284

THE DECLINE AND FALL

CHAP.

XX.

of perfidy and dissimulation, the secret corrup-tion, the open and even bloody violence whichhad formerly disgraced the freedom of electionin the common-wealths of Greece and Rome ,too often influenced the choice of the successorsof the apostles. While one of the candidatesboasted the honours of his family, a second al-lured his judges by the delicacies of a plentifultable, and a third, more guilty than his rivals,offered to share the plunder of the church a-mong the accomplices of his sacrilegious hopes.*The civil as well as ecclesiastical laws attempt-ed to exclude the populace from this solemnand important transaction. The canons of an-cient discipline, by requiring several episcopalqualifications of age, station, &c. restrained insome measure the indiscriminate caprice of theelectors. The authority of the provincial bi-shops, who w ere assembled in the vacant churchto consecrate the choice of the people, was in-terposed to moderate their passions, and to cor-rect their mistakes. The bishops could refuseto ordain an unworthy candidate, and the rageof contending factions sometimes accepted theirimpartial mediation. The submission, or theresistance, of the clergy and people, on variousoccasions, afforded different precedents, whichwere insensibly converted into positive laws,and provincial customs : y but itwas every where

* The epistles of Sidonius Apollinaris (iv, 25 ; vii, 5-9) exhibit someof the scandals of the Gallican church ; and Gaul was less polished andless corrupt than the East.

r A compromise was sometimes introduced by law or by consent;either the bishops or the people chose one of the three candidates whohad been named by the other party.