SCRIPTURE.
See the texts quoted in page 10, and under the different Marks of the Church. Also Acts, xv. which relates the celebration, by the Apostles, of the first Council at Jerusalem.
FATHERS.
VINCENT OF LERINS, L. C.-On the subject of Councils, he thus enforces the doctrine of the Proposition. “The Church of Christ, the careful and cautious guardian of the doctrines committed to her, never in them makes any change, --not diminishing—not adding-she cuts not off things necessary; adds not things superfluous; adheres to her own; usurps not what belongs to others. Her only solicitude is, in treating what is ancient, should there be any points not fully before expressed, them to open and improve ; what have been unfolded and distinctly announced, them to strengthen and confirm; what have been defined and ascertained, them to guard. By the decrees of her Councils, what more has the Church, at any time, laboured to accomplish, than that, what before was simply believed, should acquire a fuller credence; what was preached with some caution, should be urged with confidence; what was more remissly handled by the Fathers, should be more accurately treated by their successors. This, and this only, urged by the innovating attempts of heretics, has the Church by her
