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 COUNCIL of Aquileia.

THE Council of Aquileia was assembled in the Month of September of the Year 381. It should have been compos'd of the Bishops of the East and West; but St. Ambrose having declared that * 1.1 it was needless to weary the Eastern Bishops with such a Journey, none but the Western Bishops were obliged to come thither, and those of the East were only left at their Liberty to come there if they thought fit. There were about thirty Bishops present at the Council, together with the De∣puties of the Bishops of France and Africa. Valerian was President. In it two Bishops of Dacia and Moesia, nam'd Palladius and Secundianus, were accus'd of Arianism; there was read to them be∣fore the Council, a Letter of Arius, but they would neither approve, nor condemn it, and answered

only, That they should see in two Days time, that they were both Catholicks. This Day being come they appeared before the Council; but they would not acknowledge it for a Judge, desiring a General Council compos'd of the Eastern and Western Bishops; nevertheless they examined them, convicted them of the Heresy of Arius, and condemned them. The Acts of this Council, the Letter which they wrote to the Bishops of France and Spain, to thank them for the Deputies they had sent, and the Letter address'd to the Emperours, wherein there is an account of what they had done, and prays them to hinder the Hereticks from entring into the Church, are still extant: It complains after∣wards of the Crimes of an Arian Bishop nam'd Valens; and Lastly, it supplicates the Emperours to hinder the Assemblies of the Photinians. All these Monuments are extant in St. Ambrose.

The Bishops of this Council wrote a Letter to the Emperour, praying him to drive away Ursicinus, which was publish'd by Sirmondus, and is in the Second Volume of the Councils, p. 998.

They wrote also a Letter which is found in the same place, in which they give the Emperour an Account of the State of the Eastern Empire, they thank him for restoring to the Catholicks the Ea∣stern Churches; but they complain that many things were chang'd there, and that those were not kindly us'd who had always been in the Communion of the Western Churches, as Timotheus of Alex∣andria and Paulinus of Antioch. They pray that a General Council may be assembled at Alexandria, to examine those who ought to be admitted into Communion, and those to whom Communion must be denied. This Letter was delivered to the Emperour, at the time of the Second Council of Con∣stantinople, and was read in this Council.

At last, when the Bishops understood what had been done in the East without consulting them, concerning the Ordination of Flavianus and Nectarius, they complained of it by another Letter, whereof we have already spoken, preserved in the same Volume of the Councils, p. 345. They testi∣fie also by a Fourth Letter which precedes these, how much they could have wished that the Council which they desired had been held, and how necessary it would have been. These Letters do not pro∣perly belong to the Council of Aquileia, but were written some time after in the name of those Bishops which were there assembled, and for executing what they had Order'd. For which Reason, it was thought necessary to mention them here.

Notes

• * 1.1

  Of Aquileia, 381.