of the mother city, and
one of her Patriarchs, John the Faster, in the sixth century, first set
the evil example of assuming the title of "Universal Bishop," a title
which the Roman Pontiffs have since taken and retained. In proportion
as the political division between East and West became more complete,
so also did the tendency towards separation in ecclesiastical matters
increase. [Sidenote: Beginnings of disunion.] Western dioceses, now
peopled by the barbarian nations who had overrun Europe, still looked
up to Rome as their centre and head; whilst the Eastern Bishops, under
the sway of the decaying empire, clung to Constantinople. [Sidenote:
Its crisis.] The controversy respecting the use of Images, and that
about the Procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son as well as from the
Father, were, however, the means of actually bringing about the
cessation of all outward communion between East and West.

Section 2. _The Iconoclast (or Image-breaking) Controversy._

[Sidenote: Dislike of images]

There had been from very early times an extensive though not universal
feeling in the Church, against the use of painting or sculpture in {96}
Divine Worship. This feeling was occasioned partly by dread of the
idolatry still prevalent amongst the heathen, and partly, especially in
the East, where it was strongest, by the remains of Judaism still
lingering in the Church of Christ. [Sidenote: lost in the West, but
retained in the East.] As heathenism died out, it was gradually felt in
the West that the strong reasons formerly existing against the
adornment of Churches with pictures and images had passed away; but the
Eastern Church, with that dread of change which distinguishes it to
this day, clung as before to the old sentiment.

[Sidenote: Image-breaking legislation]

In the eighth century, Leo III., "the Isaurian," then reigning at
Constantinople, passed a decree for the removal of all images and
paintings from Churches, and his violent conduct in the matter
occasioned such discontent in the West, that Italy withdrew altogether
from the nominal allegiance she had hitherto paid to the emperors,
about A.D. 730. [sidenote: dissolved the link between Eastern and
Western Empires.] Other emperors were as fanatical in their
Iconoclastic (or image-breaking) prejudices as Leo, and their
extravagance excited a reaction in the other extreme in the Western
empire. [Sidenote: Reactionary decrees in the West.] In A.D. 786, a