divided into dioceses, each of which comprised many provinces. This division began only about the time of Constantine, whereas that of provinces was much older, if not coeval with the first establishment of the Christian Church. The Church adopted this division also; and as the State had an Exarch or Vicar in the capital city of each civil diocese, so the Church in process of time came to have her Exarchs or Patriarchs, in many if not in all the capital cities of the empire. These Patriarchs were at first called Archbishops, which title had therefore originally a much more extensive signification than it has at present, when it is generally taken for the Metropolitan of a single province. There are various questions respecting the rise and progress of Patriarchal power, which it is unnecessary to enter into here, but which are fully considered by Bingham and Beveridge. The principal privileges of Patriarchs were, 1. To ordain all the Metropolitans of the diocese (who before the institution of Patriarchs were ordained by the Synod of the province), and to receive their own ordination from a Diocesan Synod. 2. To call Diocesan Synods, and to preside in them. 3 To receive appeals from Metropolitans, and from Metropolitan Synods. 4. To censure Metropolitans, and also their Suffragans when Metropolitans were remiss in censuring them. The Patriarch of Alexandria had from very early times some peculiar privileges within his diocese, but all Patriarchs were originally co-ordinate, as well as independent of each other as regards actual power, though some had a precedence of honor, as those of Rome, Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, and Jerusalem, who had by the Canons precedence of all others. For a more full account of the matters contained in this note, see Bingham, b. viii. c. 16 and 17. and b. ix. and Beveridge's Annotations upon the 6th Canon of the Council of Nice; and also his treatise upon Metropolitans in the Codex Canonum Eccl. Prim. vindicatus.

5. Easter.] The controversy respecting the proper time of celebrating the Easter festival was of very early origin in the Church. The generality of the Asiatic Churches kept the festival as the Jews did their Passover, on the 14th day of the first moon in the new year, whatever day of the week that happened to be. The Western Churches generally deferred it to the first Sunday after

the first full moon. The former alleged the authority of St. Philip and St. John for their practice, the latter that of St. Peter and St. Paul, and of a revelation made by an Angel to Hermas, brother of Pius I., Bishop of Rome. Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, came to Rome about the middle of the second century, to confer with Anicetus, Bishop of Rome, upon the subject; but they could not come to any agreement as to the proper day. They agreed, however, in this, that the peace and communion of the Church were not to be broken on account of the difference. Some years after, Victor, Bishop of Rome, being unable to persuade the Asiatics to adopt the Western custom, excommunicated the Asiatic Churches, and sent circular letters to all the Churches which agreed with him respecting Easter, that they should hold no communion with the Asiatics. This proceeding of Victor's was, however, condemned by all the wise and sober men of his own party, several of whom wrote sharply to him upon the subject, and particularly Irenæus, who wrote to him in the name of the Churches of Gaul. The dispute still prevailed till the time of Constantine, who, wishing to terminate it, sent, in the first instance, Hosius, Bishop of Corduba in Spain, into the East, to endeavor to bring those Churches which still retained the Asiatic custom to an agreement with the rest of the Church. The mission, however, proving fruitless, the subject was submitted to the decision of the Council of Nice, which decreed, that from thenceforth all Churches should keep the feast on the same day, i. e. the first Sunday after the full moon; which happens upon, or next after, the vernal equinox, i. e. the 21st day of March. The great reverence which was paid to the decrees of this Council produced a more general agreement, which was further enforced by the decrees of other Councils, and thenceforth those persons who kept the feast according to the old Asiatic practice were accounted heretics, and subjected to ecclesiastical punishment. Bingham, b. xx. c. 5.

THE NICENE CREED. (1.) ·

We believe in one God, the Father Almighty, Maker of all things, both visible and invisible. And in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father, the only begotten, that is of the substance of the Father, God of God, Light of light, very God of very God, begotten not made, consubstantial with the Father, by whom all things were made, both those in heaven and those in earth: who for us men, and for our salvation, came down, and was incarnate, made man, suffered, and rose again the third day, ascended into the heavens, and will come to judge the living and the dead. And in the Holy Ghost. But those who say, that there was once a time when he was not, and that he was not before he was begotten, and that he was made out of things which did not exist, or who say, that he is of another substance or essence (2), or that the Son of God is created, capable of change, or alteration, the Catholic Church anathematizes.

NOTES.

1. This Creed is found in Greek, 1. In the Epistle of Eusebius to the Cæsareans, of which Epistle we have four copies preserved in the works of Theodoret, Socrates, Athanasius, and Gelasius of Cyzicum. 2. In the Epistle of Athanasius to Jovian. 3. In the 125th Epistle of Basil the Great. 4. In Socrates, Hist. Eccl. lib. i. c. 8. 5. In the Epistle of Cyril of Alexandria to Anastasius. 6. In the Codex Canonum Ecclesiæ Africanæ ; though probably, in this instance, it is a retranslation from the Latin version. 7. In the Acts of the Council of Ephesus. 8. In Gelasius Cyzicenus, lib. ii. c, 26. 9. In the Confession of Faith presented by Eutyches to the Council of Chalcedon, which is to be found amongst the Acts of that Council. 10. In the Exposi

tion of the Creed by Theodotus of Ancyra. 11. In the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, in which it occurs twice. These copies have been collated by Walchius, and the various readings enumerated; but with the exception of those which occur in the second form, in the Acts of the Council of Chalcedon, in which several of the additions of the Constantinopolitan Creed are introduced, there is not one of any consequence, or which in the least affects the sense.

Walchius also gives copies of the principal early Latin versions, which only vary in some of the Latin synonyms, by which they render some of the words of the Greek original. In most of them the Greek word Homoousion is retained with a translation of it added, of which there occur four forms in the different versions. Unius substantiæ cum Patre, ejusdem cum Patre substantiæ, ejusdem cum Patris substantiâ, and, consubstantialem Patri. Walchius, Biblioth. Symbol. vetus, p. 75.

2. Substance or essence.] iróorao¿ws ǹ ovoías. The word iñóoraσis is here used as synonymous with ovcía, essence, or, as it is commonly translated, substance; in other places it is used as synonymous with πρóσwπоv, person; and much confusion and many disputes have at times been occasioned by this indiscriminate use of the word. It may, therefore, be as well to give some account of the three words here, as it will prevent the necessity of frequent repetitions in the notes upon the other documents.

1. There is no difficulty about the word ovcía, which, when applied to the Deity, always signifies the one divine essence or substance which is common to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, and which is also expressed by the synonymous word puois, nature. Thus Leontius, quoted by Suicer, “It should be known, that essence and nature, ovoía kai púois, are the same thing with the Fathers. The Arians, therefore, objected equally to both terms; as, in the account of the Arian Synod of Sirmium, A. D, 351, it is said, that it put forth an impious definition of faith, forbidding to speak of nature or substance in God. In like manner both ov☛ía and púσis are used in the plural with respect to Christ, to express the divine and human substances or natures which are in him united in one person. Thus Athanasius, as quoted by Suicer, "Christ had the two substances and natures,

ovoías xaì púocis, without change or mixture, the Godhead and the Manhood; to be acknowledged in one person, úroσráσεi, perfect God and perfect man."

2. There is not much more difficulty respecting the word Tрóσwяоv, person, which when applied to the Godhead, expresses the distinction between the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, by which the one is not either of the others. There were therefore held to be three Persons in the Godhead, so that the Godhead might be properly called tri-personal, rрinρóσwños. The Sabellians, however, though in the catholic sense of the word they acknowledged only one Person in the Godhead, still, for the purpose of deception, would also use the word Tрiрóσwоs, and profess to acknowledge that God was one tripersonal substance, μία ὑπόστασις τριπρόσωπος, but then the sense which they attached to the word person was that of appearance or manifestation, so that by the expression μía úñóoracis TpTpóσwоs, they in reality meant only one personal substance under three manifestations. The Sabellian use of the word, however, is not common enough to cause any confusion.

3. We come now to the word inórraris, hypostasis, respecting the meaning and use of which there have been various differences and disputes. In the Nicene Creed, as we have seen, it is used as synonymous with ovcía, and other instances of this meaning are quoted by Suicer. In this sense of course there is only one hypostasis in the Godhead. But the word is more commonly used as synonymous with ρówπov. Thus Theodoret as quoted by Suicer, "As the name man is the common name of that nature, so we have taken the words divine substance, Ocíav ovoíav, to signify the Holy Trinity: but the word hypostasis is indicative of some person, πpocínov Tivòs inλwTiny, as either of the Father, or of the Son, or of the Holy Ghost. For we following the definitions of the Fathers say, that the words ὑπόστασις, πρόσωπον, and ιδιότης (that is, property or propriety), signify the same thing." Many others of the Greek Fathers used the word in the same sense, and objected to the expression one hypostasis, which they thought savored of Sabellianism. The Latins however translated the word inboracis, substantia, which was the same word by which they rendered