catholicism, what those
denominate heresy. The ablest theologian of the papacy, in
this way, cannot discriminate between truth and error, and
confound Romanism with heterodoxy. This presents an odd
specimen of unity, and a strange proof of the immutability of
a system.
The distracted state of the church, under Anastasius in 491,
has been depicted, in bold language, by Evagrius a contempo-
rary historian, who witnessed the scenes which he has described.
The representation, in part, has been transcribed b} r Alexander. 3
All Christendom, in Europe, Asia, and Africa, was, says
Evagrius, divided into diversified and jarring factions. One
party adhered, with the utmost pertinacity, to the faith of
Chalcedon. These deprecated the alteration of a single sylla-
ble or even a single letter in the Chalcedonian definition. The
opposing faction, on the contrary, rejected and even anathe-
matized the faith of Chalcedon. One class patronized the
Henoticon with unshaken obstinacy and resolution, while
another execrated that edict as the fountain of heresy. The
partizans and opponents of Zeno's manifesto, in the mean time,
1 Tacitam immiscuit abrogationem concilii Chalcedonensis. Spon. 482. III. In
eo tacita inerat concilii Chalcedonensis abrogatio. Petav. 1. 330. Get edit pro-
noii9bit anatheme contre le concile de Cbalcedoine. Moreri, 4. 77. Omnes
hseretici, dainnata synodo Chalcedonense, efficerentur. Bisciola, 423. Get edit
impie pronon9oit auatbeme contre ]e concile de Cbalcedoine, qui otoit la derniere
regie de la verite ortbodoxe. Godeau, 3. 656. Pour cacber 1'approbation de
I'heresie. Godeau, 3. 656. Zeno, per Henoticum, a catholica fide recedit.
Victor, 324.
8 Henolicon Zenonis Eutychianam hseresim non adstruere. Alex. 10. 412.
Assem. I. 343. Pagius, 2. 411.
3 Alii Zenonis Heuotico mordicus adhserebant, tametsi de una aut de dnabus na-
turis inter se dissiderunt. Alex. 10. 424. Evag. III. 30.
DISTRACTED STATE OF THE CHURCH. 337;
disagreed about the unity and duality of our Lord. Some, de-
ceived by the ambiguity of the imperial confession, ascribed
two natures to the Son of God and others only one.
The several factions, amid the Eastern, Western, and African,
dissensions, -refused reciprocal communion. The easterns
would not communicate with the westerns or Africans ; and
these again in return, rejected the communion of the easterns.
Dissension, at last, advanced even to a greater extremity. The
orientals, among themselves, proceeded to mutual division and
excommunication : while the Europeans and Africans engaged
in similar altercation with each other and with strangers. Such
was the state of the Latins and Greeks in the end of the fifth
century. The annals of the reformation present no scene of
equal diversity and anathemas. The patrons of Protestantism
have, on some points, differed, but never anathematized.
Execrations of this kind, the protestant leaves to the papist, as
they express a concentrated malevolence and miscreancy,
inconsistent with the light and the principles of the reformation.
The popish communion through eastern and western Chris-
tendom, exhibited, in this manner, a ridiculous and disgusting
diversity on the subject of Monophysitism. Emperors, popes,
and councils clashed in continued anathemas and excommuni-
cation. A theory, which had been entertained by the pontiffs
Felix and Julius, as well as by the saints Cyril, Gregory,
Athanasius, and Nazianzen, was, when broached by a monk of
Constantinople, stigmatized as a heresy. A Byzantine council,
amidst curses and execrations, deprived its advocate of the
sacerdotal dignity and ecclesiastical communion. The Ephe-
sian council, convened by Theodosius and containing an
hundred and fifty of the eastern prelacy, reversed the Con-
stantinopolitan decision, declared the alleged heresiarch ortho-
dox, and restored him to communion with the priesthood.
The general council of Chalcedon repealed the enactments
ofEphesus, and issued three jarring 'creeds. This assembly,
clothed with infallibility, first passed, in loud acclaim, the famed
Tome of Leo, which has been styled the column of orthodoxy.
Its second confession, which was clearly the faith of the council,
consisted of unqualified monophysitism. Its definition, at last,
which was forced on the infallible synod by Leo and Mar-
cian, the Pope and the Emperor, contained the faith, which, on
account of its final triumph and establishment, has been de-
nominated Catholicism. All these forms of belief, the holy
unerring council adopted in deafening yells and with frightful
and reiterated anathemas.
Eastern and western Christendom, notwithstanding the defi-
nition of Chalcedon, split into three contending factions.
22
338 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
Emperors, pontiffs, clergy, and people divided in favour of
Eutychianism, the Chalcedonian faith, or Zeno's Henoticon.
The emperors Marcian, Leo, and Justin patronized Catholicism.
Zeno, Basiliscus, and Anastasius, in the general opinion, coun-
tenanced heresy. Leo and Felix, Roman pontiffs, stamped the
definition of Chalcedon with the broad seal of their infallibility.
Vigilius and Martin affixed the signature of their inerrability
to monophysitism and the simple unity of Emmanuel. The
oriental patriarchs, Fullo, Mongos, and JEluros waged a spirit-
ual war against Calendion, Proterios, and Timothy, while the
prelacy and populace fought in the ranks of their respective
leaders. Latins and Greeks, Europeans and Africans, thun-
dered mutual excommunications and anathemas.
ARIAISM.
CHAPTER XL
MONOTHELITISM.
ITS GENERAL RECEPTION SUPPORTED BY THE ROMAN EMPEROR, AND BY THE
ANTIOCHIAN, ALEXANDRIAN, BYZANTINE, AND ROMAN PATRIARCHS ITS DEGRA-
DATION FROM CATHOLICISM TO HERESY THE ECTHESIS OR EXPOSITION THE
EMPEROR AND THE GREEKS AGAINST THE POPE AND THE LATINS THE TYPE OR
FORMULARY SECOND BATTLE BETWEEN THE GREEKS AND THE LATINS SECOND
TRIUMPH OF MONOTHELITISM SIXTH GENERAL COUNCIL TOTAL OVERTHROW OF
MONOTHELITISM ITS PARTIAL REVIVAL ITS UNIVERSAL AND FINAL EXTINCTION.
MONOTHELITISM ascribed only one will and one operation to
the Son of God. This will or volition, according to this system,
proceeded, not from the humanity, but from the divinity. The
patrons of this theology, indeed, disclaimed monopbysitism,
admitted the Mediator's Godhead and manhood, and attributed
to the latter both action and passion, such as volition, motion,
thirst, hunger, and pain. But the agency, the partizans of this
system referred to the deity, and the mere instrumentality to
the humanity, in the same manner as the soul actuates the
body. Catholicism, on the contrary, as established by the
sixth general council, rejected this unity, and maintained the
dogma of two wills and operations. One volition, in this
system, belonged to the deity and one to the humanity. 1 This
metaphysical distinction, in which, however, Catholicism seems
to use the correctest phraseology, continued, for a long period,
to divide Christendom, and, in its progress, to excite dissension,
animosity, execration, anathemas, excommunications, massacre,
and bloodshed.
Alexander traces monothelitism to an infernal origin. * This
heresy,' says the historian, 'burst from hell.' 2 Its earthly
author, however, as appears from Stephen, Bishop of Dora, in
the Lateran council under Martin, was Theodoras of Pharan in
Palestina, who perhaps according to Alexander, came from
the Tartarian regions or had a commission from Satan. This
innovator broached his shocking impiety, as his silly meta-
i Theoph. 218. Godea. 5. 128. Alex. 13. 23. Bin. 4, 577. et 5. 6.
3 Hseresis ex inferis erupit. Alex. 13. 27. Labb. 7. 106.
22*
340 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
physics have been called, about the year 620. A speculator,
who had lived in obscurity, fabricated this new theory, to
employ the thoughts or awaken the animosity of emperors,
popes, and councils.
But neither the obscurity of the author nor the alleged blas-
phemy of the system prevented its circulation. Heresy, like
pestilence, .is contagious; and Monothelitism soon obtained
general dissemination, and, by its universal reception, became
entitled to assume the boasted name of Catholicism. Greeks
and Latins, through oriental and western Christendom, em-
braced the innovation, which, in its infancy, was. patronized by
the Roman emperor, and by the Antiochian, Alexandrian,
Byzantine, and Roman Patriarchs and Clergy.
The emperor Heraclius, anxious to reconcile the Jacobites
to Catholicism, and influenced by the opinions of Anastasius,
Cyrus, and Sergius, issued an edict in favour of Monothelitism.
Depending on the judgment of others, and conversant with
military tactics rather than with Christian theology, the royal
warrior lent his imperial authority in support of heterodoxy.
Godeau accuses Heraclius of ' abandoning the faith, protecting
a heresy, and inflicting a mortal wound on Catholicism.'
' Inimical to God and Hardened in soul, the emperor,' says
Baronius, ' published his exposition to establish an impiety.' 1
Anastasius, Macedonius, and Macarius, Patriarchs of
Antioch, disseminated the Monothelitism, which was patronized
by the emperor Heraclius. Anastasius or Athariasius, who had
supported Jacobitism as well as Monothelitism, was promoted
to the patriarchal throne by the emperor in 630, and retained
this dignity for ten years. Macedonius, his successor favoured
trie same theory. Macarius, who was deposed in the sixth
general council, maintained this error with the ulmost obsti-
nacy. The suffragans of these dignitaries embraced this
system, and were followed by the laity without a. single murmur
of opposition or animosity. 2
Cyrus followed the example of Anastasius. Promoted to the
See of Alexandria, this Patriarch in 633, convened, in that city,
a great council, which decided in favour of one will and opera-
tion and anathematized all who dissented. The decision was
received without any opposition by the prelacy as well as the
Eeople of the diocese. 3 Monothelitism, therefore, became the
lith of the Alexandrian as well as the Antiochian See.
Sergius concurred with Anastasius and Cyrus. The Byzan-
tine Patriarch, with the design of giving more weight to his
1 Theoph. 218. Zonaras, 2. 6. Godeau, 5. 161. Spon. 639. I.
8 Theoph. 218. Cedren. 1. 331. Godeau, 5. 128. Moreri, 1. 499.
3 Cedren. 1. 332. Bin. 5. 220. Godeau, 5. 138. Spon. 633. II.
MONOTHELITISM SUPPORTED BY HONORIUS. .341
decision, assembled also a council of his suffragans; and all
these, with the utmost unanimity, decided in favour of the
same speculation. The clergy agreed with their patriarch*
Cyrus, some time after, wrote a flattering letter to Sergius : and
praised the Ecthesis of the emperor and the patriarch, which,
he said, ' was clear as sun-beams.' 1
Monothelitism, in this manner, became the faith of the
Greeks. The harmonj'- of the eastern clergy, on this theory, is
stated in the celebrated Ecthesis or Exposition. The Oriental
prelacy received, with the utmost readiness, a form of belief,
which inculcated the dogma of one will. This heresy, Godeau
admits, ' was maintained by the emperor and the three oriental
patriarchs, poisoned nearly the whole of eastern Christendom,
and corrupted the prelacy and the people.' Godeau's state-
ment is repeated by Bruys. Maimhourg attests * the concord
of the emperor Heraclius, and the patriarchs Anastasius,
Macarius, Cyrus, and Sergius in behalf of this error.' 2
Honorius, the Roman pontiff, next declared in favour of
Monothelitism. His infallibility, in two letters written in reply
to the Byzantine patriarch, expressed, in clear and unequivocal
terms, his belief of one will in the Son of God, and his un-
qualified assent to the decision of Sergius. His supremacy
denied that any of the fathers had taught the doctrine of two
wills. He represented the question concerning the operations,
as trifling and undecided by Scriptural or Synodal authority.
His infallibility's approbation of the opinion, embraced by the
Byzantine patriarch, was express, and caused Honorius to be
anathematised with Sergius in the sixth general council, as the
follower of that chief of the heresy. 3
The pontiff's letter, on this occasion, was dogmatical : and
the sixth general council characterised it by this epithet. His
holiness, says Du Pin, ' spo%.e in this production from the chair,
and supported the Monothelan error by a decretal definition. 4
His bull was an answer to the Constantinopolitan patriarch,
* Theoph. 219. Labb. 7. 214. Alex. 13. 32.
2 Exceperunt Patriarchis sedibus praesules, et gratanter ei consenserunt. Labb.
7. 202. Qui etoit soustenue par 1'Erripereur, et les trois Patriarches d'Orient.
Presque tout 1'Orient en fut empoisonne. Les Patriarches et les prelats etant cor-
rumpus, corrompoient leurs troupeaux. Godeau, 5. 153, 166. L'heresie dea
Monothelites soustenue par presque tout 1'Orient. Bruy. 1. 423.
Sergius entreprit de repandre cette heresie dans tout 1'Orient. II avoit pour lui,
Cyrus, Macaire, et Athanase. II entraina ce pauvre Prince, dans cette nouvelle
heresie. Maimb. 108.
3 Unam voluntatem fatemur Domini. Bin. 5. 203. Labb. 7. 962. Haec nobis-
cum Fraternitas vestra pradicat, sicut et nos ea vobiscum unanimiter praedicainus.
Labb. 7. 966. .
Sergio et Honorio anathema. Alexander, 13. 303. In omnibus ejus mentem
secutus est. Labb. 7. 978. Maimburg, 110.
4 Monothelitarum errorem decretali epistola definivit. Du Pin, 349, 352. Bruys,
1. 424. Godeau, 5. 140. Bellarmin, ad Clem. 8. Garn. in Diurn.
342 , THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
and indeed to the Byzantine and Alexandrian councils, to whom
he prescribed the means, which he thought necessary for the
unity of the faith and the preservation of Catholicism. His
letter also was sanctioned by a Roman Synod. The pontiffs
of this age, Bellarmme and Gamier have shown, issued nothing
of this kind without the authority of a council. The faith of
Honorius therefore was, like that of Cyrus and Sei-gius, recom
mended by the Synodal sentence of the Suffragan clergy.
The only opposition to Monothelitism arose from Sophronius,
patriarch of Jerusalem. He convened a council in 633, which
condemned this system and decided in favour of two wills.
He also dispatched Stephen, Bishop of Dora, at the head of a
solemn deputation to the Roman pontiff, to solicit the condem
nation of the Monothelan theology, as inconsistent with the
council of Chalcedon and the faith of antiquity. But his
infallibility had already declared for the unity of the Mediator's
will. He therefore recommended peace, and obliged the
deputation to promise, in name of their patriarch, to forego all
discussion on this difficult question. This injunction, which
was the offspring of sound wisdom and discretion, and which,
had it been always afterward observed, would have prevented
much useless discussion and unchristian animosity, was, during
the life of Honorius, faithfully obeyed. Sophronius, as well as
Cyrus, and Sergius, preserved, on this subject, a profound
silence and remained in inactivity. 1
During the five years, therefore, which elapsed from the
deputation of Sophronius to Honorius in 633, till the death of
the pontiff in 638, the whole Romish communion, Greeks and
Latins, received, by silent or avowed consent, the faith of
Monothelitism. A pontifical decision, admitted by the clergy,
constitutes, according to Popish theologians, a standard of faith.
Such at the Maynooth examination, was the statement of Grotty,
Brown, Slevin, and Higgins. 2 Monothelitism, on this supposi-
tion, was, in the beginning of the seventh century, transubstan-
tiated into Catholicism. The Greeks, in general, avowed their
Monothelitism. Sophronius and his clergy, who at first resisted,
concurred, at last, in accordance with the advice of Honorius,
in tacit acquiescence. The western hierarch and episcopacy
received the same theology without the faintest murmur of
hostility. The pope declared in its favour, and the clergy
submitted in cordial unanimity. A breath of discontent was
not heard, for five revolving years, through all the wide extent
of oriental and western Christendom. A single fact, indicating
1 Theoph. 218. Oedren. 1. 331. Zonaras, 2. 67. Spoil. 633. III. Labbeus,
6. 1481.
* May. Beport, 78, 154, 259, 274.
MONOTHELITISM DECLARED TO BE HERESY. 343
a disbelief of this system, from the publication of the pontiff's
letter till his dissolution, could not be culled from all the maga-
zines of ecclesiastical history and all the literary monuments
of the east and west. The Monothelan theology, therefore,
embraced by the clergy of the papal communion, was, by this
easy and simple process, transformed into genuine Romanism.
According to Godeau, ' Heraclius inflicted" a mortal wound on
the church.' The Chalcedonian council, says Theophanes,
became, on this occasion, a great reproach, ' and the CATHOLIC
CHURCH was overthrown.' 1
Monothelitism, however, which, in the Popedom of Hono-
rius, had been elevated into orthodoxy, was, in the vicissitude
of human affairs and in the variations of the Roman faith,
degraded into heresy. This theology, expelled from the throne
of Catholicism, which it had usurped, was, amid sacerdotal
and imperial anathemas, consigned, with execration, to the
empire of heterodoxy and perdition. Its legitimacy was dis-
puted, and its dynasty, amidst clerical imprecations and bal-
derdash, was overthrown. A revolution of this kind, however,
was not effected without opposition and animosity.
The belligerents, in this war of words, were the Greeks and
the Latins. The Pope and the Latins arrayed themselves
against the emperor and the Greeks : and each, during the
campaign, displayed admirable skill in ecclesiastical tactics.
Heraclius or Sergius in his name commenced hostilities in 639,
by the publication of the Ecthesis or Exposition of the faith.
This celebrated edict, having rejected Arianism, Nestorianism,
and Eutychianism, proceeded, in express terms, to teach the
unity of the Mediator's will and to interdict all controversy on
the operations. The unity of the one was defined, and silence
enjoined on the other; while the definition and interdiction
were followed by the usual volleys of anathemas. 2 This
exposition, issued by the emperor, was received by the oriental
patriarchs and prelacy.
Monothelitism and the Exposition, approved, in this manner,
by the emperor and the easterns, were, with horror and execra-
tion, condemned by the pope and the westerns. Pope John
marshalled his episcopal troops, and, at their head, discharged
his spiritual artillery from the Vatican, loaded with curses and
anathemas against the Monothelan army of the east. His
synodal battery was pointed against Monothelitism and the
Exposition. Monothelitism, John in his synod declared to be
Heraclius fit une playe mortelle a 1'Eglise. Godeau, 5. 161. Eij /*y wstfloj
oXxjjSovoj, xtu q xajdo^txtj sxxi>fa?}(Sia rttpitrisfo. Theop. 218,
Zonaras. 2. 69. Labb. 6. 1503, et 7. 206. Bin. 4. 696.. Alex. 13. 31.
344: THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
contrary to the faith, the fathers, and the council of Chalcedon. 1
The silence enjoined, as well as the unity of will taught in the
Ecthesis, offended the pontiff and his clergy. Ecclesiastics,
in all ages, seem to have challenged verbal contention as their
inalienable prerogative ; and this, at that period, appears to have
been their ruling passion. The emperor's interdict therefore,
these noisy polemics deprecated as an invasion of their rights,
and as treason against the church and their freedom.
The African clergy also declared, with distinguished zeal,
against Monothelitism. Colombas, Stephen, and Raparatus,
metropolitans of Numidia, Byzaca, and Mauritania, anathema-
tized the heresy of one will in their respective councils ; and
sent letters to the same effect addressed to the emperor, the
pope, and the Byzantine patriarch. Victor also, the Cartha-
ginian bishop, despatched Melosus, with a solemn embassy to
the Roman hierarch, declaring his promotion, his attachment
to the faith of antiquity, and his detestation of the heresy of
Monothelitism. 2
All this apparatus of edicts, councils, imprecations, anathe-
mas, and excommunications, however, produced no decisive
effect. The Greeks and .the Latins, the partizans of orthodoxy
and heterodoxy, held their several systems with unyielding
pertinacity. The authority of the emperor and the pope, on
this occasion, was divided. The emperor, when he exerted
his influence, could always command a majority, and often
the whole of the clergy. The emperor and pope, when united,
could always effect unanimity of profession among the conscien-
tious bishops. But Heraclius and John, on this occasion, pat-
ronized two contending factions ; and his majesty, besides, was
not determined. He had been entrapped into Monothelitism
by Anastasius, Cyrus, and Sergius, in the full confidence of its
orthodoxy. But the declaration of the Latins awakened doubts
in his mind ; and he remained, therefore, in suspense and
inactivity, The balance of victory, in consequence, was sus-
pended in equilibrium ; and the holy Fathers, both of the East
and West, expended their curses and their excommunications
for nothing.
The former battle being indecisive, the Greeks and Latins
prepared again for action. The Greeks indeed, though headed
by the emperor, being weary of war, appear, on this occasion,
to have been inclined to peace. But the Latins rejected all
cessation of arms. The organs of combativeness, in the lan-
guage of Spurzheim and phrenology, must have been well
1 Theoph. 219. Oedren.2. 332. Petav. 2. 138. Maimb. 111. Labb. 6. 1502.
Bin. 4. 734.
8 Cedren. 2. 332. Theoph. 219. Bruy. 1. 440. Petavius, 1. 379.
THE TYPE OR FORMULARY OF CONSTANS. 345
developed in the Western clergy. Their pugnacity, after six-
teen years war, with some intervals, had suffered no diminution,
notwithstanding the severity of the former campaign.
The emperor Constans, pretending to inspiration, issued, in
648, a pacific overture, which he styled the Type or Formulary.
This edict, suggested by Paul the Byzantine patriarch, having,
with great perspicuity and without any partiality, explained
the opinions on the subject of contention, and expressed deep
regret for the unhallowed divisions of the Christian community,
interdicted all disputation on the contested topics of the will
and operations. All discussion of these metaphysical and
difficult questions was forbidden each party, on pain of Divine
judgment and imperial indignation. The clergy who should
offend against the edict of pacification were to be degraded,
the monks excommunicated, and' the nobility deprived of their
rank and property. The Type differed from the Ecthesis.
The Ecthesis defined the unity of the will, and enjoined silence
only on the operations. The Type defined nothing, and pro-
hibited all controversy on both these subjects. The Greeks
acquiesced in the manifesto of pacification, and submitted,
with willingness, to the imperial authority. 1
But the Latins, headed by the pope and disinclined to peace^
commenced immediate hostilities ; and, from the secretary of
the Lateran, hurled anathemas from their spiritual engines
against the impiety of the Ecthesis, the atrocity of the Type,
and the heresy of Monothelitism. Pope Martin led the charge
against the emperor and the Greeks. Full of zeal for the
faith, or rather actuated with the spirit of faction, this pontiff,
in 649, assembled, in the Lateran, no less than 150 bishops
collected from Italy and the adjacent islands. This assembly,
more numerous than some general councils, fulminated execra^
tions against Monothelitism and the most wicked Type, which
was published by Constans, and calculated to restrain men
from professing the truth or combating error. The sacred
synod also thundered imprecations, with great spirit and devo-
tion, against Theodorus, Cyrus, Sergius, Pyrrhus, Paul, and all
who entertained their heretical impiety. 2
This campaign, like the former, was indecisive. Constans
showed no partiality to Monothelitism or to Catholicism ; but
maintained, on the contrary, an armed neutrality. His only
design seems to have been the promotion of peace, and the
extinction of faction and animosity. Caliopas, therefore,
1 Labb. 7. 239. Alex. 13. 35. Brays, 1. 441. ,
2 Typo Constantis Imperatoris danraato, Monothelitarnm haeresim, ejusque
auctores et promotores diris multavit. Mabillon. 1. 407. Maimburg, 111. Crabb.
2. 232. Platina, in Martin. Theoph. 219.
346 'THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY '.
Exarch of Italy, seized Martin by the emperor's orders, and
confined, this disturber of the peace a whole year in Naxos, an
island in the Archipelago or Egean Sea. He was then, after a
mock trial and the utmost cruelty, banished to Cherson, where
he died. 1 He suffered with great fortitude and patience, and,
in consequence, has, in the Roman communion, obtained the
honours of saintship and martyrdom.
Martin's punishment tamed the haughty insolence of his
successors Eugenius and Vitalian, and taught these pontiffs to
respect the imperial authority. These took special care not to
imitate their predecessors, John and Martin, in condemning the
Type; but, on the contrary, maintained, during their spiritual
reigns, a suspicious and provoking silence and neutrality. The
red-hot anathemas, such as John and Martin had thundered
from the Vatican against all the patrons of the Ecthesis, the
Type, and Monothelitism, got time to cool, and the church
and empire in consequence enjoyed a temporary peace.
Eugenius and Vitalian, it has been alleged, conferred their
formal sanction on the emperor's pacific formulary. This has
been inferred from the friendship which Constans discovered
for these two pontiffs. His majesty enlarged the privileges of
the Roman See. He sent Vitalian a copy of the Gospels, orna-
mented with gold and jewels of extraordinary magnitude and
brilliancy. But the Sovereign, who wreaked such vengeance
on Martin for condemning the Type, would not, in so distin-
guished a manner, have countenanced Vitalian in the same
offence. 2 Eugenius and Vitalian, therefore, if they withheld
their avowed approbation of the Edict, suspended their open
condemnation.
This neutrality was a virtual, if not a formal submission to
the formulary, which was issued merely to prevent discussion
and animosity. The Type interdicted controversy, and this
interdiction, these pontiffs obeyed. This taciturnity, which was
execrated by Martin, was a direct compliance with the requisi-
tions of Constans. Eugenius and Vitalian sanctioned, by their
cessation of hostility, what Theodorus and Martin in two Roman
councils, had denounced as heresy inimical to Catholicism. 3
Christendom, for a second time, saw all opposition to Monothe-
litism entirely abandoned, and his infallibility, ' the universal
bishop, the head of the church, and the father and teacher of
all Christians,' with all his Western suffragans, resting, for a
1 Cedren. 2. 332. Bruy. 1. 461. Beda, 30.
a Bruys. 1. 463. Labbeus, 7. 457. Beda, Chron. Ann. 671.
3 Theodorus Papa, coucilio congregate, eundem typum damnavit. Binius, 4.
572. revopsvov- . xorta rijj Ixxtyaiag aos^ata-tov Hyrtov. Labbeus, 7. 365
Bxposuit Typum adversus Catholicam fidem. Beda, 30. '
THE SIXTH GENERAL COUNCIL CONVENED. 347
long series of years, in connivance and inactivity. This was
plainly the second triumph of Monothelitism. The Monothelan
theology, if a total cessation of all opposition to a doctrine con-
stitutes it an article of faith, was, for the second time, raised to
the throne of orthodoxy and Catholicism.
Monothelitism, however, enjoyed only a precarious and tem-
porary reign. The era of its dethronement had nearly made
its appearance on the broad theatre of the world. A revolution,
which had taken place in the imperial mind, portended its speedy
overthrow and dissolution. The emperor Constantine, a de-
scendant of Heraclius, and educated in the Monothelite system,
induced by reason, caprice, interest, passion, whim, fancy,
inclination, or some of these diversified motives which actuate
the human mind, abjured the catechism of his infancy, and
embraced the theology which he afterward raised to the throne
of orthodoxy. ' His majesty, the warm friend of Catholicism,*
says Binius, ' hastened to expunge the domestic and hereditary
stain of his family.' The royal convert concluded pacific
negotiations with the Saracens, and formed a treaty with the
pope for the destruction of .Monothelitism : and when his
majesty and his holiness united against this or any other creed,
the spirit of prophecy was unnecessary to anticipate its doom.
The royal smiles and frowns, seconded by pontifical influence,
always conveyed instant conviction to episcopal consciences,
and reduced jarring systems to unanimity.
Constantine, anxious to allay ecclesiastical discord, summoned
for this end a general council, which met at Constantinople in
the year 680. The bishops of this assembly, in its first session,
did not exceed forty, though in the end, they amounted to 166.
The emperor, attended by the counsellors of state, presided,
and, in the acts of the synod, they are styled the judges. These
prescribed the subjects, ruled the discussions, collected the
suffrages, and indeed conducted the whole machinery of the
council. Their partiality appeared in the first session. Maca-
rius, patriarch of Antioch, and the representatives of the Roman
pontiff, had disputed about a quotation from Cyril of Alexan-
dria. This, though couched in the language of metaphysical
jargon and unqualified nonsense, equally unintelligible and
senseless, the judges decided in favour of the party which was
now, in consequence of imperial patronage, to become orthodox. 1
The acts of the sixth general council were distinguished by
the speedy proselytism of the Greeks, the condemnation of
Macarius and Honorius, and the synodal decision against
Monothelitism. Georgius of Constantinople was the first who,
i Alexander, 13. 47. Maimbourg, 112. Labbeus,7. 635.
348 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
changed by a hasty conversion, recanted his former opinion,
and anathematized the dogma of one will and operation. The
logic of imperial favour, in an instant, flashed conviction on his
mind. The arguments of the monarch bore, no doubt, the
imperial stamp, and therefore possessed, beyond question, a
sterling value. His conversion was immediately followed by
that of all his suffragans. These, imitating their superior, and
sensible to the dialectics of their sovereign, cursed, in loud
vociferation, all the patrons of Monothelitism. 1
But Macarius, the Antiochian patriarch, was formed of less
yielding materials. He publicly declared in the eighth session,
that he would not retract, though, on account of his obstinacy,
he should be torn into fragments, and hurled headlong into the
sea. This shocking blasphemy awakened all the zeal of the
pious bishops, who, in consequence, roared out, ' Cursed be the
new Dioscorus. Put out the new Dioscorus. Cursed be the
new Apollinaris. Strip him of his pall.' The sacred synod
and Roman sovereign then commanded the pall to be torn off
Macarius. Basil the Cretan, then leaped up, seized the
unhappy patriarch, rent the pall from his shoulders ; and,
while the council continued cursing, expelled the heretic and
his throne, by sheer violence, out of the assembly. The Roman
clergy next caught Stephen, the abettor of Macarius, by the
shoulders, and threw him, amidst direful execrations, out of the
sacred synod. 2 The holy fathers, on the occasion, had no
mercy on Macarius, Stephen, or their own lungs : and had it
not been for their facility of cursing, acquired by long habit,
must have cursed themselves out of breath.
The condemnation of his infallibility pope Honorius, for
heresy, formed the most extraordinary act of the sixth general
council. This pontiff had sunk into the cold tomb, and his
bones, during a period of half a century, had been mouldering
in the dust. Bat death, the coffin, the shroud, and the grave
could not shield his memory from the holy church's anathemas,
which were pronounced with perfect unanimity, and without
the least opposition or faintest murmur of mercy. 3
The council, in the thirteenth session, having condemned the
dogmatic letters of Honorius as conformed to heresy, and con-
trary to Catholicism and the faith of the Apostles arid the
1 Binius, 5. 88. Alexander, 13. 50.
* Sancta synodus, una cum principe ejus orarium auferri jusserunt a collo ejus,
et exiliens Basilius episcopus Cretensis ecclesias, ejus orarium abstulit, et anatbe-
matizantes projecerunt eum foris synodum, simulque et Thronum ejus. Stephanum
. autem discipulum ejus cervicibus a sancta synodo clerici Roman! ejicientes ex-
pulerunt. Anastasius, 30. Labbeus, 7. 590. Bin. 5. 92. 365. Crabb. 2. 319,
321. Caranza, 421. Alex. 13, 52.
3 Honorio ab Orientalibus post mortem anathema sit dictum. Caranza, 522.
ACTS OF THE GENERAL COUNCILS. 349
Fathers, anathematized their pontifical author in company with
Theodoras, Cyrus, and Sergius. Honorius was represented as
agreeing, in every respect, with Sergius, whose impiety the
pontiff confirmed. The sacred synod, in its sixteenth session,
repeated these anathemas against the heretical Honorius and
his companions. Having, in the eighteenth session, condemned
Monothelkism, and issued their definition of two wills and
operations in Emmanuel, the holy Fathers again anathematized
Theodorus, Sergius, Pyrrhus, Paul, Cyrus, Macarius, and
Honorius. 1
The unerring council, in its eighteenth session, among other
compliments, represented his holiness, in company with Theo-
dorus, Sergius, Pyrrhus, Cyrus, and Paul, as an organ of the
devil, who had used the pontiff, like the serpent, in bringing
death on man in the dissemination of scandal and heresy. 2 His
supremacy, it seems, occupied two important situations. He
was the organ of Satan and the viceroy of God. Clothed with
infallibility, the Byzantine council proclaimed his agency, as a
Monothelite, in the dynasty of his infernal majesty. Vested in
like manner with infallibility, the Florentian and Lateran coun-
cils defined his holiness, as pontiff, the vicar-general of the
supernal Emmanuel. Honorius, in this way, was promoted to
the premiership of both heaven and hell, and, with characteris-
tic ability, conducted the administration of the two dominions.
He presided, like all other popes, in the kingdom of Jesus, and,
at the same time, by special favour in the empire of Belzebub. N
The anathemas of the Byzantine assembly were repeated
by the seventh and eighth general councils. The seventh, in
its third session, anathematized and execrated Cyrus, Sergius,
Pyrrhus, and Honorius, and, in its seventh session, uttered a
similar denunciation. The eighth, in its tenth session, also
pronounced anathemas against Honorius, Cyrus, Stephen, and
Macarius. 3
Condemned by these general councils, Honorius was also
denounced by six Roman pontiffs and by the old Roman bre-
viary. He was anathematized for heresy, by Agatho, Nicholas,
twoLeos, and two Adrians, on a question, says Caron, not of
fact, but of faith. Agatho, says Caranza, excommunicated the
heretics Honorius, Macarius, Stephen, and Cyrus. Leo the
Second and four of his successors confirmed the sixth, seventh,
1 Sequi falsas doctrinas haereticqrum. In omnibus ejus mentem secntus est, et
impia dogmata confirmavit. Labb. 7. 978. Honorio haeretico anathema. Labb.
7. 1043. Du Pin, 350. Maimb. 113.
2 Organa ad propriam sui voluntatem apta reperiens, Theodorum, Sergimn,
Pyrrhum, Paulum, insuper etHonorium. Labb. 7. 1058. Alexander, 13. 303.
Bin. 7. 854. et 9. 151. Crabb. 3. 476, 694, Du Pin, 349.
3 Bin. 5. 819. et 6. 844. Crabb, 2. 403.
350 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
and eighth general councils, that had condemned and anathe-
matized Honorms. Leo, in his confirmation of the Byzantine
council, characterized Honorius as a traitor to the holy apostolic
faith. The old Roman breviary also, approved by the Roman
pontiffs and used in the Romish worship, attested the condem-
nation of Cyrus, Sergius, and Honorms for the error of
Monothelitism. 1
The decisions and anathemas of these councils and pontiffs
have, in modern times, distracted the friends of the papacy.
One party, in the face of this overwhelming evidence, main-
tain the hierarch's orthodoxy, while, another, in the exercise of
common sense and candour, confess his heresy. Baronius,
Bellarmine, and Binius, in the genuine spirit of Ultramontane
servility, assert his Catholicism. Binius represents Honorius,
as free from every stain or suspicion of error. The means,
which this faction employ in his vindication, are extraordinary.
One party, in this faction, such as Baronius, Bellarmine,
Pighius, and Binius, represent the synodal acts of the sixth
universal synod as corrupted, and the name of Honorius
inserted in the place of Theodoras. This hopeful solution
prevailed for some time ; but is now the object of scorn and
contempt. The silly conjecture had its day ; but has passed to
oblivion with many other variations of popery. The Shandian
supposition has been demolished by the overwhelming argu-
ments and criticisms of Du Pin, Alexander, Godeau, Launoy,
and Maimbourg. 2
Another party in this faction, among whom were Turre-
crema, Pallavicino, Spondanus, and Arsdekin, admit the
genuineness of the acts ; but allege an error in the council.
The condemnation of Honorius, according to these critics, was
a question, not of faith, but of fact, in which, even a general
council may err. Popes and councils, according to these vin-
dicators, condemned Honorius ; but, in their sentence, were
mistaken. The modest critics weigh their own opinion, though
void of all evidence, against the decision of pontiffs, councils,
and all antiquity. 3 His infallibility's vindicators, in their noble
enterprize, have displayed a tissue of sophistry, quibbling,
misrepresentation, distinctions, nonsense, shuffling, evasion,
and chicanery, unrivalled in the annals of controversy.
1 Novimus Honorium Papam, tanquam haereticum Monothelitam a 3 synodis
generalibus, VI, VII, VIII. sicut et a 4 Pontificibus Eomanis, Leone, Agathone,
duobus Adrianis damnatum esse. Caron. 8.9. 418. Alex. 13. 311. Maimbourg,
11. Proditione immaculatam fidem subvertere conatus est. Labb. 7. 1155. et 8.
652. Bin. 5.307. Moreri, 4. 186.
2 Spon. 681. V. Bell. IV. 11. Bin. 4. 572. Maimb. 116. Du Pin, 350. Alex.
13.302. Godeau. 5. 339. Launoy, 1.118.
3 Turrecrema, II. 92. Pallav. VII. 4. Arsdek. 1. 127. Bell. IV. 11. Maim-
bourg, 120.
TEMPORARY REVIVAL OF MONOTHELITISM. 351
J
A second party, among whom may be reckoned Marca,
Garner, Pagius, Alexander, Godeau, Moreri, Launoy, Bruys,
Maimbourg, Caron, Canus, Beda, and Du Pin, confess the
justice of the pontifF's sentence. This party again is divided
into two factions. One of these, supported by the authority
of Marca, Garner, Pagius, Alexander, Godeau, and Moreri,
represent Honorius merely as guilty of remissness and inac-
tivity, in neglecting to suppress the rising heresy of Monothe-
litism. Launoy, Bruys, Caron, Canus, Beda, Maimbourg, and
Du Pin have characterized Honorius as guilty of heresy, and
have evinced their allegation by a mass of evidence which
must command the assent of every unprejudiced mind. 1
Monothelitism, by the decision of the Byzantine council,
received a total overthrow. The Greeks and Latins, through
the oriental and western empire, acknowledged, by open or
tacit consent, the definition of the Constantinopolitan assembly.
The theology of one will and operation, seemed, for a lapse
of about thirty-two years, to be extinguished.
The Monothelan theory, however, was destined to enjoy a
temporary revival, in the reign of Philippicus. Justinian, dis-
tinguished by his cruelty, was assassinated in the year 712,
and Philippicus raised to the throne. His elevation to the impe-
rial dignity, Binius ascribes to the devil and a blind magician.
The usurper, says Theophanes, had been educated by Stephen,
a Monothelite, and a pupil of Macarius the Antiochan patriarch,
and had, from his infancy, imbibed the principles of his tutor.
The magician, who, though blind in mind and body, was, it
seems, skilled in astrology, foretold the promotion of Philippi-
cus, and, should he patronize Monothelitism, the prosperity of
his reign. The prophet, however, in this latter circumstance,
happened to be mistaken. The stars had been unfaithful, or
the sage astrologer had miscalculated. Philippicus, however,
believing the impostor's prediction, bound himself by oath to
the conditions. 2
Vested with the sovereign authority, the emperor convened a
council in Constantinople, for the purpose of overturning
Catholicism and substituting Monothelitism. This assembly,
which Theophanes calls 'a mad synod,' was, says Binius,
attended by numberless oriental bishops, who, according to the
same author, were, at the emperor's suggestion, converted, in
a moment, from orthodoxy to heresy. The proselytism, on
this occasion, was somewhat sudden ; but nothing extraordi-
nary. The prelacy of these days possessed an admirable
i Alex. 13. 320. Godeau, 5. 140. Moreri, 4. 186. Launoy, 1. 118. Bruy, 1.
423. Caron. 89. Cai)us,V. 5. Beda, 31. Maimb. 113. Du Pin, 350.
* Cedren. 1. 353. Theoph. 254. Bin. 5. 447.
352 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
versatility of belief and elasticity of conscience ; and could
generally conform, with accommodating and obliging facility,
to the faith of the emperor. Many of these holy lathers, who,
on this occasion, embraced the imperial religion, had, under
Constantine, supported Catholicism, and, again, under Anasta-
sius, who succeeded Phillippicus, returned, with equal ease, to
orthodoxy. The sacred synod, therefore, at the nod of the
emperor and with the utmost unanimity, condemned the sixth
general council, consigned its acts to the flames, and declared
the theology of one will, which many of them had formerly
anathematized, the true faith of antiquity. John, whom
Philippicus substituted for Cyrus in the See of Constantinople,
poisoned, according to Godeau, all the Greeks with heresy.
The Eastern clergy abandoned the faith rather than their
dignity. The Byzantine conventicle, whose atrocious acts,
. full of blasphemy, are, says Labbeus, buried with the wicked
emperor and consigned to eternal anathemas, renewed the
impiety of Monothelitism. 1
Philippicus, who was a man of learning, having, on the dis-
missal of the council, compiled a confession agreeable to its
definition, transmitted it to the several metropolitans, and
enjoined it on the clergy on pain of deposition and banishment.
A few, unwilling to make the imperial faith and conscience the
standard of their own, remonstrated. But these refractory
spirits were soon removed, and others of greater pliancy were
substituted. Monothelitism, in consequence, was again em-
braced by all the Greeks, and even by the envoys of the apos-
tolic see, who, at that time, resided in the imperial city.
The Latins, however, were, for once, less passive or com-
plying. The emperor's power in the west had become less
arbitrary than in the east. The Roman city, in which the
imperial authority had been reduced to a low ebb, was, in a
great measure, governed by the Roman pontiff. The pope,
therefore, rejected the imperial confession with indignation, and
condemned it, in council, as fraught with blasphemy, dictated
by the enemy of truth, and calculated to sap the foundations of
Catholicism, the faith of the fathers, and the authority of coun-
cils. The Roman populace, unaccustomed to moderation, pro-
ceeded to greater extremity. These, in the extravagancy of
their zeal, threw the emperor's image from the church, and ex-
punged his name from the public liturgy. The infatuated peo-
ple proceeded even to oppose the Roman governor, who had
been appointed by the heretical emperor. A skirmish, before
the palace, was the consequence, in which twenty-five were
1 Zonarae, XIV. 26. Theoph. 240. Bin. 5. 448. Labb. 1. 130. Spon. 712.
VIII. Godeau, 5. 339.
FINAL EXTINCTION OF MONOTHBLITISM. 353
killed. The Pope, however, dispatched a deputation to the
clergy with the gospel and cross in their hand, to part the
combatants and allow the governor to take possession of the
palace. 1
Philippicus, in the mean time, prepared to wreak his ven-
geance on the pontiff and the people, was, by a conspiracy,
driven from the throne, and Anastasius, as zealous for orthodoxy
as Philippicus had been for heresy, was raised to the imperial
dignity. He, accordingly, issued an edict to the metropolitans,
commanding the reception of the sixth general council, and the
condemnation of all who should reject its decisions, which, he
said, had been dictated by the Holy Ghost. The imperial edict
met no opposition. The will of the reigning emperor being
known, the transition of the Grecian clergy from rank heresy to
high orthodoxy was instantaneous. Monothelitism never re-
covered this shock, but hastened, by rapid declension, to nearly
total extinction. Arianism, Nestorianism, and Monophysitismj
survived the anathemas of general councils, and even flourished
in the face of opposition. But imperial, papal, and synodal
authority, which had formerly been wielded in support of
Monothelitism, succeeded, in the vicissitudes of religion, in its
suppression, and finally to its almost universal extinction.
1 Beda, Chron. Ann. 716. Bruy. 1. 512. Alex. 13. 61, 62.
23
CHAPTER XII.
PELAGIANISM.
ITS AUTHOR AND DISSEMINATION PATRONIZED BY THE ASIANS OPPOSED BY THE
AFRICANS CONDEMNED BY INNOCENT APPROVED BY ZOZIMUS ANATHEMATIZED
BY ZOZIMUS DENOUNCED BY THE ASIANS CENSURED BY THE GENERAL COUNCIL
. OF EPHESUS DECLENSION OF PELAGIANISM CONTROVERSY IN THE NINTH CEN-
TURY GOTTESCALCUS AGAINST RABANUS THE COUNCILS OF MENTZ-AND QUIERCY
AGAINST THE COUNCILS OF VALENCE AND LANGRES MODERN CONTROVERSY
COUNCIL OF TRENT RHEMISH ANNOTATIONS DOMINICANS AGAINST THE MOLINISTS
CONGREGATION OF HELPS THE JESUITS AGAINST THE JANSENISTS CONTRO.
VERSY ON QUESNEL'S MORAL REFLECTIONS.
PELAGIANISM misrepresented man, as Arianisrn misrepresented
Emmanuel, who is both God and man. The whole human
family, according to the Pelagian system, continues, in its
present condition, to possess the same moral power and purity
as Adam in a state of innocence. The patrons of this theology
deny the fall and recovery of man, and the imputation of sin
and righteousness. Grace, which in this theory is the reward
of merit, is, its abettors maintain, wholly unnecessary for the
attainment of holiness, which is the offspring of free-will. Man,
in the due exercise of his moral powers, actuated by free-will
and unaided by divine influence, may arrive at a moral perfec-
tion, beyond the sphere of criminality and condemnation.
Adam was created mortal ; and death is not the effect of sin,
but a law of nature. 1 The design of this impiety was the vain
adulation of human ability, for the purpose of superseding the
necessity of divine assistance.
The authors of this heresy were Pelagius and Celestius.
Pelagius was an Englishman : and possessed eloquence and
capacity ; but at the same time, artifice and dissimulation.
Celestius, his pupil, was a native of Scotland or, as some say,
of Ireland. He was educated in the Pelagian school and
attached lo the Pelagian system, but excelled his tutor in can-
dour and uprightness. 2
1 August. Peccat. Orig. c. 17, 30. Morery, 7. 105. Crabb. 1. 470. Prosp. 1.
430. Tournelly, 1. 131. Godeau, 3. 113.
2 Poly. Virg. 56. Bin. 1. 863. Alex. 10. 50.
PELAGIANISM PATRONIZED BY THE ARIANS. 355
These two companions in error began the dissemination of
their opinions in the Roman capital, about the commencement
of the fifth century. The publication of the Pelagian theology
in the Roman city was, through fear of detection, conducted
with caution and in privacy. Retiring from Rome in 410, on
the approach of the Goths, the two heresiarchs repaired to Sicily
and afterwards to Africa ,where they published their sentiments
with more freedom. Celestius, for some time, remained in
Africa, while Pelagius passed into Asia to Palestine. Pelagian-
ism, in this way, was propagated in the European, African, and
Asian continents ; and succeeded, says Augustine, far beyond
expectation. A spark, says Godeau, ' augmented to a confla-
gration, which threatened to consume the Christian common-
wealth.' 3
Pelagianism, like all systems introduced among men, met a
diversified reception ; and was alternately praised and blamed,
condemned and approved, by popes and councils. Pelagius
in Palestine gained the friendship of John, patriarch of Jeru-
salem, and was protected by this chief from the accusations
preferred against the heresiarch in the synods of Jerusalem and
Diospolis. Orosius, in 415, accused Pelagius of heresy, in a
synod or conference at Jerusalem. John, the friend of
Pelagius, presided in this assembly. Orosius opposed the
authority of Jerome and Augustine to that of Pelagius. 2 The
plea, however, was disregarded. The synod, after some alter-
cation, agreed to consult Pope Innocent before they should
come to a decision.
Heros and Lazarus, in the same year, accused Pelagius before
fourteen bishops in,the synod of Diospolis or Lydda, a city of
Palestine. Eulogius, a metropolitan of Cassarea, presided, and
John of Jerusalem occupied the second place. Pelagius was
again acquitted. One of his accusers was detained by sickness,
and the other would not abandon his friend in that extremity.
The judges were, in a great measure, unacquainted with Latin,
and could not understand the book of Pelagius, which he had
published in favour of his system. The accused, besides,
showed his usual prevarication and address. He disclaimed
some of his errors, explained others in an orthodox sense, and
anathematized all opinions contrary to Catholicism. .His the-
ology in consequence was approved, and he himself continued
in the enjoyment of ecclesiastical communion. Pelagius after-
ward boasted that his opinion on the moral powers of man was
1 Godea. 3. 118. Phot. cod. 54. Crabb. 1. 470. Aug. Ep. 89
2 Alex. 10. 155. Aug. 10. 508.
23*
356 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY:
sanctioned by this synod, which Jerome called the pitiful con-
vention of Diospolis. 1 /
Pelagius and bis principles in this manner escaped the con-
demnation of the Asians ; and even, in a limited sense, obtained
their approbation. But all his finesse could neither elude the
vigilance nor escape the activity of the African clergy. Celes-
tius, the companion and pupil of Pelagius, had, early as the year
412, been condemned and excommunicated in the Carthaginian
synod. Aurelius, the Carthaginian bishop presided on the
occasion. The accusation was preferred by Paulinus a
deacon, and the sentence of condemnation extended both to
the heresy and its author. The Carthaginian prelacy, amount-
ing to sixty-eight, again in 416 anathematized both Pelagius
and Celestius and condemned their principles. The Numidians,
also, to the amount of sixty, following the example of the Car-
thaginians, assembled in council at Milevum, expressed their
horror of Pelagianism and anathematized its abettors. Augus-
tine, also, who swayed the African councils and influenced
their decisions, declared, in a public manner, against the
Pelagian impiety. The whole African episcopacy in this way,
raised their voice with resolution and unanimity against the
rising error. 2
The Africans, in this manner, in a church boasting its unvary-
ing unity, encountered the x\sians, and condemned the theology
which the latter approved. But diversity of sentiment, on this
topic, was not limited to the African and Asian prelacy. Roman
pontiffs, in Roman councils, displayed similar discordancy.
The African clergy transmitted their decisions, on the subject
of Pelagianism, to Pope Innocent for his approbation. The
pontiff, though at one time suspected of countenancing Pelag-
ianism, proceeded, after some big talk about the dignity of the
apostolic see, to sanction the judgment of the Africans, and
excommunicated Pelagius, who according to his holiness, * was
led captive by Satan, and unworthy of ecclesiastical communion,
civil society, or even human life.' Pelagianism, contained in
a book which the heresiarch had published, his infallibility
characterized e as contagion and blasphemy.' 3 The African
decisions, in this manner, were corroborated by pontifical
authority, and the westerns, with steady and determined
unanimity, declared against the orientals.
But Innocent in the mean time died, and was succeeded by
1 Godeau, 3. 140, 143. Bruy. 1. 162. Augustin, 2. 622. et 10. 219. Alexander,
10. 159. Jerom, Bp. 79.
3 Crabb. 1. 469, 473, 475. Bin. 1. 864, 866, 869. Godeau, 3. 147. Alexander,
10. 159.
3 In quo, multa blasphemia. Innocent, ad Aurel. II n'y atrouvC* que des blas-
phemes. Godeau, 3. 150. Aug. Ep. 93. Labb. 3. 8. Bruys, 1. 178. Alex. 10. H>3.
PEIJAGIANISM APPROVED BY ZOZIMUS. 357
Zozimus ; and this event interrupted } the harmony of the Latins.
This pontiff threw the whole weight of his infallibilty into the
scale of the Asians and of Pelagianisra against the Africans and
orthodoxy. Celestius, condemned by the Carthaginians and
Numidians, fled to Ephesus and Constantinople. But the
odium of his theology caused his expulsion from both these
cities ; and he repaired, in consequence, to the Roman capital,
to seek the protection of the Roman pontiff, who, he knew,
seldom rejected the opportunity of extending his jurisdiction
and drawing appeals to his tribunal.
Celestius, therefore, in full anticipation of success, presented
himself before Zozimus, declared his innocence, and deprecated
the aspersions which had been circulated to blast his reputation.
He also presented a confession of faith, which among other
things, contained a rejection of original sin, and, of course, ac-
cording to the theology of Romanism and the future profession
of Zozimus, an avowal of rank heresy. His sentiments on this
subject have been preserved by Augustine. Sin, Celestius said,
'is not conveyed to man by traduction or hereditary transmis-
sion. Such an idea is foreign to Catholicism. Sin, on the con-
trary, which is the fault, not of our nature, but our will, is not
born with man, but is his own act after he comes into the
world.' 1 Such was his statement, as transmitted by a Roman
saint of the first magnitude. The heresiarch's denial of man's
moral apostacy and original sin in his confession is also admitted
or rather stated by Godeau, Bruys, and Alexander. 2 This con-
fession, disclaiming the depravation of man, his infallibility ap-
proved in a Roman synod, and vouched to the African clergy
for its Catholicism. He absolved the heretic and confirmed the
heresy. This confirmation did not satisfy his holiness. He
accused the African bishops of temerity, and represented all
discussions on grace and original sin as empty speculations,
proceeding from useless refinement or criminal curiosity. 3 His
holiness also vented his spleen against Heros and Lazarus, who
have been eulogized by Augustine and Prosper, and who, with
distinguished zeal and activity, had opposed Pelagianisrri.
1 Id asseveravit expressias quod parvulorum nerninem obstringat originate
peccatum. August, De peccat. Orig. II. 2.
Non dichnus, ut peccatum ex traduce firmare videamur, quod longe a Catholico
sensu alienum est. Quia Peccatum non cum homine nascitur, quod postmodum
exercetur ab homine, quia non naturae delictum, Bed voluntatis ease monstratur.
Aug. De Peccat. Orig. 10. 253, 255. Labb. 3. 408.
2 II nioit ouvertement le peche originel. Godeau, 3. 145.
L'aveu qu'il fit de sa doctrine BUT le peche originel me paroit elair et sans equi-
voque. Bruys, 1. 181.
Peccatum originale Caelestius, eo libello, negabat. Alex. 10. 166.
5 Inepta certamina, quae non aedificant, ex ilia curiositatis contagione profluere
Zozim. ad Aurel. Bin. 1. 877. Labb. 3. 404.
Isti turbines ecclesiae vel procelle. Zozim. ad Aurel. Labb. 3. 404.
358 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERiF :
Zozimus treated both with the bitterest acrimony, and called
them pests, whirlwinds, and storms, while he hurled excom-
munication, fraught with imprecations and fury, against their
devoted heads. Ail this was transacted in a Roman council
which his infallibility had assembled in the Basilic of Clement
The heresy of Celestius, on this occasion, was unequivocal
and avowed. He was candid, and used neither concealment
nor disguise. His doctrine on original sin, the infallible council
of Trent in its fifth session, complimented with an anathema.
The Sacred Synod, in its holy denunciations against all who
deny original sin, cursed Pope Zozimus with all his infallibility. 1
The acquittal of Celestius was followed by that of Pelagius.
This heresiarch wrote the pontiff a letter, which contained his
own vindication, and which was accompanied with a confession
of his faith. His opinion, according to Augustine and Zozimus,
corresponded with those of Celestius. ' All the good and evil,'
said Pelagius in Augustine's statement, ' for which man is
praised or blamed, is not born with him, but performed by him.
Man is procreated without sin.' 2 The confession of Pelagius,
says Zozimus, was, in diction and signification, the same as
that of Celestius, which denied the apostacy of the human
species. His infallibility, nevertheless, declared himself satis-
fied with the Pelagian theology and vouched for its truth and
Catholicism. His reply to the African Episcopacy, on the
occasion, contained a eulogy on Pelagius and Celestius, an
invective against Heros and Lazarus, and a condemnation of
the Carthaginian and Numidian councils.
The recitation of the Pelagian creed had a curious effect on
the Roman clergy, who were present in the council, as well as
on the Roman pontiff. The heresy, as it afterwards became,
awakened joy and admiration in these holy men, who, on this
occasion, could scarcely refrain from weeping. The calumny,
which had been circulated against a man of such sound faith
as Pelagius, moved the compassion of the Sacred Synod, and
had nearly drawn streams of sympathetic tears from their
eyes. 3
The Roman convention was not the onlv ecclesiastical assem-
tj
bly which, in western Christendom, sanctioned Pelagianism.
i Labb. 20. 27.
3 Omne boiium et malum, quo vel laudabiles vel vituperabiles sumus, non nobis-
cum otitur sed agitur a nobis. Sine vitio procreamur August. Pec. Or. 14. P,
258. Gpdea. 3. 155. Labb. 3. 403.
Lavement Zosimum, fidem ipsius Pelagii, tanquam veram et catholicam, laudan-
tern. Pelagium et Coelestium putai-ent oz-thodoxos. Facundus vii. 3. Augustin,
10. 102.
3 Quod sanctorum virorum, qui aderant, gaudium fait ? Quve admiratio singulo-
rum? Vix fletu quidem Be et lacrymis temperabant. Labb. 3. 404. Alex. 10,
168. Godeau, 3. 156.
PELAGIANISM APPROVED BY ZOZIMTJS. ,
This heresy, in 794, was approved by the council of Frankfort,
consisting of three hundred bishops from Germany, France,
and Italy, assembled by the French monarch, superintended
by the Papal Legates, Theophylact and Stephen, and con-
firmed by the Roman pontiff. Mistaking the confession of
Pelagius for a work of Jerome, this great congress of the Latin
clergy stamped the Pelagian creed with the broad seal of their
approbation. Pelagianism, which was then heterodoxy, the
holy synod characterized as the true faith, which, he who
believes, shall enjoy eternal salvation. The Frankfordians,
who represented the whole Latin communion, became Pelagians.
The German council confounded the works of Jerome and
Pelagius, and could not distinguish between heresy and
Catholicism, as the Roman Synod, though superintended by
his infallibility, had been unable to discriminate Pelagianism
from orthodoxy. 1
The Africans, however, were not intimidated by his infalli-
bility's threats and indignation ; but, on the contrary, continued
their opposition, with resolution and unanimity. The Prelacy
of all Africa, to the amount of 214, assembled in 417, and
confirmed their former sentence, in opposition to the judgment
of Zozimus. This did not satisfy their zeal. These active de-
fenders of the faith, to the number of 225, met again in 418,
and enacted eight canons against Pelagianism. 2 The firmness
of the African clergy, indeed, seems to have been the means of
preventing the Pelagian theology from becoming the faith of
Christendom. Had their zeal yielded to the perversity of his
holiness, Pelagianism would, in all probability, have become
Catholicism. Heresy might have been transubstantiated into
orthodoxy, and become the divinity of the Greek and Latin
communion. But the energy of the African, not the Roman
church, overcame every difficulty, and the faith of Augustine,
not of Zozimus, prevailed.
The patrons of the papacy admit the mistake of Zozimus.
These have been forced to grant that the pontiff sanctioned
heresy as Catholicism. Augustine, having formed several
excuses for Zozimas and his council, insinuates, in the end,
'the prevarication of the Roman clergy.' Zozimus, says
Facundus, 'condemned the sentence of his predecessor and
the African prelacy, and extolled the faith of Pelagius and
Celestius as true Catholicism.' Zozimus, says Godeau in
modern times, ' received the confession of Celestius as Catho-
licism and its author as orthodox.' The credulous pontiff,
according to Alexander, ' accounted the Herestarch's book
1 Brays, 1. 183. Vossius, 18. 3 Bin. 1. 883. Bruys, 1. 186.
356 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEKY :
sanctioned by this synod, which Jerome called the pitiful con-
vention of Diospolis. 1 /
Pelagius and his principles in this manner escaped the con-
demnation of the Asians ; and even, in a limited sense, obtained
their approbation. But all his finesse could neither elude the
vigilance nor escape the activity of the African clergy. Celes-
tius, the companion and pupil of Pelagius, had, early as the year
412, been condemned and excommunicated in the Carthaginian
synod. Aurelius, the Carthaginian bishop presided on the
occasion. The accusation was preferred by Paulinus a
deacon, and the sentence of condemnation extended both to
the heresy and its author. The Carthaginian prelacy, amount-
ing to sixty-eight, again in 416 anathematized both Pelagius
and Celestius and condemned their principles. The Numidians,
also, to the amount of sixty, following the example of the Car-
thaginians, assembled in council at Milevum, expressed their
horror of Pelagianism and anathematized its abettors. Augus-
tine, also, who swayed the African councils and influenced
their decisions, declared, in a public manner, against the
Pelagian impiety. The whole African episcopacy in this way,
raised their voice with resolution and unanimity against the
rising error. 2
The Africans, in this manner, in a church boasting its unvary-
ing unity, encountered the Asians, and condemned the theology
which the latter approved. But diversity of sentiment, on this
topic, was not limited to the African and Asian prelacy. Roman
pontiffs, in Roman councils, displayed similar discordancy.
The African clergy transmitted their decisions, on the subject
of Pelagianism, to Pope Innocent for his approbation. The
pontiff, though at one time suspected of countenancing Pelag-
ianism, proceeded, after some big talk about the dignity of the
apostolic see, to sanction the judgment of the Africans, and
excommunicated Pelagius, who according to his holiness, ' was
led captive by Satan, and unworthy of ecclesiastical communion,
civil society, or even human life.' Pelagianism, contained in
a book which the heresiarch had published, his infallibility
characterized ' as contagion and blasphemy.' 3 The African
decisions, in this manner, were corroborated by pontifical
authority, and the westerns, with steady and determined
unanimity, declared against the orientals.
But Innocent in the mean time died, and was succeeded by
1 Godeau, 3. 140, 143. Bray. 1. 162. Augustin, 2. 622. et 10. 219. Alexander,
10. 159. Jerom, Ep. 79.
* Crabb. 1. 469, 473, 475. Bin. 1. 864, 866, 869. Godeau, 3. 147. Alexander,
10. 159.
3 In quo, mnlta blasphemia. Innocent, ad Aurel. II n'y a trouve que des blas-
phemes. Godeau, 3. 150. Aug. Ep. 93. Labb. 3. 8. Brays, 1. 178. Alex. 10. 163.
PEIiAGIANISM APPROVED BY ZOZIMUS. 357
Zozimus ; and this event interrupted ,the harmony of the Latins.
This pontiff threw the whole weight of his infallibilty into the
scale of the Asians and of Pelagianisra against the Africans and
orthodoxy. Celestius, condemned by the Carthaginians and
Numidians, fled to Ephesus and Constantinople. But the
odium of his theology caused his expulsion from both these
cities ; and he repaired, in consequence, to the Roman capital,
to seek the protection of the Roman pontiff, who, he knew,
seldom rejected the opportunity of extending his jurisdiction
and drawing appeals to his tribunal.
Celestius, therefore, in full anticipation of success, presented
himself before Zozimus, declared his innocence, and deprecated
the aspersions which had been circulated to blast his reputation.
He also presented a confession of faith, which among other
things, contained a rejection of original sin, and, of course, ac-
cording to the theology of Romanism and the future profession
of Zozimus, an avowal of rank heresy. His sentiments on this
subject have been preserved by Augustine. Sin, Celestius said,
' is not conveyed to man by traduction or hereditary transmis-
sion. Such an idea is foreign to Catholicism. Sin, on the con-
trary, which is the fault, not of our nature, but our will, is not
born with man, but is his own act after he comes into the
world.' 1 Such was his statement, as transmitted by a Roman
saint of the first magnitude. The heresiarch's denial of man's
moral apostacy and original sin in his confession is also admitted
or rather stated by Godeau, Bruys, and Alexander. 2 This con-
fession, disclaiming the depravation of man, his infallibility ap-
proved in a Roman synod, and vouched to the African clergy
for its Catholicism. He absolved the heretic and confirmed the
heresy. This confirmation did not satisfy his hqjiness. He
accused the African bishops of temerity, and represented all
discussions on grace and original sin as empty speculations,
proceeding from useless refinement or criminal curiosity. 3 His
holiness also vented his spleen against He ros and Lazarus, who
have been eulogized by Augustine and Prosper, and who, with
distinguished zeal and activity, had opposed Pelagianism.
1 Id asseveravit expressius quod parvulorum neminem obstringat originate
peccatum. August. De peecat. Orig. II. 2.
Non dicimus, ut peccatum ex traduce firmare videamur, quod longe a Catbolico
sensu alienum est. Quia Peccatum non cum homine nascitur, quod postmodum
exercetur ab homine, quia non naturae delictum, sed voluntatis esse monstratur.
Aug. De Peecat. Orig. 10. 253, 255. Labb. 3. 408.
2 II nioit ouvertement le peche originel. Godeau, 3. 145.
L'aveu qu'il fit de sa doctrine sur le peche originel me paroit clair et sans equi-
voque. Bruys, 1. 181.
Peccatum originale Caelestius, eo libello, negabat. Alex. 10. 166.
5 Inepta certamina, quae non aedificant, ex ilia curiositatis contagione profluere
Zozim. ad Aurel. Bin. 1. 877. Labb. 3. 404.
Isti turbines ecclesiae vel procellEe. Zozim. ad Aurel. Labb. 3. 404.
358 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
^
Zozimus treated both with the bitterest acrimony, and called
them pests, whirlwinds, and storms, while he hurled excom-
munication, fraught with imprecations and fury, against their
devoted heads. All this was transacted in a Roman council
which his infallibility had assembled in the Basilic of Clement
The heresy of Celestius, on this occasion, was unequivocal
and avowed. He was candid, and used neither concealment
nor disguise. His doctrine on original sin, the infallible council
of Trent in its fifth session, complimented with an anathema.
The Sacred Synod, in its holy denunciations against all who
deny original sin, cursed Pope Zozimus with all his infallibility. 1
The acquittal of Celestius was followed by that of Pelagius.
This heresiarch wrote the pontiff a letter, which contained his
own vindication, and which was accompanied with a confession
of his faith. His opinion, according to Augustine and Zozimus,
corresponded with those of Celestius. ' All the good and evil,'
said Pelagius in Augustine's statement, ' for which man is
praised or blamed, is not born with him, but performed by him.
Man is procreated without sin.' 2 The confession of Pelagius,
says Zozimus, was, in diction and signification, the same as
that of Celestius, which denied the apostacy of the human
species. His infallibility, nevertheless, declared himself satis-
fied with the Pelagian theology and vouched for its truth and
Catholicism. His reply to the African Episcopacy, on the
occasion, contained a eulogy on Pelagius and Celestius, an
invective against Heros and Lazarus, a.nd a condemnation of
the Carthaginian .and Numidian councils.
The recitation of the Pelagian creed had a curious effect on
the Roman clergy, who were present in the council, as well as
on the Roman pontiff. The heresy, as it afterwards became,
awakened joy and admiration in these holy men, who, on this
occasion, could scarcely refrain from weeping. The calumny,
which had been circulated against a man of such sound faith
as Pelagius, moved the compassion of the Sacred Synod, a.nd
had nearly drawn streams of sympathetic tears from their
eyes. 3
The Roman convention was not the onlv ecclesiastical assem-
/
bly which, in western Christendom, sanctioned Pelagianism.
i Labb. 20. 27.
s Omne bouum et malum, quo vel laudabiles vel vituperabiles snmus, non nobis-
cum oritur sed agitur a nobis. Sine vitio procreamur August. Pec. Or. 14. P,
258. Godea. 3. 155. Labb. 3. 403.
Invenient Zosimuiu, fidem ipsius Pelagii, tanquam veram et catholicam, laudan-
tern. Pelagium et Ccelestium putarent orthodoxos. Facundus vii. 3. Augustin,,
10. 102.
3 Quod sanctorum virorum, qui aderant, gaudium fuit? QUEB admiratio singulo-
rum? Vix fleta quidem se et lacrymis temperabant. Labb. 3. 404. Alex. 10.
168. Godeau, 3. 156.
PELAGIANISM APPROVED BY ZOZIMUS.
This heresy, in 794, was approved by the council of Frankfort,
consisting of three hundred bishops from Germany, France,
and Italy, assembled by the French monarch, superintended
by the Papal Legates, Theophylact and Stephen, and con-
firmed by the Roman pontiff. Mistaking the confession of
Pelagius for a work of Jerome, this great congress of the Latin
clergy stamped the Pelagian creed with the broad seal of their
approbation. Pelagianism, which was then heterodoxy, the
holy synod characterized as the true faith, which, he who
believes, shall enjoy eternal salvation. The Frankfordians,
who represented the whole Latin communion, became Pelagians.
The German council confounded the works of Jerome and
Pelagius, and could not distinguish between heresy and
Catholicism, as the Roman Synod, though superintended by
his infallibility, had been unable to discriminate Pelagianism
from orthodoxy. 1
The Africans, however, were not intimidated by his infalli-
bility's threats and indignation ; but, on the contrary, continued
their opposition, with resolution and unanimity. The Prelacy
of all Africa, to the amount of 214, assembled in 417, and
confirmed their former sentence, in opposition to the judgment
of Zozimus. This did not satisfy their zeal. These active de-
fenders of the faith, to the number of 225, met again in 418,
and enacted eight canons against Pelagianism. 2 The firmness
of the African clergy, indeed, seems to have been the means of
preventing the Pelagian theology from becoming the faith of
Christendom. Had their zeal yielded to the perversity of his
holiness, Pelagianism would, in all probability, have become
Catholicism. Heresy might have been transubstantiated into
orthodoxy, and become the divinity of the Greek and Latin
communion. But the energy of the African, not the Roman
church, overcame every difficulty, and the faith of Augustine,
not of Zozimus, prevailed.
The patrons of the papacy admit the mistake of Zozimus.
These have been forced to grant that the pontiff sanctioned
heresy as Catholicism. Augustine, having formed several
excuses for Zozimus and his council, insinuates, in the end,
'the prevarication of the Roman clergy.' Zozimus, says
Facundus, ' condemned the sentence of his predecessor and
the African prelacy, and extolled the faith of Pelagius and
Celestius as true Catholicism.' Zozimus, says Godeau in
modern times, 'received the confession of Celestius as Catho-
licism and its author as orthodox.' The credulous pontiff,
according to Alexander, ' accounted the Heresiarch's book
1 Brays, 1. 183. Vossins, 18. 2 Bin. 1. 883. Brays, 1. 186.
360 ..... THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY .*
orthodox, and formed a high opinion of his Catholicism,'
Zozimus, says Caron, ' erred, when he vouched for the ortho-
doxy of Pelagianism.' The confession of Celestius, according
to Moreri, ' was not entirely exempted from error.' Zozimus,
in the statement of Du Pin, * pronounced the Catholicism of a
heretical creed, and recommended it by letters to the African
clergy. 1
The Africans, in these scenes of altercation, engaged in mor-
tal conflict with the Asians, and Pope Innocent with Pope
Zozimus. Church appeared against church, and infallibility
against infallibility. Zozimus is next to take the field against
himself. Several reasons contributed to this effect. The Afri-
cans continued their opposition with the utmost resolution.
Jerome and Augustine, the two greatest luminaries of the Latin
communion, and whose judgment influenced Western Chris-
tendom, declared openly against his holiness. The Emperor
Honorius, also, induced by a deputation from the African Synod
in 418, approved its decisions, and enacted cruel laws, dated
from Ravenna, against the Pelagians, whom the pretorian
prefects were, by royal authority, empowered to deprive of
their estates and condemn to perpetual banishment. 2
His infallibility, at this crisis, saw his danger and sounded a
retreat. His holiness yielded to the storm ; and, facing to the
right about, anathematized Pelagius and Celestius, whom he had
honoured with his approbation and covered with his protection ;
while, in the midst of his perplexity, he continued, with ridicu-
lous vanity and inconsistency, to boast of his pontifical preroga-
tives and authority. This vice-god, in the modest language of
Pope Paul, chattered about the pre-eminence of the popedom,
and, at the same time, cursed Pelagianism, which he had for-
merly sanctioned, with might and main. His infallibility, in a
sacred synod of the Roman clergy, condemned the confession of
faith which he had approved, confirmed the sentence of the
Africans which he had rejected, and anathematized the persons
whom he had patronized. Pelagianism, which, a few months
before, he had dubbed Catholicism, now, by a hasty process,
1 Ex hoc potins esset praevaricationis nota Romania clericis inurenda. August.
10. 434. Invenient Zozimum contra Innocentii decessoris sui sententiam, qui
primus Pelagianam haeresim condemnavit, fidem ipsius Pelagii ejusque complicis
Celestii, tanquam veratn et Catholicam laudantem, insuper etiam Africanos culpan-
tem episcopos. Facundus, VII. 3. Zozime re9ut son livre comine Oatholique, et
lui comme orthodoxe. Godea. 3. 153. Zozimus magnam de Pelagii ipsius et
Caelestii orthodoxia concepit opinionem. Libellum Oatholicum existimavit. Alex.
10. 167, 169. Zozimus aberravit, cum Caelestinum Pelagianum pro Catholico
declarasset. Caron, 100. Qui n'etoit pas entierement exempte d'erreur. Moreri,
8. 116. Zozimus Oselestii haeretici Libellum Oatholicum ease pronunciavit. Du
Phi, 348.
a Alex. 10. 183. Godeau, 3. 166.
PELAGIANISM CONDEMNED BY THE ASIANS. 361
became, in the language of Zozimus, impiety, poison, abomina-
tion, error, perversity, execration, pestilence, and heresy. Un-
satisfied with these imprecations, he proceeded, in the fervour
of his zeal for orthodoxy, to publish through Christendom circu-
lar letters, denouncing anathemas on the Pelagian im piety .\
His holiness, to do him justice, showed himself, on this occa-
sion, a profound adept in the Christian art of cursing. He
formed his anathemas with skill, pointed them with precision,
and launched them with energy. His infallibility, probably
from the proficiency which he displayed in the evangelical duty
of cursing, and for his attachment to injustice arid ambition
during his life, was canonized after his death. He lived a tyrant
and died a saint, or rather, by a lucky hit or Baronian blunder,
acquired the saintified character after his decease. His carcass
affords materials for worship : and indeed, with all his imper-
fections, which were many, Zozimus is not the worst article
of the kind, which has graced the Roman calendar and chal-
lenged Roman adoration.
The Asians also, like the pope, wheeled to the right about,
and manfully condemned their former sentences, which they
had pronounced in favour of Pelagius. The heresiarch had
been patronized by John and Eulogius, and was afterward
denounced by Theodotus and Theodorus. He had been
acquitted in the councils of Jerusalem and.Diospolis, and was
afterwards condemned in those of Antioch and Cilicia.
Theodotus, patriarch of Antioch, assembled a council in that
city about the end of the year 418, and without any ceremony,
condemned Pelagianism and anathematized its unfortunate
author. 2
Theodotus was imitated by Theodorus. This changeling,
who, like his Roman infallibility, varied his religion with the
occasion, had patronised Pelagius and opposed Augustine. But
his temporising versatility induced him, about 420, to convene
a synod in Cilicia, in which he abjured his former profession and
denounced his former system. The Cilician clergy, with easy
docility and Christian resignation, copied the obliging politeness
of their superior. 3 Such was the accomodating facility with
which the orientals abandoned their prior faith, and embraced
the fashionable theology.
Pelagianism, in conjunction with Nestorianism, was, in 431,
denounced by the general council of Ephesus. The Ephesian
assembly, being accounted a representation of the whole church
1 Detectus a Zozimo, et haereticorum scelestissimus postea ostensus fuit. Labb.
3. 403. Augustin. 1. 58. et 10. 263. Prosper, 1. 76. Bin. 1. 871. Alex. 10. 176.
3 Mercator. c. 3. POSS. i. 298. Labb. 3. 497.
3 Alex. 10. 178. Labb. 3. 498. Garner, 219.
362 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
its sentence, in consequence, was of the highest authority, and
gave the Pelagian heresy the finishing blow. Celestine also, the
Roman pontiff of the day, exerted all his energy for the exter-
mination of the error, which had been patronized by his prede-
cessor. Addressing Maximian the Byzantine patriarch, he
characterised Pelagianism as an impiety which deserved no
quarter. Its partizans, he admonished the patriarch to expel
from human society, lest the impious system, through his lenity,
should revive. 1
These synodal canons and imperial laws were followed by the
rapid declension of Pelagianism. An odium, by these means,
was thrown on the system, which covered its partizans with sus-
picion and unpopularity. Its enemies, in consequence, ima.gined
they had effected its destruction. Prosper composed the epi-
taph of Pelagianism and Nestorianisrn, which he denominated
mother and daughter, and represented as buried in the same
tomb. 2 But the triumph was ideal. A future day witnessed
the resurrection of the entombed theology. The ancient
pontiffs, after a lapse of many years, were opposed by their
more modern successors.
The controversy on grace, free-will, and predestination seemed,
for a long period after the declension of Pelagianism, to sleep.
Christendom, says Calmet in his Dissertation on predestination,
continued, after the council of Orange, to enjoy, on these
topics, a peace of three hundred years. But a theological dis-
putation, similar to the Pelagian, originated in the ninth cen-
tury. Augustine, refuting Pelagian free-will, taught, as Calmet,
Godeau, and Mabillon have shown, the doctrine of gratuitous
predestination. ' Predestination,' said the African saint, 'is the
precursor of grace ; but grace is the donation itself.' 3 This
theology, insinuated by Augustine, became afterward a fertile
source of contest among the French clergy.
Gottescalcus and Raban, in this controversy, appeared first
in the arena of literary combat. Gottescalcus was a monk and
distinguished for learning. He maintained the system of pre-
destination, and particular redemption, which, in modern times,
has been called Calvinism. He taught the kindred doctrines
of election and reprobation. Raban and Hincmar, indeed,
represented Gottescalcus as denying free-will and teaching
predestination to sin as well as to punishment. This, however,
was a mere calumny. The monk rejected every insinuation
of the kind with the utmost indignation. The wicked, Gottes-
. 2. 576, 577, 578. Alex. 10. 182.
3 Prosp. 1. 114. Bruy. 1. 209.
3 Praedestinatio est gratiae praeparatio ; gratia vero jam ipsa donatio. Aug. De
Praed. c. 10. Godeau. 6. 368. Calmet, 3. 384.
COUNCILS OPPOSED TO COUNCILS. 363
calcus declared, were not compelled by any necessity to perpe-
trate immorality, and would be punished only for voluntary
transgression. 1
Raban, Archbishop of Mentz, opposed Gottescalcus. The
archbishop seems to have admitted election; but denied repro-
bation. He acknowledged predestination to life ; but not to
death : and, like many other- polemics, misrepresented his
adversary. He wrote to Count Eberard and Bishop Notingus,
and characterized Gottescalcus as a perverter of religion and a
former of heresy. 2
CJ / H ^^
Gottescalcus and Raban were not left to single combat : but
were supported by some of the ablest theologians and the most
celebrated characters of the day. Hincmar, Scotus, and Ama-
larius seconded Raban ; whilst Gottescalcus was patronized by
Remigius, Bertram, Prudentius, Florus, Lupus, and Pope
Nicholas. These two factions maintained their own particular
views by copious quotations from the fathers, who indeed are
a kind of mercenary soldiery, whose alliance, offensive and
defensive, may be obtained by all theological polemics on every
topic of ecclesiastical controversy. Gottescalcus and Remigius
cited Augustine, Fulgentius, Jerome, Isidorus, and Gregory ;
while Raban and Hinemar quoted Chrysostom, Gennadius,
Hilary, Cyprian, Cyril, Beda, and Theodoras.
The shock of councils followed the war of theologians. The
councils of Mentz and Quiercy appeared against those of Valence
and Langres, as Raban, Hincmar, and Scotus had encountered
Gottescalcus, Remigius, and Florus. Gottescalcus and his
cause were first tried in the council of Mentz in 848. The
monk presented his confession of faith, in which he unfolded his
system of predestination to this assembly. The synod con-
demned Gottescalcus for heresy, and sent him to Hincmar,
Archbishop of Rheims, in whose diocese he had been ordained
to the priesthood. 3
Gottescalcus was next tried in the council of Quiercy in 849,
and convicted of contumacy and heresy. He was, in conse-
quence, deposed by a solemn sentence, from the priesthood,
and scourged, without mercy, before the emperor and the
surrounding prelacy. 4 Charles was a spectator of this act of
inhumanity and feasted his royal eyes with this refined enter-
tainment. The punishment was inflicted with the utmost cruel-
ty, so that Gottescalcus, in the agony of torment, threw into
1 Du Pin, 2, 52, 53. Calmet, 3, 186.
a Mabillon, 2, 681. Mezeray, 1, 409. Calmet, 3, 484, 486. Godeau, 6, 368.
3 Du Pin, 2, 53. Labbe 9, 1048. Mabillbn, 2. 286. Godeau, 6, 132.
4 II fut condamne, comme heretique. Calmet, 3, 486. Inventus haereticus et
incorrigibilis. Labbe, 9. 1055. Mabillon. 2. 682.
On le disciplina crueUement. Godeau, 3, 136.
364 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
the fire a book which he had written in favour of his system.
He was then cast into prison, where he was doomed to suffer
the greatest privations.
But the decisions of Mentz and Quiercy were afterward re-
scinded by those of Valence and Langres. The synod of Valence,
composed of the prelacy from the three provinces of Lyons,
Aries, and Vienna, met in 855, and employed all its authority
to sanction the theory of Gottescalcus and overthrow the system
of Hincmar. The Valentian fathers accordingly issued six
canons, which treated on free-will and predestination, and which
established election, reprobation, and particular redemption. 1
The third canon teaches the predestination of the elect to life,
and the predestination of the wicked to death. The fourth
represents the decision of Quiercy, in favour of universal re-
demption, as a grand error, useless, hurtful, and contrary to
the truth. The sacred synod, on these points, professed to
follow Cyprian, Hilary, Ambrosius, Jerome, Augustine, and
tradition.
The Valentians treated Scotus with great severity. His
propositions, unfit for pious ears, contained, according to these
holy bishops, ' a comment of the devil rather than an argument
for the truth ; while his silly work, full of confusion, exhibited
trifling and foolish fables, calculated to create a disgust for the
purity of the faith.' 2 His production indeed, on this subject,
was a distinguished specimen of folly and extravagance.
The council of Valence, according to the statement of Sir-
mond, Godeau, Mabillon, and even Hincmar, condemned the
faith of Quiercy. The canons of Quiercy, says Sirmond, were
exploded by the synod of Valence. A similar statement is given
by Godeau, Mabillon, and Hincmar himself. 3 These authors,
though attached to Romanism, admit the repugnance of the
synod of Valence to those of Mentz and Quiercy.
The Valentian council was confirmed by Pope Nicholas.
This pontiff was highly dissatisfied with the condemnation and
imprisonment of Gottescalcus. The inhumanity of Hincmar
1 Les eveques y reconnoissent hardement la predestination des bons a la vie eter-
nelle, et celle des mechans a la mort eternelle. Calmet, 3. 420.
Fatemur praedestinationem electorum ad vitam, et praedestinationem impioriim
ad mortem. Labbg, 9, 1151.
Us confessent qu'il y a une predestination, des impies a la mort eternelle. Godeau,
6. 150. Qalmet, 3. 489. MabiUion, 3, 46.
Propter inutilitatem, vel etiam noxietatem, et errorem contrarium veritati. Labbe,
9. 1152.
lls nomment une grande erreur 1'opinion de ceux, qui disent que le sang de Jesus
Christ a ete repandu pour les impies. Godeau, 6. 150.
2 Commentum Diaboli potius quam argumentum aliquod fidei. Ineptas qua?sti-
unculas, et aniles pene fabulas, Scottorumque pultes, puritati fidei nauseam inferen-
tes. Mabillon, 3. 46. Labb. 10. 129.
s Labb. 9. 1162. Godeau, 6. 150. Mabillon, 3. 46. Calmet> 3. 490,
DECISION OF THE COUNCIL OF TRENT. 365
and his faction excited the indignation of the hierarch. He
cited Hincmar and Gottescalcus to Rome for the purpose of
further investigation. This, however, Hincmar evaded. But
Prudentius transmitted the canons of Valence to Nicholas- for
confirmation, and these, accordingly, received the sanction of
the pontiff. 1
Confirmed, in this manner, by the authority of the pope, the
canons of Valence were also approved by the council of Lan-
gres. This assembly met in 859, and having considered the
Valentian decisions on grace, free-will, and predestination, con-
ferred on them the full sanction of its authority. 2
The controversy on grace, free-will, and election was little
agitated from the ninth till the sixteenth century. The school-
men indeed exercised their pens on these different topics, and
discussed their knotty subjects with their accustomed subtility:
and their disputations on these points exhibited, as usual, a
great variety of sense and phraseology. 3 But these disquisitions
were carried on in the secrecy of the schools, rather than on
the public theatre of the world ; and, in consequence, excited
little general interest.
The reformation under Luther and Calvin rekindled the con-
troversy. Luther had studied the theology of Augustine and
Aquinas, and embraced their system. Calvin also adopted the
same theory, which represents predestination as entirely gra-
tuitous and unconditional, and which, in general, had been
patronized in the Latin communion. Many of the Romish
theologians, therefore, from their aversion to alleged heresy,
shifted their ground, and countenanced conditional election,
founded on the foresight of human merit. Calmet acknowledges
this variation with the utmost candour. ' This question,' says
the learned Benedictine, ' has often changed its phasis in the
church.' Arsdekin, with equal ingenuousness, makes a similar
confession, and admits, on this point, 'a wide diversity of
opinion even at this time among the Romish doctors.' 4 The
one party advocate the unconditional predestination which has
since been denominated Calvinism. The other faction, opposing
I Le Pape lea approuva. Calmet, 3. 490. Mabillon, 2. 682,
2 Morery, 5, 45. Mabillon, 3. 79.
3 Calmet, 3. 491. Bossuet, 38.
4 Cette question a change de face plus d'une fois dans 1'Eglise. Calmet, 3. 478.
Inter rJoctorea Catholicos, magna eat etiam hoc tempore, sententiarum discre-
pantia. Arsdekin, 1. 360. Bossut, 38. Du Pin, 3. 728.
II y avoit deux sentimens parmi les theologiens de 1' eglise Romaine. Mem.
sur la Pred. 169.
^Luther, qni avoit etudie la theologie de Thomas d' Aquin, embrassa cette doc-
trine. Calvin tomba dans les memea sentimens. Mem. 155, 156. Cenx qui
suivent les sentiments de St. Augustin, SB futigueat vainement a prouver qu'ils ne
sout Calvinistes. Limiens, 10. 72.
366 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY'.
the predestinarian hypothesis, support the system which has
since been called Arminianism.
The celebrated council of Trent exemplified the diversity of
sentiment, which, on this subject, reigned in the Romish com-
munity. The Franciscans, in this assembly, opposed the Domi-
nicans, and theologian encountered theologian. One party
which included the most esteemed doctors, maintained uncon-
ditional and gratuitous predestination j and, in favour of this
opinion, quoted the apostolic authority of John and Paul, to
whom they added Augustine, Scotus, and Aquinas. Another
party accused this system of impiety, making God partial and
unjust, subverting free-will, encouraging men in sin, and
abandoning them to despair. These conflicting opinions had a
neutralizing effect on the canons of this convention. The design,
in their composition, was to satisfy each party ; and the result
therefore was an unmeaning compromise. Calmet admits their
omission of any decision, on the manner and motives of election
and reprobation. 1
The controversy was continued after the council of Trent with
the bitterest animosity. The Rhemists, Dominicans, and Janse-
nists arrayed themselves against the Molinists, Franciscans, and
Jesuits. The university of Paris opened a battery against those
of Louvain and Douay ; and the French against the Belgian
clergy. The hostile factions, on these occasions, fought their
theological battles with shocking violence and fury.
The Rhemists, in their annotations, have, in strong language,
advocated unconditional election. The elect, sav these com-
mentators in their observations on Paul to the Romans, Ephe-
sians, and Thessalonians, are called according to the good-will
or eternal decree of God, and not according to the purpose or
will of man. The divine foreknowledge is not a mere provision
of human works, influenced by ordinary providence or natural
strength ; but comprehends an act of God's will to his elect.
God has predestinated these elect to a conformity with his Son.
The call, santification, perseverance, and glorification are the
effects of free election and predestination. Jacob was a figure
of the elected, and Esau of the reprobated. God's mercy is
displayed on the former, and his justice on the latter. Predes-
tination is to be ascribed, not to man's merit, but to God's
mercy. The Almighty has chosen some as vessels of election,
and left others as vessels of wrath to be lost in sin. God has
predestinated his people to glory through the merits, not of
man, but of his beloved Son. He calls some, by his eternal
1 Paolo, 1. 332. Du Pin, 3. 438. Calmet, 3. 491. Mem. 164-169,
THE DOMINICANS AGAINST THE MOLINISTS. 367
decree, to the faith; while he leaves others to darkness and
infidelity. 1
The principal persons, whose publications and opinions on
this subject, excited contests, were Molina, Lessius, Plamel,
Jansenitis, and Quesnel. The works of these authors raised
dreadful commotions in Spain, Belgium, France, and Italy.
The Spanish controversy originated in the publication of Mo-
lina's work, on the Concord of Grace and Free-will. The Jesuit
Molina was born at Cuenca in Spain. He became professor of
theology at Evora in Portugal, and died in Madrid, anno 1600.
His book, which occasioned such angry and useless contentions,
was published in 15S8, and attempted to reconcile divine grace
and free-will by a theory which its author called the Middle
Science. His discovery, when divested of its novel diction,
founded the purposes of God on the divine foresight of the
merit and good works of men. 2
Molina's work had the honour of being both approved and
condemned in an infallible communion. The Dominicans, on
this subject, encountered the Jesuits. Attached to the faith of
Augustine and Aquinas, as well as mindful of their ancient
enmity to the Jesuits, the former society commenced a vigorous
attack on Molinism. The Middle Science, these partizans of
predestination represented as a system of Pelagianism. The
Jesuits, on the contrary, defended Molina's Middle Science,
which they extolled as truth and Christianity. The theory
which the one called heresy, the other denominated Catholicism.
Each party published its theses, brimfull of virulence and
sarcasm. The two factions vented their indignation with such
fury, that the king of Spain had to interfere, for the purpose of
allaying their mutual rage and keeping the peace : while all
the royal authority was found incompetent entirely to suppress
the theological war. 3
The university of Salamanca, on this speculation, assailed the
university of Alcala. The former seminary, in nine propositions,
proscribed Molinism. The latter, having subjected the work to
a rigid examination for a whole year, vouched for its Catho-
licism, and conformity to scripture, councils, fathers, and
schoolmen. 4 Of the two learned and orthodox colleges, the
1 Rhem. Annot. on Rom. viii. 22. 29, 30. et ix. 10. 14-16. 22. Epli. i. 4.
2 Thess. ii. 13.
3 Arsdekin, 1. 385. Moreri, 3. 568. et 6. 365. Mem. 219.
3 Les Dominicains 1' attaquerent vivement. Les Jesuites le defenderent de
meme. Calmet, 3. 495. Les deux ordres commencerent a s' echauffer en
Espagne, 1' un contre 1' autre, d' une maniere scandaleuse. Mem. sur Predest.
223, 226.
Les Jesuites sont ti-es-embarrassez a montrer qu 1 ils ne sont ni Pelagians ni
Demi-Pelagiens. Limiers, 10. 72.
* L' universite de Salamanque le censura. Mem. 222, 225.
868 . THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
one censured as error, the system which the other patronized
as truth and Romaniam.
The Inquisition of Spain, on this topic, attacked the Inqui-
sition of Portugal. The latter declared the Concord of Grace
and Free Will free from all suspicion of error. But the former,
always favourable to the Dominicans, censured a number of
propositions, extracted from Molina's celebrated production. 1
The peninsular inquisitors, the professed enemies of mercy
and heresy and the avowed friends of inhumanity and Roman-
ism, differed on a question of which they were the accredited
and official judges, and whose sentence entailed death, in all
its horrors, on its devoted victim.
Two Roman pontiffs, Clement and Paul, next pronounced
different sentences on this question. The controversy was
transferred from the holy office to the holy see, and from Spain
to Italy. Clement the Eighth, who then occupied the pontifical
throne, established the Congregation of Helps for the decision
of this contest. This assembly consisted of ten consultors, who
were the appointed judges, and who met for the first time in^
1598. The Dominicans and Jesuits argued their several
systems, before this convention, and awaited its sentence with
anxiety.
The Congregation, under his infallibility's immediate superin-
tendence, rejected Molina's theory of a middle science, and con-
demned sixty of his propositions. This decision, in the eleventh
session, represented the Spanish speculator's sentiments on pre-
destination as consonant with those of Faustus, Cassian, arid the
Pelagians, and contrary, not only to Augustine, and Aquinas,
but also to sacred writ and the canons of councils. 2
Paul the Fifth, who succeeded Clement in 1605, proceeded in
a course widely different from his predecessor. He issued no
determination. His design, lest he should offend the French
king who protected the Jesuits, or the Spanish monarch who
patronized the Jansenists, was, not the decision, but the sup-
pression of the controversy. His supremacy, therefore, after
many solemn deliberations, evaded a definitive sentence : and,
Complutensis Universitas Molinse Concordiam per annum integrum rigido ex-
amini subjecit. Universitatis calculo declarator, in Molinse Concordia contineri
sauani et Catholicam doctrinam. Arsdekin, 1. 325.
1 Omni erroris suspicione liberate. Arsdekia, 1. 325. Calmet, 3. 495;
L' inquisition d' Espagne, toujours i'avorable aux Dominicains. Mem. 243. Illi,
ex Molinse Concordia, propositiones aliquas modo cousurarent. Arsdekin, 1. 326.
3 On declara qne le sentiment de Molina, touehant la predestination, etoit non
aeulenient contraire a la doctrine de Saint Thomas, et de Saint Augustin, mais en-
core a 1' ecriture sainte, aux decrets des conciles, et conforme a celle de Cassien
et de Fauste. Calmet. Diss. 3. 496 ; Amour, 40, 44, 45, 100, 123.
La congregation declara que Molina etoit dans des sentimens semblables & ceux
des Pelagiens. Mem. 233, 236. Calmet, 3. 497. Thuan. 6. 241.
THE JESUITS AGAINST THE JANSENISTS. 369
advising both to modify their expressions and to abstain from
mutual obloquy, left each faction to enjoy its own opinions. 1
Each party, in consequence, as might be expected, claimed
the victory. The Dominicans averred that the decision, if
announced, would have been in their favour : and this was the
general opinion. The Jesuits, on the contrary, shouted triumph,
and, patronized by the greater part of European Christendom,
contemned the empty boasts of the enemy.
France and the Netherlands became the scene of this contro-
versy, which had raged with such fearful animosity in Spain and
Italy. The belligerents, on this occasion, were the Jesuits and
Jansenists, as on the former, the Jesuits and Dominicans. The
Dominican ardor, through time and the suggestions of prudence,
had cooled, and this party, in consequence, had, in general, left
the field. But their place was well supplied by the fiery zeal
of the Jansenists, who, in the support of their system, spurned
every idea of prudence or caution. These two leading factions
soon drew into the vortex of contention, kings, parliaments,
pontiffs, prelates, doctors, nuns, universities, and councils.
The Jansenists, who now in place of the Dominicans, entered
the arena against the Jesuits, took their name from Jansenius,
a bishop in the Romish communion, and a doctor in the Univer-
sity of Louvain. His work, which he styled Augustine, and
which treated on grace, free will, and predestination, was pub-
lished at Louvain in 1640. The author, who was celebrated for
his learning and piety, undertook to deliver not his own, but
Augustine's sentiments on Divine Grace and human imbecility.
He even transcribed in many instances his patron's own words.
The faith of the Roman saint was like its author, idolized in the
Romish communion. Jansenius, therefore, wished to shield
.himself under the authority of his mighty name. But the
march of events and the sap of time had wrought their accus-
tomed changes, and manifested on this topic the mutability of
human opinions. Many who revered Augustine's name had
renounced his theology, though others still adhered to his
ancient system.
France and the Netherlands encountered each other on the
subject of Jansenism. The latter, in general embraced this
theory, which the former as generally rejected. Pope Urban, .
but in vain, condemned the work entitled Augustinus, as fraught
with several errors. Many misinterpreted his manifesto, and
still more disregarded its authority. The doctors of Louvain,
like the authors of Port-Royal, persevered in their support of
1 Paul V. n'avoit encore rien decide. Morery, 3. 568. Litem postea in sus-
penso posuit Paulus Papa V. Juenin, 5. 188. Amour, 39, 40. Calmet, 3. 499
Bausset, 2. 320
24
370 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
the condemned system. The popish population of Holland
also, through the agency and influence of Arnold, who, in 1674,
sought an asylum in that country, embraced the same sentiments.
The Dutch and Belgian professors of Romanism, clergy and
laity, continued in general, notwithstanding the sentences of
popes and inquisitions, to patronize Jansenism. 1 The two na-
tions in this manner, varied and adopted jarring systems, in the
precincts of an unerring communion.
The French were divided, though the majority of its prelacy
favoured Jesuitism. This nation, however, escaped the agita-
tion of this controversy till 1644 ; and hostilities, till 1649, were
confined to a literary war of polemical writers, which was suc-
ceeded by excommunication, interdict, incarceration, banish-
ment, and confiscation.
The Jansenists opened this wordy campaign with great spirit
and ability. An overwhelming phalanx of their authors, on
this occasion, seized the pen. Cyran, Arnold, Nicole, Quesnel,
and Pascal displayed all the powers of learning and eloquence.
All these were men of genius and erudition, and actuated with
the deepest detestation of Jesuitism. Pascal, by the poignancy
of his satire, rendered the enemy ridiculous. His Provincial
Letters written against the hostile faction, are, says Voltaire,
models of eloquence and ridicule, and combine the wit of Mo-
liere with the sublimity of Bossuet. The production, indeed,
exhibits not only the excellence of taste and style, but also all
the force of reason and raillery. 2
This party also assailed the foe with another weapon of a
more flashy, but more deceitful "kind. This consisted in ' lying
wonders,' which their authors called thunder-peals, but their
opponents fictions and fanciful convulsions, which dazzled the
spectator, embarrassed the adversary, and astonished the world.
The sick, who had been restored to health, the blind, the deaf,
the dumb, and the lame, who had been enabled to see, hear,
speak, and walk, demonstrated to the eye of superstition and
credulity, the truth of their heaven-attested system.
The Jesuits assumed similar arms, and endeavoured, as well
as they could, to ply counteracting argument and invective.
But a miserable want of literary talent, at this time, characterized
this faction. Their whole array could not supply a single man
of genius and learning, capable of meeting those who, in the
field of theological controversy, figured to such advantage in
the hostile ranks. Though remarkable, in general, for prudence
1 Orta ease inter theologos Belgii dessidia. Lalbb. 21. 1790. Les theologiens se
partagerent. Calmet, Diss. 3. 493. Morery, 5. 22. Bausset, 2. 91. Mem. 273.
3 Le8 Lettres Provinciates passent pour on modele de nettfete, d'elegance, et de
bon sens. Mem. 334. vol. 9. 94.
THE JESUITS AGAINST THE JANSENISTS. 371
and caution, the infatuated men, on this occasion, also attempted
miracles to confront those of their opponents ; but were again
beaten by the enemy in tnis kind of manufacture. Their.miraeu-
lous exhibitions only afforded a laugh to the spectator, and
exposed their authors to contempt. The prodigies of their
rivals alone were in fashion. But these bunglers, as they ap-
peared, in jugglery and legerdemain, were supported in the war
by kings, popes, anathemas, excommunication, exile, imprison-
ment, and the tangible logic of guns, bayonets, and dragoons,
when the fulminations of papal bulls followed the shock of
theological discussion and miraculous display.
This faction, however, notwithstanding their awkwardness in
writing and miracles, had, at this time, obtained the favour of
the Roman pontiff and of the French king and clergy. Their
present prosperity in the French kingdom formed a striking
contrast with their former adversity. The Parisian faculty of
theology, as well as the French church and parliament, opposed'
this society on its early introduction into France. The Faculty
in 1554, accused them of every atrocity, of strife, wrangling,
contention, envy, and rebellion, which endanger religion, trouble
the church, and tend to destruction rather than to edification,
and petitioned the parliament to expel them from the kingdom.
The parliament, accordingly, in 1594, banished the whole
company from the nation, as enemies of the king, corrupters
of youth, and disturbers of the public peace. 1
But the society afterwards returned, and were patronised by
the French king and clergy, as well as by the Roman pontiff.
The French prelacy in consequence, to the number of eighty-
eight, favouring Jesuitism and influenced by its partizans, soli-
cited his infallibility, Pope Innocent the Tenth, for his official
decision on this momentous question of Jansenism. But eleven
of the bishops, notwithstanding the unity of the Romish com-
munion, varied from their fellows ; and for several reasons which
they enumerated, such as the difficulty of the subject, the unfit-
ness of the time, and the propriety of allowing a French synod
to finish a French controversy, they deprecated papal interfe-
rence. But the pontiff complied with the majority, and, in a
definitive sentence issued in 1653, denounced Jansenism, which
had been reduced to five propositions, as fraught with rashness,
impiety, scandal, blasphemy, falsehood, and heresy. 2
1 Querelas, lites, dissidia, contentiones, Eemulationes, rebelliones, variasque scis-
suras inducere : his de causis, hanc societatem in religionis negotio periculosam
videri; ut quae pacem ecclesiae conturbet, et magis ad destructionem ,quam sedifi-
cationem pertineat. Thuanus, 2. 430.
Us fureht bannis du Roiaume, comme cprrupteurs de la jeunesse, perturbateurs
du repos public, et ennemis du roi. Daniel, 10. 64. Limiers, 7. 228;
2 Labb. 21. 1643, 1644. Mem. 318. Moreri, 5. 22 Juenin, 5. 188. Bausset,
2.331. Amour, 67. 425.
24*
372 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
An assembly of the French prelacy in 1654, convened and
influenced by Cardinal Mazarin, who was an enemy of the
Jansenists, unanimously accepted the papal decision. The
same was also sanctioned by his most Christian majesty's royal
authority. The Parisian Faculty of Theology next received
the bull; but not like the clergy, with unanimity. Sixty of its
doctors, notwithstanding popish harmony, protested and ap-
pealed from the pope to the parliament. 1
Pope Alexander the Seventh next interposed his supreme
authority. The Jansenists distinguished between right and
fact, and admitted that the five propositions were, by right,
condemned ; but, in fact, were not in the work of Jansenius.
Alexander in 1656, renewed his predecessor's constitution, and
extended it to both right and fact. He also prescribed a for-
mulary in 1665, to be signed by all the French clergy : and all
he declared, who should gainsay it, would incur the indignation
of Almighty God and the blessed Apostles Peter and Paul.
Four prelates, Arnold, Buzenval, Pavilion, and Coulet, with
many of the inferior clergy, refused to sign, notwithstanding the
pope's interdict and excommunications. The nuns of Port-
royal also followed the example of these bishops. Dreadful con-
fusion ensued. A process was commenced for the deposition of
.the refractory prelates. The nuns of Port-royal were torn from
their cloisters, and the feeble captives, armed only with inno-
cence and simplicity, and guarded by a squadron of soldiery,
were conveyed to strange convents, and their nunnery, once the
object of their fondest attachment and now their deepest regret,
was razed from the foundation.
But Clement the Ninth, in the meantime, proceeded, not-
withstanding papal unity, to overthrow the acts of his predeces-
sors, Innocent and Alexander. His supremacy, in 1668, amid
theological commotion and war, issued an edict of pacification.
He modified the formulary of Alexander, and permitted the
dissatisfied clergy to interpret his predecessor's rescript in their
own sense, and to subscribe in sincerity. These accordingly
signed for the right in sincerity, and preserved for the fact
mental reservation and a respectful silence. This modification,
which diffused joy through the nation, was called the peace of
Clement, and continued with slight interruptions for thirty-four
years. 2
Clement the Tenth, who succeeded to the popedom, seems
1 Les Docteurs de Sorbonne se trofivant partagez : soixante Docteurs protesterent
et en appellerent an Parlement. Mem. BUT. Pred. 274, 278. Volt. 9. 89. Bausset,
2.331. Labb. 21. 1643, 1644. Moreri, 5. 22. Juenin, 5. 188, 119. Lemiers,
10. 257.
2 Clement s'empressa de donner la paix a 1'eglise. Moreri, 3. 454. Bausset, 2.
337-340.
CONTROVERSY ON QUESNEt's REFLECTIONS. 373
i
to have countenanced the pacification effected by his prede-
cessor. Innocent the Eleventh, his successor, not only concurred
in the act of pacification and in the repeal of Alexander's
Constitution and Formulary, but also, notwithstanding papal
unanimity, probably adopted Jansenism and certainly pa-
tronized its partizans. His holiness, in the opinion of many,
embraced their system, though formerly denounced in pontifical
anathemas. During his whole papacy he had constant inter-
course with its patrons, whom he honoured with his favour and
commendation, and supported with his friendship and protection.
The calumny and punishments which they had endured, he
regarded as unmerited and unjust persecution. Their conduct,
he respected, as far superior to that of their opponents, whom
he hated, and who, in return detested his supremacy. This
treatment of the persecuted secured, as might be expected, the
gratitude and attachment which they always manifested to this
pontiff. Innocent, in this manner, retracted the decisions of
former pontiffs and displayed the variations of Romanism. 1
Clement the Eleventh, in defiance of unity, overturned the
pacification of Clement the Ninth and the patronage of Innocent
the Eleventh. He also confirmed and renewed the constitu-
tions of Innocent the Tenth and Alexander the Seventh
against Jansenism, and denounced a work of Quesnel's on the
New Testament. The condemnation of this book, which he had
formerly praised, manifested papal inconsistency, and rekindled
the theological war in aggravated horrors, through the French
nation.
Quesnel, a priest of the Oratory and an abettor of Janse-
nism, inwove his system with great eloquence and address in
his moral reflections on the New Testament. This theory, in
his composition, which was distinguished by its elegance and
simplicity, assumed the fairest aspect and the most pleasing
form.
This work on its publication was eulogized by Bossuet,
Vialart, Noailles, Urfe, the Parisian Faculty, the French king,
and the Roman pontiff. Bossuet, Bishop of Meaux, composed
a Vindication of Quesnel's Moral Reflections. Vialart, Bishop
of Chalons, respected for his wisdom and piety, having sub-
mitted the work to a careful examination, approved, and, in
1671, recommended it to the clergy and laity of his diocese.
1 Us ont meme accuse le Pape d'etre Janseniste, Mem. 376.
Innocent XI. haissoit lea Jesaites et temoi^noit faire grand cas des Jansenistes.
Moreri, 5. 128. On accusa ce pape de n'avoir cesse d'entretenir commerce avec
tons les Jansenistes, de lea avoir comblez de ses graces, d'avoir fait leur eloge,
d'etre declare leur protecteur. Limiers, 7. 226.
Innocent XI. auroit retracte les decrets de ses predecesseurs. Limiers, 7. 227
228.
374 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
The author, he attested, had long been a disciple in the school
of the Holy Spirit. Noailles, Archbishop of Paris, praised, its
Catholicism and tendency to instruct and edify the pastor and
the people. Urfe, bishop of Limoges, requested the author to
publish his Reflections on the Gospels and Epistles in one
volume for the use of the clergy in the country. The Parisian
Faculty vouched for its Catholicism and conformity to the
Apostolic Roman faith. Louis the French king granted a
liberty of publication and conveyed the sanction of his royal
authority. The Roman pontiff in the presence of Renaudot
extolled the work as a matchless performance, superior to any
commentary by the theologians of Italy. Its doctrine, which
he afterwards branded with the seal of reprobation, he had
formerly preached to the Roman people. 1
But these encomiasts soon changed their note, and condemned
the book which they had approved. Quesnel's work offended
the king and the Jesuits. Its morality exhibited too spotless a
standard of purity for the filthy confraternity, who, according
to the witty Boileau, lengthened the creed and shortened the
commandments, or for the French sovereign, who was actuated
by ambition and sunk in sensuality. Its rigour in the prescrip-
tion of duty presented a spectacle of horror to the voluptuary
and to the profane and careless, which these accommodating
moralists contrasted with the easy pliancy of Jesuitism. His
majesty also saw, or thought he saw in Jansenism, a tendency
to Presbyterianism instead of Popery. Its faith, besides, was
too like Calvinism for the royal and Jesuitical taste. The king
and the Jesuits, therefore, solicited and obtained its condemna-
tion. The Moral Reflections were denounced by their former
adulators, Clement, Louis, the Parisian University, and the
French clergy. 2
Clement, solicited by Lewis and the Jesuits, censured the
work, on which, a few years before, he had lavished his fulsome
flattery. His infallibility, in 1713, denounced, in his bull
Unigenitus, no less than a hundred and one propositions
extracted from Quesnel's Annotations. These, his supremacy
1 Bossuet composa la justification des Reflexions Morales. Moreri, 7. 13.
Vialart lut cet ouvrage, 1'approuva, 1'adopta, etc. Moreri, 7. 12. Noailles 1'ap-
prouva. II recommanda a son clerg6 et a son peuple la lecture de cet livre.
Moreri, 1. 13.
Noailles avoit accorde son approbation aux Reflexions sur le Nouveau Testa-
ment. Limiers, 12. 112. Bausset, 2. 109.
Urfe fit prier 1'auteur de faire imprimer ses Reflexions, etc. Moreri, 7. 13.
Nous ayons lu ces Reflexions Morales. Nous avons trouve qu'elles ne con-
tiennent rien que de conforme a la foi Catholique. App. in Quesn. 1. 8, 10.
La doctrine de ses propositions se trouve dans les homelies que le Pape a autre-
fois precheesau peuple Remain. Limiers, 12. 115. Bausset, 2. 108.
2 Bib. An. 21. 400. Bausset, 2. 75. Limiers, 10. 75. et 12. 113.
CONTROVERSY ON QUESNEL*S REFLECTIONS. 375
convicted of temerity, captiousness, scandal, impiety, falsehood,
blasphemy, sedition, schism, and heresy. The Moral Reflec-
tions, according to his holiness, contained truth blended with
error, calculated to lead men to perdition. 1
Louis, in 1714, revoked the privilege of publication, which
he had granted, and b) r which he had impressed the work with
the broad seal of his royal authority. Jansenism, his majesty
called a novelty, and the Moral Reflections a false and danger-
ous book : and he interdicted its publication and circulation
under pain of exemplary punishment. 2
The Parisian university, that had lauded the Catholicism of
Quesnel's work, accepted Clement's constitution, taxing the same
work with blasphemy and heresy. The learned doctors styled
Jansenism a heresy, and received with submission the pontiff's
condemnation of the once praised, but now vilified propositions.
Truth, by such a simple process, could be transubstantiated
into falsehood. 3
The assembly of the French prelacy, also, which met in Paris
in 1713 and 1714, accepted the papal constitution with submis-
sion and respect. The holy bishops forbade the reading of the
Moral Reflections, which they said contained blasphemy and
heresy. This sentence they published in a Pastoral Instruction,
which was circulated through their dioceses. The decision,
however, was not unanimous. Forty accepted, and eight
rejected the bull. Of those who accepted, many added such
explanations and restrictions as might protect from attaint the
faith and morality of Catholicism, the rights of the French
prelacy, and the discipline and liberty of the Gallican church.
Many also who had subscribed afterward retracted ; and some
of these at the point of death. 4
The schism on the pontifical constitution extended not only
to the Parisian council, but also to the whole French clergy.
These, on this occasion, were divided into two factions, the
ACCEPTANTS and RECUSANTS. The former, comprehending a
hundred bishops with many of the inferior clergy, were patro-
1 La doctrine de ces propositions qualifiees de fausses, captieuses, scandaleuses,
temeraires, impies, blasphemataires, se trouve pourtant dans lea homelies que le
Pape a autre fois prechees au peuple Romain. Limiers, 12. 115. Labb. 21. 1821.
3 Nous devions commencer par revoquer la privilege que nous avions aecorde,
ponr ea permettre 1' impression. Labb. 21. 1831, 1132. Limiers, 12. 180.
3 Sacra Facultas Constitutionem summa cum reverentia et obsequio recepit.
Labb. 21. 1840.
4 Elle accepts avec soumession et avec respect. Labb. 21. 1823. Quarante eve'-
ques acceptoient cette Bulle. Le Cardinal de Noailles et plusieurs autoes eveques
refuserent d'accepter la Constitution. Limiers, 12. 117, 118.
Quelques eveques et docteurs n'ont pas voulu y souscrire sans explication.
Moreri, 5. 22.
On varra dans la suite lea retractations de plusieurs de ses prelats acceptans.
Limiers, 12. 118, 271.
376 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
nized by the pope, the king, and the Jesuits. The latter,
including fifteen of the prelacy, and some of the priesthood,
were supported, in general, by the parliaments and the people ;
but underwent all kinds of persecution from the pontiff and
their sovereign. The pope and the monarch, indeed, forced it,
in a great measure, on the clergy, the Sorbonne, and the great
body of the people, who were influenced by royal threats and
promises. 1
The French varied in the explanation of the bull, as well as
in its acceptance. Of the acceptants, some received it in purity
and simplicity. Such thought it so clear as to need no illustra-
tion. Others accused it of obscurity, and accompanied its
publication with a world of explanations and restrictions. The
cardinals Bissy and Tencin loudly declared their utter inability
to understand it, and received it, strange to say, because it
was unintelligible. 2
The Recusants, differing indeed in words, agreed in sense.
Harmonious in its condemnation, this party painted its meaning
in varying colours. The canvass, under their hands, uniformly
bore the mark of reprobation, and was stamped with the broad
seal of heresy. The Constitution Unigenitus, all these avowed,
inflicted a mortal wound on faith and morality, and enveloped
in sacrilegious censure, the canons of councils, and even the
words of eternal truth. Some reckoned it pointed against
Calvinism, and some against the Angelic Doctor Thomas
Aquinas, for the purpose of overthrowing his system. Others
thought his infallibility had become a patron of Molina, and
intended to support the theory which had been condemned by
pope Clement and the Congregation of Helps. The condemned
propositions of Quesnel, on the contrary, were, this faction
averred, a faithful expression of Catholicism, couched, in general,
as even Languet admitted, in the language of Augustine,
Prosper, Fulgentius, and Leo. 3
1 Les prelate du roiaume etoient sont partagez sur sa acceptation. Limiens, 12.
269 ' .
Les menaces et les promesses ont etc emploiees. La volonte du Prince a ete
le motif. Apol. 1. 269. Le Eoi de France a pblig6 par son authorite et le clerge
de France et la Sorbonne d'admettre la Constitution. Moreri, 5. 22.
2 La Constitution est si claire qu'elle n'a pas besoin d'explication. Limiers, 12.
119. Us y donassent explications, avec diverses modifications et restrictions.
Moreri, 7. 13.
On ne peut le recevoir, comme les Cardinaux de Bissy et de Tencin, en faisant
hautement profession de ne le pas entendre. Apol. 1. 169.
3 La Constitution donne manifestement atteinte a plusieurs veritez de foi et de
morale. Limiers, 12. 120.
Les 101 propositions sont une fidelle expression de la foi Catholique. Apol.
Adv. 7.
La Bulle souffre les explanations les plus opposees. Apol. 264. Les uns 1'
entendent d'une fa$on et les autres de 1'autre. Apol. 1. 131. On y a trouve la
confirmation du systeme de Molina. Apolog. 2. 41.
CONTROVERSY ON QUESNEL 5 S REFLECTIONS. 377
The recusant clergy were as unanimous in their opposition
to its execution, as in their condemnation of its contents. The
majority of the priesthood reclaimed against it. The people,
the parliaments, and, in general, the universities, helid it in
detestation. The Cardinals Bissy and Fleury, bishops of
Meaux and Frejus, two of its defenders, were compelled to
avow that a hundred thousand voices were raised against it,
and that it could not have been treated with greater indignation
at Geneva than in France. 1
But all opposition appeared useless. The king and the pope
urged its execution by the dint of excommunication, calumny,
interdict, proscription, banishment, confiscation, and the bastile.
Red hot anathemas flashed from the Vatican. Its opponents
were stigmatized with the name of innovators, rebels, schis-
matics, and heretics. Some were imprisoned, and some banished.
Absolution was refused to the refractory, and even the sacra-
ments to the dying. The departing, when life was at the last
ebb, were frequently outraged with reproach, instead of being
solaced with consolation. This treatment sometimes hastened
their dissolution. The fury of the ruthless enemy pursued its
hapless victims beyond the precincts of death. Their remains,
deprived of ecclesiastical burial, were excluded from the sepul-
chre, or consigned, with unbaptized infants, to the unhallowed
tomb. 2
But a new revolution, on this question, was soon to be
effected in the French nation. Louis, in 1715, departed this
life, and the Duke of Orleans was appointed Regent. The
royal declaration, therefore, obliging the French prelacy to
receive the Roman bull, was suppressed. Tellier, the king's
confessor, and an active enemy of the refractory clergy, was
loaded with public odium, and banished to La Flesche, then to
Bourges, and afterward to Amiens. The exiled were recalled,
and the imprisoned liberated. Freedom was restored to the
clergy, the people, the parliaments, and the faculty of theology.
Many of the clergy recanted, and the laity who had generally
opposed the constitution, enjoyed a triumph. The parliament
exulted in the victory. The faculty of theology, serving the
time and changing with the scene, protested against the bull,
1 En France, les fideles la detestent. Le grand nombre des theologiens la com-
battent. Le commun des premiers pasteurs la rejettent. Apol. 1. 242.
Les Gardinaux de Bissy et de Fleury out ete forces d'avouer, que cent mille voix
s'etoient elevees centre ce decret, et qu'il n' eut pas ete traite plus indignement
Geueve qu'il 1'a 6te en France. Apol. 1. 240. Volt. 9. 110, 111.
2 Ceux qui refuserent de le signer furent interdits et excommuniez. Moreri,
5. 22.
Ils fulmineront contre eux les anathemes redontables. Apol. 1. 92.
On avoit m6me deja commence par des proscriptions et des exils contra les
Eecusans. Limiers, 12. 311, 312. Apolog. 1. 3.
378 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
and declared their former decision a forgery. Present declara-
tions, through the kingdom, were, on this topic, opposed to for-
mer decisions, and all things seemed to change, in a communion
which vainly boasts of immutability. 1
But the pope, in his obstinacy, published apostolic letters, in
1717, separating from his communion all who would not accept
the constitution. The Regent resolved, if possible, to restore
peace. The papal bull was modified, so as to give general
satisfaction. This modification, the parliament, in 1720,
registered with the customary reservations ; and a general
pacification ensued, which lasted, with few interruptions, till
the year 175 O. 2
New disturbances arose in France, in 1750, on the subject
of the Ball Unigenitus. This pontifical edict, though detested
by the parliaments and execrated by the people, was cherished
with fond attachment by the Archbishop of Paris and many of
the prelacy and inferior clergy. This section of the French
hierarchy resolved to force the constitution, which was the idol
of their hearts, on the people, by refusing the communion and
extreme unction to all who opposed. The clergy obtained the
support of the king, Louis the Fifteenth. Pope Benedict also,
in a circular to the French episcopacy, urged the reception of
the Roman manifesto. But the parliament and the people
resisted with great resolution. Dreadful confusion ensued.
The king tried the strength of the secular arm in alternately
banishing and recalling the parliament and some of the most
active of the prelacy. The parliament, however, was firm,
notwithstanding banishment and the bastile, The people also
resisted the clergy with unshaken determination. The parlia-
ment and popular firmness, in the end, gained a victory over
the king, the pope, and the clergy, who, after a long and
desperate struggle diversified by alternate triumph and defeat,
submitted to a virtual repeal of the obnoxious constitution.
Jansenism and Jesuitism soon lost all interest in ( the tranquillity
and transactions which followed. The Jansenists were no longer
supported by the pen of an Arnold, a Nicole, a Pascal, and a
1 Louis etant mort, la declaration fat supprimee. Moreri, 7. 13. Volt. 9
112, 113.
Les exiles ont ete rappellez. La liberte a etc rendue aux parlemens et ax
eveques. Limiers, 12. 311.
La Faculte de Theologie de Paris declara quo le decret du cinquieme Mars 1714,
etoit faux. Moreri, 7. 13. Castel, 320.
On les vit opposer a ces decrets des decrets contraires. Moreri, 7. 13. Les
choses ont entiereinent change de face. Voila tout d' un coup un grand changement.
Limiers, 12. 312. Mem. de la Regen. 1. 40.
2 Le Pape a fait publie des Lettres apostoliques, par lesquelles il separe de sa
communion tous ceux qui n'ont pas re?u, ou qui ne reevront pas a 1'ayenir, sa
constitution. Limiers, 12. 314. Volt. 9. 118.
EFFECTS OF THE JANSENIST CONTROVERSY. 379
Quesnel. These had departed, and given place to far inferior
men. Peace divested their controversial writings of all popu-
larity. Many, indeed, in the learned professions and in the
intelligent class of society, still retain the leading principles of
Jansenism. But the denomination, as a religious body, can
hardly be said to exist.
The Jesuits also, on the return of peace, sunk into disrepute.
The loss of credit at the French court, which this faction had
long enjoyed, was attended with the contempt of the prelacy,
the hostility of parliament, and the detestation of the people:
and all these were only a prelude to their final expulsion from
the French kingdom for dishonesty in trade, and for the immo-
rality of their institution. The society committed fraud in
certain commercial transactions, and the parliament, their ancient
enemy, seized the opportunity of prosecuting them for the
offence. ' D uring these transactions the company were compelled
to produce their secret institution, embodying the rules of their
order. This, it was found, contained maxims subversive of
all civil government and moral principle. The document,
contrary, at once, to the safety of the king and to the laws of
the nation, completed their ruin. Their colleges were seized,
and their effects confiscated. The king, ashamed or afraid to
patronize such a fraternity, not only withdrew his protection,
but expelled the whole order, by a solemn edict from the
kingdom.
So terminated the eventful existence of Jesuits and Jansenists
in France. The two rival factions arose nearly at the same
time, flourished for a short period, entertained diametrically
hostile principles in the bosom of the same community, warred
during their continuance, with deadly hatred, and then, as if to
display the mutations of Romanism, and indeed the vicissitudes
of all earthly things, sunk into oblivion, or were banished the
nation.
Such were the dissensions of Franciscans, Rhemists, Molin-
ists, Jesuits, and Jansenists. Theologian, in these spiritual
wars, encountered theologian, pope opposed pope, and synod
assailed synod. Bangs, pontiffs, statesmen, and parliaments
entered the field, and fought with fury in the theological cam-
paigns. The child rose against the parent, and the parent
against the child. Fellow citizens conceived against each
other dreadful suspicions and mortal hatred. The shock of
conflicting factions in the empire of the popedom convulsed
the troubled nations, which were the scene of action. One
volume of noisy controversy was heaped on another. The
system which one party styled truth and Catholicism, the other
called error and heresy. Each treated its opponent as the
380 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEEY.
abettor of schism and blasphemy, while a deluge of rancour
and bitterness, which rent asunder the ties of Christian charity,
was poured on insulted Christendom. The channels of
philanthropy were closed, arid the flood-gates of malevolence,
set wide open, discharged then: pestilential torrents on dis-
tracted man, contending, in many instances, for a shadow.
Mutual execration, a weapon unknown in every reformed
communion, diversified the popish war, and carried damnation
into the adverse ranks. Protestantism, from its rise till the
present day, affords no such example of rage and division.
Bossuet, ai|||d by learning and exaggeration, could supply no
scene of edjjil vensreance and variety in all the annals of the
Of- ^;K:;/ J
Reformation*
CHAPTER XIII.
TRANSUBSTANTIATION.
VARIETY OF OPINIONS SCRIPTURAL AND TRADITIONAL ARGUMENTS ELEMENTS
ACCOUNTED SIGNS, FIGURES, AND EMBLEMS RETAINED THEIR OWN SUBSTANCE
rNOURISHED THE HUMAN BODY SIMILAR CHANGE IN BAPTISM AND REGENERA-
TION CAUSES WHICH FACILITATED THE INTRODUCTION OF TRAN8UBSTANTIATION
HISTORY OF TRANSUBSTANTIATION PASCHASIUS BERENGARIUS DIVERSITY OF
OPINIONS DIVERSITY OF PROOFS ABSURDITY Of TRANSUBSTANTIATION CREA-
TION OF THE CREATOR ITS CANNIBALISM.
TRANSUBSTANTIATION, in the language of Romanism, consists
in the transmutation of the bread and wine in the communion,
into the body and blood, and by connexion and concomitance,
into the soul and divinity of our Lord. The whole substance
of the sacred elements is, according to this chimera, changed
into the true, real, numerical, and integral Emmanuel, God
and Man, who was born of Mary, existed in the world, suffered
on the cross, and remains immortal and glorious in heaven.
The host, therefore, under the form of bread, contains the
mediator's total and identical body, soul, and Deity. Nothing
of the substance of bread and wine remains after consecration.
All, except the accidents, is transformed into the Messiah, in
his godhead, with all its perfections, and in his manhood with
all its component parts, soul, body, blood, bones, flesh, nerves,
muscles, veins, and sinews. 1
Our Lord, according to the same absurdity, is not only whole
in the whole, but also whole in every part. The whole God
and man is comprehended in every crumb of the bread, and
in every drop of the wine. He is entire in the bread, and
entire in the wine, and in every particle of each element. He
is entire without division in countless hosts .on numberless
1 Credimus panem convert! in earn camera, quse in cruce pependit. Lanfranc.
243. Sint quatuor ilia, caro, sanguis, anima, et Divinitas Christi. Labbe, 20. 619.
Domini corpus, quod natum ex virgine in coelis sedet ad dextram Patris, hoc
sacramento contineri. Divinitatem et totam humanam naturam complectitur. Cat.
Trid. 122. 125.
Oontinetur totum corpus Christi, scilicit, ossa, nervi et alia. Aquin. iii. 2. 76,
c. 1. Comprehendens carnem, ossa, nervos, &c. Dens, 5. 276,
382 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY C
altars. He is entire in heaven, and at the same time, entire on
the earth. The whole is equal to a part, and a part equal to
the whole. The same substance may, at the same time, be in
many places, and many substances in the same place. This
sacrament, in consequence of' these manifold contradictions, is,
says Ragusa, 'a display of Almighty power;' while Faber.
calls transubstantiation 'the greatest miracle of omnipotence.' 1
The species, in this system, exist without a subject. The
substance is transformed into flesh and blood, while the acci-
dents, such as colour, taste, touch, smell, and quantity, still
remain. The taste and smell continue without any thing
tasted or smelled. Colour remains ; but nothing to which it
belongs, and, of course, is the external show of nonentity.
Quantity is only the hollow shadow .of emptiness. But these
appearances, notwithstanding their want of substance, can, it
seems, be eaten, and afford sustenance to man and nourish the
human body. 2
Such is the usual outline of transubstantiation. The absur-
dity resembles the production of some satirist, who wished to
ridicule the mystery, or some visionary, who had laboured to
bring forth nonsense. A person feels humbled in having to
oppose such inconsistency, and scarcely knows whether to
weep over the imbecility of his own species, or to vent his
bursting indignation against the impostors, who, lost to all sense
of shame, obtruded this mass of contradictions on man. His-
tory, in all its ample folios, displays, in the deceiving and the
deceived, no equal instance- of assurance and credulity.
This statement of transubstantiation is couched in general
terms, in which its patrons seem to hold the same faith. The
doctrine, expressed in this manner, obtains the assent of every
professor of Romanism. All these agree in principles, but, in
many respects, differ in details. This agreement and difference
appeared in a striking light, at the celebrated council of Trent.
1 Non solus sab toto, sed totus sub qualibet parte. Canisius, 4. 468. Bin. 9.
380. Crabb. 2. 946,
Ubi pars est corporis, est totum. Gibert, 3. 331. Christus totus et integer sub
qualibet particula divisionis perseverat. Canisius, 4. 818.
Totus et integer Ohristus sub panis specie et sub quavis ipsius specie! parte,
item sub vini specie et sub ejus partibus, existit. Labb. 20. 32.
Idem corpus sit simul in pluribus locis. Faber. 1. 128. Paolo, 1. 530. Possunt
esse duo corpora quanta et plura in eodem spatio. Faber, 1. 136. Corpus noii
expellat prseexistens corpus. Faber. i. 137.
Hoc sacramentum continet miraculum maximum, quod pertinet ad omnipoten-
tiam. Faber, 1. 126. Divina omnipotentia ostenditur. Eagus. in Canisius, 4. 818.
2 In sacramento altaris, manere accidentia sine subjecto. Faber, 1. 202.
Nntrit et saturat eodom modo quo alius panis. Faber, 1. 219. Non sunt snb-
stahtise: habent tamen virtutem substantia?. Aquinas, iii. 2. 71. A. vi.
Les accidens par 1' operation miraculense de la toute-puissance Divine produi-
eent les m6mes effets que la substance. Godeau, 5. 378.
ROMISH ACCOUNT OF TRANSUBSTANTIATION. 383
The doctors of that assembly wrangled on this topic, in tedious
and nonsensical jargon. An attempt was made, but in vain,
to satisfy all in the composition of the canons. None were
pleased. The dogma, in consequence, had, for the sake of
peace, to be propounded in few words and general expres-
sions : and this stratagem effected an ostensible unanimity. 1
The Dominicans and Franciscans differed at the council of
Trent, as they do still, on an essential point of this theory.
The former, following the common opinion, maintain the anni-
hilation of the substance of the sacramental bread and wine,
by their conversion into our Lord's body and blood. The
latter, on the contrary, verging on heresy, denied this annihila-
tion and conversion. The substance of the sacramental
elements, in this system, remains unchanged, while the
substance of our Lord's body and blood takes its place. The
one succeeds to the room of the other, and both, as neither
possesses quantity or extension, occupy the same space. 2 This
would appear to trench on heresy, and would require a skilful
metaphysician to distinguish it from Lutheran consubstantiation.
But our Lord, say the Franciscans, in passing in this manner
from heaven to earth, proceeds, not by successive movements,
but by instantaneous change. His passage occupies rio time.
He is on the altar as soon as he leaves the sky ; or rather, he,
obtains the one position, without departing from the other. 3
Both factions, at Trent, thought their statements very clear, and
each wondered at the other's nonsense and stupidity. The
Franciscan faction, if nonsense admit of degree or comparison^,
is entitled to the praise of superior absurdity. The idea of two
material substances being at the same time in the same place,
and of a human being coming from heaven to earth, without
intermediate time or motion, seems to merit the palm of
balderdash.
1 Mais elles ne purent contenter pesonne, on resolat dans la congregation gen6-
rale d'user de moins de paroles qu' serait possible dans 1' exposition de la doctrine,
et de se servir d' expressions si generales, qu'elles pusseut s'accommoder aox sen-
timens des deux parties. Paolo, 1. 531.
8 Les Franciscains disoient que la substance du pain et da vin n'est point anean-
tie, et ne fait que changer de lieu. Couray, in Paolo, 1. 531. Corpus Christ!
succedit loco substantia? panis et supplet vicem. Faber, iv. D. 10. Q. 1.
Non que la substance du corps de Jesus Christ se forme de la substance du pain,
comrne le soutenoient les Dominicains ; mais parce que la premiere succede a la
seconde. Paolo, 1. 530.
Non fit prasens Corpus Ckristi expellendo substantiam panis, neque enim sub-
stantia panis mutatur de loco ad locum. Faber, 1. 132.
Corpus Christi non fit preesens per istam conversionem substantialem. Faber,
1. 129.
3 Les Franciscains soutenoient qu'il y va, non plus par un mouvement succesif,
mais par un changement d'un instant, qui lui 'fait occuper un second lieu sans
sortir du premier. Paolo, 1. 530.
Corpus Christi fit prsesans ibi non per mbtum localem. Faber, iv. D. 10. p. 128.
Non pertransit omnia media. Canisius, 4. 485.
384 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
A third party differ from the Dominicans and Franciscans.
The substance of the bread and wine, in the theology of. this
faction, neither remains, as say the Franciscans, nor changes,
according to the Dominicans, but ceases to exist either by anni-
hilation, resolution, or corruption. The substance of the sacra-
mental elements is reduced to nothing, or by analysis or putre-
faction, returns to its former principles. This opinion, says
Faber, was held by Henry, Cajetan, and many other abettors
of Catholicism. 1
A fourth class, in this unerring and harmonious communion,
varies from all these speculations on the substance of the sacra-
mental elements. According to these theorists, the body and
blood of Jesus, and something of the bread and wine after con-
secration, remains united. Both exist together in the host.
This notion was patronized by Innocent the Third, as well as by
many other theologians, such as Paris, Rupert, Aegidius, Du-
randus, Goffrid, Mirandula, and Soto. 2
A fifth division within the precincts of Popery, entertains a
theory different from all the former. Emmanuel's existence in
the host, according to these theologians, is the action of his
body, effectively supporting the species. His presence is
nothing but the operation of his substance. He is in the
species ih a spiritual and angelic manner, but not under the
modality of quantity. 3 His real substantial presence, there-
fore, degenerates, in this scheme, into mere spiritual action or
operation.
Such are the variations of popery on our Lord's sacramental
substance in soul and body. But Romish diversity does not end
on the topic of substance, which refers to both soul and body, to
both matter and mind ; but extends to the separate consideration
of each, to the distinct state of his corporeal and mental exis-
tence in the communion. One division in the papal connexion,
allows his sacramental body all the chief properties of matter,
such as quantity, extension, visibility, motion, and locality : all
which a second section deny. A third party ascribes to his soul
in the host the principal powers and operations of mind, such as
understanding, will, sensation, passion, and action : while this
theory is rejected by a fourth faction. The chief warriors who
fought in these bloodless battles, were the schoolmen, who have
1 Snbstantia panis non manet, nee tamen convertitur, sed desinit ease vel per
annihilationem, vel per resolutionem, &c. Faber, iv. 3.
2 Panis mauet in eucharistia post consecrationem, et tamen simul cum ipso vere
est corpus Christi. Aliquod substantia? panis et vini remanere. Faber, iv. 3. p.
183.
3 Ejus prresentia nihil aliad esse videtur quam ejusdem substantia? actio vel
operatio. Faber, i. 133.
ON OUR LORD' s SACRAMENTAL SUBSTANCE . 385
displayed admirable skill and heroism in the alternate attack
and defence of subtilized folly and absurdity.
One division allows our Lord's body on the altar all the chief
properties of matter, such as quantity, extension, visibility,
motion, locality, and extension. Jesus, according to these spec-
ulations, is, in the host, formed of parts, occupies space, and has
length, breadth, and thickness. He can be touched, felt, and
broken. He can also be seen, say some, by men on earth, or
only, as others allege, by spirits in heaven. This view,. which,
though the more rational, is contrary to the common opinion,
has been maintained by Scotus, Alensis, Bonaventura, Richar-
dus, and their followers, who charge their opponents, if not with
heresy, at least with rashness and absurdity. 1
A second section in the Romish communion divests our Lord's
sacramental body of the principal properties of matter. Jesus
in the host, say these theologians, occupies no place, and pos-
sesses no locality. He fills no space. He has no parts, no
length, breadth, or thickness. He exists not in the modality of
quantity, but of substance, and, in consequence, has no exten-
sion, figure, situation, colour, or dimensions. He cannot be
seen, touched, felt, tasted, or broken. He is motionless, or, at
least, cannot be moved by created power. 2
From these premises, many curious conclusions have been
deduced. One part of the sacramental elements may enter an-
other, without any distinction, and all the parts by introsuscep-
tion, exist in the same place. Emmanuel's eyes, as he lies on
the altar, are in his hands, and his hands in his feet. His mouth
is not more distant from his feet, than from his eyes. His nose
is not separated from his chin, his neck from his belly, nor his
head from his hands. He is motionless, though the host be
moved ; and, therefore, his position can neither be changed nor
inverted. He neither stands, leans, nor rests, though he may
assume these postures in heaven. However the wafer be turned,
he cannot be placed with his head above and his feet beneath,
or on his back or his face. 3 This, in all its ridiculousness and
1 Faber, 1. 168. Paolo, 1. 530. Aquinas, 3. 361.
3 Corpus Christi non est in loco. Aquinas, 3. 350. A nullo oculo corporali
corpus Christi potest videri, prout est in hoc Sacramento. Aquin. 3. 365.
Corpus Christi, ut est hie, non potest tangi, nee approximari, nee est coloratura.
Faber, 1. 178. Du Pin, 3. 475.
Les Franciscains soutenpient que dans le sacrement la substance n'oecupe point
de lieu. Paolo, 1. 530.
3 Subintratio unius partis ad alteram absque distinctione partim. Faber, 1. 136.
Nasus non distal ab oculis et caput a ventre. Non magis distat a pede quam ab
oculis. Oculi Bint in raanibus, manus in pedibus. Faber, 1. 134, 137.
Corpus Christi non habet differentials positionis in Sacramento, ut quod caput sit
eursum et pedes deorsum. Quocunque modo vertatur hostia, non est corpus supi-
num vel resupinum. Si in coelo stat, recumbit, et sedet, non est necesse quod
recumbat, sedeat, et stet in sacramento. Faber, i. 137, 166.
25
386 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
absurdity, is the common opinion, and was adopted by the
Franciscans, as well as by Aquinas, Varro, Durandus, Alliaco,
Ocham, Soto, Paludan, Bonaventura, Gabriel, Cajetan, and,
indeed, by the generality of popish theologians.
A third party ascribes to his soul in the sacrament, all the
principal powers and operations of mind. According to these,
he possesses, like other men, life, sense, understanding, will,
sensation, and passion. He has the same intellect and sensation
on the altar as in heaven. He can, like another human being,
see, hear, feel, move, act, and suffer. Some have assigned him
in this situation, still more extraordinary endowments. These
make him sometimes sing, and warm the officiating priest's
hands, which, in return, warm him in the consecrated elements. 1
Such was the opinion of the nominalists, as well as of Ocham,
Major, Scotus, and their numerous followers.
A fourth faction, manifesting the diversity of Romanism,
rejects this theory. These strip the Son of God, as he exists
in the communion, o.f intellect, sensation, action, passion, motion,
animal life, and external senses. Like a dead body, he is, on
the altar, incapable of speaking, hearing, seeing, tasting, feeling,
and smslling. He has spiritual, without corporal life, as the
moon has the light of the sun without its heat. This idea was
entertained by Rupert in the twelfth century. Jacobel, in the
fifteenth century, embraced a similar opinion, which he sup-
ported by the authority of Augustine, Jerome, Ambrosius,
Anselm, Paschasius, and the schoolmen. This, says Mabillon,
is the common opinion held by the schoolmen, and, in general,
by the ancient and modern professors of popery. 2
Transubstantiation is a variation from Scriptural antiquity.
The absurdity has no foundation in revelation. Its advocates,
indeed, for the support of their opinion, quote our Lord's ad-
dress to the citizens of Capernaum, recorded by the sacred his-
torian John. The Son of God, on that occasion, mentioned the
eating of his flesh, and the drinking of his blood ; and some
friends of Romanism, chiefly among the moderns, have pressed
this language into the service of their absurd system.
The metaphor, used on this occasion, is indeed of that bold
.1 Operatic intellectus et voluntatis potest inesse Christo ut in eucharistia. Corpus
Christ! est capax harum sensationum et passionum. Faber, 1. 167.
Christum in Sacramento posse videre, cauere, audlre, et facere et pati omnia, quse
caeteri homines pati et agere. Ut est in Sacramento, posse propriam manum sacerdo-
tum calefacere et ab ipsa califieri. Faber, 1. 178.
2 Christum ipsum in hoc sacramento, nullam posse habere sensationem activam
neque passivam. Est impassibile natnraliter ipsum habere aliquam actionem vel
passionem. Faber, 1. 177, 178,
Non aliam vitam esse in copore Domini quam spiritualem. Mabillon, 4. 562.
Nunc plerique theologorum senticmt, Christum in eucharistia nullas exercere sen-
suum externorum functiones, sed sacrum ejus corpus, mortuum modo,in sacramento
existere. Mabillon, 5. '563. Lenfant. 2. 214.
TRANSUBSTANTIATION UNSCKIPTURAL. 387
kind which is common in the eastern style ; but which is less
frequent in western language : % and which, to Europeans, seems
carried to the extreme of propriety. Nothing, however, is more
usual in the inspired volume, than the representation of mental
attention and intellectual attainments by oral manducation and
corporeal nourishment. The actions of the mind are signified
by those of the body. The soul of the transgressor, says Solo-
mon " shall eat violence." Jeremiah ate the words of God.
Ezekiel caused his belly to eat "a roll of a book." John ate
the little book, which was sweet in his mouth, and bitter in his
belly. Jesus, to the women of Samaria, spoke of men drinking
living water, which, as a fountain, would spring up into ever-
lasting life. He also represented the reception of the Holy
Spirit to the Jews, by the act of drinking living water. These
are only a few specimens of this kind of speech, taken from
Revelation. Eating and drinking, therefore, though acts of the
body, are often used as metaphors, to signify the operations of
the mind in believing. Common sense, then, whose suggestions
are too seldom embraced, would dictate the application of this
trope for the interpretation of the Messiah's language in John's
gospel. Cajetan accordingly avows, that ' our Lord's expres-
sion there is not literal, nor is intended to signify sacramental
meat and drink.' Augustine and Pius the Second, in their
works, as well as Villetan in the council of Trent, are armed
with all its authority, represented it as a figure or metaphor.' 1
This metaphorical signification has, in general, been patron-
ised in the Romish communion by doctors, saints, popes, and
councils. Some indeed, to show the diversity of Romanism,
have adhered to the literal meaning. But these, compared with
the others, have been few and contemptible. The figurative
is the common interpretation, and has been sanctioned, not only
by saints and pontiffs, but also, as shall appear by the general
councils of Constance, Basil, and Trent, in all their infallibility.
Mauricius, supported by the authority of the Constantian assem-
bly, declared this 'the authentic exposition of holy doctors, and
approved explanations. These commonly understood it to sig
nify, not the sacramental, but the spiritual reception of out .
Lord's body and blood.' Ragusa, in the council of Basil,
declined, on account of its tediousness, to enumerate ' the seve-
ral doctors who explain it principally and directly to imply
spiritual manducation.' Villetan, at Trent, said to the assem-
!Prov. xiii. 2. Jer. xv. 16. Ezek. ii. 9. John iv. 10, 14, and vii. 3739.
Cor. x. 3, 4.
Non loquitur ibi Dominus ad literam de sacramental! cibo et potn. Cajetan, T. 3.
Tract 2. c. 1. .
Figura est. Augustin, 3. 52. Jesus Christ parloit alors figurement, Aen. Syl-
Bp. 130. Est metaphora. Villet. in Labb 20, (615.
388 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
bled Fathers, ' you will wonder, I well know, at the singular
agreement of all in this interpretation. The universal church r
you may say, has understood this passage ever since its pro-
mulgation, to mean spiritual eating and drinking by a living
faith.' 1
Mauricius, on this occasion, wrote and published by the
command and authority of the Constantino council. Ragusa
spoke under correction of the Basilian assembly, and without
any contradiction. Villetan, at Trent, spoke in a general
congregation, and with its entire approbation. The comments
of these theologians, therefore, have been sanctioned by the
three general unerring councils : and these, in all their infallibility r
together with a multitude of fathers, saints, doctors, and popes,
supply the following statements.
The passage in John's gospel cannot refer to the communion ;
for it was not yet instituted. Such is the argument of Cardinal
iCajetan and Pope Pius II. Our Lord, says the Cardinal,
' spoke of faith ; as he had not yet appointed the sacrament.
This, Jesus ordained at Jerusalem, the night in which he was
betrayed.' According to the pope, ' The words whoso eateth
and drinketh are not in the future, but in the present time :
and the expression, therefore, could not, by anticipation, refer
to futurity.' The inspired diction would, on this supposition,
relate to a nonentity. 2
The language recorded by John will not agree with sacramental
communion. The instructions of our Lord, on that occasion,
will not quadrate with the opinions entertained, on this topic,
by the advocates of transubstantiation. The Son of God sus-
pended the possession of eternal life on the eating of his flesh
and the drinking of his blood. This was the condition, without
which man could have no life. None can possess spiritual life,
unless, in this sense, they eat and drink his body and blood.
The manducation mentioned by the apostle, is necessary for
salvation. This,, if it. referred to the sacrament, would exclude
aM infants, though partakers of Christian baptism. The suppo-
1 Exponatur secundum expositiones authenticas sanctorum Doctorum et approba-
tarum glossarum. De ista manducatione aut sumptione sacramental! corporis et
sanguinis Christi, non intelligitur authoritas praedicta, ut decent sane Doctores
communiter. Labb. 16. 1141, 1144.
2 Longum esset singulos Doctores inducere, qui totum praesens capitulum de
spiritual! manducatione principaliter et ex directo exposuerunt. Labb. 17. 934.
Oanisius, 4. 538.
Miraberis, sat scio, summam omnium concordiam *ad bunc sensum. Dicere
possis prseceptum illud Joannis VI. de spiritual! manducatione et bibitione per fidem
vivam in Christum, jam inde esque ab ejus promulgatione fecisse interpretatum
ab ecclesia universa. Labb. 20. 615, 616.
Dominus loquitur de fide. Nondum instituerat sacramentum. Cajetan, T.
2. Tract. 2. c. 1.
Le sacrament n'otoit pas encore institue. Pius II. Ep. 130.
TRANSUBSTANTIATION NOT SUPPORTED BY JOHN, CH. VI. 389
sition, therefore, which would involve this exclusion, must, even
according to the Romish system, be rejected. Participation in
the communion is not, according to the Trentine council in the
twenty-first session, necessary for salvation : nor is it to be
administered to any till the developement of reason.
This agrees with the statements of Augustine, Bonaventure,
Aquinas, Ales, and Cajetan, as well as those of the general
councils of Constance, Basil, and Trent. If the communion
were necessary for salvation, all who do not partake of that
institution, say Augustine, Bonaventure, and Aquinas, ' would
be damned. Such could nave no life : and, therefore, the words
signify spiritual eating by faith and love.' Ales speaks in the
same style. The literal sense of this passage, says Cajetan,
* would . destroy the sufficiency of baptism, and such an inter-
pretation, therefore, is inconsistent with the Christian faith.' l
The comments of the Constantian, Basilian, and Trentine
fathers, expressed by Mauricius, Ragusa, and Villetan, are to
the same purpose. The passage, taken in the literal accepta-
tion, would, according to these infallible commentators, ' teach
the necessity of the communion and the insufficiency of baptism.
On this supposition, children, though baptized, would perish,
which is contrary to the truth. Our Lord, therefore, in John's
gospel, points to spiritual participation in his flesh and blood by
faith, of which all who believe partake in baptism, and without
which neither child nor adult can obtain salvation.' 2
The literal sense of this passage, limited salvation to the par-
ticipations of oral manducation, extends the blessing to all such
persons. This comment, as it would overthrow the competency
of baptism without the communion,, so it would establish the
competency of the communion without baptism, as well as
without faith and holiness. He who observes this duty, ' hath
1 Bonaventura arguit per Augustinum, sufficit ergo ad manducandum, credere.
Labb. 17. 937.
Si necesse eat accedere, parvuli onmes damnarentur. Hoc sacramentum non eat
de necessitate salutis. De hac etiam opinione fuisse videtur Sanctus Thomas. Labb.
17. 938.
Patet per B. Thomam super Joarmem, ubi dicit, referendo literam ad manduca-
tionem spiritualem. Qui autem sic non manducat, non habet vitam. Labb. 16. 1144.
Ales arguit, tune nullus salvaretur, si moreretur ante ejus susceptionem. Prsedic-
tus Doctor dicit quod intelligitur de manducatione spirituali et per fidem, sine qua
nullus adultus salvabitur, nee etiam parvulus. Labb. 17. 937.
Quia igitur idem est asserere verba ilia Ghristi, Jo. 6. intelligi de cibi et potu
sacramentali eucharistiae et negare baptismi sufficientiam ad salutem, clare patet
verba iUa nee intelligi posse de cibo et potu eucharistiae. Cajetan. T. 3. T. 12. c.
1. p. 293.
3 Baptismus est sacramentum necessitates. Parvuli non possunt sine eo consequi
salutem. Labb. 16. 1141. Eucharistia non ponitur sacramentum necessitatis.
Labb. 16. 942.
Parvuli sic non manducant, et habent tamen vitam in se. Labb. 16. 1142.
Singuh Ohristi fideles, dum in baptismate credentes in Christum ejus manduca-
mus carnem et sanguinem bibimus. Labb. 20. 616.
390 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
everlasting life.' Such , however, is contrary even to Romish
theology. The unworthy, all admit, have often intruded on
this mystery, and partaken to their own condemnation. The
metaphorical meaning, therefore, is necessary to reconcile this
part of Revelation with the avowed principles of popery.
The figurative interpretation, accordingly, has been adopted
by most Romish commentators. This is the exposition of
Augustine, Cajetan, and Innocent, as well as of the general
councils of Constance, Basil, and Trent, transmitted in the
diction of Mauritius, Ragusa, and Villetan. The Redeemer,
according to Augustine, ' refers not to the communion : for
many receive from the altar and die, and, in receiving, die.'
Our Lord, says Cajetan, ' speaks not here of the sacrament :
for he, it is said, who eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood,
dwelleth in me and I in him. But many, it is plain, receive
the communion, and do not dwell in him by faith. This is
often the case with the unworthy.' Pope Innocent's reasoning
is to the same purpose. The good as well as the bad, says
the pontiff, * partake in a sacramental manner, the good to sal-
vation, and the bad to condemnation. Our Lord therefore, in
John's gospel, refers not to oral participation, but to reception
by faith : for, in this manner, the good only eat his body.' 1
This interpretation was approved by the assembled fathers at
Constance, Basil, and Trent. The reception mentioned in the
gospel, ensures everlasting life ; and this, say the Constantians,
' is not true of sacramental manducation, which many take, not
in life, but to their own condemnation. You shall not have
life, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink his
blood with the teeth of faith. Such reception is necessary as
baptism. The Basilians', by their orator Ragusa, delivered a
similar comment. Sacramental manducation, according to this
interpretation, ' does not always give life, nay, often death.
But spiritual manducation always gives life. Jesus, therefore,
it is plain, speaks of spiritual reception, because he annexes life
to it, which does not always follow, but sometimes rather death,
from sacramental eating. Many, eating sacramentally, are
damned : and many, not eating sacramentally, such as children
and martyrs, are saved.' Similar is the gloss admitted at Trent.
John here, said Villetan to the approved synod, ' understands
1 Augustinus, Horn. 23, quam multi de altari accipiuut et moriuntur, et accipi-
endo moriuntur. Labb. 17. 929.
Dominus, Joann. 6. non loquitur de eucharistia. Constat autem multos sumere
eucharistise sacramentum, et non manere in Christo per fidem. Cajetan, Tom. H.
P. 142.
Ad idem est Innocentius in Libro de Officio, ubi ita dicit, comeditur spiritualiter,
id est, in fide. Hoc modo comedunt corpus Christi soli boni. Innocen. De Off. IV.
10. Labb. 17. 933.
TRANSUBSTANTIATION NOT SUPPORTED BY JOHN, CH. VI. 391
eating and drinking by faith. He teaches that all who believe
shall not perish, but have everlasting life.' 1
These observations, in a negative manner, shew what the
scriptural phraseology in this place does not mean. The fol-
lowing remarks will teach every unprejudiced mind what the
expression does signify. Eating and drinking here, in meta-
phorical style, are, in literal language, synonymous with be-
lieving. The manducation mentioned by the Son of God
denotes faith. He uses believing and eating as convertible
terms, and to each he annexes the blessing of "everlasting
life." The same effects proceed from the same causes : and
everlasting life is, according to this phraseology, the conse-
quence of believing or of eating his flesh and drinking his blood,
which, therefore, must signify the same. Jesus clearly uses
them as equivalent expressions. Faith, indeed, in numberless
recitations that might be transcribed from revelation, is the grace
which is always attended with salvation.
This interpretation is not solely the offspring of protestan-
tism, but of popery. It is not merely the child of Luther or
Calvin, Cranmer or Knox, but of fathers, doctors, theologians,
schoolmen, saints, cardinals, popes, general councils, and the
universal church. This was the comment of the fathers Origen,
Theophylact, and Bede. Ragusa, in the Council of Basil,
quoted Origen as authority for this explanation. According to
Theophylact, * Christians understand the expression spiritually,
and are not devourers of flesh.' Bede, following Augustine,
interprets the words to signify ' spiritual eating and drinking,
eating not with the teeth, but in the heart.' 2 Ignatius, Cyril,
Jerome, Chrysostom, Augustine, Remigius, and Bernard, who
will afterwards occur as saints, are also among the fathers who
embraced this explanation.
1 Non est verum de manducatione sacramentali, quam multi non ad vitam, sed ad
judicium sibi sumunt. Labb. 16. 1143.
Nisi dentibus fidei manducaveritis carnem Filii Hominis, et biberitis ejus sangni-
nem, non habebitia yitam iii vobis. Talis manducatio corporis et sanguinis Christ!
est ita necessaria sicut baptismus. Labb. 16, 1221, 1222.
Sacramentalis manducatio non semper dat vitam, immo saspe mortem. Spiritualis
manducatio semper dat vitam. Quod de spiritual! manducatione Christus hie loqui-
tur patet, quia ubicumque hie de manducatione loquitur, semper adjungit vitam,
quae utique ad sacramentalem semper non sequitur, immo potius mors. Multi ea-
cramentaliter non comedentes, ut pueri et martyres, salvati stint et ealvantur. Labb.
17. 930. Canisius, 4. 536.
Ex qua mirifica conspiratione contecedentium capitum quis non facile colligat.
intellectam a Divo Joanne spiritualem de fide in Christum manducationem carnis, et
bibitionem sanguinis ejus ? Inculcans quod omnis qui credit in ipsum non pereat,
sed habeat vitam Beternam. Labb. 20. 614.
2 Hoc patet per authoritatem Origenis. Labb. 16. 1144.
Oo jtvevfurtixus voovvfs$ Jfttstj ovts ffapxo^ayot afywv. Theophylact, 1, 655.
in Joann. VI. .
Spiritualiter manducetur, spiritualiter bibatur. Beda, 6. 363. Qui manducat
in corde, non qui premit dente. Beda, in 1 Corin. X.
892 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
. Origen, Theophylact, and Bede, have on this topic, been
followed by a long train of doctors or theologians, such as
Mauricius, Ragusa, Villetan, Guerrero, William, Gerson, Jan-
senius, Biel, Walden, Tilmann, Stephen, Lindan, and many
other theologians, as well as by the schoolmen Lombard, Albert,
Aquinas, Ales, and Bonaventure. The same comment was
embraced by the Saints Ignatius, Cyril, Chrysostom, Jerome,
Augustine, Remigius, Bernard, Bonaventure, and Aquinas. 1
Augustine, in particular, was, as has been shewn by Ragusa
in the Council of Basil, the distinguished patron of this opinion.
Our Lord, says this saint, ' seems to command an atrocity. It
is, therefore, a figure which is to be understood in a spiritual
sense. He is spritually eaten and drunk. Eat, not with your
teeth, but with your heart. Believe, and you have eaten : for
to believe and to eat are the same.' This in numberless places,
is, adds Ragusa, ' the explanation of Augustine, who, in
language clearer than the sun or noon-day, explains the passage
in John's Gospel to denote spiritual reception by faith.' 2
This acceptation of the passage was also adopted by the Car-
dinals Bonaventure, Alliaco, Cusan, and Cajetan. Bonaven-
ture has already been quoted as a saint, and with him agrees
Alliaco. The language, says Cusan, ' is to be understood, not
of visible or sacramental, but of spiritual manducation by faith.'
Cajetan, on this part of holy writ, is, if possible, clearer and
stronger than Cusan. The Lord, says he, ' speaks of faith.
iLabb. 16. 942, 1141, 1142, et 17. 926, 928. et 20. 615, 616. Canisius, 4. 533.
Paolo, 2. 227. Albertin. 1. 30.
De ista manducatione spiritual! intelligitur illud Augustini, quod allegat Magister
sentential-urn. Labb. 16. 1142.
Patet per Albertum super Joannem, ubi dicit referendo literam ad manduca-
tionem spiritualem. Labb. 16. 1144.
Ad hoc sunt in terminis propriis Alexander de Ales et Bonaventura. Labb. 17.
937.
JLv rtt'G'fst, ' fgfiv erapf -tov K.vpt,ov. Ignatius ad Trail. Cotel. 2. 23.
(MI aacxoo'fe$ rtvsvp.a'ti'Xtos for Xsyo/tsi/caj; oxavSahsaOsvOs ?, vo[u%ovi!$ oil
avfov $ rtpoTtpsTCsTtad- Cyril, 293.
v jtoa-tWj "tt^v j tawtov* Chrysostom, 8. 277. Horn. 47.
Hieronymus diserte dixit, quod est autem manducationem carnis et bibitionem
sanguinis Christi Joannis VI. de fide intelligi debere. Labb. 20. 615.
HiBC estprofecto vera intentio Augustini et Remigii. Labb. 17. 943. /
Bernardus dicit, quod est autem manducare ejus carnem et bibere ejus sangui-
nem, nisi communicare passionibus ejus. Labb. 17. 951.
Illud patet expresse per B. Thomam et per Bonaventuram. Labb. 16. 1144.
3 Flagitium videtur jubere. Figura est ergo. Augustin, 3. 52. De Doct. III.
16. Augustinus et glossa exponunt textum istum Domini de spiritual! manduca-
tione. Labb. 16. 1245.
Idem est manducare et bibere quod credere. Canisius, 4. 535. Qui manducat
corde, non qui premit dente. Labb. 17. 932.
Crede et manducasti. Canisius, 4. 928. Innumerabilia. sunt loca Augustini in
quibus dictam auctoritatem Joannis 6. de spiritual! manducatione exponit. Labb.
17. 232.
Augustinus sole clarius et luce meridiana in multis locis declaravit, evangelium,
Joanuis debere intelligi de spiritual! manducatione. Labb. 17. 944.
TRANSUBSTANTIATION NOT SUPPORTED BY JOHN, CH. VI. 393
The sacrament was not then appointed. The words are plain
and cannot, according to the letter, be understood of Eucha-
ristical meat and drink.' 1
The same is the explanation of Pope Innocent III. and Pius
II. The Son of God, says Innocent on the Mass, ' speaks of
spiritual participation in faith. He is eaten, when we are in-
corporated with him by faith. Pius the Second concurs with
Innocent, and, if possible, in still more explicit terms. Jesus,
says his infallibility, * treats there, not of sacramental, but of
spiritual drinking. Faith is the only means of such participa-
tion : for the communion was not then instituted.' 2
The General Councils of Constance, Basil, and Trent, sanc-
tioned this same comment. This is the explanation of Mauri-
cius, in his Treatise written by the command of the Constan-
tian council, and reported at Constance in the Council. The
words, according to this work, authorized by the unerring
assembly, * cannot signify sacramental participation, but spiritual
reception by faith. 3
The same interpretation was authorized by the General*
Council of Basil. This assembly appointed Ragusa as the
champion of Catholicism against Rokzana, the patron of the
Bohemian heresy. The hero of the faith proceeded in a long
and learned speech to examine this part of John's Gospel, arid
he shewed, beyond all question, that ' Our Lord never here, in
any way, mentions sacramental manducation, but spiritual eating
and drinking by faith.' He proved to a demonstration, that
Jesus meant, ' not the communion, but believing. To eat and
drink is to believe, and to believe is to eat and drink.' 4 The
sacred synod received his advocacy, not only without opposition
1 Bonaventura arguit per Augustinum, sufficit ergo ad manducandum, .credere.
Labb. 17. 237.
Non intelligendnm de visibili seu sacramental! manducatione, sed de spiritual!.
Bp. 7. p. 857.
Dominus loquitur de fide. Nondum instituerat sacramentum eucharistias. Ca-
jetan, T. 2. T. 2. c. 1. Clare patet verba ilia nee intelligi posse de cibo et potu
eucharistiae. Non loquitur ibi Dominus ad literam de sacramentali cibo et pbtu.
Cajetan, Tom. 3."T. 2. c. 1. De fide in ipsum, non de sacramentali manducatione,
sermo sit. Cajet. in Aquin. 3. 394.
2 Ad idem eat Innocentius in Libro de officio, ubi ita dicit, comeditur. spiritua-
liter, id est, in fide. De spirituali comestione, Dominus ait, nisi manducaveritis.
Comedit ipsum, quand incorporatur Christo per fidem. Labb. 17. 933.
II ne s'agit pas la de boire sacramentalement, mais de boire spirituellement.
Cenx croyoient en lui, ceux la mangoient sa chair et buvoient son sang. On ne
pouvoient manger etc. Aen. Syl. Ep. 130. Lenfan. 2. 211, 242*
3 Christi verba non sunt intelligenda de manducatione sacramentali. Oportet
ista intelligi de manducatione spirituali. De ista manducatione spirituali seu
sumptione intelligitur praedictum Obristi verbum. Labb. 16. 1142-1144.
4 Christus in nulla parte praesentis capitis, nee per se nee per accidens, facial
quoquomodo mentionem de sacramentali manducatione. Manducaverunt carnem
quando crediderunt. .... Biberunt ejus sanguinem, quando modo simili
ee crediderunt. Labb. 17. 931, 932. Canisius, 4. 536. Manducare et bibeire idem
eit quod credere. Labb. 17. 926.
394 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
but with approbation. The conclusion, therefore, is, according
to the popish system, marked with the seal of infallibility.
The council of Trent followed those of Constance and Basil.
Villetan was the champion of popery at this time, as Mauricius
and Kagusa on the two former occasions. According to his
advocacy in a general congregation, * the fruits of eating our
Lord's flesh and drinking his blood are everlasting life and
dwelling in him ; and both referred to a living faith. All who
believe do not perish, but have eternal life.' 'Thee, Lord,'
said the orator, ' thee, we eat and drink when we believe in
thee.' This exposition Villetan affirmed, without any contra-
diction before the unerring assembly, ' has always, ever since
its promulgation, been the interpretation of the Universal
Church.' This, therefore is not the gloss of heretical protes-
tantism, but of Catholicism and the church. 1 Yet every modern
scribbler in favour of transubstantiation, such as Milner,
Challenor, Maguire, and Kinsella, cite the passage without
hesitation as an irrefragable proof of their system.
The advocates of transubstantiation deduce a second scrip-
tural argument from the words of Institution. Jesus, when he
appointed the sacrament, said, " This is my body ; this is my
blood." The bread and wine, therefore, say these theologians
who interpret the expression to suit their system, were trans-
formed into his body and blood. The argument is pitiful
beyond expression ; and properly deserves nothing but con-
tempt. Its whole force depends on the meaning of the term,
which its patrons have taken in a sense of their own, for the
purpose of imposing a doctrine of their own on the Word of
God. But the term, in its usual acceptation, signifies to repre-
sent. The words of institution, according to their common
scriptural signification, might be translated, " This represents
my body ; this represents my blood." All then would be
rational and consonant with the original ; while the monster
transubstantiation, in Cardinal Perron's language, would, even
in appearance, be excluded.
Mathematicians sometimes demonstrate the truth of a propo-
sition, by shewing the absurdity of a contrary supposition.
Many demonstrations of this kind are to be found in Euclid and
other geometricians. The absurdity of the meaning which the
partizans of transubstantiation attach to the word, used by our
Lord at the celebration of the sacrament, may be exposed in the
same way. Admit the accuracy of the papal exposition, and
1 Duos imprimis dicatur inde percipere fructus, ut scilicet habeat vitam aeternam
et ut maneat in Christo, utrumque fidei vivse referri. Omnis qui credit in ipsam
non pereat, sed habeat vitam seternam. Labb. 20. 616.
De spiritual! manducatione et bibitione per fidem vivam, jam inde usque ab ejus
promulgatione fuisse interpretatum ab ecclesia universa. Labb. 20. 616.
TRANSTJBSTANTIATION NOT PROVED BY MATT. XXVI. 26, 28. 395
any expositor, by a simple process, could transform the God of
heaven into a sun, a shield, a rock, a fortress, a buckler, or any
thing. The Jewish monarch, indeed, under the afflatus of in-
spiration, has designated the. Almighty by all these appellations.
The Messiah, by a similar interpretation, might be transubstan-
tiated into a door, a vine, a rock, a way, a foundation, a lamb,
a lion, a rose, a lily, a star, a sun, or any object, according to
whim or fancy. 1 Jesus, in the scriptural vocabulary, is called
by all these names and many more, whose enumeration would
be tedious and is unnecessary. Such consequences, in loudest
acclamation, proclaim the condemnation of the system.
The simplicity of the process, by which all these metamor-
phoses may be effected, is admirable. Allow any popish doctor
a convenient interpretation of a monosyllable composed of two
letters, and he will, with the utmost dispatch, transubstantiate
a wafer into the Almighty ; and, with equal ease, could, by the
same simple means, transform the Messiah into nearly any ob-
ject of the mineral, vegetable, or animal kingdom. He performs
his feats with talismanic facility. All difficulty vanishes before
his magic touch. He works with as much rapidity as Mer-
cury, in Lucian, piled Pelion on Ossa and Parnassus on Peliqn.
His definition enables the sacerdotal conjurer to surpass all the
wonders of jugglery, legerdemain, enchantments, spells, and
necromancy. He can encase Emmanuel, body, blood, bones,
nerves, muscles, and sinews together with his soul and divinity,
in a neat little piece of pastry, which he can transfer with
becoming grace, into the mouth, down the throat, and into
the stomacji : and send home the devout communicant with his
God in his belly. This conveyance it seems, was sometimes,
as might be expected, attended with, astonishing effects. ' Being
permitted,' says Aquinas, ' to fasten their teeth in the Lord's
flesh, such rise from his table, like lions, breathing fire frightful
to the devil.' 2
The same scriptural evidence might be produced for the
transubstantiation of the Water, obtained by Adino, Eleazar,
and Shammah from the fountain of Bethelehem, as for the wine
in the sacramental cup. David longed to drink from this spring,
and three Jewish heroes cut their dangerous way through the
squadrons of the enemy, and brought the king, the object of his
wish. This, however, when offered, he would not drink. He
called it ' the blood of the men that went in jeopardy of their
lives,' and poured it out as an oblation to God. 3 The argument,
1 Psalm xviii. 2. and Ixxxiv. 11. John x. 7. John xv. 1. Corin. x. 4. John i.
29. Eev. v. 5. Malach. iv. 2.
2 Ut leones flammam spirantes, sic ab ilia mensa dicedimus terribiles effecti dia-
bolo. Aquinas, III. 79.' vi. P. 383. 3 2 Sain, xxiii. 17. Chron. xi.-19.
396 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY I
in the one instance, is as strong for the change of the water into
blood, as in the other for the transmutation of the wine.
The popish meaning of the term would transubstantiate the
whole church into the Lord's body. 1 Paul, addressing the Corin-
thians, Ephesians, and Colossians, says, " the church is the
Lord's body." Take the term in the Romish acceptation, and
all Christians are transformed into the real and substantial
body of Jesus, comprehending of course his blood. The argu-
ment, deduced from the Scriptural expression, is as strong for
the transubstantiation of the church as for that of the Sacrament.
Grant the one, and, in consequence, the other follows.
The friends of transubstantiation, in the words of institution,
declare for the literal acceptation and deprecate all figurative
interpretation. Challenor would take the expression in ' its
obvious and natural meaning.' This statement supposes two
things. One is, that Jesus used no metaphorical language at
the appointment of the sacrament ; and the other, that the popish
gloss is the natural or usual sense of the term. But these are
both misrepresentations. The Institutor said, " this cup is the
New Testament in my blood." Salmeron acknowledges what
indeed cannot be denied, that this expression contains two
metaphors. The cup, by a metonymy, is put for its wine, and
the New Testament for its sign or symbol. Admit the papal
or literal sense, and the cup, not the wine, would be transub-
stantiated, not into the blood of the Mediator, but into the New
Testament.
Neither is the Romish interpretation the usual meaning of the
term. Its common acceptation, in Scriptural phraseology, cor-
responds, on the contrary, with the protestant exposition. The
opponents of transubstantiation use the word in ' its obvious and
natural meaning,' in the Sacred Volume. This was its general
signification among the Jews, as might be shown from the Old
Testament ; and the same might be evinced by many citations
from the Christian Revelation. 2
This interpretation may be corroborated by many quotations
from the Fathers. The ancients patronized this exposition.
All these characterized the sacramental bread and wine as
signs, figures, symbols, emblems, or images of the Institutor's
body and blood. This, in effect, was considering them as
signifying or representing our Lord. Saying that the bread and
wine were the signs of his body and blood was, in other words,
saying that these sacramental elements signified or represented
the Divine author of the Institution.
i 1 Corin. xii. 27. Eph. i. 22, 23. Eph. iv. 12. Cobs. i. 24.
*Gen. xl. 12, ISetxli. 26, 27. Matt. xiii. 19. 37, 38, 39, 40. Corin. x. 4.
ELEMENTS ACCOUNTED SIGNS, FIGURES, AND EMBLEMS. 397
A few instances out of many, in which the sacramental ele-
ments are represented as signs, symbols, figures, and emblems,
may be selected from Tertullian, Ambrosius, Augustine
Ephrem, Procopius, and Bede. 1 Jesus, according to Tertullian
said at the first celebration of this mystery, " This is my body,
that is, the figure of my body." Ambrosius, Augustine,
Ephrem, and Bede, characterized the sacramental elements as
figures ; while Augustine and Procopius represent the bread
as "the sign or emblem of his body."
Transubstantiation, therefore, is not to be found in the
inspired canon. This, many of its partizans, such as Erasmus,
Scotus, Bellarmine, Alliaco, Cajetan, Fisher, Biel, Tanner, and
Canus, have conceded. These indeed believe the absurdity.
Their faith, however, or rather credulity, was, according to
their own confession, founded, not on the evidence of Revela-
tion, but on the testimony of tradition and the authority of the
church. Erasmus ' found no certain scriptural declaration of
this dogma.' Scotus admits ' the want , of express scriptural
evidence in favour of transubstantiation,' and Bellarmine grants
' the probability of the statement.' ' The opinion,' says Cardi-
nal Alliaco, which maintains that the bread and wine preserve
their own substance, ' is not unscriptural ; and is more rational
and easy of belief than the contrary.' Cajetan's admission,
that ' transubstantiation is not expressly taught in the gospel,'
was so pointed that Pius the Fifth ordered it to be expunged
from the Roman edition of the Cardinal's works. 'The true
presence in the mass,' says Fisher, * cannot be proved from the
words of institution.' This theory, according to Biel, Tanner,
and Canus, 'is not revealed in the sacred canon.' 2 Similar
concessions have been made by Occam, Alphonsus, Cantaren,
Durand, and Vasquesius.
Transubstantiation is a variation from ecclesiastical as well as
Scriptural antiquity. The church, in its days of early purity,
1 Corpus suum ilium fecit dicendo 'hoc est corpus meum,' id est figura corporis
mei. Tertul. Contra Marcian. IV. 40. p. 458. Est figura corporis et sanguinis
Domini. Ambros. IV. 5 Dominus non dubitavit dicere ' hoc est corpus meum,'
cum daret signum corporis sui. Aug. 8. 154. Contra Adiman. c. 12. Fregit in
figuram immaculati corporis, Ephrem, De Natur. 681. ILapaSaxe tixova, lav
tSi&v tfayiatfoj naJdqtoU'S' Procop. in Gen. 49. Suae carnis sanguinisque sacramen-
tum in panis et vini figura substituens. Beda, 5. 424. in Luc. 22.
2 Nullum reperio locum in Scripturis Divinis unde certo' constet Apostolos con-
secrasse panem et vimtm in carnem et sanguinem Domini. Erasmus, 3. 1193.
Scotus dicit non extare locum ullum scriptures tarn expressum at sine declarations
ecclesiae evidenter cogat transubstantionem admittere, et id non est omnino impro-
babile. Bellarm. III. 33. NecrepugnatrationinecauthoritatiBibliEe. Alliaco, XI.
6. 1. Evangelium non explicayit expresse. Cajetan, III. 75. 1. in Aquin. 3. 348.
Nee ullum hie verbum positum est quo probetur, in nbstra missa veram fieri carnis
et sanguinis Christi praesentiam. Fisher, c. 10. Non invenitur expressum in
canone Bibliae. Biel. Lect. 40. Quse in Scripura sola non continentur, Tanner,
Comp. c. 6. Non sit proditum in sacris. Canus, III. 3.
398 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
disowned the ugly monster. The Fathers as well as the Apostles
disclaimed the absurdity, which insults reason, outrages Revela-
tion, and degrades man. This appears from several considera-
tions. Ecclesiastical antiquity represents the bread and the wine
as retaining their own nature or substance ; and as conveying
nourishment to the human body ; and ascribes a transmutation,
similar to that effected in these elements, to the water of bap-
tism ; and to man in regeneration.
The monuments of ecclesiastical antiquity represent the sacra-
mental elements as retaining their own nature or substance,
without any change or transubstantiation. Such is the state-
ment of Gelasius, Chrysostom, Theodoret, and Facundus. 1
* The elements in the sacrament,' says Pope Gelasius, who
flourished in the fifth century, * are divine, yet cease not to t>e
the substance or nature of bread : and are certainly the image
and similitude of the Lord's body.' Chrysostom, the saint and
the patriarch, declares that ' the bread after consecration, is
worthy of being called the Lord's body ; though the nature of
the bread remains in it.' Theodoret, in his First and Second
Dialogue, is, if possible, still plainer. * The Lord,' says this
Bishop, ' hath honoured the visible signs with the appellation
of his body and blood ; not having changed their nature, but
having added grace to nature. The mystic symbols, after
consecration, do not change their proper nature ; but remain in
their former substance, form, and species.' According to
Facundus an African bishop, ' the sacrament of his body and
blood, in the consecrated bread and cup, is denominated his
body and blood; not that the bread is properly his body and
the cup his blood ; but because they contain in them the mys-
tery of his body and blood.'
The authors of these quotations were men, who, in their day,
stood high in erudition and Catholicism. Their theological
learning must have secured them from mistaking the opinions
of the age on the subject of the sacrament. Their works were
widely circulated through Christendom, and their arguments
were never contradicted or even suspected. These citations,
therefore, must decide the question in the judgment of every
unprejudiced mind.
These statements from Gelasius, Chrysostom, Theodoret, and
1 Base non desinit substantia vel natura panis et vini. Gelasius. adv. Euty. 689.
Dignus habitus est Domini Corporis appellatione, etiamsi natara panis in ipso
permansit. Chrysostom, ad Caesarium, 3. 744.
Ovtof "fa opajucva <Jt>/*j3<&a *tt] -tov cfw/ia-foj xat ac/Mti'o; rtpotf^yopta 'fs'ftfjufjxsv,
ov fqv ipvaw /wtfajSokttv o&Aa -trjv %a$w iftj $vtf jtfoe-tsdetxuf. Theod. Dial. 1.
OvSs yap pstn "tov aytarf/*ov I'a ju/uttftxa aujuj3o%a T^J OIXSIOA ^ta^a-fcu, tyvaeuf ;
fitvst yap *wj rfpotfEpaj ovtsias, xat, fov rf^fWWos, xcu -fov itSovf. Theod. 4. 18. 85.
Non quod proprie corpus ejus sit panis et poculum sanguis, sed quod in se
mysterium corporis ejus et sanguinis contineant. Facund. is.. 5.
TRANSUBSTANTIATION NOT TAUGHT BY THE FATHERS. 399
Facundus have sadly puzzled and perplexed the partizans of]
transubstantiation. The testimony of Gelasius silenced Cardinal
Cantaren in a disputation at Ratisbon. Cardinal Alan admits
Gelasius's and Theodoret's rejection of a substantial change in
the sacramental elements ; but maintains that these two alone
in their age embraced this heresy. Du Pin, having quoted
Facundus, refers the reader to others for a resolution of the
difficulty. Harduin, Alexander, and Arnold, however, have
attempted the arduous task. 1 The nature or substance,
according to these authors, signifies, in this case the species or
accidents, which remain unchanged in the sacramental elements.
But Theodoret, in the above quotation, distinguishing the
substance from the accidents, represents the sacramental
elements, as retaining their former substance and species. The
substance is here discriminated from the species or accidents ;
and all these, which he enumerates, remain in the mass without
any transmutation.
The answer of these authors shews their skill at transforma-
tions. The substance of the sacramental bread, in their hands,
becomes, at pleasure, either accidents or the body of our Lord.
These theologians could not only, as priests, transubstantiate the
substance of the elements into flesh and blood, but also, as
authors, when it served their purpose, into accidents or species.
A few words from their mouths could convert the substance of
Avine into blood, and a few strokes from their pens could meta-
morphose the same into accidents. These jugglers should have
displayed their extraordinary powers, in transforming accidents
into substance as well as substance into accidents ; and they
would then have exhibited the perfection of their art.
The ancients represent the bread and wine as conveying
nourishment to the human body. Such are the statements of
Justin, Irenseus, and Tertullian. 2 * The sacramental bread and
wine,' says Justin, c nourish our flesh and blood by digestion.'
According to Irenaeus, ' the consecrated elements increase our
body.' Tertullian represents ' our flesh as feeding on his body
and blood.' Ludovicus lived entirely on the host for forty days ;
and Catharina subsisted on the same from Ash- Wednesday till
Ascension. The consecrated elements therefore are food for the
body as well as for the soul ; and in consequence preserve their
own substance. None surely will maintain the impiety, if not
1 Chrysostom, 3. 740. Alex. 19. 509.
1 E| ^5 o*/Mt xai aapxts xafa. /wzta^ojtojv tf pj^wfcw j^acoy. Justin, Apol. 96. A$*
ov fa fifiefsfa, a/ut crcojKai'a. Iren. V. 2.
Oaro corpore et sanguine Christi vescitur. Tertullian, de Besur. c. 8. p. 330.
Catharina inventa est aliquando a die cinerum usque ad ascensionem Domini jeju-
uium perduxisse, sola Eucharistije communione conteuta. Brey. Rom. 763.
400 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
blasphemy, that the flesh of man is, by digestion and nutrition,
formed of the flesh of Emmanuel.
Innocent the third resolved this difficulty by granting that
something of the bread and wine remain in the sacrament, to
allay hunger and thirst. 1 His infallibility, for once, was right,
for which he was afterward anathematized by the holy council
of Trent. This infallible assembly, in its thirteenth session,
heartily cursed all who should say that the bread and wine
remain with the Lord's body and blood, or should deny the
transformation of the whole bread and wine. This denunciation
was a retrospective dash at the vicar-general of God. Whether
the imprecation sent his holiness to purgatory or to a worse
place, the friends of transubstantiation and the papacy may
determine.
Aquinas, Godeau, Du Pin, and Ghallenor endeavour to evade
the difficulty by an extraordinary distinction and supposition. 2
These distinguish the substance from the species; and with
the former, which is not subject to corruption, would feed the
soul ; and with the latter, which some might perhaps think light
provision, would sustain the body. The accidents, Aquinas and
Godeau make no doubt, may, by an operation of the Almighty,
produce the same effects as the substance and nourish the human
frame. The angelic doctor confers on the host, ' the efficacy of
substance without the reality.' Du Pin and Challenor entertain
a similar idea. The learned divines, it seems, have discovered
a method of fattening men on accidents, such as form, quality,
taste, smell, colour, signs, and appearances. Signs without sig-
nification, shadow without substance, shew without any thing
shewn, colour without any thing coloured, smell without any
thing smelled, present, it appears, an exquisite luxury, and form,
according to these theological cooks, an excellent sustenance
ibr the human constitution.
Challenor, however, doubtful of this theory, and suspicious of
this unsubstantial food, has, by a happy invention, provided a
kind of supernatural meat, if his immaterial diet should happen
to be condemned for inefficiency. Some miraculous nourish-
ment of a solid kind, he thinks, may be substituted by Omnipo-
tence, when, by deglutition and digestion, ' the sacramental spe-
cies are changed,' and the sacramental substance is removed.
Aquinas, Godeau, Du Pin, and Challenor, in this manner, rather
1 Innocent. III. avouoit lui meme, qu'il restoit dans 1'eucharistie tine certaine
paneite et vineite, qui appaisent la faim et la soif. Innocent, in Bruy. 3. 148.
Labb. 29. 84.
2 Non eint substantia, habent tamen virtutem substantise. Aquin. III. Q. 77.
Art. VI.
Lea accidens par 1'operatiou miraculeuse de la toute-puissance Divine produisent
lea memes effets. que la substance. Godeau, 5. 378. DuPin, 2. 84. Challenor, 48.
TRANST7BSTANTIATION NOT TAUGHT BY THE FATHERS. 401
than renounce a nonsensical system, condescend to talk balder-
dash. The credulity and blind zeal of Aquinas, Godeau, and
Challenor indeed prepared these superstitionists for the recep-
tion of any absurdity ; and the greater the absurdity the more
acceptable to their taste, and the better calculated for the meri-
dian of their intellect. But more sense might have been ex-
pected from Du Pin, who, on other occasions, shews judgment
and discrimination.
Many of the fathers, indeed, have been quoted in favour of
transubstantiation. Some of these express themselves in strong
language. A person unacquainted with the hyperbolical diction
of ecclesiastical antiquity, and the forms of speech used in these
days, might be led to suppose that some of the fathers held a
doctrine similar to modern transubstantiation. An opinion of
this kind, however, must arise from indiscrimination in the
reader, and from the exaggeration of the author. The ancients,
through want of precision, often confounded the, sign with the
signification. This confusion led them to exaggeration, and to
ascribe to the sign what was true only of the signification ; and
this communion and exaggeration of antiquity have been augmen-
ted by the misrepresentations of the moderns, in their garbled
and unfair citations.
Ignatius and Cyril supply a specimen of such confusion and
misstatement. Ignatius, who so nobly faced the horrors of
martyrdom, has been characterized as the friend of transubr
stantiation. The martyr desired ' the bread of God, which is
the flesh of Jesus, and the drink, which is his blood : ' and he
mentioned some persons, who, in his day, denied the sacrament
to be the flesh of the Saviour.
The apparent force of this quotation arises from its want of
precision, and its separation from a parallel part of the author's
work. Ignatius elsewhere calls ' the gospel, and the faith that
comes by the gospel, the flesh of Jesus, and love, his blood." 1
A comparison of these two citations removes every difficulty.
Cyril affords another specimen. According to this saint, * the
Lord's body is given under the emblem of bread and his blood
under the emblem of wine. Consider them, therefore, not as
mere bread and wine ; for they are the body and blood of
Emmanuel.'
But the same author ascribes a similar change to the oil, used
at that, time in baptism. He represents * the oil of baptism
after consecration, not as mere oil, but as the grace of Jesus,
-tu> jwxysAtaw, w$ aapxt I^tfow. Avax'iieasds tuwtovs V rfcrftfM, o
-tov Kvptov, svwyajfc? 6 sattv (Wjtto Irgov. Ignat. ad Trail, -et ad Phil.
Cotel. 2, 23, 31.
26
402 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
as the bread is not mere bread, but the body of our Lord." 1
The argument, from these two words, is as conclusive for the
transubstantiation of the baptismal oil as for the eucharistical
bread.
Cyril also represents the manducation of the Son of Man,
mentioned by John, in a spiritual sense which does not imply
the eating of human flesh. This communion, he adds, ' consists
in receiving the emblems of our Lord's body.'
Antiquity furnishes no stronger proofs of transubstantiation,
than those of Ignatius and Cyril. But these two saints, when
allowed to interpret themselves, disclaim the absurdity. The
monster had not appeared in their day. All the monuments of
Christian antiquity, in like manner, when rightly understood,
concur in the rejection of this modern innovation.
The fathers ascribe the same change, the same presence of
Jesus, and the same effect on man, to the water of baptism, as
to the bread and wine of the Lord's supper. His substantial
presence in baptism, and the consequent participation of his
blood by the baptized is declared by Chrysostom, Cyril, Jerome,
Augustine, Fulgentius, Prosper, and Bede. 2
Chrysostom represents the baptized as ' clothed in purple gar-
ments dyed in the Lord's blood.' Cyril, patriarch of Alexandria,
describes men as ' made partakers of the Saviour's holy flesh
by holy baptism.' Jerome represents Jesus as saying to all
Christians, ' ye are baptized in my blood.' The eunuch, says
the same saint, ' was baptized in the blood of the Lamb;' Au-
gustine, on this subject, is very express. He depicts ' the faith-
ful, as participating in our Lord's flesh and blood in baptism.'
This is cited by Fulgentius, and, therefore, sanctioned by his
authority. The redeemed, says Prosper, * are in baptism, tinged
with the blood of Jesus.' Augustine, Prosper, and Bede pour-
1 O optfos tfjjj sv^aptffT'caf, fie-t a -ftjv tttixbtjaiv <tw ayn> IIvEU/tat'os, ovx
aptfoj, a/V/uz. crtojua Xpicri'Dv, outfwj XOA -to aytoy <tawto [ivpov ovx fft tyto
trtixtejaw, aWia Xptotfotj zapttfjita. Cyril, 290, 292, 293, 300.
2 T^v jtop^vpav 7tptj3aM,J7<T0e 'tat tufMt-fi j3a$t(Jav Ssarto-tixu- Chrysos. 2. 226.
ad illumin. Cetech. I.
Fsyovs ju.stfoa t^j aytaj avfov tfopxoj Sta -tora ayiov tyhwo'ti /3artT > tytat'os.
Cyril, 4. 602 in John 26.
Baptizemini in saguine meo. Jerome, 3. 16. in Isa. i. Baptizatns in sanguine
agni. Jerom, 3. 385. in Isa. liii.
Unumquemque fidelium corporis sanguinisque dominici participem fieri, quando
in Baptiamate membrum Christi eficitur. Fulgentius, de Bap. Unde rubet bap-
tismus, nisi sanguine Christi conseeratus. Augustin, Tract. 1 1. Beda. 6. 356. in
1 Corin. x. August, ad Bonif. c. 130. Labb. 17. 944. Aquinas, 3. 341. Paulinus,
892. August. 10. 473.
Baptismo Christi in saguine tingnntnr. Prosper, c. 2. P. 84. Per Mare Rubrum,
Baptismum sacratum Christi sanguine liberantur. Prosper, 2. 233.
Baptismo Christi sanguine consecrate. Augustine, 1. 1206. Ascendas de fonte
Christi coneecrata in sanguine. Augustin. 6. 600.
TRANSUBSTANTIATION NOT TAUGHT BY THE FATHERS. 403
tray 'the true Israel as consecrated in baptism, with the blood
of. the Lord.'
The ancients also represent the same substantial change corn-
muuicated to men, especially in baptism and regeneration, as
to the elements of the communion. Such are the representations
of Cyril, Gregory, Etherius, Beda, and Leo. 1 According to
Cyril, ' water transforms by a divine and ineffable power.' Re-
generation, says the same author, ' changes into the Son of God.'
Gregory's statement is to the same purpose. ' I am changed '
says this author, * into Christ in baptism.' The faithful* say
Etherius and Bede, * are transformed into our Lord's members
and become his body. Pope Leo the First is still more express.
* Receiving the efficacy of celestial food,' says his infallibility,
' we pass into his flesh who was made our flesh. Man, in baptism,
is made the body of Christ.'
Our Lord, therefore, in the monuments of antiquity, is repre-
sented as present in baptism as well as in the communion. The
water, in the one institution, is represented as changed into
blood, in the same way as the wine in the other. Man's nature
or substance, according to the same authority, is transformed in
baptism and regeneration. The person who is renewed and bap-
tized is, in these statements, changed into the nature, body,
flesh, or substance of the Son of God. The language of the
fathers is as. strong and decided for transubstantiation in baptism
as in the communion ; for the corporeal presence in the former
as in the latter; and for the substantial change of man in re-
generation as for the elements in the sacrament. The abettors
of the corporeal presence, notwithstanding, with awkward incon-
sistency, admit transubstantiation in the communion and reject
it in baptism and regeneration.
The truth, however, is, that the use of such language in the
literary and ecclesiastical monuments of antiquity was, in gene-
ral, the consequence of confounding the sign with the significa-
tion, and ascribing to the former the attributes of the latter.
The appellation and properties of the Lord's flesh and blood were,
by a natural tendency of the human mind, transferred to the
bread, the wine, and the water of the two sacramental institu-
tions. The change, however, in the elements was considered
tov fwa, XCM. appijitov fis-taa'fotxtrta* Swapsv* Cyril, 4. 147. in
John 3. Mstfaertfo^stwffa rtpoj fovv ww. Cyril, 5. 474. Dial. Ill
Xpietov pe-tartErtoiqat, -tat /Sartt'tff/taii't.. Gregory, orat. 40.
In membi-is ejus transformamus. Nos in ilio transformamur. Etherias adv.
Blipan. I. Canisius, 2. 322, 324. Nos ipsius corpus facti eumns. Fideles fiant cor-
pus Chriati. Beda, 6. 365. in Cor. x. et 5. 509. in Joan. 'VI.
Accipientes virtutem cselestis cibi, in carnam ipsius qui caro nostra factns est,
transeamus. In Baptismate, efficiatur homo corpus Christi. Leo. I. Bp. 23. Labb.
4, 815, 817
26*
404 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
not as physical but moral. The bread and wine altered not
their substance but their signification, not their nature but their
use. This may be illustrated by a citation from Cyril of Jeru-
salem. ' The meat of the pomp of Satan,' says the Saint, ' is,
in its own nature, pure, but, by the invocation of demons,
becomes unholy, as the elements of communion, before conse-
cration, are mere bread and wine ; but afterward became the
body and blood of our Lord.' 1 The immolations of Gentilism,
all will admit, might, according to Cyril, contract impurity, but
not alter their nature : and the elements in the sacrament might,
in like manner, change their signification, but would retain their
substance.
Transubstantiation, therefore, is without any foundation in
scriptural or ecclesiastical antiquity. Many ages elapsed before
the monster, which was the child of darkness and superstition,
appeared in the world. The deformity, however, in the progress
of time, the change of system, and diversity of opinion raised
at length its portentous head in Christendom. Several causes
concurred to facilitate its introduction into the church. The
mind of man, in the contemplation of emblematical representa-
tions, delights to confound the sign with the signification. The
sacramental symbols, in consequence, were often, in ancient
works on Christian theology, not sufficiently discriminated from
the objects which they were intended to notify. The ancients
in consequence used strong language and bold metaphors in
celebrating this institution, and in discoursing on it in their
literary productions. Accustomed, on all topics, to flash and
rhetoric, these authors, in treating on this mystery, dealt even
beyond their usual style, in superlatives and exaggeration.
Habituated to such phraseology, men were prepared for the re-
ception of a novelty, which added the corporeal to the spiritual
presence in the communion.
Man is also prone to form a material deity, whom he can see
while he worships. A pure spirit seems too impalpable and re-
fined for a being like man, whose soul is embodied in matter.
He seeks something, therefore, to attract and engage the exter-
nal senses. This principle, deep-rooted in human nature, has
given rise to all the idolatry which has deformed and dishonoured
Pagan, Jewish, and Popish worship. The idols of Gentilism
exceeded all enumeration. The Jews, though blessed with a
divine revelation, and warned, in a special manner, against
idolatry, often forgot Jehovah, and adored Baal and other gods
of heathenism. The votaries of Romanism, in like manner, and
from the same principle, have formed a material divinity and
bow to the host.
1 Oyra,281.
THE INTRODUCTION OF TRANSUBSTANTIATION. 405
The Aristotelian philosophy which had become the reigning
system, facilitated the reception of transubstantiation. The
philosopher of Stagira supposed a primary matter and substantial
forms, which compose the constitution of all things. This pri-
mary matter, without quantity, quality, figure, or any propriety
of body, was the subject on which substantial forms might be
impressed, arid to which they might adhere. The forms were
a convenient coverlet for the matter. This nonsense was exceed-
ingly useful for the fabrication of transubstantiation. The inter-
nal matter or substance, in the papal theology, was, in the host,
changed into flesh and blood, which were inclosed in the form
or species of bread and wine. A theological fiction, in this
manner, was countenanced and illustrated by a philosophical
vision : and the philosophy, in inconsistency, yields only to the
theology. Transubstantiation annexed . a few motley additions
to the airy theory of the Grecian speculator ; and, in conse-
quence, became the consummation of absurdity. The climax
of nonsense ended in the faith of the corporeal presence in the
sacrament.
The state of the Latin communion, at the introduction of
transubstantiation, was perhaps the chief reason of its origin,
progress, and final establishment. The tenth century was a
period of darkness and superstition. Philosophy seemed to have
taken its departure from Christendom, and to have left mankind
to grovel in a night of ignorance unenlightened with a single ray
of learning. Cimmerian clouds overspread the literary horizon,
and quenched the sun of science. Immorality kept pace with
ignorance, and extended itself to the priesthood and to the
people. The flood-gates of moral pollution seemed to have been
set wide open, and inundations of all impurity, poured on the
Christian world through the channels of the Roman Hierarchy.
The enormity of the clergy was faithfully copied by the laity.
Both sunk into equal degeneracy, and the popedom appeared
one vast, deep, frightful, overflowing ocean of corruption, horror,
and contamination. 1 Ignorance and immorality are the parents
of error and superstition. The mind void of information, and
the heart destitute of sanctity, are prepared to embrace any
fabrication or absurdity,
Such was the mingled mass of darkness, depravity, and
superstition, which produced the portentous monster of Iran-
substantiation. Pascasius, in the ninth century, seems to have
been the father of this deformity, which he hatched in his
melancholy cell. His claim to the honour and improvement
of this paradox is admitted by Sirmond, Bellarmine, and Bruys. 2
1 Baron. An. 900. Platina, in Bened. Geneb. An. 901.
2 Genuinum ecclesiae Catholics sensom ita primus explicnit, ut viam Caeteris
aperuerit. Sinnon. in Badb.
406 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
Pascasius, says Sirmond, ' was the first who, on this question,
explained the genuine sense of the church.' This monk,
according to Be]larmine, ' was the first who, in an express and
copious manner, wrote on the truth of the Lord's body and
blood.' Men, says Mabillon, ' were from reading his work,
led to a more full and profound knowledge of the subject.'
Bruys candidly confesses that transubstantiadon was a discovery
of the ninth century, and unknown in the darker ages of anti-
quity.' The celebrated Erasmus entertained a similar opinion.
He represents ' the church as late in defining trans ubstantiation,
and accounting it enough, during a long period, to believe that
the Lord's true body was present under the consecrated bread
or in any other way.' 1 Scotus acknowledges, that transub-
stantiation was no article of faith before the council of the
Lateran in 1215.
The celebrated Arnold, in his perpetuity of the faith, has
endeavoured to prove the antiquity of transubstantiation from
the tranquillity, which, he says, always reigned on the subject
in the church. Its introduction, he alleges, had it be an inno-
vation, would have been attended with tremendous opposition.
The commotion and noise, he seems to think, would have been
little inferior to the shock of an earthquake, or the explosion of
a world. Arnold's attempt, however, proves nothing but the
effrontery of its author, who, on this occasion, must have been
at a loss for an argument, and presumed much on the reader's
ignorance. Mabillon, more candid than Arnold, admits the
opposition of many against Pascasius, who ascribed too much to
the divine sacrament. Frudegard, with many others, doubted,
and with Augustine, understood the words of institution in a
metaphorical sense. These, with the African saint, accounting
it shocking to eat the flesh that was born of the virgin, and to
drink the blood that was shed on the cross, ' reckoned the con-
secrated elements, the Lord's flesh and blood only in power and
efficacy. . ' Some,' says Mabillon, ' assented, and many doubted.
Some resisted Pascasius, and many were brought to understand
the mystery.' 2
Primus autor qui serio et copiose scripsit de veritate corporis et sanguinis Dom-
ini. Bel. in Pas. Ex hoc lectione ad pleniorum peritiouemqize ejtis cognitionem
pei'ducti fuerint. Mabillon, 3. 67.
Le dogme de la transubstantiation, ou de la presence reelle, etoit inconnua.-
vant le IX. Siecle. Bruy. 2. 349.
1 Sero transubstantionem definivit ecclesia. Diu satis erat credere, sive sub
pane consecrato sive quocunque modo adesse verum corpus Christi. Erasrn. 6.
696. in Gorin. 7. Bellarmin, III. 23.
2 Qui dicunt esse virtutem carnis, non carnem, virtutem sanguinis, non sangui-
nem. Pascasius in Matth, 26. Plusieurs enteudoient, avec Saint Augustin, les
paroles de I'institution dans un sens de figure. Moreri, 7. 68. Multi dubitant.
Mabillon, 3, 67. Pascasios ad Frudegard. Du Pin, 2. 80.
Multi ex hoc dubitant. Nonnullis haud placuit quod dixerat. Fatendum est
quosdam contra insurrexisse et scripsisse adversus Pascasium. Mabillon, 3. 67.
PASCASIAN CONTROVERSY ON TRANSUBSTANTIATION. 407
The Pascasian innovation was opposed by nearly all the piety
and erudition of the age. A constellation of theologians rose in
arms against the absurdity. Raban, Walafrid, Herebald, Pru-
dentius, Florus, Scotus, and Bertramn, the ablest theologians
of the day, arrayed themselves against the novelty. All these,
the literary suns of the age, resisted the Pascasian theology.
Raban, Archbishop of Mentz, who was deeply skilled in Latin,
Greek, and Hebrew, had a taste for poetry, and was accounted
the glory of Germany, resisted the Pascasian theory with
determined hostility. Heribald and Raban, says Marca, ' wrote
against Pascasius, while Pascasius and Raban divided the
people into two factions.' 1
Scotus and Bertramn were the most distinguished opposers of
Pascasius. Scotus was eminent for his skill in languages and
theology. He was the companion of Carolus, the French sove-
reign, who patronized his work against Pascasius. During his
whole life, he incurred no suspicion of heresy ; and his work,
for two hundred years, circulated through Christendom without
any mark of reprobation from pope or council, from clergy or
laity. 2
Bertramn, like Scotus, replied to Pascasius at the instance of
the French king. He was esteemed for his sanctity, and for his
profound attainments in science and theology. His book on the
body and blood of the Lord, in answer to the Pascasian specu-
lation, was widely disseminated through the Christian world,
and was never during that age, condemned for heresy. 3 The
free and extensive circulation, which these publications of Scotus
and Bertramn obtained without even an insinuation of error,
must to every unprejudiced mind, supply^,n irrefragable proof
of their conformity to the theology of the ninth century.
The treatment of Betramn's work after the Reformation
argued little for the unity of Romanism. This production,
which, during the dark ages, had lain concealed and unknown,
was discovered in 1533, and published by the Protestants of
Germany. The Reformed, who rescued it from oblivion, ac-
counted it favourable to their system. The Romish reckoned
it a work of heresy, and a forgery of (Ecolompadius. This
production, though afterwards extolled as the perfection of
orthodoxy, was condemned as heretical by a pope, by councils,
cardinals, the expurgatorian index, and a whole phalanx of
theologians.
Clement the Eighth exercised his infallibillity on Bertramn's
1 Heribaldus et Rabanus statim contrariis adversus Pascasium scriptis certave-
ront. Pascasio et Rabano ducibus, fideles populos in duos veluti factiones scinde-
bat. Marca, Ep. in Dachery, 3. 853.
3 Da Pin, 2. 87. Dachery, 4. 513. Labb. 11. 1425.
3 Bruys. 2. 38. Morery, 7. 40
408 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
production, and denounced it, after due examination, for heresy.
The synod of Treves, for the same reason, interdicted its circu-
lation. The general council of Trent, by its expurgatorian
index, pronounced its reprobation and prohibition. This assem-
bly, which was clothed with infallibility, had as great a concern
in the index, which proscribed B.ertramn's work, as in its cate-
chism. The sentence, therefore, may be considered as sanc^
tioned by its supreme authority. These pontifical and synodal
decisions were approved by the cardinals Bellarmine, Quiroga,
Sandoval, Alan, and Perron. The theologians of Louvain, who
conducted the Belgic expurgatorian index, submitted the per-
formance, which these doctors represented as interpolated, to
correction. These censors expunged many of the pretended
interpolations, which, in their estimation, contained rank heresy ;
and allowed its publicity in this state of mutilation. This sen-
tence of error and Protestantism was re-echoed by Turrian,
Sixtus, Genebrard, Espenceus, Marca, Possevin, Claudius,
Valentia, Paris, and Harduin. All these, in concert indeed
with the whole popish communion, continued, for the exten-
ded period of more than one hundred and forty years, to
represent Bertramn's treatise as a forgery and full of error and
heresy. 1
But this book, decried in this manner in the popish commu-
nion, for heterodoxy, was in process of time, transformed by a
sudden revolution in public opinion, into orthodoxy. A church,
which boasts its unity and unchangeableness, proceeded, after
the lapse of many years, to transubstantiate Bertramn's work,
without any useless ceremony, into Catholicism. Mabillon, in
1680, by the aid of manuscripts and arguments, evinced, beyond
all contradiction, the genuineness of the work ; and endeavoured,
by partial statements and perverted criticism, to shew its ortho-
doxy. 2 The learned Benedictine's discovery effected, on this
point, a sudden change in Romish Christendom. The book,
which, for near a century and a half, had been denounced as
unsound and supposition, became, all at once, both true and
genuine. The church transformed heresy into Catholicism with
as much facility, arid in nearly as short a time, as a priest tran-
substantiates a wafer into a God.
The controversy, for two hundred years after the Pascasian age,
seems to have slept. The noisy polemic, on this topic, resigned
his pen, and Christendom, entombed in Egyptian darkness, sunk
into immorality and superstition. Transubstantiation, in this
destitution of literature, continued to gain ground : till, at last,
1 Moreri, 7. 40. Boileau, 8. Bell. I. 1. Du Pin, 2, 81, 86. Turrian, I. 22.
Fossey. 1. 219.
2 Mabillon, 3. 68. Dachery, 4. 17.
BERENGARIAN CONTROVERSY ON TRANSTTBSTANTIATION. 409
its pestilential breath infected all orders and ranks of men; The
priesthood soon perceived its tendency to the advancement of
sacerdotal influence and emolument. Their alleged power of
creating God excited the veneration and liberality of the admir-
ing populace. Miracles were supposed to be wrought by the
consecrated wafer ; and this, opening another source of imposi-
tion and astonishment, endeared the wonder-working theology
to the clergy and laity. The dogma, indeed, is calculated for
the meridian of superstition. The idea of a visible deity must
be ever welcome to an ignorant crowd. The innovation, be-
sides, made no direct or violent attack on the popular prepos-
sessions. The error effected no mutilation of the ancient faith ;
but an addition, which is calculated to become the idol of super-
stition. The Pascasian theory superinduced the corporeal on
the spiritual presence, and tended, not to the diminution, but to
the augmentation of the fabric of faith, the structure of super-
stition, and the mass of mystery. The novelty added a change
of substance to the ancient admitted change of use and significa-
tion, and was fitted for becoming the food of credulity.
The controversy was awakened from the sleep of two hundred
years by Berengarius in the eleventh century. This celebrated
character was principal in the public school of Tours, and after-
ward archdeacon of Angers. He was distinguished, according
to Paris, for genius, learning, piety, charity, holiness, and humi-
lity. Following Bertramn and Scotus on the sacrament, he
publicly, in 104-5, opposed Pascasius. Many adopted and many
rejected his system. Romanism displayed a diversity of faith
inconsistent with modern boasts of unity. The clergy and the
laity, in the ninth century, united, in general, against Pascasir
anism ; but differed, about two hundred years after, about
Berengarianism. This shews the progress, which transubstan-
tiation in this period, had made in the spiritual dominions of the >
popedom. The controversy was agitated in many verbal and
written disputations. 1 Berengarianism, however, according to
cotemporary and succeeding historians, was the general faith of
England, France, and Italy. All France, says Sigebert, aboun-
ded in Berengarians : and the same is repeated by Matthew of
Paris and William of Malmesbury. Alan represents the evil
as extended, not only to France, but also to the neighbouring
nations. The heresy, says Matthew of Westminster, had cor-
rupted nearly all the French, Italians, and English. 2
Berengarianism was denounced, with determined hostility
and tremendous anathemas, by the Roman pontiffs. Its author
1 Berengarius commenija a dogmatizer de I'eucharistie selon la doctrine quo
Bertramnus et 1'Escot avoient 170 arts auparavant enseignee. Vignier, 2. 696.
2 Contra eum et pro eo, multum a multis et verbis et scriptis, disputandum est
Sigebert, An. 1051.
410 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
was persecuted by Leo, Victor, Nicholas, and Alexander. He
was compelled to sign three different and conflicting confessions,
in three Roman councils under Nicholas and Gregory.
Nicholas, in 1058, convened a council at the Lateran against
Berengarius. This assembly consisted of one hundred and thir-
teen bishops ; and the patron of the reputed heresy was sum-
moned to attend. He complied ; and supported his system
with a strength of reason and eloquence, which, Sigonius, Leo,
and Henry attest, withered all opposition. All shrunk in terror,,
. while the Vatican resounded with the thunder of his oratory.
His infallibility urged his clergy to the contest. He endea-
voured to rouse his veterans to the battle. But no David ap-
peared against this Goliath. No hero of orthodoxy dared, in
single combat, to encounter this dreadful son of heresy. His
holiness, in this exigency, sent an express for Alberic, a cardinal
deacon of great erudition, who, it was hoped, could face this
fearful champion of error. 1 Alberic, after a warm discussion,
solicited a cessation of arms for a week, to employ his pen
against the enemy. 2
The council, findingthe insufficiency of their dialectics, threat-
ened the application of more tangible and convincing arguments,
which they could wield with more facility. Anathemas, excom-
munication, fire, and fagot were brought into requisition. The
mention of this kind of logic soon converted Berengarius, who
x was unambitious of the honour of martyrdom. Humbert was
appointed to compose a confession for Berengarius, and executed
his task to the satisfaction of his infallibility and the whole
council. This formulary declared, that ' the bread and wine on
the altar are the Lord's real body and blood, which, not only in
a sacramental, but also in a sensible manner, are broken by the
hands of the priest and ground by the teeth of the faithful.' 3
His infallibility and his clergy were for submitting the flesh of
Emmanuel, when created by their power of transubstantiation,
to the action of the teeth, particularly the grinders. His flesh,
it appears, is, according to the sacred synod, subject to mastica-
tion, deglutition, digestion, and all the necessary consequences.
His holiness and his council seem to have entertained the same
refined sentiments as the ancient citizens of Capernaum, who
1 Afficiebatur ornnis Gallia ejus doctrina. M. Paris, 12, Scatebat otnnis Gallia
ejus doctrina. Malm. III. P. 63. Omnis pene Gallia ac vicinae gentes eo malo
quam citissime laborarent. Alan, de Each. I. 21. Omnes Gallos, Italos, et An-
glos suis jam pene corruperat pravitatibus. Westm. in Ush. c. 7.
* Ei, cum nullus valeret obsistere, Albericus evocabatur ad synodnm. Leo. III.
33. Non erat, qui Berengarip responderet, licet Papa fortiter institisset. Henry,
II. 5. Nullus Berengario resistere valeret. Mabillon, 5. 139. Sigonius. IX.
Bin. 7. 273.
3 Fideliutn dentibus atteritur. Gibert, 3. 330. Crabb. 2. 766. Labb. 12. 46.
Lanfranc, 233. Dachery, 4. 515. Canisius, 4. 468.
BERENGARIAN CONTROVERSY ON TRANSUBSTANTIATION. 411
understood the Lord's words in a literal sense. Christians,
according to the holy Roman council, enjoy a carnival in the
sacrament, similar to the festivals of the polite cannibals of
Fegee and New Zealand. The confession remains a foul stain
on the synod from which it emanated, and a filthy blot in the
annals of the papacy.
Lombard censured the grossness of this confession. Simica
denounced it, if not interpreted with caution and ingenuity, as a
greater heresy than Berengarianism. Aquinas refers the attri-
tion of the teeth to the species or accidents. The angelic doctors
invented a plan, by which the jaws could chew form without
substance, and masticate colour, taste, and smell. The synod
of Arras, however, in 1025, denied that ' the Lord's body is con-
sumed by the mouth or ground by the teeth.' The moderns
have abandoned the absurdity. Caron characterizes the Roman
synod's creed, as a heresy. Challenor warns the communicant
against ' chewing with the teeth ;' though, in so doing, he sub-
jects himself to an anathema of a holy Roman council. 1
This precious specimen of blasphemy and absurdity, issued
by a Roman council headed by a Roman pontiff, Beren-
garius, through human frailty and horror of death, signed and
swore to maintain. This profession, however, was only hypo-
crisy and extorted by intimidation. Shielded by the protection
of his ancient patrons, he relapsed into heresy, declared his de-
testation of the creed which he had subscribed, and characterized
the Roman synod as an assembly of vanity, and the popedom as
the throne of Satan.
Berengarms signed a second confession, in the year 1078.
Gregory the Seventh assembled a Roman council for the pur-
pose of terminating the controversy. This synod differed from
the former in its decisions. Gregory and his clergy allowed
Berengarius to renounce his former confession and substitute
another. This, in reality, was* a virtual, if not a formal con-
demnation and repeal of the creed prescribed by Nicholas and
his synod, and sanctioned'by their authority. This new confes-
sion, which Berengarius composed and signed, merely signified
that 'the bread and wine, after consecration, became the Lord's
true body and blood.' 2 This form of belief might have been
subscribed by Zuinglius, Calvin, Cranmer, or Knox. The
Zuinglians, in fact, at Marpurg, admitted the true presence of
the body and blood in the sacrament. Expressions of a similar
1 Attritio dentium referatur ad speciem. Aquin. 3. 372. Haec gratia non con-
Burnitur morsibus, nee dentibus teritur. Dachery, 1. 611. Labb. 11. 1161, 1426.
Caron, 90. Chellen. 61.
2 Profitebatur, panem altaris post consecrationem ease verum corpus Christ!
Cossart, 2. 28. MabiUon, 5. 125.
412 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
or identical kind may be found in the reformed confessions of
Switzerland, France, Strasburg, Holland, and England. 1
The Roman clergy were divided in their opinion of this con-
fession. One party acknowledged its Catholicism j while another
faction maintained its heresy. The latter insisted on the pre-
scription of another creed, which might be free from ambiguity.
Its error and inadequacy have, in modern times, been conceded
by Alexander, Cossart, and Mabillon. Alexander complains of
its trickery, Cossart, like many others, of its heresy, and Mabillon
of its equivocation and insufficiency. 2
Gregory seems to have embraced the same opinions as Beren-
garius on the communion. His infallibility declared ' that he
entertained no doubt but Berengarius had, on this institution,
adopted the scriptural idea, and all that was necessary for the
faith of Catholicism.' 3 This, in his holiness, was an unequivocal
profession of Berengarianism.
Pope Gregory was countenanced in his heterodoxy by Lady
Mary. His infallibiliiy, actuated by hypocrisy or fanaticism,
was accustomed, on every difficult or important emergency, to
consult her ladyship. Mary, on this occasion, answered with
oracular decision, that ' nothing should be acknowledged on this
subject, but what is contained in authentic scripture, against
which Berengarius had no objection.' 4 The mother of God, it
appears, a thousand years after her assumption, became a here-
tic, opposed transubstantiation, and patronized Berengarianism.
This was a sad defection in the queen of heaven and star of the
sea. The blessed Virgin should have been transported to
purgatory or the inquisition, to atone for her apostacy from the
faith.
His infallibility, whatever may have become of her ladyship,
was, in 1080, condemned for Berengarianism by thirty bishops,
in the council of Brescia. This assembly found his holiness
guilty of attachment to * the Berengarian heresy, and of calling
in question the apostolic truth of the Lord's body and blood.' 5
1 Neque negare volunt vernm corpus et sanguinem Christi adesse. Seckendorf,
138. Chouet, 67, 109, 110, 120, 204.
3 Fidei professionem edidit subdolis verbis conceptam. Alex. 18. 246. Quidam
Catholicam agnoverunt, sed alii latere in ilia veneni aliquid haeretici. Coss. 2. 28.
Berengarius brevem fidei suae formulam sed insufficientem ediderat. Sub his veri
corporis et sanguinis verbis eequivoca latere, non immerito crederetur. Mabillon,
5. 25, 139.
3 Ego plane te de Christi sacrificio secundum scripturas bene sentire non dubito.
Marten. Thesaur. 4. 108. Fidei professionem ab ipso Berengario editam, ad
fidem Catholicam sufficere dixisset Gregorius. Mabillon, 5. 140.
4 Nihil de Christi sacrificio cogitandum, nihil tenendum prater id quod habe-
rent authenticae scripturas, contra quas Berengarius nihil sentiret. Mabillpn, 5.
140. Marten, 4. 108.
- 5 Catholicam de eucharistia fidem in qusestionem poneret, et Berengarii antiquus
discipulus esset. Mabillon, 5. 140. Coss. 2. 48. Labb. 12. 646.
BERENGARIAN CONTROVERSY ON TRANSUBSTANTIATION. 413
The vicar-general of God and the queen of Heaven, in this man-
ner, patronized a heretic and encouraged one another in hetero-
doxy.
Gregory's partiality to Berengarianism appears also from his
treatment of its author. He honoured him with, his friendship,
and -protected him against his persecutors. He anathematized
all who should injure his person or estate, or call him a heretic.
He recommended him to the protection of the Bishop of Tours
and Angers against the enmity of Count Fulco. He shewed no
resentment against his . renunciation of MsT former profession.
He refused to attempt any thing against Berengarius, and left
his enemies, who endeavoured to overwhelm him with invective
and perplex him with sophistry, to fret, and fume, and growl
without a remedy or opportunity to gratify their malevolence. 1
Gregory, however, importuned by some of the disaffected
clergy, who persecuted Berengarius and hated his theology, was
induced, notwithstanding his predilection for this author and his
system, to summon another council for the final settlement of
the controversy. A Roman synod accordingly met in 1079.
This assembly consisted of the prelacy from ' the adjoining and
different other regions,' and therefore represented the faith,
which, on this topic, was, in the eleventh century, entertained
in various nations of the Christian commonwealth.
The holy Roman synod, however, displayed, in the Lateran,
the head-quarters of Catholicism, the utmost diversity of senti-
ment. Some held one opinion, and some another. One party
maintained transubstantiation. The other patronized Beren-
garianism ; and endeavoured, according to the partial accounts
of these transactions, to support their error and deceive them-
selves and others with cavils. The majority advocated a sub-
stantial change of the elements in the. communion. The minority
represented the bread and wine only as signs, and the substan-
tial body as sitting at the right hand of God. The disputation
continued for three days. The council, in the end, came to an
agreement, which, when compared with the two former decisions,
seems to have been effected by mutual concessions. A confes-
sion was imposed on Berengarius, declaring the change in the
bread and wine after consecration, to be, not merely sacramental
and figurative, but also true and substantial. 2
This confession differed, both by omission and addition, from
the former, issued under Nicholas and Gregory in -two holy
Roman councils. The impiety of breaking the Lord's body with
1 Du Pin, 2. 199. Labb. 12. 630. Dachery, 4. 514.
3 Moltis haec, nonnullis ilia sentientibus. Quidam veto caecitate nimia et longa
perculai, figuram tantum, substantiate illud corpus in dextera. Patris sedens ease ;
BO et alios decipientes quibusdam cavillationibus. Labb. 12. 629. Bin. 7. 488.
414 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEBY :
the hands and grinding it with the teeth, enjoined by Nicholas
and his clergy in 1 059, was omitted ; and the epithet substantial
was added to the prior formulary enacted in 1078. This is no
convincing proof of unity. The third is a medium between the
other two, and seems to have been a compromise for the sake
of peace and harmony. Two factions opposed each other in
this theological campaign. Each, for the purpose of terminating
the war, made concessions ; and the result was a creed inter-
mediate between the two previous forms of belief.
Transubstantiation, after the death of Berengarius, advanced
by slow and gradual steps to maturity. Some continued to re-
sist its inroads on the truth of Christian theology. But the
majority of the clergy and laity, in the spirit of perversity and
the phrenzy of superstition, adopted the deformity. Its patrons,
however, found great difficulty in moulding the monster into
form. Many editions of the novelty were circulated through
Christendom ; and all exhibited the changes of correction and
the charms of variety. The council of the Lateran, in 1215,
enrolled it among the canons of the Romish communion : and
the Lateran decision was confirmed at Constance and finally
established at Trent. 1
The partizans of transubstantiation, having by numbers, if not
by reason, defeated the enemy, quarrelled among themselves.
The foreign war against the adversary was followed by internal
sedition among its friends. The subject, indeed, opened a wide
field for refinement and ingenuity. Some believed, some
doubted, and some speculated. Lombard could not define
whether the transmutation of the sacramental elements was
substantial, or formal, or of some other kind. Aquinas and
Gabriel, says Erasmus, grant the diversity of opinions on this
question, even among orthodox theologians; Cajetan admits
similar variations. Guitmond and Algerus, in the eleventh
century, mention many variations of opinion circulated on this
topic in their day. Some, according to these contemporary
historians, imagined that the transformation extended only to a
part, and some to the whole of the elements. Some allowed a
change in the wine of the communion, but such as in the water
of baptism. One party fancied that the bread and wine, though
changed to the worthy, resumed their own substance when pre-
sented to the wicked. Another faction, in the wild wanderings
of imagination and extravagancy, admitted a transmutation of
the bread and wine into flesh and blood ; but not into those of
the Son of God. One class alleged the same union between
the consecrated elements and the Divine Emmanuel as between
1 Crabb. 2. 946. Labb. 18. 519. Bin. 9. 380. Labb. 13. 930.
DIVERSITY 03? OPINIONS ON TRANST7BSTANTIATION. 415
his Deity and humanity, or a bypostatical union of the Mediator
to the substance of the bread. Another alleged, that not the
substance, but the entity remained, but changed into Christ's
body. Some believed the digestion and the corruption of the
bread and wine ; while others denied this theory. Some spec-
ulators thought that the metamorphosis was effected by the
change of the elements, and some by their annihilation. The
creed-makers, on this innovation, seem, according to their taste
or fancy, to have embraced impannation, consubstantiation, or
transubstantiation. Many of the sage and useful theologians
of the day diversified their systems with lofty speculations on
the sublime and fragrant topic of stercoranism, with all its
attendant and lovely train of grandeur and purity. 1
The schoolmen subtilized theory into nonsense and hair-
breadth distinctions. These doctors brought all their attenuated
discriminations into requisitions on this mystery, and divided
and- subdivided without end or meaning, on the topics of mat-
ter, form, substance, and accidents. The real body, according
to Scotus, is present by circumscription ; but according to
Aquinas and his followers, not by circumscription, but by pene-
tration, and the modality, not of quantity, but of substance. 2
These metaphysicians, of course, knew their own meaning in
these ' words of learned length and thundering sound.' Scho-
lasticism, indeed, like metaphysics, is a learned and ingenious
way of talking nonsense, and of shewing an author's ignorance.
The Dominicans and Franciscans, as usual, encountered each
other in theological combat on this subject at the council of
Trent. The Dominicans contended, that the substance of the
bread is changed by transmutation, into the substance of the
Lord's body. No new matter, according to this system, is added,
but the old transformed. The Franciscans maintained that
transubstantiation is effected, not by the conversion of the bread
into the Lord's body, but by the recession of the former, and
the accessions of the latter. The bread, except the species,
politely retires, according to this theory, for the purpose of
giving place to the flesh of Emmanuel. Dominican and Fran-
ciscan enmity, in this manner, evaporated in mutual nonsense
and contradiction.
The jargon of the two schools on substance, form, matter,
1 An formalis, an substantialis, an alterius generis, definire non sufficio. Lom-
bard, IV. Nee ipse Thomas, nee hoc recentior Gabriel dissimulant varias theolo-
gorum, hac de re, fuisse sententias etiam orthodoxorum. Erasm. 9. 1065.
Variae fuerunt opiniones eruditorum. Cajetan, in Aquin. 3. 348. Alger. Prpl.
Bray. 2. 398. Da Pin. 2. 203, 204.
Substantiam et naturam panis hypostatice unire Christo. Faber, IV. D. 11, c. 3.
Alii dixerunt, nee substantiam panis monere Bed entitatem panis manere tamen
conversam in corpus Christi. Faber, 1. 183. Aquinas, 3. 385.
2 Aquin. III. 66. V. P. 350, 360, 363. Cajetan in Aquin, 3. 348.
410 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
nature, body, quantity, magnitude, locality, annihilation, and
transformation was unintelligible to all others, though clear to
its several advocates, who, with reason, represented the contrary
as attended with infinite absurdity. Forms of faith were com-
posed, which, adopting something from each, might satisfy both.
But the accornodation pleased neither party. The general
congregation therefore resolved to employ only a few words and
general expressions, suited, as much as possible, to the ideas or
rather to the balderdash of the several contending factions. 1
Such, on the important subject of the sacrament, was the har-
mony and management of the holy, apostolical, infallible, Roman
council of Trent.
The advocates of the corporeal presence, jarring in this way,
about the doctrine, differ also about its evidence. Some found
their faith on Revelation ; some on tradition ; some on miracles ;
and others again on these united. Its modern partizans com-
monly endeavour to found their system on scriptural authority.
The scriptural arguments, on the contrary, were resigned by
Scotus, Bellarmine, Alliaco, Cajetan, Occam, Alphonsus,
Durand, Biel, Fisher, Cusan, and Canus, who rest their belief,
not on the Bible, but on the testimony of tradition, and the
authority of the church. The majority wish to draw their
proofs from both scriptural and traditional declarations.
Many, on this subject, have called in the extraordinary aid of
miracles. The Lord's body and blood, according to Pascasius,
the father of the deformity, has often appeared visible on the
altar. ' God, from heaven,' says Binius, ' confuted Berengarius
by miracles.' ' God,' says Dens, ' hath confirmed this truth by
open and frequent miracles, wrought in various places and
times.' Pope Gregory, in 600, convinced a Roman lady by
similar means. A Roman matron, when his holiness was cele-
brating mass, had the audacity to smile at the idea of calling a
morsel of bread the body of the Lord. The pontiff, pitying the
woman's incredulity, prayed, in conjunction with the people, to
God for a sensible manifestation of the mystery, to overcome
the woman's unbelief. The sacramental bread, in consequence,
' was changed into bloody flesh.' 2 The lady, of course, could
have x no objection to an argument of this kind, and immediately
believed. This, the silly and superstitious Mabillon considers
as a powerful corroboration of the truth.
Odo, in 960, undeceived, by this means, several unbelieving
1 On ne put s'accorder. Us nepouvoient s'entendre eux-memes. Paolo, 1. 530.
Du Pin. 3. 475. Labb> 17. 818.
2 Deus e caelo rniraculis Berengarium confatavit. Bin. 7. 275. Veritatem
prcBsentise realis, Deus confirmavit per aperta et frequentia miracula, variis locis et
temporibus facta. Dens, 5. 283. Partem digiti sanguine cruentam advertit.
Mabil. 1. 263. Nangis, An. 10&8. Dach. 3. 19.
TRANSUBSTANTIATION SUPPORTED BY PRETENDED MIRACLES.417
clergymen. '^ Seduced by the spirit of error, some of the clergy
maintained that the bread, and wine even after consecration,
retained their substance, and were only the signs of flesh and
blood. But Odo prayed, and the host, in consequence, during
the solemnization of mass in the priest's hands, ' began to drop
blood.' 1 The phenomenon, it may be easily conceived, silenced
allopposition.
Wonders of a similar description have sometimes appeared,
not to remedy unbelief, but to reward sanctity. This was the
case with Mary, Hugo, and Nativity. These saints had the
pleasure, during the solemnity of mass, to see Jesus in the form
of an infant of unparalleled beauty. The child, which sister
Nativity beheld, was living and clothed with rays of light;
while eager to be received, or in other terms, swallowed, he
desired, in infantile accents, to be devoured. This ridiculous
if not blasphemous tale constitutes part of a Revelation which
has been lately eulogized by Rayment, Hodgson, Bruning,
and Milnef. 2
The variations of the transubstantiated God are diversified as
the opinions of his votaries. The Protean God of the Greeks
and Romans, famed in ancient mythology and song for his mul-,
tiplicity of forms, has been eclipsed in his own department by
the popish Deity.' All the metamorphoses recorded in Ovidian
verse are nothing compared with the transformations of this
divinity. His god ship, in his variations in his pre-exis-
tent state prior to his deification, presents a curious speci-
men of natural history. His materials are enclosed in a
wheaten grain, and he blooms in the wheaten field. He imbibes
the sap of the earth, sucks the dews of night, and drinks the
rain of the clouds. The future god, by these means, ripens to
maturity under the suns of heaven. The flail and the mill ad-
vance his deityship a few more steps towards his final apotheosis.
The confectioner moulds this new god into new forms, and
introduces him to new acquaintances. He is exhibited to the
eye in a mass of pastry, composed of flour and water. His chief
chemical elements are carbon, hydrogen, and oxygen. He is,
however, in this state, near his promotion. He is rounded into
a wafer, handed to the altar, and, at the muttering of some sorry
priest, wonderful to tell, starts into a god. The new-made
Deity is immediately exhibited for adoration oh the bended
knee. He is then placed in the mouth, swallowed down the
throat, and safely lodged in the stomach of his manufacturer and:
worshippers. He is next, by digestion or some other way,
destined to undergo a chemical analysis, and to be resolved
1 Sanguis guttatim defluere coepit. Mabillon. 3. 556. Osbern, 83.
Andilly, 648, 719. Dachery, 1. 612. .
27
418 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
into his constituent principles. But his future history and
transmigrations may be left to the filthy historian of ster-
coranism.
Transubstantiation, varying, in this manner, from scriptural
and ecclesiastical antiquity, and diversified by the jarring opin-
ions of its patrons and the transformations of its God, varies
also from reason and common sense. Nothing, indeed, invented
by man ever equalled it in irrationality. The theory presents
the last test of human credulity, and the grand consummation
of unqualified absurdity. Search the vast range of religion
and philosophy; examine the wide amplitude of folly and
superstition; and you will find no other opinion so utterly in-
compatible with reason, so completely fraught with inconsistency,
and so entirely irreconcileable with common sense. The
whole system is like the fairy fiction of some visionary labour-
ing with nonsense, some speculator straining to invent an
absurdity, or some satirist resolved to ridicule the faith of its
partizans.
Transubstantiation varies from our ideas of matter and the
evidences of the senses, while it presents the absurdity of creat-
ing the Creator, and the horror of cannibalism in eating an
incarnated God. This dogma contradicts all our ideas of mate-
rial substances. Matter, it represents as divested of dimension,
figure, parts, impenetrability, motion, divisibility, extension,
locality, or quantity. Length, breadth, and thickness, accord-
ing to this theology, exist without any thing long, broad, or
thick. Matter exists without occupying space or time. Sub-
stance remains without accidents, and accidents without sub-
stance. The same body is in many places at the same time.
Jesus, at the same instant, is entire in heaven, on earth, and on
thousands of altars ; while millions of bodies are but one body.
A whole is equal to a part, and a part equal to a whole. A
whole human body is compressed into an host, and remains
entire and undivided in each often thousands hosts. The person
who can digest all these contradictions, must have an extraor-
dinary capacity of faith or credulity.
, This popish dogma also contradicts the information conveyed
by our senses. Sight, touch, taste, and smell declare flesh and
blood, if this tenet be true, to be bread and wine. No man can
see, feel, taste, or smell any difference between a consecrated
and unconsecrated wafer. The senses, not merely of one, but
of all men, even when neither the organ or medium is indisposed,
are, according to this theory deceived without any possibility
of detecting the fallacy. The senses too, in this case, are
acting in their own sphere and conversant about their peculiar
objects. Many subjects, such as the Trinity and the Incarna-
ABSURDITY OF TRANSUBSTANTIATIOtf. 4il9
lion, are beyond the grasp of our bodily senses and indeed of
human reason. These are to be judged by the testimony of
Revelation. But bread and wine are material, and level with
the view of our organs of perception. The sacramental
elements can be seen, smelled, touched, and tasted. Our
external organs, say the friends of transubstantiation, are, in
this institution, deceived in all men, at all times, and on all
occasions.
The patrons of this absurdity, driven from all other positions,
have recourse to the omnipotence of God. Almighty power is
a very convenient resource to the abettor of inconsistency in the
day of difficulty and confusion. This shield, the advocate of
absurdity opposes to all the assaults of reason and common sense.
Intrenched behind Omnipotence, he mocks the suggestions of
probability, and laughs at the artillery of the logician. But
even this plea will not support irrationality, or rescue its parti-
zans from the grasp of the dialectician. Scriptural language is
not to be explained so as to involve a frightful absurdity. The
patron of the corporeal presence, for the support of his fabrica-
tion, modestly requires God to work an inconsistency. But inr
eomprebensibility is to be distinguished from impossibility, and
mystery from contradiction. God works many things incom-
prehensible to man; but nothing which, in itself, is con-
tradictory. Omnipotence extends only to possibility, and
not to inconsistency, to things above, but not contrary to
reason.
The creation of the Creator, which, according to Urban,
Biel, and many others, is implied in this dogma, is another
deviation from common sense, and an inroad into the dominions
of blasphemy. ' The hands of the Pontiff,' said Urban in a
great Roman Council, 'are raised to an eminence granted to
none of the angels, of creating God the Creator of all things,
and of offering him up for the salvation of the whole world.'
This prerogative, adds the same authority, as it elevates the
pope above angels, renders pontifical submission to kings an
execration. To all this the Sacred Synod, with the utmost
unanimity, responded, Amen. 1
Biel extends this power to all priests. ' He that created- me,'
says the cardinal, 'gave me, if it be lawful to tell j to, create
himself.' JEis holiness not only manufactures his own God,
but transfers, with the utmost freedom and facility, the same
1 Dicens, nimis execrabile videri, ut manus, quse in tantam eminentiam excreve.
runt, quod nulli an^elorum concesaum est, ut Deum cuncta creantem sno signactllo
creent, et eundem ipsura pro saluti totius mundi, Dei Patris 'obtutibus offerant.
Etab omnibus acclamatum est 'Fiat, fiat.' Hoveden, ad Ann. 1099. P. 268.
Labb. 12. 960. Bruy, 2. 635.
27* ' '"
420 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
prerogative to the whole priesthood. This power, Biel, shews,
exalts the clergy, not only above emperors and angels ; but,
which is a higher elevation, above Lady Mary herself. ' Her
ladyship,' says the cardinal, ' once ^conceived the Son of God
and the Redeemer of the world j while the priest daily calls
into existence the same Deity.' 1 This is very clear. Her
ladyship effected only once, what the clergy repeat every day
or as often as they please : and these creators of God, therefore,
excel the Mother of God. These sacerdotal artizans have
established a manufactory on earth, in which they can, by the
easiest process and in the shortest time, forge new gods, or, at
least, new editions of the old one. Lady Mary, in this manner,
is the Mother of God, and the creating priest, in Urban's
system, is his father. \
The Deity, created in this manner, is a very convenient ar-
ticle. He may be deposited on the altar, put into the pocket,
carried in a box, swallowed down the throat, or used for more
detestable purposes. Pope Theodorus, in 648, anathematized
Pyrrhus the Monothelan Patriarch, and subscribed his condem-
nation with the consecrated wine, which, of course, was his in-
fallibility's God. This transaction was accompanied with all
that is calculated to strike the mind of superstition with terror,
The pontiff, standing at the tomb of the chief of the apostles,
called for the vivifying cup, and taking a drop from the living
blood of Jesus, signed, with his own hand, the excommunication
of Pyrrhus and all his communion. Gregory the Seventh, on
one occasion, committed the Host to the flames. The Council
of Constantinople, in 869, signed the condemnation of Photius
with a pen dipped in this transubstantiated God. The Emperor
Michael and Basil his chamberlain subscribed an oath for the
safety of Bardas on a Cretan expedition with the consecrated
wine, which was supplied, on the occasion, by Photius the
Byzantine patriarch ; and this engagement, Basil afterwards
violated. 2
The popish clergy, as they make, so they eat their God, and
transfer him to be dlevoured by others. The papist a lores the
God whom he eats, and eats the God whom he adores. This
divinity is tasted, masticated, swallowed, and, accidents ex-
cepted, digested. The partizan o'i popery, in this manner,
1 Qui creavit me, si fas est dicere, dedit raibi creare se. Semel concepit Dei
filium, eundem Dei filium advocant quotidie corporaliter. Biel, Lect. 4.
to Btiov itoitijpiov tx -fov <oorto?'ou atjuatfoj ton X
#Hpt, seaflaipsffw IIvppoD. Theopli. 219, 370.
Qtri jetta lasainte Hostie dans le feu. Bruy, 2. 472. Mabillon, 1. 407.
Tous les eveques souscriberent & ce decret, avec le sang de Jesus. Moren, 7.
201.
CANNIBALISM OF TRANSUBSTANTIATION. 421
i
worships and swallows a God of pastry, which, if made big
enough, would furnish a breakfast for himself or for his dog.
The manducation of the sacramental elements, if transub-
stantiation be true, makes the communicant the rankest cannibal.
The patron of the corporeal presence, according to his own
system, devours human flesh and blood : and, to show the
refinement of his taste, indulges in all the luxury of cannibalism.
He rivals the polite Indian, who eats the quivering limbs and
drinks the flowing gore of the enemy. The papist even
exceeds the Indian in grossness. The cannibals of America
or New Zealand swallow only the mangled remains of an
enemy, and would shudder at the idea of devouring any other
human flesh. But the partizans of Romanism glut themselves
with the flesh and blood of a friend. The Indian only eats the
dead, while the Papist, with more shocking ferocity, devours
the living. The Indian eats man of mortal mould on earth.
The Papist devours God-man, as he exists exalted, immortal,
and glorious in heaven. Papal exceeds even Egyptian stupidi-
ty. The Egyptians indeed worshipped sheep, oxen, garlic,
and onions. But even these deluded votaries of idolatry and
superstition, in all their barbarism and indelicacy, abstained
from eating the objects of their adoration. But the believer in
the corporeal presence at once worships and swallows, adores
and devours his Deity. This oral manducation would, shock-
ing to say, make Jesus more inhuman than Saturn. Saturn,
according to Pagan Mythology, devoured his own offspring.
Jesus, according to the , Popish theology, swallowed his own
flesh. He ate the consecrated bread and drank the hallowed
wine, which he administered to his apostles. Such are the
horrors which follow in the train of this absurdity.
This is the light in which the corporeal presence has been
vie wed, not only by Protestants, but also by Jews, Mahometans,
and Heathens. ' Christians,' said Crotus the Jew, * eat their
God.' I have travelled over the world, said Averroes the
Arabian philosopher, and seen many people ; but none so
sottish and ridiculous as Christians, who devour the God whom
they worship. 1 Cicero entertained a similar opinion. Whom,
said the Roman orator, do you think so demented as to believe
what he eats to be God ! 2 Roman philosophy shames and
confounds Romish theology.
Aimon, Lanfranc, Hugo, Durand, Aquinas, Bernard, Alcuin,
Pithou, Faber, Lyra, and the Trentine Catechism have indeed
1 Christian! comedunt Deuin suum. Dachery, 3. 60.
Qui adorent ce qu'ils mangent. Bayle, 1. 385. Perron, III. 29. Morery, 1.
754. Aquin. 3. 397. .
2 Ecquem tarn amentem esse putas, qui illud quo vescatur, Deum credat esse.
Cicero, De Natura. Deor. III.
422 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
endeavoured to gild the Cannibalism of Popery, 1 These
admit the horror of feeding on human flesh and blood in their
own forms. But the sacramental elements, say they, appear
under the species of bread and wine that conceal the human
substance, which, in consequence, becomes, these theologians
seem to think, a great delicacy.
The statements of these authors present a curious attempt to
disguise the grossness and inhumanity of eating human flesh.
Aimon, in Dachery, represents ' the taste and figure of bread
and wine as remaining in the sacrament, to prevent the horror
of the communicant.' Similar statements are found in Lan-
franc. According to this author, ' The species remain, lest
the spectator should be horrified at the sight of raw and bloody
flesh. The nature of Jesus is concealed and received for
salvation, without the horror which might be excited by blood.'
Hugo acknowledges that * few would approach the communion,
if blood should appear in the cup, and the flesh should appear
red as in the shambles. Hunger itself, which would be dis-
gusted at such bloody food.' Durand admits, that ' human
infirmity, unaccustomed to eat man's flesh, would, if the sub-
stance were seen, refuse participation.' Aquinas avows ' the
horror of swallowing human flesh and blood.' The smell, the
species, and the taste of bread and wine remain,' says the
sainted Bernard, 'to conceal flesh and blood, which, if offered
without disguise as meat and drink, might horrify human
weakness.' According to Alcuin in Pithou, ' Almighty God
causes the prior form to continue in condescension to the frailty
of man, who is unused to swallow raw flesh and blood.' The
1 Propter sumentium horrorem, sapor panis et vim remanet et figura. Aimon,
inDach. 1. 42.
Reservatis ipsarum rerum speciebus, et quibusdam aliis qualitatibus, ne percipi-
entes crada et cruenta horrerent. Lanfranc, 244.
Christi natura contegitur, et siue cruoris horrore a digne sumentibus in salutein
accepitur. Lanfraiic, 248.
Si cruor in calico fieret manifestos et si in macello Christi ruberet sua caro, rarus
in terns ille qui hoc non abhorreret. Hugo, de corp. 70.
Fragilitas humana, quae suis carnibus non consuevit vesci, ipso visa nihil hauriat,
quod horreat. Durand, in Lanfranc, 100.
Non est consuetum hominibus, horribilem camera hominis comedere et sangui-
netn bibere. Aquin. III. 75. V. P. 357.
Odor, species sapor, pond us reman ent, ut horror penitus tollatur, ne hamana in-
firmit&s escuin carnis et potum sanguiuis in sutnptione horreret. Bernard, 1682.
Oonsulens omnipotens Deus iufirmitati nostrae, qui non habetnus usum come-
dere camera crudam et sanguinem bibere, fecit ut in pristina remanens forma ilia
duo munera. Alcuia iu Pithou, 4.67.
Similitudinem preciosi sanguinis bibis, ut nullius horror cruoris, Pithou, 460.
Neque decuisset manducare carnem Christi sub propria forma. Faber, 1. 127.
Si daretur in propria specie et sicut lauiatur vel venditur in macello, quod esset
horribile. Lyra in Cossart, 4. 457.
A commuui hominnm natura maxime abhorreat humanae carnia esca, aut san-
guinis potione vesci, sapientissime fecit, ut sanctissimnm corpus et sanguis sub
earum rerum specie panis et vini nobis administraretur. Cat. Trid. 129.
CANNIBALISM OF TRANSTJBSTANTIATION. 423
partaker, says Pithou in the Canon Law, ' drinks the likeness
of blood, and therefore no horror is excited, nor any thing done
which might be ridiculed by pagans.' The statements of Faber
and Lyra are to the same effect. According to the Trentine
Catechism, ' the Lord's body and blood are administered under
the species of bread and wine, on account of man's horror of
eating and drinking human flesh and blood.' These descrip-
tions are shocking, and calculated, in some measure, to awaken
the horror which they pourtray. ,
The accidents, it appears, which remain after consecration,
are like sugar, which conceals bitter medicine from a child and
renders it pleasing and palatable. This is actually the simile of
Hugo. He compares the forms of the bread and wine to the
ingredients with which a physician would sweeten a bitter
draught for a squeamish patient. 1 Human flesh and blood,
clothed in this manner with the external appearance of bread
and wine, may, according to popish divinity, be swallowed
without any disgust or nausea j and with pleasure and good
taste. The apology, however, is a very silly device. The same
reason might excuse the Cannibals of New Zealand. The
American savage might mix human gore with other food, and
cover human flesh with something less offensive to the senses, so
as to disguise the outward appearance, and then glut his appetite
with a full meal. He would then enjoy the substance clothed
with another exterior. All this, however, would not exempt
the barbarian from the brutality of anthropophagy. The Rom-
anist, on the supposition of the corporeal presence, swallows
human flesh and blood as well as the Indian.
Algerus has suggested another reason for the manner, in
which the Lord's body is administered in the sacrament. 2 This
arises from a man's incapability of swallowing a human body
in its natural dimensions. The capacity of the mouth, the
learned divine seems to think, would not admit so large a
supply, which therefore could not be submitted to the action of
the teeth. The quantity would be too great for the expansion
of the jaws or the process of mastication. A whole human
crasis would, according to this author, exceed the powers of
deglutition. The throat, being too contracted for its object,
might fail at the swallow. But the substance being reduced
to the size of a wafer is managed with the utmost facility.
The whole, when enclosed in the host, goes down the gullet
with convenience, ease, and rapidity.
Transubstantiation exposes the popish deity to be devoured,
1 Sicut medicus fastidienti aegro austeram potionem per alienas dulcedines
temperando saporat. Hugo in Lanfranc, 70.
2 Du Pin, 2. 204.
424 THE VARIATIONS, OF POPERY.
not only by man, but also by the irrational animals. This
divinity may yield a rich repast to mice, rats, vermin, worms,
and every reptile that crawls on the earth. The smallest mouse,
says Bernard, sometimes gnaws the species of the bread. An
event of this kind proselyted Gage, author of the Survey, from
Romanism. A sacrilegious mouse sallied forth, seized, and, in
triumph, carried off the wafer God whom the priest had made.
The priest alarmed the people, who, distracted like Micah of
old about his Gods, began to search for the thief that had stolen
their Almighty. The malefactor, that committed the depreda-
tion, escaped. The God, however, was found, but mutilated
and mouse-eaten. The half-devoured Jehovah was carried in
procession about the church amidst joyful and solemn music. 1
The transaction was the means of showing Gage, though a
priest, the absurdity of his opinion, and teaching him a more
rational system.
1 Bernard, 1683. Gage, 197. Judges, xviii. 24.
CHAPTER XIV.
COMMUNION IN ONE KIND.
ITS CONTRARIETY TO SCRIPTURAL INSTITUTION CONCESSIONS ARGUMENTS ITS
CONTRARIETY TO THE USAGE OF THE EARLY AND MIDDLE AGES CONCESSIONS
ITS CONTRARIETY TO THE CUSTOM OF THE ORIENTAL CHRISTIANS ORIGIN OF
HALF-COMMUNION COUNCILS OF CONSTANCE AND BASIL INCONSISTENCY OF THE
CONSTANTIAN AND BASILIAN CANONS INCONSISTENCY OF THE BASILIAN ASSEM-
BLY WITH ITS OWN ENACTMENTS IS GRANTING THE CUP TO THE MORAVIANS
"AND BOHEMIANS COUNCIL OF TRENT OPPOSITION TO THE IRENTINE CANONS is
FRANCE, GERMANY, BOHEMIA, POLAND, AND HUNGARY.
COMMUNION in one kind, the child of transubstantiation, con-
sists in the administration of the sacramental bread only,
without the cup, to the laity and non-officiating clergy. Both
elements, indeed, are always consecrated and received by the
administrator. The sacrificial character of the institution,
according to papal theology, requires the distinct consecration
of the bread and the wine, in order to represent the separation
of the body and blood of the immolated victim. The officia-
ting priest participates in both species ; but the people only in
one. The cup, for the prevention of scandal and accidents, is
withheld from the laity. 1
Communion in one kind is contrary to Scriptural institution.
The Divine Institutor administered both the bread and the
wine to all who communicated : and commanded them to drink
as well as to eat. He neither dispensed the sacrament, nor
authorized its dispensation, under one form. 2
This, indeed, has been granted, in general, by popish doctors
and councils. Such is the admission of Pascal, Ragusa,
Bellarmine, Erasmus, Gibert, and Cajetan. These acknowl-
edge that. ' our Lord instituted the sacrament under both
species ;' and they have been followed, in. more modern times,
by Bossuet, Gother, Petavius, Challenor, Du Pin, and Milner.
The council of Constance makes a similar concession. The
Lord, according to this assembly, 'instituted the sacrament,
1 Labb. 16. 218. et 17. 317. et 20. 122. Paolo, VI. Bass. . 17. Gother, c. 21.
Challeuor, 52.
2 Matth. xxvi. 27. Mark, xiv. 23. 1 Oorin. xi. 28.
426 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY:
and administered it to his disciples in both elements of bread
and wine.' The admission of the Trentine Synod, which
acknowledges ' our Lord's administration of each species in
the original institution,' is to the same purpose. 1
But these theologians and synods, notwithstanding their
concessions, have urged the propriety of half-communion. Their
attempts at proof, however, in which they endeavour to throw
obscurity over a plain subject, and to puzzle, xvhen they cannot
reason, are of the most awkward and contemptible kind. This
question was discussed in a general congregation at Trent ; and
the arguments used on the occasion supply a specimen of the
most egregious sophistry, trifling, and dissension that ever dis-
graced the annals of theology.
The manna in the wilderness, said these precious divines,
which, under the Jewish dispensation, prefigured the sacramental
bread, was used without wine. The Hebrew, wandering in
the desert, was destitute of wine, and had to be contented with
water from the rock : and, therefore, according to Trentine
logic, the sacramental bread, under the Christian establishment,
is, notwithstanding Christ's precept and example to the contrary,
to be administered without the accompaniment of the cup. One
cannot sufficiently admire the clearness and cogency of the
Trentine dialectics.
The Jewish laity, according to the same theologians, were
permitted to eat the flesh of the sacrificed animals ; but not, on
the occasion, to drink the offered wine. The priesthood, on the
contrary, were allowed both the meat arid drink. The Chris-
tian clergy, therefore, according to the infallible fathers, may
use both the sacramental elements ; whilst the laity, notwith-
standing our Lord's command, are entitled only to one.
The Old Testament afforded the sacred synod a third proof
and illustration. Jonathan, when in pursuit of the enemy,
tasted honey from the top of his staff; but had nothing, on the
occasion, to drink. The honey which the Hebrew prince found
in the wood, was unaccompanied with wine : and, therefore,
the bread in the communion is, with respect to the laity and
even the non-administering clergy, to be disconnected with the
cup. 2
These and a few other instances that might be added, afford
1 Per se panem, per se vinum, ab ipso Domino traditum. Pascal, Ep. 32. Labb.
12. 999. Ghristus in coena sub duplici specie tradidit. Ragusa in Labb. 17. 865.
Christus instituit sub duplici specie. Bell. IV. 4. Praeter auctoritatem Scriptural
Divine dirnidium ejus sacramenti subtraherent laicis. Erasm. Con. Mon. 1066.
Gibert, 3. 331. Cajetan in Aquin. 3. 393.
Christus instituit et suis discipulis administravit sub utraque specie, panis et
vini, hoc venerabile sacramentum. Labb. 16. 218. Dominus hoc sacramentum
in panis et vini speciebus instituit. Labb. 20. 122.
- * Paolo, 2. 205. Eatius, 1. 330.
POPISH ARGUMENTS FOR "COMMUNION IN ONE KIND. 427
a specimen of the understanding and intelligence manifested by
the Trentine doctors. The bishops, who seem to have possessed'
rather more common sense than the divines, became weary of
the discussion. The episcopal patience was fairly exhausted
by the tedious balderdash and prolix .verbosity of the theological
orators. Courayer, on Paolo, admits the vexatious and provok-
ing weakness of the arguments used at Trent by the learned
doctors.
The statements of the Trentine divines were as discordant
as they were nonsensical. Each had his own opinion, which,
however foolish or unfounded, he held with the utmost pertin-
acity. The spirit of faction also actuated the learned doctors.
One party, consisting of sixty-three divines, attacked the different
opinions of the rest without discrimination or mercy. The
theological gladiators, in this manner, displayed the unity of
Romanism in the holy council by unwearied altercation, diversity,
and debate.
Gerson, followed by Bossuet, resolves the contrariety- in the
Scriptural and Popish manner of administration by summoning
ecclesiastical exposition to their aid. Divine Revelation, which
is the rule of faith, admits, according to this author, ' some
interpretation.' Bossuet and a thousand other Romish doctors
sing to the same tune, and subject the Lord's expression to the
arbitrary explanation of the church or popish hierarchy. 1
This kind of theological alchemy is an easy mode of trans-
forming Revelation and removing a difficulty. Gerson and
Bossuet had only to assume, as right, the gloss of the popish
hierarchy, which these doctors dignify with the name of the
church. But assumption is no proof. The principle, asserted
by Gerson and Bossuet, would if admitted, substitute the com-
mandments of men for the Revelation of heaven, and like the
traditions of the Jewish Rabbins, ' make the word of God of
none effect.' The gloss, in this case, would make the inspired
language mean the direct contrary of what it says. The Scrip-
tural expression enjoins the use of the cup on all, clergy and
laity ; while the popish interpretation would restrict it to the
priesthood, to the utter exclusion of the people.
The council of Trent, differing from Gerson and Bossuet,
arrogated, for the church, the power, not only of convenient and
accommodating explanation, but also, retaining the substance,
of changing and ordaining the mode of administration, accord-
ing to the variety of circumstances, times, and places. This
extraordinary position, the unerring doctors attempted to evince
by a quotation from the book of inspiration. The apostle calls
1 Gerson in Du Pin, 3. 49. Bossuet, Expo. . 17.
428 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
the administrators of this institution, " the ministers of Christ
and the stewards of the mysteries of God." The sacred synod
must have been at a woful loss for an argument, when they
adduced this citation, which, instead of supporting, overthrows
their whole system. A minister or steward possesses no
authority to violate the instructions of his master. His duty,
on the contrary, is to execute the commands of his Lord, who
has a right to exact obedience. Pope Pascal, accordingly, in
reference to this sacrament, declared that ' it is necessary for
the faithful servant always to obey his Lord, nor to depart, by
a human and novel institution, from the precept and example
of Christ his master :' and the hierarch, in consequence, en-
joined entire communion on the whole church. Similar laws
were enacted by Leo, Gelasius, and Urban. 1 The salutary
directions of these pontiffs, had they been followed, would have
prevented a world of superstition.
Challenor, Arsdekin, and many other doctors endeavour to
remove the difficulty by another process. All to whom the cup,
at the time of institution, was presented, were not laymen, but
priests : and the use of the wine by the clergy affords no ex-
ample for its distribution to the laity. 2 But this argument, if it
prove any thing, proves too much, and evinces that neither
elements is to be dispensed to the people. The bread as well as
the wine, at the first celebration of this institution, was given
only to the apostles ; and Challenor, therefore, might as well
infer that the former as that the latter are to be withheld from
the laity.
The apostles, on this occasion, even on popish principles,
represented the people. Their office, when they did not act in
a sacerdotal capacity, could give them no title to whole com-
munion. The lay communicants and the non-officiating clergy,
in this respect are, according to the general councils of Con-
stance, Basil, and Trent, precisely on an equality. These
councils allow the cup only to the consecrating priest, and with-
hold it from the clergy, when they do not administer, as well as
from the people. Challenor himself declares that ' no priest,
bishop or pope, even on his death-bed, when not saying mass,
receives otherwise than in one kind.' Another catechist states
that ' there is no priest, though in the most exalted degree, but
in private communion, receives as others do, in one kind.'
But the apostles, at the appointment of the sacrament, per-
formed no official part in the ceremony. The Son of God, in
1 Necesse est Domino servus fidelis obtemperet, nee ab eo quod Christus magis-
ter et praecepit et gessit humana et novella institutione, diceditur. Labb. 12. 199.
Du Pin, 2. 286. Mabillon, 6. 13. Bin. 7. 507.
s Challenor, 52. Arsdekin, c. 5. . :
POPISH ARGUMENTS FOB COMMUNION IN ONE KIND. 429
person, blessed and distributed the elements. He alone, there-
fore, according to the popish usage, was entitled to both kinds ;
while the rest, as they did not consecrate, could, notwithstand-
ing their office, partake only of one element. The Divine
Institiitor, therefore, showed little respect for the future councils
of Constance, Basil, and Trent; or rather, these councils, in
their retrospective canons, manifested little deference for the
Divine Institutor. Our Lord, contrary to these sacred synods,
comimnded and exemplified whole , communion, with respect
to ail who partook of the sacrament. 1
The patrons of half-communion argue from the name, which,
they suppose, is sometimes given to this institution in the New
Testament. This ordinance, it has been alleged, Luke in his
gospels and in the Acts, calls " the breaking of bread," without
any mention of the cup. But this language, if it refer to the
sacrament, must be synecdochal. A part must be put for the
whole. The wine as well as the other element, must, even on
popish principles, have been consecrated and received, at least
by the administrator. Consecration and reception in both
kinds is indispensable, as has been shown by Boileau, Bellar-
mine, Bossuet, Challenor, and Milner. Valentia characterized
consecration in one kind as sacrilege ; and the Jesuit's sentence,
Mondolfo, an Augustinian, averred at the council of Trent, to
be consentaneous with all the doctors and the whole church.
The person, therefore, who invented this sophism, as well as
those who have adopted it, must have been at a miserable loss
for an argument. Their situation must have been like a
drowning man, who, in the moment of desperation and ex-
tremity, will catch at a straw or a, shadow.
Milner and many other advocates of half-communion, argue
from Paul's words to the Corinthians, " whosoever shall eat
this bread and drink this cup." This phrase, Milner would
render, " whosoever shall eat this bread OR drink this cup;"
ami he accuses protestants of mistranslation. The distributive
or, indeed, is the usual version of the original term. But the
Alexandrian and Royal manuscripts, as well as the Syriac,
Arabic, and JEthiopic versions, and some ancient editions of
the hn Tin Vulgate, agree, according to Bengelius, Wetstein,
and Whitby, with our translation. The same may be said of
Clemens, Cyril, and Athanasius. The disjunctive, besides, is
often, in Greek, equivalent to the copulative. Mark's expres-
sion, " and who gave thee this authority," is, in Luke, according
1 L>ihb. 17. 370. et 20. 122. Challenor, 55.
*' Luke xxiv. 30. Acts ii. 42. et xx. 7. Si enim ana species absqne altera con.
ficiatiir, sacrilegium committnr. Boileau, c. 13. Du Pin, 3. 550. Bellarmin, iv.
4. Challenor, 52. Milner, 316.
430 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
to the original, "or who gave thee this authority." Matthew's
diction, " the law or the prophets," is, in Luke, agreeable to
the Greek, " the law and the prophets." Paul, addressing the
Romans, says, "to Abraham or his seed ;" but to the Galatians,
the Apostle says, "to Abraham and his seed." Many other
examples of the kind might be added. The copulative con-
junction, in like manner, is used by Paul to the Corinthians in
the preceding and two following verses : and this shows that
the intermediate expression is to be taken in the same sense. 1
Half-communion is contrary, not only to scriptural institu-
tion, but also to the usage of the early and middle ages. A
host of fathers might be summoned to testify for the whole
communion of primitive times. From these may be selected
the unquestionable authority of Ignatius, Justin, Chrysostom,
and Jerome. 2 ' One bread,' says Ignatius, ' is broken, and
one cup distributed to all.' ' The deacons,' says Justin, 'give
to every one present to partake of the blessed bread and wine.'
Chrysostom's attestation is to the same effect. ' One body and
one cup,' says the Grecian saint, ' is presented to all.' Accord-
ing to Jerome, 'the priests who administer the communion,
divide the Lord's blood among the people.'
The authority of Ignatius, Justin, Chrysostom, and Jerome
evinces the integrity of communion in the Christian common-
wealth for 400 years. Their testimony is clear and express :
and might be corroborated by the evidence of many others,
such as Dionysius, Irenaeus, Cyprian, Cyril, and Augustine.
The usage of later ages will appear from Leo, Gelasius, Urban,
and Pascal. 3
Pope Leo, in 44-3, commanded the Manicheans, who refused
the sacramental cup, to be excommunicated. This denomina-
tion abhorred wine, which they called 'the gall of the dragon;'
^Cor.-xi. 27. Milner, 318. Bengel. 6. 70. Wetstein.2. 149. Whitby, 2. 193.
Clem. Srnm. I. P. 318. Lyra, 5. 51. Walton, 5. 704. Mill, 2. 381. Mark xi.
28. et Luke xx. 2. Matt v. 17. et Luke xxiv. 44. Rom. iv. 13. et Gal. iii. 16.
2 'Ev jtottjpiov tfoij oTiotj ^avf^dtj. Ignat. ad Philad. Cotel. 2. 77. Ataxovot
SiSoaaw Ixacrrw "fov rtapovtov [is-ta&afietv arto tov sv%apia'ft}9fv'fof aptov xat
oiyov* Justin, Ap. P. 96. Haaiv v aa/ia rfpoxstt'cu. xat, tv rtotqpiov* Chrysos. 10.
568. Horn. 18. in 2 Cor. Sacerdotes eucharistise eerviunt et sanguinem Domini
popnlis ejus dividunt. .Terom. 3. 1671. in Sophon. c. 3.
3 Sanguinem redemptions nostrje haurire omnino declinent. Deprehensa fuerit
Sacrilega sirnulatio, notati et proditi a sanctorum societate sacerdotali autoiitate
pellantur. Leo, Serm. 4. Bin. 3. 618. Labb. 5. 283.
Divisio unius ejusdemque mysterii sine grandi sacrilegio non potest provenire.
<5elasius in Pithou, 454. Aquin. Ill 80. XI. P. 393. Baron. 496. XX. Bruy. 1. 265.
Corpus Dominicum et sanguis Dominicus singulatim accipiatur. Urban in
Oderic, VI. Labb. 12. 897, 896, 905. Mabillon, 6. 13.
Novimus per se panem, per se vinum ab ipso Domino traditum, quern morem sic
semper in saucta ecclesia conservandum doc emus et praecipimus. Pascal, Ep. 32.
Labb. 12. 999. Mabillon, 6. 13. II ordonne de donner ^ la communion les deux
especes separement. Bruy. 2. 593. - -
HALF COMMUNION NOT KNOWN IN THE EARLY AGES. 431
but. attended the holy mystery to conceal their infidelity ; and,
in consequence, were the first that practised half-communion.
Their disconformity, by which they were discovered, Leo
termed ' sacrilegious dissimulation,' and ordered them to be
expelled, by sacerdotal authority, from Christian society.
Communion in one species, which distinguished, this sect from
other Christians, his holiness accounted a sacrilege worthy of
excommunication.
Pope Gelasius, on a similar occasion, in 495, used still
stronger and more explicit language. These men, said, his holi-
ness in the end of the fifth century, partook of the sacred body ;
but actuated by superstition, rejected the sacred blood. The
hierarch enjoined the entire observance or the entire relinquish-
ment of the institution ; because ' the division of one and the
same mystery could not be effected without great sacrilege. 7
His infallibility, in prospective anticipation, denounced the
future defalcation in the mystery as sacrilege and superstition :
and by his pontifical authority, enacted that the sacrament
should be celebrated in both kinds.
Aquinas avers that Gelasius, in this instance, addressed only
the clergy. He condescends, however, to give no reason for
his assertion. Baronius, on the contrary, admits that the pontiff
makes no mention of the clergy, to whom, therefore, the words,
which are general, should not be confined. The Roman cardi-
nal styles the angelic doctor's account a frigid solution of the ,
difficulty. Binius, also, differing from Aquinas, represents the -
pontiff's enactment as a mere temporary expedient, adopted
for a short period, on account of the present exigence, and con-
trary to former usage, which was afterwards to be resumed.
This statement, like the other, is a mere assumption without
evidence. The two, disagreeing in opinion, agree in substitu-
ting affirmation for proof. Cassander grants that the deter-
minations of Leo and Gelasius are conclusive for the antiquity
of entire communion. The language of these pontiffs, indeed,
is general, and cannot, without the utmost violence, be restric-
ted to the priesthood.
Urban, in 1095, presiding with his cardinals in the council of
Clermont, consisting of 238 bishops, with a multitude of abbots
and other persons, followed Leo and Gelasius. This pontiff", in
a synod more numerous than the generality of universal coun-
cils, commanded ' the separate reception of the Lord's body and
blood.' According to his infallibility, ' no person, except in
cases of necessity, is to communicate at the altar, but must
partake separately of the bread and wine.' Baronius and
Binius suppose that this canon was issued against Berengarius,
who, these authors allege, interdicted the use of the cup.
432 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
This, however, Berengarius never attempted : and if he had,
he would only have anticipated an unerring communion, and
his prohibition, which would then have been heresy, would
now be Catholicism. Marca and Mabillon, therefore, in dia-
metrical opposition to Baronius and Binius, have shown that
Urbnn's injunction was directed against intinction, and was
published before the introduction of half-communion into the
Romish form of dispensation.
Pope Pascal, so late as 1118, issued enactments on this
topic, similar to those of Leo, Gelasius, and Urban. ' Our Lord
himself snid the hierarch, ' dispensed the bread and the wine,
each by itself; and this usage we teach and command the
holy Church always to observe.' But Popish Christendom
soon learned to disregard his infallibility's injunctions as well
as our Lord's example.
The determinations of Roman pontiffs are corroborated by
the acknowledgements of popish theologians and councils.
Such have been the concessions of Bellarmine, Baronius, Lyra,
Erasmus, Cajetan, Courayer, Cassander, and Petavius. 1 The
ancient church, say Bellarmine, Baronius, and Lyra, celebrated
this institution in both kinds. Erasmus represents half com-
munion as contrary to the ancient ecclesiastical custom. The
ancients, according to Cajetan and Courayer, made no differ-
ence, on this point, between the priesthood a.nd the people ;
but admitted both to the participation of the wine as well as of
the other element. Cassander, among other strong expressions,
avers that the person who has the hardihood to deny this fact
must possess an abundant stock of effrontery. Similar admis-
sions have been made by Bona, Salmeron, Valentia, Alphonsus,
Lindfin, Aquinas, La Cerda, Vasquesius, and whole files of
other popish divines and historians.
The concessions of councils, on this point, correspond with
those of theologians. Similar acknowledgments have been made
by the Councils of Constance, Basil, and Trent. 2 The General
Council of Constance, in its thirteenth session, grants that ' the
1 Ecclesia vetus rniuistrabfit sub dnplici specie. Bell. IV. 4. Fideleeo liin in
ecolesiH sub ntraque specie, pauis et vini communicarunt. Baron. 57. XLTV. In
primitiva ecclesin, populus sub utraque specie communicarunt. Lyrain Labi). 17.
874. Brnsm. Con. Mon. 1066. Tune populus communicavit sub utraque specie.
Cajetan in Aquin. 3. 395. L'ancienne eglise n' ajamais mis aucune distinction sur
ce point eutre les pretres et les laiques. Couray. in Paolo, 2. 206. Nbn putem
pllquera paulo cordatiorem tarn impudentem esse. Cassan. Ep. 25. In prima
impudentinm hominutn classe. Petavins, c. 5.
2 In primitiva ecclesia hujusmodi sacramentiim reciperetur a fidelibus sub utraque
specie. Labb. 16. 218. Ab ecclesia et sanctis patribus rationabiliter introducta,
et hacteuus diutissime observata. Labb. 17. 370. Lenfant, 2. 70. Ab initio
Christiana; religionis non infrequens utriusque epeciei usus fuit ; tamen progressu
temporis latissime jam mutatailla coasuetudine. Labb. 20. 122. Gibert, 3. 331.
Thuam. 2. 251.
COMMUNION IN ONE KIND NOT PRACTISED IN THE EAST. 433
faithful, in the primitive church, received this sacrament in each
kind. This language is clear, express, and decisive.
The general Council of Basil in its thirtieth session acknow-
ledged that half communion was an innovation. The Basilians
called this retrenchment a rational and praiseworthy custom,
introduced by the church and holy fathers, and observed for a
long lapse of time.' The usage, which, in this manner was in-
troduced, though at a distant date, into Christendom, was later
in its commencement than the era of redemption.
The general Council of Trent, in its twenty-first session,
admitted the same in still clearer language. According to this
convention, ' both elements were often used from the beginning
of the Christian religion; but, in process of time, this usage
was changed, for just and weighty reasons.' The sacred synod
here expressly acknowledges the former use and posterior
retrenchment of the sacramental cup.
The half-communion of the Latins, varying, in this manner,
from all antiquity, is also a variation from the custom of all
other Christians, Eastern and Western, at the present day.
The Greeks, Nestorians, Jacobites, Armenians, and Syrians,
all these, in word and deed, deprecate the popish mutilation of
the sacrament. Some, as the Armenians, use intinction ; and
others, as the Greeks, administer the two elements mixed in a
spoon. But all consider both as necessary, in some way, for
the institution. The Western Waldensians agreed on this
subject, with several oriental denominations : and these again
have been followed by the friends of protestantism, dispersed
through the world. 1
The only denomination of antiquity who practised half-com-
munion, were the Manicheans, from whom the Latins seem to
have adopted it. The advocates of Catholicism appear to have
copied the error from the adherents of heresy. Leo and Gela-
sius in the fifth century denounced the system as sacrilege and
superstition, and excommunicated its partizans. 2 Their succes-
sors, at a future day, transferred the heresy, with all its accom-
panying anathemas, into the theology of Romanism.
The Manicheans and Latins, however, in the rejection of the
cup, were actuated by different reasons. The conduct of the one
proceeded from deep abhorrence ; but of the other, from exces-
sive veneration, for the sacramental wine. The Manicheans
accounted wine the gall of the dragon, and refused to drink.
The Latins reckoned it the blood of the Messiah, and relin-'
_ J Eamdem quam reliqui omnes in Oriente Christian!. Renaudot,2. 614. Paolo,
II. More, 199. Godeau, 1.. 274, 275. Labb. 12. 905, 906.
- A sumptione calicis superstitiose abstinebant. Bin. 3. 618. Labb. 5. 283.
Aquinas, 3. 393. Bruy. 1. 224, 265.
28
434 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
guished its use through fear of profanation, effusion, or other
accidents. The two extremes, in this instance as in many
others, met. Half-communion is the child of transubstantiation,
and was the consequence of the superstitious dread or horror
which men began to harbour for the supposed blood of
Emmanuel.
This mutilation of the sacrament entered Christendom by
slow progressive steps. These steps were intinction, suction,
and then half-communion. Intinction, which consisted in
dipping the bread in the wine before its presentation to
the communicant, entered at an early date. The council
of Braga, in 575, condemned this superstition, which had so
soon begun to infest the Christian commonwealth. Micrologus
wrote against this error, which had become frequent in the
eleventh century : and Urban, in the Council of Clermont,
issued an enactment against this superstitious mode of com-
munion. 1
The second step to the defalcation of the cup consisted in suc-
tion. Pipes or quills were annexed to the chalice, through
which the devout communicant sucked the wine, or, as it was
tljen thought, the blood, with great piety and precision. These
sacred tubes were commonly made of silver,x as they were the
channels through which, as was alleged, flowed the blood of
Emmanuel. 2
The design of this ecclesastical instrument was to prevent
the spilling of the Divine fluid, or the irreverent intrusion of the
men's beards. Its introduction, however, must have thrown
an air of ridicule over the whole scene. The act of sucking,.
practised in this manner, could only tend to burlesque the
institution, provoke the satirist to laugh, and cover the whole
ceremony with contempt. The mummery*of the mass, indeed,
has, in every age been a ludicrous spectacle. An apostle or
primitive Christian, could he lift his head from the grave and
behold such an exhibition of folly, would be wholly at a loss to
unriddle its meaning : and, if informed of its design must be
filled with indignation at the parody on the Divine ordinance,
and with pity for the deluded, but ridiculous votary of
superstition.
The era of half-communion can be ascertained with facility
and precision. No vestige of it appears in the annals of the
twelfth or any preceding century. Anno 1095, the council of
Clermont enjoined the separate dispensation of the bread and
Labb. 7. 580 et 12. 832, 1000. Micrologus, c. 26. Mabillon, 6. 13.
* Brat fistula, qua sanguis Christ! a. communicantibus hauriebatur. Du Gauge,
2. 167. Mabillon, 4. 496. Pugillaris quibus sanguis a Dominico calice exuge-
batur. Du Conge, 5.963. On se servit de chalumeaux comme on faisoit autrefois
dans 1'egliae Eomaine. Paolo, 2. 214.
INTRODUCTION OF COMMUNION" IN ONE KIND. 43'5
wine to the people. Pascal, in 1118, enacted a similar regula-
tion. Bernard, who flourished in the middle of the twelfth ceii-
tury, writing expressly on the subject of the Lord's supper,
stated ' the form of administration,' which, in his account, ' com-
prehended bread and wine, dispensed separately and received
by the people.' 1 The retrenchment, therefore, was unknown in
his day. The Saint of Clairvaux, in all his stores of knowledge,
had heard nothing of this innovation.
The integrity of the sacrament in the twelfth century, has
been acknowledged by Mabillon and Mezeray. Whole commu-
nion, says Mabillon, flourished without any change in the year
1121. "He fixes the introduction of the mutilation .in the
middle of the twelfth age. But its use, at that time, could ex-
tend only to a few instances. According to Mezeray, ' the
Seople communicated in both kinds, in the twelfth century.'
imilar concessions have been made by Bona, Cassander, Peta-
vius, Marca, Gourayer, Valentia, and other Romish authors. 2
Communion in one kind was the child of the thirteenth cen-
tury. The deformity was ushered into life at this era, and,
nourished by the belief of transubstantiation, the superstition
of the human mind, and the dread of profaning the supposed
blood of God, soon grew from feeble infancy to full maturity.
Its reception was partial in the begining of the age; but
extended towards its close, through nearly the whole of popish
Christendom.
Its origin and spread, during this period, appear from the
testimony of Bouaventure and Aquinas. Bona venture, who
died in 1274, mentions its introduction ' into some churches'.'
Aquinas, Bonaventure's contemporary, makes a similar state-
ment. According to both these saints, its observance was not
universal, but restricted, and did not extend to the whole, but
only to a part. Marca, in consequence, remarks that ' the use
of one sacramental emblem did not simultaneously invade all
the Occidental churches.' Some received it at an earlier and
others at a later period. Aquinas, says Marca, was consulted
on .the propriety of this usage : and on his answer in the affir-
mative, all with emulation embraced the novelty. 3
1 Formse prsescriptio in pane et vino. Seorsum panem, seorsum tradens et
vinum. Bernard, in Coen. Dom. 1679. Caro Christi et sanguis, qui in altari a
fidelibus sumitur. Bernard in Coen. Dom. Serm. 14. p. 1360. Du Pin, 2. 233.
Mabillon, 6. 13. LaTbb. 12. 999. '
3 Communionem sub utraque specie adhucimmutabiliterviguisse, anno MG XXL
Communio sub utraque specie jam desierat medio saeculo duodecimo. Mabillon,
6. 14. On communioit encore en ce temps la sous lea deux especes. Mazeray,
2. 679, 680. Bona, II. 18. Petar. c. 5. Marca, in Labb. 12. 905. Couray. in
Paol.2. 208. Velen.c.lO. :
3 _ Adhuc in aliquibus ecclesiis servatum, ut solus sacerdos communicet sanguine ;
reliqui vero corpore. Bonaven. in John VI. In quibusdam ecclesiis observatnr,
28*
4:36 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
This usage, adopted by the people, was afterward established
by the Councils of Constance, Basil, and Trent. ' This reason-
able custom, introduced by the church and very long observed,'
the General Council of Constance, in its thirteenth session,
enacted into a law, and denounced all its impugners as heretics,
who should be punished by the diocesans, their officials, and
the inquisition.' 1 The space which the council accounted very
long from its adoption by the church, was about 200 years.
The Constantian council in its decision, declared the reason-
ableness of curtailing the wine in the communion of the laity.
These reasons, which are ludicrous rather than convincing,
have been enumerated by Gerson, Ragusa, and the council of
Trent.. The expense of wine sufficient for such multitudes of
people ; the danger of spilling it at the altar, or in carrying it
over fields, woods, and mountains, to the sick ; the fear of
contamination in dirty vessels, or by the touch of the laity ; its
liability to sour and become vinegar, and by this means to
occasion idolatry ; its tendency to putrefy and produce flies
and worms; the disgust which might arise from so many
drinking out of the same cup ; the dread of the holy fluid's
freezing and becoming ice ; the apprehension of the men's beards
dipping in daring and unseemly irreverence into the sacred
liquor, which Was accounted the blood of Emmanuel; all
these reasons and several others, were urged in favour of the
retrenchment. 2
The reasons are better fitted to provoke laughter, than to
produce conviction. But the Cardinal of Angelo adduced a
reason which is shocking rather than ridiculous. The cardinal,
in a Roman consistory, and without any reprehension from his
holiness, declared that ' the sacramental wine, if administered
to laymen, is poison rather than medicine ; and that the death
of the patient would be better than his recovery effected by such
a remedy.' Francisco, a Jesuit, urged similar blasphemy in a
general congregation at the council of Trent. ' Satan,' the
Jesuit averred, ' was tempting the synod to grant the people a
cup of poison, under the appearance of the Lord's blood.' 3
The enactment of Constance was renewed and confirmed at
ut populo siimendiis sanguis non detur. Aquinas, III. 80. XII. Consuetude ilia
unius symbol! non statim invasit omnes ecclesias occidentis. Marca, in Labb. 12.
905.
1 Hujusmodi consuetude habenda eat pro lege, quam non licet reprobare. As-
serentes oppositum, tanquam > hseretici arcendi sunt, et graviter puniendi per
dioecesanos locorum seu officiales eorum, aut inquisitores ha?reticae pravitatis.
Labb. 16.218.
2 Ragusa in Labb. 17. 883. Paolo, 2. 212. Du Pin, 3. 552. Arsdekin, 1. 223.
z II ne donneroit jamais pour medicine aux Francois un calice rempli de poison.
Paolo, 2. 117. Satan faissoit presentement presenter au people une coupe de
poison sous le voile du calice. Paolo, 2. 212.
INCONSISTENCY OF THE BASILIAN COUNCIL WITH ITSELF. 437
Basil. The general council, in 1437, in its thirtieth session,
* denied the obligation of the laity or non-officiating clergy, by
any divine command, to partake in both kinds ; admitted the
profitableness of communion, in each way, to the worthy, accor-
ding to the institution and observance of the church ; and estab-
lished by law the custom of participating in one element.' 1
The Basilians varied from the Constantian decision. The Con-
stantians denounced as heresy, what the Basilians represented
as agreeable to the institution of the church* The former ex-
communicated as obnoxious to punishment and the inquisition,
those whom the latter described as worthy of communion and
salvation. The one authorised as Catholicism, what the other
condemned as heresy.' 2
The Basilians differed from themselves, as well as from the
Constantians. 3 The sacred synod, notwithstanding their own
decision, granted the participation of the cup to the Bohemians
and Moravians. This indeed became, in some measure, a
matter of necessity. Mathias, Jacobel, and Huss had, at the
hazard of martyrdom, taught and established whole communion
in the kingdom of Bohemia. Determined to maintain -their
freedom, and headed by Zisca, the ablest general, though blind,
that ever took the field, the brave Bohemians withstood all the
temporal and spiritual artillery of the popedom ; and extorted
by force, the concession which was refused to reason. The
integrity of the sacrament, which the Basilians allowed the
Bohemians, was a violation of their own law, issued in favour
of half-communion.
This subject, on which the councils of Constance and Basil
had decided, came before the council of Trent in its twenty-first
session. The Trentine discussion, poll, and canons, on this
topic, as delineated by the pens of Paolo and Du Pin, opened a
scene of diversity, contention, chicanery, and folly, unequalled
in all the annals of the Reformation, or in the records of any
assembly, civil, ecclesiastical, or literary. \
The Trentine discussion of this question exhibited all the
charms of variety. The divines, in a general congregation,
wrangled in endless altercation, and exhausted the patience of
the bishops. A faction of sixty-three doctors opposed the opi-
nions of all the rest. The prelates differed like the theologians.
Cardinal Mandruccio argued in the council for the restoration
of the cup, and was followed by the bishops of Otranto, Praga,
Coimbra, Modena, Leria, and Ossimo. The patriarchs of
Aquileia, Venice, and Jerusalem, supported the contrary, and
1 Sive .sub uha specie, sive sub duplici quiscomnmnicet, secundum ordinationem
seu oYiservantiam ecclesias, proficit digue coramutiicantibus ad salutem. Labb.
17.370. s Bruy. 4. 119. s Labb. 17. 1271. Lenfant, 2. 42.
438, THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY C
were followed by the bishops of Rossano, Philadelphia, Lava,
Braga, Leon, Almeria, Lugo, and Imola. Fifty, possesssing
the greatest intelligence and piety, advocated a return to the
primeval usage. This the Spanish and Venetians, actuated
by Various motives, opposed with the utmost obstinacy. 1
This diversity in the discussion was succeeded by equal vari-
ety in the poll. A hundred and forty-six voted. Twenty-nine
voted for the restoration of the cup, and thirty-eight against it.
Fourteen were for deferring the decision, and ten for sending a
delegation to Germany, to investigate the subject. Twenty-
four would refer the question to the pontiff, and thirty-one to
the prelacy. 2
The majority that voted against the restoration of the cup,
was changed into a minority by legatine cabal and finesse.
The legates, who wished to refer all to the pope, engaged
Lamellino and Visconto to use their influence for this purpose
with the opposition. The patriarchs yielded to the address 'of
the two bishops, and drew with them the Venetians, who were
numerous. Their plans, in consequence, succeeded, and a
discretionary power of granting or refusing the cup to the laity
was vested in the Roman pontiff. The majority of an unerring
synod, in this manner, issued a decision, which was afterward
reversed by a minority, augmented by intrigue into a majority. 3
The Trentine canons, notwithstanding the jarring debate and
suffrage, were strong and express in favour of half-communion.
The infallible assembly declared the lawfulness and validity of
participation in one species, the illegality of rejecting the syno-
dal sentence or attributing error to the church, and cursed, as
usual, all who dissented. Divided among themselves, and
changing their decisions at the nod of the pontiff, or the cabals
of the prelacy, the holy synod launched its anathemas, with the
most liberal profusion, against all who should suspect them of
error or resist their tyranny. 4
The popish priesthood and people, dispersed through the
European nations, were, like those which met at Trent, divided
in their opinions. Spain and Italy dissented from France, Ger-
many, Bohemia, Poland, and Hungary. The Spanish and Ita-
lians were against the restoration of the sacramental cup. The
application for this purpose, the Spanish and Italian clergy
opposed with all their oratory and influence in the Roman con-
sistory and council of Trent : and even stigmatized the French
1 Paolo, 2. 264, 265. Du Pin, 3. 544570.
2 Du Pin, 3. 568, 569.
3 Totum negotium ad Pontificem retulit. Thuan. XXXIII. 1. Paolo, 2. 290.
4 Ecclesia hanc consuetudinem sub altera specie communicandi approbavit, et
pro lege habendam decrevit. Labb. 20. 122, 123. Gibert, 3. 331.
OPPOSITION TO THE TRENTINE CANONS. 439
and Germans, who solicited the return of this privilege, with
the imputation of heresy. 1
The French king, clergy, and people, on the contrary, insist-
ed on the integrity of the sacrament. The king of France, in
1561, requested this favour for himself and his subjects. The
petition was afterward renewed at Trent. The French sover-
eign supplicated the renewal of the law of Leo and Gelasius,-.
which enacted the use of both elements in the communion,
The petition, indeed, was rejected ; but it showed, nevertheless,
the mind of the nation, on the integrity of the institution. 2
The Germans, clergy, and laity, supported the motion of the
French. The Emperor, the Duke of Bavaria, and the other
princes of Germany laboured for this purpose both in the Tren-
tine council, and afterward at the Roman court. The Empe-
ror's ambassador in the council represented whole communion
as the anxious desire of Germany, Hungary, Austria, Moravia,
Silesia, Carinthia, Carniola, Stiria, Bavaria, and Swabia. All
the friends of Catholicism, in these states, which contained
such an immense population, urged the claims with an impa-
tience that bordered on rebellion. One fact, mentioned in the
council of Trent, will show the zeal of the Germans in this
cause. These, when asked for supplies against the Turks, who
were ready to enter not only Hungary, but also Germany and
the neighbouring nations, refused, till the integrity of commu-
nion should be restored.
The people of Bohemia and Hungary showed, if possible,
still more anxiety. This appears from the strong, but indeed
unwarrantable arguments which they used to eSect their purpose.
The laity, in these states, forced the clergy to, dispense the
sacramental cup by threatening them, if they refused, with
the loss of life and property. Such conduct, indeed, was
indefensible. The use of menace and compulsion, on questions
of religion and conscience, is unscriptural. But the fact mani-
fested their zeal, if not their knowledge, in their efforts to obtain
their end. 3
Such were the variations of Romanism, on the subject of the
communion. A church boasting of immutability, changed and
disputed in reckless inconsistency. The usage of Jesus, his
apostles, and antiquity, observed for 1200 years, was repealed
by the infallible council of Constance, followed by those of Basil
and Trent. The change was adopted from the Manicheans,
who were the partizans of heresy, and whose aversion to the
eucharistic cup was denounced by Leo and Gelasius, as sacrilege
1 Paolo, 2. 219, 220, 399. Thuan. 2. 416. Du Pin, 3. 552.
8 Paolo, 2. 116. Da Pin, 3. 522. Thuan. 2. 361.
3 Paolo, 2. 220. Du Pin, 3. 551. 552, 564. Thuan. 2. 361. 441. Bray. 4. 621.
440 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
and superstition. The synod of Basil, which confirmed the
law of half-communion, but admitted the utility of reception in
both kinds, varied from the assembly of Constance, which
consigned the participators in the cup to the inquisitors of
heretical pravity. The council of Trent, disputing and
divided among themselves, determined by a majority for with-
holding the cup from the people : and shortly afterward,
changed by papal intrigue, resolved, by another majority, to
confer on the Roman pontiff a discretionary power of granting
whole communion to the laity. The popish clergy and laity
dispersed through European Christendom, differed about the
canons issued, on this question, at Trent. Spain and Italy, in
general, condemned whole com'munion, which was demanded
with ardour and anxiety in France, Germany, Bohemia,
Poland, Hungary, and several smaller states.
CHAPTER XV.
EXTREME UNCTION.
VARIATIONS ON ITS EFFECTS DISAGREEMENT ON ITS INSTITUTION THE SCRIPTURAL
AND POPISH UNCTION VARY IN THEIR ADMINISTRATOR, SIGN, FORM, SUBJECT,
AND END RECOVERY OF HEALTH THE SCRIPTURAL END OF ANOINTING THE
SICK TRADITIONAL EVIDENCE HISTORY OF EXTREME UNCTION
EXTREME unction in the Popish system, consists in the sacra-
mental application of oil to the sick, for the remission of sin.
The administrator is a priest or bishop. The subject is the
sick, who, to all human appearance, are at the point of death.
The sign is oil, consecrated by episcopal benediction. The
form requires the application of the sign to the eyes, ears, nose,
mouth, hands, feet, and, if the patient be a male, to the reins,
accompanied with -prayer.
Popish doctors, notwithstanding their pretended unity, vary,
as Faber, Bellarmine, Estius, and. Dens have shown, on the
effect of this unction. Dens has enumerated no less than ten
different opinions, entertained on this point in the Romish com-
munion. The chief differences, however, may be reduced to
four, which have given rise to four factions in Papal Christen-'
dom.
One faction, patronised by Bonaventure, Fleury, Challenor,
and the Trent Catechism, reckon the effect of this ceremony,
the remission of venial sins. But this opinion has been rejected
by others, such as Aquinas, Soto, Valencia, Scotus, Faber, and
many moderns. A second party, supported by Estius, Dens,
and the council of Mentz, as well as by other divines, extend
its effects to the dismission of mortal transgressions. This
theory, however, has been deprecated by Aquinas, Soto,
Valentia, Scotus, Bellarmine, Faber, and many other. theolo-
gians, because mortal offences are pardoned in baptism, and
afterwards in penance. A third class include both venial and
mortal sins in the effect of this unction. This, according to
the interpretation of Estius and Calmet, was the, doctrine of
the council of Trent, which conferred on this ceremony the
power of cancelling unexpiated and remaining transgressions.
442 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
This explanation, therefore, embracing both trifling and heinous
sins, sins both of frailty and enormity, is clothed by the Tren-
tine dictators with all the glory of:' infallibility.
A fourth description ascribe the effect of this institution
neither to venial nor mortal iniquity, but to weakness, infirmity,
and the remains of sin. This, \vhich some reckon the common
opinion, has been sanctioned by Aquinas, Soto, Valeritia,
Durandus, and many moderns.' But these doctors, differing
from others, differ also among themselves on the meaning
attached to the remains of sin. Valentia, in the remains of
sin, comprehends aversion to good and inclination to evil;
while Bellarmine and others, eit the expense of a little incon-
sistency, extend it to venial and mortal offences, as well as to
sorrow and anxiety. 1
Popish doctors vary in the institution of this sacrament, as
well as on its effects. Lombard and several since his day,
refer its institution to mere apostolic authority; while others
attribute its appointment to our Lord, and its promulgation to
the apostle James. Some identify this ceremony with the
anointing mentioned by Mark in his gospel. Such were Beda,
Cajetan, Arsdekin, Maldonat, and the Rhemish annotators, as
well as the Trent Catechism, and the councils of Milan, Sens,
and Augsburg. Many, on the contrary, distinguish between
the apostolic ceremony recorded by Mark, and the sacramental
rite mentioned by James. Such were Jonas, Valentia, Bellar-
mine, Faber, and Dens, as well as the councils of Worms,
Cologne, Florence, and Trent. 2
The council of Trent, puzzled and inconsistent, displayed,
on this occasion, a striking variety. This unerring assembly
1 Effectus non uno modo ab omnibus explicatur. Quidam de remissione venia-
]ium intelligunt. Alii de peccatis mortafium Apostolum exponunt. Ad omnia
cujuscumque generis peccata extendendum videtur. Peccati reliquias abstergit.
Estius, 2. 1145. Labb. 19. 1412.
Peccata venialia remittit. Cat. Trid. 169. Fleury, 246. Challenor, 113. Rivers,
c. 7. Faber, 2- 262.
Quidam dicunt contra veniale ordinatur ; sed hoc non videtur verum. Aquinas,
3. 465. Faber, 2. 259.
Aquinas, Soto, Valentia, et multi recentiores asserunt propritim effectum hnjus
sacramenti non esse abstergere et delere peccata venialia; sed esse sanare et ab-
Btergere peccatorum reliquias. Non conveniunt Doctores hujus opiuionis. Faber,
2. 259, 260.
Peccata mortalia remittit. Dens, 7. 18. Estius, 2. 1145. Non intelligitur de
peccato mortali. Faber, 2. 259.
Infert Scotus illud non potest intelligi de peccatis mortalibus. Omnes asserunt
peccata mortalia dimitti solum per poenitentiam. Faber, 2. 253, 261.
Concilium Tridentinum inquit effectum hujus sacramenti esse peccata, si qass
sint, delere, et reliquias peccati abstergere. Faber, 2. 260.
Delicta, si quse adhuc expianda et peccati reliquias abstergit. Labb. 20. 98.
3 Dnctiones adhibitae ab Apostolis, non erant sacramentales. Dens, 7. 2. Faber,
2.257. Paolo,!. 377. Jonas, III. 14. Dachery, 1'. 316. Arsdekin, 1. 245.
Beda, 5. 693. Labb. 10. 467, and 19. 269.
VARIATIONS IN THE 13FFECTS OF EXTREME UNCTION. 443
had declared that this sacrament was instituted by Jesus and
recorded by Mark. But a divine who was present, and who
possessed rather more sense than his fellows, remarked that
this ceremony could not have been observed at that time, as
the apostles, even according to the Trentine assembly, were
not then priests, and were, therefore, incapable of administer-
ing it. The meddling theologian disconcerted the sacred
synod. The holy fathers, embarrassed by the inconsistency,
began to invent means of disentangling themselves from the
contradiction. Extreme unction, said the infallible assembly,
was not instituted, but merely INSINUATED in Mark, and after-
ward published in James. The institution was, with the
utmost facility, transubstantiated by these theological jugglers
into an insinuation. The holy men insinuated what they feared
to affirm. The unction of the Evangelist became, in the hands
of the wise and learned Trentines, an insinuated sacrament.
But the insinuation of the sacred council was, under the
auspices of its authors, destined to make another change, and
return to its ancient form. The insinuation was again transub-
stantiated into an institution. The council's canon declared
extreme unction a true sacrament, instituted by Jesus and
published by James : and then thundered anathemas against
all who should gainsay. 1
The Rhemists, with a happy versatility, discovered another
plan of interpretation. These expositors, by their magic touch,;
transformed the anointing related in the gospel into the figure
of a sacrament. The apostles, it seems, though at that time
no priests, and incapable of performing this ceremony in reality,
administered it in metaphor. The Trentine insinuation be-
came a Rhemish trope. The sacrament of the council degen-
erated, in the laboratory of these annotators, into a mere
emblem. This, no doubt, was very clever and ingenious, and,
though a little at variance with many other expositions in the
same unchangeable communion, removed all difficulty. Popish
councils and commentators, in this manner, could transform an
unction into a metaphor, an institution into an insinuation, and
the insinuation back again into an institution, with as much
ease as an alchemist, in his own crazy mind, could transmute
copper into gold, or a priest, in the credulity of superstition,
could transubstantiate a Wafer into a God.
Extreme unction is a variation from scriptural unction. The
Scriptural and Romish institution differ in the administration,
sign, form, subject, and end. The Popish unction requires but
one administrator. This has been defined by Pope Alexander
1 Paolo, 1. 570. Faber, 2. 253. Cat. Trid. 167. Labb. 20. 98. 102. Estins,2.
1443. Rivers, c. 7.
444 THE VARIATIONS. OF POPERY:
and Benedict, as well a.s by the Trentine council. A solitary
priest, unaided and alone, can, with facility and dispatch, per-
form t^e whole ceremony in all its diversified evolutions, and
in all its modern additions and improvements. The scriptural
unction, recommended by the pen of inspiration, requires, on
the contrary, a plurality of administrators. The sick person
was to * call for the elders of the church.' The words which
signify the anointing and the prayer are in the plural number,
indicating beyond all question, the necessity of more than one
dispensator. 1
Extreme and Scriptural unction differ also in their sign.
The sign of both, indeed, is oil. But the oil of the popish
ceremony must be consecrated by a bishop, and the consecra-
tion is attended with a world of superstition and chicanery.
The Romish institution, celebrated with any other kind of oil,
is invalid. Should the administrator, through mistake, use
chrism, he is instructed by the council of Milan to repeat the
ceremony, and apply the proper sign. The holy oil only, is,
in this ordinance, possessed of any efficacy. The primeval
Christians knew nothing of these superstitions. The use of
the ceremony, stated by the sacred historian Mark, was, accord-
ing to the council of Trent, prior to the existence of the priestly
or episcopal order: and the unguent, therefore, employed at
that time, was guiltless of episcopal benediction. 2
; The modern and primitive unctions differ in their form, as
well as in their administrator and sign. The form of the
Popish rite, consisting in anointing and prayer, is one continued
scene of superstition, balderdash, and indecency. The priest
makes the sign of the cross three times on the sick person, in
the name of the Trinity. The imposition of the sacerdotal
hands, and the invocation of angels, patriarchs, prophets,
apostles, martyrs, confessors, and virgins, are used for the ex-
tinction of the power of the devil, and every unclean spirit in
the patient's members, marrow, and every joint of his limbs.
The priest then dips his thumb in the holy ointment, and
anoints the sick person in the form of a cross on the eyes, ears,
nose, mouth, hands, and feet. These organs are then wiped
with cotton, which is burned, and the ashes, for fear of pro-
fanation, are thrown into the sacrarium. Even the water with
' Minister hujus sacramenti est sacerdos. Labb. 20. 101. Bin. 8. 866. Ncm a
pluribus, sed ab uno. Estius, 2. 1142. Dens, 7. 25. .
2 Materia est oleum olivarum. Cousecratio episcopalis est necessaria. Faber,
2. 254. Bin. 8. 866. Crabb. 3. 506.
Non nisi oleo per episcopum benedicto fas est hanc sacram unctionem peragi.
Estius, 2. 1142. Bit. Rom. 96.
Les Apotres n'etoient point encore pretres. Calmet, Com. 19, 20.
VARIATION BETWEEN SCRIPTURAL AND POPISH UNCTION. 445
which the priest washes his hands is, for the same reason,
poured into a clean and retired place. 1
The administration of this observance adds indecency to
superstition. The patient, except in women and Monks, is
anointed on the loins or reins, because, says the Roman Ritual,
this is the seat of lasciviousness and pleasure. 2 This part of the
ceremony is of the most revolting description, and is expressed
in the language of grossness and indelicacy. The whole scene,
as represented in their formulas, must, to every mind possessing
the least sensibility or refinement, present a spectacle of loath-
ing and disgust. , . .
This ceremony sometimes assumes a truly ridiculous appear-
ance. The sacerdotal thumb is the usual instrument in con-
veying the greasy application. But when pestilence prevails
and contagion threatens, the priest may apply the sacramental
oil with a long rod. This, he dips with due gravity into the
blessed fluid : and standing at a respectful distance to avoid in-
fection, he extends his wand in proper form and in a graceful
manner, to the sick, whom, to escape danger, he anoints with
this simple but useful ecclesiastical machine, instead of his pre-
cious thumb. The rod, having by this means administered the
sacrament of the dying, and communicated all the virtues of
the holy ointment, is burned, and the ashes, with iproper
attention, cast into some sacred place. 3 The simplicity of the
Apostolical institution presents a complete contrast to this
display of complicated folly, uncountenanced by one hint of
revelation or a j single monument of Christian antiquity.
The Apostolic and Popish unctions differ in the persons to
whom they are to be administered. The latter is applied only
to those who, in all human appearance, are departing, and, in
consequence, has been called the sacrament of the dying. The
sacerdotal plrysician never administers this spiritual prescrip-
1 Intincto pollice in oleo sancto, in modum crucis nngit infirmran. Sacerdoa
tiugat loca inuncta novo globulo bombacii, et comburat, cineresque projiciat in
eacrarium. Kit. Rom. 96, 97.
Laval manns et lavatio non nisi in loco mimdo et abdito solet effundi. TJlderic
III 28. Dachery, 1. 700. Dens, 7.6.
* Septima in organo principal! generative. Faber, 2. 254. Renes, velut volup-
tntis et libinis sedes, ungmitur. Cat. Trid. 168. Super inguines per ardorem
libiiHuis. Dacheiy, 1. 700.
Quoad renes, non est decens, prassertim in foeminis et viris religiosis. Arsde
kin, 2. 378. Kit. Rom. 93.
1 Peate grassante, potest uti virga oblonsra oleo tincta, qnam postea comburat.
Arsdekin, 2. 378
Penicillo inungatur corpus segrotos peste infecti. Licet, in eo casu, inungere
aBgroadhibita virga, cujus extrema parte sit gossypium oleo sacro imbutum. Dens,
8. 79, 166.
446 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
tion, while there is any expectation of recovery. The sacred
unction is always intended as a mittimus to eternity. 1
The Apostolic unction was administered to weak or infirm
persons. Mark and James, indeed, use two different terms on
this subject ; but both, according to their derivation and their
usual acceptation, signify ' without strength,' and include all
who are in a state of weakness and infirmity. The words of
the Evangelist and the Apostle never imply that severity of
sickness or of pain, which preclude all hopes of recovery, and
which, in a short time, commonly issues in death. The expres-
sion used by James is applied to the woman who had ' a spirit
of infirmity' eighteen years, whom Jesus healed in Judea, and
to the diseased persons who came to Paul in the island of
Melita and were cured. Those who could visit Jesus and Paul
could not be labouring under severe complaints, or such as
would indicate a speedy dissolution. 2
But the great and leading distinction between the Scriptural
and Romish unction consists in the end or effect. The effect of
the former referred to the body ; but of the latter to the soul.
The ancients anointed the infirm for the expulsion of sickness
and the restoration of strength. The moderns anoint the dying
for the pardon of sin and the conveyance of grace. The one
used it as a miraculous and temporary remedy for the recovery
of health ; and the other as an ordinary and permanent sacra-
ment for the attainment of salvation. The design of the primi-
tive ceremony was to enable men to live ; but of the present
superstition to prepare them to die. 3
The popish communion, indeed, both in its ancient and
modern rituals, refers, on this topic, to the body as well as to
the soul ; and to the recovery of health as well as to the pardon
of sin. But its modern usage displays a striking aberration
from the scriptural model. Romanism makes the recovery of
health conditional, which revelation makes absolute : and the
remission of sins absolute, which revelation makes conditional.
The Lord, says James, without any condition, " will raise him
up." But the recovery, in the Romish theology, is clogged
with the condition of expedience. The expiation of iniquity,
on the contrary, is, in scriptural language, united with the
condition, " if he have committed sin." But forgiveness, in the
1 Hoc sacramentum nisi infirmo, de cujus morte timetur dari non debet. Labb.
18. 550. Exeuntibus a corpore detur. Aquin. 3. 146. Cat. Trid. 168. Kit
Rom. 91. Labb. 20. 98. Erasmus, 6. 174.
2 Mark, vi. 13. James v. 14. Lukexiii.il. Acts xxviii. 9.
3 L'onction qu' employient les Apostres regardoit principalement les maladies
es malades, qui se fait dans 1'eglise, a pour premier
du corps ; au lieu que 1'onction des :
objetles maladies de 1'ame. Calmet, Comva. 19. 50. Le salut de son ame est
1'objet de ce sacrement. Calm. Comm. 24. 80.
VARIATION BETVTEEiN SCRIPTURAL AND POPISH UNCTION. 447
popish system, is attached to the unction without any condition.
This variation and (perversion are evidently intended for the
purpose of accommodating the statement of revelation to a
system of superstition. 1
The declaration of Mark, compared with the injunction of
James, will clearly shew the truth of the protestant interpreta-
tion, which refers the words to the body and the recovery of
health. The two in spired penmen, it is plain, allude to the same
ceremony. Both mention the same agents, actions, patients,
and effects. This has been shewn by Bede, CEcumenius,
Jonas, Lyra, Cajetan, Erasmus, D'Achery, Maldonat, and
Arsdekin, as well as by the Rhemish annotators, and the councils
of Milan, Sens, Augsburg, and Trent. The latter assembly,
in all its , infallibility, identified the history of Mark and the
directionofJam.es. 2
The effect, therefore, of these two identical rites must be the
same. The healing of Mark and the upraising of James may be
reckoned synonymous expressions. The former, it is clear, re-
fers to recovery from disease and restitution to bodily health.
This exposition is sanctioned by the authority of Bede, Jonas,
CEcumenius, Calmet, Cajetan, and many other popish comment
tators. The statement of James, says Cajetan, * does neither in
word nor effect signify sacramental unction, but that ceremony
instituted by our Lord, and applied by his disciples for the re-
covery of the sick.' The cardinal, like Bede, Jonas, CEcume-
nius, and Calmet, delivered the plain meaning of the passage,
which will approve itself to every unprejudiced mind. 3 Let .the
Romish priest, then, in this way, cure the patient, and the Pro-
testant has no objection. Let him accomplish the original
design of the scriptural institution, and in this convincing man-
ner, shew his power and authority. Let him free the sick from
the pains of the fever, the dropsy, the consumption, or any other
1 Estius, 2. 1114. Kit. Kum. 90. James v. 14, 15.
3 Hoc et Apostolis fecisse in evangelic legitnus. Beda, 5. 693. Jonas, iii. 14.
Dachery, 1. 316.
Touto of. Aitoo-tohot, trtoiovv- CEcumen. in loc. Ex hoc patet, quod tmctio ex-
trema fuit instituta a Christo. Lyra in Mark vi. 13.
Cajetan soutient que ce passage ne regarde que 1'onction miraculense, dont les
Ap&tres se servoient pour la guerison des malades. Luo et Maldonat le soutie-
nent. Calmet, 19. '49. Maldonat, 754.
Hoc relictum erat ex prsecepto evangelico. Erasmus, 6. 1037. Sacramentum
extremiE unctionis fundatur in Scriptuns Marci 6. Arsdekin, 1. 245. Bin. 9. 197,
619. Crabb. 3. 746, 855. Cat. Triden. 167.
3 Nee in verbis nee in effectu, verba bsec loqunntur de sacramentali nnctione
extremse unctionis, sed magis de unctione quam instituit Dominus Jesus a discipulis
exercendam in asgrotis. Caiet. inloco. Faber, 2. 257. Beda, 5. 693. Jonas, iii.
14. Dachery, 1. 316.
On voit le meme sentiment dans CEcumenius. Calm. Comm. 24. 78.
Caietanus negat absolute hoc loco, Jacobum loqui de sacramento extremse
unctionis. Faber, 2. 257.
448 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
-*;.
of the ills that attack frail fallen man j and he will, by the
triumphs of his art or .his faith, disarm all ^opposition. He may
then claim credit for his commission. But the constant applica-
tion of a sign, which is never attended with the proper or
primitive signification, only renders its author ridiculous. The
continuation of the means, when the end cannot be effected,
merely exposes the vain pretender, as well as his credulous
dupes, to merited contempt.
This healing of the diseased, like other miraculous powers
granted for promoting the establishment of Christianity, was
extraordinary and temporary. This, resembling other miracles,
scarcely survived the apostolic age. The oil, in this respect,
was similar to the water of Bethesda. This pool, when the
descending angel troubled its water, cured the diseased who
immediately bathed in its healing wave. But this effect was
miraculous and transitory. The efficacy was not native or
inherent, but supernatural and communicated, and ceased on
the cessation of the angelic visits. Bethesda, at the present
day, is as cureless as any other pool. The effect of unction,
in like manner, was preternatural and transient. Its application,
accompanied with prayer, can, at the present day, effect no
recovery. The use of unction and the use of Bethesda, in the
nineteenth century, are equally silly. The patient, who should
seek to expel disorder in the pool of the holy city, would only
meet with a laugh from the passing spectator. His simplicity
might excite a smile, but his folly would convey no health : and
the application of oil to the sick, whatever the deceiving and
deceived may fancy, is equally ridiculous and absurd.
The remission of sin, mentioned by James, might, on a
superficial view, appear to militate against this interpretation,
which limits the effect of the ancient ceremony to the recovery
of health. But this difficulty, on a close inspection, will vanish.
The sins, pardoned through 'the prayer of faith,' were such as
in God's judicial or chastening pi-ovidence, were punished with
sickness. Infirmity, disease, and even death were sometimes
in Bided by the Creator, as a punishment or correction for cer-
tain offences. This has been granted and indeed proved by
Bede, Jonas, Lyra, Estius, and Calmet. God, as these and
many other authors attached to Romanism have shown, often,
as in the case of Ananias and Sapphira, visits flagrant trans-
gression with disease and even mortality. 1
1 Multi propter peccata in animo facta, infirmitate ant etiam morte plectuntur.
Beda in Jacob. V. 15. Jonas, III. 14. Dachery, 1. 316.
Mnlti propter peccata etiam corporis plectantur morte. Ananias et Sapphira
pnniti fuerunt subitauea morte pro peccato. Lyra, 6. 52, 217. in Corin. xi. et
Jacob v.
Pliirimum causs morborum sint peccata. Estius, 2. 1145.
Souvent Dieu punissoit les peches par des maladies. Calm. Com. 24. 81.
VARIATION BETWEEN SCRIPTURAL AND POPISH UNCTION. 449
The fact, which these authors have stated, was exemplified
and evidenced in the Corinthians, with respect to- whom, as
depicted by Paul, many were weak and sickly, and many
slept. Our Lord, therefore, in allusion to this truth, said to
the man whom he healed of the palsy! " thy sins be forgiven
thee." He also admonished the man whom he cured of an
infirmity at Bethesda, to "sin no more," 'for fear of a severer
sentence. These instances show the connexion in some cases,
between trangression and disorder, as well as between remis 1 -
sion and recovery.
James, had he meant iniquity in general, need not have used
the supposition, 'if he have committed sins.' All, in this
respect, are guilty. But only some were visited with a par-
ticular malady, on account of a particular crime. He declared,
in the expressive language of Estius, that 'the cause, which
was iniquity, would be removed, that the effect, which was
disease, might cease.' 1 The indisposition and the punishment
had the relation of cause and effect, and the one was remitted
for the removal of the other. All this, however, shows that
the institution was intended for lengthening the days of the
living, and not, as it has been falsely called, a sacrament de-
signed for the use of the dying.
Romanism is here guilty, of another variation and perversion!
The inspired penman ascribes the recovery of health and the
remission of sin to " the prayer of faith." But these effects,
the popish theologians attribute to the application of the oint-
ment. The prayers, says Fleury, may, in case of necessity,
be omitted, and the unction alone used. The moderns depend,
for the effect, on the unguent plastered on the patient in the
form of a cross. The ancients relied on ' the prayer of faith,*
offered with devotion for the recovery of the afflicted and the
pardon of sin. *
This explanation of the Apostolic injunction is open only to
one objection. None of the primitive Christians, say Faber
and Bellarmine, need, on this supposition, have been subject to
mortality. The unction and accompanying prayer of the
elders would have saved all from death. This argument, on a
slight view, is specious. But its plausibility, on a closer
examination, will totally disappear. The objection, if it have
any weight, presses as hard on popery as on protestantism.
The Romish as well as the Reformed must admit the exist-
ence of the healing gifts among the early Christians. Our
Lord cured the sick, and even raised the dead. His apostles
anointed and healed many. Paul, addressing the Corinthians,
mentions " the gifts of healing," communicated to the pristine
1 Causa remota morbus eesset. Estius, 2. 1145. '
29
450 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEEY :
Christians, whose possession of this extraordinary power,
infidelity only would venture to deny. A belief of this fact,
whatever may be the conclusion, forms, in this case, an article
in the objector's faith, as well as in that of his adversary.
But the conclusion from this fact is not, that all the sick
recovered. This power of restoring to health could not, at all
times, be exercised, 'even by those on whom it had been
bestowed. The prophet could not always prophesy ; nor
could the supernatural gift of healing always expel disorder or
prevent death. The apostles themselves were enabled to com-
mand this miraculous power only on some occasions. Paul
healed the father of Publius and others who had diseases in
the island of Melita ; but left Trophimus, his friend, sick at
Melitum. He also advised Timothy to use wine, as an ordi-
nary means, and an approved medicine for his infirmity. This
supernatural endowment, therefore, was occasional, and
brought into operation only by the permission and assistance
of God. The extraordinary power, sometimes inactive, had
to be called into energy by the Divine impulse. 1
This may be applied to the pastors mentioned by James.
These could wield the healing power only when actuated by
the Spirit of God. Their petition, in consequence, is styled
'the prayer of faith,' because it inspired assurance of success.
James, accordingly, in the English version, denominates the
prayer effectual, which, according to the original, should be
translated inwrought or inspired. This miracle-working faith
is the kind, which, says Jesus and Paul, is capable of removing
mountains, and enabled its possessor to expel indisposition, and
convey health to the subjects of sickness and infirmity.
This objection, inconsistent with the objector's own belief,
recoils also, with tremendous destruction, on his own acknowl-
edged s}^stem. The modern ceremony would, even on popish
principles, as certainly save every soul, as the ancient institu-
tion would have healed every body. All, on the former suppo-
sition, would as surely be transmitted to heaven, as on the latter
have, according to the objection, been restored to health. The
one would as unquestionably deliver from spiritual as the other
from temporal death. The modern. unction, according to the
council of Trent, pardons remaining and unexpiated sins,
which, in the interpretation of Estius and Calmet, comprehend
both venial and mortal offences : and, at the same time, con-
veys grace and strength, and heals all weakness and propensity
to transgress. This freedom from sin and attainment of purity
would inevitably transfer all the dying, who receive the greasy
1 La guerison de malades par les onctions etoit une chose accidentelle et d'un
asage passager. Calmet, 24. 81.
SCRIPTURAL END OF ANOINTING THE SICK. 451
application, to happiness, and reserve for a worse situation, only
the protestant who contemns the unctuous plaster, and the child,
the idiot, and the executed criminal, who are incapable of
becoming candidates for this holy sacrament. 1
The modern ointment, therefore, must, in a great measure,
unpeople purgatory. The heretic, who despises this unguent,
must march, not to the middle place, but to a worse country.
The Romish unction, if, according to the popish theology, it
remit venial and mortal sins, heal infirmity, impart strength, and
fortify the soul against/temptation, will certainly transfer
the recipient 'jwith safety, to the port of eternal happiness.'
Heaven and hell, therefore, being, in this manner, forestalled
by the use or rejection of this .sacramental ointment, the prince
of the intermediate district, if it have any, must want subjects, or
accept of youths, madmen," or sentenced offenders. 2 The inter-
mediate empire, by these means, will be reduced to a waste.
Its plains will become a wilderness, and its palaces and cities
fall into ruin.
Extreme unction is a variation from tradition, as well as from
revelation. The ceremony is destitute of written and un-
written authority, and was unknown both to the apostles and
fathers of antiquity. Fleury, -Ward, Sclater, Mumford, and
Challenor, in consequence, forbear, on this topic, to make any
quotations from the record of early Christianity. The omission,
indeed, was dictated by prudence. Antiquity could afford no
authority for such an innovation, but which, by its impertinence,
would have disgraced, if possible, even the popish system of
superstition and absurdity. BeHarmine endeavours to excuse
the ancients for omitting the history of this sacrament in their
\vorks, by alleging their want of occasion. The cardinal, for
once, was right. The early Christian authors had no opportu-
nity of discussing a non-entity.
The Rhemists admit that the fathers of the first four centu-
ries make no mention of this institution. These annotators
indeed refer to Origen, who flourished in the. third century;
but, at the same, insist not on his testimony, clearly from a
consciousness of its utter inadequacy. The concession, in
reality, is an abandonment of the cause so far as concerns this
source of evidence. Four hundred revolving years ran their
ample round, and left no trace of this sacrament. The aposto-
lic men, Clemens, Hermas, Barnabas, Ignatius, and Polycarp
lived, and wrote, and departed, without once mentioning the
sacrament of the dying. The successors of the apostolic men,
1 Aquinas, 3. 467. Cat. Trid. 166. Rit. Rom. 91. Estius, 2. 1145. Calmet
e Cha'lenor, 113. Fleury, 246.
29*
452 'THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
such as Justin, Irenseus, Clemens, Tertullian, Cyprian, Athena-
goras, Tatian, Epiphanius, and the apostolic constitutions are,
on this theme, equally silent and disobliging. The pretended
Dionysius, who has left circumstantial details on similar topics,
has, says Aquinas, made no mention of extreme unction. 1
These authors have emblazoned the other sacraments in their
works, and drawn minute delineations of baptism and the
communion. These topics meet the reader's eye in nearly
every page of their literary productions. But extreme unction,
wonderful to tell, is never mentioned. This ceremony, which,
in modern days, remits sin and strengthens tfce soul of the
dying, forms no part of either the light or shade of the picture
sketched by the pen of antiquity. This was a woful and vex-
atious omission in the good fathers, and has put many moderns
to a sad puzzle.
The Christian men and women of old, such as Constantino,
Helen, Anthony, Basil, Ghrysostom, Monica, and Augustine,
whose death-bed biography has been transmitted to the present
day, seem never to have been anointed. Their biographers
never so much as mention the sacrament of the dying. All
these, it is to be feared, departed without the application of the
blessed oil. The holy men and women, in all probability, con-
trived getting to heaven without being greased for the journey.
But the modern saints and sinners of Romanism are prepared
for heaven or purgatory by consecrated oil. The death of
many, in latter days, has been recorded by Surius and Butler :
and these, on their death-bed, were always complimented with
a plaster of blessed ointment? The modern saints make their
exit from time and their entrance into eternity, ornamented in
seven different places, with the cross-streaks of the oily figures,
formed by the graceful motion of the sacerdotal thumb. x
The friends of this ceremony have endeavoured to prop the
baseless fabric by historical testimony, extracted from the
annals of the fifth and' following centuries. All this evidence,
worthy of any attention, is taken from Innocent, Bede, and the
councils of Chalons and Worms.
Pope Innocent, who flourished so late as the fifth century, is
their first witness. Decentius, bishop of Eugubium in Italy,
had. occasion, on this subject, to consult the pontiff', who re-
turned the following-answer. ' T*he diseased faithful, to whom
James refers, may be anointed with' the consecrated oil of
chrisni. This ointment ..may be used not only by priests, but
also by all Christians, who may anoint not only themselves,
1 Dionysius uon facit aliquatn meufionem de extrema unctione. Aquinas, III.
29. 1. p. 462.
TRADITIONAIi EVIDENCE FOR EXTREME UNCTION. 453
Out also their friends, -, But .the chrism may riot be poured on
penitents, for it is a kind of sacrament.' 1 v
The utter ignorance of Decentius and Innocent, on this sub-
jectj irrefragably shows the non-existence of extreme unction m
the fifth century. Decentius, a dignified clergyman of Italy,
knew so little of the ceremony, that he could not, without; in-
struction, administer the pretended sacrament of the dying.
He applied in his difficulty, to the Pope, the father and teacher
of all Christians : and the pontiff, who has bee.n eulogized for
genius and learning by Jerome, Augustine, Chrysostom, and
Bellarmine, knewvno mor : e.of it, except in jhis^ownredneeit, than
the bishop. He called the rite ' a KIND of sacrament.' This
appellation would have called down on his holiness the anathe-
mas of the Trentine council, that pronounced this observance
' a true and proper sacrament.' His infallibility, besides, mis-
took the administrator and the sign of this ' kind of sacrament.'
Its minister, in his infallibility's hands, was not only a priest,
but every Christian, both for himself and his friends. The lay-
man, however, who, in modern times, should make the attempt,
would, says Faber, ' not only sin, but effect nothing.' The sign ,
according to his holiness, was chrism, which, in modern days,
is utterly unfit for this use. This unction, performed now with
chrism, is invalid, and the whole process, in this case, must*
says the council of Milan, be repeated with the proper element.
His infallibility's ' kind of sacrament,' administered according to
his pontifical directions, would, in modern times, be perfectly
useless. Innocent and Decentius, the pontiff and the bishop,
were, in reality, strangers to one of the seven sacraments, and
would have needed a fugleman to show the motion of his
spiritual exercise. Both would have required a modern priest
to drill these two raw recruits, and teach them the manoeuvres
of sacerdotal duty and the use of ecclesiastical arms. 2
Bede's testimony, more than 300 years later,: is similar to
Innocant's. The sick, says the English monk, ' is, according to
ecclesiastical use, to be anointed with consecrated oil and healed.
This is lawful, not only for the pastors, but 7 also, as Innocent
hath declared, for all Christians, both for themselves and their
friends.' 3 This only shows that the unction of the sick remained
in the same state in the eighth century as in the fifth, and that
1 De fidelibus sgrotantibus accipi vel intelligi debere, qui sancto oleo chrismatis,
peraagi peasant. Non. solum sacerdotibus, sed omnibus uti Ghristianis licet in sua
et suorum necessitate inungendo. Pcenitentibus illud fundi non potest, qaia genus
est sacramenti. Carranza, 187. Labb. 3. 6. Jonas iii. 14. C' est une especede
sacrament. Brays, 1. 175.
2 Si laicus attentet, non solum peccat, sed nihil facit. Faber, 2. 254. Labb.
18. 550. et 21. 368. Bin. 8. 866. et 9. 619. Crabb; 3. 506.
3 lufirmi oleo consecrato ungantiif a presbyteris. et, oratione conlmilitante,
sanetur, etc. Beda, 5. 693. -.
454 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
the unction of Romanism was as little known in the days of
Bede as of Innocent, and in England as in Italy. Bede and
Innocent would have needed some modern adept in superstition
to teach them the proper movements and evolutions in applying
the sacramental plaster. Bede, besides, represents the recovery
of health as the end or effect of this ceremony : and this shows
that the unction of the sick, in the English monk's time, was
still used for the original design, and referred, not to the soul,
but to the body.
The provincial synod of Chalons' testimony has been added
to that of Innocent and Bede. This assembly met in 813, and
in its forty-eighth canon enjoined the unction of the sick with
oil blessed by the bishop. 'This kind of medicine,' said the
council, 'is not to be despised, which heals the infirmity of
soul and body.' 1 This canon only shows that the unction of
the sick was in the ninth century, still confined to its primeval
intention. -The sign is called medicine, and the effect is
spiritual and corporeal health. The body, by its application,
recovered its strength, and the soul obtained pardon of the sin
which occasioned the malady. The convenient modern con-
dition of this rite being beneficial to the body, when pleasing
to God and good for the patient, was unknown in the ninth
century. Recovery of health, according to this synod, attend-
ed the unction as uniformly as the remission of crime. The
only addition which the ceremony, in the long lapse of eight
hundred years, seems to have received from the spirit of su-
perstition, consisted in the episcopal consecration of the oint-
ment, and its indiscriminate application to the infirm. The
council also erred in continuing an extraordinary and temporary
observance, when the age of miracles had passed, and when
its administration had ceased to convey its original and proper
effect.
The provincial council of Worms has been added to that of
Chalons, as evidence of this superstition. But this assembly
affords no additional testimony: its seventy-second canon
merely embodied Pope Innocent's reply to Bishop Decentius.
The fathers of Worms only adopted and repeated his infalli-
bility's decision without preface or explanation. The subject
was no better known, and the future sacrament had made no
farther progress than 450 years before, in the fifth century.
The unction still remained a kind of sacrament. Hundreds
of ye&rs had elapsed from the commencement of Christianity,
and still the sacrament was misunderstood. Decentius, Inno-
cent, and Bede, as well as the councils of Chalons and Worms,
1 Non estparvipendendahujascemodimedicina, quse animae corporisque medetur
languoribus. Bin. 6. 222. Crabb. 2. 628. Labb. 9. 370.
HISTORY OF EXTREME UNCTION. 455
were ignorant of the administrator, the sign, and the end of
the ceremony, which the Treh tine fathers of infallible memory,
pronounced a true and proper sacrament, insinuated by Mark,
published by James, and instituted by Emmanuel.
The history of this innovation is easily traced. Extreme
unction in its present form, was the child of the twelfth cen-
tury. The monuments of Christian theology for eleven hun-
dred years, mention no ceremony, which in its varied and
unmeaning mummery, corresponds with the unction of Roman-
ism. The patrons of this superstition have rifled the annals
of ecclesiastical history for eleven ages, and have failed in the
discovery of either precept or example for a rite, which, they
affirm, was practised as a sacrament in every nation of
Christendom since the era of redemption.
The twelfth century, of which this filthy ceremony is the
offspring, was the reign of ignorance and superstition. Science
and literature seemed, in disgust, to fly from a tasteless and
degenerated world. Philosophy refused to shed a single ray
on a grovelling race, who hated or despised its light. Immo-
rality, as usual, kept pace with barbarism. Moral, and intel-
lectual darkness commingled their clouds around man, for the
purpose of forming a night of concentrated horror and atrocity.
The king and the subject, the clergy and the laity, conspired
against all information; while the Sun of Righteousness seemed
to withdraw his beams from a wicked and a wandering world.
Amid this intellectual and moral darkness, the apostolic cere-
mony, noticed by Mark and James, degenerated, by accumu-
lated innovations, into the Romish sacrament. Superstition,
from her overflowing fountain, poured her copious streams,
which mingling, but not united with the scriptural spring,
formed the heterogeneous and unsightly mass. The simple
rite was transformed into the clumsy sacrament. The original
unction, intended for the recovery of health to particular
individuals, continued, while the gift of healing and the power
of working miracles remained. But these, in process of time,
ceased, and the weakness of man prompted many to use the
external rite after the miraculous power was suspended. The
patient's health, not indeed by the miraculous application of
the oil, but by the ordinary operations of Providence, was
sometimes restored: and the recovery, in these cases, was
ascribed to the ointment. But many, though anointed, died :
and the observance, in these instances, though .the body
suffered, was supposed to be beneficial to the soul. The
recovery of health, therefore, was accounted conditional, and
the good of the soul was reckoned certain. Superstition, from
day to day and from age to age, appended new additions to
THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
the growing ceremony. The episcopal consecration of the oil,
its indiscriminate application and other innovations, dictated
by the demon of superstition, were superinduced on the pristine
institution. The filthy progeny of ignorance and superstition
came, at last, to maturity. Bernard, Victor, and Lombard, in.
the twelfth century, speak of the unction of the sick in modern
language, enlarged with the multiplied accessions of eleven
hundred years. Albert, Aquinas, and other schoolmen touched
the picture with characteristic subtilty. These theological
projectors brought the system to perfection, and exhibited it to
the world in a finished form. The novelty, in 1439, was
adopted by Pope Eugenius and the Florentine council, and
stamped with the seal of their unqualified approbation and
synodal infallibility.
The subject came afterwards before the council of Trent.
But the doctors who attended that assembly differed, and
quibbled, and argued, and squabbled on this, as on every other
subject without harmony and often without meaning. 1 Each
maintained his own opinion with warmth and obstinacy. The
Legates, therefore, in forming the canons, omitted many of the
jarring opinions of the angry theologians, and inserted only those
in which they agreed. These, the sacred synod in the four-
teenth session, ratified with dreadful anathemas, discharged from
their spiritual artillery against all who should gainsay. These
canons, therefore, though hardly intelligible, became, oh this
topic of theology, the professed standard of faith, and form of
external conformity among the patrons of Romanism. The
veering vane of popery, which had shifted in ceaseless varia-
tion round all the points of the theological compass, rusted, in
motionless inflexibility, during the long sessions of the Trentine
congress, and, on this, as on every other topic of divinity, fixed,
in a great measure, the modern system of superstition.
1 De 1&. etoient nees les contestations, qui les empechoient d'etre tous bien unis
centre les Lutheriens. Paolo, 1. 556. Du Fin, 3. 481. Labb. 20. 102.
CHAPTER XVI.
IMAGE-WORSHIP.
THREE SYSTEMS ONE ALLOWS THE USE OP IMAGES THE SECOND PATRONIZES
THEIR INFERIOR OR HONORARY WORSHIP THE THIRD PREFERS THE SAME
ADORATION TO THE REPRESENTATION AS TO THE ORIGINAL IMAGE-WORSHIP A
VARIATION FROM SCRIPTURAL AUTHORITY A VARIATION FROM ECCLESIASTICAL
ANTIQUITY MIRACULOUS PROOFS ADMISSIONS INTRODUCTION OF IMAGES INTO
THE CHURCH THEIR WORSHIP ICONOCLASM BYZANTINE COUNCIL SECOND NI-
CENE COUNCIL WESTERN SYSTEM CAROLINE BOOKS FRANKFORDIAN- COUNCIL
PARISIAN COUNCIL EASTERN VARIATIONS FINAL ESTABLISHMENT OF IDOLATRY
BY THEODORA.
BELLARMINE and Juenin distinguish the Popish systems on
image-worship into three classes. 1 One class recommends the
use of images, but rejects their worship. This party allows
the superstition of Romanism, but forbids its idolatry. A
second class patronizes both the use, and the imperfect or
inferior worship of these painted and sculptured representa-
tions. This faction countenances the idolatry as well as the
superstition. A third class prefers the same adoration to the
copy as to the original: and, therefore, with respect to the
images of God and his Son, are guilty of the grossest idolatry.
The class that permits the use of painted forms in the wor-
ship of God, have touched the subject with a deceitful pern
God only, according to these authors, is worshipped in the pre-
sence of the image, which is not honoured for its own sake.
A picture or statue is neither God, the place of His residence,
the symbol of His presence, nor the seat of His power. The
painted or sculptured representation possesses neither divinity
nor power, and is the object of neither prayer nor confidence.
The suppliant prays not to, but, before the effigy, for the pur-
pose of fixing his thoughts and preventing distraction of mind.
He offers no adoration to the work of the pencil or the chisel,
as if it were substituted for God. The supplication is ad-
dressed not to the material representation, but to the person
represented. The likeness, the production of the painter or
the statuary, is a mere memorial of the original, as a portrait is
'J3ell. ii. 20. Juenin, 4. 414.
458 THE VABiATioisrs OP POPEKY:
of a friend. The sensible resemblance, in the one case,
awakens friendship : and, in the other, kindles devotion, assists
the memory, and communicates instruction. The copy raises
the soul, in holy gratitude and piety, to the great exemplar, as
time, painted with its hour-glass, reminds . the spectator of its
motion and fleetness. 1
Pictures, in this system, are the books of the unlearned,
which, in the unlettered mind, awaken trains of holy thought
and meditation. The effigy or painting, which, in this manner,
is the book of the illiterate, is also the ornament of the temple.
These partizans of modern refinement seldom use the term
worship or adoration, but honour, esteem, homage, respect, or
veneration. These allow no more respect for the material
form, than a Jew would feel for the ark, or the altar, or a
Christian for the Bible or the sacramental elements. 2
Such, on this topic, is the refined system of many, and among
the rest, of Thomassin, Bossuet, Alexander, Juenin, Du Pin,
Gother, Challenor, and Lanciano. Statements of this kind are
very convenient in the kingdoms of Protestantism and safety ;
but the authors were prudent in publishing their opinions at a
respectful distance from Spain, Portugal, Goa, and the inqui-
sition.
The second class honour images with an inferior or imperfect
worship. These, however, offer no Latria or supreme adora-
tion to the pencilled resemblance. This homage, they ascribe
only to the Almighty. But the copy, they contend, is entitled
to veneration, on account of its dedication and similarity to the
prototype. This worship, Bellarmine calls imperfect, and
Juenin internal or absolute. This faction include a numerous
party in the Romish communion, among whom are Bellarmine,
Baronius, Estins, Godeau, and Spondanus. 3
This class, Bellarmine has shewn, maintain the same system
as the second Nicene council. The Niceans represented images
as holy, communicating holiness, and entitled to the same vene-
ration as the gospels. The infallible s} r nod also condemned
those who used pictures only for assisting the memory, and not
for adoration. 4
The Trentine professed to follow the Nicene council. The
former, however, seems on this subject to have modified, if not
contradicted the latter. The Niceans characterized images as
1 Non quod credatur inesse aliqua Diviuitas vel virtus, vel quod ab eis sit
aliquid petendurn, vel quod fiducia in imaginibus sit figenda. Labb. 20. 171.
Bell. II. 20. Juenin, 4. 415. Gother, c. 1. Boss. . 4. Fleury, 197. Chal-
lon. c. 27.
3 Godeau, 5. 13. Crabb. 3. 748. Personne n'adore le bois. On adore Dieu, et
en un certain sens, on n'adore que lui seal. Bossuet, Op. 1. 445, 448
s Bell. II. 20, 25. Godeau, 5. 512. Labb. 8. 700.
4 DuPin, 2. 42. Bell. II. 21. Bin. 5. 530.
DIFFERENT SYSTEMS OF IMAGE WORSHIP. 459
holy, while the Trentine accounted these painted and sculp-
tured forms void of any virtue. The worship and adoration
of the Nicene assembly are, in the. canons of Trent, reduced to
honour and veneration. The Latin synod, which met after the
reformation, had, in some measure, to follow the advanced
state of literature and philosophy, and to present a more rational
view of the subject than the Grecian convention, which issued
its decisions in an age of barbarism and superstition.
The third class prefer the same adoration to the representa-
tion as to the represented. The copy, taken in connexion with
the pattern, is, according to these authors, entitled to equal
veneration, as the royal robe, which adorns a king, shares the
honours of majesty. The likeness of God or his Son, in mental
conjunction with the original, is therefore the object of Latria
or divine adoration. The effigy of Lady Mary is to receive
Hyperdulia or intermediate worship ; while the statue of the
saint or the martyr can claim only Dulia or inferior honour
and veneration. This honour, however, is only relative.
Bellarmine, entangled in the intricacy and absurdity of his
statements on this topic, extricates himself by hair-breadth and
unintelligible distinctions. This is the system of Aquinas,
Cajetan, Bonaventure, Antoninus, Turrecrema, Turrian,
Vasquez, and the schoolmen, 1
The Romish communion, in general, ascribes supreme wor-
ship to the cross. Aquinas, with the utmost perspicuity and
without any equivocation, attributes Latria or sovereign wor-
ship to the cross as well as to our Lord's image. According to
the Angelic doctor, ' the cross is to be worshipped with Latria,
which is also to be addressed to Jesus and his image.' 2 The"
schoolmen, in general, supported the same system, and main-
tained that ' Latrian adoration is due to the holy cross ; and to
the image of Irntnanuel.'
Similar idolatry is encouraged in the Roman pontifical, mis-
sal, breviary, and processional. The Pontifical expressly de-
clares that ' Latria is due to the cross.' Divine worship, in
this manner, is addressed to a wooden deity. The missal,
published by the authority of Pius, Clement, and Urban, enjoins,
'The clergy and laity on bended knees to adore the cross..
The whole choir, in the mean time, sing, 'Thy cross, O Lord,
we adore ; for by the wood of the cross, the whole world is
filled with joy.' The breviary, revised and corrected also by
pontifical authority, contains ttye following hymns and petitions,
1 Bell. It. 20. Jnenin, 4. 414. Aquin. iii. 25. IV. P. 140.
Eadem adoratione, qua adoratur prototftpum, adorandum esse imaginem ejus :
at sic imngo Christi et Dei adoranda est latri&. Faber, 1. 121. Dens, 5. 38^ 45.
3 Saiut Thomas attribue a la Croix, le culte de Latria, qui est le culte supreme.
Bossuet, Oeuvres, 1. 448.
460 THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY:
supplicating the cross for righteousness, pardon, and salvation.
* Hail, O cross, our only hope : increase righteousness to the
pious and bestow pardon on the guilty. Save the present
assembly, met this day for thy praise. O venerable cross, that
has procured salvation for the wretched. Thy cross, O Lord,
we adore, and we commemorate thy glorious passion.' Similar
prayers are found in the processional, edited by Urban, Inno-
cent, Alexander, and Clement: and stronger language of
adoration could riot be addressed to God. 1 This homage and
these requests, offered to the wood and accompanied with all
the mummery of bowing, kissing, .kneeling, lighting, incensing,
and prostration, are nothing less than bare-faced idolatry,
exhibited in noon-day without a shadow to screen its nakedness
or deformity.
Bossuet indeed .would excuse the impiety, by representing
the cross, though -made of wood and so denominated, as a
poetical expression or figurative language for Immanuel, who
suffered crucifixion. The adoration, therefore, on the occasion,
is, it would appear, only metaphorical idolatry. This, no doubt,
was a happy discovery. The learned bishop, by his superior
discernment, might see how lifeless timber could, by a trope,
be transubstantiated into the living Saviour. He might plaster
his conscience and display his ingenuity, by such evasion or
subterfuge. But the unlettered worshipper might have less
refinement, and possess less acquaintance with figures of speech
and license of poetry. The metaphor might, to the people, be
hard of digestion. A plain man might, in his simplicity, think
that wood, though in the form of a cross, is wood, and not
Jehovah.
The many kinds of worship, ascribed to images by Romish
doctors, shew their disagreement, shuffling, and difficulty, as
well as the absurdity of their system. Latria, Dulia, Hyper-
dulia, sovereign, supreme, divine, subordinate, inferior, impro-
per, relative, outward, reductive, analogical, accidental, imper-
fect and honorary worship, all these epithets and distinctions
and many more, have been used by Romish theologians, to
1 Crux Christi est adoranda adoratione Latriae. Aquin. III. 25. iv. Eadem reve-
rentia exbibeatur imagini Christi et ipsi Christo ; ejus imago sit adoratione latriffi
a'doranda. Aquinas. III. Q. 25. art. III. P. 140.
Scholasticos illos, qui Christi imagini, atque sanctissimae cruci Latriae cultum
tribuendum esse. Spon. 787. VII.
Crux Legati Apostolici erit ad dextram, quia Latria illi debetur. Pon. Rom. 205
Clerici et laici, ter genibus flexis crucem adorant. Proper lignum, gaudium in
universo rnundo. Miss. Bom. 157. 158.
O Crux, ave spes unica,
Auge piis justitiam,
Reisque dona veniam.
Salve praesentem catervam, In tuis hodie laudibns congregatem. O crux vene-
rabilis quae salutem attulisti miseris. Brev. Rom. 982, 983. Process. Rom. 306.
IMAGE WORSHIP A VARIATION FROM SCRIPTURE. 461
evade difficulty or explain nonsense. These, they wield with
equal resolution and fury against heretics and against each
other. The popish advocate finds himself opposed to the
ancients, and exposed to their heaviest artillery. But he escapes
by a distinction. His system differs from some Pope or council.
But all is reconciled by the mediation of some lucky epithet or
some useful discrimination : and these are numerous and ready
on every occasion of difficulty.
Such, on this topic, is the unity of Romanism. Its councils
and doctors, like the workmen of Babel at the confusion of
speech, are unintelligible and contradictory. Papal theologians
and. schoolmen, for, the purpose of reconciling their jarring sys-
tems, have recourse to hair-breadth distinctions, which involve
their works in midnight obscurity. The discrepancy of their
councils is augmented by the war of commentators, who rival
each other in nonsense and hostility.
Image worship, in all its forms, is a variation from scriptural
authority, and from Jewish and C hristian antiquity. The Jewish
theology and usage excluded all pencilled, graven, and sculp-
tured representations. The God of the Hebrews, in the second
commandment, which many popish catechisms have prudently
omitted, forbids making and adoring the likeness of any thing
in heaven or earth. The Jewish legislator, actuated by inspira-
tion, cautioned Israel against the formation of any graven or
stony effigy, for the purpose of bowing down to such a senseless
statue. He warned the Jews against shaping the likeness of
any beast, fowl, fish, or reptile, and against worshipping the
sun, moon, or stars of heaven. 1 Perversity itself, one would
think, could scarcely misunderstand or misrepresent language,
which possesses such perspicuity and precision. The interdic-
tion comprehends every likeness or effigy, which, if worshipped,
become in a scriptural sense an idol.
Pope Adrian, the second Nicene council, and many moderns,
have pretended to find examples of their system in the cherubim
and brazen serpent. But these, unhappily for the Romish
theology, were neither images of saints nor objects of worship.
The cherubim overshadowed the mercy-seat in the inner court
of the temple, where they we're not even seen, and, if possible,
still less worshipped by the Hebrews. No evidence of their
adoration indeed has been attempted, Adrian and the Niceans,
as an evidence of their infallibility, have, in this case, substitu-
ted an assumption for proof. Aquinas, Vasquez, Lorin, Azorius,
and Visorius, Popish theologians, admit that no adoration was
addressed to the cherubim. 2
1 Leviticus xxvi. 1. Deuteronomy iv. 15.
* Seraphim non ponebantur ad culturn, Aqnin. 1. 328. Labb. 8. 1398. Orabb.
2. 480. Alex. 14. 589. Bell. II. 12.
462 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
The brazen serpent, typical of the healing Emmanuel, could
not be the image of a beautiful saint. A serpent could riot re-
semble ' the human face divine.' The beauty of the one could
not be represented by the other's deformity, which is calcula-
ted to excite horror rather than veneration. Serpentine subtilty
presents a contrast rather than a similarity to the holy rnen and
women, especially to the latter, raised to the honour of Roman
canonization. These, characterized, as all know, by innocence
and purity, are a foil to an animal distinguished by its noxious-
ness and deceit.
The Jews, immured in barbarism, had established, it would
seem, no manufactory of saints similar to the Roman process,
which has been so useful in the days of modern improvement
and popery. The Hebrews were allowed to pass to heaven or
purgatory without any apotheosis or beatification. The serpent,
which the Jewish legislator made of brass, was exposed to the
view of Israel, but never recommended to their adoration. No
insinuation of the kind is found in all the inspired canon. The
Hebrews indeed, prone, like modern papists, to idolatry, began,
in the reign of Hezekiah, to burn incense to that monument of
Jewish antiquity. But the Jewish sovereign, moved, like the
Emperors, Leo, Constantine, and Theophilus, with holy ardour
for the honour of God, shattered the object of idolatry into
fragments. 1
Gregory the Second represents Ozias, who lived eighty-four
years before the event and was great grand-father to Hezekiah,
as the breaker of the brazen serpent. Ozias, says the pontiff
to the emperor, was your brother and displayed the same perti-
nacity. His holiness, having spent in worshipping images the
time, which he should have devoted to the reading of the Bible,
was ignorant that the breaking of the serpent ' was right in the
sight of the Lord.' His Infallibility also makes ' David bring
the brazen serpent and the t holy ark into the Jewish temple,
though the Hebrew monarch, as all except his holiness knew,
died before the erection of that sacred edifice which was built
by Solomon.' 2 This was very clever in his holiness, and a
fine specimen of this terrestrial god's infallibility. Few, it is
probable, could have effected such an achievement. His
supremacy, in his unerring wisdom, should have explained the
means by. which, with so great facility, he conveyed the serpent
and the ark into a house that was a non-entity. He should
have described the manner and wonderful machinery, which
deposited the two Jewish implements with so much safety in
1 2 Kings, xviii. 4.
3 Ilium serpentem sanctificatus David, una cum area sancta in templura invexit.
Greg, in Labb. 8. 658. Bin. 5. 505. Chron. xxvi. 23. et xxvii. 9. xxviii. 27.
IMAGE WORSHIP A VARIATION FROM SCRIPTURE. 463
an unbuilt fabric and under an unformed roof. Gregory was
a valuable head of the church, a precious vicar-general of God,
and a useful teacher of all Christians. His infallibility, notwith-
standing these and many other blunders of his own, had the
hardihood to upbraid the emperor Leo with his ignorance and
stupidity. Having characterized the emperor as a mere ninny,
his holiness, in his sacerdotal modesty and Christian humility,
represented himself as ' an earthly deity.'
Image worship is a variation from the Christian as well as
from the Jewish revelation. The superstition receives no coun-
tenance from the monuments of ecclesiastical antiquity. Pope
Adrian, in a letter read and approved in the second Nicene
council, could muster only one quotation in the New Testament
in favour of idolatry ; and this, his infallibility was obliged tb
pervert to make it answer his purpose. Jacob, according to
his holiness, followed by the Rhemists, ' adored the top of his
rod.' The patriarch, on this supposition, must through age
have been doting. His adoration, if his infallibility and the
Rhemists were not mistaken, was addressed to a very humble
deity; and was certainly the offspring of bad taste as well as
little sense. Adrian, to maintain a silly system, makes an idiot
of Jacob. All, however, is the effect of mistranslation and
misrepresentation. The patriarch was not a fool; but the
Pope, supported in the rear by the Nicene council and the
Rhemish annotators, was a knave. Hoary Israel, worn out
with age and infirmity, leaned on his staff, whilst, in faith, he
adored God and blessed the sous of Joseph. The pontiff, the
Niceans, and the Rhemists, unfaithful to the original, have,
with unblushing impudence and perversity, omitted the pre-
position, and, in consequence, made the Hebrew prophet
worship the worthless wood, the produce of the soil. The
Rhemists besides have, with shameless effrontery, accused the
Protestants of mistranslation and corruption of the Greek,
which contains the preposition. 1
The Niceans, varying on this topic from fact and reason, vary
also from themselves. Having made the patriarch worship a
walking-stick, the infallible fathers wheeled to the right about,
and denied point-blank that his adoration was addressed to the
wood. Jacob, says Adrian approved by the Niceans, worship
ped not the stick, but Joseph. 2 The. unerring synod, in sheer
1 Jacob summitatem virgas filii Joseph deosculatus est. Labb. 8. 754. Bin. .5.
558. Hebrews, xi. 21.
2 Non quod virgam illam, sed tenentem earn, in sisnum dilectionis. adoravit.
Crabb. 2. 480.
Lignum non adoravit, sed per lignnm, Joseph. Labb. 8. 1400.
Jacob, in summitate virgas Joseph adorasse dicitur, non sane ligno ilium cultum
exhibens. Labb. 8. 1423.
464 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY I
contradiction, proceeded, on the same subject and nearly in
the same breath, both to affirm and deny.
The Rhemists on this point vary from the Niceans, who had
differed from themselves. The former make the Jewish seer
worship the end of a rod. The latter affirm that, his adoration
was addressed to his son ; though, soaring nobly above all con-
sistency, they had, in the preceding sentence, represented a
walking-staff as the object of his homage. Agreed in imputing
idolatry to Jacob, these two interpreters differ in attempting to
account for the impiety. Jacob, say the Niceans, acted from
regard to his son and a partiality to the staff, which, these
fathers discovered by their infallibility belonged to Joseph,
The patriarch, say the Rhemists, was moved by a veneration
for the rod, which, the sage annotators discovered, without
any infallibility, perfigured the sceptre and kingdom of the
Messiah. 1
The council and the annotators, jarring in this way with one
another, gainsay the ablest Jewish translators, Christian fathers,
and Popish commentators. The English Protestant transla-
tion agrees with those of Aquila, Symmachus, and the Targums
of Onkelos and Jerusalem. 2 Aquila, Symmachus and Onkelos,
in Origen, Calmet, and Walton, render the parallel passage in
Genesis, ' Israel, worshipped, turning towards the head of his
couch.' According to the Targum of Jerusalem, ' Jacob
praised God on his bed.'
The Popish version, varying from the Jewish critics Aquila,
Symmachus, and Onkelos, varies also from the Christian
fathers, Jerome, Augustine, Theodoret, and a Parisian synod. 8
Jerome translates the Hebrew, ' Israel, turning to the head of
the bed, adored God.' According to the comment of Augus-
tine on Paul's words taken from the Septuagint, "Jacob,
leaning on the end of his staff, worshipped God." Theodoret's
interpretation is similar to Augustine's. . Israel, according to
this expositor on Genesis, ' worshipped, reclining his head on
his staff which he held in his right hand.' The Parisian
council's interpretation in 824, coincides with that of Jerome,
Augustine, and Theodoret.
The second synod of Nice and the translators of Rheims,
differing from Jerome, Augustine, and Theodoret, differ also
1 Orabb, 2. 480. Ehein. on Heb. xi. 21.
s Upofcxvvyatv Itfpo^X srtt <fqv xffya&qv -tvfi xfaviis- Aquil. in Orig. Hex. 1. 52.
Ilpogfxvvqtsv lapaifl. rtt to axpov T'JJJ xMvi}$. Orig. Hex. 1. 52. Calm. 23.
742. Walton, 6. 8.
3 Adoravit Israel, conversus ad lectuli capnt. Jerom. 1-. 52.
Se inclinvait ad Deum adorandum, id titique fecisse super cacnmen virgae suae
qmam sic ferebat, ut super earn, caput inclinando adoraret. Aug. 3. 418.
<ty pafiSu -f^v xstyatyv- Theodoret, 1. 71.
IMAGE WORSHIP A VARIATION FROM SCRIPTURE. 465
from the learned translators Simon, Capellus, Houbigant,
Hasselan, Csesareus, Vatablus, Pagnin, and Montanus, as well
as from the Syriac, Samaritan, and Vulgate. All these represent
Jacob as worshipping, leaning on the head of his staff or bed.
The Vulgate of Genesis, faithful to the Hebrew, inserts the
preposition : and the Douay translators accordingly have
followed the Latin, and allowed the patriarch to adore, not a
rod, but Jehovah. The preposition, which is found in the
Greek Septuagint cited by Paul, is now omitted in the Latin
of the Vulgate ; though used in the days of Augustine in some
of the more correct manuscripts. 1
The Niceans and Rhemists, clashing with other expositors
and translators, disagree with the ablest Popish commentators,
such as Bede, Lyra, Erasmus, Quesnel, and Calmet, who per-
mit Jacob to worship the Almighty. 2 The patriarch, says Bede*
4 adored God.' According to Lyra, 'Israel, being old, held a
staff on which he reclined in adoring God. The meaning is not,
that he adored the top of his staff; but that he adored God,
leaning on the top of his staff.' Christians, says Erasmus,
* abhorred, at that time, the adoration of any created object, and
kept this honour only for God. Jacob, says Quesnel, ' wor-
shipped God, leaning on his staff.' The Jewish prophet, says
the learned and judicious Calmet, ' adored God, supported on
the end of his staff. He leaned his head on his staff to worship
God.'
Pope Gregory, who had made Ozias break the brazen serpent
before he was born, and David bring it into the temple before
it was built, discovered another argument in the New Testa-
ment. Jesus said r " where the carcass is, there will the eagles
be gathered." The Lord, says Gregory, was the carcass.
The eagles were men of piety, who,. according to his infallibility,
flew aloft like eagles to Jerusalem, and pourtrayed Jesus, James,
Stephen, and the martyrs. 3 The portraits, taken as they were
from real life, being exhibited to the whole world, meo, engaged
by the holy representations, forsook the worship of Satan for
the worship of these striking likenesses of Jesus, James, and
I Alex. 14. 753. Simon, in Loco. Calm. 23. 742. Estius, 2. 1049. Houbig.
1. 155. Montan. 1. 60. Walton, 1. 214. Aug. 3. 418.
3 Adoravit Deum. Beda, 6. 811.
Quia erat senex, habebat baculum, super hujus summitatem nitebatur, in ado-
rando Deum. Unde non eat intelligendum, quod adoravit snmmitatem virgse vel
baculi, sed adoravit Deum, innixus super baculum. Lyra, 5.156.
In tantum, eo tempore, abhorrebant ab adorandis ullis rebus creatis, soli Deo,
. hoc honoris servantes. Erasm. 6. 1015.
II adora Dieu, appuye sur le baton. Quesnel, 4. 333.
II adora Dieu, appuye-sur I'extremite de son baton. II pencha la tete snr son
baton pour adorer Dieu. Calmet, 23. 741.
3 Christuaf antem cadaver. Aquilae, in sublime volantes, reiigiosi sunt homines
Labb. 8. j655, 770. Bin 5. 503. Matt. xxiv. 28.
30
466 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Stephen. This was very sensible in the vicar-general of God,
and makes the thing very clear. Some heretical critics, indeed,
who are too officious, have wondered' how the supreme pontiff
obtained his information ; while many have had the temerity
to hint that the proselytism, on this supposition, was only from
one kind of idolatry to another. Some, too, supposing through
ignorance or mistake that the world was converted by the
preaching of the gospel, have questioned the use of images in
the important work. But these heretics, always meddling and
troublesome, have, in these insinuations, shewn, as usual, their
insufferable impertinence. The second Nicene council, on these
kinds of topics, deprecated, in their usual prudence, all narrow
and unnecessary scrutiny. The Roman hierarch's exposition
contains a momentous discovery, which, in importance and
utility, rivals those of Montanus, Swedenborg, and Southcott,
and must have been very satisfactory to himself and his friends.
His infallibility's comment is like the raving of a man who is
crazy, and who has escaped from the responsibility which might
be supposed to attend on sanity of intellect. The pontiff's
interpretation presents an unequalled specimen of jargon. The
father and teacher of all Christians, on this occasion, has carried
nonsense to a state of unqualified perfection which fears no
rivalry.
Such is the specimen of arguments, for this system, taken
from the Bible and founded on Scriptural authority.. Many
others of the same kind and equally silly might be produced.
But the Nicene logic, if it deserve the name, is unworthy of
repetition. The reasoning resembles the mockery of a Swift or
some other satirist, who, in a keen vein of irony, exposed the
cause which he pretended to advocate. Gregory, Adrian, and
the Nicene council, it would seem, wished to excite a laugh at
their own expense.
Symbolical worship is a variation from ecclesiastical antiquity,
as well as from Scriptural authority. The early fathers, copy-
ing the example of the Jewish prophets and Christian apostles,
exploded the impiety from their system. These disclaimed the
worship of images as the invention of Satan, injurious to devo-
tion, and deceitful, as books for the unlearned, as monitors for
the memory, or aids for piety.
The partizans of emblematic worship, driven from the fort-
ress of Scriptural authority and authentic history, have in-
trenched themselves behind the wonders of legendary tales and
miraculous testimony. Fabrications and miracles have, in the
absence of Scriptural and historical evidence, been sought for
the support of a system inconsistent with reason and Revela-
tion. The second Nicene council collected a vast accumulation
VARIATION FROM ECCLESIASTICAL ANTIQUITY. 467
of this rubbish, and have been followed in modern times by
Baronius, Bellarmine, Binius, Turriano, Maimbourg, and
Alexander, who have transcribed the fictions and emblazoned
the 'lying wonders' of Evagrius, Nicephorus, Damascen, and
Theodorus. A few of these will shew the ignorance and
credulity of the ancient and modern patrons of idolatry.
The portrait of Jesus, sent to Abgarus, King of- Edessa,
claims the first place. His Edessan majesty, it seems, sent
Ananias to Judea to draw the Messiah's likeness. This task
the artist attempted, but could not perform, on account of the
splendour which radiated from Emmanuel's countenance.
Seeing the painter's embarrassment, Jesus washed his face,
and, in a miraculous manner, impressed his sacred and divine
likeness on a linen cloth, which, with the politest attention, he
handed to Ananias. The Son of God, says Pope Gregory,
sent Abgarus his glorious face, which the sovereign of Edessa
worshipped with great devotion. 1 This portrait, wonderful to
tell, the work of no mortal pencil, the creation of the Divine
original, was left during a tedious lapse of five hundred years,
to slumber on the niche of a wall, from which, after long obliv-
ion, it was released by the hand of superstition or credulity.
The unpencilled picture, made without hands, became the
palladium of the nation's safety, and delivered the Edessans
from the arms of the Persians. The silly fabrication, in reality,
unknown in the days of Eusebius, was the invention of the
sixth century. The Syrian legend, which adorned the annals
of superstition and credulity, constituted the panoply of Gregory,
Damascen, and the second Nicene council.
Images of lady Mary, as well as of her son, adorned the altar
and edified the faithful. Arnold, it seems, in his peregrinations
in Palestine, saw an extraordinary likeness of her ladyship. This
portrait had been drawn on wood, which afterward, wonderful
to tell, was transformed into human mould and assumed a living
form and substance. Flesh grew over the wood of the tablet,
and over the colours, of the pencil. 2 The incarnated painting
began to emit a fragrant oil, which healed the disorders of all
kinds of men, Christians, Jews, and Saracens. The medicinal
fluid continued, from age to age, to flow without any diminu-
tion either in quantity or effect.
John, who was a hermit and who lived in a cave in Palestine,
twenty miles from Jerusalem, worshipped an image of lady
Mary with her son in her arms, before which, in his cell, he
. x Sacram et sloriosain faciem snam ad eum misit. Greg, ad Leo. Labb. 8.
655. Spon. 31. XXIII. Evag. IV. 27. Cedren. 1, 140. Bin. 5. 716.
2 Pictura super lignum est incarnata, et oleum maxime odoriferum emittere
cpepit. Spondau. 870. IX.'
30*
468 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY!
kept a candle always burning. The solitary made frequent
peregrinations to Sina, to the great desert, and to Jerusalem,
for the important purpose of adoring the hqly cross. He was
also a great votary of the martyrs ; and shewing no mercy to
his unfortunate feet, which he wore for the good of his soul, he
visited Theodorus, John, Sergius, and Tecla. His journey
would, at a time, occupy two, four, or six months ; and, during
his absence, he committed the light to the care of her ladyship,
to prevent the mother and son from being in darkness. The
anchoret travelled, and left the queen of heaven to snuff the
candle. The mother of God executed the humble task with
great fidelity. John, on his return from his holy and useful
pilgrimages, found the candle always burning, and notwith-
standing his long absence, remaining, through her ladyship's
attention, not the least wasted. 1
The cross, like the images of Jesus and Mary, became the
object of worship and the agent of miracles. Theodorus, accord-
ing to Bede and Godeau, brought the true cross from Jeru-
salem to Constantinople, and deposited it in the temple of
Sophia. This wooden deity was there exhibited on the Thursday,
Friday, and Saturday of holy-week, for the adoration of the
laymen, the women, and the clergy. The laymen on Thursday
adored the jointed divinity, who, in all probability, was worm-
eaten, but still perhaps respectable as Priapus. The women,
on Friday, performed the sublime and august ceremony, and
the clergy, on Saturday, engaged, with great piety and edifica-
tion, in the same duty. The god was then locked in a chest,
to sleep for the rest of the year. During the display, and while
the cross lay on the altar, the temple was filled with a wonder-
ful odour. His transverse godsnip, it appears, was, among
other attributes, distinguished by the superiority of his smell.
A fragrant liquor, also, like oil, which healed all kinds of
sickness, flowed in copious streams from the knots of the sacred
wood, which composed the frame of this clumsy god. 2
The authority, on which the second Nicene council as well as
the moderns, Baronius, Bellarmine, Maimbourg, and Alexander
rest these accounts, is, as the candid Du Pin has shewn, desti-
tute of authenticity, pertinence, and antiquity. Many of their
quotations for evidence are from suppositions productions.
Works are ascribed to Basil, Chrysostom, and Athanasius,
which these saints never saw, though cited in their name, by
the Niceans, Baronius, and Bellarmine. Some of their author-
ides are impertinent as well as apocryphal. Many of the
Nicene citations from Basil, Cyril, and Gregory, testify, says
Du Pin, not the worship of images but merely their use.
1 Labb. 8. 1451. Bin. 5. 718. - 2 Beda, 323. Godean, 5. 137. Horace, Sat. 2.
PRETENDED MIRACULOUS PROOFS OF IMAGE WORSHIP. 469
*
The authorities of the Niceans, Baronius, Bellarmine, and
Alexander are as yoid of antiquity as of pertinence and authen-
ticity. The sacred synod and their copyists could not, for their
system, produce the testimony of a single father who lived
prior to the fourth century. Their chief vouchers for this su-
perstition are Chrysostom, Gregory, Athanasius, Basil, Cyril,
Nilus, Simeon, Sophron, Anastasius, Leontius, Germanus.
Damascen, and Evagrius. Chrysostom, Gregory, Athanasius,
and Basil flourished in the fourth century, and the rest in the
succeeding ages of Christianity. All these, it is admitted,
lived after the introduction of symbolical worship. No author,
for three hundred years after the commencement of the Christian
era, is quoted. This tedious and lengthened period elapsed
without a single individual, in all Christendom, to recommend
or exemplify this impiety. The annals of these ages supply
not a solitary testimony which ingenuity itself, and much less
the stupidity of Gregory, Adrian, and the Nicene prelacy,, could
pervert into evidence for emblematic adoration.
The force of truth extorted confessions to this effect from
many popish critics and historians. Many who were attached
to Romanism have admitted the exclusion of images in the
days of antiquity, notwithstanding the confident, but unfounded
assertions of Baronius, Bellarmine, Binius, Turriano, Juenin,
Maimbourg, and many more of the same description. From
among the number who have made this acknowledgement, may,
as a specimen, be selected Petavius, Daniel, Mezeray, Alexan-
der, Pagius, D u Pin, Erasmus, Cassander, Gyraldus, Mendoza,
Bruys, Polydorus, Clemangis, and Crinitus. Petavius, Daniel,
Mezeray, Alexander, Pagius, and Du Pin grant the scarcity or
total want of painted or sculptured representations in primitive
times, lest their use should have offended the Jews or tempted
the Pagans to idolatry. Erasmus represents men of piety as
excluding painted, sculptured, and woven images from Christian
temples till the age of Jerome in the fourth century. Christians,
at the commencement of preaching the Gospel, detested, says
Cassander, the use and veneration of any likeness in the wor-
ship of God. According to Gyraldus, Christians, like the
Romans, remained for some time without images. Mendoza,
Bruys, Polydorus, and Clemangis make similar admissions.
Crinitus reprehends Origen, Lactantius, and some others of
the ancients for condemning symbolical worship. 1
1 Imagines, per tria priora saecula in oratoriis collocates non fiiisse, nee frequen-
ter etiam in domibus privatis servatas. Petav. in Juenin, 4. 380.
Dans le commencement de L'eglise, 1'usage des images n'etoit pas frequent.
Dan. 2. 77.
Les peintures et lea images de relief etoient fort tares dans les eglises avant
Constaiitine le grand. Mezeray, Av. Clov. 451.
470 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
The use of images, which preceded their worship and which
commenced in the fourth century, was, on this topic, the first
variation from Romanism. The Simonians, Carpocratians,
Manicheans, and Cpllyridians, at an earlier date, had, as
appears from Irenseus, Augustine, and Epiphanius, begun this
impiety. The Gnostics, in succeeding times, began to worship
the statues of Jesus, Pythagoras, and Plato, and the Simonian,
Manichean, and Gnostic absurdity of emblematic worship, was
afterward copied by the mistaken friends of Christianity.
Images, says Alexander, unknown in Christendom in the first
ages, were uncommon in the fourth century, and unnumbered
among the implements of the church by Eusebius, Athanasius,
Optatus, and Jerome. 1
The second variation of Romanism, on this subject, consisted
in the worship of images which succeeded their use. Many
adored these lifeless forms on their first introduction into the
Christian commonwealth* Their adoration, however, was not
general till the end of the sixth century. But the innovation
soon advanced to maturity. The visible similitudes of Saints
and Martyrs became admirable physicians ; and, by application
to diseased limbs, effected astonishing cures. The credulity
of the populace was fed with tales, miracles, visions, and the
dreams of fanatical monks. The rank superstition in conse-
quence had arrived at full growth, and appeared in all its
disgusting formality in the beginning of the eighth century.
The use and worship of images, adopted from Gnosticism or
Gentilism, became, in this way, an adventitious appendage of
Christianity. The ugly excrescence was affixed to a fair sys-
tem, as the deformity of a wen on the cheek of beauty. Idola-
try, inconsistent indeed with Christianity, is congenial with the
human mind. The Jews under a theocracy and the immediate
tuition of heaven, often adored idols insteads of Jehovah. The
Vix ullum fuisse imaginum usum, tribus prioribus sseculis. Alex. 14. 655. Pa-
gius, Ann. 56. Da Pin, 2. 43.
Veteres qui tanto studio obstiterunt, ne quid imaginum in templo Christiano re-
perietur. Erasm. 11. 1770.
In templis nullam ferebant imaginem. Erasm. 5. 1187.
Aliquanto tempore, inter Christianos imaginum usum non fuisse. Cassander, 163.
Nos dico Christianos, ut aliquando Romanes fuisse sine imaginibus, in primitiva
quse vocatur ecclesia. Gyraldus, I.
Abstinebant ad tempus. Mendoza. III. 5. Labb. 1. 1252.
Ha (lea Empereurs) vouloient ramener la practique de primiers siecles. Bruys,
1. 608.
Simulachrorum cultum .omnes fere veteres patres damnasse. Poly. Virg. VI. 13.
Statuit olinvuniversa ecclesia ut nullse in templis imagines ponerentur. Clem
aag. 151. Crinitus, IX. 9.
* Vix ullum fuisse imaginum usum tribus prioribus sasculis ; nee admodum quarto
etiam aajculo. Neque quarto sseculo statim in ecclesiis omnibus obtinuit, nee inter
ecclesias instrumenta numerals fuerunt icones ab Eusebio. Athanasio, Optato, aut
Hieronymo. Alex. 14, 654, 656. Iren. I. 24. Epiph. H. 27. Augustin, 8. 7.
INTRODUCTION OF IMAGES INTO THE CHURCH. 471
heathen, forgetting the spiritual and invisible Deity, bowed to
the sunj moon, and stars* The adoration of Grentilism, through
a partiality to emblematic worship, was addressed to nearly
every reptile of the earth and every luminary of the sky. The
Christians, awed by the authority of heaven, were, for more
than three ages, restrained from the headlong impiety. But
the bias of the soul burst, at length, through the injunctions of
the Creator, and launched with crowded canvass into the wide
ocean of symbolical and popular superstition. The veneration
of the cross and of relics was first introduced. The emblem
of redemption or the remains of a saint were preserved with
superstitious devotion. The portrait or the statue of the Saint
or the Saviour succeeded, as more striking memorials of holiness
or salvation. The painted, or sculptured effigy, introduced
indeed with caution, was allowed to adorn the oratory, instruct
the ignorant, warm the frigid, or gratify the prepossessions of
the convert from Gentilism. The new portraits and statues,
though executed in defiance of all taste, spread from east to
west, gratified the imagination of the superstitious, ornamented
the Grecian Temple or Roman Basilic, and finally received the
adoration of the deluded and degraded votary.
Symbolical worship, on its introduction, was opposed by
Synodal, Episcopal, Pontifical, arid Imperial authority. The
impiety was interdicted by a synod in the beginning of the fourth
century. The Council of Elvira in Spain, about the year 305,
decreed, that ' pictures should not be in churches, lest what is
worshipped or adored should be painted on walls.' 1 The deci-
sion of Elvira, which condemned the superstition, is in direct
contradiction to the canons of Nicsea and Trent.
The popish theologians have exerted all their ingenuity to
evade this unlucky enactment. Their comments display an
amusing diversity ; but an odd specimen of papal unity. Baro-
nius and Bosius regard the council, or at least this canon, as a
forgery of the Iconoclasts. This imputation is an admission of
its hostility to the reigning system of Romanism. The ground-
less opinion, however, is now universally exploded. Vasquez,
Sanderus, Turriano, and Bellarmine think that the Spanish pre-
lacy forbad pictures, not on wood or canvass, but on walls,
lest they should be defaced by the damp or profaned by the
Jews and Pagans. Albaspinaeus and Payva represent the in-
terdiction as restricted to portraits of God. Mendoza, Pagius,
and Bona would limit the prohibition to similitudes of the Trinity,
lest that mystery should be divulged to the uninitiated. The
Spanish episcopacy, according to Alan and Alexander, were
1 Placuit picturas iu ecclesia esse non debate, ne quod colitur et adoratur in
parietibus depingatur. Bin. 1. 235. Labbeus, 1. 995.
472 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
afraid of idolatry which then prevailed in the kingdom. Fleury
accounted the canon a mere temporary decision, suited to the
times of persecution. This explanation, says Bruys, is calcu-
lated to afford a laugh to the adversary. 1
Carranza, Canus, Petavius, Alexander, Bruys, and Du Pin
admit the genuineness and natural signification of the canon:
but with different designs. Carranza accuses the Spanish bishops
of error, and Canus of imprudence and impiety. Petavius,
Alexander, Bruys, and Du Pin candidly confess that the
primitive discipline still prevailed in Spain, to the exclusion of
the use and worship of the portrait or the statue. 2 This indeed
is the plain meaning of the canon : and every other gloss makes
the words signify the direct contrary of what they say.
Emblematic worship, at its introduction, was prescribed by
episcopal as well as by synodal authority. The empress Con-
stantia sent to Eusebius of Csesarea for an image of our Lord.
But the bishop, in return, objected to the painting of either
Emmanuel's divinity or humanity. The Deity, said Eusebius,
has no form, and the manhood, clothed with Divine glory, can-
not be represented by the lifeless colours of the pencil. 3
The popish critics, in reply to this relation, display their
unity by the variety of their answers. Petavius and Alan,
without any reason, account it a forgery of the Iconoclasts.
This, however, is a plain confession of its hostility to symboli-
cal adoration. The Nicene council, in reply, called Eusebius
an Arian : though, in the quotation, he acknowledges, in the
plainest terms, the Godhead of the Son. Du Pin admits the
weakness of the Nicene answer. Alexander, notwithstanding
his prepossessions, grants that the Csesarean Christians, ad-
hering to primitive simplicity, used in that age no images. 4
Epiphanius, like Eusebius, deprecated the adoration of
visible representations. The bishop of Salamis and Metropoli-
tan of Cyprus, passing through Anablatha in Palestine, saw
the image of Jesus or some saint hanging on a wall before the
door of the church. This the bishop rent, and declared such
an abuse to be contrary to Scriptural authority, inconsistent
with the Christian religion, and unworthy of a professing
people. Jerome, who translated the letter, which contains
this relation, and which was written by Epiphanius to John of
1 Labbeus, 1. 1021. Bosius, XII. 1. Sanderus, III. 4. Turrian. I. 2. Bell.
II. 9. Albasp. c. 36. Mend. HI. 5. Alan. IV. 16. Fleury. IX.
2 Imagines per tria priora esecula in Oratoriis collocatas non fuisse. Petav. in
Juen. 4. 380. Sublatum fuisse in provincia Boetica imaginum usum et cultum,
Alexander, 14. 662. Du Pin, 1. 593. Canus V. 4. Labb. 1. 1052. Bruy. ? 90.
s Juenin, 4. 390. Du Pin, 2. 37.
Petnv. XV. 14. Alex. 14. 665.
PROGRESS OF IMAGE-WORSHIP. 473
Jerusalem, throws no blame on the Metropolitan, but, on -the
contrary, calls him a pattern of pristine sanctity. 1
The worship of images was, in the seventh century, con-
demned by pontifical authority, as it had, on former occasions,
been denounced by Eusebius, Epiphanius, and the council of
Elvira. Serenus, the Massilian bishop, had demolished some
images, which his flock, in mistaken piety, had adored. Greg-
ory the Great, in 601, wrote to Serenus on this occasion ; and
blamed the bishop for breaking these pictures, but praised
him, in unqualified language, for preventing their adoration.
These similitudes, said his infallibility, are erected, " not for
the worship of any, but ONLY for the instruction of the ignorant.
Allow images therefore to be made, but forbid them to be wor-
shipped in any manner." Such are the statements of Du Pin,
Bruys, and Godeau. Du Pin renders Gregory's words by a
French expression, signifying " in any manner whatever:"
Bruys translates the pontiff's language, " in any way," and
Godeau " in every manner." 2
Dionysius, Bellarmine, Alexander, and Juenin represent
Gregory as condemning, not the subordinate veneration of
images, but their supreme adoration. His infallibility, accord-
ing to these critics, allowed the inferior homage of these pictures
but interdicted their sovereign worship. This is to make his
holiness mean the direct opposite of what he says. The inter-
pretation is a diametrical inversion of the expression. The
reasoning of these authors is a beautiful specimen of dialec-
tics. Images, says Gregory, are intended only for instruction,
and therefore, say Dionysius, Bellarmine, and Juenin, they
are also designed for adoration. Pictures, according to his
infallibility, are to be worshipped in no way, and therefore,
according to modern logicians, they are to be worshipped in
some way. These theologians reason like men, who wish to
ridicule the subject on which they treat. The allegation of
Dionysius, says Bruys, is ridiculous in the view of sincerity
and impartiality. 3
Synodal, episcopal, and pontifical authority began, in the
eighth century, to be supported by imperial power. The bishop,
the pontiff, and the council, attempted in vain to stem the tide
1 Contra autoritatem Scriptural-urn. Jerom. 1. 828.
_ In ecclesi& Christi istiusmodi vela quse contra religionem npstram veniunt. In-
digna est ecclesia Christi et populis, qui tibi credhi sunt. Jerom, 4. 829. Ep.
110. Alex. 14. 666. Da Pin, 1. 296. Juenin, 4. 380.
2 Quia eas adorari vetuisses omnino laudavimus. Labb. 6. 1156.
^ Non ad adorandum in ecclesiis, sed ad instruendas solummodo mentes fuit nes-
cientium collocatum. Greg. IX. Ep. 9.
Adorare vero imagines omnibus modis evita. Greg, ad Seren. Evitez en toute
maniers, qu'on ne les adore. Godea. 5. 14. Du Pin, 1. 574.
3 Diony. IV. 1. Alex. 14. 682. Bruy. 1. 375.
474 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
of popular superstition. The current of idolatry, so congenial
with human depravity, overwhelmed or subverted all the
barriers of ecclesiastical prohibition. The clergy, like the laity,
were hurried down the overflowing and headlong stream of
apostacy, and bowed with the multitude to the painted or
sculptured idol. The priesthood and the people, yielding to
the inundation of error, perpetrated high treason against God,
and substituted the work of the pencil and chisel for the Creator
of earth and heaven. The emperor, on this exigency, inter-
posed the arm of power, and shattered into fragments the
objects of idolatry.
Leo the Isaurian was the first emperor who ventured to
oppose the threatening impiety. This prince, though descended
from an humble origin, and devoid of literary or philosophical
attainments, possessed extraordinary vigour and intrepidity.
Disgusted with the new idolatry, and stimulated by the sar-
casms of the Jews and Saracens, he resolved to exterminate the
Antichristian innovation. Full of this design, he convoked an
assembly of the bishops and senators ; and all these, except
Germanus, concurred in the plan of eradicating the superstition,
as an innovation in the church, a scandal to Christianity, and
the degradation of man. The emperor, however, proceeded at
first with caution. He interdicted the worship of images, and
removed the idols from the altars to a higher place in the tem-
ples. This remedy proving insufficient, Leo ordered their
demolition without delay or restriction. 1
The execution of the imperial edict was attended with dread-
ful commotions. Leo, stigmatized for irreligion and heresy, was
resisted by Germanus and Gregory, the patriarch and the
pontiff. ' The partizans of superstition, priests and laymen,
flew to arms. The Byzantine citizens, man and women,
attacked the imperial army and massacred several of the
soldiery. Some of the women fell in arms, and received, says
Andilly, a glorious death as the reward of their piety. 2
Pope Gregory, in the meantime, attacked Leo with the pen,
as the Byzantines had assailed him with the sword. The pon-
tiff, in his letter, characterized the emperor as stupid and igno-
rant, and in the warmth and benevolence of his zeal, " prayed
the Lord to set the devil upon his majesty." 3 His infallibility's
petition, no doubt, showed great piety. But the holy viceroy
of heaven, while he described the emperor as a ninny and
invoked the aid of Satan, took special care to mention his own
1 Leon, d'une naissance obscure, ne devoit 1* empire qu' sa rare valeur. Ver-
tot, 7. Theoph. 272. Labb. 8. 646. Giannon, V. $. 2. Alex. 14. 70.
8 Labb. 8. 646. Andilly, 381.
3 Invocamus Christum ut immittat tibi Daemonem. Labb. 8. 671. Bin. 5. 503
Brays, 1. 530.
IMAGE-WORSHIP OPPOSED BY THE EMPEROR LEO. 475
dignity, and represented himself as an earthly God. Gregory,
in his supplication for Leo, had evinced great piety, and in
like manner, in his report of himself, displayed equal modesty.
Theophanes, Alexander, Baronius, Maimbourg, and Pagius
have flattered Gregory with the grossest adulation, notwith-
standing his invocation of his infernal majesty. Theophanes
represents his holiness as ' excelling in word and deed.' Alex-
ander calls the superstitious blasphemer a 'holy pontiff.' Gre-
gory's letter, says Baronius and Maimbourg, was worthy of the
high pontiff who was its author. 1 The pontifical production, in
its politeness and devotion, was quite satisfactory to the Jesuits.
The epistle remains a lasting monument of the earthly God's
erudition and infallibility. Gregory's devotion, in his reply to
Leo, far surpassed Luther's in his answer to Henry. The Ger-
man reformer certainly did not spare the English king. His
zeal ofter evaporated in abuse and scurrility. But the reformer,
in the use of these weapons, was far excelled by the pontiff.
Gregory's devotion also outshone Luther's as much as his zeal.
Luther, though he used language which did not exceed in
urbanity, never ventured to solicit the interference of the devil.
But the vicar-general of God prayed that Satan might be let
loose on Leo, and this was the pontiff's best supplication for
the emperor.
His holiness wielded not only his pen, but, if credit may be
attached to Theophanes, Cedrenus, Zonaras, and Nicephorus,
plied, on this occasion, his spiritual artillery, and excommunica-
ted his majesty. He. circulated apostolic letters through the
empire, stimulating all to resist the imperial edict for the
destruction of images. The Romans, Italians, Venetians, and
Lombards flew to arms, in support of the pontiff and their idols,
against their sovereign, whom they accounted guilty of apostacy
and a design of substituting Judaism for Christianity. These
holy warriors, Who contended for the faith which was idolatry,
overthrew Leo's : statues, rejected his authority, withheld, at
Gregory's command, the public revenue, elected a new magis-
tracy, and finally separated Ravenna, Venice, Pentapolis, and
the Roman dukedom from the imperial dominions. 2
Ecclesiastical was mingled with military war, and the fulmi-
nations of councils with the tangible logic of the legions. Gre-
gory the Second, in 726, assembled a Roman synod, consisting
of the neighbouring bishops. His holiness presided in person,
and opened the convention with a speech fraught with silly
sophistry. The assembled prelacy, as in duty bound, acquies-
1 Theoph. 272. _ Alex. 14. 68. Baron. An. 726. Pagi. Brey. 528. Maimb. 282.
-..v- u g,it. M>-*. -li-l^.v. ~X, U(J. JJrLl Uii. .T3.IA. I ^,U. J. ttQ 1 * Ji ^ * **'*^-" iTA'HHlU. MOv.
3re.E;oire disoitaux peuples qn'ilsue ponvoient en conscience payer des tribute
i prince heretique. Vertot, 13. Giannon, V. . 2. Bruy. 1. 520. Lib. Pon. 156.
2 Gre
un
476 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
ced ,in his infallibility's dialectics, and issued an enactment
enjoining image-worship, and denouncing iconoclasm, as pes-
tilence and heresy. Gregory the Third followed his predeces-
sor's example. His holiness, in 732, headed a Roman synod
of ninety-three bishops, who issued a constitution establishing
the apostolic practice of symbolical worship, and denouncing
the profane atrocity of Iconoclasm. 1
These western synods, superintended by the Roman pontiff,
were opposed by an eastern, sanctioned by the Byzantine
patriarch and the Grecian emperor. Leo had designed a
general council for the decision of this point, which had excited
such commotions through Christendom. This, however, was
opposed by the pope and finally relinquished. Constantino, his
son and successor, having subdued the Saracens, Bulgarians,
and other Barbarians, turned his attention to the ecclesiastical
state of the empire. He resolved to assemble a general council
for the final settlement of the contested topic of Iconoclasm. He
accordingly summoned the eastern bishops to meet at Constan-
tinople, for the purpose of deciding the long-agitated contro-
versy. The metropolitans were instructed to hold provincial
councils of their suffragans for discussion, and for the attainment
of information on the subject of disputation.
The imperial directions were obeyed ; and the Grecian pre-
lacy, to the amount of 338, met at Constantinople in the year
754. Anastasius being dead, Theodosius exarch of Asia, and
Postillus metropolitan of Pamphilia presided : and the assem-
bled fathers were left free of all imperial control. The session
lasted six months ; during which time, the subject was investi-
gated with perseverance and deliberation. The result was as
might be expected. The council condemned both the use and
the worship of images. Their use was represented as dan-
gerous and hurtful. Their worship was stigmatized as the
invention of Satan, the sin of idolatry, and the restoration of
paganism under the name of Christianity. The adoration of
images, the Byzantine Synod pronounced blasphemy. Depo-
sition was pronounced against the clergy, and excommunication
against the laity, who should be guilty of the impiety. This
decision was delivered as founded on the word of God, the
definitions of councils, the usage of the church, and the faith
of the fathers. The chief fathers, whom the Byzantines quoted,
were Eusebius, Epiphanius, Amphilochius, and Theodotus. 2
The abettors of emblematic substitutions in the worship of
God have made the Byzantine synod the mark of insult and
obloquy. Damascen represented it as destitute of authority.
l Labb. 8. 191. Bin. 5. 460. Labb. 8. 217.
8 Theoph. 285. Zonaras, 2. 85. Bruy. 1. 554.
IMAGE-WORSHIP CONDEMNED BY THE BYZANTINE COUNCIL. 477
The Niceans and monks accused it .of heresy, Judaism,
apostacy, Mahometanism, and blasphemy. Labbeus calls it a
mad conventicle : whilst Baronius and Bellarmine found it
guilty of folly, absurdity, irreligion, and profanity. The By-
zantine fathers, says Andilly, ' worshipped the Devil.' These
allegations, however, are all slanders. The mutilated acts of
the assembly display decided evidence of sense and piety.
The Niceans only showed their weakness in their attempts to
confute its arguments. No good reason can be alleged against
its universality. Its bishops were convened by the emperor :
and were free and unanimous. The patriarchs of Rome,
Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, did not indeed assist
either in person or by delegation. But the Roman pontiff
assisted neither by personal or deputed authority in the second
and fifth general councils. The patriarchs of Alexandria,
Antioch, and Jerusalem were under the control of the Saracens,
and, in consequence, prevented from attending the Byzantine
synod. But the Caliphs, in the same manner, hindered these
dignitaries from appearing in the second Nicene council, which,
nevertheless, was in the end vested with the honour of oecu-
menicity. 1
The emperor, having by rigour and severity repressed the
opposition of the monks, who were the great patrons of this
superstition, and, in the end, suppressed the whole lazy order,
succeeded in establishing the enactments of the Byzantine
assembly and restoring the purity of Christian worship. Idol-
atry fled from the sanctuary of the church and retired to the
caves of the wilderness. Andilly complains that 'the whole
world had embraced the heresy of Iconoclasm.' 2 The oriental
or Grecian communion, clergy and laity, submitted to the Con-
stantinopolitan decisions, rejected idols, and returned to the
simplicity of pristine purity.
The ancient and modern partizans of Popery have exhausted
language in abusing the emperor's character, and contended, on
this topic, for the palm of scandal and calumny. Theophanes,
Cedrenus, Zonaras, Baronius, Alexander, Petavius, Maim-
bourg, and Labbeus, in their zeal for orthodoxy and in their
rivalry of detestation to heresy, have compared Copronymus,
while living, to Nero, Domitian, and Dioclesian, and consigned
him, when dead, to unquenchable fire in the lowest abyss of
perdition. 2
1 Labb. 8. 650. Andilly, 389. Labb. 8. 648. Du Pin, 2. 36. Alex. 14. 688.
s Tont le monde avoit embrasse cette heresie. Andilly. 413.
3 Hupt aepee-tto rtapttiodqv. Theophan. 300.
Ad qnjB migraret supplicia ncn obscure monstravit. Labb. 8. 649.
JSterno damnatum incendio. Petav. 1. 394. Cedren. 370. Zonaras, 2. 89.
Alex. 14. 74. Andilly, 451.
478 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
The emperor not only destroyed images and relics, but also
deprived saints of their titles. , Paul and Peter, Georgius and
Theodorus were, by imperial authority, divested of saintship.
The two former were to be denominated apostles, and the two
latter, martyrs : and this regulation he extended to the whole
canonized confraternity. The mother of God herself did not
escape the emperor's impiety. He proscribed the invocation,
intercession, and holy-days of her ladyship, whom he repre-
sented as destitute of all power either in heaven or on earth.
He would not even allow a petition to be preferred, or a holy
day kept, in honour of the queen of heaven. This, which Alex-
ander calls execrable blasphemy, was, to be sure, a shocking
sin and a pestilent heresy, for which his name deserved to be
consigned to ignominy and his soul to Satan.
The accession of Constantine and Irene, who succeeded Leo
and Copronymus, diversified Christendom with another variation
from Iconoclasm to idolatry. Irene, who during Constantine's
minority executed the imperial power, was the patroness and
protector of emblematical adoration. This women possessed
the ambition of Lucifer and the malignity of a demon. Many
historians have accused her of being instrumental to the murder
of her husband ; and the circumstances of his death create
strong suspicions. She swore against the worship of images,
which she revived, and therefore was guilty of perjury. She
put out the eyes of Nicephorus, and amputated the tongues of
Christopher, Nicetas, Anthemus, and Eudoxas, Constantine's
sons, for suspicion of conspiracy. She destroyed the eyes of
her own son with such barbarity, that, according to Theophanes,
he expired in agony. The sun, avenging the deed of cruelty,
continued, say the Greek historians, to withhold his rays for
seventeen days ; while ships, deprived of light, wandered on
the darkened ocean. Heaven, says Moreri, felt a horror at
the work of inhumanity. An ambiguity in Theophanes
deceived some moderns, whose error has been adopted by the
credulity of Popery and copied by the zeal of Protestantism.
The son of Irene, blinded indeed by the maternal tenderness
of his parent, survived many years, oppressed by the court and
forgotten by the world. ' No woman,' says Bruys, ' was ever
less worthy of life than this princess.' ' Her ambition,' says
Godeau, ' made her violate all the laws of God and man.' 1
These accomplishments fitted the empress for the agency. of
Satan in the restoration of idolatry. She was worthy of the
task which she undertook and executed.
Many, indeed, both Greeks and Latins, have praised Irene's
''Zonaras, 2. 85, 95. Tlieoph. 317. Peatav. 1. 396. Moreri, 5. 168. Bruy. 1
606. Godeau, 5. 649.
IMAGE-WORSHIP PATRONIZED BY IRENE. 479
purity, zeal* piety, and constancy. Theodoras and Theophanes
' extol her virtue and excellence. The Greeks placed her
among the saints in their menology ; and, in holy festivity, cele-
brate her anniversary. Hartmann and Binius, in more modern
times, flatter her prudence and piety. Alexander lauds ' her
religion and faith, as worthy of immortal honour,' though her
ambition and the blinding of her son, he admits, ' exposed her
to reprehension.' Andilly eulogizes ' the virtue and devotion
of this princess, who soared above the weakness of her sex,
and restored the church to its primeval beauty.' Baronius
justifies ' the assassination of her son.' He commends ' the
inhumanity which arose from zeal for religion.' The annalist
even dares, in shocking and blasphemous misapplication, to
abuse scriptural language in support of the atrocity. 1
The empress, in the prosecution of her plan, began with an
act, which in itself may be commendable, but which, in Irene
as afterward in the papist, James II. king of England, was
only an ostensible step to the accomplishment of a secret design,
destructive in the end of the pretended project. She proclaimed
liberty of conscience to all her subjects, which, in this deceiver,
was only preparatory to the total destruction of all freedom of
worship. She next, in furtherance of her scheme, promoted
Tarasius her secretary, who was devoted to idols, and who
possessed resolution and address, but a layman, to the patri-
archal dignity. She summoned a general council for the
settlement of the controversy and the restoration of peace.
Adrian, the Roman pontiff, delegated two sacerdotal represen-
tatives of his holiness. The patriarch of Alexandria, Antioeh,
and Jerusalem, oppressed by the Saracens, could attend neither
in person nor by representation. But two vagabond monks,
without any commission, assumed for the occasion their autho-
rity; though undeputed, say Baronius and Godeau, by these
oriental prelates. 2 The bishops, amounting to three hundred,
met at Nicsea. and were all from the eastern empire, which,
owing to the incursions of the Saracens and the separation of
the western provinces, was exceedingly contracted. No
bishops attended from Africa, Italy, France, Spain, Germany,
or Britain.
The council, after its convention, soon despatched the busi-
ness for which it had assembled. Eighteen days of uproar and
m
1 Mulier prudentissima et religiosa. Hartmanis, in Mt&t. VI.
Religipne et pietate florentissima mulier. Bin. 5. 583.
Awrtpsjtsi/ E-utfEjSsta. Thepph. 273. Laanoy, 4. 227.
Ob religionem, fidem, et pietatem, imtndrtali laude digna Irene. Alex. 14. 413.
Andilly, 451. Spoil. 797. 1.
2 Les patriarcnes ne lea avoieut pas proprement deputez. Godean, 5. 597.
Baron. Ann. 785. Theophanes, 309. Platina, 107. Bin. 6. 151. Crabb. 2. 458.
480 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
cursing, ended in a definition of faith in favour of idolatry. f
Painted, woven, and sculptured images of Jesus, Mary, angels,
saints, prophets, apostles, martyrs, and all holy men, were,
according to the Nicene enactment, to be erected in churches,
houses, and highways ; on walls, tablets, holy vestments, and
sacred vessels ; and these were to be worshipped not with sove-
reign but honorary adoration. The person who should dissent,
was, if an ecclesiastic, to be deposed, and, if a layman, to be ex-
communicated. This definition, which the good bishops in loud
vociferation declared to be the faith of the apostles, the fathers,
and the church, was signed by the council, the empress, and
afterward by pope Adrian.
The sacred synod, having issued this Christian definition, had
only one other duty to perform. This consisted in the cere-
mony of the parting benediction. The holy fathers, on this as
on similar occasions, always concluded their sessions with be-
stowing their blessing in very evangelical terms, on all who
should have the assurance to reject their infallible authority.
This benediction consisted in an anthem of execrations, not
indeed sung but shouted in concert, and in deafening yells, against
all who should deny or oppose their oracular decisions. 1 " Curs-
ed," roared the holy men, " cursed be all who do not salute,
honour, venerate, worship, and adore the holy images. Cursed
be they who call images idols. Cursed be all those who
dissent. Cursed be all who gainsay. Cursed be all Iconoclasts.
Cursed be all who hold communion with Iconoclasts."'* The
holy men certainly showed themselves adepts in the Christian
accomplishment of cursing, and delivered their maledictions
with wonderful freedom and precision. The infallible fathers,
whatever might have been their skill in theology, were masters
in the art of launching imprecations. It was well they did not
burst their precious lungs in pronouncing these anathemas.
Their shoulders, after being delivered from such a load of
denunciations, must have felt relieved, light, and easy. 2
The Nicene council was an intriguing cabal of knaves and
superstitionists. 'Its acts,' says Gibbon, 'remain a curious
monument of superstition and ignorance, of falsehood and
folly.' The French king and prelacy, in the Caroline Books,
pronounced the Nicene assembly destitute of eloquence and
common sense. The eighteen general councils indeed are so
many instances of human perversity. But the Niceans, in this
respect, seemed to have eclipsed all their predecessors arid
successors, and to have fairly carried away the palm of credu-
lity, ignorance, jargon, and knavery. Partial as weak, the
i Caron. 490. Crabb. 2. 599. Bray. 1. 584. Mabillon. 2. 280.
* Crabb. 2. 605. Bin. 5. 722. Caron, 401. Labb. 8. 1226.
PROCEEDINGS OF THE SECOND NICENE COUNCIL. 481
Nicene fathers were the mere tools of a superstitious empress,
'and were assembled not to examine but to dogmatize, not to
try the cause, but to pronounce sentence. Their decision
denoted ' a foregone conclusion.' The council were the passive
creatures of an arbitrary and wicked woman, and submitted
with crouching imbecility to imperial dictation. 1
The Byzantine and Nicene councils of the Greeks were
rejected by all the Latins, except the Italians, and exhibit in
striking colours the diversity of Romanism. The Greeks were
divided into two factions, the Iconolatrians and the Iconoclasts.
The former were devoted to the use and worship of images :
both of which the latter rejected. The Iconolatrians bowed to
the decision of the Nicene Synod sanctioned by Irene ; and the
Iconoclasts submitted to the Constantinopolitan council sanc-
tioned by Constantine. The Latins, except the mere creatures
of the pope, patronized a third system, and admitted the use
of painted and sculptured representations, but deprecated their
adoration. These steered a middle course between the adora-
tion and the destruction of the portrait and the statue, which
they admitted into the temple, not as objects of worship, but as
ornaments of the sanctuary, and memorials of devotion and
history. This system, which is a medium between the worship
and abolition of symbolical substitutions, was adopted in
France, Germany, Spain, and England. 2 This appears from
the opposition, of the Caroline Books, the English clergy, and
the Frankfordian and Parisian councils.
The Caroline Books, which were the composition of the
French clergy in the name of the French monarch Charle-
magne, who published the work as his own production, depre-
cated Iconoclasm and Iconolatrianism, and censured the
Byzantine and Nicene councils. The imperial critic and theo-
logian arraigned the Byzantines for ignorance and temerity, ira
confounding images with idols, and banishing these ornaments
of the temple, these memorials of piety, and helps of instruc-
tion. 3
The royal disputant, however, stigmatized the Nicean-s- with
the deepest marks of reprehension. He disclaimed their
authority, and deprecated, in the strongest terms, their anathe-
mas and errors. He called, the Nicene council the false synod
of the Greeks, and ridiculed its assumed universality as a mere
dotage : while he exposed the madness of their imprecations
against all who rejected their superstition. These observations,
the Western emperor ^accompanied with many cutting reflec-
1 Gibbon, 9. 145. Du Pin, 2. 39.
3 Dan 2. 79. Moreri, 4. 171. Alex. 14. 750. Du Pin, 2. 43
3 Lib. Carol. I. 1. Du Pin, 2. 39. Velly. 1. 438.
31
482 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
tions on the Eastern empress and the Byzantine patriarch, who
had patronized the impiety.
The French sovereign refuted all the arguments of the Nice-
ans, and proscribed all image-worship of every description.
He condemned this kind of adoration in all its forms ; whether
denominated veneration, worship, salutation, honour, homage,
or invocation : while, in diametrical opposition to the Nicene
definition, he prohibited the lighting, incensing, and kissing of
these senseless productions of the pencil or chisel. The sove-
reign, in direct opposition to the holy oecumenical assembly of
Nicea, interdicted the honouring of images even with relative
worship, or the veneration due under the Jewish establishment
to the ark, or under the Christian dispensation, to the Bible.
Image- worship, in all its forms, he characterized as superfluity,
superstition, vanity, sacrilege, and superlative absurdity. 1
The opposition to the Nicene council, in the Caroline Books,
has been acknowledged by all the candid critics of Romanism;
such as Daniel, Du Pin, Moreri, Brays, and Mabillon. The
Caroline Books, says Daniel, ' represent the Nicene convention
as the object of execration, and turn all its arguments into ridi-
cule.' 2 Similar statements are found in Du Pin, Moreri, Bruys,
Mabillon, and many other historians.
These statements are corroborated by the admission of those
who deny the genuineness of the Caroline Books, such as
Bellarmine, Surius, Sanderus, and Alan. 3 These critics
account the Caroline publication a forgeiy, composed by some
friend of Iconoclasm and transmitted by Charlemagne to
Adrian for refutation. The insinuation of forgery has been
amply confuted by Alexander and Juenin ; and is now aban-
doned. But the patrons of this opinion grant, that the design
and tendency of the imperial production was to overthrow the
Nicene council and symbolical worship.
The Nicene council, rejected in this manner by the French,
was also disclaimed by the English. Offa, king of the Mer-
cians, transmitted a copy of its acts to the British clergy, who,
according to- Hoveden and Westminister, condemned its defini-
tion as contrary to the faith, and worthy of execration by the
whole church of God. 4 Alcuin, at the instance of the English
* Lib. Carol. 11. 21, 23, 24, 25, 28, 29, 30. Jueiiin, 4. 396. Alex. 14. 691, 737.
Bruy. 1. 586. Da Pin, 2. 40.
2 Dans cet ouvrage le concile de Nicee tenu contre lesBrises-images est repre-
sente comme un objet d'execration, une affectation de tourner en ridicule toutes
lea preuves da dogma. Dan. 2. 81.
3 Bell. II. 15. Sand. II. 5.
4 Omnino ecclesia Dei execratur. Hoveden, Ann. 792. West. Ann. 793. Alex
14. 739. Spelm. 1. 308.
Contempserunt atque consentientea condeumaverunt. LaVb. 9. 101- Alex. 14
205.
THE SECOND NICENE COUNCIL CONDEMNED AT FRANKFORT. 483
episcopacy, confuted the Nicene dogma on scriptural authority,
in a work which was afterward presented in their name to
Charlemagne the French king.
The Nicene council, disclaimed in this manner by the French
and British clergy, was, in 794, condemned at Frankfort, by
the whole Western prelacy. This synod was assembled by
the Western emperor from all Italy, France, Germany, Spain,
and England, and consisted of three hundred bishops with the
Roman pontiff's vicars " Theophylact and Stephen. The
Frankfordian council, Baronius admits, was, from its numbers
and the presidency of the papal legates, called plenary or
general. 1
Its second canon condemned the definition of the second Nicene
council on the worship of images. The Frankfordians called
the Nicene, the Byzantine council, because it began and ended
at Constantinople. In order to reconcile the jarring councils,
Alan, Valentia, Vasquez, and'Binius, have alleged that
the fathers of Frankfort condemned, not the assembly under
Irene in favour of image-worship, but the synod under Con-
stantine in favwir of Iconoclasm. But the supposition is un-
founded, and, at the present day, is rejected by the ablest
popish critics. The Frankfordian canon condemns emblematic
adoration; and therefore is in direct hostility to the Nicene
definition. This condemnation of the Niceans by the Frank-
fordians was maintained by all the contemporary historians,
and has been admitted by all the papal authors possessing
any candour till the present day. The fact is attested by
Eginhard, Hincmar, Adhelm, Ado, Conrad, Regino, Aimon,
Herman, and Aventtnus, as well as by Mabillon, Bellarmine,
Velly, Platina, Baronius, Perron, Cassander, Moreri, and Du
Pin. 2 'The second canon of Frankfort, says Mabillon, 'was
enacted against the Byzantine or Nicene Synod of the Greeks,
which the French, at that time, did not account universal,
because it was composed of the Orientals and not yet received
by the Westerns.' According to Bellarmine, ' image-worship
and the sixth general council were proscribed at Frankfort.'
The Frankfordians, says Velly, ' unanimously rejected the
authority and universality of the second Nicean assembly.'
The statements of Platina, Baronius, Perron, Cassander, Moreri,
and Du Pin, are similar to those of Mabillon, Bellarmine, and
Velly.
1 Bin. 6. 184. Labb. 9. 57. Spon. 704. III.
2 Secundus est contra novam synodum Graecorum Constantinopoli habitam, id
est, contra secundam Nicaenam, quatn Galli tuiic pro universali haberi non, fere bat.
Mabillon, 2. 311. In synodo Francofordiensi esse definitum ut imagines non ado-
rentur. Bellarmin, II, 14. Les peres de Francfort le rejetterent d'un cbnsente-
ment unanime et defenderent de ie regarder comme GEcumenique. Velly, 1. 438.
Godeau, 5. 635. Alex. 14. 730, 732. Platiua, 107. Bin. 6. 186. Moreri, 4..171.
31*
484 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
The Frankfordians, besides condemning the Niceans, ' pro-
hibited all kinds of image worship,' without any exception or
limitation. 1 The assembly, in the' second canon, interdicted
this kind of homage, i in all its forms,' whether denominated
respect, honour, invocation, Worship, or adoration. One indeed
can hardly help feeling some pity for ]|5aromus, Alexander,
Maimbourg, Pagius, and Juenin, in their attempts. to elude the
unqualified and unsparing prohibition contained in this unyield-
ing and unmanageable canon. The Frankfbrdian council also
adopted and sanctioned the Caroline Books, which had proscribed
every species of symbolical adoration. The Caroline Books
besides had approved the sentiments of Gregory the Great, who,
in his epistle to Serenus, had denounced every description of
image- worship. The language of the pontiff, the emperor, and
the council on these occasions is so clear and unambiguous as
to defy all the efforts of evasion and chicanery.
The Frankfordian council was followed by the Parisian synod
under Lewis in 825. This assembly met at the suggestion of
Michael the Grecian emperor, by permission of Eugenius the
Roman pontiff, and by the authority of Lewis the French king.
Michael sent a solemn embassy to Lewis, requesting his inter-
ference with Eugenius for the settlement of the protracted divi-
sions respecting emblematic worship. Lewis interposed his
influence, and endeavoured to engage Eugenius against the new
idolatry, but without success. " The Roman hierarch, however,
granted the French prelacy the liberty of assembling for the
examination of the controversy. A synod therefore met at
Paris in 825, and consisted of the most learned and judicious
of the French clergy; such as Agobard, Jeremy, Jonas, Fre-
culf, Theodomir, Amalarius, and Dungal. 2
The sacred synod, assembled in consultation, decided. against
the Roman pontiff, the Nicene council, and symbolical adora-
tion. The Parisians, it must be confessed, treated Adrian,
God's vicar-general, with very little ceremony. The French
episcopacy, in Daniel's statement, ' spoke of the Roman pon-
tiff, as well as of the Nicene council, with the utmost contempt ;'
and had the assurance, according to Bruys, Labbeus, and
Alexander, to charge his infallibility with ignorance, supersti-
tion, impertinence, indiscretion, absurdity, falsehood, impiety,
error, obstinacy, and opposition to the truth. 3 This was hardly
1 Sanctissimi Patres nostri omnimodia adorationem et servitutem renuentes con-
tempserunt. Labb. 9. 101. Alex. 14. 205. Juenin. 4. 397.
3 Mabillon, 2. 495. Alex. 14. 749. Bruy. 2. 9.
3 Hs parloient avec beaucoup de raepris de celle que le Pape Adrian I. avoit
ecrite quelques anuees auparavont a 1'Imperatrice Irene. Us ne traitoient pas
mieux le second concile de Nicee, et 1'ouvrage que le ineme Pape avoit fait perca-
le defendre centre les Livres Carolina. Dan. 2. 211.
DECREE OF THE PARISIAN COUNCIL. 485
civil to the head of the church, and is calculated to convey no
high opinion of French politeness in the ninth century.
The Parisian assembly censured the holy, infallible, Nicene
synod with equal freedom. The Niceans, these refractory
Parisians found guilty of presumption, ignorance, error, and
superstition. The Grecian council also, according to these
French critics, tortured revelation and tradition to extort evi-
dence in favour of emblematic adoration. The Nicene
definition was represented as contrary to reason, revelation,
and tradition : and many passages, in proof of this allegation,
were collected from the fathers and other ecclesiastical monu-
ments. The Caroline Books against the Nicene council and
sculptured adoration were approved and sanctioned. 1 The
French clergy, it seems, were insensible to Nicene infallibility.
The French convention, in unequivocal language, condemned
image "worship, and in very unflattering terms, 'traced the
origin of this pestilential superstition in Italy to ignorance and
the wickedest custom.' The Parisian prelacy would allow
this plague no better origin than Roman and Italian usage,
ignorance, and atrocity. The likeness of the saint, they
described as unworthy of adoration, and inferior to the cross
and the holy vessels of the sanctuary. 2
The Latins, in this manner, through Germany, France, Spain,
England, Ireland,, and Scotland, rejected the new form of idola-
try. The French, in particular, resisted the novelty with
firmness and freedom. This, in consequence, Sirmond called
the French heresy. The impugners of the superstition in
France, Mezeray describes as superior in number and erudition.
Daniel, following Mezeray, represents the innovation as depre-
cated by the more numerous and learned of the French nation.
These, in the strongest language, denounced the adoration of
images; though, steering a middle course between their wor-
ship and abolition, they permitted their use for the ornament of
temples, the instruction of spectators, and the encouragement
of devotion. ,
Us jugerent impies les responses du Pape. II y a certaines choses, qu'il y a
appose a la verite. Bray. 2. 9, 10.
Ignoranter in eodem facto a. recto tamite deviaverit. Indiscrete fecisse in eo
quod superstitiose eas adorari jussit. Labb. 9. 645, 446.
Earn inseruisse in eadatn epistola qusedam testimonia. Patrum valde absona, et
ad rem de tua agebatur minime pertinentia. Alex. 14. 749.
1 Us passerent jusque a condanmer le septieme synode. Godea. 6. 65
^ Isti non mediocriter erraverunt. Quaedam Scripturarum testimonia et Patrum
dicta ad suum snperstitiosum errorem confirmandum violenter sumpserunt et eidem
suo operi incompetenter aptavenint. Alex. 14.749. Us approuverent la censure
que Charlemagne avoit faite du concile de Nicee dans les Livres Carolins. Bruy. 2. 9.
2 II ne falloit point permettre le culte des images. Mezeray,!. 409. Partim
veritatis ignorantia, partim pessimas consuetudinis usu, hujus superstitionis pestis
in ipsa etiam Italia inolevisset. Alex. 14. 75'0. Jueuin, 4. 394. 412.
486 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
Charlemagne, Agobard, Jonas and Walafrid, in particular,
resisted the novelty with distinguished ability. This has been
stated in clear terms by Godeau, Mabillon, and Mezefay.
Godeau remarks that the French king wrqte a work against this
kind of worship to Pope Adrian. The Caroline Books also
were pointed against the rising superstition. Agobard, Arch-
bishop of Lyons, acted a distinguished part in the controversy.
This prelate, Mabillon observes, recommended the destruction
of images rather than their adoration. This description of
homage, even when relative, Agobard, says Godeau, ' declared
a violation of the faith,, a change of forms rather than a renun-
t-*
ciation of idols, and an act inconsistent with the sincere worship
of God.' Jonas, bishop of Orleans, according to this historian,
'entertained the same opinion.' Mezeray delivers the same
account of Jonas and Agobard, and relates their hostility to
the new mode of worship. Walafrid, though more moderate,
avowed, on this topic, similar sentiments. The French,
Mabillon grants, ' persisted in this system till the end of the
ninth century.' 1
Such was the hostility in the West against image-worship.
Its destiny, in the East, was less uniform. The propagation of
the impiety among the Greeks, with whom it originated, was,
for half a century after as well as before the Nicene council, at-
tended with many vicissitudes and. variations. The Empress
Irene had, during the minority of her son Constantine, estab-
lished the superstition by an ecclesiastical decision, which she
supported by civil enactments. Idolatry, in'consequence, gained
a temporary triumph. The victory, however, was transitory.
Constantine, on obtaining a shadow of power, proceeded, says
Platina, to repeal the synodal and imperial laws in favour of
emblematic worship. But Constantine's authority was also
temporary. The orthodox mother deprived the heretical son
of his power and his eyes : and, by these means, restored the
painted, woven, and sculptured gods to all their glory. Their
adoration, however, was destined soon to experience another
revolution. Irene, the tender parent and pious empress, depar-
ted, and was enrolled as a saint in the firmament of Grecian
Menology, in which, to the present day, she shines as a star
of the first magnitude. Nicephorus, her successor, allowed a
general liberty of worship, which, according to the monks,
1 Plusieurs et des plus doctes, entre autre Jonas d'Orleans et Agobard de Lyon,
ne pouvoient suffrir qu'on adora les image. Mezeray, 1. 409. Plusieurs etoit
d'avis qu'ne falloit point leur rendre de culte. Ce parti, qui tenoit le milieu entre
1'adoration et 1'abolition des images, paroit avoir fete celui de plus graude partie
des scavans de France et de la cour. Daniel, 2. 79.
Charlemagne envoya un Livre coritre le culte des images au Pape. Godea. 5.
.VARIATIONS IN THE EAST ON IMAGE-WORSHIP. 487
caused his temporal and eternal perdition. 1 Michael's reign
was. marked by superstition and idolatry; whilst the monks
and idols, ithat he patronized were incapable of supporting their
votary on the throne.
The accession of Leo the Armenian again changed the scene.
He assembled a council at Constantinople in the year 814. This
synod approved and confirmed the Byzantine conncil, and, at
the same time, condemned and anathematized the Nicene con-
vention. The emperor, in consequence, was assailed with all
kinds of vituperation and obloquy. A Byzantine synod of 270
bishops called his majesty the harbinger of antichrist and the
fiery oven of blasphemy. 2 The imperial hostility to image-
worship, these holy mep compared to the fury of a lion roaring
in the forest for his prey.
Michael, Leo's assassin and successor, granted universal tole-
ration, which he hoped .would be attended with general tran-
quillity. But his .clemency only provoked the insolence of the
faction that abetted idolatry, who refused to grant the liberty
which they claimed. Their fury aroused imperial vengeance.
Michael, in 821, called a council to. determine the controversy.
But the*partizans of the idols, pretending that it was unlawful
for the patrons of Catholicism to. meet the abettors pf heresy, re-
fused to attend. The emperor afterward treated the haughty
faction with rigour. Michael's timidity, however, mitigated his
severity. But Theophilus, his son and successor j regardless of
fear or pity, was the determined and uncompromising patron of
Iconoclasm. His energy restored tranquillity to the state, and
banished idolatry in a great measure from the church. The
clergy and laity submitted to the imperial authority ; while the
eastern and western Christians seemed again to relinguish idola-
try. 3 The Grecian Monks alone in the east, and the Latin
pontiff with his immediate dependants, continued to murmur
and support the honour of the idols.
Such were the dissensions which raged in Christendom, for
a century, on image worship. This diversity has been admit-
ted by Tarasius, Adrian, and Daniel. 4 Tarasius, the Byzan-
tine patriarch in 784, lamented the schisms and divisions in the
612. Satius putat abjicere et comminuere. Mabillon. 2. 614. Agobard 'sefforce
de pronver qu'il h'est point permis aux Chrestiens d'avoir des images par lesquelles
. la foi est yiolee. Si lea Chrestiens etoient obfigez de les houorer ils. .auroient
plutot change des simulachres qu'abandonne les idoles. Jonas eveque d'Oileans
fat de meme opinion. Godeau, 5.' 612. Gallicana ecclesia in sua sententia perstitit
usque ad finem sreculi noni. Mabillon, 2. 495.
1 Crabb, 2. 457. Platina, 107.
3 Antichristi prascursor, cujus ex oi'e egreditur igneus blasphemise clibanus.
Labb. 9. 386, 390. Bin. 6. 232. Coss. 1. 781.
3 Bin. 6. 295. Coss. 1. 821. Theod. II. Bp. 86.
4 Video ecclesiatn scissam et divisani, et nos alias atque aliterloquentes, et aliter
eos Christianos qui in Oriente unius nobiscum sunt fidei, sed et his concordantes
I
488 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY: .
Christian Commonwealth. He represented the Byzantine
church as having embraced, on this subject, a different system
from the other oriental Christians ; and the result, he added,
was mutual anathemas. Adrian, the Roman pontiff, declared,
in his letter to the emperor, that all the eastern world on this
topic had erred, prior to the accession of his Grecian majesty.
Daniel acknowledges the prevalence of this heresy in oriental
Christendom, as well as in the wesfern communion. Amidst
this diversity, however, an overwhelming majority, according
to the confession of Tarasius, Adrian, and Daniel, disclaimed
the faith of symbolical worship.
Image-worship, after the revolutions of more than a century,
was finally established in the east by the Empress Theodora.
Theophilus dying, left Theodora his widow guardian of the em-
pire during the minority of his son Michael. This delegated
power, she used for the restoration of idolatry. Her measures
were bold, summary, and decisive. John the Byzantine Patri-
arch, who was an Iconoclast, Theodora deposed: and Me-
thodius, who was an Iconolatrian, she raised to the patriarchal
dignity. A council, in 842, was assembled at Constantinople, in
which Iconoclasm was condemned, and image- worship), in all
its heathenism, was sanctioned. John, who had been patri-
arch, received 200 lashes for being in the right. The punish-
ment of the patriarch had a happy effect on the inferior clergy.
The empress knew the proper argument for the occasion. The
logic of the lash possessed wonderful efficacy in enlight-
ening the episcopal intellects, regulating the prelatic consciences,
and teaching the proselyted priesthood the duty of idolatry.
Many, who had been the devoted friends of Iconoclasm,
changed their minds, and anathematized, in loud vociferation,
the patrons of that heresy. All, with unvarying unanimity,
shouted for the restoration of the idols. The festival of ortho-
doxy was instituted as a trophy of their triumph, and an
annual commemoration of their victory. A heresy, say the
historians of this controversy, was in this manner suppressed,
which, bursting from the portals of hell, had, for a hundred
and twenty years, raged against the church of God. 1
This superstition was imposed on Christendom, not by syno-
dal or ecclesiastical authority, but by civil and imperial despo-
tism. Only a despicable minority of the clergy had, on any
occasion, voted for the impiety. The Christian community, at
the accession of Constantine the first Christian emperor, con-
sisted,, according to Paolo, Holstenius, and Bingham, of 1800
Occideutules et nos ab omnibus illis alienates et per singulas dies anathematizatos
habere. Labb. 8. 679. Theophanes, 308. Omnis populus qui eat in Orientalibua
partibus erraverunt. Adrian ad Constan'. Labb. 8. 746. Dan. 2. 214.
i Bin. 6. 396. Labb. 919, 920.
.IDOLATRY FINALLY ESTABLISHED BY THEODOKA. 489
bishops. One thousand were Greeks and eight hundred Latins.
These must have been much increased under Theodora in the
ninth century. But the greatest number that, on any occasion,
voted for symbolical worship, amounted only to 350 in the
Nicean council. These were all the ecclesiastical troops which
Irene could bring to the field in favour of her darling idolatry ;
and, at a fair calculation, could amount only to about a sixth
of the whole, and therefore only a small minority. Three
hundred and thirty-eight Grecian bishops under Constantine,
voted for Iconoclasm : and only the monks of the east opposed.
The Roman Pontiff alone and a few of his mere creatures in
the west supported the superstition. All the Latins, these
excepted, opposed the impiety. But the tendency of idolatry
is headlong and downhill. Man, led by sense and imagination,
delights in a visible Deity or his effigy, before whom he may
bow and prefer his adoration. This tendency of the human
mind prevailed, and idols were introduced in opposition to
reasori, revelation, and common sense.
CHAPTER XVII.
PURGATORY.
ITS SITUATION AND PUNISHMENTS DESTITUTE OF SCRIPTURAL AUTHORITY ADMIS-
SIONS SCRIPTURAL ARGUMENTS DESTITUTE OF TRADITIONAL AUTHORITY
ADMISSIONS PRAYER FOR THE DEAD PAGAN, JEWISH, AND MAHOMETAN PURGA-
TORY ITS INTRODUCTION INTO THE CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY ITS SLOW PROGRESS
COMPLETED BY THE SCHOOLMEN FLORENTINE COUNCIL TRENTINE COUNCIL.
PURGATORY, in the Romish theology,; is a middle place or state,
in which departed souls make expiation for venial faults, and
for the temporal punishment of mortal sins. Romanism repre-
sents sin as venial or mortal, or, in other terms, as trivial or
aggravated. Those who depart this life guilty of mortal or ag-
gravated sin go direct to hell, from which there is no redemp-
tion. Those who die guiltless of venial or trivial sins, and, at
the same time, of the temporal penalty of aggravated transgres-
sion, go immediately to heaven. But many, belonging to
neither of these two classes, are, at the hour of death, obnoxious
to the penalty attached to venial faults and the temporal pains
of heinous iniquity. These, in purgatory, undergo the due
punishment ; and, purified by this means, are admitted into
heaven. All mankind, says the Florentine council, consist of
saints, sinners, and an intermediate class. Saints go to heaven ;
sinners go to hell ; and the middling class to purgatory. 1
Agreed, in accordance with the councils of Florence and
Trent, on the existence of a middle state, the Popish theologians
differ on the place and medium of punishment. Bellarmine
reckons eight variations of opinion on its situation. Augustine,
according to Bellarmine and Aquinas, divested this intermediate
mansion of all material locality : and characterized it as a spiri-
tual residence for spiritual souls. 1 The middle receptacle of
1 Labb. 18. 533. et 20. 170. Crabb. 3. 476, 939. Bin. 9. 322. Arsdekin, 1.
227. " Paolo, 1. 280. Alex. 9. 352.
Tria esse loca, mempe, sanctorum animas esse in Coelo. peccatorura in inferno.
Medium vero locum esse habentium peccata venialia. Labb. 18. 26.
Ad purgatorium deferuntur justomm animae, obnoxiiE pcenis temporalibus.
Dens, 7. 347.
3 Bell. II. 6. Aquin. 3. 541. Certum est, purgatorium esse aliquem locum
corporalem. Faber, 2. 448.
SITUATION OF PURGATOKY. 491
human spirits, the African saint alleged, is an ideal world. But
this notion, it appears, he afterwards retraced.
Alexander is doubtful whether the purgatorial realms are in
this world ; under the earth ; in the dark air with devils ; in
the hell of the damned ; or in its vicinity. 1 Chrysostom, Gregory
Nyssen, and Fursetis, say Bellarmine and Bede, place it with
devils in the air between -heaven and earth. Chrysostom and
Gregory Nyssen however, saints as they were, had no oppor-
tunity beyond other mortals of ascertaining the fact: nor was
the fiction invented in their day. But Furseus, in a vision,
saw the place of expiation and therefore had a right to know.
Many identify purgatory with hell. The punishments, in-
deed, of the former are temporary, while those of the latter are
everlasting. But the situation and severity of the pains, in the
idea of these speculators, are the same.
The majority, however, make this earth the scene of posthu-
mous expiation. Gregory and Damian, with glaring inconsis-
tency, lay the scene in different parts of the world, where con-
science accuses or where the criminal offended. His infallibility
and his saintship could drilLa luckless ghost in any convenient
place, such as an icy stream, a warm bath, a flaming cavern *
or a burning mountain. Aquinas and Bellarmine show a strong
inclination to the theory of Gregory and Damian. 2
The schoolmen place this intermediate state of punishment
in the bowels of the earth. The vast cavity in the central region
of the world is, according to these theologians, divided into four
apartments, which form hell, purgatory, and the limbo of infants
and of the fathers. The two former, it appears, are in the same
neighbourhood. Purgatory, says Faber, ' is on the brink of
hell.' 3 The prison of children is raised above purgatory, say the
schoolmen and Innocent the Third, so that the flames of the
latter come not near the establishment of the former. 4 The
prison of the fathers was left empty at the descent of the Messiah,
who liberated the Jewish saints. Its dominions, therefore, are
now uninhabited, and its cities, if it have any, are useless and
1 Utru'm vel in hoc mundo et super terrain ; vel in a'fire caliginosa ubi dasmones
versantur, vel in inferno damnatorum, vel in yicino terrain subtus loco. Alex. 9.
352. Beda, III. 19.
3 Greg. Dial. IV. 40. Aquin. 3. 544.
3 Purgatorium esse infra viscera terra. Alex. 9. 352. Habemus Purgatorium,
Infernum, et limbos patram, et puerorum loca subterranea esse. Infemain et pur-
gatorium sunt loco vicina. Bell. II. 6. Aquin. III. 69. VII.
Est sub terra, vicinns inferno. Dens, 7.353. Est sub terra, versus centrum,
ad ripam inferni. Faber, 2. 448, 449.
4 Infernum damnatonim, secundum omnes, est in ipso centre terras. Ultra in
lernum et purgatorium est et limbus pueroi-um, et fueritlimbus sanctorum patrurn.
Limbas patruoi erat remotus a centre et prr>pe terrain. Locus puerorum est super
purgatorium et infra limbum sanctorum patrum. Faber, 2. 449.
492 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
may fall into ruin. Purgatory, in like manner, will, at the
resurrection, be evacuated and fall into similar dilapidation. 1
Gregory the Great, the universal pastor, sanctioned this specu-
lation by his unerring authority. Believing this place of tem-
porary and eternal punishment to be in the central regions of
the earth, his infallibility considered the volcanic eruptions of
Vesuvius, jEtna, and Hecla, as flames arising from hell and
purgatory, which, according to his holiness, lay in the same
neighbourhood, in the hollow bosom of the world. These
Volcanoes, said the Vicar-General of God, are an evidence of
the Mediteranean position of the purgatorian prison and the
fiery punishment of its inhabitants. Theodoric the Arian king
of the Goths, says the viceroy of heaven, was, at the hour of
death, seen descending into a flaming gulph in Sicily. Souls,
says Surius, appear amid the conflagration and thunders of
Hecla, and proclaim their sufferings in the flaming fulmi nations
of that mountain. 2
The medium of punishment is uncertain as the situation of
the place. The general opinion, however, favours the agency
of fire. This was the idea entertained by the schoolmen. The
Latins in the council of Florence, maintained, with the utmost
perspicuity, the same theory, though in complaisance to the
Greeks, the term was omitted in the synodal definition. The
Florentines were followed by the synod of Diamper, which is
received in the Romish communion. The catechism of Trent
copied after the schoolmen and the councils of Florence and
Diamper. The Cardinal of Warmia and the theologians ap-
pointed to frame the Trentine canon, though they resolved to
avoid every difficulty, differed on the place and medium of pur-
gation. Some, like the council of Florence, wished to mention
fire as the means of punishment and expiation ; while others re-
jected this idea. This disagreement caused the omission of the
term and the substitution of a general expression. But the
word was introduced into the catechism of Trent, published by
the authority of the council and the agency of the pontiff! The
same has been sanctioned by the majority of the popish theolo-
gians ; such as Gregory, Aquinas, Surius, and Bellarmine.
Bellarmine, however, is doubtful whether the fire is proper or
metaphorical. 3 Venial impurity, the cardinal thinks, may be
1 Nunc vacuus remanet. Bellarmin, II. 6. Post Judicium novissimum non
fore purgatorium. Bellarmin, I. 4. Purgatoire sera aboli au jour da jugement.
Calmet, 22. 362. Aquin. 3. 544.
z Greg. Dial. IV. 30. 35. Bell. II. 11. Surius, Ann. 1537.
3 Itali fatentur Purgatorium per ignem. Labb. 18. 27. Inter Latinos, certissi-
mum est, ignem ilium esse corporeum. Faber, 2. 453.
Latini dicentes Purgatorium ignem esse. Bin. 8. 564. Hi, dubio procnl, in
Bupradicto igne quod purgutorium appellari solet, purgantur. Crabb. 3. 376. Est
PRETENDED PUNISHMENTS OF PURGATORY. 493
expunged by the application of allegorical or figurative flames.
Many have represented water, accompanied with darkness,
tempest, whirlwind, snow, ice, frost, hail, and raiii, as the
means of purgatorian atonement. Perpetua, in a vision, saw
a pond in this land of temporary penalty, though its water was
inaccessible to the thirsty inhabitants, whom it only tantalized
with illusive mockery. Gregory, the Roman pontiff, soused
Pascasius a Roman deacon in the warm baths of Angelo, for
the expiation of his venial sins. Severinus of Cologne ap-
peared to Damian, immersed in a river in whicn he was steeped
as an abstergent for his trifling contaminations. The water of
this country, in the most 'authentic accounts, is 'both hot and
cold : and the wretched inhabitants pass in rapid but painful
transition from the warm to the frosty element, from the torrid
to the frigid zone. The purga.torians enjoy, in succession, the
cool and the tepid bath ; and are transferred, .without any use-
less ceremony, from the icy pond to the boiling caldron. 1
These accounts have been authenticated by travellers, who
visited this subterranean empire, and who were privileged to
survey all its dismal scenery. Ulysses, Telemachus, and
jEneas were admitted to view the arcana of Tartarus; and
Drithelm, Enus, and Thurcal, in like manner, were permitted
to explore the secrets of purgatory. The visions of the three
latter are recorded in the prose of Bede and Paris, as the
gloomy path of the three former had been blazoned in the
poetry of Homer, Virgil, and Fenelon. The travels of the
heroes, however, were attended with greater difficulty than
those of the saints. Ulysses, Telemachus, and JEneas were
entangled, on their journey, with the encumbrance of the body ;
while Drithelm, Enus, and Thurcal, unfettered by that re-
straint, winged their easy way and expatiated in spirit through
purgatory in all its sulphurous walks and roasting furnaces.
Drithelm, whose story is related by Bede and Bellarmine,
was led on his journey by an angel in shining raiment ; and
proceeded, in the company of his guide, towards the rising of
the sun. The travellers, at length, arrived in a valley of vast
dimensions. This region, to the left, was covered with roasting
furnaces, and, to the right, with icy cold, hail, and snow. The
whole valley was filled with human souls, which a tempest
seemed to toss in all directions. The unhappy spirits, unable
purgatorius ignis. Cat. Trid. 50. Per ignem aliasque poenas ablnuntar. Syn.
Diam. in Cossart, 6. 20.. Paolo, 2. 633.
Non sit metaphorice dictus. sed versus ignis corporeus. Aquin. Pars. III. Q. 70.
Art. III. P. 547. ^ , . ,
In purgatorio sicut etiam in inferno esse pbenam ignis. Sive iste ignis accipia
tar proprie sive metaphorice. Bellarmin. II. 10.
' Alex. 9. 393. Gregory, IV. 40. Bellarmin, II. 6.
4:94 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
in the one part to bear the violent heat, leaped into the shiver-
ing cold, which again drove them into the scorching flames
which cannot be extinguished. A numberless multitude of
deformed souls were, in this manner, whirled about and tor-
mented without intermission in the extremes of alternate heat
and cold. This, according to the angelic conductor who
piloted Drithelm, is the place of chastisement for such as defer
confession and amendment till the hour of death. All these,
however, will, at the last day, be admitted to heaven : while
many, through alms, vigils, prayers, and especially the mass,
will be liberated even before the general judgment. 1
The story of Enus is told by Paris. 2 This adventurer w T as
a warrior and had campaigned under Stephen, king of England.
Resolved to make reparation in Saint Patrick's purgatory for
the enormity of his life, Enus visited Ireland. The Son of
God, if old chronicles may be credited, appeared to the Saint
when he preached the gospel to the BESTIAL Irish, and instructed
the missionary to construct a purgatory at Lough Derg : and
promised the plenary remission of sin to all who should remain
a day and a night in this laboratory of atonement. Fortified by
the holy communion and sprinkled with holy water, the fearless
soldier entered the gloomy cave.
Protected by invoking the Son of God, Enus beheld the
punishments of the wretched purgatorians. The groans of the
sufferers soon began to stun his ears. . Numberless men and
women, lying naked on the earth and transfixed with red-hot
nails, bit the dust with pain. Devils lashed some with dread-
ful whips. Fiery dragons gnawed some with ignited teeth;
while flaming serpents pierced others with burning stings.
Toads of amazing size and terror endeavoured, with ugly
beaks, to extract the hearts of many. Monstrous deformed
worms, breathing fire from their mouths, devoured some with
insatiable voracity. Some hung in sulphurous flames, with
chains through their feet, legs, hands, arms, and heads, or with
iron hooks in a state of ignition through their eyes, nose, jaws,
and breasts. Some were roasted on spits, fried in 1 pans, or
broiled in furnaces. Many were hurled headlong into a fetid,
tumbling, roaring river, and, if any raised their heads above
the surface, devils, running along the stream, 'sunk them again
into the cold element. A sulphurous well, emitting flame and
stench, threw up men like sparkling scintillations,' into the air,
and again received them falling into its burning mouth.
Thurcal's adventure is also related by Paris. " Julian, who
officiated as guide on the occasion, left the body of Thurcal
1 Beda, V. 12. Bell. I. 7. Faber, 2. 449. * M. Paris, 83, 180, 27(1.
PRETENDED PUNISHMENTS OF PURGATORY. 4:95
sleeping in bed, and took only the soul as the companion of his
journey to the nether world. He wisely, however, breathed
life into the soulless body, lest, in the spirit's absence, it should
appear dead. Having settled these necessary prelimi-
nary arrangements, the two spiritual travellers departed, at
night, from England for purgatory. The two disembodied
companions soon winged their aerial way to the middle of the
world towards the east, and entered a spacious fabric of won-
derful structure. This edifice was the general rendezvous of
departed souls, and was built by Jesus the Son of God, at the
intercession of Lady Mary, his mother. The palace, of course,
had a respectable' architect.
Many souls in this depot of spirits, and many beyond the
north wall, were marked with spots indicating their venial sins.
The apostle Paul sat in the palace at the end of the north wall.
The Devil and his guards sat without the wal^opposite the
apostle. A balance was affixed to the wall between the apostle
and the Devil, in which Paul and Satan, with precision and care,
weighed the souls. The former had two weights, which were
bright and golden ; and the latter two, which, as might be ex- -
pected, were dark and smoky. When the beam inclined to
Beelzebub, the guards threw the soul, wailing and cursing, into
a flamy gulph, which, of course, was hell. This unceremonious
treatment of sinners afforded fine fun to the devils, whose duty,
on the occasion, was attended with loud peals of infernal laughter.
When the beam inclined to Paul, the apostle introduced the soul
through the eastern gate to purgatory, to make compensation
for its venial crimes.
Purgatory, according to our subterranean traveller, consists
of a vast valley between two walls, the northern and southern.
The entrance into this ancient domain is occupied with purga-
torian fire : caldrons, filled with flaming pitch, blazing sulphur,
and other fiery materials, boil or roast the souls for the expiation
of their sins. These furnaces also exhaled a stench, which was
not very pleasing to the olfactory nerves ; and which caused
even the disembodied souls that on earth had wallowed in
filthy gratifications to cough, hiccup, and sneeze. Having
enjoyed the warm bath, the souls, for the sake of variety, were
introduced into the cold one. The unhappy spirits exemplified
the variations of Popery, and passed into a frosty pool, "whicii
skirted the eastern extremity of the valley. The water of this
pool was icy, salt, and shivering. The spirits, according to
their crimes, were immersed in this lake to the knee, the middle,
or the neck. Removed from this shivering situation, the sui-'
ferer had to undergo another trial. A bridge, studded with
sharp nails and thorns with their points turned upwards, had
i96 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
to be crossed. The souls walked bare-footed on this rough
road, and endeavouring to ease their feet, leaned on their hands :
and afterwards rolled, with the whole body, on the perforating
spikes, till, pierced and bloody, they worked their painful tedious
way over the thorny path. Passing this defile was often the
labour of man} r years. But this last difficulty being surmounted
the spirits, forgetful of their pain, escaped to heaven, called the
mount of joy.
Perpetua's vision may, for the sake of variety, be added to
the Tartarean travels of Drithelm, Enus, and Thurcal. This
holy martyr had a brother called Dinocrates, who died of an
ulcer in his face in the seventh year of his age. His sister, in
a vision of the night, saw the boy after his death going out of a
dark thirsty place, with a dirty face, a pale colour, and the
ulcer of which he died remaining in his visage. The smoky
thirsty enclosure, in which he was confined, contained a pond
full of water, which however, being inaccessible, only tanta-
lized the thirsty child.
JPerpetua knew this prison to be purgatory j and her prayers
and tears, day and night, for his deliverance were attended with
their usual success. She soon had the pleasure of seeing her
brother clean, dressed, and joyful. The malady, which had dis-
figured his face, was healed. He had obtained access to the
Tartarean pool, and, from a golden cup, swallowed copious
potations; and then played, like a child, through the plain. 1
Perpetua awaking, understood that the youth was released
from punishment. All this is very clear and satisfactory. The
vision presents a graphic description of purgatory, as a place
of dirt, paleness, disease, heat, thirst, smoke, and tantalizing
water ; and, at the same time, opens a pleasing prospect of
heaven, as a country of cleanness, dress, health, water, cups,
joy, and, at least with respect to boys, of fun and frolic.
Perpetua's dream was eulogized by many of the ancients. Its
truth and fidelity, in a particular manner and on several occa-
sions, was applauded by Augustine of sainted memory. The
report has also extorted an encomium from Alexander, who,
moreover, discovered that those who deny purgatory are never
privileged with such visions. Dreams of this kind, the learned
Sorbonnist found out, are peculiar to the faithful, friends of a
middle state of expiation. He must have been a man of genius
or inspiration to have made, such a prodigious discovery. Bel-
larmine sings to the same tune. These holy men, says the
cardinal, could neither deceive nor be deceived : as they pos-
Lndere more infafttiain gaudens. Alex. 9. 393. Augustin, 5> 1134, et 10, 401.
Bell. II. 6.
PURGATORY DESTITUTE OF SCRIPTURAL. AUTHORITY. 497
'sessed the spirit of discrimination, and were the particular
friends of God.
Such are the visions of purgatory, recorded by Bede, Paris,
and Perpetua. The tales are as silly as the Pagan mythology
of Charon and his fabled boat. The relation is as ridiculous
as any of the sarcastic dialogues of Lucian, concerning the
ferryman of Tartarus, which were designed to ridicule the
absurdity of gentilism. The Protestantism and philosophy of
modern days have exposed such notions, and made the patrons
of Romanism shy in recognizing the ridiculous delineations.
But the statements, however risible, obtained the undivided
.belief and unqualified respect of our Popish ancestors. The
denial of these details would once have been accounted rank
heresy. Bellarmine, in later days, swallowed the reports with
avidity, in all their revolting fatuity. The moderns, who may
choose to reject the tales of folly, wiU only add another instance
to the many variations of Popery.
Purgatory, in all its forms, is a variation from scriptural
authority. Revelation affords it no countenance. No other
dogma of Romanism, except image-worship and the invocation
of saints, seems to borrow so little support from the Book of
Inspiration. The Bible, by certain management and dexterity,
may appear to lend some encouragement .to transubstantiatioh
and extreme unction. But the ingenuity of man has never been
able to discover a single argument for a middle place of purifi-
cation, possessing even a shadow of plausibility. The name
itself is not in all the Sacred Volume, and the attempts which
have been made to find the tenet in its inspired contents have
only shown the fatuity of the authors. The Book of God, oh
these occasions, has been uniformly tortured, for the purpose
of extorting acknowledgements of which it is guiltless, and
which, without compulsion, it would obstinately deny. The
body of an unhappy heretic was never more unmercifully rrian-
tled and disjointed in a Spanish inquisition, with the design of
>rcing confession, than the Book of Divine Revelation, with the
intention of compelling it to patronize purgatory. The soul of
a venial sinner never suffered more exquisite torments in pur-
gatory itself, even if its existence were real, for the expiation of
venial iniquity, than the language of the inspired volume for
proof of a place of posthumous purgation.
The uselessness of attempting scriptural evidence for this
opinion, indeed, has been acknowledged by many popish
authors. Many distinguished theologians have, with laudable
candour, admitted the silence of Revelation on this topic : and
among the rest, Bairns, Bruys, Courayer, Alphonsus, Fisher,
Polydorus, Soto, Perionius; Picherel, Wicelius, Cajetan, and
32
498 - ^ THE VARIATIONS OF POPERYr: ; : ,
Trevern. Barns declares 'purgatorial punishment a matter of *
human opinion, which can be evinced neither from scripture,
fathers, nor councils.' The belief of this intermediate place,
according to Bruys, * was unknown to the Apostles and original
Christians.' Courayer, in his annotations on Paolo ^admits
'the incorrectness of ascribing this dogma to Scripture or even
to tradition. Alphonsus, Fisher, and Polydorus ' grant the
total omission or rare mention of this tenet in the monuments of
antiquity.' Similar concessions have been made = by Soto,
Perionius, Picherel, Wicelius, Cajetan, and Trevern. 1
Bellarmine and Alexander^ the two celebrated advocates of
this theology, have, between them, rejected - all its scriptural
proofs, and agree only in one apocryphal argument. Alexan^
der explodes all Bellarmine's quotations for this purpose, from
the Old and New Testament, but one and this, Bellarmine
admits, is illogical. 2 The Sorbonnist, without any hesitation or
ceremony, condemns seventeen of the Jesuits' citations, and
reduces his evidence to a mere shadow. He combats the cardi-
nal's sophistry with learning and fearlessness. The single argu-
ment, which the former represents as demonstrative, the latter
characterizes as sophistical and inconclusive. .The two cham-
pions of purgatory contrive, in this manner, to free Revelation
from all tendency to countenance the unscriptural and ridiculous
invention. Both these polemics, indeed, quote the Maccabean
history as demonstrative in favour of a middle state. But this
book is uncanonical ; and is disclaimed, Bellarmine grants, by
the Jews, and was formerly doubted by Christians. 3 The proof,
besides, taken from this work, is founded on intercession for
departed souls, which by no means supposes a place of propi-
tiation between death and the resurrection.
Calmet, the Benedictine, offers three citations, canonical and
uncanonical, on this topic. Two of these agree with Alexan-
der's. One is apocryphal ; and another led Bellarmine, accord-
ing to his own concession, in pressing it to favour his system,
into sophistry. Calmet, in-the third, supposes, that Paul prayed
for Onesiphorus when the latter was dead. But the supposition
is unfounded : and, even if true, supplication for the dead, as
1 Punitio ergo in Purgatorio est res in opinione hutnana posita, quse nee ex
Scripturis, nee Patribu? nee Conciliis deducere potest. Barns. $. 9. Ce que 1' on
croit aujonrd'hui du Purgatoire avoit 6te incqnnu aux Apotres et aux premiers
fideles. Bruys, 1. 378. Ce n'est done pas parler exactement que de dire que
f ecriture et la tradition enseignent le Purgatoire. Couray. in Paol. 2. 644. In
veteribus de Purgatorio fere nulla potissimum apud Graecos scriptores mentio .est.,
Alphonsus, VIII. De Purgatorio, apud priscos illos, nulla, vel quam rarissima
fiebat mentio. Fisher, Art. 18. Polydorus, VIII. Pich. c. 21 Trevern, 242.
2 Non seqni secundem regulas dialecticnrum. Bellarmin, 1. 4. Matth. xii. 32.
3 Lib. Machabaeorum non ease canonicum apud Judseos. Libri Machabaeorum
sunt ex eornm numero, de quibus aliquando etiam inter Catholicos dubitatum.
Bellarmia, I. 3.
ROMISH ARGUMENTS FROM SCRIPTURE REFUTED. 499
shall afterwards be shown, supplies no evidence for purgatory.
Challenor, always insidious and soothing, adduces seven quota-
tions, without hinting at their inadequacy or the opposition of
ancient fathers or modern theologians. 1
' The ancients, in scriptural interpretation on this subject,
differ, even according to Bellarminej Alexander, and Calmet, =as
much as the moderns. The cardinal, the sorbonnist, and : the
benedictine have cited Augustine, Jerome, Gregory, Cyril,
Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophylact, Ambroses* Anselm,
and Bede. All these have been quoted, and quoted against
each other. Bellarmine, Alexander, and Galmet havey at great
length and with extraordinary patience, shown that these
authors are at utter variance on the inspired proofs for ; the
support of a middle state of purification. The interpretation
which one adopts, another rejects. One approves the ; exposi-
tion which another condemns. 2 The collector of -their varia-
tions, which, on this question, are nearly past reckoning, would
require the learning of Lardner, and their reader the patience
of Job.
The patrons of this system have urged four scriptural quo-
tations, which are worthy of attention, and will, .on this subject,
show the inconsistency and variations of popish advocacy.
These proofs are taken from Matthewi Paul, and Peter. The
sacred- historian Matthew records our Lord's: sermon, which
mentions a prison, from which the debtor shall not escape till
he pay ' the uttermost farthing.' Bellarmine,; Ghallenor, Milrier,
and the Rhemists say, this prison is purgatory, which detains
the venial transgressor till he satisfy for his trivial impurity.
Many Romish saints and commentators,- however, give a
different explanation. Augustine, Jerome, Bede, Maldoriat,
and Alexander say, the prison is hell, and. the punishpaent ever-
lasting. 3 Augustine, a saint of superior manufacture, patron-
ized this exposition. Jerome, another saint overflowing with
gall and superstition, maintained the same opinion. According
to the canonized commentator of Palestine, 'The pierson, who
does not, before the end of his lifej pay the last farthing, men+-
- 1 Calm. Diet. 3. 746. Alex. 9. 365. 2 Tim. I. 18. Challenor, c. 14.
8 Bellarmin, L 4. Alexan. 9. 353. Gal. Cora. 22. 361.
3 Sernper non exiturum esse qui semper ; solvit .novissimum -quadrantem. ^.u-
gustin, 3. 177: Nunquam solvitur a careere, qui quadrantem verbi novissimum
non solveret ante finem vitae. ; Jerpm, 5. 895. et 4. 133. Donee salves pro infinite,
ponitiir sicut alibi 'donee ponam inimicos taos,' Beda, 5. 12. Via est hnjns vitae
tempus, career infernus. Nunquam exiturus, cjuia qui in inferno sunt nunqnam
persolvuut. Maldonat, 121. Non significat unde nos exituros postea sedVnuh-
q^uam. Quia cum posnas infinitas pro quolibet mortali peccato diluantrdamBati
nanquam eas persolvunt. Nunquam ex inferni carcere exituri sunt de quibus hoc
dictum est. Alex. 9. 385. Matth. v. 26v Psal. ex. 1. 1 Corin.-xv. 25. Ehem.
On Matth, v- 25.
32*
300 , THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
tioned iii the words of the inspired penman, will never be
released from the prison.' The two Roman saints were
followed by Bede, an English monk of learning and orthodoxy.
He makes the term UNTIL signify endless duration as in the
expression of David, cited by Paul, "till I put all your ene-
mies under your feet." Maldonat concurs with Augustine,
Jerome, and Bede. The learned Jesuit interprets ' the prison
to signify hell, from which the debtor, who will be punished
with the utmost rigour, will .never escape, because he will
never pay.'
Alexander delivers a similar interpretation, in a more length-
ened and detailed form. The inspired 'phraseology, says this
doctor, 'signifies not whence he will afterward depart, but
whence he will. never depart. The words are spoken of hell,
from which the condemned, who undergo the infinite punish-
ment of mortal sin, which they can never pay, will never be
released.' He quotes David and Paul for illustration and
confirmation of his comment. The word until, in Scriptural
language, often denotes that the event, to which it refers, will
never happen. God invited his Son to " sit at his right hand,
till his enemies should become his fodtstool." But he will not
then leave his seat. The king of Zion will reign till every foe
is subdued. But he will not then cease to reign. The raven
returned not to Noah, "till the waters were dried." But no
return succeeded. Apply this to the words of Jesus in
Matthew, and allis clear. The person imprisoned, unable to
pay, will never be liberated. Augustine quotes the same
passages from David and Paul for proof and illustration. The
Rhemists against Helvidius, on another part of Matthew's gos-
pel, give a similar explanation of the phrase ; 'and, in this
manner, furnish arms against themselves. -
Such is the genuine signification of the passage. Popish
commentators, in modern times, may be dissatisfied with the
explanation ; and, if they please, call it a heresy. The inter-
pretation, however, is not the production of Luther, Zuinglius,
Calvin, Cranmer, or Knox; but of Augustine, Jerome, Beda,
Maldonat, and Alexander : two saints, a monk, a Jesuit, and a
sorbonnist.
The partizans of purgatory argue from another passage in
Matthew. Sin against the Holy Ghost, it is said, shall be for-
given, "neither in this world, nor in the world to come."
This, the Romish doctors account their strong hold. .This,
they reckon the impregnable bulwark of their system. This,
Alexander who condemns all other arguments taken from the
New Testament, calls demonstration, Calmet accounts it the
main pillar of the mighty superstructure : and in this opinion 1 ,
ROMISH ARGUMENTS, FROM SCREPT.URE, REFUTED.. 5-OTT
modern Romish comm'e'htatbrs, in general, seem to concur. 1
Sin, say these critics, committed against the Spirit, will not be
pardoned "in the world to come," and this implies, if it does
not express, that some sins -will -be remitted in a future world.
But forgiveness can have no reference to heaven or hell, and,
therefore, there must be a middle state of pardon, and this is
called purgatory.
The least discernment might enable any person to' see the
futility of, this argument. The Romish Dogma is variation
from the words of the sacred historian. Matthew mentions
forgiveness. But the intermediate state of popery is not a place
of pardon, but of punishment and expiation. The venial trans-
gressor cannot be released from that prison, till he pay the
uttermost farthing. This is plainly no remission. No sin, says
Alexander, can be remitted by ordinary law without satisfaction
and due punishment. Full expiation is made in the purgatorial
state ; and, therefore, there is no remission in the world to come
on popish any more than on protestant principles.
The irremission of the sin against the Holy Ghost in a future
state, does not imply the remission of other sins. The unpar-~
donableness of one sin infers not the pardonableness of another.
The conclusion, in this syllogism, is not contained in the pre-
mises. This, Bellarmine had the discernment to see and the
candour to confess. He quotes the text, and, from it, concludes
the existence of a middle state of pardon, and then, in glorious
inconsistency, admits the conclusion to be illogicaL The Car-
dinal, in this instance as in many others, varies from himself.
His boasted argument, he grants, as he well might* is a pitiful
sophism. 2 Mark and Luke have explained Matthew with more
consistency than Bellarmine. The two inspired historians say,
this kind of blasphemy shall never be forgiven, and their lan-
guage, which only prejudice could misunderstand, is synony-
mous with" Matthew's, and explodes the silly and unfounded
idea of purgatorian remission. . i .
The statements of Mark and Luke, as explanatory of Matthew,
have been adopted by Augustine, Jerome, Chrysostom, Theo-
phylaet, Basil, Calmet, and Maldonat. 3 This blasphemy, says
1 Matth. xuV32. Alex. 9. 374. Calm. Diet. 3. 746. '
2 Bellannin, I. 4. Mark iii. 29. Luke xii. 10. .
3 Non habet remissionem in sternum. Aliis verbiset alio loquendimodo eadem
ipsa est expressa sententia. Augustin, 5. 390. Serm. 71. Remitti nobis hoc
peccatum omnino non possit. Augustin, ad Bon. 2. 662. Nullo tempore blasphe-
mia-remittetur. Jerpm. 4. 50. -
EviUrfla xat, SXH Saae-fs Stxqv. "RvtuvQu xvOM^ovtaA xat> fxet- Chrysos. 7. 449;
E.vtav9axai sxst 'tintopfOqtrtai. Theophylact in Matt. xii. Arfvyfcwpjjfov twew
^57 Jtj *o rtvfvfut, -to aytov jSJtaor^/tta- Basil, 3. 59.
Ce peche ne sera remis, ni en ce monde, ni en 1'autre, c'est d dire qu'il est irre-
missible par sa nature. Calmet, Diss. 3. 389. Non ignoramus phrasim esse quse
idem valeat quod in aeternum. Maldonat, 264.
502 . THE VARIATIONS OP POPERY:
Augustine, ' shall never be remitted. Matthew and Mark vary
in expression, but agree in signification. This sin cannot at all
be forgiven.' Jerome, concurring with Augustine, says, ' this
blasphemy shall, at no time, be remitted.' Chrysostom's com-
ment, is if possible, still plainer and more explicit than those of
Augustine and Jerome. The scriptural diction, in his expla-
nation, means that the perpetrator of this atrocity shall be
punished here and hereafter.: here, like the Corinthian fornicator,
by excommunication, and hereafter, like the citizens of Sodom,
by suffering ' the vengeance of eternal fire. ? Calmet, in his
Dissertations, observes according to the same exposition ' This
sin shall be pardoned neither in this world nor in the other, that
is to say, it is unpardonable in its nature.' Maldonat, though
he strenuously maintains the purgatorian system from our Lord's
words, admits that the phraseology of Matthew and that of
Mark are synonymous * and signify the eternal irremission of
blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.
The original term, translated world, signifies time, age, or
duration. Jerome, accordingly, has rendered the Greek by a
"Latin wOrd denoting time. This sin, in the commentary of
this Saint, shall be forgiven neither in the present nor at a future
time. 1 This expression seems to confine the meaning to the
present life. The inspired language simply states, that this
blasphemy would be pardoned neither at the present nor at a
future period. The word sometimes signifies the Jewish estab-
lishment ^and sometimes the Christian dispensation. Matthew,
in his Gospel, used it in the former sense. Paul, addressing
the Corinthians and Hebrews, takes it in the latter acceptation.
The blasphemy, according- to this explanation, would be for-
given neither under the Jewish or Christian economy, though
the latter was to be an age of mercy.
Paul's words to the Corinthians have also been pressed into
the service, for the support of purgatory. The Apostle, of
Tarsus taught the Christians of Corinth that the professor,
building < wood, hay, or stubble,' on the foundation, though his
' work shall be burnt, shall be saved, yet so as by fire.' This
fire, say Bellarmine; Ward, Challenor, the council of Sens, the
Latins in the council of Florence, and many other advocates
of Romanism, awaits the perpetrator of trifling transgressions
in the middle state. 2
The difficulty of this passage might have caused some hesita-
tion in making it the basis of any system. Its difficulty has
been acknowledged in emphatic language, by Augustine, Bede,
1 Neque in praesenti tempore neque in -future. Jerom, 4. 50. Matth. xxiv. 3
1 Corin. ix. 11. Heb. x. 26.
* I Conn. in. 12. Estius, 1. 215. Crabb. 3. 747. Bell. 1. 4. Challen. 128.
ROMISH ARGUMENTS FROM SCRIPTURE REFUTED. 503
Bellaimine, Alexander, 1 and lEstius. Bellarmine represents it
as one of the obscurest, andj at-the same time, 'one of the most
useful passages 4n^ all ; revelation. Its^obscurity , in Bellarmine's
opinion, contributed to its .utility, as it enabled the Jesuit, with
a little management, to explain it as he pleased. But Alexan-
der, with more sense and honesty, has, on account of its want
of perspicuity, rejected it as a demonstration of purgatory. 1
Its obscurity, says Estius, ' has occasioned many and various
expositions.' This authority, observes Faber, ' is very obscure j
and variously explained, not, only by different fathers and doc-
tors, but by the ; same doctor. Augustine interprets this place
in various ways.' Bellarmine, Alexander, and Calmet have
collected a copious specimen of the jarring interpretations of
expositors* on this : part -of the inspired volume, and their collec-
tions afford no very flattering view of the unity of Romanism.
The principal significations which have been attached to the
apostolic expression, are three. Gregory, Augustine, Bernard,
and Bede, account the fire a metaphor for tribulation or trial in
this life. The Roman pontiff and saints, as well as the English
monk, refer the expression* to the pains endured not'after but
before death ; and so exclude posthumous expiation. < Similai
to this is Cajetan's explanation, who makes it signify severe
judgments. 2 : .
Origen, Ambrosius, Lactantiusj Basil, Jerome, and Augus-
tine, according to Estius, reckon the language literal, and refer
it to the general conflagration on the day of the last judgment j
though purgatory,- at that period, will, according to Bellarmine,
be evacuated and left empty. This ancient interpretation has
been followed by 'Lombard, Aquinas, sHaimo, Alcuin, and
Estius. This ;party make saint and sinner pass through the
fiery ordeal, .which; will try the work of every one, whether he
build : gold and silver on the foundation, or wood, hay, and stub-
ble. 3 But the intermediate place of purgation, in the theology
of Romanism, contains only the middling class, who are guilty
of venial frailty. - ^
1 Pauli ilia, sententia plane ad intelligendum difficilis. Augustin, 6. 124. Beda,
6.285. Unum ex difficilimis et utilissimis totius Scripturae. Bell. 1. 5. Locus
obscurissimus est, cujus sensum vix assequi liceat. Alex. 9. 378. Estius, 1. 214.
Non demonstrative contra haereticps pstendi. Alexander, 9, 378. Hcec auctoritas
est certe valde obscura, et variae explicationes offeruntur, non solum a diversis
patribus et docloribuSj sed ab- eodem Doctore. Augustinus hunc locum variis
mbdis intei-pretatur. Faber, 2. 444.
a Hoc de igne tribulatipnis, hac nobis vita adhibito, possit intelligi. Greg. Dial.
IV. 39. Eandem tribulationem ignem vocat; Aug. C. D. XXI. 26. Sentiat
Poenitentiae tribulationem. Bernar. 411. Ignis tribulationis. Beda, 6. 287. Pro
severe judicio Cajetanus exponit Estius, 1. 216.
3 Excepturus sit omnes etiam eos qui aurum et argentum superaedificant funda-
mento: Probaturus opus uniuscuiiisque. Estius, 1. 216. * Ambos prolr at. Aug. 7.
648. Arab. 3. 350. Aquin. 3. 563. .
504 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Chrysostom and Theodoret interpret Paul's diction to signify
the unquenchable fire of hell, and these two Grecian commen-
mentators have been followed, say Bellarmine, Calmet, and
Alexander, by Theophylact, Sedulius, and Anselm. 1 This was
the opinion of the, whole Grecian communion. The Greeks,
accordingly, in the council of Florence, represented the fire
mentioned by the apostle, not as purgatorian but eternal.
Alexander and Erasmus also declare against the popish exposi-
tion of Paul's language ; and display the singular unanimity of
Romish commentators. Gregory, Augustine, Bernard, and
Bede appear, on this topic, against Origen, Ambrosius, Hilary,
Lactantius, Jerome, Lombard, Aquinas, Haimo, Alcuin, and
Estius ; and all these against Chrysostom, Theodoret, Theophy-
lact, Sedulius, and Anselm. Saint encounters saint, and
commentator attacks commentator; and all these, formed in
deep phalanx, explode from Paul's words the modern fabrication
of purgatory.
The searching fire, mentioned by the apostle, is not purgato-
rian but probatory. Its effect is not to purify but to try. The
trial is not of persons, but of works. The persons, in this
ordeal, shall be saved ; while the works, if wood, .hay, or stub-
ble, shall as the Greeks observed at the council of Florence, be
consumed. The popish purgatory, on the contrary, is not for
probation, but expiation, and tries, not the action but the agent,
not the work but the worker, 2
The scriptural language, in this case, is metaphorical. The
foundation and the superstructure, consisting of gold, silver, and
precious stones, or of wood, hay, and stubble, as well as the
scrutinizing flame, all these are not literal but figurative.
The phrase, 'so as,' it is plain, denotes a comparison. The
salvation, which is accomplished so as by fire* is one which, as
critics have shown from similar language in sacred and profane
authors, is effected with difficulty. Amos, the Hebrew prophet,
represents the Jewish nation, who were rescued from imminent
danger, " as a fire-brand plucked out of the burning." Zach-
ariah, another Jewish seer, in the same spirit and in similar
style, characterizes a person who was delivered from impending
destruction, as a brand snatched " out of the fire." Diction of
1 Acartai/foj ixwi] <ttj $Xoyt. Chrysos. II. 243. Horn. 6*. Olf rjv-tpertwtai "tij$
/tfvvqs -to rtvp. Theod. 3. i34. in 1 Cor. iii. 12, 13. Chrysostome, Thfcophylacte,
et d'aatres Grecs 1'expliquent du feu de 1'enfer dans lequel les rfeprouvez demeu-
rent sans pouvoir de mourir. Calm. 22. 363. Ignis ipse non purgatorius, verum
aeternum supplicium sit. Crabb. 3. 377. Theoph. in Conn. iii. Bell. 1. 4. Alex.
9. 378, 381.
2 Nonnulli inter quos Cajetanus dictum putant de opere non de operante.
Estiusj 1. 213.
Pia quidem opera manent, et non comburuntur. Prava vero comburantur.
Ipse permanebit igne, poenas luendo seternas. Libb. 18. 27.
ROMISH ARGUMENTS FROM SCRIPTURE REFUTED. 505
a similar kind, Calmet, Wetstein, and other, critics have shown,
has been used by Livy, Cicero, and Cyprian, for denoting great
hazard and difficulty. Paul, in like manner, designed to tell
us, that he who should blend vain and useless speculations with
the truths of the gospel ; but should rest, nevertheless, in the
mainv on the only basis, would, in the end, be saved ; but with
the difficulty of a person, who should escape with the possession
of his life, but with the loss of his property, from an over-
whelming conflagration: or, according to Estius, like ;the
merchant, who should gain the shore with the destruction of
his goods, but the preservation of his life, from the tempest of
the sea. 1
Peter has also been quoted in favour of purgatory. OUT
Lord, says the Galilean fisherman, 'preached to the spirits in
prison.' This prison, according to many modern abettors of
Romanism, is the intermediate state of souls, into which the
Son of God, after his crucifixion and before his resurrection
descended, for the purpose of preaching the gospel to its suffer-
ing inmates.
The obscurity of the text shows the folly of making it the
foundation of any theory. Augustine, Bellarmine, and Estius
confess its difficulty, which, as might be expected > has occa-
sioned a variety of interpretations. Lorin us, without exhaust-
ing the diversity, has enumerated ten different expositions.
Some, by the prison, understand hell, into which, they allege,
Jesus descended to preach the gospel to pagans and infidels.
This interpretation, Calmet and Estius call error and heresy.
Some say, our Lord preached in the prison both to the good
and the bad. Some maintain that he preached only to the
good, while others aver that he preached only to the bad, to
whom he proclaimed their condemnation. 2 .
The principal interpretations of this difficult passage" are
two. The prison, according to one party, is the limbo of
the fathers or the bosom of Abraham, into which the Son of
God, some time between his crucifixion and resurrection, de-
scended to liberate the Jewish saints. This, say Calmet and
the Rhemists, was the common opinion of the ancients : such
as Justin, Clemens, Athanasius, Cyril, Epiphanius, Jerome,
Ambrosius, and Hilary. The schoolmen, at a later period,
1 Quemadmodum mercator non nisi cum jactura rerum suarum quas amat, nee
sine dolore amittit, e tempestate maris evadit. Estius, 1. 218. Amos, iv. 11.
Zach. iii. 2. Calm. 22. 363. Wetstein in Corin. iii. 15.
3 Locus hie omnium pene interpretum judicio difficillimus, idemque tarn varie
expositus. Estius, 2. 1182. v Angus, ad Evod. Le Sauveur avoit prech6 meme
aux payens et aux Infideles. Calmet, 24. 146. Estius, 2. 1183. Bell. 1.416.
Quidam solos bonos spin tus intelligunt ; alii solos malos, alii denique tarn bonos
quam malos. Estius, 2. 1183.
506 . THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY: :
adopted the same belief -This interpretation has been followed
by the ^Trent Catechism, the Rhemish annotators, and indeed
by the generality of modern popish .theologians. '
The ^prison, according to a second party, Is hell, in which
those who, in the days of Noah, 'were incredulous, were, in the
time of Peter, incarcerated for their unbelief. 1 These spirits
were prior to the flood, in the body and on earth ; but, in the
apostolic age, were consigned to the : place of endless punish-
ment. To these, Jesus, before their death, preached not in his
humanity but in his divinity : not by his own but by Noah's
ministry. He inspired the antediluvian patriarch to preach
righteousness to a degenerated people. He officiated, says
Calmet, 'not in person but by his spirit, which he communica-
ted to Noah. Augustine among' the ancients, and Aquinas
among the schoolmen, were the great patrons of this interpre-
tation : and the African saint and the angelic doctor have been
followed by Bede, Hassel, Calmetj and many other commen-
tators both in the Romish, and reformed communions. 2
The interpretation, which would make the prison to signify
purgatoryj is entirely modern, and wds uttered unknown to the
ancients. : The exposition is not to be found in all the ponderous
tomes of the fathers. Bellarmine and Alexander, in their la-
boured attempts to evince posthumous purgation, omit this pas-
sage. The cardinal has adduced many scriptural quotations to
prove an unscriptural absurdity ; and the sorbonnist has endea-
voured to support the same supposition from the pages of reve-
lation. Both, however, omit the words of Pope Peter. The
omission is a silent confession of the argument's utter iricompe-
tency, in the opinion of these distinguished authors, and a con-
firmation of its novelty as an evidence of purgatorian purification
after death. Bellarmine's nineteen quotations comprehend all
that were alleged for this theory in his day. Alexander re-
viewed all the scriptural proofs, which had been formerly urged
on this controversy. But neither Bellarmine nor Alexander
mention this prison of the antediluvians. The citation was
pressed into the ranks by some modern scribblers, who were
at a loss for an argument. -
1 Christ descendit dans le lieu ou les ames des saints Patriarches etoient deten-
ues. Calm. 24. 146. Cat. Trid. 35.
s Augustinus melius exponit ut referatur non ad descensum Christi ad inferos.
His praedicavit qui increduli fuerant aliquando. Noe praedicanti. Aquin. Par.
111. Quaest. 52. Art. 11. P. 145. Augustin, 2. 579. Ep. 164. Ipse ante
diluvium iis, qui tune incrednli erant et carnaliter vivebant, spiritu veniens praedi-
cavit. Ipse enim per Spiritum Sanctum erat in Noe et pravis illius hominibus ut
admeliora converterentur, praedicavit. Beda, 5. 706. Christ parson esprit, dont
il remplit. Noe, precha aux homines incredules de ce terns 14. Christ precha
done a les incredules, non en personne ni visiblernent, mais par son Esprit qu'il
avoit communique a Noe. Calmet, 24. 159. Du Pin, 1. 386.
PURGATORY DESTITUTE OF TRADITIONAL AUTHORITY.
509
The prison, therefore, according to some, was hell; and, ac-*
cordinf tq others, the limbo, of the Jews. Nonej except a few
infatuated, scribbling, nonplussed modems, make it signify pur-
gatory. Bede and Bellarmine, however, have placed hell,
purgatory, and fhe gaol of the Hebrews in the same neighbour-
hood ; .and our Lord, when he descended to the subterranean
lodgings of Abraham, Isaac., and Jacob, and their companions,
had perhaps, given :the citizens of purgatory a call and an
exhortation. 1 He might, when he was in the, vicinity, have
paid these suffering subterraneans a visit and preached them a
sermon ; though a mass, if modern accounts may be credited,
would' have been more .useful. But the Son of God, it would
appear, was some way or other, unaccountably guilty of neg-
lecting the latter ceremony. >
Purgatory is a variation from tradition as well as from revela-
tion. None of the ancients,, for 400, years after the Christian
era, mention any such place. The intermediate state of purifi-
cation of souls between death and, the resurrection, is unknown
land in the monuments of Christian ' antiquity.
Many of the fathers testify, in the plainest language,' against
an intermediate state of expiation^ From these may, as a
specimen, be selected Augustine, Epbraim, and Epiphanius. 2
Augustine, while he. owns aiheaven and a hell, rejects, in un-
qualified and emphatical -language, ':the idea of a third place,
as unknown to the .church and foreign to the Sacred Scriptures.'
Ephraim, like Augustine, 'acknowledges a heaven and a tell,
but disclaims, in the .clearest, terms, the belief of a middle
place.' ' To avoid hell is,' he avers, 'to obtain heaven, and to
miss, heaven is to enter. helU' /Scripture, he adds, teaches no
third region. E piphanius ^admits : no use or advantage of -piety
or of repentance after death.'
, The silence of the ancients on this theory has been granted
by many moderns ; such as Cajetan, Barns, Alpbonsus, Fisher,
and Polydorus. Cajetan remarks the omission of this topic,
in the, scriptural canon, as well as in the works of the ancient
Greek and Latin theologians. Barns, on this subject, admits
.1 Purgatorium est ad ripam inferni. Faber 2. 449. Est sub -terrae vicinus in-
ferno. Dens. 7. 353. -
: Infernum et Purgatorium 'simt loco Vicina. Purgatoriam ease infra viscera ter-
rae inferno ipsi vicinum." Bellarmin, 11. 6. Beda, V. 12.
: S ' Tertium peuitus ignoramus, immoi nee ,e'sse in scripturis Bahctis inveniemus,
Aug. 10. 40. Hyp V. 5. Extra duos hosce ordines, .alias npn est ordo medius.
Loquor antem de altero quidem supernp, altero vero iniferno. Effugere gehennam,
hoc ipsum sit regnum coelofum ingredi, quemadmodum et eo excidere in gehen-
nam iutrare. Ephraim, 19,20. '
OvSe (tap/ rfoptcr/toj WcffjSEias ouSs p-stavoia; fii-fa ffavatov. Epiph. I.. 502.
508 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
the silence of revelation, tradition, and councils. Similar -con-
cessions have been made by Alphonsus, Fisher, and Polydorus. 1
The advocates of this dogma do not even pretend to the
authority of the earlier fathers ; such as Barnabas, Clemens,
Hermas, Ignatius, Polycarp, Justin, Tatian, Ireneus, Melito,
Athenagoras, and Theophilus. ' Its abettors appeal to no writers,
who flourished for 200 years after the Christian era; nor, if we
except those who found their speculation on the illogical argu-
ment of prayer for the dead, till the fourth century. These
authors had often occasion to treat on the subjects of heaven,
hell, death, judgment, and the resurrection. Future happiness
and misery were frequently, in their works, made to pass in
review before the mind of the reader, amid an* entire omission
of any temporary state of punishment or expiation. Ignatius,
addressing the Magnesians, teaches a state of death and of life
without the slightest allusion to a middle place. Polycarp
wrote on the resurrection ; Athenagoras, the Athenian philoso-
pher, composed a whole treatise on the same topic : and yet
neither of these authors betrays a single hint, or offers a solitary
observation on the subject of purgatory. This theme, so
lucrative and notorious in modern times, was unknown to the
simple autnors and Christians of antiquity.
The Latins, on this question, in the council of Florence,
quoted for authority Athanasius, Hilary, Basil, Gregory, Am-
brosius, Augustine, Cyril, and Leo. Bellarmme, Alexander,
and many other moderns refer to the same authors. 2 But the
earliest of these flourished in the end of the fourth century,
when error and superstition began their reign, and after a
period of near four hundred years had elapsed from the intro-
duction of Christianity. These writers, besides, only testify
the prevalence of intercession for the dead. But this super-
stition, notwithstanding its absurdity, implies, as shall afterward
be shown, no middle place of purification between death and
the resurrection.
Bellarmine, nevertheless, and many who follow his steps,
have endeavoured to find this theory in the fathers. This they
attempt in two ways. One consists in confounding the Orige-
nian ordeal with the popish purgatory. Origen, carried on the
wings of vain speculation, imagined that all, saint. and sinner,
prophet, martyr, and confessor, would, after the resurrection
at the last judgment, pass through the fire of the general con-
flagration. 3 This passage through the igneous element, in the
scheme of the Grecian visionary, would try and purify men as
1 Cajetan, c. 2. Barns, 9. Alphon. viii. Fish. Art. 18. Polydor. viii
2 Labb. 18. 1149. Bell. 1. 6. Alex. D. 41.
3 Homines omnes igne examinationis iri definit. Huet. 1. 139. Bell. 1. 11.
Estius, 1. 216. Calm. 22. 362.
ADMISSIONS OF ROMISH WRITERS. 509
the furnace separates the alloy from the precious metals, such
as silver, and gold. This chimera, broached by Origen, was
adopted by Hilary, Ambrosius, Gregory, Lactantius, Jerome,
Ephraim, Basil, and many of the schoolmen.
But the ordeal of Origen differs widely from the purgatory
of Bellarmine. Origen's scrutiny begins after the general
resurrection -, and will be accomplished in the universal confla-
gration. Bellarmine's purgatory begins at the day of death,
and will terminate at or before: the day of general judg-
ment. Its inhabitants will then be translated to heaven, and
the habitation left empty. These two states of purgation,
therefore, will not exist even at the same time. The one ends
before the other begins.
Origen's process differs from Bellarmine's also in the persons
exposed to the refining operation. The Grecian fanatic's hot
bath extends to all, soul and body, good, bad, and indifferent.
The saint, the sinner, and the middling class, whether guilty
of venial or mortal delinquency, must submit, in this specula-
tor's system, to the devouring and scrutinizing flame. Holy
Mary herself must fry, in undistinguished torment, with less
exalted mortals. Even her God-bearing ladyship can claim no
exemption. The only exception will be Immanuel, whb is the
Righteousness of God.. The Roman siiperstitionist's labora-
tory, on the contrary, is only for the intermediate class, who
are bespattered with venial pollution. His furnace, however
warm and capacious, will not be allowed to roast the saint, the
martyr, or confessor, and, much less, the mother of God.
Th.ese distinctions will appear from the works of Origen, Hi-
lary, Ambrosius, Augustine, Lactantius, Jerome, Ephraimy
Basil, Aquinas, Paulinus, and Isidorus. 1 Origen represents all,
1 Post resurrectionem ex morte, indigeamus Sacramento- eluente nos et pur-
gante. Nemo enim absque sordibus resurgere potent., Veniendum est omnibus
ad ignem. Omnes nos venire necesse est ad ilium ignem, etiamsi Paulus sit aliquis
vel Petrus. Origen, Horn. 3, 6, 14.
An diem judicii concupiscimus, in quo nobis est ille indefessus obeundus, in quo
subeunda sunt gravia ilia expiandae a peccatis animae supplicia? Beatae Maria
animam gladius pertransivit. Hilary in Psalm cxviii. P. 856. Hilarius insinuat
etiana, beatam Mariam transire debuisse per ilium ingem. Bellarmiii, II. 1.
} Igne purgabuntur filii Leyi, igne Ezechiel, igne DanieL Amb. 1. 693. in Psalm
xxxvi. ' Oinnes oportet transire per flammas, sive ille Joannes sit, sive ille sit
Petrus. Amb. 1. 1064. in Psalm cxviii.
Per judicium purgata^ novissimum eis quoque igne mundatis. Augustin, C. D.
XX. 25. Justos cum judicayerit etiam igne eos examinabit. Lactan. VII. 21,.'
Ddminus ad ignem judicium vocare se monstriit. Ad sanctos illius pervenit.
Jerom, 2. 1434. in Amos' vii.' Transibimus ignem. Per iarnem transiturus sit
Ephraim, 91. 441.
Ev to rfvpc tfijf xptcrseoj j3affo*o?. AtpjttEvat fwj w fa xavpaft, xaiaeuis. Basil.
1. 475. ia Bsa. IV.
J Iguis ille finalis confiagrationis aget in males et bonos. Elementa purgnbuntur
per Ignem etiam in corporibus electorum. Aquin. III. 74. VIII P. 563, 564. .
610 THE .VARIATIONS OF POPERY! '
after the res urrectionj as heeding and undergoing the purifying
flame. He excepts not even Peter and Paul. Hilary subjects
every individual, even Lady Mary, to the burning scrutiny.
His saintship transfers even the queen of heaven, without any
ceremony, to the rude discipline. Arnbrosius, like Origen and
Hilary, urges the necessity of such an examination, and 1 con-
signs, to the common conflagration, the Jewish prophets and
Christian apostles, Ezekiel, Daniel, Peter, and Paul. Similar
statements may be found in Augustine, Lactantius, Jerome*
Ephraim, Basil, Paulinus and Isidorus. The -same system,
according to Bellarmine, Calmet, and Esthis, was patronized
by Oecumenius, Rupert, Eucherius, Alcuini, Haimo, and
Lombard.
Bellarmine, on this subject, acts an inconsistent and uncandid
part. He first cites Origen,. Hilary, Arnbrosius, Lactantius,
Jerome, and Basil, in favour of his purgatorian theory ; and
afterward without any hesitation admits and even exposes their
error. The Jesuit transubstantiates the Origenian ordeal into
the popish purgatory ; and then, in sheer inconsistency, shews,
with clear discrimination, the distinction between the two sys-
tems and the two kinds of purgation ; and characterizes Origen-
ism as a mistake, if not a heresy. 1 This was to vary from him-
self, and to give up the authority of. these; authors, whom he
had quoted in support of his darling superstition.
Bellarmine, in these concessions, has been followed, and with
reason^ by Calmet, Estius, Courayer, and Du Pin. 2 Calmet,
in his comment, represents Origen, Hilary, Arnbrosius, Lactan-
tius, Basil, Rupert, Eucherius, and Alcuin as teaching the ne-
cessity of those who are the most holy to; pass through the fire
to heaven. Estius states the same, and adds the names of Au-
gustine, Haimo, Lombard, and Aquinas. Courayer on Paolo,
as well as Du Pin in his account of these authors, gives a
similar representation. Galmet, Estius, Courayer, and Du Pin,
therefore, like BeUarmine, abandon this: argument for an inter-:
mediate place of expiation.
The patrons of Romanism argue also from the prayers, pre-:
ferred by the ancients for the dead, which,: they suppose, imply
purgatory. The argument, taken from supplication for depar-
Opus per omne curret ignis arbiter, quod non cremarit flamma, sedprobaverit.
Nostras illo punget in igne animas. Paulinus, 345,686. "'.
Sunt qu:Edam crimiiia, quae per ignem judicii purgari possunt. Isidorus, c. 13.
1 Bell. 2. 1. et 1. 6. , /
2 Lea uns croyent que toutes les ames, memes celles des plus justes, Bortant-de
ce moiide, passent par le feii avant-qne d'arriver au Ciel. " Calmet. 22. 362. Onus
et idem ignis proluibit cranes. De igne novissimi diei, senserunt veteres. Estiiu,
1.216. Origeiies, Lactance, Hilaire, et qnelques autres avoient cru qu'an joar
dujugement,' toils seroient purifiez par le leu. Couraver, in Paol.'2. 644.
ARGUMENT FKOM PRAYERS FOR THE DEAD REFUTED.
ted souls, has been urged with great confidence but little
success. The fact is admitted, but the con sequence is denied.
The Maccabean history has been cited, to evince the belief
of the Jews in purgatorian expiation. But this book is unca-
npnical. Its oanonicity, doubted, saysBellarmine, by the ancient
Christians, was rejected by the Jews, and denied by Cyril,
Jerome, Hilary, Ruffinus, Gregory, and the council of Laodicea. 1
This authority, if prejudice were not blind, might decide the
controversy.
The Apocryphal work has a greater want than that of canoni-
city, and is deficient in morality and, in this instance, in mean-
ing. The author commends suicide. He eulogized Razis for
a bold attempt to kill himself with his sword, rather than fall
into the hands of the enemy. This act, the historian calls noble,
though contrary to the. law of God. 2
His reason for praying for the dead is senseless, as his enco-
mium on self-assassination is immoral. Judas collected money
for this purpose, because " he was mindful of the resurrection."
Intercession for departed spirits, if the slain should not rise
again, would', he said, be '' superfluous and vain.' 3 But the
resurrection refers to the body ; while supplication for the
deceased refers to the soul. The body, at death, goes not to
purgatory, even according to Romish theology ; but to the tomb,
there to wait the summons of the archangel. The immortal
spirit, if in a place of punishment, might need the petition of
the living ; though the body remain in the grave. The design
of mass and supplication for the departed is not to deliver the
body from the sepulchre, but the soul from purgatory, which
will be entirely unpeopled at the resurrection, of which Judas
was so mindful.
The Jews, who fell in the battle of Idumea, were guilty of
idolatry, which is a mortal sin. The coats of the slain contained
things consecrated to the idols of Jamnia. These votive offer-
ings, the unhappy, men retained till their death : and must,
therefore, as guilty not merely of venial frailty but mortal trans-
gression, have been- in a place not of temporary, but -everlasting
punishment ; and, therefore, beyond the aid of sacrifice or
supplication. ,-The- Maccabean historian was as bad a theolo-
gian as moralist.
The modest author, however, makes no high pretensions.
He wrote his history, he remarks, according to his ability. This,
if well, was as he wished ; but if ill, . would, he hoped, Be
excused. He did, it seems, as well as he could, which, no
. doubt, is all a reasonable person would expect. This, how-
1 2 Maccab. xii. 44. Cyril, 66. Jerom, 5. 141. Hilary, 615. Orab..l. 380.
* Maccab. xiv. 41. a Maccab. xii. 43.
512 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
ever, as the author suggests, is one part of his history, which
certainly does not discover the hand of a master. 1
The argument, at any rate, is in this case, taken from prayer
for the dead, which is inconclusive. Intercessions were prefer-
red for the good and the bad, for the saint and the sinner, in the
days of antiquity. These supplications, says Courayer in
Paolo, ' are much more ancient and general than the doctrine
of purgatory, and were offered for martyrs and confessors;'
The dogma, therefore, being more recent than such supplications,
cannot be founded on this basis. 2 ' The supposition does not
necessarily imply a temporary state of punishment, but may
be performed for enhancing the eternal joys of the blessed, or
alleviating the endless sorrows of those who are sentenced to
destruction.
The Christian fathers, from the days of Tertullian, who is
the first who mentions this custom, prayed for their friends after
their departure from this earth and their entrance" on a world
of spirits. Tertullian, about the end of the second century,
admonished a widow to pray for her late husband, and to
commemorate the anniversary of- His death. This, however,
was after his apostacy to Montanism. But the superstition is
natural, and soon, in consequence, became general. The people,
says Eusebius, 'wept at the funeral of Constantine, and sup-
plicated God with tears and lamentations for the emperor's
soul.' 3 Augustine, in a similar manner, prayed for Monica ;
and Ambrosius for V-alentinian aud Theodosius.
All this, however, affords no argument for purgatory. The
ancient Christians supplicated for those, who, the moderns will
admit, could not be in a place of purgatorian punishment or
pain. Constantine's spirit, while the people prayed, had, says
Eusebius ' ascended to its God.' Monica's soul, before Augus-
tine's intercessions, was, the saint believed, in heaven. She
already enjoyed what he asked. Valentinian had ascended to
the flowery scenes of delight, while he enjoyed the fruition of
eternal life, and borrowed light from the Sun of Righteousness.'
Theodosius, while Ambrosius petitioned, ' lived in immortal
light and lasting tranquillity.' The saint, nevertheless, resolved
that no day or night should pass without supplication for .the
deceased and glorified emperor. 4
1 Maccab. xii. 40. et xvl 33.
3 Ces prieres etant bien plus anciennea et plus generales que la doctrine du pur-
gatoire, puisqu'elles se faisoient pour les martyrs et les confesseurs. Paolo, 2. 633.
3 Ttt$ tv%as vittp -TOD j3aaa.Ej fyvzySi arfsStSocav * sw. Eusebius, iv. 71.
Tertullian, 501. . "
4 IIpoj "tov o/vtov soi> av&apfiajvnlo. Euseb. iv. 64, Credo, jam feceris quod
te rego. Artg. confess. IX. 13. p. 170.
Nunc lumen a sole jnstitiae mutuata clarum diem ducis. Amb. 5 T 114.
Fruitur Theodoaius luce perpetua et trauquillitate diuturna. Ambrosius, 5. 121
ARGUMENT FROM PRAYERS FOR THE DEAD REFUTED. 518
The ancient Liturgies, collected by Renaudot and ascribed to
James, Mark, Clemens, Cyril, Gregory, Chrysostom, and Basil,
contain forms of prayer for prophets, patriarchs, apostles, evan-
gelists, martyrs, confessors, and the mother of God. The
liturgy of James contains a ' commemoration of the departed
faithful,- and a prayer to God who received their souls, for a
merciful pardon of their sins.' Mark's Liturgy ' asks rest and
remission for all who had slept in the faith, left this world, gone
to God, and arrived at the mansions of felicity.' The Liturgy
of Clemens 'supplicates God to bless all, who, having run the
course of this life, had come to heaven, with tranquillity in his
spiritual bosom and gladness in the habitations of light and joy.'
Cyril's comprehends ' a commemoration of all the holy patri-
archs, prophets, apostles; martyrs, confessors, and especially
the most glorious god-bearing virgin, and a prayer for the peace
of all their souls in the bosom of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.'
Gregory's contains ' a prayer, used iri presenting the unbloody
sacrifice, for the repose of the fathers who had slept in the faith,
a supplication for their refreshment, and a memento of lady
Mary mother of God.' Chrysoetom's ' mention those who had
left this world, and gone in purity of soul and body to God,
and prays for their repose in the celestial habitations.' Basil's
* remembers all the departed clergy and laity, particularly the
most holy, glorious, immaculate, blessed, god-bearing lady, and
prays for the tranquillity of their souls in the bosorn of Abra-
ham, Isaac, and Jacob, and in the bowers of bliss in the
paradise of pleasure, whence, in the light of the saints, fly
sorrow, sighing, and sadness.' 1
Intercessions, in these prayers, were, in this manner, pre-
ferred for lady Mary herself. Some of these forms had, been
1 Deprecamur Christum, ut praestet illos dignos venia delictorum et remissione
peccatorum. Renaudot, 2. 37.
Illis qnietem trilmas, qui, & nobis profecti,. ad te migraverunt. Remitte omnia
peccata eprum. Renaudot, 2. 37.
Illis omnibus, qui stadium vitse decurrentes, perfect! et praeelari coram te ap-
parnerunt, qiiietem praesta. Domine, in sum illo spiiituali. Da illis spiritual,
gaudii in habitabulis lucis et laetitiae. Renaudot, 2. 196.
Memento omnium sanctorum patriarcharum, prophetarum. Apostoloram, evan-
gelistarutn, martynim, confessorum, praecipue autem . sanctae gloriosissima? Deipa-
rae semper Virginia sanctae Marias. Requiescant animre illorum omnes in emu
patrum nostrorum Abraham, Isaac, et Jacob. Renaudot, 1. 41. 42.
Offerain tibi hoc sacrificium rationabile incruentum in requiem et refrigerium
patrum nostrorum, qui olim obdorraierunt in fide orthodpxa. Dignare, Domine,
recordari omnium sanctorum patriarcharnm prophetarum, apostolorum, evangelis-
taruin, martyrum,. confessorum, praecipue vero sanctae gloria plenae semper vir-
ginis genetricia Dei sanctae. Da illis omnibus requiem. Renaudot, 1. 26. 33. 34.
Memento illorum, qui, cum puritate cordis et sauctitate arrimae et corporis, ex
saeculo isto egressi sunt et ad te, Deus, pervenernnt. Quietem illis praesta in
habitaculis tuis coelestibus. Reuaudot, 2. 250.
Mememto etiam, Domine, omnium qui dormierunt et quieverunt in sacerdotio et
omm ordine laicomm. Dignare, Domine, animas eorum omnium quiete donare in
sanctorum Abraham, Isaac, et Jacob. Renaudot, 1. 18. 72.
33
514 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
in use for hundreds of years and, therefore, if petitions for the
dead suppose a state of purgatorian punishment, her ladyship,
during all this time, must have been in a pretty situation. The
Roman pontiff and priesthood, who wield all the treasury of
the church and all the efficacy of the mass for departed souls,
had, it would appear, neglected the goddess of, Romanism
These, it seems, have, shown little respect for their virgin
patroness, when they left the mother .of God for ages in such
vulgar and smoky apartments. His supremacy, to whom* 1'
appears, this gloomy territory belongs, and who has authority
over its imprisoned spirits, should have paid some attention 'tc
her ladyship. 1 His holiness surely might have spared some-
thing from the fund 'of supererogation for such a particulai
friend. The ecclesiastical bank must have been sadly ex
hausted, when her god-bearing ladyship could not, for so long a.
time, be purchased out of purgatory. The clergy should have
plied the mass and the Latin liturgy, which, if wielded with
the precision of modern times, woulH, in their amazing potency,
soon have enabled holy Mary to scale the walls of the purga-
torian prison, which is said to be-in a very warm cliinace, and
to breathe a cooler atmosphere in some more respectable and
healthy seat. The prison of purgatory was ceitainly a very
sorry accommodation, during so long a period, for the queen of
heaven.
The ancient Christians prayed for those in hell, as well as
for those in heaven. This fact is stated, arul the reasons are
assigned by Cyril, Epiphanius, Chrysoslom, and Augustine. 2
These supplications, it was alleged, increase celestial happi-
ness and diminish infernal misery. The torments- of the guilty,
though, in the world of spirits, they could not be extinguished,
might, it was believed, be extenuated ; and the joys of the
just, though great, might be augmented. No sufferer indeed
could, by any advocacy, be translated from punishment to
felicity. No transmission could be effected from the regions of
sorrow to the mansions of joy. But the enjoyment of heaven
might be enhanced, and the pains of hell be alleviated by the
intercessions of the faithful.
Purgatory therefore formed no part in the faith of Christian
antiquity. The idea, however, though excluded from Clms-
tianity, may be found in the monuments of Pagan, Jewish, and
1 Papa habet auctoritatem super animos purgatorii. Fabery 2. 501.
2 M.sywtijv ovyow jtiGlfvovtes eataQat, -to,^ tyvxat-s vrte p j> q Stoats
Cyril, Myst. V. p. 297. Aixcuwv noiov^Oa tr t v fivijfiL^v xat iirtsp
iliJiAEt Se XOA "tj vrttp awtov yivofjievq evzy- Epiph. H. 75. p. 911.
ywqfat, pioOov xat avtiSotszaf. Chrys. 7. 362. TJt tolerabilior fiat damutitio.
Aug. 7. 2. 239- Non aetemo supplicio finem dando, sed levamen adhlbeiido.
Aug. 7. 239.
PAGAN AND JEWISH PURGATORY. 515
Mahometan mythology. A purgatorian region and process
obtained a place in the Platonic philosophy, near four hundred
years before the commencement of the Christian era. , Plato
taught this theory in his Phaedo and Gorgias. The Grecian
sage divided men into three classes, the good, the bad, and the
middling. The good comprised men distinguished for tempe-
rance, justice, fortitude, liberality, and truth. Philosophers
and legislators, whose wisdom and laws had conferred im-
provement and happiness on mankind, were all comprehended
in this division. The bad included all who had spent their
days in the perpetration of aggravated crimes, such as sacrilege
and murder. The middling kind occupied the space between
the patrons of sanctity and atrocity: and their neutrality, at a
distance from both extremes, left them" open to purgation and
amendment. The good, at death, passed, without pain or
delay, 'to the islands of the blessed, and to the habitations of
unparalleled beauty.' The bad, at death, sunk immediately
into endless torment in Tartarus. The intermediate descrip-
tion, 'purified in Acheron, and punished till the, ir guilt was
expiated, were at length admitted to the participation of
felicity.' 1
This fiction, Plato embellished with all the pomp of language
and metaphor. The Athenian sage possessed perhaps the
greatest luxuriance of imagination and elegance of expression
which have adorned the annals of philosophy. His theory, in
consequence, though chimerical in itself, assumes an interest and
borrows a charm from the witchery of its author's style, the
grandeur of his conceptions, and the colouring of his fancy.
The Grecian philosophy, on this subject, has been decorated
with the fascinations of Roman eloquence and poetry. Cicero,
in his dream of Scipio, has clothed Plato's speculation with all.
the beauty of diction. The soul, says the Roman orator, which
has wallowed in sensuality, submitted to the dominion of licen-
tiousness, and violated the laws of God and man, will not, after
its separation from the body, attain happiness, till it shall, for
many ages, have been tossed in restless agitation through the
world. Virgil has inwoven the Platonic fiction in his immortal
jEneid ; and represented souls, in the infernal world, as making
expiation and obtaining purification by the application of water,
wind, and fire. 2
Such is the- dream of -Platonic philosophy, Ciceronian elo-
quence, and Virgilian verse. The existence of a Purgatorian
world, if Plato, Cicero, and Virgil were canonical, could be
Oo ftsv av OD 5o|wgt /tEffeoj jSiptwzjrat jtopsvOsv-tss srti -fov A%spovta, xa*
atpo/nEvoc. Plato, Phaed. 84. Aug. 733. Brag. 1. 378. Boll. 1. 7.
Cicero, 3. 397. Virgil. Mn. VI.
33*
I
516 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
easily evinced. The proofs, omitted in the Jewish and Chris-
tian revelation, might be found, with great facility, in the Gre-
cian and Roman classics. The topography and polity of the
purgatorian empire, which are unmentionea in the sacred annals,
are delineated in the heathen poetry and mythology. The
council of Trent was silly, or it would have adopted the works
of Plato, Cicero, and Virgil into the canon, instead of the Apo-
crypha. These had as good a title to the honour of canonicity
as the Apocryphal books, and would have supplied irrefragable
evidence for posthumous expiation as well as for many other
Romish superstitoins.
The modern superstition, therefore, which has been imposed
on the world for Christianity, is no discovery. Platonism, on this
topic, anticipated Popery at least a thousand years. The Athe-
nian embodied the fabrication in his philosophical speculations,
and taught a system, which, on this subject, is similar to Ro-
manism. The absurdity has, with some modifications adapting
it to another system, been stolen without being acknowledged
from heathenism ; and appended, like a useless and deforming
wen, to the fair form of Christianity.
The Jews, like the Pagans, believe in purgatory. The He-
brews, though after the lapse of many ages, became acquainted
with the heathen philosophy. Alexander the Great planted a
Jewish colony in Egypt ; and these, mingling with the nations,
began, in process of time, to blend the Oriental and Grecian
philosophy with the Divine simplicity of their own ancient
theology. This perhaps was the channel through which this
ancient people received the Pagan notion of clarification after
death. The soul, in the modern Jewish system, undergoes this
Erocess of expiation for only twelve months after its separation
om the body : and is allowed, during this time, to visit the
persons and places on earth, to which during life it was attached.
Spirits, in this intermediate state, enjoy, on the Sabbath, a tem-
porary cessation of punishment. The dead, in this system,
rested on the seventh day from pain as the living fro^n labour.
The Jewish, like the popish purgatorians, obtained consolation
and pardon from the intercessions of their friends on earth. 1
The Mussulmen adopted the idea of purgatorian punishment,
in all probability, from the popish and Jewish systems. The
Arabian impostor formed his theology from Judaism and Popery.
The unlettered prophet of Mecca, it is commonly believed, was
assisted by an apostatized Christian and a temporizing Jew in
the composition of the Koran and in the fabrication of Is-
lamisnr. The notion of posthumous purification had, at the
commencement of the Hegira, obtained a reception into the
1 Basn. IV. 32. Calm. Diet. 3. 747. Morery, 7. 396.
INTRODUCTION OF PURGATORY. 517
church and into the synagogue ; and, from them, into Mahom-
etanism. Gentilism also in all probability, was, in this amal-
gamation of heterogeneous elements, made to contribute a part :
and all again were, as might be expected, modified according
to the dictation of prejudice or fancy. 1
Such, on this question, were the notions of Pagans, Jews, and
Mussulmen. A similar appendage was, in the progress of su-
perstition, obtruded on Christianity. Augustine seems to have
been the first Christian author, who entertained the idea of pu-
rifying the soul while the body lay in the tomb. The African
saint, though, in some instances, he evinced judgment and piety,
displayed, on many occasions, unqualified and glaring inconsis-
tency. His works, which are voluminous, present an odd
medley of sense, devotion, folly, recantations, contradictions,
and balderdash.
His opinions on purgatorian punishment exhibit many in-
stances of fickleness and incongruity. He declares, in many
places, against any intermediate state after death between heaven
and hell. He rejects, in emphatical language, * the idea of a
third place, as unknown to Christians and foreign to revelation.'
He acknowledges only two habitations, the one of eternal
glory and the other of endless misery. Man, he avers, ' will
appear in the last day of the world as he was in the last day of
his life, and will be judged in the same state in which he had
died.' 2
But the saint, notwithstanding this unequivocal language, is,
at other times, full of doubt and difficulty. The subject, he
grants, and with truth, is one that he could never clearly under-
stand. He admits the salvation of some by the fire mentioned
by the Apostle. This, however, he sometimes interprets to
signify temporal tribulation before death, and sometimes the
general conflagration after the resurrection. He generally ex-
tends this ordeal to all men without any exception : and he
conjectures, in a few instances, that this fire may, as a tempo-
rary purification, be applied to some in the interval between
death and the general judgment. This interpretation, however,
he offers as a mere hypothetical speculation. He cannot tell
whether the temporary punishment is here or will be hereafter;
or whether it is here that it may not be hereafter.' The idea,
he grants, is a supposition without any proof, and 'unsupported
by any canonical authority.' He would not, however, * contra-
dict the presumption, because it might perhaps be the truth."
1 Sale, 76. Calmet, 3. 748. Morery, 397.
2 In quo enim quemque invenerit suus novissimus dies, in hoc earn comprehen-
det mundi novissimus dies ; quoniam qualis in die isto quisque moritur, talis in die
illo judicabitur. Augustin, ad Hesyeh. 2. 743. et Hypog. V. 5. P. 40.
3 Eamdem tribulationem ignem vocat. Aug. C. D. XXI. 26. Ambos probat.
518 THE VARIATIONS OF POPEEY :
Augustine's doubts show, to a demonstration, the novelty of
the purgatorian chimera. His conjectural statements and his
difficulty of decision afford decisive proof, that this dogma, in
his day, was no article of faith. The saint would never have
made an acknowledged doctrine of the church a subject of
hesitation and inquiry. Jle would not have represented a
received opinion as destitute of canonical authority : much less
would he have acknowledged a heaven and a hell, and, at -the
same time, in direct unambiguous language,' disavowed a third
or middle place. Purgatory, therefore, in the beginning of the
fifth century, was no tenet of theology. .Augustine seems to
have been the connecting link between the exclusion and re-
ception of this theory. The fiction, after his day, was owing
to circumstances, slowly and after several ages admitted into
Romanism.
Augustine's literary and theological celebrity tended to the
propagation of this superstition. The Saint's reputation was
high, and his works were widely circulated. His piety indeecl
was deservedly respected through Christendom. His influence
swayed the African church. The African councils, in their
opposition to Pelagianisrn, were, in a particular manner, con-
trolled by his authority. His fame extended to the European
nations, and the Bishop of Hippo, from his character for sanc-
tity and ability, possessed, through a great part of his life, more
real power than the Roman pontiff. A hint from a man of his
acknowledged superiority would circulate with rapidity, and
be accompanied with a powerful recommendation through the
Christian commonwealth.
This superstition, like many others that grew up in the dark
ages, was promoted by the barbarism of the times. Italy,
France, Spain, and England were overrun with hordes of
savages. The Goths and Lombards invaded Italy. France
was subdued by the Franks; while the Vandals desolated
Spain. The martial but unlettered Saxons from the forests of
Germany wasted the fairest provinces of Britain. The rude
invaders destroyed nearly every vestige of learning, and, in its
stead, introduced their own native ignorance and uncivilization.
Cimmerian darkness, in consequence, seemed to overspread
the world. Art, science, philosophy, and literature appeared,
in terror or disgust, to have fled from barbarized man, and
from the general wreck of all the monuments of taste and
Christianity. The clouds of ignorance extended to the Asians
Aug. 7. 648. Ambo per eum transeant. Iste ignis in hac interim vita facit quod
Apostolus dixit. Aug. 6. 127, 128. Sive ibi tantura, sive et hie et ibi, sive ideo
hie ut non ibi non redargue, quia forsitan verum est. Aug. C. D. XXI. 26, P. G49.
In eis nulla velut canonica constituitur authoritas. Aug. Dul. 6. 131. 132.
SLOW .PROGRESS OF PURGATORY. 519
and Africans as well as to the Europeans, prepared the world
for the reception, of any absurdity, and facilitated the progress
of superstition.
The innovation, however, notwithstanding the authority of
Augustine and the Vandalism of the age, made slow progress.
A loose and indetermined idea of temporary . punishment and
atonement after death, but void of system or consistency, began
to float, at random, through the minds of men. The supersti-
tion, congenial with the human soul, especially when destitute
of religious and literary attainments, continued, in gradual and
tardy advances, to receive new accessions. .The notion, in this
crude and indigested state, and augmenting VJ^r continual accu-
mulations, proceeded to the popedom of Gregory in the end of
the sixth century. .
Gregory, like Augustine, spoke on this theme with striking
indecision. The Roman pontiff and the African saint, discours-
ing on venial frailty and posthumous atonement, wrote with
hesitation and inconsistency. His infallibility, in his annota-
tions on Job, disclaims an intermediate state of propitiation.
* Mercy, if once a fault consign to punishment, will not, says
the pontiff, afterward return to pardon. A holy or a malignant
spirit seizes the soul, departing at death from the body, and
detains it for ever without any change.' 1 This, at the present
day, would hardly pass for popish orthodoxy. This, in modern
times, would, at the Vatican, be accounted little better than
Protestantism. '
His infallibility, however, dares nobly to vary from himself.
The annotator and the dialogist are not the same person or, at
least, do not teach the 'same faith. The vicar-general of God,
in his dialogues, ' teaches the belief of a purgatorian fire, prior
to the general judgment, for trivial offences.' 2 This, it must
be granted, is one bold step towards modern Romanism. But .
his holiness is still defective. He mentions trivial failings ; but
says nothing of the temporal punishment of mortal delinquency.
This, to the sovereign pontiff in the sixth century, was un-
known land.
His holiness is guilty of another variation from modern Ca-
tholicism. He had no common .receptacle or common means
of punishment, as at the present day, for the luckless souls satis-
fying for venial frailty. He consigns the unhappy purgatorians
to various places, and refines them sometimes in fire and some-
1 Si semel culpa ad poenam pertrahit, misericordia ulterins ad veniatn non redu-
ce". Greg, in Job viii. 10. Human! casus tempore, sive sanctus sive malignus
spiritus, egredientem animam claustfa carnis acceperit, in selenium secum, sine
ulla permutations retinebit. Greg, in Job viii. 8.
2 De quibusdam levibug culpis, esse, ante judicium. purgatorius ignis credendus
est. Greg. Dial. IV. 39.
52Q THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
times in water. He accordingly boiled the spirit of Pascasius,
for this purpose, in the hot baths of Angelo. Germanus.
bishop of Capua, saw the Roman deacon standing in the scald-
ing steam, as the punishment of supporting Laurentius against
Symmachus in a contested election for the popedom. 1 This
vapour, his infallibility seems to have thought the proper men-
struum for the solution of a hardened soul, and for the precipita-
tion or sublimation of moral pollution. Steam, which now in
the improvement of science and in the march of mind, propels,
by its chemical power, the ship, the coach, and other kinds of
machinery, was used in the days of old for its moral effects in
cleansing purgatorian ghosts from, venial stains. The ancients,
it appears, had a steam purgatory, as the moderns have steam
engines. Posterity therefore need not boast of superiority
'over their ancestors, who ingeniously applied this element for a
nobler purpose than any discovery of the nineteenth century.
Germanus prayed for Pascasius, who therefore escaped from
the purifying steam. But no mention is made of any mass.
This sublime mummery, which is the invention of a later age,
had not in Gregory's time come into fashion. 2
Damian, on the contrary, in the eleventh century, represen-
ted the soul of Severinus bishop of Cologne, as steeped, for
some misdemeanors, in a river, which, he was satisfied, would
yield the necessary abstersion for removing the stain of moral
defilement. He soused the departed spirit in water, as a moral
lotion of approved and unfailing efficacy. Caloric, it seems, is
nor the only solvent for decomposing the defilement of sin.
The cold element as well as the hot steam, in the theory of
Gregory and Damian, the pontiff and the saint, will effect this
purpose.
Nidhard, quoted by Hottinger, mentions another mode of pu-
rifying souls. This consists in con signing them to cold lodgings.
Some fishermen, it seems, (luring the time of a violent heat,
found in the water a mass of the coldest ice. This, the fisher-
men having presented to bishop Theobald, a naked, shivering,
frozen ghost, which suffered the pains of purgatory in this' con-
gelation, revealed, in loud outcry from its icy tenement, its dis-
tress, and begged the aid of Theobald's prayers. 3 The bishop's
intercessions soon thawed the congealment, and liberated the
ice-imprisoned spirit. According to Gregory, Damian, and
Nidhard, therefore, not only fire, but also water in its fluid,
frozen, and steamified state, will serve as a wash in a purgatorian
1 Pascasium in caloribus stantem invenerit. Labb. 5. 419. Greg. Dial. IV. 40
Pascasius in Thermis Angulanis puniebatur. Faber, IV. p. 448.
* Bell. II. 6. Godeau, 3. 744.
s Episcopus audiverit quandam animam clamantem de ista glacie. Nidtard, 91.
Hotting. 6. 1366.
SLOW PROGRESS OP PURGATORY. 521
process for purging venial transgressors. These authors there-
fore had discovered or invented no common depot or medium
of execution for the unfortunate ghosts doomed to satisfy for
trivial misdemeanors.
Platina, in his life of Benedict, presents a view of purgatory
in the eleventh century. His posthumous infallibility pope
Benedict appeared to a traveller, decorated with the beautiful
ears and tail of an ass, and dignified with the graceful counte-
nance and limbs of a bear. The traveller, whoever he was,
took the liberty of asking the cause of the unholy transforma-
tion. My deformity after death, replied his holiness, is the
reward of my pollution in life. The pontiff, according to the
historian, was doomed to be dragged till the day of judgment
through thorns and filth, in regions exhaling stench, and sulphur,
and fire.
Gregory has, by several authors, been represented as the dis-
coverer or rather the creator of purgatory. Otho, a learned
historian of the twelfth century, and a man of extensive informa-
tion, accounted this pontiff's fabulous dialogues the foundation
of the purgatorian fiction. Bruys, in modern times, agreeing
with Otho, represents Gregory as the person who discovered this
middle state for venial sinners. His infallibility certainly
sanctioned the fabrication, with his pontifical authority : and his
name gave it circulation. He enriched the meagre figure with
several additions, and has the credit of becoming the early patron
and improver of the innovation. He did not indeed perfect the
system. . This honour was reserved for the schoolmen, who, in
many instances, completed the inventions of their predecessors.
But the unfinished portrait received several new touches from his
pencil, which was always the willing instrument of superstition. 1
The pontiff himself seems to confess the novelty of the system.
Many things, says his infallibility, have in these last times be-
come clear, which were formerly concealed. 2 This declaration
is in the dialogue that announces the- existence of purgatory ;
which, he reckons, was one of the bright discoveries that dis-
tinguished his age. This consideration perhaps will account for
the pontiff's inconsistency. The hierarch, as already shown,
both opposed and advocated the purgatorian theology. His
opposition perhaps preceded the happy moment, in which the
flood of light burst on his mind, and poured the knowledge of
the new-born faith with overwhelming illumination on his
astonished soul.
1 Gregoire eu fit la decoaverte dans ses beaux dialogues. Brays, 1. 378. Otho,
Ann. 1146.
2 In his extremis temporibus, tarn multa animabus, elarescunt, quae antelatue-
runt Gregory, Dial. IV. 40
522 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY t
The innovation mentioned in this manner with doubt by
Augustine, and recommended with inconsistency by Gregory,
men of high authority in their day, continued to spread and
claim the attention and belief of men. The names of the Afri-
can and Roman saints were calculated to influence the faith of
the Latins, among whom the invention advanced, though with
tardy steps, to perfection. Its bulk, like that of the Alpine ava-
lanche, increased in its progress. This terror of the Alps, as it
proceeds on its headlong course, acquires new accessions of
snowy materials ; and the opinion, patronized by a saint and a
pontiff, received, in like manner, continual accretions from con-
genial minds. The shallow river, advancing to the main swells
by the influx of tributary waves, and the recent theory, in a
similar wav, as it flowed down the stream of time, augmented
its dimensions from the unfailing treasury of superstition.
The progress of the fabrication, however, was slow. Its move-
ments to perfection were as tardy, as its introduction into Chris-
tendom had been late. This opinion, says Courayer, ' did not
begin to assume a form till the fifth century.' Fisher admits
that 'all the Latins did not apprehend its truth at the same time,
but by gradual advances. The universal church,- he admits,
knew and received purgatory at a late period.' 1 Its belief ob-
tained no general establishment in the Christian commonwealth
for ages after Gregory's death. The council of Aix la Chapelle,
in 836, decided in direct opposition to posthumous satisfaction
or pardon. This synod mentions ' three ways of punishment
for men's sins.' Of the.se, two are in this life and one after
death. Sins, said this assembly, ' are, in this world, punished
by the repentance or compunction of the transgressor, and by
the correction or chastisement of God. The third, after death,
is tremendous and awful, when the judge shall say, depart from
me, ye cursed, into everlasting fire, prepared for the devil and
his angels.' 2 The fathers of this council knew nothing of pur-
gatory, and left no room for its expiation.
The innovation, in 998, obtained an establishment at Cluny.
Odilo, whom Fulbert calls an archangel, and Baronius the
brightest star of the age, opened an extensive mart of prayers
and masses for the use of souls detained in the purgatorian
retort. Fulbert's archangel seems, in this department, to have
1 Ce n'est proprement que dans le cinquieme siecle, qne cette opinion a com-
mencee a. prendre une forme. Couray. in Paol. 2. 644. Neque Latini simul
omnes sed sensim hujus rei veritatem concerpernnt. Purgatorium tarn sero cogni-
turn ac receptum universEE.ecclesiiE fuerit. Fish. Con. Luth. Art. 18. Geddis, 110.
3 Tribus modis peccata mortalium vindicantur ; dnobus in liac vita : tertio vero
iu futura vita. Tertia autern extat valde pertimescenda- et terrihilis, qna? non in
hoc sed in futu.ro jnstissimo Dei judicio fiet si-BCulo, qnmido Justus judex dieturus
est, discredite a me, malediciti, iu ignem asternum. Labb. 9. 844. Crabb. 2. 711.
PURGATORY COMPLETED BY THE SCHOOLMEN. 523
excelled all his predecessors. A few, in several places, had be-
ffun to retail intercessions for the purgatorians. But Odilo
commenced business 1 as a wholesale merchant. 1 The traffic,
no doubt, was as beneficial as it was benevolent, and gratified
at once the selfish and social passions.
Odilo's exertions, in his spiritual emporium, gained the grati-
tude, if not the money of Benedict the Eighth, His infalli-
bility, notwithstanding his holiness and supremacy in life, had,
after death, the mischance of falling into the place of posthu-
mous punishment. His holiness, however, through the media-
tion and masses of the Abbot, escaped from the smoke and fire
of purgatory. 2 All this must have been very satisfactory to
Benedict, and also, as he died rich, to Odilo.
The purgatoriari novelty, however, though admitted by many,
had not obtained a general reception in the middle of the twelfth
century. This is clear from Otho the historian, who was a
man of profound erudition and research. This author repre-
sents * some as believing in a purgatorian place situated in the
infernal regions, were souls are consigned to darkness or roasted'
with the fire of expiation.' 3 This testimony is very explicit.
The opinion was not entertained by all, but asserted by some.
The historian, who possessed enlarged information, would
never have used such language, had purgatory, in his day, been
the common belief of the ecclesiastical community. The peo-
ple were divided. Some maintained, and some rejected the
dogma of a temporary expiation after death. Those who
believed in the posthumous satisfaction could not agree whether
the medium of torment was darkness or fire. The innovation,
it is plain, had not, in Otho's day, become the general faith of
Christendom. Bernard, who flourishecl in the same age as
Otho, could not, with all his saintship, determine whether the
posthumous punishment 'was by heat, cold, or some other
infliction.' 4
The speculation of Augustine, Gregory, and Odilo fell, after
Otho's time, into the hands of Aquinas and other schoolmen.
The angelic oloctor and the rest of the confraternity finished
the fabric, which others had founded. These, on this subject
as on others, gave the finishing touch to the outline of former
1 Odilonem hoc anno commemorationem omnium defunctorum instituisse : cujus
exemplo ad ceeteras ecclesias base institutio promanavit. Mabillon, 4. 125. Spon.
.1048. II, III. Brays, 2. 240.
2 Vir Dei prsecepit, at pro defancto pontifice, preces fierent. Mabillon, 4. 312,
313.
3 Esse apud Tnferos locum purgatorium, in quo salvandi vel tenebras tantum
afficiantur, vel expiationis igne detorquentur, quid-am asserunt. Otho, Chrou.
viii. 26. ,
$ * Qui in purgatorio sunt, expectant redemptionem prius cruciandi aut calore ig-
nis,, aut rigore frigoris, aut alicujua gravitate doloris. Bernard, 1719.
524 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
days, and furnished the skeleton with sinews, muscles, form,
and colour. Their distinctions on this topic exhibit a display
of supererogation in subtilty, metaphysics, and refinement.
Their attention fixed the place and the punishment of the pur-
gatorian mansions. 1
The plan, finished in this manner by the schoolmen, came
before the general council of Florence in its twenty-fifth session
in 1438, and received its sanction. This decision was ratified
by pope Eugenius : and the opinion, after a long succession of
variations, became at length a dogma of faith in the Latin
communion. 2
The Greeks, however, opposed the Latins on this question in
the Florentine council, and the discordancy occasioned long
and nonsensical discussions. The Greeks, with impregnable
obstinacy, disclaimed the -idea of fiery pain or expiation.
Each, however, actuated with the desire of accommodation,
yielded a little to the other. The Latins waved the idea of
purgatorian fire : and the Greeks, in their turn, politely ad-
mitted a posthumous atonement by darkness, labour, sorrow,
and the deprivation of the vision of God. A temporary union
therefore was formed without sincerity, but soon afterward viola-
ted. The Grecian disbelief of purgatory has been granted by
Guido, Alphonsus, Fisher, More, Prateolus, Renaudot, and
Simon. Bellarmine himself here suspected the Greeks of
heresy; and supported his surmises with the authority of
Thomas Aquinas the angelic doctor. The disbelief of this
theology was also entertained by the other oriental denomina-
tions, such as the Abyssinians, Georgians, Armenians, and
Syrians. 3
The city of Trent witnessed the last synodal discussion on
this topic in a general council. The decision, on that occasion,
presented an extraordinary demonstration of unity. The pre-
paration of a formulary was committed, says Paolo, to the
cardinal of Warmia and eight bishops, or, according to Pala-
vicino, to five bishops and five divines. These, knowing the
delicacy of the task, endeavoured to avoid every difficulty, yet
could not agree. Terms, says Paolo and Du Pin, could not
be found to express each person's mind. 4 Language, incapa-
ble of representing their diversity of opinion, sunk under the
i Aquin. III. 69, 70. P. 544, 547, 565.
* Labb. 18. 526. Bin. 8. 568. Crabb, 3. 476.
s Bin. 8. 561. Crabb. 3. 376. GOBS. 6. 20. Bell. 1. 2. Alphon. VIII. Fish.
A. 18. More, 63. Prateol. VII. Renaud. 2. 105. Simon, c. 1. Bell. 1. 1370.
* N'etant pas possible de trouver des termes propres a exprimer les choses an
gre de chacun, il valoit mieux n'en dire autre chose sinori* que bonnes oeuvres des
fideles servent aux morts pour la remission de leurs peines. Paol. 2. 633, 634.
Pallav. XIV. 2. Du Pin, 3. 633 Labb. 20 170.
PURGATORY COMPLETED BY THE SCHOOLMEN. 525
mighty task of enumerating the minute and numberless varia-
tions, entertained by a communion which boasts of perfect and
exclusive agreement and immutability. This, in variety, out-
rivalled the patrons of Protestantism. These, in the utterance
of heresy, have sometimes evinced ample want of accordancy ;
but never, like the Trentine fathers, exhausted language in
stating their jarring notions. The theological vocabulary was
always found sufficient to do justice to heretical variety. But
the universal, infallible, holy, Roman council, through want of
words or harmony, was forced to admit, in general terms, the
existence of a middle place, disengaged of all particular cir-
cumstantial explanation. This, the council pledged their word,
is taught by revelation and tradition, as well as by the mighty
assembly of Trent. The holy unerring fathers, however,
though they could not agree themselves nor find expression. for
their clashing speculations, did not forget to curse, with cordi-
ality and devotion, all who dissented from their sovereign
decision. The cursing system, indeed, was the only thing on
which the sacred synod showed any unanimity.
CHAPTER XVIII.
CELIBACY OF THE CLERGY.
VARIETY OF SYSTEMS JEWISH THEOCRACY CHRISTIAN ESTABLISHMENT ANCIENT
TRADITION INTRODUCTION OF CLERICAL CELIBACY REASONS GREEKS LATINS
EFFECTS OF SACERDOTAL CELIBACY DOMEST1CISM, CONCUBINAGE, AND MATRIr.'
MONY SECOND PERIOD OF CELIBACY OPPOSITION TO GREGORY TOLERATION OF
FORNICATION PREFERENCE OF FORNICATION TO MATRIMONY AMONG THE CLER-
GY PERMISSION Oik ADULTERY OR BIGAMY TO THE LAITY VIEW OF PRIESTLY
PROFLIGACY IN ENGLAND, SPAIN, GERMANY, SWITZERLAND, FRANCE, ITALY, AND
PERU COUNCILS OF LYONS, CONSTANCE, AND BASIL.
THE celibacy of the clergy has, for a long series of time, been
established in the Romish communion. The bishop, the priest,
and the deacon are, in the popish theology, forbid to marry.
This connexion indeed is allowed to the laity. The institution,
in the system of Catholicism, is accounted a sacrament, and
therefore the sign and means of grace and holiness. The council
of Trent, in its twenty-fourth session, declares this ceremony
one of the sacraments, by which, according to its seventh ses-
sion, ' all real righteousness is begun and augmented.' The
same is taught in the Trent Catechism, published by the com-
mand of Pope Pius. J But, wonderful to tell, the council as well
as the Catechism prescribes, in sheer inconsistency, a renuncia-
tion of an institution which conveys true sanctity, as a necessary
qualification for the priesthood.
The advocates of Romanism, however, vary on the decision
of the question, whether this celibacy be divine, or human, or
even useful. One party in the popish community account the
interdiction a divine appointment. These make the prohibition
a matter of faith and moral obligation, which, unlike a question
of mere discipline, neither the pope nor the universal church
can change or modify. Commanded by God, and sanctioned
by his Almighty fiat, no earthly power can repeal the enactment,
which, according to this system, must remain for ever without
alteration. This opinion was patronized by Jerome, Epipha-
1 Per sacramenta, omnis vera justitia vel incipit, vel coepta augetur, vel omissa
reparatur. Bin. 9. 367, 411. Labb. 20. 150. Gratiam quoque hoc sacrameuto
significare et tribui. Cat. Trid. 187. Aquin. 3. 486. Gibert, 3. 315.
VARIETY OF SYSTEMS.
527
nius, Major, Clichtovius, Gabutius, Siricius, and Innocent. 1
This party, however, was never considerable either in number
or influence.
A second party reckons the celibacy of the clergy a human
constitution. These, in general, esteem the prohibition a ques-
tion not of faith but of discipline, prescribed not by God but
by man, and capable of being altered or even repealed by
human authority. These are numerous, and include the ma-
jority of the popish communion : and the opinion has been
patronized by many theologians of influence and learning, such
as Aquinas, Cajetan, Soto, Bellarmine, Valentia, Bossuet, Da
Pin, Gother, Ghallenor, and Milner.
The partizans of this opinion, however, are subdivided into
two factions, distinguished by a slight shade of difference. One
of these factions accounts the matrimonial interdiction, apos-
tolical, established by the inspired heralds of the gospel ; and
continued in uninterrupted succession till the present day. This
forms a close approximation to the former system ; and seems
to have been advocated, with some variation and inconsistency,
by Jerome, Chfysostom, Siricius, Innocent, Gregory, Bellar-
mine, Godeau, and Thomassin. 2 The other faction reckons
the regulation merely ecclesiastical or human, and a matter of
mere expediency, and capable of dispensation or recission
according to utility. This s} r stem has been countenanced by
Aquinas, Cajetan, Antonius, and Gratian. The marriage of
the clergy, says Gratian, is forbidden neither by evangelical or
apostolical authority. Similar statements have been made by
Aquinas and Cajetan. 3
A third party account sacerdotal celibacy not only ecclesias-*.
tical or human, but also useless or hurtful. The opposition to
the prohibition, even in the bosom of the Romish communion,
has in every age, been persevering and powerful. This hosti-
lity will, in glowing colours, appear in the*ensuing details. The
privation has been discountenanced by many of the ablest pat-
rons of Romanism, such as Panormitan, Erasmus, Dtirand,
Polydorus, Alvarus, and Pius. : The celibacy of the clergy, says
Pius the Second, is supported by strong reasons, but opposed
by stronger. The edicts of Siricius and Innocent, by which
the privation was first enforced, were rejected by many of the
1 Jerom. adv. Jov. Bpiph. H. 48. Major, D. 24. Clich. c. 4. Bell. I. 18. Gibert,
1. 109. Gabut. 21.
2 Cette loi est aussi ancienne, quel'eglise. Thomassin, I. 43. Anton, c. 21.
3 Non est essentialiter anhexum debitnm continentiae ordini sacro, sed ex sta-
tute ecclesiae. Aquin. II. Q. 88. A. II. P. 311. Potest Stimmus Pontifex dispen-
sare in matrimonio cum sacerdote. Nee ratione nee autoritate probattir quod, ab-
solute loquendo, sacerdos peceet contrahendo matrimonium, quin ratio potius et
ad oppositum ducit. Cajetan, 1. 121. Bell. 1. 19. Godea. 2. 154,
528 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
clergy. Gregory's tyranny on this topic met with decided hos-
tility. His attempt was-, by many, accounted an innovation and
produced a schism. Many chose to renounce the priesthood
rather than submit to pontifical despotism, violate their conjugal
engagements, or relinquish the objects of their affections. The
German emperor and clergy supplicated Pope Pius the Fourth,
for a repeal of the enactments against sacerdotal matrimony, and
supported their petition with the most irrefragable arguments,
such as the novelty of privation, and its dreadful consequences
on morality. Augustine, the Bavarian ambassador at Trent,
petitioned against clerical celibacy, which, he declared, " was
not of divine right or commanded by God." His speech, on
the occasion, met, even in the council of Trent, with attention
and even applause. The French king and clergy at Poissy
issued a similar petition to the pope in 1561, enforced by similar
reasons. 1 Many of the popish errors indeed may, in theory, be
absurd as clerical celibacy. But none, in practice, has been
attended with such odious and appalling effects in the demor-
alization of man. The rankest and most disgusting debauchery,
originating in the unnatural interdiction, has, in the Romish
communion, disgraced sacerdotal dignitj r , and stained the annals
of civil and ecclesiastical history.
The celibacy of the clergy, in all its forms, is a variation
from the Jewish theocracy delivered in the Old Testament.
The Jews countenanced neither celibacy nor maidenhood, and
the Jewish nation contained neither unmatrimonial priests nor
cloistered nuns. The patriarchs, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,
were married, and had a numerous offspring. Prior to Moses,
the first-born of the Hebrews possessed both civil and ecclesi-
astical authority, and was prince and priest; but was not
debarred connubial enjoyments. Moses, the celebrated legisla-
tor of Israel, was married and had a family. The holy prophets
of Palestine, such as Noah, Joseph, Samuel, David, Isaiah, and
Ezekiel, formed this connexion, and became the parents of sons
and daughters. The levitical priesthood were allowed the
same liberty. Matrimony indeed, among the Israelitish clergy,
could hardly be called a bare permission ; but amounted in one
sense to a command. The priesthood, among the descendants
of Abraham, was hereditary. The sons of the Aaronical
priests succeeded, in consequence of their birth-right, to the
administration of the sacerdotal functions. 2 An injunction
therefore seems, in this manner, to have been laid on the min-
ister of the Jewish establishment in favour of that institution,
. Brays, 3. 398. Bell. 1. 1110. Da Pin, 3. 336, 522. Erasm. 1. 422. Platma
in Pius 2. Paolo, 2. 680.
3 Crab. 1. 417. Chrysostom, 1. 2G8, 568, et 2. 298. Bell. 1. 18.
CELIBACY A VARIATION FROM . THE JEWISH THEOCRACY. 529
by which, according to the Divine appointment, the priestly
office was transmitted to their posterity and successors, who
presided in the worship of Jehovah and the religion of Canaan.
Sacerdotal celibacy is ,a variation from the Christian dispen-
sation revealed in the New Testament. The Christian Reve-
lation affords express precept and example for the marriage of
the clergy. Paul,- addressing Timothy and Titus, represents
the bishop as ' the husband of one wife.' The same is said of
the deacon. Matrimony, therefore, according to the book of
God, does not disqualify for the episcopacy or the deaconship.
The inspired penman also characterizes ' forbidding to marry '
as 'a doctrine of devils.' The interdiction of the conjugal
union, according to apostolical authority, emanated not from
God but from Satan. The prohibition and its practical conse-
quences among the Romish clergy are worthy of their author.
All who are acquainted with the annals of sacerdotal celibacy
reflect with disgust on an institution, whjch, in its progress, has
been marked with scenes of filthiness, that have disgraced
ecclesiastical history, the popish priesthood, and our common
species. ' Take away honourable wedlock,' says Bernard,
'and you will fill the church with fornication, incest, sodomy
and all -pollution.' Erasmus, who was well acquainted with
its effects, compared it to a pestilence. 1 These authors have
drawn the evil with the pencil of truth, and emblazoned the
canvass with a picture taken from life.
The apostles have left examples as well as precepts in favour
of matrimony. All the apostles, says Ambrosius, except John
and Paul, were married. Simon, whose pretended successors
have become the vicegerents of heaven, was a married man,
and the sacred historians mention his mother-in-law. Peter
and Philip, say Clemens and Eusebius, had children. Paul
was married, according to Clemens, Ignatius, and Eusebius ;
though the contrary was alleged by Tertullian, Hilary, Epiph-
anius, Jerome, Ambrosius, and Augustine. 2
The celibacy of the clergy, varying in this manner from the
Christian dispensation, is also a variation from ancient tradi-
tion. .The interdiction of sacerdotal matrimony is unknown to
the oldest monuments of the church, the mouldering fragments
of Christian antiquity, and the primeval records of ecclesiastical
1 Tolle de ecclesia honorabile connubium et thorum immaculatum, nonne reples
earn concubinariis, incestuosis, seminifluis, mollibus masculorum concubitoribus,
et omni denique genere immundorum ? Bernard, Serm. 66. P. 763. Tim. III. 2.
12. et IV. 3. Titus, I. 6.
Quae pestis aut lues a soperis aut infernis immitti possit nocentior. Erasm.
1. 442.
* Omnes Apostoli, excepto Johanne et* Paulo, uxores habuerunt. Amb, in 2
C.onn. u. Matth. vni. 14. Clem. 535. Strom. 3. Euseb. iii. 30. 31, Calm 98.
410*
34
530 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
history. No vestige of the prohibition is to be found in the long
lapse of three hundred years after the era of redemption. Its
warmest patrons can produce no testimony of its existence for
three ages after the epoch of the incarnation; nor any indeed
possessing the least authority till the days of Jerome and
Epiphanius in the end of the fourth century. The monk of
Palestine and the bishop of Salamis are the first witnesses
which could be produced by all the learning and research of
Bellarmine, or Thomassin ; and even their attestation is con-
tradictory and inconsistent with cotemporary history.
This lengthened period was enlightened and adorned by a
succession of Apostolical and Christian authors; and all are
silent on this theme, or bear testimony to the unconfined free-
dom of matrimony. The inspired writers were followed by
the apostolical men, Hermas, Clemens, Barnabas, Polycarp,
and Ignatius. These again were succeeded by a long train of
ecclesiastical authors, such as Justin, Irenseus, Clemens, Ori-
gen, Tertullian, Minucius, Athenagoras, and Cyprian. But
none of these mention, in express or implied phraseology, any
connubial restriction on the clergy : and the omission is not
supplied by a single pontifical edict or synodal canon prior to
the fourth century.
Many documents of antiquity, on the contrary, remain,
which testify their unrestrained liberty to form and enjoy the
nuptial connexion, and which are conclusive and above all
suspicion. A few of these may be subjoined, taken from
Dionysius, Clemens, Origen, and the Apostolic canons.
Dionysius, about the year one hundred and seventy, affords
one decisive testimony to the marriage of the priesthood in his
day. The interesting relation is preserved by Eusebius. Dio-
nysius, according to the father of ecclesiastical history, was
bishop of Corinth. He was esteemed for his wisdom and
piety ; and did not confine his valuable labours to his own
diocese, but extended them to other parts of Christendom. He
wrote to the Lacedemonians, Athenians, Nicomedians, Gortini-
ans, Amastrians, and Gnossians, for the purpose of enforcing
truth and peace. His letter to the Gnossians was on the sub-
ject of sacerdotal celibacy. Pinytus, a Cretan bishop, actuated
by ignorance or presumption, urged the necessity of abstinence
in all its rigour on the clergy of his diocese. Dionysius, hav-
ing heard of the unconstitutional attempt, wrote to the
Gnossians and admonished Pinytus to regard the weakness of
man, and to lay no such heavy burden on the clergy. Pinytus,
convinced of his error, bowed to the wise and well-timed
counsel, and replied to his Corinthian monitor in strains of
eulogy and admiration. The relation is conclusive against
PROOFS THAT THE CLERG1T ANCIENTLY WERE MARRIED. 531
sacerdotal celibacy in the days of the Cretian and Corinthian
bishops. Dionysius, famed for superior information on eccle-
siastical laws, condemned the injurious and unwarranted inno-
vation. Pinytus pleaded no authority for his opinion, and
acquiesced in the other's decision without hesitation. Had the
interdiction of priestly wedlock been apostolical or even eccle-
siastical, and continued in the church in uninterrupted succes-
sion from the establishment of Christianity, the one would not
have, advised its abolition, nor the other have admitted his
determination with so much submission. 1
Clemens, who flourished about the year 200, testifies to the
same effect. ' God,' say? the catechist of Alexandria, * allows
every man, whether priest, deacon, or layman, to be the hus-
band of one wife, and to use matrimony without reprehension.
What can the enemy of matrimony say against procreation,
when it is permitted to a bishop, that ruleth well his own house,
and who governs the church.' 2 This is clear and satisfactory.
The use, as well as the contract of marriage was, in the begin-
ning of the third century, lawful both for the clergy and for the
laity. The connubial state and its enjoyments extended in the
days of Clemens to the pastor as well as to the flock. Clemens
was a man of extensive erudition both in philosophy arid the-
ology, and therefore could not, on this topic, be mistaken in the
existing regulations of his day. -.
Origen, who flourished about the middle of the third century,
is another witness. Origen's testimony is quoted by Bellar-*
mine in favor of sacerdotal celibacy; but .certainly with little
judgment. His argument recoils on its author. 'The duties
of matrimony,' says Origen cited by Bellarmine, 'hinder the
continual sacrifice, which, it appears to me, should be offered
only by such as devote themselves to constant and perpetual
continency.' 3 This evinces just the contrary of what the car-
dinal intended. Some who ministered at the altar, according
to Origen's words, were married, and he complained that their
connubial engagements prevented their due and regular attend"
ance on the sacred duty. He does not mention or pretend any
ecclesiastical law or injunction, requiring the observation of
clerical celibacy. He only speaks his own private opinion as
a matter of expediency. His language bears testimony to the
fact, that married men, in the third century, officiated at the
altar, and to the non-existence of any ecclesiastical canon or
1 Euseb. IV, 23. Niceph. IV. 8. Mendoza,.II. 60.
2 Tor T'sfj/wx.j yuwwxo? avSpa, rtavv arioSfxceat,, xav IIpEtfjSvr'fpof, q xav Ataxwoy,
xav AOMCOS, ^avfrtifyrttas ya^to ^pw^tsj/oj. Clem. Alexun. 1. 552. Tim. III. 4.
3 Impeditur sacrificium indesiuens iis qui conjugalibus necessitatibus serviunt.
Cade videtur mihi, quod illius solius est oflere sacrificium qui indesineati et perpe-
tuae se devoverit castitati. Origen. Horn. 23. Bell. I. 1114.
34*
532 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
usage enforcing clerical abstinence. He pleads only his private
judgment in behalf of his opinion. His prepossessions against
all nuptial engagements are well known, and prompted him to
use a remedy in his own person, contrary to all law human
and divine. He armed himself against temptation, by a
mutilation which was interdicted by the twenty-second apos-
tolical and first Nicene canons : and one would expect by self-
preservation. This shows the insignificance of his opinion on
this as on other topics of faith and discipline. Bellarmine must
have been possessed by the demon of infatuation, when he
appealed to Origen's judgment.
The fifth apostolical canon is to 'the same purpose. This
enactment ' pronounces excommunication and, in case of con-
tumacy, deposition against the bishop, priest, or deacon, who,
under pretext of religion, puts away his wife.' 1 The canon,
notwithstanding the scribbling of Binius, plainly supposes cler-
ical matrimony and forbids separation. These canons indeed
were compiled neither by an apostolic pen nor in an apostolic
age. Turriano, it is true, ascribed them to the apostles
Baronius and Bellarmine retained fifty of them and rejected
thirty-five. The ablest critics, however, such as Du Pin,
Beveridge, Albaspinasus and Giannon, have regarded them as
a collection of canons, selected from Synods prior to the council
of Nice in 325. This seems to be the true statement. The
canons are often cited by the councils and authors of the fourth
century. John of Antioch inserted them in his collection in the
reign of Justinian, and the emperor himself eulogized them in
his sixth Novel ; whilst their authority, at a later date, was
acknowledged by Damascen, Photius, and the Seventh General
Council. 2
The celibacy of the clergy, however, in consequence of the
march of superstition, obtained at length in the west, though
always rejected in Eastern Christendom. The mind of super-
stition seems inclined to ascribe superior holiness to virginity
and celibacy, and to venerate abstinence of this kind with blind
devotion. Men, therefore, in all ages, have endeavoured to draw
attention by pretensions to this species of self-denial and its
fancied purity, and abstraction from sublunary care and enjoy-
ment. Its votaries, in every age, have, by an effected singu-
larity and ascetic contempt of pleasure, contrived to attract jhe
eye of superstition, deceive themselves, or amuse a silly world.
This veneration for celibacy has appeared through the nations,
and in the systems of Paganism, Heresy, and Romanism.
1 Episcopus, vel presbiter, vel Diaconus uxorem suam, ne ejiciat religionis prae-
textu, sin autem ejiceeit segregetur, et si perseveret deponatur. Labb. 1. SO.
Bin. 1. 6. Crabb. 1. 15.
* Da Pin, c. 10. Gianaon, II. 8. Cotel. 1. 429. 442.
CELIBACY OF THE CLERGY REJECTED IN THE EAST. 533
Clerical celibacy is the child, not of religion or Christianity, but
of superstition and policy.
Austerity of life and abstinence from lawful as well as unlaw-
ful gratifications, the heathen accounted the summit of perfec-
tion. The Romans, during their profession of Gentilism, though
their Pontifex JVIaxirnus was a married man, had their vestal
virgins, who possessed extraordinary influence and immunity.
The Athenian Hierophants, according to Jerome's expression,
unmanned themselves by drinking cold hemlock. Becoming
priests, they ceased to be men. The Egyptian priesthood
observed similar continency. These, says Cheremon the Stoic,
quoted by Jerome, were induced, for the purpose of subduing
the body, to forego the use of flesh, wine, and every luxury of
eating and. drinking, which might pamper passion or awaken
concupiscence. The priests of Cybele, in like manner, in
entering on their office, vanquished the enemy by mutilation.
- The Gnostic and Manichean systems also declared against
matrimony and in favour of celibacy. The Manicheans, indeed,
according to Augustine, allowed their auditors, who occupied
the second rank, to marry, but refused the same liberty, to the
Elect, who aimed at the primary honours of purity. The gro-
velling many, who were contented with mediocrity, indulged
in nuptial enjoyments, whilst the chosen few, who aspired at
perfection, renounced these degrading gratifications, and rose
to the sublimity of self-denial and spirituality. 1
Popery followed the footsteps of heathenism and heresy.
The imperfect laity, like the Manichean auditors, may attach
themselves to the other sex, and enjoy connubial gratifications.
But the clergy and sisterhood, who airn at perfection, must, like
the Manichean elect, soar to the grandeur of abstinence and
virginity.
This admiration of virginity began at an early period of
Christianity. Ignatius, who was the companion of the inspired
messengers of the Gospel, commenced, in his epistolarly address
to Polycarp in the beginning of the second century, to eulogize,
though in very measured language, the haughty virgins of the
day. This affectation of holiness, which was then in its infancy,
had presumed to rear its head above unpretending and humble
purity. Ignatius was followed by Justin and Athenagoras: but
still in the language of moderation. Their encomiums, however,
were general, and had no particular reference to the clergy.
Tertullian, led astray by the illusions of Montanism, forsook
the moderation of Ignatius, Justin, and Athenagoras, and ex-
tolled virginity to the sky. He exhausted language in vilifying
^
1 Jerom, 4. 192. Bruys, 1. 142. Moreri, 4. 142. Augustin, 1. 739. et 8. 14.
534 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
marriage and praising celibacy. Tertullian, in his flattery of
this mock purity, was equalled or excelled by Origen, Chrysos-
tom, Augustine, Basil, Ambrosius, Jerome, Syricius, Innocent,
and F ulgentius. 1 These saints and pontiffs represented virginity
as the excellence of Christianity, and viewed with admiration
the system which Paul of Tarsus, under the inspiration of God,
characterized as a ' doctrine of devils.'
The reason of this admiration may be worth an investigation.
One reason arose from the difficulty of abstinence. Virginity,
Jerome admits, ' is difficult and therefore rare.' The Monk
of Palestine was a living example of this difficulty. Sitting, the
companion of scorpions in a frightful solitude, parched with the
rays of the sun, clothed in sackcloth, pale with fasting, and
quenching his thirst only from the cold spring, the Saint, in his
own confession, wept and groaned, while ' his blood boiled with
the flames of licentiousness.' Bernard prescribes ' fasting, as a
necessary remedy for the wantonness of the flesh and the inflam-
mation of the blood.' Chrysostom makes similar concessions
of difficulty. 2 The passion indeed, which prompts the matri-
monial union, being necessary for the continuation of the species,
has, by the Creator, been deeply planted in the breast, and
forms an essential part of the constitution. The prohibition is
high treason against the laws of God, and open rebellion against
the spring tide of human nature and the full flow of human
affection. An attempt, therefore, to stem the irresistible current
must ever recoil with tremendous effect on its authors. But
the affectation of singularity, the show of sanctity, and the pro-
fession of extraordinary attainments, which outrage the senti-
ments of nature, will, like Phaeton's attempt to drive the chariot
of the sun, attract the gaze of the spectator, gain the applause
of superstition, and figure in the annals of the world.
Jerome and Chrysostom, quoted by the Rhemists, say that
continency may always be obtained by prayer. The attainment,
according to the Grecian and Roman Saint, is the uniform re-
ward of supplication to heaven. Theodolf makes a similar
statement. But the allegation of Jerome and Chrysostom as
well as Theodolf, is the offspring of inconsistency, and wholly
incompatible with their usual sentiments. Chrysostom, like Je-
rome, gives, in another place, a different view of the votaries" of
virginity in his day. Some of these, to counteract the move-
ments of the flesh, cased the body in steel, put on sack-cloth,
ran to the mountains, spent night and day in fasting, vigils, and
in all the rigor of severity. Shunning the company of women,
1 Ignat. c. 5. Cotel. ii. 92. Justin, 22.
2 Sola libidinum incendia bulliebant, Jerom, 4. .0, 177. Necesse est, lasciviens
caro oerum crebria frangatur jejuuiis. Galore sauguinis inflamata, ut evadere
possit, omni indiget custodia. Bernard, 1114. Chrysostom, 1. 249.
PROGRESS OF CLERICAL CELIBACY IN THE ROMISH CHURCH. 535
the whole sex were forbidden access to their solitary retreat.
All this self-mortification, however, could scarcely allay the
rebellion of their blood. 1 ; The relation must convey a singular
idea of these victims of superstition, and the manners of the age.
The portrait is like the representation of a Lucian or Swift,
who, in sarcastic irony, would ridicule the whole transaction ;
while it displays, in striking colours, the difficulty of the attempt
as well as the folly of the system.
The difficulty of continence, if reports may be credited, was
not peculiar to Chrysostom's clay. Succeeding saints felt the
arduousness of the mighty attempt. A few instances of this
may amuse, as exemplified in the lives of Francis, Godric,
Ulfric, Aquinas, Benedict, an Irish priest, the Bishop of Sher-
burn, and related by Bonaventura, Paris, Malmesbury, Mabil-
lon, Ranolf, arid the Roman Breviary.
The Seraphic Francis, who flourished in the thirteenth cen-
tury, was the father of the Franciscans. The saint, though de-
voted to chastity and brimful of the spirit, was, it seems, some-
times troubled with the movements of the flesh. An enemy that
wrought within was difficult to keep in subjection. His saint-
ship, however, on these occasions, adopted an effectual Way of
cooling the internal flame, and allaying the carnal conflict. He
stood, in winter, to the neck in a pit full of icy water. One day,
being attacked in an extraordinary manner by the demon of
sensuality, he stripped naked, and- belaboured his unfortunate
back with a disciplinarian whip : and then leaving his cell, he
buried his body, naked as it was, in a deep wreath of snow. 2
The cold bath, the knotted thong, and the snowy bed were
necessary for discharging the superabundant caloric of his
saintship's constitution.
Godric, an English hermit, was troubled with the same com-
plaint, and had recourse to the same remedy. He was a native
of Norfolk, but had visited Jerusalem, wept over the sacred
sepulchre, and kissed, in holy devotion, the tomb of Emmanuel,
and the monument of redemption. He lived on the banks of
the Werus, and was the companion of the bear and the scorpion,
which were gentle and obliging to the man of God. But he
had to contend, even in his solitude, with temptation. Satan,
assuming the form of a lion or a wolf, endeavoured to allure
him from his duty. These outward trials, however, were
<tTr\s xa-ta tr)v titidvputv fuwvia^ Chtysostom, 1. 234.
A. Deo datur continentia, sed petite et accipietis. Theod. in Daehery, 1, 255.
2 II se jettoit souvent en hyver dans une fosse pleine de glace, afiu de vaincre
parfaitement 1'ennemi domestique. Bray. 3. 151. Etant attaque nn .jour d'une
grande tentatiou de la chair, il se depouilla et se donna une rude discipline. Puis
il se jetta dans la neige Morery, 4. 179.
536 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
nothing compared with the inward conflicts, arising from the
ferment of concupiscence and " the lusts of the flesh." He
counteracted the rebellion of his blood, however, by the rigour
of discipline. The cold earth was his only bed, and a stone,
which he placed under his head, was his nightly pillow. The
herb of the field, and the water of the spring, were his meat
and drink, which he used only when compelled by the assaults
of hunger and thirst. Clothed in hair cloth, he spent his days
in tears and fasting. The hermit, with these applications lor
keeping the body under, used a sufficiently cooling regimen.
During the wintry frost and snow, he immersed himself, says
his historian, in the stream of the Werus, where, pouring forth
prayers and tears, he offered himself a living victim to God. 1
The flesh, it is likely, after this nightly dip, was discharged of
all unnecessary heat and became duly cool. But the Devil, it
seems, played -some pranks on the hermit, while he was enjoy-
ing the cold bath, and freezing his body for the 'good of his
soul. Satan sometimes ran away with Godric's clothes which
were 011 the banks. But Godric terrified Beelzebub with
shouts, so that affrighted, he dropped his hair-cloth garment
and fled. A relic of Godric's beard, says Bede, was, after his
death, transferred to Durham, and adorned the church of that
city.
Ulric's history is of a similar kind. He was born near
Bristol, and fought the enemies of the human race for twenty-
nine years. He was visited, notwithstanding, by the demon
of licentiousness. The holy man, in his distress, applied the
remedy of fasting and vigils, and endeavoured to subdue the
stimulations of the flesh by the regimen of the cold bath. He
fasted, till the skin was the only remaining covering of his
bones. He nightly descended into a vessel filled with freezing
water, and during the hours of darkness, continued, in this
comfortable lodging, which constituted his head quarters, to
sing the Psalms of David. 2 This Christian discipline, in all
probability, delivered his veins of all superfluous caloric, and
enabled him to practice moderation during the day.
Thomas Aquinas, the angelic doctor, required angelic aid to
counteract the natural disposition of the mind or rather the
flesh. He was born of a noble family, and enjoyed the benefit
1 Insultus libidinis lacryruis arcebat et jejuniis. Ut carnis incenda saperaret,
cilicio carnem domabat asperrimo. Hieme, gelu, et nive rigenti, nudus flumen in-
gressus, nocte ibi tota et usque ad collum submersus, orationes et psalmos cum
lacrymis profundebat. M. Paris, 114. Beda, 741.
3 Noctibus, in vas quoddam cum frigore nudus, aqua plenum frigida, descendere
Bolebat, in quo psalmos Davidicos Domino offerebat, et sic aliquamdiu perseve-
rans, carnis incentiva, cujus acerrimos patiebatur stimulos, mortificabat in. aquis.
M. Paris, 89.
PROGRESS OF CLERICAL CELIBACY .IN THE ROMISH CHURCH. 537
of a Parisian education. His friends opposed, but in vain, his
resolution of immuring himself in the retreats of monkery.
He resisted their attemp.ts with signal success, though, it seems,
not always with spiritual weapons. He chased one woman,
who opposed his resolution, with a fire-brand. The blessed
youth, says the Roman breviary, praying on bended knees
before the cross, was seized with sleep, and seemed, through a
dream, 'to undergo a constriction of a certain part by angels,
and lost, from that time forward, all sense of concupiscence.' 1
His angelic saintship's natural propensity required supernatural
power to restrain its fury. The grasp of angels was necessary
to allay his carnality and confer continence.
Benedict, in his distress, had recourse to a pointed remedy.
This saint, like Aquinas, was born of a noble family. 'He was
educated at Rome, and devoted himself wholly to religion or
rather to superstition. He lived three years in a deep cave ;
and, in his retreat, wrought many miracles. 'He knocked the
Devil out of one monk with a blow of his fist, and out of
another with the lash of a whip.' But Satan, actuated by
malice and envious of human happiness, appeared to Benedict
in the form of a blackbird, and renewed, in his heart, the image
of a woman whom he had seen at Rome. The Devil, in this
matter, rekindled the torch of passion^ and excited such a con-
flagration in the flesh, that the saint nearly yielded to the temp-
tation. But he soon, according to Mabillon and the Roman
breviary, discovered a remedy. Having undressed himself,
' he rolled his naked body on nettles and thorns, till the lacera-
ted carcass, through pain, lost all sense of pleasure.' 2 The
father of the Benedictines, it appears, had his own difficulty
in attempting to allay the ferment of the flesh, notwithstanding
the allegations of Jerome and Chrysostom.
An Irish priest, actuated like Francis, Godric, Ulric, Aquinas,
and Benedict, by a carnal propensity, had recourse to a differ-
ent remedy. The holy man lived near Patrick's purgatory in
Ireland, and spent his days in official duty and in works of
charity. Rising early each morning, he walked round the
adjoining cemetery, and preferred his orisons for those whose
mortal remains there mouldered in the clay, and mingled with
their kindred dust. His devotion, however, did not place him
beyond the reach of temptation. Satan, envying his happiness
1 S entire visus est sibi ab augelis constringi lumbos, quo ex. tempore omni pos-
tea libidinis sensu caruit. Brev. Rom. 702.
2 Alapa monacho inflicta infestum hospitem expulit, quern alias flagello a nn-
nacho vago ejecerat. Mabillon, 1. 89. Nuduin se in urticas ac vepres tamdiu
volataverit, dum voluptatis sensus dolore penitus opprimeretur. Mabillon, 1. 8.
Brev. Kom. 724.
538 THE -VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
and hating his sanctity, tempted the priest in the form of a
beautiful girl. He was near yielding to the allurement. He
led the tempter into his bed-chamber, . when recollecting him-
self, he resolved to prevent the sinful gratification for the present
and in futurity. He seized a scalpellum, and adopting, like
Origen, the remedy of amputation, he incapacitated himself
for such sensuality in time to come. 1
Adhelm, bishop of Sherburn, had two ways of subduing the
insurrections of the flesh. One consisted in -remaining, during
the winter, in a river which ran past his monastery. He con-
tinued, for nights, immersed in this stream, regardless of the
icy cold. The frosty bath, in all probability, extracted the
superfluous and troublesome warmth from his veins, and stop-
ped the ebulh'tion of his rebellious blood. But the other remedy
seems to have been rather a dangerous experiment. When the
pulse began to beat high, his saintship called for a fair virgin,
who lay in his bed till he sung the whole order of the Psalms,
and overcame, by this means, the paroxysm of passion. 2 The
sacred music and this beautiful maid, who, notwithstanding her
virginity, was very accomodating, soothed the irritation of the
flesh, and castigated the ocillations of the pulse, till it beat with
philosophical precision and Christian regularity.
A second reason for the preference of virginity arose from the
supposed pollution of matrimony. Great variety indeed has,
on this subject, prevailed among the saints and the theologians
of Romanism. Some have represented marriage as a means
of purity, and some of pollution. Clemens, Augustine, Ambro-
sius, Chrysostom, Fulgentius, Harding, and Calmet characterize
this Romish sacrament as an institution of holiness, sanctity,
honour, and utility. The council of Gangra anathematized all
who should reproach wedlock : and this sentence has been
incorporated with the canon law. 3 Augustine, Chrysostom,
Ambrosius, and Fulgentius, however, in self-contradiction,
sometimes speak of the matrimonial institution in terms of
invective and detestation.
1 Cultrum arripuit et propria membra virilia abscindens, for'aa projecit. M.
Paris, 92.
2 Quando carnis sentiret incentiva, virginem pulchram in suo strata tamdiu
secum retineret, quousque Psalteritim ex ordine diceret. Ranolf, 245.
Cubilans, aliquam foemiuam detinebat, quoad carnis tepescente lubrico quieto
et immoto discederet animo. Malmsbuiy. 13.
Ut vim rebelli corpori concisseret, fonti se bumero tenus immergebat. Malm,
de vita Adhelm. Wharton, 2. 13.
3 Ayta SE tj ysveais. Clem. Strom. III. P. 559. Concnbitus conjugalis non
solum est licitus, verum est utilis et honestus. Aug. con. Pelag. 10. 270. Munda
est conjugia. Amb. 2. 364. in Corin. VII. Awsatoj o ya/toj- Cbrysos. 1. 38.
Sancta sunt Christianorum coirjngia. Fulg. ad. Gall. Le lit nuptial est pur et
honorable. Calmet, 23. 766. Si qnis mntrimoninm vitnperet, et earn qaae cum
marito suo dormit, sit anathema. Labb. 2. 427. Crabb. 1. 289. Pithou, 42.
VITUPERATIONS OF MATRIMONY BY POPISH DOCTORS. 539
Many saints, doctors, pontiffs, and councils, on. the contrary,
such as Origen, Jerome, Siricius, Innocent, Bellarmine, Estius,
Pithou, the canon law, the Rhemish annotators, and a party in
the council of Trent, have represented this Popish sacrament,
especially in the clergy, as an appointment of pollution and de-
gradation. 1 Origen, who is quoted by Pithou, reckoned 'con-
jugal intercourse inconsistent with the presence of the Holy
Spirit.' Jerome, if possible, surpassed Origen in bitterness.
The monk of Palestine growled at the very name of matrimony,
and discharged against the institution, in- all its bearings, whole
torrents of vituperation and sarcasm. Surcharged, as usual,
with gall and wormwood, which flowed in copious efflux from
his pen, the saint poured vials of wrath on this object of his
holy aversion. Marriage, according td this casuist, ' effeminates
the manly mind.' A man, says the monk, 'cannot pray, unless
he refrain from conjugal enjoyments.' -The duty of a husband
is, in his creed, 'incompatible with the duty of a Christian.'
This is a sample of his acrimony. Those who would relish a
full banquet, may read his precious production against Jovinian.
Siricius,- the Roman pontiff, called marriage filthy, and char-
acterized married persons, ' as carnal and incapable of pleasing
God.' Innocent adopted his predecessor's language and senti-
ment, and denounced this Romish sacrament as a contamination.
Conjugal cohabitation, says Bellarmine, is attended with impu-
rity, ' and carnalizes the whole man, soul and body.' Estius
affirms that ' the nuptial bed immerses the whole soul in car-
nality.' Gratian and Pithou incorporate, in the canon law, the
theology of Origen, which represents the matrirnonal sacrament
as calculated to quench the Spirit. ^The statements of the Rhe-
mist.s are equally gross and disgusting. Wedlock, according to
these dirty annotators, is a continued scen of sensuality and
pollution. The marriage of the clergy, or of persons who have
made vows of chastity, is, these theologians aver, the worst kind
of fornication. A faction in the council of Trent characterized
marriage, which they defined to be a sacrament, as ' a state of
carnality ; and these received no reprehension from the holy
unerring assembly.
The abettors of Romanism, in this manner, condemn the con-
jugal sacrament as an abomination. These theologians, on this
1 Non datur prsesentia Sancti Spiritus, tempore quo conjugales actus geruntur.
Origen, Horn. 6. iu Pithou, 383. Animum virilem e&beminat. Jerom, 4. 170.
Laicus et quicunqiie fidelis orare non potest, nisi careat officio conjngali. Jerom.
4. 150, 175. Obscoenis cupid.itatibusiub.iant. In carne simt; Deo placere non
possmit. Siricius ad Him. Crabb. 1. 417, 456. Propter actura conjugalem qui
hominem redclit totum carnalem. Animam ipsam carnalem quodummodo facit.
Bell. 1. 18, 19. Conjugalis actus quo animus qnodammodo carni totus immergitiir.
Estius, 252. Manage etoit uu e.tat churnel. Paolo, 2. 449. Rbeimists on Corin. vii.
540 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY I
topic, entertained the grossest conceptions. Their own filthy
ideas rose no higher than the gratification of the mere animal
passion, unconnected with refinement or delicacy. Their views,
on this subject, were detached from all the comminglings of the
understanding and the heart, and from all the endearments of
father, mother, and child. Their minds turned only on scenes
of gross sensuality, unallied to any moral or sentimental feeling,
and insulated from all the reciprocations of friendship or affec-
tion. Celibacy and virginity, which were unassociated with
these carnal gratifications and which affected a superiority to
their allurements, became, with persons of this disposition, the
objects of admiration. '
Matrimony, however, though it were gross as the concep-
tions of these authors, is far purer than their language. The
sentiments and phraseology of the Roman saints on virginity
are, in point of obscenity, beyond all competition. The diction
as well as the ideas of Chrysostom, Jerome, Augustine, and
Basil, would call the burning blush of sharne into the cheek of
a Juvenal, a Horace, an Ovid, or a Petronius. Chrysostom,
though disgusting, is indeed less filthy than Jerome, Augustine,
or Basil. Jerome, bursting with fury against wedlock, follows
in the footsteps of Chrysostom, and improves, but the wrong
way, on the Grecian's indecency. Augustine, in pollution,
excels both Chrysostom and Jerome. But Basil, in impurity,
soars above all rivalry, and, transcending Chrysostom, Jerome,
and Augustine, fairly carries off the palm of filthiness. The
unalloyed obscenity of Chrysostom, Jerome, and Augustine,
rises, in the pages of Basil, to concentrated blackguardism.
Du Pin confesses that Basil's treatise on virginity contains
' some passages which may offend nice ears.' Basil's Benedic-
tine editor admits its tendency to sully maiden modesty with
images of indecency. 1
These saints must have had a practical acquaintance with the
subject, to which they have done so much justice in description.
Speculation, without practice, would never have made them
such adepts. Their sanctified contamination is so perfect in
its kind, that it could not be the offspring of mere theory
without action. This charge against their saintships may be
substantiated by many quotations from their works, which,
however, shall, for the sake of decency, be left in the obscurity
of the original Greek and Latin. 2
1 Basil, 3. 588. Du Pin, I. 224.
fj jtf "fov rtoOov. Chrys. I. 229. Av*t> rtpojSoJUw
tr[v svvopov pi%w, . . . . sv yatyvq rtowi./? xaOwtijaw j^aj. Chryos,
I. 274 de Virg. c. .9.
%si, -tat TtJ^yaj I'D artsppa fo FV tjfttv, xat s-tep&Oev
Chrysos. Horn. 62. p. G24.
PAPAL POLICY, A CAUSE OF CLERICAL CELIBACY. 541
Dens, in modern times, has outrun Basil, and all the saints
of antiquity, on the stadium of blackguardism. This author
justly claims the honour of carrying this sublime branch of
science to perfection. His theology, in which contamination
lives and breathes, is a treasury of filthiness that can never be
surpassed or exhausted. He has shown an unrivalled genius
for impurity : and future discovery can, in this department qf
learning, never eclipse his glory, nor deprive this precious divine
of his well-earned .fame and merited immortality. The
philosophy of Newton has been improved. His astronomy,
notwithstanding its grandeur, has received many accessions
from a Herschel, and a La Place. But the sublimated obsce-
nity of Dens, finished in its kind, admits of no advancement or
progression. This doctor, however, does not bear ' his blushing
honours ' alone. The Popish prelacy of Ireland, .by adopting
his refined speculations to promote the education of the priest-
hood, share in his triumptis : and the inferior clergy, who are
doomed to study his divinity, will no doubt manifest the value
of his system by the superiority of their theological and holy
attainments.
A third reason for the injunction of sacerdotal celibacy arose
from pontifical policy. Cardinal Rodolf, arguing in a Roman
consistory in favour of clerical celibacy, affirmed that the priest-
hood, if allowed to marry, would transfer their attachment from
the pope to their family and prince : and this would tend to the
injury of the ecclesiastical community. The holy see, the car-
Oreata sunt genitalia, ut gestiamus in naturalem copulatn. Genitalium hoc est
officium ut semper fruantur natura sua, et uxoris ardentissimam gulam fortuita
libido restinguat. Frustra haec omnia virorum babes si complexu non uteris
fceminarum. Jerotn. Adv. Jovinian. 4. 177.
Obstetrix virginis cujusdam integritatem, manu velut explorans dum inspicit,
perdidit. Totum commovet hominem animi simul affectu cum carnia appetitu
conjuncto et permixto, ut ea voluptas sequatur, qua major in corporis voluptatibus
nulla est, ita ut momento ipso tsmporis quo ad ejus pervenitnr extremum, pene
omnis acies et quasi vigilia cogitationis obrnatur. Seminaret prolem vir, suscipe-
ret foemina genitalibus membris, quando id opus esset. Tune potuisse utero con-
jugis, salva integritate, foeminei genitales virile semen immitti, sicut nunc potest
eadem integritate salva ex utero virginis fluxus menstrui cruoris emitti; Eadem
quippe via possit illud injici, qua hoc potest ejici. Augustin. de civit. Dei, 1. 18
et XIV. 16, 24, 26. P. 18, 368, 374, 377.
Aftoxortevfuv xnifaOev fcov StSi^tcoj/, ot> T^J yovrjs aito oafyvo$ XOA i/<j>p? trtc to
Jurxrtov fiopiov Siaxovoi ywov-tai, pvxat pw fteta, tfjjv vofwjv ova ot rtopot,, ^EOMJJ
Ss sv T'otj ^i})pot.j tfjfj STtiQvpias xdt, <tt[v yovqv irtu's sfa^pi^s^j, oiti'fptnfat Hsv
rtpo? xaTfapotyv "tiffi yovijs 6 uvqp .... owiyp, Siai^ttftsvuiv tuv SiSvpov avuOev "tijv
yovqv, xai rtpoj ajtopov sv-fsvOsv JtapaitffA-^avtutv, ovt-q$ fxftsdov-tof foil ortopov
tirjv titiOvniuv xatppapaAvftat,. 'O 8s ax s^wv o9w -to yapya^t^w
fa tovov v^atv \ . Ilapfovoj artadvpe-to oft, sttt frjf xortrjz avtqs
fvvs%os, jtepisfttveasfo psv avttjv a^u-rta^coj, xat, f/w$vj 0^05 oKtj, srtst
wj -fa -em srtiQvfiuis tpyaarj'tai, -tots oSovatv exEZpy-to. sovaav sv
til gapxt f^j ^I|EWJ tip faiaaav itoi j 8-qyp.aaiv aXpiwj s^atyov. Basil, De Virgin,
3, 646.
542 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
dinal alleged, would, by this means, be soon limited to the
Roman city. The Transalpine party in the council of Trent,
used the same argument. The introduction of priestly matri-
mony, this faction urged, would sever the clergy from their close
dependance on the popedom, and turn their affections to their
family, and consequently to their king and country. 1 Marriage
connects men with their sovereign, and with the land of their
nativity. Celibacy, on the contrary, transfers the attention of
the clergy from his majesty and the- state, to his holiness and
the church. The man who has a wife and children, is bound
by conjugal and paternal attachment to his country ; and feels
the warmest glow of parental love, mingled with the flame of
patriotism. His interests and affections are entwined with the
honour and prosperity of his native land : and this, in conse-
quence, he will prefer to the aggrandizement of the Romish
hierarchy, or the grandeur of the Roman pontiff. The dearest
objects of his heart are embraced in the soil that gave them
birth, the people among whom they live, and the government
that affords them protection. Celibacy, on the contrary, pre-
cludes all these engagements, and directs the undivided affec-
tions of the priesthood to the church and its ecclesiastical
sovereign. The clergy become dependent on the pope rather
than on their king, and endeavour to promote the prosperity of
the papacy rather than their country. Such are not linked
with the state by an offspring, whose happiness is involved in
the prosperity of the nation. Gregory the Seventh, accordingly,
the great enemy of kings, was the distinguished patron of
sacerdotal celibacy.
The history of clerical celibacy, which will show its varia-
tions, may be divided into two periods. The one begins with
the edict of Siricius in 385, and ends at the popedom of
Gregory. The other commences with the papacy of Gregory,
and continues till the present time.
The first period contains the history of celibacy among the
Greeks and Latins for near seven hundred years. The eastern
and western communions varied on this point of discipline.
The Latins in the west, exclude the whole clergy from their
sacrament of matrimony. The Greeks in the east, forbid the
prelacy, but allow the priesthood and deaconship to cohabit
1 Si 1'on permettoit aux pretres de se marier, 1'interet le leurs families, de leurs
femmes, et de leurs enfans, les tirerqit de la dependance du Pape, pour les raettre
sous celle de leurs princes, et que la tendresse pour leurs enfans les feroit conde-
scendre a tout, au prejudice de 1'Eglise. En peu de temps, 1'autorite du saint
siege se borneroit a la ville de Rome. Paolo, 2. 118.
L'introduction du mariage dans le Clerge, en tonrnant toute 1'affection des pre-
tres vers leurs femmes, et leurs enfans, et par consequent, ver leurs famille, et
leur patrie, les detacheroit en menie temps de la dependance etroite, ou :ls etoient
du saint siege. Paolo, 2. 449.
PROGRESS OF CELIBACY IN THE EAST. 543
with the women whom they had married prior lo their ordina-
tion. 1
This usage, which crept into the oriental communion by
slow and gradual steps, commenced with a bigoted and super-
stitious respect for celibacy and virginity. Superstition, at the
introduction of this custom, began to entertain a blind and
unmeaning veneration for abstinence in man and woman. The
populace, therefore, preferring sacerdotal celibacy, separated
in some instances from the communion of the married clergy.
The evil, from its magnitude, required a synodal enactment to
check its progress. The council of Gangra, therefore, about
the year 324, declared 'its esteem for the chaste bond of wed-
lock, and anathematized such as "left the communion, or refused
the benediction of a, married priest.' 2 This -assembly deposed
Eustathius of Sebastia for encouraging this superstition, and
for representing the oblations of wedded clergy as an abomina-
tion. The Gangran Synod possessed great authority. Its
decisions were confirmed by many pontiffs and councils, and
were received into the ancient code of the church.
The clergy therefore, like the laity, married, as is attested
by Socrates and Nicephorus, and acknowledged by Gratian
and Mendoza, and had children. A few might abstain through
submission to the prepossessions of the people : and a few from
a supposed sanctity, which, in many instances, the pastor, like
the flock, ascribed to celibacy. The superior purity, indeed,
which superstition attached to a single life, influenced many of
the clergy. The sixth apostolical canon, therefore, to repress
this error, excommunicated, and, in case of contumacy, degra-
ded the bishop, priest, or deacon, who, under a shew of religion,
should put away his wife. Those who remained single, how-
ever, as the above-mentioned Greek, historians relate, acted
from the choice of their own mind, and not from the obligation
of a law. No canons -had been enacted against matrimony or
in favour of abstinence. The clergy, Gratian affirms, w r ere, at
the time of the Gangran council, unfettered by the law of con-
tinence. Mendoza admits the liberty, which the eastern
priesthood enjoyed, of cohabiting with the women whom, they
married before their ordination. 3
Thessaly, Thessalonica, Macedonia, and Achaia, however,
became, at an early period, an exception to this regulation.
1 Pithon, 42. Dist 31. c. 14. Paolo, 2. 446.
^Nuptiarum castum vinculum honoramus. Crabb. 1. 291. Si quis discernit de
obligationibus non communicans, qnas presbyter celebraverit conjugatus, anathema
sit. Labb. 2. 438. Bin; 4. 453. Socrat. II. 43. Du Pin, 1. 612.
IIo?iXot yap -gtivtuv sv * xatpco T'JJJ srttSxortiys xa.i rtcuSaj sx tfjjj vo[Hxijs
rafttttis rfsrfoMpacrir. Socrat. V. 22. Gratian, D. 31. Pith. 41. Niceph. XII. 34.
Labb. 1. 26.
544 THE VARIATIONS OF POPBRY :
The obligation of a single life was introduced into these regions
by Heliodorus of Tricca. 1 This bishop, in his youthful days,
had composed a work called Ethiopics, which, says Socrates
and Nicephorus, proscribed the marriage of the clergy in the
diocese under his superintendence.
A second step in the progress of sacerdotal celibacy among
the Greeks, consisted in the interdiction of matrimony after
ordination. The -Grecian clergy were allowed to cohabit with
the women whom they had married while laymen ; but not to
enter on the nuptial engagement after ordination. The council
of Ancyra about 315, in its tenth canon, allowed only those
deacons to marry, who, at their ordination,, should declare their
constitutional incapacity for abstinence. The ministers of the
altar, according to Gratian, were, when this assembly as well
as that of Gangra met, free to marry. 2 The continence of
ecclesiastics had not, at that time, been introduced into Chris-
tendom. The council of Neocaesarea, indeed, about this period,
ordered the priest, who should form the conjugal contract after
ordination, to be deposed. But this was only a small provincial
synod, unnoticed and unratified by any ensuing council or
pontiff till the middle of the ninth century. The general Nicene
council, in its third canon, forbad unmarried ecclesiastics to
have any women in their houses except a mother, a sister, or
an aunt. This canon, as the words show, was directed against
a kind of women, who, as domestics, infested the habitations
of the unmarried clergy.
The Nicene council was near passing a new law, forbidding
bishops, priests, and deacons to sleep with the women, whom
they had married before their taking of holy orders. This at-
tempt, however, was crushed by Paphnutius of. Thebais ; a
man, who, according to Socrates and Sozomen, was loved of
God and had wrought many miracles. He had been a confes-
sor in Maximin's persecution, in which, having lost an eye and
a leg, he was condemned to the mines. He had led a life of
celibacy, but opposed the enactment of this innovation.
Marriage, said the confessor with a loud voice, * is honourable
in all, and the use of the nuptial bed is chastity itself. Such
excess of abstinence would be detrimental to the church, and
might, by its rigour in imposing too weighty a burden, become
1 Socrat. V. 22. Niceph. XII. 34. Mendoza, II. 66.
8 Grseci utuntur uxoribus cum quibus ante sacros ordines contraxerunt. Canisius.
4. 433.
Quicumque diaconi constituti, in ipsa constitutione dixerunt, oportere se .uxores
ducere, cum non possint sic manere, ii, si uxorem postea duxerint, sint in ministe-
rio. Labb. 1. 1490. Pithou, 38. Du Pin, 1. 598. Nondum erat introducta
continentia ministrorum altaris. Gratian, Dist. 28. c. 13. Pithou, 41. Crabb. 1
201. Bell. I. 19.
PROGRESS OP CELIBACY IN THE EAST. 545
fatal to the chastity of man and women. Allow the clergy,
according to the- ancient tradition, to enjoy the wives which
they married before their entrance on the priesthood, and the
unmarried after ordination to remain in celibacy.' The council
assented, ' and extolled the wisdom of his speech.'^
The speech of Paphnutius, and the concurrence of the coun-
cil, supply an answer to an unfounded criticism of Challenor.
He accuses the Protestant translation of straining the words of
Paul, when he represented marriage as honourable in all. The
word, which unites marriage to the epithet honourable, is
omitted in the original, which, according to Challenor, is not
indicative but imperative, and should be rendered, ' Let mar-
riage be honourable in all.' The English version, however,
agrees with the Egyptian confessor and the Nicene council in
all its infallibility. Paphnutius, like Luther, Calvin, Cranmer,
or Knox, used the apostolic expression in the reformed accep-
tation, and the Nicene fathers acclaimed. A host of Romish
saints might be mustered, who took the words iri the same sense,
and applied them in the same manner. Challenor has at-
tempted several criticisms of a similar kind, which argue little
for his learning or his honesty.
Baronius, Bellarmine, Valesius, Thomassin, and Turnano
have endeavoured to overthrow the truth of this relation. The
attempt, however, is vain. These cavillers could adduce no
reason, possessing any validity, to countenance their insinuation.
The relation is supported by the testimony, not only of Socrates
and Sozomen, but also of Nicephorus, Suidas, Ivo, Cassiodorus,
Gratian, and Gelasius. The fact is admitted in modern times,
by Mendoza, Du Pin, and Moreri. Mendoza wonders at the
scepticism and hostility of Turriano ; and shows, with the
utmost perspicuity, not only the truth of the statement, but also
the liberty of the oriental clergy, who, at the time of the Nicene
council, were untrammelled by the vows of chastity, and, like
the laity, were allowed to enjoy the consorts whom they had
married prior to their assumption of the sacred office. Du Pin,
in his usual candor, represents the opposition to the account as
arising from the fear of prejudicing the present discipline rather
than from any solid proof. Baronius, says Moreri, controverts,
the truth of the history, but -without foundation, as the law of
celibacy had, at that era, obtained no universal establishment
in the Eastern communion. 2
strati xat, tfrjv xortyv xa& aiu-tov aftuwtov -tov yaftov Xsywm Socrat. I.
11. Sozom.l. 23 Labb. 1233. Pithou, 4&.
3 Semper in oriente, ea impunitas et licentia pennissa faerit. Uxores antea duc-
las domi retinebant, et liberia tauquam seculares operam dabant. Mendoia. IT.
66. Baronius. et quelques autres autetara ont voulu centester la verite d cette
35
546 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY: .
The testimony of Epiphariius and Jerome has been contrasted
with the relation of Socrates and Sozomen. ,The ecelesiastieal
canons, says Epiphanius, enjoined celibacy on bishop, priest,
.deacon, and subdeacon. Some of the clergy, he admits, even
in his day, violated the laws of abstinence. But this violation,
the saint contends, was an infraction of the canons, and arose
from the licentiousness of the priesthood, and the connivance
or neglect of the people. 1
But the authority of Epiphanius is unavailing against that of
Socrates and Sozomen. View his character as an historian and
a logician, drawn by Photius, Du Pin, Moreri, and Alexander.
Photius represents Epiphanius as weak in his arguments against
impious heresy. Du Pin characterizes the saint as void of
judgment, and full of credulity. He credited false records and
uncertain reports, and, in consequence, is often deceived in his-
tory. Moreri follows in the train of Du Pin, and draws a
similar portrait. Alexander, if possible, loads the canvass with
still darker colours. The Sorbonnist describes the saint, 'as
very often mistaken in history and chronology : and in many
instances wandering entirely from truth.' 2
His statement, on the topic of priestly celibacy, contains one
of his gross mistakes. He extends the prohibition of matrimony
to the subdeacon. But Jerome, his cotemporary, extends it only
to the deacon ; and Leo, who flourished half a century after
Epiphanius, was the first, who, according to the uniform testi-
mony of history, comprehended subdeacons under the interdic-
tion. This, Thomassin, Pithou, Bruys, and Du Pin have ad-
mitted and indeed proved. Siricius and Innocent, as well as
F errand and Cresconius in their compilations, impose the obli-
gation of abstinence only on bishops, priests, and deacons. Leo,
besides, on this topic, was not obeyed. Subdeacons, in his
papacy, were allowed to marry even in suburban Sicily, and to
enjoy connubial society. The- fifth Carthaginian council in 438
exacted abstinence only from bishops, priests, and deacons j but
left the rest of the clergy, on this point, at liberty. Gregory
was the first who enforced the celibacy of subdeacons : and
even his enactments had no retrospective effect; but related
merely to such as should be afterward ordained. 3 EpiphaniuSj
histoire; mais sans aucun fondement. Moreri, 7. 42. Spon. 325. XL. Bell, I.
20. Thorn. 1. 23. Socrat. I. 11. Sozomen, I. 23. Du Pin, 1. 600.
1 Bpiph. 1. 490. et2. 1104. Godeau, 1. 602.
2 In historia et chronologia, saepissime lapsus est. Ab historiea veritate toto
coelo aberrat. Alex. 7. 630. Photius, 304. Codex, 122. Du Pin, 1.298. Mo-
reri, 3. 94.
3 Le pape (Leon) est le premier qui ait etendu la loi du celibat aux sous-diacres,
Bruy, 1.221. Thorn. 1. 138, 140. Cseteros clericos ad hoc non cogi. Crabb. 1.
446, Pithou, 41, 43. Du Pin, L 571. .
Licet adulter sit licet sodomita, licet flagitiis omnibus coopertus.. Jerom, ad
ABSURD EULOGIES QF THE VIRGIN MARY. 547
therefore, is, in tms instance, convicted of falsehood, and there-
fore is unworthy of credit in the rest of his evidence.
.Epiphanius is guilty of another egregious blunder on the sub-
ject of matrimony. The person, said he, who has obtained a
divorce for adultery, fornication, or any other crime, and has
married another, is, according to scriptural authority, free from
sin, and worthy of ecclesiastical communion and eternal life.
This is in direct opposition to Augustine, Jerome, the canon
law, and the council of Trent; and exposes its author to all the
tremendous fulminations of the Trentine anathemas. The canon
law and the council of Trent in its twenty-fourth session, teach
the indissolubility of marriage, even on account of heresy,
infirmity, malevolence, desertion, fornication, adultery, sodomy,
or any other atrocity; and pronounces shocking execrations
against all who gainsay. The nuptial chain, according to that
celebrated assembly, can be, dissolved only by death ; and the
innocent party, even in case of adultery, must forego all further
matrimonial engagements during the life of the guilty. Epi-
phanius, therefore, was both worshipped and execrated by the
good fathers of Trent. He is exalted to glory and consigned
to Satan by the same communion. He is a saint, and as such,
is invoked. He is a heretic, and as such, is anathematized.
His saintship, in this manner, enjoys all the charms of variety.
He has the pleasure of being alternately in heaven and hell ;
and the satisfaction of being blessed and cursed, adored and
anathematized, by an infallible church and council.
Epiphanius, therefore in two instances, stands convicted of
misrepresentation. His testimony, in consequence, deserves no
credit. His mental imbecility, besides, which approximated to
idiotisrn, proclaims, saint as he was, the inadequacy .of his
evidence even in a matter of fact. . One specimen of his weak-
ness, taken from his eulogy on Lady Mary, is worthy of atten-
tion, as illustrating the intensity of his silliness ; though, on the
score of its indecency and profanity, it must be left in its
original language. 1
Bernard's imitation of Epiphanius is worth a digression, and
will form a suitable episode. Bernard addresses Lady Mary
in the following sensible and beautiful style ; " O firmament,
firmer than all firmaments. Him, whom the heavens of heavens
could not contain, you, O lady, contained, conceived, begot,
Atnand. 4. 162. Epiph. 1. 497. Augustin, 6. 406. Pithou, 389. Gibert, 3. 407.
Bin. 9. 411.
1 To owrtikov rtpo/Sarov, vj tov ap.vov ftxstSOt Xpifftfoi', rj SaftalUj 57
17 tov fi->a%ov ysj-'M^ffaTa - . . Xatps rfai/ayea rta,?9svs,. r t -to rfup f^
wf vac pa, jSar'oj xa-tsxsadi . . . Toy E^^ai/otjjj^sjjX, sv a^flaptw
auof^vitfov . . . .'ii yoiJT'^p a/tojiui'foj ovpowov xvx\ov %Kaaxa.i &sov
v 501 SE %apytov .jSacft'ttffaa'tt. ii yaffT^p otipavot) rtTM-twtspa, Qsov "fov
tv tfot p.*} crfEv^wp^Sttoa. Bpiph. do Laud. 2, 294, 295, 296, 297. '''-' -
48 THE VARIATION'S OF POPERY t
fed, suckled, and educated. Thou, in the midst of the waters,
dividedst the waters from the waters. The light of your eyes
dispels darkness, expels squadrons of devils, purifies the vices
of the mind, and warms the coldness of the heart. Happy, O
lady, are they whom your eyes behold. Turn, therefore, O
lady, those eyes to us, and show us, * * * * [here we must
again refer the reader to the original, which he will find in the
note. 1 ] O elevation of minds, intoxication of hearts, and salva-
tion of sinners ! O lady, gentle in consoling, mild in soothing
and sweet in kissing.'
His saintship, in the same elegant and edifying style, calls
her ladyship, heaven, earth, pasture, paradise, bread, drink,
manna, oil, wine, cinnamon, balm, myrrh, frankincense, olive,
spikenard, saffron, gum, a temple, a house, a bed-room, a bride,
a lamp, a trumpet, a mountain, a wilderness, a field, a vine, a
floor, a barn, a stable, a manger, a warehouse, a hall, a tower,
a camp, an army, a kingdom, a priesthood, a bird, a palm, a
rose, a river, a pigeon, a garment, a pearl, a candlestick, a
table, a crown, a sceptre, a tree, a cedar, a cypress, a reed,
a daughter, a sister, a mother, a sun, a moon, a star, the city
of God, the rod of Aaron, the fleece of Gideon, the gate of
Ezekiel, the star of the morning, the fountain of gardens, the
lily of the valley, and the land of promise flowing with milk
and honey.
Such are a few extracts from the balderdash and blasphemy
of two full-length Roman saints, one of whom, Bellarmine,
Valesius, Thomassin, and Turriano bring as a witness for the
perpetual celibacy of the Grecian clergy. His saintship of
Salamis, as well as of Clairvaux, certainly qualified himself for
the presidency of fools, and fairly carried off the palm of non-
sense from Montanus, Swedenborg, and Southcott. This,
notwithstanding, is the man whom the Greeks and Latins, in
their menology and martyrology, celebrate every year as an
illustrious confessor.
Jerome has been summoned as another witness for the perpe-
tual celibacy of the Grecian clergy. Jerome's testimony, how-
ever, clashes with that of Epiphanius. Epiphanius alleges the
1 Omnibus firmamentis firmius firmamentum, tu, Domina, quse eum quem cceli
coelorum capere non poterant, cepisti, et concepisti, genuisti, aluisti, pavisti, mam-
znasti, et educasti. Tu, in medio aquarum, divisisti aquas ab aquis. S'erm. III.
Suorum charitas oculorum tenebras expellit, et effugat catervas Dsemonum, purgat
vitia mentium, corda congelata accendit. O quam beati, O domina, quos tui vide-
reat oculi. Hos ergo oculos ad nos, domina, converte et Jesum beuedictum fruc-
tum ventris tui nobis oatende. O venter mirabilis, qui potuit capere salvatorera.
O venter laudabilis, qui potuit recipere redemptorem. O venter desiderabilis, e
quo emanavit desiderium mentium, gratiarum fluvins, gloriae premium. O venter
atnabilis et dulcedo animae. elevatio mentium, inebriatb cordium, sanitas pec-
catorum. O clemens consolando, pia blandiando, dulcis osculando! Bernard,
Sorm. IV. p. 1739, 1740, 1747.
SUICIDE OF VIRGINS COMMENDED. 549
authority of ecclesiastical canons in favour of clerical continence.
Jerome, on the contrary, refers merely to the usage of his day.
Epiphanius extends the prohibition to subdeacons. Jerome
comprehends in the interdiction only bishops, priests, and dea-
cons. 1 These contradictions destroy ihe evidence of both the
bishop of Salamis and the monk of Palestine.
Jerome's bias in favour of virginity led the saint into error,
which degraded His character and lessened his authority. His
declamation against wedlock, in his refutation of Jovinian, in-
curred the disapprobation of many ; and, among the rest, of
Pope Siricius. The murmur was so great that Pamachius his
friend endeavoured, though in vain, to suppress his writings on
this subject. He was accused of countenancing the Manicheans,
who, at least to the elect, entirely proscribed matrimony. He
was obliged, in consequence, to write an apology. He con-
fessed that on this subject, he had indulged in declamation.
His prepossessions, on this topic, induced him to reflect on the
conjugal duty even in the laity. The layman, says the saint
of Palestine, ' cannot pray, who indulges in nuptial enjoyments.
The person, he adds, who fulfils the duty of a husband, cannot
fiulfil that of a Christian.' 2 His language is a libel on the
divine institution, which, in the popish system, is a sacrament.
Jerome's prejudices in behalf of virginity caused his approba-
tion of suicide and assassination. Many instances might be
produced, and, as a specimen, those of the Bseotian, Milesian,
and Theban virgins. Two young men, flushed with wine, had,
during the night, violated the Baeotian maids, who, unwilling to
survive their virginity, fell by mutual wounds. 3 Jerome, on the
occasion, is at a loss for expression in favour of the shocking
action. He seems to labour for language to utter his admira-
tion of the suicidal deed.
The Milesian maids were still more blameworthy. These,
lest, on the invasion and devastations of the Gauls, they should
undergo any indecency from the enemy, escaped from defile-
ment by death. The heroines, says Jerome, ' left an example
to all virgins of honorable minds to prefer chastity to life.' 4 The
suicide, in all its enormity, challenged the unqualified approba-
tion of the Roman saint.
A Theban girl, whom a Macedonian had deflowered, dissem-
1 Epiph. Haer. 59. Thorn. 1. 135, 136. Jerom, ad vig.
a Plusieurs entre les Catholiques furent offensez de quelques endroits trop rudes.
Le Pape meme en eut quelque mauvaise opinion. Godea. 2. 581. Moreri, 5. 99.
Rhetorical! sumus et in raorem declamatorain paululam lusimus. Jerom. 4. 143.
Laicus et quicumque fidelis orare non potest, nisi careat officio conjugal!. Quamdiu
impleo mariti officium, non impleo Christian!. Jerom. adv. Jovinian. Pithou, 42.
3 Quo ore laudandae sunt Scedasi filise. Jerome, 4. 186. Moreri, 7. 159.
4 TurpitudinenTmorte fugcrunt, exernplam sai cunctis virginibus relinquentes.
Jerome, 4. 186. Lopex, III. 3.
550 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
bled her grief, and afterward cut the violator's throat when he
was sleeping ; and then slew herself with his sword. 1 The
murder and self-assassination became a theme of exultation to
Jerome.
Ambrosius, who is often associated with Jerome as a witness
of sacerdotal celibacy, recommended the same impiety of sui-
cide* Pelagia of Antibch, during Maximin's persecution in the
fourth century, with her mother and sisters, lest they should
suffer violation, escaped by a voluntary death. Pelagia, adorned
not like a person going to death but to a wedding, leaped, as
she was inspired of God, from a lofty window on the pavement,
and by her fall, says Godeau, mounted to heaven. Her mother
and sisters, says the same historian, jumped into a deep river,
where they found a baptism which purified them from every
stain. -The water, concealing their bodies, respected the brides
and martyrs of its Creator. Marcellina asked the opinion of
Ambrosius on this melancholy but unwarranted action. The
bishops eulogized the dreadful deed as a duty owed to religion,
a remedy inoffensive to God, and an achievement which enti-
tled these virgins to the crown of martyrdom. 2
These are the men, who are invoked as Gods in the Romish
communion, and whose festivals and fulsome encomiums are
registered with ostentation in the Romish missal, processional,
and breviary. The holy Jerome, on the thirtieth day of Sep-
tember, is designated as 'the light of the church, the lover of
the divine law, the greatest doctor in scriptural explanation,
who despised this world and merited the celestial kingdom,
and whom God loved and clothed with the robe of glory. His
mediation and intercession are devoutly supplicated, that men,
through the blessed saint's merits, may be enabled to perform
what he taught in word and deed.' 3 This, of course, is a peti-
tion in favour of self-assassination, which holy Jerome recom-
mended. The faithful, on this festival pray that they may,
through the monk's merits, be enabled to murder themselves.
This is very well for an infallible church.
Ambrosius is invoked with similar impiety and idolatry. The
Lord, if the Missal may be credited, 'filled the saint with the
spirit of wisdom, and. clothed him with the robe of glory.'
The sacred oblation is offered in his honour, and the people of
1 Nip vivere voluerat perditam castitatem, nee ante mori quam sui ultrix existe-
ret Jerome, 4. 186. Lopez, III. 3.
3 Deus remedio non oflenditur. M artyres reddit. Religion! debitum solverat
Amb. 4. 478, 479. Euseb. VIII. 23. Godea. 2. 65.
3 O doctor optime, ecclesiae sanctae lumen. Beate Hieronime, Divinaj legis
amator. Prsesta, qtisesumus, ut ejus suffragantibus meritis, quod ore simul et opere
docuit, te adjuvante exercere volumus. Miss. Rom. 503. Process. Rom. 370.
Brev. Rom. 1013.
SUICIDE 'OF VIRGINS COMMENDED. 551
God, on; the seventh* of December, addressing the bishop of
Milan, 'as the minister of eternal salvation on earth, pray for
everlastina: 'glory through his intercession in heaven.' 1 One
part of thfe salvation which he recommended on earth, consists
in self-murder. He must, therefore,- be a hopeful mediator in
heaven.
Men, biased and "mistaken in this manner, could not be im-
partial witnesses. These, so prejudiced in favour of a system
as to recommend suicide to preserve virginity, or murder to
revenge violated chastity, could not deliver a fair or candid
testimony. The report of Socrates and Sozomen, respecting
the speech of Paphnutius and the decision of the Nicean
council, remains unattairited. The fact is embodied in the
Theodosian code and in the canon law : and has, at the present
.day, obtained general belief. 2
The Trullan or Quin sextan council, in 692, seems to have
put the finishing hand to the matrimonial regulations of the
Grecian clergy. This assembly, in its twelfth canon, enjoined
celibacy on bishops. But the inferior clergy were permitted to
marry before ordination, and afterward to enjoy connubial
society.
The Greeks, differing in this manner from the Latins, in-
veighed against the Western discipline as contrary to Scriptural,
traditional, and synodal authority ; and used, -on the occasion,
very free and strong language. The latter, notwithstanding,
remained for many ages in the communion of the former,,
without any apparent reluctance. The Latins, says Thomassin,
suffered the incontinence of the Greeks with patience and.
charity; while the Greeks, on the contrary, could not suffer
the strict purity of the Latins. 3 The strict purity of the Latins,
as will soon appear, consisted in fornication, adultery, incest,
and every filthiness.
The Greeks, in these regulations, were, in general, joined by
the other Eastern denominations. The Syrians adopted a
similar usage. The Armenian and Georgian ecclesiastics, says
Brocard, are all married. 4 The Western interdiction of clerical
matrimony, therefore, was a variation from oriental liberty.
Such is the history of sacerdotal celibacy among the Greeks.
1 Implevit eum dominns spiritu sapientiae, stolam gloriae induit eum. Dens,
qui populo tuo aeternae salutis Beatum Ambrosium ministrum tribuisti, praesta-
qtiaesurrius, lit quern doctorem vitae habuimus in terris, iutercessorem habere
mereamur in coelis. Miss. Rom. 348. Process. Rom. 247. Brev. Kom. 699.
* God. Theod. XVI. Pithou, 42.
3 Les Grecs ne poiivoient siiffrir 1'exacte purete des Latins. Thorn. I. 28. Part.
H DuPiu, 2. 24. Bell. 1.1109.
* Sacerdotes et diaconi utuntur uxoribus, cum quibus ante sacros ordihes con-
traxerunt. Canisitts, 4. 433. Sacerdotes omnes sunt uxorati. Broeard, in Cani-
sius, 4. 25.
552 I-HE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
But the Latins on this subject, varying from the Greeks, .used
greater rigor, and enjoined perpetual continence oii all orders
of the clergy. This enactment, however, was an innovation of
the fourth century. No law of the kind is found in any of the
earlier monuments of antiquity. Many documents, on the con-:
trary, remain, which, as has been shown, testify the freedom of
the clergy on this topic in primitive times. Jerome, who
flourished in the end of the fourth century, is the earliest witness
for clerical abstinence in the Western communion, who could be
produced by all the learning of Bellarmme, Baronius, and
Thomassin. This was about four hundred years after the
Christian era. Had any law of celibacy been in use in the early
days of antiquity, some monument of the kind, one might expect,
would indicate its former existence. Jerome, besides, from his
prepossessions against wedlock, was a partial witness. Suicide,
which, according to Jerome, is a sin to be deprecated in any
other case, is lawful for the preservation of chastity. ,Tne testi-
mony of such a prejudiced evidence is utterly inadmissible.
Thomassin admits that in the primitive church, there was no
law of celibacy or penalty against marriage ; though he main-
tains that charity enforced abstinence on the clergy of antiquity.
A time was, says Gratian, when there was no institution enjoin-
ing the continence of the clergy. 1
The decretal of pope Siricius, addressed in 385 to Himerius,
contains the first general interdiction of clerical matrimony.
Its priority, as a general prohibition, is acknowledged by Clithou
as well as by Bruys, Espensaeus, Cassander, and many other
patrons of popery. 2 No authority of an earlier date can be
produced for the enactment. Siricius pleads no Christian
canon, but merely an old Jewish regulation. The Spanish
council of Elvira, indeed, in the year 300, issued its twenty-
third canon to this effect. Gibert, in the canon law, allows
this regulation the priority as an .injunction of sacerdotal
continence. The Elviran canon, indeed, in its grammatical
construction, contains a prohibition of abstinence. The whole
ministry were commanded, by a Spanish council to exercise
without interruption their powers of reproduction. 3 No suspen-
sion of the task was permitted by the sacred synod, who would
allow no cessation of arms on pain of expulsion from the
1 Non licet propria perire manu, absque eo ubi castitas periclitatur. Jerom. in
Jon. 3. 1478. La seule charite avbit fait observer. Thomassin, 1. 140. Gratian,
D. 21. Pithou, 41.
3 A Siricio Papa primum editum. Clithou, c. 4. in Bell. I. 18. II oae bien faire
des nouvelles loix. Je parle du celibat des ecclesiastiques. Bruy. 1. 142.
3 Haec prohibitio primum facta est a concilio Eliberitano. Gibert, 2. 312.
Crabb. 1. 417. Du Pin, 1. 235. Placet, in totum prohiberi episcopis, presbyleris,
diacouis, abstinere se a conjugibus suis et non generare filips. Labb. 1, 996, 1020.
Pithou, 102.
DOMESTICISM;
553
honours of the priesthood. This is the literal and verbal mean-
ino- of the words ; but was not, it is likely, the design of the
compilers. The blundering authors, in all probability, expressed
a sense directly contrary to their intention.
The Eiviran synod seems, in every respect, to have been ex-
ceedingly silly. The sage prelacy, in the thirty-fourth canon,
forbid the lighting of wax-candles in grave-yards during the
day, lest the souls of the saints should be disquieted. 1 The
light or the smell of the tapers might have frightened the unfor-
tunate ghosts which hovered over the tombs. The body of men,
who could, in solemn council, enact such a law, must have been
beneath contempt.
The council of Elvira, as it was despicable, was also partial,
and differed, in this respect, from the bull of Siricius which was
general. The Elviran canon, at most, was national and con-
fin,ed to Spain. The pontifical edict was general and extended
to Christendom, or, at least, to the Latin communion. The
Elviran enactment was evaded by the Spanish clergy, and unra-
tified by any pope or council. The papal decision was enforced
with rigour, and confirmed by the sanctions of Innocent, Leo,
and Gregory, as well as by the councils of Carlbage, Orleans,
Tours, Toledo, Aix la Chapelle, Worms, and Mentz, in Africa,
France, Spain, and Germany.
The law ran counter to the tide of human nature, and to the
stream of human affection. The clergy, in many instances,
resisted the mandate ; and the exaction of obedience, in conse-
quence, became a diffcult task. A variety of plans was inven-
ted to evade or violate its severity. One variety of evasion
consisted in DOMESTICISM. A second party engaged in open
or concealed concubinage. Many displayed a third variety,
and in bold violation of unjust and unscriptural canons, married,
and lived, not indeed in abstinence but in chastity, with .their
lawful wives. ,
Many of the clergy had recourse in this extremity, to domes-
ticism. This consisted in keeping female inmates in their dwell-
ings. These were women devoted in profession, though not
by vow, to virginity. Their ostensible duty was to superintend
the domestic concerns of the house. The clergy enjoyed their
society; while these maidens, in return, shared the clergy's
bed and board. Cyprian, Jerome, and Chrysostom have
depicted the cohabitation of these holy domestics with a bold
but faithful pencil. Cyprian mentions, in language of strong
condemnation, their domestic familiarity by day, and their
occupation of the same bed during the night. Jerome imitates
the description of Cyprian ; but gives more poignancy to his
1 Inquietandi sanctorum spiritus non aunt. Bin. 1. 235.
554 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
style and relievo to his colours. These holy men and women,
if the saint's statement may be credited, occupied the -same
house, the same chamber, and the same 'nightly couch.' 1 An
ecclesiastic would admit one of these fair saints to the partici-
pation of his bed ; but under solemn declarations of the strictest
chastity. These hallowed friends slept in each other's arms,
and their heads rested on the same pillow. Their society and
affections, however, were quite . spiritual and platonic, and
purified from all the grosser elements which sometimes attend
on ordinary mortals.
Jerome, however, had, notwithstanding their pretensions, no
very high idea of their purity. These virgins professed to seek
spiritual consolation ; but, in reality, pursued something which
the saint, as usual, expresses in very coarse language, that will
scarcely bear a literal translation. Their spiritual consolation,
in Jerome's account, had some relation to the flesh. The ex-
pansion of the women's waists and the cry of infants, which, it
seems, were phenomena that sometimes attended this kind of
Platonism. provoked the hostility of the monk of Palestine, who,
in consequence, characterized ; the whole system as a pestilence.
Some of these sentimental Platonics endeavoured to conceal
their frailty by a free use of medical applications. 2
The conduct of the clergy also awakened Jerome's holy
indignation. These affected the sacred office for, the gratifica-
tion of licentiousness in the company of women. Their whole
attention was engaged on dress and perfumery. Their fingers
shone with rings, their hair was frizzled by the curling, tongs,
and they walked on tip-toe lest the damp should sully their
feet. 3 ' '
Chrysostom also gives an animated description of the society
of these spiritualized parsons and dames. He pourtrays, in
glowing language, ' their smiles, their laughs, their free conver-
sation, their soft words, their communications at table during
the day, their supping together at night and other things .im-
proper to name.' 4 Chrysostom, weak man ! suspected the
1 Eadem domo, trao cubiculo, saepe uno tenentm* et lectuloi. Jerom ad Bust. 4.
33. Cyprian ad Pom.
2 Quaerunt alienorum spirituals solatium ut domi habeant carnale commercium.
Tumor uteri et infantum prodiderit vagitus. Unde in ecclesias Agepatarum pestis
introiit? Nonnullae abortii venena meditantur. Jerom ad Eustoch, 4. 32, 33.
3 Presbyteratum et diaconatum ambiunt, ut mulieres licentius videant. Omnis
his cura de vestibus si bene oleant. Crines calamestri vestigio rotautur. Digiti de
animlis radiant ; et ne plantas humidior via aspergat, vix imprimunt summa vesti-
gia. Jerom, 4. 40.
4 NEOJ afypLyuv i'9 tfo^uatft xopy dvvoixuv rtapBevu, xcu tsvyxaSr^tvo^, xa.i
avvSiirtvov, xai swdiateyofjifvot, -tovs nxaipovs yrtcotfoj -raj fita^vosif xai
uafaaxa p^afa, xat> -fa ca?ux, a u^Ss Xcysiv tuwf xa&ov* Chrysostom, De Su-
bin, 1. 231.
CONCUBINAGE AND:' ITS ENORMITIES. 555
chastity of a wanton youth, living in this manner with a kind
girl. But the saint, it appears, had another reason for his sus-
picions. He had seen a constant running of mid wives to the
abodes of these virgins. The driving of these beldams
alarmed his fears. The saint, in his simplicity, doubted whether
these ladies of the abstetric art would gallop so fast without
urgent business.
A second; variety of evasion or violation of these canons,
consisted in concubinage. This was a native result of the
unnatural regulations against wedlock. The accounts', on this
subject, transmitted by the historians of these; times, are appall-
ing. Profligacy, says Giannon, prevailed among the clergy,
who practised all kinds of lewdness. Ratherius, bishop of
Verona, represents the clergy as guilty of bigamy, drunken-
ness, and fornication. His representation of priestly inconti-
nence is expressed with strong sarcasm and emphatical diction.
The Italian priesthood, in particular,? fomented their passibns
by excess of food and wine. These aggravated their con-
stitutional licentiousness by luxury in eating and drinking. 1
Atto's language, on this topic, is equally striking. He re-
presents some of the clergy as sold in such a degree to their
lusts, that they kept filthy harlots in their houses. These, in a
public manner, lived, bedded, and 'boarded with their conse-
crated paramours. Fascinated with their wanton allurements,
the abandoned clergy conferred on the partners of their guilt,
the .superintendence of -their family and all their domestic
concerns. These courtezans, during the lives of their com-
panions in -iniquity, managed their households: and, at their
death, inherited their property. The ecclesiastical alms and
revenues, in this manner, descended to the accomplices of vile
prostitution. 2 The hirelings of pollution were adorned, the
church wasted, and the poor oppressed by men who professed
to be the patrons of purity, the guardians of truth, and the
protectors of the wretched and the needy.
Damian represents the guilty mistress as confessing to the
guilty priest. 3 This presented another absurdity and an ag-
gravation of the crime. The formality of confessing what the
father confessor knew,- and receiving forgiveness from a partner
in sin, was an insult on common sense, and presented one of
the many ridiculous scenes which have been exhibited on the
1 Giannon, V. 6. Dachery, 1. 354. Bray. 2. 268.
* Quod dicere pudet. Quidem in tantnm libidini mancipantur, ut obscpenas
meretricul'as sna simul in domo secum habitare, uno cibum sumere, ac publice
degere permittanti Unde meretrices ornantuv, ecclesiae vestantur, pauperes tri-
bulaiitur. Attb, Bp. Dachery, 1. 439.
3 Los coupables se confessent a leurs complices, qui ne leur imposant point de
penitences convenables. Damiau in Bray. 2. 356. Giannon, X. $ 1.
556 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
theatre of the world. Confession and absolution in this way
were, after all, very convenient. The fair penitent had not far
to go for pardon, nor for an opportunity of repeating the fault,
which might qualify her for another course of confession and
remission. Her spiritual father could spare her blushes ; and
his memory could supply any deficiency of recollection in the
enumeration of her sins. A minute recapitulation of time,
place, and other circumstantial trifles would be unnecessary.
The rehearsal of the delicious sin might, to both, be very
amusing. The sacrament of confession, in this manner, would,
by recalling the transaction to mind, become very edifying, and
afford a renewal of the enjoyment. This mode of remission
was attended with another advantage, which was a great im-
provement on the old plan. The confessor, in the penance
which he prescribed on these occasions, exemplified the virtues
of compassion and charity. Christian commiseration and
sympathy took place of rigour and strictness. The holy father
indeed could not be severe on so dear a friend ; and the lady
could not refuse to be kind again to such an indulgent father.
Damian, however, in his want of charity and liberality, saw
the transaction in a different light ; and complained in bitterness
of this laxity of discipline, and the insult on ecclesiastical juris-
diction and on rational piety.
This adultery and fornication of the clergy degenerated, in
many instances, into incest and other abominations of the grossest
kind. Some priests, according to the council of Mentz in 888,
' had sons by their own sisters.' 1 The council of Nicea and
some other of a later date, through fear of scandal, deprived
the clergy of all female company, except a mother, a sister, or
an aunt, who, it was reckoned, was beyond all suspicion. But
the means intended for prevention were the occasion of more
accumulated scandal and more heinous criminality. The
interdiction was the introduction to incestuous and unnatural
prostitution. The council of Mentz, therefore, in its tenth canon,
as well as other cotemporary and later synods, had to forbid
the clergy the society of even their nearest female relations.
A third variety for the evasion, or rather for the infraction of
these canonical interdictions, was clandestine or avowed matri-
mony. Some of the priests though they could ill afford it,
wished to keep a conscience. These, of course, would shudder
at the commission of fornication or adultery, and had recourse
therefore to the honourable institution of heaven for the preven-
tion of such pollution. These, intrenched behind the authority
of God, withstood the commandments of men. The number of
1 Quidara sac erdo turn cum propriis sororibus concumbentes, filios ex eis geiier-
assent. Bin. 7. 137. Labb. 11. 586.
OPPOSITION OF THE MARRIED CLERGY TO GREGORY. 557
these continued to increase in opposition to the decretals of
popes, the canons of councils, and the prepossessions of the
people. The frequent repetitions of these prohibitions showed
their inefficacy, and clerical obstinacy. The interdictory
councils were all provincial ; many of them contemptible : and
ecclesiastics continued to marry in despite of their regulations.
The priesthood, in general, at the accession of Gregory the
Seventh, in defiance of obsolete laws, lived in a state of mat-
rimony. 1
Such was the state of clerical matrimony, at the accession of
Hildebrand, or Gregory the Seventh, to the popedom in 1074.
The reign of this hierarch commenced a new era in the annals
of sacerdotal celibacy. Gregory enforced celibacy with a high
hand among the Latin ecclesiastics ; and was supported in the
undertaking by many of the laity. The attempt, however,
was long opposed by the priesthood : and its success termin-
ated in the general concubinage and debauchery of the western
clergy.
Gregory succeeded, to a great extent, in the suppression of
priestly marriage. Several of his predecessors had made a
similar attempt, but in vain. Stephen, Nicholas, and Alexan-
der had laboured for this purpose, and failed. But Gregory
proceeded in this, as in every other design, with superior abil-
ity and resolution; and his efforts were crowned in the end
with wonderful success. He summoned a council and issued
canons, separating the married clergy from their partners, and
forbidding the ordination of any who would not vow perpetual
continence. He prohibited the laity from hearing mass, when
celebrated by a married priest. 2 These enactments he enforced
with his usual obstinacy and with his usual success.
The laity, in general, seem to have seconded the efforts of the
pontiff. These, in many instances, refused the administration
of baptism and the communion from the married clergy. Lay^-
men administered baptism : and often trampled the bread and
spilled the wine which had been consecrated for sacramental
use by married clergymen. 3
The clergy opposed the pontiff with all their might. These,
Paris relates, characterized priestly celibacy and continence as
an innovation and a rash judgment contrary to the sentence of
the holy fathers. One, says the English historian, contended for
equity and the other against it ; while the consequence was scan-
dal and division in the church ; so that no greater schism was
1 Epiph. H. 59. Jerom. adv. Vig. thorn. I. 43. 1 Corin. VII. 2.
J Bin. 7. 473. Bruy. 2. 388, 418. Labb. 12. 547. Da Pin, 2. 244.
5 Infantes baptizant. Corpus Domini a presbyteris uxoratis consecratum pedi-
bus saepe conculcant, et sanguinem Domini voluntarie frequenter in terram effan-
doHt. M. Paris, 8. Bin. 7. 288.
558 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
produced by any heresy. Lambert and other historians have
transmitted similar accounts. The clergy, says the annalist^
raged and called Gregory the patron of heresy , and the abettor
of a mad system, who by violence would compel men to live like
angels, stop the course of nature, and give the slackened reins
to all pollution. The clergy also, in retaliation, accused the
pontiff of incest with Matilda, countess of Mantua, who, say
Marius and Carori, was a women of extraordinary superstition,
and greater effrontery than became her sex. 1
Similar dissensions, on this question, took place in 1075 at
the council of Erford in Germany. The archbishop of Mentz,
prompted by the pontiff, required the assembled clergy either to
abandon their wives or the ministry of the altar. The ecclesi-
astics, who sat round the archbishop, chose neither alternative.
They first confounded their diocesan with words, which again
were soon followed by blows as the more, efficient argument.
The archbishop, in the end,, was so" maltreated that he despaired
of his life, and wisely resolved to consign the enforcement of
celibacy to his holiness. 2
But resistance to Gregory was vain. He projected the sub-
jugation of Christendom, and executed his plan with matchless
resolution and success. He employed all means, foul and fair,
and wielded in turn, canons, decretals, threats, violence, arms,
fraud, flattery, anathemas, and excommunication. Pretended
miracles too were made the agents of his ambition. These, in
an age of ignorance and barbarism, when forgery and nonsense
passed for truth and reason, possessed, in the hand of supersti-
tion, irresistible power and efficacy. His infallibility's ' lying
wonders,' ridiculous in themselves, were irrefragable, when ad-
dressed to an unlettered and superstitious populace. The clergy
had to yield to the pontiff, and reason to tyranny.
Such was the rigour of ecclesiastical laws in the popish com-
munion against sacerdotal matrimony. But* this communion,
which was so severe against wedlock in the clergy, was, in a
very extraordinary degree, indulgent to concubinage both in the
clergy and laity. Any person, clergyman or layman, according
to the council of Toledo in its seventeenth canon, who has not
a wife but a concubine, is not to be repelled from the commu-
1 Novo exemplo, et ut multis visum est, contra sanctorum patrum sententiam.
M. Paris, 8. Bruy. 2. 431. Infremuit tota factio clericorum hominem plane
haereticum et vesani dogmatis esse clamitans. Fornicationi et immuuditiei fraena
laxaret. Lambert, Ann. 1074. Labb. 12. 547. Pontificem de incesto cum ea
amore iiifamare non veriti fuerint. Spon. 1074. III. IV. Mulier insignia supersti-
tionis et major-is audaciae quam sexum muliebrem deceret. Caron, 142.
2 Bxurgentes qui undique assidebaut clerici, ita cum verbis confundebant, ita
manibus debacchabautur, ut se vita comite e synodo dicessurum despeiaret. Bin
7. 281. Lamb. Ann. 1075. Bruy. 2. 438. Labb. 12. 582.
CLERICAL FORNICATION PREFERRED TO MATRIMONY.
nion, if he be content witb one. 1 The holy bishops, indeed, in
their wisdom, would not allow two women to one man. But
any Christian, according to the prelacy of Spain, might, at
pleasure, keep either a wife or a mistress. This, no doubt,
was very liberal and obliging in the sacred synod. But his
holiness pope Leo 'was not to be outdone by the episcopacy, in
complaisance and liberality. His infallibility, the vicar-general
of God, confirmed, in the kindest manner and with the utmost
courtesy, the council of Toledo and the act of the Spanish
prelacy. 2 ,.,.,-_
The Toledan canon and its pontifical confirmation were
equally wicked and ridiculous. The wickedness of the enact-
ment appears in its contrariety to the law of God, and indeed,
in general, to the code of all civilized nations. Its ridiculousness
is also apparent. The permission extends to every person, or,
according to one edition of the sacred canon, to the faithful,
comprising all Christians. The expression, Giann on has ob-
served, comprehended, at one time, the clergy as well as the
laity. 3 A man, at will, might keep a women of either character,
and he might therefore show^his taste in this freedom of variety.
But the holy legislators would riot allow two women to one
man. Two, the Spanish fathers thought, would be a super-
abundance of this species of live stock* But the Christian,
whose humour .inclined him to an unmarried rather than to a
married mistress, might gratify his taste, and, at the same time,
continue one of the faithful and be admitted to the communion.
Such was the hopeful decision of a Spanish council and a
Roman pontiff: but, ridiculous as it is, this is not all. The
enactment of the council and the pope has been inserted in the
Romish body of the Canon Law edited by Gratian and Pithou.
Gratian's compilation indeed was a private production, unau-
thenticated by any pope. But Pithou published by the com-
mand of Gregory the Thirteenth, and his work contains the
acknowledged Canon Law of the Romish church. His edition
is accredited by pontifical authority, and recognized through
popish Christendom. 4 Fornication therefore is sanctioned by a
Spanish council, a Roman pontiff, and the canon law.
Fornication, in this manner, was, in the clergy, not only tole-
rated but also preferred to matrimony. Many of the popish
casuists, such as Costerus, Pighius, Hosius, Campeggio, and
those reported by Agrippa, raised whoredom above wedlock in
the Hierarchy. Costerus admits that a clergyman sins, if he
1 Christiano habere licitum est unam tantum ant nxorem, aut certe loco uxoris
concubinam. Pithou, 47. Bin. 1. 739, 740. Crabb. 1. 449. Giannon, v. 5.
Dachery, 1. 528. Canisius, 2. 111.
s Coiifirmatum videtur authoritate Leonis Papae. Bin! 1. 737.
3 Giannou, XL 7. ' * Disk 34 c. 4. Pithou, 47.
560 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
commit fornication ; but more heinously if he marry. Concubi-
nage, the Jesuit grants, is sinful; but less aggravated, he
maintains, than marriage. Costerus was followed by Pighius
and Hosius. Campeggio proceeded to still greater extrava-
gancy. He represented a priest who became a husband, as
committing a more grevious transgression than if he should keep
many domestic harlots. 1 An ecclesiastic, rather than marry,
should, according to this precious divine, keep a seraglio. The
cardinal gives an odd reason for his theory. The clergyman,
he affirms, who perpetrates whoredom, acts from a persuasion
of its rectitude or legality ; while the other knows and ac-
knowledges his criminality. The priesthood, therefore, in
Campeggio' s statement, are convinced of the propriety of
fornication.
Agrippa draws a similar character of the legislators, who
enacted the laws of celibacy and who, according to this author,
would rather have clergymen fornicators in infamy than husbands
in honesty. This, in this sixteenth century, was a frightful
fact, of which the Emperor Maximilian and other German
princes complained, and which with good reason they denomi-
nated a glaring absurdity. The clergy who married were dis-
missed from the exercise of the sacred functions ; while the sa-
cerdotal fornicators, who violated the laws of God and man,
were allowed to retain the holy ministry. 2 Sacerdotal concu-
binage, accordingly, prior to the reformation, was the common
usage, and less offensive in the eyes of the papacy and the
populace than clerical matrimony. The ecclesiastics of the
papal communion, indeed, since the days of Luther and Calvin,
are, in appearance at least and in most nations, become more
circumspect, and aim at a character of decency. This is one
glorious effect of the reformation.
The popish doctors, in this way, not only indulge priestly
fornicators, but also, to encourage business, honour their part-
ners in trade. . These useful allies of the priesthood are,
according to Pope Paul the Third and all the Romish doctors,
comprehended in the ecclesiastical jurisdiction. These privi-
leged patrons of prostitution belong to the sacred hierarchy,
and enjoy the right of exemption from secular legislation and
authority. Charles the Second of Anjou, accordingly, ordained
1 Gravius peccat, si contrahat matrimonium. Cost. c. 15
Quod sacerdotes . fiant mariti, multo esse gravins peccatuxn quam si plurimas
domi meretrices alunt. Nam illoa habere persuasum quasi recte faciant, hos autem
scire et peccatnm agnoscere. Campeggk> r m Sleidan, 96.
8 Malnerunt illi legislatores sacerdotes suas cum infamia habei-e concubinas,
quam cum honesta fama uxores. Agrippa in Bayle, 1. 111.
Absurdum esse sacerdotes conjugates removere, scortatores vero qui contra
legem divinam ethumanam simul peccant, delinquentes pati. Thuan. 2. 417.
BIGAMY; ALLOWED BY ! POPE GREGORY II. 561
that these polluted companions of the clergy should not, like
the laity, forfeit the fourth of their possessions. 1 The base
fornicalress, in this manner, enjoyed, in the perpetration of
filthiness and in the bosom of an infallible church, the exemp-
tions and immunity of the ecclesiastical hierarchy.
All this, however, is not the end of the comedy, or rather
tragedy. The Roman pontiff ^knd the Roman clergy have, on
many occasions, proceeded to deer>er enormity and authorized
adultery or bigamy. Bossuet has accused Luther,. Melancthon,
Bucer, Adam, Lening, Wmfert, and Melanther of encouraging
bigamy in the Landgrave Philip; and has, in the imputation,
been followed by Varillas and Arnold. Luther and Melanc-
thon erred in their instructions to Philip. But the directions
of the reformers have, in this instance, been misstated and
exaggerated by the Bishop of Meaux. Perceiving the obsti-
nacy of the Landgrave, seven Theologians, who had patronized
the reformation, represented bigamy as, less heinous than
adultery; and advised, in this case, the closest secrecy. Ams-
dorf and Justus, however, as well as all the other reformers,
deprecated even this advice or connivance. 2 And Luther
learned this theology in the school of the Roman pontiffs and
clergy. A few specimens may be selected out of many for
illustration. .
Gregory .the Second, in all his infallibility, authorized bigamy,
which, in the popish system, is tantamount to adultery. Boni-
face, the celebrated Apostle of Germany, had, in 726, inquired
of his holiness, whether men, whose wives were not dead, but
incapacitated by infirmity, might again marry. His infalli-
bility's reply is wortlry of perpetual memory. He recommended
continence indeed to such as possessed the gift. But those
unendowed with continence, which is a great attainment, might,
according to the Viceroy of heaven, again marry. This is a
precious sample of pontifical casuistry. His infallibility re-
solved the difficulty by sanctioning bigamy and adultery.
Epiphanius, as has been already noticed, had taught the same
inconsistency as Gregory : and the Roman pontiff followed the
footsteps of the Grecian saint. Bellarmine, in this case, is,
contrary to his avowed system, constrained to grant tjie igno-
rance and error of Gregory. 3
1 Au sentiment de tons lea Docteiirs les concubines memes des pretres resortis-
spient au jugement du for ecclesiastique. Paol. 1. 133. Non settlement les eccle-
siastiques etoient exempts de la jurisdiction seculiere, mais encore leura families,
et meme leurs concubines, au sentiment de tous les Docteurs. Bruy. 4. 498.
Giannon, X. $. 1.
a Bossuet, VI. Seckendorf, 278. ,- - . :
3 Nam quod proposuisti^ quod si mulier infirmitate correptanouvaluerit debitum
viro reddere, quid ejus facial jugalis ? Bonum esset si sic permaneret, ut absti-
nentis vacaret. Sed quia hoc magnorum cst, ille qui se non poterit contiuere,
36
562 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY '.
His holiness, no doubt, was very accommodating. He
deserves the thanks of all husbands, whose partners are dis-
abled by debility. He was so liberal as to allow the man to
judge when the woman, to whom he is married, is, through
weakness, unfit for action. All, therefore, according to his
infallibility's system, may take a second companion when they
think proper. Gregory's doctrine, however, is now rank hete-
rodoxy in the Romish communion. The council of Trent, in
its twenty-fourth session, declared against the vicar-general of
God. The sacred synod, without any ceremony, launched its
anathemas against Gregory and his pestilential heresy ; and
sent the vicegerent of heaven, eight hundred years after his
death, to the abodes of the lost.
The Roman pontiff's case was far more aggravated than the
German reformer's. The Lutheran pastor's opinion related to
only one person : and its author had no more authority than any
other individual. The former referred to many : and was de-
livered by the vicar-general of God, the head of the church,
and the teacher of all Christians. Gregory's decretal was
couched in general terms, and may, in its wide extension, com-
prehend all men. Many have invested its author with the
attribute of infallibility ; though the Council of Trent, in fine
style, and in the exercise of its inerrability, tossed an anathema
at his devoted head.
This pontiff's theory was, in 752, adopted by the council of
Vermeria or Verbery. Pepin the French king, with the
French prelacy, was present in this assembly, which, say
Daniel and Velly, gave a mortal blow to the indissolubility of
the matrimonial- chain. 1 The Galtican clergy allowed the
privilege of repudiation, and subsequent wedlock to the person
who should marry a slave, who, before the nuptial ceremony,
had pretended to be free. The sacred synod granted the
same liberty to the man, whose wife should conspire against
his life or refuse to accompany him to a distant country : and
to the women whose husband should defile her sister or mother,
or should, through aversion or impotency , neglect herself. Such
were the decisions of a popish synod. These* unlike the Lu-
theran instructions to the Hessian Landgrave, extended not
merely to one but to many. The Saxon reformer, though he
erred, was, as even the partial Bishop of Meaux might have
seen, far less guilty than a Roman pontiff and a Romish council.
Charlemagne, with the contemporary Roman pontiff and
nubatmagis. Greg. II. Ep. 13. Labb. 8. 178. Bin. 5.: 454. Pontificem ex
ignorantia lapsum esse, ut hoc loco videtur Gregorius fecisse. Bell. IV. 12.
1 Qui donnent de grandes atteintes a I'indissolubilite du manage. Daniel, 2. 11.
Velly, 1.387. Labb. 8.. 405. Ootel. 1. 88.
ADULTERY OR BIGAMY PERMITTED TO THE LAITY. 563
French clergy, exemplified the theory of pope Gregory and the
Vermerian council. The French sovereign divorced Himil-
trud, the daughter of a French nobleman, and married Bertha*
a princess of Lombardy. This match, pope Stephen feared,
would ally the French and Lombards against the Roman pon-
tiff. He plied every means therefore, reason, invective, menace,
and flattery, to prevent the, union. His letter to Charles and
Carloman on the occasion is one of the most senseless, silly,
ridiculous, and disgusting monuments of antiquity. His infalli-
bility warned the emperor of the pestilential blandishments of
woman, which had expelled man from paradise, and entailed
death on the human family. He eulogized the grandeur and
celebrity of the Franks, who would be polluted by an alliance
with the contemptible, leprous, and STINKING Lombards ; a
nation without faith or religion. He mentioned the indissolu-
bility of marriage, and denounced the intended union as a
diabolical confederacy. Charles and Carloman he adjured
against the pending negotiations by the living God, the day of;
judgment, and the sacred body of Peter the prince of the
apostles. Any who should disregard his adjuration, he ana-
thematized by apostolical authority, banished from the kingdom
of heaven, and consigned to the devil to burn in everlasting
fire. 1 <
The king of Lombardy, however, soon pacified his holiness.
He restored some places, which he had taken from the ecclesias-
tical states, and this sop soon quieted the pontifical Cerberus.
He discontinued his opposition : and talked no more of the
allurements of women, the STENCH of the Lombards, the indisT
solubility of marriage, or. the thunders of excommunication.
Charles was united, in peace, to the princess of Lombardy, 2
Bertha, however, like Himiltrud, was soon divorced, to make
way for Hildegard, a Suevian princess. Bertha, through infir-
mity, was unfit for haying children. This debility, the French
clergy, like Gregory, reckoned a sufficient reason for repudi-
ation. Her impotency, in the ingenuous and honest interpre v -
tatiori of the Gallican clergy, was equivalent to death. 3
Bertha, a year after her nuptials, was sent to Lombardy, and
Hildegard, as queen, placed on the throne. The repudiation,
however, of both Bertha and Himiltrud, in the present: popish
I A regno- Dei alienum, atque cum diabolo seternis iiicendiis concrem'andum
deputatum. Steph. ad Carol. Labb. 12. 481. Velly, 1. 387.
II lear represente cette alliance comme 1' ouvrage du Demon, et les Lombards
comme une nation meprisable, perfide, infectee de la lepre. Vertot, 63.
. ? On contenta pour' adoucir son chagrin de lui faire restitiier quelqu.es places.
Velly. 1. 389. Le n'est plus nh perfide, iin lepreiix. Vertot, 71. ,
3 Bertha esset clinica et ad propagandam prolem inhabilis, ideoque judicio epis-
coporum, earn relic tarn ab illo ease velut niortuara. Porro reddita esset ex mprbo
penitus impotens ad concubitum. Spon. 771. Ill, Velly. 1. 389. Moreri, 2. 99
36*
564: THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
system, was invalid ; and the French king, like the German
landgrave, had, at one time, not merely two but three wives.
Baronius, nevertheless, calls Hildegard a princess of exemplary
piety. The French episcopacy sanctioned the divorce and
consequent marriage, while Adrian, the contemporary pontiff,
the universal bishop, whose duty it was to enforce the obser-
vance of the canons through Christendom, expressed not,
during the whole transaction, a single hint of disapprobation.
The French monarch, unlike the Hessian prince, was, after his
death, canonized by pope Pascal ; and many worshipped the
imperial saint.
Pope Celestine, in the end of the twelfth century, defined
heresy to be a reason for the dissolution of marriage, as Greg-
ory and the French clergy had admitted the plea of debility.
The person, according to this pontiff, whose paltrier in life
becomes guilty of heterodoxy, may, on account of this error in
faith, choose another. 1 Philip, could he have proved the
Landgravine a heretic, would have had pontifical authority to
transfer his hand and affections to an orthodox companion.
Celestine's definition, however, is now, according to the council
of Trent, in its twenty-fourth session, a pestilent heresy.
Innocent the Fourth sanctioned bigamy, without even the
plea of heresy. Alphonsus of Portugal, about 1243, divorced
his queen, and espoused the princess Beatrix. The repudiation
and nuptials were authorized by a bull of his holiness. 2 The
Roman pontiff, remarks Charenton, Mariana's translator, with
amusing simplicity, permitted such transactions at that time,
with much greater facility than he would at the present day.
The popish clergy, in the beginning of the fifteenth century,
though superintended by the Roman pontiff, the universal pastor,
permitted bigamy in Livonia. A man, says Henry, canon of
Worms, was, in the Livonian dominions, allowed to have two
living wives, and a woman a plurality of husbands. 3 The
bishop of Meaux, had it agreed with his taste, might have
discovered exemplifications of bigamy in his own communion
without having recourse to the Reformation.
Alexander, following the footsteps of his predecessors, issued
bulls of repudiation and dispensation of marriage to Ladislas
and Philip. Ladislas, king of Hungary, divorced Beatrix of
Arragon and married Anne of Foix. The separation from the
1 Oelestinus definivit per hseresim ita matrimonium solvi, nt liceat ei alfud con-
^ugiura inire, eujus prior conjux in haeresim lapsus sit. Alphon. 1. 4. Walsh. 33.
Bell. 1.777,
3 n obtint enfin.un decret du Pape qui deelara son mariage nul. Marian. 3. 29.
3 In Livonia, vir duas uxores vivas habeat et mulier plures maritos. Hen. iii
Lenfaa. 1. 53.
PROFLIGACY OF THE ROMISH PRIESTS. 565
one arid the union with the other were, according to Mariana,
by the express authority of his holiness. 1
Alexander was as kind to Lewis as he had been to Ladislas.
Lewis, the French king, disliked queen Jeanne, who, it seems,
was crooked, infirm, barren, and deformed. He resolved,
therefore, on a separation, which, Daniel remarks, was rather a
violent remedy. His majesty, accordingly, divorced Jeanne,
and espoused Ann. His infallibility, in the most obliging man-
ner, granted a bull of dismission and a dispensation for the
desired union. His holiness, however, did not, on this occa-
sion, work for nothing. Thirty thousand ducats ; the title and
duchy of Valentino, with a revenue of twenty thousand pounds ;
the princess Charlotta, sister to the queen of Navarre ; all
these, with a few other trifles, 'which Philip gave to Alexander's
hopeful son Borgia, were the reward of iniquity. The money
and the dukedom, Daniel admits, facilitated the dissolution of
marriage. Guicciardini, with more candour, represents these
considerations as the sole means of attainment. Lewis, not-
withstanding, was, observes Moreri, called the just and the
father of his people; and has been characterized as religious,
chaste, liberal, and the friend of letters. 2
The laxity of Romanism on the one hand, and its privations
on the other, introduced shocking impurity into its communion.
The interdiction of marriage, and the connivance at concubinage
in the priesthood, became the polluted fountains of multiplied
abominations, which inundated the popedom and swelled the
annals of ecclesiastical history. The clergy forsook the sanc-
tuary of wedlock for the sty of fornication and adultery. Gre-
gory's enactments, according to Aventinus, afforded signal
gratification to the wandering votary of sensuality, who, in the
restlessness of unsettled libertinism, relinquished one woman
for the sake of an hundred. But men, .who were actuated by
conscience or a sense of propriety, regarded the innovation as
a pestilential heresy which arose to. trouble Christendom. The
clergy, who resisted Gregory's enactments against marriage,
declared that the tendency of such interdictions was to open the
flood-gates of filthiness, and give the slackened reins to forni-
cation and defilement. Agrippa, in more modern days, draws
a similar picture, and s represents whoredom as the necessary
effect of prohibiting honourable marriage. Polydorus, agreeing
with Agrippa and Gregory's clergy, depicts celibacy as calcu-
lated to dishonour the priesthood, injure religiqn, and grieve
all good men. Matrimony, he remarks, is far more useful to
the Christian commonwealth. 3 J
1 Le Pape confirma par un bref expres le'divorce de Ladislas. Marian. 5. 299-
2 Dan. 7. 10. Guicia. III. Bruy. 4. 306. Moreri, 5. 246.
3 Aventin. V. Labb 12. 547. Bruy. 2. 431. Bayle. 1. III. Polyd. V. 4.
566 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY :
These observations have been verified by sacerdotal profli-
gacy in popish Christendom ; as will appear from the frightful
relations of Bernard, Agrippa, Henry, Clemangis, and Meze-
ray, Bernard, the saint of Clairvaux, in the twelfth century
admitted and lamented the impropriety of the prelacy and
priesthood, ' who committed, in secret, such acts of turpitude
as would be shameful to express.' 1
Agrippa accuses the prelacy of taxing the inferior clergy for
liberty to violate the laws of chastity. A bishop, on one occa-
sion, boasted of having in his diocese eleven thousand priests,
who severally paid their superior, every year, a guinea for leave
to keep concubines. 2 Licenses of this kind indeed Were com-
mon in many of the European kingdoms. Compelled by the
enormity of the evil, the council of Basil, at length, in its
twentieth session, issued a canon interdicting such abomina-
tions, on pairi of excommunication and the eternal malediction
of God. 3
Henry, a Viennan professor of theology and vice-chancellor
of the Parisian university, draws, in the fifteenth century, a
similar portrait. His description, copied by L enfant, extends
to the pope, the cardinals, the bishops, the priests, and the
monks. He depicted the ignorance, pride, simony, and licen-
tiousness of the pontiff, the cardinals, and the prelacy. The
priests, in his sketch, practised fornication, and the monks wal-
lowed in debauchery. Cathedrals became dens of thieves,
while monasteries were erected in taverns and places of
prostitution. The dissipation of the clergy, in Henry's estima-
tion, caused the corruption of Christendom and the obduracy
of infidels. 4
Clemangis reckoned the adultery, impurity, and obscenity of
the clergy beyond all description. These frequented the stews
and taverns, and spent their whole time in eating, drinking,
revelling, gaming, and dancing. Surfeited and drunk, these
sacerdotal sensualists fought, shouted, roared, rioted, and blas-
phemed God and the saints ; and passed shortly after from the
embrace of the harlot to the altar of God. The canons, like
the priests, were ignorant and drunken. Clemangis, through
shame, drew the curtain over the abominations that the nuns
* -
1 Epiacopi et sacerdotes faciunt quae non conveniunt. Quae enim in occulio
fiunt ab episcopis turpe est dicere. Bernard in Con. Rnem. 1728.
2 Legimus gloriatum in convivio quendum episcopum habere se/undecem millia
sacerdotum concjjbinariorum, qui in singulos annos illi aureum peridunt. Agrippa,
in Bayle, 1. III.
3 Nonnulli jurisdictionem ecclesiasticum habentes, pecuniarios quaestus concubi-
nariis percipere non erubescunt, patientes eos in sua foeditate sordescere. Crabb,
3.833. Dachery, 1. 757. Bruys, 4. III.
4 L& il trouve des pretres concubinaires, ici des moines debauchez, des mdnas-
teres erigez en cabarets et lieux de prostitution. Hemy in Lenfan. Pisa, 1. 53.
SACERDOTAL PROFLIGACY IN ENGLAND, FRANCE AND SPAIN. 567
practised in their convents, which he called brothels of licen-
tiousness. To veil a woman was in that age to prostitute her. 1
Mezeray's portrait of clerical profligacy, prior to the reforma-
tion, is similar to those of Bernard, Agrippa, Henry, and Cle-
mangis. The ecclesiastics, in the statement of the French
historian, were nearly all fornicatoys and drunkards. The
clergy held their offices in taverns, and spent their money in
debauchery. 2
These general details may be corroborated by a particular
retrospect of priestly incontinence, before the rise of Protest-
antism, in England, Spain, Germany, Switzerland, France,
Italy, and Peru. The accounts are furnished, in abundance*
by the contemporary Popish historians and councils.
England, as appears 'from the relations of Gildas, Fordun,
and Paris, drunk deep of the abominations flowing from sacer-
dotal celibacy. _ Gildas, in the sixth century, represents the
English priesthood as a confraternity of the filthiest fofnicators.
The British pastors, according to the historian's account, were
the patrons of folly : and wallowed, like swine, in the sinks of
lewdness and gluttony. These men, who should have been
examples of holiness, were characterized by drunkenness and
impudicity. 3
Fordun has copied the description of Edgar the English
sovereign, from Ailred of Rieval. This is similar to the outline of
Gildas. The British monarch, in the tenth century, assembled
the British clergy : and in a speech addressed to the full con-
vocation, drew the frightful portrait. These churchmen, his
Majesty told them to their face, were lascivious- in dress, inso-
lent in manner, and filthy in conversation. The time of these
heralds of the gospel was devoted to revels, inebriation, de-
bauchery, and abomination. Their abodes were the haunts of
harlots, and the scenes of the play, the dance, and the song,
which, in noisy dissipation, were prolonged till midnight or till
morning. 4
1 Fornices et cauponulas seduli frequent, ut potando, commessando, pransitando,
ccenitando, tempera tota consumunt. Crapnlati vero et inebriati puguant, clamant,
tumultuantur, nomen Dei et sanctorum suorum pollutissimis labiis execrantur;
sicque tandem compositi ex meretricum suarum complexibus ad divinum altare
veniunt. Oleman. 26. Lenfan. 1. 70.
Par pudeur, il aime mieux tirer le rideau sur les abominations, que se commet-
tent dans leurs convents, qu'il appelle des bordels de Venus. Aujourdhui voiler
one fille c'est la prostituer. Bruy. 3. 610, 611. /
3 Us tenoient leurs bureaux dans cabarets. On voyait qu'ils consumoient en de-
bauches une partie; de 1' argent. Pasteurs presque tous^ concubinaires, ivrogries,
usuriers. Mezeray, 4. 490.
. 3 Sacerdotes habet Britannia, sed insipientes, proprii plenitu3inem ventria qnae-
rentes, et soas libidines votis omnibus implere cupientes, porcorum more volu-
tantes, Clerici impudici, bilingues, ebrii. Gildas, Bp. 23. 38.
4 Jn veste lascivia, insolentia in gestu, in verbis turpitudo. Defluunt in com*
essationibus et ebrietatibus, in cubilibns et impudicitiis, ut jam domus clericornm
putentur prostibula meretricum. Fordun, c. 30.' Bray. 2. 219.
568 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Paris, in the eleventh century at the accession of Gregory
the Seventh, gives a report similar to those of Gildas and For-
dun. He represents a few as observers of continence. But he
characterizes the majority, as adding incontinence to perjury
and multiplied adultery. 1
Spain was as defiled as England. This is testified by many
historians, and, among others, by Alvarus and the councils of
Valladolid and Toledo. One fact, noticed by Alvarus, a
Spanish author on this subject, conveys a striking idea of the
Spanish nation and priesthood. The sons of the Spanish clergy,
in the beginning of the fourteenth centuiy, were in number
nearly equal to those of the laity. 2 The ecclesiastics and their
mistresses, it seems, were sufficiently prolific. The clergy, in
all likelihood, were as successful in the production of natural
progeny as of spiritual offspring. These priests would .rise
from the harlot's embrace, and proceed, without delay or even
confession, to the altar of God.
The testimony of the council of Valladolid, in its seventh
canon in 1322, is to the same purpose. The clergy, prodigal
of character and salvation, led, according to this assembly, lives
of enormity and profligacy in public concubinage. The canon
of Valladolid was renewed in 1473, in the council of Toledo.
This synod represented the clergy as living in the filthiest
atrocity, which rendered them contemptible to the people.
Some of the priests, guilty of fornication, feared not to touch the
body of the Lord with polluted hands. 3
The measureless intemperance of the Spanish clergy appears
in the history of sacerdotal and monkish SOLICITATION in that
kingdom. These solicitors were Spanish monks and priests,
who, abusing the privacy of sacramental confession, tempted
women, married and unmarried, to a violation of chastity, and,
in the language of pope Gregory, ' administered poison instead
of medicine.' 4 This kind of solicitation became so prevalent
as to demand pontifical interposition. Its notoriety, accordingly
challenged the interference of Pius, Clement, Gregory, Alexan-
der, and Benedict, who issued their bulls against this kind of
sedflction.
The publication of the papal enactments showed the extent
of the evil. The execution of the Roman mandates was con-
1 Faucis continentiam observantibus, multis incontinentiam perjurio multipliciori
adulterio cumulantibus. Paris. 8.
3 On voit presque autant d'enfans de clercs que de laiques. Us se ilevent d'au-
pres de leurs concubines pour aller a llautel. Bruy. 3. 308. Alvar. 11. 27.
3 Clericorum nonnulli famse sua? prodigi et salutis, in concubinatu publico vitam
ducunt enormiter dissolutam. Labb. 15. 247. Christi corpus, sacerdos pollutis
mariibus tractare non formidat. Labb. 19. 389. Bin. 8. 957.
* Pro medicina, venenum porrigunt. Dens, 3. 412, 413, et 6. 292, 293. Bull.
Cher. 3. 432.
SACEK,t>OTAL ; PROFLIGACY IN, GERMANY. 569
signed to the inquisitors, who summoned the attendance, at the
holy office j of -all that could inform against the guilty. The
terror of the inquisition commanded obedience. Maids and
matrons of the nobility and peasantry, of every rank and situa-
tion, crowded to the inquisition. Mode'sty and shame induced
many to go veiled. The alarm awakened jealousy in the mind
of many husbands. The fair informers in Seville alone were,
according to Gonsalvus and Lorente, so numerous, that all the
inquisitors and twenty notaries were insufficient in thirty days,
to take their depositions. -Thirty additional days had, three
several times, to be appointed for the reception of informations.
But the multitude of criminals, the jealousy of husbands, and
the odium which the discovery threw on auricular confession
and the popish priesthood, caused the sacred tribunal to quash
the prosecution, and to consign the depositions to oblivion. 1
The German clergy were as debauched as those of Spain or
England. Their overflowing and unrestricted licentiousness
appears with transparent evidence in the unsuspicious testimony
of German councils, princes, emperors, and clergy.
A German council, in 1225, accused the priesthood of un-
chastity, voluptuousness, and obscenity. Some, addicted to
filthy enjoyments, lived in open and avowed concubinage. Some
of the clergy as" well as the laity committed incest with the holy
nuns, and ' wallowing in sensuality, plunged, with ' slackened
reins, into the lake of misery and mud of filthiness.' 2
The council of Cologne, in 1536, characterized the monas-
teries, which had formerly been the schools of virtue and the
hospitals of the poor, as the taverns of soldiers and ravagers.
The nunneries, according to the same authority, had,, to say no
worse, become the alleged scenes of incontinency. Another
council of Cologne, in 1549, convicted the clergy of concubin-
age and the monks of whoredom. The sacred synod then
.prescribed a course of penance to the holy fornicators, ' to mortify
the petulance of the flesh.' 3
Albert Duke of Bavaria, in 1562, by Augustine his ambassa-
dor, depicted in glowing colours before the council of Trent, the
licentiousness of the German priesthood. The contagion" of
heresy, the ambassador said, had, on account of sacerdotal pro-
fligacy, pervaded the people of Bavaria even to the nobility.
A recital of clerical criminality would wound the ear of chastity.
i. 185. Lorent. 355. Liinborch, 111. 17. i
2 Nonnulli clerici lumbos suos cingulo continentisE, ut accipimus, non prsecingunt.
Bin. 8. 834, 835. Obsccenis voluptatibus inhiantes, concubinas usque ad haec tem-
portrpublice tenuerunt. Quidam relaxatis voluptatum habems in iacum miseriae
et in lutum fsecis se immergunt. Labb. 13. 1095. 1098.
3 In diversoria railitum et raptorum. In suspectas de mcontinentia domos esse
commutata. Labb. 19. 1280, 1384.
570 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Debauchery had covered the ecclesiastics with infamy. An
hundred priests, so general was the contagion, could hardly
muster three or four who obeyed the injunctions of chastity.^
The French applauded the ambassador's speech. The council
also, by its promoter, joined in the French eulogy, and styled
the Duke of Bavaria the bulwark of the popedom.
The emperor Ferdinand, though without success, applied to
the Pope in 1564, for a repeal of the laws against sacerdotal
matrimony. Maximilian also, with many of the German
princes, importuned Pius the fourth for thfe same purpose. The
reason, urged by the emperor was the profligacy of the priest-
hood. His majesty declared that among many of the clergy,
scarcely one could be found who lived in chastity. All, with
hardly an exception, were public fornicators, to the greatest
danger of souls and scandal of the people. 2 A repeal of clerical
celibacy Maximilian stated, would gratify the populace of
Bavaria, Bohemia, Silesia, Moravia, Austria, Carinthia, Carniola,
and Hungary. All these vast regions would have rejoiced in
the restoration of marriage among the clergy.
The emperor's application was supported by the popish priest-
hood of Germany. These, in maintenance of their petition,
alleged various reasons. The frailty of man ; the difficulty of
abstinence ; the 'strength of the passion that prompts to mar-
riage ; the permission of clerical wedlock by the. Old and New
Testament under the Jewish and Christian dispensations ; its
use with few exceptions, by the Apostles ; the instructions of
Dionysius to Pinytus ; the decision of the Nicene council sug-
gested by Paphnutius ; the usage of the Greeks and Latins in
the East and West till the popedom of Calixtus ; all these argu-
ments, the German ecclesiastics urged for the lawfulness of
sacerdotal matrimony. A second reason the Germans deduced
from clerical profligacy. Fifty priests, these churchmen con-
fessed, could with difficulty afford one, who was not a notorious
fornicator, to the offence of the people aud the injury of piety. 3
Sacerdotal logic and learning, however, were unavailing, when
weighed against pontifical policy and ecclesiastical utility.
Switzerland was the scene of similar profligacy. One fact
will sufficiently mark the state of this country. The Swiss, prior
to the Reformation, compelled every priest to take a concubine
of his own, lest he should attempt the chastity of virgins or
1 Dont il ne pouroit raconter les crimes sans blesser les oreilles chastes de son
auditoire. Le clerge s'etoit rendu infame par son impudicit6. De cent pretres, il
s'en trouvoit a peine trois on quatre qui n'entretinssent une concubine. Paol. 2.
217. DuPin, 3. 551.
3 Vix inter multos unus reperiatur, qui castura ccelibatum prsestat : nam omnes
fere publicos esse scortatores. Thuan. 2. 417. Bruy. 4. 681. Gabutins, 21.
3 De cinquant pretres Catholiques, a peine s'en trouvoit il un qui ue fut notoirement
concubinaire. Paol. 2. 680, 681. Thuan. XXXVI. 38.
PROFLIGACY OF THE ROMAN CLERGY. 571
matrons. Scandalous indeedmust have been the incontinence
of the Swiss clergy, when the cantons were necessitated to use
such a remedy for protecting women of character.
A fact of a similar kind is mentioned by Clemangis. The
laity tolerated the clergy only on condition of their keeping con-
cubines. 2 This caution was suggested by the married women,
who, protected even by this expedient, were not wholly out of
danger.
The French clergy were as debauched as those of England,
Spain, Germany, and Switzerland. All the French ecclesiastics
according to Mezeray's relation, were in a state of extreme ir-
regularity. The majority had concubines. Some of the deacons
entertained four or five of these female companions. The nuns
kept neither their cloisters nor their vows. 3
The Italian and Roman clergy appear, of all others, to have
been the most licentious. This, in the tenth century, was
stated in emphatical language by Ratherius bishop of Verona.
Arholf, who was an excellent preacher of righteousness, says
Platina, was, in the popedom of Honorius, murdered at Rome
by the agency of the priestoood, because he inveighed against
their incontinence and sensuality. 4
A select council of cardinals and bishops assembled by Paul
the Third, in 1538, have drawn a picture of the Roman courte-
zans, and the attention paid them by the Roman clergy. These
courtezans lived in splendid palaces^ walked or rode as matrons
through the city, and were attended at noon-day by a train of
the clergy and the nobility the friends of the cardinals. 5 The
Roman priesthood, in this manner, made a public exhibition of
their filthiness and infamy.
The Roman pontiffs were ..often as filthy as their clergy, and
exemplified every species of licentiousness and pollution. Some
of these hierarchs licensed stews, and raised a tax on these houses
of iniquity. These vicegerents of heaven exacted a tribute for
the permission of impurity. The pope's marshal, in many
instances, received a revenue from the Roman courtezans; and
enriched the sacred treasury with the wages of prostitution.
1 -Tin ancien edit etoitdonneparleurspredecesseurspourobligertousle&pretresa
avoir leur propre concubine, et les empecher par 1& d'attenter la pudeur des bonnetes
femmes. Paol. 1. 32.
2 Laici non aliter velintpfesbyterum tolerare, nisi concubinam habeat. Cleman.
DePraesul. : 168, Bayle, 2. 1392.
3 Tout le clerge etoit dans un extreme dereglement. La pluspart avoientdes
concubines. II se trouvoit des diacres qui en entretenoient jusqu'a quatre ou
cinque. Les religieuses n'observoient ni leur cloture ni leurs voeux. Mezeray,
1. 263.
4 Dachery, 1. 354. Platina in Hon. 2. Bray. 2. 208. Du Pin, 2. 165.
5 In hac etiam urbe, meretrices, ut matronae incedunt per urbem, sen mul& ve-
hnntur, quas assectantur de media die nobiles familiares cardinalium clericique.
Habitant etiam insignes aedes. Crabb. 3. 823. Coss. 5. 547
572 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY:
Some of the pontiffs converted the Roman court into a scene of
pollution. The Lateran palace, which had been a sanctuary,
became a brothel. 1 .
A John, a Boniface, a Sixtus, an Alexander, a Julius, arid a
Leo were notorious for adultery, incest, or the sin of Sodom.
A Roman council convicted John the Twelfth of adultery and
incest. His holiness committed incest with two sisters. John
the Twelfth was imitated, in the career of miscreancy, by John
the Twenty-third, as well as by Boniface, Sixtus, Alexander,
Julius, and Leo. 2
Gregory, who perfected the system of sacerdotal celibacy,
disobeyed his own laws. His infallibility excelled in the theory
of chastity rather than in the practice, and could prescribe to
others more easily than to himself. He was openly accused of
fornication," adultery, and incest. The council of Mentz took
the liberty of calling his holiness a fornicator. Many, both .of
1 the clergy and laity, reckoned the Vicar-General of God guilty
of incest with Matilda, princess of Tuscany, after her repudiation
from Godfrey duke of Lorrain. Binius admits the notoriety of
the report, though, without any good reason, he denies its truth.
Maimbourg, in modern days, acknowledges Matilda's impru-
dence in her devotion to Gregory, who styled the princess his
dear daughter. 3
Priestly profligacy crossed the Atlantic, and appeared in
America as well as on the European continent. The debauch-
ery of the Peruvian priesthood has been described in glowing
colours by Ulloa ; and the picture is frightful. Frailty, remarks
this candid author, accompanies man in every nation of the
earth ; but seems, in an extraordinary manner, to have debased
the monks and clergy of Peru, who surpass every other class in
sensuality and libertinism. The men, who, in this country,
should be examples of holiness, have degenerated into patterns
of 'impurity, Concubinage flourishes and fattens among these
professors of abstinence. Ulloa mentions many instances of this
enormity in the Peruvian ecclesiastics. One priest, among the
rest, celebrated mass in patriarchal style : while his fifth mis-
tress was seated in the church. He was assisted at the altar by
one son, while a brood of his spurious children witnessed the
august ceremony. 4
1 Son Marechal tiroit un tribut des femmes prostitutees. Bray. 3. 374. et 2. 244.
Lateranense palatium, sanctorum quondam nospitium, nunc est prostibulum mere-
tricum. Luitprand. VI. Labb. 11. 881.
2 Viduam Rainarii et Stephanam et Annam viduam cum nepte sua abusum esse.
Labb. 11. 881, 882. Thuan. 1. 215. Platina, 132.
3 Pontifex Mathildis complexibus furtivis frueretur. Bin. 7. 309. Lebb. 12. 232
272. Un peu moms de prudence et de discretion, qu'elle ne devoit. Maimboarg,
Decad. 244. Spon. 1074. IV.
4 Ulloa, 449, 503. Quar. Rev. 70. 330.
PROFLIGACY OF THE COUNCILS OF CONSTANCE AND BASIL. 573
General councils, as well as Romish pontiffs and popish
priests, outraged the laws, not indeed of celibacy, but of absti-
nence. This was exemplified in the universal councils of Lyons,
Constance, and Basil. The council of Lyons demoralized the
city in which it was convened. Cardinal Hugo, in a speech to
the citizens immediately after the dissolution of the sacred synod
boasted that Lyons, at the meeting of the assembly, contained
two or three stews ; but at its departure, comprehended -only
one ; which, however, extended without interruption from the
eastern to the western gate. 1 The sacred convention, by the
perpetration of licentiousness, converted the whole city into one
vast, fermenting, pestilential, overflowing sink of accumulated
pollution. The holy fathers, it appears, were men of business
and industry, and did not confine their valuable labours to the
study of musty theology.
The general council of Constance imitated the incontinence
practised at Lyons. Seven hundred public or common women
followed in the train of the Constantian fathers. The Viennan
manuscript augments the number of these female attendants,
whom it calls vagrant strumpets, to fifteen hundred. 2 This was
a reasonable supply for the thousand learned divines that com-
posed the infallible assembly. The procuring of these ladies,
who, no doubt, were trained to their profession, showed the
sacred synod's provident foresight as well as their good taste.
Constance might not have afforded a competent supply ; and,
therefore, the thoughtful theologians, mindful of their own com-
fort, imported a few hundreds of the sex. The sacerdotal forni-
cators, it seems, were very liberal to these professional ladies.
One courtezan, it is said, gained eight hundred florins, an im-
mense sum in those days. 3 She was treated very differently
from John Huss. The reverend debauchees enriched the pros-
titute and burned the reformer. These fair companions evinced
the holy men's relish for spiritual enjoyments, and refreshed the
infallible doctors at night, after being exhausted during the
day, by making speeches in the council and burning the
heretics Huss and Jerome.
The general council of Basil taught the theoiy of filthiness,
as those of Lyons and Constance had displayed the practice.
Carlery, the champion of Catholicism in this assembly against
Nicholas the Bohemian heretic, advocated the propriety of per-
mitting brothels in a city. The speculation, the hero of the
faith maintained by the authority of the sainted Jerome,
1 M. Paris, 702.
3 Mulieres comnmnea quas reperi in domibus DCC. Labb. 16. 1436. Bruya, 4.
39. Item XVO meretrices vagabundae. Labb. 16. 1435.
3 Item dicitur'quod una meretrix lucrata est VIIIO florenoa. Labb. 16. 1436.
574 THE VARIATIONS OF POPERY-
Augustine, Thomas, and Gregory. Simple fornication, the sage
and precious divine discovered, does not disturb the common-
wealth ; and the populace, addicted to voluptuousness and plea-?
sure, are unwilling to abstain. He concluded, therefore, by the
most logical deduction, that stews are to be tolerated in a city.
This theory the holy fathers heard with silent approbation. The
vile atrocity therefore was sanctioned by the holy, unerring,
apostolic, Roman council. 1
1 Per simplicem fornicationem non tarbatur politia, nee plebium multitudinem
iusibus, deliciis, voluptatibus deditam, facile est abstinere. Labb. 17 980. 988.
Canisius, 4. 457.
INDEX.
ABBAS, the Persian monarch, invites the Armenians to settle in his
dominions, 62.
Abgarus, king of. Edessa, Syrian legend on the portrait of Jesus
sent to, 467.
Abyssinians, a branch of the Monophysites, disbelieve any commix-
ture of Deity and humanity in the Son of Grod, 62.
Acacius, signal cursing-match between him and Felix, 331.
Acceptants, a faction of the French clergy, who received the Bull
" Unigenitus," 375.
Act of Faith, what, 261.
Adhelm, Bjp. of Sherburn, remedies of, to preserve himself con-
tinent, 538.
Adrian IV. [Nicolas Brekespere] pope, 1154. A striking example
of the vicissitudes of human life, 221 his actions, ib. his reply
to Henry the Second, who had requested his permission to invade
Ireland, ib. transfers Ireland to Henry, 222.
Adultery, or bigamy, permitted to the laity, 563.
jEgidius, his account of the immorality of the Romish Church, 203.
^Jlurus, partizan of Monophysitism, substituted for Proterios as
patriarch of Alexandria, 328, banished to Cherspn, but restored,
and poisons himself, ib. .
African clergy, enact eight canons against Pelagianism, 359 -their
firmness the means of preventing the Pelagian theology from
becoming the faith of Christendom, ib.
Agobard, Archbishop of Lyons, recommends the destruction of
images rather than their adoration, 486.
Agricola accompanies Luther to the conference at Marpurg, 29.
Aluv, signification of the term, 502.
Albani (J. F.) see Clement XI.
Albert, Duke of Bavaria, his picture of the licentiousness bf* ihe
German priesthood, 569.
Albigensianism : often unjustly accused of Manicheanism and Arian-
ism, 49 vindicated from this slander by Moreri, ib. ,
Albigensians : a branch of the Waldenian8,.50 untainted with the
Manichean or Arian heresy, ib. outline of their theology contained
in a Treatise on Antichrist written in 1120, ib. how confounded
with the Manicheans and Arians, 51^ number of, equipped against
the Crusaders, 53 massacre of, by the holy warriors, 257.
576 INDEX.
Alcala, University of, vouches for the Catholicism, &c. of Molinism,
367.
Alcoran, see Koran.
Alexander, patriarch of Alexandria, ascribes consubstantiality and
equality to the Son, 297 is opposed by Arius, ib. admonishes
Arius, but finding him obstinate, convenes a council who expel
.him and his faction, 298.
Alexander V. [Philarge] pope 1409, elected by the French and
Italian cardinals, 90.
Alexander VI. [Roderic Boi'gia or Lenzuoli] pope 1491, surpasses
all his predecessors in atrocity, 117 dies by a stratagem which
he had prepared for the murder of his friends, 118.
Alexander VII. pope 1599, prescribes a formulary respecting
Jansenism, 372.
Algerus, reason suggested by, for the manner in which the Lord's
body is administered in the sacrament, 423.
Alliaco, Card, his description of the moral traits of the 14th and
15th centuries, 203.
Altieri, Emilius, see Clement X.
Alva, Duke of, causes eighteen thousand persons to be executed an
six weeks for the crime of Protestantism, 267.
Amadeus, Duke of Savoy, after forty years, resigns his ducal
administration to his sons, 95 retires to his villa of Ripaille, ib
a deputation sent to him conveying the triple crown, which with
reluctance he accepts, ib.
Ambrosius, St. recommends suicide, 550.
Ammianus, his description of the affluence and ostentation of the
Roman pontiff, 213.
Amurath, Sultan, defeats Ladislaus, king of Hungary, who had been
induced by Eugenius IV. to break his treaty with him, 283-^-
displays a copy of the violated treaty in the front of the battle, ib.
Anabaptism : opposed by Luther and Calvin, 34 also by the Swiss,
French, English, and Scottish Reformers,: ib.
Anacletus, or Cletus, succeeds Linus in the Roman episcopacy, 70
but doubtful whether Anacletus and Cletus were identical or
distinct, 73.
Anastasius, excommunicated for heresy by Symmachus, 328.
Angelo, Cardinal, declaration of, that the sacramental wine, if ad-
ministered to laymen, is poison rather than medicine, 436.
Anointing the sick, scriptural end of, 450.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, remarks on, 47.
Antiquity, in the aostract, no criterion of truth, 45 papal su-
premacy unknown to, 174.'
Antitrinitarians, several factions of, 299.
Antonius, his picture of the sixteenth century, 204.
Apostles : founded and organized churches, and then consigned
their superintendency to fixed pastors, 70 word ' apostles ' inter-
preted by some theologians to signify ' the rock,' 162.
Apostles' Creed, general reception of in Christendom, 47.
Aquinas, Thomas, his opinion on transubstantiation, 411 -methods
adopted by him, to preserve himself continent, 536.
INDEX. 577
Arbitration, proposed as a means for the extinction of the schism in
the papacy, 86.
Arianisni : patronized by Liberius, and by the councils of Sirmium,
Selucia, and Ariminum, 34 also by Zosimus and Honorius, 102
heresy originated in Alexandria, 297 its prevalence, 308.
Ariminum, council of, its meeting and proceedings, 305-6.
Aristotelian philosophy, why it facilitated the reception of transub-
stantiation, 405.
Arius, the first innovator on the faith of antiquity, whose error
obtained extensive circulation, or was attended with important
consequences, 297 masterly portrait of him by Epipbanius, ib.-
is expelled from the church by a council convened by Alexander
the patriarch of Alexandria, and goes to Palestine, 298.
Aries, synod of, hostile to consubstahtiality, 300.
Armenians : scattered through Armenia, Cappadocia, Cilicia, Syria,
Persia, India, Cyprus, Poland, Turkey, Transylvania, Hungary
and Russia, 62 their merchants distinguished for industry, fru-
gality, activity, and opulence, ib. -have repelled Mahometan and
Romish superstition beyond all the Christians in Central Asia, 63
their faith a transcript of biblical purity, ib. invited by Abbas,
the Persian monarch, to settle in his dominions, 62.
Arnold (Ant.) endeavors to prove the antiquity of transubstantiation,
406 remark on this attempt, ib.
Arnolf, a preacher at Rome, murdered by the agency ol ? the priest-
hood, because he inveighed against their incontinence and
sensuality, 571.
Ass, absurd Festival of, celebrated at Beauvais in Burgundy, 43.
Assassination, approbation of, by Jerome, and Ambrosius, 549-50.
Astolf, king of Lombardy, forms the project of subduing Italy, 214
defeated by Pepin, and compelled to fulfil his treaty with
Stephen II. ib.
Athanasian Creed: its general reception in Christendom, 47.
Athanasius, supremacy bestowed on him by Gregory and others,
174 compelled to appear before the Tyrian council, 299 vin-
dicates his innocence and exposes the injustice of the council,
ib. is rescued by the soldiery and escapes, but is excommuni-
cated and banished, ib.
Atheism, displayed in the lives of the Roman hierarchs of the
middle and succeeding ages, 108.
Augsburg or Augustan Confession, the production of Melancthon,
reviewed by Luther, presented in 1530 to the Emperor of
Germany, 26 became the standard of Lutheranism through
Germany, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, ib.
Augustin, St. taught the doctrine of gratuitous predestination, 362
seems to have been the first Christian author, who entertained
the idea of purifying the soul while the body lay .in the tomb,
517 remarks on his works, 517-18.
" Augustine," a work so called, published by Jansenius, object of, 369.
Auto da Fe, see Faith, post.
37
578 INDEX.
Averroes, his opinion of Christians, 421,
Avignon : removal of the papal court from, by Gregory, XL 81.
B
Bailly (L.) ascribes to the church a power of dispensing in vows
and oaths, 278.
Baptism : errors on the subject of, 101 validity of, on what it
depends according to the Romish system, 102 same change
ascribed to the water of, as to the bread and wine of the Lord's
Supper, 403.
Baptista: his portrait of the Constantino council, 199.
Barbarossa, Emperor, compelled to officiate as equerry to Adrian
IV. 221.
Barsumas, a Syrian, active in the assassination of Flavian, 318.
Barthelemi de Prignano, see Urban VI.
Bartholomew, massacre on St. Bartholomew's day, 270 not con-
fined to Paris, but extended in general through the French
nation, 271 medals coined to perpetuate its memory, 272
approved by the pope and the Roman court, ib, Spain rejoices
in the tragedy, ib.
Basil, council of, decrees the superiority of a general council to a
pope, 94 and the obligation of all to obey the synodal authority
in questions of faith, schism, &c. ib. two bulls of dissolution
issued against it by Eugenius, ib. -new dissensions between
them, ib. deposes Condalmerio, ib.- appoints Amadeus, Duke
of Savoy, 95 recognized by the French school as general, 134
declaimed against by some,ib. called by Leo X. a conventicle,
135 acknowledges that half-communion is an innovation, 433
inconsistency of, with itself, 437 profligacy of, 573.
Basiliscus, emperor of Constantinople, both denounces and patronizes
the synod of Chalcedon, 327 is driven from the imperial dignity
by Zeno j and banished to Cappadocia, where he dies of hunger
and cold, 328.
Beata, of Cuenza in Spain, aspires to the celebrity of a Roman
sainty 34 invents a most extraordinary fiction, ib. -declaring that
her body was transubstantiated into the substance of our Lord's,
ib. this absurdity divides the Spanish priests and monks, ib.
procession of her through the 'streets, accompanied with prostra-
tion and burning of incense, 35.
Bede, Venerable-, remark of, on the unction of the sick, 453.
Belgic confession, see Dutch confession.
Belisarius, suborned by the empress Theodora, and bribed by
Vigilius, to expel Silverius from the papal chair, 77.
Bellarmine, (Rob.) his distinctions and decisions badly calculated to
establish the authority of councils, 124 affirms that the Pope
can transubstantiate sin into duty, and duty into sin, 159 urges
the eradication of heretics, when it can be effected with safety, 263.
Benedict, St. his remedy to preserve himself continent, 537.
Benedict VI. [son of HildebrandJ pope, 973, strangled by Crescen-
tius, 110.
INDEX. 579
Benedict VII. Pope (975) substituted by universal suffrage in the
stead of Boniface VII., Ill holds the papacy nine years, ib.
Benedict [XI. Theophylactus] promoted in 1033 to the papacy by
simony, 79 in 1044 is expelled by a Roman faction, ib. is
restored, ib. resigns the papacy to John for 1500Z. and retires,
80 weary, however, of privacy, he renews his claim, and seizes
by dint of arms on the Lateran, ib.
Benno, cardinal, his character of Gregory the Seventh, 111.
Berengarius, allowed by Gregory VIII to profess that the bread
and wine of the altar after consecration are the true body and
blood of our Lord, 31 opposes Pascasius, 409- Berengarian
controversy, 411.
Bernard, St. affirms that none, except God, is like the Pope, either
in heaven or on earth, 157.
Bernardin, his adventure with a female citizen of Sienna, 39. .
Bertrand de Got, see Clement V.
Bertram replies to Pascasius, 407 different treatment which his
work received, ib.
Bethesda, pool of, remarks on, 448.
Beziers, storming of, 256.
Bible, forbidden to the laity, by the council of Tolosa, 250.
Biel, cardinal, opinion of, on the creation of the Creator, as implied
in transubstantiation, 419, 420.
Bigamy, allowed by Gregory the Second, 561.
Bohemian Confession, presented in 1535 to the emperor Ferdinand
by the nobility of Bohemia, 26.
Bohorquia, a victim of the inquisition, 267.
Bonaparte, excommunicated and anathematized by Pius the
Seventh, 235.
Boniface, VII. (Francon) seizes the papal chair in 974, having mur-
dered his predecessor and successor, 110 is deposed and
expelled, ib. replaced on the pontifical throne by bribing his
paitizans, ib. imprisons John XIV. who had succeeded during
his absence, in the castle of Angelo, where he dies of starvation,
111 his body exposed by Boniface, ib.- dies suddenly, and his
body dragged with indignity through the streets, ib.
Boniface VIII. [Cardinal Cajetan] pope, 1294, forms a plan to induce
Celestin to resign, succeeds, and is chosen in his stead, 113
imprisons him, ib. -his character, 11 4^-r-taught the necessity of
submission to the pontiff for the attainment of salvation, 155.
Borgia, see Alexander VI.
Bossuet, (J. B.) bishop of Meaux, his misrepresentation of Protest-
anism, 25 eulogises the Helvetian Confession of faith, ib.
Brazen serpent, remark on, 461, 462.
" Breaking of Bread," phrase, as used by St. Luke, remark on, 429.
Brekespere, (Nicholas) see Adrian IV.
Brent, (John) accompanies Luther to the conference at Marpurg, 29.
Breviary, Roman, approves of self-flagellation, 37.
Britain, continued independent of papal authority till the end of the
sixth century, 180.
Brothels, established in Rome by Sixtus the Fourth, 117.
37*
576 INDEX.
Alcala, University of, vouches for the Catholicism, &c. of Molinism,
367.
Alcoran, see Koran.
Alexander, patriarch of Alexandria, ascribes consubstantiality and
equality to the Son, 297 is opposed by Arras, ib. admonishes
Arius, but finding him obstinate, convenes a council who expel
him and his faction, 298.
Alexander V. [Philarge] pope 1409, elected by the French and
Italian cardinals, 90.
Alexander VI. [Roderic Borgia or Lenzuoli] pope 1491, surpasses
all his predecessors in atrocity, 117 dies by a stratagem which
he had prepared for the murder of his friends, 118.
Alexander VII. pope 1599, prescribes a formulary respecting
Jansenism, 372.
Algerus, reason suggested by, for the manner in which the Lord's
body is administered in the sacrament* 423.
Alliaco, Card, his description of the moral traits of the 14th and
15th centuries, 203.
Altieri, Emilius, see Clement X.
Alva, Duke of, causes eighteen thousand persons to be executed :m
six weeks for the crime of Protestantism, 267.
Amadeus, Duke of Savoy, after forty years, resigns his ducal
administration to his sons, 95 retires to his villa of Ripaille, ib
a deputation sent to him conveying the triple crown, which with
reluctance he accepts, ib.
Ambrosius, St. recommends suicide, 550.
Ammianus, his description of the affluence and ostentation of the
Roman pontiff, 213.
Amurath, Sultan, defeats Ladislaus, king of Hungary, who had been
induced by Eugenius IV. to break his treaty with him, 283
displays a copy of the violated treaty in the front of the battle, ib.
Anabaptism : opposed by Luther and Calvin, 34 also by the Swiss,
French, English, and Scottish Reformers,, ib.
Anacletus, or Cletus, succeeds Linus in the Roman episcopacy, 70
but doubtful whether Anacletus and Cletus were identical or
distinct, 73.
Anastasius, excommunicated for heresy by Symnaachus, 328.
Angelo, Cardinal, declaration of, that the sacramental wine, if ad-
ministered to laymen, is poison rather than medicine, 436
Anointing the sick, scriptural end of, 450.
Ante-Nicene Fathers, remarks on, 47.
Antiquity, in the aostract, no criterion of truth, 45 papal su-
premacy unknown to, 174.
Antitrinitarians, several factions of, 299.
Antonius, his picture of the sixteenth century, 204.
Apostles : founded and organized churches, and then consigned
their superintendency to fixed pastors, 70 word ' apostles ' inter-
preted by some theologians to signify ' the rock,' 162.
Apostles' Creed, general reception of in Christendom, 47.
Aquinas, Thomas, his opinion on transubstantiate on, 411 -methods
adopted by him, to preserve himself continent, 536.
INDEX. 577
Arbitration, proposed as a means for the extinction of the schism in
the papacy, 86.
Arianisni : patronized by Liberius, and by the councils of Sirmium,
Selucia, and Ariminum, 34 also by Zosimus and Honorius, 102
heresy originated in Alexandria, 297 its prevalence, 308.
Ariminum, council of, its meeting and proceedings, 3056.
Aristotelian philosophy, why it facilitated the reception of transub-
stantiation, 405.
Arius, the first innovator on the faith of antiquity, whose error
obtained extensive circulation, or was attended with important
consequences, 297 masterly portrait of him by Epiphanius, ib.
is expelled from the church by a council convened by Alexander
the patriarch of Alexandria, and goes to Palestine, 298.
Aries, synod of, hostile to consubstahtiality, 300.
Armenians : scattered through Armenia, Cappadocia, Cilicia, Syria,
Persia, India, Cyprus, Poland, Turkey, Transylvania, Hungary
and Russia, 62 their merchants distinguished for industry, fru-
gality, activity, and opulence, ib. have repelled Mahometan and
Romish superstition beyond all the Christians in Central Asia, 63
their faith a transcript of biblical purity, ib. invited by Abbas,
the Persian monarch, to settle in his dominions, 62.
Arnold (Ant.) endeavors to prove the antiquity of transubstantiation,
406 remark on this attempt, ib.
Arnolf, a preacher at Rome, murdered by the agency o\ ? the priest-
hood, because he inveighed against their incontinence and
sensuality, 571.
Ass, absurd Festival of, celebrated at Beauvais in Burgundy, 43.
Assassination, approbation of, by Jerome, and Ambrosius, 549-50.
AstoTf, king of Lombardy, forms the project of subduing Italy, 214
defeated by Pepin, and compelled to fulfil his treaty with
Stephen II. ib.
Athanasian Creed : its general reception in Christendom, 47.
Athanasius, supremacy bestowed on him by Gregory and others,
174 compelled to appear before the Tyrian council, 299 vin-
dicates his innocence and exposes the injustice of the council,
ib. is rescued by the soldiery and escapes, but is excommuni-
cated and banished, ib.
Atheism, displayed in the lives of the Roman hierarchs of the
middle and succeeding ages, 108.
Augsburg or Augustan Confession, the production of Melancthon,
reviewed by Luther, presented in 1530 to the Emperor of
Germany, 26 became the standard of Lutheranism through
Germany, Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, ib.
Augustin, St. taught the doctrine of gratuitous predestination, 362
seems to have been the first Christian author, who entertained
the idea of purifying the soul while the body lay .in the tomb,
517 remarks on his works, 517-18.
" Augustine," a work so called, publishedby Jansenius, object of, 369.
Auto da Fe, see Faith, post.
37
578 INDEX.
Averroes, his opinion of Christians, 421.
Avignon : removal of the papal court from, by Gregory, XI. 81.
B
Bailly (L.) ascribes to the church a power of dispensing in vows
and oaths, 278.
Baptism : errors on the subject of, 101 validity of, on what it
depends according to the Romish system, 102 same change
ascribed to the water of, as to the bread and wine of the Lord's
Supper, 403.
Baptista: his portrait of the Constantine council, 199.
Barbarossa, Emperor, compelled to officiate as equerry to Adrian
IV. 221.
Barsumas, a Syrian, active in the assassination of Flavian, 318. ,
Barthelemi de Prignano, see Urban VI.
Bartholomew, massacre on St. Bartholomew's day, 270 not con-
fined to Paris, but extended in general through the French
nation, 271 medals coined to perpetuate its memory, 272
approved by the pope and the Roman court, ib. Spain rejoices
in the tragedy, ib.
Basil, council of, decrees the superiority of a general council to a
pope, 94 and the obligation of all to obey the synodal authority
in questions of faith, schism, &c. ib. two bulls of dissolution
issued against it by Eugenius, ib. -new dissensions between
them, ib. deposes Condalmerio, ib. appoints Amadeus, Duke
of Savoy, 95 recognized by the French school as general, 134
declaimed against by some, ib. called by Leo X. a conventicle,
135- acknowledge? that half-communion is an innovation, 433
inconsistency of, with itself, 437 profligacy of, 573.
Basiliscus, emperor of Constantinople, both denounces and patronizes
the synod of Chalcedon, 327 is driven from the imperial dignity
by ZenOj and banished to Cappadocia, where he dies of hunger
and cold, 328.
Beata, of Cuenza in Spain, aspires to the celebrity of a Roman
3aint y 34 invents a most extraordinary fiction, ib. declaring that
her body was transubstantiated into the substance of our Lord's,
ib. this absurdity divides the Spanish priests and monks, ib.
procession of her through the 'streets, accompanied with prostra-
tion and burning of incense, 35.
Bede, Venerable-, remark of, on the unction of the sick, 453.
Belgic confession, see Dutch confession.
Belisarius, suborned by the empress Theodora, and bribed by
Vigilius, to expel Silverius from the papal chair, 77.
Bellarmine, (Rob.) his distinctions and decisions badly calculated to
establish the authority of councils, 124 affirms that the Pope
can. transubstantiate sin into duty, and duty into sin, 159 urges
the eradication of heretics, when it can be eifected with safety, 263.
Benedict, St. his remedy to preserve himself continent, 537.
Benedict VI. [son of Hildebrand] pope, 973, strangled by Crescen-
tius, 110.
INDEX.
Benedict VII. Pope (975) substituted by universal suffrage in the
stead of Boniface VII., Ill holds the papacy nine years, ib.
Benedict [XI. Theophylactus] promoted in 1033 to the papacy by
simony, 79 in 1044 is expelled by a Roman faction, ib. is
restored, ib. resigns the papacy to John for 1500?. and retires,
80 weary, however, of privacy, he renews his claim, and seizes
by dint of arms on the Lateran, ib.
Benno, cardinal, his character of Gregory the Seventh, 111.
Berengarius, allowed by Gregory VIII to profess that the bread
and wine of the altar after consecration are the true body and
blood of our Lord, 31 opposes Pascasius, 409- Berengarian
controversy, 411.
Bernard, St. affirms that none, except God, is like the Pope, either
in heaven or on earth, 157.
Bernardin, his adventure with a female citizen of Sienna, 39.
Bertrand de Got, see Clement V.
Bertram replies to Pascasius, 407 different treatment which his
work received, ib.
Bethesda, pool of, remarks on, 448.
Beziers, storming of, 256.
Bible, forbidden to the laity, by the council of Tolosa, 250.
Biel, cardinal, opinion of, on the creation of the Creator, as implied
in transubstantiation, 419, 420.
Bigamy, allowed by Gregory the Second, 561.
Bohemian Confession, presented in 1535 to the emperor Ferdinand
by the nobility of Bohemia, 26.
Bohorquia, a victim of the inquisition, 267.
Bonaparte, excommunicated and anathematized by Pius the
Seventh, 235.
Boniface, VII. (Francon) seizes the papal chair in 974, having mur-
dered his predecessor and successor, 110 is deposed and
expelled, ib. replaced on the pontifical throne by bribing his
partizans, ib. imprisons John XIV. who had succeeded .during
his absence, in the castle of Angelo, where he dies of starvation,
111 his body exposed by Boniface, ib.- dies suddenly, and his
body dragged with indignity through the streets, ib.
Boniface VIII. [Cardinal Cajetan] pope, 1294, forms a plan to induce
Celestin to resign, succeeds, and is chosen in his stead, 113
imprisons him, ib. -his character, 114 taught the necessity of
submission to the pontiff for the attainment of salvation, 155.
Borgia, see Alexander VI.
Bossuet, (J. B.) bishop of Meaux, his misrepresentation of Protest-
anism, 25 eulogises the Helvetian Confession of faith, ib.
Brazen serpent, remark on, 461, 462.
" Breaking of Bread," phrase, as used by St. Luke, remark on, 429.
Brekespere, (Nicholas) see Adrian IV.
Brent, (John) accompanies Luther to the conference at Marpurg, 29.
Breviary, Roman, approves of self-flagellation, 37.
Britain, continued independent of papal authority till the end of the
sixth century, 180.
Brothels, established in Rome by Sixtus the Fourth, 117.
37*
680 INDEX.
Brunon, see Leo. IX.
Bucer, accompanies Zuinglius to the conference at Marpurg, 29.
Buchanan, Dr. antiquity of Syrianism acknowledged by, 66.
Bulls, papal, remarks on the bull "in Gcena" issued in 1567 by
Paul the Fifth, 234 a papal bull received by open or tacit assent,
and by a majority of the popish clergy, forms a dogma of faith,
255 observations on the bull " Unigenitus," 208 bull of Paul
V. against the oath of allegiance to James the First, 234 bull
of Adrian, transferring Ireland to Henry the Second, 222 opin-
ion of M. Caron on it, 223 of Clement the Fifth, 282.
Byzantine synod, proceedings of, in the year 360, 307.
Cajetan, cardinal, see Boniface VIII.
Calendion, patriarch of Antioch, banishment of, 330.
Calvinists, modified the severity of predestination, 30 unite with
the Lutherans, ib.
Canon law, extends the spirit of persecution even to the dead, 266.
Canute, king of Denmark, used self flagellation, 37.
Caraffa (John Peter) see Paul IV.
Carlerius, advocates the propriety of tolerating stews in a city, 199.
Caroline books, a composition of the French clergy in the name of
Chai'Iemagne, 481 their genuineness denied by some, 482.
Caron (R.) his opinion of the bull of Adrian IV. transferring Ire-
land to Henry the Second, 223.
Celestin, a visionary monk, transferred from a mountain cavern of
Apulia, to the holy chair of St. Peter, 113 is induced by Boniface
VIII. to resign, is imprisoned by him and dies, ib.
Celestius, a Scotchman, or as some say, an Irishman, attached to the
Pelagian school, 354- condemned by the Carthaginian prelacy,
356 flies to Ephesus and Constantinople, but is expelled from
both these cities, 357 presents himself before Zosimus, and
declares his innocence, ib. is acquitted by Zosimus, 358.
Celibacy of the clergy, 526 two parties on the subject, ib. a
variation from the Jewish theocracy, 5.28 a variation also from
ancient tradition, 529 rejected in die East, 532 progress of, in
the Romish church, 534 -papal policy, a cause of, 541 progress
of, in the East, 544.
Cession of the Papacy, a plan suggested by the Parisian University,
to put an end to the schism between the reigning Pontiffs Benedict
and Gregory, 87 this, however, defeated by the selfish obstinacy
and perjury of the competitors, ib.
Chalcedon, general council of, convened, 321 description of it,
ib. passes three distinct creeds on the subject of monophysitism,
322 conduct of, 325.
Charenton, national synod of, purity of the Lutheran faith and
worship acknowledged at, by the French reformed, 30. .
Charles, king of Naples, his kingdom bestowed upon him by Urban,
84 quarrel between them, 85 offers a reward for tHe Pontiffs
head, ib. leads an army against him, and besieges him in the
castle of Nocera, ib. is assassinated in Hungary, ib.
INDEX. 581
Charles V. Emperor of Germany and King of Spain, proscribes
Luther, his followers, and books, 266 begins the work of perse-
cution in Spain, and with his latest breath recommended its
completion to his son, Philip the Second, 267.
Charles IX. King of France, part he took in the massacre on St.
Bartholomew's day, 270 his unfeeling witticism on seeing the
body of Admiral Coligny, 271.
Childeric, king of France, deposed in 751 for inefficiency, 216.
Christian commonwealth, original state of, 212.
Ciaconia, a Dominican, urges the extermination of heresy, 265.
Cicero, his opinion of Christians, 421.
Clara at Madrid, aspires to the distinction of a prophetess, 3.5 her
claims obtain general credit, ib. feigns a paralytic affection, and
is visited by the most distinguished citizens of the capital, ib.
the sick implore her mediation with God for their cure, and judges
supplicate light to direct them in their decisions, ib. announces
that by a special call of the Spirit she is destined to become a
capuchin nun, but wants the health and strength necessary for this
mode of life, ib. Pius VII. grants her a dispensation from this,
ib. an altar erected opposite her bed, mass often said in her bed-
room, and the sacrament left there as in a sacred repository, ib.
at length, in 1802, mildly punished by the inquisition, 36.
Clemens of Alexandria, testimony of, to the marriage of priests, 531.
Clemens II. succeeds Anacletus or Cletus in the Roman episcopacy,
71.
Clement V. [Bertrand de Got] pope 1305, emancipates Edward I.
from his oath in confirmation of the great charter, 282.
Clement VII : [Robert de Geneve] pope 13781394 Christendom
divided between him and Urban VI., 81 absolves Francis II. the
French king, from a treaty which he had formed in Spain, 284.
Clement IX. [Jules de Rospigliosi,] pope, 1667 issues an edict of
pacification in 1668, modifies the formulary of Alexander VII.
and permits the dissatisfied clergy to interpret his predecessor's
rescript in their own sense, and to subscribe in sincerity, 372
this modification, called the peace of Clement, continues for 34
years, ib.
Clement X. [Emilius Altieri,] Pope, 1670, countenances the pacifi-
cation of his predecessor, 372.
Clement XI. John Francis Albani, Pope, 1700, overtures the pacifi-
cation of Clement IX. and the patronage of Innocent XI. con-
firms the constitution of Innocent X. and Alexander VII. against
Jansenism, and denounces Quesnel's Reflections, 373.
Cletus and Anacletus, doubtful whether they were identical or
distinct, 73.
Clergy, celibacy of, 526 a variation from, the Jewish theocracy
528 and from the Christian dispensation, 529 also from ancient
tradition, ib. proofs that the clergy anciently were married, 530
celibacy of the clergy rejected in the East, 532 progress of,
in the Romish church, 533 papal policy a cause of, 541 progress
of in the East, 544 domesticisrn or sunisactanism, had recourse
to by many of the clergy, 553 concubinage of, 555 incest
682 INDEX.
committed by, 556 clandestine matrimony of, ib. profligacy of,
in Germany, 569 in Switzerland, 570 in France, 571 in Italy,
ib. in America, 572.
Coleta, St. often complimented by Satan with a whipping, 40.
Coligny, Admiral, massacred on St. Bartholomew's day, 271
unfeeling witticism of the French king on seeing his body, ib.
Cologne, council of, how it characterized monasteries and nun-
neries, 569.
Communion in one kind, 425 popish arguments for, 427 contrary
not only to scriptural institution, but also to the usage of the early
and middle ages, 430 not practised in the East, 433 its intro-
duction, 435.
Compulsion on questions of religion and, conscience unscriptural, 439.
"Concord of Grace and Free-will," by Molina, design of this work,
367- by whom approved and condemned, ib.
Concubinage, and its enormities, 555.
Conjlalmerio, assumes the name of Eugenius, 93 his contest with
Felix respecting the papacy, ib. deposed, and all his constitu-
- tions abrogated by the council of Basil, 94 induces Ladislaus,
King of Hungary, to break his treaty with the Sultan Amurath, 283.
Confessions of Faith, harmony of those of the Reformers, 25-
Variety of, 307 see also Augsburg or Augustan Bohemian
Dutch English French Helvetian Palatine Polish Saxon
Scottish Tetrapolitan and Wittemberg Confessions.
Confessor, duty of, accoi'ding to Dens, 279.
Confirmation not a sacrament, 65.
Congregation of Helps, established by Clement VIII, 368.
Constance, general council of, how characterized by Baptista, one
of its own members, 199 conflicting opinions on its ecumenicity,
134 proceedings of, 232 profligacy of, 573.
Constans, Emperor, issues the Type or Formulary, 345 design
of, ib.
Constantine, Emperor, confers the appellation of God on the Pope,
158 gives legal security to the temporal possessions of the
Christian republic, 212-13 the patron of iconoclasm, 147
supremacy bestowed on him by Gregory and others, 174.
Constantius adopts Arianism, 146.
Consubstantiality, of the Son, declared by the council of Nice, 298
-when the word first came into use, ib.
Consubstantiation, absurdity of, deformed for some time Lutheran-
ism, 29 and this opinion the Saxon Reformer retained with
obstinacy during his whole life, ib.
Continence, difficulty of, and instances of remedies pursued to
preserve it, 535.
Convulsionarianism, frightful displays of, 41, 42.
Convulsionaries, Popish fanatics, who pretended to extraordinary
visitations of the Spirit, 41.
Corporeal presence, jarring of the advocates of, 416 light in which
it has been viewed by different denominations, 421.
Cossa, (Balthasar) see John XXIII.
INDEX. 583
Councils : those of Nice, Ephesus, Chalcedon, and Constantinople,
promulgated the principles of Protestantism, 48 general, in
ecclesiastical history as uncertain as the Roman pontiffs, 123 six,
marked now with the seal of approbation and infallibility, were
for a long series of time in whole or in part rejected by a part or
by the whole of Christendom, 124 these -are 1 , the second, third,
fourth, fifth, seventh, and twelfth, ib. variations in the reception
of, 123-131 and in their universality, 138 sq. difference
respecting their legality, 141 sq. presidency of> 142 ?a variety
of opinions entertained with respect to the persons who should
form a general council, 143: also respecting the manner of syn-
odal decision, 144 want of unanimity in councils, 144, 145 and
of freedom in, 145, 151-r-persecuting councils, 251 sq. councils
opposed to councils, 363 profligacy of, 573 See also Ariminum,
Basil, Cologne, Constance, Lateran, Lyons, Pisa, Seleucia, Trent,
Tyrian, Vienna.
Creeds : the Apostolic, Nicene, and Athanasian, generally received
in Christendom, 47.
Crescentius, instigated by Boniface VII., strangles Benedict VI.,
and places Boniface in the Papal chair, 110.
Cross, the, supreme worship to be ascribed to, 459 observation on,
460 the agent of miracles, 468.
Crucifixion : two instances of, in order to exhibit a lively image of
the Saviour's passion, 42.
Crusade against the Albigenses, 255.
Cup, sacramental, use of, to all, enjoined by the Scriptural expres-
sions, 427 restricted to the priesthood by the Popish interpreta-
tion, ib. refused by the Manicheans, 430 enjoined by Leo,
Gelasius, and Urban, 430, 1 and by Pascal, 432.
Cursing, specimens of the Pontifical art of, 84.
Cyprian, supremacy bestowed on him by Gregory, and others, 174.
D
Damian, (Cardinal) introduces .the practice of self-flagellation, 37.
Dead, prayer for the, remarks on, 511.
Decretals, false, publication of, about the year 800, aided the
usurpation of the papal hierarchy, 178 this fabrication displays
in a strong light the variations of Romanism, ib. countenanced
by the sovereign pontiffs* ib. its genuineness and authenticity
generally admitted from the ninth century till the Reformation,
ib. rlist of authors who have admitted its forgery, ib.
Definitions, pontifical as well as synodal, have been misunderstood
and subjected to contradictory interpretations, 208.
Deivirilian operation, what, 339.
Demi-Eutychians, who so denominated, 62.
Dens, Dr. his system of theology fraught with the most revolting
principles of persecution, 274 its Catholicism and morality
acknowledged, in whole, and in part, by the Popish clergy and
people, 275 unanimously agreed by the Popish prelacy to be the
best work and safest guide for the Irish clergy, ib. remarks
on, 541.
584 INDEX.
Deposition of Kings : difference of opinion respecting the Pope's
power of, 210 deposition of continental sovereigns, 211 made
an article of faith, 228.
Diamper, synod of: its statement of the distinctions which discrimi-
nated Syrianism from Popery, 64, 65 invalidates the oaths taken
by the Indian Christians, 285.
Dionysius, Bishop of Corinth, decisive testimony of, to the marriage
of the priesthood in his day, 530.
Dioscorus, patriarch of Alexandria, presides in the Ephesian
council, 316 his cruelty to Flavian, 318 excommunicates Leo,
320 is anathematized by him, ib. a few of his practical foibles,
325. ,
Disciplinarian variety: exists among the Romish as well as the
Reformed, 34 instances of, ib.
Disjunctive in Greek often equivalent to the copulative, 429
instances of, 430.
Dissensions, ecclesiastical, 309.
Dissimilarity of the SON maintained by the Arians, 299.
Domesticism or Sunisactanism, recourse had to by many of the
clergy, 553.
Dominic of the iron cuirass, the great patron and example of self-
flagellation, 38 makes several improvements in it, ib.
Dominic, inventor of the Inquisition, 258 well qualified for his
office of Inquisitor-General, ib. proofs of his inhumanity, 259.
Dominicans, their dispute with the Jesuits, 368.
Drithelm, story of as related by Bede and Beilarmine, 493.
Duelling, decree of the Council of Trent against, 233.
Dulia, or inferior honor and veneration, to be paid to the statues of
saints and martyrs, 459. '
Du Pin, Dr., proposes to Dr. Wake to omit the word Transubstan-
tiation, and profess a real change of the bread and wine into the
Lord's body and blood, 32.
Dunstan, St. his reported contests with the Devil, 40.
Dutch or Belgic Confession, written in French in 1561 and in Dutch
and Latin in 1581, confirmed in a national Synod 1579, 27.
E
Ecclesiastical dissensions, 309.
Ecthesis or Exposition of Faith, publication of by Heraclius, 343
rejects Arianism, Nestorianism, and Eutychianism, ib. teaches
the unity of the Mediator's will, ib. and interdicts all controversy
on the operations, ib. received, by the oriental patriarchs and
prelacy, ib. in what it differed from the Type issued by
Constans, 345.
Edgar, king of England, his portrait of the British clergy, 567.
Edmond, Archbishop of Canterbury, his curious treatment of a
Parisian lady, who solicited him to unchastity, 39.
Edward the Confessor, absolved by a Roman Council from a
vow which he had made to visit Rome and the tombs of the
apostles, 284.
INDEX. 585
Election,. controversy on, little agitated till the sixteenth century,
365- unconditional, advocated by the Rhemists, 366.
Electoral Variations as to the Pontifical succession, 74.
Elements, sacramental, accounted signs, figures, and emblems, 396
398 retain their own nature and substance, 398 nourish the
human body, 399.
Elizabeth, Queen, deposed by Pius the Fourth, 225 oath of
allegiance to her annulled by Pius the Fourth, 284.
English Confession, edited in the Synod of London in 15.62, and
printed by the authority of Queen Elizabeth in 1571, 27.
Enus, story of, as told by Matthew Paris, 494.
Ephesian council, in 449, reverses the Byzantine decree concerning
Eutychianism, 316 what this synod has been denominated, ib.
validity of, 319.
Epiphanius, remarks on his character as ail historian and logician,
546 blunder of, on the subject of matrimony, 547 -his silly
address to the Virgin Mary, ib.
Episcopacy : in its proper sense, incompatible with the apostleship,
70 a bishop's authority being limited to a city or nation, but an
apostle's commission extending to the whole world, ib.
Erasmus, (Des.) his opinion of transubstantiation, 406 of half-
communion, 432.
Eugenius, see Condalmerio.
Eusebius of Dorylaeum, arraigns Eutyches for heresy, 315 anathe-
matized by the council of Ephesus, 316.
Eutyches, superior of a Byzantine convent, his faith, 312 originator,
of Eutychianism, ib. how characterized by Leo and Petavius,
ib. declared guilty of heresy and blasphemy by a council at
Constantinople, 315 pronounced orthodox, and reinstated by the
Ephesian synod, 317.
Eutychianism, a verbal heresy, 313 its prior existence, 314
denominated monophysitism, ib. see Monophysitism.
Exposition of Faith, see Ecthesis.
Extreme unction, not a sacrament, 64 variations on its effects, 441
a variation from Scriptural unction, 443 and from tradition, as
well as from Revelation, 451 traditional evidence for, 452
history of, 455.
F
Faith, confessions of, 25, &c. act of, convicted, sentenced to, by
the Inquisition, 261 violation of, 277 taught by Romish
Doctors, 278, &c. by popes, 280' by councils, 284.
Faithlessness, one of the filthy elements of Romish superstition, 277.
Fanny, Sister, account of her crucifixion, 42.
Fathers : who have been denominated, 46 their errors and. igno-
rance have been acknowledged by Erasmus and Du Pin, 47
post-Nicene may be consigned to the Vatican, to rot with the
lumber of a thousand years, ib. ante-Nicene exhibit a view of
Protestantism in all its prominent traits, ib.
" Feed my sheep : " torture by Bellarmine and others of the
admonition, 169.
58,6 INDEX.
Felicite, Sister, suffers crucifixion for the sake of exhibiting a living
image of the Saviour's passion, 42.
Felix, Pope, elected by the Arian faction in the room of Liberius,
74 at length overthrown, retires to his estate at Ponto and dies,
75- canonized and worshipped, ib.
Flagellation, called by Baronius " a laudable usage," 36 recom-
mended also by the Roman Breviary and various Pontiffs, 37
adopted by the monks in the time of the crusades, ib. not
peculiar to men and women, but, it seems, Satan himself enjoyed
his share of the amusement, 40 names of those who have used
it, 37, sq.
Flavian, patriarch of Constantinople, condemned and assassinated
for his monophysitism, 318.
Florence, council of, rejected by the French, 130.
Formosus,in 893 gains the Pontifical throne by bribery, 78 guilty
of perjury, ib.
Formulary, see Type.
Fornication, clerical fornication preferred to matrimony, 559
practised by pontiffs, councils, and clergy, 569-574.
Fortunatian constrains Liberius to the subscription of heresy, 303.
Frances, Sister, curious comedy enacted by her of burning the
gown off her back, 42.
Francis, St. plan adopted by, to preserve continence, 535.
Francis I. King of France, enacts laws against the French Protest-
ants, and causes many Lutherans to suffer martyrdom, he himself
being present at the execution, 267.
Francis II. King of France, absolved by Clement VII. from a treaty
which he had formed in Spain, 286.
Francisca, St. uses frequent self-flagellation, 37.
Francon, see Boniface VII.
Frankfort, council of, exhibited a representation of the western
clergy from England, Italy, France, and Germany, 128.
Frederic III., Elector Palatine, issues a formulary in 1576, 26.
Free-will, controversy on, little agitated from the ninth till the six-
teenth century, 365.
French clergy, profligacy of, 571.
French confession of faith, drawn up at Paris in 1559, 27 -per-
sented by Beza to Charles IX. ib.
Friar Matthew, his adventure, 39.
Fullo, Patriarch of Antioch, impiety of, 329 maintains the Euty-
chian theory, ib,- adds a supplement to the Trisagion, or sacred
hymn, ib. banished by Zeno, but again restored to his patriarch-
ate, 330 how denominated by Felix, 331.
G
Gage (Thos.) author of the Survey, what proselyted him from
Romanism, 424.
Gelasius, Pope, enacts that the sacrament should be celebrated in
both kinds, 431 observation of, on the Manicheans, 430.
Geneve (Robt.de) see Clement XI.
Geoffrey of Monmouth, allusion to his story of the Trojan Brutus, 72.
INDEX. 587
German clergy, profligacy of, 569.
God : supposed equality of the Pope with, 157 his works as well as
name ascribed to the pope, 159 alleged superiority of the pope
to, ., 159-169 his omnipotence had recourse to by the patrons of
transubstantiation, 419. :
Godric, an English hermit, remedy of, to preserve continence, 535.
Gottescalcus, a monk distinguished for his learning, maintains the
system of predestination, and particular redemption, and of
election and reprobation, 362 is opposed by Raban (which see)
363 is tried in the council of -Mentz, and condemned for heresy,
ib. is next tried in the council of Quiercy and convicted of con-
tumacy and heresy, ib. is deposed, scourged and thrown into
prison, 364.
Grace, controversy on, little agitated from the ninth to the sixteenth
century, 365.
Gratian (John) see Gregory VI. .
Great Western Schism, began in 1378, and continued for half a
century, 81-93.
Greek Church : its religion that of European and Asiatic Russia,
58 does not agree in all things with modern Protestants, ib.
as it continued longest in conjunction with the Latin, so it has
imbibed most corruption, ib. -opposes, however, Papal usurpa-
tion, denies the. Romish to be the true church, and condemns the
dogmas of purgatory, supererogation, half-communion, human
merit, clerical celibacy, prayers for the dead, and restricting the*
circulation of the Bible, 58-59.
Greeks, their dispute with the Latins on monothelitism, 343, sqq.
Gregory II. [Marcel] pope, 715, introduces dissension between
Roman emperoi's and Roman pontiffs, 186 authorizes bigamy,
521 errors of, in making David bring the brazen serpent and
the holy ark into the Jewish temple, 425 and representing Ozias
as the breaker of the brazen serpent, ib.
Gregory, VI. (John Gratian) (1045) purchases the papacy from
Benedict, Silvester and John, 80.
Gregory VII. [Hildebrandj 1073, obtains the papacy by force and
bribery, 111 his character, ib. prescribes a form of belief on
the subject of transubstantiation, 31 subjected not only the
church, but the state, and monopolized both civil and ecclesiasti-
cal power, 155 the first who attempted the degradation of civil
potentates, 217 his description of monarchy, ib. asserts his
authority to dissolve the oath of fealty, 280 absolves all Chris-
tians from their oath to the Emperor Henry, 284- succeeds to a
great extent in the suppi'ession of priestly marriage, 557 openly
accused of fornication, adultery and incest, 532 his opinion on
the site of purgatory, 492.
Gregory IX. [Hugolin] pope, 1227, declares that none should keep
faith with the person who opposed God and the saints, 281^
absolves from their oath all who had sworn fealty to Frederic, the
Roman emperor, 285.
Gregory XL [Peter Roger] pope, 1370, restores the pagal court to
Rome, after its having been continued at Avignon for seventy
years, 81.
588 INDEX.
Gregory Nazianzen, remark of, on the' contentions of the elergy in
synods, 310 resigns and retires through an aversion to the alter-
cations of the ecclesiastics, ib.
Guido, a Dominican persecutor, wrote in the Tolosan Chronicle, 51
Guise, Duke of, massacre on St. Bartholomew's day entrusted to
him, 270.
H
Haedio, accompanies Zuinglius to the conference at Marpurg, 29.
Half-Communion, see Communion in one kind.
Hedwig, Duchess of Silesia and Great Poland, uses self-flagellation
to an unusual degree, 38.
Helvetian Confession, issued in 1536 at Basil, 26 this enlarged and
improved again published in 1566, 27.
Henoticon, or edict of union, published by Zeno, 334 its design to
conciliate the partisans of Monophysitism and Catholicism, ib.
subject of it, ib. augments the evil it was designed to remedy,
335 treatment it met with, ib. differences of opinion as to its
orthodoxy, ib.
Henricians, held nearly the same dogmas as the Calvinists, 55.
Henry II. King of England, despatches messengers to Adrian IV.
requesting his permission to invade Ireland, which is transferred
to him, 222 his persecution of the Waldenses, 249.
Henry II. King of France, indulges his taste in viewing the expiring
struggles of his heretical subjects in the pangs of dissolution, 268.
Henry VIII. King of England, withdraws from the papal jurisdic-
tion, 224 is excommunicated and deposed, &c. by Paul the
Third, ib.
Heraclius, publishes the Ecthesis or Exposition of Faith, 343.
Heresy, persecution of, 245.
Higgins, Dr. his assertion in the Maynooth examination, that no
pontiff defined for the belief of the faithful, that the pontifical
power of dethroning kings was founded on divine light, 227.
Hilary, remark of, on the variety of confessions among the Roman-
ists, 310 the severest satirist in this age on the variations of
popery, ib.
Hildebrand, see Gregory VII.
Hincmar, a French bishop, advocates in 865 the canons of Nicea
and Sardica, and explodes the novelty of the decretals, ISO.
Hugolin, see Gregory IX.
Holy Ghost, sin against, observations on, 500.
Honorius patronized Arianism, Pelagianism, and Monothelitism, 102.
Host, the, pretended miracles respecting, 417.
Huss, John, summoned to the city of Constance on a charge of
heresy, 288 his safety and return guaranteed by the Emperor
Sigismund, ib. was tried, however, condemned and burnt, ib.
his magnanimity, ib.
Hyperdulia, or intermediate worship, 459.
I
Iconolatrians, a faction of the Greeks, devoted to the use of images,
INDEX. 589
Iconoclasm, edict in favour of, issued in 726, 216.
Iconoclasts, a faction of the Greeks, 481.
Images, not to be venerated, 65 introduction of, into the church,
470.
Image-worship, three systems j 457 one allows the use of images,
but rejects their worship, ib. the second honour images with
inferior worship, 458 the third prefer the sanie adoration to the
representation as to the represented, 459 different systems of
image-worship, 460 image-worship a variation from scriptural
authority, and from Jewish and Christian antiquity, 461 also
from ecclesiastical antiquity, 466 pretended mii'aculous proofs
of, ib. progress of, 471-2 opposed by the Emperor Leo, 474
condemned by the Byzantine council, 476 patronized by Irene,
478 variations in the East on, 486.
Incest, committal of, by the Romish priests, 556.
In Ccena, bull of, issued by Paul V. in 1567, subject of, 234.
Incomprehensibility to be distinguished from impossibility, 419.
India, from time immemorial contained a chui;ch which was un-
known to the rest of Christendom, 66 and which held the same
theology that was promulgated by Luther and Calvin, ib.
Indian, parallel between and Christian, 421.
Infallibility : impossibility of, 197- moral impossibility of, 207
ecclesiastical, absurdity of, 195 pontifical, its object, 189 its
form, 190 its' uncertainty, 191 pontifical and synodal, 193
absurdity of, 195 -infallibility would require a continued miracle
and personal inspiration, 209.
Innocent I. pope, (402) first sent a missionary expedition against the
Albigenses, 255.
Innocent III. [Card. Lothairej pope, 1198, discovered the popedom
in the book of Genesis, 171 according to him, the firmament
mentioned by the Jewish legislator signifies the church, ib. and
the greater light denotes the pontifical authority, the less, repre-
sents the royal power, ib. seems to outrival Gregory in usurpa-
tion and tyranny, 186 obtains the three great objects of his
pursuit, sacerdotal sovereignty, regal monarchy, and dominion
over kings, ib. divests King John of England, 223 proclaims a
crusade against the Albigenses, 256.
Innocent IV. pope, 1243, his treatment of the Albigenses, 248.
Innocent X., [Card. Panfili] pope, 1644, declares that the' Roman
pontiff could invalidate civil contracts or oaths . made by the
friends of Catholicism with the patrons of heresy, 281.
Innocent XI. [Bened. Odescalchi] pope, 1676, patronizes the parti-
zans of Jansenism, 373 retracts the decisions of former pontiffs
and displays the variations of Romanism, ib.
Inquisition, who the inventor of, 258 where first established, 260
admitted all kinds of evidence, ib. cruelties of, 261 driven
out of many kingdoms, 262 encouraged by the Romish 'clergy,
ib. evidences the deepest 'malignity of human nature, ib.
accounted by PaulIV. the sheet-anchor of the papacy, 265.
Inquisitor, contrast between, and the Messiah, 240.
Induction, a mutilation of the sacrament, of what it consisted, 434.
590 INDEX.
Intolerance, a manifest innovation on the usage of antiquity, and
one of the variations of Romanism, 240.
Irenaeus, attacks the errors of his day, ,33.
Irene, Empress, jurisdiction of the whole ecclesiastical community
ascribed to her by Paulus, the Byzantine patriarch, 175 her
cruelty and character, 478.
Ireland : maintains its independency on the Pope still longer than
England, 182 rejects the papal supremacy, and indeed all
foreign domination, till the end of the twelfth century, ib. was
for many ages a school of learning for the European nations, ib.
but the Danish army invading her} darkness literary and moral
succeeded and prepared the way for Romanism, ib. transferred
by Adrian IV. to Henry II., 221.
Italian Clergy, profligacy of, 571.
J
Jacob, different interpretations of his worshipping God, as men-
tioned in Heb. xi. 26, 463, &c.
Jacob or Zanzal, the restorer of the denomination called Jacobites,
313.
Jacobites or Monophysites, diffused through Syria, Mesopotamia,
Armenia, Egypt, Nubia, and Abyssinia, 60 reject supremacy,
purgatory, transubstantiation, half-communion, auricular confes-
sion, extreme unction, the Latin Liturgy, and the seven sacraments,
61 do not confound the godhead and manhood of the Soil, ib.,
313 whence denominated, 312. .
James I. oath of allegiance to, papal bull against, 235.
Jansenists, their dispute with the Jesuits, 369 effects of their
controversy, 379.
Jansenius, publishes his work, styled " Augustine," 369.
Jerome, trepanned by the mockery of a safe conduct, goes to Con-
stance for the purpose of supporting John Huss, and is, like him,
burnt, 288 his heroism, 289. " '
Jesuits, in general would extend infallibility both to questions of
right and of fact, 189 defend Molina's ' Middle Science,' 367
their controversy with the Dominicans, 368 and with the Jan-
senists, 369-371 sink into disrepute and are expelled from the
French kingdom for dishonesty in trade and immorality, 379.
Jesus Christ, in the theology of Christian antiquity united in one
person, both deity and humanity, 311 difference of opinion
respecting his natures, 312 see also, Son of God.
Joan, Pope, her reign circulated without contradiction till the era
of the Reformation, 73.
Joanna, Queen of Naples : deposed by Urban, 82 betrayed and
murdered by Charles, King of Naples, and Urban, 85.
John XII. (Octavian) pope, 955 surpasses all his predecessors in
crime, 109 is deposed by the Roman council, but afterwards
regains the Holy See, ib. being caught in adultery, is killed, ib.
John XIV., Pope "(984) succeeds Boniface VII. on the expulsion
of the latter, 111 is, however, imprisoned by Boniface, who had
INDEX. 591
regained the papal chair, and dies of starvation in the castle of
Angelo, ib. his body exposed at the castle gate, ib.
John XXII. Pope, (1316) distinguished for patronising heresy, 105
- denied the admission of disembodied souls into the beatific
vision of God during their intermediate state between death and
the resurrection, ib. his belief concerning the spirits of the just,
ib. sends a mission to the Parisian faculty to effect their prose-
lytism to his system, 106.
John XXIII. Balthasar Cossa, Pope, 1410, exceeds all his prede-
cessors in enormity, 114 atrocity of his life ascertained, and
published by the general Council of Constance after a tedious
trial, ib. his character, 114, 115.
John, king of England, divested of his kingdom by Innocent the
Third, 223 excommunicated, ib. submits to the pontiff, and
delivers up his crown to Pandolph, the Pope's nuncio, 224.
Jonas, Justus, accompanies Luther to the conference at Marpurg, 29.
Juliana, St. her contest with Satan, 40.
Julius II. (1503) succeeds Alexander VI. in the papacy and in
iniquity, 119 his character, ib. grants a pardon of all sins to
any person, who would murder an individual of the French
nation, ib.
K
Keys: donation of the, mentioned by St. Matthew, adduced by
some writers in proof of the supremacy, a topic of diversified
opinion among the friends of Romanism, 168 the ancients
however, and many learned moderns in the Romish communion,
ascribe the reception of the keys to the universal church, ib.
Kings, deposition of by popes, 210 sanctioned by eight Roman
Councils, 229 dethronement of taught by the popes, 227 made
an article of faith, 229.
Koran, the, Mohammed assisted in the composition of, by an apos-
tatized Christian and a temporizing Jew, 516.
L
Languedoc, devastation of, by the holy warriors, 257.
Lateran, fourth council of, enacted formal regulations for the
dethronement of refractory kings, 229 surpassed all its prede-
cessors in severity, 251 freed the subjects of such' sovereigns as
embraced heresy from their fealty, 286 twelfth general council
has, in latter days, occasioned a wonderful diversity of opinion,
128 its canons whence extracted, 129 fifth council of, dis-
claimed by the French, 130.
Latins,, their dispute with the Greeks on Monothelitism and the
Exposition of Heraclius, 343.
Latria, or supreme adoration, 458 to whom due, according to the
schoolmen, 459.
Lavaur, storming and taking of, in 1211, horrors attending, 257.
Lenzuoli, see Alexander VI.
Leo IX. (Branon) pope, 1049, represents the church as built on the
rock, which is Emmanuel, as well as on Peter or Cephas, 168.
592 INDEX.
Leo X. ( John de Medici) 1513, pope^ succeeds Julius II. in the
papacy, and in enormity, 119 orders all to shun Luther and his
adherents, 265.
Liberius, pope, 352 opposes Arianism for a time, 74 banished by
the Emperor Constantius, ib. signs the Arian creed, and is
recalled from banishment, ib. proofs of his Arianism, 302.
Linus : represented by Eusebius, Irenaeus, Ruffirius, &c. as the first
Roman bishop, who exercised the Roman prelacy, 70 -at the
present day, however, accounted by Greeks and Latins the second
pontiif, 73.
Literature, diffusion of, change effected by, 273.
Liturgies, ancient, different forms of prayers contained in them, 513.
Lord's Supper, elements accounted signs, figures, and emblems.
396-7 retain their own nature and substance, 398 nourish the
human body, 399.
Lothaire, Cardinal, see Innocent III. *
Louvain, university of, a beautiful specimen of its Jesuitism, 274.
Lucius III. fulminates anathemas against the Waldenses, 248.
Luther, Martin, his pertinacity on the subject of consubstantiation
awakened a series of noisy, useless disputation, 29 his hostility
to Zuinglianism often overrated, ib. his answer to Henry the
Eighth, 475.
Lutherans : renounce the absurdity of consubstantiation, 30 and
unite with the Calvinists, ib. conference between them and the
Zuinglians in 1559, at Marpurg, 29.
Lyons, general council of, pronounced sentence of deposition
against Frederic the Second, 229 absolves his vassals from their
oath of fealty, 286 this council rejected by the French, 129
profligacy of, 571.
M
Macarius, patriarch of Antioch, expelled from the sixth general
council of "Constantinople, as a monothelite, 348.
Maccabees, book of, uncanonical, and deficient in morality, 511
observations on, 512.
Macgeoghegan (Mr.) his opinion of the Bull of Adrian the Fourth,
transferring Ireland to Henry the Second, 222.
Mahomet, see Mohammed.
Manducation of the sacramental elements, 421.
Manicheans, the first who practised half-communion, 430 expelled
by Leo the First, 431 observation of Pope Gelasius on them, ib.
Manna, in the wilderness, said by the Romanist divines, in a general
congregation at Trent, to prefigure the sacramental bread, 426.
Marcel, see Gregory II.
Margaret, daughter to the king of Hungary, uses self-flagellation, 39.
Mariana, John, eulogizes persecutions and the inquisition, 263 his
delineation of the moral traits of the 14th and 15th centuries, 203.
Marozia, mistress to Sergius III. with her mother Theodora,
assumes in a great measure the whole administration of the
church, 109.
Marpurg : conference in 1529, between the Lutherans and Zuing-
lians at, 29.
INDEX. 593
'Marriage, its influence on_ mankind, 542.-^See also Matrimony.
Mary, Sister, suffers crucifixion, but wanting faith or fortitude, is
taken down in less than an hour, 42.
Mary, Queen of England, professes her resolution to support
Catholicism, and to eradicate error and heresy, 272 her death
the only favor she ever conferred on her unfortunate and perse-
cuted subjects, 273.
Mary, Virgin, absurd eulogies of, 547 invocation, intercession, and
holy-days of, proscribed by Constantine, 478 images of, adorned
the altar, and edified the faithful, 467.
Mass, mummery of the, a ludicrous spectacle, 434.
Materialism, hateful and degrading doctrine of, patronized by the
councils of Nice, Vienna, and the Lateran, 200.
Matrimony, no sacrament, 65- among .the Israelitish clergy
amounted in one sense, to a command, 528 examples and pre-
cepts in favor of, left by the apostles, 529 vituperation of, by
popish doctors, 539.
Matthew, Friar, his adventure with a young nymph, 39.
Meaux, bishop of, see Bossuet, ( J. B.)
Medici, (Catharine de) plans the massacre of St. Bartholomew's
day, 270.
Medici, (John de) see Leo X.
Medici, (J. A. de) see Pius IV.
Melancthon accompanies Luther to the conference at Marpurg, 29.
Melun, synod of, for what purpose convened, 145.
Merindol, massacre of, executed by the president Oppeda, 268.
" Middle Science," a theoiy by which Molina attempted to reconcile
divine grace and free-will, 367.
Miletius, supremacy bestowed on him by Gregory and others, 174.
Militia of Jesus, who so called, 258 called also the militia of
Dominic, the warriors of the captain of salvation, in Italy the
knights of the inquisition, and in Spain the familiars of the holy
office, ib.
Milennium, exploded both by the Romish and reformed, 47.
Mind, actions of the, signified by those of the body, in scripture, 387.
Mingrelians, belong to the Greek church, and appear to disbelieve
ti-ansubstantiation, 59.
Miracles, pretended, to support transubstantiation, 416.
Mirandula, his picture of the immorality of the Romish church, 204.
Missions for the purpose of proselytism, supported on an extensive
scale by the Roman pontiff, 179.
Mohammed, assisted in the composition of the Koran, it is believed,
by an apostatized Christian and a temporizing Jew, 516.
Molina, (John) publishes his ' Concord of Grace and Free-Will,'
367 attempts to reconcile divine grace and free-will by ' the
Middle Science,' ib.
' Molinism, its Catholicism, &c. vouched for by the university of
Alcala, 387 proscribed by the university of Salamanca, ib.
Molinos, (John) see Molina.
Monasteries, how characterized by the council of Cologne, o"69.
594 INDEX.
Monks, absurd demonstration that they are angels, and therefore
proper ministers of the gospel, 44 suppression, of 477.
Monophysites, or Jacobites, divided into Asiatics and Africans, and
diffused through Syria, Mesopotamia, Armenia, Egypt, Nubia,
and Abyssinia, 60 their doctrines, 61.
Monophysitism, no novelty, 314 only a nominal or verbal heresy,
ib. its prior existence, ib. condemned by the Byzantine council,
315 approved by the Ephesian council, 316 three creeds on
the subject of, passed by the council of Chalcedon, 322 state of,
after the council of Chalcedon, 327.
Monothelitism, ascribed only one will and one operation to the Son
of God, 339 its author, ib. its general reception, 340 sup-
ported by the Roman emperor, and by the Antiochian, Alexan-
drian, Byzantine, and Roman patriarchs, ib. et sq. its degradation
from Catholicism to heresy, 343 its second triumph, 347 synodal
decision against it by the sixth general council of Constantinople,
ib. its total overthrow, 351 its temporary revival, ib. its
universal extinction, 353.
Montanism, rivals the fanaticism of Swedenborgianism, 34.
Montfort, Earl of, army against the Albigenses led by, 256 his
character, ib.
Moral variations of the popedom, 107.
Mussulmen adopted the idea of purgatorian punishment, in all pro-
bability, from the popish and Jewish systems, 516.
Mythology, Egyptian, Grecian, Roman, and Scandinavian exhibit
some faint traces of the Trinity, 296.
N
Nativity, Sister, Revelations of, recommended by Rayment, Hodson,
Bruning, and Milner, 36 her visions, ib self-flagellation the
amusement of her leisure hours, ib.
Nestorians : overspread Asiatic Turkey, Arabia, Persia, Tartary,
India, and China, 60 their churches represented by Cosmas as
infinite or unnumbered, ib. said to divide the person of the Son,
but this controversy a mere dispute about words, 62.
Nestorius, accused of denying our Lord's humanity, and of renew-
ing the errors of Gnosticism and Apollinarianism, 312.
New Jerusalem, its foundations, the names of the twelve apostles,
167.
Nicaea, council of, the first general council, thie most celebrated
congress of antiquity, 298 assembled to settle the Trinitarian
controversy, ib. proceedings of the second, 47980 condemned
at Frankfort, 483 decree of the Parisian council respecting,
484-5.
Nicea, canons of, advocated by Hincmar, the celebrated French
bishop, ISO.
Nicene Creed : its general reception in Christendom, 47.
Nicholas I. pope, 858, his annoyance respecting the Chalcedonian
canon relative to appeal, 176 his curious explanation of it, ib.
Nicholas V. [Thomas Parentucelli or de Sarzana,] pope, 1447, suc-
ceeds Eugenius in the Papacy, 97- -denominates him the supreme
INDEX. 595
head of the church, but excommunicates Felix and all his
adherents, ib.
Nunneries, how characterized by the council of Cologne, 569.
Nuns of Port Royal refused to sign the formulary of Alexander the
Seventh, 372 treatment they received in consequence, ib.
O
Oaths, invalidation of, 277 taught and practised by popes, 280, sqq.
and by popish Councils, 284, 285, 289 pontiffs by whom the
practice of annulling oath was exemplified, 281.
Octavian, see John XII.
Odecsalchi, Benedict, see Innocent XI.
Odo, undeceives several unbelieving clergymen on the subject of
the host, 416.
CEcolampadius, accompanies Zuinglius to the conference at Mar-
purg, 29.
Omnipotence of God, recourse had to, by the patrons of the absur-
dity of transubstantiation, 419 omnipotence extends only to
possibility, and not to. inconsistency, to things above, but not
contrary to sense, ib.
Oppeda massacres the Waldenses, 268.
Orange, massacre of, horrors attending it, 269.
Origen, remarks on the ordeal of, 509 testimony of in favor of
sacerdotal celibacy, 531.
Orobio, endured the rack for Judaism, 261.
Orphic theology, Trinitarianism appears in a misshapen form in, 296.
Osca : his confession, which contains an outline of Protestantism,
still extant, 50.
Osiander, accompanies Luther to the, conference at Marpurg, 29.
Oxford, council of, condemns the Waldenses, and consigns them to
the secular arm, 249.
P
Paganism, persecution of, 243.
Palatine Confession : Frederic III., Elector Palatine, issued in 1576,
a Formulary of Faith, 26.
Pandolphus, nuncio to Adrian IV., receives the crown from King
John as a token of subjection, 224.
Panfili, Cardinal, see Innocent X.
Papacy: schisms in the 74, sqq.
Papal church guilty of general apostacy, 205 sanctions Arianism,
308.
Papal court, removal of from Avignon to Rome, 81.
Papal supremacy, four variations of, 1523 silence of tradition
concerning, 172 unknown to antiquity, 174 ascribed to other
Sees besides Rome, 175 asserted by false decretals, 178 rejec-
tion of in various countries, 179.
Papias, seems to have originated the whole story of Peter's Roman
episcopacy, 73.
Paphnutius, of Thebais, character of, and his observation on mar-
riage, 544.
596 INDEX.
Parisian council, decree of, 485.
Pascal, (Blaise) opinion of Voltaire on his " Pr vvdncial Letters," 370.
Pascal, the Second, perjury of, 120 freed from an oath by a council
of the Lateran, 285 enactments of on the administration of the
sacrament, 432.
Pascasius, the father of the deformity of transubstantiation, 405
Pascasian controversy, 406 opposed by Scotus and Bertramn,
407.
Paschal festival, controversy respecting the observing of, 180.
Paul, St. in his epistles supplies no proof of the supremacy, but on
the contrary, 170.
Paul III. issues a sentence of deposition against Henry VIII, 224
forbids all sovereigns to lend any aid to him, 284.
Paul IV. [John Peter Caraffa,] pope 1555, a model of pontifical
ambition, arrogance, haughtiness, and tyranny, 155 contemned
the authority of councils and kings, ib. his power unbounded
and above all synods, and this he called an article of faith, and the
contrary he denominated a heresy, 156 accounted the inquisition
the sheet-anchor of the papacy, and recommends it for the exter-
mination of heresy, 265 absolves himself from an oath, declaring
that the pontiff could not be bound by an oath, 281.
Paul V. pope, in 1567, issued the bull " in Ccena," 234 in 1609
issued a Bull forbidding the English attached to Romanism, to
take the oath of allegiance, 234 canonized Gregory the Sev-
enth, 235. "
Pelagia, of Antioch, escapes persecution by a voluntary death, 550
is eulogized by Ambrosius, ib.
Pelagianism patronized by Liberius, Honorius, and Zozimus, 102
design of, 354 its author and dissemination, 354, 355 patronized
by the Asians, 356 opposed by the Africans, ib. 359 condemned
by Innocent, 356 approved by Zozimus, 357 anathematized by
him, 360 approved by the Frankfordians, 359 condemned by
the Asians, 361 denounced by the general council of Ephesus,
ib. its declension, 362.
Pelagius, an Englishman, author of the heresy called Pelagianism,
accused in the synods of Jerusalem and Diospolis, 355 -acquitted
in the latter, ib. anathematized by the Carthaginian prelacy, 356.
Penance, an improved species of, 37.
Pepin, King, assists Stephen II. against Astolf, King of Lombardy,
214 crowned in 751, king of France, 216.
Perjured Pontiffs, list of 119, 122.
Perjury, seventeen of the Roman pontiffs guilty of, 119 list of
them, ib. and sqq.
Perpetua, her vision, 496.
Persecuting councils, 251.
Persecution, three periods of, first period, 239 second, 241 third,
263 chief victims of, 244 enjoined by pontiffs, as well as theo-
logians, 264 persecution of paganism, 243 of heresy, 245
persecutions in Germany, 266 in the Netherlands, 267 Spain,
ib. in France, ib. in England, 272.
Peter-pence, what they were, 222.
INDEX. ' 597
Peter, St. evidence of his visit to Rome, not historical, but tradi-
tional, 68 as not a single hint is afforded on this subject by
himself, nor by Luke,. James, Jude, Paul, or John, 65 nor is it
mentioned by the Apostolic men, Clemens, Barnabas, Hennas,
Ignatius, or Polycarp, ib. the fiction began to obtain credit about
the end of the second century, ib. Irenasus the first who recorded
it, ib. great discordancy as to the length of his episcopacy, 72
story of his episcopacy seems to have originated with Papias, 73.
Philarge, see Alexander V.
Philip II. king of Spain, kindles the fires of persecution at Vallado-
lid and Seville, and consigns the professors of Protestantism to
the flames, 267.
Philip VI. king of France, threatens to roast pope John XXII. if
he do not retract his heresy respecting disembodied souls, 107.
Philip and Mary, issued a commission for the burning of heretics, 272.
Philippicus, emperor of Constantinople, convenes a council for the
purpose of substituting Monothelitism for Catholicism, 351 com-
piles a confession, 352 is driven from his throne, ib.
Phocas, a centurion, assassinates the royal family and seizes the
throne, 184 instances of his cruelty, ib. is celebrated for his
piety and benignity by Gregory, ib. title of universal bishop
conferred by, ib.
Pinytus, Bp. of Crete, urges the necessity of abstinence from
matrimony on the clergy of his diocese, but is convinced of his
error by Dionysius, Bp. of Corinth, 530.
Pisan council, dismiss Gregory and Benedict from the papacy, and
appoint Alexander V., 89 forbid all Christians to 'obey the two
former, 232 its universality denied by some, 133 the second
council of acknowledged by the French in opposition to the fifth
of the Lateran, 135.
Pitt, William, question of, to the universities of Louvain, Salamanca,
and Valladolid, whether persecution were a principle of Roman-
ism, 274.
Pius IV. [J. A. Medici or Medichino] pope, 1559, offers to confirm
the English Book of Common Prayer, if Queen Elizabeth would
acknowledge the pontifical supremacy, and the British nation join
the Romish communion, 32 writes to her and professes an
anxiety for her eternal welfare, and the establishment of her royal
dignity, ib. his overtures for union refused by the Queen and
and nation, ib. deposes and anathematizes the Queen, 225
annuls the oath of allegiance to her, 284.
Pius VII. though in captivity, excommunicates and anathematizes
Bonaparte, 235.
Plato, taught the theory of purgatory, 515 remarks on his style,
&c. ib.
Platonic philosophy, Trinitarianism, in a mis-shapen form, appears
in, 296.
Polish Confession, formed in the General Synod of Sendomir in
1570, and recognized through Poland, Lithuania, and Samogitia, 26.
Pontiffs, perjured, list of, 119, 122 profligacy of, 571.
598 INDEX.
Pontifical Infallibility, boasted unity of pretended Catholicism has
on this, as 011 every other question diverged into a medley of
jarring opinions and contending systems, 187 its object, 189 its
form, 190 its uncertainty, 191.
Pontifical maxims, 280.
Pontifical royalty, 215.
Pontifical succession, difficulty of, whence it arises, 68 historical
variations respecting, 69, sq. electoral variations on the same
subject, 74. sq.
Pope, his presidency, 152 his sovereignty or despotism, 154 his
supposed equality with God, 157 his alleged superiority to God,
159, sq. when first raised to royalty, 214.
Popery, never embraced by more than a fifth part of Christendom,
66 : may be compared to a field of wheat, overrun with tares, 48
nothing, perhaps, presents a more striking image of than a
person labouring under a dreadful disorder, ib.
Pope, see Adrian IV. 221-2 Alexander V. 90 Alexander VI.
117-18 Alexander VII. 372 Anacletus, 70, 73 Benedict VI.
110 Benedict VII. Ill Boniface VII. 110 Boniface VIII.
113, 155 Clemens, 70 Clement, VII. 81, 284 Clement IX.
372 Clement X. 372 Clement XI. 373 Felix, 74, 76 Greg-
ory II. 215 Gregory VI. 81 Gregory VII. 217, 280, 284
Gregory IX. 281, 285 Innocent I. 255 Innocent III. 171, 186,
223, 256 Innocent IV. 248 Innocent X. 281 Innocent XI. 373
John XII. 109 John XIV. Ill John XXII. 105 John
XXIII. 114 Leo IX. 168 Leo X. 265 Liberius, 74, 302
Nicholas I. 176 Nicholas V. 97 Paul III. 224, 284 Paul IV.
155, 281 Pius IV. 32, 225, 284 Silverius, 76, 77 Silvester, 79
Sixtus IV. 116 Stephen 78, 79 Urban II. 280 Urban VI. 81,
82, 84 Vigilius, 77, 104.
Posen, synod of, compact between the Reformed of Germany;
France, &c. confirmed at, 30.
Post-Nicene Fathers, may, without regret, be consigned to the
Vatican to rust with the lumber of a thousand years, 47.
Prayers for the dead, remarks on, 510 argument from, in favor of
purgatory, refuted, 511.
Predestination, gratuitous taught by St. Augustine, 362 a fertile
source of contest among the French clergy, ib.
Priesthood, marriage of, testimonies to, 531.
Priests, profligacy of the Romish, 565.
Prignano, see Urban VI.
Prison, different interpretations of the word, as used by St. Peter,
505-6.
Proterios, patriarch of Alexandria, assassinated by the populace,
and his mangled body dragged through the city, 328-9.
Protestant Faith, antiquity of, easily shown, 46.
Protestantism, its name originated in the sixteenth century, 46 is
contained in the word of God, ib. its theology to be found in the
early fathers, ib. its principles taught in the ecclesiastical pro-
ductions of three hundred years after the Christian era, 47 a
striking image of, 48.
INDEX. 599
Protestant name, its origin, 46.
Protestant theology, contained in the word of God, 46.
Protestants > persecution of by Charles the Fifth, 266 massacre of
the French, 268.
Public women, number of, who attended the Constantine council, 199.
Purgatory, what it is in the Romish theology, 490 its situation, 491
its punishments, 492 496- destitute of scriptural authority,
497 admissions, ib. Romish arguments from Scripture refuted,
499 506 destitute of traditional authority, 507 admissions, ib.
formed" no part in the faith of Christian antiquity, 514 pagan
and Jewish purgatory, 516 Mahometan, ib. its introduction,
517 its slow progress, 519 'completed by the schoolmen, 524.
Pythagoeran philosophy, Trinitarianism appears in a mis-shapen
form, in, 263.
Quesnel, (Pasquier) remark on his " Reflections," 373 controversy
on, ib. 374, 475.
Quinsextan, or Trullan council, enjoins celibacy on bishops, but
permits the inferior clergy to marry before ordination, arid after-
ward to enjoy connubial society, 551.
R
Raban, archbishop of Mentz, opposes Gottescalcus, 363 seems to
have admitted election, but denied reprobation, ib. acknowledged
predestination to life, but not to death, ib. misrepresents his
adversary, and characterises him as a perverter of religion, and a
forger of heresy, ib.
Rachel, Sister, suffers crucifixion in order to exhibit a lively image
of the Saviour's passion, 42.
Rack, the, used by the Inquisition, 260.
Ratramnus, see Bertramn.
Recusants, a faction of the French clergy, who condemned the bull
Unigenitus, 375, 376.
Reformation, the, era and influence of, 294.
Reformers, doctrinal unity of, apparent in their confessions of
faith, 25.
Regeneration, the same substantial change communicated to men
in, as to the elements of the communion, 403.
Regulatus, a self-flagellator, 37.
Religious liberty of the first three centuries, 241.
Remission of sin, as mentioned by St. James, remark on, 448.
Revelation, its truths contained in the early fathers, 46.
Rheims, college of, remedy commended by for the extinction of
heresy, 264.
Rhemists, advocate unconditional election, 336.
" Rock," a variety of interpretations of the word, 161, sq.
Roger (Peter) see Gregory XI.
Roman ritual extends the spirit of persecution even to the dead, 266.
Romanism, its superstition forms no part of Christianity, 48 de-
forms the gospel, and counteracts its utility, ib. a striking image
600 INDEX.
of, ib. boasted unity of, displayed in the diversified councils and
confessions of the fourth century, 309.
Romish church, immorality of, 201, sq. general apostacy of, 305.
Romish priesthood, in every age the fosterer of fanaticism and
absurdity, 34 impiety, malevolence, inhumanity, &c. of, 108
profligacy of, 571.
Rospigliosi (Guil. de) see Clement XI.
S
Sacramental elements accounted signs, figures, and emblems, 397,
399 retain their own nature and substance, 398 nourish the
human body, 399 manducation of by the papist, 421.
Sacramentarian controversy, account of, 29, sq.
Salamanca, university of, proscribes Molinism, 367.
Sardica, canons of, advocated by Hincmar, the celebrated French
bishop, 180 council of declare for Athanasius and Trinitarian-
ism, 300.
Saxon confession, issued in the Synod of Wittemberg and presented
in 1551 to the council of Trent, 26.
Scandinavian mythology, some faint traces of the Trinity exhibited
in, 296.
Schism, great western schism, 81 93.
Schisms in the papacy, the second began in the reigns of Liberius
and Felix, 74 the seventh distinguished the reigns of Silverius
and Vigilius, 76 the thirteenth disgraced the papacy of Formo-
sus and Sergius, 78 the nineteenth deformed the reigns of
Benedict, Silvester, and John, 79 the twenty-ninth troubled the
reigns of Urban, Boniface, Innocent, Gregory, Clement, and
Benedict, 81 the thirtieth troubled the reigns of Eugenius and
Felix, 93.
Schoolmen, their nonsense and hair-breadth distinctions on transub-
stantiation, 415 purgatory, where placed by, 491.
Scientia Media, see Middle Science.
Scottish confession, composed by Knox in 1560, and ratified by
Parliament, 27 this however sunk into neglect on the appearance
of a formulary compiled at Westminster, which was ratified by
the Scottish Parliament in 1649 and 1690, ib.
Scotus (Duns) severely treated by the Valentinians, 364 his
production on election a distinguished specimen of folly and
extravagance, ib. opposes Pascasius, 407.
Sectarianism, its prevalence since the rise of Protestantism, 33.
Seleucia, council of, its meeting in the year 359, p. 309 how char-
acterized by Gregory Nazianzen, ib. its proceedings, ib.
Self-flagellation, by whom introduced and practised, 37.
Semi-Arians, assert the similarity of the Son, 299 dispute with the
Arians, ib.
Sendomir, formal ecclesiastical union between the reformed of
Germany, France, &c. effected at, in 1570, p. 30.
Sergius, opposes Formosus in the papacy, but is expelled, 78.
Sigismund, emperor, guarantees a safe-conduct to Huss, 288 but
notwithstanding, consigns him to the duke of Bavaria, 290
remarks on this breach of faith, ib. see Huss.
INDEX. 601
Sign, changing of, does not change the signification, 46 instance
of, ib.
Silverius, pope, elected in 536 by simony, 76 is soon supplanted by
Vigilius by similar means, ib. accused by false witnesses of a
design to betray the city, 77 is banished to Palmaria, where he
dies, ib.
Silvester, is substituted in the papacy for Benedict, 79 is soon
expelled, ib. re-asserts his right, and takes possession of the
Vatican, 80.
Similarity of the Son, asserted by the Semi-Arians, 299.
Simon, St. different statements as to his episcopacy, 71.
Sin, remission of, as mentioned by St. James, remark on, 448
against the Holy Ghost, observations on, 500.
Siricius, pope, his decretal addressed to Himerius, contains the first
general interdiction of clerical matrimony, 513.
Sirmians, their three forms of faith, 301.
Sixtus IV. [Francis d'Albescola della Rovere,] elected to the papacy
in 1471, his character, 116 established brothels in Rome, 117.
Slevin, Dr. his quibbling, &c. in the Maynooth examination, 227.
" So as," remarks on the phrase, 504.
Solicitation, sacerdotal and monkish, in Spain, description of, 568
so prevalent as to demand pontifical interposition, ib.
Son of God, his deity and humanity united in one person, in the
theology of Christian antiquity, 311 his divinity acknowledged
in opposition to Arianism, and his humanity in contradiction to
Gnosticism and Apollinarianism, ib. his natures confounded by
Eutyches, as his person was divided by Nestorius, 312 opinion
of the Jacobites or Monophysites, 313 controversies upon his
natures by the councils of Constantinople, Ephesus, Chalcedon,
&c. 315-338 one will and one operation ascribed to him by the
Monothelites, 339.
Sophronius, patriarch of Jerusalem, opposes Monothelitism, 342.
Sorbonriian faculty propose to modify the doctrine of transubstan-
tiation, 32.
Southcott, (Joanna) her mania eclipsed by the dreams of Beata,
Clara, and Nativity, 34.
Spain, remained free of pontifical dominion till the beginning of the
ninth century, 180.
Stephen II. applies to King Pepin for assistance against Astolf,
King of Lombardy, 214.
Stephen VI. succeeds Formosus in the papacy in 896, and commits
atrocities on his dead body, 78 rescinds his acts and declares his
ordinations irregular and invalid, ib. is immured in a dungeon,
and strangled, 79.
Stephen, Abp. of Petrarca,his declaration that Leo possessed powei
above all powers, both in heaven and in earth, 159, 160.
Stews, propriety of tolerating, advocated by Carlerius, 199.
Suction, the second step to the defalcation of the cup, in the sacra
ment, 434 its design, ib.
Suicide, approbation of, 549 suicide of virgins commended, 550.
602
INDEX.
Sunisactan women, who infested the habitations of the unmarried
clergy, canon directed against them, 544. .
Sunisactanism or domesticism, an evasion of the injunction of cleri-
cal celibacy, 553.
Superstition, nearly as old as religion, and originated in the remotest
period of time, in the darkness and profanity of the antediluvian
world, 45.
Supremacy, four variations in the papal supremacy, 152, 153 si-
lence of tradition concerning, 172 unknown to antiquity, 174
ascribed to other sees, besides Rome, 175 asserted by false de-
cretals, 177 rejection of, in various countries, 179. sq.
Swedenborgianism, fanaticism of, rivalled by the extravagance of
Montus, 34.
Swiss confession, see Helvetian confession.
Switzerland, profligacy of her clergy, 570.
Symbolical worship, a variation from ecclesiastical antiquity, 466
opposed by synodal, episcopal, pontifical, and imperial authority,
471.
Symmachus excommunicates Anastasius for heresy, 328.
Syrian Church, its antiquity, 64 purity and simplicity of its theo-
logy, ib, its opposition to popery and agreement with protestant-
ism, 65.
Syrianism, its antiquity and identity with protestantism acknowledged
by Dr. Buchanan, 66.
Teresia, merits particular attention for her self-flagellation, 37 her
body, circumfused in a fragrant fluid, remains the undecayed
object of religious worship, 38.
Tertullian, the first who mentions the custom of paying for the
dead, 512.
Tetrapolitan confession, why so named, 26 compiled by Bucer
and Capito, ib. presented in 1530 to the Emperor of Germany, ib.
Text of Scripture :
OLD
TESTAMENT.
Chap,
xxvi. 23
GENESIS.
xxvii. 9
Chap,
xl. 12, 18
Page.
396
xxviii. 27
xli. 56, 27
. 396
ex. 1
LEVITICUS.
xxvi. 1 .
.
461
viii. 8
JUDGES.
viii. 10
xviii. 24
.
. 424
2 KINGS.
i. .
xviii. 4 .
.
462
liii. 3
1
CHRONICLES.
xi. 19
m ' ^
. 395
i. 13
PSALM.
JOB.
ISAIAH.
HABAKKUK.
Page.
462
. 462
462
. 499
519
. 519
402
402
206
INDEX.
603
APOCRYPHA.
Chap.
Page,
2 MACCAB.
xx. 28 .
169
Chap.
Page.
xxviii. 9
. 446
xii. 40 . .
512
xxviii. 15
. . . 72
xii. 43 \ .
. 511
ROMANS.
xii. 44 .
511
iv. 13
. .430
xiv. 41 ...
. 511
xiii. 1 .
212
xv. 33 .
512
xvi. . ,
. 69
NEW TESTAMENT.
1
CORINTHIANS.
"V
403
MATTHEW.
-A..
* * /* v^*
ii. 8, 19 . . .
169
x. 4 .
. 395, 396
v. 26 .
. 499
xi. 27 .
... 430
V. <U ....
499
xi. 28
. . . 425
v. 1.7 . . . .
. 430
xii. 27 .
. 396
viii. 14 .
529
xv. 25
; .. 499
xii. 32
. 498
2
CORINTHIANS.
xiii. 19, 37 40 .
396
xi. 5 :
. . .170
xiii. 29 ...
. 264
xii. 11
. ....... .170
xvi. 16 .
227
GALATIANS.
xvi. 18 ... 161, 163
ii. 11 .
170
xxiv. 28 . . .
465
iii. 16
.430
xxvi. 27 .
. 425
EPHESIANS.
xxvi. 28 ...
395
iv. 12 .
. . . 396
xxvi. 51 52,
. 240
COLOSSIANS.
MARK.
i. 24 .
. 396
vi. 13 ..
446,7
iv.
69
xi. 28 ...
. 430
xiv. 23 .
425
2 THESSALONTANS.
xiv. 47 ...
. 240
ii. 4 .
. 108
xvi. 15 .
169
1 TIMOTHY.
iii. 4
531
LUKE.
ix. 56 ...
. 240
2 TIMOTHY.
xii. 14 ..
212
i. 18
499
xiii. 11 . . .
. 446
iv.
. . 69
XX* &
430
TITUS.
xxii. 51 ...
. 240
iii. 2, 12
529
xxiv. 44 ...
430
iv. 3 .
. 529
xxiv. 47 . .
. 169
HEBREWS.
JOHN.
xi. 21 .
463, 464
<rt
395
xii. 14
. . . 206
XV. 1 ...
. 395
'
JAMES.
xvii. 16
212
v. 14 .
446
xviii. 10, 36
. 240
v. 14, 15
... 447
xxi. 16 .
169
1 PETER.
ACTS.
v. 2
169
i. 26. .
. 170
v. 13
/ &
vi. 16 . . .
170
REVELATIONS.
xv. 1-22 .
. 170
v. 5
395
604 INDEX.
Theondrian or Deivirilian operation, what, 339.
Theodora, Empress, friendly to Monophysitism, 76 aims to degrade
Mennas, the Byzantine Patriarch, who adhered to the Chalcedo-
nian faith, 77 and to restore Anthitnus, Theodosius and Severus
deposed for their Monophysitism, ib. applies to Silverius to
assist her, but is refused, ib. turns her attention to Vigilius, who
is bribed by her, ib. Suborns Belisarius to expel Silverius and
raise Vigilius, and succeeds, ib.
Theodora, a courtezan, raises John X. to the papacy, 109.
Theodorus, of Pharan, the author of Monothelitism, 339
Theophylactus, see Benedict IX.
Thurcal, adventure of, as related by Mattnew Paris, 494.
Tolosan Chronicle : contains an account of the processes against
the Albigensians, 50.
Torquemala, on being made Inquisitor-General, burned alive two
thousand sons of heresy, 262.
Tradition : its silence concerning the papal supremacy, 172.
Transubstantiation not accounted by the friends of popery as essent-
ial in their system, 31 instances of fluctuations on the subject,
31, 32 diversity of opinions on, 415 unscriptural, 387 not
* supported by John, ch. vi. 389, 393 nor by Matt. xxvi. 26, 28,
395 not taught by the Fathers, 401, 403 its introduction, 405
Pacasian controversy on, 407 Berengarian, 409, 414 supported
by pretended miracles, 417 absurdity of, 419, 20 its cannibal-
ism, 421, 424.
Trent : her disciplinarian canons rejected in France and in part of
Ireland, 33, 132 and even in Spain admitted only so far as con-
sistent with regal authority, 33 rejection of the council of, 131
reception of, 133 council of, patronized persecution, 265 cate-
chism of, remark on, 526 language used by, concerning the
administration of the sacrament, 433 declaration on extreme
unction, 442.
Trinitarianism, the faith of Christian antiquity, 296 and may be
discovered in the annals of gentilism and philosophy, ib. as in
the Persian, Egyptian, Grecian, Roman, and Scandinavian my-
thology, ib. and in the Orphic theology, and in the Zoorastrian,
Pythagorean, and Platonic philosophy, ib.
Trullan, or Quinsextan council, its canon on matrimony, 551.
Type or Formulary, issued by the Empei'or Constans, 345 purport
of, ib. in what it diifered frrm the Ecthesis, ib.
Tyrian council, pronounces sentence of excommunication and ban-
ishment against Athanasius, 299.
Ulloa (Ant. de) his frightful picture of the Peruvian priesthood, 572.
Ulric, history of, and remedy adopted by him, to preserve conti-
nence, 536.
Unction, extreme not a sacrament, 65 of what it consists, 441
variations in its effects, ib. disagreement on its institution, 442
a variation from scriptural unction, 443 form of, 444 apostolic
and popish unctions differ in the persons to whom they are to be
INDEX. 605
administered, 445 and in the end or effect, 446 extreme unction
a variation from tradition, 451 traditional evidence for, 453
history of, 455.
Unigenius, observations on the bull issued by Clement XI., 208.
Universal bishop, title of, conferred by Phocas, 183.
University, Parisian, 1589, declared the French entirely freed from
tneir oath of Allegiance to their king, Henry III, 280.
" Until," in* scriptural language, what the word denotes, 500.
Urban II. [Eudes or Odo,] pope 1088, declares that subjects are by
no authority bound to observe the fealty which they swear to a
Christian prince who withstands God and the saints, and contemns
their precepts, 280 commands the separate reception of the
Lord's body and blood, 431.
Urban VI. [Bartolomo di Prignano,] pope 1378, divides Christendom
with Clement, 81 his summary treatment of seven cardinals, 83
a few specimens of his ability in the art of cursing, 84.
Usurpation of the popes, 185.
Valentinian, Emperor, enactment of a law by, forbidding monks or
ecclesiastics to accept any donation or legacy from maids, matrons,
orphans or widows, 213.
Variations as to the pontifical succession : historical, 69, sq. electo-
ral, 74.
Vienna, general council of, declared that the Emperor was bound
to the pope by an oath of fealty, 231.
Vigilius, [537] assumes the pontifical authority, through simony, 76
his character, ib. his papacy presents a scene of fluctuation
unknown in the annals of protestantism, 105 shifted his ground
six times, ib. sanctioned Eutychianism, and afterwards retracted,
ib. withstood Justinian's edict, and afterwards recanted, ib.
shielded Ibas, Theodoret, and Theodorus, and afterwards con-
firmed the general council, which condemned them for blasphemy
and heresy, ib.
Virgin Mary, absurd eulogies of, 547, etc.
Virginity, admiration of, when it began, 533 reason of this, 534
second reason for the preference of, 538.
Wake, Bp. his correspondence with Dr. Dupin on the subject of an
union between the English and French Church, 32.
Waldensianism, its theatre, Western or European Christendom, 49
its patrons, ib. its principal branches, ib. antiquity of beyond
ill question, 51 in anticipation, a system of the purest Protes-
tantism many ages before the Reformation, 53 portrait of, 54.
Waldensians, spread through nearly every country, 51, 52 their
bravery, 53 portrait of them by Alexander, 54 their confessions
show the conformity of their principles to the Reformation, 55
their morality corresponded with the purity of their faith, 53
606 INDEX.
their piety, benevolence, and holiness have extorted the appro-
bation of friend and foe, ib. notwithstanding the persecution of
Romanism, still exists, 58 persecution of them, 249.
Wido, Marquis of Tuscany, deposes and, in all probability, strangles
Pope John the Tenth, 109.
Wine, sacramental, what accounted by the Manicheans, 433 by
the Latins, ib. why curtailed by the Constantine council in the
communion of the laity, 436 intinction and suction Uvo methods
used in partaking it, 434.
Wittemberg confession, composed by Brent published in 1552, 26.
Xavier, (Francis) the Indian apostle, uses an iron whip to flagellate
himself, 37.
Zanzal, or Jacob, restorer of the demonstration called Jacobites,
Zeno, publishes the Henoticon, 334 his design in doing so, ib.
Zisca, a Bohemian general, the ablest, though blind, that ever took
the field, 437.
Zoroastrian philosophy, Trinitarianism appears in a mis-shapen form
in, 296.
Zozimus, Pelagianism at first approved by, 357 but afterwards
anathematizes Pelagius and Celestius, 360 a profound adept in
the art of cursing, 361 lived a tyrant and died a saint, ib.
Zuinglians, at the conference at Marpurg, 1529, admit the presence
of the body and blood of Jesus in the sacrament, and their recep-
tion by those who approach the communion, 31.
Zuinglians and Lutherans, conference between, at Marpurg, in
1529, 29 were agreed on all topics but the communion, ib.
but even 011 this, though a formal union was not affected, there
existed a peaceful and amiable concord, ib.
Zuinglius, appears at the conference held at Marpurg in 1529, 29.
THE END.
THE
VARIATIONS OF POPERY.
BY
BEY. SAMUEL EDGAB, D.D.
OF IRELAND.
Tot nunc fides existere, quot voluntates. et tot nobis doctrinas esse, qnot mores. Fides
scribuntnr nt volumus, aut ita, ut volumus, intelliguntar. Annuas atque menstruas, de Deo,
fldes decernimus. HILARY, 308.
Veram non esse, quod variat. JEROM, 1, 1426.
Acta priorum Pontiflcwm sequentes aut iafringerent, aut omnino tollerent PLA.T. 126.
FIRST COMPLETE AMERICA! EDITION i
REVISED, CORRECTED, AND ENLARGED BY THE AUTHOR,
EXPRESSLY FOR THE AMERICAN PUBLISHER.
REV. C. SPARRY, EDITOR.
vwwwwv
NEW YORK:
PRINTED BY B, CRAIGHEAD, FOR THE PUBLISHER,
ANB FOR SALE AT MOFFAl's BOOK STORE, 103 FULTON STREET,
NEAR THE NORTH DUTCH CHURCH.
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