3. Book Prohibitions Antedating the Roman Index.
"The early days of the Church witnessed the earnest zeal of St. Paul," when the Christians at Ephesus brought together all the superstitious books they had in their possession and burned them publicly. This example of loyalty to the Church cost them, as Holy Scripture says, between eight and nine thousand dollars. Such was the policy in regard to bad books at Ephesus at a time when the Apostle whom many love to call the most liberal and broadminded, ruled that part of the Church.
Every subsequent age records similar measures of vigilance. The first General Council of Nicaea, in 325, besides proscribing the heresy of Arius, also issued a decree prohibiting the use of Arius' book Thalia, which contained his heresy; indeed, at all times the condemnation of a heresy by the Church entailed the prohibition of the works propagating it. Pope St. Leo the Great, 440–461, does not hesitate to declare that one who reads forbidden
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