head, and is therefore called
Father."[30] The Apostolic Canons, and those of the Council of Nicea, are
the legislative acts bearing witness to this order of things: the conduct
and words of St. Cyprian, St. Firmilian, and St. Augustin, which we have
instanced, and an innumerable multitude of other cases, exhibit it in full
life and vigour; while, on the other side, there is absolutely nothing to
allege.

The history of the Church during the three hundred years following the
Nicene Council is but a development of this constitution. The problem was,
how to combine in the harmonious action of One organized Body those
Apostolical powers which resided in the Bishops generally. The Patriarchal
system was the result. As the Church increased in extent, her rulers would
increase in number. This multiplication, which would tend so much to
augment the centrifugal force, was met by increased energy in the
centripetal: the power of the Patriarchs, and specially of the Bishop of
Rome, grew. It is impossible, in my present limits, to follow this out, but
I propose to give a few specimens, as before, in illustration.

In so vast a system of interlaced and concurrent powers as the Church of
Christ presented, differences would continually arise; and in so profound a
subject-matter as the Christian revelation, heresies would be continually
starting up: to arrange the former, and to expel or subjugate the latter,
the Bishops, says Thomassin, having already more than once appealed to the
Christian Emperors for the calling of great Councils, saw the danger of
suffering the Imperial authority to intervene in ecclesiastical causes, and
sought to establish a new jurisprudence on this head.[31] "The Council of
Antioch (A.D. 341), and that of Sardica (A.D. 347), which were held almost
at the same time,--the one in the East, the other in the West,--set about
this in a very different manner, aiming, however, at the same end. The
Council of Antioch ordered that Bishops, Priests, and Deacons, who should
have been condemned by a provincial Council, might recur to a larger
Council of Bishops; but that if they carried their complaints before the
Emperor they could never be reestablished in their dignity." "One must in
good faith admit, that this regulation had much conformity with what had
been practised in the first ages of obscurity and persecution, for it was
in the same way that extraordinary Councils had been held, such as were
those of Antioch ag