Popery condemned by scripture and the fathers - End Time Deception

74 POPERY CONDEMNED BY
" val days, but to introduce good life and pie-
*'
ty ; And it seems to me, that as many other
*'
things, in several places, have been establish-
*'
ed by custom, so the feast of Easter also had
" a peculiar observation among all persons from
*'
some old usage ; because none of the apostles,
*'
as I have said, have made any determinate
'*
decree concerning it. Now, that the obser-
''
vation of this festival had its origin among all
*'
men, in the primitive times, from, custom ra-
" ther than law, the things themselves do de-
" monstrate. For in Asia Minor, most people
**
kept the fourteenth day of the moon, disre-
*'
garding the Sabbath-day; and though this
" was their practice, they never separated from
" those who celebrated the feast of Easter other-
" wise ; till Victor, bishop of Rome, overheat-
*'
ed with anger, sent an excommunication- libel
*
to the Ouartodecimani in Asia *."
Nor is the R. better informed about the nature
of excommunication, as it was frequently
used in the primitive ages. In many cases, it
was
merely a mark, by which one bishop withdrew
himself from the communion of another,
over whom he possessed no jurisdiction. Nor
did this sentence always imply, that an excommunicated
person was removed from the communion
of other parts of the church.
the case before us is an apposite illustration.
* Hist. Ecck. lib. 5. c. 22.
Of this,
The
Ri