Decretorum Damaso I Papae Ascriptorum Censura

CENSURE OF THE DECREES ASCRIBED TO POPE DAMASUS I. What Damasus is alleged to have established in a Roman synod.—In the aforementioned collection of Sarazanius, page __, there exists: The Life of Blessed Damasus, transcribed from a manuscript codex of the archive of the canons of St. Peter, in which it is proclaimed of him: «I. In those days, moreover, having summoned bishops from diverse parts of the world, he celebrated a council, in which he condemned Macedonius, who denied the Holy Spirit, and Eunomius and Donatus, followers of the Arian blasphemy; he also condemned Apollinaris, bishop of Laodicea in Syria, against whom he decreed that, "If anyone should say that the Son of God, who was as truly God as he was truly man, had less of either humanity or divinity, he should be judged an alien from the Church." He also ordered that this sentence be confirmed in the holy second synod, which was celebrated at Constantinople by his command and authority. «II. Moreover, Damasus commanded priests to deny holy communion and entry into the churches to all sacrilegious persons who had seized ecclesiastical goods, and especially to those among them who did not pay tithes.

III. He also judged that those who engage in usury and interest should be cast out from the house of God, saying that there is no difference between a robber and a usurer. IV. Likewise, he judged that those who, while dwelling in churches, occupy themselves with idle talk and frivolous speeches; for he said: If it is a house of prayer, as the Lord says, no one in it is permitted to do anything except pray, sing psalms, confess sins, and implore forgiveness. V. Moreover, he judged that those who, unmindful of divine law, serve sorceries, superstitions, and vain incantations should be anathematized... Therefore, he says, we command that whoever observes divinations, or auguries, or lots which they falsely claim to be of the saints, and whoever listens to magicians or enchanters, shall by no means be named among Christians. VI. We also wish those women to be expelled from the churches who, seduced by the illusions and phantasms of demons, believe that in the silence of the night they ride with Herodias and an innumerable multitude of women, etc., up to, "leads through every byway," as in Gratian, Causa 26, Quest. 5, c. 12, and in Augustine, book On the Spirit and the Soul, ch. 28, with a few words changed.

VII. It was also renewed in the same council, what had been established at Nicaea, that if anyone should dare to sing Mass on the Lord's Day after the third hour, and on other days from the middle of the fourth hour until the ninth hour, he should be anathematized. VIII. At that time also, St. Damasus decreed that psalms should be sung day and night throughout all churches. And he also commanded that at the end of each psalm, the following should be added: Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit, as it was in the beginning, and now, and always, and unto the ages of ages, Amen. Baronius approves and praises these same decrees as genuine, for the year 384. Hence he also seems to admit the acts from which they are excerpted. But those things which in these acts either precede or follow those decrees, indeed even those things which are set forth in the decrees themselves, destroy all credibility for them. The unskilled architect of the false Gesta of Damasus makes Meletius and Paulinus heretics. And from those things which follow, it suffices to bring forward this: "For in those same (Eastern) parts, under the reign of Valens, of whose tyranny mention was made above, there were three heresiarchs, Meletius, Vitalis, and Paulinus, who were hastening to seize the Church, rent into three parts, for themselves." Who, hearing this, could bear the ignorance of the author of these acts, so foolishly calling Paulinus a heresiarch; Paulinus, I say, whom Damasus in his letters addresses so modestly and so honorably (Dam.

ep. 5), and about which the fathers of the council of Italy write to the Emperor Theodosius (Apud Sirm. app. cod. Th. pag. 103), "Has he remained in our communion, a fellowship which, handed down unoffended from our ancestors, bears witness?" Who would patiently hear Meletius defamed by the same name of heresiarch, who won for himself the veneration of the whole East, who deserved to be called both great and divine by orthodox writers, whom the fathers of the aforementioned council of Italy testify that they consider to be in harmony with the faith? Not even Vitalis, under the Emperor Valens, was a heresiarch: but only after the death of this emperor was it revealed that he was a disciple of the heresiarch Apollinaris. From the words of Jerome in the above epistle 11, 2: "The church, split into three parts, hastens to draw me to itself... Meletius, Vitalis, and Paulinus say they adhere to you," it is not obscure that such fictions were born from these words being wrongly understood. Hence, if it pleases to pursue the same acts, one will not have to proceed much further to detect similar fabrications. First, it is offensive that fragments of the above epistles and of Jerome's 11th to Damasus are found corrupted by interpolations which you would seek in vain in genuine copies. Then, after the petitions which Jerome set forth in those epistles are laid out, it is subjoined, "Blessed Damasus indeed satisfied these petitions fittingly," which we certainly do not know from elsewhere.

Many of his fables concern the Council of Ariminum, the exile of Liberius, etc. But if we return to what is prefixed to the aforementioned decrees, the unskilled deceit of the impostor betrays itself no less clearly there. For Lucifer, Pancratius, and Hilary, who are known to have been sent by Liberius to Constantius in the year [357] and to have been banished from the Council of Milan in the same year, are falsely represented, after the Council of Ariminum, which was held in the year [359], as having been sent as legates to this emperor to admonish him concerning the wickedness admitted at that council. Then, according to the same acts, Constantius ordered Liberius to be "deported outside the city, as if into exile: and he lived outside, at the third milestone, in the cemetery called Noella, on the Via Salaria," and "while he was being led into exile, he left Damasus as his vicar in the city." At which time "it came about that all the bishops, whom inexperience or fear had caused to stray at the Council of Ariminum, returned to the Catholic faith through his (Damasus's) persuasions." And after a few intervening words it is added, "At the same time, as the Paschal solemnity approached, in which many desired to be reborn in Christ, Liberius summoned all Catholics of ecclesiastical rank, and sitting in the aforementioned cemetery (Noella), began to speak as follows, etc." How much all these things are at variance with the genuine truth of the matter, no one fails to see. For it is established from Theodoret and Sozomenus that Liberius was banished to Beroea in Thrace, where he had no power to summon clerics.

There Liberius himself, already broken and bent to the will of the Arians, testifies that he accepted the faith set forth for him by Demophilus, who was bishop of Beroea (Liber. epist. 8, n. 6). Nor is it less certain that Liberius was not only snatched away from the Roman Church before the Council of Ariminum, but also restored to it. Hence Hilary, writing against Constantius shortly after the aforesaid council, n. 11, addresses this emperor thus: "You then turned your war as far as Rome: you snatched away the bishop from there; and, wretched man, I know not whether you banished him with greater impiety than you sent him back." Therefore, that story of Damasus, that while Liberius was in exile he exerted himself to recall those who had lapsed at Ariminum, is pure fable. The same is to be thought concerning the office of vicar, which he is also said to have discharged, and the other things there set forth. In the decrees there is manifold suspicion of falsehood. There also exists, in the other acts which are narrated there, a similar farrago of ineptitudes. Hence we cannot sufficiently wonder how the learned father of the Annals attributed such authority to acts of this kind, that he accepted as true a Roman synod otherwise unknown, and the decrees which are boasted to have been made in it, especially since in the decrees themselves there is no likeness of truth.

Donatus is falsely alleged to be a follower of the Arian blasphemy. First, who is this Donatus, follower of the Arian blasphemy, who is asserted to have been condemned together with Macedonius, Eunomius, and Apollinaris in an earlier decree? It is probable that the one noted here is the author and chief of the nefarious schism in Africa, and that he is called a follower of the Arian blasphemy because the Arians, gathered at Philippopolis, sent to him a synodal letter inscribed with the name of the Council of Sardica. But that man neither reached the times of Damasus, nor was he heard of as a follower of the Arian blasphemy. Only a rumor had spread, "that the Arians, when they had diverged from the Catholic communion, attempted to ally themselves with the Donatists in Africa," as Augustine, admonished by Alypius, writes in his letter once numbered 163, now 44, section 6. Damasus is falsely alleged to have commanded that a synod confirm his decrees. This synod is said to have been gathered in vain by his command. Moreover, what is added, "That he also commanded this sentence to be confirmed in the holy second synod," is refuted by the acts and decrees of this second synod, in which there is no mention of Donatus, nor of anyone acting in Damasus's stead, nor of anyone commanding anything in his name. This one thing Damasus commands in his letters to Acholius and his associates concerning that council: that they take care how a blameless bishop may be ordained at Constantinople. "Because," he says, in letter 8, section

3, "I have learned that it has been arranged that a council should be held at Constantinople; your sincerity shall see to it how a bishop of the aforementioned city may be elected, who has no reproach." And there it is also to be noted that he says, "I have learned that it has been arranged that a council should be held at Constantinople," and does not say, "I have ordered that a council be gathered at Constantinople." By this, that claim is also refuted, whereby "the holy second synod is alleged to have been celebrated at Constantinople by his command and authority," and the opinion of Ant. Pagius, in the year 381, n. 7, and of others who deny that this synod was summoned by Damasus, is confirmed. Most of the decrees savor of the discipline customary in the fifth and sixth centuries. The remaining decrees for the most part savor of that discipline which flourished in the fifth and later centuries. Nor is there lacking a suspicion that they were expressed from the writings either of the Fathers or of Gallican councils. And indeed the second is consistent with canon 4 of the Council of Agde, whereby it is established that those who have taken away the possessions of the Church "shall be excluded from the churches until they return them." With the same and others are to be compared those which exist in Augustine, in the appendix of volume V, the Sermons of Caesarius of Arles, and 277, on the rendering of tithes; 278, on auguries; and 286, on avoiding idle talk in church. In this, Caesarius is named.

Thus he addresses his hearers: "When you come to church, do only what is expedient, that is, either pray or sing psalms, so that by praying you may receive pardon for your sins, and by singing psalms you may attain spiritual joy." Related to this is that passage from the earlier decree: "If it is a house of prayer, as the Lord says, no one is permitted in it except to pray, sing psalms, confess sins, and implore pardon." Sortes sanctorum. Likewise, closely related to the following decree against those who observe divinations, auguries, and the sortes sanctorum is what is prescribed in the canon of the Council of Orleans: "If any cleric, monk, or layperson believes that divination or auguries should be observed, or the sortes, which they falsely claim to be of the saints, and think they should be imparted to anyone, let them be expelled from the communion of the Church." Similar provisions are enacted in the Council of Venice, canon 16, the Council of Agde, canon 42, and the Council of Auxerre, canon 4. In this, the sortes sanctorum are said to be made "from wood or from bread"; in the Venetian and Agathensis councils, it is indicated "by any inspection of the Scriptures." To this pertains that chapter cited by Sirmond in volume II of the Gallic Councils, page 157, for the year 789: "Let no one presume to cast lots with the Psalter, or the Gospel, or other things, nor observe any divinations." Among the statutes of Boniface, Archbishop of Mainz, in Spicilegium, volume IX, page 66, the chapter is expressed thus.

If any presbyter or cleric should observe auguries or divinations or dreams, whether lots or phylacteries, that is, Scriptures, let him know that he is subject to the penalties of the canons. Here it is noteworthy that lots and phylacteries are regarded as synonyms. Moreover, this custom, by which future predictions were taken from the inspection of the Scriptures, although prohibited so many times from the beginning of the sixth century onward, nevertheless persisted for a long time thereafter, and was still frequent at the beginning of the twelfth century. Hence that prognostic of which Guibert, abbot of Nogent, in book 2 of his *De Vita Sua* and book 3, chapter 4, as well as William of Malmesbury in book 1 of his *De Pontificibus Anglorum*, folio 121, make mention, namely, that by opening a sacred codex, they would conjecture the future character of an elected bishop or abbot. That this custom is most ancient is proven by our Edmund Martène in volume 2 of *De Antiquis Ecclesiae Ritibus*, page 331. Women seduced by the illusions of demons. What we read in the decree concerning women seduced by the illusions of demons, we also have in the appendix to volume 6 of Augustine, in the book *De Spiritu et Anima*, chapter 28, and it is cited as if from the canon of the Council of Ancyra by Burchard in book 10, chapter 1; by Ivo in part 11, chapter 30; and by Gratian in Causa 26, question 5, chapter 12. To whom it should be assigned is not easily determined. As regards the aforementioned book *De Spiritu et Anima*, since it is almost a pure patchwork composed of various excerpts gathered from everywhere, that entire passage about seduced little women is rightly considered to have been borrowed from elsewhere.

But it does not appear among the canons of the Council of Ancyra or of Ancyra. It would remain, therefore, that the aforementioned compilers of canons be judged to have taken it from the acts of the Roman synod praised in the life of Damasus, were it not for two obstacles: first, that it is attributed by none of them either to Damasus or to the Roman synod; second, that among them it appears fuller and more complete, whereas in the life of Damasus it appears more meager and manifestly truncated: so much so that there it flows pure from the source, but here it flows corrupted. Shorter, but entirely similar to this, is another decree which Burchard, book X, chapter 29, and Ivo, part 11, chapter 54, cite from the Council of Agde, although it is equally absent from this council: "It must be inquired whether there is any woman who says that through certain sorceries and incantations she can change the minds of men, that is, to convert from hatred to love, or from love to hatred, or to ruin or steal the goods of men; and whether there is any who says that she, transformed into the likeness of women, rides on certain nights with a crowd of demons upon certain beasts, and is counted among their company; such a one is to be beaten with rods in every way and cast out of the parish.

Concerning the Hour for Celebrating Masses.—The decree on the hours at which it is permitted to celebrate Masses seems no less fictitious than the Nicene canon, whose renewal is pretended in it. Among those things which Isidore Mercator fabricated for the early pontiffs, there exists this one under the name of Pope Telesphorus: "At other times (apart from the night of the Lord's Nativity) celebrations of Masses are by no means to be held before the third hour"; the falsity of which we have proven when treating of Telesphorus himself on page 59. Whether Damasus is the Author of the Alternate Singing of Psalms.—Decree 8, by which Saint Damasus is said to have established "that psalms be sung day and night in all churches," and that, as is added in Anastasius, he commanded this "to priests and bishops or monasteries," can be understood in two ways: namely, either that they be simply sung, or that they be sung in alternate turns. But in truth, experts in antiquity hold that this custom—that psalms be simply sung in churches—did not begin with Damasus, but had always obtained from the beginning of the Church. And that even some hymns were sung by alternating choirs, Saint Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, instituted in his own church, and that this custom spread from the Antiochene church to the others, Socrates is the authority in Book VI, chapter 8. Pliny also, in Letter 102 to Trajan, writes that he had learned from Christians themselves "that they were accustomed to assemble on a fixed day before light and to recite a hymn to Christ as to a god among themselves.

Nor does anything detract from this authority because Tertullian, in Apologeticus, chapter 2, passes over that point in turn and considers it sufficient to say that Pliny wrote to Trajan that “he had discovered nothing else about their (the Christians’) sacraments except early-morning gatherings for singing to Christ and to God.” For there, with Tertullian reporting not so much Pliny’s words as his meaning, such an omission was permissible. However, from a mutual comparison of the words of Pliny and Tertullian, Lombert’s conjecture seems almost certain, whereby he judges that in Tertullian, “to Christ and to God” should be restored as “to Christ as God.” For who does not notice that he wished to express that phrase of Pliny’s, “to Christ as to a god,” and thus that he ought to have written “as” rather than “and”? Certainly, in old books, “and” is frequently read for “as.” And I have thought it worth noting this here, so that what was noted above, on the page, in passing concerning the same passage of Tertullian from a not sufficiently accurate report, may be corrected from this. But to return to the point from which we had digressed, Pliny there, no differently than Socrates above, mentions only certain hymns, not psalms in general, sung alternately in the gatherings of Christians. Most, however, interpret the cited decree concerning the singing of psalms to be celebrated alternately, and are moved by nothing else to make Damasus the author of this usage. This was so firmly believed by an ancient writer whom our Mabillon, in the preface to the second part of the fourth century of the Acta Sanctorum Ordinis Sancti Benedicti, n.

Laudatus, as in the Lirinian Chronology concerning Saint Agricolus, who had been snatched from the Lirinian monastery to the cathedral of the church of Avignon and had wished to introduce alternate chanting there, handed down that tradition in these words: "He also wished that the canonical hours and divine offices in that same church should thereafter be recited in the same manner as was customary in monasteries, namely with alternate chants. For that custom, which Pope Damasus had introduced some years before, had not yet taken hold in those regions." The author of this custom in the West is Ambrose; Flavianus and Diodorus in the East. Nevertheless, Cardinal Bona, in *De Divina Psalmodia*, chapter 16, number 1, notes the error of those who assert that Damasus was the author of alternate chanting in the West, since all who write about sacred rites in the Latin church attribute the glory of introducing this custom to Ambrose, and they rely on the testimony of Augustine, who in book 9 of the *Confessions*, chapter [6], committed the matter to memory in this manner: "Not long before, the church of Milan had begun to celebrate this kind of consolation and exhortation, with great zeal of the brothers singing together with voices and hearts. It was certainly a year, or not much more, since Justina, the mother of the boy-king Valentinian, persecuted your servant Ambrose on account of her heresy, by which she had been seduced by the Arians. The pious people kept vigil in the church, ready to die with their bishop, your servant...

Then hymns and psalms were instituted to be sung according to the custom of the Eastern regions, lest the people waste away with the tedium of sorrow, and this practice has been retained to the present day, with many, indeed nearly all, of your flocks and throughout the rest of the world imitating it. In the East, however, as Theodoretus testifies in Book II of his Ecclesiastical History, chapter, Flavianus and Diodorus, while they were still among the laity, "first divided the chanting choirs into two parts and taught them to sing the Davidic hymns alternately: this indeed first began to be done at Antioch, then spread to the rest, and was carried to the very ends of the earth." It cannot be said that this was confirmed by Damasus.—It was propagated by pious rivalry among the churches.—Thus the aforementioned Cardinal asserts that this pious custom was first introduced into the West by Ambrose, so that it is believed to have been later confirmed by Pope Damasus with pontifical authority, and from this he opines that the error of certain historians who think Damasus to be its author has flowed. But this opinion is not free from error. For if this custom began only from the time when Ambrose was persecuted by Justina, which happened in that year, how could Damasus have confirmed it, when he died and had Siricius as his successor at least from the beginning of the year, as the letter of Siricius himself to Himerius attests? And indeed, although Augustine mentions that this custom was spread throughout almost the whole world in a short time, he is completely silent about this confirmation by Damasus.

And it is far more probable that individual churches seized upon this practice out of a kind of holy emulation rather than by any pontifical authority. Certainly, in the church of Avignon, when Saint Agricolus undertook its administration, it had not yet been established, as we saw above. The same must be said of the church of Arles, when Caesarius was placed over it; and when he finally obtained that this custom be admitted, he could not contain his joy, and revealed it in a singular sermon, which now exists in the appendix to volume V of Augustine: "For many years," he says, "my mind was agitated over this matter, and with the whole intention of my heart I desired that the pious Lord would inspire in you that custom of psalmody.... For as I desired that you should sing psalms in the way it was done in other neighboring cities, so God prepared your hearts that you might accomplish this even better, with the Lord's help." Indeed, if a general decree of the supreme pontiff had preceded on this matter, such celebrated churches, situated on the border of Italy, would not have delayed so long in obeying it; nor would Caesarius, acting as vicar of the apostolic see in Gaul, have failed to invoke such weighty authority, so that what he so ardently desired might be obtained more quickly. Yet he does not say, "For as I desired that you should sing psalms," as was commanded by a decree of the apostolic see; but only this, "as it was done in other neighboring cities.

In the passage above, from the Lérins chronology, it should be noted that the words, "For in those parts that custom, which some years earlier Pope Damasus had introduced, had not yet taken hold," are by no means the words of Saint Agricolus, but of the chronographer. Whether Damasus decreed that the Gloria Patri, etc., be added to the psalms.—Or at least whether the final part of the last decree is to be admitted, by which Damasus is said to have decreed that at the end of each psalm the Gloria Patri, etc., be added? Cardinal Bona, *De Div. Psalm.*, ch. 16, no. 2, admits that many writers, otherwise most trustworthy, refer this law of singing the doxology at the end of psalms to Damasus, and suppose that it was enacted by this pope at the persuasion and instigation of Jerome. But he warns that these have been deceived by a spurious letter, which, namely, Isidorus Mercator forged for Jerome, in which it is read: "Therefore your client prays that this voice of the psalm-singers may be sung in your Roman see day and night, and that at the end of any psalm, whether at the morning or evening hours, the order of your apostolate may command the Gloria Patri et Filio et Spiritui sancto to be joined, as it was, etc." Indeed, in the year 529, as is gathered from canon 5 of the Second Council of Vaison, which was celebrated in that year, this custom had not yet been received in Gaul, that the verse *Sicut erat* be added to the doxology *Gloria Patri*, although it had already obtained in other regions.

Thus the council speaks: "For not only in the apostolic see, but also throughout the whole East and all of Africa or Italy, on account of the cunning of heretics, who blasphemously claim that the Son of God did not always exist with the Father, but began in time, in all clauses, after the Gloria, 'As he was in the beginning' is said, and we also decree that this is to be said thus in all our churches." There indeed, after the words "in all clauses," the word "of the psalms" is not expressed, but it is clear that this is to be understood from these words of Pope Vigilius, Epistle I, to Profuturus, Bishop of Braga, number: "But we judge that to be a novelty of error, that whereas at the end of the psalms it is customary for all Catholics to say, 'Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,' etc." But if, in the adoption of the verse "As he was in the beginning," Gaul was later than the whole East, it certainly long preceded it in the custom of singing the Gloria Patri. For Cassian, in Book II of the Institutes of the Cenobites, which is believed to have been composed before that year, writes in the chapter: "That also which we have seen in this province (of Gaul), that when one sings, at the conclusion of the psalm all standing sing together with a shout, 'Glory to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit,' we have nowhere heard throughout the whole East.

Since these things are so, it must be admitted that the ancient custom of singing the doxology "Gloria Patri" with the addition of the verse "Sicut erat" at the end of each psalm, devised for the purpose of suppressing the Arian heresy and gradually received throughout the whole Church, is ancient; but there is no reason why it should be attributed to Damasus. A decree of Damasus concerning the rite of singing the Alleluia in the City.—Besides the eight earlier decrees which are ascribed to Damasus as if issued in a Roman synod, Gregory I attributes to him another concerning the rite of singing the word Alleluia in the City. Someone coming from Sicily had expostulated with this pope, that he followed the customs of the Constantinopolitan church or of the Greeks in all things, and specifically "because he had caused the Alleluia to be said at Masses outside the season of Pentecost." Then the pious and modest pontiff repulsed even the unjustly expostulating man not without a suitable satisfaction; but, as he himself writes in the month of October, Indiction 2, to John, bishop of Syracuse, "I, he says, replied that in none of those things (which he was reproaching) did we follow another church;" and then he subjoins: "For that the Alleluia should be said here (the old mss. of Reg. and Colb. say 'not'), it is reported to have been derived from the church of Jerusalem by the tradition of blessed Jerome at the time of blessed Damasus. And therefore in this matter we have rather abolished that custom." In which passage what Gregory means must be examined: so that it may be understood what he himself decreed, and what he says was decreed by Damasus.

The first interpretation of Gregory's words is set forth. Cardinal Bona, in his work *De Divinis Psalmis*, chapter [—], interprets it thus: "that whereas the Alleluia was sung only during the Paschal season, it was then (at Jerome's urging, by Damasus) decreed that it should also be used outside that season." To this interpretation of the Cardinal, Tillemont also, in volume VIII, page 420, gives his assent. From this, those two most distinguished men observe that the tradition commended by Gregory is not altogether certain; since, they say, the custom of singing the Alleluia at Rome in the time of Damasus was so frequent that it was heard even at funerals, as Jerome testifies in the epitaph of Fabiola. Tillemont adds that it is also uncertain whether Jerome had gone to Jerusalem before the death of Damasus. But even if their interpretation were admitted, and it were conceded that Jerome had not gone to Jerusalem before betaking himself to Damasus, nothing would be established from the reasons adduced against the tradition recorded by Gregory. For, first, they are speaking only of singing the Alleluia within Masses, not of using the same word outside Masses and at funerals. Secondly, the funeral of Fabiola occurred after the death of Damasus, and therefore after the introduction of the new custom. Finally, since it is established that Jerome lived in Syria before he made his way to Rome, it is beyond doubt that he could also have become acquainted there with the customs of Jerusalem.

The other interpretation is to be preferred to it. But Isidorus Mercator followed an interpretation entirely opposite to that of the praised men. For he, only on the occasion of the cited words of Gregory, brought in Jerome writing thus to Damasus: "In the Church, however, (the use of singing Alleluia) is concluded from holy Resurrection until holy Pentecost within the space of fifty days." From this it is evident that Gregory was understood by him in such a way that, whereas Alleluia was previously sung outside Pentecost, Damasus, at Jerome's urging, decreed that it should be sung only within Pentecost. And indeed this understanding of Gregory's words agrees most fittingly both with his own discourse and with historical truth. For it is certain that in Augustine's age there existed some churches in which Alleluia was sung only during the Paschal season. Wherefore the same Doctor, in his letter formerly 119, now 55, chapter 17, writes: "But that Alleluia is sung in church only on those fifty days is not everywhere observed; for on other days too it is sung variously in different places." Moreover, that among those churches which sang Alleluia only within the Paschal season one was the Roman church is not rashly inferred from Sozomen (Sozomen, Book VII, chapter 19). He indeed erred when he wrote, "At Rome Alleluia is sung once a year on the first day of the Paschal festival," and he was the cause of error for Nicephorus Callistus when he copied his words (Nicephorus, Book XII, chapter [—]).

34): But the cause of that error seems to be none other than that, since among Latin writers "Pascha" is used indiscriminately either for the entire Paschal season or for the single day of the Lord's Resurrection, when he heard that Alleluia is sung at Rome only at Pascha, he interpreted it as referring to a single day, whereas it had been said to him concerning the entire Paschal season. Nor does the same interpretation cohere less aptly with Gregory's speech. For he promises that someone had complained to him "because he had ordered Alleluia to be said at Masses outside the seasons of Pentecost." Whence it follows that before that it was said only within the seasons of Pentecost. Then, to the one protesting that he had introduced Greek customs into the Roman Church, he responds, "In none of these things have we followed another church." And thereupon, according to the Regius and Colbertinus manuscripts, he fittingly adds: "For that Alleluia would not be said here (supply: outside the seasons of Pentecost) is handed down as derived from the church of Jerusalem, from the tradition of the blessed Jerome, at the time of the blessed Pope Damasus of happy memory. And therefore in this matter," by which we have ordered it also to be said outside the seasons of Pentecost, "we have cut off that custom which had been handed down here by the Greeks." Clearly in this entire speech thus explained, there is nothing that does not most aptly accord with Gregory's purpose.

On the other hand, if with the common reading, "For that alleluia might be said here," it is likewise supplied outside the seasons of Pentecost, the same pontiff's speech becomes not only obscure and devoid of all understanding, but even absurd. How the tradition set forth by Gregory can stand. With these points established, it now remains to be asked whether at least that which Gregory writes as "drawn from tradition" by Jerome can stand. Does not a tradition of this sort conflict with the fact that the same Doctor, at the beginning of his book against Vigilantius, condemns that heretic's statement that "alleluia should never be sung except at Easter"? Or with the fact that in the epitaph of Fabiola, after recalling the whole city's gathering at her funeral, he adds, "The psalms resounded, and the gilded alleluia, echoing in the heights of the temples, shook them?" Moreover, not long before Gregory's time, at least in the churches of Italy, the alleluia was accustomed to be sung and used outside of Pentecost, as is evidenced by the Benedictine Rule itself, which was known and familiar to Gregory, in whose chapter it is prescribed: "That on every Sunday outside of Lent, the canticles of Matins, Prime, Terce, Sext, and None be said with alleluia;" but on the other days, "from Pentecost to the beginning of Lent, on all nights, (alleluia) be said only with the six latter psalms at Nocturns.

Nevertheless, the aforementioned tradition can be reconciled with this if what we have observed above is admitted—namely, that it is to be understood as referring to the singing of the alleluia at Masses. Thus, what the Benedictine Rule establishes in the cited passage, "Responsories are never to be said with alleluia except from Easter to Pentecost," also obtained at Rome before the time of Gregory in the Masses, so that they were never said with alleluia except from Easter to Pentecost. Gregory, however, thought it permissible for himself to abrogate the custom, which, as rumor had it, had begun at Rome under Damasus, and to revoke what had been abrogated by this pope. Five decrees attributed to Damasus. In the Crabbe edition of the councils, and subsequently in others, five other decrees under the name of Damasus have been published, collected from the compilations of Gratian and Ivo. The first of these is cited by Gratian, 2, q. 3, c. 2, as follows: "A calumniator, if he fails in his accusation, shall receive the talion." It is, however, excerpted from the Isidorian letter to Bishop Stephen, forged under the name of Damasus, chapter 7, the very words of which are reported by the same Gratian, IV, q. 3, c. 4. What is prescribed there is consistent with the Theodosian Code, book IX, title I, law 14, and title 10, law 3.

Another passage they report thus: "If anyone has attacked or accused a bishop, or a presbyter, or a deacon with false charges, and has been unable to prove them, we decree that communion is not to be given to him even at the end." But this, which is cited by Gratian II, quaest. 3, c. 4, as Damasus, and by Ivo part VI, c. 240, after Burchard lib. II, c. 195, as canon 5 of the Council of Carthage, belongs to neither, but is canon 75 of the Council of Liberitanum. The third, which Gratian X, quaest. I, cap. 15, sets forth, is of this kind: "We entirely forbid this custom, which seems to be increasing against the holy Catholic Church, so that in no way may the oblations which are offered within the holy church ever be detained under the dominion of laymen: but only priests, who are seen to serve the Lord daily, may be permitted to eat and drink: because in the Old Testament (Leviticus 2 and 24) the Lord forbade the sons of Israel to eat the sacred loaves, except only Aaron and his sons: which loaves were far from those loaves which are now offered in the holy Church; because those were under the shadow of the Law; but those which now are under the grace of the Holy Spirit, with the Gospel shining throughout the whole world, seem to be more luminous. With what face or with what conscience do you wish to receive oblations, who can scarcely offer prayers to God for yourselves, let alone for others?

Because it is wicked and contrary to the Lord’s command, and brings harm to his own soul, whoever attempts to do that which is in no way permitted to him. For it pleased all the holy fathers and our predecessors that this sanction be made, and we likewise wish to persist in the same, that no one dare to render void what has been established, unless he wishes to persist in perpetual damnation. But if anyone should be a rash presumptuous person against this rule of ours and against the rule of the holy 318 fathers who established this at the Council of Nicaea, and should further attempt to remove offerings from the sacred churches, let him be bound and condemned under the bond of anathema. All answered: “Let it be done, let it be done.” Regarding this decree, I observe first that it seems to be nothing other than a fabrication of the one who composed the letter published in the new edition of Jerome, vol. V, p. 420, inscribed as from Jerome to Damasus concerning offerings of the altar, in which that Doctor is feigned to write thus to this pope:

Let your holy authority know, venerable Pope, that concerning the question which your client set before you, and to which you sent fitting responses by letter—that is, concerning the loaves offered by the faithful on the altar, and who ought lawfully to use them—I have taken care to write back to you briefly, insofar as I have been able to investigate the matter from the principal teachers of the Church. The suitable witnesses whom I have consulted to corroborate this matter are these: Gregory Nazianzenus, the wonderful teacher; Cyril; Athanasius; Theophilus; Anatolius; John Chrysostom; Eustathius; Eusebius the chronographer; and our Hilary. All of them, with one voice and the same consent, as true instruments of the Holy Spirit, judge that those who have turned the offering loaves to the use of the laity ought to be struck with the sword of anathema, because these loaves are due to priests alone, unless perhaps laypersons receive them from the hand of a priest by way of blessing for the sake of religion. Moreover, our fathers decreed this not only concerning the loaves in church, but also concerning all things that are offered at the altar, saying and teaching that it is a great wickedness, and done everywhere with utterly diabolical temerity, wherever it occurs; and that it is altogether intolerable for the holy Church that it should remain without the vengeance of the sacred canons. Hence Chrysostom, in his commentaries on Matthew (Matt.

XII, 1), where the disciples were plucking ears of grain on the Sabbath, and the Pharisees were rebuking them, thus says: If it was not lawful for David and his men, while still under the shadow of the Law, to eat the loaves of proposition when he asked for loaves from Abimelech, driven by hunger; how now, with the Gospel shining forth, should the laity be persuaded to seize for their own uses the offering of loaves offered to God? For the Apostle likewise says: "Those who serve the altar shall partake of the altar (X, quaest. 1 c. 13)." Therefore, because priests are accustomed to pray for all those whose alms and offerings they receive, with what face do the laity presume either to eat the offerings which Christians offer for their sins, or to grant them to others, since they themselves ought not to pray for the people? For this reason, glorious Pope, it is necessary to send those presumptuous ones into perpetual excommunication; so that others may have a warning, and these things may no longer happen in the Church.

Both works are the product of an impostor. Regarding this letter, in the latest edition of Jerome it is noted, from his opinion, that "he heaps up names of authors, from whom, however, he adduces nothing, because he had read none of them; the commentaries of Chrysostom are cited by name, although the blessed Jerome was entirely ignorant of Chrysostom." He certainly was ignorant of his commentaries on Matthew, as long as Damasus lived. For this pope ceased to live in that year. Chrysostom, however, only began to preach when he was ordained a presbyter. But also the words, as if cited from his commentaries on Matthew XII, 1, we have sought in vain in those works. Moreover, if we compare this letter with the decree prefixed to it, we will perceive that it is the work of one and the same craftsman, who now plays the role of a counselor who is consulted, now of a judge who pronounces sentence. And from the same source, both Gregory, the presbyter known under the name of Polycarp, and Gratian excerpted each. Many other things also betray the impostor. For when, in the year under Pope Symmachus, a document of the king of the Heruli was read before the council, by which he attempted to attribute some right to kings over the property of the church, the whole council cried out against this hitherto unheard-of matter, and specifically Bishop Eulalius said (Symmach. ep. V, n. 11): "To laymen, however religious, no power to dispose of ecclesiastical properties is ever recorded to have been attributed.

Therefore, in the times of Damasus, and even more so of the Nicene Synod, there was no need to restrain the laity from claiming ecclesiastical oblations for themselves. This depraved custom, whose increase and growth the impostor laments, rather smacks of the ninth century. Hence the bishops gathered in the Second Council of Aachen confirmed with three books sent to the same King Pippin, containing testimonies from Scripture, the Fathers, and councils, what they had previously written to King Pippin "against those who said there was no difference if they used things offered to God for their own needs." Both works can be attributed to Isidorus Mercator not without reason. Therefore, each writing fits aptly into that time in which the impostor Isidorus lived. Neither, indeed, exists in his extensive collection; but nothing prevents the notion that, after his edition, a mind so fertile in falsehoods might have produced something new. Certainly, he who wrote to Damasus under the name of Jerome concerning the verse "Gloria Patri" to be added at the end of each psalm, "Therefore your client prays," now seems to address the same person under the same name in this manner: "Because concerning the question which you, your little client, proposed.

He who wishes to hear in both writings a recent sanction as if it were an ancient rule of the holy fathers, is he not recognized as the very one who is accustomed to peddle his own opinions as if they were decrees of the ancestors, and to bring forward older Roman pontiffs as the champions of those decrees which only later ones enacted? Finally, it is peculiar to him to commend his own fabrications by the fictitious authority of the Nicene council. So that this may succeed more favorably for him, from the very prooemium of his collection he strives with the utmost zeal to persuade that there were once far more canons of the Nicene council than those which are extant. Whence also, repeatedly, but especially in the pseudo-Julian epistle, he does not fear to ascribe to this council many decrees which are entirely foreign to it. To whom, therefore, shall we assign the decree against those who strive to carry off oblations from the sacred churches, which is most falsely vaunted to us as the ancient rule of the 318 Nicene fathers, if not to the most notorious parent of falsehoods of this kind?

Concerning violators of the canons. In the editions of the councils, this decree is reported fourth: “Voluntary violators of the canons are gravely judged by the holy fathers, and are condemned by the Holy Spirit, by whose instinct and gift they were dictated, since they seem not incongruously to blaspheme against the Holy Spirit, etc.” However, this was not unpublished. For it was transcribed by Gratian, 25, quaest. I, c. 5, from that epistle which Isidore Mercator, pretending that Damasus was writing back to Aurelius, bishop of Carthage, placed before his collection, and which may be seen published in Labbe, vol. II of the Councils, p. and elsewhere. Concerning metropolitans who neglect to seek the pallium. The last decree reads thus: “Since certain metropolitans, refusing to set forth their faith to the holy apostolic see according to ancient custom, neither seek nor receive the use of the pallium; and through this, the consecration of bishops for widowed churches is prolonged not without danger: it is decreed that any metropolitan who within three months of his consecration has not sent to the apostolic see to set forth his faith and to receive the pallium, shall lose the dignity committed to him; and it shall be lawful for other metropolitans, after a second and third admonition, to come to the aid of widowed churches, with the counsel of the Roman pontiff, by ordaining bishops (Ans. widowed church... by ordaining a bishop).

If, however, the negligence of the bishop to be consecrated should result in the church remaining widowed beyond three months, he shall be deprived of communion until he either yields his place or does not delay in presenting himself for consecration. But if, through his own negligence, he has kept the church widowed beyond five months, he shall receive the gift of consecration neither there nor elsewhere; indeed, he shall yield to the judgment of his metropolitan (Ans. recedat). And this indeed is ascribed to Damasus by Anselm, book VI, chapter 80; Burchard, book I, chapter 25; Polycarp, book II, title 10; and the author of the Panormia, book III, chapter 11. But Ivo, part III, chapter 136, and Gratian, Distinction 100, chapter 1, with whom Innocent III also agrees, book I, letter 117, to the Archbishop of Bourges, whose beginning is "Ne si universi," attribute that to Pelagius. The same Innocent III, in the Extravagantes, On the Transfer of Bishops, chapter 2, §1, cited, as if from a Canon, cites its final words thus: "Nor that which is read in the Canon concerning the elect, that if beyond six (note there six, not five, is read) months through his own negligence he has kept the church widowed, he shall receive the gift of consecration neither there nor elsewhere; indeed, he shall yield to the judgment of his metropolitan, etc.

But this does not suit either Damasus or Pelagius I or II, since the discipline in question is asserted and vindicated as having been introduced only in the eighth century, as can be gathered from the council over which Boniface, bishop of Mainz, presided in that year, and about which he himself writes in a letter: "We decreed in our synodal assembly, and we confessed that we would preserve the Catholic faith and unity and subjection to the Roman Church to the end, that we wish to be subject to Saint Peter and his vicars, and that metropolitans are to seek pallia from that see." Hence it is clear that metropolitans, at least in Gaul, had not yet been subjected to any law in that year compelling them to seek pallia from the apostolic see. Indeed, the Franks did not immediately obey the aforesaid decree, and we learn from both the letter of Pope Zacharias to Boniface and from Boniface's reply to him that metropolitans even afterwards deliberated whether to seek pallia from the apostolic see. But if by the middle of the eighth century this custom had not yet fully prevailed, that metropolitans should seek pallia from the apostolic see, who would not judge that a decree which is clearly shown to have been issued when it was already long established by custom that metropolitans not only sought the pallium from the apostolic see, but also could not exercise their office and ordain bishops until they had received it, is much more recent in date? The latest editors of Gratian have warned about this, as appears at the head of the aforementioned decree.

Pelagius, pope, is found in two Vatican codices to be John VIII from the third council at Ravenna. Nor will anyone deny that this fits aptly into the times of this pope, whom Gratian likewise, in Distinction 100, chapter 4, cites as writing thus to Wilibert, bishop of Cologne: "We have been unable to confer the desired pallium upon you now, because we find that the page of your faith contains less than it ought." Here I observe in passing that, even if in the era of Pope Zacharias this custom had not yet obtained—that all metropolitans were bound to seek the pallium from the Apostolic See—nevertheless, those to whom it was then granted were accustomed first to set forth their faith to the Apostolic See. Hence the same pope writes in a letter to Boniface: "For we have sent to them instructions on what the custom of the pallium is, and how those who are permitted to use the pallium ought to set forth their faith.