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Ay Li vel arreling to the use of & 108 m perform this office han I think it probable that in the bar camires, & Jes. The Engish church observed the more geners" "Like, vind restricted it to the bishop of the Borse & x: miche bishop with his license The five net as the reader w observe, supposes the presence of the bisbin, egal as in the solemnity vé a nosemidie, ne is it likely that the express de cision of Greg.ey IX. in the 15th century, would have been disregarded: “Aça per episcopum benedicta ecclesiam revocari posse per alium episcopum non Degamus; per series simplices hoc fieri de cætero prohibemus :—quia Hot episcopus committere valeat, que jurisdictions existunt, quæ ordinis tamen episcopalis sunt, non potest inferioris gradus clericis de mandare.” *

Codex juris Ecc.

* In cap. ir. r. de consecrat. ecclesiæ. Cf. Castaldus. Praris Cerem. Lib. 2. §. xi. The Pupilla in the extract above, does not appear to make any distinction between the "aqua benedicta" to be used for this, or any other ceremony. But from what Van Espen says, in the place cited before, §. xx, this ought to have been "aqua consecrata:" that is, by a bishop, and mixed with ashes: a view which is borne out by the rubric of the office below.

quote the following which be postulant.”
gives, of reconsecration, in the
A 190.
time of archbishop Abbot - When
the church of Southmalling had
not only been polluted (per bes-
tias et animalia diversorum ge-
nerum, alüsque modis profa-
nata) but was also new-built, and
then used for divine offices with-
out new consecration; archbishop
Abbot interdicted the minister,
churchwardens, and parishioners,
ab ingressu ecclesiæ,donec ec-
clexia præfata, et cœmeterium
ejusdem, per nos, aut alium auc-
toritate nostra munitum, ca-
nonice et legitime consecrata
fuerint: prout jura et sanc-
tiones ecclesiae in ea parte editæ

To what extent priests might confer benedictions, has been already discussed in a previous dis

The offices of benediction of a processional or military banner, and of an episcopal seal will sufficiently explain themselves. The practice of consecrating military standards is very ancient: Charles Martel is said to have received one, consecrated and sent to him

by pope Gregory III. William the conqueror, says Ingulph, " præpropera [f. proposita] querela papam consuluit, et ab eo animatus etiam vexillum legitimæ victoriæ pro munere accepit."" The prior of Hexham, in his history of the battle of the Standard, in 1135, not only relates how the holy banner of S. Peter was delivered to the barons by the archbishop of York, but also as follows: "Mox autem aliqui eorum in medio cujusdam machinæ quam ibi adduxerant, unius navis malum erexerunt, quod Standard appellaverunt : unde Hugo Eborac. archidiaconus:

• Dicitur a stando standardum, quod stetit illic
Militiæ probitas vincere sive mori.'

In summitate vero ipsius arboris quandam argenteam pixidem cum corpore Christi, et sanctorum Petri apos

sertation: (vol. 1. p. ccl. etc.) and I think it of sufficient interest to add the following passage from Catalani, in which the opinions of the later canonists are briefly summed up. "Ratio differentiæ cur episcopus possit inferiori presbytero, ea quæ sunt jurisdictionis committere, non vero ea quæ sunt ordinis, illa est: quia ea quæ sunt jurisdictionis non ita hærent personæ episcopi, ut ea quæ sunt ordinis, quæ episcopus in consecratione assequitur; quæ

que ita episcopi propria sunt, ut ab eo cedi non possint alii quam episcopo; coepiscopoque cedantur, non ut alii, sed ut alteri ipsimet propter vinculum et necessitudinem sacerdotii, quæ episcopos omnes velut unum habet, omnesque ecclesias velut unam colligit." In Pontif. Rom. tom. 11. p. 229. Compare Lyndwood. lib. 2. tit. 1. Excussis. verb. commissarii.

37 Hist. p. 69. Script. Anglic.

tom. 1.

toli, et Joannis Beverlacensis, et Wilfridi Ripensis confessorum ac pontificum vexilla suspenderunt.

FORM OF DEGRADATION.

THE antiquity of the punishment of Degradation, the order of which is edited in the present volume, is so well known to every reader of ecclesiastical history that I need not delay upon it. The Apostolical ca nons, and those of Nice, of S. Basil, and of Peter of Alexandria, all prove the universality of the practice and although the severity of it differed at various times and in various churches, some degrading altogether, some only from a higher to a lower order, yet as a mode of punishment, it seems everywhere and at all times to have been acknowledged and inflicted.99

Both theologians and canonists not unfrequently confound deposition, and degradation: and indeed in one sense, perhaps the most ancient one, they may be regarded as the same; but strictly, in later practice, there was a difference between the two. Simple deposition prohibited a clerk either from exercising the powers of his order, or any ecclesiastical office; or from receiving the revenues of his benefice: but it did not remove him from the spiritual and subject him to

38 Ricardus Hagulstald. de gestis R. Stephani. script. x. tom. 1. p. 322.

39

A good general account may be found in Bingham, Antiquities, Book vi. cap. 2. But the stu

Ident will do well to consult Martene, de ant. ecc. rit. 2. p. 317, and to examine the canonists, es

pecially Van Espen, Jus Eccles. par. 3. tit. xj., and the notes of Balsamon and Zonaras, Bevereg. Pandect., upon the conflicting canons of Nice and Chalcedon : the latter of which would not permit the more modified form of degradation, from a higher order to a lower.

lay jurisdiction. On the contrary, degradation included the infliction of all the penalties which accompanied deposition, and committed the offender also to the power of the temporal courts; depriving him of all the privileges and immunities attached to the clergy.

The settled form as it is below, was but of late introduction: and we have no records in the earliest pontificals which are extant, of the manner in which, very anciently, this solemnity was performed: still, it is scarcely probable, that no form or order was observed. I quote the following from Catalani. "Consuevisse depositionis sententiam calamo Christi sanguine intincto desumpto è sacro calice scribi, duo extant insignia exempla apud scriptores ecclesiasticos. Alterum refert Theophanes, ubi ait, Theodorum papam eo ritu sententiam depositionis contra Pyrrhum scripsisse: alterum narrat Nicetas in vita S. Ignatii patriarchæ Constantinopolitani, ubi depositionem Photii describit." 40

I shall therefore, to be as brief as possible, confine myself to one or two illustrations of this office, relating to the English church. Upon the necessity of a certain number of bishops to be present on the occasion, we have in Wilkins a bull directed to cardinal Wolsey, dispensing with it; and that, on account of the difficulty of collecting the proper number, he might authorize one bishop to degrade criminous priests, "adjunctis secum seu sibi assistentibus duobus abbatibus, seu dignitates seculares in cathedralibus seu collegiatis ecclesiis obtinentibus." 41 In the same collec

* Comment. in. pontif. Rom. tum. 3. p. 138.

41 Concil. tom. 3. p. 713. By the "Reformatio legum," the bi

tion, is the full order, as it was to be observed at th degradation of archbishop Cranmer: ending with th usual formula, upon delivery to the civil power, "D mine judex, rogamus vos cum omni affectu, quo po sumus, ut amore Dei, pietatis et misericordiæ intuit et nostrorum interventu precaminum, miserrimo hu nullum mortis, vel mutilationis periculum inferas." I must say, that notwithstanding the constructio which is justly and properly to be put upon this clau in many cases, evidencing the fulness of mercy an pity which befits the Church of Christ, yet in the in stance of archbishop Cranmer, and many others i that day, it was nothing but a bitter and disgracef mockery. The ministers and rulers of the Churc could not canonically themselves inflict the punish ment of death; but they knew well, what would be th sure effect of their delivering up of men, whom they ha condemned as heretics, to the civil power. They wer delivered, not to be forgiven, not even to be mercifully dealt with, but to receive at the hands of others a mos sure and barbarous punishment. We can look upo such a recommendation, in no other light than w would now regard the conduct of a judge, who, having

whys of the diocese might alone, with two priests, deprive or deande "Quando cuiquam vel diript dignitas, vel eripi beneficium Pechensticum formula deprivaHous debet, prmeipio proprius il homepracipue ad se rite evocet: londe ad reliquum omne negofum pertractandum episcopus adsit of luna ad se doctos et inbara presbyteros asciscat, quo

66

rum authoritate et decreto star placet." De depriv. cap. 3. The maxim upon which the ancien rule was founded, was: Spiri tualia facilius construuntur, quam destruuntur; quia solus episcopus dat ordinem, quem solus tollere non potest." Gibson. Codex. p. 1068.

42 Ibid. tom. 4.

p. 136.

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