the Ecclesiastical Canons upon his return he staid in the Suburbs and would not enter into the City much less into the Church till he was compelled by the Emperors commands and by the clamours of the people and withall being perswaded by the suffrage of fifty Bishops that were then with him he performed his Ecclesiastical Function and that that Canon which was alledged against him was made by an Arrian Council in the Cause of Athanasius and here it seem'd a very hard measure was offered to Chrysostom that by that Emperor who commanded his return and forced his preaching a Council should summon and condemn by an Arrian Canon The Council was resolved to satisfie their own indignation and the Empresses rage Chrysostom must be banished Chrysostom must be deposed the sentence is again pronounced against him the Emperor brings his Army into the City But Chrysostom that the people nor Court nor Army might be in danger delivers himself again privately into the hands of the Souldiers who carry him into Banishment Their noble extraction entituled The great Charity of Basil and Chrysostom them to great Revenues Basil was the Eldest Son Chrysostom the only Son of his Parents and being both raised to great Dignities they had opportunities of treasuring up a large Estate but their great Souls could not be confined by Riches Chrysostom at Antioch distributed his Estate amongst the poor Basil retained a great part of his Estate till after he was Bishop When there fell a great Famine in Caesarea which threatned the consuming of most of the Citizens this occasion this wise person took to shew his liberality for he sold all his remaining Revenue to which he laid the Revenues of his Metropolitical See by this example and most powerful preaching he wrought so upon the Nobility and Gentry of Caesarea and the rich Citizens that they brought to him vast sums of money which he so disposed on that he brought a plenty into Caesarea he so husbanded his Bank that the Markets of the City were constantly furnished with provision Chrysostom when he was banished and in perpetual fears through the rude and barbarous Nations yet received such a supply from his Friends at Constantinople and other places that for the Fatherless Widows Captives and other distressed people he had a continual supply Many Captives he redeemed multitudes of other persons he furnished with necessaries that in his greatest extremity he thought it his highest duty to convert the liberality of others to him into charity for the furnishing of others with necessities They both of them in their respective Sees built Hospitals received Strangers and indeed performed all acts of charity to all sorts of persons So much they partaked of the Divine nature that they seemed wholly to be made up of goodness and bounty by which means the very Jews and Pagans had them in very great Honour and Reverence Basil took the highest care for the Their great Labours for the peace of the Church preservation of the Churches peace against the Arrian Hereticks his labours were indefatigable and having with the assistance of his beloved friend Gregory Bishop of Nazianzen notwithstanding the power and fury of the Arrian Hereticks quietly settled the Churches in Cappadocia O Cappadocia made odious by those proverbs which rendred the Inhabitants the most wicked people in the World now became glorious by the great profession of Christianity which was made illustrious by three Bishops the best Scholars and holiest persons in the Universe thus the glory of Christianity turns the Briars of the Wilderness into the Roses of Sharon He then betook himself to the establishing of the Churches of the whole World he travelled into Armenia and into the adjacent Countries of Cappadocia the Western Churches enjoyed a great tranquility under a Catholick Emperor To the Bishops of Italy France and Spain he wrote Letters representing the calamities of the Eastern Churches imploring their Aid The brave Bishop of Millain St. Ambrose gave him his greatest assistance and with the Divine goodness and eternal Providence notwithstanding all the persecutions of Valens the Emperor and all the oppositions of the Arrian Learning and Arms could make against him Cappadocia was preserved as a Virgin not spotted with the errours of those times Chrysostom so earnestly endeavoured the Reformation of the East that the remotest parts of them were happy by the influence of his piety and learning He undertook for the expelling of Hereticks a journey of some months into Asia he sent some of his Presbyters to convert the Goths in which they had a noble success He reformed the Churches of Armenia and Palestine he maintained an union with the Western Bishops and receiving an Edict from the Emperor to destroy the Idolatrous Temples in Phaenicia with a command to the Lords of the Emperors Treasury for the delivering of money to defray the expences for that imployment he accepted of the command and refused the money Out of his own Purse and with the charge of other Noble Persons he performed the Emperors Edict without the Emperors expences So these great persons like the Caelestial Luminaries emit an happy influence to those Churches which are far distant from them The great inclination that Basil had The Calumnies and slanders cast on them to Disputations and the vast love he had to Learned men was the occasion of casting many slanders on him In his Sermons against the Arrians his enemies that came to hear him more to carp then to learn would snatch away some passage that might seem to savour of the Sabellian impiety Preaching at other times against the Sabellia Heresie some sentence would drop from him which his Adversaries would wrest to Tritheism In the Eucharistical Benediction with which he concluded his Sermons having alter'd the Prepositions in and by though that mutation was approved of in many Churches of the East and used by the most Catholick Bishops of the World yet his impudent enemies carried away the clamours and impetuous noise of Arrianism and Eunomianism which defamations being spread abroad alienated the affections of many of the Eastern and Western Bishops from him Those wicked revilers by their most desperate slanders had so changed the affections of the Citizens of Neo-Caesarea to whom he was very much endeared by his first education that all the Protestations of Basil to the contrary all the Pathetical Letters he wrote to them could hardly reduce them to better thoughts of him How strange is it that a person who in all his Writings in all his Sermons in all his Actions nay who vindicated himself bravely from the aspersions of any indiscreet language which might seem to justifie the calumny of his enemies yet should be believed to be a great friend to those Heresies which he made the whole design of his life to overthrow Yet here was Basils felicity that his beloved Gregory was his defence perpetually and the Churches of Cappadocia constantly entertained the honour for him
Church of Impiety till you drive them out with the Rod a rigorous and an ill-timed passage But still Chrysostom is the Peoples darling and the Clergy that hated his Rigours admired his Parts and Eloquence But Chrysostom confined not his severity to the Church but it flew about the City nay it staid not there but it enter'd into the Court. There was no vitious Citizen let him be of never so great Authority and Riches no vitious Courtier let him be of never so unlimited Power and Greatness but felt the sharpness of his Eloquence and was threatned with Ecclesiastical Censures This enrages the Court against him scorning that the Grandeur of the Eastern Empire should be subject to the tongue of an Antiochian Priest whom they had but lately raised to the Constantinopolitan See Whilst his severities were confined within the Church walls Chrysostom shined with extraordinary lustre in the eyes of the Court but when it reach'd the Courtiers Luxury Pride Cruelty and Avarice all their esteem of him was turned into hatred and indignation So all persons love not their own concerns be touch'd the Clergy did not love that their own Vices but the Courtiers Enormities should be severely reprehended the Courtiers likewise are vastly pleased with the Reformation of the Church whilst they remain enamoured with their own deformities And this corruption in the manners proceeds from the mistake of Religion who suppose it a remedy for others but not for their own sins or from a strange partiality whereby they are prone to magnifie the Vices of others and lessen their own Basil was freed from all those inconveniences The Court had no residence in his City he succeeded a devout and severe Bishop by whose Authority he had formerly modelled his Church He was a person of a sweet and brave temper and exceedingly prudent and so could free himself from those Rocks on which others perhaps might have split But that which most conduced to the intestine tranquility of his See was the continual persecutions to which it was obnoxious Persecution made the Church of Cappadocia severe and holy Persecution performed that which Chrysostom desired to obtain by Ecclesiastical Censures Chrysostom came to govern that Church which was debauch'd by the remisness of a former Archbishop and degenerated into Pride and Luxury which a great Peace a vast Trade and Commerce affluence of Wealth the glory and pomp of the Court had occasioned The playing of the golden beams of the Sun makes us throw off our Garments when the blustering North wind cause us straiter to bind them to us It is easie to perswade to Reason an afflicted mind but difficult to reduce to sobriety a prosperous Criminal The Eastern Church at that time was The contests and conflicts of Basil and Chrysostom with the Hereticks vexed with the Eunomians Sabellians but more chiefly by the Arrians Valens himself a person of very great Courage but of greater Impiety violently persecuted the faithful Christians He had banished most of the Bishops from their Sees and instead of pious and holy Prelates the Church was pester'd and almost ruin'd by wicked and misbelieving Bishops Valens when he had carried Trophies of his own wickedness through most of the parts of the Eastern Empire was dreadfully enraged that Cappadocia should stand so firm against all the furies and assaults of Hell he in his own person leads his Army down into Cappadocia attended with a numerous Train of the most learned of his Arrian Chaplains not questioning but that he should either terrifie Basil into obedience or else rid Cappadocia of that great Prelate But what course should he use what should he order an Army of his Heretical Priests and Bishops against one Basil No he had gained so many notorious and famous Victories over the learnedst Opponents in the World that none of them durst undertake him And it may move a pretty laughter to observe that when the greatest Scholars of the Arrian Faction trembled at the very thoughts of a contest with Basil the Emperours Cook Demosthenes challenged Basil to dispute whom when Basil had most egregiously baffled not without angry smile thus says to the people Illiterate Demosthenes would dispute the properest place for a Cook is the Kitchin Can his tongue which is only fit for the tasting of Sauces and his head filled with the fume of Meat comprehend or discourse of Spiritual things Valens assaulted Basil by a Praefect of his Army who first allured him by the promises of the greatest Preferments and told him the glory of being honoured by the Emperor and the great Officers of his Army was not to be refused by him To which Basil gallantly replied Christianity is not made illustrious by the dignity of Persons but by the integrity of Faith At which the Praefect grew enraged and thunder'd out the heaviest menaces and thus accosted him Fear'st thou not the confiscation of thy Estate to which Basil presently reply'd No all the Riches I enjoy are these poor Rags I have on my back and a few Books Not Banishment No I am a Stranger in the World the Earth is the Lords and the fulness thereof Not Torments No this worn body of mine will not endure above one stroke Not death No I am almost already dead and you will sooner send me to the Grave After he had thus answered the Praefect he ends that discourse with a passage full of sweetness and courage Sir I speak nothing in contempt of your Dignity it is not for us faithful Christians to speak roughly to the meanest person much less one of so great a quality as your self but we are obliged to profess in the Cause of our God all torments are a delight to us This carriage of Basil filled the Praefect with the Reverence of him The Praefect hastens to the Emperour giving this only account of that undertaking Basil hath conquered us This not succeeding Valens sends for Basil whom he attacks by all the arts imaginable Thousands of profits he proposed as many tortures and utmost extremities threatned But nothing moved Basil whose hopes were Heaven and fears Hell Yet Valens persisted in his determination of banishing him which he altered on several accounts Valens admiring the piety of Basil managed with so great a Prudence went to the Church to observe the demeanor and carriage of Catholick Christians in the performance of Divine Offices where coming and seeing Basil sitting in his Chair and the Multitude of Christians standing round about him all in a posture noting the highest reverence of the Divine Majesty and hearing them sing their Hymns and Hallelujahs with the greatest fervour joy and devotion and taking cognizance of the management of all the Divine Service and Worship he was struck with such a horrour that he fell into an universal trembling that as he approached to offer his gift at the Altar had he not been supported by one of the Priests that assisted Basil in a great amaze and astonishment he
That there could be no pretext of reason that she should endeavour the consuming of a Sacred Aedifice when she had spent vast sums of money in the building of many but neither a great Fine laid on her nor the Tortures she then endured could any whit diminish her affections to that Excellent Preacher but afterwards having liberty given her by the Emperour she retired to Macedonia and there in solitude and Piety spent the rest of her most glorious life Some attribute the Fire to the favourers of Chrysostom but certainly the Tortures and Racks that were inflicted on them would have extorted from one or other a confession however they who in all their actions discovered that they had rather die then sin would not have persisted in a notorious lie Others attributed it to a Miracle as thinking without praeternatural power the flame could not out of the Throne catch the roof of the Temple and without a Divine designation could not have flown over so many houses of the City and at such a distance prey only upon the Senators Palace To deny the more peculiar and miraculous operations of God is an unpardonable Blasphemy but to believe every narration is childish credulity and to make every thing that seems strange to require a supernatural cause argues ignorance and superstition It seems the most probable that the Heathens were the occasion of that conflagration that there might be an occasion given to the Heathen Governour to inflict all sorts of punishments upon the Christians For under the pretence of carrying Chrysostom into Banishment and to disperse the Christians conventions they seized upon the Church and so might justly be reputed the Authors of that fact Chrysostom being banished Arsatius aged 80 years a man of no Learning nor Eloquence the meanest and silliest person succeeds the greatest and most Eloquent person in the World Every where the Christians and Religious persons meeting Chrysostom received him with all kindness filled the Air with these Acclamations Let the Sun rather cease to shine then not Chrysostom preach In his journey to Armenia the place designed for his banishment he met with extraordinary difficulties oft-times in danger of the Isaurian Robbers The Souldiers that guarded him had in Commission that they should tire him with continued Journeys for he was reduced to great weakness and mightily obnoxious to Feavers by reason of his great Austerities But at length they arrived at Cucusum where the Bishop of that place courteously received him and had the happiness of peace and quietness To him there resorted many of his Friends from Constantinople out of Armenia Syria Asia Cappadocia and the Countries bordering upon the Euxine Sea Most of the Letters which are extant in his Works which are brave Monuments of his Piety and Learning were written in the time of his banishment But the fame of his admirable piety in those his great afflictions daily increasing and the love of the City every day hastening towards him caused the Emperour to prohibit any commerce of Letters with him The time of his banishment he continually spent in Prayers and Preachings if his Guard permitted him any liberty of rest The People from the bordering Nations and remote Countries undertaking the dangerous and tedious Journeys to hear the Eloquence of this great Person That person or Court to whom the The Appeals of these Fathers to the Church of Rome last Appeal is made is unquestionably invested with a supreme Authority Bellarmine de Rom. Pont. lib. 2. cap. 29. argues for the Roman Primacy from Appeals averring that it was the custom of the Universal Church to tender her final Addresses to the Roman Bishop which must necessarily prove that the Church did acknowledge the Roman Bishop to be her supreme Head he takes no cognizance of Basils Embassie to the West but allegdeth Chrysostoms Letters to Innocent Baronius ad An. Dom. 371 372 doth endeavour to maintain the Papal Primacy from the Letters of Basil to Damasus then Bishop of Rome Barbosa a late Canonist 2 distinct caus 10. quest 3. cap. Cuncta per mundum this boldly blasphemes He asserts 'T is an errour in the Faith to say that an Appeal lies from the Pope to God himself For when the supreme Priest is the Vicar of our Lord Jesus here upon Earth his Consistory is the same with that of Christ they therefore think Heretically who believe that they may Appeal from the definitive sentence of the Pope to Christ as though the Tribunal of Christ and the Pope were not the same Who wonders at the impious confidence of Parasites Lipsius a Romanist abhorred such sentiments when the Master of the Hospitallers was by the instigation of Philip the Fair of France condemned to be burnt by Pope Vrban he made his Appeal to Heaven and cited them both to appear before the Tribunal of Christ within the space of a year in the compass of which time the Pope and French King both died to give an account as Lipsius thinks of their cruelties and injustices before the great Judge of the World Lipsii Mon. Pol. I intend not a full discussion of this Topick but clearly to manifest that neither of these Fathers acknowledged the Papal Supremacy Basil never directs his Epistles to the Roman Bishop but to the Western Bishops Transmarine Bishops or to the Bishops of Italy and France The occasions of which Epistles was the Persecutions and great disturbances that the Eastern Church suffered by the fury of the Arrians Whilst the Western Church flourished in prosperity and peace the inscription of one of his Epistles is thus To our Brethren and Bishops in the West How can it be imagined if this great man believed the Papal Supremacy that he would so direct his Letters We charge the Romanists with Innovations they require the time in which those Innovations were introduc'd they charge the Greek Church with Schism we may enquire when that Church acknowledgeth the Roman Jurisdiction and when the Schism of Greeks commenced Basil when the East was so dreadfully tormented by the Orthodox Bishop was chosen by reason of the greatness of his Learning and fineness of his Pen to be their Secretary at whose instigation he in their names wrote to the Western Bishops and sent three several Embassies to none of which he received any answer this neglect cast him into a just passion in his Letter to Eusebius Bishop of Samosatum he thus writes What help can be expected from the superciliousness of the West for they neither know the truth nor will endure to learn it for being possessed with false prejudices they act the same things they formerly did in the case of Marcellus by their ambitious contending against those which publickly maintain the truth they themselves give a confirmation of Heresie I my self do intend to write to the chiefest of them but not in usual manner in the name of my fellow Bishops I will not mention any thing concerning Ecclesiastical affairs only I
not possibly think that an Appeal to Rome was necessary since upon the account before-recited he refused to appear at Pera withall he Appeals to a General Council he acquainteth Innocent that he was not guilty and could wholly free himself from those crimes laid to his charge but that he would not appear before incompetent Judges an unlawful Judicature which consisted of his professed and implacable enemies but that he would appear before a General Council where in the presence of 1000 Bishops he could manifest his Innocency By which it is evident he Appealed not to Rome but addressed himself to the Western Bishops that as much as in them lay they would endeavour that a General Council might be called before whom he might appear all grievances redressed and Peace to the Church restored And that it was not an Appeal to Rome appeareth by the Epistle it self for though the title be to Innocent Bishop of Rome yet in the body of the Epistle we find that he addresseth himself to the Bishops of the West whom he calls most Reverend and most Holy Bishops Farther to evince that the Greek Church did not acknowledge the Roman Primacy we must attend to what Phocius averrs Innocent saith he laboured much on the behalf of John but all in vain he fent his Apocrisarii who were injuriously treated and scornfully sent back and what prayers so ever he used were to no purpose The persons to whom the Letters and Messengers of Innocent were sent were undoubtedly the Emperour Theophilus and the rest of the Holy Bishops If so this fact must needs manifest the opinion they had of the Roman Primacy That neither St. Basil nor St. Chrysostom did believe the Roman Primacy the case of Miletius and Paulinus evidently declares Miletius was thought to be an Arrian he was Bishop of Sebastia in Armenia Eudoxius the Arrian Bishop of Antioch being dead he was by the Arrians translated from Sebastia to Antioch then in every City of the East every Sect of Christians in it had its peculiar Bishop when Eudoxius governed the Arrian Church in Antioch the Catholick Christians had Eustachius for their Bishop The Antiochian Arrians hearing that Miletius was a person of a singular life and of very great Eloquence and that he was once of the same opinion with them they judged that the opinion the World had of this Person would be a means to draw to their Party the Inhabitants of Antioch There was so great a same of him that when he came to Antioch multitudes of persons went out to meet him both those which were followers of Arrius and those that were adherers to Paulinus When he came first to Antioch he preached publickly the moral Duties of Christianity afterwards he publickly taught the Faith of one substance There was then a Synod the Emperour commanded the Bishops to give their opinion After George of Laodicea had most heretically delivered and Acasius of Caesarea had not so blasphemously but not truly and Apostolically delivered his Miletius was commanded to make a profession of his Faith he contrary to the opinions of the Arrians according to the Nicene decree gave his belief with a great deal of exactness and truth upon which by the instigation of the Arrians he was banished Eustachius who from Perea in Syria was translated to Antioch a person famous for constancy soundness in the Faith and Religion was banished in the time of Constantius Paulinus a Presbyter of Antioch governed the Catholick Church in Antioch those of the people that were sound in the Faith notwithstanding the endeavours of the Arrians he retained and confirmed in the Catholick Doctrine The Bishops of the Church that were banished under Julian the Emperour being restored endeavoured to apply fit remedies for the redressing the disorders of the Church Lucifer a Bishop of Sardinia taking to himself two other Bishops ordained Paulinus Bishop of Antioch Miletius being by the Emperour Gratian recalled from Exile went to Antioch to take possession of his See Paulinus though ordained after Miletius would remain Shepherd of his own Flock and Bishop of Antioch Miletius would not forsake that honour which his Ordination conferred on him nor ought he do it for he was pre-ordained and was a person of that holiness that he judged his office of more concern to him then his dignity This was the great calamity that in a City in which there were so many evil opinions to the encouraging of Heresie two Catholick Bishops should contend one with another both were excellent persons both of admirable fame what cause should be assigned of their divisions both of them appeared by Characters given by excellent Historians to be very holy persons the Eastern sided with Miletius the Western Church with Paulinus perhaps there were heats and animosities failings to which retired and severe persons are obnoxious May I give a conjecture which may give some justification of them both Miletius advanced to the See of Antioch by the Arrians themselves when he discovered himself to be of a contrary opinion his Holiness Learning and Eloquence converted many of the Arrians these would never forsake him who was the instrument of their conversion Paulinus after the banishment of Eustachius being constant in the Faith continuing in Antioch administring the holy office to the Faithful he so obliged him that they would never forsake him Withall his adherents were offended with Miletius because he was ordained by Arrians Miletius was of so sweet a temper as he proffer'd amicable terms of reconciliation Let what will be said that can be said in favour of Paulinus Miletius had the better cause and the suffrage of the Western Church in his behalf doth make it fully appear that the Western Bishops refused the Roman Primacy The Roman Bishop and the West took the part of Paulinus the Grecian Bishops and those of the East that of Miletius If that the Eastern Church did believe the Primacy how durst they maintain that Bishop which was not approved by the Roman It was against the Ecclesiastical Canons that two Bishops should be in the same Church and yet there were two Catholick Bishops in Antioch one approved by the Western the other by the Eastern Church Miletius was a man of most singular Piety and of equal meekness he conversing with Paulinus thus bespeaks him When our Sheep are at union they feed in the same common Pasture and we contend about the right of governing of them Let us leave off our quarrelling and live in mutual concord If I die before you be you the only Pastor of the Sheep If God shall call you hence before me then to the utmost of my power and with my greatest care I will govern the Church of God This moderate proposal Sapores one of Gratians Generals who had in command from that Emperour to thrust all the Arrians out of the Churches and to restore the banished Catholicks being at Antioch seeing this dissention and knowing both of them to be Catholicks