Part 47

[274] Constantine Porphyrogenetta succeeded Leo the Wise in the empire in 911; in 919 he associated in the throne his Drungar or admiral Romanus Lecapenus, whose daughter Helena he had married. Romanus reigned in the year 944; from which time his covetous daughter Helena had a great share in governing the empire. Constantine was buried in his studies, and dying in 959, fifty-four years old, left the empire to his impious son Romanus II., who is said to have poisoned him, and who died in 963, leaving the empire to Nicephorus Phocas, his valiant general, who had often defeated the Russians and Saracens. His daughter Anne was married to Wladimir, duke of Russia. Constantine Porphyrogenetta (l. de Cœm. Aulæ Byzant. l. 2, c. 15) relates, that on Wednesday, the 9th of September, 946, Olga, princess of Russia, was received with great pomp at Constantinople by Constantine (himself) and Romanus, emperors; and describes her different receptions at their court, the banquets which they prepared for her, the presents in money which they made to her uncle of thirty miliaretia (each of which contained two ceratia, each ceratium twelve folles, of which five hundred made a pound of silver), eight to her priest Gregory and to each of her friends, to herself five hundred miliaretia in a gold dish studded with diamonds and precious stones. At each other entertainment like presents were distributed. The dessert of sweetmeats was served on a little gold table, in dishes made of or studded with precious stones.

[275] See the Annals of the Russians in Hebersteinius, in Rerum Muscovit. Comment. and Jos. Assemani, in Calend. Univ. t. 2, p. 265, and t. 3.

[276] Syn. Zamosciania, tit. de Jejun. et Fest. p. 121. Jos. Assemani, de Calend. Univ. t. 4, p. 65, t. 6, p. 497.

[277] The United Russians, who, renouncing the schism, embraced the communion of the Roman Church, are chiefly subject to Poland, and ever since Clement VIII. have a metropolitan of Kiow (since Kiow was conquered by the Muscovites these have established there their schism with a metropolitan of their communion), an archbishop of Plosco, and bishops of Kelma, Presmilia, Liceoria, and Leopold, with several convents of Basilian monks, who all follow the Greek rites; though several Russians in the Polish dominions still adhere to the Greek schism. See Urban Cerri’s (secretary to the Propaganda) Relation, p. 56, and Mamachi, Orig. et Antiquit. Christ. l. 2, c. 17, t. 2, p. 180. Papebroke, Not. in Ephemer. Græc. Mosch. t. 1, Maij Bollandiani, p. 54, &c.

The metropolitan of Moscow was declared patriarch of all the Russian schismatics by Jeremy, patriarch of Constantinople in 1588, and was acknowledged in that character by the other Oriental patriarchs. But the czar Peter I. having learned from the experience of above a hundred years that the patriarchs made use of their great influence and authority in matters of state, after that dignity had been vacant nineteen years, caused it to be abolished, and an archbishop of Moscow to be chosen in 1719. For the government of the church of Muscovy, and receiving appeals, he appointed a council of eleven bishops and other clergymen, the president of which the czar nominates. See John Von Strahlenburg (Historical and Geographical Description of Russia and Siberia, an. 1738) and Le Quien. (Oriens Christianus, t. 1, p. 1296.) Some Catholics enjoy the exercise of their religion in several parts of Muscovy. Kulcinius observes that many saints have flourished in this nation since it has been engaged in schism. Possevinus and Papebroke take notice that the Greeks since their schism have been reunited to the Latin church fourteen times. The latter of these learned authors also remarks, that even when the archbishops were most turbulent schismatics, no one will say that all the people were involved in the same guilt; even ignorance might excuse many, as Baronius answered, with regard to monks who lived under a schismatical abbot (ad an. 1036). As for Polish Russia, F. Kulesza, a learned Polish Jesuit, in a book entitled, Fides Orthodoxa, printed at Vilna, assures us, that all the archbishops of Kiow have been Catholics, except two, Photius and Jonas II., till in 1686 it was given up to the Muscovites. By the intrigues of this Photius, in the middle of the fifteenth century, the Greek schism was propagated through all Muscovy.

[278] See Jos. Assemani in Calend. t. 6, p. 480, on the 15th of July, et t. 4, p. 34, to 52.

[279] See Jos. Assemani in Calend. p. 471, t. 6, ad 10 Julij.

[280] Id. ad 5 Julij, p. 462, et t. 1, p. 21, 29.

[281] Ardmore (so called from its situation on an eminence) stands on the sea-coast, not far from the mouth of the river now called Broad-water or Black-water. The see was united to that of Lismore after the arrival of the English in Ireland; and this again to Waterford. See St. Carthag’s life, 14 May.

[282] Mat. iv. 22.

[283] Luke v. 11.

[284] Luke ix.

[285] Julij, t. 6, p. 69. See on the same the learned F. Flores, in his España Sagrada, t. 3, c. 3, de la Predicacion de San Jago in España, p. 39, and his answers to F. Mamachi, the Roman Dominican, prefixed to his sixth tome. The mission of St. James in Spain is defended at large by the learned Jesuit F. Farlat, Illyrici Sacri Prolegom. part 3, t. 1, p. 252. See also Card. d’Aguirre, t. 1, Conc. Hisp. p. 140, upon the words of St. Jerom in Isaiæ c. 34, p. 279, t. 3.

[286] Diss. de Divisione Apost. ante t. 4, Julij, et in vita S. Jacobi, t. 6, p. 71.

[287] Agrippa the Elder was a worldly man, addicted to pleasures, yet attached to the Jewish religion. Of this he gave a remarkable proof when the emperor Caligula ordered a statue of Jupiter to be set up in the temple of Jerusalem. The Jews opposed the attempt with tears and remonstrances, and throwing themselves prostrate on the ground at the feet of the Roman governor, protested they were ready rather to suffer death. But the murderers of the Son of God were unworthy to die in so good a cause. Agrippa exposed himself to the danger of losing the tyrant’s favor, and by a strong letter, which he wrote to him on that occasion, obtained that the order should be superseded at that time. When that emperor was attempting to renew it his death delivered the Jews from the danger.

[288] Eus. Hist. l. 2, c. 9.

[289] Agrippa was the first prince that persecuted the Church. After having put to death St. James, he imprisoned St. Peter, but God delivered him out of the persecutor’s hands. Nor was it long before this king felt the effects of divine vengeance. After the feast of the passover he returned to Cæsarea to exhibit there public games in honor of Claudius Cæsar, and was attended thither with a numerous train of the must considerable persons, both of his own and of the neighboring nations. He appeared early on the second morning of the shows at the theatre, in a costly robe of silver tissue, artfully wrought, and so bright that the sunbeams which darted upon it were reflected with such an uncommon lustre, as to dazzle the eyes of the spectators who beheld him with a kind of divine respect. He addressed himself in an elegant speech, to the deputies of the Tyrians and Sidonians, who were come to beg his pardon for some offence for which they had been some time in disgrace with him. Whilst he spoke, the ambassadors and some court sycophants gave a great shout, crying out that it was the voice of a god and not of a man. The king, too sensible of the people’s praise, and elated with pride, seemed to forget himself, and to approve, instead of checking the impious flattery. But at that instant the angel of the Lord smote him with a dreadful disease, and he felt himself seized with a violent pain in his bowels. Perceiving his distemper to be mortal, he rejected the flattery of his sycophants, telling them that he whom they called immortal was dying. Yet still full of false ideas of human grandeur, though he saw death inevitable, he comforted himself with the remembrance of the splendor in which he had lived. So true it is that a man dies such as he lives. After lingering five days in exquisite torments, under which no remedy gave him any ease, being eaten up by worms, he expired in all the miseries that can be expressed or imagined. This account is given us by Josephus (Antiq. l. 19, c. 7), and by St. Luke (Acts xii. 23). He died in the fifty-fourth year of his age, and the seventh of his reign. The most learned Mr. Stukely in his medallic history of Carausius, t. 2, c. 1, p. 72, will have it that Agrippa was smitten four days after he celebrated the Roman festival, in which the people made vows for the emperor’s health and safety, marked in the ancient Roman Calendar which he has published on the 4th of January. It was, indeed, the festival of the emperor Claudius, but after the passover, which happened that year on the 10th of April, the equinoctial new moon falling on the 28th of March. Herod Agrippa left a son of his own name, who was then at Rome with Claudius, only seventeen years old. The emperor would willingly have given him his father’s dominions; but his freemen and counsellors represented to him that an extensive kingdom was too great a burden for so young a prince to bear. Whereupon Judæa was again reduced into the form of a Roman province, and Cuspius Fadus appointed the first prefect or governor.

[290] See on the Translation of the body of St. James to Compostella, F. Flores, the learned and inquisitive Austin friar, rector of the royal college at Alcala, in his curious work entitled España Sagrada (of which the first volume was printed in 1747), t. 3, App. p. 50 and 56.

[291]

“Christophore, infixum quòd cum usque in corde gerebas, Pictores Christum dant tibi ferre humeris,” &c.

_Vida_, Hym. 26, t. 2, p. 150.

[292] Procop. de Ædif. Justin. l. 1, c. 2.

[293] Julij, t. 6, p. 250.

[294] 2 Tim ii. 5. 1 Tim. v. 4.

[295] Plutarch l. de Educand. liberis.

[296] Hist. Episc. Antisiodor. See Messieurs De Ste. Marthe, in Gallia Christiana.

[297] Prosp. in Chron. et l. contra Collat. c. 21.

[298] Bede Hist l. 1, c. 17, Constant. in vita S. Germani.

[299] Vita S. Genevevæ.

[300] Hist. Episcop. Antisiod.

[301] Bede, Hist. l. 1, c. 1. Gildas ep. p. 17, 18. Constantius in vitâ S. Germani. Carte, p. 184, 185.

[302] Antiq. Brit. c. 11, p. 179, 180. Carte, t. 1, p. 288.

[303] Carte, p. 184, 186, thinks the Alleluiah victory gained over the Picts and the Saxons, and the other transactions of St. Germanus in Wales, happened in his second mission. For SS. Dubricius and Iltutus, whom he ordained bishops, lived beyond the year 512, according to some until 527 or even 540. Sir Henry Spelman and Wilkins (Conc. Brit. t. 1, p. 1), on this account place the synod of Verulam held by St. Germanus against the Pelagians in 446.

[304] Bede, Hist. l. 1, c. 21. Bollandus and Henschenius in vitâ S. Theliau ad 9 Februarij, &c.

[305] Stillingfleet, Orig. Britan. p. 349.

[306] Or. 3, de Imag.

[307] Ecclus. xxxviii. 1, 2.

[308] 4 Kings xx. 7. See Syn. Critic. and Mead, De Morbis Biblicis, c. 5.

[309] Serm. 22, in Ps. 118.

[310] Regul. fus. explic.

[311] Ep. 345, ol. 321, p. 316, et in Cant.

[312] See Estius in Eccli. xxxviii.

[313] Ephes. v. 29, Aug. ep. 130, ol. 121, ad Probam.

[314] 2 Paral. xv. 12.

[315] Paulin. Nat. 9, or Carm. 24.

[316] Horat. l. 1, od. 3.

[317] _Pueri._ See Diss. de SS. 7, Dormient. c. 18, p. 65, et c. 6, p. 11. The Menology of the emperor Basil, printed at Rome in 1727, &c.

[318] Spon, Voyage d’Italie et du Levant, t. 1, l. 3, p. 327.

[319] St. Paulin. Carm. 24, and ep. 12. On the relics of St. Nazarius at Milan, see the life of St. Charles Borromeo, by Guissiano, in the new Latin edition, l. 5, c. 9. p. 435, and the notes of Oltrocci, ibid.

[320] S. Bas. hom. de S. Gordio.

[321] S. Epiph. Hær. 54. Eus. l. 5, c. 28. Conc. t. 1. Theodoret, Hæret. Fabul. l. 2, c. 5.

[322] Eus. l. 5, c. 17. St. Hier. ep. 54, ad Marcel. Tert. l. de Fugâ, de Pudic., &c.

[323] Tert. l. adv. Praxeam.

[324] S. Epiph. Hær. 46. S. Iren. l. 1, c. 31. Clem. Alex. Strom. l. 3, p. 465.

[325] Tatian’s Oration against the Greeks is extant. In it he displays much profane erudition, showing that Moses was older than the Gentile philosophers, who borrowed the sciences from the patriarchs. He wrote this piece after the death of Saint Justin, but before his separation from the Church: for in it he proves one God the Creator of all things, and seems to approve the state of matrimony. It wants method; but the style is elegant enough, though exuberant, and not very elaborate. This piece is often published at the end of the works of St. Justin. We have an accurate separate edition, printed at Oxford in 1700, with notes and dissertations, by the care of Mr. William Worth, archdeacon of Worcester. P. Travasa in his learned history of heresiarchs, demonstrates against Massuet, &c., that Tatian’s Oration against the Gentiles is not orthodox; and that in it the author teaches that the human soul is of its own nature mortal. See Travasa Storia Critica delle vite degli eresiarchi, t. 2, at Venice, 1760.

[326] Ἀκοενωνησίαν ἑπέϛειλεν.

[327] Monti, Cler. Reg. S. Pauli, S. Th. Prof. Mediolani, Dissertationes Theologico-historicæ tres, quarum prima propugnat gratiam per se efficacem; Secunda agit de Canonibus vulgò apostolicis; Tertia versatur super dissidio de opportuno Paschatis celebrandi tempore. Papiæ, 1760.

[328] Mem. Eccles. t. 3, p. 112.

[329] From this example, it is manifest, that the African bishops referred greater causes, at least those of faith to the holy see, and in them always allowed appeals to it; though at that time they carried on a contest with the popes Innocent, Zosimus, and Celestine, against appeals being made in lesser causes of personal facts, which it is often difficult to carry on in remote courts, and which, if too easy and frequent, are a bar to the speedy execution of justice. Yet such appeals or revisions of causes are sometimes necessary to hinder crying injustices and oppressions. Whence the regulation of the manner of restraining appeals in smaller ecclesiastical causes is a point of discipline; but the general council of Sardica, which was an appendix of the council of Nice, declared, that appeals must be allowed from the whole world to the bishops of Rome; and in this discipline the Africans soon after acquiesced.

[330] St. Aug. Serm. 131, n. 10.

[331] _Dole_ in the old British language signifies a low fruitful plain.

[332] Tours, which was the metropolis of the province of Armorica under the Romans, enjoyed, from the time of St. Martin, the metropolitical jurisdiction over Mans, Angers, and the nine bishoprics of Brittany. Sampson the elder, bishop of York, being expelled by the Saxons, came into Armorica, and founded the see of Dole, in which he exercised a metropolitical jurisdiction, which king Howel or Rioval obliged him to assert, because these Britons were an independent people, separate from the Gauls. Sampson’s two successors, St. Turiave and St. Sampson, enjoyed the same. The contest between Tours and Dole was not finished till Innocent III. In 1199, declared Dole and all the other bishoprics of Brittany subject to the archbishop of Tours. See D. Morice, Hist. de Bretagne, p. 17, &c.

[333] Luke x. 38.

[334] Ibid.

[335] Cant. ii.

[336] 3, p. 9, 40, a. l. ad 2 et 3. Item 2, 2dæ. q. 182, art. 1 et 2, in corp.

[337] L. de Perfect. Religios.

[338] Mat. xxvi.; John xii.

[339] Unicum mihi negotium est; aliud non curo quam ne curem. Tert. l. de Pallio, c. 5.

[340] See the Chronicle of Norway by Snorro Sturleson, first magistrate in the republic of Iceland in 1240.

[341] _Scot_ and _lot_ are originally Swedish or Teutonic words, signifying tax. Romescot is a tax for Rome, and Scot-Konung, the king’s tax. See baron Holberg, and Mess. Scondia illustrata, t. 1.

[342] Aringhi Roma Subterranea, l. 1, c. 25.

[343] Noris, Diss. 3, de Epochis Syro-Macedonum.

[344] Apol. c. 21.

[345] Plato in Phædo.

[346] Act. ii.

[347] Act. xvi. 26.

[348] Constantine Cajetan, a Benedictin of the Congregation of Mount Cassino, pretends this book to have been first written by Gracias Cisneros or Swan, a Benedictin abbot of Montserrat. But the work of that pious and learned abbot is a very different piece, as is evident to every one that will compare the two books, and as Pinius demonstrates. That of Cisneros is indeed full of unction and spiritual knowledge; but compiled in a scholastic method, and runs into superfluous subdivisions. The meditations of St. Ignatius are altogether new, and written upon a different plan. He appoints, for the foundation of these exercises, a moving meditation on the end for which we are created, that we fully convince ourselves that nothing is otherwise to be valued, sought, or enjoyed, than as it conduces to the honor and service of God. The meditations on the fall of the angels and of man, on the future punishments of sin, and on the last things, show us the general effects of sin. To point out the particular disorders of our passions, and to purge our hearts of them, he represents to us the two standards of Christ and the devil, and all men ranging themselves under the one or the other, that we may be moved ardently to make our choice with the generous souls that follow Christ. Then he proposes what this resolution requires, and how we are to express in ourselves the perfect image of our Saviour, by the three degrees of humility, by meditating on the mysteries of Christ’s life, and by choosing a state of life, and regulating our employments in it. By meditating on Christ’s sufferings, he will have us learn the heroic virtues of meekness and charity, &c., he taught us by them to fortify our souls against contradictions; and by those on his glorious mysteries, and on the happiness of divine love, he teaches us to unite our hearts closely to God. See Bartoli, l. 1, &c.

[349] Exerc. Spir. Max. 2, 3.

[350] Ego vobis Romæ propitius ero. See F. Bouhours, b. 3.

[351] There is another religious Order, very famous in Italy, established for the education of youth, called the Regular Clergy of the _Schola Pia_. The founder was F. Joseph Cazalana, a nobleman of Arragon. He took priestly orders in 1582, and, going to Rome, devoted himself with great fervor to the heroic practice of all good works, especially to the catechising and teaching of children. To propagate this design, he instituted a congregation of priests, approved by Paul V. in 1617, and declared a religious Order with ample privileges, by Gregory XV. in 1621. These religious men bind themselves by a fourth vow, to labor in instructing children, especially the poor. The holy founder died in 1648, on the 25th of August.

[352] He appointed no other habit than that used by the clergy in his time, the more decently and courteously to converse with all ranks of people, and because he instituted an order only of regular clerks. He would not have his religious to keep choir, because he destined their time to evangelical functions. He ordered all, before they are admitted, to employ a month for a general confession and a spiritual exercise. After this, two years in a novitiate; then to take the simple vows of scholars, binding themselves to poverty, chastity, and obedience, which vows make them strictly religious men; for by them a person in this Order irrevocably consecrates himself to God on his side, though the Order does not bind itself absolutely to him, and the general has power to dismiss him; by which discharge he is freed from all obligation to the Society, his first vows being made under this condition. These simple vows are only made in the presence of domestics. The professed Jesuits make these same vows again (commonly after all their studies) but publicly, and without the former condition; so that these second are solemn vows, absolutely binding on both sides: wherefore a professed Jesuit can be no more dismissed by his Order, so as to be discharged from his obligations by which he is tied to it. In these last is added a fourth vow of undertaking any missions, whether among the faithful or infidels, if enjoined them by the pope. There is a class of Jesuits who take the other vows, without this last relating to the missions; and these are called spiritual coadjutors. So this Order consists of four sorts of persons; scholars or Jesuits of the first vows; professed Jesuits or of the last or four vows; spiritual coadjutors, and temporal coadjutors.