discipline which regulate the relations between the members of the Church and maintain order, offers not a few changes which are a proper subject for historical investigation.
We are now in a position to grasp the scope of ecclesiastical history. It consists in the scientific investigation and methodical treatment of the life of the Church in all its manifestations from the beginning of its existence to our own day among the various divisions of mankind hitherto reached by Christianity. While the Church remains essentially the same despite the changes which she undergoes in time, these changes help to exhibit more fully her internal and external life. As to the latter, ecclesiastical history makes known in detail the local and temporal expansion or restriction of the Church in the various countries, and indicates the factors influencing the same (History of Missions, in the widest sense), also the attitude which individual states or political bodies and other religious associations assume towards her (History of Ecclesiastical Polity, of Heresies and their Refutation, and of the Relations of the Church with Non-Catholic Religious Associations). If we turn to the internal life of the Church, ecclesiastical history treats of the development of ecclesiastical teaching, based on the original supernatural deposit of faith (History of Dogma, of Ecclesiastical Theology, and Ecclesiastical Sciences in general), of the development of ecclesiastical worship in its various forms (History of Liturgy), of the utilization of the arts in the service of the Church, especially in connexion with worship (History of Ecclesiastical Art), of the forms of ecclesiastical government and the exercise of ecclesiastical functions (History of the Hierarchy, of the Constitution and Law of the Church), of the different ways of cultivating the perfect religious life (History of Religious Orders), of the manifestations of religious life and sentiment among the people, and of the disciplinary rules whereby Christian morality is cultivated and preserved and the faithful are sanctified (History of Discipline, Religious Life, Christian Civilization.)
II. Method and Characteristics. — The ecclesiastical historian must apply the principles and general rules of the historical method exactly and in their entirety, and must accept at their proper value all facts which have been proved to be certain. The cornerstone of all historical science is the careful establishment of facts. The ecclesiastical historian will accomplish this by a full knowledge and critical treatment of the sources. An objective, reasonable, and unbiased interpretation of the sources, based on the laws of criticism, is the first principle of the true method of ecclesiastical history. Systematic instruction in this field is obtained through the historical sciences usually known as auxiliary or introductory, i. e. palæography, diplomatics, and criticism.
Secondly, in discussing the facts, ecclesiastical history must ascertain and explain the relation of cause and effect in the events. It is not sufficient merely to establish a certain series of events in their objective appearance; the historian is also bound to lay bare their causes and effects. Nor does it suffice to consider only those factors which lie on the surface and are suggested by the events themselves, as it were: the internal, deeper, and real causes must be brought to light. As in the physical world there is no effect without an adequate cause, so too in the spiritual and moral world every phenomenon has its particular cause, and is in turn the cause of other phenomena. In the ethical and religious world the facts are the concrete realization or outcome of definite spiritual ideas and forces, not only in the life of the individual, but also in that of groups and associations. Individuals and groups without exception are members of the one human race created for a sublime destiny beyond this mortal life. Thus, the action of the individual exercises its influence on the development of the whole human race, and this is true in a special manner of the religious life. Ecclesiastical history must therefore give us an insight into this moral and religious life, and lay clearly before us the development of the ideas active therein, as they appear both in the individual and in the groups of the human race. Moreover, to discover fully the really decisive causes of a given event, the historian must take into account all the forces that concur in producing it. This is particularly true of the free will of man, a consideration of great importance in forming a judgment about ethical phenomena. It follows that the influence of given individuals on the development of the whole body must be properly appreciated. Moreover, the ideas once current in religious, social, and political spheres, and which often survive in the masses of the people, must be justly appreciated, for they help, though as a rule imperceptibly, to determine the voluntary acts of individuals, and thereby to prepare the way for the work of especially prominent persons, and thus make possible the influence of individuals upon the whole race. Scientific church history must therefore take into consideration both the individual and the general factors in its investigation of the genetic connexion of the outward phenomena, at the same time never losing sight of the freedom of man's will. The ecclesiastical historian, moreover, can by no means exclude the possibility of supernatural factors. That God cannot intervene in the course of nature, and that miracles are therefore impossible is an assumption which has not been and cannot be proved, and which makes a correct appreciation of facts in their objective reality impossible. Herein appears the difference between the standpoint of the believing Christian historian, who bears in mind not only the existence of God but also the relations of creatures to Him, and that of the rationalistic and infidel historian, who rejects even the possibility of Divine intervention in the course of natural law.
The same difference of principle appears in the teleological appreciation of the several phenomena and their causal connexion. The believing ecclesiastical historian is not satisfied with establishing the facts and ascertaining the internal relation of cause and effect; he also estimates the value and importance of the events in their relation to the object of the Church, whose sole Christ-given aim is to realize the Divine economy of salvation for the individual as well as for the whole race and its particular groups. This ideal, however, was not pursued with equal intensity at all times. External causes often exercised great influence. In his judgment on such events, the Christian historian keeps in view the fact that the founder of the Church is the Son of God, and that the Church was instituted by Him in order to communicate to the whole human race, with the assistance of the Holy Spirit, its salvation through Christ. It is from this standpoint that the Christian historian estimates all particular events in their relation to the end or purpose of the Church. The unbelieving historian on the other hand, recognizing only natural forces both at the origin and throughout the development of Christianity, and rejecting the possibility of any supernatural intervention is incapable of appreciating the work of the Church in as far as it is the agent of Divine design.
The foregoing considerations enable us also to understand in what sense ecclesiastical history should be pragmatical. The ecclesiastical historian applies first that philosophical pragmatism which traces the genesis of events from a natural standpoint and in the light of the philosophy of history, and tries to discover the ideas which underlie or are embodied in them. But to this must be added theological pragmatism, which takes its stand on supernatural revealed truth, and strives to recognize the agency of God and His providence, and thus to trace (as far as it is possible for the created mind) the eternal purpose of God as it manifests itself in time. The Catholic historian in-
