Thomas Allies - The Church of England cleared from the charge of Schism

The restrictions under which, according to the Council of Sardica, the Pope could cause a matter to be reheard, are specific. Much larger power is assigned in the fourth General Council, that of Chalcedon, to the see of Constantinople, in the ninth Canon, which says, "If any Bishop or Clergyman has a controversy against the Bishop of the province himself ( i. e. the Metropolitan), let him have recourse to the Exarch of the diocese, or to the throne of the Imperial city of Constantinople, and plead his cause before him."

But, between these two Councils of Nicea, A.D. 325, and Chalcedon, 451, the whole Patriarchal system of the Church had sprung up, and covered the provinces of the Roman Empire with as it were a finely reticulated net. The system may be said to be built on two principles, recognised and enforced in the Apostolic Canons, and consistently carried out, from the Bishop of the poorest country town up to the primatial see of Rome. These principles are, "the authority of the Metropolitan over his Bishops in important and extraordinary affairs, and the supreme authority of Bishops in the ordinary government of their particular bishoprics. With this distinction, that the Metropolitan even cannot arrange important and extraordinary affairs but with the counsel of his suffragans, whilst every Bishop conducts all the common and ordinary affairs of his Diocese without being obliged to take the advice of his Metropolitan." 33 33 Thomassin, Part I. liv. i. ch. 40. sect. 2. This latter principle, it will be seen, expresses the essential equality and unity of the High Priesthood vested in Bishops by descent from the Apostles, to which St. Cyprian bears such constant witness, so that it may be said to be the one spirit which animates all his government: while the former, leaving this quite inviolate, builds together the whole Church in one vast living structure. For as the Bishops of the province have their Metropolitan, and their spring and autumn Councils under him, so the Metropolitan stands in a like relation to his Exarch, or Patriarch; and of the five great Patriarchs of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, who are found at the Council of Chalcedon to preside over the Church Catholic, that of Rome has the unquestioned primacy, and is seen at the centre, sustaining and animating the whole. "The most important of all the powers of Metropolitans, Exarchs, and Patriarchs, was the election of Bishops, the confirmation and consecration of Bishops elected. For all the other degrees of authority were founded on this one, which rendered the Metropolitan the Father, Master, and Judge of all his suffragans." 34 34 Idem, ut supra. "And so that famous Canon of the Council of Nicea, (the 6th,) which seems in appearance only to confirm the ancient right of the three first Metropolitans of the world to ordain the Bishops of all the provinces of their dependence, establishes in effect all the rights and all the powers of the Metropolitans, because it establishes the foundation on which they all rest. 'If any one be made a Bishop contrary to the sentence of his Metropolitan, the great Synod declares that he should not be a Bishop.' Nothing is juster than to found the right of a holy and paternal rule on the right of generation. For by ordination the Bishops engender not children indeed, but Fathers, to the Church." This system continued unimpaired in the whole Church, at least to the time of St. Gregory the Great. It offers, I think, an unanswerable refutation to what must be considered the strongest argument of the Roman Catholics for the Supremacy, that there could be no unity in the Church without it, as a living organized body; history says, there was

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Bellarmin. de Rom. Pont. Lib. iv. 25; iv. 24; i. 9.

De Maistre, du Pape. Liv. i. ch. i.

S. Cyprian de Unit. Ecc. 12.

"Development," &c. p. 22.

Thomassin, Part i. lib. i. ch. 4. De l'ancienne discipline de l'Eglise.

St. Cypr. de Unit. 4. Oxford Tr.

Quoted by Thomassin, ut sup.

Ibid.

S. Aug. Tom. v. 706, B.

S. Chrys. Tom. ii. 594, B.

St. Jerome, tom. ii. 279, Vallarsi.

Development, p. 279.

The words in italics are left out by Mr. N.

Thomassin, Part i. liv. i. ch. iii.

Of a passage in this letter, De Maistre says (Du Pape, liv. i. ch. 6): "Resuming the order of the most marked testimonies which present themselves to me on the general question, I find, first, St. Cyprian declare, in the middle of the third century, that heresies and schisms only existed in the Church because all eyes were not turned towards the Priest of God, towards the Pontiff who judges in the Church in the place of Jesus Christ ." A pretty strong testimony, indeed, and one which would go far to convince me of the fact. Pity it is, that when one refers to the original, one finds that St. Cyprian is actually speaking of himself, and of the consequences of any where setting up in a see a schismatical Bishop against the true one. After this, who will trust De Maistre's facts without testing them? The truth is, he had taken the quotation at second hand, and never looked to see to whom it was applied. It suited the Pope so admirably that it must have been meant for him. But I recommend no one to change their faith upon the authority of quotations which they do not test.

Epist. 67. De Marciano Arelatensi.

S. Cyp. Ep. 29.

Ep. 73.

Ep. 74.

De Unit. Ecc. Oxf. Tr.

Op. St. Cypr. p. 329. ed. Baluz.

Tom. ix. p. 110.

S. Cyp. Ep. 75.

Liv. VII. sec. 32.

Tom. ix. 97. G.

Tom. ii. 96. F.

Tom. ii. 299. C.

Fleury, liv. vii. 23.

Ep. 68. S. Cypriani.

Liv. i. ch. 2, sect. 5.

Liv. i. ch. 3, sect. 8.

Fleury, Liv. xii. xxix. Conc. Sard. Can. 3, 4, 7.

Thomassin, Part I. liv. i. ch. 40. sect. 2.