About this period, also, several of the _Gnostic_ and _Manichean_ errors prevailed extensively in Asia Minor. The _fanatics_ denied the lawfulness of _marriage_; they forbid _meat to be eaten_; they condemned the _use of wine_; they praised extravagantly the monastic institutions, and proclaimed the _obligation on all_ to enter into religious societies; they decried the _lawfulness of slavery_; they denounced the _slaveholders_ as violating equally the laws of _nature and of religion_; they offered to _aid slaves_ to _desert their owners_; gave them _exhortations_, _invitations_, _asylum_, and _protection_; and in all things assumed to be more _holy_, more _perfect_, and more _spiritual_ than other men.!!! Osius, bishop of Cordova, whom Pope Sylvester sent as his legate into the east, and who presided in the council of Nice, was present when several bishops assembled in the city of Gangræ, Paphlagonia, to correct those errors. Pope Symmachus declared, in a council held in Rome, about the year 500, that Osius confirmed, by the authority of the pope, the acts of this council. The decrees have been admitted into the body of canon law, and have always been regarded as a rule of conduct in the Catholic church. The third canon: Si quis docet servum, pietatis prætextu, dominum contemnere, et a ministerio recedere, et non cum benevolentia et omni honore domino suo inservire. Anathema sit. _If any one, under the pretence of piety, teaches a slave to despise his master, and to withdraw from his service, and not to serve his master with good-will and all respect. Let him be anathema._ _Let him be anathema_ is never appended to any decree which does not contain the expression of unchangeable doctrine respecting belief or morality, and indicates that the doctrine has been revealed by God. It is precisely what St. Paul says in _Gal._ i. 8: “But though we, or an angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you beside that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema.” 9: “As we said before to you, so I say now again: If any man preach to you a gospel besides that which you have received; let him be anathema.” It is therefore manifest, that although this council of Gangræ was a particular one, yet the universal reception of this third canon, with its _anathema_, and its recognition in the Roman council by Pope Symmachus, gives it the greatest authority and in Labbe it is further entitled as approved by Leo IV., about the year 850, _dist. 20, C. de libell_.