Lucius, a British King, is said, by Bede, to have written to Pope Eleutherius, intreating him to send a proper Person into Britain, to instruct him in the Mysteries of the Christian Religion; which the Pope readily granted[[246]]. But as this is vouched only by Bede, who lived many Ages after him, and by a Pontifical, supposed to have been written about the Middle of the Sixth Century, what Credit the whole History of Lucius may deserve, I leave the Reader to judge. Such a remarkable Event could not have escaped Eusebius, who, speaking of this very Period of Time, tells us, that, at Rome, many Persons, eminent for their Birth and Wealth, embraced the Christian Religion, with their whole Families[[247]]. A solemn Embassy from a British King, and his Conversion, surely deserved a Place in the History of the Church. |The whole Account
fabulous.| He informs us, that, in the Reign of Commodus, and the Pontificate of Eleutherius, the Christian Religion enjoyed a profound Tranquillity all over the World; that it flourished, and attracted, to use his Expression, the Minds of many People[[248]]. Had he not here a favourable Opportunity of mentioning our Royal Proselyte, who, in the Reign of Commodus, is supposed to have written to Eleutherius, and by his means to have been converted to the Christian Religion? To what can we ascribe the Silence of such an exact and accurate Writer, concerning an Event which would have greatly recommended both his History, and the Christian Religion? To an invincible Antipathy, says the Jesuit Alford[[249]], which he bore to the Name of Britain, and which was so prevalent in him, that he chose rather to suppress the Conversion of Lucius than mention it. But what could thus set Eusebius against Britain? Had he been ever injured by the Britons? Does he not elsewhere mention both them and their Country? This jesuitical, absurd, and groundless Speculation, which must expose the Author of it to the Ridicule of every Reader, I should perhaps have let pass unobserved, had he not in this very Place insulted, beyond the Bounds of common Decency, the Reformers of Religion, for rejecting some idle Ceremonies, which he supposes to have been practised at the Conversion of Lucius. But, not to lay the whole Stress on the Silence of Eusebius, and other antient Writers, to whom King Lucius was utterly unknown, why should he have been at the Trouble of sending to Rome for an Instructor? Were there not many in his own Kingdom as capable of instructing him as any Rome could send? The Christian Religion had been planted in this Island long before the Reign of Lucius, in the Time of the Apostles, as Gildas seems to insinuate[[250]], at least very early in the Second Century; for Origen, who flourished in the Beginning of the Third, tells us, that the Virtue of the Name of Jesus had passed the Seas, to find out the Britons in another World[[251]].
Several Monkish
Fables concerning
King Lucius.
The short Account, which Bede gives us of the Embassy and Conversion of King Lucius, has not only been greedily swallowed by the Monkish Writers, who came after him, but has served as a Ground-plot to the innumerable Fables with which they have filled this Part of their Histories. They even tell us the Names of the Embassadors sent by Lucius to the Pope, and of the Legates a Latere sent by the Pope to Lucius. The former were Elvanus and Medwinus, who, being ordained Bishops by Eleutherius, returned to Britain, and greatly contributed to the Conversion of this Island. These Fables gained Credit, by Degrees, in those Ages of Ignorance and Superstition, insomuch that the Two Embassadors were at last ranked among the Saints; and their Bodies, where or when found, nobody knows, exposed to public Veneration, in the Monastery of Glassenbury, on the First of January[[252]]. The Pope’s Legates were Fugacius and Damianus[Damianus], who, as we are told, went back to Rome, to obtain of Eleutherius a Confirmation of what they had done; and, from Rome, returned into Britain, with a Letter from the Pope to King Lucius[[253]]. As for the King himself, he is said to have quitted his Kingdom, and, turning Missionary, to have preached the Gospel in Germany, especially at Ausburgh; to have travelled from thence into the Country of the Grisons; and, lastly, to have been ordained Bishop of Coire, their Metropolis; and to have died there a Martyr[[254]]. To these Monkish Fables King Lucius owes a Place among the Saints; for on the Third of December is kept, in the Church of Rome, the Festival of Lucius, King of the Britons, who died at Coire in Germany[[255]]: these are the Words of the Roman Martyrology; but Bede does not so much as mention him in his; a plain Proof, that what is said of his Preaching, of his Martyrdom, &c. was invented after that Writer’s Time. And yet Alford has not only filled his Annals with these, and suchlike fabulous Accounts, giving an intire Credit to them, but inveighs, with great Acrimony, against those who have not the Gift of Belief in the same Degree with himself, especially against Dempster, telling, him, that till his Time the Conversion of Lucius had never been questioned by any Man of Sense or Learning[[256]]. And truly, the Story of King Lucius has been credited even by the greater Part of Protestant Writers, out of Respect to our venerable Historian; but as he wrote many Ages after the pretended Conversion of that Prince, and none of the Writers of those Days, whom such a remarkable Event could hardly have escaped, give us the least Hint of it, we may be well allowed to question the Whole, notwithstanding the Authority of Bede, which can be of no Weight with respect to Transactions that are said to have happened in Times so remote.
Eleutherius governed, according to the best Chronologers, Fifteen Years; and died in 192. the last of the Emperor Commodus[[257]]. To him are ascribed a Decretal, addressed to the Bishops of Gaul, and a Decree, declaring against Montanus, and his Followers, that no Food was forbidden to the Christians; but both are deemed spurious. He was buried, according to some, in the Salarian Way, according to others, in the Vatican; but, in what Place soever he was buried, his Body is now worshiped in the Vatican at Rome, in the Cathedral of Troia in Apulia, and in several other Places[[258]]. The Title of Martyr is given him by the Church of Rome, but not by any of the antient Writers. Under him flourished Hegesippus, who wrote, in Five Books, an Account of what had happened in the Church since our Saviour’s Death, to his Time[[259]]. He came to Rome in the Pontificate of Anicetus, who was chosen in 157. and, remaining there to the Time of Eleutherius, who succeeded Anicetus and Soter in 177. he wrote a Book on the Doctrine received by Tradition in that Church[[260]]; but neither of these Works has reached our Times.
| Commodus, Pertinax, | VICTOR, Thirteenth Bishop of Rome. | Severus. |
Year of Christ 192.
Victor, the Successor of Eleutherius, is counted by a Writer, who at this very time lived in Rome, the Thirteenth Bishop of that City[[261]]: so that neither is St. Peter reckoned among them, nor is Cletus distinguished from Anacletus. |The Heresy of
Theodotus.| In Victor’s Time a new Heresy was broached at Rome by one Theodotus of Byzantium, denying the Divinity of Christ[[262]]. The Theodotians gave out, that Victor favoured their Doctrine[[263]]; which he did, perhaps, at that Time[[264]]; though he cut them off afterwards from his Communion. |Victor approves
the prophetic Spirit
of Montanus.| Be that as it will, he can by no means be cleared from another Imputation, namely, that of owning and approving the prophetic Spirit of Montanus, and his Two Prophetesses, Prisca and Maximilla: for Tertullian, his Contemporary, tells us, in express Terms, that he received their Prophecies; that, upon receiving them, he gave Letters of Peace to the Churches of Asia and Phrygia; but that one Praxeas, just come from those Parts, giving him a false Account of those Prophets, and their Churches, and remonstrating, that by approving them, he condemned his Predecessors, prevailed upon him to revoke the Letters, which he had already written in their Behalf. |His Infallibility,
how defended by
Baronius and
Bellarmine.| Thus Tertullian, who was then himself become a Follower of Montanus[[265]]. Here Baronius and Bellarmine, the Two great Advocates for the Pope’s Infallibility, are put to a Stand: they own, and cannot help owning, that the Pope was deceived, and imposed upon; but, for all that, will not give up his Infallibility. How great is the Power of Prejudice and Prepossession! They find the Pope actually erring, and yet maintain, that he cannot err. But this Apostacy from common Sense, if I may be allowed the Expression, is not, perhaps, so much owing to Prejudice, as to something worse; for no Prejudice, however prevalent, can withstand the indisputable Evidence of plain Matters of Fact. It is no new thing, says Baronius, nor what ought to cause in us the least Surprize, that a Pope should be over-reached by Impostors[[266]]. A Pope over-reached in Matters of Faith! What then becomes of Infallibility? or what is the Use of it? But the Montanists, says Bellarmine[[267]], craftily concealed from the Pope what was erroneous and heretical in their Prophecies; so that he, discovering nothing in their Doctrine repugnant to that of the Church, believed they had been unjustly accused to, and condemned by, his Predecessors. But, in the first Place, Tertullian tells us, in express Terms, that the Prophecies of Montanus, and his Followers, were approved by the Pope; whereas the Prophecies, which he is supposed by Bellarmine to have approved, were not the Prophecies of Montanus, but others, quite different, and in every respect orthodox. In the second Place, if Victor believed, that the Montanists had been unjustly condemned by his Predecessors, he did not believe them infallible; so that, in every Light, this Fact oversets the pretended Infallibility. We may add, that, if the Pope’s Infallibility depends upon a right Information, and neither he nor we can know whether he has been rightly informed, his Infallibility is thereby rendered quite useless; since, in every particular Case, we may doubt, and that Doubt cannot be removed, whether the Information, upon which he acts, was right, or no.
The famous Contro-
versy about the Cele-
bration of Easter.