isr ORIGIN OF METROPOLITAN DIGNITY. 213 public good; because, declining such judgments, he plainly showed that he would admit none, there not being any fairer way of deter- mining things than by common advice and agreement of pastors; because he in effect refused all good terms of communion and peace. Thus, I conceive, the metropolitical governance was introduced, by human prudence following considerations of public necessity or utility. There are, indeed, some who think it was instituted by the apostles, but their arguments do not seem convincing; and such a constitution does not, as I take it, well suit to the state of their times, and the course they took in founding churches. Into such a channel, through all parts of Christendom (though with some petty differences in the methods and measures of acting), had ecclesiastical administrations fallen of themselves, plain com- munity of reason and imitation insensibly propagating that course; and therein it ran for a good time, before it was by general consent and solemn sanction established. The whole church then was a body consisting of several confede- rations of bishops, acting in behalf of their churches under their re- spective metropolitans, who managed the common affairs in each province; convoking synods at stated times and upon emergent oc- casions; in them deciding causes and controversies incident, relating to faith or practice;' framing rules serviceable to commonedification and decent uniformity in God's service ; quashing heresies and schisms; declaring truths impugned or questioned; [and] maintaining the harmony of communion and concord with other provinces, adja- cent or remote.' Such was the state of the church to which the Apostolical Canons and Constitutions refer, answerable to the times in which they were framed, andwhich we may discern in the practice of ancient synods. Such it continued when the great synod of Nice was celebrated;' which by its authority, presumed to represent the authority of all bishops in the world, who were summoned thereto, and backed by the imperial authority and power, confirmed those orders, as they found them standing by more general custom and received rules in most provinces,' reducing them into more uniform practice; so that what before stood upon reason, customary usage, particular consent, by so august sanction became universal law, and obtained so great venera- tion as by some to be conceived everlastinglyand immutably obliga- tory, according to those maxims of Pope Leo. .c,,á máç ÉKxñ.Y/Olap'PI1o2Ç xPÚaç ..1 Ta; PWV üftlQrGuP7f4ot1Ftivo,v OraXÚCsr &c. Syn. Ant., can. xx. 2 Can. Apost. xxxviii.; Tertuu. de Jej., cap. xiii.; Syn. Nic., can. v. S naT.arEç 4t ó,Ç 7OP6 .gsGftÓ, mix, ocTpxs, xai 4a,v Ó:y(av íV NrxaÌ;e na7i'aY öoç, &C.Syn. Constant. Theod. v. 9. 4'Y'ag? TO; 7-air= iv orriTn 74-a?orxiá ótr.oiaç fuxársollar.Can. xx.
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