An Essay on the Development of Christian DoctrineNewman, John Henry
Religion
An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine
Newman, John Henry
Catholic Church -- Doctrines; Dogma, Development of
Such a division of an heretical party, into the maintainers, of an
extreme and a moderate view, perspicuous and plausible on paper, yet in
fact unreal, impracticable, and hopeless, was no new phenomenon in the
history of the Church. As Eutyches put forward an extravagant tenet,
which was first corrected into the Monophysite, and then relapsed
hopelessly into the doctrine of the Phantasiasts and the Theopaschites,
so had Arius been superseded by the Eusebians and had revived in
Eunomius; and as the moderate Eusebians had formed the great body of the
dissentients from the Nicene Council, so did the Monophysites include
the mass of those who protested against Chalcedon; and as the Eusebians
had been moderate in creed, yet unscrupulous in act, so were the
Monophysites. And as the Eusebians were ever running individually into
pure Arianism, so did the Monophysites run into pure Eutychianism. And
as the Monophysites set themselves against Pope Leo, so had the
Eusebians, with even less provocation, withstood and complained of Pope
Julius. In like manner, the Apollinarians had divided into two sects;
one, with Timotheus, going the whole length of the inferences which the
tenet of their master involved, and the more cautious or timid party
making an unintelligible stand with Valentinus. Again, in the history of
Nestorianism, though it admitted less opportunity for division of
opinion, the See of Rome was with St. Cyril in one extreme, Nestorius in
the other, and between them the great Eastern party, headed by John of
Antioch and Theodoret, not heretical, but for a time dissatisfied with
the Council of Ephesus.
19.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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