those  Sanctions  or  decretal  Epistles  in  which  nothing  is
found  contrary  to  the  decrees  of  preceding  fathers  or  the
precepts  of  the  Gospel/'

The  objects  for  which  the  Council  of  Constance  was  as-
sembled forced  upon  it  a  question  which,,  except  in  a  dis-
eased state  of  things,  could  never  occur ;  whether  a  Council
was  superior  to  a  Pope  or  a  Pope  to  a  Council.  For  both  a
Council  as  the  representative  of  the  whole  Church,  and  the
Bishop  of  Eome  as  having  from  old  times  a  Primacy  in  it,
ought  to  be  of  one  mind.  Being  called  together,  as  the
last  resource  to  end  the  long  schism  between  the  Popes  at
Rome  and  at  Avignon,  the  Council  had  to  decide  between
the  claims  of  three  anti-popes  or,  if  necessary,  to  obtain
the  resignation  of  all.  It  was  therefore,  by  its  office,  supe-
rior to  all.
The  anti-popes,  whose  cession  it  had  to  obtain,  were  each
of  them  a  disgrace  to  the  Papacy.  The  worst  was  John
XXIII.,  whose  name  stands  in  the  list  of  Bishops  of
Home,  who  had  convened  the  Council,  and  who  fled  from
it  when  the  list  of  crimes  imputed  to  him,  some  of  which
he  owned  and  some  denied,  was  privately  circulated.  We
naturally  cannot  think  much  of  a  Council  which  induced
the  Emperor  Sigismund  to  break  his  safe-conduct  to  Huss.
