NOV A TIANS

A Christian sect, which sprang up in the third century; occasioned by the jealousy which Nov at i an, a priest of Rome, conceived upon seeing Cornel i us raised to the episcopate of the Roman Church, to which he himself aspired. Enraged at the disappointment, he endeavoured to blacken the character of Cornel i us, by charging him with a criminal lenity towards those who had apostatized during the persecution of Decius. He maintained, that such persons ought indeed to be exhorted to repentance, but never to be absolved by the Church, reserving their absolution to God alone, who had the power and authority to remit sins. Hence he was led to deny, in general, that the Church had the power of remitting mortal sins, upon the offender’s repentance. And at last he went so far as to deny that apostates could ever hope for pardon even from God himself: a doctrine which so terrified some of those who had lapsed and repented, that, in despair, they quite abjured Christianity, and returned to Paganism. The followers of Nov at i an added to this original heresy of their master another, which was the unlawfulne of second marriages; against which they were as severe as against apostates; denying communion for ever to such persons as married a second time after baptism, and treating widows who married again as adultere es. As these heretics pretended that the Church was corrupted by the communion it granted to sinners, it is no wonder they rebaptized those they gained over to their sect. In baptizing, they used the received forms of the Church, and had the same belief concerning the Father , Son , and Holy Ghost , in whose name they baptized. St. Cyprian rejected their baptism, as he did that of all heretics; but it was admitted by the eighth canon of the Council of Nice. The Nov a tians put on the external appearance of great piety and purity; and though they did not refuse the title of Nov a tians, they a umed the proud appellation of Catharii , that is, the Pure, or Puritans; and like the Pharisees among the Jews, they would not suffer other men to come near them, lest their purity should be defiled thereby. The schism which Nov at i an had formed in the Roman Church was not confined to Rome, nor to Italy, nor even to the West. It made its way into the East, and subsisted a long time at Alexandria, in several provinces of Asia, at Constantinople, in Scythia, and in Africa. The Nov a tians abounded particularly in Phrygia and Paphlagonia. Const an tine seems to have favoured them a little by a law of the year 326; which preserves to them their churches and burying-places, provided they never belonged to the Catholic Church. But in a famous edict about the year 331, he sets them at the head of the most detestable of all heretics, forbidding them to hold public or private a emblies, confiscating their oratories or churches, and condemning their leaders to banishment. It is pretended this edict had not the designed effect as to the Nov a tians, by means of Acesius their bishop, who resided at Constantinople, and was in great esteem with the emperor, on account of his virtuous and irreproachable life. The Nov at i an sect was entirely extinct, or at least reduced to a very inconsiderable party, about the middle of the fifth century.