COUNCIL, OF THE CHURCH. 



COUNCIL, OP THE CHURCH. 



council to another place. It also passed Mrenl regulations of disci- 

 pline, against simony, Ac. Eugeniua on hi. part abrogated by a bull 

 the decr.es of the council against himself, and declared the councU to 

 have bean in rrur when it nanrted iu imperiority above the i'pe. 



Thirteenth MMon, September. At the request of the Duke of 

 Bantu another month WM allowed to Eugenius before the father. 

 pMMd jiHlgnHmt upou'hiul. 



Fourteenth itmtau. November. The Emperor Siramund was pre- 

 >ut at th council Three month* were granted to bugenius to reroke 

 all hi. acU against the council. 



Fifteenth MMOD. Eugvnius, having at length listened to the media- 

 tion of France, Burgundy, owl other power., revoked the bull, which 

 he had launched agaitut the council, and issued another bull according 

 to the form tent to him by that amnmbly, in which he declared that 

 although be had diMolvwi the ootuicil of lUnlo lawfully aaoeiubled, yet, 

 in order t> iivoi<t diiuwiuuon, he now declared thai the council had been 

 lawfully continued "ince iu flnt beginning, aud that he approved of all 

 to decuion., and declared the bull of dissolution to be null and void. 

 He then appointed four cardinal) to preside in the council together 

 with Cardinal Julian. 



Sixteenth session, February, 1484. The loiters of Eugenius were 

 read in full council and presence of the Kmperor Sigixnumd. The 

 |xi|l legates were introduced and iiicorporaU-d with the council. 



Seventeenth sesskm, April. The legates were made to swear to 

 support the dignity of the council, and to observe its decrees as well 

 as those of the CouncU of Constance, and that their authority should 

 be dependent on that of the council and not coactive with or com- 

 pulsory upon the council. 



Eighteenth session, June. The council confirmed the decrees of the 

 fourth and fifth sessions of the CouncU of Constance. John, Patriarch 

 of Antioch, read a thesis in favour of the superiority of the general 

 council above the pope. 



Nineteenth session, September. Conferences with the ambassadors 

 of John Palrcologus, emperor of Constantinople, concerning the pro- 

 jected union of the Eastern and Western churches. Legates appointed 

 by the council to proceed to Constantinople. The councU decreed that 

 in every university there shall be professors of Hebrew, Arabic, Greek, 

 and CliaMicau. 



Twentieth session, January, 1435. Decrees of reform of church 

 discipline, penalties against concubiuari.in priests, &c. 



Twenty-first session, June. Decree against the " annates," or first 

 fruits, and other payments and fees exacted by the court of Rome. 

 Three years of undisturbed possession of a benefice, obtained by legiti- 

 mate title, to be considered as affording a prescriptive title to the 

 possessor. Several decrees on public worship and other matters. 

 Pope Eugenius remonstrated strongly against the suppression of the 

 " annates," urging that the councU ought at least to make compensa- 

 tion for the support of the Holy See. Cardinal Julian's reply to the 

 pope's remonstrances. 



Twenty-second session, October. Condemnation of a book written 

 by on Austin friar, who had iwnribed some attributes to the human 

 nature of I'hri.-t which properly belonged to his divine nature. 



Twenty-third session, March, 1436. Decrees concerning the free 

 election of the pope, his profession of faith, the number of cardinals 

 reduced to twenty-four, &c. AU reserved benefices, mandates, and other 

 grants applied by the popes to their own profit, declared null and void. 



Twenty-fourth session, April. The legates of Eugenius urged the 

 fathers to fix upon a town where to assemble a new council, in order 

 to meet the Eastern emperor and bin retinue and prelates, for the 

 purpose of effecting the reconciliation of the two churches. A con- 

 gregation was held in consequence, which was attended by 357 prelates, 

 two-thirds of whom voted for the city of Basle, if the Greeks should 

 agree to it, and if not, they proposed Avignon or some town of Savoy. 

 A deputation was sent to Eugenius to entreat him to crown the labours 

 of the present councU by the reunion of the Eastern with the Western 

 churches, and inviting him to come in person and expedite the neces- 

 sary bulls. Eugenius, however, supported by a minority in the councU, 

 was for holding a new council in some town of Italy, and many months 

 lamed in fruitless negotiations upon this subject. 



Twenty-fifth session, May, 1437. The council decreed th.it the 

 trcumenic council for the union of the two churches should sit either 

 at Basle or at Avignon. Mont of the fathers did not wish to go to 

 Italy, where they would have been too much in the power of the pope. 

 A division then occurred in the assembly. A minority joimil tin- pupal 

 legates, and made a decree by which they assumed the authority ami 

 name of a councU, and transferred the council to Ferrara. Eugenius 

 hastened to issue a bull which confirmed this decision, and immediately 

 caused a squadron of galleys to be equipped at Venice, to proceed to 

 Constantinople with three papal legates, for the purpose of bringing 

 the emperor and the eastern prelate, to Ferrara. The council of Basle, 

 that is to say the majority of that assembly, which hod kept together, 

 sent likewise galleys for a similar purpose, but they were too late, and 

 the emperor repaired to Venice with the papal legates on board the 

 Venetian galleys. Cardinal Julian, who was still at Basle, proposed to 

 the council to send a deputation to Venice to receive the emperor on 

 liis landing, and, by explaining to him how matters stood, to endeavour 

 to bring him to Basle. The fathers, however, hesitated and lost time. 

 Up to this period the councU of Basle is considered by most Roman 



theologians, to have been truly ODcumenio and legitimate, as 

 genius had solemnly acknowledged it as such since November, 



Catholic 

 Pop* Eugenius j 



1433, and had since acted In union with it by means of hi* 

 But tome ultramontane divine*, and Holstenius among the rest, con- 

 trovert the authority of the council altogether. I las V. 

 however, who succeeded Eugenitu, in his bull beginning " Ut pod.," 

 dated Spoleto, July, 1449, speaks of the councU of Basle with respect 

 as a council, and not as a oonoiliabulum, and Eugenius hinuelf in his 

 letter* to hi. legates in Germany, dated Rome; August, 1446, inserted 

 in the Annals of Uaynaldus, speaks of the general councils of Constance 

 and Basle, as Wing by him acknowledged and venerated, without 

 prejudice, however, to the right and pro eminence of the Holy See. 



The councU of Basle, in iU twenty-sixth session, July, 1437, again 

 summoned Eugenius to appear before it, and Eugenius answered by a 

 bull for the dissolution of the council, appointing the meeting of a new 

 council, to which he invited all Christian prelates, and forbidding 

 under heavy canonical penalties, the making of any more synodal acts 

 at Basle, after the period of thirty days, which were to be . 

 winding up the negotiations with the Bohemian deputies. 

 Charles VII. of France forbade his bishops to repair to Ferrara. 



In their twenty-seventh session, September, the fathers at Basle 

 declared null and void the creation of two cardinals recently in: 

 Eugenius. 



In the twenty-eighth session, October, the period assigned to Euge- 

 nius for his appearance being expired, the fathers declared him " con- 

 tumax," and resolved to proceed canonically against him. Eugenius at 

 the same time issued a bull, transferring the council to Ferrara. In his 

 letters to his legates in Germany he speaks of the councU of Basle as a 

 legitimate assembly, untU the order for transferring it to Ferrara. 



In the twenty -ninth session, October, the fathers rejected the bull of 

 transfer to Ferrara, and assigned their reasons for it 



In January, 1 438, one Cardinal Nicholas, Eugenius's legate, opened 

 the new council at Ferrara. Cardinal Julian, who xtill remained at 

 Basle, quitted that town with four other prelates, and j"in.-,l tin- 

 council of Ferrara. The councU of Basle was declared hen< 

 null, and all its future acts were declared void. Several theologians 

 date from this epoch the termination of the legality of the council of 

 Basle. That assembly, however, went on holding its sessions for five 

 years longer, and a schism in the Church was the result. The cmnu -il 

 of Basle deposed Eugenius in 1439, and elected Amadous VIII. '. 

 Savoy, by the name of Felix V. These measures, however, were dis- 

 countenanced by the great majority of the catholic world; France, 

 England, and Germany disapproved of them. Most of the bishops 

 withdrew from Basle, and their places were filled up by archdeacons, 

 friars, provosts, and doctors, and other churchmen not of episcopal 

 rank. From that period it is 'impossible to consider the council of 

 Basle any longer OB tucuiucuic. The last session of this self-styled 

 council of Bade was held in May, 1443, when it decreed that within 

 three years a councU, or rather a continuation of the oouncfl, should 

 be held at Lyon. It, however, met ultimately at Lausanne, in 144!>, 

 when Felix having abdicated, the remaining fathers of the council of 

 Basle made their peace with Nicholas V. 



Iu the collection of the Acts of General Councils, handsomely pub- 

 lished in Greek and Latin, by order of Pope Paul V., 'Concifionuu 

 gcneralium Eccleeuo Catholicic,' 4 vols. folio, Rome, 1628, 

 of Basle is altogether omitted, but that of Constance is inserted. The 

 following writers have treated especially of the council of Baslo : 

 JSneas Sylvius Piccolomini (afterwards Pope Pius V.), who was for a 

 time secretary to the council, in his ' Opera,' which also contain the 

 two celebrated epistles of Cardinal Julian to Pope Eugenius, maintain- 

 ing the paramount authority of the council ; le Pcre Alexan 

 Dominican, ' Dissertationes do Conciliis Senensi et Basilicnsi,' in the 

 eighth volume of his ' Historia Ecclesiostica,' Paris, 1714, ami \ 

 1749; Richer 'Responsio Synodolis data Basilito, Oratoril 

 Ku.^enii P. P. IV., in Congregatione General! III., Non. Se| 

 1432 : De Auctoritate cujusTibet Concflu general!* supra Papam et 

 quoslibet Fideles, pars pnccipua, et in earn Commentorius,' Oolootax, 

 1613 ; Lenfont, ' Histoire de la Guerre des Hussites et du Concile da 

 Basle,' which refers chiefly to the transactions of the Bohemian 

 HcliisinaticA and their negociationH with the Council of Basle, on 

 particular points of rite and discipline ; Richard ' Analyse de Conciles.' 



Ferrara, Council of , was attended by Pope Eugenhu*, the En 

 .T'llm Manuel Paltcologus, the patriarch of Constantinople. Mark 

 bishop of Ephcsus, and about twenty more eastern bishops. The dis- 

 cuusions between them and the Latin prelates turn- " the 



dogma of the proceeding of the Holy Ghost and the word "til 

 said to have been added by the Latins. 



In 1439 the council was transferred to Florence, and the discussions 

 were continued. The two parties effected a reconciliation, excepting 

 Mark of Ephesus, upon the dogma of the Holy Ghost, that of pin 

 and the supremacy of the pope, which .- acknowledged, 



" Raving the privileges and rights of the ]triarchs of the Ivn-t." The 

 onion was signed by the vicars of the patriarchs of 

 ii, and Jerusalem, and by several metropolitan*, but it was soon 

 after disavowed by the great body t the K:i.->trni ' 'iiiEEK 



ii. j The eastern prelates, about thirty in number, ! 

 in August, 1489, to return to their country. After their departure, 

 Pope Eugenius continued the council, although it could no longer be 



