472 THE DECLINE AND FALL lates ; they embarked for Italy, with rich ornaments and rare perfumes for the altar of St. Peter ; and their secret orders authorised and recommended a boundless compliance. They [AD. 1274] were received in the general council of Lyons, by pope Gregory the Tenth, at the head of five hundred bishops.*^ fjg em. braced with tears his long-lost and repentant children ; ac- cepted the oath of the ambassadors, who abjured the schism in the name of the two emperors ; adorned the prelates with the ring and mitre ; chaunted in Greek and Latin the Nicene creed, with the addition of Jilioque ; and rejoiced in the union of the East and West, which had been reserved for his reign. To consummate this pious work, the Byzantine de- puties were speedily followed by the pope's nuncios ; and their instruction discloses the policy of the Vatican, which could not be satisfied with the vain title of supremacy. After viewing the temper of the prince and people, they were enjoined to absolve the schismatic clergy who should subscribe and swear their abjuration and obedience ; to establish in all the churches the use of the perfect creed ; to prepare the entrance of a car- dinal legate, Avith the full powers and dignity of his office ; and to instruct the emperor in the advantages which he might de- rive from the temporal protection of the Roman pontiff. ^^ Hia perse- But thcv found a country without a friend, a nation in which cution of the -' •' iiii mTm2 ^ °' ^ names of Rome and Union were pronounced with abhorrence. The patriarch Joseph was indeed removed ; his place was filled by Veccus,** an ecclesiastic of learning and moderation ; and the emperor was still urged by the same motives, to persevere in the same professions. But, in his private language, Palaeologus affected to deplore the pride, and to blame the innovations, of the Latins ; and, while he debased his character by this double hypocrisy, he justified and punished the opposition of his subjects. By the joint suffrage of the new and the ancient Rome, a sentence ^^See the Acts of the Council of Lyons in the year 1274. Fleury, Hist. Eccl^siastique, torn, xviii. p. 181-199. Dupin, Bibliot. Eccles. torn. x. p. 135. [George Acropolites was the chief ambassador of Michael.] ^2 This curious instruction, which has been drawn with more or less honesty by Wading and Leo Allatius from the archives of the Vatican, is given in an abstract or version by Fleury (torn, xviii. p. 352-258).
- [Johannes Veccus (Patriarch 1275) was the chief theologian who supported
the Union. His work. On the Union and Peace of the Churches of Old and New Rome, and others on the same subject, were published in the Grtecia Orthodoxa of Leo Allatius (vol. i., 1652) and will be found in Migne, P. G. vol. 141. His most formidable controversial opponent, Gregory of Cyprus (for whose works see Migne, vol. 142), became Patriarch in 1283.]
