Papal supremacy not established in the fourth century.

persuasion was a new source both of honors and profit to the sacred order. This notion was propagated with industry, some time after the reign of Adrian, when the second destruction of Jerusalem had extinguished among the Jews all hopes of seeing their government restored to its former lustre, and their country arising out of ruins. And accordingly the bishops considered themselves as invested with a rank and character similar to those of the high priest among the Jews, while the presbyters represented the priests, and the deacons the levites. It is, indeed, highly probable, that they who first introduced this absurd comparison of offices so entirely distinct, did. it rather through ignorance and error, than through artifice or design. The notion, however, once introduced, produced its natural effects; and these effects were pernicious. The errors to which it gave rise were many; and one of its immediate consequences was the establishing a greater difference between the Christian pastors and their flock, than the genius of the gospel seems to admit.”*

§13. It was long after these innovations upon primitive simplicity, before the bishops of Rome enjoyed, or even claimed that spiritual sovereignty over other bishops, and over the universal church, which they afterwards demanded as a divine right. Notwithstanding the pomp and splendor that surrounded the Roman See, in the fourth century it is remarked by the same historian from whom we have just quoted, that the bishops of that city had not then acquired that pre-eminence of power and jurisdiction in the church which they afterwards enjoyed. In the ecclesiastical commonwealth, they were indeed the most eminent order of citizens as well as their brethren, and subject like them to the edicts and laws of the emperors. None of the bishops acknowledged that they derived their authority from the permission and appointment of the bishop of Rome, or that they were created bishops by the favor of the apostolic see. On the contrary, they all maintained that they were the ambassadors and ministers of Jesus Christ, and that their authority was derived from above. It must, however, be observed, that even in this century, several of those steps were partly laid by which the bishops of Rome mounted afterwards to the summit of ecclesiastical power and despotism. These steps were partly laid by the imprudence of the emperors, partly by the dexterity of the Roman prelates themselves, and partly by the inconsiderate zeal and precipitate judgment of certain bishops.†

One of these steps was a decree of a somewhat obscure council held at Sardis, during the Arian controversy, in the year 347. Among other things enacted in this council, it was provided "that in the event of any bishop considering himself aggrieved by the sentence of the bishops of his province, he might apply to the bishop of Rome, who should write to the bishops in the neighborhood of the province of the aggrieved bishop, to rehear the cause; and should

* Mosheim, cent. i., part 2, cent. ii., part 2. + See Dupin de antiqua Ecclesiæ disciplina.

Council of Sardis.

Decree of Valentinian.

Steps toward supremacy. also, if it seemed desirable to do so, send some presbyters of his own church to assist at the rehearing." It is probable, indeed, as Richerius in his History of Councils observes, that this decree was only provisional, and intended for the security of the Eastern orthodox bishops against the Arians, and that the privilege conferred upon the bishop of Rome, was not meant to be given to the See of Rome, but only to the then bishop Julius, who is expressly mentioned therein; and consequently that it was only designed for the case then before the council. An attempt, however, was made, at the beginning of the fifth century, by Zosimus, bishop of Rome, to establish his authority in the African churches, by means of this decree, on the following occasion. Apiarius, a presbyter of the church of Sicca, in Africa, having been deposed by his bishop for gross immoralities, fled to Rome, A. D. 415, and was received to communion by Zosimus, who forthwith sent legates into Africa, to the bishops there, demanding that Apiarius's cause should be heard over again; asserting that the bishops of Rome had the privilege of requiring such rehearings conferred upon them in virtue of this decree of the Council of Sardis. The African bishops, however, refused to acknowledge the authority of this decree, and after a protracted controversy, sent a final letter to the bishop of Rome," in which they assert the independence of their own, and all other churches, and deny the pretended right of hearing appeals claimed by the bishop of Rome and further exhort him not to receive into communion persons who had been excommunicated by their own bishops, or to interfere in any way with the privileges of other churches."*

§14.-A second step toward the papal supremacy, was a law enacted in the year 372, by the emperor Valentinian, which favored extremely the rise and ambition of the bishops of Rome, by empowering them to examine and judge other bishops. A few years afterward, the bishops assembled in council at Rome, without considering the dangerous power they entrusted to one of their number, and intent only upon the privilege it secured to them of exemption from the jurisdiction of secular judges, declared in the strongest terms their approbation of this law, and recommended that it should be immediately carried into effect, in an address which they presented to the emperor Gratian.†

A third circumstance which contributed toward the rapidly increasing influence of the Roman bishops, was the custom which obtained somewhat extensively before the close of the fourth century, of referring to their decision in consequence of their claim to apostolic descent, all questions concerning the apostolic customs and doctrines. This gave them occasion to issue a vast number of didactic letters, generally called Decretals, which soon assumed a tone of apostolic authority, and were held in high estimation in

* See Hammond on the Six Councils-Oxford, 1843, p. 40. † See Dr. Maclaine's note in Mosheim, i., p. 344.

Council of Chalcedon decrees the equality of the bishops of Rome and Constantinople.

the West, as flowing from apostolic tradition. "From this time. forth, there was ne controversy in the East in which each party did not seek to win the shop of Rome, and through him the Western church, to its cause, vying with each other in flattery and servility. At the councils, his legates were always treated with the greatest deference, and at the council of Chalcedon, they, for the first time, presided."*

The council of Chalcedon was held A. D. 451, and notwithstanding the pre-eminence assumed therein by the legate of the bishop of Rome, he had not power or influence to prevent the passage of a canon which proved extremely odious to his lordly master Leo, who has been surnamed the Great, and which resulted in a protracted and bitter controversy between the bishops of Rome and Constantinople who should be greatest. Some years previous to this time, since the removal of the seat of empire to Constantinople, the ambition and assumption of the bishop of Constantinople had almost equalled that of Rome. He had lately usurped the spiritual government of the provinces of Asia Minor, Thrace, Pontus, and the eastern part of Illyricum, very much to the chagrin and dissatisfaction of Leo. This dissatisfaction was increased when, by the twenty-eighth canon of the council of Chalcedon, it was resolved, that the same rights and honors which had been conferred upon the bishop of Rome, were due to the bishop of Constantinople on account of the equal dignity and lustre of the two cities, in which these prelates exercised their authority. The same council confirmed also, by a solemn act, the bishop of Constantinople in the spiritual government of those provinces over which he had ambitiously usurped the jurisdiction. Leo opposed with vehemence the passing of these decrees, and his opposition was seconded by that of several other prelates. But their efforts were vain, as the emperors threw in their weight into the balance, and thus supported the decisions of the Grecian bishops.

In consequence then of the decrees of this famous council, the bishop of Constantinople began to contend obstinately for the supremacy with the Roman pontiff, and to crush the patriarchs of Alexandria and Antioch, so as to make them feel the oppressive effects of his pretended superiority. Elated with the favor and proximity of the imperial court, he cast a haughty eye on all sides where any objects were to be found on which he might exercise his ambition. After reducing under his jurisdiction these two patriarchs, as prelates only of the second order, he invaded the diocese of the Roman pontiff, and spoiled him of several provinces. The two former prelates, though they struggled with vehemence, and raised considerable tumults by their opposition, yet they struggled ineffectually, both for want of strength, and likewise on account of a variety of unfavorable circumstances. But the Roman pontiff, far superior to them in wealth and power, contended also with more vigor and

* Gieseler, Vol. i., page 260.

Appeals of other bishops to Rome.

Reverence of the barbarian conquerors.

obstinacy, and in his turn, gave a deadly wound to the usurped supremacy of the patriarch of Constantinople. Notwithstanding the redoubled efforts of the latter, a variety of circumstances united in augmenting the power and authority of the Roman pontiff, though he had not, as yet, assumed the dignity of supreme lawgiver and judge of the whole Christian church. The bishops of Alexandria and Antioch, unable to make head against the lordly prelate of Constantinople, often fled to the Roman pontiff for succor against his violence; and the inferior order of bishops used the same method, when their rights were invaded by the prelates of Alexandria and Antioch. So that the bishop of Rome, by taking all these prelates alternately under his protection, daily added new degrees of influence and authority to the Roman See, rendered it everywhere respected, and was thus imperceptibly establishing its supremacy. This was, evidently, another of the steps by which he was rapidly ascending to the summit of ghostly dominion.*

§ 15.-One more circumstance is worthy of mention, as contributing in no small degree to the increase of the power and influence of the bishop of Rome, viz., the regard almost universally paid to him by the fierce and barbarous tribes, who now in quick succession poured in from the north, and conquered and ravaged Italy and the capital of the ancient empire. In the years 408, 409, and 410, the proud city of Rome was three times in succession subjected to a siege by the renowned Alaric, king of the Goths, who is distinguished by contemporary historians by the terrible epithets of the scourge of God and the destroyer of nations. At first he was bought off by the terrified inhabitants, but at length the city was taken and given up to be pillaged and sacked by the fierce Gothic soldiery. In the year 452, the ferocious Attila, king of the Huns, invaded the north of Italy, laid waste some of its fairest provinces, and was only prevented from marching to Rome and renewing the horrid cruelties and excesses of Alaric by an immense ransom, and the powerful influence of the Roman pontiff, Leo the Great, who, at the head of an embassy, waited on Attila, as he lay "encamped at the place where the slow-winding Mincius is lost in the foaming waves of the lake Benacus, and trampled with his Scythian cavalry the farms of Catullus and Virgil."+ In the year 454, Rome was again taken and pillaged by Genseric, king of the Vandals; and in the year 476, the western empire was finally subverted, and Italy, with its renowned and time-honored capital, reduced under the dominion of the Gothic barbarians by the conquests of Odoacer, king of the Heruli, a tribe of Goths, and the deposition and banishment of Augustulus, the last of the western Roman emperors.

§16.-These barbarous nations, these fierce and warlike Germans who, after the defeat of the Romans, divided among them the western empire, bore, with the utmost patience and moderation, both

* See Mosheim, Cent. v. Part 2, Chap. ii.

Gibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. ii., p. 303.

Heathen rites adopted at Rome.

Opinions of Robertson and Hallam.

the dominion and vices of the bishops and priests, because, upon their conversion to Christianity, they became naturally subject to their jurisdiction; and still more, because they looked upon the ministers of Christ as invested with the same rights and privileges, which distinguished the priests of their fictitious deities. Nor is it at all to be wondered at that these superstitious barbarians, accustomed as they were to regard with a feeling amounting almost to adoration, the high priests of their own heathen gods, should manifest a readiness to transfer that veneration to the high priests of Rome, especially when they saw the multitude of heathen rites that were already introduced into Christian worship, and the willingness of the Roman pontiffs, by still further increasing the number of these pagan ceremonies, to accommodate their religion to the prejudices and inclinations of all.

In ages of ignorance and credulity, remarks a celebrated Scottish historian, "the ministers of religion are the objects of superstitious veneration. When the barbarians who overran the Roman empire first embraced the Christian faith, they found the clergy in possession of considerable power; and they naturally transferred to those new guides the profound submission and reverence, which they were accustomed to yield to the priests of that religion which they had just forsaken. They deemed their persons to be equally sacred with their function, and would have considered it as impious to subject them to the profane jurisdiction of the laity. The clergy were not blind to these advantages which the weakness of mankind afforded them. They established courts, in which every question relating to their own character, their function, their property, was tried and pleaded, and obtained an almost total exemption from the authority of civil judges." Thus was a kind of mutual compromise effected between these barbarous heathen conquerors, and the bishop of Rome, and his clergy. The former generally agreeing to accept the Christian name, and the latter tacitly consenting to conform as much as possible to their heathen rites and ceremonies of worship. The blind submission of these heathen tribes to the degenerate ministers of Christianity, tended much to increase the wealth and consequently the power of the clergy. On this subject remarks the elegant historian of the middle ages, "The devotion of the conquering nations, as it was still less enlightened than that of the subjects of the empire, so was it still more munificent. They left, indeed, the worship of Hesus and Taranis in their forests; but they retained the elementary principles of that, and of all barbarous idolatry, a superstitious reverence for the priesthood, a credulity that seemed to invite imposture, and a confidence in the efficacy of gifts to expiate offences. Of this temper it is undeniable that the ministers of religion, influenced probably not so much by personal covetousness as by zeal for the interests of their order, took advantage. Many of the peculiar and prominent characteristics in the faith and

* Robertson's Charles V.,American edition, page 34.