OF THE COUNCIL OF NICE AND ITS RESULTS.

51. THE Ecumenical Council of Nice was unquestionably one of the most august assemblies on record. The world had never seen anything that could be compared to it. There, among the bishops, from all parts, of whom it was composed, and the elders or deacons who accompanied them, was to be found all that was most learned and most holy in the Church of God: Hosius, bishop of Cordova, an old man universally venerated, who had already presided in other synods, and who was the first that attached his signature to the acts of this: Eustathius, bishop of Antioch, who delivered the opening address: Alexander, the pious bishop of Alexandria, who had been the first to assail Arius, and who had brought with him to Nice the famous Athanasius, then a young deacon of Alexandria, about twenty-nine years of age: James, bishop of Nisibe in Mesopotamia: Alexander, bishop of Byzantium: Marcellus, bishop of Ancyra: Macarius, bishop of Jerusalem: Cecilianus, bishop of Carthage. Even the bishops of Persia, of Scythia, and of the country of the Goths, were to be seen there, as well as a great number of glorious confessors of Jesus Christ, who had endured imprisonment and torture during the previous persecutions; three bishops of the name of Nicholas: Spyridion, bishop of Cyprus, an old man honoured by all: Paphnutius, whose right eye had been torn out, and his left hough mutilated with red-hot iron: Paul, of Neo-Caesarea on the Euphrates, who had lost both hands, which Licinius had caused to be burnt off. But, besides these steadfast adherents of the faith, the council counted a great number of members that were followers of Arius, but illustrious for their talents and erudition; such as the two Eusebiuses, Maris of Chalcedon, Paulinus of Tyre, Menophantes of Ephesus, Lucius, a Sarmatian bishop, and many others. The assembly was opened in the imperial palace on the 22d day of May 325, and lasted till the 25th of August.

SECTION FIRST.

THE COUNCIL MADE NO DECREE ON THE CANON.

52. People often speak of the canon of the New Testament as if the first general council, convoked by Constantine to put an end to all differences that then disturbed the Church, had passed a decree fixing the list of sacred scriptures. There could not bea greater mistake.

We find, it is true, “in that convocation of the whole Church,” says Eusebius, “an assembly in which the most eminent servants of God from all the churches of Europe, Africa, and Asia, had met.” They passed resolutions, indeed, on the disputes which then shook the Christian world in the East and in the West, and the Scriptures were often mentioned as a work common to the universal Church, but no disagreement on the subject of the canon was ever in question. Not one of the existing documents relating to this council makes the slightest mention of such a matter.

The sacred volume of the Gospels was then placed on a large and lofty throne in the middle of the assembly, to intimate, as in all the earlier general councils,¹ that Scripture is the supreme rule in all controversies; and Constantine the Great, in the speech he himself addressed to the assembled fathers,² reminded them that “they had the doctrine of the Holy Spirit in writing,” and that the books of the evangelists and the apostles, and the oracles of the prophets, teach us clearly and distinctly (σαφῶς) what we are to believe concerning the things of God, and that differences of opinion which arise are to be settled according to the words of divine inspiration (ἐκ τῶν θεοπνεύστων λόγων λάβωμεν τῶν ζητουμένων τὴν λύσιν.)” Finally, the council, precisely in reference to its formula of faith, (μαθήματος) “declared that its doctrine was entirely grounded on the divine Scriptures, (θείων γραφῶν,)” when, in the preamble suggested by Eusebius, it says, “As we have learned it from the Holy Scriptures, this is our creed: I believe in one God, the Father Almighty,” &c. Yet, we repeat, the council, amid all these declarations, nowhere indicated the slightest intention of passing a decree respecting the catalogue of the sacred books of the New Testament.

53. It is true that many Romanist theologians, such as Bellarmin,³ Baronius,⁴ Catharin,⁵ Binius,⁶ constantly thinking of the authority of human tribunals in matters of faith, and of the too compromising case of the apocryphal books, have tried to pass off, on this point, some rash assertions. Notwithstanding the silence of antiquity, and in defiance of all existing documents relating to the assembly at Nice, they pretend to infer from an expression of Jerome's, that the council had passed a decree fixing the canon. Jerome, indeed, earnestly urged by several persons to write a commentary on the history of Judith (the canonicity of which he distinctly denied), says, ‘that he had somewhere read that the Council of Nice had reckoned it among the Holy Scriptures.”⁷ It is easy, however, to demonstrate that this inference is utterly unwarranted. For, —

(1.) No ancient ecclesiastical writer ever referred to any decision of the Council of Nice on the canon of Scripture.

(2.) The acts of the council do not contain a single word relating to such pretended decision.

(3.) Jerome himself states very distinctly that the book of Judith is not canonical; and even in that “Preface” from which Romanists pretend to derive their argument in its favour, he is at pains to state that “the Hebrews class Judith among those books which cannot be adduced as authority in determining controverted doctrines.” Again, in his “Prologus Galeatus,” he says, “that book is not in the canon;” and in his commentary on the books of Solomon, “The Church, it is true, allows it to be read, but does not receive it as one of the canonical scriptures.”⁸

(4.) Roman theologians are so well aware of the import of Jerome’s opinion on this point that they decline it in all discussions about the Apocrypha.

(5.) Jerome, in the passage in question, does not say that the Council of Nice had received the book of Judith as canonical, but that “certain persons asserted it had.” He says merely, Legitur. Perhaps some bishop at Nice had quoted some passage of the book; but that would not have proved that the council regarded the book as canonical, and much less does it show that the council passed any decree concerning the canon.

(6.) If the Council of Nice had received that history of Judith as canonical, how could it have happened that the Council of Laodicea, held forty years afterwards, and sanctioned by the General Council of Chalcedon, excluded it from the canon? How could Eusebius and Athanasius, both present and both powerful in the council, and how could Hilarius, who suffered exile for defending its decrees, have all denied its canonicity? How, also, could Basil the Great, how could Gregory of Nazianzus, how could Amphilochius, all three living nearer the time of the council than Jerome, have, in like manner, omitted it in their catalogue of inspired books?

SECTION SECOND.

FROM THE DATE OF THE COUNCIL ALL DISAGREEMENT REGARDING THE CONTROVERTED BOOKS CEASED IN ALL THE CHURCHES OF CHRISTENDOM.

54. Whatever, through the providence of God, (as we shall afterwards demonstrate,) may have been the reserve of the councils in reference to the canon, — a reserve the more striking, as it was entirely unintentional, — it is an unquestionable fact that, within a very short space of time after that solemn assembly of Nice, a remarkable change took place in public opinion, which had been hitherto undecided regarding some of the ἀντιλεγόμενα. All hesitation forthwith disappeared in one place after another, till all the churches of Christ throughout the world exhibited that perfect unanimity. which, amid every diversity of race and of language, has continued to exist for fifteen hundred years. The council, there can be no doubt, powerfully, though indirectly, contributed to that important result. Having united in the closest intercourse, for the space of three months, the most illustrious and the most enlightened representatives of Christianity, the council afforded them an opportunity of interchanging their views, and comparing their documents, and of thus laying aside all unfounded prejudices, and of becoming unanimously agreed.

It will, therefore, be proper to prove, by quotations, this rapid change in public opinion. We shall not, however, extend the inquiry beyond the fourth century; as, from that period to the present day, the testimonies are so continuous and so abundant as not to require either to be quoted or enumerated.

1) Le Sueur, Histoire de I’Egl. et de I’Emp., tom. ii., p. 454; tom. iv., pp. 275 and 375; tom. vi., p. 220.

2) This circumstance is recorded of the Council of Chalcedon and of several others. I have not, however, been able to find in Eusebius, any more more than in Socrates, Sozomen, or Theodoret, the passage whence historians have derived it as far as relates to the Council of Nice.

3) “De Verbo Dei,” lib. i., cap. 10.

4) “Annales,” tom. iii., § 137.

5) “In Cajetan.”

6) Notes on the Council of Laodicea,

7) Cujus auctoritas ad roboranda illa quæ in contentionem veniunt minus idonea judicatur.

8) Sed eum inter canonicas scripturas non recipit.