33G OPINIONS OF THE FATHERS AS TO JURISDICTION. St Cyprian affirms " each bishop to be constituted by the judg- ment of God and of Christ," and that " in his church he is for the present a judge in the place of Christ ;" and that " our Lord Jesus Christ, one and alone, has a power both to prefer us to the govern- ment of his church and to judge of our acting. "1 St Basil, "A prelate is nothing else but one that sustains the per- son of Christ."' St Chrysostom, as We have received the commission of ambassa- dors and come fromGod; for this is the dignity of the episcopal office."' " It behoves us all, who by divine authority are constituted in the priesthood, to prevent,"6 &c. Wherefore, the ancient bishops did all of them take themselves to be vicars of Christ, not of the pope, and no less than the proudest pope of them all; whence it was ordinaryfor them in their addresses and compellations to the bishopof Rome, and in their speeches about him, to call him their "brother," their " colleague," their " fellow- minister,"which had not been modest or just if they had been his ministers or shadows. Yea, the popes themselves, even the highest and haughtiest of them (Leo, Ep. lxxxiv.), who of any in old times most stood on their presumed pre-eminence, yet vouch- safed to call other bishops their fellow-bishops and fellow-mi- nisters. Those bishops of France with good reason complained of Pope Nicholas I. " for calling them his clerks; whereas, if his pride had suffered him, he should have acknowledged them for his brethren and fellow-bishops."' In fine, the ancient bishops did not allege any commission from the pope to warrant their jurisdiction, but from God : " If Moses' chair were so venerable that what was said out of that ought there- fore to be heard, howmuch more is Christ's throne so ! We suc- sions, many of which have been shown to be mere interpolations. It is a remarkable fact, that, in the Syriac version of the Ignatian Epistles, lately discovered, those pas- ' sages which magnify so highly the office and authority of the bishop are not to be found. Mosh. Eccl. Hist. p. 88, note, Reid's ed. En. ' De Dei et Christi ejus judicio. Cypr., Ep. lii. et alibi scepe. Unus in ecclesia ad tempus sacerdos, et ad tempus judex, vice Christi. Id., Ep. Iv. Sed eipectemus uni- versi judicium Domini nostri Jesu Christi, qui unus et solus habet potestatem et prie- ponendi nos in ecclesiae suae gubernatione, et de actu nostro judicandi. Id. in Conc. Carthag. 2 'O yáp xxilnyeóasvas only i,rspór ion,, , ó ,rav aw,4p, ivrizmv ,rpívwxov. Bas. Const. Non., cap. xxii. 8 .1-11.ce7g 1.6%YUV #pseßeías iivEasZ' uAa %Óyav xa1 ;zaps', vrapel POV e,,V, riÚP, yáp ier, a'Ó cie is e,oaa'ñs m,íaEoa. Chrys. in Coloss., Orat. iii. e Oportere nos omnes, qui Dee auctore sumus in sacerdotio constituti illius ccrta- minibus obviare, &c.Anatol. in Syn. Chale. p. 512. 6 Sciesque nosnon tuos esse ut to jactas et extollis elericos, quos ut fratres et coepis- copos recognoscere si elatio permitteret, debueras. Ann. Pith.
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