A new history of ecclesiastical writers containing an account of the authors of the several books of the Old and New Testament, of the lives and writings of the primitive fathers, an abridgement and catalogue of their works ... also a compendious history of the councils, with chronological tables of the whole / written in French by Lewis Ellies du Pin.

Of the Decretum of Ivo.

THe Decretum is a Collection of Rules and Constitutions in Church-Affairs, taken out of the Let∣ters of the Popes, the Antient Canons and Councils, the writings of the Fathers of the Church and the Laws of Catholick Princes. In the Preface, Ivo gives notice, that he has rang'd them under general heads, or Titles, for the easier finding out any Canon the Reader has occasion to consult. And admonishes that if one Canon shall seem to have a different meaning from that of another, we are not presently to conclude they are contradictory; but to remember that some are to be understood accord∣ing to the Rigour of their import, others are to be taken with allowances; for that all Ecclesiastical Discipline aiming only at that Edification which is founded upon Charity, every Rule and Order of the Church is intended for the same End; upon which Account, the Spiritual Physicians, the Guides of Souls, Accommodate their Remedies and Prescriptions to the quality of the distempers and the con∣dition of their patients: that moreover, we are to distinguish between what is laid down by way of advice, and what is deliver'd as a precept or command, what is forbid from what is permitted or tolera∣ted only: and among those things that are commanded or forbidden, we must carefully consider that some of them are so, by an Eternal and Immutable Law; others, by the Laws of Men, which may be either changed, repealed, or dispensed with: Of all which distinctions, exceptions, restrictions and allowances he gives very pertinent instances and illustrations out of the Writings of the Fathers.