From the commencement of Christianity its professors had been exhorted to withdraw their differences from the cognizance of profane tribunals, and to submit them to the paternal authority of their bishops, who, by the nature of their office, were bound to heal the wounds of dissension, and by the sacredness of their character were removed beyond the suspicion of partiality or prejudice.  Though an honorable, it was a distracting, servitude, from which the more pious would gladly have been relieved; but the advantages of the system recommended it to the approbation of the Christian emperors.

Constantine and his successors appointed the bishops the general arbitrators within their respective dioceses; and the officers of justice were compelled to execute their decisions without either delay or appeal.  At first, to authorize the interference of the spiritual judge, the previous consent of both the plaintiff and defendant was requisite; but Theodosius left it to the option of the parties, either of whom was indulged with the liberty of carrying the cause in the first instance into the bishop’s court, or even of removing it thither in any stage of the pleadings before the civil magistrate.  Charlemagne inserted this constitution of Theodosius in his code, and ordered it to be invariably observed among all the nations which acknowledged his authority.  If by the imperial law the laity were permitted, by the canon law the clergy were compelled, to accept of the bishop as the judge of civil controversies.  It did not become them to quit the spiritual duties of their profession, and entangle themselves in the intricacies of law proceedings.  The principle was fully admitted by the emperor Justinian, who decided that in cases in which only one of the parties was a clergyman, the cause must be submitted to the decision of the bishop.  This valuable privilege, to which the teachers of the northern nations had been accustomed under their own princes, they naturally established among their converts; and it was soon confirmed to the clergy by the civil power in every Christian country.

Constantine had thought that the irregularities of an order of men devoted to the offices of religion should be veiled from the scrutinizing eye of the people.  With this view he granted to each bishop, if he were accused of violating the law, the liberty of being tried by his colleagues, and moreover invested him with a criminal jurisdiction over his own clergy.  Whether his authority was confined to lesser offences, or extended to capital crimes, is a subject of controversy.  There are many edicts which without any limitation reserve the correction of the clergy to the discretion of the bishop; but in the novels of Justinian a distinction is drawn between ecclesiastical and civil transgressions.  With the former the Emperor acknowledges that the civil power has no concern:  the latter are cognisable by the civil judge.  Yet before his sentence can be executed, the convict must be degraded by his ecclesiastical