on two proofs: first, that the essential forms had not been observed; secondly, that the consecrating Bishop had not the episcopal character.

They pretended that a consecration made without the presence of three Bishops, as prescribed by the canons, is null, except in cases where the Holy See permits the consecrating Bishop to be assisted by two priests. Now it was publicly notorious that the consecrating Bishop had no assistant whatever. This is the same argument afterwards used against the consecration of the first Jansenist Bishop of Holland, who was consecrated by the archbishop of Babylon alone. Now, as no one could maintain the validity of these illegitimate orders in Belgium or Holland, without being almost reckoned an adherent of the schism of Utrecht; so in Poland, in the midst of the passions awakened by the events at Kief, a man was obliged to declare that Job Borecki and company were not real Bishops, because three Bishops had not taken part at their consecration.

This argument went too far; for though the canon which prescribes the presence of three Bishops ought to be religiously observed, yet it does not thence follow that it is of divine right, and that its non-observance entails the nullity of the act. Could the Pope ever dispense with it, if it were essential to the Sacrament? What Catholic nowadays calls in question the validity of the schismatical ordinations of Utrecht? And how can they be attacked, without attacking the consecration of Pope Pelagius I., who received the imposition of hands from two Bishops only, assisted by one priest? It is certain that the Council of Sardica commands any Bishop who happens to be the sole remaining one in any ecclesiastical province to consecrate Bishops for the towns that require them, without allowing the neighbouring Bishops to have a hand in these consecrations, except when the above-mentioned Bishop refuses to make them. Who would reject the orders of those Bishops who, according to the testimony of the first Council of Arles were often consecrated in France by a single Bishop, or of those who, in conformity with the apostolic canons, were consecrated by two? Who would call the consecration of John of Châlons invalid, given, as St. Sidonius Appolinaris affirms, by Patiens of Lyons alone? Who ever called in question the orders of the Catholic Church in England, where St. Gregory the Great dispensed with the presence of any assistants whatever, and wrote to St. Augustine, "In the English Church, wherein there is no other Bishop but thyself, thou canst not ordain a Bishop otherwise than * As allowed by St. Thomas Aq., sum. iii, q. lxxii. art. 11, ad 1.

alone"? Who objects to Bellarmine for allowing that in case of necessity a Bishop and two mitred abbots may consecrate a Bishop?* The Council of Riez, in invalidating the ordination of the Bishop of Embrun, because it was only performed by two Bishops, yet implicitly allows it when it permits the deposed Bishop to confirm, and the new Bishop to continue the priests ordained by the deposed one in their offices. It is clear that the sentence had reference to the irregularity of the proceeding, and not to the validity of the Sacrament.

To put forth, then, the principle, that no consecration which is not performed by three Bishops is valid, is to raise doubts about all ordinations. For what Bishop could ever be sure that among his ancestors in the priesthood there are not some such as those spoken of in the councils above mentioned?

The second argument against the validity of the orders of the non-united Bishops of the province of Kief has the same flaw. Not that we pretend to defend Strahl, who, in his Russian Church History, can only see through the spectacles of the Russian orthodox writers; nor Count Krasinski, who writes solely in the interests of Protestantism in the Sclavonic provinces; nor the Dominican Lequien, in his Oriens Christianus, written from the Catholic point of view; who all assure us that it was really Theophilus patriarch of Jerusalem who came into Muscovy and re-established the non-uniate hierarchy of Kief. We will allow that his name was not Theophilus, but Theophanes; with James Susza, the author of the Latin life of the Blessed Josaphat Kuncewicz, we will admit that he was but a pretended patriarch, uti se nominabat patriarcha Hierosolymitanus; that he was a pseudo-patriarch, as the Jesuits Cordara and Albert Viak call him; that he was only a quack, circulator, brought from Greece by the Russian monks and Popes, and that his magnificent title of Patriarch turned to the disgrace of the schism as soon as it was proved that he had no right to it, as Viak again says; lastly, that he was merely a vagabond sycophant, sycophantes vagabundus, who usurped the pompous title of Patriarch of Jerusalem, as the theologian John Aloysius Kulista calls him. We admit that all these hard words are deserved; but it by no means follows from thence that Theophilus, or Theophanes, had not the episcopal character. All those who were most directly interested in knowing whether he was truly a Bishop, were convinced that there was no doubt whatever on the matter.

Our proofs are these: Meleci Smotricki, who had been ordained by the pretended patriarch of Jerusalem for the archiepiscopal see of Polock, returned afterwards to the unity

* De Eccl. Mil. iv. c. viii.

of the Church. Whether it was to escape the penalties he had incurred as one of the principal instigators, direct or indirect, of the murder of the Blessed Josaphat, the legitimate Archbishop of the same see, or for any other unknown reason, Smotricki had fled to Greece. There he found the Church in the greatest confusion and disorder: this sad spectacle made a happy impression on his mind; he resolved to abandon the schism, and even set about writing a book in favour of the union. He was betrayed by a false friend, and cited before a schismatic synod of Kief, where he had the weakness to recant, and to tear up his book with his own hands. But grace soon regained its supremacy; he went to Rome, was absolved by the Pope, and returned into Lithuania with the title of a Bishop in partibus, because he could not be placed on the see of Polock, which was occupied by the legitimate successor of the Blessed Josaphat. He persevered till the end of his life in the unity of the Church, and at his death there happened prodigies, recorded by Viak.

Now neither the Pope, nor the Catholic Bishops of Lithuania, nor Smotricki himself, ever showed the least doubt about the validity of his consecration. Indeed, a layman wrote to the Bishop in partibus to beg him to be re-consecrated; but Smotricki took good care not to comply with the invitation.

Here is another fact. In the beginning of the eighteenth century, Innocent, schismatic Bishop of Vinnitzy, demanded to be received with his whole flock into the communion of the Holy See. Innocent was looked upon at Rome as a relapsed heretic. The papal nuncio in Poland was also against him, and Mgr. Malacoski, the uniate Bishop of Vinnitzy, was his open enemy. The demand of Innocent was generally considered as a trap. People said, when he is sole Bishop of Vinnitzy, he will once more abandon the union, and will take with him, not only his old flock, but a great number of Catholics also. There is nothing to gain, much to lose, by his admission into the Church.

The king of Poland was of a different opinion. He deputed his confessor, the Piedmontese Jesuit Vota, to go to Rome, and to treat with the Pope. Innocent XII. referred him to the Congregation of the Propaganda, which was infected with all the prejudices current in Poland against Bishop Innocent. At a meeting of the Congregation, under the presidence of Cardinal Altieri, Cardinal Casanatta spoke with great power against the admission of Bishop Innocent. His chief object was to prove that the Bishop was not in good faith. But when it was Vota's turn to speak, he answered the Cardinal with such success, that the admission of the Bishop of Vinnitzy

was unanimously decided upon. In consequence, Malacoski was transferred to the see of Chelm, to make room for Innocent, who afterwards showed so much zeal and devotedness for the union, that by his means the Archbishop of Lemberg and the Bishop of Luck were induced to renounce the schism.

Here, then, are three Bishops whose orders are derived from Theophanes, or Theophilus. They were received, not without difficulty, into the communion of the Roman Church. The cause was discussed, examined on all sides, in the presence of ardent, numerous, and powerful enemies; and the only argument which was not produced was that which, if producible, would have been decisive, but which no one either in Poland or Rome thought of, namely, the invalidity of their ordinations.

After such plain facts, to attack the validity of the Russian orders looks like attacking the Holy See itself; it throws a doubt over the orders of the uniate Bishops of Galicia, and in particular over those of Mgr. Lewicki, Archbishop of Lemberg, Cardinal of the holy Roman Church, and successor of the former schismatical Bishops. There are plenty of good arguments to prove to the Russians that their ecclesiastical position is not regular, without being obliged to use weapons which wound the hand that wields them.

The case of the Anglican orders is very different. In the first place, the Holy See, which has shown itself so circumspect in its dealings with the orders of Utrecht and Kief, in spite of the prejudices of the Catholics of the Low Countries and of Poland, and has thereby proved that she would never deny the validity of the ordinations of heretics merely from a spite against their persons, -the Holy See has from the first treated the Anglican orders as nullities. The same respect that would teach us to refrain from questioning the episcopal character of Cardinal Lewicki would make us refrain from acknowledging such a character in Archbishop Sumner or Bishop Wilberforce.

But as we may be speaking to some with whom respect for the Holy See is not a decisive argument, we must enter into the particulars of the case, and show that the Anglican orders are historically in the highest degree doubtful; so doubtful, that no one who values his salvation and believes that to obtain it he must have valid sacraments, can be finally satisfied with the security they promise, even though he though he may be prepared to die in schism. Let us begin with the two old objections discussed by Courayer. "The first regarding Barlow, Parker's consecrator; the other, the form he used in the

ceremony of their ordination. It is pretended that Barlow was not consecrated himself, and that the rite of which he made use is entirely insufficient to insure the validity of ordination. Either the one or the other of these facts would be sufficient of itself to annihilate the English hierarchy."*

The third point shall be, the intention with which the first Elizabethan Bishops were made, as judged not so much from the known opinions of themselves, as from the meaning attached to the word 'bishop,' and to the functions he was to exercise, by the English Protestants of the period. There are Bishops and Bishops. The Catholic Bishop is the summus sacerdos, the centre and fount of sacramental power for his diocese; he is the chief sacrificer, as well as the governor of his flock. The Lutheran Bishop, on the other hand, is a mere superintendent, not the source of the power of the clergy, but only their governor and head. Is the Anglican Bishop,-or rather, was he in the minds of the Protestants of Elizabeth's days, more like the Catholic or the Lutheran type? Was he the summus sacerdos, or only the minister who was made a royal commissioner, to look after the morals and conduct of the other ministers of his charge? Was his highest function to sacrifice or to preach? Is it not true to say of the Anglican Church and her episcopate, Nomen callide retinuit; rem ipsam definiendo sustulit,-she cunningly retained the name; the thing itself she totally destroyed by her definitions?

The fourth point is, to inquire into the probability of the nullity of the baptism of several of the Anglican hierarchy, who, if they were not Christians, evidently could not be Christian Bishops.

Was Barlow, the consecrator of Parker, ever consecrated himself? There are the gravest doubts on the subject. He was elected Bishop of St. Asaph, January 16th, 1536. The king's commission for his consecration was dated Feb. 22d, 1536,† and directed to Cranmer. Did Cranmer act upon it; or did both he and Barlow consider that the king's commission was to all intents and purposes a valid consecration, nay, that it would please the king to treat it as such, omitting all further ceremonies? In the first place, there is no direct testimony of Cranmer's having proceeded to consecrate Barlow, or directed a commission to other Bishops for his consecration. The Lambeth register, which contains all the other documents relating to Barlow,―his election, confirmation, &c.,is quite silent about his consecration; and though Godwin positively says, that "William Barlow, prior of the Canons* Courayer, Dissertation, chap. iii. † Rymer, vol. xiv. p. 559. De Præsul. Ang. p. 663,