of Britain, Milan, and others, to the least pretence of patriarchal power over them."* Contending that" the ten provinces of the Roman diocese were the legal bounds of the jurisdiction" of the bishop of Rome, even if ranked as a patriarch, Bingham adds, " And so Dupin amongst the Romanists makes no scruple ingenuously to confess; exempting Germany, Spain, France, Britain, Africa, Illyricum, and seven of the Italick provinces from any subjection to the jurisdiction of the Roman patriarch in those first and primitive ages." The seven provinces of the Italick diocese under the exarch of Milan, thus exempted, are, Amongst other important inferences from these extracts, favourable to the recovery of their christian liberty by churches that still acknowledge the pope's authority; and favourable to the British church, since the "Britannick Diocese" was independent both of the " "Italick Diocese" and the "Roman Prefecture;" one inference highly favourable to the Vaudois also may be drawn, and is largely insisted upon by Dr. Allix in his History of the Church of Piedmont,"-that Rome could never establish her claim to dominion in the early ages over the valleys of Piedmont; that they were exempt even in the arrangement of dioceses (Turin being included in the province of the Cottian Alps) from subjec tion to her authority: and that her charge of schism against the Vaudois is consequently untenable. When will the other churches of Europe investigate christian doctrines and christian antiquities with scrupulous attention, and dare, like that small remnant of faithful witnesses, the Vaudois, to reject the errors introduced, and the yoke affixed by the church of Rome? The time is however doubtless approaching, when the mistaken members of that church, many of whom deserve the respect and love of their fellow-christians for their virtues, will place less stress on the gorgeous pomp of circumstance and ceremony, more on the purity of christian doctrine; and when they will more perfectly understand the meaning of that oftenrepeated, word "the church." "Le peuple," says M. Peyran, in an unpublished MS." place l'église dans les parvis, les chaires, les temples, où la vraie foi a été autrefois enseignée, et dans une succession personnelle aux anciens docteurs, sans considérer s'il y a succession de doctrine; et il regarde comme étant hors de l'église tous ceux qui sont hors d'une telle communion. Et il est étonnant que des gens qui ont étudié les documens de l'antiquité chrétienne soyent peuple à cet égard. Mais les sages jugeront de la vraie église par l'application de la definition,'La société de ceux que Dieu a appellés à salut, par la profession de la vraie foi, sincere administration des sacremens, et adhérence aux pasteurs légitimes."* Et du reste ils diront par rapport aux temples, aux parvis, et aux chaires, ce que St. Hilaire disait aux Ariens qui les ocpaient, Unum moneo, cavete antichristum; malè enim vos parietum amor cepit; malè ecclesiam Christi in tectis ædificiisque veneramini; malè sub his pacis nomen ingeritis. Anne ambiguum est in his antichristum esse sessurum? Montes mihi, et sylvæ, et lacus, et carceres, et voragines, sunt tutiores. In his enim prophetæ, aut manentes, aut demersi, Dei spiritu prophetizabant,'" Must we not acknowledge that * The definition of Cardinal du Perron, adopted by Nicole and the bishop of Pignerol, and allowed by the moderator. this fine passage of the bishop of Poitiers,himself a confessor and an exile for his adherence to pure christian doctrine,-thus repeated by the chief pastor of the oppressed Waldensian church, and re-echoed, so to speak, from the rocks and Alpine solitudes of Pomaretto, becomes invested with a new feature of sublimity? If it appeals to the understanding by the truth of the sentiment, it is no less formed to awaken the noblest feelings of the soul. P. 243. "On ne se gouvernait pas à Alexandrie comme à Rome, même dans l'ordination d'un évéque."-At Alexandria the presbyters chose one of themselves to be their bishop, according to the testimony of St. Jerome, who loudly condemns the practice at Rome, "" where deacons, being grown great through wealth, challenged place above presbyters." Hooker enters largely into the subject.* "A diversity, (he observes,) prevailed elsewhere. Unto Ignatius, bishop of Antioch, a deacon there was made successor. Chrysostom being a presbyter of Antioch, was chosen to succeed Nectarius in the bishoprick of Constantinople." The tumults attending the election of the bishop of Rome were often very disgraceful. In the year 366, upon the death of Liberius, one faction elected Damasus, while another chose Ursicinus, a deacon. P. 244. "Dans le 3me siècle....il n'y avait point de conciles nationaux ou œcuméniques.”— Ecumenical, or general councils, could not be convened until christianity was patronized by the state; for whilst struggling against the strong current of paganism under heathen emperors, such assemblies of christian bishops would have been viewed with alarm, and either suppressed or followed by fresh persecutions. But since such general councils were not convoked during the three first, the purest ages of christianity, it follows that the decisions of councils cannot be the divinely appointed standard of truth. There must have been some other standard. What was that standard?— Clearly that which the reformed churches appeal to the sacred volume; for the true or false interpretation of which, individuals are responsible, not to any fallible human tribunal, but to the supreme tribunal of God. The Waldenses and the members of the reformed churches, therefore, do but revert to the 'example and practice of primitive ages,—those of sanctity and martyrdom,-in contending for the authority of the inspired and unerring word, and against the authority of councils composed |