The great solicitude of the Bishops of Antioch to enjoy the communion of the Apostolic See, appears from the efforts made in their behalf by St. John Chrysostom, on his elevation to the See of Constantinople. Having been priest of that Church, he charged the ambassadors whom he sent to Rome to announce his own election, to use their influence to procure a formal recognition of the actual bishop of Antioch. Ambassadors also came from Flavian himself, as Innocent I. testifies: "The Church of Antioch, which the blessed apostle Peter, before he came to the city of Rome, illustrated by his presence, as a sister of the Roman Church, did not suffer herself to be long estranged from her, for, having sent ambassadors, she sought and obtained peace."* The misunderstanding had lasted seventeen years; but it implied no difference of belief, or breach of unity. It arose from the difficulty of putting facts in their true light, and dissipating prejudices honestly entertained against individuals. It is freely admitted, that, in such circumstances, the want of direct communion with the Apostolic See may not be fatal to the claims of membership of the Catholic Church but the nature of unity and catholicity manifestly forbids us to consider as members of the Church, those who positively reject her communion.

Mr. Palmer, after having assigned unity as a mark of the Church, labors with great industry to prove that it is possible that she may be divided in respect of external communion: thus throwing down with one hand what he builds up with the other. He particularly endeavors to show, that at various times the communion between the Church of Rome and the oriental churches was actually interrupted, as after the death of St. Chrysostom, when the Roman Church, followed by all the West, refused to communicate with the oriental bishops, especially with Theophilus of Alexandria, as long as they declined to re-establish the memory of the holy Bishop of Constantinople. This, however, was not an absolute excommunication, excluding them from the pale of the Church, but a denial of the usual marks of brotherhood, in order to compel them to do justice to the memory of a persecuted prelate. When Acacius, bishop of the same see, was excommunicated by the Pope, he could no longer be a member of the Church, since Christ binds in heaven those whom His vicar binds on earth. The oriental bishops who still adhered to Acacius, violated their duty, and such of them as professed the heresy for which he was condemned, forfeited thereby the communion of the Church: but those who only indulged partisan attachment, without rejecting the faith and communion of the Pontiff, and who were not expressly separated from the Church by his act, might remain included among her members. The period of thirty-five years which elapsed before this dissension was healed, was not one of absolute interruption. The communion between the East and the West was partially suspended, rather than broken off; the Pope refusing to give tokens of his communion to the oriental prelates, as long

Ep. xxiii. Bonifacio, col. 852, t. 1. Coustant.

as the name of Acacius remained on the sacred tablets. The condition on which a reconciliation took place, was a solemn engagement on the part of John, Bishop of Constantinople, not to allow to be inscribed on the tablets of the Church, the names of any who did not in all things harmonize with the Apostolic See: "We promise," said he, writing to Pope Hormisdas, in the year 515, that "hereafter the names of such as are separated from the communion of the Catholic Church, that is, such as do not in all things harmonize with the Apostolic See, shall not be recited in the celebration of the sacred mysteries."* Thus harmony with the Holy See was declared to be identical with communion with the Catholic Church.

In the great schism between the rival claimants of the papal chair, in the fourteenth century, on which Mr. Palmer lays great stress, there was no rejection of the pontifical authority, which on the contrary all solemnly recognised, although the doubt which existed as to the fact-who was lawful Pontiff―prevented their mutual intercourse. No instance can be produced from the history of the Church to prove, that any one who openly denies the primacy of the Apostolic See, or who is solemnly excommunicated by the lawful occupant of the papal chair, can be regarded as a member of the Church: much less can it be shown that any local church, or any collection of churches, absolutely separated by their own act, or by the act of the Pontiff, from his communion, can be considered as portions of the universal Church. The unanimous teaching of the fathers demonstrates that the unity of the Church is indivisible, and that she is one, not only in each place by her local government, but throughout the world, by the compact connection of all her parts; on which account she is compared by St. Cyprian to a tree, whose branches spread all around, to a spring whose waters flow through numberless channels, and to the sun whose rays shed light abroad throughout the entire earth: "The Church is one, which, by the growth of its fruitfulness, is spread widely into a multitude as there are many rays of the sun, but one light, and many branches of a tree, but one trunk planted in the clinging root: and though from one source many rivers flow, so that there seem to be many several streams, by reason of the fulness of the abundant flood, yet is the oneness maintained in the original spring. Take off a ray from the body of the sun, the unity of light admits no division; cut off a stream from the source that which is cut off dries up; so the Church, filled throughout with the light of the Lord, spreads its rays through the whole world; yet is it only one light which is everywhere diffused; nor is the unity of the body severed: by reason of its abundant fulness it stretches its rays into all the earth, it pours widely its flowing streams, yet there is one head, and one beginning, and one mother, teeming with continual fruitfulness."†

Conc. t. ii. col. 1077.

† Cyprian de Unit. Eccl.

CHAPTER X.

Ancient Examples of Papal Authority.

? 1.-DISTURBANCES AT CORINTH.

IT is declared by St. Paul that heresies are attended with advantage, inasmuch as they serve to try men, and to distinguish the faithful and stable from the unsteady and perverse: "there must be also heresies, that they also who are approved, may be made manifest among you."* They serve, at the same time, to mark more clearly the faith of the Church, and to render it more illustrious. In like manner schisms, controversies, and scandals, in the designs of Providence, become instrumental for good, afford us a salutary warning to shun strife and crime, and lead us to respect authority.

Toward the end of the first century, before the death of St. John the apostle, violent commotions broke out at Corinth, in which the clergy suffered by the opposition of rash and misguided men. The persecutions which, about the same time, raged at Rome, prevented immediate action in the case on the part of the Church of this city; but as soon as an interval of peace was granted, an effort to restore harmony was made in the name of the Roman Church, and a letter of expostulation and advice was sent, which was so esteemed and venerated, that long afterward it was wont to be read publicly in the Church of Corinth,† and is justly valued among the most precious monuments of Christian antiquity. Messengers were despatched, charged to use every exertion to re-establish order. The terms of the letter may not satisfy a fastidious critic that superior authority was claimed by the writer, because persuasion only is used; but the judicious reader will easily understand, that where passions are excited, they can scarcely be subdued by urging abstract views of power. The interposition of a distant prelate in the internal affairs of the Corinthian Church, cannot be accounted for satisfactorily unless by reference to his universal charge, especially as the apostle John, then residing at Ephesus, was much nearer to the scene of strife, and could hope to exercise greater personal influence, besides the authority of his office. Had not Clement felt it to be his

1 Cor. xi. 19.

Dionys. cor. apud Euseb. Hist. Eecl. 1. iv. c. xxiii. This forms a difficulty in the mind of Dr. Schaff, that an apostle should be in any way subordinate to Clement, the Roman Bishop; but it is nowise incompatible with his privileges as an apostle to respect the order established by Christ for the benefit of the whole Church.

duty, he scarcely would have ventured, in such circumstances, to address the revolters. That he wrote the letter, although it bears the name of "the Church of God which is at Rome," is attested by Irenæus, a writer of the next age;* and the title is sufficiently accounted for, by the ancient custom of assembling the clergy on occasions of great importance, and acting with their advice and concurrence. The bishop and the church were identified in such acts, since, as ST. CYPRIAN remarks, "the church is the people united with the priest and the flock following its pastor; whence you should know that the bishop is in the church, and the church is in the bishop."†

22.-PASCHAL CONTROVERSY.

The second century affords us more decisive proofs of the official interference of the Bishop of Rome in the affairs of the Eastern churches. A difference of discipline in regard to the time of celebrating Easter existed, from the commencement, between the churches of Asia Minor and the Western churches. The former alleged the authority of St. John the evangelist for celebrating it on the same day as the Jews; thus changing the object of the festival, and commemorating the resurrection of our Lord, while the Jews ate of the paschal lamb. The Western churches, especially the Church of Rome, and also the Church of Alexandria, celebrated it on the Sunday following the Jewish feast; not wishing to appear to retain any thing of the abrogated ceremonial. The matter in itself was indifferent, and the various usages may have been originally sanctioned by the respective apostles, who founded the churches, since variety in discipline may be expedient, according to local circumstances. In places where the converts from Judaism formed the main body of Christians, their transition to Christianity was rendered less difficult by retaining the day of their solemnity; and thus the usages of the Asiatic churches may have had the sanction of St. John. At Rome, and wherever the churches were chiefly composed of converts from heathenism, the same delicate regard to Jewish feelings not being required, it seemed expedient to leave no occasion for supposing that any legal observance was still in force among Christians. Anicetus, who held the chair of St. Peter about the middle of the second century, endeavored to persuade Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, on occasion of his visit to Rome, to conform to the more general usage; but the venerable prelate pleaded so strongly in favor of the custom of the Asiatic churches, that Anicetus abstained from any positive prohibition, and* treated his illustrious guest with the honor which his virtues and station deserved.

*

Near the close of the same century, Victor, Bishop of Rome, resolved to procure uniformity, even by having recourse to severe measures, if necessary.

L. iii. adv. hær. c. iii.

† Ep. lxix. ad Pupianum.

The Western bishops were unanimous in desiring it, and among others, Irenæus, Bishop of Lyons, at the head of a synod in Gaul, wrote to the Asiatic churches, strongly recommending it.* A letter to the same effect was issued in the name of Victor, by a Roman synod over which he presided, exhorting the bishops of Asia to hold synods, in order to bring about the change.† At Cæsarea of Palestine a numerous Council was held, which enacted that the Paschal festival should thenceforward be celebrated on Sunday: but Polycrates, Bishop of Ephesus, with a synod in which he presided, persisted in defending the ancient usage. Victor resolved on cutting off the refractory from his communion, which so alarmed Irenæus, that he wrote to him an earnest letter of remonstrance, deprecating the loss of so many churches to Catholic unity, for an observance which had been so long tolerated, and reminding him of the wise indulgence of Anicetus, who treated Polycarp with marked distinction, notwithstanding the tenacity with which he clung to the Asiatic practice.† All these facts, which are detailed by Eusebius, are not called in question by any of the learned. It is, however, doubted whether Victor actually pronounced excommunication.

Of the justice and wisdom of the course pursued by Victor, different sentiments may be entertained: but it cannot fairly be questioned that he claimed authority over the Asiatic churches, and, at least, threatened to employ it, in the severest manner, to compel them to conform to the more general usage. The pertinacious adherence of Polycrates and other bishops to the custom of the East, may be used to show that the ancient rites of local churches should not be hastily proscribed, even by the Bishop of Rome: but it does not prove that his authority was called in question. In the letter of the synod, which maintained the usage, precedents are insisted on as justifying it; while the obvious reply is omitted, which would have been at once conclusive, had Victor no right to control the churches of the East. The holding of various local Councils by his orders, the compliance of some of them with his injunction, the plea of ancient precedent strongly urged by others, the remonstrance of Irenæus against precipitate severity, all concur to prove that the authority of Victor was universally admitted, although the justice or expediency of its exercise was questioned by some. This is all that is implied in the words of Polycrates: "I am not at all moved by the threats held out to me: for greater than I have said: 'It behoveth us to obey God, rather than men.'"§ It is plain that he considered Victor as commanding, and menacing; but under the false impression that the festival day prescribed by God to the Jews was still obligatory, he refused obedience to what he deemed an un

See letter of Irenæus, inter Ep. Rom. Pont. Coustant. col. 105. t. i.

† See letter of Polycrates to Victor, ibidem, col. 100. He states that he had summoned the bishops at his request.

L. v. Hist. Eccl. c. xxiii. xxiv.

? Vide inter Rom. Pontif. epist. studio Petri Coustant, t. i. col. 99.