heretic, and he calls on S. Flavian "to fight on behalf of the faith which is being attacked, and of the canons which are being trodden under foot." "For," he says, "when the blessed Fathers held a synod there in the imperial city [of Constantinople], they, acting in harmony with those who assembled at Nicaea, distinguished the patriarchates (ràs Soukhσeis), and assigned to each patriarchate the management of its own affairs ;" and then he goes on to summarize the remainder of the second canon of the Constantinopolitan Council of 381, and to show that Dioscorus had acted in manifest disobedience to its requirements; and he again begs S. Flavian to vindicate the authority of the holy canons.

But, although the canons of 381 were regarded as authoritative in the East, and although signs are not wanting that the creed, which is commonly called the Constantinopolitan creed,1 and in all probability received some measure of sanction from the Second Council,2 was regarded as a document of authority in Constantinople early in the fifth century,3 yet for all that the first written testimony which can at present be cited in favour of the council of 381 being put on a line with the great Ecumenical Councils of Nicaea and Ephesus, belongs, as we shall see, to the year 449.

There is certainly no trace of the Council of Constantinople being regarded as ecumenical by the Fathers of Ephesus (A.D. 431). Not a word was said at Ephesus either of the Council or of the creed of Constantinople; whereas the creed of Nicaea was read both in the first session and in the sixth, and frequent references to the decrees of the Nicene Council occur in the acts.

6

It would seem that the council of 381 was not regarded as an ecumenical assembly by the civil power in Constantinople in 448, for on February 16 in that year Theodosius the Younger addressed a law to the praetorian prefect, Hormisdas, in which the Emperor twice refers to the faith set forth at Nicaea and Ephesus, while he makes no reference to the Council of Constantinople.

Again, during the first session of the council held at Constantinople on November 8, 448, for the trial of Eutyches, under the presidency of S. Flavian, Eusebius of Dorylaeum presented a libellus of accusation, in which he protested that for himself he remained firm in the faith of the Fathers of Nicaea and Ephesus. And at the second session of the same council (November 12), on the invitation of S. Flavian, the bishops present made, each one, his declaration of his belief in the doctrine of the two

1 This creed is an enlarged edition of the creed of the Church of Jerusalem. The earlier form of the creed of that church was probably enlarged by S. Cyril of Jerusalem about the year 363, and promulgated for the use of his church. Besides other emendations, six clauses, containing thirty words, and taken from the Nicene creed, were inserted into the middle of the second paragraph (compare Hort's Two Dissertations, pp. 94-96, 142–144).

2 Compare Hort's Two Dissertations, pp. 97-107.

3 Ibid., pp. 75 and 112-115.

Yet a primacy of honour was always reserved for the council, creed, and canons of Nicaea. All subsequent ecumenical formularies were regarded as explanations of the Nicene creed.

5 Cf. Coleti, iii. 1008, 1201.

• Cod. Just., i. 1, 3.

Coleti, iv. 932.

Natures in one Person. Many of them made references to the Councils of Nicaea and Ephesus; but the council of 381 was not mentioned.1

Not long after S. Flavian's condemnation of Eutyches in November, 448, he was requested by Theodosius to send him in writing a confession of his faith. S. Flavian did so, and it is in the letter which he sent on that occasion to the Emperor that we for the first time find the Constantinopolitan Council of 381 put on a line with the Councils of Nicaea and Ephesus. S. Flavian says in this letter that having been appointed to the ministry of the evangelical priesthood, he had been orthodox and unblamable in his belief, "always following the divine scriptures and the dogmatic formularies 2 of the holy Fathers who assembled at Nicaea and Constantinople, and of those who assembled at Ephesus under Cyril of holy memory, the former Bishop of Alexandria."3 The wording of this sentence may perhaps imply that the position assigned to the council and creed of Constantinople was not a new departure of Flavian's, but was traditional in the imperial city. I should not, however, wish to lay too much stress on this last inference, as it cannot be said to be free from all doubtfulness. This important document was almost certainly written at some date between November, 448, and March 30, 449;5 and, if one may speculate on probabilities, I should say rather late than early in that period.

In the following August the Robber-council met. As it was entirely under the influence of Dioscorus of Alexandria, we might a priori expect that there would be no reference made by it to the Constantinopolitan Council of 381. And such, in fact, is the case. During its first session Dioscorus says that he has lying before him the decrees of Nicaea and Ephesus. And Eutyches in the libellus, which he presented to the council, and which contained the confession of his faith, refers more than once to the doctrine set forth at Nicaea and Ephesus; and near the end of this libellus he speaks of the faith which the Fathers who met at Nicaea delivered, and which the Fathers at Ephesus "in the second council con

1 Cf. Coleti, iv. 965-973. See also Theodosius' message to the council during its seventh session (Coleti, iv. 1005).

2 Ταῖς ἐκθέσεσι. Cf. Suicer., s.v. ἔκθεσις.

3 Coleti, iv. 777. It is interesting to notice that at the Conference between Catholics and Monophysites, which was held at Constantinople in the year 533, the Monophysites produced a copy of this letter, from which all mention of the Council of Constantinople had been removed (cf. Coleti, v. 915). As we shall see, the Monophysites, or at any rate many of them, never admitted the ecumenicity of the Second Council.

* Duchesne (Eglises Séparées, p. 79) expresses his opinion that the creed of Constantinople was adopté pour son usage propre par l'église de Constantinople entre 381 et 451." He agrees with Dr. Hort in thinking that the so-called Constantinopolitan creed is in all probability the creed of the Church of Jerusalem, as it was edited by S. Cyril of Jerusalem.

The imperial letters convoking the Robber-council bear this date.

"Time must be allowed for the intrigues of Eutyches, having for their object the winning of the Emperor over to his side, and also for the frequent efforts which the Emperor made to induce S. Flavian to be content with the definitions of Nicaea and Ephesus, and not to insist on the formula of the Two Natures (see Theodosius' letter to the Robber-council in Coleti, iv. 881).

7 Cf. Coleti, iv. 908.

8 Ibid., iv. 920, 921.

firmed."1

Similarly, the Robber-council itself, in the letter which it wrote to Theodosius at the end of its first session, declares that it had ascertained that Eutyches had introduced no innovations into the definitions of the Fathers of Nicaea and Ephesus.2

When we pass from the Robber-council to the Council of Chalcedon (October, 451), we become very soon conscious of the fact that it is no longer Alexandrine but Constantinopolitan influences that are uppermost. At the second session the imperial commissioners and the senate, in their opening speech, said to the assembled bishops, "We wish you to know" that the Emperor [that is to say, Marcian 3] and ourselves "maintain the orthodox faith delivered to us by the 318, and by the 150,6 and by the rest of the holy and glorious Fathers."6 Here we find the council of 381 put on a line with the Council of Nicaea; while the Council of Ephesus is not expressly mentioned.

After this opening speech by the laymen, there follow some short speeches by various bishops, in the course of which reference is made to the Council of Nicaea and to the Council of Ephesus, but not to the council of 381.

Then the commissioners and the senate direct that the Nicene creed shall be recited. The order is carried out by the Metropolitan of Nicomedia; and the creed is received by the bishops with acclamations. When they have subsided, the commissioners and the senate direct that the Constantinopolitan creed shall be recited. The order is carried out by Aetius, the Archdeacon of Constantinople and Chief of the Notaries. Whereupon the acts inform us that "all the most reverend bishops exclaim, 'This is the belief of us all ;''This is the belief of the orthodox ;' 'This we all believe.'"7 Then, at the suggestion of Aetius and by the order of the commissioners and of the senate, two letters of S. Cyril of Alexandria are read, the first of which had been received and confirmed by the First Council of Ephesus. These letters also were received with acclamations. Then S. Leo's tome was read and acclaimed; but the decision of the question whether S. Leo's tome agreed with the two creeds was postponed for five days, so as to give time for consideration.

At the fourth session the commissioners and the senate request the Fathers of the council to say whether Pope Leo's tome agrees with the Nicene and Constantinopolitan creeds. In conformity with this request 158 Fathers, one by one, give their judgement in short speeches. They express their opinion that Leo's tome agrees with the creed of Nicaea and with the creed of Constantinople and with the exposition of the faith by S. Cyril, which was synodically sanctioned at Ephesus.10

1 Coleti, iv. 924.

2 See the Abbé Martin's Pseudo-Synode d'Éphèse, p. 170.

3 Theodosius had died on July 28, 450.

That is to say, by the Council of Nicaea.

That is to say, by the Constantinopolitan Council of 381.

6 Coleti, iv. 1205.

1 Ibid., iv. 1212.

8 Ibid., iv. 1240.

Ibid., iv. 1361.

10 Strictly speaking, only 149 Fathers made express mention of all the three councils-that is to say, of the Councils of Nicaea, Constantinople, and Ephesus. Of the remaining nine Fathers, one omitted Nicaea; one omitted both Constantinople and Ephesus; four others omitted Constantinople; and three others

It will, I think, be obvious to every one that the general effect of these proceedings must have been to impress on the minds of the bishops assembled at Chalcedon the idea that the Constantinopolitan Council of 381 was a council which had a right to be put in the same category as the Councils of Nicaea and Ephesus. The ecumenicity of those two councils was admitted by all Catholics; and it would not be long before the Council of Constantinople would be regarded, at any rate, in the Eastern Church, as sharing in that attribute. Moreover, in its fifth and sixth sessions, the Council of Chalcedon took a further step in the same direction. It incorporated into the definition of faith, which was proposed in the fifth session and was adopted and subscribed in the sixth, the two creeds-that is to say, the creed promulgated by the Council of Nicaea, and the creed which was attributed to the Constantinopolitan Council of 381. Thus clear and unmistakable marks of the extraordinary honour which was being conferred on the Constantinopolitan Council, were stamped upon the formulary, which was the principal outcome of the Chalcedonian Fathers' labours in the domain of dogma.

It is to be noted that the Council of Chalcedon nowhere formally attributed ecumenicity to the Council of Constantinople, but the measures which it took were morally certain to result in that council being regarded as in fact ecumenical.' Thus what had been originally the particular view of the local Church of Constantinople became, through the action of the Fathers of Chalcedon, the generally accepted teaching of the whole Eastern Church.

Four or five months after the close of the council the Emperor Marcian issued his edict of confirmation, and in that edict he put the four Councils of Nicaea, Constantinople, Ephesus, and Chalcedon completely on a level. A few years later, in response to a request from the Emperor Leo I., letters confirming the Council of Chalcedon were written by most of the metropolitans of the empire. In a number of these letters the same four councils are mentioned by name, and Constantinople is ranked with the other three. In the letter, written by the provincial synod of the province of Syria Secunda, the three first councils, namely, those of Nicaea, Constantinople, and Ephesus, are expressly called "sanctae et universales synodi." On the other hand, certain Monophysite bishops of Egypt, writing on behalf of Timothy the Cat, in a letter to the Emperor Leo, say that they know nothing of the Council of Constantinople, and that they do not receive the Council of Chalcedon."

So far we have considered what the action of the Chalcedonian Council effected in the East with respect to the recognition of the ecumenicity of the Council of Constantinople. We must now turn to the West. There we shall find a very different view prevailing. omitted Ephesus. Besides the 158 Fathers who expressed their judgements separately, there were others who, at the invitation of the commissioners and to save time, signified their assent by acclamations (cf. Coleti, iv. 1396).

Dr. Rivington is substantially right when he says (Prim. Ch., p. 444), "The Council of Constantinople was not called 'the second synod' until after the Council of Chalcedon had placed it in that rank.”

2 Cf. Coleti, iv. 1785.

3 Ibid., iv. 1835-1934. These letters must have been written in 457 or 458. Ibid., iv. 1864. 5 Ibid., iv. 1849.

In two different letters S. Leo speaks depreciatingly of the Second Council, describing its third canon as "a document drawn up by certain bishops," and denying that "the agreement of certain bishops" 2 could abrogate the decrees of Nicaea. In October, 485, a Roman Council, held under the authority of Pope Felix III., in a letter to the anti-Acacian presbyters and archimandrites in Constantinople and Bithynia, assures them that it "upholds the venerable synods of Nicaea, Ephesus (the first), and Chalcedon";3 but it says nothing about the Constantinopolitan Council of 381. Similarly, Pope Gelasius (492-496) in his decree, De libris recipiendis, in which he gives a list of the Ecumenical Councils, mentions only three such councils, namely, those of Nicaea, Ephesus, and Chalcedon. On the whole it appears evident that the action of the Council of Chalcedon, which produced so great an effect in the East in leading the Church to recognize the ecumenicity of the Second Council, produced no similar effect on the West, at any rate during the fifth century.

In 484 began the long schism resulting from the excommunication of Acacius, which broke the communion between East and West. We have every reason to suppose that during the whole period of the schism the Eastern Catholics continued to regard the Ecumenical Councils as four in number. As we have seen, they recognized four before the schism began, and we find them still recognizing four in the year 518,o which was the last complete year before the breach between Rome and Constantinople was healed.

As regards the West, we have no reason to think that either Pope Anastasius II. (496-498) or Pope Symmachus (498-514) receded from the position taken up by Felix III. and Gelasius. But there is good ground for believing that at some time during the first five years of the episcopate of Pope Hormisdas, the ecumenicity of the Constantinopolitan Council of 381 was by synodical enactment recognized at Rome.

Hormisdas became Bishop of Rome in July, 514. Two years afterwards, in 516, a considerable number of the bishops of Eastern Illyricum, who had hitherto taken sides with Constantinople in the long quarrel, petitioned Hormisdas for admission to the communion of Rome. The 1 S. Leon. Ep. cvi. ad Anatolium, cap 5, P. L., liv. 1005, 1007. 2 Ibid., Ep. cv. ad Pulcheriam, cap. 2, P. L., liv. 1000.

3 Coleti, v. 248.

Cf. Ballerin., De Antiq. Collection. et Collector., pars ii. cap. i. § 2, n. 7, et pars ii. cap. xi. § 5, n. 10, P. L., lvi. 67, 68 et 178; and see Hefele (E. tr., ii. 373, 374).

5 Yet in Eastern Illyricum, which ecclesiastically remained part of the West, though politically it belonged to the Eastern empire, we find references to the Four Councils as early as 457 or 458 (compare Coleti, iv. 1920, 1928, 1929).

6

In the year 518, while the schism was still going on, the Four Councils were mentioned with honour by John of Jerusalem and the council of the three Palestines in a synodical letter addressed to John of Constantinople (cf. Coleti, v. 1161), also by the Council of Tyre (Coleti, v. 1172), also by a Council of Constantinople in a report presented to the Patriarch John (Coleti, v. 1133, 1136, compare 1141). Finally, on the day of the great acclamations (see p. 397), the Four Councils were, by order of the Patriarch, solemnly preconized at the reading of the diptychs in the great church at Constantinople (Coleti, v. 1156,