810 THE MIDDLE AGES. A.D. 1040-1294.
Lateran Councils, from the Lateran in Rome, where they assembled. The last two were held in Lyons. They were called by the popes, and temporal sovereigns had nothing to do in summoning them.1 They were presided over by popes, and the dockets of business were prepared by papal direc tion. The pope ratified their decrees. The first canon of the First Lateran ran, " by the authority of the Apostolic see, we forbid," etc., — auctoritate sedis apostol. prohibemus. It is true that the assent of the assembled prelates was assumed or, if expressly mentioned, the formula ran, "with the assent of the holy synod," or " the holy synod being in session," — sacro approbante concilia, or sacro prcesente concilia. So it was with the Fourth Lateran. The six oecumenical councils are: -
1. The First Lateran, 1123, called by Calixtus II., is listed by the Latins as the Ninth oecumenical council. Its chief business was to ratify the Concordat of Worms. It was the first oecumenical council to forbid the marriage of priests. It renewed Urban II. 's legislation granting indulgences to the Crusaders.
2. The Second Lateran, 1139, opened with an address by Innocent II., consummated the close of the recent papal schism and pronounced against the errors of Arnold of Brescia.
3. The Third Lateran, 1179, under the presidency of Alexander III., celebrated the restoration of peace between the Church and the empire and, falling back on the canon of the Second Lateran, legislated against the Cathari and Patarenes. It ordered separate churches and burial-grounds for lepers. Two hundred and eighty-seven, or, according to other reports, three hundred or three hundred and ninetysix bishops attended.
4. The Fourth Lateran or Twelfth oecumenical, 1215, marks an epoch in the Middle Ages. It established the Inquisition and formulated the doctrine of transubstantiation, the two most far-reaching decrees of the mediaeval
1 Dftllinger-Friedrich, D. Papstthum, p. 88 sqq.
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Church. Innocent III. dominated the council, and its dis ciplinary and moral canons are on a high plane and would of themselves have made the assemblage notable. It was here that the matter of Raymund of Toulouse was adjudi cated, and here the crusade was appointed for 1217 which afterwards gave Frederick II. and Innocent's two immediate successors so much trouble. A novel feature was the attendance of a number of Latin patriarchs from the East, possessing meagre authority, but venerable titles. The de cisions of the council were quoted as authoritative by Bonaventura and Thomas Aquinas.1
5. The First council of Lyons, 1245, presided over by Innocent IV., has its fame from the prosecution and deposi tion of the emperor Frederick II. It also took up the dis tressed condition of Jerusalem and the menace of the Tartars to Eastern Europe.
6. The Second council of Lyons or the Fourteenth oecu menical, 1274, was summoned by Gregory X., and attended by five hundred bishops and one thousand other ecclesiastics. Gregory opened the sessions with an address as Innocent III. had opened the Fourth Lateran and Innocent IV. the First council of Lyons. The first of its thirty-one canons re affirmed the doctrine of the procession of the Holy Spirit from the Son. It repeated the legislation of the Fourth Lat eran, prohibiting the institution of new monastic orders. The council's chief significance was the attempt to reunite the churches of the West and the East, the latter being repre sented by an imposing delegation.
These ecumenical assemblages have their importance from the questions they discussed and the personalities they brought together. They had an important influence in unit ing all parts of Western Christendom and in developing the attachment to the Apostolic see, as the norm of Church unity.
III. Local Synods, 1122-1294. — Some of the local synods of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries are of even more importance than some of the oecumenical councils of the
1 Summa, supplem., VIII. 4, Migue, IV. 946, etc.