rowed the model of a representative council from the celebrated
examples of their own country, the Amphictyons, the Achaean league, or
the assemblies of the Ionian cities. It was soon established as a custom
and as a law, that the bishops of the independent churches should meet
in the capital of the province at the stated periods of spring and
autumn. Their deliberations were assisted by the advice of a few
distinguished presbyters, and moderated by the presence of a listening
multitude. [115] Their decrees, which were styled Canons, regulated every
important controversy of faith and discipline; and it was natural to
believe that a liberal effusion of the Holy Spirit would be poured
on the united assembly of the delegates of the Christian people. The
institution of synods was so well suited to private ambition, and
to public interest, that in the space of a few years it was received
throughout the whole empire. A regular correspondence was established
between the provincial councils, which mutually communicated and
approved their respective proceedings; and the catholic church soon
assumed the form, and acquired the strength, of a great foederative
republic. [116]

[Footnote 1141: The synods were not the first means taken by the insulated
churches to enter into communion and to assume a corporate character.
The dioceses were first formed by the union of several country churches
with a church in a city: many churches in one city uniting among
themselves, or joining a more considerable church, became metropolitan.
The dioceses were not formed before the beginning of the second century:
before that time the Christians had not established sufficient churches
in the country to stand in need of that union. It is towards the
middle of the same century that we discover the first traces of the
metropolitan constitution. (Probably the country churches were founded
in general by missionaries from those in the city, and would preserve a
natural connection with the parent church.)--M. ----The provincial
synods did not commence till towards the middle of the third century,
and were not the first synods. History gives us distinct notions of the
synods, held towards the end of the second century, at Ephesus at
Jerusalem, at Pontus, and at Rome, to put an end to the disputes which
had arisen between the Latin and Asiatic churches about the celebration
of Easter. But these synods were not subject to any regular form or
periodical return;