both his view of the Primacy, and of the Episcopal relation to it. He
wishes St. Stephen to write a letter to the people of Arles, by which their
actual Bishop Marcian, who had joined himself to the schismatic Novatian,
might be excommunicated, and another substituted for him. This alone shows
how great the authority of the Bishop of Rome in such an emergency was. But
the tone of his language is worth considering. It is just such incidents as
these which are made use of by Roman Catholic controversialists in late
times to justify the full extent of Papal power now claimed.[16] "Cyprian
to his brother Stephen, greeting. Faustinus, our colleague at Lyons,
dearest brother, hath more than once written to me, signifying what I know
has certainly been reported to you also, both by him, and by the rest of
our brother-Bishops, in that province, that Marcian of Arles, has joined
himself to Novatian, and has departed from the unity of the Catholic
Church, and from the agreement of our body and priesthood.... This matter
it is our duty to provide against and remedy, most dear brother, we, who
considering the Divine clemency, and holding the balance of the Church's
government, so exhibit to sinners our vigorous censure as not to deny the
medicine of Divine goodness and mercy to the restoration of the fallen and
the healing of the wounded. Wherefore it behoves you to write a very
explicit letter to our fellow Bishops in the Gauls, that they may not any
longer suffer our order (_collegio nostro_) to be insulted by Marcian,
obstinate, haughty, the enemy both of piety to God, and of his brethren's
salvation.... For, therefore, most dear brother, is the numerous body of
priests joined together in mutual concord, and the bond of unity, that _if
any one of our order_ attempt to make a heresy, and to sever and lay waste
the flock of Christ, the rest may fly to the rescue, and, like useful and
merciful shepherds, collect the Lord's sheep into a flock.... For, although
we are many shepherds, yet we feed one flock; and we ought to collect and
cherish all those sheep which Christ sought with His own blood and
passion.... For we must preserve the glorious honour _of our predecessors_,
the blessed Martyrs, Cornelius and Lucius," (the last Popes,) "whose memory
we indeed honour, but which you much more, most dear brother, who are
become their successor, ought to distinguish and preserve by your weight
and authority. For they being full of the spirit of God, and made glorious
martyrs, determined that reconciliation was to be granted to the lapsed,
and set down in their letters, that, after a course of penitence, the
advantage of communion and peace was not to be refused them. _Which thing
we all have everywhere entirely determined._ For there could not be in us a
difference of judgment in whom there is One Spirit." Now, might it not be
stated, that St. Cyprian wrote to Pope Stephen, to request him to depose
Marcian, Bishop of Arles? But how much is the inference from this fact
modified by the language of Cyprian himself? It is just such a letter as an
Eastern Primate would have written to the Patriarch of Alexandria, or of
Antioch, to request his interference at a dangerous juncture. It bears
witness, not to the present Papal, but to the Patriarchal, system. It
tallies exactly with the spirit of him who wrote elsewhere, to the lapsed,
"Our Lord, whose precepts and warnings we are bound to observe, regulating
the honour of the Bishop, and the constitution of his Church, speaks in the
Gospel, and says to Peter, 'I say unto thee that thou art Peter,' &c.
Thence, according to the change of times and successions, the ordination of
Bishops and the constitution of the Church has descended, _so that the
Church is established upon the Bishops, and every act of the Church is
directed by the same, its governors_. This being established by Divine
law,"[17] &c. It is evident that, if the see of Peter, so often referred to
by St. Cyprian, means the local see of Rome, it also means the see of every
Bishop who holds that office, whereof Peter is the great type, example, and
source.
But it was reserved for a more celebrated controversy, fully to bring out
St. Cyprian's view of the relation of the Bishop of Rome to the rest of the
Episcopal body: I mean, of course, the controversy whether heretics should
be admitted into the Church by rebaptization or by the imposition of hands.
I most fully believe, be it observed, that Cyprian acknowledged the Roman
Primacy, that he admitted certain high prerogatives to be lodged in the
Roman Pontiff, as St. Peter's successor, which did not belong to any other
Bishop. It is this very thing which makes his conduct the more remarkable.
He took a very strong view on one side of the controversy in question: and
St. Stephen took an equally strong one on the other. St. Stephen, we all
know, turned out to be right. That fervent Pontiff, it may be remarked,
when St. Cyprian would not give up his view, seemed inclined to treat him
much as St. Gregory the Seventh did a refractory Emperor, or St. Innocent
the Third, the dastard tyrant John. This may be very satisfactory to the
modern defenders of Papal omnipotence, but St. Cyprian's conduct is not so
at all. St. Cyprian called a Council of Bishops of the provinces of
Carthage and Numidia; they attended to the number of seventy-one, and
decided that heretics should be rebaptized. St. Cyprian informs the Pope of
the decision of himself and his colleagues. After saying that they had
found it necessary to hold a council, he proceeds--[18]"But I thought I
ought to write to you and confer with your gravity and wisdom concerning
that especially which most belongs to the authority of the priesthood, and
to the unity alike and dignity of the Catholic Church derived from the
ordering of a Divine disposition.... This, most dear Brother, we have
brought to your knowledge on account both of the honour we share with you,
and of our single-hearted affection, believing that what is both religious
and true is acceptable to you also according to your true religion and
faith. But we know that some are unwilling to give up an opinion they have
once imbibed, nor easily change their mind; but, without interruption to
the bonds of peace and concord with their colleagues, retain certain
peculiarities which have once grown into usage among themselves." (Such is
the manner in which St. Cyprian mentions a judgment deliberately expressed
by a Pope on a matter of high discipline, which involved a point of faith.)
"In which matter we too do violence and give the law to no one, inasmuch as
_every Bishop has the free choice of his own will in the administration of
the Church, as he will give an account of his acts to the Lord_." St.
Stephen received this decision of the African Council so ill, that he would
not even see the Bishops who brought it, nor allow the faithful to offer
them common hospitality. So important in his eyes was the matter in
dispute. St. Cyprian reports his answer in a letter to his Brother-Bishop
Pompeius, in which he says, [19]"Although we have fully embraced all that
is to be said concerning the baptizing of heretics, in the letters of which
we have sent to you copies, most dear Brother, yet, because you desired to
be informed what answer our Brother Stephen sent me to our letters, I send
you a copy of his rescript, after reading which you will more and more mark
his error, who attempts to assert the cause of heretics against Christians
and against the Church of God. For amongst other either proud or
impertinent or inconsistent remarks, which he has written rashly and
improvidently, &c.... But what blindness of mind is it, what perverseness
to refuse to recognise the unity of the faith coming from God the Father
and the tradition of Jesus Christ our Lord and God.... But since no heresy
at all, nor indeed any schism, can possess outside (the Body) the
sanctification of saving baptism, why has the harsh obstinacy of our
Brother Stephen burst forth to such a degree?" &c.... "Does he give honour
to God, who, the friend of heretics and the enemy of Christians, deems the
priests of God, maintaining the truth of Christ and the unity of the
Church, worthy of excommunication?" St. Stephen had inflicted this on the
African prelates, until they should give up their judgment on the point in
question.... "Nor ought the custom, which has crept in _among certain
persons_, to hinder truth from prevailing and conquering. For custom
without truth is but old error."... "But it is hurried away by presumption
and contumacy that a person rather defends his own perverseness and falsity
than accedes to the right and truth of another. Which thing the blessed
apostle Paul foreseeing, writes to Timothy and warns, that a Bishop must
not be quarrelsome, nor contentious, but gentle and teachable. Now he is
teachable, who is mild and gentle to learn patiently. For a Bishop ought
not only to teach, but also to learn, because he teaches better who daily
improves and profits by learning better." Even as we copy this language
used concerning a Pope by a great Bishop and Martyr of the third century,
who elsewhere writes, [20]"That our Lord built His Church upon Peter alone,
and though He gave to all the apostles an equal power, yet in order to
manifest unity He has by His own authority so placed the source of the same
unity as to begin from one;" we feel the contrast to be almost overpowering
with the tone in which the first Patriarch of the Latin Church, however
good his cause might be, would now venture to address the Supreme Pontiff.
Towards the conclusion of this letter he says, instead of admitting that
the Pope's judgment terminated the matter--"This now the priests of God
ought to do, preserving the Divine precepts, so that if in anything truth
has been shaken and tottered, we may return to the fountain-head of the
Lord, and to the evangelical and apostolical tradition, and that the rule
of our acting may spring thence, whence its order and origin arose."
After receiving the Pope's rescript, and his excommunication, St. Cyprian
convoked another Council of the three provinces of Africa, Numidia, and
Mauritania, which was held at Carthage on the 1st of Sept. 256. It was
attended by eighty-five Bishops, among whom were fifteen Confessors, beside
Priests and Deacons, and a great part of the people. St. Cyprian opened it,
observing: "It remains for us each to deliver our sentiments on this
matter, judging no one, nor removing any one, if he be of a different
opinion, from the right of Communion. _For no one of us sets himself up to
be a Bishop of Bishops, or by fear of his tyranny compels his colleagues to
the necessity of obedience, since every Bishop according to his recognised
liberty and power possesses a free choice, and can no more be judged by
another than he himself can judge another. But let us all await the
judgment of our Lord Jesus Christ, who singly and alone has the power both
of setting us up in the government of His Church, and of judging our
proceedings._"[21] The Bishops delivered their judgments _seriatim_,
finishing with St. Cyprian, and unanimously ratified what they had agreed
upon before, that heretics should be admitted into the Church by baptism,
and not merely by the imposition of hands: and thus an African Council of
the third century treated a judgment of the Pope, and his sentence of
excommunication until they altered their practice.
But these last words of St. Cyprian are so remarkable in themselves, and
have such a bearing on the present Papal claims, that they deserve further
notice. Now, lest we should imagine that St. Cyprian was hurried away by
the ardour of his defence of a favourite doctrine, and his sense of the
Pope's severity, into unjustifiable expressions concerning the rights of
Bishops, it so happens that we possess the comment of the greatest of the
Fathers on these very words. St. Augustin, writing 140 years after, and
fully agreeing with the judgment of Pope Stephen, as had the whole Church
finally, quotes the whole passage. "'It remains for us each to deliver our
sentiments on this matter, judging no one, nor removing any one, if he be
of a different opinion, from the right of communion.'[22] There he not only
permits me without loss of communion further to seek the truth, but even to
be of a different judgment. 'For no one of us,' saith he, 'sets himself up
to be a Bishop of Bishops, or by fear of his tyranny compels his colleagues
to the necessity of obedience.' What can be more gentle? What more humble?
Certainly no authority deters us from seeking what is the truth: 'since,'
he says, 'every Bishop according to his recognised liberty and power
possesses a free choice, and can no more be judged by another than he
himself can judge another:' certainly, I imagine, in those questions which
have not yet been thoroughly and completely settled. For he knew how great
and mysterious a sacrament the whole Church was then with various
reasonings considering, and he left open a freedom of inquiry, that the
truth might by search be laid open.... I cannot by any means be induced to
believe that Cyprian, a Catholic Bishop, a Catholic Martyr, and the greater
he was the more in every respect humbling himself, that he might find grace
before God, did, especially in a holy Council of his colleagues, utter with
his mouth other than what he carried in his heart, particularly as he
adds--'But let us all await the judgment of our Lord Jesus Christ, who
singly and alone has the power both of setting us up in the government of
His Church, and of judging our proceedings.' Under appeal then to so great
a judgment, expecting to hear the truth from his colleagues, should he
offer them the first example of falsehood? God avert such a madness from
any Christian, how much more from Cyprian. We possess then a free power of
inquiry, admitted us by Cyprian's own most gentle and true language."
Who can conclude otherwise than that St. Augustin in the year 400, as St.
Cyprian in the year 256, was utterly ignorant of any such power as is now
claimed for the See of Rome, under cover of that original Primacy to which
both these great saints have borne indubitable witness? For the words of
St. Cyprian, attested and approved by St. Augustin, contain the most
explicit denial of that power lodged in the see of Rome as distinct from an
Oecumenical Council, by which alone, if at all, the Church of England has
been declared schismatical and excommunicate.
These are Bishops of the West speaking, but the East also must give its
voice. St. Dionysius of Alexandria, and many other Eastern Prelates, among
the rest Firmilian, Metropolitan of Cesarea, in Cappadocia, supported St.
Cyprian on the question of rebaptization. The latter had been informed of
St. Stephen's strong judgment and decided proceedings in the matter, who
had threatened to separate the Bishops of the East also from his communion,
if they did not comply with his rule. Firmilian wrote a long letter to
Cyprian, which contains very remarkable expressions. He alludes in it more
than once to the Primacy of St. Peter, and to that of Stephen as descending
from him. [23]"But what is the error, and how great the blindness of him
(_i.e._ the Pope) who says, remission of sins can be given in the meetings
of heretics, nor remains in the foundation of the one Church which was once
fixed by Christ upon the rock, may be hence understood, because to Peter
alone Christ said, Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in
heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven;
and again, in the Gospel, when on the Apostles alone Christ breathed and
said, Receive the Holy Ghost: whose sins ye remit they are remitted, and
whose ye retain, they are retained. _Therefore the power of remitting sins
was given to the Apostles and the Churches which they, being sent by
Christ, set up, and to the Bishops who have succeeded them by ordination in
their stead_.... And here I am justly indignant at this so open and
manifest folly of Stephen, because, glorying as he does in the rank of his
Episcopate, and maintaining that he holds the succession of Peter, upon
whom the foundations of the Church were laid, he introduces many other
rocks, and sets up new buildings of many Churches, while he affirms, on his
own authority, that Baptism is in them.... Nor does he perceive that the
truth of the Christian rock is clouded over by him, and in a manner
abolished, who thus betrays and deserts unity.... You Africans can say
against Stephen, that, when the truth became known to you, you relinquished
an erroneous custom. But we join custom also to truth, and to the custom of
the Romans oppose a custom indeed, but that of truth, holding from the
beginning this which has been delivered down from Christ, and from the
Apostles." He had said before, "One may know that those who are at Rome do
not in all things observe what has been delivered down from the beginning,
and vainly allege the authority of the Apostles, even by this, that in
celebrating Easter, and in many other sacred rites, one may see there is
among them certain variations; nor are all things there kept as they are
kept at Jerusalem; just as in very many other provinces also, according to
the diversity of places and names, there are variations; nor yet on this
account have the peace and unity of the Catholic Church ever been departed
from. Which now Stephen has dared to do, breaking peace towards you, which
his predecessors always kept with you, in reciprocal love and honour;
casting, too, shameful reproach (infamans) on the blessed Apostles, Peter
and Paul, as if they had handed this down, &c." The letter concludes with
an apostrophe to Stephen, which only a regard to truth induces us to quote,
so painful is its vehemence, though it proves _ex abundanti_ the point we
are upon: "And Stephen is not ashamed to assert this, that remission of
sins can be given through those who are themselves in all their sins....
But thou art worse than all heretics; for whilst many, acknowledging their
error, come to thee thence to receive the true light of the Church, thou
assistest the errors of those so coming.... Nor understandest that their
souls will be demanded at thy hand, when the day of judgment is come, who
to the thirsting hast denied the Church's draught, and hast been the cause
of death to those who would live. And moreover thou art indignant! See with
what ignorance thou venturest to censure those who strive for the truth
against falsehood. For who had most right to be angry at another; he who
supports the enemies of God, or he who argues for the truth of the Church
against him who supports God's enemies? except that it is evident that the
ignorant are also passionate and wrathful, whilst, through lack of wisdom
and discourse, they readily betake themselves to passion, so that it is of
none other than thee that Holy Scripture says, 'The passionate man prepares
quarrels, and the wrathful man heaps up sins;' for what quarrels and
dissensions hast thou caused through the Churches of the whole world! But
how great a sin hast thou heaped upon thyself, _when thou didst cut thyself
off from so many flocks; for thou hast destroyed thyself. Do not be
deceived. Since he is the true schismatic who has made himself an apostate
from the communion of the Church's oneness; for whilst thou dost fancy that
all can be excommunicated by thee, thou hast excommunicated thyself alone
from all_.... This salutary advice of the Apostle how diligently hath
Stephen fulfilled! preserving humility of feeling and lenity, _in his first
rank_, (primo in loco.) For what could be more humble or gentle, than to
have disagreed with so many Bishops throughout the whole world, breaking
peace with one and the other on various grounds of discord, now with the
Eastern, as we are sure you are aware, now with you in the South; episcopal
deputies from whom he received with such patience and mildness, that he did
not even admit them to an interview; moreover, so mindful of the claims of
charity and affection, that he charged the whole brotherhood, that no one
should receive them into his house?" &c.
Concerning this remarkable history, Fleury says:[24] "It is not known what
was then the issue of this dispute. It is certain that it still continued
under Pope Saint Sixtus, successor of St. Stephen: this is seen by the
letters that St. Dionysius of Alexandria wrote him; and it does not appear
that St. Cyprian or Firmilian changed their mind." (So that St. Cyprian
died under excommunication from Pope Stephen.) "Still St. Cyprian is
counted among the most illustrious martyrs, even in the Roman Church, which
names him in the Canon of the Mass, in preference to Pope St. Stephen; and
the Greeks, in their Menologium, honour the memory of Firmilian. With
reason, since we shall see him preside over the first Council of Antioch,
against Paul of Samosata; and the Fathers of the second Council, writing to
the Pope, name Firmilian, of happy memory, as they do Dionysius of
Alexandria. Why the error of St. Cyprian and St. Firmilian hurt not their
sanctity is, that they always preserved on their part the unity of the
Church, and charity, and that they maintained in good faith a bad cause,
which they believed good, _and upon which there had not yet been a decision
received by unanimous consent of the whole Church_. Thus St. Augustin
speaks of it, _not counting as a final decision the decree of Pope St.
Stephen, though true in its matter, and clothed with all the force that he
could give it. No one of the ancients has accused these holy Bishops of
obstinacy for not having obeyed this decree_. The decision of Pope St.
Stephen respecting the baptism of heretics has prevailed, because it was
the most ancient and the most universal, and consequently the best.... At
length this question was entirely set at rest by the authority of the
universal Council, that is to say, at the latest, at the Council of Nicea."
Most fair and just: St. Cyprian and St. Firmilian may have innocently erred
in such a matter; but what of the way in which they treated the Pope? Could
they be ignorant of the constitution of that Church of which they were
Primates, Saints, and one a Martyr? If his decision was final, must they
not have known it? If his primacy involved their obedience, must they not
have rendered it? But if they were his deputies, as the present Roman claim
would have it, who can express their rashness? Had they been right, and the
Pope wrong, according to the present tenets of the Latin Church, obedience
had been better than sacrifice. In truth, they would have anticipated the
noble submission of the Archbishop of Cambrai, and yielded at once to the
chair of St. Peter, whatever had been their conviction as to the truth of
their views; but the Archbishop of Carthage, the sternest defender of
ecclesiastical unity and discipline which even the Church of the Fathers
produced, knew not that he had any such duty towards the See of St. Peter.