It is only in the Fathers of the Church, and the Councils, that we can find the proofs of the authenticity of the Christian traditions, and according to the proofs which remain it appears, that they only approved or rejected opinions, as they found them favourable or injurious to the interests of the party which they had embraced. Every ecclesiastical writer, and every assembly of Bishops, adopted as canonical the writings in which they found their own particular dogmas, the others they treated as apocryphal or suppositious. A slight acquaintance with the writings of the Fathers, will show us that we cannot rely on them for any facts; we shall find that their books are filled with negligences, tales, impertinences and falsehoods; we shall see them buried in the thickest darkness of superstition and prejudice. Every word announces their incredulity or their insincerity. St. Clement the Roman, believed the fable of the phoenix reviving from its ashes, and cites it as a proof of the resurrection. Papias, who was the master of St. Irenæus, was, in the opinion of Eusebius himself, a man of weak mind, a fabulous author, who had contributed to lead many men into error, and amongst others St. Irenæus who was his disciple, whom Eusebius regards as a very credulous man, though he was the first ecclesiastical historian of note. It is not surprising that those who have followed such guides have fallen into error. On the other side, we should never finish, were we to enter into a detail of the excesses committed by the Fathers of the Church and the Councils: their history would only serve to prove their ambition their pride, their infatuation, their seditious spirit, their cheats, their intrigues, and their cruelties in the persecutions which they excited against their adversaries. It is nevertheless on the probity and on the knowledge of these great personages that we are called to rely! It is pretended that it is from them that we hold the pure oracles of truth; must we then take lessons of mildness, of charity, of, holiness, from the writings of some factious individuals, who were perpetually quarrelling and treating their adversaries with the utmost cruelty, whose works were filled with gall, whose conduct it is admitted even by their own friends and admirers, was almost always unjust, violent, and criminal? How can it be expected that we should find any point of unity in the canons and decrees of assemblies agitated by intrigue, discord, and animosity? How can we regard as saints, and infallible doctors, as persons worthy of our confidence, perverse men, continually involved in disputations with others, and in contradictions with themselves? What guide can we expect to find in turbulent priests whose ambition, avarice, and intriguing and persecuting spirit are every where visible? It is only necessary to read ecclesiastical history to be convinced that the picture which we have drawn of the Councils and Fathers is no ways exaggerated.