Jesus Christ, we determine, decide, and declare that Ignatius has not been deposed or excommunicate, that he was tyrannically driven from his see by the power of the Emperor without any canonical right, that he was only condemned by those who should themselves be condemned, who had no lawful authority, and who were not appointed by the Apostolic See for that purpose, so that the sentence has no value. Wherefore we, by reason of the authority given to us by God through the blessed Peter, by reason of the laws of the holy Canons and the Papal Constitutions, acknowledge him, our brother and fellow-bishop Ignatius, cancelling all contrary sentences, in his office and right as Patriarch and establish and confirm him therein."[1] Photius is to be excommunicate unless he retires from the usurped See of Constantinople as soon as he receives notice of this decision. Once more then, as in the cases of St. Athanasius, St. John Chrysostom, and so many others, Rome had spoken and had taken up the cause of a lawful bishop who was being persecuted by the civil power. The result was that the civil power dragged a great part of the Church into schism.
3. Open Schism.
It was at this juncture that Michael and Photius determined to throw off the authority of the Pope.[2] We have seen how they had hitherto acknowledged it. They had themselves appealed to Rome, they had asked for the Legates, they had stopped at nothing to have those Legates on their side. Now that the final decision had gone against them they had two alternatives left, to submit or to go into schism. Photius had lost his case by every right of Canon Law and by the decision of the highest court of Christendom, to which he himself had appealed. It would have been to the eternal disgrace of the Pope if he had not lost it. But he had one more card to play.
