II. CHAP. was condemned by three hundred and one Bishops; the whole number present being but three hundred and eighteen, and of the seventeen who dissented eleven afterwards recanted and submitted, so that there remained only six who continued obstinate. Constantine himself was present in this council, and he and he alone confirmed the decrees and acts thereof, and sent them so confirmed to Pope SilvesCouncil of ter, who thereupon called a council at Rome of two hundred sixty-seven Bishops, who confirmed all that had been done at Nice, which confirmation was no other than a submission and conformity thereunto; as the Council at Granada in Spain, which was then Eliberitan likewise assembled and is called the first Eliberitan Council at Granada. Council, likewise did. And there needs no other Rome. evidence of the Emperor's supreme authority in that Council than his Letter to all churches for the due observation of all that was concluded at Nice, and for the observation of Easter, and the burning of all books written by Arius, which he commanded to be done in a very imperial style: "Si quid autem scrip"tum ab Ario compositum reperiatur, ut igni id tra"datur volumus; ut non modo improba ejus doctrina abrogetur, verum etiam ne monumentum quidem ali 66 quod ejus relinquatur: Illud equidem predictum "volo; Si quis libellum aliquem ab Ario conscriptum "celare, nec continuo igni comburere deprehensus fu"erit, supplicium ei mortis esse constitutum." And Council of the Letter which was shortly after written from the Council of Arles (where Eborius Bishop of York and Restitutus Bishop of London were both present and subscribed) is very notable to the argument we are upon, and for the abridgment whereof we are beholden to Sir H. Spelman in the first tome of the Arles. Coun II. Councils: "Domino sanctissimo, Fratri Silvestro, CHAP. "Marinus vel cœtus Episcoporum, qui adunati fu"erunt in oppido Arelatensi, quid decreverimus com"muni concilio, charitati tua significavimus, ut omnes "sciant quid in futurum observare debeant." This is the same Pope Silvester to whom they would persuade us the Emperor Constantine had such deference, when we see how the poor Council at Arles treat him as they did any other Bishop. Council of Pope Julius sent some reprehension as they pre-ntioch. tend to the Eastern Bishops for having presumed to meet in council without his consent; but they expressed all manner of indignation at his reprehension, and shortly after met in a council at Antioch ; and the Emperor continued so obstinate in that opinion, that Pope Liberius who had succeeded Julius was banished, and Felix was chosen Pope; but Liberius redeeming himself from banishment by becoming and turning Arian, Felix was again turned out; and to wipe off this scandal in Liberius the distinction was first made between the Pope and his of fice, which hath so often since been inverted owned and contradicted, as the occasion and the humour of persons concerned in the disputation have thought fit. In this time was St. Austin born in Africa and Pelagius in England, as those historians report who did not distinguish between England, and Scotland, where that nation will needs have him be born, preferring the fame of his wit and learning as a greater honour to their country than the infamy and reproach of his heresy can detract from it. And now succeeded Julian in the Empire; whe The Empe His charac ter. CHAP. ther an apostate or no, may for aught I know be lawII. fully doubted. That he was a great enemy to the ror Julian. Christians, and that he found a way more to discredit and dishonour Christianity by his wit and mirth and scoffs and discountenance, (which made a greater impression upon the Christians of that age, and made more of them to renounce their faith, than any one of the fiery and bloody persecutions had done,) is very clear: yet I have never seen ground enough to conclude that he ever embraced the Christian faith, or was instructed in it; for though he had conformed in some outward appearance to the commands of his uncle the Emperor Constantine, yet he appeared always addicted to the religion of the Gentiles, in which he was very learned; and taking him as a Gentile, he may be well looked upon as a prince of extraordinary virtue; and one, who if he had not been carried by a wonderful providence, and against all the advice of his friends and several predictions (to which he was naturally superstitious enough) into that war where he was slain, it is probable might have extended the empire to as great an extent of dominion and reputation as ever it had under any of his predecessors. And here it may not be unfit (though I believe it will be very unpopular) to observe how much passion and prejudice contributes to the corruption of history; for we know not to what else to impute all those relations of the manner of his death, and his last speech in contempt of our Saviour, than to the over zeal of religious persons of that age; who, believing his apostasy, thought they could not load his memory with too many reproaches, nor sufficiently celebrate God's mercy in the vengeance acted upon him in so extraordinary a manner. And the Spaniards do still believe II. believe that he was killed by St. Mercurius with one CHAP. of the lances which was always kept in that Saint's tomb, as it was missed on the day in which Julian was killed, and found again the next day in its place all bloody. Whereas, if we will believe Ammianus Marcellinus, (who is incomparably the best writer of that age, and was himself in that battle,) he was hurt in a very sharp charge of the enemy when great numbers fell on both sides; and being carried out of the field into his tent, where he lived some days after he found his wound to be mortal, he sent for the principal officers of his army, made a long discourse to them of the public affairs and of his particular person and his actions and intentions, full of wisdom and magnanimity, and died with as great serenity and tranquillity of mind as any Roman general of whom we have received very good account in story. Not long after Julian, Damasus was Pope, who reigned no less than nineteen years; and there were but three Popes after him, that is to say, Siritius and Anastasius (in whose time the Council of Toledo was held in which priests were forbidden to marry) and Innocent the First, before the Goths entered Italy with an army of two hundred thousand men, and entered and sacked Rome, Innocent himself being then at Ravenna; and this was about the year four hundred and twenty, being two years before the death of Innocent. the Goths quent state In this great deluge both the language and man- Irruption of ners and religion of Italy grew so much corrupted and subsethat there are few records of the actions of that time of Papal juwhich have any credit: and this confusion was short-till the time ly improved by the Hunns and the Vandals overran all Italy; so that for an age or two there risdiction who of Pope Hildebrand Gregory VII. A. D. was 1073. II. ror Honori Boniface I. and Eula lius. Ephesus. CHAP. was little other notice taken of the Papacy than by the schisms that were in it, and by the Popes' applications to the Emperors to assist them, and the acts of jurisdiction by the Emperors in punishments and The Empe- reformation. Thus the Emperor Honorius, in the us banishes schism between Boniface the First and Eulalius, (which was the third schism) first banished both the pretenders the city of Rome for seven months; and then, after examination of the business, he confirmed Boniface to be the true and right Pope, and made a law, which is still amongst the decretals, that if two were chosen Popes together neither of them should be allowed. And again in the time of the very next Pope, which was Celestine the First, the Emperor Council of Theodotius the Second called the Council at Ephesus, where Cyrill Bishop of Alexandria presided; but they will have this office to be performed by Cyrill by commission from the Pope; for which as there is no authority, so there appears no probability; because Sixtus the Third, who was the very next Pope after Celestine, was a person so totally neglected by all degrees of men, upon a scandal which Bassus had raised upon him, that nobody would so much as communicate with him, until he had prevailed with the Emperor Valentinian the Third to call a council which might examine the whole matter; which being done at Rome, where fifty-seven Bishops met, all allegations and suggestions being examined, the Pope was cleared and acquitted, and Bassus excommunicated. Of so little authority was the Pope himself in that age when so much was done in the matter of religion. For in the time of the very next Council of Pope, which was Leo the First, the Council at Calcedon was held; and in his successor's time, which Calcedon. was |