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The Decretals
[2681] Compare these Canons: Nicæa, vi.; Constantinople, ii., iii.; Ephesus, viii.; and Chalcedon, xxviii.
[2682] Episcopus ab extra; i.e., head of temporalities.
[2683] Hincmar of Rheims opposed them as he could. See Prichard’s Hincmar, Oxford, 1849.
[2684] See vol. v. p. 154, Elucidation III.
[2685] See his Eccles. History, Cent. iii. p. 173, ed. London, 1693.
[2686] Ed. Hayes, London, 1868.
[2687] De Ord. Sacram., § 49.
[2688] § 5.
[2689] P. 173, as above.
[2690] Elucidation II., infra.
[2691] [Elucidation I.]
[2692] [Elucidation II.]
[2693] History of Latin Christianity, vol. iii. p. 191.
[2694] History of Latin Christianity, vol. iii. p. 193. [In the marvellous confusion of vol. ix. of the Edinburgh series, these Decretals are mixed up with genuine works as “Fragments of the Third Century.”]
[2695] The little that is known of Zephyrinus is derived from Eusebius. That historian states that Zephyrinus succeeded Victor in the presidency of the Roman church “about the ninth year of the reign of Severus” (a.d. 201), and that he died in the first year of the reign of Antoninus (Heliogabalus, a.d. 218). He is several times alluded to in the fragments ascribed to Caius, or in connection with them.
The two letters bearing his name are forgeries. They belong to the famous collection of False Decretals forged in the ninth century.
The First Epistle: To All the Bishops of Sicily.
[2697] The word “bishops” is omitted in ms.
[2699] This means the seventy-third apostolic canon, in which it is ordained that episcopal cases be not decided but by superior bishops, councils, or the Roman pontiff. [See note 1, p. 612.]
[2700] Another reading has sixty, and another fifty. Whatever be the reading, it is true that by these decrees are meant the apostolic canons: and although their number was only fifty, yet, because sometimes several decrees are comprehended in one canon, there would be no inconsistency between the number of sixty or seventy apostolic decrees and the number of fifty apostolic canons (Sev. Bin.).
[2703] Job xxix. 13-17, according to the Vulgate version.
[2704] Or, Gallus. But Saturninus and Gallus were consuls in the year 198, while Victor was yet alive.
The Second Epistle: To the Bishops of the Province of Egypt.
[2705] Or, diligence. [See note 2, p. 612.]
[2707] By these apocrisarii are meant the deputies of the bishops, and their locum tenentes, as it were, who manage the affairs of the Church, hear the cases of individuals, and refer them to the bishops. They are therefore called apocrisarii, i.e., responders, from ἀποκρίνομαι, to respond. Mention is made of them in Justinian Novell., Quomodo oporteat Episcopos, chap. xii. Albericus understands by them the legates of the Pope. [Note 3.]
[2719] The ms. reads, “and those wearing the priestly dignity.”
[2722] Or, Gallus. [See note 5, p. 610.]
The Epistles of Pope Callistus.
[2723] Callistus succeeded Zephyrinus in the bishopric of Rome, and discharged the duties of that office for five years. This is all the information which Eusebius (in his Chronicon and Hist. Eccl., vi. 21) gives us in regard to Callistus. Later writers make many other statements. [See note, p. 618.]
The letters attributed to him form part of the False Decretals of the pseudo-Isidorus, mentioned in the notice of Zephyrinus.
[2724] Mansi, Concil., i. 737.
[2729] Ecclesiasticus 18.30.
[2730] See Augustine’s Confessions, book ix. ch. ix.
[2731] See Augustine on Ps. xciii.
[2732] See Ambrose, Epistle xxi.
[2733] In the year 222.
The Second Epistle: To All the Bishops of Gaul.
[2734] Comp.Rom. i. 32.
[2735] The reference is to the 11th and 12th of the canons of the apostles. [Vol. vii. p. 501, this series.]
[2738] Canons 35 and 36. [Vol. vii. p. 503.]
[2744] Comp.Tobit iv. 15.
[2761] In the year 222.
The Epistle of Pope Urban First.
[2762] Urban was the successor of Callistus. The letter ascribed to him is one of the pseudo-Isidorian forgeries.
[2763] Mansi, Concil. Collect., i. p. 748.
I. Of the life in common, and of the reason why the Church has begun to hold property.
IV. Of the seats of the bishops.
[2775] “Sectatori,” for which read “factori.”
The Epistles of Pope Pontianus.
[2779] Eusebius tells us that Pontianus was bishop of the Roman church five or six years (230–235 a.d.). He succeeded Urbanus. The letters are the forgeries of the pseudo-Isidorus.
The First Epistle: To Felix Subscribonius
[2780] Mansi, Concil. Collect., i. 735.
[2781] Perhaps Zech. ii. 8.
[2783] In the year 235.
The Second Epistle: To All Bishops.
[2790] Ecclesiasticus 32.1-3.
[2791] Ecclesiasticus 35.1-3.
[2792] Ecclesiasticus 27.17-30.
[2793] Veridicas. The text reads “Viratas.”
[2794] Ecclesiasticus 28.
[2795] Ecclesiasticus 5.7-18.
[2796] Ecclesiasticus 6.1-4.
[2798] Anterus succeeded Pontianus in the bishopric of the Roman church (232–236 a.d.). The letter ascribed to him is one of the pseudo-Isidorian forgeries.
[2804] Hos. vi. 6; judicium.
[2806] The bracketed passage is wanting in one manuscript.
[2810] Wisd. i.
[2811] Wisd. ii. 1-5.
[2814] Thus far Jerome.
[2816] Wisd. xii. 1.
[2817] Wisd. xii. 2.
[2818] Wisd. xv. 1, 2.
[2819] Ecclesiasticus 34.13,14.
[2826] Fabian was bishop of Rome from 236 to 250 a.d. The letters ascribed to him are rejected by all as spurious.
The First Epistle: To All the Ministers of the Church Catholic.
[2835] Clementines: Ep. of Clem. to James, xviii. [P. 221, supra.]
[2836] Wisd. v. 14.
[2840] In the year 236.
The Second Epistle: To All the Bishops of the East.
[2841] The unguent of oil and balsam used in the so-called sacrament of confirmation. [See p. 604, supra.]
[2843] Matt. vii. 12; Luke vi.
[2844] Matt. xxii. 39; Mark xii. 31.
[2847] Prov. xxiv. 17, etc.
[2859] Ecclesiasticus 22.15.
[2860] Ecclesiasticus 16.23.
[2861] Ecclesiasticus 3.24, etc.
[2863] Ecclesiasticus 10.7, etc.
[2864] Ecclesiasticus 11.7,8.
[2866] Ecclesiasticus 7.29-32.
The Third Epistle: To Bishop Hilary.
[2872] Ecclesiasticus 27.17-30.
[2873] Ecclesiasticus 28.
Taken from the Decretal of Gratian.
[2876] Dist. 90, Si quis contristatus. Basil, in Reg., c. 74.
[2877] , Q. 1, Quicunque sciens. Regino in the Book of Penance.
[2878] 32, Q. 7, Neque furiosus. And in the Decret. Ivo., book vi., Regino adduces it from the law of Rome.
[2879] 35, Q. 2 and 3, De propinquis. From the Pœnitentiale of Theodorus.
[2880] From the same.
[2881] 35, Q. 6, Consanguineos extraneorum. And in the Decret. Ivo., vii.
[2882] De Consecr., dist. 2, Etsi non. And in the Decret. Ivo., i.
[2883] Dist. 78, Si quis, 30; and in the Decret. Ivo., iii.; from Martin Bracar, ch. 20.
[2884] See his genuine Epistle, vol. i. p. 1, this series. Compare vol. i. pp. 69, 416, with vii. p. 478.
[2885] 1 Pet. v. 1-4. The Bishops of Rome have only to restore themselves to the spirit of St. Peter as here set forth, and the schisms of the churches will be at an end. For Tertullian’s testimony, see vol. iii. p. 258, note 9.
[2886] De Maistre, thinking to overthrow the Anglicans, and imagining the Thirty-nine Articles to be “terms of communion” in the Anglican Church, where they never were, commits himself rashly to the following position: “If a people possess one of these Codes of Belief, we may be sure of this: that the religion of such a people is false.” No people on earth has such as enormous Code of Belief as those who profess the creed of Pius the Fourth, and who accept the decrees of Pius the Ninth. See De Maistre, Le Principe Générateur, etc., p. 20, Paris, 1852. This Trent Creed is the fruit of the Decretals.
[2887] Dupin, ut supra, p. 17. See also Bryce’s Holy Roman Empire, pp. 43 and 100. He pronounces “the Donation of Constantine” to be “the most stupendous of all the mediæval forgeries. The Decretals certainly surpass it in their nature and their effects; but Mr. Bryce’s reference to these is very feeble and unsatisfactory, after Dupin. See p. 156 of his work, ed. Macmillan, 1880.
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