i?38 THIRD PERKD. A.D. 311-590.
4. Several of tlie most learned and able fatliers of tlie fourtlj century received their general scientific education in heathen schools, under the sotting snn of the classic culture, and then studied theology either in ascetic retirement or under some distinguished church teacher, or by the private reading of the ScrijDtures and the earlier church literature.
Thus Basil the Great and Gregory Nazianzen were in the high school of Athens at the same time with the prince Julian the Apostate ; Chrysostom attended the lectures of the celebrated rhetorician Libanius in Antioch ; Augustine studied at Carthage, Rome, and Milan ; and Jerome was introduced to the study of the classics by the grammarian Donatus of Rome. The great and invaluable service of these fathers in the development and defence of the church doctrine, in pulpit eloquence, and especially in the translation and exposition of the Holy Scriptures, is the best evidence of tbe high value of a classical education. And the church has always, with good I'eason, acknowledged it.
§ 49. Clergy and Laity. Elections.
The clergy, according to the precedent of the Old Testament, came to be more and more rigidly distinguished, as a peculiar order, from the body of the laity. The ordination, which was solemnized by the laying on of hands and prayer, with the addition at a later period of an anointing with oil and balsam, marked the formal entrance into the special priesthood, us baptism initiated into the universal priesthood ; and, like baptism, it bore an indefeasible character {character indelebilis). By degrees tlie priestly oflSce assumed the additional distinction of celibacy and of external marks, such as tonsure, and pacerdotal vestments worn at first only during official service, then in every-day life. The idea of the universal priesthood of believers retreated in proportion, though it never passed entirely out of sight, but was from time to time asserted even in this age. Augustine, for example, says, that as all are called Chj-jstians on account of their baptism, bo all believ-
g 49. CLEKGY AND LAITY, ELECTIONS. 239
ers are priests, because they arc members of tlie one High Priest.'
The progress of the hierarchical principle also encroached gradually upon tbe rights of the people in the election of their pastors." But in this period it did not as yet entirely suppress them. The lower clergy were chosen by the bisbops, the bishops by their colleagues in the province and by the clergy. The fourth canon of Nice, probably at the instance of the Meletian schism, directed tbat a bishop should be instituted and consecrated by all, or at least by three, of the bishops of the province. This was not aimed, however, against the rights of the people, but against election by only one bishop — the act of Meletius. For the consent of the people in the choice of presbyters, and especially of bishops, long remained, at least in outward form, in memory of the custom of the apostles and the primitive church. There was either a formal vote,' particularly when there were three or more candidates before the people, or the people were thrice required to signify their confirmation or rejection hj the formula : " Worthy," or "unworthy." * The influence of the people in this period appears
* De civit. Dei, lib. xx. cap. 10: '■'■ Enmt sacerdoles Dei et Christi et regnabwnt cum eo mille annos (Apoc. xx. 6) : non utique de solis episcopis et piesbyteris dictum est, qui proprie jam vocantur in Ecclesia sacerdotes ; sed sicut omnes Christianos dicimus propter mysticum chrisma, sic omnes sacerdotes, quoniam membra sunt unius sacerdotis. De quibus apostolus Petrus: Plebs, inquit, sancta regale sacerdotium (1 Pet. ii. 9)." Comp. Ambrosiaster ad Eph. iv. 11 ; Jerome ad Tit. i. 1 ; and Pope Leo I., Sermon, iv. 1.
' According to Clemens Romanus, ad Corinth, c. 44, the consent of the whole congregation in the choice of their officers was the apostolic and post-apostolic custom ; and the Epistles of Cyprian, especially Ep. 68, show that the same rule continued in the middle of the third century. Comp. vol. ii. § 42 (p. 129).
^ ZnTTiTis, \f/r}(f>i(Tfxa, \f/ri(pos, scrutinium.
* ''A|ios, dignus, or aud^ios, indignus. Constitut. Apost. viii. 4 ; Concil. Aurelat. ii. (a. d. 452) c. 54 ; Gregor. Naz. Orat. xxi. According to a letter of Peter of Alexandria, in Theodor. Hist. Eccl. iv. 22, the bishop in the East was elected ema- K6-ira>v avvoScti, \\/v(pq! KXrjpiKuv, aiTTJffei Xaajf. He himself was elected archbishop of Alexandria and successor of Athanasius (a. d. 373), according to the desire of the latter, " by the unanimous consent of the clergy and of the chief men of the city " (iv. cap, 20), and, after his expulsion, he objected to his wicked successor Lucius, among other things, that " he had purchased the episcopal office with gold, as though it had been a secular dignity, . . . and had not been elected by a synod of bishops, by the votes of the clergy, or by the request of the people, accordi'^g to the regulatiom ■if the church " Hv. c. 22).