Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 5 (1897).djvu/118

 96 THE DECLINE AND FALL CHAPTER XLYII Tht'oloi(ic(tl llislurij of tlic Duclrine of I lie Jiicunuiliou — T/ic Hiimwi and Divine Xature of C/irisI — Enmitij of the Palriarchs oj Ahwdiidrut and Coiista)dinople — <S7. Ci/ril and Nestorius — Third Geveral Council of Ephesus — Heresy of Euh/ches — Fourth General Council of Chalcedon- — Ciiril and Ecclesiastical Discord — Intolerance of Justinian — The Three Chapters — The Monothelite Controversi/ — State of the Oriental Sects — /. The Ncstorians—ll. The Jacobites — ///. The Maronites — //'. The Armenians — /'. The Copts and .Ihi/ssinia/ts After the extinction of paganism, the Christians in peace and piety might have enjoyed their solitary triumph. But the principle of discord was alive in their bosom, and they were more solicitous to explore the nature, than to practise the laws, of their founder. I have already observed that the disputes of the Trinity were succeeded by those of the Incarnation : alike scandalous to the church, alike pernicious to the state, still more minute in their origin, still more durable in their effects. It is my design to comprise in the present chapter a religious war of two hundred and fifty years, to represent the ecclesias- tical and political schism of the Oriental sects, and to introduce their clamorous or sanguinary contests by a modest inquiry into the doctrines of the primitive church. ^ 1 By what means shall I authenticate this previous inquiry, which I have studied to circumscribe and compress? — If I persist in supporting each fact or reflection by its proper and special evidence, every line would demand a string of testimonies, and every note would swell to a critical dissertation. But the numberless passages of antiquity which I have seen with my own eyes are compiled, digested, and illustrated by Petavius and Le Clerc, by Beauiohre and Mosheim. I shall be con- tent to fortify my narrative by the names and characters of these respectable guides ; and in the contemplation of a minute or remote object I am not ashamed to borrow the aid of the strongest glasses, i. The Dogmata Theologica of Petavius are a work of incredible labour and compass ; the volumes which relate solely to the in- carnation (two folios, vth and vith, of 837 pages) are divided into .xvi books — the first of history, the remainder of controversy and doctrine. The Jesuit's learning is copious and correct ; his Latinity is pure, his method clear, his argument pro- found and well connected ; but he is the slave of the fathers, the scourge of heretics, the enemy of truth and candour, as often as they are inimical to the Catholic