СНАР. Grounds of p. 2. CHAPTER XII. THE DOCTRINES AND ORDER OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, THE emperor, at the time of the first universal council, was ac- 2. This point, the cunning priesthood finally gained, whereby they duped the emperor out of his throne, supplanted the whole civil authority, and engrossed the administration into their own hands. This, however, was not effected in an instant, but required more than a hundred years labor of the ingenious doctors, who were continually commenting and improving upon the canons, decrees, and established doctrines of the Nicene council. This leads us to make a few remarks on the character and doctrines of some of the most eminent fathers, who succeeded this first universal council. 3. ST. ATHANASIUS says, "Whosoever will be saved, before Cath. Doct. all things it is necessary that he hold the Catholic faith. Which faith, except every one do keep whole and undefiled, without doubt he shall perish everlastingly." This may serve as an introduction: it then remains to find out in whom such a Catholic faith is deposited; whether in the Nicene or Arian party, in the Donatists, the Nestorians, the Pelagians, or in the Manichean and Marcionite heretics. Eccl. His 4. The Catholics, however, have a right to claim what they call the Catholic faith, that is, such a faith as they are able to impose upon mankind by the allurements of eloquence, or the power of the secular arm. Let us enquire then what this faith was in its first stages of authority, and who they were that formed it, and gave it the awful sanction. 5. Ephraim the Syrian, acquired an immortal name by the tory, vol. i. multitude of his writings, in which he combated the sectaries. p. 350, 351, Hilary, bishop of Poictiers, is immortalized by his twelve books concerning the TRINITY, which he wrote against the Arians. 354. 6. Rufinus, presbyter of Aquileia, was famous for his commentaries on several passages of the holy Scriptures, and his bit ter contest with St. Jerome. "He would (says Mosheim) have obtained a very honorable place among the Latin writers of this century, had it not been his misfortune to have the powerful and foul-mouthed Jerome for his adversary." CHAP. XII. 7. But the glory of these, and almost all the other writers of this age, was eclipsed by St. Augustin. Mosheim says, "The fame of Augustin, bishop of Hippo, in Africa, filled the whole Christian world." He gained much honor by his contest with Pelagius, suppressing the Pelagian heresy almost in its very beginning, and establishing the Catholic doctrines of the Eccl. Hisimputation of original sin-Election and reprobation, and of tory, vol ii. salvation by mere grace, without any foresight of faith, or regard to good works, which have darkened the earth even to the present day. p. 87, 89. 8. The African bishops, with Augustin at their head, maintained the Catholic faith, even against the Bishop of Rome, who esteemed Pelagius sound in the faith, and by their exhortations, letters and writings, gained over the Roman pontiff to their side. Pelagius and his doctrines are condemned with the utmost severity at Rome. Likewise in the famous council at Ephesus, A. D. 431. "In short, (says Mosheim,) the Gauls, Britons, and Ibid. p. 86. Africans by their councils, and the emperors by their edicts and penal laws, demolished this sect in its infancy.' 9. But this was not all: Robinson says, "While Genseric was defending the [Arian] faith at the head of eighty thousand men, Augustin who had now no command over the sword, was inflaming his hearers with violent passions, by urging them to hate one another for their speculations." 10. In a part of one of his sermons the following is worthy of notice. The discourse is about the strait gate; and this according to the Catholic faith, cannot be good works, or obedience to the law of Christ; but the wounded side of Jesus. "By this strait gate of the side of Christ, (says St. Augustin,) the converted thief entered, the penitent Jew, every converted Pagan, but the wicked heretic Arian turns his back on him and goes He is one of those of whom St. John says, they went out from us-O you Arian heretic." out. Eccl. Re101 earchess, p. 11. "Several Catholic historians, (says Robinson) observe, Ibid. p. 102. for the glory of God, for the honor of his providence, and for the benefit of the Church, that the very day on which Pelagius was born in Britain to shed darkness over the empire, Saint Monico lay in with ST. AUGUSTIN in Africa, to dispel the darkness, and throw light and sunshine and midday splendor over the minds of all mankind." 12. "Just so, say they, when heretics appeared in the western world, did God by his spirit excite pope INNOCENT to erect the most holy office of the Inquisition. From [Augustin] this bitter CHAP. Eccl. Researches, p. 103. Ibid. Note [2] and bloody fanatic of Africa, proceeded two hundred and thirtytwo pamphlets. He understood the ten commandments in a spiritual sense, and, Thou shalt not kill, signified, thou shalt not kill an orthodox believer. The command did not protect the life of a heretic." 13. "This Saint Augustin had as fine a scent for this sort of game as ever saint had. He reckoned up no less than eightyeight sorts of these poor beings, whom he and other such holy men doomed to utter destruction." He had a little parish in his own diocese infested with heresy, which is briefly described in his own words, as follows. 14. There is a certain rustic heresy in our district, of Hippo, in one small village, we may call them Abelites. They are not mixed with wives, yet, according to the decree of the sect, it is not allowed them to live separate from wives. Therefore males and females dwelling together, under a profession of continence, they adopted to themselves a boy and a girl, as their future heirs in the covenant of the same conjunction: each and every one going before by death, others are sought out to fill their place. 15. Moreover, provided that either parent being dead, one remaining, the children served until their departure also, after whose death, they (the successors) adopted boy and girl in like manner: nor was there ever any lack from whence they might adopt, their neighbors generating on all sides, and freely giving up their needy children upon the hope of heirship to the property of strangers.' 16. "This (says Robinson,) afflicted the chaste bishop so greatly, that he corrected them till they became Catholics." Most likely this great saint cleared his diocese of such kind of heretics; however, he could neither expel them from the earth, nor reduce them to a conformity to his hypocritical life and manBut as long as orthodoxy was the established virtue of the Catholics, heresy, which must of course be the established vice, remained as the principal object of their hatred and persecution. ners. 17. The following is the character of three great Catholic saints, who in their time were leading oracles of the orthodox world, as given by ecclesiastical writers, viz: "St. Bernard," whose word," says the historian, "was in his time, a law to all Christendom;" also "St. Athanasius, and St. Augustine;" who by their writings did much to establish the fundamental principles of the Catholic church, and kindle the flame of persecuting bitterness. 18. "Dr. Haweis, (says Jones) loses all patience with his brother Milner, for attempting to introduce the great Bernard into the calendar of saints." "I am astonished " says he, "at his attempt to enroll Bernard into his catalogue of evangelical religion. Saint added to such a name would be impious. However orthodox some of his sentiments may be, can false miracles, lying prophecies, bloody persecutions of the faithful, and servitude to the papacy and her dominion, constitute a saint of the first water? A protestant divine disgraces his pages by these commendations." 19. Jones replies: "In all this I fully agree with Dr. Haweis; but then it furnishes me with a powerful plea against his own consistency, who has no scruple to enrol in his catalogue the names of ATHANASIUS, and AUGUSTINE, men equally renowned for their lust of power, their persecuting principles, their false miracles, their lying prophecies, and abject servitude to the prevailing corruption of their respective times." 20. It seems that the most spiritually blind cannot help seeing the awful depravity of the Church and ecclesiastical councils, which domineered over the professed Christian world in the dark ages that succeeded the decline of the primitive Church; when ecclesiastical writers, hunting among the noblest and the best, to find some marks of genuine Christianity, all declare, and prove, that the most renowned saints" of those dark ages, such as St. Athanasius, St. Augustine, St. Bernard, and other great "saints," were neither more nor less than bloody persecutors of those who were more virtuous, and "abject slaves to, and leading characters of the prevailing corruptions of their respective times." 66 21. The very constitution of the Catholic Church, from the period of the Nicene council, inspired the priesthood with a growing ambition to clear the empire of every object that would expose their hypocrisy, or weaken their lordly influence over a benighted world. Heretics stood principally in their way; therefore the greatest champion in detecting and rooting out heretics, however contrary to the precepts of the Gospel the means he used, stood highest on the list of Catholic heroes, or canonized saints. 22. It is easy to see that there could be no room, either for truth or virtue, where the continual strife was, who should be the greatest. And the source of revenue, which flowed from the head of influence to these ministers of darkness, prompted them to still higher degrees of ambition, by which the rustics, as they are called, or common people, were trampled under foot, or at best considered as necessary tools for promoting their opulence and grandeur, and supporting them in luxury and idleness. 66 p. 339. 23. To show that this was the true genius of this imperious hierarchy, the following particulars may suffice. Many of the Eccl. Hisprivileges, (says Mosheim,) which had formerly belonged to the presbyters and people, were [under Constantine] usurped by the bishops. Their first step was an entire exclusion of the people from all part in the administration of ecclesiastical affairs." CHAP. Eccl. History, vol. i. p. 312. Ibid. p. 343. Ibid. p. 346. 24. "In the episcopal order, the bishop of Rome was the first in rank, and was distinguished by a sort of pre-eminence over all other prelates. Prejudices, arising from a great variety of causes, contributed to establish this superiority; but it was chiefly owing to certain circumstances of grandeur and opulence, by which mortals, for the most part, form their ideas of pre-eminence and dignity." 25. "The bishop of Rome surpassed all his brethren in the magnificence and splendor of the church over which he presided; in the riches of his revenues and possessions; in the number and variety of his ministers; in his credit with the people; and in his sumptuous and splendid manner of living. These dazzling marks of human power had such a mighty influence upon the minds of the multitude, that the see of Rome became a most seducing object of sacerdotal ambition." 26. Hence it happened, that when a new pontiff was to be elected by the suffrages of the people, the city of Rome was generally agitated with dissensions, tumults, and cabals, whose consequences were often deplorable and fatal. The intrigues and disturbances that prevailed in that city in the year 366, when, upon the death of Liberius, another pontiff was to be chosen in his place, are a sufficient proof of what we have now advanced." 27. Upon this occasion, one faction elected Damasus to that high dignity, while the opposite party chose Ursicinus, a deacon of the vacant church, to succeed Liberius. This double election gave rise to a dangerous schism, and to a sort of civil war within the city of Rome, which was carried on with the utmost barbarity and fury, and produced the most cruel massacres and desolations. This inhuman contest ended in the victory of Damasus.” 66 28. Such was the degree of lawless power, which those degenerate plants of the vine of Sodom had already attained, and which evidently proceeded from the antichristian authority which had been reposed in the emperors, that head of the false church, as will appear from what follows. 29. "The additions made by the emperors and others to the wealth, honors and advantages of the clergy, were, followed with a proportionable augmentation of vices and luxury, particularly among those of the sacred order, [or rather according to their fruits, that satanic order,] who lived in great and opulent cities; and that many such additions were made to that order after the time of Constantine, is a matter that admits of no dispute." So says Mosheim. 30. Here then was the source of all their ambition: A sordid thirst for temporal glory! And hence the historian observes,Ibid. p. 347. "The bishops, on the one hand, contended with each other, in the most scandalous manner, concerning the extent of their respective jurisdictions; while on the other, they trampled upon |