312 SYNODS ALONE HAD THE POWER OF ABSOLUTION. self as his special prerogative. " It is," says Baronius, " a privilege of the church of Rome only, that a bishop deposed by a synod may without another synod of a greater number be restored by the pope."' And Pope Gelasius I. says, " That the see of St Peter the apostle has a right of loosing whatever the sentences of other bishops have bound," &c.' " That the apostolic see, according to frequent ancient custom, had a power, without the precedence of any synod, toabsolve those whom a synod had unjustly condemned, and, without a council, to condemn those who deserved it."' It was an old pretence of popes, that bishops were not condemned except the pope consented renouncing communion with them. So Pope Vigilius says of St Chrysostom and Flavianus that "although theywere violently excluded, yet were they not looked upon as con- demned, because the bishops of Rome always inviolably kept com- munion with them."' And, before him, Pope Gelasius says that " the pope, by not con- senting to the condemnation of Athanasius, Chrysostom, Flavianus, absolved them."` But such a power of old did not belong to him; for, - 1. There is not extant any ancient canon of the church nor ap- parent footsteps of custom allowing such a power to him. 2. Decrees ofsynods (provincial inthe former times, and diocesan afterwards) were inconsistent with or repugnant to sucha power; for judgments concerningepiscopal causes were deemed irrevocable, and appointed to be so by decrees of divers synods, and consequently no power was reserved to the pope of thwarting them by restitution of any bishop condemned in them. 3. The apostolical canons, which at least serve to prove or illus- trate ancient custom, and divers synodical decrees, prohibited en- tertaining communion with any person condemned or rejected by canonical judgment, without exception, or reservation of power of infringing or relaxing that prohibition.' And Pope Gelasius himself ' Privilegium quidem solins ecclesias Romance ease reperitur, ut depositus a synodo episcopusabsque alia synodo majoris numeri restitui possit perRomanum pontificem. Baron., ann. 449, § 127. Quorumlibet sententiis ligata pontificum sedes B. Petri apostoli jus habet resol- vendi.P. Gelas I., Ep. xiii. Sedes apostolica frequenter more majorum, etiam sineulla synodo procedente et absolvendi quos synodus inique damnaverat, et damnandi nulla existente synodo quos oportuit habuit facultatem, &c. P. Gelas. L, Ep. xiii. 4 Qui licet violenter exclusi sunt, non tarnen pro damnatis sunt habiti, eo quod semper inviolatam eorum communionem Rom. pontifices servaverant. P. Vigilius in Constit. Athan.., &c. Quem (Johannem Chrys.) sedes apostolica etiam sola, quia non consensit, absolvit. P. Gelas., Ep. s Can. Apost. x., xi., xii., xiii. ; Conc. Nia., can. v.; Sard. avi., xvii. ; Cod. Afr. ix. ; Conc. Antioch. vi. xv.; Evag. ii. 4.
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