bear the offices of their country; so that out of their body were chosen all civil officers, the magistrates of every city, the collectors of the public revenue, the overseers of all public works, the pontifices or flamens who exhibited the public games and shows to the people, with abundance of others, whose offices are specified by Gothofred' to the number of twenty-two, which I need not here recite. These were always men of estates, whose substance amounted to the value of three hundred solids; which is the sum that is specified by Theodosius Junior, as qualifying a man to be a member of the Curia: and both they and their estates were so tied to civil offices, that no member of that body was to be admitted into any ecclesiastical office, till he had first discharged all the offices of his country, or else provided a proper substitute, one of his relations qualified with his estate, to bear offices in his room. Otherwise the person so ordained was liable by the laws of the empire, (of which I give a more particular account hereafter in the next book,) to be called back by the Curia from an ecclesiastical to a secular life again. Which was such an inconvenience to the Church, that she herself made laws to prohibit the ordination of any of these Curiales, to avoid the trouble and molestation, which was commonly the consequent of their ordination. St. Ambrose assures us, "that sometimes presbyters and deacons, who were thus ordained out of the Curiales, were fetched back to serve in curial offices, after they had been thirty years and more in the service of the Church." And therefore to prevent this calamity, the council of Illyricum, mentioned by Theodoret, made a decree, "that presbyters and deacons should always be chosen out of the inferior clergy, and not out of these Curiales, or any other officers of the civil government. Innocent, bishop of Rome, frequently refers to this rule of

3 See

I Gothofred. Paratitlon. Cod. Th. lib. xii. tit. 1. de Decurionibus, tom. iv. p. 339. Theodos. Novel. 38. ad. Calcem Cod. Th. Book v. chap. iii. sect. 15. * Ambr. Ep. 29. Per triginta et innumeros annos Presbyteri quidam gradu functi, vel Ministri Ecclesiæ retrahuntur à munere sacro, et Curiæ deputantur. 5 Ap. Theodor. lib. iv. c. 9.

Εκ τὸ ἱερατικό τάγματος, καὶ μὴ ἀπὸ τῶ βελευτηρίω και τρατιωτικῆς ἀρχῆς.

the Church in his Epistles, where he gives two reasons against their ordination. First, that they were often recalled by the Curia to serve in civil offices, which brought some tribulation upon the Church." Secondly, "because many of them had served in the office of flamens after baptism; and were crowned, as the heathen high-priests were used to be, while they exhibited the public games and shows to the people." Which, though it was indulged by the civil law in Christian magistrates, yet the Church reckoned a crime, for which men were sometimes obliged to do public penance, as appears from the canons of the council of Eliberis; and consequently such a crime, as made men irregular and incapable of ordination. So that upon both accounts these Curiales were to be excluded from the orders of the Church. And though this rule by the importunity of men was sometimes transgressed, yet the laws, both of Church and State, always stood in force against such ordinations; and sometimes the ordainers themselves were punished with ecclesiastical censures. Of which there is a famous instance related by Sozomen, who says, the council of Constantinople, Anno 360, deposed Neonas from his bishopric for ordaining some of these Curiales bishops. Sozomen indeed calls them "Пoλtevóμevol,” but that is but another name for Curiales, whom the Greeks otherwise term "Beλevral, counsellors ;" and the Latins, Municipes, burghers, or corporation-men; and Minor Senatus, the little senate of every city," in opposition to the great senate of Constantinople and Rome. These persons, whatever denomination they went by, were so entirely devoted to the service of the Common-wealth, that, till they

Innoc. Ep. iv. c. 3. De Curialibus manifesta ratio est, quoniam etsi inveniantur hujusmodi viri qui debeant Clerici fieri, tamen quoniam sæpius ad Curiam repetuntur, cavendum ab his est propter tribulationem, quæ sæpe de his Ecclesiæ provenit. 2 Innoc. Ep. xxiv. c. 4. Neque de Curialibus aliquem ad ecclesiasticum ordinem venire posse, qui post baptismum vel coronati fuerint, vel sacerdotium, quod dicitur, sustinuerint, et editiones ́ publicas celebraverint, &e. 8 Con. Eliber. c. 3. 4 Sozom. lib. iv. c. 24.

Majorian. Novel. 1. ad Calcem Cod. Theod. Curiales

servos esse reipublicæ ac viscera civitatum nulius ignorat, quorum cœtum

rectè appellavit antiquitas Minorem Senatum.

had some way or other discharged that duty, they might not, as appears, be admitted to serve in any office of the Church.

SECT. 5.-Nor any Proctor or Guardian, till his Office expired.

Indeed it was a general rule in this matter, as we learn from one of the councils of Carthage,' "that no one was to be ordained, who was bound to any secular service." And for that reason it was decreed by the same council, at least for the Churches of Afric, "that no agent or factor in other men's business, nor any guardian of orphans, should be ordained, till his office and administration was perfectly expired; because the ordination of such would otherwise turn to the reproach and defamation of the Church." But, if I mistake not, this prohibition did not extend to the inferior orders, but only to those, whose office was to serve at the altar.

SECT. 6.-Pleaders at Law denied Ordination in the Roman Church.

In some Churches there seems also to have been an absolute prohibition and rule against ordaining advocates or pleaders at law, not only whilst they continued in their profession, but for ever after. This seems to have been the custom of the Roman and Spanish Churches. For Innocent, bishop of Rome, in a letter to the council of Toledo, complains of an abuse then crept into the Spanish Church, which was, that many, who were exercised in pleading at the bar, were called to the priesthood. To correct which abuse, as he deemed it, he proposed this rule to them to be observed, "that no one, who had pleaded causes after baptism, should be admitted to any order of the clergy." What particular reasons the Church of Rome might then

2 Ibid.

Con. Carth. i. c. 9. Obnoxii alienis negotiis non ordinentur. c. 8. Procuratores, et actores, etiam tutores pupillorum - - - - si ante libertatem negotiorum vel officiorum, ab aliquo sine consideratione fuerint ordinati, Ecclesia infamatur. 8 Innoc. Ep. 24. ad Concil. Tolet. c. 2. quantos ex eis, qui post acceptam baptismi gratiam, in forensi exercitatione versati sunt, et obtinendi pertinaciam susceperunt, accitos ad Sacerdotium esse comperimus ? * Ibid. c. 4. Ne quispiam ad ordinem debeat Cle ricatûs admitti, qui causas post acceptum baptismum egerit.

have for this prohibition I cannot say; but it does not appear, that this was the general rule of the whole Catholic Church. For the council of Sardica1 allows a lawyer even to be ordained bishop, if he first went regularly through the offices of reader, deacon, and presbyter; which shows, that the custom, as to this particular, was not one and the same in all Churches.

SECT. 7. Also Energumens, Actors, Stage-players, &c. in all Churches,

The reader may find several other cautions, given by Gennadius, against ordaining any, who had been actors or stage-players; or energumens, during the time of their being possessed; or such as had married concubines, that is, wives without formality of law; or that had married harlots, or wives divorced from a former husband. But I need not insist upon these, since the very naming them shows all such persons to have been in such a state of life, as might reasonably be accounted a just impediment of ordination. It will be more material to inquire, what the ancients meant by digamy, which, after the Apostle, they always reckoned an objection against a man's ordination ?-And whether any vow of perpetual celibacy was exacted of the ancient clergy, when they were admitted to the orders of the Church? Which, because they are questions that come properly under this head, it will not be amiss to resolve distinctly, but briefly, in the following chapter.

CHAP. V.

Of the State of Digamy and Celibacy in particular; and of the Laws of the Church about these, in reference to the Ancient Clergy.

SECT. 1.-No Digamist to be Ordained, by the Rule of the Apostle. As to what concerns digamy, it was a primitive aposto

1 Con. Sardic. c. 10. Εάν τις σχολασικὸς ἀπὸ τῆς ἀγορᾶς ἀξιοῖτο ἐπίσκοπος γίνεσθαι, μὴ πρόξενον καθίσασθαι, ἐὰν μὴ καὶ ἀναγνώσε, και διακόνε, και πρεσβυτέρω υπηρεσίαν ἐκτελέσῃ. Gennad. de Eccles. Dogm. c. 73.

lical rule," that a bishop or a deacon should be one, who was the husband of one wife only," on which rule all the laws against digamy in the primitive Church were founded. But then we are to observe, that the ancients were not exactly agreed about the sense of that apostolical rule; and that occasioned different notions and different practices among them in reference to the ordination of digamists.

SECT. 2.-Three different Opinions among the Ancients about Digamy. 1. That all Persons were to be refused Orders, as Digamists, who were twice Married after Baptism.

One very common and prevailing notion was, that all persons were to be refused orders, as digamists, who were twice married after baptism, though legally and successively to two wives, one after another. For though they did not condemn second marriages, as sinful and unlawful, with the Novatians and Montanists; yet upon presumption that the Apostle had forbidden persons twice married to be ordained bishops, they repelled such from the superior orders of the Church. That this was the practice of some Churches in the time of Origen, may appear from what he says in his Comments upon St. Luke, "that not only fornication,' but marriages excluded men from the dignities of the Church; for no digamist could be either bishop, or presbyter, or deacon, or deaconess in the Church," Tertullian, when he became a Montanist, laid hold of this argument, and urged it to decry second marriages in all persons; pleading, "that a layman could not in decency desire licence of the ecclesiastics to be married a second time, seeing the ecclesiastics themselves, bishops, presbyters, and deacons, were but once married;" which he repeats frequently in several parts of his writings. And it cannot be denied, but that many other ancient writers, St.

Orig. Hom. 17. in Luc. p. 228. Ab ecclesiasticis dignitatibus non solum fornicatio, sed et nuptiæ repellunt: neque enim Episcopus, nec Presbyter, nec Diaconus, nec Vidua, possunt esse digami. 2 Ter

tul. de Monogam. c. 11. Qualis es id matrimonium postulans, quod eis, à quibus postulas, non licet habere?-Ab Episcopo monogamo, à Presbyteris et Diaconis ejusdem sacramenti, &c. 3 Vid. Tertul. de Pœnitent. c. 9.

De Exhort. Castitat, c. 7. Ad Uxor. lib. i. c. 7.