CHAPTER VI.

THE ACTUAL RELATION BETWEEN CHURCH AND STATE FROM THE DAY OF PENTECOST TO

CONSTANTINE.

_The Independence of the Ante-Nicene Church shown in her Organic Growth._

The foundation-stone of the Church of God is the Person of our Lord, a

truth embodied with marvellous force and terseness of expression in that

famous symbol of the Catacombs, the Sacred Fish, denoting by its initial

letters the name of our Lord as Man, His office as Messiah, the two

natures in the one Divine Person, the salvation which is their result,

Jesus, the Christ, Son of God, Saviour.[110] As in that Divine Person the

Godhead and Manhood are joined in that special union which constitutes

personality, as He who governs and He who teaches, He who offers

sacrifice and He who is sacrificed, is one and the same Saviour

throughout, so He continues to be in the life of His Body the Church. And

this is very manifest during the first stadium of the Church's course,

stretching from the Day of Pentecost to the decree of Constantino, which

granted to it civil recognition as a lawful religion; for government and

doctrine, like warp and woof, form the robe woven from the top

throughout in which our Lord as High Priest appears to the world.

According to the prophecy, "He builds a temple to the Lord, and bears the

glory, and is a Priest upon His throne."[111] His kingdom resides in this

unity. It is one flock, and the pastures in which His people feed upon

the truth make the domain of the government by which the kingdom is

ruled, and to feed the flock is to rule it. It is the one temple in which

the sacrifice offered is the Lord Himself, while in the sacrifice the

people is fed and grows, and is reciprocally offered to the Lord.

In all this the Church continues the mystery of her Lord's life, the

Divine Incarnation, the suffering of the Nature assumed, the resurrection

which follows. We have, then, to deal with one particular but complex

fact, the outcome of this whole period in the government, teaching, and

worship of the Church inseparably blent together, as borne into and upon

the world by its hierarchy, as enacted in its liturgy, as contained in

its sacramental life, as exhibited in the living Christian people, the

invincible race,[112] which grew up in those centuries without

interference by the State. It is a period during which the State's legal

position of undeviating hostility served as the guardian of the new

spiritual kingdom's independence.

That independence resided in a threefold sanctuary, which is one and the

same, being the House, the Temple, the Tribunal which the Blessed

Trinity, the source and model of the Church, had constructed for Himself

in the hearts of His people. First there is the sanctuary of worship, in

which Christ is Priest, the starting-point of the whole economy;

secondly, the sanctuary of teaching, from which as Prophet He dispenses

all that doctrine wherewith He is charged; thirdly, there is the

sanctuary of government, whereof jurisdiction is a necessary and

inalienable part, and in this He rules as King the distribution of all

powers belonging to His kingdom.

We have to consider how, in the first three centuries, all this was

actually carried out; and we shall best do so by placing ourselves at the

remarkable point of history, the convocation of the Nicene Council in the

year 325, and by summing up the result of the long conflict which

preceded that event, as regards these three particulars.

The Nicene Council was convoked to terminate the question which Arius had

raised as to the Godhead of our Lord. It was the remedy of the Emperor

Constantine for the malady which had broken out in the Church. He had

just become, by the death of Licinius, sole ruler of the Roman world.

Though not yet a Christian by the reception of baptism, he had conceived

the highest veneration for the Christian Church. There can be no doubt

that he trusted, by means of its spiritual unity, to weld together on a

firmer basis the shaken fabric of imperial Rome. Thus he looked with much

sorrow and no little perplexity upon the rise of a heresy in the

important Church of Alexandria; and when its bishop, in spite of his

great authority, as the head of the second Church in the world, which by

a most powerful organisation governed the three secular provinces of

Egypt, Libya, and Pentapolis, was unable to expel the mischief, he urged

the convocation of a General Council. He convoked it, so far as a secular

prince could do so, by giving all the assistance which the public

authority could render in a State politically absolute; for he not only

invited the bishops to attend, but ordered that they should travel free

of cost at the public expense. Pope Sylvester, on his side, assented; he

sent his legates to the Council, where they alone represented the whole

West, and so by his assent and by the mission of his legates gave the

Council its oecumenical character.

By this act the Emperor, who, it should be borne in mind, was still the

Pontifex Maximus of heathen worship, and the official head of the old

State religion, recognised the Church of Christ as a spiritual kingdom,

possessing a doctrine of which it was the sole judge and bearer;

recognised in its bishops the representatives of the various powers

placed by Christ, its Founder, therein, as those who bore throughout his

empire a priesthood, and exercised a spiritual rule and jurisdiction, and

preached a doctrine all bound together in one whole; who, moreover, in

virtue of this triple character, which came upon them from above, by the

institution of Christ and through the medium of consecration, which is to

say, by the force of a divine unction, and not by any human authority,

represented a people which likewise was spread everywhere, while it was

one likewise in virtue of a divine consecration, baptism in the threefold

name of God.

Such a recognition is an enormous fact, which reason and imagination flag

in their effort to realise. Two hundred and ninety-six years before, a

Man had died upon a cross the death of a Roman slave, and the evening

before His death He had ordered His disciples to commemorate that death

for ever in a certain rite which should constitute the central worship of

His people. This Man died by the edict of a Roman procurator, which had

been extorted from him by the threats of the people and their rulers over

whom he maintained Rome's supremacy. This Man also died with the record

over His head that the cause for which He died was, the assumption of

kingship over a people who refused Him for their King, and chose in

preference the Roman Emperor. His death was reported to the Emperor of

that day; but we know not whether he took any note of the death of one

recorded as a pretender to a provincial throne, or of a death enacted at

the command of a very subordinate officer of his empire, a mere

procurator under the Proconsul of Syria. The twelve disciples of this

Man, made up of fishermen, a publican, and afterwards a tent-maker, went

forth, carrying with them this rite, which they delivered to other men

throughout the empire. Upon this rite grew up a whole fabric of doctrine

and worship; rulers who propagated the doctrine and celebrated the rite,

and a people which sprung out of both. The Roman emperors, at first

superciliously disregarding the seed which had been so silently dropped

in their cities, presently turned to persecute this people and their

rulers; during ten generations having always persistently

discountenanced them, they imprisoned, tormented, or executed a certain

portion. They also destroyed the seat and worship of the people who had

rejected this Man as their King, and had chosen the Emperor instead. And

now, in rather less than three centuries, the Emperor of Rome, the

successor of Tiberius, acknowledged this crucified Man for what He

declared Himself to be: acknowledged His kingdom; acknowledged as princes

in all lands the missionaries whom He had sent forth; acknowledged as one

people, bound together in sacraments, those who had believed in His word,

or in the word of others derived from Him; acknowledged, moreover, as a

living authority, as judges of what was or was not the true doctrine as

so derived from Him, men whose sole claim was the consecration received

from that Man on the eve of His public execution, and transmitted by the

imposition of hands to their successors; acknowledged the rite of

sacrifice which He had created by His word in the offering of His Body as

the most august, the most tremendous, the most precious thing existing in

the world.

Moreover, in the convocation of the Council, the Emperor acknowledged of

his own accord the solidarity of the Christian episcopate. St. Cyprian

did not express it more plainly in his famous aphorism, "The episcopate

is one of which a part is held by each without division of the whole,"

than the Emperor in supposing that a point of doctrine on the maintenance

of which the whole fabric of revelation rested, since it concerned the

Person of the Founder, could be resolved by the common consent of its

episcopate. For the decision to be come to would bind the whole as one

Body; and herein lay another imperial attestation of Christ's kingdom.

The Emperor of Rome looked upon the Church and treated it, not as a

beehive of separable cells, but as a Body the force and life of which lay

in its oneness; and in causing a single heresy to be thus judged, he was

condemning the principle of every heresy which should at any time arise.

All this and much more is comprehended in that act of the Emperor

Constantino which sanctioned the convocation of the Nicene Council. It

was not a Christianity split up into sects, but the solid unity of the

Catholic Church in doctrine, discipline, worship, and constitution, which

the Emperor looked to for a support to the tottering political fabric of

the State, and as a new bond to its maintenance.[113]

But yet again. The Senate of Rome had been in the day of Rome's freedom a

great power. At first representing the authority of a free people who had

in course of time established a vast rule, it was a name of dignity and

glory on the earth. Next, as the official bestower or ratifier of

imperial authority, as even yet representing the Roman people, as

collecting in its bosom those who had borne high offices, ruled

provinces, gained victories, were the instruments by which the Pax Romana

kept the earth quiet and obedient, the Senate was still an august body.

But now appeared before the world another council, consisting of men

each of whom represented in his person a spiritual community while he

carried a divine power. These men were not imposers of taxes or rulers of

armies, not enactors of laws for human contracts, but men whose rule was

over souls, whose word was divine, who announced not to a particular race

but to all races of the earth one God, one Christ, one faith; a rule the

centre of which was an act of transcendent worship, and the scope and

object holiness. And this council, while it met in the empire of an

absolute sovereign, who raised up and put down whom he pleased, the lives

and fortunes of whose subjects were entirely in his hands, alone

possessed freedom, the freedom to worship what they believed, to obey the

commands of their conscience as Christians, to acknowledge a power

stretching over the whole range of their most secret life, and in nowise

derived from the Roman Emperor nor dependent on him. This power

Constantine acknowledged in causing the Council to be convoked; and by so

doing he pointed out the Council of the Christian Church as that from the

imitation of which every future parliament should spring to construct

civil liberty under Christian sovereigns. Assuredly the Council, as a

deliberative body, possessed a dignity far transcending that of the

Senate whether of free or of imperial Rome.

This is the meaning of the Nicene Council in the great arbitrament

between the Spiritual and the Civil Powers, or, in Catholic language,

between the Priesthood and the Empire. And it is a meaning put upon it

by the Roman Emperor himself. Viewed on this side, the Council is a

summary of the whole preceding history from the Day of Pentecost to its

convocation, the records of which are as scant as the facts are precious.

What know we as to the number of the martyrs and confessors in that

interval? What infinitesimal portion of individual lives and sufferings

then undergone has been preserved for our love and imitation? Among the

Fathers present at the Council there was one, Paphnutius, who had lost an

eye in the preceding persecution. We are told the Emperor would kiss the

empty socket in token of his veneration. That act symbolised his whole

demeanour to the Church for whose faith Paphnutius had suffered. It

likewise expressed the witness which the fact of the Council convoked and

acknowledged by the Roman Emperor gave to all those sufferings the

innumerable incidents of which went to construct that victory of patience

over force whereby the Christian kingdom was established in its first

field of combat. This was the conflict of the natural society of man, as

it existed in the grandest empire of Gentilism, with the supernatural

society founded in Christ.

Thus the convocation of the Nicene Council is the definitive declaration

by the Roman Empire through the mouth of its chief that it recognised a

kingdom of Christ upon earth.

To illustrate the spiritual government of this kingdom, as it had grown

up in the three centuries which intervene between the Day of Pentecost

and the convocation of the Council, let us touch upon five points: the

first shall be the ordered gradation of the hierarchy; the second, the

holding of provincial councils; the third, the hearing and the judging of

causes; the fourth, the election of the Church's ministers; the fifth,

the administration of her temporal goods.[114]

1. As to the first, the Sixth Canon of the Council ordered that the

ancient custom should continue in force, according to which the great

mother Churches of Alexandria and Antioch possessed jurisdiction over the

whole civil diocese, the one of Egypt and the other of the East, in like

manner as the Church of Rome possessed a similar jurisdiction in the

West. The ground upon which the Council rests this canon is much to be

observed; it does not institute this jurisdiction, but orders it be

continued because it was the ancient custom. Now as there had been no

other Council prior to that of Nicæa, in which this power of jurisdiction

over the Metropolitans in the civil dioceses of Egypt and of the East had

been granted to the Bishops of Alexandria and of Antioch, the origin of

this ancient custom must be referred to apostolic institution, according

to St. Augustine's rule, "That which is held by the whole Church, which

has not been ordered by councils, but always been kept, we are most right

in believing to have been handed down by none other than apostolic

authority."[115] Pope Innocent I.,[116] writing to Alexander Bishop of

Antioch, about eighty years after the Council, recognises his

jurisdiction over not only one province, but over the whole assemblage of

provinces which made up the civil jurisdiction of the Prefect of the

East, not so much on the ground of the city's civil dignity as because it

had been the first See of the chief of the Apostles. St. Gregory the

Great[117] repeatedly in his letters speaks of the See of the chief of

the Apostles as being the See of one in three places, Rome, Alexandria,

and Antioch.

That which the Sixth Canon of the Council witnesses, therefore, is the

original jurisdiction of the two great mother Sees of Alexandria and

Antioch over their daughter churches, which it corroborates by referring

to the norm, as it were, supplied by the still greater See of Rome.

Though these Sees were not called at the time of the Nicene Council

patriarchal, a name which arose in the fifth century; yet the thing

itself, and the institution which it denoted, existed from the beginning.

The system of mother and daughter churches is shown in the highest degree

in these three great Sees, in two of which St. Peter himself sat, while

he founded the third by his disciple Mark. It is, in fact, a derivation

from St. Peter's Primacy, and the constituent principle of the hierarchy

in its intermediate gradation of ranks. As the institution of bishops

throughout the world is a derivation of apostolic authority, so likewise

is the repartition of jurisdiction among them. One and the same

principle--power coming from above--made the whole hierarchy, whether in

the bishop over the simple diocese, or in the metropolitan over a single

province, or in the primate over several metropolitans, or in the central

See of St. Peter, the Head of all. The three former of these gradations,

the Sixth Canon of the Council recognised as of immemorial existence.

With regard to the fourth, when the Roman legate at the Council of

Chalcedon cited this canon, he cited it with the heading: "The Roman

church always had the Primacy." And although the Greek copies of the

Council did not bear this heading, the Greek bishops there did not

dispute the fact which it stated. And it must be noted that this heading

did not assert the Primacy of Rome to be given by the Council, but that

it had always existed; nor was any fact more constantly repeated by Pope

after Pope when addressing the Church in her bishops, than this, that his

authority, whatever it was, was the gift of Christ to St. Peter, and not

bestowed by any Council: and so of divine, not apostolical, institution.

It would appear that the Apostles,[118] in carrying out the divine

instructions of their Master for the establishment of His kingdom,

followed His own example. Inasmuch as He had given them a head, they

would appoint inferior heads in the Church who should hold an order among

themselves in its administration, and all refer to the Superior. In doing

this they had regard to the civil disposition of the empire, using it as

a model upon which they formed the exterior polity of the Church. For

just as in the civil and temporal government of each province there was a

mother city, the prefect of which administered the whole province,

ruling under the Prince over the subordinate governors, to whom matters

of more grave importance were referred, so the Apostles and their

disciples after them instituted in the chief cities bishops to whom they

gave all the powers of metropolitans before the name came into use, in

order that ecclesiastical regulations of the greatest moment might be

treated before them in union with the bishops of their respective

provinces.[119] Thus St. Paul, finding Ephesus the metropolis of

Proconsular Asia, placed Timotheus to be bishop there, giving him at the

same time jurisdiction over the bishops of that province, who should be

drawn as it were out of the womb of the parent See; and in his first

letter we find instructions as to the quality of the bishops whom he

should select. In the 19th chapter of the Acts, we are told that St. Paul

had drawn a great number of disciples to him, not only at Ephesus, but in

nearly every part of Asia, that is, the proconsular province of that

name. In the 17th chapter, at a later date, he summoned at Miletus the

bishops of Ephesus and its province to meet him, calling them "all you

among whom I have passed preaching the kingdom of God," which words

denote that he was speaking, not to the priests of one city, but to the

bishops of a province, in which "the Holy Ghost had set them as bishops

to rule over the church of God." St. Irenæus also notes that they were

bishops and elders from Ephesus and the adjoining cities. St. John

recognises these bishops in the seven letters which he is ordered to

communicate to the angels of the churches in the Apocalypse. At the head

of these is the Angel of the church of Ephesus as metropolis. So, again,

the Apostle Paul set Titus as metropolitan over the whole of Crete,

expressly ordering him to establish bishops in every city, and describing

what their character should be. His letters to Corinth and to

Thessalonica, as well as to Ephesus, are letters to cities each of which

was a metropolis. Thus the 34th of the Canons, called apostolical, runs:

"It behoves the bishops of each nation to recognise him, who is the first

among them, and to esteem him as their head, and to do nothing of

importance without his sentence; but let each of them do only what

concerns his own diocese and the places belonging to it, and not that

without the agreement of all."[120] Here is seen the discipline of the

ancient church, beyond a doubt derived from the Apostles, as to the

Metropolitan's superintendence over the bishops of every province.

Thus the distribution[121] of episcopal jurisdiction began with the

beginning, and was the outflow of one principle as stable as it was

simple. The structure of the diocese, that of the province, that of the

patriarchate, that of the whole Church, was identical throughout. It was

a series of concentric circles, at the centre of which was our Lord

Himself. In the simple diocese He was seen as walking and teaching with

His Apostles on earth; in the province the metropolitan, with his

suffragans, repeated the same image; in the patriarchate, the Primate

and his metropolitans; while in the See of Peter, our Lord stood by the

lake of Galilee delivering with the thrice enjoined question, "Lovest

thou Me more than these?" the divine pastoral power over His whole flock.

This was the example of the Master Himself, which the Apostles faithfully

followed.

From the beginning as to this exterior polity of His Church nothing was

undefined, nothing was casual; it was the Body of Christ in its natural

action gradually filling the world, by which the Head was gradually

drawing man to Himself. It was the perfection of order, and yet the

perfection of a divine liberty, which took hold of earthly things, such

as the civil disposition of a temporal empire, to exalt it into the

structure of a supernatural kingdom.

The great builders of the Middle Ages, in these stupendous cathedrals

which the piety of generations raised in honour of the Mother of God,

represented the Body of our Lord in that form of the cross on which He

purchased our redemption. Every wall, every buttress, every chapel

therein converged towards the centre, and lent its several portion of

support to the whole. Therein the Church in her unity and solidarity was

visibly portrayed, the Head with His members, the Mother of fair love,

bearing the Divine Child, with His saints and confessors around Him.

Therein the mystery of our salvation, the mystical altar of sacrifice,

was ever set forth, in which the Divine Presence, the greater Schechinah

of the new law, abode without ceasing. Such an intellectual and moral

structure is presented to us in the hierarchy of the Church, graduated

according to the system just described, from the first Apostolic Council

at Jerusalem to the first General Council at Nicæa. No bishop stood apart

from his fellows; no important matter of doctrine or discipline, of

government or worship, was terminated by him without common council of

his brethren. Every province was ranged round the central shrine, and

made part of the one edifice. It was the Body of Christ sculptured, not

on stone, but on human hearts, joined together by the wisdom of His

saints, and cemented with the blood of His martyrs.

2. The second point[122] to be considered is the development of synodical

institutions which kept even pace with the metropolitical hierarchy. As

the council of his priests stood beside the bishop, so the provincial

synod, the earliest form of councils, stood beside the metropolitan. From

the second half of the second century these came into action for the

subjugation of doctrinal errors and divisions, such as the Montanist

heresy, and the contest as to the proper day for the celebration of

Easter. The unity and solidarity of the churches and their bishops found

more and more expression in these synods; here the heretical attack was

stayed, and the common action of the bishops met the common assault of

opponents. In the third century these episcopal meetings took place

generally once, and in some countries twice a year. In them the bishops

only had a decisive voice; priests and deacons could take part in them,

the latter usually standing, while bishops and priests sat; the laity

also were not absolutely excluded. The decrees of councils were usually

sent by encyclical letters to other bishops. Bishops who could not appear

in person had to be represented either by other bishops, as in A.D. 286

at Carthage, or by clerics of their church, as in 314 at Arles. The

bishops of higher rank, who presided over the synod, generally

metropolitans, were accustomed to subscribe the decrees alone.

Accusations against bishops, and wrong acts on their part, were likewise

examined at synods, and decided there. We no longer possess acts of the

most ancient councils, except those of some African synods under Cyprian,

and of that of Antioch in 269; we have 28 disciplinary decrees of the

Council of Amyra in 314, and 14 of that of Neocæsarea held at about the

same time.

3. Nothing sheds clearer light upon the constitution of the Church, as a

perfect society, than her action in the hearing and deciding of

causes.[123] The coercive power of the Church descends to her direct from

God, and not from man, and was comprised from the beginning in the

twofold jurisdiction of the external and the internal forum, the one

criminal and the other penitential. The Son of God, who gave this power

to the prelates of His Church, appointed them to be judges of men,

granting to them full power to absolve and to condemn, and pledging His

divine word that their sentences should be confirmed in heaven. The grant

is recorded in the sixteenth chapter of St. Matthew, as promised to St.

Peter in his quality as head of the Church, and in the eighteenth chapter

as promised to the Apostles collectively, and in their persons to the

bishops who descend from them. By this divine disposition they are the

sole and ordinary judges of the Church who belong essentially to the

ecclesiastical polity; and therefore St. Cyprian wrote: that "heresies

have arisen and schisms sprung up from no other reason than the not

yielding obedience to God's priest; and from not reflecting that there is

at a time but one priest in the Church, and one judge at a time in

Christ's place: to whom, if according to the divine commands the whole

brotherhood yielded obedience, no one would venture to do anything

against the College of Priests;"[124] that is the episcopate.

This power of the keys gave a true and proper jurisdiction as well in the

criminal as the penitential forum. But the difference between the two is

marked. The punishment inflicted by the Church on those who were accused

and convicted in judgment was different from that which was laid upon

such as of their own accord, either in public or in secret, confessed

their sins. The punishment inflicted on delinquents after accusation and

proof of their misconduct was called a sentence, a condemnation, a

sacerdotal censure, to use St. Cyprian's term; the other, which was laid

upon any one who of his own accord confessed his faults, was properly a

penitence, and never called a condemnation, but, on the contrary, carried

with it a sacerdotal absolution from the soul's stains. The former

belonged to the exterior forum, judicial and contentious; the latter to

the interior forum, that of conscience. There was, indeed, a great

difference between the two; for the censure laid its stroke upon those

who resisted and were contumacious, who refused to confess their crime,

if they were once judicially convicted; but penitence was only given to

those who, by confession, voluntarily disclosed their fault, and they

only who were the guilty parties formed the accusers and the witnesses

against themselves.[125]

During the whole period of the first three centuries the Church exercised

through her bishops this true and proper jurisdiction, both of the

exterior and the interior forum. Instances of the former are the

punishment of Ananias and Sapphira by St. Peter; of Elymas the sorcerer

and the incestuous person at Corinth by St. Paul. But, further, the

latter Apostle in his first Epistle to the Corinthians directed that

causes of all kinds among Christians should be settled, not before the

secular Gentile magistrates, but before the divine magistracy of the

Church. And according to this rule the bishops in the first ages took

cognisance of all causes and temporal differences, as well of clergy as

of laity, and terminated them by their judgment; and this custom lasted

even into the fourth century, after the peace of the Church, so that the

most troublesome occupation which the bishops of those ages had was to

exercise this judicial power over secular matters, as St. Augustine

confesses in his own case, where he says, "They demand of us that we

should occupy ourselves with their vicious and troublesome covetousness,

and give them up our time; at least they press the weak, and force them

to bring their causes to us; and we do not venture to say to them, 'Man,

who made me a judge or a divider among you?' For the Apostle instituted

ecclesiastical judges in such causes by prohibiting Christians from

pleading before secular tribunals."[126]

Jurisdiction is defined to be "cognition of causes belonging to the

magistrate by right of his office."[127] Such a cognition was exercised

by the bishops over every sort of cause among Christians in the first

centuries. Aristotle says, "Those are most properly to be called

magistrates whose function it is to deliberate, to judge, and to command,

but especially the latter, as being more characteristic of them." And

when St. Paul writes, "Obey those that are set over you, and be subject

to them; for they watch as those who will give account of your souls," he

says the same, since by the force of relative terms there cannot be the

duty of obedience on one side without the right to command on the other.

This episcopal magistracy was executed in four degrees, corresponding to

the hierarchy and the councils as they have been just described. First,

in his diocese the bishop was the proper judge, as Origen in his answer

to Celsus draws a parallel between the bishop with his presbytery in each

particular city and the chief magistrate of that city with the council.

Secondly, the metropolitan with his council of bishops, so that the

apostolical canons enjoin that if a bishop be accused by persons of the

faith, worthy of credit, he should be brought and judged before that

tribunal.[128] Thirdly, if a metropolitan were accused, the higher

tribunal of the Primate and his Episcopal Council would intervene.

Fourthly, if a Primate, or one of those afterwards termed Patriarchs,

were in fault, as Paul of Samosata, holding the See of Antioch in the

third century, a council of still greater rank would meet to judge him;

and in this case even the secular sovereign, the Emperor Aurelius,

recognised that the episcopal house ought to belong to the person

indicated by the bishops of Italy, that is, the Pope.

4. The fourth point which I will endeavour to sum up is the practice of

the Church in the period preceding the Nicene Council as to the election

of bishops and the other ministers of inferior rank to the bishop from

the priest downwards, together with the principle on which this practice

was founded.

It has been shown above how the first bishops were planted by St. Peter,

St. Paul, and the other Apostles, who chose by direction of the Holy

Spirit, in the cities wherein they preached, those whom they would invest

with the plenitude of the priesthood, to be sources of future spiritual

rule and centres of Christian life. But when successors to those had in

the course of time to be appointed, what rule was followed?

The form of the sacred elections in those first ages was this: when a

bishop died, the bishops of the province, together with the metropolitan,

assembled in the city of the defunct prelate. They here took information

from the clergy and the people respecting the persons who were considered

worthy of episcopal rank. The bishops deliberated by themselves on the

matter, and then proposed in public the person whom they considered

worthy of the bishop's seat. They heard thereupon the opinion and the

wish of the clergy and the faithful people. Having heard these, they

issued their judgment, in which the sentence of the metropolitan had the

larger share; and the new bishop being elected, they at once consecrated

him. As to the election of the priests and the other inferior clergy, the

same order was pursued in consulting clergy and people, and the whole

judgment was ultimately reserved to the bishop.

St. Cyprian has left us in his 68th letter a most lucid testimony to this

being the custom in his day, not only in the Churches of Africa, but in

all other provinces. "We must," he says, "diligently observe and maintain

the custom which has come down to us by divine tradition and apostolical

observance, which is kept among ourselves and in almost every province.

In order that ordination be rightly celebrated, the nearest bishops of

the province must assemble among that people for whom a superior is to be

appointed. The bishop must be chosen in the presence of the people,

which has the fullest knowledge of the life of every one, and is

thoroughly acquainted with his conduct by his acts." He supports the

custom by the example of Eleazar, who, though chosen to be high priest by

Moses alone, in obedience to a divine command, was yet set before the

people, to show that sacerdotal ordinations should be made in the

presence of those who by intimate knowledge can testify the merits of

those chosen; and, again, by the example of the Apostles, who, in the

election as well of St. Matthias as of the seven deacons, called together

the people and heard their testimony, "that no unworthy person might find

means to be advanced to a higher rank or the sacerdotal dignity."

The outcome of these three centuries is, that the election of the bishop

lay in the hands of the metropolitan, assisted by the bishops of his

province, and that the election of the metropolitan lay in the synod of

his bishops, but confirmed by the bishops of the first Sees, to whom

belonged the consecration of metropolitans.[129] This was the discipline

in the East, while in the West the Roman Pontiff, through the dignity of

his throne as head of the whole Church and of all particular Churches,

did not personally intervene in the election of bishops to vacant Sees,

but the successor was chosen by the neighbouring bishops according to the

desires of the clergy and people, and the decree of the election was

transmitted him, leaving to his choice its confirmation, or provision

for the vacant See in some other manner, as might seem to him most

expedient.

The election of all ministers below the bishop belonged to the bishop

alone.

It is evident that the great number of bishops who in the course of two

centuries were sent out by the Roman Pontiffs[130] to convert the nations

to the faith were not elected by the faithful people which they

themselves founded; nor could the testimony or the consent of the people

be asked. But if the election of ministers had belonged by divine

institution to the faithful laity and the Christian people, neither the

Apostles, nor their disciples, nor the successors of St. Peter could have

altered a divine disposition, nor elected pastors without the consent of

the people.

But the principle on which the Church acted from the beginning is as

clear as her practice; for the priesthood and the whole order of pastors

in the Church having been established by the Son of God, and the

perpetuity of this same priesthood in this same Church being also

necessary by this divine disposition, it follows that the election of

sacred ministers to maintain the succession and the disposition given by

Christ to the Church, must belong by divine order to some one. As it

cannot belong to laymen, it must belong to the clergy alone. In fact, St.

Paul, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, declares that God Himself prescribed

the form of this election in the priesthood of Aaron, and that this form

was observed by our Lord. "No one," he says, "takes this honour to

himself but he that is called by God, as was Aaron. So, too, Christ

glorified not Himself to be called High Priest, but He that said to Him,

'Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee;' as also in another

place He says, 'Thou art a Priest for ever after the order of

Melchisedec.'"

Exactly, then, as Aaron was elected solely by Moses at God's command,

without waiting for any consent or any council of the people, so in the

Church bishops did not need the consent or counsel of the people to be

elected to their ministry, but they required the suffrage and the

institution of their own order. And our Lord, on the day of His

Resurrection, when He met His assembled Apostles, gave the whole rule,

order, and descent of election and institution in His Church in the

words, "As My Father sent Me, so I also send you." As He elected His

apostles and disciples, excluding all consent of the multitude, so He

made them electors and institutors of the ministers who should succeed

them, independent of popular election. In His Church power is from above,

not from below; from within, not from without; nor is any truth attested

with a more complete and unbroken witness in the history of three hundred

years than this.

5. The fifth point to be considered is the administration of the Church's

temporal goods.

Our Lord died upon the cross in utter want and nakedness; in similar want

and nakedness of temporal goods the Church, His Body, began her course.

She had to draw by the power of His resurrection from the hearts of men

what should be sufficient for her clothing and sustenance. The charge of

our Lord in sending out His twelve Apostles is, in brief, the history of

His Church during these three centuries. They went out without gold or

silver in their girdles; they stayed in the houses which received them,

eating and drinking of what was set before them. They preached the

kingdom of heaven; freely they had received, and freely they gave; and

for their heavenly gifts, since the labourer is worthy of his hire, they

received temporal support. The 34th Apostolic Canon expresses the

obligation to support the clergy and the divine service, which created

all the property of the Church. "The law of God has appointed that those

who abide at the altar should live by the altar."

The support of their religion was from the beginning both a natural and a

divine obligation lying upon all Christians; the natural obligation,

expressed in the words "The labourer is worthy of his hire," received

from our Lord a supernatural application, when, using these words, He

commanded that they who preached the gospel should live of the

gospel.[131]

We may note three states of the Church in these early ages as to this

matter.[132] In the beginning, during the first fervour of the disciples

in Jerusalem, the clergy and laity were united in one heart and spirit,

and had all things in common, and those who possessed property sold it,

and laid the price at the feet of the Apostles, that they might provide

for the common needs. Those who lived in this manner had no obligation

of paying tithes or first-fruits. A second state was that when the faith

was spread beyond the bounds of Palestine, and that common life could

hardly be maintained. Then the faithful retained their property as

individuals, but collections were made on certain days for the support of

the clergy and the poor, as St. Paul records.[133] When, subsequently,

the Christian faith spread through the whole Roman Empire, and assumed a

more complete and established form, these stated collections were

retained, while Irenæus, and Origen, and Cyprian bear witness to the

institution of tithes and first-fruits. Whether the specific amount of

contribution was or was not imposed, at least the sustenance of the

clergy and of religion was ever considered a debt of justice.

As to the acquisition and usage of temporal goods, the course of things

in these first ages may be thus summed up.[134] It is not easy to know

precisely at what time churches began to possess immovable goods; it is,

however, very probable that this took place soon after the death of the

Apostles, and as soon as the faithful gave up the practice of selling

their property. Not that every Church made such acquisitions, but that by

degrees, now in one city and now in another, some real property was

secured; for it is certain that collections continued to be made for a

long time, and the faithful continued to give tithes and first-fruits.

These collections were not only made for the local Church, but for

churches of distant provinces which were in need, for such a

communication of goods was always enjoined by charity and recommended by

unity. And it must be further remarked that these oblations of a

particular Church were not only sent to another Church when they were

more than were needed at home, but often made on purpose to be sent to a

distance, as we learn from innumerable examples of ecclesiastical

history. The reason of this is plain; for the whole Church being one, as

all particular parts are bound to maintain religious union, so are they

bound to have communication of those temporal goods which are the

endowments necessary to preserve it, and one must help the other when

just reason requires it, that all may help reciprocally in maintaining

each other.

There was also in these centuries already made a fourfold distribution of

the temporal goods acquired; one portion was given to the bishop, a

second to the other clergy, a third for the support and relief of the

poor and of strangers, a fourth for the building, reparation, and

furnishing of churches, for it would seem that there were from the

beginning places destined for divine worship. St. Paul[135] speaks of

such for the reception of our Lord's Body and Blood. The Martyrology

records the festival of the first Christian Church at Rome, which was

consecrated by St. Peter. Justin, Tertullian, Cyprian make mention of

churches, sometimes the heathen emperors even allowed these, as is

specially mentioned of Alexander Severus.

If, then, we compare the want and nakedness in which the Church began

with the state in which she emerged from the period of persecution

terminated by Constantine, we find that in spite of spoliations undergone

in so many assaults of the heathen empire, she had created funds to

support the whole body of her Episcopate, and the clergy subject to them

in each diocese, to make ample relief for the poor, for the reception of

strangers, for the support of hospitals; to build, maintain, and adorn

churches for the celebration of her sacraments and the preaching of her

word. In all this she exerted a parallel force with that which shows

itself in the construction of her hierarchy, the system of her provincial

councils, the constitution of her tribunals, the free election of her

bishops and subordinate ministers. In no one of these things did the

temporal government give her any aid. That is, indeed, to say much less

than the truth. In no one of them did the temporal government do

otherwise than thwart her, from the lowest degree of persecution,

consisting in a social contempt and disregard, to the highest, of violent

confiscation and bloody torture. The extent of favour which she enjoyed

was that here and there a politic emperor shut his eyes to her

proceedings, or even remarked in the plenitude of his forbearance that a

church was better than a cookshop.[136] As the hierarchy proceeded forth

by an inward strength derived from our Lord's command, uniting local

autonomy with central authority, exercising a rule at once paternal and

majestical, the rule of Him who joined the commission to feed His whole

flock with the condition to love Him more than all others loved Him, so

this same hierarchy, passing from house to house and city to city with

the word, "the Kingdom of God is at hand," clothed itself as it passed

with such a measure of material goods as was necessary for its

maintenance by the offerings of the faithful, which they considered at

once a natural and a divine obligation, for throughout they saw in the

body they were covering the Body of the Lord, who for their sakes, being

rich, had become poor.

The five subjects we have just reviewed belong to the Church's external

government, in which she manifested from the beginning a complete liberty

and independence of all power outside of herself. It is next in order to

show the same liberty and independence in the evolution of her teaching.

In this respect the task which fell upon the Apostles, from the time of

her Lord's departure, has been very concisely but, at the same time, very

exactly defined in the last words of St. Matthew's Gospel, wherein our

Lord Himself charged them to "Go forth and make disciples all nations,

baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy

Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded

you." Herein the construction of the Church is marked in the authority

which makes disciples everywhere, for the disciple stands to the teacher

in a relation of obedience; in the rite of baptism, which binds them

together in one whole, and which, standing at the head, represents the

whole system of sacraments; while the teachers are enjoined to require

observance of all those things which Christ had commanded them to teach

in His name. These injunctions were recorded by St. Matthew in his Gospel

many years after they had been exactly fulfilled by those to whom they

were addressed. As soon as the Apostles were invested "with power from on

high" at the Day of Pentecost, they began the simple work of making

disciples, binding them together with sacraments, teaching them obedience

to those things in which they had been enjoined by their Lord to instruct

them. Again, we possess in the Gospel of St. Luke, dated, as is supposed,

at least thirty years after the Day of Pentecost, a continuous record of

what they began to do. But the work done, in all its length and breadth,

was independent of these records. It is important to realise as well as

we can the fact that the whole settlement of the Church as an

institution, which embraces the worship of God, the administration of

sacraments, the regulation of discipline, her essential polity, including

the vocation, ordination, and jurisdiction of her ministers, and no less

the instruction of men in that whole doctrine of salvation which

consisted in the confession that our Lord was the Christ; all this, which

was effected in the forty years which passed between the Day of Pentecost

and the destruction of Jerusalem, was effected by oral teaching and

living authority. The chief Sees were planted, and the divine polity in

each of them, which formed the life of the Christian people, was laid

down before the writings of the New Testament began to be published,

long before they were collected, still longer before the Canon of the

writings forming them was closed. The first generation of Christians

received their religion from the lips of Messengers, Ambassadors,

Heralds, who spoke in Christ's name the words which Christ had put in

them. Christians so made entered upon the practice of a life the whole

course of which was drawn out for them by their teachers. This is the

force of the commission, "Make disciples of all nations." Mysteries were

dispensed to them of which these teachers were stewards, and which they

accepted from the hands of the teachers. And only when this work had been

done, during a course of years and in many great cities, did the first

written collection of some of the words and acts of Christ begin to be

made public; while the last of this fourfold collection was not

communicated to the general body of disciples until more than sixty years

after the termination of our Lord's earthly life. Before that time the

structure of the Church in those points of her external government which

we have touched above had been entirely completed; the sound of the

Apostles had gone out into all the world; a multitude of teachers had

been commissioned by the Apostles; a multitude of people had been taught

by them; martyrs had borne witness to the faith thus planted everywhere.

In this first era, which lasted certainly during the lifetime of the

Apostles in general, probably to the death of the last Apostle, John, the

tradition of the Christian faith was oral. By all this period the

kingdom of Christ preceded the book in which we read at the distance of

so many centuries the account of its origin. The book did not make the

kingdom, but the kingdom made itself, and in making gave us the book, as

a part of itself, a permanent though not a complete record of our Lord's

words and acts, and a portion of that oral teaching which had been the

instrument of its first propagation.

This oral teaching comprehended three classes of facts: first, the things

taught by our Lord to His Apostles, whether they were afterwards written

or whether they were not written; and as to such a distinction nothing

can be more express than St. John's repeated testimony that only a small

portion of the things which He did and the signs which He wrought were

written--a testimony the more important as it comes from him whose

writings close the canon of Scripture. Secondly, it comprehended those

things which the Apostles learnt by illumination from the Holy Spirit,

according to the promise recorded for us by St. John, "I have yet many

things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now; but when He the

Spirit of Truth is come, He will guide you by the hand into all

truth,"[137] and which under His guidance they taught to the first

disciples; and these two classes of things make up together the divine

tradition. Thirdly, it comprehended those things which the Apostles in

propagating the Church enjoined upon the pastors whom they appointed for

the regulation of discipline, for the administration of sacraments, and

for the worship of God, which were not written; and these things make up

the apostolic tradition.

It is obvious that out of this treasure-house of the divine and

apostolical tradition came the whole planting and propagation of the

Church during that first period which elapsed from the Day of Pentecost

to the end of the personal teaching of the Apostles. At first, and for

many years, the Gospels were not set forth in a written shape, much less

were the other books of the New Testament composed. The writings forming

the actual canon were not completed until about the year 98. In this

interval the acts and the life of Christ were to be impressed on the

world; the character of His people was to be formed upon them; the

Christian race was born and passed through more than two generations, and

the kingdom of heaven upon earth received its definite shape. The divine

and apostolic tradition which came from Christ through living men worked

these effects. The principle upon which all rested was personal

authority. The historical demonstration of the Apostolic Church in this

respect is complete and absolute.

It would seem as if this period were of special importance in enabling us

to understand distinctly the nature of the Church's teaching office. The

work then done comprised the whole evangelical announcement, the

preaching, that is, of Christ in His kingdom; the establishment of the

worship which He had enjoined, the administering not merely the sacrament

of baptism, but the other sacraments in their due order, as they touched

the several parts of human life, the discipline which regulated the daily

course of life, and also the ordering of penance. In the first community

set up at Jerusalem all this would take place; it would be repeated at

Antioch, at Rome, at Alexandria, at Ephesus, at Corinth, at every place

in which the Apostles established bishops. These things, with the almost

interminable series of arrangements and actions which they involve, are

all contained in the charge given by our Lord to His Apostles, to which

we have just referred. This it is "to make disciples of all nations."

Thus when St. Peter preached on the Day of Pentecost, the immediate

effect of his word was the reception of about three thousand hearers into

the Church. These had at once to be baptized; therefore the form and

ceremonies of baptism were ready prepared for them; but their life is

immediately described as a steadfast continuance upon the teaching of the

Apostles, in the communion of the breaking of bread, which took place day

by day, and in prayers.

From the Day of Pentecost, therefore, the Liturgy of the Church, with all

the treasure of doctrine and worship which it contains, was in full

operation. I have endeavoured above to give a very short sketch of the

vast amount of doctrine contained in the Liturgy, which is at the same

time an explicit confession of faith, an act of worship, and an

exhibition of spiritual rule. Further, it is an act daily repeated

throughout the whole Church, in which she testifies her life, and the

dwelling of her Lord in her. The testimony thus given of the threefold

power of doctrine, worship, and rule is entirely independent of those

allusions to it which are afterwards made in the narrative either of the

Gospels or of the Apostolic Epistles. For instance, the term "breaking of

bread" points indeed unmistakably to the Eucharistic service, but it

gives no description of what that service as celebrated was. We gather

this from the ancient Liturgies of the East and West which have come down

to us, showing a perfect accord in their parts and meaning and general

disposition. Vast is the difference between these Liturgies, viewed in

their completeness as acts of worship--that is, not merely in their

words, which are so grand and spirit-stirring, but likewise in the

function visibly carried out by the bishop, his attendant clergy, and the

adoring people--between all this, and the allusion made to it in the few

passages of the Gospels, the Acts, and the Epistles. Yet all this existed

from the very beginning, and is part of that which St. Peter at the head

of the Apostles instituted from the Day of Pentecost. As an act, it is

quite independent of any subsequent narrative which records it; but

before the end of this first period it was an act which had been carried

out daily in a vast number of cities wherein the Church had taken root.

The Eucharistic Liturgy was from the beginning the Church's explicit and

solemn exhibition of her faith in her worship. She kept it strictly for

her own people, and did not allow it to be divulged. It was an act

expressing Christ visibly in the midst of His Church. The altar was His

throne. The chiefs ministrant bore His person, and enacted before the

eyes of the observant people the work of Christ's Incarnation and

Redemption, presenting it to God the Father. The rites and ceremonies

which accompanied the words removed, for those beholding and

participating the mysteries, that obscurity which may belong in matters

of faith to mere words. But, moreover, words of singular simplicity and

perspicuity were used in describing the acts by which our Lord became man

for us and redeemed us. When the attendant deacon[138] gave warning that

all should be in fear and trembling, before the commencement of the

sacred action, and before the invocation of the Holy Ghost, did not the

words themselves signify the expectation of some signal miracle to be

wrought by the Divine Omnipotence? When the people heard the celebrant

invoking the descent of the Holy Ghost on the gifts lying before him,

that by His presence He might make the bread to be the Body of Christ,

and the wine and water the Blood of Christ, transmuting them by His

divine power,--when the ministers delivered them to each of the faithful,

with the words, "the Body of Christ," "the Blood of Christ," to which he

replied, "Amen," what merely verbal announcement could equal in force of

teaching that visible setting forth of Christ? On one part, it was Christ

giving Himself to His people; on the other, a supreme acknowledgment of

joy, gratitude, and prostrate homage by His people for the gift.

When the Beloved Disciple, who lay on the Lord's bosom, had a revelation

of what was to happen in the time to come, the vision was presented to

him under the form of that worship which Peter first, in the company of

his brother Apostles, which the bishop of each city afterwards,

surrounded by his ancients and in the presence of the faithful people,

celebrated. It seems to be the interior of a church in the apostolic age

which we have described, and all the meaning of the Eucharistic

Sacrifice, as the witness of creative power and redeeming love, set

forth. But it is the Lord Himself, who with the voice of a trumpet

proclaimed Himself to be the First and the Last, and charged His Apostle

with letters to the Seven Churches, who now says with the same voice,

"Come up hither, and I will show thee the things which must be done

hereafter." "I looked," he says, "and behold a door was opened in heaven,

and immediately I was in the spirit; and behold there was a throne set in

heaven, and upon the throne One sitting. And He that sat was to the sight

like the jasper and the sardine-stone; and there was a rainbow round

about the throne in sight like unto an emerald. And round about the

throne were four-and-twenty seats; and upon the seats four-and-twenty

ancients sitting, clothed in white garments, and on their heads crowns of

gold. And from the throne proceeded lightnings and voices and thunders;

and there were seven lamps burning before the throne, which are the seven

spirits of God." Here, in the likeness of an ancient basilica, with the

throne of the bishop in the apse, and the seats of his presbyters in a

semicircle round him, we have the court of the Almighty set forth, and

the ineffable grandeur of the creating God: when "the four living

creatures full of eyes gave glory and honour and benediction to Him that

sitteth on the throne, who liveth for ever and ever, the four-and-twenty

ancients fell down before Him that sitteth on the throne, and adored Him

that liveth for ever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne,

saying, Thou art worthy, O Lord our God, to receive glory and honour and

power, because Thou hast created all things, and for Thy will they are

(eisi,) and have been created."

So far the homage paid to God in the great overwhelming mystery of

creation. All things have been made by Him and for Him. But another

mystery succeeds: the fall and the redemption of man. "And I saw in the

right hand of Him that sat on the throne a book written within and

without, sealed with seven seals. And I saw a strong angel proclaiming

with a loud voice, Who is worthy to open the book and to loose the seals

thereof? And no man was able, neither in heaven, nor on earth, nor under

the earth, to open the book, nor to look on it. And I wept much because

no man was found worthy to open the book nor to see it. And one of the

ancients said to me, Weep not; behold the Lion of the tribe of Juda, the

root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven

seals thereof. And I saw, and behold in the midst of the throne and of

the four living creatures, and in the midst of the ancients, a Lamb

standing as it were slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are

the seven spirits of God sent forth into all the earth. And He came and

took the book out of the right hand of Him that sat upon the throne.--And

when He had opened the book, the four living creatures and the

four-and-twenty ancients fell down before the Lamb, having every one of

them harps and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of

saints; and they sang a new canticle, saying, Thou art worthy, O Lord, to

take the book and to open the seals thereof; because Thou wast slain and

hast redeemed us to God in Thy blood, out of every tribe and tongue, and

people and nation, and hast made us to our God a kingdom and priests, and

we shall reign on the earth. And I beheld, and I beard the voice of many

angels round about the throne and the living creatures and the ancients;

and the number of them was thousands of thousands, saying with a loud

voice, The Lamb that was slain is worthy to receive power and divinity,

and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and benediction. And every

creature which is in heaven and on the earth, and under the earth, and

such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, I heard all saying, To

Him that sitteth on the throne, and to the Lamb, benediction and honour

and glory and power for ever and ever. And the four living creatures

said, Amen. And the four-and-twenty ancients fell down on their faces,

and adored Him that liveth for ever and ever."

We have now added to the throne of the Almighty, in the midst of the four

living creatures and the twenty-four crowned elders, "a Lamb standing as

it were slain," who, having received the sealed book from Him that sat

upon the throne, becomes Himself the centre of adoration. He takes the

place of the altar in the Church, being Himself the altar and the

celebrant; He opens the seals of the book which no one in heaven or earth

could open but Himself; He rules the evolution of all the events which

make up the history of His people; He the victim; He the priest; He the

ruler. And under the Eucharist Sacrifice thus exhibited the whole

evolution of judgments and victories are drawn out, which ends with "the

holy city, the New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God,

prepared as a Bride adorned for her Husband."

Only this vision of the Beloved Disciple and the feelings which it

exhibits would adequately represent that awe and joy, that gratitude and

triumph, with which the faithful took part in what the Fathers call "the

tremendous and unbloody sacrifice." And could any Christian of the

Apostle's day read the words of this heavenly vision without recognising

in it the very order and arrangement of the great worship which formed

then, as it forms now, the central act of united Christian life?

No higher act of authority is even conceivable than that establishment of

worship. But this was a worship which the Apostles had received in secret

from their Lord, which they did not commit to writing, but carefully

imprinted upon the memories of their disciples, which they guarded with

the utmost care and jealousy from the knowledge of all until they had

first instructed them and then baptized them, the participation in which

was the crown of all Christian privileges. Thus they understood what

Christ had ordered them to do in commemoration of Himself. They began it

at Jerusalem; they carried it with them in their dispersion to all

Churches. It is found the same in its principal parts and sequence in all

places. The same form was received everywhere solely in virtue of an

Apostolic tradition, which originally was not written, but conveyed by

word of mouth, and at once and incessantly practised.

The commemoration in which they earned out their Lord's command was

contained in words, and rites, and vestments illustrating those words,

and making up together an act, a permanent act, going through all the

life of the Church from end to end. This act in the present day, as in

every past age, is not derived from any written authority, though the

Gospels and Epistles of the Apostles, and, as we have seen, the

Apocalypse, bear witness to it, but from the authority of the Church,

immanent in her from the beginning by perpetual descent from the

Apostles.

Another instance of the like kind is scarcely inferior in its force. The

Apostles, in passing from city to city in the course of their preaching,

selected those in whom they would deposit a portion of their power. But

this they did by the imposition of their hands, accompanied by a certain

rite, which, like the Eucharistic rite in the beginning, was not written,

but conveyed by word of mouth. But the life of the Church depended upon

this transmission of spiritual power. The conveying of this power was an

act of authority similar in character to the institution of worship, with

which indeed it was closely allied. Part of the power which they conveyed

by their act was the right to celebrate this very worship. The pastoral

Epistles of St. Paul speak of the grace and gift bestowed upon Timotheus

by the imposition of hands, as well as of the power given both to

Timotheus and to Titus to impart these gifts to others, accompanied with

advice as to the quality of persons whom they should select. But the

Scriptures of the New Testament do not contain the rite itself, than

which nothing could be more necessary to the continued existence of the

Church.

No acts could possibly exhibit the teaching office of the Church in

greater perfection and fulness than the exercise of the rite which

admitted men into her fold; of the rite, again, which communicated to

them daily the divine life of the Saviour indwelling in her; and thirdly,

of the rite which propagated the whole of that hierarchy by the descent

of which from our Lord Himself her existence was secured and perpetuated.

The immense authority which documents such as these possess is mentioned

in a letter of Pope St. Celestine in the year 431 to the Gallic bishops.

"Let us have regard," he says, "to the sacred rites used in sacerdotal

supplications, which, having been handed down from the Apostles, are

celebrated uniformly in the whole world and in every Catholic Church,

wherein the law of supplication establishes the law of belief. For when

those who preside over the holy people in various places exercise the

office of ambassadors committed to them, they plead the cause of the

human race before the divine mercy, and offer their requests and their

prayers while the whole Church joins with them in urgent entreaty."[139]

It is sufficient to mention these several public and official acts

without going on to dwell upon the system of penance in its doctrinal

aspect, which has been described above in another aspect, that of

government. Such a system, it is evident, existed from the beginning, and

the act of St. Paul in reference to the incestuous person at Corinth

bears witness to it. The society possessing and exercising these rites,

and forming a people upon their discipline, had a complete rule of inward

life. Such was the Christian society in the first forty years following

the day of Pentecost. And this whole life rested upon the personal

authority of its teachers, which they exercised in the name of Christ,

and by the power of the Holy Spirit continually attending upon their

ministry, and attesting His presence as well by the perpetual operation

of His grace as by the extraordinary and visible action of spiritual

gifts. That authority was complete before the sacred writings of the New

Testament were made public, and without their attestation.

The authority divinely instituted[140] to preserve and propagate the

doctrine preached by the Apostles was neither changed in character nor

diminished by the writing of the books of the New Testament and by their

delivery to the several churches. The proof of this is twofold. First,

the nature of the teaching office itself, placed by Christ in the

Apostles and their perpetual succession, to which He promised His own

ever-abiding assistance, with the gift of the Holy Spirit dwelling in

them. For these two things were not accidental or temporary, but the

cause for ever of the Christian profession's continuance.

Secondly, the consideration of all the circumstances which surround the

writings themselves corroborates this conclusion.

Before these books were written,[141] and much more before they were all

collected and read in all churches, these churches themselves had been

arranged by the teaching and ordering of the Apostles according to the

charge they had received from Christ; bishops had been appointed in them

by imposition of the Apostles' hands; the doctrine delivered to them by

the Apostles had been committed to them as a deposit to be faithfully

guarded through the gift of the Holy Spirit: they had been charged to

appoint successors in every place, endowed with the like authority and

the same gift. Thus the faithful everywhere depended, with the obedience

of faith, upon the authority of the apostolic successors as God's

messengers, from whom they were to receive Christian doctrine and

discipline. This was not a mere dependence of those who were learning

upon the knowledge of those who were teaching, because as yet there were

no books from which each individual might learn for himself, but it was a

proper office of teaching upon which the obedience of faith depended by

Christ's institution, and by which the unity of the churches was

maintained. When, therefore, inspired books containing revealed doctrine

were gradually delivered by the Apostles to the churches, the

ecclesiastical constitution already existing was not destroyed, but

documents were added to be used in accordance with that constitution, to

be preserved by those same bishops as successors of the Apostles and

guardians of the deposit, and to be explained by them should doubt arise

as to the meaning.

Further, it is an historical fact, and is evident from the internal

arrangement of the books, that each one of them was written on some

particular occasion and necessity for some particular end. No one of the

sacred writers had the intention to give complete instruction as to the

doctrine, discipline, and worship of the Christian religion. Accordingly

in no one of them is the whole Christian doctrine found set out in

catechetical order and connection; and in each one many most important

points are either omitted, or merely alluded to, or can only be deduced

from it, if otherwise known. Now such an origin of the books from

particular occasions and for a particular scope, and such an internal

arrangement, make it evident that it was not the Holy Spirit's design in

writing any particular book, or the whole together, nor any purpose of

the Apostles, to substitute books so composed for the ministry of those

pastors and doctors whom Christ had appointed to teach all nations to the

end of the world. It was not meant to abolish the constitution of a

teaching office by which, up to the moment when these books appeared,

every one had, in virtue of Christ's institution, been taught by the

acknowledged messengers of God, in order that he might teach himself from

a written book. This would be plain even were it to be granted that the

whole revealed doctrine was contained in those books; for the argument

holds not so much from deficiency of matter as from the form of teaching,

and the manner of proposing and explaining doctrine.

But when we have stated the historical origin of the books, and their

internal arrangement which corresponds to their origin, it is a mere

gratuitous assertion that all revealed doctrine is contained in them. For

as neither the sacred writers, each taken by himself, intended to

comprehend the whole Christian doctrine in his own books, nor concerted

together to contribute each his portion to make up one whole, but as each

wrote on the most diverse occasions what was necessary or opportune for

the particular circumstances, the Holy Spirit indeed, who is the chief

Author of the Scriptures, might direct everything, so as to form a

complete body of doctrine without the knowledge and beyond the intention

of the writers, but that He did so can in nowise be shown. For this the

supposition is required that it was the will of God that Scripture should

be the sole source, or at least the complete code, from which the entire

revelation might be acquired. We have certain evidence from the charge of

Christ that the Apostles and their successors should teach to the end of

the world all nations to observe whatever He had commanded them, and from

the promise of the Spirit of truth teaching all truth and remaining with

them for ever, by whom Christ's witnesses are ordered to go to the end of

the earth, that the whole revelation was to be preached by an authentic

office of teaching in perpetual succession. On the other hand, there is

not a vestige of a charge that this revelation should be committed entire

to writing, either in the words of Christ or in the sayings of the

Apostles, or in the manner of acting and writing of the Apostles or of

the other sacred writers, or in the arrangement, scope, and occasion of

the books, or in the persuasion of Christians down to the sixteenth

century. How, then, is this to be maintained unless you first lay down

not to believe the word propagated by preaching which Christ appointed by

charges and promises distinct and irrefragable, and enjoined to

comprehend the whole revealed truth, but to believe only the word in

Scripture, which He did indeed superadd to preaching, but never either

enjoined or promised that all revealed truth should be contained in it?

But whatever be the fact as to the material fulness of Scripture, the

form of the books, each and all, is such that they evidently are not

written for the purpose of teaching the whole Christian religion to each

of the faithful independently of the teaching office.

It must be added that these books were addressed to those who were

already Christians, and give directions and advice which could not be

rightly understood save by those who had been previously instructed, and,

moreover, refer the faithful in express words to the preaching which they

had heard and received, and in which they are exhorted to abide. They

further also refer to guardians of the deposit, and to a line of

authentic teachers who shall continue to hand it on from generation to

generation.[142]

That which had existed from the beginning by the institution of Christ,

and that which was to last unaltered to the end, was an apostolic

succession of men, in whom He put His power and presence, to whom He

promised the perpetual assistance of His Holy Spirit, and to whom He

committed the propagation of His faith. It was impossible that this

principle of action, the living personal authority, which, as we have

seen, did everything in the first two generations of the Christian

people, should ever be changed, because Christ appointed it to bear His

Word, the Word of God, whether oral or written, to every succeeding

generation.

Among the things which preceded in time the publication of the writings

of the New Testament, and which, therefore, were not derived from them,

were these: The hierarchy, including therein the election, ordination,

and jurisdiction of bishops throughout the world, and of the ministers

inferior to them; the several sacraments, with the rites which conveyed

them; the worship, and herein especially the Eucharist, and all which

belongs to it; and fourthly, that daily discipline of life which received

men into the Christian body, numbered them in it, imposed penance for

faults committed, restored the fallen, and, in fact, which was that

atmosphere by breathing which the Christian lived. All this the living

succession of men, instinct with the power and presence of the Holy

Ghost, the Sanctifier and the Comforter, the Spirit of truth, originally

conveyed, as the living succession of men perpetuates it from age to age.

These things, the writings of the New Testament, as they were gradually,

first one and then another, given to particular churches, or intended for

classes of believers, and finally collected in one and made the heirloom

of the whole body, found in existence and in full operation. With all the

instruments of the divine life thus enumerated these writings did not

meddle, except that they alluded to them more or less, usually in few

words, attesting them, it is true, but in a manner which those only who

were in possession of them would understand aright. The action of the

Church as a living Body consisted very largely in these things, and this

action, at least in all its details, the Apostles were not directed by

any charge of their Lord, nor inspired by the Holy Ghost, to commit to a

book. These things, from their nature, formed an essential part of the

ecclesiastical tradition; in fact, the Church as a society could not

exist without them.

Another part of the ecclesiastical tradition was the announcing to men

the words and the acts of Christ. The Christian character was to be

formed upon the living example of the Shepherd who had gone before His

sheep. For this task men were chosen who had been with Him during the

whole time of His ministry. So long as they were on earth they would

speak with all the authority of those who had seen what they witnessed;

but it is not apparent how an accurate account of our Lord's words and

acts could be transmitted to succeeding generations except by writing.

Thus it pleased the Holy Spirit to inspire some of the Apostles and some

of their disciples to commit to writing that record of our Lord's words

and actions which we possess in the four Gospels. Inexpressibly dear,

indeed, and precious to every Christian, must be the words of the Word;

like nothing else upon earth, the sounds which came from the lips of God

manifest in the flesh; of untold depth His utterances; of inexhaustible

fruitfulness His teaching. And the same may be said of His acts. As a

single parable would disclose the nature of His kingdom, so a single act

might be rich in endless application to the history of His Church and to

the heart of every believer. This most precious part of the

ecclesiastical tradition the Evangelists deposited in the bosom of the

Church, to be communicated, guarded, interpreted by her for ever to the

end of time. It was not the creation of one power to balance another,

for a book and a society do not come into competition; it was endowing

the society which Christ had created with the breath of His mouth, and

investing it with a permanent knowledge of His words and acts--a

knowledge to be transmitted under its keeping to all times.

As the Gospels contained words and acts of our Lord, so the Apostolic

Epistles contained comments, illustrations, and developments of their

personal teaching, bearing witness everywhere to that teaching, and to

the society which their own labours had constructed under their Lord's

direction, and only by the power of His Spirit working in themselves who

preached, and in the hearers who accepted the faith which they preached.

These writings the Church collected and placed in her treasury; they

became part of that deposit which St. Irenæus[143] celebrates "as being

new and fresh in an excellent vessel, and giving perpetual youth to that

vessel, which is the divine office intrusted to the Church, as life is

given to the body to vivify all the limbs belonging to it."

If we put together that large mass of teaching above described, which

consisted in the government everywhere set up by the Apostles, in the

sacraments which they carried into effect according to their Lord's

instructions, in the worship which they established, in the life of

faith, the daily discipline of which they set on foot, with that written

mass of documents of which by the end of the first century the Church was

in possession, we can form an approximate notion of the written and

unwritten tradition which it was her abiding office to expound.

That which is primary and essential,[144] the very substance of God's

institution, is the perpetual succession of living men from the Apostles.

All the rest are means by which that succession acts. These means the

providence of God has placed round His own central creation. Such means

are the word contained in the Divine Scriptures, the word contained in

sacraments, the word contained in worship, the word contained in the most

various ecclesiastical monuments, which exhibit the consent and

definitive judgment of the successors of the Apostles in past time.

These were the various means which the apostolic succession itself used,

under the assistance of the Holy Spirit, to maintain and expound and

preserve from error that whole tradition of the truth which Christ in the

beginning committed to it. But the subject requires further

illustration.

FOOTNOTES:

[110] Iêsous Christos, Theou Uios, Sôtêr = Ichthus.

[111] Zach. vi. 13.

[112] to amachon genos, St. Chrys., above quoted.

[113] See Hagemann, Die römische Kirche, p. 558.

[114] Bianchi, vol. iii. pp. 120, 121.

[115] Aug. l. iv. De Bapt. c. Donat. cap. ult. (B. 120 note).

[116] Innocent. Ep. 18, c. 1.

[117] S. Greg. I., 1. 6, Ep. 39; 8, Ep. 35.

[118] Bianchi, 3, 137.

[119] Bianchi, 3, 136.

[120] The Council of Antioch, in the year 341, almost repeats this canon,

and lays it down as of universal application.

[121] Bianchi, 3, 132.

[122] The following paragraph is a translation from Cardinal Hergenröther's

History, vol. i. pp. 196, 197, sec. 228.

[123] Bianchi, 3, 468; quoting the constitution of Pope John XXII.

[124] Bianchi, 3, 440. The word _Sacerdos_ is here used as the proper

appellation of the bishop in his diocese by Cyprian, Ep. 57, according to

the usage in the third century, as the word _Ecclesia_ indicates the

diocese; the argument being that if complete obedience were rendered to the

bishop in the diocese, there would be complete peace in the whole Church

ruled by the Collegium of Bishops.

[125] This paragraph translated from Bianchi, 3, 445.

[126] Bianchi, 3, 457, 458; St. Augustine in Ps. cxviii.

[127] Bianchi, 3, 474, 475.

[128] Bianchi, 3, 444; Apostol. Canon, 66 and 74.

[129] Bianchi, 3, 500, translated.

[130] Bianchi, 3, 485, translated.

[131] 1 Cor. ix. 14.

[132] Bianchi, 3, 526, 527.

[133] 1 Cor. xvi. 1.

[134] Bianchi, 3, 536, translated.

[135] 1 Cor. xi. 22.

[136] An incident mentioned of Alexander Severus.

[137] John xx. 30, xxi. 25, xvi. 12.

[138] Renaudot, Dissertatio de Liturgiarum Orientalium Origine et

Auctoritate, p. li.

[139] St. Coelestini, Ep. 21, Coustant, p. 493. The part quoted is supposed

to have been added to St. Coelestine's letter (which refers to the death of

St. Augustine as having just happened) a little later, but was always

joined with it afterwards from the beginning of the sixth century.

[140] Franzelin, De Traditione, Thesis vii. p. 49.

[141] Translated from Franzelin, Tractatus da Traditione Divina et

Scriptura, pp. 50-53, down to "The Teaching Office."

[142] As, _e.g._, Rom. xvi. 17; 1 Cor. vii. 17, xi. 23, xiv. 33, xv. 12; 2

Cor. i. 18; Gal. i. 18; Phil. iv. 9; Colos. ii. 6, 7; 1 Thess. iv. 2; 2

Thess. ii. 14; 2 Tim. ii. 2; Heb. ii. 3, referred to by Franzelin, but

especially Ephes. iv. 11-16, which is of itself sufficient to decide the

whole question.

[143] St. Irenæus, iii. 24.

[144] See Franzelin, De Traditione, p. 134.