Part 3 (2/2)
Each held firmly the central error of the conservatives, and rejected as illogical the modifications and side views by which they were finding their way to something better. Both parties, says Athanasius, are equally inconsistent. The conservatives, who refuse eternal being to the Son of G.o.d, will not endure to hear that his kingdom is other than eternal; while the Marcellians, who deny his personality outright, are equally shocked at the Arian limitation of it to the sphere of time. Nor had Marcellus escaped the difficulties of Arius. If, for example, the idea of an eternal Son is polytheistic, nothing is gained by transferring the eternity to an impersonal Word. If the generation of the Son is materializing, so also is the coming forth of the Word. If the work of creation is unworthy of G.o.d, it may as well be delegated to a created Son as to a transitory Word. So far Athanasius. Indeed, to Marcellus the Son of G.o.d is a mere phenomenon of time, and even the Word is as foreign to the divine essence as the Arian Son. If the one can only reveal in finite measure, the other gives but broken hints of an infinity beyond. Instead of destroying Arianism by the roots, Marcellus had fallen into something very like Sabellianism. He reaches no true mediation, no true union of G.o.d and man, for he makes the incarnation a mere theophany, the flesh a useless burden, to be one day laid aside.
The Lord is our Redeemer and the conqueror of death and Satan, but there is no room for a second Adam, the organic head of regenerate mankind.
The redemption becomes a mere intervention from without, not also the planting of a power of life within, which will one day quicken our mortal bodies too.
[Sidenote: (3.) Athanasius.]
Marcellus had fairly exposed himself to a doctrinal attack; other methods were used with Athanasius. They had material enough without touching doctrine. His election was disputed: Meletians and Arians complained of oppression: there were some useful charges of magic and political intrigue. At first, however, the Meletians could not even get a hearing from the Emperor. When Eusebius of Nicomedia took up their cause, they fared a little better. The attack had to be put off till the winter of 331, and was even then a failure. Their charges were partly answered by two presbyters of Athanasius who were on the spot; and when the bishop himself was summoned to court, he soon completed their discomfiture. As Constantine was now occupied with the Gothic war, nothing more could be done till 334. When, however, Athanasius was ordered to attend a council at Caesarea, he treated it as a mere cabal of his enemies, and refused to appear.
[Sidenote: The Council of Tyre (335).]
Next year the Eastern bishops gathered to Jerusalem to keep the festival of the thirtieth year of Constantine's reign and to dedicate his splendid church on Golgotha. But first it was a work of charity to restore peace in Egypt. A synod of about 150 bishops was held at Tyre, and this time the appearance of Athanasius was secured by peremptory orders from the Emperor. The Eusebians had the upper hand, though there was a strong minority. Athanasius brought nearly fifty bishops from Egypt, and others, like Maximus of Jerusalem and Alexander of Thessalonica, were willing to do justice. Athanasius was not accused of heresy, but, with more plausibility, of episcopal tyranny. His friends replied with reckless violence. Potammon aimed a bitter and unrighteous taunt at Eusebius of Caesarea. 'You and I were once in prison for the faith. I lost an eye: how did you escape?' Athanasius might perhaps have been crushed if his enemies had kept up a decent semblance of truth and fairness. But nothing was further from their thoughts than an impartial trial. Scandal succeeded scandal, till the iniquity culminated in the dispatch of an openly partizan commission to superintend the manufacture of evidence in Egypt. Maximus of Jerusalem and Paphnutius left the council, saying that it was not good that old confessors like them should share its evil deeds. The Egyptian bishops protested. Alexander of Thessalonica denounced the plot to the Emperor's representative.
Athanasius himself took s.h.i.+p for Constantinople without waiting for the end of the farce, and the council condemned him by default. This done, the bishops went on to Jerusalem for the proper business of their meeting.
[Sidenote: a.s.sembly at Jerusalem.]
The concourse on Golgotha was a brilliant spectacle. Ten years had pa.s.sed since the still unrivalled a.s.sembly at Nicaea, and the veterans of the last great persecution must have been deeply moved at their meeting once again in this world. The stately ceremonial suited Maximus and Eusebius much better than the noisy scene at Tyre, and may for the moment have soothed the swelling indignation of Potammon and Paphnutius.
Constantine had once more plastered over the divisions of the churches with a general reconciliation, but this time Athanasius was condemned and Arius received to communion. The heretic had long since left his exile in Illyric.u.m, though we cannot fix the date of his recall.
However, one winter the Emperor invited Arius and his friend Euzoius to Constantinople, where they laid before him a short and simple confession of their faith. It said nothing of the disputed points, but was not unorthodox as far as it went. Nor were they bishops, that the Nicene creed should be forced upon them. Constantine was therefore satisfied, and now directed them to lay it before the bishops at Jerusalem, who duly approved of it and received its authors to communion. In order to complete the work of peace, Athanasius was condemned afresh on the return of the commission from Egypt, and proceedings were begun against Marcellus of Ancyra.
[Sidenote: First exile of Athanasius.]
Meanwhile Constantine's dreams of peace were rudely dissipated by the sudden appearance of Athanasius before him in the streets of Constantinople. Whatever the bishops had done, they had plainly caused dissensions just when the Emperor was most anxious for harmony. An angry letter summoned the whole a.s.sembly straight to court. The meeting, however, was most likely dispersed before its arrival; at any rate, there came only a deputation of Eusebians. The result was unexpected.
Instead of attempting to defend the council of Tyre, Eusebius of Nicomedia suddenly accused Athanasius of hindering the supply of corn for the capital. This was quite a new charge, and chosen with much skill. Athanasius was not allowed to defend himself, but summarily sent away to Trier in Gaul, where he was honourably received by the younger Constantine. On the other hand, the Emperor refused to let his place be filled up at Alexandria, and exiled the Meletian leader, John Archaph, 'for causing divisions.' To Constantinople came also Marcellus. He had kept away from the councils of Tyre and Jerusalem, and only came now to invite the Emperor's decision on his book. Constantine referred it as usual to the bishops, who promptly condemned it and deposed its author.
[Sidenote: Death of Arius.]
There remained only the formal restoration of Arius to communion at Constantinople. But the heretic was taken ill suddenly, and died in the midst of a procession the evening before the day appointed. His enemies saw in his death a judgment from heaven, and likened it to that of Judas. Only Athanasius relates it with reserve and dignity.
[Sidenote: Policy of Constantine.]
Upon the whole, Constantine had done his best for peace by leaving matters in an uneasy suspense which satisfied neither party. This seems the best explanation of his wavering. He had not turned Arian, for there is no sign that he ever allowed the decisions of Nicaea to be openly rejected inside the churches. Athanasius was not exiled for heresy, for there was no question of heresy in the case. The quarrel was ostensibly one of orthodox bishops, for Eusebius had signed the Nicene creed as well as Athanasius. Constantine's action seems to have been determined by Asiatic feeling. Had he believed the charge of delaying the corn-s.h.i.+ps, he would have executed Athanasius at once. His conduct does not look like a real explosion of rage. The merits of the case were not easy to find out, but the quarrel between Athanasius and the Asiatic bishops was a nuisance, so he sent him out of the way as a troublesome person. The Asiatics were not all of them either Arians or intriguers.
It was not always furtive sympathy with heresy which led them to regret the heresiarch's expulsion for doctrines which he disavowed; neither was it always partizans.h.i.+p which could not see the innocence of Athanasius.
Constantine's vacillation is natural if his policy was to seek for unity by letting the bishops guide him.
CHAPTER IV.
_THE COUNCIL OF SARDICA._
[Sidenote: Death of Constantine, May 22, 337.]
Constantine's work on earth was done. When the hand of death was on him, he laid aside the purple, and the ambiguous position of a Christian Caesar with it, and pa.s.sed away in the white robe of a simple convert.
Long as he had been a friend to the churches, he had till now put off the elementary rite of baptism, in the hope one day to receive it in the waters of the Jordan, like the Lord himself. Darkly as his memory is stained with isolated crimes, Constantine must for ever rank among the greatest of the emperors; and as an actual benefactor of mankind, he stands alone among them. Besides his great services to the Empire in his own time, he gave the civilization of later days a new centre on the Bosphorus, beyond the reach of Goth or Vandal. Bulgarians and Saracens and Russians dashed themselves in pieces on the walls of Constantinople, and the [Sidenote: A.D. 1204.] strong arms of Western and crusading traitors were needed at last to overthrow the old bulwark which for so many centuries had guarded Christendom. Above all, it was Constantine who first essayed the problem of putting a Christian spirit into the statecraft of the world. Hard as the task is even now, it was harder still in times when the gospel had not yet had time to form, as it were, an outwork of common feeling against some of the grosser sins. Yet whatever might be his errors, his legislation was a landmark for ever, because no emperor before him had been guided by a Christian sense of duty.
[Sidenote: Division of the Empire.]
The sons of Constantine shared the Empire among them 'like an ancestral inheritance.' Thrace and Pontus had been a.s.signed to their cousins, Dalmatius and Hannibalia.n.u.s; but the army would have none but Constantine's own sons to reign over them. The whole house of Theodora perished in the tumult except two boys--Gallus and Julian, afterwards the apostate Emperor. Thus Constantine's sons were left in possession of the Empire. Constantine II. took Gaul and Britain, the legions of Syria secured the East for Constantius, and Italy and Illyric.u.m were left for the share of the youngest, Constans.
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