Aduertisement.
From the time of Siluester the first and others after him, the Bishops or Archbishops of Rome being inriched by gifts & munificences of many, began to liue at their ease, and to receiue vnvsed apparell, as Miters and other pontificall ornaments, to make themselues to be accounted of, and to prepare the seate for the great Antichrist by their traditions and canons: yet neither Siluester nor his successors till Boniface the 9. (who was about the yeare, 1390. were Lords of Rome, much lesse did they holde the domination of the West. For wee haue seene that Liberius was sent into exile by Constantius:* 1.1 that Iulius im∣plored the aide of Constantius for Athanasius against the furie of the Arrians: and that Damasus by vertue of the Letters of Theodosius, called the Easterne Bishop vnto the Sinode of Rome.
* 1.2And as for the right to choose the Emperours to Crowne them, and put on their Imperiall purple and such other solem∣nities requisite, it was partly done by ordinary souldiers. And the Emperours Constantine the great, Iulian, Iouinian, Valentini∣an the first and second, were created Emperours and Cesars by the Campe of souldiers: Constantine ordained his three sonnes. Valens was ordained by his brother. Theodosius by Gratian. Ar∣cadius, and Honorius by the Father. It is not read in any appro∣ued Author of this time, that any Romane Bishop thrust him∣selfe in, to choose or crowne an Emperour. Theodo. lib. 5. chap. 6. saith, that Theodosius in a dreame sawe Meletius Bishop of Antioche, who gaue vnto him the Mantle, and the Imperiall Crowne.
Syricius a Romane, the sonne of one Tiburtius, succeeded Damasus. There are attributed vnto him many ordinances. Hee put such as were Bigami, that is, such as were married twise, from the misteries of the Masse, and was the first