Here is something interesting about how heresies and schisms were handled at the Council of Nicea.

The Meletian schism was started by Bishop Meletius in the regions of Egypt as a rigorist movement that denied the sacraments to those who had equivocated during the Diocletian persecutions. Meltius began consecrating men to the episcopate (alone, not in the canonical mode of three consecrators). There were between 29 and 35 Melitian bishops by AD 325.

The Council of Nicea ruled that if reconciled the schismat Melitian bishops could function as Catholic bishops. They received something like an ordination to perfect what was lacking before the translated text of Nicea reads:

“but that those who have been placed by him [Meletius], after they have been confirmed by a more sacred laying on of hands, shall on these conditions be admitted to communion: that they shall both have their rank and the right to officiate.”

After receiving “more sacred laying on of hands” these Meletian bishops were allowed to function as bishops in Egypt under the close attention of the Patriarch of Alexandria and when seated Catholic bishops died, they were to be allowed to replace them in the Sees with permission of the Patriarch of Alexandria. As for Meletius, he was allowed to be called an “episcopos” but deprived of all episcopal faculties.

In the end, it seems that Meletius did not favor the graciousness of the Council but eventually joined up with the Arians.