The Church of England cleared from the charge of Schism

ADVERTISEMENT

The writer of the following pages is more and more convinced that the whole question between the Roman Church and ourselves, as well as the Eastern Church, turns upon the Papal Supremacy, as at present claimed, being of divine right or not. If it be, then have we nothing else to do, on peril of salvation, but submit ourselves to the authority of Rome: and better it were to do so before we meet the attack, which is close at hand, of an enemy who bears equal hatred to ourselves and to Rome; the predicted Lawless One, the Logos, reason, or private judgment of apostate humanity rising up against the Divine Logos, incarnate in His Church. If it be not, then may we take courage; for the position of the Church of England being tenable, all the evils within her pale, which we are now so deeply feeling, will, by God's blessing, be gradually overcome. As to practical abuses in her, who will venture to say they are so great as in the Roman Church of the tenth century, when the First See was filled successively by the lovers of abandoned women, who made and deposed Popes at their will? Our cause being good, all that we have to deplore of actual evil should lead to more earnest intercession, more continued striving after that love which breathes itself forth in unity, but should not shake the confidence of any obedient heart in our mother's title. When the Donatists made the crimes of individuals an excuse for breaking unity, St. Augustin reminded them, that the crimes of the chaff do not prejudice the wheat, but that both must grow together till the Lord of the harvest send forth his angels to make the separation.

The writer will not conceal that he took up this inquiry for the purpose of satisfying his own mind. Had he found the Councils and Fathers of the first six centuries bearing witness to the Roman supremacy, as at present claimed, instead of against it, he should have felt bound to obey them. As a Priest of the Church Catholic in England, he desires to hold, and to the best of his ability will teach, all doctrine which the undivided Church always held. He finds by reference to those authorities which could not be deceived, and cannot be adulterated, that while they unanimously held the Roman primacy, and the patriarchal system, of which the Roman pontiff stood at the head, they as unanimously did not hold, nor even contemplate, that supremacy or monarchy which alone Rome will now accept as the price of her communion. They not only do not recognise it, but their words and their actions most manifestly contradict it. This is, in one word, his justification of his mother from the sin of Schism. If true, it is sufficient: if untrue, he knows of no other.

But should any opponent think these pages worthy of a reply, the writer warns him, at the outset, that he must in fairness discard that old disingenuous trick of using testimonies of the Fathers to the primacy of the Roman See in the episcopal and patriarchal system, in order to prove the full papal supremacy, as now claimed, in a system which is nearly come to pure monarchy. By this method, because the Fathers recognise the Bishop of Rome as successor of St. Peter, they are counted witnesses to that absolute power now claimed by the Roman pontiff, though they recognise other Bishops, in just the same sense, to be successors of the holy Apostles; or though they call every Bishop's see the see of Peter, as the great type and example of the episcopate. What such an one has to establish in order to justify the Roman Church, and to prove that the English and the Eastern are in Schism, is, that Roman doctrine, as stated by Bellarmine, which is really the key-stone of the whole system, that "Bishops succeed not properly to the Apostles," "for they have no part of the true apostolic authority," but that "all ordinary jurisdiction of Bishops descends immediately from the Pope," and that "the Pope has, full and entire, that power which Christ left on the earth for the good of the Church."1 Let this be proved on the testimony of the first six centuries, and if it be true, nothing can be more easy than to prove it, as the contradictory of it is attempted to be proved in the following pages, and all controversy will be at an end. We claim that it should be proved, for even De Maistre, who has put forward this theory with the least compromise, declares, "There is nothing new in the Church, and never will she believe save what she has always believed."2

THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND CLEARED FROM

THE CHARGE OF SCHISM

The course of events, for some time past, has been such as to force upon the most faithful sons of the Church of England the consideration of questions which they would rather have left alone, as long ago settled; for the nature of these questions is such, not to speak of their intricacy and painfulness, as almost to compel the student to place himself, as it were, ab extra to that community, which he would rather regard with the unreasoning and unhesitating instinct of filial affection. One of these questions, perhaps the first which directly meets and encounters him, is the charge of Schism brought against the Church of England on account of the events of the sixteenth century, and her actual state of separation from the Latin communion, which has been their result. Time was, and that not long since, when it might have been thought a sort of treason for one who ministers at the altars of the Church of England, and receives by her instrumentality the gift of Life, so much as to entertain the thought, whether there was a flaw in the commission of his spiritual mother, a flaw which, reducing her to the condition of a sect, would invalidate his own sonship. And certainly the treatment of such a question must be most painful to any one, who desires to be obedient and dutiful, and therefore to be at peace. How can it be otherwise, when, instead of eating his daily portion of food in his Father's house, he is called upon to search and inquire whether indeed he have found that house at all, and be not rather a fugitive or an outcast from it. Such, however, is the hard necessity which is come upon us. Let no one imagine that it is our choice to speak on such subjects. We are in the case of a beleaguered soldier in an enemy's country; he may not think of peace; he must maintain his post or die; his part is not aggression, but defence: the matter at issue is the preservation of all that he holds dear, or extermination. The question of schism is a question of salvation.

But over and above the general course of events which forces us to reconsider this question, circumstances have taken place in the past year which we may boldly pronounce to be without a parallel in the history of the Church in England since she became divided from Catholic communion. Those who have followed with anxious sympathy that great restorative movement which, for twelve years, has agitated her bosom, – those who have felt with an ever increasing conviction, as time went on, and the different parties consolidated and unfolded themselves, that it was at the bottom a contest for the ancient faith delivered to the saints, for dogmatic truth, for a visible Church, in whom, as in a great sacrament, was lodged the presence of the Lord, communicating Himself by a thousand acts of spiritual efficacy, against the monstrous and shapeless latitudinarianism of the day; against the unnumbered and even unsuspected heresies which have infected the whole atmosphere that we breathe; against, in fine, the individual will of fallen man, under cover of which the coming Antichrist is marshalling interests the most opposite, and passions the most contradictory; and further, those not few nor inconsiderable, we believe, who, by God's grace, owe to the teaching of one man in particular a debt they never can repay, – the recovery, perchance, of themselves from some form of error which he has taught them to discern, or the building them up in a faith whose fair proportions he first discovered to them, – these will feel with deeper sorrow than we can express the urgency of the occasion to which we allude. For how, indeed, could the question, whether the Church of England is fallen into schism, or be, as from the laver of their regeneration they have been taught to believe, a member of that one sacred Body in which Christ incarnate dwells, – how could this question be so forced upon their minds, as by the fact that her Champion, whom they had hitherto felt to be invincible, who had seemed her heaven-sent defender, with the talisman of victory in his hands, of whom they were even tempted to think

Si Pergama dextra

Defendi possent, etiam hac defensa fuissent,

that he, who fighting her battles, never met with his equal, unsubdued by any foe from without, has surrendered to his own doubts and fears; self-conquered, has laid down her arms, and has gone over to the camp opposed. Henceforth she has ranged against her those powers of genius and that sanctity of life, to which so many of her children looked as to a certain omen of her Catholicity. They felt that she who bore such children, must needs be the spouse of God. It is no wonder that many others, of no mean name among us, and whom we could ill afford to spare, have had their doubts and disquietudes determined by such a fact as this. For the first time, I repeat, in the history of the Church of England have earnest and zealous children of hers, who desired nothing but their own salvation and the salvation of others, found no rest for the sole of their feet within her communion. Men who set out with the most single-minded purpose of defending her cause, nay, of winning back to her bosom alienated multitudes, of building her up in a beauty and a glory which she has not yet seen, and one, especially, who has been the soul of that great movement to restore her, – these have now, after years of hard fighting spent in her service, quitted her, and proclaim that all who value their salvation must quit her likewise.

These are some of the special circumstances which force upon the most reluctant the question of Schism. It was the privilege of other days to feed in the quiet pastures of truth. We have to seek the path to Heaven through the wilderness of controversy, where too often "the highways are unoccupied, and the travellers walk through byways." But it is a question which cannot be put off or thrust aside. No instructed Christian, who has any true faith or love, can bear the thought that he is out of the one fold of Christ. The question cannot be put off, for it will brood upon him in his daily devotions and labours; a doubt as to the justice of his cause will paralyse all his exertions. It cannot be thrust aside; for the imputation of heresy on another has no tendency to answer the charge of schism against oneself. It must be met openly, honestly, and without shrinking. The charge of Schism touches immediately the Christian's conscience, for this reason, that, if true, it takes away from his prayers, his motives, his actions, his sufferings, that one quality which is acceptable to Almighty God. Here it is most true, that "all, which is not of faith, is sin: " he who does not believe, at least, that he is a member of the one Church, whatever outward acts he may perform, cannot please his Judge. In the words of one who himself gave his goods to feed the poor, and shed his blood for the testimony of Jesus,3 "if such men were even killed for confession of the Christian name, not even by their blood is this stain washed out. Inexpiable and heavy is the sin of discord, and is purged by no suffering. He cannot be a martyr who is not in the Church; he can never attain to the kingdom, who leaves her with whom the kingdom shall be." "A man of such sort may indeed be killed, crowned he cannot be." Therefore the charge of Schism, when once brought before the reflecting mind, cannot be turned aside, – it must be met and answered: if it is not answered, at least to the conviction of the individual, it leaves upon the whole of his obedience the stain of insincerity, which is fatal. In this respect it is more pressing and imperious, more fatal, even than that of heresy. I observe this, because, in the comments I have seen on the painful departures of friends from among us, and in exhortations not to follow them, it has not seemed to be always recognised. When men leave us on the ground that we are in schism, surely all censure of them, and all defence of ourselves, is beside the mark, which does not meet and rebut this particular accusation. Under this no man can rest: it is useless, it is sinful, to ask him to rest, unless you can remove the imputation. To talk of "disappointment, or a morbid desire of distinction, or impatience under deficiencies, want of discipline, or sympathy in spiritual superiors," and such-like causes, as being those which have impelled a man to the most painful sacrifices, and "in the middle of his days to begin life again," is surely both untrue as regards the individual, and futile as to preventing others doing like him, when the ground of schism among others is alleged by himself, and is felt to lie at the bottom. Could we prove that the Church of England is clear both of enunciating heresy in her formularies, and of allowing it within her pale, it would in no respect answer this charge of schism against her, except so far as the à priori presumption, that she who is clear of the one would be clear of the other also. But it would remain to be met and answered specifically.

Moreover, I must confess that this is a point on which I, for one, cannot write in the spirit of a controversialist. I must state, to the best of my poor ability, and to the utmost reach of my limited discernment, not only the truth, but the whole truth. I cannot keep back points which tell against us. Gibbon charges Thomassin with telling one half the truth, and Bingham the other half, in their books upon the ancient discipline of the Church. Whether this be true or not, I cannot, in my small degree, do likewise. I have found Bishop Beveridge, in his defence of the 37th Article, quote, in several instances, part of a paragraph from ancient Fathers, because it told for him, and omit the other part, because it told against him. And, in considering the celibacy of the clergy, it is usual to find Protestant writers enlarging on the fact, that St. Peter was married; and that the Greek Church has always allowed its parish priests to be married; while they keep out of view that St. Peter's marriage preceded his call, and that the Eastern Church never allowed those who were already in holy orders, to marry, but only to keep those wives which they had taken as laymen. Or again, in deference to the circumstances of the English Church, writers conceal the fact, that the whole Church of the East and West, on the authority, as to the first point, of the express Word of God itself, has never allowed a person who married twice, or who married a widow, to be in holy orders at all. I have observed Bingham, when he treats of celibacy, alluding triumphantly to the biography of St. Cyprian, by Pontius, to prove that an ancient saint, martyr, and bishop, of the third century, was a married man; but taking care to leave out the express notice of Pontius, that, from his conversion, he lived in continence. Those who wish to see on the Roman side another sort of unfairness alluded to in the Advertisement may look to the 6th Chapter of the 1st Book of De Maistre, on the Pope, where they will find a host of quotations to prove the Supremacy, which only prove at the outside the Primacy; and by far the greater number of them might be paralleled by like expressions which are addressed to other bishops, but of which fact no mention is made. They are assumed in a sort of triumphant strain to prove the point in question, while, to the student of antiquity, their weakness, or, sometimes, their irrelevancy, only proves the reverse. This sort of disingenuousness is so common on both sides, that it may be said to be the besetting sin of controversialists. If, however, there be any question in which perfect candour is requisite, it is surely this of schism. Would it not be a most miserable success to be able to deceive oneself, or others, as to whether one is or is not within the covenant of salvation? The special pleader in such a case is surely the most unhappy of all men; for he deprives himself of the greatest of blessings. He seems to win his cause, while he most thoroughly loses it; for if a man be indeed out of the ark of Christ's Church, what benefit can one possibly render him equal to that of bringing him within it? I write, then, with the strongest sense of responsibility on this subject, and shall not be deterred from making admissions, if truth require them, which seem to tell on the other side, and which have accordingly been shrunk from, or slurred over, by our defenders in former times.

And this leads to another consideration. The charge of Schism against the Church of England is, that by rejecting the Papal authority in the sixteenth century, she lost the blessing of Catholic communion, and ceased to belong to that One Body to which salvation is promised. Now, in such a matter, the Church of England must be judged by principles which have been, from the first, and are still, recognised by all Christendom. Whatever obedience we may owe, in virtue of our personal subscription, to articles or other formularies, drawn up in the sixteenth century, it is obvious they can decide nothing here. What I mean will be best shown by an example. Suppose a person were to take the 6th Article, and set upon it a meaning, not at all uncommon in these days, viz. that the Church of England therein declares, that Holy Scripture is the sole standard of faith; and that every man must decide for himself, what is, or is not, contained in Holy Scripture; and that he, searching Holy Scripture for the purpose, can find nothing whatever said about the Papal authority; – it is obvious, that such a mode of arguing would be utterly inadequate either to terminate controversy, or, one would think, to quiet any troubled conscience: for whether or no this be the meaning of the 6th Article, the whole Greek and Latin Church would reject with horror such propositions as the first two put together, as being subversive of the very existence of a Church, and of all dogmatic authority. It is a valid argument enough to an individual to say, You have signed such and such documents, and are bound by them: but if he is in doubt whether the documents themselves be tenable, they cannot be taken to prove themselves. The decision of a province of the Church in the sixteenth century cannot be quoted to prove that that decision is right, for it is the very thing called in question. It is the Reformation itself which is put on trial; it cannot appeal to itself as a witness; it must be content to bring its cause before a judge, whose authority all will admit, – and that judge, need we say, must be antiquity, and the consent of the undivided Church. And the Church of England, it must be admitted, has not shrunk from this appeal. Her often-quoted canon enjoins her ministers, in that part of their duty wherein most is left to their private judgment, "to teach nothing which they wish to be held and believed religiously by the people, save what is agreeable to the doctrine of the Old or New Testament, and what the Catholic Fathers and ancient Bishops, have collected out of that very doctrine." Thus she spoke in the year 1571. The Church had then passed through fifteen centuries of a chequered, but superhuman, and most marvellous existence. Her continuous life implies a continuity of principles, ruling her from the beginning; and any controversy which affects her well-being, as does that concerning the integrity or loss of a great member, must be judged according to those principles. The present position of the Church of England may be merely a provisional one, I firmly believe that such is the fact; but if she is to claim the allegiance of her children as a part of the Catholic Church, it must be proved that such her position is tenable upon the principles which directed that Church when undivided. In short, I propose honestly, though briefly, to meet this imputation of schism by an appeal to the authority of the first six centuries: an authority, which no Roman Catholic can slight or refuse.

Let us go back to the first period at which the universal Church, emerging from the fires of persecution, is found acting as one body. United, indeed, it had ever been from the day of Pentecost, in charity, in doctrine, in sacraments, in communion. The Christian people, scattered throughout the wide precincts of the Roman empire, and speaking its various tongues, was one in heart and spirit – "A peculiar people," like none other: the Bread which they ate, and the Cup which they drank, made them One living Body. But so long as the Church was engaged in a fierce and unrelenting conflict with the Paganism and despotism of the empire, she could hardly exhibit to the world her complete outward organization. So, although in the intervals of persecution, important provincial councils had been held, and though it was felt to be necessary for discipline that local synods should take place twice every year, yet not until the year 325, at the Council of Nicea, does the whole Church meet in representation; the immediate cause of that assemblage being a heresy so malignant as to threaten her existence, and which could be repressed by no less energetic means. That is a strongly marked and important point in her existence, throwing light upon the centuries preceding, and establishing irremovable landmarks for those ensuing, at which we have full means for judging what her constitution and government were. As the decrees of the 318 Fathers established for ever the true doctrine concerning the Eternal Son, so do they offer an imperishable and unambiguous witness concerning the discipline and hierarchy of the Church. What was schism then, is schism now; what was lawful and compatible with Christian Sonship and privileges then, is so now. What then is the view they present us with? We find the Bishops throughout the whole world recognised, without so much as a doubt, to be the successors of the Apostles, invested with the plenitude of that royal Priesthood which the Son of God had set up on the earth in His own Person, and from that Person had communicated to His chosen disciples, and so possessed of whatever authority was necessary to govern the Church. Thus spoke a fresh and unbroken tradition, so universal and so unquestionable that no other voice was heard beside. Thus the Episcopal power may be safely recognised as of divine appointment: in truth it is scarcely possible to have stronger evidence than we have of this. One of the most learned of those who are opposed to us on the charge of schism, thus sums up the decisions "of all the Fathers and all the Councils of the first ages." "The Bishop represents Christ, and stands in his place on earth. As therefore the Priesthood of Christ embraces all sacerdotal authority and complete power to feed the flock, so that while we may indeed distinguish and define the various powers included in that fullness and perfection, yet it is a great crime to dissever and rend them in any way from each other, just as we distinguish without dividing the attributes and perfections of the Godhead itself; so the Episcopate in its own nature contains the fullness of the Priesthood, and the perfection of the Pastoral office. For Christ received the perfection of the Priesthood from His Father, when He was sent by Him. Moreover the perfection of the Priesthood, or both the Episcopal powers, (i. e. the Sacerdotal and the Pastoral,) He gave at once to His Apostles when he sent them as He himself was sent by the Father. Lastly, that same perfection they transmitted to Bishops, sending them as they themselves were sent by Christ." "Whence Bishops are Fathers by the most noble participation of divine Fathership which is on earth; so that here that expression of Paul is true – 'From whom every Fathership in heaven and earth is named.' For no greater Fathership is there on the earth than the Apostolical and the Episcopal." Thomassin, Part I. Liv. i. ch. 2.

And, viewed in itself, this power was sovereign and independent in every individual Bishop, who was the spouse of the Church, the successor of the Apostles, and of Peter, the centre of unity; able, moreover, to communicate this authority to others, and to become the source of a long line of spiritual descendants. But was this power in practice exercised in so unmodified a form? Would there not have been not only imminent danger, but almost certainty, that a power unlimited in its nature, committed to so large a body of men, who might become indefinitely more numerous, yet were each independent centres of authority, instead of tending to unity would produce diversity? Accordingly we find, together with the apostolical authority, admitted to be lodged in the Episcopal body in general, a preponderating influence exercised by certain sees, viz. by Rome in the West, and by Alexandria and Antioch in the East. Under these leading Bishops are a great number of metropolitans; and others, again, like the Bishops of Cyprus, have their own metropolitan, but are not subordinate to either of the three great sees. Next to these, rank the Bishops of Ephesus, Cesarea, and Heraclea, who preside respectively over the provinces of Asia, Cappadocia, and Thrace, and were afterwards called Exarchs. And the source of this preponderating influence is to be traced to the fact that the Apostles laid hold of the principal cities, and founded Churches in them, which became centres of light to their several provinces, and naturally exercised a parental authority over their children. The three great Bishops, though not yet called Patriarchs, or even Archbishops, seem to have exercised all the power of Patriarchs. No general Council would be binding without their presence in person, or by deputy, or their subsequent ratification. Moreover, among these, the Bishop of Rome, as successor of St. Peter, has a decided preeminence. What the extent of that preeminence was, had not yet been defined; but it is very apparent, and acknowledged in the East as well as in the West. It does not seem, indeed, that his authority differed in kind, but only in degree, from that of his brethren, especially those of Alexandria and Antioch. The Apostolical Canons, more ancient than the Council of Nice, and representing the whole East, say: – "The Bishops of every nation must acknowledge him who is first among them, and account him as their head, and do nothing of consequence without his consent; but each may do those things only which concern his own parish, (i. e. diocese,) and the country places which belong to it. But neither let him (who is the first) do anything without the consent of all, for so there will be unanimity, and God will be glorified through the Lord Jesus Christ." Canon 34. The Council of Nicea mentions the sees of Alexandria, Antioch, and Rome in precisely similar terms: – "Let the ancient customs be maintained, which are in Egypt and Libya, and Pentapolis; according to which the Bishop of Alexandria has authority over all those places. For this is also customary to the Bishop of Rome. In like manner in Antioch, and in the other provinces, the privileges are to be preserved to the Churches." Canon 6. That is, as it would seem, let the Bishop of Alexandria have the power to consecrate Bishops in the three provinces of his Patriarchate, for the Bishop of Rome does the same in his, i. e. in the suburbicarian provinces, or in Italy, south of the province of Milan, and in Sicily. This precedence or prerogative of Rome, to whatever extent it reached, was certainly, notwithstanding the famous 28th Canon of Chalcedon, not either claimed or granted merely because Rome was the imperial city. It was explicitly claimed by the Bishop of Rome himself, and as freely conceded by others to him, as in a special sense successor of St. Peter. From the earliest times that the Church comes before us as an organized body, the germ at least of this preeminence is observable. From the very first, the Roman Pontiff seems possessed himself, as from a living tradition which had thoroughly penetrated the local Roman Church, with a consciousness of some peculiar influence he was to exercise on the whole Church. This consciousness does not show itself here and there in the line of Roman Pontiffs, but one and all, whatever their individual characters might be, seem to have imbibed it from the atmosphere which they breathed. St. Victor, and St. Stephen, St. Innocent, St. Leo the Great, and St. Gregory, are quite of one mind here. That they were the successors of St. Peter, who himself sat and ruled and spoke in their person, was as strongly felt, and as consistently declared, by those Pontiffs who preceded the time of Constantine, and who had continually to pay with their blood the price of that high preeminence, as by those who followed the conversion of the empire, when the honour of their post was not accompanied by so much danger. We are speaking now, be it remembered, of the feeling which possessed them. The feeling of their brother Bishops concerning them may have been less definite, as was natural: but, at least, even those who most opposed any arbitrary stretch of authority on their part, as St. Cyprian, fully admitted that they sat in the See of Peter, and ordinarily treated them with the greatest deference. This is written so very legibly upon the records of antiquity, that I am persuaded any one, who is even very slightly acquainted with them, cannot with sincerity dispute it. I cannot think Mr. Newman has the least overstated the fact when he says, "Faint they (the ante-Nicene Testimonies to the authority of the Holy See) may be one by one, but at least they are various, and are drawn from many times and countries, and thereby serve to illustrate each other, and form a body of proof. Thus, St. Clement, in the name of the Church of Rome, writes a letter to the Corinthians, when they were without a Bishop. St. Ignatius, of Antioch, addresses the Roman Church, and it only out of the Churches to which he writes, as 'the Church which has the first seat in the place of the country of the Romans.' St. Polycarp, of Smyrna, betakes himself to the Bishop of Rome on the question of Easter;" (but the Pope, St. Anicetus, and he, not being able to agree as to the rule of keeping Easter, agreed to retain their several customs; a fact which is as much opposed to the present notion of the Roman Supremacy, as any fact can well be.) "The heretic, Marcion, excommunicated in Pontus, betakes himself to Rome. Soter, Bishop of Rome, sends alms, according to the custom of his Church, to the Churches throughout the empire, and, in the words of Eusebius, 'affectionately exhorted those who came to Rome, as a father his children.' The Montanists, from Phrygia, come to Rome to gain the countenance of its Bishop. Praxeas, from Africa, attempts the like, and for a while is successful. St. Victor, Bishop of Rome, threatens to excommunicate the Asian Churches. St. Irenæus speaks of Rome, as 'the greatest Church, the most ancient, the most conspicuous, and founded and established by Peter and Paul,' appeals to its tradition, not in contrast, indeed, but in preference to that of other Churches, and declares that 'in this Church every Church – that is, the faithful from every side, must meet,' or 'agree together, propter potiorem principalitatem.' 'O Church, happy in its position,' says Tertullian, 'into which the Apostles poured out, together with their blood, their whole doctrine.' The Presbyters of St. Dionysius, Bishop of Alexandria, complain of his doctrine to St. Dionysius, of Rome; the latter expostulates with him, and he explains. The Emperor Aurelian leaves 'to the Bishops of Italy and of Rome' the decision, whether or not Paul, of Samosata, shall be dispossessed of the see-house at Antioch. St. Cyprian speaks of Rome as 'the See of Peter, and the principal Church, whence the unity of the Priesthood took its rise, … whose faith has been commended by the Apostles, to whom faithlessness can have no access.' St. Stephen refuses to receive St. Cyprian's deputation, and separates himself from various Churches of the East. Fortunatus and Felix, deposed by St. Cyprian, have recourse to Rome. Basilides, deposed in Spain, betakes himself to Rome, and gains the ear of St. Stephen."4