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Rh be found chiefly in the second title of book xvi. of the Theodosian code, headed de episcopis ecclesiis et clericis. In 357 the emperor confirmed all the privileges granted to the church of Rome, at that time under the emperor's nominee, Felix, whilst Liberius was in exile. Another rescript of the same year is addressed to Felix, more explicitly guaranteeing the immunity from taxation and forced service. The next law (A.D. 360) refers to the synod of Rimini, and the opinion expressed by various bishops from different parts of Italy, and from Spain and Africa. The last law in the series (in 361) is remarkable, as the heading gives Julian the title of Augustus.

Relations to Heathenism.—The state of things that we have seen in the last years of Constantine continued during his son's reign. There was the same disposition on the part of the empire to put down paganism and the same elements of reaction. In the West, especially in Rome, real heathenism still retained much of its vitality and still swayed the minds of the aristocracy and the populace; in the East the supporters of the old religion were the philosophers and rhetoricians, men more attached to its literary and artistic associations than prepared to defend polytheism as a creed. They were mixed up with another class, the theurgists, practisers of a higher kind of magic which was particularly attractive to Julian. The following laws from the tenth title of book xvi. of the Theodosian code relate distinctly to heathen sacrifice. Sec. 2, in 341, issued by Constantius, says: "Cesset superstitio, sacrificiorum aboleatur insania," and refers to the law of Constantine noticed above. A year or two later (the date is uncertain and wrongly given in the code), Constantius and Constans ordered the temples in Roman territory to be kept intact for the pleasure of the Roman people, though all "superstition" is to be eradicated; almost at the same time they issued a law to the praetorian prefect inflicting death and confiscation on persons sacrificing. In 353 Constantius forbade the "nocturna sacrificia" permitted by Magnentius: in 356 he and Julian made it capital to sacrifice or worship images. [J.W.]  Cornelius (2), bp. of Rome, successor of Fabianus, said to have been son of Castinus. After the martyrdom of Fabianus in Jan. 250, in the Decian persecution, the see remained vacant for a year and a half. In June, A.D. 251, Cornelius was elected to the vacant post; and, although very reluctantly, he accepted an election almost unanimously made by both orders, during the life of a tyrant who had declared that he would rather see a new pretender to the empire than a new bishop of Rome (Cyprian, Ep. lii.). Decius was at that time absent from Rome, prosecuting the Gothic war which ended in his death in the winter of the same year. The persecution of the Christians thus came to an end; but then arose the difficult question of how to treat the libellatici, Christians who had bought their life by the acceptance of false certificates of having sacrificed to heathen gods. Cornelius took a line at variance with that of Cyprian and the church of Carthage, which required rigorous penance as the price of readmission, while Rome prescribed milder terms. The difference was kept alive by the discontent of the minority within both the churches. This was represented at Carthage by Novatus, who separated from the church when unable to obtain less harsh terms; in Rome by a man of similar name, Novatian, who was in favour of greater rigour than the church would allow. Novatus crossed the sea to aid Novatian in designs at Rome which must have been directly opposed to his own at Carthage. Mainly by his influence Novatian was consecrated a bishop, and thus constituted the head of a schismatic body in Rome. Eusebius (Hist. Eccl. vi. 43) quotes from a letter of bp. Cornelius to bp. Fabius of Antioch, in which he gives an account of his rival, with statistics as to the number of Roman clergy in his day. These were 46 priests, 7 deacons, 7 subdeacons, 42 acolytes, 52 exorcists, 52 readers and ostiarii; 1,500 widows and orphans were provided for by the church.

The Novatianist heresy gave rise to a correspondence between Cyprian and Cornelius. Persecution was revived in Rome by Gallus, and Cornelius, followed by almost the whole church (among whom were many restored libellatics), took refuge at Centumcellae in Etruria. There Cornelius died, and another bishop, Lucius, was at the head of the church when it returned. It is doubtful whether Cornelius died a violent death. Cyprian and Jerome both speak of him as a martyr. He died Sept. 14, 252. His name as a martyr has been found in the Catacombs at some little distance from those of other popes, and in a cemetery apparently devoted almost exclusively to the gens Cornelia, whence De Rossi argues that he probably belonged to that patrician gens (Roma Sotterranea, by Northcote and Brownlow, pp. 177‒183). [G.H.M.]  Cosmas (1) and Damianus, brothers, physicians, "silverless" martyrs. They became types of a class, the ἀνάργυροι, "silverless" martyrs, i.e. physicians who took no fees, but went about curing people gratis, and claiming as their reward that those whom they benefited should believe in Christ. They were certainly not earlier than the last quarter of the 3rd cent., and the legends of martyrs of that time, whose fame is known only by popular tradition, seem in many cases to succeed naturally to the place of those heathen myths that were slowest to die. For Hercules, Christopher; for Apollo, Sebastian; for Diana, Ursula; for Proserpine, Agnes. Cosmas and Damian take the place of Aesculapius, in whose story heathenism made the nearest approach to Christianity. The Greeks distinguished three pairs of these brothers. (1) July 1, in the time of Carinus; (2) Oct. 27, Arabs, with their brothers, Anthimus, Leontius, and Euprepius, martyred under Diocletian; (3) Nov. 1, sons of Theodote. (Menol.) For the legends connected with them see D. C. B. (4-vol. ed.). The names were early inserted in the Canon of the Mass. [E.B.B.]  Cosmas (3), surnamed Indicopleustes (Indian navigator), a native of Egypt, probably of Alexandria (lib. ii. 114, vi. 264), originally a merchant (lib. ii. 132, iii. 178, xi. 336), who flourished about the middle of the 6th cent. In pursuit of his mercantile business he navigated the Mediterranean, Red Sea, and Persian 