any more, saying that he had never known an assembly of bishops
terminate well; that, instead of removing evils, they only increased
them, and that their strifes and lust of power were not to be described.
A thousand years later, Aeneas Sylvius, Pope Pius II., speaking of
another council, observes that it was not so much directed by the Holy
Ghost as by the passions of men.

[Sidenote: Progressive variation of human thought manifested by these
councils.]

[Sidenote: Pontifical power sustained by physical force.]

Notwithstanding the contradictions and opposition they so frequently
exhibit, there may be discerned in the decisions of these bodies the
traces of an affiliation indicating the continuous progression of
thought. Thus, of the four oecumenical councils that were concerned
with the facts spoken of in the preceding pages, that of Nicea
determined the Son to be of the same substance with the Father; that of
Constantinople, that the Son and Holy Spirit are equal to the Father;
that of Ephesus, that the two natures of Christ make but one person; and
that of Chalcedon, that these natures remain two, notwithstanding their
personal union. But that they failed of their object in constituting a
criterion of truth is plainly demonstrated by such simple facts as that,
in the fourth century alone, there were thirteen councils adverse to
Arius, fifteen in his favour, and seventeen for the semi-Arians--in all,
forty-five. From such a confusion, it was necessary that the councils
themselves must be subordinate to a higher authority--a higher
criterion, able to give to them or refuse to them authenticity. That the
source of power, both for the council in the East and the papacy in the
West, was altogether political, is proved by almost every transaction in
which they were concerned. In the case of the papacy, this was well seen
in the contest between Hilary the Bishop of Arles, and Leo, on which
occasion an edict was issued by the Emperor Valentinian denouncing the
contumacy of Hilary, and setting forth that "though the sentence of so
great a pontiff as the Bishop of Rome did not need imperial
confirmation, yet that it must now be understood by all bishops that the
decrees of the apostolic see should henceforth be law, and that whoever
refused to obey the citation of the Roman pontiff should be compelled to
do so by the Moderator of the province." Herein we see the intrinsic
nature of Papal power distinctly. It is allied with