Page:Guettée papacy.djvu/100

96 council was not universal; that it was not of divine right. The ultramontane system, being entirely based upon the universal and divine character of the Papal authority, is diametrically opposed to the sixth canon of the Nicene Council.

Nevertheless, it must be admitted that the council, by invoking the Roman custom, in confirmation of that of Alexandria, recognized the legitimacy of the established usage, and rendered homage to the dignity of the Roman see; but we must add, that the prerogatives recognized in it were not those to which it has since laid claim.

The General Council of Constantinople, A.D. 381, which is the second œcumenical council, has well interpreted that of Nicea by its third canon, "Let the Bishop of Constantinople have the primacy of honour (priores honoris partes) after the Bishop of Rome, because Constantinople is the new Rome."

The Bishop of Rome was, therefore, regarded as the first in honour, because he was bishop of the capital of the empire. Byzantium having become the second capital, under the name of Constantinople, its bishop became entitled to be second in rank, according to the principle that had governed the Council of Nicea in the exterior constitution of the Church, and according to which the divisions of the empire were made the divisions of the Church.

The Œcumenical Council of Chalcedon, A.D. 451, which met a century after that of Constantinople, throws a new light upon this point, and thus expresses itself in the twenty-eighth canon:

"In all things following the decrees of the holy Fathers, and recognizing the canon just read by the one hundred and fifty bishops well-beloved of God, (third canon of the second council,) we decree and establish the same thing touching the privileges of the most holy