was not as the Papists say because Christ prayed for Peter that his Faith might not fail but because the Emperours of the West were Orthodox while those in the East were Arians And the Bishops much followed the Emperours Will. That this last was the Cause is notorious in the History That Christs foresaid promise was not the Cause is certain Because whatever promise Christ maketh he fulfilleth But he hath not kept all the Bishops of Rome from failing in their Faith Therefore he never promised so to do The minor is certain by History To pass by Marcellinus and Liberius and Honorius falls which were but like Peters all those wicked men whom Councils deposed as Infidels or Hereticks Simoniacks Murderers Adulterers one as a Devil Incarnate and all those that Baronius and Genebrard stigmatize as Apostatical and not Apostolical 50 together had not this promise fulfilled Nor Sixtus Quintus if Bellarmine judged truly that he was damned For it was not a dead faith but a saving faith which Christ promised Peter should not fail such a saith as had the promise of life He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved Whoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life a faith that worketh by love Else Peter might have been a wicked man and damned notwithstanding this Prayer of Christ and Promise If the faith of Constantine senior junior Constans Valentinian Theodosius Honorius Gratian c. had failed the General Councils at Milan and Ariminum tell us how failing the Bishops faith was like to be when Ierome said that the whole world groaned to find it self turned Arian § 2. The blind zeal of Valens made him restless in Persecuting the Orthodox in the East At Antioch he vexed those that would not Communicate with Euzoius the allowed Arian Bishop At Cyzicum Eunomius was put in Eleusius place but his followers built them a separate Church without the Walls Socrat. lib. 4. c. 6 7. He Persecuted the Novatians and exiled Agelius their Bishop at Const. He banished Eustathius Antioch and Evagrius chosen by the Orthodox Bishop of Const. against Demophilus the Arian Fourscore Bishops â—ent to crave Justice of him were put to Sea in a Ship there set on fire and were both burnt and drowned together Socr. l. 4. c. 13. In all the East he deposed abused murdered many that would not for sake the Nicene Creed He set his Officers to suppress their Conventicles At Alexandria he imprisoned Peter that succeeded Athanasius and banished his Presbyters and set up Lucius an Arian Bishop He persecuted the Monks of the Wilderness of Egypt Nitria and Scitis and destroyed their Houses Banished Macarius of Egypt and Macarius of Alexandria their Leaders He persecuted Basil at Caesarea He went in person at Antioch to disturb and scatter the Conventicles of the Orthodox And when he had banished one of their Bishops Meletius enduring Paulinus the Presbyters kept the Meeting when he drove them away a Deacon kept it up At last Themistius a Philosopher made an Oration before him bidding him not marvel that the Christians had such differences for they were nothing to those of the Philosophers who were of three hundred different Opinions and that God would be honoured even under diversity of Opinions This somewhat asswaged him and shortly after in the 50th year of his age he was slain § 3. Gratian and Valentinian junior coming to the Empire Liberty of Conscience and Restoration was given to all Sects except the Eunomians Photinians and Manichees Socrat. l. 5. c. 2. He took Theodosius into the Empire with him And so the Orthodox Party got up again and the Arians after this went every where down save among the Goths § 4. LXXI Theodosius called a General Council at Constantinople where the chief things done were 1. the setting up of Gregory Nazianzene as Bishop 2. The condemning of the Macedonians 3. The giving of the second Patriarchate to Constantinople because it was the Imperial Seat putting under him the Diocesses of Pontuâ— Heraclea and Asia 4. The putting down of Nazianzene again and putting Nectarius in his stead 5. The setling Flavianus at Antioch § 5. Some would perswade us that it was two Councils and not one that did these things But the question is but de nomine In the beginning they dispatch'd part of their work and before they departed Meletius the Bishop of Antioch dying the Bishops returned to Council and more Egyptian Bishops came and did the rest § 6. The Case of Gregory Naz. was thus A Council at Antioch in the reign of Arianisme sent him with three more able speakers to go visit the Churches and draw them from Arianisme He came to Constantinople and an Arian being in possession he got into a little empty Church and there so long Preached till he had recovered much of the City from Arianisme Hereupon Peter Bishop of Alexandria signified by Letters that he would have him be Bishop of Constantinople against the Arian Bishop The Orthodox Party chose him One Maximus that of a Philosopher turned Christian and insinuated into Gregories familiarity by money first and threats after gets Peter of Alexander and the Egyptian Bishops to make him Bishop of Constant supposing Gregory not yet lawfully settled Meletius Antioch being at Const. Ordaineth Gregory Bishop The Council when Convened Confirm him and cast out Maximus that never had possession Theodosius owneth Gregory and putteth out the Arian Bishop and possesseth him of the Great Church The Antiochian Controversie falling in at the death of Meletius Gregory was against Flavian The Egyptian Bishops being for him set against Gregory and resolved to cast him out and choose another He seeing their resolution and offended at their furious carriage in the Council resigneth to the Emperour and departeth some make it as if his resignation was unconstrained but his own words shew that he did it but to prevent the deposition which they resolved on Else he durst not have deserted his Flock that lamented his departure In his place they chose Nectarius a Pretor that was no Christian in foro Ecclesiae as being not yet baptized and so was indeed uncapable and the choice null But the man was honest And Nicephorus saith that they put down his name in a Paper with others leaving it to the Emperour to chuse one of them and that he chose Nectarius § 7. The description of this Council and the good Bishops of his time by Gregory Naz. in his Poems and his Orations is very doleful How implacably factious and contentious they were how fierce and violent leaping and carrying themselves in the Council like mad-men He describeth the People as contentious but yet endued with the love of God though their zeal wanted knowledg Page 528. Orat. 32. The Courtiers he saith whether true to the Emperour he knew not but for the most part perfidious to God And the Bishops as sitting on adverse thrones and feeding adverse opposite Flocks drawn by them into factions like
month in lesser meetings and once a quarter in greater yet where there is danger of such degeneracy it is better to hold them but pro re natâ occasionally at various seasons and places § 65. The lesser Synods and correspondency of Pastors before there were Christian Magistrates were managed much more humbly and harmlesly than the great ones afterward Because that men and their interest and motives differed And even of later times there have been few Councils called General that have been managed so blamelesly or made so many profitable Canons as many Provincial or smaller Synods did Divers Toletane Councils and many others in Spain England and other Countries have laboured well to promote piety and peace As did the African Synods and many others of old And such as these have been serviceable to the Church And the Greater Councils though more turbulent have many of them done great good against Heresie and Vice especially the first at Nice And nothing in this Book is intended to cloud their worth and glory or to extenuate any good which they have done But I am thankful to God that gave his Church so many worthy Pastors and made so much use as he did of many Synods for the Churches purity and peace § 66. But the true reason of this Collection and why I have besides good products made so much mention of the errours and mischiefs that many Councils have been guilty of are these following 1. The carnal and aspiring part of the Clergy do very ordinarily under the equivocal names of Bishops confound the Primitive Episcopacy with the Diocesane tyranny before described And they make the ignorant believe that all that is said in Church-Writers for Episcopacy is said for their Diocesane Species And while they put down an hundred or a thousand Bishops and Churches of the Primitive Species they make men believe that it is they that are for the old Episcopacy and we that are against it and that it is we and not they that are against the Church while we are submissive to them as Arch-bishops if they would but leave Parishes to be Churches or Great Towns formerly called Cities at least and make the Discipline of all Churches but a possible practicable thing § 67. II. And to promote their ends as these men are for the largest Diocesses and turning a thousand Churches into one only so they are commonly for violent Administration ruling by constraint and either usurping the power of the sword themselves or perswading and urging the Magistrate to punish all that obey not their needless impositions and reproaching or threatning at least the Magistrates that will not be their Executioners And making themselves the Church snuffers or made without the Churches consent their Office is exercised in putting out the Lights sometimes hundreds of faithful Ministers being silenced by their means in a little time And they take the sword of Discipline or power of the Keys as the Church used it 300 years to be vain unless prisons or mulcts enforce it And to escape the Primitive poverty they overthrow the Primitive Church Form and Discipline and tell men All this is for the Churches honour and peace § 68. Yea all that like not their arrogances and grandure they render odious as Aerian Hereticks or Schismaticks provoking men to hate and revile them and Magistrates to destroy them as intolerable And by making their own numerous Canons and Inventions necessary to Ministry and Church-Communion they will leave no place for true unity and peace but tear the Churches in pieces by the racks and engines of their brains and wills § 69. III. Yea worse than all this there are some besides the French Papists who tell the world That the Vniversal Church on Earth is one visible political body having a visible Head or Supreme vicarious Government under Christ even a Collective Supreme that hath universal Legislative Iudicial and Executive power And they make this Summa Potestas Constitutive of the Church Vniversal and say that this is Christs body out of which none have his Spirit nor are Church-members and that there is no Vnity or Concord but in obeying this supreme visible power And that this is in General Councils and in the intervals in a College of Bishops Successors of the Apostles I know not who or where unless it be all the Bishops as scattered over the earth and that they rule per literas formatas as others say It is the Pope and Roman Clergy or Cardinals § 70. And when our Christianity Salvation Union and Communion yea our Lives Liberties and mutual forbearances and Love is laid upon this very form of Church-policy and Prelacy and Christ is supposed to have such a Church as is not in the World even constituted with a Visible Vicarious Collective Soveraign that must make Laws for the whole Christian World it 's time to do our best to save men from this deceit § 71. I must confess If I believed that the Whole Church had any Head or Soveraign under Christ I should rather take it to be the Pope than any one finding no other regardable Competitor He is uncapable of ruling at the Antipodes and all the Earth but a General Council is much more uncapable and so are the feigned College of Pastors or Bishops none knoweth who § 72. IV. And a blind zeal against errour called Heresie doth cry down the necessary Love and toleration of many tolerable Christians And some cry down with them and away with them that erre more themselves and by their measures would leave but few Christians endured by one another in the World Thus do they teach us to understand Solomon Eccl. 7. 16. Be not righteous and wise overmuch so much are these men for Vnity that they will leave no place for much Unity on earth As if none should be tolerated but men of one Stature Complexion c. § 73. Briefly they do as one that would set up a Family Government made up of many hundred or thousand families dissolved and turned into one and ruled supremely by a Council of the Heads of such enlarged Families and then tell us that this is not to alter the old Species of Families but to make them greater that were before too small Keep but the same name and a City is but a Family still And when they have done they would have none endured but cast out imprisoned or banished as seditious that are for any smaller Family than a City or any lesser School than an University And these City Governours must in one Convention rule all the Kingdom and in a greater all the World § 74. I shall therefore first tell you what errour must not be tolerated and then by an Epitome of Church-History Bishops and Councils and Popes shew the ignorant so much of the Matter of Fact as may tell them who have been the Cause of Church-corruptions Heresies Schisms and Sedition and how And whether such Diocesane Prelacy and grandure be the
creaturam sed non tanquam rerum creatarum aliquam foetum itidem sed non tanquam unum è caeteris They thought that before God made the rest of the creatures he made one super-angelical perfect Spirit by which he made all the rest and that this is Christ and that he received no other soul but a body only at his Incarnation and this super-angelical spirit was his soul. This was the dangerous heresie of Arius § 5. Dion Petavius truly telleth us that his great advantage was that many of the Fathers of that Church had spoken in such kind of words before him the Controversie being not then well considered p. 285. ad Haeres 69. having spoken of Lucian the Martyr's giving advantage to Aâ—ius he addeth Quod idem plerisque veterum Patrum cùm in hoc negatio tùm in aliis fidei Christianae capitibus usu venit ut ante errorum atque haereseon quibus ea singillatim oppugnabantur originem nondum satis illustratà ac patefactâ rei veritate quaedam suis scriptis asperserint quae cum orthodoxae sidei regulâ minimè consentiant And yet the Papists swear not to expound Scripture but according to the unanimous consent of the Fathers Nè ab hoc Trinitatis mysterio ac quaestione discedam observavimus jamdudum Justinum Mart. Dialogo cum Tryph. de filio Dei idem propemodum cum Arians sentire And in his Books De Trinit he at large citeth the very words of him and many other Fathers But he here giveth them this gentle excuse Sed ab omni culpâ tam hic quam Lucianus aliique liberandi sunt qui nondum agitatâ controversiâ panem de eâ commodè pronunciâsse videntur Simile quiddam de Dionys. Alex. tradit Basilius Ep. 41 c. But it is enough to think charitably that they were saved without going so far as to say they were without all fault For Christianity is the same thing before such Controversies and after And it 's hard to think how he can be a Christian that denyeth Christs Essence But God is merciful and requireth not knowledge alike in all that have not equal means of knowledge Which charity must be extended to others as well as to these Fathers Yet the same Petavius cannot endure Camerarius for saying that Athanasius though a valiant Champion of the truth did sometime indulge his own desires and mix some ill with sacred things But if he were not at all to be blamed Constantine was much the more to be blamed for banishing him And why should not his honour be of some regard The truth is the Alexandrian Bishops and People were long more violent and troublesome than others as not only Socrates but many other Historians note And as it was noted with dishonour in Theophilus and Cyril and Dioscorus c. so it can hardly be believed by them that read the History throughout that Alexander and Athanasius wanted not something of the humble patience meekness and healing tenderness and skill that their Case required For who is perfect And how apt are great Bishops to be too violent against Dissenters instead of healing them with Love and clear convincing Evidence § 5. Happy had it been if Prudence had silenced this Heresie betimes for never any one did so great mischief to the Church The badness of it was the honour of the Niccne Council that suppressed it as far as in them lay But alas the Remedy seemed quickly conquered by the Disease As Constantine had work enough to keep Peace among the Bishops in the Council by his presence and reproofs so when the Arians profess'd repentance his peaceableness caused him too far to indulge them by which some of them got such interest in his Court as proved the following Calamity of the Church And it is the sadder to think on that the two great Emperours Constantius and Valens that were deceived by them and drawn into violent Persecution are noted to be otherwise none of the worst men Epiphanius saith p. 737. Accessit Impâ—ratorum favor cujus initium à Constantio Imperatore profectum est Qui cùm caeteris in rebus perhumanus ac bonus esset alioquinpius â—c multis probitatis ornamentis praeditus hâc unâre aâ—eâ—ravit quod non impressa à parente fidei vestigia seqâ—utus est Quod ipsum tamen non illius culpâ factum sed nonnullorum fraude qui in die Iudicii rationem reddituri sunt qui specie nomine tenùs Episcopi sinceram Dei fidem labefactarunt Et beati Constantii in errorem ab illis inducti qui rectae fidei regulam ignoravit eâdemque ignorantiâ ad illorum se utpote sacerdotum Authoritatem accommodavit quod ipsum error illorum ac caecitas dep 〈◊〉 ataque fides ex diaboli profect a consilio lateret Accessit alia causa quae huic serpentum officinae plurimum adjecit virium Eusebius scilicet qui callidè se insinuans Valentis aures pii ac religiosi Imperatoris ac Divini numinis amantissimi corrupit Qui quòd ab illo baptismo sit initiatus ea causa fuit cur haec factio stabilis ac firma consisteret If Epiphanius say true we see what men these Persecuting Emperours were § 6. As to the other part of the Councils work the fixing of Easter-day had not the Bishops been sinfully fierce about it against each other it had never been taken for a Heresie to mistake the time nor had it been a work so necessary and great to determine it seeing as Socrates Sozomen c. tell us many Churches differed in this and matters as great as this without condemning or separating from each other And the Asians erred by the Motive of Tradition and Irenaeus had long before censured the Roman Bishop for his violence in condemning them And many good Christians even after the Councils determination durst not forsake their old Tradition nor obey them Among whom how long our Britains and the Scots stood out Beda telleth us And though the Audians that also disobeyed were called Hereticks I would all Adversaries to Hereticks were no worse men § 7. And because these Audians rose about that time I think it worth the labour to add the sum of their History out of Epiphanius that the World may better perceive what spirit the Hereticating Prelates were then of and how some called Hereticks were made such or defamed as such and who they were that did divide the Churches and break their peace Epiph. l. 3. Tom. 1. p. 811. Of the Schism of the Audians which is the 50th or 70th Heresie The Audians live in Monasteries in Solitudes c. Audius their Founder arose in Mesopotamia famous for his integrity of life and ardent zeal of Divine Faith Who oft seeing things ill carried in the Churches feared not to their faces to reprove and admonish the Bishops and Priests and say These things should not be so done You should not thus Administer As a