465 harshly of appeals to Rome, he is not considering appeals of bishops, but those of simple priests, such as Fortunatus and Felicissimus, to whom the African discipline did not allow recourse to Rome. St. Cyprian, when explaining and justifying this discipline, does not deny to the Pope the supreme power ex plenitudine potestatis.461 Neither is this the only case in which, while St. Cyprian was Primate of Carthage, appeals of bishops were carried to Rome. He mentions the appeal of Bishop Novatus, and when stating the crimes by which he incurred condemnation by the bishops of Africa, he does not at all deny the right of appealing, declaring that all causes of great importance (causæ majores) should be referred to the Papal tribunal.466 Nay, St. Cyprian himself applied to Pope Stephen to transfer the cause of Marcianus, Bishop of Arles, guilty of Novatianism, to his own tribunal, and to condemn and deprive him of his see, in order that they might proceed to elect another bishop in his stead.467 De Marca, whose authority is so highly appreciated by Protestant writers, remarks, on this point: "In vain do Protestants endeavour to make little of this testimony, for it is futile to say that Marcianus was not deposed by Stephen, but only declared worthy to be deposed. St. Cyprian plainly requires of Stephen, in 464 L. c., p. 86. In this letter St. Cyprian gives two reasons for which that discipline had been established in Africa for the inferior clergy. (1.) "Oportet eos quibus præsumus non circumcursare.” (2.) "Nec episcoporum concordiam cohærentem subdola et fallaci temeritate collidere." Such were the faults of the inferior African clergy, which that discipline intended to obviate.--See Lupus: De Africanæ Ecclesiæ Appellationibus, c. xvii., Op., t. viii., p. 220. 465 S. Cyprianus: Epist. xlix., ad Cornelium, p. 64. Edit. Balut. 466 Ibid., Epist. lv., ad Cornelium, p. 83. 467 Ibid., Epist. lxvii., ad Stephanum Papam, p. 116. "Dirigantur in provinciam et ad plebem Arelate consistentem a te litteræ quibus, abstento Marciano, alius in loco ejus substituatur," &c. the most explicit manner, to condemn Marcianus by his letters, and let another be appointed to his see.468 VII. But, on the other hand, it is absurd to say that the people and the clergy of Astorga appealed to St. Cyprian. According to the theory put forward by Dr. Pusey, all bishops are equal; so that each diocese is a perfectly independent church, and is to act on the principle of episcopal independence. Now it cannot be denied that appeal is a recourse from a sentence of an inferior to a superior judge; a minore judice ad majorem provocatio, say the jurists. How then, on the theory just mentioned, could the people and clergy of Astorga appeal to St. Cyprian from the sentence of Pope Stephen? Even if Stephen were not the supreme pastor of the whole Church, he was undoubtedly the Patriarch of the West, and hence had, in virtue even of that dignity, the right of judging in the last instance. He was at least a bishop, and as Dr. Pusey would grant, in no respect inferior to St. Cyprian. How, then, could an appeal be made from his sentence to the tribunal of an African bishop? But we need not dwell on this discussion, when the very letter of St. Cyprian to the clergy and people of Spain plainly tells us what was the nature of their application to the Bishop of Carthage. "As soon as we assembled," writes St. Cyprian and the other bishops with him, "we read your letters . . . in which you inform us that Basilides and Martialis, being found guilty of the charges of idolatry and other nefarious crimes, ought not to preserve their episcopal dignity and the administration of the divine priesthood. And you wish that we should answer your question, that your just and necessary anxiety might be allayed by the consolation or the help of our opinion." They continue: "But, better than our advice, the divine 468 De Marca: De Concordia, 1. i., c. x., n. viii., p. 42. precepts will satisfy your desires." 400 Now, who does not see that the clergy of Spain, and, in an especial manner, the two bishops newly consecrated in the place of Basilides and Martialis, merely sought advice in addressing themselves to the Primate of Africa. They propose to him a case of conscience and of Canon Law. They wish to know whether the election and consecration of Felix and Sabinus, after the deposition of Basilides and Martialis, had been canonical and valid; whether the deceit and fraud used at Rome by Basilides and Martialis could have the effect of invalidating the lawful and canonical election and consecration of the two newly-appointed bishops. The synod assembled by St. Cyprian examined the proposed question, and gave an opinion thereon. This has nothing to do with formal appeals. VIII. Finally, Dr. Pusey, following in the footsteps of De Marca,470 gives the name relations to what all antiquity calls appeals; and he remarks that, "These, in the times nearest to the Apostles, were very different from those which the Church of England laid aside."471 In the times nearest to the Apostles, the head of the Church, the Roman Pontiff, had the same authority, the same jurisdiction, as in the fifth or in the sixteenth - century, because his authority and his jurisdiction are of divine origin. But the form in which he exercised this jurisdiction in ecclesiastical judgments was not always the same, for it varied according to the requirements of the discipline of successive centuries, and of the divers needs of the Church and particular provinces. Dr. Pusey first confounds substance with accident, and then, with no less inconsistency, concludes 469 S. Cyprianus: Epist. lxviii., p. 117. 470 De Marca: Op. cit., 1. i., c. x., n. 2, seq., p. 37, seq. that the English Church, in the sixteenth century, did more than the African in the fifth. We have seen how this author has misconceived and misrepresented the African controversy concerning appeals to Rome. The African Church did not complain in the fifth century, more than in the fourth, of the supreme authority of the Pope, nor of Roman appeals; it merely protested in favour of an old provincial custom, which no law, either of Popes or of general councils, had ever repealed. The English Church, in the sixteenth century, rejected Roman appeals because it refused to acknowledge the divine supremacy of the Apostolic See. SECTION VII. GALLICANISM: ITS ORIGIN, ITS PROGRESS, ITS TENDENCY AND EFFECTS. I. DR. PUSEY and Protestants in general show great sympathy for the Gallican Church of the time of Louis XIV. They appeal to the writers of that country and period as to infallible oracles; eulogize their works as treasures of erudition, and draw upon them as storehouses for charges against the Catholic Church. Du Pin, Fleury, and the author of the Defensio Declarationis Cleri Gallicani, are, in the eyes of Protestants, great names before whom all must bow. The Gallican system seems to them the pure system established by the Apostles before the Papal usurpations; and they are indignant at those who dare to assert that Galli -canism is now extinct in France. Dr. Pusey throughout his Eirenicon expresses sentiments such as these, and goes so far as to say that he would rest his principles on the Gallican system; that the Church of Du Pin would have been able to restore communion on the basis of the explanation appended to the Articles of Lambeth, "had not the ascendancy of the Jesuits quenched the hope of the restoration of the union ;"472 that "he would long to see the Church united on the terms which," as he fancies, "Bossuet would have sanctioned."473 In writing this, Dr. Pusey has fallen into three palpable mistakes. First, he seems to believe that the Gallican Church and its principal writers agree with him on the essential question of Papal authority. Secondly, he represents the Gallican system as a source of liberty and independence for the episcopacy. Thirdly, he thinks that the Gallican doctrines were those of the early Church, not only in France, but also in the whole world. These three points once explained, no ground will remain for imagining that the Gallican system gives any countenance to the opinions of Protestants. II. First, the Gallican school, in all its phases, has ever professed to believe that the Papal supremacy was of divine institution; that the Pope is not only the first in order among the bishops, but that he has also a real jurisdiction over the whole Church, and is the centre of unity in the Church; that he can exercise a coercive power in order to enforce this jurisdiction; and, finally, that communion with the Pope is equivalent to communion with the Church, and is, therefore, necessary to salvation. We challenge our adversaries to point out a single theologian of the Gallican school, even of the times of Louis XIV. or his successor, who does not explicitly maintain these doctrines, which are essential 473 Ibid., p. 335. 472 Eirenicon, p. 236. |