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THE PAPAL CLAIMS. 
 
THE 
 
 PAPAL CLAIMS 
 
 CONSIDERED IN THE LIGHT 
 
 SCRIPTURE AND HISTORY. 
 
 WITH AN INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER BY 
 
 THE RT. REV. GEORGE F. SEYMOUR, S.T.D., LL.D., 
 
 P.ISHOF OP^ SPRINGFIELD, U.S.A. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 JAMES POTT, 12 i^STOR PLACE. 
 
LOAN STACK 
 

 PREFACE. 
 
 The question of the Papal Claims is essentially a Biblical 
 and an historical question ; and there is some danger at 
 present of this simple and obvious truth being forgotten, 
 and the controversy being diverted into all kinds of 
 byways. It has not been thought safe to ignore some of 
 the arguments now commonly brought forward by Roman 
 controversialists, however little importance they may 
 appear to possess; but it has been the object of the 
 writer to keep the main question in view throughout 
 and to treat it as such. 
 
 That question, as both sides admit, is the Supremacy 
 of the Bishop of Rome over the Christian Church. Did 
 our Lord give to St. Peter, and through him to the 
 Bishops of Rome, supreme power to teach and to rule 
 the Catholic Church ? We have endeavoured to examine 
 the evidence adduced in support of this theory with 
 all possible care and candour : nothing has been wilfully 
 passed by, and nothing has been consciously misre- 
 presented. The reader, however, must judge as to the 
 
 597 
 
X PREFACE, 
 
 fairness and cogency of the arguments and the legitimacy 
 of the conclusions. 
 
 Whatever may be the value of the work, it is at least 
 an independent testimony. The authors consulted, with 
 few exceptions, have been Roman Catholic contro- 
 versialists; and no point of the least importance urged 
 by them in support of their position has been disre- 
 garded. - The principal foreign authorities made use of, 
 in opposition to the claims of Rome, have been — Fried- 
 rich, Z>^^^;;/^;2/<^/ Langen, Z>^j Vaticanische Dogma ; and 
 Friedrich, Zur dltesien Geschichte des Primats : the prin- 
 cipal Roman works — Passaglia, De prcBrogativis Beaii 
 Petri; Foggini, De Ro7nano St. Petri Itinere ; Allies, St. 
 Peter ^ his na?ne and his office ; Do., See of St. Peter ; Do.,^ 
 Dr. Pusey and the Ancient Church ; Hergenroether, De 
 Catholicce Ecclesice pri^nordiis ; Kellner, Verfassiing, 
 Lehramt^ &^c; Schneemann, Sancti Irencei De ecclesia 
 Roma7ia^ &*c.; Hefele, Beitrdge ; Do., History of the 
 Councils (German and English) ; Friedrich, Kirchen- 
 geschichte Deutschlands ; Hist, polit. Blatter filr das Kathol- 
 Deutschland^ vol. Ixxiv. ; Gallwey, Lectures on Ritualism ; 
 Commentaries. Of the early writers quoted may be 
 mentioned — The Apostolic Fathers (Editions of Geb- 
 hardt, Harnack, and Zahn ; Hefele and Funk ; and Light- 
 foot) ; Irenaeus (Editions of Migne, Harvey, and Stieren) ; 
 Tertullian (Editions of Migne and Oehler) ; Cyprian 
 (Editions of Benedictines, Fell, and Hartel, and tran- 
 slation of Newman); Origen, Eusebius, &c. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE QUESTION STATED. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The influence and claims of the Roman Church — Importance of the 
 question — A serious matter to pass from the Enghsh Church 
 to the Roman, or vice versa — A truth forgotten — Above all, 
 necessary to understand the real grounds on which such a 
 change should be made — Some assigned reasons for changing 
 utterly insufficient — Restlessness and unhappiness — Personal 
 inclination — Abuses in the Church — Only one reason for 
 changing sufficient : that the claims of the Papal See are valid ; 
 that they are supported by Scripture and the primitive Church 
 — Is the Papal supremacy, as at present claimed, of divine 
 right or not ? This the whole question — Papal statement of 
 this question— Such claims must be fully substantiated — The 
 object of this book to examine the grounds on which they 
 rest I 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ARGUMENT FROM THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 
 
 Roman Appeal : Those who beheve in one Catholic Church can 
 find that Church only in the Roman Communion— Grant that 
 Christ intended the Church to be one, and schism is a sin — Who 
 is to blame for the schism ? — How can it be lawfully healed ? — 
 The real facts of the case frequently ignored — What is the true 
 basis of union ? — The question of the Papal claims must be 
 settled — If they are invalid, the Papacy the real cause of 
 
xii CONTENTS, 
 
 PAGE 
 
 disunion — Duty of individuals — Illustration from the Old 
 Testament— On what grounds are the Papal claims supported? 
 ^Three principal reasons — The only valid proof . . .16 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE 'A priori' ARGUMENT FOR THE PAPAL CLAIMS. 
 
 The Roman boast of uncbangeableness — Virtually abandoned — The 
 argument from history disparaged — The argument "from 
 common sense," or d priori — Partly true, partly false — To be 
 used with caution and impartiahty — The argument stated — 
 The need of certainty — The Roman Church alone professes to 
 give it — Criticism of the argument— (1) The craving for cer- 
 tainty not really satisfied — (2) Not universally professed — 
 (3) Is it better that all our questions should be conclusively 
 settled? As a matter of fact, many important questions re- 
 mained long unsettled — (4) The Papal profession to answer 
 such questions no proof of ability to do so — The real question 
 again : What proof can we obtain of the Papal pretensions ? . 26 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION. 
 
 The existence cf the Roman primacy — Its claims widely acknow- 
 ledged — How is this to be accounted for? — Compared with the 
 argument for the Episcopate — This great difference : the claims 
 of tlie Episcopate always substantially the same, while the 
 Papal claims are enlarged from age to age— The appeal on this 
 point must be made to history — Certain facts admitted — 
 Diverse interpretations of the facts— History must setde the 
 question 39 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE POSITION OF ST. PETER IN THE GOSPELS. 
 
 Scripture testimony — Principles of interpretation — The quotation of 
 isolated texts misleading — Illustration — The principal text : 
 St. Matt. xvi. 18— Different interpretations — The Roman 
 
CONTENTS. xiif 
 
 PACK 
 
 interpretation does not support the Papal claims — Position of 
 St. Peter — Power of the keys— Binding and loosing — Not given 
 to Peter alone or supremely — Consequences of such a theory — 
 Second text : St. Luke xxii. 31, 32 — Third text : St. John xxi. 
 15-17 — Peter has no primacy of jurisdiction assigned to him 
 in the Gospels 49 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ST. PETER IN THE CHURCH, AND IN RELATION TO THE OTHER 
 APOSTLES. 
 
 The interpretation of the Gospel texts must be sought in the Acts 
 and apostolical epistles — Was the primacy of Peter one of 
 honour only, or of power also ? — Peter not the master of the 
 Church — In the Acts — In the Epistles — St. Peter had no 
 authority over the other apostles — All his powers and privileges 
 shared by the rest — Illustrated by recorded facts — By the rela- 
 tion between St. Peter and St. Paul — A relation of perfect 
 equality— St. Paul's epistles — His independence of Peter and 
 the other apostles 67 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 ST. PETER, ST. JAMES, AND THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. 
 
 St. James and Jerusalem — Romans ignore the importance of this 
 argument— The Council— Significance of the very holding of a 
 Council — The question not referred to Peter, but to the apostles 
 and elders — St. Peter the foremost speaker, not the president 
 — Position of St. James at Jerusalem and in the Church — The 
 Church of Jerusalem — Testimony of Eusebius— Hegesippus — 
 Clement — Inferences from these testimonies — Manner in which 
 St, Peter is referred to — Growth of the Petrine legend . . 84 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 
 
 Is the Roman interpretation verified by ecclesiastical testimony? — 
 The Vincentian Canon — The Apostolic Fathers — The signifi- 
 
xiv CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 cance of their writings — St. Clement of Rome— His Epistle to 
 the Corinthians — Its bearing on the Papal question — Dr. Light- 
 foot's remarks — Quotations — Germ of Roman, not of Papal, 
 pretensions — Barnabas — Hermas — St. Ignatius of Antioch — 
 Dr. Lightfoot's remarks — St. Ignatius writes to the Romans, 
 but makes no reference to any Petrine or Papal supremacy — 
 His other writings — No trace of Roman claims — General effect 
 of the testimony of this p)eriod loo 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 ST. IRENiEUS AND HIS AGE. 
 
 The Apologists — Irenaeus, his age — The importance of his testimony 
 — The principal passage, Bk. iii. c. 3 — The Greek lost — Quoted 
 in Latin — The occasion of his statement — The meaning of the 
 passage— Various interpretations — Assigned great importance 
 to the Roman Church— Not to the Roman Bishop — Nor to the 
 Roman Church as deriving a primacy from St. Peter — Parti- 
 cular expressions considered — Irenaeus says nothing of Papal 
 authority or supremacy — Accounted for only by the fact that 
 Irenaeus knew nothing of such authority — The Paschal con- 
 troversy — Bishop Victor of Rome — His arbitrary conduct — Its 
 effect — Interposition of Irenaeus— His ignorance of any Papal 
 supremacy — Clement of Alexandria — Tertullian — His argument 
 against heretics similar to that of Irenaeus — He knows nothing 
 of a Roman or Papal primacy— Origen misrepresented — His 
 testimony — General result of the testimonies of this period . 113 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 ST. CYPRIAN AND THE ROMAN SEE. 
 
 The germ of the Roman theory not in the Bible — Something only 
 partially resembling this theory — Need of caution — Influence of 
 Rome useful — Unsuspected, and hence unresisted — Writings of 
 St. Cyprian — Apparent concession to modern Roman claims — 
 Dr. Newman's statement of the question — The principal passage 
 — Interpolated — Its true meaning — It teaches no more than 
 earlier testimonies— St. Peter the centre of unity, not the ruler 
 of the Church — All the Apostles equal in power — St. Cyprian 
 
CONTENTS. XV 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Speaks of the Roman Church as the See of Peter, but assigns 
 no superiority of authority to the Roman Bishop — Illustrated 
 by the controversy on the baptism of heretics — African Councils 
 act independently, and in opposition to the Roman Bishop — 
 Their testimonies — Firmilian of Csesarea — Conclusion . . 131 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 THE COUNCIL OF NICiEA. 
 
 Importance of the Nicene Council — Bearing on the Papal claims — 
 The position, circumstances, authority of the council — Ques- 
 tions demanding solution — (i) By whom was the council con- 
 voked? — By the Emperor, as all agree — Was Pope Silvester 
 specially consulted? — Bishop Hefele's argument — Insufficient — 
 Dr. Friedrich's remarks— (2) Who presided over the council ? 
 Generally Bishop Hosius of Corduba — Was he Papal Legate ? 
 — No evidence of this— Shown by a statement of the facts — (3) 
 Were the decrees of the Council confirmed by the Pope? — 
 Hefele's arguments in support of this theory — No evidence of 
 such confirmation — Testimony of the Synod itself : Canons 6 
 and 7 — The precedence of the Sees referred to custom — Ex- 
 planations — Interpolations — The synod knew nothing of the 
 Papal Supremacy — Conclusion , 147 
 
 CHAPTER XIL 
 
 POST-NICENE TESTIMONY. 
 
 The early Church ignorant of modern Papal claims— How do we 
 account, then, for the rise of the Papal power ?— Further facts 
 considered — The Papal claims never universally accepted- 
 Traces of gradual Papal aggressions— The Council of Sardica 
 — Third Canon — Appeals to the Roman Bishop— Fifth Canon 
 — Inconsistent witli Papal claims — Council of Constantinople^- 
 Second Canon— Third Canon — The greatness of the cities, not 
 the apostolic origin of the sees, determined their precedence — 
 Growth of Roman Papal power explained— Illustrated from 
 secular history — Papal power and influence — The real question 165 
 
xvi CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE CATHOLIC FAITH. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Objection : no security for the Catholic faith in the English Church 
 — Rests upon the assumption that Roman teaching is true — 
 This, the very point to be proved — The objection used as a 
 subsidiary argument in behalf of Roman claims — The Catholic 
 Faith — What it means — (i) All religious truth (even if truth) not 
 of equal importance — Opinion and faith illustrated— (2) The 
 multiphcatioii of dogmas — Not desirable — Not scriptural or 
 primitive — Necessity of doctrinal definitions conceded — Creed 
 of Nicaea — Contrasted with recent Roman definitions— English 
 formularies and ecclesiastical courts — What do the formularies 
 teach? — Compared with primitive doctrine — The demands of 
 the Bishop of Rome make it impossible to give him his old 
 position in the Church — Decisions of ecclesiastical courts — 
 The Gorham case — The Bennett case — Essays and reviews — 
 Conclusion 179 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 
 
 What is Catholicism ? What is Romanism ? Is 
 there any difference between them ? It would be 
 interesting and profitable and withal very sad to hear 
 the answers which would be given by nine men out 
 of every ten to these questions. The ignorance on 
 the subject which these inquiries probe and lay bare 
 is almost universal, and as profound as it is wide- 
 spread. The learned share it with the illiterate, the 
 scholar and the refined gentleman with the rustic 
 and the boor. The great mass of Romanists, equally 
 with Protestants, are here at one ; they know little 
 or nothing about the subject. They both identify 
 Catholicism and Romanism, and for the same reason, 
 ignorance, though with an opposite result. The one 
 is a Romanist because he holds that Romanism and 
 Catholicism are identical, and he must be a Catholic j 
 and the other is a Protestant because he is persuaded 
 that Catholicism and Romanism are the same, and 
 whatever else he may be he cannot be a Romanist, 
 This ignorance seems to be proof against ordinary 
 methods of enlightenment. Its victims love the 
 shadow of ignorance, partly because it is hereditary 
 and covers a multitude of sins of their forefathers 
 
   
 
xviii INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER, 
 
 and their own, partly because it is an excuse for 
 their position ; it reconciles them to their religious 
 habits, and accounts for their temper, and disposition, 
 and acts, and words ; and partly because it is their 
 interest to remain ignorant, since the capital with 
 which they trade and the weapons with which they 
 fight would be swept away were the distinction be- 
 tween Romanism and true Catholicism generally un- 
 derstood, and clearly apprehended by the public. 
 The object of this excellent little monograph by an 
 anonymous English author to which we have been 
 asked by the enterprising American publisher to 
 write an introduction, has this laudable object in 
 view, to enlighten the public as to the essence of 
 Romanism and the true nature of Catholicism, and 
 the consequent real distinction between them. 
 
 When this object has been secured an immense 
 amount of utterly useless controversy will be forever 
 at an end, the mischievous occupation of a large 
 number of polemics will be forever gone, the drift to 
 Rome on the part of earnest but ill-informed persons, 
 which has of late years been checked, will virtually 
 cease, and on the other hand candid and intelligent 
 Romanists, when their eyes are opened, will seek the 
 communion of the one holy catholic and apostolic 
 Church in this land by renouncing allegiance to the 
 usurped and uncatholic and uncanonical claim to 
 spiritual obedience on the part of the bishop of 
 Rome. We commend this little book to the careful 
 and thoughtful perusal of all into whose hands it 
 may come. It is indeed itself but an introduction, 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. xix 
 
 but it opens the subject wisely and well — wisely^ 
 because the spirit in which it is written is admirable ; 
 there is no bitterness, there is no abuse ; well^ because 
 the case is plainly and succinctly stated, and the in- 
 terested inquirer, who would prosecute his researches 
 further, is modestly yet sufficiently helped to do so. 
 To recur to our questions with which we started, 
 What is Catholicism ? what is Romanism ? Is there 
 any difference between them ? Catholicism is the 
 word which expresses the universality of the Church 
 of God, the Body of Christ, as united under one 
 head, her sovereign incarnate Lord, seated on the 
 eternal throne in heaven which continues now as 
 from the first " steadfastly in the doctrine of the 
 apostles and the fellowship, and the breaking of the 
 bread, and the prayers." '^ The centre of unity in 
 the Catholic Church is Christ in heaven, the sun of 
 righteousness. He diffuses His life-giving power 
 organically through His deputies, appointed by Him- 
 self, the apostles, and their successors in all lands. 
 When Christ, risen from the dead in His glorified 
 humanity, stood on the Mount of the Ascension just 
 before He went up into heaven, with His eleven 
 apostles around Him, there was presented an initial 
 object lesson of the Catholic Church in its Head and 
 ministers, in its character, and scope, and duration. 
 
 * The original has the article prefixed to each of the nouns, 
 doctrine, fellowship, breaking of bread, and prayers. 
 
 " 'Hdav da Ttpodxaprepovvrei rj; didaxfj rojr airodro- 
 Xgov, Hal ry KoircDvla, ual r^ nKdidEi rov apvov, uai 
 ral^ Ttpodevxocl^.'"' — Acts ii. 42. 
 
   
 
XX INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 
 
 The centre, the Head is Christ, the apostles stand 
 equally related to Him. They are the radii. He 
 speaks to them all alike^ and His commission through 
 them sweeps around the entire circle, " Go ye into all 
 the Avorld and preach the Gospel to every creature.'* 
 It is a commission universal as to territory, " all the 
 world ; *' universal as to subjects, " every creature." 
 In their relation to Him, as subordinates to a supe- 
 rior, they are on a perfect equality, " Go ye,' He 
 says to the eleven^ not ^^ go thou,'' to one, St. Peter. 
 Their message is the same, to proclaim and teach 
 " Whatsoever He has commanded them," and they 
 are all equally empowered to teach, not one inde- 
 pendently of the rest, and they dependent upon 
 him, but all mutually dependent upon each other 
 in order to secure compliance with the condition 
 imposed by Christ as a limit and boundary of 
 their teaching, "whatsoever He had commanded," 
 nothing 7?iore, fiothing less. The duration of this 
 state of things in all its essential details is to be 
 for all time." " Lo ! I am with you alway," says 
 our Lord, "even to the end of the world."* Here 
 we have the picture of the Catholic Church. It is 
 prepared and arranged by our Blessed Lord Himself. 
 It is photographed for us, for our study, by the 
 Holy Ghost. The grouping is Christ's, the adjust- 
 ment of all the particulars is His. It is the solemn 
 moment of His departure from earth no more to 
 appear again until He comes when human history is 
 
 * St. Matthew, xxviii. 19, 20. St. Mark, xvi. 15. 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. xxi 
 
 ended, to judge both the quick and the dead at the 
 last great day. It is the initial object lesson given 
 by Christ of His Church, the Catholic Church. Look 
 at it. It shows us Christ in His relation to His 
 chief ministers and their successors, equally near to 
 all ; not one, St. Peter reclining on His bosom and 
 the others at a distance, learning through his lips 
 their Master's will. That place had been St. John's 
 at the last supper, never St. Peter's, now all are at an 
 equal remove, and all hear alike and on equal terms 
 their Lord's commands, " Go ye," '' teach ye," "bap- 
 tize ye." They are to go, to teach, to baptize in 
 immediate dependence upon Him, not in subordi- 
 nate dependence upon one preferred before his fel- 
 lows, and then through him and only through him 
 responsible to Christ. Look at the picture narrowly, 
 carefully, critically, you will find it in the Holy 
 Gospel, it refuses absolutely to suggest, much less 
 present, such an idea. The next picture of the 
 Christian Church, the Body of Christ, is sketched by 
 the Holy Ghost of its condition immediately after 
 the day of Pentecost, and in its teaching as regards 
 all points indeed, but especially the one which now 
 claims our attention is in perfect harmony with the 
 first. The Blessed Spirit paints the portrait of the 
 first Christians, the very firsts there were none before 
 them, by these graphic words : " They continued 
 steadfastly in the Apostle's doctrine and fellowship, 
 and in breaking of bread and in prayers." How pre- 
 cisely and accurately does this state of things as a 
 reality presenting existing facts, correspond with 
 
xxii INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 
 
 what our Lord contemplates when He says to the 
 eleven, " Go ye," " teach ye," ^' baptize ye " ! They 
 with St. Matthias added to their number, have 
 fulfilled His behests, and lo ! the results, the sub- 
 jects of their teaching and ministrations, the laity, 
 " continue steadfastly in their (the Apostles') doc- 
 trine and fellowship, and the breaking of bread 
 and in the prayers." As on the Mount of Ascen- 
 sion, in prospect of work, the Apostles stand in offi- 
 cial relation equally near to their divine Master, 
 so now when they have begun their labors, and are 
 ministering to devout men *' out of every nation 
 under heaven," their converts look to them severally 
 as on a level of perfect equality, they continue stead- 
 fastly in the Apostles' doctrine, etc., not one's St, 
 Peter s^ but in that of alL This is catholicity ; it is 
 utterly inconsistent with Romanism. It is equally, be 
 it observed, with our Lord's object lesson just before 
 He ascended, inconsistent with sectarianism. Roman- 
 ism and sectarianism are alike utterly and absolutely 
 irreconcilable with the chart and charter of His 
 Church as given by Christ on the Mount of Ascen- 
 sion, and with the organism and condition of the 
 Church as it existed at the first, in pentecostal times, 
 when the original eleven, inspired by the Holy 
 Ghost, planted, and watered, and builded, and God 
 gave the increase. Catholicism, then, expresses the 
 condition of the Church of Christ, as organized by 
 Him, so that all, through His deputies, the Apostles, 
 and their successors, teaching, laboring, ministering 
 in His name in all lands, should stand equally re- 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. xxiii 
 
 lated to Him, should be equally near to Him, should 
 equally share in His blessings the fullness of Him 
 that filleth all in all. The Catholic Church in its 
 government and jurisdiction, as organized by Christ, 
 is an oligarchy on earth composed originally of the 
 eleven Apostles under their divine Master as their 
 head, and then and afterward to the end of the 
 world of their official successors, the bishops under 
 Christ, as their head. The ministry of the Church 
 in its highest order. Bishops, is first in order of 
 time, and through their official acts they beget the 
 laity, and nourish them and build them up by the 
 word and sacraments. The essential principles of 
 the government of the Church are confessedly re- 
 vealed in Holy Scripture, and these in the nature of 
 things cannot change ; when once, therefore, we 
 clearly ascertain these principles, we have settled 
 the question forever what the polity of the Church 
 must be. This we can assuredly do by the repeated 
 illustrations given us in the Acts and Epistles and 
 Revelation of the condition of the Church through- 
 out the civilized world for the first one hundred 
 years of its existence, and hence we have abundant 
 opportunity and ample material to enable us to form 
 a sure and solid judgment as to what these princi- 
 ples are, and what they are not. For our present 
 purpose it is sufficient to state that we clearly see the 
 Apostles after their long sojourn together in Jeru- 
 salem, in obedience to their Lord's behest, going 
 forth into all the world and planting and organizing 
 churches independent of any earthly centre, and 
 
   
 
XXIV INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER, 
 
 dependent through them on Christ alone as their 
 sovereign ruler and head. 
 
 We see nothing in Holy Scripture of an absolute 
 monarchy dominating the Church and substituting a 
 human head on earth unlimited from beneath in the 
 place of Christ the divine Head in heaven. We see 
 the Apostles laboring in different countries, working 
 on their own lines, with results varying as to the 
 people whom they taught, and their own individual- 
 ity as to genius, and temper, and character, but the 
 same as to doctrine, and practice, and sacraments, 
 and worship. These churches, thus apostolically 
 founded, we find in the earliest glimpses which eccle- 
 siastical history affords us of their condition to be 
 mutually related to each other as members of a com- 
 mon family looking up to their Head, Christ in 
 heaven. The differences as to power and influence 
 among these branches of the Church were due, then, 
 as in all time, to what are called the accidents of 
 earthly estate and circumstances, so that the bishop 
 of a large wealthy diocese was accounted among 
 men as more important than his brother who pre- 
 sided over an obscure and insignificant see, but in 
 their official character they were absolutely equal. 
 For purposes of government and administration 
 there must needs be conventional arrangement by 
 which there shall be officers of human appointment 
 to preside in the assemblies of the faithful, and exe- 
 cute their behests as embodied in canons, and take 
 order for the carrying on the various functions of 
 the kingdom of Christ on earth. These offices, called 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. xxv 
 
 by whatever name, are not orders in the divinely 
 appointed ministry of the Church, but simply titles 
 and distinctions to denote those whose duty it is to 
 discharge these functions more or less necessary to 
 the well being of the Church. Hence patriarchs, 
 metropolitans, archbishops, primates, and other like 
 names are words of purely ecclesiastical origin, and 
 describe, with more or less accuracy, the position 
 and duties to which the Church has called certain 
 bishops. When thus elevated by their fellows to 
 posts of relative superiority, they are in their official 
 character simply bishops still. More they cannot 
 be, because God has appointed no higher order in 
 His ministry than that of bishop. The Pope of Rome, 
 the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Presiding Bishop 
 of the Church in the United States, are by divine 
 appointment simply bishops ; by human arrangement 
 they hold the respective positions on earth indicated 
 by these names. The Catholic Church, then, in its 
 corporate union by divine constitution, is a kingdom 
 with its King on His throne in heaven. His imme- 
 diate deputies on earth are bishops who prolong in 
 time the radii which carried the original official com- 
 mission from His divine human person on the Mount 
 of Ascension to the eleven, and subsequently to the 
 twelfth, St. Matthias. They, under Him, have the 
 plenitude of official power. The original eleven, act- 
 ing under their Lord, not only created an equal in 
 filling Judas' place with St. Matthias, but also ap- 
 pointed successors who would take their places when 
 they were removed by death, besides they called into 
 
xxvi INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 
 
 being the diaconate, to which they delegated a cer- 
 tain portion of their powers, and the priesthood or 
 presbyterate to which they added other powers be- 
 yond those of the diaconate, but not all their powers, 
 reserving to themselves pre-eminently the power of 
 ordination. " All power," said our Lord, " is given 
 unto me. Go ye therefore teach, preach, baptize." 
 Spiritual power comes from above, not from beneath, 
 from Christ, the Head, the King on His throne in 
 heaven to the Apostles as officers, the highest offi- 
 cers by divine appointment on earth, and through 
 them the spiritual power for the same blessed pur- 
 poses of governing, administering, and preserving 
 Christ's kingdom on earth is continued in their offi- 
 cial successors, the bishops, who are over the churches 
 in all lands. The Catholic Church as constituted 
 by God, as appears in Scripture and early ecclesias- 
 tical history runs a parallel with the kingdom of 
 nature, the head is in the skies, the ministers are on 
 earth, and receive from Him and dispense His good 
 gifts. The sun of righteousness, like the natural 
 sun, is above the clouds, and sheds His light and 
 heat and life-giving power from above through 
 earthly ministries in all lands, and is the common 
 property of all, and belongs exclusively to none. 
 Romanism, by which we mean the system of Church 
 government as formulated and now held as de Jide, as 
 " of faith," by the Roman communion, is the direct 
 antithesis of Catholicism. Catholicism is universal, 
 Romanism is local. Catholicism looks to Christ in 
 heaven as the Head, Romanism looks to the Pope on 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER, xxvii 
 
 earth as the head. Catholicism recognizes freedom 
 regulated by law as the inheritance of all lands, Ro- 
 manism subjects all to the absolute will and control 
 of one man. Catholicism appeals to Scripture and 
 ecclesiastical history in vindication of its essential 
 principles and lines of action. Romanism super- 
 sedes both and substitutes the unlimited will of one 
 bishop as the absolute arbiter and judge in all mat- 
 ters of faith and morals. Catholicism embodies and 
 reduces to practice in their best sense the democratic 
 and oligarchic principles ; it recognizes fully the 
 rights and makes provision for the expression of the. 
 voice of the people^ and it places over them in the 
 Lord the sacred ministry to win, persuade, teach, 
 and guide them, and execute their w^ill. Romanism 
 is an absolute unlimited monarchy. Its sovereign, 
 the Pope, is above all and controlled by none. In 
 theory the clergy and laity under their system have 
 no will much less a voice. Let us clearly under- 
 stand the essence of Romanism, the root error which 
 is the parent, and the nourisher, and protector of the 
 whole system of doctrinal error and practical corrup- 
 tion which Rome endorses and owns. This root 
 error is her theory of church government. On this 
 everything else turns, to this everything else ulti- 
 mately comes. " The supremacy of the Pope " ex- 
 presses the idea. This means that the Pope is in 
 the place of Christ as the head and centre of the 
 Church. He is above all and different from all. No 
 limitations can be put upon his will, since as a logi- 
 cal outcome of the doctrine of the supremacy the 
 
xxviii INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 
 
 Pope is, as the Roman Church now teaches, infalli- 
 ble. The Holy Ghost imparts to him the supernat- 
 ural [^ift which secures him officially, within the sphere 
 of faith and morals, from falling into error. Coun- 
 cils, if convened, simply assemble to record his con- 
 clusions. Clergy and laity, if they speak, simply 
 open their lips to echo his sentiments and wishes. 
 The Roman theory of church government makes the 
 Pope the universal monarch. The whole earth is 
 his diocese, and he is by Christ's commission the 
 one bishop of the entire world. There are in the 
 Roman communion, it is true, cardinals, and arch- 
 bishops, and bishops, but these are merely agents of 
 the Pope, acting in his place, because he cannot, in 
 the nature of things, as a man, be everywhere, they 
 simply represent him. He appoints them all, and if 
 the local authorities are allowed to suggest nominees 
 for his preference, this is not by right, but only by 
 permission. Romanism replaces Judaism, and so 
 utterly fails to satisfy the prophecies which have 
 gone before declaring the nature, and scope, and 
 character of the Catholic Church. " In Judah is 
 God known ; His name is great in Israel,'' * is the 
 genius of Judaism. By God's express arrangement 
 it was a local religion, its successor, the Church of 
 Christ, as the prophets declare, was to be catholic, 
 world-wide, universal. Romanism replaces Judaism, 
 and so fails to satisfy the claims of prophecy which 
 demand an economy in contradistinction to Judaism, 
 „ji , . . . _— — . — 
 
 ••' Psalms Ixxvi. I. 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER, xxix 
 
 not local, not national, but diffusive, equally at home 
 in all lands and among all peoples. Romanism re- 
 places, we say, Judaism, Italy takes the place of 
 Palestine, Rome that of Jerusalem, the Vatican that 
 of the Temple, and the Pope that of the High Priest. 
 Every Jew was obliged, wherever he might be on the 
 face of the earth, to look toward Jerusalem for his 
 spiritual privileges and blessings. Daniel in Baby- 
 lon opens his window toward Jerusalem when he 
 prays, the Eunuch comes from Ethiopia to Jerusalem 
 to worship, so precisely every subject of the Pope 
 must look to Rome for his ministry and sacraments. 
 The Pope appoints and consecrates his bishop, and 
 so the Pope and the Pope alone gives him his spirit- 
 ual life, and teaching, and sustenance. Romanism 
 is thus utterly out of joint with the Old Testament 
 Scriptures, the word of prophecy ; it is equally in- 
 consistent with the New. Romanism asserts that our 
 Lord made St. Peter the sole depository of ministe- 
 rial gifts, and through him the other apostles received. 
 He was made Christ's vicar, and the earth was given 
 to him for his spiritual possession. His successors 
 in his chair at Rome inherit his plenitude of power, 
 and so they are to-day precisely what he was officially 
 when he ruled from Rome the Church of God while 
 he was alive. We have seen that this theory is abso- 
 lutely inconsistent with the original and fmal charter 
 and commission given by Christ to His apostles to 
 plant and organize His church, which was to come 
 into being ten days after He had spoken and acted. 
 The whole scene, the grouping of the persons, as 
 
XXX INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER, 
 
 well as the words spoken, cannot by any ingenuity 
 be brought into harmony with papal supremacy. 
 Our Lord does not have St. Peter resting on His 
 breast and allow the others to ask him what is said, 
 but He addresses directly all alike, and bids them 
 ** go ye," '' teach ye," *' baptize ye." Compare this 
 picture with our Lord as the centre, as the head, and 
 the apostles around Him, with Romanism, which 
 presents the Church with St. Peter locked in our 
 Lord's embrace, and his fellow disciples beneath 
 him, at the foot of the Mount, looking up to him, 
 and learning from his mouth what Jesus says, and it 
 Avill be seen that the two are absolutely inconsistent. 
 Again, take another point of comparison out of 
 many which might be presented, and see how utterly 
 irreconcilable Catholicity and Romanism are. St. 
 Peter, remember, in the theory of Roman supremacy, 
 was precisely what the Pope is. The Bishop of 
 Rome derives his prerogatives, and powers, and 
 privileges from St. Peter. The stream cannot rise 
 above its fountain, the present Pope cannot be 
 higher than St. Peter. He cannot, in relation to his 
 cardinals, be more than St. Peter was to his fellow 
 apostles. In the eighth chapter of the Acts we read 
 that, " when the apostles, which were at Jerusalem, 
 heard that Samaria had received the word of God, 
 they sent unto them Peter and John." Imagine the 
 College of Cardinals to-day sending the Pope and 
 the Bishop of Ostia on a confirmation tour to Flor- 
 ence or Naples. The very idea is absurd. The 
 Chiirch of Rome is responsible for holding and 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. xxxi 
 
 teaching that St. Peter sat and presided as her first 
 bishop for five and twenty years. During this inter- 
 val St. Paul addressed his Epistle to the Romans. 
 Can it be conceived that if St. Peter were what the 
 Pope claims to be, the Apostle of the Gentiles would 
 absolutely ignore the presence and jurisdiction, not 
 merely of his colleague and equal, but his superior 
 upon whom he depended for his official existence 
 and mission ? Is it possible that St. Paul could have 
 withstood St. Peter to the face because he was to be 
 blamed '^ had he enjoyed the place and prerogatives 
 which the Bishop of Rome claims to possess to-day ? 
 The words of St. Paul, had they occurred in the 
 Epistles of St. Peter, would doubtless have replaced 
 the text which now surrounds the dome of St. Peter's, 
 because they would have been much more to the pur- 
 pose of supporting the Papal claims than the declar- 
 ation of our Lord to St. Peter. St. Paul says : 
 " Besides those things that are without, that which 
 cometh upon me daily, the care of all the churches." 
 (2 Cor. xi. 28). How accurately does this state- 
 ment describe the practical duties of the Pope in 
 accordance with the theory of Roman supremacy ! 
 But the statement is made by St. Paul, not by St. 
 Peter ; and it is absolutely inconsistent with the 
 sovereignty of St. Peter and his alleged successors 
 in the See of Rome. Our Lord's words to St. 
 Peter, ^^ Thou art Peter, and on this rock I will 
 build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not pre- 
 
 "'^Galatians ii. 11. 
 
xxxu INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 
 
 vail against it," '" are now the stronghold of the Roman 
 controversialist in seeking to maintain his cause from 
 Holy Scripture. If this be all, how weak his case 
 must be ! It must be all, or next to all he has to 
 allege in favor of his monstrous claims for the Pope, 
 since he makes the most of his single text. He 
 places it on the dome of his great cathedral, he 
 adduces it on every occasion, he brings it forward to 
 settle every controversy, he flings it with triumph at 
 the head of every adversary, it is his great his almost 
 only resource. How far removed it is from giving 
 support to what the Pope claims to-day, a moment's 
 consideration v/ill show. Our Lord had asked a 
 question, and in doing so asserted a fact. " Whom 
 do men say that I, the Son of Man, am ? " The ques- 
 tion v/hich He puts is what men's estimate of Him 
 is, the fact which He asserts is that He is the Son of 
 of Man, that is, the perfect man. St. Peter responds, 
 when our Lord presses the inquiry still further, "but 
 whom do ye say that I, the Son of Man, am ? " with 
 the reply, '' I say that Thou, the Son of Man, art the 
 Christ, the Son of the living God." Here we have 
 the confession of the doctrine of the Incarnation in 
 its fullness, the acknowledgment of the perfect 
 divinity in the affirming " that He is the Son of God," 
 and the acknowledgment of His perfect humanity 
 in the acceptance of our Lord's assertion, " that He 
 is the Son of Man." It is the first time this declara- 
 tion of the Catholic faith in its fullness had fallen 
 
 ^St. Matt. xvi. i8. 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. xxxiii 
 
 from human lips. These factors, the believing in 
 the heart, and the confession with the mouth, make 
 the living stones with which the spiritual temple, the 
 church, is to be built, and St. Peter is the lirst of 
 these living stones by the grace of God into which 
 these elements enter, and our Lord, the foundation 
 stone, the corner stone, accepts him as the first, and 
 places him on Himself, and rewards him with the 
 promise that on him, Peter, in thus believing and 
 making profession of his faith, all others who in 
 future shall believe and proclaim their faith, shall be 
 built. This is literally true ; no one ever has, or does, 
 or can believe in the incarnation, the Catholic faith, 
 without following the example of St. Peter, and be- 
 coming like him a living stone and taking his place 
 in one or other of the two walls which meet and rest 
 upon the sure foundation corner stone, which is 
 Christ. The divine history of the New Testament 
 goes still further to illustrate and explain these 
 words of our Lord to St. Petej:. He who first be- 
 came a living stone by believing and confessing was 
 chosen to be the first to proclaim this faith to others, 
 and win them to accept and own it, and so through 
 the spirit of God to convert them from dead stones 
 into living stones, and build them with his own hand 
 into the spiritual temple. This he did both to the 
 Jews on the day of Pentecost, and the Gentiles in 
 the persons of Cornelius and his household. These 
 incidents in St. Peter's life are not accidental, as 
 men count occurrences ; they are crucial, signal 
 acts, designed and arranged by God Himself. St. 
 
 2 
 
xxxiv INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER, 
 
 Peter challenges attention to this himself when he 
 says to his assembled colleagues and brethren in the 
 council at Jerusalem, " God made choice among us, 
 that the Gentiles by my mouth should hear the 
 word of the Gospel, and believe." 
 
 The significance of the facts is great. St. Peter, 
 by divine arrangement, first puts forth his hand and 
 takes the stones from the Jewish quarry and places 
 them on the corner stone in the one wall, and then, 
 by the same appointment, he first puts forth his 
 hand again and takes the stones from the Gentile 
 quarry and places them on the corner stone in the 
 other wall, and thus historically he fulfills in his own 
 person the promise of our Lord in that he begins 
 the building of the two walls which meet and rest 
 upon and are bound together by the corner stone, 
 Christ. What connection have the declaration and 
 the promise, " Thou art Peter, and on this rock I 
 will build my Church " with the claims of the pres- 
 ent or any previous Bishop of Rome ? It is difficult 
 to see. Whatever they suggest, they do not imply 
 any successors to whom the name and the privilege 
 will descend, they do not convey the idea of any offi- 
 cial gift which was to be transmitted to others ; they 
 simply affirm a fact that the great apostle in first 
 grasping with the mind and believing with the heart 
 and professing with the mouth the Catholic faith, 
 justified the name long since given to him, and be- 
 came a living stone, the first of those which should 
 be added until the building was complete, resting 
 upon the same foundation, Christ, the Rock, the 
 
INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. xxxv 
 
 living God. Such a discussion might be prolonged, 
 but an introduction must have limits, and we will 
 close with calling attention to a difficulty which is 
 fatal to the continuance of the powers and privileges 
 of St. Peter as claimed by the Papal theory of church 
 government, even granting that they once existed. 
 In the polity of the Catholic Church provision is 
 made for the transmission of the grace of orders by 
 the apostolical canon, ^' Let a bishop be consecrated 
 by two or three bishops," and by the Nicene enact- 
 ment that three bishops at least must unite in conse- 
 crating a new bishop. Here equals create an equal, 
 and the apostolical succession is not, as it is fre- 
 quently and erroneously alleged, a chain of single 
 links^ but a network of innumerable strands. In the 
 polity of the Roman obedience, however, the Papal 
 succession is not only a chain of single links, but, won- 
 derful to relate, with only a few exceptions, the links 
 are all disconnected, separated generally by weeks, 
 frequently by months, sometimes by years. The 
 doctrine of Roman supremacy teaches that the Pope 
 is above all, that he is invented with powers which 
 no one else on earth possesses. All are beneath him 
 in official power, and privilege, and dignity. He is 
 sui generis. When the Pope dies, therefore, where 
 are his powers, and privileges, and prerogatives ? 
 No human being possesses them. After an interval 
 a new Pope is chosen ; how does he recover these 
 powers, not by the hands of any earthly ecclesiastic, 
 since there is none that has them to bestow. It 
 would seem, therefore, that the Pope must descend 
 
xxxvi INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER. 
 
 to the level of the congregational minister, and affirm 
 that his official status is conferred upon him by the 
 people, or their representatives in the Roman system, 
 the cardinals. But this involves the absurdity of 
 admitting that the stream can rise higher than the 
 fountain, that it is possible to give to another what 
 you do not possess yourself ; or else the Bishop of 
 Rome may say that he has the inward call and an- 
 nointing of the Holy Spirit, and that he himself is 
 alone the judge and witness in the premises, and so 
 he takes his place side by side with the self-appointed 
 and constituted ministries of the religious bodies 
 around us. Extremes meet, ultra Romanism and 
 ultra Protestantism unite in a hundred points. In 
 opposite ways, unintentionally, they both help for- 
 ward the cause of infidelity and rebellion against 
 God. From opposite motives, yet with equal zeal, 
 they both unite in seeking to oppose and beat down 
 and destroy the Holy Catholic Church. This little 
 book is directed against errors, not men ; it is in- 
 tended to present the case in a calm, argumentative 
 way as far removed from bitterness and ill-temper as 
 possible. We sincerely trust that this introduction 
 breathes the same spirit. Such, at least, is our pur- 
 pose ; it has been our aim to follow the apostolic 
 precept, and speak the truth in love. 
 George F. Seymour, 
 
 Bishop of Springfield, 
 New York, August 30, 1883. 
 
THE PAPAL CLAIMS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE QUESTION STATED, 
 
 The influence and claims of the Roman Church— Importance of the 
 question — A serious matter to pass from the Enghsh Church to 
 the Roman, or vice versa — A truth forgotten — Above all, necessary 
 to understand the real grounds on which such a change should 
 be made — Some assigned reasons for changing utterly insufficient 
 — Restlessness and unhappiness — Personal inchnation — Abuses 
 in the Church — Only one reason for changing sufficient : that the 
 claims of the Papal See are valid ; that they are supported by 
 Scripture and the primitive Church — Is the Papal supremacy, as 
 at present claimed, of divine right or not ? This the whole ques- 
 tion — ^ Papal statement of this question — Such claims must be fully 
 substantiated — The object of this book to examine the grounds on 
 which they rest. 
 
 There are two questions which will naturally arise in 
 the minds of those who study carefully and devoutly the 
 religious history of our own times. In view of events 
 which are passing before us, they will be constrained 
 to ask : What is the secret of the influence which the 
 Church of Rome undoubtedly exerts over certain classes 
 of character ? And perhaps a second question may be 
 worthy of attention on the part of those who think the 
 
 A 
 
2 THE PAPAL CLAIMS. 
 
 first very easy of solution : How is it, if the claims of the 
 Roman Church are so strong, that multitudes of single- 
 minded, devout, and learned men do not yield to them? 
 nay, that some who may certainly be thus described, 
 have recently left her communion ? 
 
 In any case, the question of our relation to the Church 
 of Rome cannot be ignored ; and its importance is very 
 widely felt. It may be that the gravity of the case 
 has been exaggerated. It w^ould, indeed, appear that the 
 secessions to Rome are by no means so numerous as the 
 popular imagination had represented them. Still they 
 do occur not unfrequently, and are often attended by 
 the most calamitous consequences in families. It is 
 also widely believed that a convert will leave no stone 
 unturned in order to induce others to take the same 
 course ; and it does happen, from time to time, that 
 persons are brought under the influence of the Roman 
 Church in such a manner as to arouse very grave suspi- 
 cions as to the kind of warfare which the members and 
 ministers of that Church think lawful in order to gain 
 their ends. 
 
 We refrain from dwelling upon this aspect of the sub- 
 ject, because it is our wish and intention to treat this 
 question, as far as may be, without prejudice, and especi- 
 ally without offering what might be regarded as insults 
 to another communion or to its members. Truth and 
 charity alike suffer from a mode of controversy which 
 seems to care more for personal triumph than for the 
 assertion of that w^iich God has revealed ; which seems 
 to delight more in wounding an adversary, than in con- 
 vincing and converting him. 
 
 Let us, then, assume as our starting-point a principle 
 
THE QUESTION STATED, 3 
 
 which will be conceded by Romans and Reformed alike. 
 It will be admitted, on all sides, that it is a very serious 
 thing to change one's religious convictions — to pass over 
 from one communion to another ; and this general prin- 
 ciple will not be weakened when it is applied to a change 
 so great and momentous as the passing from the Church 
 of England to the Church of Rome, or the reverse. 
 
 Roman Catholics will be the first to assert this principle 
 with all earnestness, when it is applied to those who are 
 tempted or solicited to leave themselves. We know what 
 they think and what they say of Father Hyacinthe, of 
 Dr. Dollinger, and of others who have recently broken 
 with the Papal authority. But the principle is of uni- 
 versal application. This can be denied only on the 
 assumption that one side is certainly right, and the other 
 certainly wrong; and this is an assumption which a 
 controversialist cannot be allowed to make. We concede 
 to others ; we demand that the same concession shall 
 be made to ourselves \ that those who are brought up in 
 a certain faith should have good and sufficient reasons 
 for making such a change before they relinquish it. 
 
 It may seem unnecessary to insist upon so obvious a 
 truism, but it is unfortunately a truth which, however 
 obvious, is constantly ignored. Men and women trifle 
 with their convictions, allow doubts of all kinds to under- 
 mine the beliefs in which they have grown up, without 
 giving a thought to the solemn responsibility which 
 belongs to such a proceeding, or the consequences — 
 abiding and irremediable — which may flow to themselves 
 and others from the course on which they are entering. 
 
 It is becoming more and more necessary to protest 
 against this dangerous species of levity. We have no 
 
4 THE PAPAL CLAIMS, 
 
 mind to insult the Roman Church or its new converts. 
 We have taken as our motto '^speaking the truth in 
 love," and we will endeavour to verify it. The truth we 
 will speak as far as we are able ; and in love as far as 
 God may give us grace. Indeed, we are sure that those 
 who love truth supremely, far better than their own 
 opinions and views of truth, will necessarily speak it in 
 love, since they are contending for nothing which is 
 really their own. 
 
 In this spirit, then, we solemnly protest against the 
 levity which first assumes that the Papal claims are true 
 and valid, and then professes calmly to investigate the 
 grounds upon which they repose. As a matter of fact, it 
 is done every day. Persons are taken with something 
 in the Church of Rome ; many are awed by its lofty 
 claims and pretensions ; some are attracted by its impres- 
 sive ritual, some by its wonderful history; and the 
 resolution to submit to those influences is as good as 
 formed before there has been any serious consideration 
 of the grounds upon which such a resolution should be 
 taken. 
 
 To persons who are bent upon treating their religious 
 responsibiHties in this spirit, we fear there is nothing to 
 be said. They are swayed by inclination, or by the 
 accident of their circumstances, not by any real desire 
 to know what is true, nor by any serious resolution to 
 follow out their convictions when they have been 
 thoughtfully and rationally formed. 
 
 To those, however, who realize the responsibility 
 involved in considering such a question, and who may 
 yet be capable of giving attention to the whole bearings 
 of the controversy, we wish in this introductory chapter 
 
THE QUESTION STATED. 5 
 
 to say a few words on the real nature of the question 
 which has to be settled before an English Churchman, 
 for example, can have a right to leave his own com- 
 munion and join that of the Church of Rome. In a 
 measure, these v/ords must of necessity be words of 
 warning ; we are bound first of all to point out certain 
 considerations by which persons are influenced in this 
 matter, which can by no means be regarded as reasons 
 for making such a change. But this is only preliminary : 
 it is our principal business to ascertain clearly the very 
 point which must be decided one way or the other, before 
 we resolve to reject or to accept the Papal claims ; and 
 to this particular subject the chief part of this volume 
 will be dedicated. 
 
 Roman Catholics will not deny that there are Protes- 
 tants who join their Church without knowing why they 
 ought to do so \ even as they would assert, and as we 
 should concede, that there are others who leave the 
 Roman Communion on grounds which are equally 
 insufficient. We are all agreed that this should not be 
 done. However we may reduce our opinions to practice, 
 no one really thinks that he or any one else has any 
 right whatever to make a change so momentous without 
 having reasons, good, solid, and sufficient, for doing so. 
 
 Could it be said — we ask in all seriousness and charity 
 — that all or most of those who leave the Church of 
 England for the Church of Rome are influenced by such 
 reasons as would justify thoughtful men and women in 
 taking such a step ? Do we not know, on the contrary, 
 that many take this step under the influence of reasons 
 or motives which are decidedly insufficient ? And if so, 
 it becomes a serious duty to ascertain, as far as we are 
 
6 THE PAPAL CLAIMS, 
 
 able, the true nature of the question on which such a 
 decision should turn. By this means we shall at least 
 satisfy ourselves that the conclusion at which we arrive, 
 and the action which may follow upon it, result from 
 no mere caprice or passing inclination, but, whether in- 
 themselves right or wrong, are at least based upon 
 considerations which are not unworthy of rational and 
 responsible creatures. 
 
 As a simple matter of fact, many persons do enter the 
 Roman Communion, for reasons which an educated 
 Roman Catholic would be the first to pronounce in- 
 sufficient. Whether it be right or wrong to go to Rome, 
 such persons have clearly no moral right to go, because 
 they have no good reason for doing so. Let us glance 
 at some of these reasons. 
 
 A very common reason for joining the Roman Commu- 
 nion is a sense of restlessness, unhappiness, uncertainty. 
 The desire to be at rest is one of the deepest in human 
 nature. An utter wilUngness to submit to the Divine 
 discipline by which peace may be attained is far less 
 common. Those who long for rest and yet do not know 
 the way of peace, cast about for some shorter road to 
 the end which they desire. They hear of people going 
 to Rome and being quite calm and happy, so they 
 think they will go too. 
 
 No wise Roman Catholic will think this a valid reason 
 for such a change. What would he think of a member 
 of his own Church who became a Mahometan or even a 
 Protestant for such a reason ? As far as the mere method 
 is concerned, a man might as well seek for peace by 
 taking a dose of opium. Roman Catholics hold, as we do, 
 that you must seek for ^* peace through the truth." They 
 
I 
 
 THE QUESTION STATED, 
 
 believe, as we believe, that such a gratification of a 
 craving, genuine or morbid, is unlawful ; and they would 
 join in warning any one who might think of leaving their 
 own communion and joining another, in which some 
 friend had found peace and rest, that he was trifling with 
 the highest interests of his immortal nature. 
 
 Still less worthy of respect, if that be possible, is the 
 state of mind which turns to the Roman system because 
 it likes it. Such a reason is, indeed, often a purely local 
 one. The services of the Church of England in some 
 particular locality may be cold and unattractive, and 
 those of the Church of Rome in the same locality may 
 be the reverse. If it were not quite certain that some 
 people do for this reason go from one communion to 
 another, it would seem hardly worth while even to men- 
 tion the case. It must be sufficient to note it ; it would 
 be absurd to waste words upon it, further than to utter a 
 brief, earnest warning against a proceeding so utterly 
 irrational. 
 
 Akin to this, although perhaps a degree more respect- 
 able, is the reason for change which arises from the 
 existence of abuses in the Church, either generally or in 
 the particular locahty with which one may happen to be 
 acquainted. On this point it is necessary to dwell for a 
 moment, inasmuch as no small portion of religious con- 
 troversy has frequently turned on this very aspect of the 
 question. 
 
 Of course, there is a true side to an argument of this 
 kind. If it could be shown that any particular system or 
 set of doctrines had been regularly productive of good on 
 the one side, or of evil on the other, had wrought either 
 happiness or misery systematically to those who had 
 
8 THE PAPAL CLAIMS. 
 
 come under their influence, then a strong case would be 
 estabUshed for or against such a system, according to its 
 visible and manifest effects. 
 
 But even here there is great need of discrimination in 
 the collection of facts. Two men, starting with different 
 prejudices and different expectations, will find the very 
 facts before their eyes widely different, and the conclusions 
 which they draw from them still more diverse. Before 
 these can be of any real value, they must be verified by 
 investigators approaching the consideration of them 
 from different points of view. 
 
 But even a prejudiced consideration of a wide induc- 
 tion of facts is far different from the fault against which we 
 are here contending. What we would most earnestly warn 
 people against is, the tendency to rush from one system 
 to another, because of manifest faults or corruptions in 
 the system which they are tempted to abandon, faults 
 which belong to some particular place or time perhaps, 
 and which they have not remarked in the system which 
 they think of espousing. 
 
 Very often this tendency takes the form of discontent 
 with the state of religion in some particular locality, in 
 utter forgetfulness of the fact that, if the rival system 
 were known as widely and as intimately, similar or 
 greater disadvantages might be found in it. Sometimes 
 the dissatisfaction arises from the study of some parti- 
 cular period in the history of the Church j and people 
 have been known to go to the Church of Rome because 
 of the state of the English Church in the eighteenth 
 century; whereas the condition of the Roman Church 
 at that particular time was no better, nor indeed, one 
 might almost say, of any other Church. 
 
THE QUESTION STATED. 9 
 
 Few Roman controversialists will employ arguments 
 like these in defending their own Church or in assailing 
 the position of others. Yet not a few of those who are 
 drawn to the Roman Communion are influenced by such 
 considerations. It would be easy to retort, it would be 
 easy to gather from the long and varied history of the 
 Latin Church, a plentiful crop of abuses and corruptions 
 of all kinds (perhaps exceeding all that is known to 
 history elswhere) ; and it would be manifestly unfair. 
 Such gleanings could be of no value for their purpose 
 unless they could be shown in their relation to the 
 general history of the Church, unless they could be 
 studied, so to speak, in their due proportion. 
 
 Such arguments will find no place in these pages. 
 We refer to them now only to warn our readers against 
 them. A person may have one of two reasons, which 
 to him seem valid, for leaving the communion of the 
 Church of England, or joining that of the Church of 
 Rome. If he believes that the English Church is 
 heretical or schismatical, then it would probably be- 
 come his duty to leave it. If, on the other hand, he 
 believes that the claims of the Roman Church are well 
 grounded, then he can have no right to refuse submission 
 to its authority. Right or wrong, these are intelligible 
 reasons for making such a change, serious as it may be ; 
 and one who has arrived at definite conclusions respecting 
 these questions, will doubtless feel bound to give effect to 
 his convictions by taking the course which they prescribe. 
 But surely it is his duty to make careful inquiry on these 
 points, to ascertain exactly what they mean, and by 
 what arguments the claims or the accusations which are 
 advanced may be sustained, before concluding that they 
 are fully established. 
 
   
 
lo THE PAPAL CLAIMS, 
 
 Thus, the Church of England may be faulty and de- 
 fective ; but that can be no reason for becoming a mem- 
 ber of a foreign communion, unless it shows claims and 
 credentials such as can hardly be resisted or set aside. 
 Whether the Church of England is heretical in its teach- 
 ing will be considered at the end of this book. The 
 main question with which we have to deal will be the 
 claims of the Roman Church and of the Papal See ; for, 
 unless these are established, it is of little use to prove 
 any number of abuses in the Church of England. A 
 man does not think of becoming a Frenchman or a 
 German, because he thinks some of the English laws 
 inequitable, or because he dislikes some of the customs 
 of its people. And a man has no right to leave the 
 Church to which he belongs merely because he dis- 
 approves of something in it, or likes another Church 
 better. He must be satisfied that that other Church has 
 claims which he has no right to resist, claims to which 
 he is bound to yield submission and obedience. 
 
 Before he can do this he must know somewhat accu- 
 rately what these claims are, he must learn the grounds 
 on which they are based, and he must satisfy himself 
 that these grounds are valid. We will here, therefore, 
 endeavour first to state accurately and clearly the nature 
 of the Papal claims, and then we will examine the 
 arguments by which they are commended to our ac- 
 ceptance. 
 
 According to the teaching of the Roman Church, St. 
 Peter was appointed supreme teacher and governor in 
 the Christian Church, to whom everything in doctrine 
 and in discipline should be referred for his final decision; 
 and these powers were by him transmitted to his sue- 
 
THE Q UES nON ST A TED, i r 
 
 cessors in the See of Rome, who were to exercise 
 them as long as the Christian Church should exist on 
 earth. 
 
 As a writer who formerly belonged to the Church of 
 England, but who has for many years been a member of 
 the Church of Rome, has truly said, both before and 
 after his secession, *' The whole question between the 
 Roman Church and ourselves, as well as the Eastern 
 Church, turns upon the Papal supremacy, as at present 
 claimed, being of Divine right or not.'' 
 
 This supremacy was first given to St. Peter. Accord- 
 ing to the writer just quoted, our Lord ^'marked him 
 out for a peculiar and singular office, connected him 
 with Himself in a special manner, and after having thus 
 the whole of His ministry given him tokens and intima- 
 tions of his future destination, at last expi^essly nominated 
 him to take His own place and preside among his brethren^* 
 This position, with all its privileges, rights, and powers, 
 St. Peter handed on to the Roman Pontiffs. 
 
 That there may be no doubt or question as to the nature 
 and significance of the Papal claims, we will present 
 them as they are stated by Pope Pius VI., in words 
 which, to use the expression of an eminent writer of the 
 Roman Church, "he pronounced with the assent and 
 joyous approval of the whole Catholic world," in the 
 year 1786, in condemning the work of Eybel, entitled 
 "What is the Pope?" Here are his words: "That in 
 the solidity of the rock the Church was founded by 
 Christ, and by an especial favour Peter was chosen by 
 Him before the other apostles, that with vicarious power 
 he should be the prince of the apostolic choir, and that 
 he should take upon himself the supreme supervision 
 
12 THE PAPAL CLAIMS, 
 
 and authority — an authority to be transmitted to his 
 successors in every age — for feeding the whole flock, for 
 confirming the brethren, for binding and loosing through- 
 out the whole world ; this is a Catholic dogma, which 
 the whole Church hath received from the lips of Christ, 
 which she hath handed down and defended by the con- 
 tinuous preaching of the fathers, which she hath firmly 
 held in all times with holy reverence, and often against 
 the errors of innovators, confirmed by decrees of popes 
 and of councils. In this pre-eminence of the Apostolic 
 See, Christ wished that the bond of unity should be 
 firmly and strongly held, whereby the Church, destined 
 to spread over the whole world and to be composed of 
 members ever so remote, should, by the union of all 
 under one Head, grow into a firmly knit body." 
 
 One other authority may be adduced, the formal 
 decision of the Vatican Council, as voted on the 
 thirteenth of July 1870. We present only those por- 
 tions which are necessary for our purpose. In the first 
 dogmatic constitution ^' On the Church of Christ,"* it is 
 said that ^' if any one shall say that the blessed Apostle 
 Peter was not constituted by Christ our Lord the prince 
 of all the apostles, and the visible head of the whole 
 Church militant ; or that he received this directly and 
 immediately from the same our Lord Jesus Christ only 
 as a primacy of honour, but not of true and proper 
 jurisdiction, let him be anathema." 
 
 In the second chapter the same anathema is pro- 
 nounced upon any one who shall say "that it is not of 
 
 * Commencing, ^^ Pastor ceternus.''^ The whole document may be 
 seen in Friedrich's Docnmenta ad Illustrandtim Concilium Vatica- 
 numj part ii. pp. 314-318. 
 
THE QUESTION ST A TED. 13 
 
 the institution of Christ our Lord Himself, or by Divine 
 right, that blessed Peter has perpetual successors in the 
 primacy over the universal Church ; or that the Roman 
 Pontiff is not the successor of blessed Peter in the same 
 primacy." 
 
 In the third chapter an anathema is pronounced on 
 any one who shall say *^ that the Roman Pontiff has only 
 an office of inspection and direction, but not full and 
 supreme power of jurisdiction over the universal Church, 
 in things which pertain not only to faith and morals, but 
 also to the discipline and government of the Church 
 diffused throughout the whole world ; or that he has 
 only the greater part, but not the whole plenitude of 
 this supreme power." 
 
 The fourth chapter deals with the Papal infallibility, 
 which it asserts to be independent of the '^ consent of 
 the Church." But this is a question which concerns those 
 who admit the supremacy of the Pope, and with which 
 we need not here concern ourselves except incidentally. 
 The Papal claims, as they affect those who are external 
 to the Roman Communion, are stated with sufficient 
 clearness and force in the extracts which we have given. 
 
 Higher or more comprehensive claims could hardly 
 be put forward j and two things become at once obvious 
 to any one who seriously considers their nature : first, 
 that, unless they can be substantiated, no one can have 
 a right to submit to the authority of the Pope by enter- 
 ing the Roman Communion, because in so doing he 
 would be affirming what he regarded as false, and 
 accepting an authority for which he believed there was 
 no valid foundation ; or, on the other hand, that, if these 
 claims can be substantiated, then we are under the most 
 
14 THE PAPAL CLAIMS. 
 
 solemn obligation to seek admission to the communion 
 of the Church of Rome, whatever it may cost, whatever 
 sacrifice it may involve. 
 
 If these pretensions of the Roman See are valid, then 
 they are in the right who say that to be out of com- 
 munion with Rome is to be out of Peter, and to be out 
 of Peter is to be out of Christ. In this case, as we have 
 said, no sacrifice can be too great to make in submitting 
 to an authority which can claim to represent the autho- 
 rity of Christ and of God. If the Pope be the Vicar 
 of Christ, with plenary authority received from Him to 
 teach and to govern, then we must not take counsel of 
 flesh and blood, we must simply yield ourselves to his 
 rule as to the government of the Most High. 
 
 But surely those who advocate such claims will allow 
 that, when pretensions of a character so awful are put 
 forward, they ought to be investigated with no ordinary 
 care, and evidences, which are virtually irresistible, should 
 be demanded and provided, before a conclusion is ac- 
 cepted which must draw after it such responsibilities and 
 duties. It is to the consideration of these evidences 
 that the main part of this book will be dedicated. We 
 believe that, in examining them, our supreme regard will 
 be for truth, and our supreme concern to discover what 
 is true on the subject of the Papal claims. If this pro- 
 fession be well founded, then, however solemn the feeling 
 of responsibility with which we enter upon the discussion, 
 it will at least be possible to carry it on without passion 
 or bitterness, remembering that only truth can be bene- 
 ficial to ourselves and others, as the real teaching of 
 Him Whom we profess to serve. 
 
 There are, of course, other subordinate questions in 
 
THE Q UESTION ST A TED, 1 5 
 
 this controversy, such as the validity of English orders, 
 the orthodoxy of Anglican doctrine, and some other 
 related topics. On the question of English orders we 
 do not propose here to enter. On the subject of 
 Anglican orthodoxy, a chapter will be found at the end 
 of the book. One chapter, the second, will be given 
 to a consideration of the objection brought against the 
 English Church, as not being a part of that holy Catholic 
 Church which is commemorated in the creeds. It 
 seemed desirable to deal first briefly with this topic, as 
 it would probably recur to the minds of some of our 
 readers during their consideration of the other portions 
 of the book. We must, however, point out that the 
 great question has reference to the Papal position and 
 claims. If the Pope has this authority from God, to 
 which he lays claim, then there is nothing for us but to 
 submit to it ; if he has not, then, however much any one 
 may prefer Roman customs, observances, or ritual, he 
 must resist it to the death. 
 
( i6 ) 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 ARGUMENT FROM THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 
 
 Roman Appeal : Those who believe in one Catholic Church can find 
 that Church only in the Roman Communion — Grant that Christ 
 intended the Church to be one, and schism is a sin — Who is to 
 blame for the schism ? — How can it be lawfully healed ? — The real 
 facts of the case frequently ignored — What is the true basis of 
 union? — The question of the Papal claims must be settled — If they 
 are invalid, the Papacy the real cause of disunion — Duty of indivi- 
 duals — Illustration from the Old Testament — On what grounds are 
 the Papal claims supported ? — Three principal reasons — The only 
 valid proof. 
 
 A COMMON argument by which it is sought to enforce 
 the claims of the Roman Church is derived from the 
 unity of the Catholic Church ; and we have reason to 
 think that many English Churchmen have been in- 
 fluenced by it. Let us endeavour to state this argu- 
 ment fairly, and then to examine its force. 
 
 You believe in the Catholic Church — this is the form 
 of the argument — that belief is part of your confession. 
 In the Apostles' Creed you say, *' I believe in the 
 holy Catholic Church ; " in the Nicene Creed you 
 declare, ** I believe one [holy] Catholic and Apos- 
 tolic Church." What do you mean by this Church ? 
 Are you really a member of it ? Do you think that the 
 English Church is a portion of it ? 
 
ARGUMEN2' FROM CATHOLIC CHURCH. 17 
 
 We have no wish to evade this question, or to 
 escape from its force by any side issue. We beUeve 
 that Jesus Christ has a Church on earth, a visible 
 society which He estabhshed by the descent of the 
 Holy Ghost on the day of Pentecost, and that He 
 intended that all His followers should be members 
 of that society. We further beUeve that our Blessed 
 Lord intended that this society should be one, and 
 that it should realize on earth, as far as that might be 
 possible, the communion of saints. It can hardly be 
 denied either, if these statements are true, that the 
 culpable breaking of that unity must be a sin, and not 
 a matter of indifference as many regard it. These are 
 statements which we hold to be all perfectly true; and 
 yet we cannot see that they involve us in the obligation 
 of submitting ourselves to the authority of the Roman 
 Pontiff. 
 
 Granting that this disunion is a serious evil, there 
 are several questions which naturally arise, and which 
 must be answered to our satisfaction, before we can see 
 our own duty in reference to it ; such questions as 
 these : Who is to blame for the Church's broken unity ? 
 What is the Divine intention in permitting it ? By 
 what means may we hope to restore this unity according 
 to the will of God ? And what is our duty with reference 
 to that work and the means which may be used in order 
 to attain it ? 
 
 It may be safely said that most of those who profess 
 to be influenced by this argument from the unity of the 
 Christian Church, have never seriously grappled with any 
 one of these questions. They know that the English 
 Church is a part^ and a comparatively small part, of the 
 
 B 
 
   
 
i8 ARGUMENT FROM 
 
 whole of Western Christendom. They are awed by the 
 greatness, the past history, and the lofty pretensions of the 
 Latin Church ; and they escape from a position which 
 seems to be isolated and therefore, perhaps, schismatical, 
 to take one which impresses the imagination with an 
 idea of unity, comprehension, Catholicity. 
 
 But they do not consider other facts which are at 
 least elements in any true solution of these questions. 
 They do not consider, for example, the position of the 
 Oriental Churches before and after the breach of com- 
 munion between them and the Western Church ; they 
 do not consider — a more important matter — who was 
 responsible for the events which led to the schism ; 
 they do not consider who was the actual author of the 
 schism between ourselves and the Church of Rome, 
 or what were the grounds on which communion was 
 refused by the one to the other. And yet every 
 reasonable human being will admit that mere genera- 
 lities about the unity of the Catholic Church are of no 
 weight -or importance whatever, unless we can be satisfied 
 on questions like these. 
 
 The breaking up of the Church of Christ into frag- 
 ments is a simple fact ; and it is a fact which does not 
 concern the English Church alone. To pronounce a 
 hasty judgment on this "broken unity" of the Church 
 is to be guilty of a common fault against which Bishop 
 Butler long ago uttered one of his wise cautions — the 
 fault of judging of a whole plan from a knowledge of 
 some of its parts, W^e may be quite certain that, if the 
 great Ruler of the Church and the world thus permitted 
 that family which He gathered together from the various 
 nations of the earth to be broken and divided, He had 
 
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH 19 
 
 some wise and merciful reason for so allowing it. He 
 had the power to prevent it, if He would ; and it becomes 
 us to consider well why He allowed its history to take 
 the course which it has actually followed. We do not 
 mean, for a moment, that such considerations prove that 
 disunion is not an evil, or that we are absolved from 
 the duty and requirement to ^'pray for the peace of 
 Jerusalem," and to labour for the reunion of the parted 
 fragments of Christendom. But in doing so, we have 
 no right to ignore the whole facts, or any portion of the 
 facts of the case. To speak of the position of the Church 
 of England and its irelation to the Roman Communion 
 in utter forgetfulness of the existence of the Oriental 
 Churches — to argue from the assumption that the breach 
 of other Churches with the Roman See is a thing of 
 yesterday, a mere passing act of insubordination and 
 rebellion^ — is as absurd and irrational as the assumption 
 on which it is based is false. 
 
 The truth is, that most of these arguments as addressed 
 to us from the Roman side, and as entertained by thought- 
 less persons belonging to our own communion, utterly 
 ignore the one point of importance apart from which 
 all attempts to re-establish unity are and ought to be 
 utterly futile and unavailing. The real question must 
 always be : On what basis are we required to establish 
 this unity ? On what conditions can it be secured ? 
 Unless the basis be sound, unless the conditions be 
 permanently valid, then the whole work which proceeds 
 from them must fail. 
 
 Roman Catholics cannot deny the truth of this. They 
 may say what they please about the duty of finding the 
 Catholic Church, about the English Church not being a 
 
 I 
 
20 ARG UMENT FROM 
 
 portion of it, and the like ; but they know that, unless 
 the Papal claims can be sustained, such an argument is 
 of no value whatever; and, in fact, they always proceed 
 on the assumption that they are vaHd. 
 
 Now, this is the point on which we desire most 
 earnestly to concentrate the attention of our readers ; 
 because we wish them to decide this question according 
 to truth and to the real merits of the case, and not on 
 any side issue. If the Papal claims are false, then we 
 have no right to restore, or to endeavour to restore, 
 Catholic unity on the basis of an idea which cannot be 
 maintained. If these claims are not true and valid, then 
 the Papal authority is a mere human tyranny, and not 
 a divinely established monarchy. In short, the Roman 
 CathoHc himself must allow that, in this case — and this 
 is the point to be considered — the Papal See, instead of 
 being the true centre of unity, is the cause of disunion 
 and confusion ; and any temporary adoption of terms 
 of peace based upon such an error could only lead to 
 greater discord and confusion. 
 
 There is a consideration upon which we are not inclined 
 to lay any great stress, because it is unnecessary, which 
 may, however, be worthy of a passing notice. Granting 
 that the divisions of Christendom are full of danger to 
 the best interests of mankind, is it the duty of individual 
 Christians to put an end to those divisions, apart from 
 the action of the particular communion in which Divine 
 Providence may have cast their lot ? Should we really 
 be helping towards universal Christian unity by destroy- 
 ing national Christian unity ? Will individual secessions 
 from a smaller fragment of the broken Church to a larger 
 fragment of it, really promote this reunion and unity to 
 
I 
 
 THE CATHOLIC CHURCH, 21 
 
 any considerable extent? Is not this a question to be 
 entertained and considered by the whole of the separated 
 communities, or their representatives, rather than by 
 individuals belonging to them? 
 
 Let us seek an illustration of this subject from the 
 history of the Old Testament. Some resemblance to the 
 divisions of Christendom is found in the separation of 
 the kingdoms of Judah and Israel. Now, whatever may 
 have been the faults of Judah, whatever the provocation 
 received by Israel, the northern tribes were clearly wrong 
 in breaking away from the worship of the covenant 
 people, and from the sanctuary at Jerusalem. Of this 
 there can be no doubt whatever. Yet God does not 
 seem to have neglected them, or treated them as having 
 no interest in His covenant; nor do we find that indi- 
 vidual subjects of the kingdom of Israel were exhorted 
 tQ seek reconciliation with the kingdom of Judah, or to 
 submit themselves to its kings, as a means of obtaining 
 access to the temple of the Most High, and the Divine 
 presence which was there vouchsafed. 
 
 But this illustration greatly overstates the strength 
 of the Roman claims. In the first place, there was no 
 doubt at all in regard to the duty incumbent upon adult 
 Israelites of going up to worship in the place where the 
 temple was ; whereas there is great doubt as to the 
 necessity of communion with Rome ; this, indeed, is the 
 very point in question. In the case of Jerusalem and 
 the sanctuary, the orders in the Bible are precise; in this 
 other case, we have no order at all which, either directly 
 or indirectly, can be thought to lay upon Christians the 
 obligation of being in communion with any particular 
 church or bishop. 
 
 I 
 
22 ARGUMENT FROM 
 
 Let us go a little deeper. The reason for the com- 
 mand to worship in Jerusalem was found in the fact that 
 the visible manifestation of the Divine Presence was 
 given there in the Shechinah which hung over the mercy- 
 seat within the tabernacle of testimony in the wilderness, 
 and in the most holy place in the temple. No Roman 
 Catholic will think of contending that any Divine Pre- 
 sence, under the new and better covenant which is ours, 
 is confined to any particular locaHty, or is dependent 
 upon the officiating of any particular priest or bishop. 
 At Jerusalem, at Alexandria, at Antioch, the Holy Ghost 
 was manifested through the Word and the Sacraments, 
 and our Blessed Lord was present in His ordinance, 
 when there was as little thought of consulting or defer- 
 ring to the Bishop of Rome, as there is now in the chapel 
 at Lambeth or in the cathedral at Canterbury. 
 
 Let not our readers mistake our meaning or our inten- 
 tion in these remarks. They prove nothing, it may be 
 said ; they are not adduced to prove anything. They are 
 brought forward only to show that the thing which we 
 might have expected to happen did not happen. Arguing 
 as people do about the duty of joining the Roman 
 Communion, in order to be sure that we belong to the 
 Catholic Church, we should certainly expect that the 
 great burden of the prophetic message to the northern 
 kingdom would be the duty of reconciliation to the 
 kingdom of Judah, and the sin of remaining separated 
 from it. Yet we hear of nothing of the kind. And this, 
 be it observed, in a case in which there was no doubt. 
 Jerusalem was undoubtedly the place in which the chil- 
 dren of Israel ought to worship. The kingdom of the 
 ten tribes was undoubtedly in a state of schism. And 
 
THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 23 
 
 yet it was never hinted that persons belonging to those 
 tribes should join themselves to the tribe of Judah. 
 
 How different is the ease with our modern Roma- 
 nisers ! For the sake of preserving and restoring a unity 
 which may not be according to the mind of God, they 
 take a course for which they have no command, with a 
 certainty apparently as absolute as though their duty had 
 been revealed from heaven. They act in a manner at 
 variance with all accredited principles of action, which 
 require that we should abstain from acting when the 
 duty to do so is not clear. If a man finds himself, by 
 God's providence, in a certain position, and it is suggested 
 to him that he should make an important change, draw- 
 ing after it the most serious consequences, he would 
 reasonably require that the arguments in favour of such 
 a change should be of considerable cogency. What 
 would he do if they were doubtful? He would do 
 nothing. He would refuse to act upon the doubt. The 
 very reverse of this is done by those who listen to these 
 vague and general reasons for entering the Roman Com- 
 munion. They are induced to entertain doubts as to 
 their present position ; and they act upon the doubt, not 
 upon the evidence in favour of the new position which 
 they are required to assume. 
 
 This is utterly irrational and unlawful. To those who 
 bid us leave what they call our position of Anglican isola- 
 tion, our answer must be this : Before we can take such 
 a step, Romans must prove to our satisfaction that Christ 
 intended the centre of His kingdom on earth to be found 
 in the Holy See, and in that see invested with the privi- 
 leges and powers to which it now lays claim. 
 
 If they can prove this, then the argument for the 
 
24 A RGUMENT FROM 
 
 Roman Church is conclusive ; and we have no business 
 to resist her claims for an hour. If they cannot, then we 
 must hold not only that the Roman See has 'no claim 
 upon our allegiance, but that it is actually responsible 
 for the divisions which it professes to remedy. The 
 more deeply we consider the subject, the more clearly 
 we shall see that the whole question really turns upon 
 the Papal supremacy; and all fair and enlightened 
 Roman controversialists will allow that this is the case. 
 It is a great matter to see clearly the point at issue. 
 The thing of next importance is to know accurately the 
 arguments by which the point is sought to be established. 
 As time passes, the forms of these controversies are apt 
 to change. We believe we shall be stating the Roman 
 position accurately if we say that they support the 77iagiS' 
 terium of the Roman Pontiff chiefly on these grounds : — 
 
 1. On the ground of common sense, or the necessity 
 of the case. The Church was promised a teacher such 
 as the Pope professes to be, and no one but the Pope 
 professes to fulfil that promise. This we call the i priori 
 argument. 
 
 2. On the ground of actual possession. The Pope of 
 Rome exercises, and has long exercised, the supreme 
 oflice of teaching and ruling in the Christian Church. 
 How did such a power come into his possession ? If 
 it be a usurpation, how was he allowed to usurp it? 
 This power, they allege, has varied in its mode of 
 exercise, but has always existed. This we call the argu- 
 ment from possession. 
 
 3. It is alleged that this power was given by our Lord 
 to St. Peter, and was by him transmitted to his suc- 
 cessors in the See of Rome, who have exercised it from 
 
I 
 
 THE CATHOLIC CHURCH. 25 
 
 the beginning ; and that there is evidence of these state- 
 ments in the New Testament and in the history of the 
 Church. This we call the argument from Scripture and 
 from history. 
 
 These evidences we will do our best to examine in all 
 fairness and candour. The first two will occupy but a 
 small space in our discussion of the subject. They are 
 of a comparatively intangible character until they are 
 brought face to face with Scripture and history ; and it 
 will be w^ell for both sides in this controversy if they can 
 see and acknowledge that these are the grounds on which 
 alone the subject can be satisfactorily discussed. If we 
 devote some portion of our space to these preliminary 
 considerations, it is because we have no right to ignore 
 arguments which the other side regard as of importance 
 in the settlement of this controversy. If we do not 
 dwell upon them at great length, it is because their chief 
 value consists in bringing us face to face with the ques- 
 tion as it presents itself in history, and because it is in 
 the field of history that it must be settled. 
 
( 26 ) 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE 'A PRIORP ARGUMENT FOR THE PAPAL 
 CLAIMS, 
 
 The Roman boast of unchangeableness — Virtually abandoned — The 
 argument from history disparaged — The argument ' ' from common 
 sense," or a priori — Partly true, partly false — To be used with 
 caution and impartiality — The argument stated — The need of cer- 
 tainty — The Roman Church alone professes to give it — Criticism of 
 the argument — (i.) The craving for certainty not really satisfied. 
 (2. ) Not universally professed. (3. ) Is it better that all our questions 
 should be conclusively settled ? As a matter of fact, many import- 
 ant questions remained long unsettled. (4.) The Papal profession 
 to answer such questions no proof of ability to do so— The real 
 question again : What proof can we obtain of the Papal preten- 
 sions? 
 
 It was, in former days, the boast of the Church of Rome 
 that her doctrine was unchanged and unchangeable. 
 Amid all the alterations to which other communions may 
 be liable, she is always the same. Over her whole 
 system she professed to write the Vincentian Canon : 
 " That which was always, everywhere, and by all men 
 believed.*' Hence her constant appeal was made to the 
 history of the past and to the traditions of the Church. 
 A doctrine was condemned because it was new; another 
 was true or probable because it was old. 
 
 It can hardly be denied that, in this respect, a change 
 
THE 'A PRIORP ARGUMENT. 27 
 
 has come over the spirit of the Roman Church and her 
 mode of controversy. Whether it be that the recent 
 additions to her dogmatic system have made her dis- 
 satisfied with the partial support for them which alone 
 can be derived from the testimonies of earlier times ; or 
 whether it be that a more careful examination of ancient 
 documents has enabled her adversaries to turn the 
 argument from tradition against herself; there can be 
 no doubt that Roman controversialists have become 
 less inclined to make use of the argument from history. 
 To quote fathers or schoolmen against the present 
 Roman system, is to set up a dead past against the 
 living Divine power of the Church. We are incapable 
 of understanding the testimony of history, we are told, 
 without the guidance of the Church. These voices 
 which speak to us from the past are jarring and dis- 
 cordant, until they are harmonized by the infallible 
 utterances of a power which presides over them and 
 separates truth from error. It is obvious to remark that 
 the introduction of such a principle utterly neutralizes 
 the value of the argument from history ; it is an assump- 
 tion of the truth of the question under consideration; 
 it is a rejection beforehand of all that might be urged 
 as a reason for deciding otherwise than the authority 
 whose conclusions we are hesitating to accept. 
 
 This jealousy of history has led to the adoption of 
 other modes of argument, which are supposed to be 
 better adapted to the ordinary intelligence ; and these 
 arguments are recommended by considerations of some 
 plausibility. Most persons, we are told with perfect 
 truth, are incapable of prosecuting a protracted historical 
 inquiry ; they cannot be sure that they have got a suffi- 
 
28 THE 'A PRIORI' ARGUMENT 
 
 cient collection of the facts ; and even if their induction 
 is tolerably complete, their inferences are perhaps as 
 likely to be right as to be wrong. 
 
 If there is force in this objection to the testimony 
 of history, which we are far from denying, one should 
 suppose that it would be the duty of those who are 
 incapable of thus conducting the inquiry to abstain 
 from the controversy altogether, and to be satisfied to 
 do their duty in the position to which God's providence 
 had assigned them. But this is not the conclusion of the 
 Roman controversialist. No, he says, your position is 
 one of danger; and you must abandon it. And, although 
 you are incapable of investigating the argument from his- 
 tory, there is an argument which you can understand — 
 the argument of common sense. You may fairly judge 
 of what is from considering 7e.>hat must be. You know 
 what God has intended His Church to be, you know 
 what He has promised to His Church; and you can 
 judge whether that which He has promised is found in 
 your own so-called Reformed Church or in the holy 
 Roman Catholic Church. 
 
 As a simple matter of fact, there are few arguments 
 more dangerous than this one. We are not capable of 
 judging of what God might possibly do, except by study- 
 ing what He has done. To set up a certain theory of 
 our own as that which must necessarily be the true one, 
 and then to seek about for the system which most nearly 
 corresponds with our preconceived theory, is to expose 
 ourselves to the danger of falling into any heresy which 
 may seem to meet our requirements. Such a mode of 
 thinking has actually produced multitudes of heresies and 
 schisms. 
 
FOR THE PAPAL CLAIMS, 29 
 
 While, therefore, we do not entirely reject this form of 
 argument — while we allow that all reasoning must proceed 
 upon certain fundamental axioms universally accepted — 
 while we fully admit that there are certain broad prin- 
 ciples laid down in Holy Scripture by which every existing 
 religious system may properly be tested, it is equally 
 obvious that this species of argument must be employed 
 with the greatest caution. We must, in fact, make no 
 use of it which we are not willing that others should 
 make; and, if we are not careful in this respect, we may 
 be laying foundations which will equally bear super- 
 structions differing most widely from those which we 
 are desirous of erecting. 
 
 Let us then endeavour in this spirit, at once of can- 
 dour and watchfulness, to examine the argument for the 
 supreme teaching authority of the Pope, which is supposed 
 to be derived from the necessity of the case. 
 
 It may be stated in the following manner : — Man has 
 need of truth in order to rightness of life here and the 
 prospect of happiness hereafter. It is the truth which 
 makes us free, while error enslaves. It is truth which 
 sanctifies, while error degrades and defiles. This is the 
 first principle. 
 
 The second is equally undeniable : Jesus Christ came 
 into the world as a witness for the truth. He was Him- 
 self the Truth which makes men free, because it brings 
 them into the family of God, and makes them children 
 instead of slaves. He was the Truth which sanctifies and 
 saves, for to know Him and the Father by whom He 
 was sent is everlasting life. 
 
 Now, it is further urged, this Divine truth is as much 
 a necessity of our own times as of the days in which the 
 
so THE 'A PRIORV ARGUMENT 
 
 Son of God appeared on earth. Whatever was necessary- 
 then, is necessary now. Men have the same needs, 
 intellectual, moral, spiritual; and these can be satisfied 
 now only in the same manner in which they were satis- 
 fied then. 
 
 But, further, Jesus Christ actually promised to continue 
 to the Church the same kind of guidance which He 
 provided for His disciples during His earthly ministry. 
 *' As My Father sent Me,'^ He said to His apostles, '^so 
 send I you ; " " He that receiveth you, receiveth Me ; " 
 " He that heareth you, heareth Me." And lest these 
 indications and promises should lack precision and 
 definiteness, He told them of a Divine Presence which 
 should be accorded to them in order to preserve them 
 from error and forgetfulness, the Holy Ghost, the Para- 
 clete, the Spirit of truth, who should bring all things to 
 their remembrance that He had said to them, and who 
 should guide them into all truth. 
 
 Once more, this Divine Teacher was promised to 
 remain with them for ever. He was not to come for 
 a season, and to go away as the Incarnate Son had 
 done. It was better, He told them, that they should have 
 this invisible Teacher in the place of the visible One ; 
 but He was not to depart. **I will pray the Father, 
 and He shall give you another Comforter, that He 
 may abide with you for ever," As long as human needs 
 endure, there will be this supply ; as long as men have 
 questions to ask, there will be this means of answering 
 them. 
 
 So far, it must be admitted, these are points on which 
 all Christians are agreed. Not only are they laid down in 
 the plainest words by our Lord in the Gospel narrative, 
 
FOR THE PAPAL CLAIMS, 31 
 
 but they lie at the basis of all Christian belief and 
 doctrine. 
 
 Now, then, asks the Roman advocate triumphantly, 
 Where do you find this religious guidance at the present 
 day ? What Church professes to give you this certainty 
 of teaching, this perfect assurance of Divine truth for 
 which your heart is longing ? Where shall we find it — 
 at Canterbury, at St. Petersburg, at Constantinople, or 
 at Rome ? 
 
 Two things, we are told, are quite certain : first, that 
 Jesus Christ must have given to the Church what He 
 promised it ; and that this authoritative teaching, wher- 
 ever it may be, cannot be with any communion or body 
 which does not profess to have it, and must be with 
 some communion which is conscious of possessing it and 
 actually claims to exercise it. 
 
 Now, it is continued, there is only one body on earth 
 which ever lays claim to infallibility in its teaching, and 
 that is the Holy Catholic Church, whose centre is the 
 throne of Peter, and whose mouthpiece is the Vicar of 
 Christ. If this be not the authoritative infallible teacher, 
 where is he to be found ? The English Church lays no 
 claim to such power ; the Eastern Church calls itself 
 orthodox, but does not venture to assume the title of 
 Catholic, nor does it pretend to teach with infallible 
 truth. Are we not then driven, perforce, to the See of 
 Rome for the instruction which we need and which our 
 Lord promised to His people? 
 
 We have stated this argument fully and fairly, as it is 
 given by the most able Roman controversialists of the 
 present day. We are sure that they will accept these 
 statements as accurately representing their position. 
 
32 THE 'A PRIORI' ARGUMENT 
 
 We must add that we can quite appreciate the force of 
 this appeal when directed to a certain class of minds. 
 It is simple and intelligible ; it is even plausible. As a 
 matter of fact, it has swayed many more than any care- 
 ful and minute examination of authorities. Not merely 
 unlearned persons, but men of mark and influence might 
 be named who have yielded to the power of such con- 
 siderations. If we refuse to acknowledge their force, 
 we must be prepared to give our reasons ; and this we 
 will endeavour to do. 
 
 I. Let us then remark, first, that the whole power of 
 this appeal is derived from its professing to meet our 
 craving for certainty. Probabilities, we are told, are 
 insufficient ; we must have absolute certainty. We must 
 have the truth presented to us with such clearness and 
 force that we shall feel we have no right to resist it for 
 a moment. 
 
 - Now, although we have acknowledged the plausibility 
 and recognised the actual power of such an appeal, we 
 must equally assert that the answer to it is not far to 
 seek. And the answer is contained in the very simple 
 principle, that in this world and in our present condition, 
 moral evidence and moral certainty are all that we can 
 hope to attain to. It is not only Bishop Butler who has 
 told us that, to us at least, probability is the very guide of 
 life ; the same principle has been abundantly recognised 
 by Roman theologians and casuists. Any teacher, there- 
 fore, who professes to give us miore than this, lays himself 
 open to the suspicion of promising more than God has 
 intended us to possess. 
 
 But this is not all. The question still arises, even 
 supposing that the Pope has this power of giving ab- 
 
FOR THE PAPAL CLAIMS. 3;^ 
 
 solute certainty on religious truth, and that his utterances 
 are infallibly true, does this actually give certainty to the 
 individual learner? Supposing for a moment that the 
 Pope is infallible, at least I cannot be infaUibly certain 
 that he is so. Before I accept that proposition, true 
 or false, I must examine the grounds on which it rests; 
 I must satisfy myself that the arguments by which it is 
 supported are valid. If I am not to do this, books of 
 controversy are utterly worthless, and those learned 
 Roman divines who write them are simply wasting their 
 time. But my examination of these arguments can bring 
 me no more than moral certainty, can never make me 
 infallibly sure, unless I am infallible myself. We repeat 
 therefore, as regards certainty, the introduction of the 
 infaUibility of the Pope does not get rid of the difficulty ; 
 it only pushes it a little further back. As far as we are 
 concerned, no absolute certainty is possible. 
 
 2. Another consideration may be urged : Even if the 
 Pope professes to settle a great many questions which 
 other Churches leave open, and confess that they are 
 unable to decide, he does not settle every question ; nay, 
 questions of the deepest interest in connection with his 
 own claims are frequently raised and debated, without 
 either side being able to quote infallible authority as 
 having pronounced in favour of their views. This cer- 
 tainty, then, which the Roman Church promises us, is a 
 mere matter of degree. Apart entirely from the question 
 —quite a legitimate one — whether the multiplication of 
 dogmas is an advantage or a disadvantage, whether it 
 be better or worse that men should leave a number of 
 these questions open, it must be clear that a large 
 number of very important questions do still remain 
 
 I 
 
34 THE 'A PRIORI' ARGUMENT 
 
 open, and that no answer which professes to be con- 
 clusive can be obtained to many inquiries which are 
 felt to be by no means insignificant. 
 
 Thus, twenty years ago the doctrine of the immaculate 
 conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary was still un- 
 decided, and it might be denied without encountering 
 the charge of heresy. Of course, the advocate of the 
 Roman position will assert that the dogma was pro- 
 mulgated at the right moment — neither too soon nor too 
 late ; but here, again, we have to assume the perfect 
 wisdom, as well as the infallibility, of the Roman See. 
 
 About ten years ago the doctrine of Papal infallibility had 
 not been promulgated, and before the Vatican Council a 
 member of the Church of Rome might deny it or affirm 
 it ; but he could get no answer to his inquiry, however 
 anxious he might be for certainty on the subject. 
 
 But we must go further ; this very question of Papal 
 infallibility is still in a state of great uncertainty. It is 
 indeed required that faithful Catholics shall confess that 
 the utterances of the Roman Pontiff, when speaking ex 
 cathedra and addressing the whole Church, are irre- 
 formable and certainly true; but it has not yet been 
 explained what is the exact force of the expression ex 
 cathedra. It has been asserted, and not denied, that it 
 is lawful to believe that the Pope does not speak ex 
 cathedra unless when he is promulgating the decrees of 
 an oecumenical council. It is a matter of controversy, 
 at the present moment, whether the Syllabus of Pope 
 Pius IX. was an utterance ex cathedra or not, whether 
 all its statements are binding upon "Catholics as a part of 
 Divine revelation, or whether they are only the private 
 opinions of a Catholic doctor. 
 
  FOR THE PAPAL CLAIMS. 35 
 
 These are strange illustrations of the certainty which 
 the Roman Church promises to afford, and which it pro- 
 fesses to convey to the minds of its members. And, 
 indeed, the difficulties which we are suggesting are by 
 no means imaginary. There would seem to be almost 
 insuperable obstacles to the acceptance of either view 
 of the infallibility of the Pope. Suppose we take the 
 view, that an oecumenical council is necessary before the 
 Pope can promulgate ex cathedra a new theological dogma, 
 what then becomes of the dogma of the immaculate con- 
 ception ? This was sent forth to the Church without 
 any council being assembled, and yet the doctrine is 
 now regarded as part of the Catholic faith, and the 
 denial of it would expose one to the charge of heresy. 
 
 On the other hand, let us suppose that the solemn 
 utterances of the Pope, speaking as the Vicar of Christ, 
 and addressing himself to the whole Christian body, 
 are to be received as the utterances of God, then the 
 Syllabus must certainly be regarded as infallible ; for it 
 is hardly possible to imagine anything put forth with 
 greater solemnity. It would appear, then, that a Roman 
 Catholic, so far from having attained to absolute certainty 
 on these subjects, is involved in a difficulty out of which 
 one can hardly see a way of escape. If he accepts, as he 
 is apparently bound to do, the dogma of the immaculate 
 conception as a part of the CathoUc faith, one can hardly 
 see how he can refuse to give the same character to the 
 contents of the Syllabus. If, on the contrary, he takes 
 the view, which we are told is lawful for a Catholic, 
 that the Syllabus is not to be considered as proceeding 
 from the Pope ex cathedra^ then it would appear that, on 
 the same principle, the immaculate conception of the 
 
   
 
36 THE 'A PRIORI' ARGUMENT 
 
 Blessed Virgin may still be regarded as an open question. 
 But, in this case, what becomes of the boasted certainty 
 of Roman teaching ? These are not matters of slight 
 importance, but are closely connected with the very 
 foundations of the faith, and yet we have no certain 
 guidance with reference to them. 
 
 3. No one will, of course, think of denying that, on 
 a good many questions, those who can unhesitatingly 
 accept the guidance of the Church of Rome, will have a 
 degree of satisfaction to which none besides can attain. 
 But a question of some importance may reasonably be 
 asked in connection with this point. Is it better for us 
 that many of our doubts and difficulties should thus be 
 settled — that we should at once be set free from the 
 necessity of further discussing them? Is it, in short, 
 according to the will of God that these questions, some 
 of them doubtless very perplexing, should be set at rest 
 in this fashion ? If we accepted the Roman view of 
 our Lord's promise, we should probably say that it was 
 most natural and reasonable to expect that Christians 
 should not be left to torture themselves with doubts on 
 questions like these. He who can so easily put an 
 end to all our doubts ; He who has given His own Holy 
 Spirit to be with His Church for ever, for the very purpose 
 of guiding it into all truth, might, on this theory, be 
 expected, when any heresy arose, or any doubtful 
 question was asked, to interpose with His infallible 
 decision and put an end to the controversy. 
 
 Might we not go further and say that, if such conflicts 
 were evil. He might have prevented heresies or even 
 doubts from arising? It is needless further to speculate 
 on what He might have done, when we know what He 
 
FOR THE PAPAL CLAIMS. ^ 
 
 actually has done, and has not done, in the past history 
 of the Church. Controversies have arisen in the Church 
 affecting the most fundamental articles of the Christian 
 faith, and yet no voice from heaven has been heard 
 declaring, " This is truth, that is error." The advocates 
 of doctrines which are now regarded by Roman and 
 Anglican, by Catholic and Protestant alike, as of the 
 very essence of the faith, have been persecuted and 
 driven from land to land, and no voice claiming iner- 
 rancy, professing to speak as the representative of the 
 infaUible Head of the Church, has attempted to gain a 
 hearing, in order to deliver the faithful and smite the 
 enemies of the truth. All the great fundamental doc- 
 trines of the Christian faith have been formulated after 
 long and painful controversies and conflicts which the 
 Church in some cases would willingly forget. The need 
 for such interposition as the Roman Pontiff now offers can 
 never be so sore as it was in the fourth century ; yet it 
 was not by such means, by such a short and easy method, 
 that it pleased God to terminate those disputes. 
 
 Let this, then, be clearly noted. If a requirement 
 such as we mentioned at the beginning of this chapter, 
 and to which the Roman Church now professes to re- 
 spond, had been put forth in the first days of the faith, 
 there would have been no response to it. There was, at 
 the time of the Council of Nicaea, no bishop or Church 
 which professed to be the organ of the Holy Ghost for 
 the settlement of all controversies and the removal of 
 all doubts. But the requirement would have been as 
 reasonable then as it is now. If we have a right thus to 
 understand our Lord's promise, surely they had an equal 
 right ; if we may demand that it shall be fulfilled by the 
 
38 THE 'A PRIORV ARGUMENT. 
 
 utterances of an infallible voice, they had a right to de- 
 mand the same. This consideration would seem to be con- 
 clusive. An ciprio7'i argument which is valid only at some 
 particular portion of the history of the Church has for- 
 feited its claim to that character. Whatever the claims 
 of the Roman Church may be, this is no basis for them. 
 
 4. But let us further remark^ even if such expectations 
 were more reasonable than we take them to be, the ques- 
 tion would still arise : Has the Bishop of Rome the right 
 and the power to settle these controversies .^ It is true, he 
 is the only bishop who professes to have the authority to 
 do so. But is that sufficient? What if he should prove 
 an impostor? And we must remember that one who 
 bears witness of himself is not necessarily true. Of what 
 avail is it for us that we should have our questions 
 answered, and our doubts resolved, if it should turn out 
 that he who gives the answers has no authority to do so ? 
 Our expectation that our anxieties will be set to rest, 
 the profession of another that he is able to grant us this 
 relief, our readiness to believe his profession and to 
 submit to his decision, — all this is worth nothing and less 
 than'nothing. The solemn"responsibility is still laid upon 
 the claimant to infallibility to give evidences of the 
 validity of his claim, upon the inquirer to examine the 
 evidences which he professes to supply. 
 
 Every thorough investigation of any aspect of this 
 subject brings us back to the question : Has the Bishop 
 of Rome, by Divine right, power and authority supremely 
 to teach and to govern the whole of Christ's Church 
 militant here on earth ? And until this question receives 
 a satisfactory answer, all arguments of a merely abstract 
 character are comparatively valueless. 
 
( 39 ) 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION, 
 
 The existence of the Roman primacy — Its claims widely acknowledged 
   — How is this to be accounted for? — Compared with the argument 
 for the Episcopate— This great difference : the claims of the Epis- 
 copate always substantially the same, while the Papal claims are 
 enlarged from age to age— The appeal on this point must be made to 
 history — Certain facts admitted — Diverse interpretations of the facts 
 — History must settle the question. 
 
 We have seen how every argument for submission to 
 the Church of Rome leads us to consider the support 
 which its claims may receive from Scripture and from 
 history. However much any one may like the Roman 
 system, or dislike any other, if he is a reasonable man, 
 he must come back to this question : But are the Roman 
 claims valid ? Are they a Divine endowment or a 
 human invention? However desirable it may seem to 
 us that there should be an unerring teacher on earth, 
 who can set all our doubts at rest, we must still satisfy 
 ourselves that there is such a teacher, and that he 
 derives his power and authority from God. Those 
 other arguments, if indeed they have any claim to that 
 designation, can at the very utmost only create a pre- 
 sumption in favour of the Papal theory, or rather perhaps 
 induce us to give a hearing to the arguments by which 
 
40 THE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION. 
 
 its claims are enforced. Those who feel the force of 
 them — for to some they will have no force — will recog- 
 nize the obligation to examine the subject with care and 
 candour, perhaps with sympathy. But that is all. They 
 cannot settle the question, or make any approach to 
 settling it. However great our supposed need for that 
 which the Papal supremacy offers to supply, however 
 strong our inclinations in favour of the system over 
 which it presides, we are still bound, as reasonable 
 creatures, to ask, ** Where are the credentials by which 
 its claims are made good ? " 
 
 There is one other consideration, of a preliminary 
 character, which is often urged by the advocates of the 
 Papal claims, which will bring us face to face with that 
 which we have stated to be the real question at issue 
 between Roman and Reformed : it is what we have called 
 the argument from possession ; and it has a certain 
 striking and impressive character which is certainly, in a 
 way, effective, if it cannot be thought convincing. 
 
 It may be stated in the following manner : — The 
 Roman primacy exists, its claims are not only put forth, 
 but actually recognized by a very large proportion of 
 Christendom. How did these claims come into exist- 
 ence? How is it that they have been so widely and so 
 completely recognized and deferred to ? Here is a 
 fact which must be accounted for. Go back through 
 the past centuries of Christian history, and you are con- 
 fronted by it in every age. You cannot show the 
 moment when it began to be. Must it not, therefore, 
 be coeval with the Christian Church ? Must it not be 
 the gift of the Divine Teacher, for the guidance and 
 instruction of His people? 
 
■ii 
 
 THE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION, 41 
 
 The appeal is intelligible and it is powerful. We have 
 no right to dismiss it without serious consideration ; and 
 it does actually raise the question which, as we have 
 said, is the real question at issue. 
 
 Before, however, we attempt to respond to the appeal, 
 we must endeavour thoroughly to understand its signifi- 
 cance and force. It belongs to the same class with an 
 argument for the apostolic origin of the Episcopate, 
 with which it will be useful to compare it, that we may 
 honestly ask ourselves whether we reject evidence in one 
 case which we accept in another — whether we do not, 
 as Roman Catholics allege against us, use their arguments 
 in defence of our own system, and refuse to apply them 
 when they would lead us on to the adoption of theirs ? 
 
 This argument for the Episcopate has been ably 
 stated by Dean Milman in his " History of Christianity,'* 
 and may be presented in the following form : — By about 
 the middle or the third quarter of the second century 
 we find bishops everywhere throughout the Christian 
 Church recognized as the first of three orders of 
 the ministry. If their office is the result of human 
 usurpation, how is it that this usurpation was allowed 
 without resistance or opposition? How is it that a 
 change so momentous took place throughout the whole 
 Church, without leaving the slightest trace of a struggle ? 
 This is a question which Presbyterians find it almost 
 impossible to answer. But in that case, are we not shut 
 up to the conclusion that the episcopal office was of 
 apostolic origin ? It must be confessed that the argu- 
 ment is a very powerful one, and one the force of which 
 it is most difficult to evade. 
 
 I Now the Roman argument from possession is of the 
 
42 THE ARGUMENT EROM POSSESSION, 
 
 same character; and the real question to be determined 
 is this : Has it the same force ? If it has, we do not 
 hesitate to say that those who accept its validity for the 
 Episcopate are bound to admit its cogency in behalf 
 of the Papacy. But is it of the same strength for the 
 one conclusion as for the other ? Let us consider. 
 
 In regard to the episcopal order^ it is a simple fact 
 that, after the days of the apostles, we have no records 
 of Christian Churches without bishops being over them. 
 And this fact is not dependent upon the genuineness of 
 any particular document, as, for instance, the Ignatian 
 epistles ; it is asserted or assumed by all primitive 
 Christian history and testimony. Not only so, but the 
 position and office of a bishop in those earliest days are 
 substantially the same as in later times. The earthly 
 surroundings are very different from age to age. At one 
 time dioceses are small and poor; at another they 
 are large and wealthy. At one time the office brings 
 opprobrium and persecution ; at another time it brings 
 honour and dignity. At one time the power exercised 
 by the bishop is enforced by the law of the State ; at 
 another it has only moral and spiritual sanctions to 
 which it can appeal. But the real meaning and signifi- 
 cance of the office are the same from the beginning. 
 Towards the end of the nineteenth century, a bishop 
 claims no more than he did towards the end of the 
 second. Circumstances being taken into account, his 
 powers and his pretensions are identical with those of 
 his most remote ancestors. 
 
 Further, when we trace the history of the Episcopate 
 from age to age, we find that its character remains 
 always the same. Individual bishops may be lax or 
 
I 
 
 THE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION, 43 
 
 tyrannical, and the result may be, in particular cases, 
 disorder or rebellion ] but the authority of the office is 
 sufficiently defined, and is generally understood and 
 acknowledged. It is true that, at the time of the 
 Reformation, several Christian Churches abolished the 
 office, or rather, perhaps, continued their history without 
 bishops ; but it can hardly be asserted that this course 
 was taken from any deliberate conviction that the office 
 itself was inconsistent with the Divine will and purpose. 
 The leading Reformers on the Continent were in favour 
 of Episcopacy; but they had difficulties in getting 
 bishops to espouse their cause. It may be said, then, 
 with truth, that the episcopal office has existed 
 consecutively with the same powers and privileges, and 
 almost without opposition or protest, from the very 
 earliest days of the Church of Christ. 
 
 Can the same thing be said of the Papacy? Virtually 
 the same thing is asserted. *^ If," askes an able advo- 
 cate of the Papal claims, "if for some centuries nc 
 Bishop of Rome claimed the powers of a Pope, how 
 came they at last to make the claim ? and, what is more 
 strange, how came they to get the power which they 
 claimed and hold now? And to this question which I 
 put I venture to give this answer, that if for some 
 centuries, or even for some weeks, the authority of the 
 Pope had no existence, and no valid title to exist, it 
 could not be existing now." 
 
 He then asks us **to call to mind what sort of 
 authority the Popes claim and exercise. Theirs is not 
 merely a nominal supremacy. . . . Their sovereignty 
 is a great reality. They claim and assert rights which 
 make themselves felt in every grade of society through- 
 
   
 
44 T^HE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION, 
 
 out the Christian world ; and so far from their being 
 passive or sleeping potentates, there is no other govern- 
 ment so vigilant, so active, so searching, so intimately- 
 felt in the inmost recesses of the privacy of every 
 Christian home." 
 
 Further, he asks us to observe *^that the men who 
 bow down before " this authority, " are not the feeble 
 and ignorant," but ^' the strong men of the Christian 
 Church ; men themselves rulers and princes ; men of 
 all different nationalities ; and men who, if they felt 
 inclined to defy the authority of the Pope, would often- 
 times have all the power of the Crown at their back." 
 
 Undoubtedly, as we have said, the appeal is striking 
 and impressive ; but it cannot prevent our interrogating 
 history with the view of ascertaining whether this power 
 has descended to the Popes by Divine gift, or whether 
 it is a human usurpation. According to the Roman 
 view, the former theory alone will acount for the facts. 
 The Oriental schism was the breaking away from the 
 centre of unity which up to that time had been acknow- 
 ledged equally in the East and the West ; the Reforma- 
 tion of the sixteenth century was a rebellion within the 
 Latin Church itself, the throwing off of an authority 
 of Divine origination, not a revolt against an unlawful 
 tyranny and a return to earlier and purer doctrines and 
 customs. 
 
 Now here we must take liberty to make two remarks 
 on plain matters of history. The first is, that the Papal 
 authority was by no means acquiesced in throughout 
 even those periods of time which are generally called 
 the ages of faith. There was, perhaps, no Christian 
 land in which it was not actually resisted, and resisted 
 
THE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION, 45 
 
 on principle. There was, no doubt, a remarkable 
 consistency and persistency on the part of the Popes, 
 in seizing every opportunity for the establishment and 
 enlargement of their authority \ but it would be difficult 
 to discover a period in the whole history of the Church 
 in which it was not somewhere resisted, opposed, or 
 called in question. The English Reformation, for 
 example, was only the termination, final and definite, 
 of a series of struggles between the Papal power and 
 the government of the Enghsh people. This is simple 
 matter of history. 
 
 The other fact is no less significant. Roman Catholics 
 themselves will admit that the Popes have not always 
 put forth the same claims and pretensions, or, at least, 
 that they have not always been put forth in the same 
 form. Nay, further, it is acknowledged that in many 
 cases ^' obedience was not yielded without a struggle to 
 the Papal See. I conceive," continues the writer, "^ 
 *' that while the Principate of the Apostolic Chair of 
 Rome was acknowledged all over the Church . . . yet 
 all that was contained in that Principate was not seen 
 and understood by every bishop, or even by every pro- 
 vince of the Church. From the cessation of external 
 persecution onwards through the fourth and fifth cen- 
 turies, the Apostolic See, as the great unifying power 
 of the Church, was making itself more and more felt. 
 It was contracting that partial autonomy which in the 
 first ages was exercised by local Churches." 
 
 This statement will enable us to point out clearly the 
 different points of view from which the same acknowledged 
 facts are regarded by those who accept and those who 
 Allies : Dr. Pusey and the Ancient Churchy pp. 76, 77. 
 
 I 
 
46 THE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION. 
 
 deny the Papal supremacy. That the assertion and 
 recognition of this supremacy were gradual and never 
 universal, are facts which both parties will probably 
 admit. We should concede to the Roman advocate 
 that a kind of primacy was allowed to the bishops of 
 Rome from very early times, although not from the 
 beginning ; and while we should deny that the primacy 
 was primitive, we should equally deny that in the first 
 days of its existence it contained those elements which 
 are assigned to it by its modern defenders. A primacy 
 of honour was clearly allowed to the Bishop of Rome 
 at the beginning of the fourth century. We should deny 
 that he was then recognised as supreme ruler and 
 teacher. The writer just quoted speaks of the time 
 when " the Apostolic See, having a fuller consciousness 
 of its own powers and rights, as was natural, than was 
 possessed elsewhere, began to stretch out its arms in 
 all directions, and to make the whole Body move, as it 
 were, with one impulse ; " and he admits that the other 
 bishops then "naturally felt this action, and, as the 
 whole Church lived upon tradition, as naturally appealed 
 to this tradition [of their own self-government], and 
 sometimes almost in menacing language." 
 
 Facts like these then, showing at least a great develop 
 ment of Papal power, are generally acknowledged by both 
 sides. The difference lies in the explanation of the facts. 
 According to the Roman view, the supreme power was 
 inherent in the Papacy from the beginning ; according 
 to our view, it was a gradual usurpation on the part of 
 the Roman bishops, aided by the circumstances of the 
 times, rendered almost inevitable, we might say, by the 
 state of the world during the ages in which it grew up, 
 
THE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION, 47 
 
 and therefore permitted by God's providence until the 
 necessity for it should pass away. 
 
 Perhaps we ought to emphasize this last remark, 
 which is no real concession to the Roman claims. We 
 might even go so far as to say that it was in accordance 
 with the will of God that a great Christian monarchy 
 should exist in the Middle Ages ; that, whatever evils 
 were connected with it, whatever abuses flowed from its 
 existence and exercise, whatever false or exaggerated 
 claims and pretensions it might put forth, it was on the 
 whole a benefit to the ages in which it flourished. All 
 this is perfectly compatible with the conviction that the 
 bishops of Rome do not possess the power and authority 
 to which they lay claim by Divine right j and that their 
 system, having had its day and subserved its purpose, is 
 destined to pass away. 
 
 This, we say, is a view af Christian history which in 
 no way requires us to believe that St. Peter received 
 from our Lord the supreme power of teaching and ruling 
 in the Christian Church ; and that he transmitted these 
 powers, by the will and ordinance of God, to the Roman 
 Pontiffs. These claims we hold to be unsubstantiated 
 by Scripture and histor}'-. We do not believe that such 
 authority was given by our Lord to St. Peter. We can 
 find no evidence of his having exercised such authority. 
 There is no proof in early Christian history that, if 
 he had this power, he transmitted it to his supposed 
 successors in the Roman See, or that such power was 
 conceded to them by the bishops of the Christian Church 
 in the earliest days of its history. Now these — let it be 
 remarked — are the very points on which this question 
 turns. If Romans can prove that we are mistaken in 
 
 i 
 
48 THE ARGUMENT FROM POSSESSION, 
 
 making these assertions, then it is our clear duty to make 
 our submission to the Papal system, whatever it may 
 cost us. If they cannot — if the view here presented be 
 true to Scripture and history, then, whatever our own 
 difficulties, likings, or dislikings ; whatever the attractions 
 of Roman history, dogma, ritual; however repulsive 
 many of the features of popular Protestantism may appear, 
 we have no right whatever to ** seek reconciliation with 
 the Roman Bishop." 
 
 We implore our readers to keep this point clearly, 
 steadily, constantly before their eyes. We will do our 
 best to present it in its scriptural and historical bearings 
 with all fairness and candour. At least, the facts con- 
 nected with it shall be stated with all possible accuracy. 
 If our readers will follow us with the same fairness and 
 earnestness, we shall be contented with the result, even 
 if it should be at variance with our own conclusions. 
 
( 49 ) 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 
 THE POSITION OF ST. PETER IN THE GOSPELS. 
 
 Scripture testimony — Principles of interpretation — The quotation of 
 isolated texts misleading — Illustration — The principal text * ' St. 
 Matt. xvi. i8 — Different interpretations — The Roman interpretation 
 does not support the Papal claims — Position of St. Peter — Power 
 of the keys — Binding and loosing — Not given to Peter alone or 
 supremely — Consequences of such a theory — Second text : St. Luke 
 xxii. 31, 32 — Third text : St. John xxi. 15-17 — Peter has no 
 primacy of jurisdiction assigned to him in the Gospels. 
 
 The application of Scripture to the subject of the primacy 
 of St. Peter and the claims of the Roman See, must be 
 made in the same spirit and on the same principles as to 
 all other subjects ; and this is a rule which should be 
 carefully observed on both sides. We have no right to 
 say to the Roman that his suspicious use of Scripture in 
 reference to other topics precludes his using it in behalt 
 of the Papal claims. We are bound to be true to our 
 
 Kwn principles, whatever we think of his. 
 t On the other hand, the Roman controversialist has 
 no right to use the testimony of holy Scripture on this 
 subject in a manner which he would condemn if it were 
 apphed to the discussion of Christian doctrine in general. 
 These remarks are not unneeded. We wish to study the 
 
 I^xts which are adduced to prove the primacy of St. Peter, 
 I 
 
so THE POSITION OF 
 
 in precisely the same manner in which we should study 
 any texts brought forward to prove any doctrine which 
 we accepted or rejected. We must consider the exact 
 meaning of the words, the force and bearing of the words 
 upon the particular point which they are supposed to 
 support, how far the meaning which we assign to them 
 is confirmed by the analogy of Scripture, and whether 
 and to what extent it has been accepted in the Church. 
 These are criteria which we should feel bound to apply 
 to any text brought forward in support of any subject, 
 and we must be careful to apply them here. 
 
 That Roman controversialists do, in the use of the 
 texts which apply to St. Peter, ignore some of these prin- 
 ciples which, in other cases, they earnestly insist upon, 
 is most certain. This need not be imputed to them as a 
 conscious inconsistency. Men who are very much im- 
 pressed with any particular doctrine or principle, natu- 
 rally see evidences and illustrations in support of that 
 doctrine where other men can see no traces of it. But 
 this only shows the necessity of greater watchfulness on 
 the part of their opponents. To ourselves it appears 
 that the Roman fashion of quoting some of the texts 
 which have reference to St. Peter, is as wild and arbi- 
 trary as the use which the most uneducated field-preacher 
 makes of the words of prophets and apostles. We have 
 heard Roman Catholics, and persons on the point of 
 becoming Roman Catholics, quote one of their favourite 
 texts, as though the mere recitation of a few words spoken 
 by our Lord, without any further consideration of their 
 meaning, must forever settle the question. " Thou art 
 Peter, and upon this rock I will build My Church " — these 
 words are quoted, and the triumphant question is asked ; 
 
ST, PETER IN THE GOSPELS. 51 
 
 " How can you get over that ? " And if you suggest, 
 however meekl}^, that the text says nothing of the Pope, 
 nor of any successor that St. Peter might have, nor does 
 it determine the exact nature of the building, or in 
 what sense St. Peter was the rock, even if the word 
 applied to him ; you are probably told that you are 
 trifling, or evading the force of the text ; and instead of 
 any calm attempt to ascertain its real meaning being 
 made or allowed, the words are quoted again still more 
 triumphantly, and the cause is finished. 
 
 That this is either an exaggeration or a rare instance 
 of the treatment to which these texts are subjected no 
 one will suggest who is acquainted with the manner in 
 which this controversy is commonly conducted. Take, 
 for instance, the chief of the three great texts which are 
 commonly brought forward in support of the Roman 
 claims. We refer, of course, to St. Matt. xvi. 18,^ 
 "Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build My 
 Church." 
 
 We have at this moment before us a sermon or 
 lecture delivered by an eminent Roman ecclesiastic, in 
 which he not only assumes, but plainly declares, that any 
 one who thinks, or professes to think, that "this rock'' 
 can mean anything but St. Peter, must either be wilfully 
 blind, or else so prejudiced, and indeed perverted, by an 
 unfortunate position, or as he goes so far as to suggest, 
 by worldly interests and motives, that he is incapable of 
 seeing the plain meaning of the words, which could not 
 be otherwise understood unless there were some in- 
 tellectual prejudice or moral obstruction in the way. 
 
 * The other two, which will hereafter be noticed, are St. Luke 
 xxii. 31, 32 ; and St. John xxi. 15-17. 
 
52 THE POSITION OF 
 
 We have no doubt that this writer was perfectly 
 sincere, and thought himself in no way lacking in 
 Christian charity, when he made these remarks ; yet he 
 must have known that some of the Fathers did not take 
 his view of the text, and he could hardly imagine that 
 those Fathers, some of whom believed in the primacy of 
 St. Peter, and regarded the Bishop of Rome as in some 
 sense his successor, were so prejudiced as not to be able 
 to see the meaning of our Lord's words. 
 
 A recent Roman Catholic commentator on this passage 
 declares roundly, that only one meaning can be attached 
 to the words ''this rock," according to all "the laws of 
 grammar," and that to attribute any other meaning to 
 them is '' to do violence to the phrase ; " and yet that 
 same writer is constrained to acknowledge that a good 
 many of the Fathers, and these not the least important, 
 are against him. "How comes it," he asks, "that 
 several of the Fathers, distinguished exegetes for the most 
 part, St. John Chrysostom, St. Hilary, St. Gregory of 
 Nyssa, St. Augustine, St Cyril [he might have added 
 to the number], have held that the foundation, on which 
 Jesus Christ has built the Church, is simply the faith or 
 confidence of His disciples ? " The reconciliation is easy, 
 he says; and he proceeds to prove his statement to 
 his own satisfaction; but he does not deny the fact. 
 Surely we may be contented to be charged with igno- 
 rance, prejudice, and obstinacy, with a perversion of 
 the words of Scripture and a violation of the laws of 
 grammar, when in this accusation we are associated with 
 such names as those which have been mentioned. 
 
 We are unable to attach the greatest importance to 
 the mere application of the word "rock.'' The inter- 
 
ST, PETER IN THE GOSPELS, 53 
 
 pretation of the phrase in which it occurs may be settled 
 either way, without greatly affecting the main question 
 before us. It is, however, of some importance to show 
 that these words of our Lord were not universally or 
 even generally understood to confer a primacy upon St. 
 Peter, and still less upon his supposed successors in the 
 See of Rome. 
 
 There are, in fact, three interpretations of the phrase 
 "upon this rock," found in the writings of the Fathers, 
 and not one of them is precisely the same as that 
 adopted by the ordinary Roman controversialists. 
 
 Some, for example, regard Peter himself as the rock ; 
 but of these some suggest that it was Peter not as a 
 man, an individual, but as a believer. And this is put 
 forth in two forms, some taking Peter, in this case, as 
 the representative of all believers, others regarding his 
 faith or his confession as the rock. This seems to have 
 been the earUer view of St. Augustine, as expressed in 
 his treatise on St. John, and in his sermons. " On this 
 rock," he says,"^ 'Svill I build My Church ; not upon the 
 Peter {Petrus), which thou art, but upon the rock 
 i^Petrani)^ which thy confession is." And the same 
 view is taken by many of the Fathers. 
 
 Others regard the rock as Christ Himself; and this 
 is the view presented by St. Augustine in his retracta- 
 tions, probably without intending to condemn the other 
 aspect of the truth, which is closely allied with this. 
 " For," he remarks, " it was not said to him, * Thou art 
 the rock {Fetra),' but ' thou art Peter {Petrus): But 
 the rock was Christ, whom Simon confessed, as the 
 
 * Serm. 270. 2. St. Augustine seems to have given, at different 
 times, all tlie three interpretations. 
 
54 THE POSITION OF 
 
 whole Church confesses Him, and was called Peter." 
 We repeat that we do not regard the controversy re- 
 specting the interpretation of this phrase as of the 
 greatest importance,"^ for the simple reason that its 
 decision either way would finally settle nothing. But 
 it is necessary to point out that so far from the ordinary 
 Roman view being the universal one, it has not even a 
 majority of voices in its favour; and even those early 
 writers who regard Peter as the rock, yet refer the 
 word to him personally, or to him as a believer, and not 
 to him and any successors that he might have. 
 
 * The following summary of patristic opiuion on this passage is 
 given in a pamphlet attributed to the late Bishop Ketteler of Mainz : 
 **The first interpretation asserts that the Church is built upon Peter; 
 and this is followed by seventeen Fathers, among whom are Ori- 
 gen, Cyprian, Jerome, Hilary, Ambrose, Cyril of Alexandria, Leo, 
 Augustine. 
 
 "The second asserts that the Church is built upon all the 
 Apostles, whom Peter represented by reason of his primacy ; and 
 this is followed by eight Fathers, and among them, Origen, Cyprian, 
 Jerome, Augustine, Theodoret. 
 
 "The third asserts that the words are to be understood of the 
 faith which Peter had confessed, and particularly that this faith — 
 the profession of faith by which Christ is declared to be the Son of 
 the living God — is the eternal and immovable foundation of the 
 Church. And this interpretation is followed oy forty-four Fathers 
 and Doctors, and among them by the Eastern — Origen, Gregory of 
 Nyssa, Cyril of Alexandria, Chrysostom, Theophylact, and the Wes- 
 tern — Hilary, Ambrose, Leo, Augustine. 
 
 "The fourth asserts that the words are to be understood of that 
 rock which Peter had confessed, that is Christ, so that it is declared 
 that the Church is founded upon Christ ; and this interpretation is 
 followed by sixteen Fathers and Doctors. 
 
 " The fifth patristic interpretation understands, under the name of 
 Peter, the faithful generally, who, believing that Christ is the Son of 
 
ST. PETER IN THE GOSPELS. 55 
 
 But even if we were to regard the application of the 
 phrase to St. Peter as beyond all question, we should 
 still have to determine in what sense Peter was this rock, 
 and in what sense Jesus Christ intended to build His 
 Church upon it. We know that in one sense He is 
 Himself the foundation; for "other foundation can no 
 man lay." We know that, in another sense, the Church 
 is built upon the foundation of apostles and prophets. 
 It would also be true, in accordance with a wide patristic 
 interpretation of the passage, to say that the Church is 
 founded upon the faith and confession of Jesus as "the 
 Christ, the Son of the living God." These are all obvious 
 truths; and before we determine the meaning of the 
 honour here assigned to St. Peter, we must carefully 
 consider the particular sense in which the building of 
 the Church upon him is intended. 
 
 Certainly it cannot be meant that He is the very basis, 
 foundation, support of the Church. That is not possible. 
 Nor is anything even remotely conveyed as to any 
 future governing of the Church, by him or his successors, 
 in these words, at least. By him, it would be said, sup- 
 posing him to be the rock, our Lord actually founded 
 the Church; and this would not be denied. St. Peter 
 was the instrument employed for that work on the day 
 of Pentecost. Then he opened the door of the new 
 society to Jews, and afterwards, in the person of Cor- 
 nelius, to Gentiles. 
 
 There can be no doubt that the position of St. Peter 
 in the apostolic body was a very remarkable, peculiar, 
 and conspicuous one. He was the foremost man among 
 
 God, are constituted as living stones, of which the Church is built." 
 Friedrich, Docunieitta, pp. 6, 7. 
 
56 THE POSITION OF 
 
 them all, foremost in speech and action, perhaps we 
 might add foremost in dignity and honour ; but we 
 know of no authority in the New Testament for adding, 
 foremost in power. A primacy of honour, although not 
 of jurisdiction, may be accorded to him, and the 
 denial of this is not merely useless in the controversy 
 with the Roman view, but it actually embarrasses the 
 sincere student of history, whose one great desire must 
 be to know and understand the facts. 
 
 If St. Peter had not this position, how could it come 
 to pass that the Roman view of his relation to the other 
 Apostles should ever be accepted? The limits of his 
 primacy, if we may use the word, we shall ascertain 
 without much difficulty from the later writings of the 
 New Testament ; but the pre-eminence of his position, 
 partly arising from his own temperament and character, 
 partly assigned to him by the ordinance of our Lord, in 
 order to the unity of the Apostolic body, can hardly be 
 called in question. 
 
 One aspect of this truth is stated well and eloquently 
 by St. Chrysostom, in speaking of St. Peter's confession 
 of our Lord, which was the occasion of the words which 
 we have been examining. When he had quoted our 
 Lord's question, he goes on : " What answer will Peter, 
 the mouth of the Apostles, give to this question.? 
 Always ardent, the Coryphaeus of the Apostolic choir, 
 when all are interrogated, it is he who replies. . . Peter 
 dashes forward, anticipates all the others, and cries : 
 'Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God.' It 
 was, in fact, his custom to speak for all." 
 
 This readiness in speech and action marked him out 
 as a leader ; and the discipUne of grace so changed the 
 
ST, PETER IN THE GOSPELS, 57 
 
 man of hasty and sometimes feeble impulses into the 
 man of rock, that he was adapted and chosen to be 
 the centre of unity in the Apostolic body. 
 
 It may be that the building of the Church of which 
 our Lord speaks, had reference to the first preaching of 
 the full Gospel of the kingdom on the day of Pentecost; 
 but if so, this need not exclude the common view of the 
 Fathers that it was on the faith and confession of St. 
 Peter that the Church was founded : in their view it was 
 upon Peter the believer and confessor that Christ would 
 found His Church ; Peter the man was not a rock ; he 
 was, in his worse moments, as a Satan ; and it would be 
 almost as reasonable for an antipetrine party to form a 
 theory of St. Peter's position among the Apostles, from 
 the strong language of denunciation in which our Lord 
 bid the offending disciple get behind Him, as for those 
 who claim the succession from the Apostle to base their 
 claims upon these words of Christ. 
 
 Whatever may be the peculiar meaning which we 
 attach to our Lord's promise, no one can reasonably 
 deny that St. Peter was a leading man among the 
 Apostles j while, on the other hand, it is impossible to 
 prove that he had any authority over the others, that he 
 determined the doctrines of the faith beyond any of the 
 other eleven, that he exercised any power which they 
 did not share with him as equals, or that he transmitted 
 any peculiar authority which he possessed to any special 
 person, office, or position. 
 
 But the words which we have been examining are 
 followed by a second promise, and a third ; the promises 
 of the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and the power of 
 binding and loosing. It will be sufficient for our purpose 
 
58 THE POSITION OF 
 
 to consider both together, and especially the last. In 
 doing so we need concern ourselves very little with the 
 exact meaning of the possession of the keys, or of the 
 power of binding and loosing. It may suffice to remark 
 that, while there is perhaps no direct reference here to the 
 retaining and the remitting of sins, the words are intended 
 to set forth the Apostolic authority in the government of 
 the Church, the control which the twelve exercised over 
 the treasures of grace in the kingdom of God, and the 
 power of admitting or excluding others from the fellow- 
 ship of the Church. 
 
 It may, at first sight, appear that such an interpreta- 
 tion of the passage is a concession of the whole Roman 
 claim; but this would be an entire misapprehension. 
 Indeed, there would be nothing more unsafe than to 
 take what people would call the obvious and natural 
 meaning of many passages of this kind as conveying the 
 true mind of the speaker. In most of such cases the 
 obvious and natural meaning is that which the reader 
 brings in his mind to the perusal of the passage. 
 
 Can we say, for example, that our Lord has given 
 absokitely to St. Peter, or to any other man or angel, the 
 absolute power of government over the Church? We 
 know that it is not so. It is He alone that "hath the key 
 of David " absolutely. He alone " openeth, and no man 
 shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth. '^ What- 
 ever authority may be given to St. Peter in the Church, 
 he exercises in subordination to our Lord Jesus Christ, 
 and under the guidance of His Spirit. This will be 
 generally conceded. 
 
 But further, is it to be imagined that these powers, 
 whatever they were, and at this moment we raise no 
 
ST. PETER IN THE GOSPELS. 59 
 
 question on that point, were committed to St. Peter 
 alone ? Yet this is what might seem to be taught by 
 what some persons would call the obvious and natural 
 meaning of the words, "whatsoever thotc shalt bind," 
 " whatsoever thou shalt loose." If so, then what is the 
 meaning of those other words recorded by St. John : 
 *' Whosesoever sins ye remit, they are remitted; and 
 whosesoever sins ye retain, they are retained?" These 
 powers, then, were not committed to St. Peter alone; but 
 also to the other Apostles. And this is in a sense 
 admitted by Roman Catholics themselves. 
 
 Thus, to quote the words of the commentator to whom 
 we have already referred : " Without doubt we under- 
 stand our Lord to address to the whole Apostolic college 
 the words which He pronounces at this moment ex- 
 clusively to St. Peter ; . . . but He does not make them 
 equal to St. Peter, who is here constituted their chief 
 . . . He does not confer the keys on them (the other 
 apostles) without restriction, as He does on St. Peter. 
 They are placed under the direction of a superior who 
 will continue to be for them that which Jesus Christ had 
 been." 
 
 These words, by an eminent French ecclesiastic, 
 represent quite fairly the Roman view; and a careful 
 examination of them will show how much is read into 
 the text, rather than fairly drawn out of it. The keys are 
 conferred upon St. Peter without restriction, we are told, 
 and this is quite compatible with the meaning of the 
 words as they stand, but cannot possibly represent their 
 real intention and significance. At the same time we 
 are told that they are addressed to the whole Apostolic 
 college, in which case we could not be sure that they 
 
 I 
 
6o THE POSITION OF 
 
 conferred those pre-eminent powers upon St. Peter. The 
 truth is, that they were spoken to the whole Apostolic 
 college, and to St. Peter as its leading and foremost 
 member; but they determine nothing as to the relations 
 which the Apostles shall sustain to each other, or as 
 to the position of Peter hniiself or any other member of 
 the body. 
 
 Besides, if we were to grant that St. Peter had this 
 place of supreme government in the college of the 
 Apostles — which we cannot grant, because we can find 
 no evidence of it in the New Testament — we should 
 still lack any proof that this power descended to any 
 successor. There is not a word in the whole passage 
 which gives us a hint that there is here the establishment 
 of a spiritually hereditary monarchy : what is said is 
 quite compatible with the bestowal of these powers upon 
 the Church as represented by the Apostles, upon the 
 Apostles as represented by St. Peter. But there is 
 nothing to hint that behind and below St. Peter, there is 
 a Roman Pontiff who has the reversion of all the privi- 
 leges and powers of the Prince of the Apostles. 
 
 Let us suppose, for a moment, that this is the case ; 
 and what follows ? After the death of St. Peter, all the 
 Apostles who remained alive must have referred cases of 
 difficulty to the ultimate and supreme decision of the 
 Bishops of Rome. St. John, in his old age at Ephesus, 
 at the end of the first century, must have had recourse 
 to Clement, the successor of Peter and Linus and Cletus 
 in the Apostolic See ! Happily for us St. Clement 
 says nothing of the kind in that precious epistle of his 
 to the Corinthians, which we still possess — not even in 
 that fragment which has recently been so wonderfully 
 
ST. PETER IN THE GOSPELS. 6i 
 
 recovered ! The absurdity in which we are thus landed 
 by the Roman theory will become more apparent when 
 we consider the next text. 
 
 The second of the three great texts which are adduced 
 to support the Petrine Sovereignty and that of his 
 successors the Popes, is St. Luke xxii. 31, 32. It will 
 probably astonish some of our Protestant readers, who 
 may not be familiar with the Roman arguments, to hear 
 that the words of our Lord to St. Peter, " When thou art 
 converted, strengthen thy brethren,'' are brought forward 
 to prove that St. Peter was appointed supreme teacher 
 among the Apostles and in the Church ; and not only so, 
 but that the same power was, by these words, assured 
 to his successors in the Roman See ! 
 
 It would hardly be possible to find words more dis- 
 tinctly personal, and, so to speak, local and occasional, 
 in their origin, meaning, and application. St. Peter had 
 sinned and fallen ; but his Master would not abandon 
 him : his faith should not utterly and finally fail, and his 
 knowledge of his own weakness and of God's grace 
 would fit him to be a teacher, a guide, and a strengthener 
 of others who might be tempted and fall. 
 
 To derive an argument for the special prerogatives of 
 St. Peter from the use of the plural at the beginning, and 
 the singular at the end of the passage, — ^' Satan hath 
 desired to hsive you^ that he may sift yoii as wheat; but 
 I have prayed for ^/lee, that f/iy faith fail not " — is cer- 
 tainly very far fetched. The special reference to St. 
 Peter is sufficiently accounted for by our Lord's foresight 
 of his special temptation and fall. And the command 
 which follows upon the assurance, has distinct and direct 
 reference to his sin and his repentance. Indeed, if we 
 
62 THE POSITION OF 
 
 were as anxious to depress this great apostle, as others 
 are to exalt him, we might point out that there was a 
 moment in which Peter's faith did fail, when he denied 
 his Master ; and further that he only imperfectly obeyed 
 the command to strengthen the brethren, since by his 
 vacillation he on one important occasion greatly weak- 
 ened them. But it is sufficient for our purpose to point 
 out that these words do not in any way determine St. 
 Peter's official position or teaching power, to which, as 
 far as we can judge from the words or from the connec- 
 tion in which they stand, there is no allusion whatever. 
 
 Let us, for a moment, suppose that these words are 
 intended to teach the Roman doctrine of the primacy 
 and infallibility of Peter and his successors. Jesus Christ 
 says He has asked inerrancy for His Apostle, and he, 
 being thus made infallible, is commanded to strengthen 
 his brethren ; in other words, to prevent the other 
 Apostles from falling into error. Extravagant as this 
 supposition may appear, there are Roman controver- 
 sialists who do not shrink from it -, and who are ready to 
 maintain that St. Peter was infallible in a sense different 
 from the other Apostles.* 
 
 According to this view of the text, St. Peter alone was 
 immediately infallible, as alone standing immediately 
 under that Divine guidance which secured inerrancy to 
 
 * ** Duo igitur prseter csetera statiiit, quibus infallibilitatis exequui- 
 tionem obtineret : ac primo quidem suo numine ita Petro adesse, ut 
 ipse numquam a veritate, coelitus revelata aberraret : deinde vero 
 apostolorum omnium ita animos prseparare, voluntatesque dirigere, 
 ut iidem et perspicue viderent fas non esse a Petri fide discedere, et 
 constanter vellent in una eademque cum Petro fide perseverare." 
 Passaglia, De Prerogativis Beati Petri, Lib. ii. c. 14. See the 
 whole chapter. 
 
ST. PETER IN THE GOSPELS. 63 
 
 the Church, and the other Apostles were infallible by 
 reason of their connection with him. It will hereafter 
 be considered how far such a view accords or disagrees 
 with the representations respecting the Apostles in other 
 parts of the New Testament. There is certainly nothing 
 of the kind elsewhere hinted in the Gospels ; and one 
 tries to imagine the emotions with which St. Paul would 
 have listened to the enunciation of such a theory about 
 the time when he was composing his epistle to the 
 Galatians ! 
 
 If, again, we recur to the supposition of St. John's 
 position in the Church after the death of St. Peter, we 
 try to imagine the aged apostle referring* to St. Clement 
 of Rome, on the appearance of some new form of the 
 ever-changeful Gnostic heresy. As we have said, St. 
 Clement has left no record of his pretensions to be a 
 guide of apostles, although surely in that case he might 
 have claimed to speak with authority to the Christians of 
 Corinth ; nor does St. John in any of his writings use the 
 form so familiar to us in modern times, that he submits 
 beforehand the statements which he makes to the judg- 
 ment of the successor of St. Peter 1 
 
 As regards the judgments of the Fathers, most of them 
 refer the words to St. Peter as fallen, restored, and thus 
 specially qualified to help the penitent. A few of them 
 refer them to the primacy of the Apostle, none to that 
 of the Pope. The first who discovered in Christ's prayer 
 that Peter's faith should not fail an argument for Papal 
 infallibility was himself a Pope — Agatho, near the end of 
 the seventh century. 
 
 If ordinary readers of the Bible were not prepared to 
 read an argument for Papal infallibility in St. Luke xxii. 
 
 i 
 
64 THE POSITION OF 
 
 32, they will be no more prepared to see a proof of the 
 supremacy of the Roman pastorate in St. John xxi. 
 15-17. That beautiful narrative sets before us a most 
 charming picture of the intercourse of our loving Lord 
 with His penitent Apostle. By his sin he had given his 
 Master a right to doubt of the truth of his affection ; yet 
 he could appeal to Him who reads the heart, for an 
 answer to His own question. The evidence which was 
 henceforth required of his loving devotion was his feeding 
 of the sheep and of the lambs of the flock of Christ. 
 Nothing could be more simple or more beautiful. There 
 is not a word of Peter's primacy ; but only of his personal 
 and official relation to his Master, as a loving believer 
 and a faithful pastor of his flock. Still less is there a 
 word as to any one who should henceforth occupy the 
 place of supreme pastor of the sheep of God in the 
 Church. 
 
 There is nothing, then, in the Gospels, which teaches 
 us that St. Peter was placed over the other Apostles, with 
 greater power and authority to teach or rule than that 
 which they possessed. Even Roman controversialists 
 admit that the words which were addressed to him alone, 
 were spoken to him as the representative of the Apostolic 
 college, and we do not deny that he had a foremost 
 place, a kind of primacy of honour among the other 
 Apostles. 
 
 Let it, however, be marked that there is nothing in 
 the Gospels which helps more nearly to define that 
 primacy; and although he is everywhere the foremost 
 among them, the first to speak and the first to act, there 
 is nowhere a hint that he had any power or privilege 
 which did not belong to the rest, or that our Lord 
 
ST, PETER IN THE GOSPELS. 65 
 
 communicated His commands to the eleven or to any one 
 among them through Peter as their chief. It is true, he 
 was with our Lord on the mount of transfiguration ; but 
 so were James and John : he was also with Him in the 
 garden during His agony ; but the same other two 
 disciples were there as well. On one solemn occasion, 
 it would appear, he did not occupy the place at the 
 table next to our Lord. That John reclined beside 
 Him at the last supper is clear ; and it is natural to 
 suppose that Peter was next to John, from his getting the 
 latter to put the question respecting Judas to our Lord. 
 Painters often set Peter on the right hand and John 
 on the left. Ecclesiastically, they may be right ; histori- 
 cally, they are probably wrong. Those who witnessed the 
 Passion Play at Oberammergau may remember that Peter, 
 who was seated on the right hand of Jesus, sprang from 
 his seat, passed behind his Master, and requested John 
 to ask the question. One felt that it was hardly possible 
 that this should have been the situation. Yet if St. 
 Peter had happened to be next to Jesus, and John next 
 to him ; and if St. John had requested St. Peter to put 
 this question to our Lord and to convey the answer 
 back to him, what a beautiful illustration the Roman 
 advocate would have found, in this scene, of the primacy 
 of the prince of the apostles ! 
 
 As far as the Gospels are concerned, there is abso- 
 lutely nothing to show that St. Peter enjoyed any 
 superiority of power to the others. What the meaning 
 of his primacy may be we shall expect to find illus- 
 trated in the subsequent history of the Christian society, 
 more especially after our Lord's removal from His 
 disciples, and the descent of the Holy Ghost on the 
 
 E 
 
66 ST. PETER IN THE GOSPELS. 
 
 day of Pentecost. It is to the examination of this part 
 of the argument that we must now proceed. If St. Peter 
 had this place of supreme authority among the twelve, 
 we cannot fail to perceive evidences of it in the Acts of 
 the Apostles and in the apostolic epistles. We will try 
 to examine these with care and candour, considering 
 first his general position in the Church and his relation 
 to the other apostles, and afterwards more particularly 
 the history x)f the first council at Jerusalem. 
 
( (>7 \ 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ST. PETER IN THE CHURCH, AND IN RELATION 
 TO THE OTHER APOSTLES. 
 
 The interpretation of the Gospel texts must be sought in the Acts and 
 apostoHcal epistles — Was the primacy of Peter one of honour only, 
 or of power also? — Peter not the master of the Church — In the 
 Acts — In the Epistles — St, Peter had no authority over the other 
 apostles — All his powers and privileges shared by the rest — Illus- 
 trated by recorded facts — By the relation between St. Peter and 
 St. Paul — A relation of perfect equality — St. Paul's epistles— His 
 independence of Peter and the other apostles. 
 
 If the Roman view of the privileges of St. Peter be 
 the true one, it will be confirmed and illustrated by 
 the primitive records of the Church's history. If the 
 Roman interpretation of the three great texts be accurate, 
 that teaching will not be contradicted, but supported, by 
 a consideration of the position which St. Peter actually 
 occupied in the Church after its constitution on the day 
 of Pentecost, and by his relation to his brother apostles. 
 
 We must repeat, it would be most unsafe to take any 
 passage of Scripture, and affix to it off-hand the meaning 
 which to us might seem most probable on a mere super- 
 ficial and passing examination of its contents. Such a 
 treatment of Scripture, especially if it were employed 
 against their own positions, would be indignantly and 
 
68 ST. PETER IN THE CHURCH, AND IN 
 
 justly resented by Roman theologians. They would tell 
 us that we are not to isolate a few words of the Bible, 
 and interpret them to suit our own purpose, however 
 plausible our interpretation may be. We are bound to 
 consider them in their whole connection, in the light of 
 the general testimony of the Word of God, and with due 
 regard to the traditional teaching of the Church. If a 
 text seems to teach a doctrine which finds no support in 
 other parts of Holy Scripture, it is almost certain that 
 we have misunderstood it. If it seems to teach anything 
 which is elsewhere contradicted, or which is evidently 
 incompatible with the general testimony of inspiration, 
 then we may be quite sure that our interpretation of it 
 has been erroneous."^ 
 
 These reasonable and Catholic principles of interpre- 
 tation we must insist upon applying to those texts in 
 the Gospels which the Papal advocates understand as 
 supporting the sovereignty of St. Peter and his successors 
 in the Roman See. We must insist — and they will not 
 
 * This principle of interpretation is excellently stated by 
 Passaglia, De Prerog. Pet., lib. ii. c. i, 21 : ** Catholics and Protes- 
 tants are agreed in considering analogy as one of the best helps in 
 interpretation, and in assigning to it the force of a real parallelism, 
 a proceeding which rests on the necessity of the Scripture presenting 
 one whole and harmonious body of doctrine in its several parts. 
 And in order not to deprive this help of its efficacy, both parties 
 give two conditions for its exercise ; the first, that no sense be put 
 upon passages of Scripture contrary to analogy ; the second, that no 
 violence be used to the language of Scripture to conform it with 
 analogy, which would be imposing on Holy Writ the sense wanted 
 from it. These two faults carefully avoided, analogy is of great 
 service, and throws much light upon interpretation." (We give the 
 translation of Mr. Allies.) 
 
RELATION TO THE OTHER APOSTLES. 69 
 
 deny the general truth of the principle, however we may 
 differ when we come to apply it — that, if St. Peter had 
 that position of supremacy assigned to him by our Lord, 
 then we shall without doubt find unmistakable traces 
 of it in the history of the Church. A position so re- 
 markable and unique must be recognised in the first 
 historical records of the Church — the Acts of the 
 Apostles : it cannot possibly be ignored in the various 
 apostoUc epistles which have descended to us, especially 
 as his name is not unfrequently introduced. 
 
 As we read those texts in the Gospels w^iich were 
 examined in the previous chapter, we find that St. Peter 
 had a kind of priority or primacy among the apostles ; 
 but it was a priority of honour, not of jurisdiction — not 
 of power or authority ; his position is that of a pri?nus 
 inter pares (the first among equals), not that of a superior 
 over inferiors. 
 
 The Roman view, on the contrary, demands for St. 
 Peter (and for his successors) a position of sovereignty 
 practically unlimited, or at least limited only by the 
 Pope's own views of the limitations. They hold that 
 St. Peter was the monarch or master of the Church, 
 which might be regarded as his servant \ that he was its 
 supreme teacher and governor, having his power con- 
 trolled only by our Lord, whose representative he was ; 
 and that the other apostles possessed only a power 
 derived from him, and dependent upon his, being, so 
 to speak, united to Christ through Peter, and receiving 
 their rights, privileges, and power from their Master 
 only through him who was their chief 
 
 These two views are quite clear and quite distinct. If 
 the one be true, the other cannot. It will therefore be 
 
70 ST. PETER IN THE CHURCH, AND IN 
 
 possible to confront them successively with the plain 
 facts recorded in the Acts and the Epistles ; so that we 
 may hope to determine whether the one or the other is 
 supported by these testimonies. 
 
 Let us try to be quite clear on this point. We hold 
 that it is quite impossible that these claims made on 
 behalf of St. Peter, if they are true, should be unknown 
 or ignored in the first days of the Church's history ; if 
 they were known and recognized, we shall certainly find 
 unmistakable reference to them in the records which we 
 still possess of those early times. 
 
 Turning to these documents, we ask : Is the Church, 
 as there presented to us, a kingdom with a visible earthly 
 sovereign, whose teaching is received without question 
 by clergy (including apostles) and laity alike, and 
 whose commands are unhesitatingly obeyed by the 
 members of the Church who recognize themselves as 
 his subjects? 
 
 If this be so, then the Roman claims, on behalf of St. 
 Peter at least, are substantiated. If this be not so — if 
 such a representation be inconsistent with, and con- 
 tradicted by, the earliest Christian documents — then we 
 must, beyond all question, declare the Petrine claims to 
 be unfounded and false. 
 
 It would, in this case, be useless to speak of develop- 
 ment. The idea, at least, must be unmistakably present ; 
 the germ must be found. We might allow that it would 
 take time to get the idea into the universal Christian 
 conscience that the Bishop of Rome was actually the 
 representative of St. Peter, and the inheritor of all his 
 privileges and powers. Even that is a concession which 
 we could hardly be required to make if the Roman sue- 
 
RELATION TO THE OTHER APOSTLES. 71 
 
 cession of St. Peter was at once a primitive fact and a 
 primitive doctrine. 
 
 But even if we allowed that the idea of the Roman 
 primacy — of the Papal sovereignty — might remain for a 
 season somewhat indefinite in certain portions of the 
 Christian Church, it is utterly impossible that the Petrine 
 sovereignty, if it were a reality, should not be acknow- 
 ledged in the apostolic Church. The apostles, at least, 
 must have known well the position of their prince in the 
 Church, and the nature of their own relations to him. 
 They must have known what their Master meant by the 
 words which He spoke to. Peter; and they must have 
 done what they could to give effect to His ordinance 
 and purpose in the Christian body. 
 
 Do we find, then, that the Church was a kingdom in 
 which Peter was recognized as king— the visible repre- 
 sentative and vicar of the invisible King? Do we find 
 that in the teaching of Christian doctrine, and in the 
 ruling of Christian communities, the other apostles 
 derived their authority from him, and exercised it in 
 subjection to him? 
 
 To ask these questions is, in fact, to answer them 
 unhesitatingly and definitely. It is hardly possible to 
 imagine anything more different from the actual facts 
 of the case. In the Acts of the Apostles we find, as we 
 should expect, that St. Peter is the foremost man among 
 the twelve, their spokesman and mouthpiece, as during 
 their Master's earthly ministry; but of any absolute 
 power over the Christian society, of any superiority in 
 authority to the other apostles, we find no trace what- 
 ever. 
 
 Take, first, St. Peter's sovereignty over the Church. 
 
72 ST. PETER IN THE CHURCH, AND IN 
 
 \i he possessed it, he knew it, and so did his fellow- 
 apostles. There was no ecclesiastical organization to 
 oppose him ; no privileges of other Churches and bishops 
 to come into collision with his claims ; no vested rights, 
 grown up in evil times and in evil places, to render the 
 exercise of his sovereignty difficult. And yet, we must 
 repeat, there was no trace of this power over the king- 
 dom of God. The Church was not a society in which 
 the laity had to do nothing but to obey ; it was not a 
 state in which every subject simply listened to the voice 
 of the supreme ruler^ and fulfilled his commands. It 
 is a kingdom ; but Christ alone is its King. He has 
 His officers and representatives on earth ; but they rule 
 with gentleness, and with a full recognition of the rights 
 and privileges of all the members. They have official 
 duties to perform, which belong to them alone ; but even 
 in the administration of discipline, they do not ignore the 
 members of the society over which they are set. 
 
 This is, indeed, what we should expect when we 
 remember our Lord's commands to them respecting the 
 spirit which they were to exercise and the relations which 
 they were to sustain towards those who should believe 
 in Him, their brethren in the Church. " Ye know," 
 He had said, " that the princes of the Gentiles exercise 
 dominion over them, and they that are great exercise 
 authority upon them. But it shall not be so among you " 
 (St. Matt. XX. 25). 
 
 But, it may be urged, that He adds, " Whosoever will 
 be chief among you, let him be your servant ; even as 
 the Son of Man came not to be ministered unto, but to 
 minister.'' And surely this only says that their authority 
 is to be exercised as their Master's was } Yes, but as 
 
RELATION TO THE OTHER APOSTLES. 73 
 
 their Master exercised it upon earth, not when He took 
 to Himself His great power and reigned, not after all 
 power had been given to Him in heaven and on earth. 
 
 But turn to another passage : " Be not ye called 
 Rabbi, for one is your Master, even Christ ; and all ye are 
 brethren. And call no man your father upon the earth, 
 for one is your Father, which is in heaven. Neither be 
 ye called masters ; for one is your Master, even Christ " 
 (St. Matt, xxiii. 8-10). 
 
 The observance of these injunctions is absolutely 
 incompatible with the Papal view of St. Peter's position 
 in the Church ; but it is not inconsistent with what we 
 read of the actual history of the Church. Neither the 
 apostles collectively, nor any one of their number, ever 
 assumed the position of masters of the Church. They 
 did not profess to have dominion over the faith of 
 Christ's people : they were helpers of their joy. And 
 this spirit is everywhere. We find it in the Acts of the 
 Apostles as a fact ; it is enforced in the Epistles as a 
 principle. 
 
 If an apostle reminds his hearers of the greatness of 
 his office, he is careful to add that it is not his own, his 
 *^ sufficiency is of God,'' and that it is not bestowed for 
 his own elevation. " We preach not ourselves, but 
 Christ Jesus the Lord." If God has given them privi- 
 leges and gifts of wondrous excellence, they are for the 
 benefit of the body of which they are members. There 
 is but one Head, their ascended Lord within the veil ; 
 and they " are one body in Christ, and every one 
 members one of another." 
 
 Even when discipline is to be exercised, when one is 
 to be bound or loosed, to have the doors of the kingdom 
 
74 si: peter in the church, and in 
 
 opened for him, or closed against him, the command is 
 given by no autocrat : the members of the Church are 
 themselves to punish the guilty, and to restore th^, 
 penitent. " Do not ye judge them that are within ? " says 
 St. Paul ; and the sin of which he spoke was manifest. 
 ** Therefore,'^ he adds, " put away from among yourselves 
 that wicked person." And afterwards, when the sinful 
 man had repented of his misdeeds, although the apostle 
 required this proof of their obedience to him that they 
 would restore the penitent member, and forgive him, 
 and comfort him, lest perhaps such an one should be 
 swallowed up with overmuch sorrow, yet it was in the 
 tone of one who did not presume to be their master, 
 but was their brother and their servant, " for Jesus' 
 sake." 
 
 Nowhere does the Church appear as the servant of 
 the apostles, still less as the servant of Peter. It is the 
 bride and body of Christ, in which the greatest of saints 
 and apostles are but members. It is the kingdom of 
 God, which has no sovereign but Christ ; and He has 
 no vicar on earth but the Holy Ghost. Everywhere we 
 feel that, while the apostles have an official position of 
 great importance and utility, they never represent them- 
 selves as the masters of the Church. 
 
 Still more important, however, in reference to our 
 present inquiry, is the relation of St. Peter to the other 
 apostles ; and this is a point which is not left doubtful 
 in the New Testament history. 
 
 We turn to the Acts of the Apostles ; we study the 
 contents of that precious record with simplicity and 
 candour, desiring simply to know what it contains. If 
 it sets Peter over the other apostles as their superior 
 
RELATION TO THE OTHER APOSTLES, 75 
 
 and sovereign, it must be good and right for us to see 
 and believe this. But we must not impatiently read 
 this meaning into texts which teach something different, 
 if that meaning be not there. 
 
 In the Acts of the Apostles St. Peter undoubtedly 
 occupies a position of great prominence and importance, 
 as we might say, of priority among the apostles. This 
 we should expect to find, if our view of his position in 
 the Gospels was correct. If we attempt to go beyond 
 this, if we say that St. Peter was the pope among the 
 apostles, their superior from whom they derived authority 
 and power to teach and to govern, then we are bound 
 to say that in the whole book there is not a trace of such 
 a doctrine. 
 
 The prominence of St. Peter, even in a sense his 
 priority, comes out alike from his position in the 
 Gospels, from the words addressed to him by our 
 Lord, and from his relation to the primitive Church 
 and to the other apostles. But he is no sovereign over 
 a subject Church, he is no superior having dominion 
 over the other apostles. 
 
 Even if he is described by our Lord as, in a sense, 
 the foundation of the Church, yet St. Paul speaks in 
 the same language of all the apostles. Christ gave to 
 him the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and the 
 power to bind and loose ] but He bestowed these 
 privileges upon him as the representative of the twelve. 
 It was not to Peter alone, or to him pre-eminently, that 
 He said, " Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted 
 unto them ; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are 
 retained." 
 
 It is true that our Lord prayed especially for St. 
 
76 ST, PETER IN THE CHURCH, AND IN 
 
 Peter that his faith might not fail, but He did so as 
 foreseeing the temptation to which it would be exposed ; 
 and He also prayed for all His* disciples, that they 
 might be sanctified for the work which He had given them 
 to do in the world, — a work to which He sent them 
 as the Father had sent Him, a work in the execution oi 
 which those who should receive and hear them would 
 also be receiving and hearing Him who had sent them. 
 Peter was at the same time commanded to strengthen 
 his brethren ; but this power was not bestowed upon 
 him alone. St. Paul also longed to impart " some 
 spiritual gift " to the Romans, **to the end "that they 
 might be "established.'* 
 
 Jesus Christ made St. Peter a shepherd of His flock, 
 commanding him to feed His sheep and His lambs; 
 but St. Peter" did not regard himself as the sole 
 shepherd, or as supreme over the rest. " The elders," 
 he says, " I exhort, who am also an elder . . . feed 
 the flock of God, which is amongst you . . . neither 
 as being lords over God's heritage, but being ensamples 
 to the flock. And when the chief Shepherd shall 
 appear "... He is not Peter, but Peter's Lord. 
 
 Even in Peter's expressed readiness to die for His 
 Master, he was but the representative of the rest : 
 " Likewise also said all the disciples ; " and in his want 
 of faith and in his cowardice the others resembled him ; 
 for if they did not actually deny their Lord, it was because 
 "they all forsook Him and fled." 
 
 Now it is exactly this place of prominence, but not 
 of supremacy or authority, which we find occupied by 
 St. Peter in the apostolic Church. He presides at 
 the election of Matthias ; but it is certaijily very far 
 
RELATION TO THE OTHER APOSTLES. 77 
 
 from the truth when a Roman writer says that '' he fills 
 up the vacancy in the apostolic college." No doubt, 
 this is what he would have done if the Roman theory 
 were the true one ; but this he certainly does not do. 
 We have said he presided; and this is not actually stated. 
 Perhaps there was no president ; but he, as the foremost 
 man, introduced the subject which they were convened 
 to consider, the death of Judas, and the filling up of 
 his vacant place; and indicated to the others what was 
 their duty on the occasion. But, when that was done, 
 all were on an equality. ^' They,'' the apostles, not 
 Peter, "appointed two." Of these two one was chosen, 
 not by the so-called prince of the society, but by the 
 *' lots " of the whole number ; and " the lot fell upon 
 Matthias, and he was numbered with the eleven 
 apostles." All is simple and intelligible in the view of 
 St. Peter's position which we have found in the Gospels; 
 it is absolutely unintelligible on the Roman view. 
 
 Again, St. Peter was appointed to proclaim the good 
 message on the day of Pentecost ; and, so to speak, to 
 preside at the inauguration of the Christian Church. 
 But it is impossible to use language stronger than this. 
 Yet this by no means represents the pretensions put 
 forth on his behalf by those who claim to be his succes- 
 sors. The same or similar remarks may be made on his 
 opening the door of the Church to the Gentiles by the 
 reception of Cornelius. 
 
 It was in every way fitting that this should be done by 
 St. Peter. He was the leading and representative man 
 of the apostolic body, and for this reason he was fitly 
 chosen for this work. He had preached the first Chris- 
 tian sermon after the descent of the Holy Ghost, and 
 
78 ST. PETER IN THE CHURCH, AND IN 
 
 had received the first believers into the fold by holy 
 baptism ; it was therefore convenient that he should also 
 receive the first-fruits of the Gentiles. Moreover, it was 
 of importance that an act implying what might be called 
 a new point of departure in the history of the Church 
 should be performed by one who could be under no 
 suspicion in respect to the nature of the act. If St. 
 Paul had been the agent, it would probably have excited 
 opposition and resistance as having only or chiefly the 
 sanction of the Aposde of the Gentiles, whereas it 
 could not be so judged as being done by the Apostle of 
 the circumcision. 
 
 But in all this there is not a trace of dominion over 
 the other apostles, or of their subjection to him. When 
 a question of discipline, and perhaps even of doctrine, 
 arises with reference to the position of Gentiles in the 
 Church, it is discussed and decided by the apostles in 
 common. The Council of Jerusalem is, however, in 
 various ways, of such importance that it must receive 
 separate consideration. 
 
 Even when St. Peter takes a prominent place on 
 some occasion of importance in the apostolic Church, it 
 is by the designation of the others, and not in virtue of 
 any inherent authority or power in himself. Thus in 
 Acts viii. 14, we read : "When the apostles which were 
 at Jerusalem heard that Samaria had received the word 
 of God, they sent unto them Peter and John." This 
 statement harmonizes perfectly with our representation 
 of the position of St. Peter ; but it differs very widely 
 from what the Roman view would lead us to expect. 
 
 But we shall obtain the best illustration of the in- 
 dependence of the other apostles — we shall see how 
 
RELATION TO THE OTHER APOSTLES, 79 
 
 absurdly untrue it is to say that they depended upon 
 St. Peter for their power and authority — if we consider 
 the relation between St. Peter and St. Paul. It is not 
 too much to say, it is, in fact, the accurate statement of 
 the historical fact, when we assert that St. Paul regarded 
 himself as being on a perfect equality with St. Peter. 
 
 We do not lay any great stress upon the fact, recorded 
 by St. Paul himself, that he "withstood him [Peter] to 
 the face, because he was to be blamed.'' This might 
 not be altogether incompatible with the position of an 
 inferior who remonstrated with a superior on account of 
 his want of moral courage. But the whole attitude of 
 St. Paul tells us that he was sensible of no inferiority in 
 his own position, and conceded no superiority to that of 
 St. Peter. 
 
 His apostleship to the Gentiles was on a perfect 
 equality, in his own view, with that of St. Peter to the 
 Jews. " The Gospel of the uncircumcision," he says, 
 " was committed unto me, as the Gospel of the circum- 
 cision was unto Peter ; for He that wrought effectually 
 in Peter to the apostleship of the circumcision, the 
 same w^as mighty in me toward the Gentiles." This is 
 the language of an equal speaking of an equal. 
 
 But, it has been said, St. Paul evidently did recognize 
 the superiority of St. Peter by his coming up to Jeru- 
 salem to "see" him — or whatever the exact force of 
 the word (/(rro^Jitra/) may be (Gal. i. 18) — "a word used," 
 says St. Chrysostom, "by those who go to see great and 
 famous cities." No doubt St. Paul did recognise the 
 eminence of St. Peter, and of others besides him, in the 
 early Church. It was of importance that he should do 
 so. He was one " born out of due time," and his claims 
 
   
 
8o ST. PETER IN THE CHURCH, AND IN 
 
 were disputed. He must make it clear that he had not 
 " run in vain/* 
 
 Seldom was there a time when one apostle would be 
 under a greater temptation to submit himself to others who 
 might be of authority, and by whose support he might 
 strengthen his own. What an opportunity for St. Paul, 
 to be able to go back and tell those who had resisted 
 him that he had satisfied the prince of the apostles of his 
 having received a valid call from Christ ; that St. Peter 
 had decided that his doctrine was sound, and his disci- 
 plinary rules for the Gentiles were good ; so that he could 
 now come back to them with all the power of the chief 
 of the apostles to enforce his teaching and government ! 
 
 If the Roman theory were true, St. Paul must have 
 done something like this ; but he does nothing of the 
 sort. He goes indeed to see the *^ pillar Apostles : '' 
 James, the bishop of the first metropolis of the Christian 
 world ; Cephas, who was the foremost of the twelve ; and 
 John, the disciple whom Jesus loved. But here he does 
 not give the first place to Peter, but to James, who pre- 
 sided over the mother Church. We do not attach over- 
 whelming importance to this circumstance, although we 
 shall see hereafter that it is by no means without signi- 
 ficance;"^ but the Roman controversialists are never 
 weary of referring to every passage in which Peter is the 
 first named. 
 
 Well, but let us grant St. Paul went up particularly to 
 see Peter. This statement might produce a presumption 
 that he felt the necessity, in some w^ay, of giving an 
 account of himself and his work to St. Peter, or of 
 obtaining some increase of authority or influence by his 
 * See in the next chapter. 
 
RELATION TO THE OTHER APOSTLES. 8i 
 
 means. If such a notion were for a moment entertained, 
 it must speedily be dispelled by St. Paul's own words. 
 
 What does he say of his apostolic authority ? ** Paul an 
 apostle, not of men, neither by man, but by Jesus Christ, 
 and God the Father.'' It is thus that he begins the very 
 epistle in which he speaics of his visit to Peter ; and the 
 same sentiment is elsewhere expressed in similar language. 
 
 What does he think of his own power to teach and to 
 preach in the Church of God? Did he derive it, or any 
 part of it, or gain any additional authority for his work, 
 from the support of the other apostles, even the very 
 chief of them ? On this point he is equally explicit. As 
 for his gospel, he says : " I neither received it of man, 
 neither was I taught it, but by the revelation of Jesus 
 Christ. . . . Neither went I up to Jerusalem to them 
 which were apostles before me ; . . . and was unknown 
 by face unto the churches of Judea" (Gal. i. 12, 17, 22). 
 
 It is true he went up afterwards, when his teaching 
 was called in question ; but this time not specially ''to 
 see Peter," but " to them which were of reputation," parti- 
 cularly, no doubt, to the three already named ; but not 
 in any way as acknowledging their superior authority, or 
 as desiring from them any power or knowledge which 
 he did not already possess. ''They," he says, ''who 
 seemed to be somewhat, in conference added nothing to 
 me ; " and " whatsoever they were," he says, " it maketh 
 no matter to me " (Gal. ii. 6). 
 
 These are, indeed, very remarkable words. We can 
 quite understand that the partizans of Peter should 
 resent the boldness and independence of an apostle who 
 could not claim to have been the personal friend and 
 companion of the Lord. But there is no hint anywhere 
 
 F 
 
82 ST. PETER TV THE CHURCH, AND IN 
 
 that St. Peter himself resented the attitude of St. Paul, 
 or claimed to give him the slightest direction in his 
 teaching or work ; and St. Paul's own tone is uniform 
 throughout. There is not a single phrase or word in 
 the whole of his writings which indicates his conscious- 
 ness of dependence upon St. Peter or any other apostle. 
 There is not a syllable in St. Peter's writings which ex- 
 presses or implies any pretension of superiority over the 
 other apostles. There is only one way of accounting 
 for this undeniable fact — no such power belonged to St. 
 Peter, no such power was ever thought of by him or by 
 his colleagues. If it had been, we could not have missed 
 some trace of it in the New Testament. 
 
 There is one other passage in the epistles of St. Paul 
 in which the name of Peter is brought forward ; but in 
 that passage there is as little evidence of the superiority 
 of the Apostle of the circumcision as in the one which 
 we have examined. '^ Every one of you saith," St. Paul 
 complains to the Corinthians (i, i. 12), *' I am of Paul, 
 and I of Apollos, and I of Cephas, and I of Christ." 
 These parties were dividing and distracting the Church ; 
 and St. Paul protested against them, and denounced the 
 spirit out of which they had arisen. 
 
 There was no difficulty in separating the name of 
 Christ from the other names. He alone was crucified 
 for them. But in regard to the others there is no 
 distinction made between them. Cephas is no more 
 the vicar of Christ than Paul or Apollos. If we imagine 
 a Roman Catholic bishop using language of this kind 
 respecting himself and another bishop and the Pope, 
 we shall see how totally different is the modern concep- 
 tion of the primacy from any position which was assigned 
 
RELATION TO THE OTHER APOSTLES. Zi 
 
 to St. Peter in the early Church \ and yet, if the modern 
 Roman theory be true, St. Peter was to the rest of the 
 apostles, to all intents and purposes, that which the Pope 
 now is to the bishops of his communion. 
 
 It is clear, then, that the New Testament, at least, 
 knows nothing of any subjection of the other apostles 
 to St. Peter, and even less, if that were possible, of their 
 being merely his representatives and officials. At the 
 very utmost, he is but the primus inter pares ^ the first 
 among equals. But we must remember that the claim 
 which is put forth on his behalf, and on behalf of the 
 Roman See, is not that a primacy of power was accorded 
 by the Church to St. Peter and his successors, but that 
 they possess it by divine right, as the gift of Christ to 
 the first of their line, the prince of the apostles. 
 
 It would be of no avail to show that these powers 
 were subsequently possessed, acknowledged, exercised ; 
 however soon this may have come to pass, and it did 
 not happen at once, it could not prove the original en- 
 dowment. The endeavour to prove the Petrine and the 
 Papal sovereignty as a divine ordinance existing from 
 the beginning entirely fails. How soon this idea appears, 
 and under what forms, we may perceive hereafter. The 
 process of usurpation was gradual and slow ; and we shall, 
 perhaps, be able to indicate some of the circumstances 
 which made it possible. 
 
 Before leaving the ground of Scripture, however, we 
 must examine carefully the account given of the first 
 Christian Council at Jerusalem ; and see what light is 
 thrown upon the position of St. Peter by its transactions, 
 and what was thought of the Church of Jerusalem and 
 its bishop in those early days. 
 
( 84 ) 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 ST. PETER, ST. JAMES, AND THE COUNCIL OF 
 JERUSALEM. 
 
 St. James and Jerusalem — Romans ignore the importance of this argu 
 ment — The Council — Significance of the very holding of a council — 
 The question not referred to Peter, but to the apostles and elders — 
 St. Peter the foremost speaker, not the president — Position of St. 
 James at Jerusalem and in the Church — The Church of Jerusalem — 
 Testimony of Eusebius — Hegesippus — Clement — Inferences from 
 these testimonies — Manner in which St. Peter is referred to — Growth 
 of the Petrine legend. 
 
 In considering the relation of St. Peter to the other 
 apostles, we have had occasion to refer to the position 
 of St. James. But the importance of this apostolic man, 
 and of the Church over which he presided, renders it 
 necessary to give more particular attention, not merely to 
 the transactions at the Council of Jerusalem, but to the 
 whole circumstances of that Church and its bishop. 
 
 It can hardly be said that this subject has been ignored, 
 or altogether neglected ; yet its real importance has 
 undoubtedly been slurred over by Roman controversial- 
 ists, and has hardly been made sufficiently prominent by 
 their antagonists. An able Roman writer, whom we have 
 already quoted, dismisses the subject in the following 
 manner: — ^'Take, for instance, that favourite objec- 
 tion to St. Peter's claim which all adversaries of the Holy 
 
ST. PETER AND ST. JAMES. 85 
 
 See are obliged to use for want of better, that in the 
 Council of Jerusalem St. James the apostle spoke after 
 St. Peter, and used the word ' I judge ; ' evidently, they 
 say, taking the post of honour and giving judgment. It 
 would be a waste of time seriously to refute this triviality. 
 I mention it merely to show what real and solid weight the 
 scene [on the day of Pentecost] we are now considering 
 has when put by the side of this sophistry. St. James 
 spoke last, therefore was president; but if he had spoken 
 first, as St. Peter did, they would have said that the first 
 place was the post of honour. Again, he used the word 
 * I judge.' Well, brethren, I think that any one of the 
 bishops in the Vatican Council would have had no 
 difficulty in saying, I judge that the time is opportune 
 or inopportune for defining the infaUibility of the Pope. 
 Lastly, if such a passage as this proves anything at all, 
 it would prove that St. James had precedence over St 
 Peter. Is Christendom prepared to accept this conclu- 
 sion on the strength of this argument?" 
 
 This is every word which is given to the Council of 
 Jerusalem, the first of a long series in the Christian 
 Church, by a wTiter who is considering *'St. Peter's 
 Mission as revealed in Holy Writ," and who devotes 
 many pages to texts, the application of which to this 
 subject, in our view, involves both ^^ triviality '' and 
 *' sophistry." Do we suppose, then, that this writer was 
 consciously evading a difficulty — that he w^as deliberately 
 using a controversial and rhetorical trick by thus slurring 
 over that which we regard as an important part of the 
 evidence ? By no means. He reads the Acts of the 
 Apostles under the light of the Petrine and Papal supre- 
 macy; and finds everything interesting and important 
 
86 ST. PETER, ST. JAMES, AND 
 
 which illustrates that theory, and all trivial and sophis- 
 tical which is brought forward as being at variance 
 with it. 
 
 This is, of course, quite natural ; but we must, on our 
 part, beware of being thus betrayed into surrendering 
 positions of importance. And we have no hesitation in 
 saying that the position of the Church of Jerusalem in 
 the apostolic Church, and that of St. James its bishop, 
 have received an amount of consideration not at all 
 proportioned to their importance, whether we consider 
 the Scripture texts which refer to the subject, or the 
 remarkable testimonies of early Christian writers which 
 have in a great degree been overlooked or neglected. 
 
 " If such a passage proves anything at all, it would 
 prove that St. James had precedence over St. Peter,'* are 
 the words of the Roman writer just quoted. The word 
 ** precedence" is ambiguous. Neither St. Peter nor St. 
 James had any primacy of jurisdiction — any power or 
 authority which was not possessed by the other apostles. 
 St. Peter was evidently the foremost man among the 
 apostles throughout his life. At Jerusalem, however, 
 whatever *' precedence " was possessed by any apostle 
 apparently did belong to St. James ; and this is not only 
 made probable by the narrative of the Council, but by 
 other circumstances to which we shall draw attention. 
 In short, it would not be difficult to make out a case for 
 St. James, and not St. Peter, being the primate of the 
 Christian Church j although not in the later sense of 
 the word, which certainly belonged to no one at that 
 period in the Church's history. 
 
 First, then, we will draw attention to the history of 
 the Council of Jerusalem; and then, still more particu- 
 
THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM, ?>7 
 
 larly, to the testimony of Eusebius and of earlier writers 
 quoted by him. 
 
 Now, it is obvious to remark, first of all, that the very 
 fact of a council being held at all, in order to decide 
 the position of Gentiles in the Christian Church, is a 
 strong argument against the supreme teaching power of 
 any particular apostle. If Christ had given the Holy 
 Ghost to the Church to teach it and to lead it into 
 all truth, then we could understand that representative 
 members should come together, endowed with various 
 gifts, and, after mutual consultation, should declare, '* It 
 seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us " that these 
 rules should be promulgated. But it does not seem at 
 all easy to reconcile this conduct with the theory that 
 the plenitude of teaching power resided in St. Peter, 
 and was by him communicated to the other apostles 
 and to the Church. Why, in that case, hold a council 
 at all ? Why should not St. Peter stand up, as he did 
 when preaching on the day of Pentecost, and declare the 
 mind of Christ and of the Spirit? Roman Catholics ask 
 us to use the argument from common sense. They say 
 w^e are promised certain guidance in religious difficulties. 
 They declare that this promise would not really be ful- 
 filled if there were no unerring authority to which we 
 could appeal. We apply their assumptions and their 
 theory to the present case : and they absolutely break 
 down. Here were very serious questions arising in the 
 Church with reference to the duties and obligations of 
 Gentile converts. The settlement of them caused much 
 anxiety to the apostles, not here only, but in many 
 other parts of the world. It would even appear that 
 they were not finally set at rest by these solemn apos- 
 
88 S7\ PETER, ST, JAMES, AND 
 
 tolic decisions and utterances. This is certainly not 
 what we should expect. But God is wiser than we are. 
 It is thus by doubts and difficulties and questions and 
 conflicts that He educates and trains His Church ; and 
 not by settHng every controversy beforehand, or at 
 once. If, however, this state of things is not what we 
 should expect generally, it is still less what we should 
 look for on the Roman theory of the Petrine position 
 and claims. We should have expected that St. Peter 
 would pronounce definitely on the subject. What do 
 we find? 
 
 We find, in the first place, what the passages of 
 Scripture already examined would quite prepare us for : 
 that St. Peter is the foremost to speak, and the most 
 prominent man at the Council. We also find, beyond 
 all question, that he is not the president, and that it is 
 not by his authority that the decisions of the Council 
 are issued to the Church. 
 
 There was, in fact, a good deal of discussion, or, as 
 the sacred writer says, "much disputing." It was not 
 necessary to report the whole proceedings. It is 
 mentioned that St. Paul and St. Barnabas gave an 
 account of their work ; such, probably, as is contained 
 in other parts of the book. A report, probably con- 
 densed, is given of St. Peter's speech ; afterwards a 
 much longer report of St. James's speech. But St. 
 Peter did not in any way settle the particular questions 
 on which the Council had to decide. God had chosen 
 him *' that the Gentiles by " his " mouth should hear 
 the word of the Gospel and believe ; " and he could tell 
 what the mind of God was in sending him to that work, 
 and what the Gospel was which he had preached to the 
 
THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM, 89 
 
 Gentiles. These were important elements in the dis- 
 cussion ; and he was able to lay down the principle 
 that God had ''put no difference between" them, and 
 that there should not be laid upon these converts a 
 yoke which they and their fathers had been unable to 
 bear. But the particular details were evidently discussed 
 by the assembly, and it was St. James who, as the mouth- 
 piece of the Council, declared its decisions. The words 
 '' I judge," or '' I decide,'' are simply the words of the 
 president, of one who, at that time and on that occasion, 
 was primus inter pares. There was, apparently, no 
 thought of superiority or pre-eminence in the mind of 
 any one, in any other sense of the words. 
 
 That which follows is no less remarkable. The 
 decisions of the Council have been arrived at. The 
 president has pronounced them, as his *' sentence " and 
 the sentence of the assembly, without a dissentient 
 voice being heard. But they must now be promulgated. 
 And how is this done? Surely, if St. Peter be in any 
 sense the necessary head of the apostolic college, if 
 his primacy be anything beyond one of honour, we had 
 almost said of accident, then he must be the organ for 
 communicating these decisions to the universal Church. 
 But nothing of the kind takes place. This is what we 
 read, " Then pleased it the apostles and elders with 
 the whole Church " to give effect to the decisions ; " and 
 they wrote letters by them after this manner, The 
 apostles and elders and brethren send greeting," and 
 further on, " It seemed good unto us being assembled 
 with one accord," and again, " It seemed good to the 
 Holy Ghost, and to us." Now, we fancy, these state- 
 ments will seem the very reverse of trivial to one w^ho 
 
90 ST. PETER, ST JAMES, AND 
 
 considers the whole history of the Christian Church, 
 and the particular crisis to which they refer ; and as 
 regards '' sophistry/' although we can easily imagine 
 arguments by which it might be attempted to reconcile 
 the transactions of the Council of Jerusalem with the 
 sovereignty of St. Peter, it must be clear to any one 
 that considerable ingenuity must be employed in order 
 to evade what would appear to be the real force of the 
 narrative. 
 
 We have said, we can imagine arguments being 
 employed in order to reconcile St. Peter's alleged 
 primacy of jurisdiction with the place occupied by 
 himself and St. James at this Council, and the manner 
 of promulgating its decrees. But we cannot even 
 imagine an argument which would, with any degree of 
 probability, make the position of St. Peter compatible 
 with that which is by Romans assigned to him as the 
 supreme teacher and ruler in the Christian Church. 
 
 We have already drawn attention to the prominence 
 of St. James in the Church at this time. He is one of 
 the three, and he is the first mentioned of the three, 
 to whom St. Paul has recourse on the occasion of his 
 second visit to Jerusalem, when his authority was called 
 in question. On his first visit he went to see Peter. 
 At that time St. James was not, perhaps, bishop of the 
 metropolis of the Church. Peter, as the foremost man 
 and representative of the twelve, was the person to whom 
 he naturally had recourse. But now James had been 
 associated with the very foremost of the apostles ; ap- 
 parently taking the place, among the three first of the 
 sacred college, of that one, now slain with the sword, 
 who had borne his name. 
 
THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM, 91 
 
 Not only had he taken the place of James the son 
 of Zebedee ; but apparently, in some sense, he had 
 become more prominent than Peter. St. Paul, as we 
 have seen, mentions him first. When St. Peter was 
 delivered from prison by the angel and was restored to 
 the disciples, before he left Jerusalem he told them, 
 " Go, show these things unto James and to the brethren." 
 James was now the centre of Christian life and action 
 at Jerusalem, perhaps we might say, beyond Jerusalem. 
 Do we find any way of accounting for these facts ? We 
 think that there is testimony on the subject which has 
 not been sufficiently considered, and we wish to draw 
 attention to it, as it bears upon the position of the 
 Church of Jerusalem and St. James's presidency over 
 it 
 
 It must often have seemed remarkable to stiidents of 
 Church history that, for a time, Jerusalem should have 
 been in the patriarchate of Csesarea. The explanation 
 of the difficulty is found in the destruction of the city 
 by Titus, a.d. 70. Even when it was rebuilt, its old 
 name had passed away, and it was known only as MX\2l 
 Capitolina. By this name it is designated in the seventh 
 Canon of Nicaea. Jerusalem, therefore, had no con- 
 tinuous history ; and we must go back to the records 
 of the New Testament, and to the scanty testimonies of 
 the first ages preserved by Eusebius, if we would under- 
 stand its importance in primitive times. 
 
 That Jerusalem was originally the metropolis of 
 Christendom needs no proof; that Antioch, the capital 
 of Syria, and then Rome, the capital of the world, should 
 have succeeded to the honour, was quite natural. And 
 it is not wonderful that, when the great Church of Rome, 
 
92 ST. PETER, ST. JAMES, AND 
 
 the mistress of the world, had claimed to be the head of 
 Christendom, the martyrdom of St. Paul and St. Peter 
 in that city should lead to the assertion of St. Peter's 
 primacy over the Church, of his episcopate first at 
 Antioch and then at Rome, and finally to the statement 
 that he had transmitted his jurisdiction to the bishops of 
 the metropolis. It was quite possible for the legend to 
 take this form under the circumstances. It was not 
 possible that it should climb a step higher ; it could not 
 place St. Peter on the throne of Jerusalem, as it would 
 naturally have done : history, stern and immovable, stood 
 in the way. 
 
 And yet this would have been not only the teaching 
 of legend but the actual truth of history, if St. Peter had 
 been, in the Roman sense, or in anything like the Roman 
 sense, the primate of the whole Christian Church. It 
 is truly absurd to say that St. James was attached to 
 the local Church of Jerusalem, because St. Peter was 
 employed as an apostle in the work of the whole 
 Church, unless the same reason can be given for his not 
 occupying any other see. Such a statement would be 
 perfectly true, as far as it goes, of St. Peter and St. Paul 
 as well. But how, then, came he to be Bishop of 
 Antioch for seven years, and then for twenty-five years 
 Bishop of Rome ? The thing is almost impossible ; 
 utterly improbable, and incapable of proof. St. Peter 
 was the head of the circumcision, as St. Paul was the 
 head of the uncircumcision ; but neither the one nor 
 the other was a diocesan bishop. Of such a position as 
 belonging to St. Peter the early Church knew nothing. 
 We shall presently show this still more clearly. 
 
 Let us see what information we may obtain respecting 
 
THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. 93 
 
 St. James, and his appointment to be bishop of Jeru- 
 salem, and his position as such. Apart from the New 
 Testament, our chief, if not our only authority, is Euse- 
 bius, who depends mainly, although not exclusively, upon 
 the authority of Hegesippus, a writer of the second half 
 of the second century. We will bring the principal pas- 
 sages which bear upon the subject together, and, placing 
 them before us, ask what they teach us. 
 
 *' James, called the brother of our Lord, because he is 
 also called the son of Joseph, . . . whom the ancients, 
 on account of the excellence of his virtue, surnamed the 
 Just, was the first that received the episcopate of the 
 Church at Jerusalem. But Clement [of Alexandria], in 
 the sixth book of his Institutions, represents it thus : 
 
 * Peter, and James, and John, after the ascension of our 
 Saviour, though they had been preferred by our Lord, 
 did not contend for the honour, but chose James the 
 Just as bishop of Jerusalem.""^ In another placet he 
 says : ^* Hegesippus, also, who flourished nearest the 
 days of the apostles, in the fifth book of his Commen- 
 taries, gives the most accurate account of him, thus : 
 
 * James, the brother of the Lord, who, as there were 
 many of this name, was surnamed the Just by all, from 
 the days of our Lord until now, received the government 
 of the Church [mark this expression] with the apostles.' " 
 
 Again, J " James being the first that received the 
 dignity of the episcopate at Jerusalem from our Saviour 
 Himself, as the Sacred Scriptures show that he was 
 generally called the brother of Christ ; this see, which 
 has been preserved until the present times, has ever been 
 held in veneration by the brethren that have followed in 
 * Euseb., Ecc. Hist, ii. i. f Ibid., ii. 23. % Ibid., vii. 19. 
 
94 ST, PETER, ST. JAMES, AND 
 
 the succession there." This testimony, we remark in 
 passing, is the more remarkable as coming from Eusebius 
 who was himself Bishop of Caesarea, to which patriar- 
 chate Jerusalem then belonged. 
 
 On the importance of the position we cite one other 
 extract \^ *' The Clmrch of Jerusalem, after Hymenaeus, 
 was under the episcopal care of Zabdas, and he not long 
 after dying, Hermon was the last before the persecution 
 of our day, the same that now holds the apostolic chair 
 preserved there to the present. ^^ 
 
 There is one question of deep interest, not wholly un- 
 connected with the historical question, to which we can 
 but briefly refer. Was this James one of the twelve 
 apostles ? Was he, in other words, identical with James 
 the Less ? It is a difficult question ; but we incline to 
 the opinion that, while James the son of Alphseus was 
 perhaps the cousin of our Lord, this James, ** the son 
 of Joseph," was legally the Lord's brother ; one of those 
 who did not believe in Him before His death, and who 
 was converted, as Eusebius tells us, by the appearance 
 of the risen Saviour to him, which is recorded by St. 
 Paul. There can be no doubt, at least, that it was James 
 of Jerusalem to whom the appearance of our Lord 
 recorded by St. Paul was granted. And the whole theory 
 here stated has, it appears, fewer difficulties than any 
 other. It has been adopted, among others, by Rothe, 
 Alford, Friedrich, and Lightfoot. 
 
 It would appear that this relationship to our Lord 
 
 formed one reason for the election of St. James to this 
 
 office ; and this is curiously confirmed by what we are 
 
 told of the appointment of his successor. "After the 
 
 * Euseb., Ecc.Hist.i vii. 32. 
 
THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM, 95 
 
 martyrdom of James," says Eusebius/ ''and the capture 
 of Jerusalem, which immediately followed, it is reported 
 that those of the apostles and the disciples of our Lord 
 that were yet surviving came together from all parts 
 with those that were related to our Lord according to 
 the flesh ; for the greater part of them were yet living. 
 These consulted together, to determine whom it was 
 proper to pronounce worthy of being the successor of 
 James. They all unanimously declared Simeon, the son 
 of Clopas, of whom mention is made in the sacred 
 volume, as worthy of the episcopal seat there. They 
 say he was the cousin of our Saviour, for Hegesippus 
 asserts that Clopas was the brother of Joseph." 
 
 If we had only these testimonies, we should, without 
 much hesitation, draw the following inferences : — (i.) 
 That Jerusalem, and not Rome, was the '' apostoHc 
 see;" (2.) That James, and not Peter, was primate of 
 the Church, if there was a primate ; and (3.) That what- 
 ever might be true of the prominence and importance of 
 St. Peter among the apostles, Eusebius knew nothing of 
 any primacy, in anything like the later sense of the 
 word, as belonging to him. For let it be observed, 
 Eusebius distinctly speaks of the see of Jerusalem 
 as '' the apostolic chair," and of the great honour 
 assigned to it in the Church. Then he not only 
 gives no hint of any superiority on the part of 
 St. Peter, but he says distinctly that the three great 
 apostles who had been the most intimately connected 
 with our Lord during His ministry, did not contend for 
 honour (po^ni), but chose James the Just as Bishop of 
 Jerusalem — actually assigning to him that position which 
 * Euseb., Ecc, Hist,, iii. 1 1. 
 
96 ST. PETER, ST. JAMES, AND 
 
 would seem to be the most honourable, the presidency 
 of the metropohs of the Christian Church. 
 
 And it was not this mere local office that was bestowed 
 upon him, but another privilege which gave completeness, 
 so to speak, and added dignity to his position. It is 
 Clement who speaks of his being made Bishop of Jeru- 
 salem. The earlier testimony of Hegesippus is somewhat 
 different, and very remarkable. According to him, St. 
 James "received the government of the Church with the 
 apostles;" and apparently a very prominent place in 
 that government by being made Bishop of Jerusalem, so 
 that he was the president of the first Council and the 
 human centre of Christian life and work throughout the 
 world. 
 
 Let it be observed that these conclusions claim for St. 
 James no superiority over any other apostle, or any other 
 Christian bishop; but simply that, in the manner described, 
 he did come to occupy a position similar to that of St. 
 Peter in the Christian society. If it be asked how it 
 was that this lofty position of the Bishop of Jerusalem 
 came to be forgotten, the answer has already been given. 
 Jerusalem utterly perished. Antioch, the centre of 
 Gentile Christianity and the capital of Syria, became the 
 principal patriarchal see of Asia ; Rome as naturally came 
 to be regarded as the capital of the Christian world. "^ 
 
 * That the Petrine legend grew up, and his name became con- 
 nected with Antioch and Rome on account of the importance of 
 those cities, is confirmed by another circumstance. In assigning 
 their order of priority to the various patriarchates, the first place 
 was given to Rome, the second to Alexandria^ and the third to 
 Antioch. Why was this ? St. Peter, according to the legend, was 
 Bishop of Antioch, and not of Alexandria. But Alexandria was the 
 
THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. 97 
 
 But it was long before St. Peter was spoken of as Bishop 
 either of Rome or of Antioch, especially of the former. 
 Even in the time of the Nicene Council Eusebius does 
 not speak of Peter as the first Bishop of Rome, although 
 he represents him as preaching there. 
 
 " After the martyrdo7n of Paul and Peter^^ * he says, 
 ^* Linus was the first that received the episcopate at 
 Rome." And he reckons the bishops from Linus, without 
 ever speaking of St. Peter as Bishop of Rome. It is not 
 quite the same with respect to Antioch. '' On the death 
 of Evodius," t he says, "who was the first Bishop of 
 Antioch, Ignatius was appointed the second." It is true 
 that, in another place, he shows that St. Peter had been 
 spoken of as Bishop of Antioch ; for, although he does 
 not actually give him that designation, he does say 
 of Ignatius that he is "celebrated by many (-ra^a 
 crXs/tfro/g), even to this day, as the successor of Peter at 
 Antioch," and " the second that obtained the episcopal 
 office there," that is, next to Evodius, the first bishop. 
 It is interesting to remark, as confirmatory of our theory 
 respecting the association of St. Peter with these two 
 great centres, how much earlier he was spoken of as 
 Bishop of Antioch than of Rome. Thus, of his con- 
 nection with Rome, Origen (quoted by Eusebius, EccL 
 Hist., iii. 1) says, "At last he [Peter] came to Rome, 
 and was crucified head downwards ; for he had requested 
 that he might be thus crucified ; " whereas, of his con- 
 nection with Antioch he says (Horn. 6 in St. Luc), 
 " I mean Ignatius, the second Bishop of Antioch after 
 
 more important place, consequently it was placed next to the capital 
 of the empire. 
 
 * Ecd.Hist., iii. 2. f Ibid., iii. i^. 
 
 G 
 
98 ST. PETER, ST JAMES, AND 
 
 blessed Peter." This is what might reasonably be ex- 
 pected under the circumstances. St. Peter could not 
 possibly be set over the Church at Jerusalem. The 
 facts respecting his connection with Rome were too 
 well known to make it easy at will to confer upon him the 
 episcopate of that city ; but Antioch and its history were 
 comparatively little known ; and undoubtedly St. Peter 
 would have been, for a long time, the leading teacher 
 and apostle in that place. If, however, we accept the 
 legend that he was for twenty-five years Bishop of Rome, 
 and any possible chronology of the earlier apostolic 
 history, it will be extremely difficult to find a period in 
 his life when he could have been Bishop of Antioch, 
 and for seven years ! Let the reader try to work the 
 problem. 
 
 The importance of these considerations will be appa- 
 rent. We have at least endeavoured to state the facts 
 with accuracy, and we are not aware of others which 
 conflict with them. As regards our conclusions, it may 
 be observed that they do little beyond bringing out 
 clearly the points which are not ambiguously contained 
 in the authorities which have been adduced. 
 
 Our readers can judge whether this has been done 
 with fairness and candour. The question which we 
 must always keep clearly before us • is this : Do these 
 records testify to a primacy of jurisdiction as belonging 
 to St. Peter ? Do they even leave room for the working 
 of such a principle ? We can see no place for it either 
 in the Acts of the Apostles or in the Apostolic Epistles. 
 And undoubtedly the natural view of the position of St. 
 James, as set forth in the Acts, is supported by the 
 account of his election and position as given by Eusebius. 
 
THE COUNCIL OF JERUSALEM. gg 
 
 If the Roman view be the true one, the history could 
 not possibly have been written in this form. We find 
 no single difiiculty in the Acts, the Epistles, the Church 
 History of Eusebius, if we confront their contents with 
 that view of St. Peter's position which we have endea- 
 voured to state as the true one. One incidental gain, 
 besides, may accrue to us from this investigation, that it 
 does enable us in a measure to account for the rise of 
 the legend of St. Peter. The Romans challenge us to 
 account for the fact which is before our eyes : our answer 
 is, that the careful and minute study of Christian history 
 will at least enable us to give a fairly adequate response 
 to that challenge. 
 
( loo ) 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 
 
 Is the Roman interpretation verified by ecclesiastical testimony ? — The 
 Vincentian Canon— The Apostolic Fathers — I'he significance of their 
 writings — St Clement of Rome — His Epistle to the Corinthians 
 — Its bearing on the Papal question — Dr. Lightfoot's remarks — 
 Quotations— Germ of Roman, not of Papal, pretensions — Barnabas 
 — Hennas — St. Ignatius of A ntioch — Dr. Lightfoot's remarks— St. 
 Ignatius writes to the Romans, but makes no reference to any 
 Petrine or Papal supremacy — His other writings — No trace of 
 Roman claims — General effect of the testimony of this period. 
 
 We have endeavoured, with all possible fairness, to 
 examine the first records of the Christian Church, with 
 the view of ascertaining what information they give us 
 respecting the primacy of St. Peter. Do they confirm 
 the Roman or the anti-Roman view of the subject? 
 Do they tell us — would they, apart from any precon- 
 ceived theory either way, lead us to think — that Christ 
 gave to St. Peter the earthly sovereignty of the Christian 
 Church? This is the question which we must, so to 
 speak, carry about with us, as we pass through these 
 successive stages of Church history. 
 
 It is constantly said by Roman advocates that no one 
 would think of giving any other interpretation than that 
 which they defend, of the great text respecting the Rock 
 
THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, loi 
 
 on which the Church is built, unless he had the most 
 inveterate prejudice against the truth. But this is beg- 
 ging the question. Each side in the controversy comes 
 to the text with his own prejudices ; each side views it 
 under the influence of those prejudices. There is one 
 arbiter to which both parties, if they are honest and 
 earnest, must submit the decision of the question, viz., 
 the testimony of other portions of Scripture, and the 
 testimony of history. 
 
 A tremendous truth like that, if it be a truth, must 
 make its presence and power felt everywhere. The 
 Romans do not exaggerate the importance of the ques- 
 tion. If their view of the subject be true, they are right 
 in sounding an alarm throughout Christendom. If to 
 be out of Peter is to be out of Christ ; and, if one can- 
 not be *^in Peter '^ unless he recognizes the sovereignty 
 of the Pope, then those who are not in communion with 
 Rome are in mortal peril ; and no warnings can be too 
 emphatic, no appeals addressed to them can be too 
 urgent. 
 
 But if this be so, so much the more important is it 
 that we should investigate with care the evidences upon 
 which this theory is alleged to rest. And we are con- 
 tented to adopt the Catholic test — Quod semper, quod 
 ubique, quod ab ojitnibus (^'We must receive that w4iich 
 has been always, everywhere, and universally believed ") 
 — and to adopt that test understood in the most liberal 
 manner fairly possible — yea, even in the sense most 
 favourable to the Church of Rome, so long as its letter 
 and its spirit are not alike contradicted. 
 
 Do the evidences afforded from the Roman side meet 
 the demands of this canon? This, of course, is the 
 
102 THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, 
 
 question which is diversely answered. We think not ; 
 they beUeve that they do. And it is here, and we may 
 say here only, that accurate and careful investigation 
 is demanded. As we read the proofs which are offered 
 from the other side, they seem to us to be of this nature: 
 First, we have one text which is said to be utterly and 
 entirely conclusive; then we have two others which 
 offer a strong presumption on the same side ; and finally, 
 a large number of sayings and of words which either 
 demand the same theory to satisfy them, or else adapt 
 themselves better to this than to any other. 
 
 Now, let us say distinctly, that, although the texts in 
 the Gospels do not speak to us as they do to Romans, 
 yet we should not finally quarrel with their interpretation 
 of them, if it were continuously illustrated and coiifirnied 
 by the Scripture records of the early days of the Christian 
 Church, and by the subsequent history of the Church, in 
 its inward relations. This is what we understand by 
 the Vincentian Canon. And this, we are forced to say, 
 is not what the Romans give us. 
 
 They profess, indeed, to find their idea of St. Peter's 
 office in the Church confirmed by the history of the 
 Acts j but we can discover no trace of the authority 
 which they assign to him : on the contrary, it appears 
 to be excluded by the facts which are there recorded^ 
 and it is absolutely incompatible with the language of 
 St. Paul. 
 
 When we leave the pages of the Bible and ask for 
 post-scriptural testimony to the continuous and unbroken 
 recognition of the Petrine and Papal sovereignty, we are 
 referred to the Council of Ephesusand St. Leo, or, worse 
 still, to the claims of St. Gregory the Great. In other 
 
THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, 103 
 
 words, when we have barely left the first century, and 
 are only crossing the threshold of the second, we are 
 asked to contemplate the irresistible testimony of facts 
 which belong to the fifth. We cannot accept this as an 
 answer to our demand. We confess that our opponents 
 have a perfect right to ask that we shall give some ex- 
 planation of the acceptance of the Papal authority in 
 later times \ and we believe that such reasonable explana- 
 tion will be afforded by a careful examination of the 
 history ; but we cannot allow decades and generations 
 and centuries to be passed over, and then the assump- 
 tion to be made that sufficient proof has been given of 
 the continuity of the Papal claims and of their acceptance 
 by the Church. 
 
 It is not necessary that we should dwell longer upon 
 the Biblical aspect of the question. If St. James and 
 St. Paul know nothing of any subjection to St. Peter, 
 St, John knows as little. He knows of One who has the 
 Key of David, Who opens so that no one shall shut, and 
 shuts so that no one shall open ; but that One is not 
 Peter. We will therefore go forward to the age of the 
 writers who are known as the "Apostolic Fathers," and 
 ask whether these venerable authorities have preserved 
 for us any record of the acknowledgment of the Petrine 
 and Papal supremacy during the age to which they 
 belong — roughly speaking, from near the end of the 
 first century to the middle or third quarter of the 
 second. 
 
 Now, we have no wish to forget that the writings of 
 the Apostolic Fathers are what are called occasional 
 productions and in no sense theological treatises. We 
 also admit the fairness of the Roman statement, from 
 
I04 ' THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, 
 
 that point of view, that we are not to expect any formal 
 defence of a position when it is not assailed; and there- 
 fore, if the supremacy of Peter and of the Pope was 
 acknowledged or tacitly accepted in the first two cen- 
 turies, we have no right to expect any formal, earnest 
 assertion of it. 
 
 All these statements are quite reasonable. On the 
 other hand, we have a right to expect that some trace 
 shall be found of a power and influence so tremendous 
 and so all-pervading as that which is claimed for the 
 bishops of Rome throughout the whole history of the 
 Church. We cannot bring ourselves to beheve that 
 such claims should have been conceded without our 
 having, at least, some slight evidence of it in these docu- 
 ments, especially in those which refer to Rome or its 
 bishop. 
 
 Do we find any such testimony in the Apostolic 
 Fathers ? This is the question we are now to answer ; 
 and we say at once, that it must be answered emphati- 
 cally in the negative. And such a phenomenon, in any 
 case remarkable, is made increasingly so by the con- 
 sideration that we possess one precious composition of 
 a Bishop of Rome, written probably before the end of 
 the first century, and under circumstances which would 
 have led him quite naturally to assert his authority, if he 
 had claimed any over the Church, and had thought that 
 it would be allowed by those to whom he wrote. 
 
 We refer, of course, to St. Clement of Rome ; and we 
 assume, as generally acknowledged by critics of all 
 schools, that he wrote the first of the two epistles to 
 which his name has been attached, and that it was 
 written, almost certainly, not long before the end of the 
 
THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, 105 
 
 first century, long indeed after the death of St. Peter 
 and St. Paul, but probably before the composition of 
 St. John's Gospel was concluded. 
 
 Now, when we consider that this letter was written to 
 the Corinthian Church at a time when those very faults 
 were prevailing for which they had been rebuked by St. 
 Paul, it is hardly possible to imagine that a Bishop of 
 Rome should have written to them on such a subject, 
 without in some way referring to his authority over the 
 Church at large, if he were understood to possess any 
 such authority. And yet, as we have said, he does 
 not once refer to himself or his office. The letter is 
 addressed throughout from the Church of Rome to the 
 Church of Corinth, from " the Church of God sojourning 
 {^aoarAoZca) at Rome to the Church of God sojourning 
 at Corinth ; '^ and the plural number, evidently with 
 reference to the Church, and not to the bishop, is 
 constantly used. In fact, it is described, in the second 
 century, by Dionysius of Corinth and Irenaeus of Lyons, 
 as a letter from the Church of Rome, and not from the 
 bishop. 
 
 In this epistle there is not the slightest allusion to 
 any power claimed, or supposed to be possessed, by the 
 Romari bishop. His self-suppression, indeed, is some- 
 thing quite remarkable. *' It might have been expected 
 that somewhere towards the close mention would have 
 been made (though in the third person) of the famous 
 man who was at once the actual writer of the letter and 
 the chief ruler of the Church in whose name it was 
 written. Now, however, that we possess the work 
 complete, we see that his existence is not once hinted 
 at from beginning to end. The name and personality of 
 
io6 ^ THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, 
 
 Clement are absorbed in the Church of which he is the 
 spokesman." 
 
 And yet, as Bishop Lightfoot (whose words we have 
 been quoting) has pointed out,*^ although there is nothing 
 like the Papal claims in this epistle, it does in some 
 measure enable us **to understand more fully the secret 
 of Papal domination." The tone in which the letter is 
 written, as this writer remarks, is "urgent and almost 
 imperious. . . . They exhort the offenders to submit 
 ' not to them, but to the will of God/ ' Receive our 
 counsel,' they write again, ' and ye shall have no occa- 
 sion of regret.' Then they return to the subject and use 
 still stronger language : * Ye will give us great joy and 
 gladness, if ye render obedience unto the things written 
 by us through the Holy Spirit, and root out the un- 
 righteous anger of your jealousy, according to the 
 entreaty which we have made for peace and concord 
 in this letter ; and we have also sent unto you faithful 
 and prudent men, that have walked among us from 
 youth unto old age unblameably, who shall be witnesses 
 between you and us. And this we have done, that ye 
 might know that we have had, and still have, every 
 solicitude, that ye may speedily be at peace.' * It may 
 perhaps,' proceeds Dr. Lightfoot, ^ seem strange to de- 
 scribe this noble remonstrance as the first step towards 
 Papal aggression. And yet undoubtedly this is the case. 
 There is all the difference in the world between the 
 attitude of Rome towards other Churches at the close 
 of the first century, when the Romans as a community 
 remonstrate on terms of equality with the Corinthians on 
 
 * In the Appendix to his edition of St. Clement of Rome, 
 IfttroducHonj pp. 252 ff. 
 
THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 107 
 
 their irregularities, strong only in the righteousness of 
 their cause, and feeling, as they had a right to feel, that 
 these counsels of peace were the dictation of the Holy 
 Spirit, and its attitude at the close of the second century, 
 when Victor the bishop excommunicates the Churches of 
 Asia Minor for clinging to a usage in regard to the cele- 
 bration of Easter which had been handed down to them 
 from the apostles, and thus foments instead of healing 
 dissensions. Even this second stage has carried the 
 power of Rome only a very small step in advance towards 
 the pretensions of a Hildebrand or an Innocent or a 
 Boniface, or even of a Leo j but it is nevertheless a 
 decided step. The substitution of the Bishop of Rome 
 for the Church of Rome is an all-important point. The 
 later Roman theory supposes that the Church of Rome 
 derives all its authority from the Bishop of Rome, as the 
 successor of St. Peter. History inverts this relation and 
 shows that, as a matter of fact, the power of the Bishop 
 of Rome was built upon the power of the Church of 
 Rome. It was originally a primacy, not of the episcopate, 
 but of the Church. The position of the Roman Church, 
 which this newly recovered ending of Clement's epistle 
 throws out in such strong relief, accords entirely with 
 the notices in other early documents.'' 
 
 x\part from this there is nothing in the epistle which 
 bears even remotely on this question. The name of 
 Peter occurs but once; and with no reference either to 
 any supremacy which he possessed, or to any connection 
 of his with the Church of Rome. He and St. Paul are 
 mentioned together as examples of suffering virtue and 
 of martyrdom on account of their fidelity. There is 
 
io8 THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, 
 
 not a word of any peculiar powers possessed by him, or 
 transmitted by him to the Church or the Bishop of 
 Rome. 
 
 In the so-called second epistle of Clement, which is 
 now generally believed to be neither an epistle nor a 
 composition of that writer, but a homily of the second 
 century, the name of St. Peter also occurs, and curiously 
 in connection, as it would appear, with a quotation 
 from an apocryphal Gospel ; but of any Petrine or Papal 
 claims there is not a word or a hint. 
 
 We pass on to the epistle of Barnabas. Without dis- 
 cussing the authorship, although it seems to us impossible 
 that it should proceed from the companion of St. Paul,"^ 
 we may remark that the name of Peter does not occur 
 in it ; nor is there the slightest allusion to any Petrine 
 or Papal claims. 
 
 Leaving St. Ignatius till the last, as the most important, 
 we take up the Shepherd of Hermas. In this book we 
 might expect to hear something of Roman claims, if the 
 view be true that he was a brother of the Bishop of 
 Rome. But in any case he was connected with Rome ; 
 for in the only place in which the city is named he tells 
 us that he was sold in Rome by the man who had brought 
 him up. Here, again, the name of Peter does not once 
 occur. In the *^ Similitudes " (ix. 2) he introduces a very 
 elaborate description of a symbolical rock (-Trsr^a) ; but 
 the Rock is Christ (ix. 12). It should, however, be men- 
 tioned that, in another part of the '-'Shepherd'' (Vis. ii.4), 
 there is an allusion to a Clement, whom almost all com- 
 mentators regard as the St. Clement of whom we have 
 
 * As is, however, maintained by Dr. Lee, On Inspiration, and 
 Dr. Milligan, in Smith's Diet, of Christian Biography. 
 
THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, 109 
 
 already spoken."^ Hermas is commanded by the 
 *' Shepherd " to write two copies of the revelation made 
 to him, " and thou shalt send one to Clement, and one 
 to Grapte ; and Clement shall send to the cities abroad, 
 for to him this charge is entrusted." It is not absolutely 
 certain that the allusion is to Clement of Rome. If it 
 is, we may truly say with Bishop Lightfoot, that ^' the 
 reserve of Clement in his epistle harmonizes also with 
 the very modest estimate of his dignity implied '' in this 
 language. Of the writings of St. Polycarp it may be 
 sufficient to say, that there is nothing in them which has 
 any reference to this question. 
 
 The writings of St. Ignatius are of more importance. 
 He was the second Bishop of Antioch, and suffered martyr- 
 dom at Rome in the first or second decade of the second 
 century, so that he was a contemporary of St. Clement, 
 although the latter is said to have been dead before 
 Ignatius arrived in Rome. Among other letters which 
 are ascribed to him, some genuine and others spurious, 
 there is one addressed to the Church of Rome. This is 
 not the place to discuss the question of the genuineness 
 of the writings which pass under his name. We are 
 contented to express our belief, with nearly all com- 
 petent critics, that the fifteen lengthy epistles are either 
 spurious or interpolated, and to believe wdth the more 
 moderate and reasonable of all schools that the shorter 
 Greek form is genuine. We shall not, however, find it 
 necessary to ignore any part of the writings which are 
 assigned to him. 
 
 * Donaldson thinks there is no evidence whatever that the refer- 
 ence is to Clement of Rome. Even if it be so, it proves nothmg in 
 reference to the Papal claims. 
 
no THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, 
 
 On the Epistle of Ignatius to the Romans, Dr. Light- 
 foot has the following remarks: — '^A very few years 
 later [than the date of St. Clement's epistle] — from ten 
 to twenty — Ignatius writes to Rome. He is a staunch 
 advocate of episcopacy. Of his six remaining letters [in 
 the shorter Greek form] one is addressed to a bishop as 
 bishop ; and the other five all enforce the duty of the 
 Churches whom he addresses to their respective bishops. 
 Yet in the letter to the Church of Rome there is not the 
 faintest allusion to the episcopal office from first to last. 
 He entreats the Roman Christians not to intercede, and 
 thus, by obtaining a pardon or commutation of sentence, 
 to rob him of the crown of martyrdom. In the course 
 of his entreaty he uses words which doubtless refer in 
 part to Clement's epistle, and which the newly recovered 
 ending enables us to appreciate more fully : * Ye never 
 yet,' he writes, * envied any one,' that is, grudged him 
 the glory of a consistent course of endurance and self- 
 sacrifice, 'ye were the teachers of others.' They would 
 therefore be inconsistent with their former selves, he 
 implies, if in his own case they departed from those 
 counsels of self-renunciation and patience which they 
 had urged so strongly on the Corinthians and others. 
 But, though Clement's letter is apparently in his mind, 
 there is no mention of Clement or Clement's successor 
 throughout. Yet at the same time he assigns a primacy 
 to Rome. The Church is addressed in the opening 
 salutation as ' she who hath the presidency (^^oxddrjTa/) 
 in the place of the region of the Romans.' But im- 
 mediately afterwards the nature of this supremacy is 
 defined. The presidency of this Church is declared to 
 be a presidency of love (cr^oxa^^j^.si'Tj tt;; uyaTrr};). This, 
 
I 
 
 THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH. iii 
 
 then, was the original primacy of Rome — a primacy not 
 of the bishop but of the whole Church, a primacy not 
 of official authority but of practical goodness, backed, 
 however, by the prestige and the advantages which were 
 necessarily enjoyed by the Church of the metropolis.'' 
 
 This is the most important of the references of St. 
 Ignatius to the Church of Rome ; and in no other part 
 of his writings is there a line or a word which betrays 
 any knowledge, on his part, of a supremacy as belonging 
 to the Roman bishop, or of any privileges inherited by 
 him from St. Peter. 
 
 In fact, Peter is mentioned by name only twice in the 
 genuine epistles, and not very often in the spurious; 
 Rome also twice in the first class, and five or six times in 
 the second. The first three bishops are mentioned only 
 in the spurious epistles. These allusions are of slight 
 importance, and have no other bearing upon this con- 
 troversy than to show that Ignatius, and even pseudo- 
 Ignatius, had no knowledge of the Petrine and Papal 
 claims. 
 
 Thus in his Epistle to the Romans (iv. 2, 3) he says, 
 " Not as Peter and Paul do I command you. They were 
 apostles, I am a condemned man ; they were free, I am 
 a slave until now;" where, like other writers of that 
 period, he places Peter and Paul on an equality. The 
 allusions in the spurious epistles to the Roman bishops 
 are not without interest, as showing at least the view of 
 the time in which these writings originated. In the Epis- 
 tola ad Martain Cassoholitam (cap. 4), the writer refers 
 to what she had heard *^from the blessed Pope (cra-Tra — 
 a name for a long time given to all bishops) Anencletus, 
 who was succeeded by the most blessed Clement, the 
 
112 THE SUB-APOSTOLIC CHURCH, 
 
 hearer of Peter and Paul." In the Epistola ad Trallianos^ 
 the writer speaks of deacons as being " imitators of Christ 
 and servants to the bishop, as Christ to the Father . . . 
 as Timothy and Linus were to Paul, and Anencletus and 
 Clement to Peter." It is indeed somewhat surprising, 
 when we consider how these ancient documents have 
 been tampered with, that nothing had ever been foisted 
 in, either innocently or with a controversial purpose, in 
 support of the Papal pretensions. 
 
 And what, now, is the result of our inquiries into the 
 Christian literature of the age immediately succeeding 
 that of the apostles ? It is simply this, that any supe- 
 riority of one bishop to another, or of one Church to 
 another, was altogether unknown. Precedence might 
 be at one time granted to one apostle, as was undoubtedly 
 the case with St Peter; at another time to another, as 
 would appear not at all unlikely in the case of St. James. 
 The same honorary priority might be given to a Church, 
 as in the first days to Jerusalem, subsequently to Antioch, 
 and afterwards to Rome ; but in each case for reasons 
 which we might call accidental. Of any power given to 
 any particular Church because it was the See of Peter, 
 to any bishop because he succeeded to the possession 
 and privileges of that see, primitive Christianity has no 
 knowledge. In other words, the sub-apostolic age knows 
 nothing of the Petrine and Papal sovereignty. 
 
( 113 ) 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 ST, IRE N^ US AND HIS AGE. 
 
 The Apologists — Irenaeus, his age — The importance of his testimony — 
 The principal passage, Bk. iii. c. 3 — The Greek lost — Quoted in 
 Latin — The occasion of his statement — The meaning of the passage 
 — Various interpretations — Assigned great importance to the Roman 
 Church — Not to the Roman Bishop — Nor to the Roman Church as 
 deriving a Primacy from St. Peter — Particular expressions considered 
 — Irenaeus says nothing of Papal authority or supremacy — Accounted 
 for only by the fact that Irenaeus knew nothing of such authority — 
 The Paschal controversy — Bishop Victor of Rome — His arbitrary 
 conduct — Its effect— Interposition of Irenaeus — His ignorance of 
 any Papal supremacy — Clement of Alexandria — Tertullian— His 
 argument against ^leretics similar to that of Irenaeus— He knows 
 nothing of a Roman or Papal primacy — Origen misrepresented — 
 His testimony— General result of the testimonies of this period. 
 
 It is quite reasonable that we should expect but little 
 reference to the subject of our inquiry in the writings 
 of the Apologists ; and, as a matter of fact, neither side 
 adduces their testimony. When, however, we pass from 
 them to the next earliest Christian writer, Irenaeus, we 
 meet with at least one passage of the very greatest im- 
 portance in this controversy ; which, therefore, we are 
 bound to examine with the utmost care. 
 
 Irenaeus, let it be remembered, flourished during the 
 last three-quarters of the second century, dying a martyr 
 
 H 
 
114 ST. IRENA^US AND HIS AGE, 
 
 at the very end of it, after being Bishop of Lyons about 
 twenty years. "^ His birth was probably from twenty to 
 five and twenty years after the death of St. John ; and 
 he was a disciple of Polycarp. Consequently his testi- 
 mony is of the greatest value. 
 
 Without attempting to discuss the question of the 
 just influence of the Fathers in Christian controversies, 
 we must state briefly and clearly what it is that Irenaeus 
 may properly be brought forward to prove or to disprove. 
 To what points does his testimony refer? For what 
 purpose is it adduced ? The answer is simple. Irenaeus 
 is not brought forward to settle any controversy by his 
 own authority. He is only cited as a witness to facts. 
 He can tell us what was his own opinion and the opinion 
 of his age. He can bear credible testimony to facts that 
 were within his own knowledge ; and this is all. The 
 distinct remembrance of these points will greatly simplify 
 our inquiry. 
 
 There are considerable difficulties with regard to 
 particular points in the passage of Irenaeus, which we 
 are about to quote (Book iii. Chap. 3). The original 
 Greek is lost, and the Latin is of a peculiar and un- 
 certain character. Considerable difference of opinion 
 exists as to the probable words in the Greek original 
 which are represented by the Latin translation. In 
 spite of all these difficulties, we shall find that, on certain 
 points at least, there is no doubt as to the meaning of 
 Irenaeus. On account of the importance of the subject, 
 we will first give the passage as it stands in the Latin, 
 simply premising that Irenaeus is writing against certain 
 
 * According to Eusebius {Eccl. Hist., v. 24) he succeeded Pothinus 
 as Bishop of Lyons, A.D. 177. 
 
ST. IREN^US AND HIS AGE. 115 
 
 heresies which were prevalent in his day, and saying 
 that they may be detected and exposed by confronting 
 them with the teaching of the Catholic Church. As, 
 however, it would be a long and tedious work thus to go 
 through the whole Church, he adds, it will be sufficient 
 to test them by the teaching of the Church of Rome. 
 
 " Sed quoniam valde longum est in hoc tali volumine 
 omnium Ecclesiarum enumerare successiones ; maximae 
 et antiquissimse et omnibus cognitse, a gloriosissimis 
 duobus apostolis Petro et Paulo Romse fundatae et con- 
 stitutae Ecclesiae, eam quam habet ab Apostolis traditi- 
 onem, et annunciatam hominibus fidem, per successiones 
 episcoporum pervenientem usque ad nos indicantes, 
 confundimus omnes eos, qui quoquemodo, vel per sibi 
 placentia [sibi placentiam malam,"^] vel vanam gloriam, 
 vel per caecitatem et malam sententiam, praeterquam 
 oportet colligunt. Ad hanc enim Ecclesiam propter 
 potentiorem [potiorem] principalitatem necesse est 
 omnem convenire Ecclesiam, hoc est, eos qui sunt 
 undique fideles, in qua semper ab his, qui sunt undique, 
 conservata est ea quae est ab apostolis traditio.'' 
 
 This passage is thus translated by Mr. Allies, himself 
 a Roman Catholic, in his work entitled, " St. Peter, his 
 Name and his Office, as set forth in Holy Scripture," 
 Chap. viii. (near the end) : "For since it would be very 
 long in the compass of our present work to enumerate 
 the successions of all the Churches, taking that Church 
 which is the greatest, the m^ost ancient, and well known 
 to all, founded and established at Rome by the two 
 most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul, by indicating 
 that tradition which it has from the apostles, and the 
 * The phrases bracketed are the various readings. 
 
ii6 ST. IREN^US AND HIS AGE. 
 
 faith which it announces to men, which has reached 
 sven to us by the succession of Bishops, we confound all 
 those, who, in whatsoever manner, either through self- 
 pleasing or vain-glory, or blindness and evil intention, 
 gather otherwise than they ought. For to this Church, 
 on account of its superior"^ principate, it is necessary 
 that every Church should come together, that is, the 
 faithful who are everywhere ; for in this Church the 
 tradition which is from the apostles has been preserved 
 by those who are everywhere/^ 
 
 The two parts as to the meaning of which there is 
 some difference of opinion are first the expression 
 translated "superior principate," and then the passage 
 which follows that to the end of the extract. It could 
 serve little purpose to collect here the various sug- 
 gestions which have been offered as to the Greek words 
 which occupied the place of these Latin expressions.t 
 We must determine upon the passage as it stands : first, 
 what is its probable meaning ; and secondly, what is the 
 teaching of that part of its meaning which is certain and 
 undeniable. 
 
 Now, without indulging in over-criticism, we may 
 remark that Irenseus is here stating his own opinion 
 simply, and this, as regards his facts, in a somewhat 
 loose and careless manner. For instance, it is not 
 strictly accurate to say that Rome is the "most ancient" 
 Church [perhaps he means only "very ancient"], 
 
 * Many different translations of this phrase have been suggested. 
 Mr. Keble makes it "higher original." It is of no great con- 
 sequence which we adopt. 
 
 t Scholars will find them in the editions of Stieren, Harvey, and 
 Migne. . 
 
ST. IRENALUS AND HIS AGE, i ty 
 
 v~ 
 
 True to say that it was, in the strict sense of the word, 
 '^ founded " by St. Peter and St. Paul, although we hold 
 it for almost certain that they both died at Rome. 
 These are small points which we note only to show that 
 Irenaeus was not arguing this question, as though much 
 depended upon the origin of the Church. 
 
 Leaving these points on one side, what, we must ask, 
 does Irenaeus assert? He ^^ clearly and conclusively 
 enunciated," says a Roman Catholic writer, ^^that the 
 Roman Church, among all Churches of apostolic origin, 
 is the first and the most eminent; that among these 
 Churches it has the same authority as Peter and Paul had 
 among the apostles ; and that the faith of this Church 
 is the rule and the standard for the faith of all other 
 Churches.'' Now, on these statements, we have two 
 questions to ask: First, Does Irenaeus say all this? and 
 secondly. If he does, will his words cover the Roman 
 and Papal claims ? We must be careful not to assume 
 that, because he may seem to say something like this, 
 therefore he says all this fully and precisely. 
 
 In answering these questions we must be careful to 
 draw no conclusions from uncertain interpcetations of 
 the words ; and both sides, as we shall see, seem tolerably 
 agreed on this point. And the general meaning of the 
 passage may be fairly ascertained without determining 
 the precise sense of every expression in detail. 
 
 There can be no doubt, then, that Irenaeus did pro- 
 pose and recommend that the errors of heretics should 
 be tested and so condemned by comparing them with 
 the teaching of the Church of Rome. Such a course, he 
 says, would save the trouble of going through the other 
 
ii8 ST. IRENjEUS and HIS AGE, 
 
 Churches. But undoubtedly there was a special reason 
 for selecting the Roman Church and not another as the 
 test and arbiter of orthodoxy. 
 
 Yet, let it be remarked, first, that it is the Church, and 
 not the Bishop. If there is an advance upon the theory 
 of the Romans in the days of St. Clement, it has not yet 
 got to the point of putting forward the authority of the 
 Bishop, instead of that of the Church. It is still the 
 great and powerful Church of the Metropolis of the 
 world, which has this place of eminence. 
 
 Remark, again, that the statement of the writer just 
 quoted, that among other Churches *^it has the same 
 authority as Peter and Paul had among the Apostles," 
 has no place whatever in the words of Irenseus ; nor, if it 
 had, would it convey to us the idea of the sovereignty of 
 the Roman Church or its Bishop — much less of the Papal 
 Primacy as derived from that of St. Peter. Irenaeus tells 
 us, indeed (what it is impossible to believe in the strict 
 sense of the words), that the Roman Church was 
 ^* founded" by the two great Apostles. But a believer 
 in the Roman theory would have spoken differently. Pie 
 would have said that Peter the Prince of the Apostles 
 was the first Bishop of this Church, and that his primacy 
 had descended to his successors, who had the right and 
 the power to examine those various forms of truth and 
 error which were going about in the world, and to decide 
 authoritatively as to what was true, and what false. 
 
 It is quite true that Irenaeus assigns a position of pre- 
 eminence to the Roman Church; and it is tolerably 
 certain that, in ordinary circumstances, such a position 
 would be claimed by, and conceded to, the Church of 
 the chief city of the empire. The desire to preserve the 
 
57; IRENJ£US AND /7/S AGE. 119 
 
 unity of the Church, the advantage of having a central 
 authority to appeal to, the importance of the city, its 
 greater accessibleness to other Churches in all parts of 
 the empire — these and other circumstances would con- 
 duce to its obtaining a place of priority with privileges 
 and powers which naturally were more and more extended 
 and more closely defined. But Irenaeus knows nothing 
 of a Roman " principalitas " descending from St. Peter, 
 bestowed by a Divine grant, inalienable from the Roman 
 Bishop as the successor and representative of the first 
 Primate of the Church, the first Vicar of Christ. 
 
 What reason, then, does he assign for the "powerful 
 pre-eminence " of this Church. The words which follow 
 are differently understood. Some think that "con- 
 venire '^ means to " come together," * or assemble at 
 Rome; others think it means "agree with" (probably 
 representing the Greek word cvixiSamiv) the Church of 
 Rome. The latter has been the ordinary Roman view 
 of the word, the former was strongly insisted upon in a 
 pamphlet, f published by Bollinger's party during the 
 Vatican Council. It does not appear that any impor- 
 tant difference in our conclusions need result from 
 adopting either of these translations of the passage. Mr. 
 Allies, a Roman Catholic, translates "come together," 
 while the Ante-Nicene Library version, edited by Protes- 
 tants, takes the other view ; and an able writer in a 
 Roman Catholic Review J accepts the translation of the 
 
 * Hefele (Beitrdge) says that this interpretation is ridiculous 
 {Idcherlich) ; it is not however, as we see, absolutely rejected by the 
 advocates of the Roman view. 
 
 t Erwdgungen fur Bischofe. 
 
 X Blatter fiir das Katholische Dentschland^ vol. Ixxiv. 
 
I20 ST. I RE N^ US AND HIS AGE. 
 
 German pamphlet, and argues for the Papal theory upon 
 that meaning of the words of Irenaeus. 
 
 Let us suppose that Irenaeus says that every other 
 Church must agree with the Church of Rome on account 
 of its ^' superior principate," whatever that may mean. 
 There are some who think that Irenaeus is here referring 
 to the pre-eminence of the city in the empire. But 
 whatever may be the force of these words, he goes on to 
 assign a reason for the acceptance of the faith as it is 
 found in the Roman Church, and for agreement with it. 
 ^' For in this Church " (we give Mr. Allies' translation), 
 " the tradition which is from the apostles has been pre- 
 served by those who are everywhere.'' Only one word 
 we will ask leave to alter here, and instead of " every- 
 where," put '' from everywhere," or " from all parts," a 
 somewhat more common translation oi undiqiie.'^ 
 
 Mr. Harvey, in his edition of Irenaeus, says, " the words 
 in qua, translated above ^ in this Church,' can hardly 
 refer to the Church of Rome ; for how was the Apos- 
 tolical tradition preserved in the Church of Rome by the 
 members of foreign Churches ? " but surely this question 
 entirely misses the very point of Irenaeus' statement. 
 The Church of Rome preserves the universal faith 
 because the universal Church comes to Rome. Every 
 one goes to Rome — every one carries with him to Rome 
 the tradition, the faith, of his own Church. Hence, this 
 faith handed down from the Apostles, in all the various 
 Churches of the world, is by their members brought to 
 Rome and there preserved. This seems to be the exact 
 
 * The Greek word was probably iravTdxoBev. It may have been 
 iroLVTaxov, 
 
ST, IREN^US AND HIS AGE. 121 
 
 meaning of the words, in qiia ^ se?nper ab his^ qui sunt 
 undique^ conservata est ea qucB est ab Apostolis traditio, 
 i^' In which always by these, who are from all parts, is 
 preserved that tradition which is from the apostles.") 
 
 Can it be said, now, on a consideration of the whole 
 meaning of this passage, that it affords the least sup- 
 port to the Roman claims ? Does it not, on the contrary, 
 invert the whole argument for the authority and influence 
 of that Church ? According to Irenaeus the Church of 
 Rome is a receptacle of truth, receiving and retaining 
 the truth which is brought to it from all parts of the 
 world : according to the Papal theory, it is, on the 
 contrary, a fountain of truth, having its springs in the 
 heaven of heavens, and diffusing the doctrine which is 
 thence received through all parts of the Church on earth. 
 There is all the difference in the world between these 
 two views. Even if Irenaeus taught the necessity of 
 universal conformity with Roman teaching, which on any 
 view of his words he can hardly be said to do — even 
 if he said that this was the accepted theory of his age, of 
 which he gives not a hint — there would still be wanting 
 a testimony to the one point upon which the whole 
 Roman theory turns — the primacy, the monarchy of the 
 Pope, and the derivation of that primacy from the Prince 
 of the Apostles. 
 
 How can we account for such an omission under the 
 circumstances? It is not as though he ignored St. Peter 
 altogether. He mentions his name, but along with that 
 of St. Paul, as though they were on a perfect equality; 
 
 * We must agree with Friedrich (before his rupture with the 
 Papacy), who says {Kirchengeschichte Deutschlands) that the attempt 
 to refer in qua not to Rome, but to ovmem ecdesiam, is an absurdity. 
 
122 ST. IREN^US AND HIS AGE. 
 
 and the manner in which he mentions them is no less 
 significant. Neither from one nor from both does the 
 Church of Rome or its Bishop receive any special privi- 
 lege or power. Its greatness is uncontested; but it 
 does not derive it from the See of Peter. How can we 
 account for this omission on the part of Irenaeus? Only 
 in one way. Irenaeus knew nothing of any such claims 
 or pretensions. The power of the great Church is 
 growing, it is stretching out its hands to the right and to 
 the left, it is becoming the arbiter and umpire among the 
 Churches, quite naturally — we had almost said necessarily 
 — in many cases usefully. The greatness of many of its 
 Bishops will come to support its local pretensions. And 
 by and by we shall hear that the Bishop of Rome sits 
 upon the throne of Peter, although it will be long before 
 he claims to possess absolute power as his representative. 
 
 As far as this passage of Irenaeus goes, simply leaving 
 it to say what it does say — not reading the later Roman 
 theory into it, by putting Bishop for Church, by assuming 
 that the authority comes from Peter instead of resulting 
 from the united and concurrent testimony of the Church 
 — if we leave the passage just as it is, it is in complete 
 ao^reement with all that we have learnt from the New 
 Testament and the Apostolic Fathers; it helps us to 
 understand the subsequent growth of the Papal legend ; 
 but it does not tell us that the modern Papal claims were 
 admitted in the days of Irenaeus, or that those claims 
 were asserted as having descended by spiritual inheritance 
 from St. Peter. 
 
 It is interesting to observe that we find illustrations 
 of the same state of things at this period of time from 
 authorities external to the works of Irenaeus. We refer 
 
ST. IREN^US AND HIS AGE, 123 
 
 to the action of the Roman Bishop in the paschal 
 controversy.* Briefly, it will be remembered that the 
 Orientals, in accordance with a tradition said to be 
 derived from St. John, kept Easter according to the day 
 of the month ; the Westerns on the first day of the week. 
 The difference of use had given rise to various discus- 
 sions, when at last Victor, the Bishop of Rome (a.d. 
 190-202), proceeded to excommunicate those Eastern 
 Churches who would not adopt the Western usage. 
 
 It might appear that an extreme measure like this was 
 a convincing proof of the supremacy of Rome ; and it 
 would have been so if the Roman excommunication had 
 shut out the Churches in question from communion 
 with all other Churches. But this was not the case, 
 although doubtless the influence of such action on the 
 part of the Bishop of Rome would be widely felt. This 
 conduct of Victor was not, however, allowed to pass 
 without protest. Various Churches remonstrated widi 
 him on his harsh and arbitrary conduct. 
 
 Among others the Church of Lyons wrote to him by 
 the hand of its Bishop, Irenaeus ; and his letter, as 
 quoted by Eusebius,t shows that he was so far from 
 admitting any right on the part of the Bishop of Rome 
 to dictate to other Churches the times or manners of 
 keeping their festivals, that he assumed the perfect 
 equality of all the bishops in such matters. He himself, 
 Eusebius says, ** maintains the duty of celebrating the 
 mystery of the resurrection of our Lord only on the day 
 of the Lord \ but he becomingly admonishes Victor not 
 
 * We do not enter upon the controversy itself, which is admirably 
 described in Hefele's History of the Councils. 
 t Eccl, Hist., V. 24. 
 
124 'ST. IREN^US AND HIS AGE, 
 
 to cut off whole Churches of God who observed the 
 tradition of an ancient custom." Eusebius quotes from 
 the letter of Irenaeus in which he points out to Victor 
 that these paschal controversies were of ancient date, 
 having reference not only to the day, but to the whole 
 mode of celebration, and particularly to the duration 
 of the preceding fast. " And," he goes on, ^' when the 
 blessed Polycarp went to Rome, in the time of Anicetus, 
 and they had a little difference among themselves like- 
 wise respecting other matters, they immediately were 
 reconciled, not disputing much with one another on this 
 head. For neither could Anicetus persuade Polycarp 
 not to observe what he had always observed with John 
 the disciple of the Lord and the rest of the apostles 
 with whom he associated; and neither did Polycarp 
 persuade Anicetus to observe it, who said that he was 
 bound to maintain the practice of the presbyters before 
 him. Which things being so, they communed with each 
 other, and Anicetus, out of respect, allowed Polycarp [to 
 celebrate] the Eucharist, and they separated from each 
 other in peace." Comment on these statements is quite 
 unnecessary : in the view of Irenaeus these bishops dis- 
 cussed the matters under dispute on a footing of perfect 
 equality. Even if they disagreed, and refused each 
 other communion, it was not because the one assumed 
 a right to dictate to the other. 
 
 Of the three great Christian writers who lived nearest 
 to Irenaeus, Clement of Alexandria, TertuUian, and Ori- 
 gen, it is necessary to say a few words ; and these will 
 probably suffice. Of Clement we have already noticed the 
 testimony adduced from his writings by Eusebius respect- 
 ing St. James of Jerusalem. His reference to the position 
 
ST. IRENJEUS AND HIS AGE. 125 
 
 of James shows the changing form of the tradition respect- 
 ing the apostles and their contemporaries. According to 
 Hegesippus, St. James " received the government of the 
 Church along with the apostles : " according to the later 
 testimony of St. Clement, he was Bishop of Jerusalem. 
 Both statements are doubtless true ; but they show that, 
 as time advanced, the importance of Jerusalem and its 
 bishop was beginning to be forgotten. Clement, we 
 must remember, was the head of the Catechetical school 
 of Alexandria, which he is said to have left on account 
 of the persecution of Severus at the beginning of the 
 third century. His death is stated to have occurred 
 from 213 to 220. There is nothing else of importance 
 in his writings with reference to this controversy. 
 
 Tertullian (a.d. 160-240), as the first great Christian 
 writer who makes use of the Latin language, is of 
 obvious importance as a witness on this question. Ter- 
 tullian, let us remark, is not absolutely trustworthy in 
 his statement of facts; he is fiery, passionate, rhetori- 
 cal, and more anxious for an argument that will tell 
 against an adversary, than for perfect accuracy either of 
 statement or of demonstration. But the nature of some 
 of his subjects is such that he could hardly have missed 
 a reference to the supreme teaching power of the Roman 
 See, if he had believed in it. In his book "Against 
 Heretics " {^De Prescriptionibus)^ he is engaged in a work 
 similar to that of Irenaeus, and he has recourse to similar 
 modes of argument. In order to convince his readers 
 of the errors of heretics, he points out the novelty of 
 their opinions and their entire want of authority to teach 
 as they do. He, too, confronts these errors of yesterday 
 with the unchanging truth : he too brings these perverters 
 
126 ST. IRE N^ US AND HIS AGE. ^ 
 
 of the Gospel face to face with the teaching of the 
 Catholic Church. 
 
 Like all other early Christian writers, he gives a place 
 of honour to St. Peter among the apostles, and to Rome 
 among the Churches ; but he knows nothing of a primacy 
 of jurisdiction as belonging to either: apparently he has 
 never heard that either is to be considered the supreme 
 arbiter of the truth of Christian doctrine. This will 
 sufficiently appear from an examination of the principal 
 passages bearing upon the subject. 
 
 In Chapter xxii. he speaks of Peter, *^so called be- 
 cause upon him, as on a rock, the Church was to be built, 
 who obtained the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and 
 the power of binding and loosing in heaven and on 
 earth;'* and of St. John, "who was most dear to the 
 Lord, and lay upon His breast," and so forth. But there 
 is not a word to indicate his belief in any special power 
 or authority as belonging to St. Peter. 
 
 In Chapter xxxii., insisting upon the recent origin 
 of the heretical sects, he says, " If any of those sects 
 venture to place themselves in the Apostolic age, so as 
 to seem to be derived from the apostles, because they 
 were under the apostles, we can say to them : * Show us 
 the origin of your Churches, disclose the order of their 
 bishops, coming down by succession from the beginning, 
 so that that bishop may have had as his beginning and 
 predecessor some one of the apostles, or apostolic men 
 who remained with the apostles.' For in this manner 
 the Churches which are truly apostolic prove their rights ; 
 as the Church of the Smyrnseans goes back to Polycarp, 
 set over it by St. John, and that of the Romans to 
 Clement, ordained by Peter." Mark two or three things 
 
ST. IRENAlUS and HIS AGE, 127 
 
 in these words : first, a possible inaccuracy respecting 
 the ordination of Saint Clement, although the subject 
 is one of difficulty. Next, the Church of Rome is men- 
 tioned simply as one of the Apostolic Churches. Again, 
 Peter is no more Bishop of Rome than John is Bishop 
 of Smyrna ; and there is not a hint of any special 
 authority as belonging to Peter as the Roman Bishop. 
 
 More important still is the passage in Chapter xxxvi. 
 '^Come now,^' he says, referring to the same subject, ''if 
 you will better exercise your curiosity in the matter of 
 your salvation, go through the Apostolic Churches, in 
 which the chairs of the apostles still preside in their 
 places ; in which their own genuine letters are read, 
 echoing the voice and representing the face of each one 
 of them. Is Achaia near you ? you have Corinth. If 
 you are not far from Macedonia, you have Philippi, you 
 have the Thessalonians. If you can cross to Asia, you 
 have Ephesus. If you are near Italy, you have Rome, 
 whose authority extends to us also [Africans]. How 
 happy is that Church to which the apostles poured out 
 their whole doctrine with their blood ! where Peter 
 was honoured with the same death as his Master; 
 where Paul was crowned with the martyrdom of John 
 [the Baptist]; whence the Apostle John, after having 
 escaped unharmed from the boiling oil, was sent to an 
 island ; let us see what it has learnt — what it has taught 
 — in agreement with the Churches of Africa ; " and then 
 he proceeds to recapitulate the principal articles of the 
 faith which they hold in common. 
 
 Now, here we find the same tone, although perhaps 
 less emphatic, which we met wath in Irenaeus. The 
 true doctrine of Christ is that which is found in all the 
 
128 ST. IRENjEUS and HIS AGE, 
 
 Churches ; but the Church of Rome is the greatest of 
 them all, and the most glorious in history, in position, in 
 character. Yet there is not a hint that this is the mother 
 and mistress of Churches, or that she derives her queenly 
 position from her first Sovereign Bishop — the Prince of 
 the Apostles. And let it be remarked these are the very 
 points which require to be proved. Anything short of 
 this does not meet the necessities of the case. If the 
 primacy of St. Peter and his successors be the result of 
 ecclesiastical development, and not a Divine ordinance 
 which dates back to the institution of Christ, then the 
 Roman position can no longer be defended. Tertullian's 
 attitude is entirely compatible with what we have found 
 in the New Testament. It does not accord with the 
 Roman point of view. 
 
 Of Origen it would hardly be necessary to say more 
 than simply to mention that he throws no further light 
 on the question of the primacy ; but for the fact that 
 Perrone has quoted him as a witness for the infaUibility 
 of the Pope. The passage which has been thus mis- 
 applied occurs in his commentary on the classical text 
 in St. Matthew, and must not be passed over. Un- 
 doubtedly Origen uses strong language respecting our 
 Lord's promise to St. Peter, and if it were taken by 
 itself it might seem to teach what Origen certainly did 
 not believe. But this impression is removed when we 
 read the passage to the end. 
 
 ^^ Shall we then dare to say," he goes on, "that the 
 gates of hell shall not prevail against Peter in particular; 
 but that they will prevail against the other apostles and 
 perfect men ? Did not that refer to all of them and to 
 each one of them, which was said : ' The gates of hell 
 
ST. IREN^US AND HIS AGE. 129 
 
 shall not prevail against it'? And this: 'Upon this 
 rock I will build my Church ' ? Are the keys of the 
 Kingdom of Heaven given by the Lord to Peter alone, 
 and does no other of the blessed ones receive them? 
 But if this is common to the others : ' I will give unto 
 thee the keys of the Kingdom of Heaven/ why not also 
 all those words which were spoken before, and which 
 are quoted as being addressed to Peter. ... In the 
 Gospel according to John, the Saviour, giving the Holy 
 Spirit to the disciples by breathing upon them, says : 
 'Receive ye the Holy Ghost,' and so forth." And then 
 he proceeds to say that whoever shall say, as Peter did, 
 " Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God," having 
 it revealed to them not by flesh and blood, but by their 
 Father in heaven, they will receive the same commenda- 
 tion as Peter did. He even adds that all who imitate 
 Christ will be Peters (Rocks), as following the spiritual 
 Rock, which is Christ. When we remember that Perrone 
 understands St. Paul's statement, that the faith of the 
 Romans has gone abroad into all the world, to mean 
 that the whole Church has accepted the Creed of the 
 Church of Rome, we must not be surprised at the use 
 which he makes of Origen. This, at least, is certain, 
 that Origen, however great may be the honour which he 
 assigns to St. Peter, concedes to him nothing in dignity 
 or in power which he does not equally assign to the 
 other apostles. 
 
 The passage from Irenseus is by far the most im- 
 portant of those which belong to the latter half of the 
 second century, or the beginning of the third. We may go 
 further, and say that nothing so strong on the Roman side 
 can be found before the Council of Nicaea. Yet those 
 
 I 
 
I30 ST. IREN^US AND HIS AGE. 
 
 expressions, energetic as they are, do not support the 
 Roman claims, and are quite compatible with our reading 
 of our Lord's words in the Gospel and the apostolic 
 history. 
 
 If we were wrong in our interpretation of that remark- 
 able passage, we should expect to find something in the 
 contemporaries or immediate successors of the writer to 
 admonish us of our error, and to throw light upon its 
 true meaning. We find no such correction or admonition. 
 Clement, Tertullian, and Origen all know of the great 
 Church of Rome; but none of them has recourse to 
 it as a supreme governor, as an unerring teacher. None 
 of them seems to have heard of any supremacy in 
 the Church of Christ, possessed by its Bishop, through 
 inheritance from St. I'eter. 
 
131 ) 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 ST, CYPRIAN AND THE ROMAN SEE. 
 
 The germ of the Roman theory not in the Bible — Something only par- 
 tially resembling this theory — Need of caution — Influence of Rome 
 useful — Unsuspected, and hence unresisted — Writings of St. Cyprian 
 — Apparent concession to modern Roman claims — Dr. Newman's 
 statement of the question — The principal passage — Interpolated — 
 Its true meaning — It teaches no more than earlier testimonies — St. 
 Peter the centre of unity, not the ruler of the Church — All the 
 Apostles equal in power — St. Cyprian speaks of the Roman Church 
 as the See of Peter, but assigns no superiority of authority to the 
 Roman Bishop — Illustrated by the controversy on the baptism of 
 heretics — African Councils act independently, and in opposition to 
 the Roman Bishop — Their testimonies — Firmilian of Csesarea — 
 Conclusion. 
 
 If the view which is here presented of the rise and growth 
 of the papal power be the true one, it is clear that the 
 early authorities on the subject must be examined with 
 great care. And particularly for this reason, that we may 
 expect to find passages in primitive Christian writers 
 which at first sight will appear to lend support to the 
 Roman theory, but which, on a nearer examination, will 
 be found to teach something quite different. 
 
 We think we have shown that even the germ of the 
 papal claims does not exist in the Bible or in the first age 
 
132 ST, CYPRIAN AND 
 
 of the Church. Something like it may be found — some- 
 thing which, in the course of ages, it was not very difficult, 
 imder the circumstances, so to pervert as to make it 
 appear to contain in its elements the whole dogma of 
 papal infallibility as promulgated by the Vatican 
 Council. But the idea thus developed was not there even 
 in its most rudimentary form ; but a quite different idea. 
 This statement is of the greatest importance. If the idea 
 of the supreme teaching and governing power of the 
 Roman Bishop, as the spiritual heir of the supreme 
 ruler among the Apostles, even in the most elementary 
 form, be found in the Bible, or even in any very early 
 Christian writer, then we must allow that the Roman 
 theory has established the strongest case for considera- 
 tion. Such a germ of the theory, however, we are unable 
 to discover. We can find, and we have found, some- 
 thing which looks like it, and which on closerexamination 
 proves to be something entirely different; but a primacy 
 of jurisdiction, of power and authority possessed by St. 
 Peter, and transmitted by him to the Bishops of Rome, 
 we have not found. 
 
 There can be no doubt that very early in the history 
 of Christianity, the Church of Rome assumed a position 
 of unique importance. As the Capital of the world, as 
 the scene of the martyrdom of Peter and Paul, Rome 
 had pretensions which could belong to no other city; 
 and these pretensions were supported by the character 
 and influence of many of its bishops. The manifest 
 utility of such a centre led other churches cheerfully to 
 recognize the position of the Roman See ; and this was 
 done the more unreservedly and emphatically from the 
 fact that, in the earliest times, Rome put forth no claims 
 
THE ROMAN SEE, 133 
 
 which endangered the independence of other churches. 
 Expressions were often employed which were, in the 
 minds of those who used them, httle more than com- 
 phmentary, and which would have been modified, if it 
 had been thought that they would be turned to a mean- 
 ing which was not intended. Yet for all this we have 
 not as yet found a line written by any Christian writer 
 which concedes that which is now understood as the 
 papal claims, namely, the Divine right of the Bishop of 
 Rome to teach and rule the Church with supreme autho- 
 rity as the successor of St. Peter. 
 
 The bearing of these remarks on the writings of St. 
 Cyprian, the subject of the present chapter, will soon be 
 apparent. He is, in every way, a most important witness, 
 from his character, from his position, from his being one 
 of the three great Africans who moulded the theology 
 of the Latin Church, the link between the impetuous 
 Tertullian and the great Augustine. He was born about 
 the beginning of the third century, baptized about 246, 
 made Bishop of Carthage 248, and martyred 258. 
 
 It is well known that Roman controversialists lay the 
 greatest stress upon the testimony of St. Cyprian ; and 
 this is quite natural and reasonable. Strong expressions 
 abound in his writings respecting the importance of St. 
 Peter in the apostolic body, and the importance of the 
 Church of Rome as the See of Peter (^Cathedra Petri) 
 in the Christian Church. The question is as to the mean- 
 ing of these expressions. Do they go to the length of 
 the Roman claims, or do they only bring out the same 
 facts which we have found other witnesses testifying to? 
 This question is diversely answered, and we must try to 
 find out the true answer to it, first, by a careful scanning 
 
134 ST. CYPRIAN AND 
 
 of the passages adduced, and secondly, by placing them 
 in the light of other statements by the same writer. 
 
 The principal passage, although the idea which it con- 
 tains is illustrated and enforced in other writings from 
 the same hand, is found in the treatise " On the unity 
 of the Church " {De unitate ecdesice), Chapter iv. (Fell, 3, 
 4). Before quoting the words, it may be useful to give 
 the statement of the question in the words of Dr. New- 
 man, then a clergyman of the English Church ; "^ "Roman 
 Catholics,^' he says, "regard St. Peter as an actual 
 head of the actual apostles, not merely as representing 
 them, nor as taking rank before them in the system of 
 order, but as really governing them. They make St. 
 Peter the real centre of unity, we the emphatic image 
 and lesson of it; they make St. Peter's Chair, the Holy 
 Roman See, a necessary instriwient of grace, we a sy?nbol; 
 we make every bishop the real centre, they the one 
 bishop who succeeds in the apostle's seat ; we make 
 schism and separation from Christ lie in opposing one 
 bishop, they in opposing the Bishop of Rome." The 
 contrast is presented somewhat differently in these words 
 from the statement which we have given as to the ques- 
 tion in dispute, because Mr. Newman was limiting his 
 view to one particular point ; but the real point of diver- 
 gence between the two views is the same. 
 
 Let us now give the famous passage, and in domg so 
 we will present it as it appears in the Benedictine edition 
 with all its interpolations, indicating the latter in brackets. 
 That these latter are interpolations there can be no 
 
 * In his translation of Irenaeus, note on the passage, at the end 
 of the treatise, De unitate (p. 150). 
 
THE ROMAN SEE. 135 
 
 reasonable doubt."^ Baliize, the editor of the Benedic- 
 tine edition, omitted them ; but he died before the book 
 was pubUshed, and his successors restored them while 
 they retained his notes, but with some modifications, 
 against them. In this passage, then, St. Cyprian, after 
 quoting the texts from St. Matt. xvi. 18, 19; and St. 
 John XX. 21, goes on : " Upon him being one He builds 
 His Church [and commits to him His sheep to feed]. 
 And though He gives to all the apostles [after His 
 resurrection] an equal power, and says, * As My Father 
 hath sent Me, even so send I you,' &c., yet in order to 
 manifest unity. He has by His own authority placed 
 the source of the same unity as beginning from one- 
 Certainly the other apostles also were, what Peter was, en- 
 dued with an equal fellowship both of honour and power, 
 but a commencement is made from unity [and primacy 
 is given to Peter that the Church of Christ may be set 
 forth as one, and the See {Cathedra) as one. And they 
 are all shepherds, yet the flock is shown to be one, such 
 as to be fed by all the apostles with unanimous agree- 
 ment], that the Church [of Christ] may be set forth as 
 one. . . . He who holds not this unity of the Church, 
 does he think that he holds the faith? He who strives 
 against and resists the Church [he who deserts the See 
 of Peter, on whom the Church is founded], is he assured 
 that he is in the Church ? '' 
 
 First, with respect to the interpolations. It is quite 
 possible that they were originally marginal glosses, in- 
 tended to explain the text, according to the views of 
 
 * On this subject see Friedrich, Primat in der Kircke, s. 105 ; 
 Newman, p. 151 ; and Hartel's ed. of St. Cyprian, p. xlii. ss. and 
 212 ss. 
 
136 ST, CYPRIAN AND 
 
 some particular reader; in which case it would be a 
 harsh proceeding to accuse the original author, or the 
 first transcriber, of forgery, or of wilfully corrupting the 
 text. Subsequent editors cannot claim the same indul- 
 gence ; and we hardly know what to think of the Fathers 
 of the Vatican Council, who quote the interpolations as 
 part of the text. 
 
 In considering the passage, our view of its meaning 
 would not be greatly affected if the whole of it, as quoted 
 above, were the genuine production of St. Cyprian ; so 
 long as no part of it is omitted. We may, however, 
 leave the interpolations on one side; and indeed we 
 shall find that they could not be a real part of the pas- 
 sage, as they represent views opposed to those expressed 
 elsewhere by St. Cyprian, as well as by his contemporary 
 Firniilian. It is quite true that elsewhere St. Cyprian 
 speaks of a primacy as claimed by the Roman bishop, 
 but he mentions it to oppose it. 
 
 Let us then take the passage as it is now accepted in 
 the critical editions of editors Roman Catholic and 
 Reformed ; and what does it teach more than we have 
 found in the New Testament, that St. Peter was the repre- 
 sentative and the foremost man of the apostolic body? 
 It has been said repeatedly that our Lord addressed St. 
 Peter alone, as indicating the unity of the Church and 
 its rulers, not as giving him privileges which were not 
 conferred upon the other apostles. And this is exactly 
 what St. Cyprian says. Undoubtedly the Church was, 
 in a peculiar sense of the words, founded on St. Peter : 
 he was the first Christian preacher on the Day of Pente- 
 cost, and he was the means of introducing the Gentiles 
 into the Covenant Body. But he was not the only 
 
THE ROMAN SEE, 137 
 
 foundation-stone. The Church has no other '^ one 
 foundation" but its Lord and Redeemer; and apart 
 from Him all others are on an equaUty and are only 
 secondary substructures. And this is the teaching of 
 Cyprian. It is not merely that his language respecting 
 St. Peter ascribes no superiority to him in the Apostolic 
 College ; he distinctly excludes any such supposition by 
 telling us that our Lord 'Ogives to all the apostles an equal 
 power P 
 
 The passage now quoted may be said to represent the 
 whole mind and spirit of St. Cyprian with respect to this 
 question. As, however, there is here no reference to 
 the Roman See, it is but fair that some of the passages 
 on this subject should be adduced, and their meaning 
 ascertained. 
 
 In the 48th Epistle, Cyprian, writing to Cornelius, the 
 Bishop of Rome, says that, in order to protect Christians 
 who were going to the metropolis from false teachers, he 
 instructed them to join the communion of the Roman See, 
 He uses remarkable language in speaking of it : ''We," 
 he says, " know well that we have exhorted them to 
 acknowledge and hold to the root and womb of the 
 Catholic Church " (ecclesice catholicce, matricem et radicem). 
 If the words stood by themselves, they would certainly 
 appear irresistible on the Roman side. But a little 
 further acquaintance with the modes of expression 
 current in those days, enables us to decide that they give 
 no higher position to the Church of Rome than that 
 which was assigned to the Church of Carthage. The 
 *' Catholic Church," as here employed, does not mean the 
 whole Church throughout the world, but any part or 
 diocese in the true Church, as distinguished from any 
 
138 ST. CYPRIAN AND 
 
 schismatical or heretical body that might have been 
 formed in opposition or rivalry. And the Church which 
 was the matrix or mother Church was that which could 
 trace back its pedigree to an apostle or an apostolic 
 man. 
 
 In this sense such churches are described by Tertullian, 
 in the w^ork from which we have quoted {De prcescript. 
 c. 2i), as "original and mother Churches" {ecdesice 
 matrices et originaks). And this interpretation of St. 
 Cyprian's language is verified by the use of it in another 
 place (Ep. 71), where, speaking of some members of the 
 Church who had left his communion and joined the 
 heretics, but had afterwards returned, he says : *^ After- 
 wards, acknowledging their sin, and laying aside their 
 error, they return to the truth and to their mother " {ad 
 veritatem et matricem). According to this view, every 
 particular diocese is a " Catholic Church," as representing 
 the whole, and inasmuch as each individual Church, in 
 its unity, possesses through its one bishop all the 
 essential attributes of the Church instituted by Christ. 
 It is in this sense that Cyprian remarks in another letter 
 to Bishop Cornelius (Ep. 49), that certain persons from 
 Rome who had been misled into heresy and schism, and 
 had returned to Catholic unity, had been restored on 
 confessing the Catholic Bishop of Rome. " We," they 
 say — St. Cyprian tells Cornelius that he w^as setting down 
 their own words, " acknowledge Cornelius bishop of the 
 most holy Catholic Church, chosen by God Almighty and 
 Christ our Lord. . . . For we are not ignorant that there 
 is one God, one Christ the Lord, whom we confess, 
 one Holy Ghost, that there should be one bishop in the 
 Catholic Church." As Newman remarks on the passage, 
 
THE ROMAN SEE. 139 
 
 "each particular Church being the miniature of the 
 whole, each bishop the representative of Christ, the Chief 
 Bishop. . . . Whoever, then, set up a bishop in any See 
 where one was already, broke the oneness of the whole 
 episcopate." There is not in St. Cyprian's language a 
 trace of the notion that Cornelius was universal bishop 
 of the Church, and that all other bishops were his vicars, 
 in accordance with the papal theory. He was the duly 
 chosen bishop in the succession of the Roman Church, 
 which is in that place the representative of the universal 
 Church, inasmuch as it has regularly received, in ac- 
 cordance with the divine institution, its one bishop. 
 
 But there are other passages in which St. Cyprian has 
 been thought to confess a Primacy of Rome. Thus in 
 the 55th (52) Epistle (to Antonianus), he speaks of the 
 Roman See as the '* Place of Peter " {locus Petri)^ and 
 in the 59th (55) Epistle (to Cornelius), speaking of cer- 
 tain heretics which had set up a Conventicle of their 
 own, he says, they " dare to set sail, and to carry letters 
 from schismatic and profane persons to the chair of 
 Peter, and to the principal Church, whence the unity of 
 the Priesthood took its rise." {Ad Petri Caihedram atque 
 ad ecdesiam principalem^ unde unit as sacerdotalis exorta 
 est.) 
 
 It is not wonderful that the advocates of the papal 
 claims should fasten upon expressions like these (and 
 this is the strongest of them all) and adduce them to 
 prove the primacy of the Pope. But even as they stand, 
 they furnish no such proof; and we know that they bore 
 no such meaning in the mouth of St. Cyprian. Let us 
 see what they exactly tell us of the opinions of the writer. 
 In the first place, they tell us that Cyprian regarded St. 
 
140 ST. CYPRIAN AMD 
 
 Peter as the founder of the Roman Church. In this he 
 only followed Tertullian, whom he confessed as his 
 " master." * He does not speak of Peter as Bishop 
 of Rome, any more than Tertullian had done ; but he 
 evidently does regard the Bishop of Rome as the suc- 
 cessor of St. Peter. But this is not to give to the Roman 
 bishop the primacy of the Christian Church ; for he had 
 not assigned to St. Peter that place among the apostles. 
 Indeed he had said the very reverse : he had said that 
 Christ made all the apostles equal ; and thus he would 
 here assert no superiority as belonging to the Roman 
 bishop ; and we know, from other parts of his writings, 
 that he allowed him no superiority. All that he had 
 said of St. Peter was that he was the representative, and, 
 so to speak, the centre of unity; and this is what he 
 says of the Bishop of Rome. The whole letter from 
 which the extract is taken shows that he paid no special 
 deference to the judgment of the Roman bishop. He 
 is writing of some heretics who had gone to Rome, and 
 had received letters which might induce the Bishop 
 Cornelius to receive them into communion. Does he 
 ask the occupant of the chair of Peter to consider the 
 case, to examine these schismatics, and find out whether 
 they are in error? On the contrary, he tells him that 
 there is no need to do anything of the kind. " Already,'' 
 he says, *' has their cause been heard : already has sen- 
 tence been given concerning them ; " and he as good as 
 intimates that it w^ould be improper to reopen the case. 
 Indeed, there is no hint anywhere that he regards him as 
 more than his fellow-bishop, — he calls him ^' brother and 
 colleague" — although he occupies a more importantthrone. 
 
 *His words respecting Tertullian are well known : Da magistrum. 
 
THE ROMAN SEE. 141 
 
 The most remarkable illustration of this sense of in- 
 dependence and denial of any authority as belonging to 
 the Bishop of Rome, is found in the controversy which 
 arose at this time respecting the rebaptism of heretics. 
 The controversy in its details belongs to general Church 
 History and to the History of the Councils. On the 
 general question the Roman Bishop Stephen, who suc- 
 ceeded Cornelius, was undoubtedly in the right, as the 
 Church has since decided ; but that is not the question. 
 It is quite clear, from the whole history of the contro- 
 versy, that the African bishops considered that they had 
 a perfect right to settle the matter for themselves, and 
 that neither the Bishop of Rome nor any other bishop 
 had the least right to interfere with them. 
 
 It has been customary with controversialists on the 
 Roman side to represent that Cyprian and his brethren 
 and suffragans did concede a superiority to the Church 
 of Rome, and were guilty of a kind of rebellion in 
 quarrelling with Bishop Stephen on this question. We 
 have seen that the passages to which they appeal in 
 no way support the opinion that the superior authority 
 of the Roman See was conceded ; and the whole history 
 of the controversy shows most clearly that the African 
 bishops regarded Stephen as guilty of unlawful inter- 
 ference, and were conscious of no offence on their part 
 in resisting and resenting his dictation. The leader of 
 the Africans throughout was Cyprian. He had decided 
 that baptism by heretics was invalid, on the ground that 
 they could not give what they did not possess. Under 
 his influence the same judgment was pronounced by a 
 synod at Carthage, a.d. 255. At this synod thirty-one 
 bishops were present. 
 
142 ST. CYPRIAN AND 
 
 As the question was still agitated, Cyprian convened 
 a second and greater synod in the following year, in 
 which no fewer than seventy-one bishops took part. 
 The decision was the same, and was announced by 
 Cyprian on behalf of the Council to Bishop Stephen in 
 a synodal letter (Ep. 72). The close of the letter is 
 remarkable alike for its independence and its moderation. 
 They tell the Bishop of Rome what they have decided ; 
 they hope he may be of the same opinion ; but they 
 submit nothing to his arbitration, and they ask for no 
 confirmation at his hand of their proceedings. They 
 intimate that some do not agree with them, but this 
 disagreement has produced no discord ; they wish to do 
 violence to no one's convictions, nor do they lay down 
 any universal law; since every bishop has in the ad- 
 ministration of his Church his own freedom of decision 
 for which he shall give account to God. The whole 
 document is most valuable : it is the calm utterance of 
 men who are not in the least conscious that they are 
 violating any rule or practice of the Church. 
 
 The answer of Stephen is lost; but we may judge of 
 its character from the expressions of Cyprian and Fir- 
 milian respecting it, and some passages from it are 
 preserved in their letters. It seems that the Roman 
 Bishop had condemned the decisions of the synod of 
 Carthage as contrary to the ^'custom" of his own Church; 
 and this he had done with no little violence, at the same 
 time denouncing Cyprian as *'a false Christ, a false 
 apostle, and a deceitful worker" (Ep. 75). It was 
 the old imperial and imperious instinct of Rome which 
 could brook no departure from its own customs : the 
 same spirit which in a much milder form, had spoken 
 
THE ROMAN SEE, 143 
 
 in St. Clement's letter to the Corinthians, which in a 
 later and more offensive form had led Bishop Victor to 
 excommunicate the Eastern Churches who followed a 
 different custom in the keeping of Easter. Stephen 
 too declared that he could not hold communion with 
 the African bishops if they did not retrace their steps'; 
 and he made known the same decision, with no less 
 violence of language to some Asiatic Churches which 
 had taken Cyprian's view of the question. 
 
 Cyprian, in no way daunted, called a third synod, pro- 
 bably in the same year,"^ at which no fewer than eighty- 
 seven bishops were present. The bishops regarded 
 themselves as placed under no restraint by the adverse 
 judgment of their brother at Rome. Cyprian even 
 went so far as to denounce his tyranny and to deride 
 his pretensions. There is not a hint anywhere of the 
 opinion that Stephen had merely exercised his authority 
 in a harsh and arbitrary manner ; no kind of authority 
 was for an instant conceded to him. Cyprian, who pre- 
 sided at all these synods, after reading a letter from 
 Jubaianus in which he declared his agreement with him, 
 asked that every bishop present should freely express 
 his view on the subject of the baptism of heretics, so 
 that no one should condemn or excommunicate any one 
 else who might happen to be of a different opinion ; 
 adding emphatically and significantly that no one should 
 set himself up as a bishop of bishops {episcopus episco- 
 porum), and by tyrannical terrorism force his colleagues 
 to surrender their own freedom of judgmentt 
 
 * So Hefele thinks. See his ** History of the Councils" on the 
 whole subject, vol. i. § 6. 
 
 t Given in Cyprian's works, at the head of the Sententice Episco* 
 porum de hcsreticis baptizandis. 
 
144 ST. CYPRIAN AND 
 
 There can be no doubt that these last remarks were 
 directed against Bishop Stephen of Rome : the use of 
 the phrase Episcopus episcoporiim would alone prove the 
 allusion, as this was the epithet which his "Master'' 
 Tertullian had sarcastically bestowed upon the Roman 
 bishop. The opinions of the bishops are preserved ; 
 Cyprian gave his own last ; and the decision of the 
 Council was the same as on the former occasions. Hefele 
 thinks that it was after this synod, and not the second, 
 that Stephen showed his *' great unfriendliness towards 
 the Africans." There are some difficulties both ways, 
 and the matter is of little practical importance ; but it 
 would certainly seem that the utterances of the bishops 
 at the third synod were intended as a reply to Stephen's 
 letter. One thing, however, is certain, that, as the Afri- 
 can bishops had acted with the most perfect freedom, 
 never for a moment regarding the approval of Stephen 
 as necessary, so they did not regard his displeasure as a 
 reason for changing their opinions. It has been said by 
 a Roman writer (Alzog) that Cyprian confessed the 
 primacy of the Roman See. The word occurs in the 
 spurious passage already quoted : it is also found in one 
 of his epistles (71, to Quintus), but only to reject it; and 
 in the same letter he utterly refuses to have any regard 
 for the " custom " which Stephen had pleaded, saying 
 that it is a matter of right reason and not of custom 
 (non est autem de consuetudine prcescribendum, sed ratione 
 vincendu77i). The other bishops present at the Council 
 take entirely the same line, one after another indirectly 
 rebuking Stephen and condemning his opinion. Thus 
 Fortunatus of Thuccaboris is represented as saying : * 
 * Lent, episc, 17. 
 
THE ROMAN SEE. 145 
 
 "Jesus Christ our Lord . . . founded the Church upon 
 Peter, not upon heresy." Libosus of Vaga "^ said : " Our 
 Lord in the Gospel says : ^ I am the truth/ He did not 
 say : * I am the custom ' {Ego sum, inqmf, Veritas. Non 
 dixit: Ego sum consuetudo)^ This was evidently a 
 sarcastic reference to the Roman consueiudo which had 
 been urged by Stephen. 
 
 It is of no avail to say that these bishops were re- 
 belling against their head, or that they were driven to 
 resist the authority of the Roman See by the harshness 
 of Stephen in exercising it. There is no question 
 of authority from beginning to end. The bishops are 
 consciously free and independent of all external con- 
 trol. They resent the interference of Stephen, and the 
 arguments which he seems to have employed ; but it 
 was not his manner of dictation that they disliked, it 
 was the fact of his presuming to censure his fellow- 
 bishops and equals. 
 
 Still more energetic was the protest of an Asiatic 
 bishop, Firmilian of Csesarea in Cappadocia. The 
 African decrees had been transmitted to the bishops of 
 Asia Minor, who had concurred in them, and thereby 
 had drawn down the wrath of Stephen upon themselves. 
 Firmilian's view is expressed in a letter to Cyprian (Ep. 
 75), and he certainly does not spare the Roman bishop; 
 but he says, " Let these acts of Stephen's be passed over, 
 lest, while we remember his audacity and hisolence, we 
 bring upon ourselves a longer sorrow on account of the 
 things which have been wickedly done by him " (cap. 3) ; 
 and he speaks of his alleged apostolic tradition or custom 
 as a folly and a defaming of Peter and Paul 1 
 * Lent, episc. 30. 
 
 K 
 
146 THE ROMAN SEE. 
 
 From Firmilian, too, we learn that Stephen had ap- 
 pealed to his succession from Peter and to an authority 
 therewith connected ; but those pretensions only excite 
 his indignation : " I am justly indignant," he says, " at this 
 ope7i and 7}ianif est folly of Stephen, that he who boasts of 
 the place of his episcopate, and contends that he holds 
 the succession of Peter, upon whom the foundations of 
 the Church were placed, should bring in many other 
 rocks {petras), and set up new buildings of many 
 churches" (cap. 17). Consequently, he is so far from 
 being alarmed by threats of excommunication, that he 
 regards this as a great sin, and the act of a schismatic, 
 who apostatizes from ecclesiastical unity, and who in his 
 ignorance and presumption cuts off himself, and not his 
 brethren, from the Church "^ (cap. 24). 
 
 We have not consciously misrepresented the facts 
 which the times of Cyprian present for our consideration, 
 nor the words which he has written ; and what is their 
 testimony ? Great and honourable things, no doubt, are 
 said of Peter, of the See of Peter, and of Rome. But 
 there is not a word in all the writings of St. Cyprian 
 which assigns any authority to the Bishop of Rome over 
 other bishops, and his whole life and conduct contradict 
 the notion that he entertained any such view of the 
 position of the occupant of Peter^s chair. In short, the 
 peculiar claims of the Papacy, as they were understood 
 in later times, are still wholly unknown in the Christian 
 Church. 
 
 * Vide qua inperitia tu reprehendere audeas eos qui contra 
 mendacium pro veritate nituntur , , , excidisti enim te ipsum, noli 
 te fallere. 
 
{ w ) 
 
 CHAPTER XL 
 
 TUB COUNCIL OF NICMA. ' 
 
 Importance of the Nicene Council — Bearing on the Papal claims — The 
 position, circumstances, authority of the Council — Questions de- 
 manding solution — (i) By whom'was the Council convoked? — By the 
 Emperor, as all agree — Was Pope Silvester specially consulted?— 
 Bishop Hefele's argument — Insufficient — Dr. Friedrich's remarks — 
 (2) Who presided over the Council? — Generally Bishop Hosius of 
 Corduba — Was he Papal Legate ? — No evidence of this — Shown by 
 a statement of the facts — (3) Were the decrees of the Council con- 
 firmed by the Pope ? — Hefele's arguments in support of this theory 
 — No evidence of such confirmation — Testimony of the Synod itself : 
 Canons 6 and 7 — The precedence of the- Sees referred to custom — 
 Explanations — Interpolations — The Synod knew nothing of the 
 Papal supremacy—Conclusion, 
 
 It is impossible to exaggerate the importance of the 
 Council of Nicaea in the history of the Christian Church. 
 The period at which it was held was one of the most 
 momentous. Christianity had been but lately recog- 
 nized by the Roman Empire. The principal subject 
 to be considered was the greatest which could occupy 
 the thoughts of those who professed themselves Chris- 
 tians — no less a matter than to determine whether the 
 Church was to regard her Lord as a mere man, or as 
 very God. To this we must add the fact of its accept- 
 ance not only by all subsequent ecclesiastical authority, 
 
148 THE COUNCIL OF NICJEIA, 
 
 but, generally speaking, by the universal Christian con- 
 science. 
 
 Every authority looks back to the Council of Nicsea. 
 It is accepted by the Popes of every age and the Councils 
 of every land. A teacher who contradicts its main doc- 
 trinal utterances is not regarded as a Christian in the 
 accepted sense of that word. The decisions of the 
 Council lie at the foundation of all Christian doctrine and 
 of all ecclesiastical law. These are not private opinions, 
 they are universally accepted facts. 
 
 The important bearing of this Council on the position 
 of the Bishops of Rome can be ignored by no one who has 
 a clear discernment of the point under consideration. Is 
 the Roman Bishop by Divine right supreme teacher and 
 governor of the whole Christian Churcli ? If he is, and 
 if he was from the beginning known to be such, this 
 position of his must, in some way or other, be recognized 
 by this great Council. In this assembly we have the 
 Church of Christ by its representatives solemnly con- 
 sidering the greatest theme which can be the object of 
 its contemplation, the Person of its Founder, the true 
 character of its Head. Under what conditions is that 
 assembly held ? By whose authority is it convoked ? 
 Who presides over its deliberations? Is it perfectly 
 free in its discussions, or is there a reference, open or 
 tacit, to some other authority which may set aside its 
 decisions or require their revision? Finally, when it 
 has formulated its decrees, do they need confirmation by 
 any authority external to the Council ; and, if so, of what 
 nature is that authority ? 
 
 These are questions of fundamental and incalculable 
 importance; and they have often been discussed. So 
 
THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A, 149 
 
 long as the claims of the Roman Pontiff, in their present 
 form, are put forth by one side and resisted by the other, 
 so long must these questions continue to be discussed, 
 for they are vital. Let us look at them in their relation 
 to the Bishop of Rome, and then we shall understand 
 what the defenders of the Papal power must be required 
 to prove. 
 
 These, then, are the questions which we have to ask : 
 (i.) Had the Bishop of Rome any part in the convocation 
 of the Synod of Nicaea ? We know that it was actually 
 called together by the Emperor Constantine ; but we 
 wish to know whether that was done with the concurrence 
 and co-operation of the Pope."^ (2.) Was the Bishop of 
 Rome, in any sense, the President of the Council, and 
 was he supposed to have any right to control its delibera- 
 tions? Bishop Hosius of Corduba was generally its 
 actual president : did he in any sense represent the Pope 
 in that position? (3.) Were the decrees of the Council 
 of Nicsea confirmed by the Bishop of Rome ? and were 
 they regarded as needing that confirmation, in order to 
 give them authority over the Church ? These are, as we 
 have said, vital questions, and they must be considered 
 fairly and seriously. We must be contented with reason- 
 able and probable evidence on the subject; not asking 
 for more than this, yet not being contented with less. 
 We will consider these three questions in succession. 
 
 I. The Convocation of the Council. 
 
 On this subject, to ensure accuracy and fairness, we 
 will quote the words of Hefele in his " History of the 
 
 * This name was not for long after the Council of Nicasa restricted 
 to the Bishops of Rome. 
 
ISO THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A. 
 
 Councils" (§ 24) : "* " It is impossible to determine 
 whether the Emperor Constantine acted only in his own 
 name, or in concert with the Pope, in assembHng the 
 bishops. Eusebius and the most ancient documents 
 speak only of the Emperor's part in the Council, without, 
 however, a positive denial of the participation of the Pope. 
 The Sixth CEcumenical Synod, v/hich took place in 680, 
 says, on the contrary : * Arius arose as an adversary to 
 the doctrine of the Trinity, and Constantine and Silvester 
 immediately assembled (ovnXiyov) the great synod at 
 Nicsea.' The Pontifical of Damasus affirms the same 
 fact. From that time the opinion that the Emperor and 
 the Pope had agreed together to assemble the Council 
 became more and more general; and with whatever 
 vivacity certain Protestant authors may have arrayed 
 themselves against this supposition, it certainly seems 
 probable that in such an important measure the Emperor 
 would have thought it necessary not to act without the 
 consent and co-operation of him who was recognized as 
 the first bishop of Christendom. Let us add that Rufinus 
 had already expressly said that the Emperor assembled 
 the synod ex sacerdotum senientia (in accordance with 
 the opinion of the bishops). If he consulted several 
 bishops upon the measure which he had in view, he 
 certainly would have taken the advice of the first among 
 them ; and the part of the latter in the convocation of 
 the Council must certainly have been more considerable 
 than that of the other bishops, or the Sixth Council 
 would doubtless have expressed itself in another way. 
 The testimony of this Council is here of real importance. 
 If it had been held in the West, or even at Rome, what 
 * Vol. i. p. 269 (Engl. Ed.) 
 
THE COUNCIL OF NICE A. 151 
 
 it says might appear suspicious to some critics ; but it 
 took place at Constantinople, at a period when the 
 bishops of this city were beginning to be rivals to those 
 of Rome. The Greeks formed greatly the majority of 
 the members of the Council, and consequently their 
 testimony in favour of Rome, more especially in favour 
 of the co-operation of Silvester, is very important.'' 
 
 Bishop Hefele is a writer of known learning, modera- 
 tion, and candour j and his statements are worthy of 
 respectful consideration, more especially as he confesses 
 that "it is impossible to determine" the question which 
 he argues. It is for us to give all due weight to his 
 arguments, and to consider whether he makes out any- 
 thing like a probable case for the participation of the 
 Pope in the summoning of the Nicene Council. 
 
 Assuredly our first impression is one of astonishment 
 that there should be so little evidence of any special 
 deference shown towards the Bishop of Rome on an 
 occasion of such world-wide importance. Taking the 
 view of his position which has been presented in these 
 pages, we should have found it quite natural that he 
 should be consulted before such an assembly was 
 summoned. We should have been under no necessity 
 of accepting the modern Roman theory, even if it had 
 been shown that a Pope had presided at Nicaea or the 
 representative of a Pope. But none of these things can 
 be shown, or even made probable. 
 
 If, however, we assume for a moment the Roman 
 point of view, it is utterly incomprehensible that there 
 should not be clear evidence of the influence of the Pope 
 on this great Council. Yet evidence there is none, in the 
 true sense of that word. We have given the statement 
 
152 THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A. 
 
 of the Roman argument in the words of the most learned 
 Roman historian of the Councils. We give the answer in 
 the words of Friedrich, a hardly less learned old Catholic : 
 
 ^^The only positive result is, however/' he says,* 
 ^^that Rufinust tells us that Constantine convoked the 
 Council in accordance with the opinion of the bishops {ex 
 sacerdotum sefitefiHa). It is, therefore, not improbable that 
 he consulted the Bishop of the chief city of the Empire. 
 But from the statement of Rufinus it is quite clear 
 that neither Constantine nor himself attributed decisive 
 importance to the individual judgment of the Roman 
 Bishop, even if he was consulted. If Rufinus had 
 known anything of the authority ascribed in later times 
 to the Roman Bishop in the convoking of CEcumenical 
 Councils, he would have expressed it in a decisive and 
 unambiguous manner." 
 
 Hefele admits that the authority of the Liber Pontifi- 
 calls must " be considered of slight value,'' but he insists 
 that the "importance" of that of the Sixth Council "must 
 be admitted " (1. c. p. 9). On this statement Friedrich re- 
 marks, " that it is somewhat hazardous to bring forward 
 so late a testimony to an event dating more than three 
 hundred years back, when there is no other intermediate 
 authority which can be adduced. To derive the importance 
 of the testimony from the impartiality of a synod which is, 
 for the most part, Greek, is no less hazardous ; since the 
 Greeks never attached to the co-operation of the Roman 
 Bishop, in the convoking of an CEcumenical Council, the 
 importance which was afterwards attributed to it in the 
 West. Moreover, it is a fact that the Roman Bishops 
 
 * Zur dltesten Geschichte des Prtmats, § 135 P^ge 135. 
 t Rufinus is practically contemporaneous with Augustine. 
 
THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A, 153 
 
 co-operated in the summoning of the Third and Fourth 
 GEcumenical Synods ; so that the statement of the sixth 
 was a very natural inference with reference to the first. 
 But this can give no historical value to its statement 
 respecting the Council of Nicaea." 
 
 It would be useless to continue this controversy. 
 There is, in fact, no evidence at all which any person 
 or party would accept in favour of any fact or opinion 
 which they called in question, which can be adduced to 
 prove that the Bishop of Rome had any part whatever 
 in the convoking of this Council. If the contemporaries 
 of Silvester had believed anything of the claims which 
 are now brought forward on behalf of the Roman Bishop, 
 this fact would be absolutely uninteUigible. 
 
 2. The Presidency of the Council. 
 
 As a matter of fact, the ordinary President of the 
 Nicene Council was Hosius, Bishop of Corduba ; but it 
 has been said that he was the legate of the Pope^ the 
 representative of Bishop Silvester. Was this the case ? 
 
 On this Bishop Hefele remarks (1. c. p. 270) : " As the 
 presidency of a diocesan synod belongs to the bishop, 
 of a provincial synod to the metropolitan, of a national 
 to the primate or patriarch, so, in the nature of the 
 case, the presidency of an GEcumenical Council belongs 
 to the supreme ruler of the whole Church — to the 
 Pope ; and this is so clear, that the most violent partisans 
 of the episcopal system who assign to the Pope only a 
 primacy of honour {primatus honoris)^ yet do not in the 
 least impugn his right to preside at GEcumenical Synods." 
 
 This is a very admirable statement of the case, and we 
 commend it to the consideration of our readers. As we 
 have said, it would occasion us no perplexity or surprise, 
 
154 THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A, 
 
 if we found the Bishop of Rome presiding, or his legate 
 for him, at Nicaea. That this is not found is utterly 
 incompatible with tli^e Roman claims, and shows con- 
 clusively that no great importance was attached to that 
 modest precedence which we have conceded to the 
 Bishop of the Imperial City. 
 
 "The solution of the question respecting the pre- 
 sidency of the First CEcumenical Council," says Hefele,"is 
 not without difficulty ; and the greatest acumen has been 
 displayed, and the most venturesome conjectures have 
 been made, in order to prove that in the First Council, 
 at any rate, the Pope was not the President." It would 
 be too long, and it is not necessary, to quote the whole 
 argument of Hefele, to prove that Hosius was the Pope's 
 legate ; but the facts on both sides may be easily stated. 
 
 In the first place, he disposes of the argument that 
 the Emperor Constantine was president, and rightly; for 
 the Emperor did not pretend to preside, but after his 
 opening speech, as Eusebius tells us, " made way for the 
 presidents of the synod.'''' Hefele remarks quite truly that 
 " Constantine was simply the honorary president, as the 
 Emperor Marcian was, subsequently, in the sixth session 
 of the Council of Chalcedon;" and with equal truth he 
 remarks, "it would appear that there were several pre- 
 sidents." 
 
 It is, however, generally agreed that the leading man, 
 and the one who commonly presided over the Council, 
 was Hosius of Corduba. Athanasius, who was present, 
 says of him: "Of what synod was he not president?" 
 And Socrates places him first in the list of the principal 
 members of the Council ; while his name appears at the 
 head of all the subscribing bishops. " In every copy, 
 
THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A, 155 
 
 without one exception, Hosius and the two Roman priests 
 sign the first, and afiei' them Alexander, Patriarch of 
 Alexandria, signs " (Hefele), and then follow the Bishops 
 of Antioch and Jerusalem in due order. 
 
 Now the question is : Did Hosius occupy this posi- 
 tion as representative of the Roman Bishop ? The 
 earliest evidence for this theory is Gelasius of Cyzicus, 
 who, in the fifth century, tells us that Hosius represented 
 Bishop Silvester, together with the two Roman priests 
 Vito (or Vitus) and Vincentius. It is obvious that a 
 witness so far removed from the time to which he refers 
 cannot be accepted without external confirmation of his 
 testimony ; and there is none such to be found. Hosius 
 signs first, giving no token that he represents any one 
 but himself; then follow the two Roman priests, who 
 professedly sign on behalf of Silvester, their bishop. 
 
 Hefele accounts for this difference by saying that 
 Vito and Vincentius, not being bishops, had no right to 
 sign unless as representing a bishop, whereas Hosius 
 had a right to sign on his own behalf, and therefore did 
 not need to add the same description. There are two 
 answers to this argument : (i) That at the Fourth Council 
 at Chalcedon, when the Bishop of Rome was represented 
 by episcopal legates, these bishops, in signing, indicated 
 that they were the representatives of the Roman See ; 
 and (2), it must seem very strange that, if those three 
 men all represented Bishop Silvester, although their 
 signatures stood next to each other below the decrees 
 of the Council, two of them should sign as representing 
 the Bishop of Rome, and the other should not. '^The 
 solution of the question," as Hefele remarks, "is not with- 
 out difficulty." It certainly is not without difiiculty to 
 those who hold that the Roman Bishop was the real 
 
156 THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A. 
 
 President of the Council ; and the most ardent supporter 
 of this view will hardly venture to say it is proved. 
 
 3. The Confirmation of the Decrees. 
 
 This is certainly not the least important of the three 
 questions under discussion; and it demands careful exa- 
 mination. It is not pretended that the Pope exercised 
 any direct or indirect influence on the discussions of the 
 Council. Those w^ere perfectly free ; and, as far as we 
 know, it never occurred to any one who took part in 
 them that there was anywhere in the world a sovereign 
 bishop who might interfere and reverse the conclusions 
 at which they should arrive. But it has been said that 
 the decrees of the Council could have no real validity 
 until they had received the sanction of the Roman Bishop, 
 and had been by him promulgated. We must now con- 
 sider whether this is so. 
 
 ^^ The decrees of the ancient G]]cumenical Councils," 
 says Hefele, " were confirmed by the Emperors and by 
 the Popes ; those of the later Councils by the Popes 
 alone." He then mentions that Constantine *^ solemnly 
 confirmed the Nicene creed after it had been drawn up 
 by the Council, and threatened such as would not sub- 
 scribe it with exile.'' Theodosius the Great confirmed 
 the decrees of Constantinople ; and so forth, mentioning 
 eight Councils. 
 
 He then proceeds : " The papal confirmation of all 
 these eight first CEcumenical Councils is not so clear and 
 distinct. The signatures of the Pope's legates, Hosius 
 (?), Vitus, and Vincentius, subscribed to the acts of the 
 Council before the other bishops, must be regarded 
 as a sanction from the See of Rome to the decrees of 
 Nicaea. Five documents, dating from the fifth century, 
 
THE COUNCIL OF NICJ^A, 157 
 
 mention, besides, a solemn approval of the acts of the 
 Council of Nicsea, given by Pope Silvester, &c., and a 
 Roman Synod of two hundred and seventy-five bishops. 
 It is granted that these documents are not authentic, as 
 we shall show in the history of the Council of Nicaea ; 
 but we nevertheless consider it very probable that the 
 Council of Nicaea was recognized and approved by an 
 especial act of Pope Silvester, and not merely by the 
 signature of his legates." For this he assigns four reasons, 
 which we must consider. 
 
 First, however, we must remark that the signatures of 
 the tw^o Roman priests, as the Roman legates, even if 
 we add Hosius to the number, can prove nothing as to 
 the necessity of any confirmation of the decrees of the 
 synod by the Bishop of Rome; and further, even if it 
 could be shown that the Pope did give public sanction 
 to the decisions of the synod, that could prove nothing 
 as regards the subsequent claims of the Holy See, un- 
 less it could be shown that this confirmation was sent 
 forth to the whole Church, and by the whole Church 
 accepted. 
 
 Let us next look at Hefele's reasons for believing in 
 the papal confirmation of the Nicene decrees. As we 
 have said, they are, or rather they were, four : 
 
 I. The Council of Chalcedon regarded such con- 
 firmation "as absolutely necessary;'^ and it is not likely 
 "that this was a new principle, and one that was not 
 known and recognized at the time of the Nicene 
 Council." So far the argument is a mere inference ; but 
 the fact from which it is drawn is not correctly stated. 
 The Fourth Council did not require the confirmation of 
 its decrees generally of the Pope, but only that of the 
 
158 THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A, 
 
 twenty-eighth canon, which had reference to the rank of 
 the Church of Constantinople, as the legates said they 
 had no instructions on that subject, and it was a point 
 which nearly affected the Roman See. Indeed, when 
 the Emperor Marcian afterwards asked the Bishop of 
 Rome to confirm all the decisions of the synod, Leo 
 answered that it was unnecessary. 
 
 2. A second argument is found in the fact that a 
 synod of more than forty bishops from different parts of 
 Italy, held in the year 485, declared with all definiteness 
 and confidence, '^that the three hundred and eighteen 
 bishops at Nicsea obtained the confirmation of their 
 transactions from the authority of the holy Roman 
 Church " (confir7?iationei7i rerum atque auctoritatem sanctce 
 Roma7ice. ecclesice detukrunt). On this statement two 
 remarks may be offered, first, that the testimony of a 
 synod held one hundr-ed and sixty years after the event 
 to which it refers can hardly be regarded as suflficient ; 
 and further, as Friedrich has pointed out, that the fourth 
 canon of Nicaea, to which that synod refers, does not 
 support the statement which it makes. That canon,"^ 
 speaking of the appointment of bishops, says that " the 
 confirmation of what is done (ro ok xu^og rSi/ yivo/xsvu)^) 
 shall belong in each province to the metropolitan." 
 It is quite true that there is a copy of the canons which 
 says that such an authority was assigned to the Bishop 
 of Rome as the Head of all the Churches, because of 
 Christ's words to Peter : *^ Upon this rock," &c. But it 
 is now agreed that this text is spurious ; so that the 
 assertion of the Roman Synod and this supposed testi- 
 
 * See Hefele, vol. i. § 42. 
 
THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A. 159 
 
 mony of the Nicene Council must fall to the ground 
 together. 
 
 3. Hefele's third argument consists in a statement of 
 Pope Julius I., made a few years after the close of the 
 Nicene Council, that ecclesiastical decrees (the decisions 
 of Councils) cannot have validity without the confirma- 
 tion of the Roman bishop, and that this is an ecclesias- 
 tical rule and law {canon ecdesiasticus). (The authority 
 for the statement is Socrates, Eccl. Hist, ii. 17). Hefele 
 does not himself regard this testimony as satisfactory, 
 for (§ 44) he has modified his opinion on the subject 
 since the first edition of his history was published. In 
 that he had said, " As Pope Julius filled the Holy See only 
 eleven years after the Nicene Synod, we are forced to 
 believe that such a rule must have existed at the time of 
 the Nicene Synod." In the new edition, after ^* Nicene 
 Synod," he writes : " A rule of the kind of which he 
 speaks must, at the time of the Nicene Synod, have 
 been asserted at least in Rome "^ — which is a very diffe- 
 rent thing. Even that is open to discussion ; but it need 
 not detain us longer. 
 
 A fourth argument adduced in the first edition of 
 the " History of the Councils," is silently dropped in 
 the second, so that it demands no further consideration 
 at our hands. 
 
 The conclusion which alone is justified by the facts 
 before us is simply this, that there is no evidence what- 
 ever that would be considered valid by any impartial 
 inquirer, to prove that the Bishop of Rome joined in 
 summoning the Council, or presided over it by his 
 legate, or finally confirmed its decrees after they were 
 drawn up by the Council. 
 
i6o THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A. 
 
 We must not, however, overlook an important although 
 indirect testimony on the subject, which is contained in 
 the canons of the synod. The question of the precedence 
 of the great Sees was one of the subjects discussed. 
 As we do not possess the Acts of the Council in their 
 entirety, we cannot say in what form the question came 
 up ; but we possess the decisions of the bishops in the 
 sixth and seventh canons. 
 
 To the seventh we have already referred in connection 
 with the Church of Jerusalem. The sixth refers to 
 Alexandria, Antioch, and " the other eparchies (pro- 
 vinces) ; " and incidentally to Rome. The words of the 
 canon are : '' Let the ancient customs prevail (KParsiru) 
 in Egypt, Lybia, and Pentapolis, that the Bishop of 
 Alexandria have authority (s^cvffla) over all these, as this 
 is also the custom for the Bishop in Rome. In like 
 manner, at Antioch and in the other provinces, shall the 
 seniority (ra ir^jo^ua) be preserved for the Churches.^' 
 It is beyond our purpose to consider the various ques- 
 tions which have been discussed in connection with the 
 whole contents of this canon ; but two things are quite 
 clear in the words which we have quoted; first, that 
 Alexandria is here spoken of as having a position parallel 
 or analogous to that of the Church of Rome, and secondly, 
 that the authority, priority, or seniority of these Metro- ' 
 politan Sees is not traced to a Divine appointment, but 
 is made to rest on custom. 
 
 It is the old custom {ra a^yjiTa Uri) w^hich determines 
 the position of the Bishop of Alexandria in relation to 
 the African Churches ; and it is the same with the 
 Bishop of Rome. Curiously, Hefele drops this word in 
 his translation of the canon when he comes to the part 
 
THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A. i6i 
 
 respecting Rome, and renders it ^*a like relation exists 
 for the Bishop of Rome " [fur deii Roniischen Bischof ein 
 gleiches Verhdltniss besteht). Of course there was no 
 intention, on his part, to conceal the exact statement of 
 the Council. It is necessary, however, to point out that 
 it is as we have rendered it: "also for the Bishop in 
 Rome this is customary " (xa/ ru) sv rfj *Pw<a?j sV/^rxoVw 
 
 Here, then, we find there is nothing of a tradition from 
 the apostles, nor of any positive law, determining the 
 precedence of those Sees, but only an ancient custom, 
 v/hich is to be treated with respect and preserved. For 
 practical reasons this custom is now to be solemnly 
 recognized by the Church, and so made a right belonging 
 to those Sees. It is hardly possible to suppose that the 
 bishops at Nicsea could have so worded their decree, if 
 they had been aware of any special authority belonging 
 to the Roman Bishop as the successor of St. Peter ; or 
 if they had considered that he possessed a primacy over 
 the whole Church. In their view " custom " made him 
 the senior bishop of the Western Churches just as " old 
 custom " made the Bishop of Alexandria first among the 
 African bishops. 
 
 It is but fair, however, to state the Roman view of 
 the canon in the words of its representatives. Phillips 
 remarks : " That the canon will not serve as evidence, 
 for the primacy of the Pope admits of no doubt ; " but 
 he adds : "the primacy, which had certainly no need 
 of recognition by the Council of Nicaea, is not here 
 considered." And Hefele remarks : " It must not be 
 forgotten that the Pope unites in himself several 
 ecclesiastical dignities; he is bishop, metropolitan, 
 
 L 
 
1 62 THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A. 
 
 patriarch, and lastly, primate of the whole Church. 
 Each one of these dignities may be regarded separately, 
 and that is what the canon has done : it does not con- 
 sider the Roman Bishop as Pope, nor as mere Bishop of 
 the City of Rome ; but it treats him as one of the great 
 metropolitans, which have not merely one province, but 
 several, under their jurisdiction." 
 
 These remarks are perfectly natural as coming from 
 those who believe in tire primacy of the Roman Bishop. 
 But those who can discover no satisfactory evidence of 
 this supremacy before the time of the Nicene Council will 
 find their opinion confirmed by seeing that it is entirely 
 ignored — more correctly, perhaps, it seems entirely un- 
 known — by the Council of Nicaea. They will find it 
 impossible to understand that, if it had been then recog- 
 nized by the Church, an CEcumenical Council should so 
 entirely pass it by, even when pronouncing upon subjects 
 which would naturally have led to a reference to it. 
 
 And this impression is strengthened by the fact that 
 the canon, as it stood, was not regarded as satisfactory 
 by the Latin Church, since before long a version of it 
 appeared at Rome, supplying the words which the 
 Council would have been almost certain to employ if it 
 had recognized the Roman theory. ''• In some ancient 
 Latin translations," says Hefele, "this canon begins 
 with the words, Ecclesia Roma7ia semper hahuit priijia- 
 turn (the Roman Church has always had the primacy) ; " 
 and consequently " the Emperor Theodosius IL main- 
 tained that the holy synod had confirmed the primacy 
 of the Apostolic See." Further " at the sixteenth session 
 of the Fourth CEcumenical Synod at Chalcedon, the 
 
THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A, 163 
 
 Roman Legate Paschasinus read the sixth canon," as 
 commencing with the words quoted above. 
 
 It has been asserted that, from the acceptance of this 
 version of the canon, the Fourth Council recognized and 
 confirmed the Roman primacy. Even if this were so, 
 it would prove nothing as regards the Nicene Council ; 
 but in fact the declaration of the imperial commissioners 
 at Chalcedon falls far short of the claims which are now 
 put forth on the Roman side : *' We acknowledge," they 
 said, after hearing the papal legate on the one side and 
 the canons of Constantinople on the other, '^ that the 
 most ancient right of all, and the pre-eminence (r^jv 
 s^a/^sTov Ttixriv) belong to the Archbishop of Old Rome ; 
 but that the same pre-eminence of honour (ra cr^gj/SsTa 
 Trig '^iMi) ought to be given to the Archbishop of New 
 Rome." 
 
 The facts in connection with the Council of Nicaea, 
 as far as they bear on the Roman primacy, are now 
 sufficiently before the reader. It is admitted on all 
 hands that the Council of Nicoea did not formally 
 recognize the primacy of the Bishop of Rome over the 
 whole Church, or in any way refer to it. The real 
 questions which arise when we ask how far the Papal 
 claims are supported, or the reverse, by the transactions 
 of the Council, are these : Is it likely that the Council 
 would have thus expressed itself on the subject of the 
 great patriarchates, if it had understood that Rome was 
 set over them all, and its bishop was the sovereign of 
 the whole Church ? And further : Do the admitted facts 
 in connection with this Council agree best with the 
 modern Roman theory, or with the position which we 
 have assigned to the Roman Bishop after an examination 
 
1 64 THE COUNCIL OF NIC^A. 
 
 of all the early documents which bear upon the sub- 
 ject ? 
 
 We have stated the case as fairly as we can. The 
 reader must judge for himself whether our inference is 
 just — that the Nicene Council admitted nothing, and 
 knew nothing, of the Papal claims to a sovereignty over 
 the Christian Church. 
 
( i65 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 POST-NICENE TESTIMONY, 
 
 Tlie early Church ignorant of modern Papal claims — How do we account, 
 then, for the rise of the Papal power ? — Further facts considered — 
 The Papal claims never universally accepted— Traces of gradual 
 Papal aggressions— The Council of Sardica — Third canon — Appeals 
 to the Roman Bishop — Fifth canon — Inconsistent with Papal claims 
 — Council of Constantinople — Second canon — Third canon — The 
 greatness of the cities, not the apostolic origin of the sees, deter- 
 mined their precedence — Growth of Roman Papal power explained 
 — Illustrated from secular history — Papal power and influence— The 
 real question. 
 
 If we have shown that Primitive Christianity knew 
 nothing of modern Papal pretensions, we have accom- 
 pUshed our undertaking : and this we believe we have 
 satisfactorily made out. Let it be clearly understood 
 what we mean by this. It is not merely that the Papal 
 pretensions were resented and its aggressions resisted. 
 It is much more than this. Those pretensions, in their 
 modern form, were never put forward at all — were never 
 so much as heard of. 
 
 If this has not been made out, our case has failed : if 
 it has been established, then the demands of the Roman 
 See and the Roman Church must be resisted to the 
 death. From such a quarter we can accept no help in 
 our hour of need, no deliverance from any difficulties, 
 
1 66 POST'NICENE TESTIMONY, 
 
 however embarrassing; for the simple reason that we 
 cannot be helped by falsehood. And this is the plain 
 alternative, as our antagonists will concede. The de- 
 mands of Rome are either the authoritative utterances 
 of Christ's living representative on earth, or they are a 
 falsehood. If they are the former, we owe instant and 
 penitent submission ; if the latter, we cannot give place 
 to them for an hour, or a second. 
 
 If these claims cannot be discovered in the Church 
 up to the time of the Council of Nicaea, we may unhesi- 
 tatingly decide that they are not divine, but human ; 
 that they are not a part of the original institution of the 
 Christian Church, but a subsequent introduction. We 
 might therefore now hold our hand, and leave the facts 
 and arguments which have already been adduced to the 
 candid consideration of our readers. 
 
 It may be well, however, to glance at one argument 
 from the Roman side, which has already been noticed, 
 but which is sometimes put forth in a more definite form, 
 with special reference to the age which follows after the 
 Council of Nicaea. ^' How do we account '' — this is the 
 question which is put to us — " for the universal accept- 
 ance of the Roman claims? and more particularly, how 
 do we account for the manner in which the Council of 
 Ephesus received the pretensions of St. Leo ? " 
 
 It is not altogether impossible to answer this question, 
 although our failure to do so would in no way invaUdate 
 the conclusions at which we have arrived. It may, how- 
 ever, be well to ask whether we have not, in the fourth 
 century, further evidence against the modern claims of 
 the Roman Church, as well as certain facts which will 
 help us to understand the growth of the Papal power. 
 
POST-NICENE TESTIMONY, 167 
 
 For a complete discussion of the subject, the reader 
 must go to the ecclesiastical histories, and to works 
 which have dealt formally with this portion of the subject 
 of the supremacy. We must restrict ourselves to certain 
 points which bear directly upon the question before us. 
 
 We remark, then, that the claims put forth by Pope 
 Leo, especially as they were understood by the Council, 
 were very different from those of the modern Popes ; and 
 further, that the supposed universality of the acceptance 
 of the Roman supremacy is not an historical fact. There 
 is no period in the whole history of Christianity in which 
 the Eastern Churches acknowledged the Bishop of Rome 
 as the supreme governor of the Church, although they 
 did recognize his precedence or seniority. 
 
 It is not, however, denied that the encroachments of 
 the Roman See upon the liberties of other bishops and 
 Churches made great progress after the adoption of 
 Christianity as the religion of the empire j and it may 
 be well to mark some traces of these encroachments, 
 especially as they are found in the most trustworthy 
 documents, the decrees of Councils. 
 
 Two of these are of great interest and importance in 
 their bearing upon the Papal claims, and have been 
 frequently discussed at great length. We refer to canons 
 passed at the Council of Sardica (344), and to two of 
 the canons of Constantinople (381). Many questions 
 have been raised respecting the Council of Sardica — 
 whether it was oecumenical, a question which has generally 
 been answered in the negative ; whether it may be 
 regarded as a continuation of the Council of Nicaea, 
 which at one time seemed to be the Roman view; and 
 other questions. Into these we can here enter no 
 
i68 POST-NICENE TESTIMONY. 
 
 further than to remark that, beyond doubt, the Synod of 
 Sardica cannot be regarded as having equal authority 
 with that of Nicaea."^ 
 
 It is to a part of the third canon of this Council, as 
 proposed by Hosius who presided, and accepted by the 
 bishops present, that we must draw particular attention. 
 The canon first states that bishops are not to go from 
 their own province to another unless they are invited 
 by their brethren ; and further, that, in a general way, 
 quarrels between bishops should not be settled by a 
 bishop from another province ; yet, the canon goes on, 
 **If any one of the bishops has been condemned in any 
 matter, and thinks that he has a good cause, so that the 
 trial should again be renewed : if it seem good to your 
 charity, let us honour the memory of the [holy] Apostle 
 Peter, so that those who have judged the case may write 
 to Julius, the Bishop of Rome, and if he shall judge that 
 the case should be reopened, this may be done, and he 
 may appoint judges." t 
 
 The subject of this canon is further dealt with in the 
 fifth, from which we extract the latter part. After saying 
 that the Roman Bishop may have the question tried by the 
 nearest bishops, it goes on: "But if the appellant can 
 induce the Bishop of Rome to send priests of his own to 
 be judges along with the appointed bishops, which priests 
 shall possess the authority of him by whom they are 
 appointed, it shall be at his discretion to do so. But if 
 
 * For a fuller discussion of the subject, see Hussey's '*Rise of the 
 Papal Power." 
 
 t The Greek and Latin texts (apparently both original) differ 
 considerably in expression, but the meaning of both is the same. 
 
POST-NICENE TESTIMONY, 169 
 
 he should think the bishops alone sufficient to finish the 
 business, he shall do what he thinks most wise.""^ 
 
 ^' A violent controversy," says Hefele, ** has arisen 
 between the Galilean and Curiahst theologians respecting 
 the meaning of this canon/' It is well known that in 
 certain cases of appeals to Rome, the Papal theologians 
 quoted these canons as being put forth by the Council 
 of Nicaea, a statement which the African bishops called 
 in question, as they said they could not find them in 
 their copy of the Nicene canons. 
 
 Even this fact is significant. Here we find the Bishop 
 of Rome supporting his claims, not on the ground of 
 Divine right, conferred by our Lord upon St. Peter, and 
 by him transmitted to his successors in the Roman See ; 
 but on the ground of the canons of a provincial synod, 
 which he (probably by mistake) joins on to the great 
 Synod of Nicaea. 
 
 Now, the question is simply inevitable : If the Bishop 
 of Rome had these supreme powers, what need was there 
 to refer to these or any canons as conferring such rights 
 upon him ? According to the Roman theory, the Pope 
 was acknowledged to be the successor of St. Peter, and 
 as such had an inherent right to reverse the decisions of 
 all other bishops, and to give or refuse his confirmation 
 to the decrees of all synods. These powers were not 
 only claimed by the Roman bishops, but universally 
 understood and conceded to them. If this theory be 
 true, it is perfectly unintelligible that regulations such as 
 those made at Sardica should have found their way into 
 the canons of a synod. What need was there to confer 
 such slender powers upon one to whom all power 
 * Hefele, § 64 (Vol. ii. p. 120 Eng. Trans.). 
 
4 
 
 1 70 POST-NICENE TESTIMONY. 
 
 belonged? What could such enactments add to the 
 authority of one who was already, and was acknowledged 
 to be, the Vicar of Christ upon earth ? 
 
 But this is not all. How could the Pope appeal to 
 these canons if he had no need of them? and, more 
 wonderful still, how could the bishops of another pro- 
 vince call in question his power of hearing appeals, and 
 argue with him the validity of the very canons on which 
 he based his rights? Yet all this actually took place. 
 We do not here enter into particular cases, or the merits 
 of them, or their final decision. These points are all 
 beside the question. What we are now considering is 
 the possibility of reconciling these unquestioned facts 
 with the claims and pretensions of the Roman See. If 
 the historical view, which we have here endeavoured to 
 present, is true, all becomes perfectly intelligible. The 
 power of the Roman See is growing quite naturally out 
 of the circumstances in which it is placed ; but it is a 
 power which was not derived from Christ or St. Peter, 
 but which was freely given by the other churches, or 
 forcibly wrested from them, as the occasion served. 
 
 The inconsistency here involved is so great that we 
 might safely leave it to be considered as an argument 
 to be well weighed on the one side, or as a difficulty to 
 be accounted for on the other. But the actual contents 
 of the canon should not be overlooked, nor the nature 
 of the power which it confers upon the Roman Bishop. 
 In the first place, the power itself is of a very limited 
 description. It gives the Pope no right of interference ; 
 but simply the power of appointing judges to hear ap- 
 peals if any should be brought before him : a regulation 
 which must have proved most useful and convenient, 
 
POST-NICENE TESTIMONY. 171 
 
 and which has something analogous to it in almost every 
 Church of Christendom. 
 
 A second thing to be noted in the canon is, that it 
 does not confer these powers and privileges upon the 
 Popes in general, but upon the particular Bishop of 
 Rome who was then living. It is quite true that the 
 fourth and fifth canons refer simply to the Bishop of 
 Rome without naming Julius, as the third does; but 
 it may be that the reference is still to the same. In any 
 case, the difficulty has been felt by Roman commentators 
 on these canons, who have in some cases attempted to 
 show that the reading is corrupt. 
 
 One other point may be noted. Each of these canons 
 begins with the words: *' Bishop Hosius said," implying 
 that he, as president, submitted these proposals to the 
 assembly of the bishops ; and we have seen that in the 
 third canon he distinctly introduces the words, '4fit 
 pleases you " (in the Latin copy), or " if it pleases your 
 charity" (in the Greek copy). What can these words 
 mean, if not, that it was in the power of the Council to 
 grant or refuse this right of appeal to the Roman Bishop? 
 Again we ask : Is the principle involved in this proceed- 
 ing compatible with an acknowledgment of the primacy 
 of jurisdiction claimed by the See of Rome? 
 
 We pass to the Council of Constantinople (381), and 
 draw attention to its second canon, which begins as 
 follows : " The bishops of another diocese shall not pass 
 over to foreign Churches, and introduce confusion among 
 them; but, in accordance with the canons, the Bishop of 
 Alexandria shall govern the affairs of Egypt only, and 
 the Eastern Bishops shall have charge of the affairs of 
 the East only, while the rights of the Antiochene Church, 
 
172 POST-NICENE TESTIMONY, 
 
 as declared in the sixth canon of Nicaea, shall be pre- 
 served, and the bishops of the dioceses of Asia [that is, 
 the western side of Asia Minor] shall have jurisdiction 
 only over Asia, those of the dioceses of Pontus over 
 Pontus, and those of the dioceses of Thrace over 
 Thrace.'' 
 
 There is no exception made in favour of Rome as 
 universal metropolis : it is simply ignored, as having no 
 control whatsoever over the Eastern Churches. This 
 happens, the Roman advocates tell us, because there 
 was no question made of the Papal primacy ; but it 
 must be admitted as at least remarkable that in so many 
 places, in which it might seem the most natural thing 
 possible to refer to the Roman power, if it had been 
 acknowledged, we find not the most distant allusion 
 to it. 
 
 The third canon should also be noticed : " The Bishop 
 of Constantinople shall hold the first rank after the Bishop 
 of Rome, because Constantinople is New Rome." This 
 canon throws light on the nature of the precedence given 
 to the several bishops, and also to the reason on which 
 it was founded. Up to this time Alexandria, supreme 
 in its own province, had held the place in the whole 
 Church next to Rome ; now Constantinople is elevated 
 to the second place. 
 
 The position here assigned to Constantinople was 
 resisted at Rome, and was never fully recognized ; but 
 this is of no importance for our present purpose. What 
 we would point out is, that the Council, while admitting 
 the precedence or seniority of the See of Rome, is evi- 
 dently unaware of any authority which it possesses over 
 the other Churches; and further, that we have here, 
 
POST-NICENE TESTIMONY. 173 
 
 again, an explanation of the position conceded to the 
 Church of Rome. It was the first of Churches because 
 Rome was the first of cities. Up to this time Alexandria, 
 and not Antioch (the traditional See of Peter), was the 
 second in priority; but now Constantinople, as *^New 
 Rome," is to be elevated into the second place. There 
 is nothing said of any apostolic chair, nothing of any 
 succession from one or more of the Apostles. Rome, 
 Constantinople, Alexandria; these are the three great 
 cities of the Roman Empire ; and therefore they are the 
 three first thrones in the Christian Church. 
 
 It is obvious that, as we follow the history of the 
 Church, we obtain increasing light upon the development 
 of the Papal pretensions. Step by step, as the Church 
 goes forward, does this central authority advance with 
 it, making its presence, its influence, and its power felt 
 increasingly in all parts of the world. As we consider 
 attentively the circumstances in which it is placed, the 
 history of the ages through which it passes, we find no 
 great difficulty in understanding how it was that the 
 growing pretensions of the Roman See were finally 
 acquiesced in by the Western Churches. 
 
 This is the question which, Roman advocates tell us, 
 it is impossible to answer. It is in fact not even difficult 
 to explain, when the whole circumstances of the case are 
 considered. First of all, we have priority or seniority, 
 at one time of Jerusalem, at another of Antioch, finally 
 of Rome. Then we have appeals allowed and actually 
 carried to the senior bishop of Christendom ; and to 
 whom should they be carried with so much propriety ? 
 Yet this is not allowed at first ; and it was probably 
 never admitted as a universal principle by the Oriental 
 
174 POST-NICENE TESTIMONY. 
 
 Churches. Then, again, the love of unity, so strongly 
 exemplified in St. Cyprian, for instance, led to the 
 recognition of Rome as a convenient centre. To this 
 great metropolis all civil causes were carried ; how could 
 a better court of appeal be found for all ecclesiastical 
 causes ? 
 
 Is it strange that the authority to whom it was given 
 to decide these difficulties and controversies should 
 gradually usurp a power which it did not originally pos- 
 sess ? Is it strange that the decision of a cause which 
 w^as originally regarded as belonging to the Synod or 
 the Council should come to be ascribed to the bishop, 
 and that this bishop should become more and more 
 absolute? It was, in fact, quite natural. Or, again, 
 that this bishop who became supreme judge in matters 
 of discipline and the like, should arrogate to himself the 
 right to sit in judgment on doctrine? This, too, is not 
 at all difficult to understand. It was but the response 
 to the desire for certainty, which was almost as readily 
 received as it was offered. When people tell us that 
 the Bishop of Rome ought to be listened to, because he 
 alone can give us that certainty for which we crave and 
 which we have a right to expect, they are in fact answer- 
 ing that other question, as to how the Church came to 
 acquiesce in the Papal pretensions. They are telling us 
 that men grow weary, of doubts and difficulties — grow 
 weary, in short, of the discipline which God has ordained 
 for us all, and gladly listen to any one who professes to 
 give them certainty and rest from their doubts, and so 
 accept the Papal authority without inquiring too carefully 
 into the grounds on which it rests. 
 
 We might as w^ell ask : How came the English 
 
POST-NICENE TESTIMONY. 175 
 
 people to acquiesce in the tyranny of Henry VIII ? 
 Or better still : How came the French people to sub- 
 mit to the tyranny of Louis XIV ? The question is 
 almost exactly parallel to the Roman inquiry? How 
 came the other bishops to submit to the tyranny of the 
 Bishop of Rome? France had its Dukes and Counts 
 and local Parliaments — all having a certain independence 
 of their own. By degrees the necessity became apparent 
 for a great central authority which should give unity to 
 the whole, and thus present a strong defence against ex- 
 ternal enemies. Not at once, but by slow degrees, w^as 
 this unity brought about. It was after generations of 
 conflict that the whole power of France, legislative and 
 administrative, came to be centred in the king ; and it 
 was also by slow degrees, by revolutions and counter- 
 revolutions, by long and bloody conflicts, which some 
 think not yet terminated, that this central autocratic 
 power was broken. By the very same process the 
 autocracy of the Bishop of Rome came to be established ; 
 by a very similar process, now going on, sometimes 
 visibly, sometimes invisibly, that power will be broken 
 down and destroyed. 
 
 Indeed, the illustration adduced not only throws light 
 upon the history of the past, it may help us to under- 
 stand something of what is passing before our eyes in 
 the present. The discontent which is often expressed 
 with the difiiculties and uncertainties Avhich are ex- 
 perienced by members of the English Church — a dis- 
 content which has led many to cast themselves into the 
 arms of self-styled infallibility — finds its parallel in the 
 dissatisfaction with which some persons regard con- 
 stitutional government. We have heard English people 
 
176 POST-NICENE TESTIMONY, 
 
 lament the good old times when an English king was 
 almost as absolute as the Emperor of Russia is now — 
 little thinking how gladly that Emperor would abandon 
 his autocracy, if he could trust his people as an English 
 sovereign can ; forgetting, too, how ill it fared, com- 
 paratively, with the English people when they were 
 subject to such an authority. 
 
 Let us suppose a case. Take any ordinary English 
 man or woman who has given but little thought to what 
 we call constitutional history, or who has not much 
 knowledge of the condition of nations under various 
 forms of government Let such a person go and 
 see the United States of America with its republican 
 government ; let him then see, if that were possible, the 
 Court of Versailles under Louis XIV. We are putting 
 the contrast as strongly as possible. Let us even suppose 
 that it is a highly cultivated American citizen who is 
 studying the two pictures. What are his emotions ? In 
 many cases such an one would be utterly shocked and 
 disgusted by the phenomena of the young Republic, with 
 its selfish place-hunters and its ill-regulated discussions, 
 and its general meanness and vulgarity. On the other 
 side, there is dignity, refinement, culture — a majesty 
 which awes, enthrals, and fascinates. It would be a 
 strong brain that could contemplate the two pictures 
 without deciding to prefer the latter, unless he looked 
 carefully below the surface of things. Yet a philanthro- 
 pist who is also a careful student of history will come to 
 a different conclusion. America is probably not a model 
 Republic ; but it knows, with all its faults, much more of 
 righteousness, equity, humanity, and general human well- 
 being than the splendid Ancien I'egime under Louis XIV. 
 
POST-NICENE TESTIMONY, 177 
 
 If those who are disturbed by the tumults of freedom in 
 the Enghsh Communion, and fascinated by the antiquity, 
 splendour, and apparent repose of the Roman Church, 
 were to look a little below the surface, they might dis- 
 cover bondage and disease under the papal cloth of 
 gold, and liberty and health under the simpler attire of 
 the reformed faith. 
 
 These illustrations, it may be said, prove nothing. 
 They are not adduced to prove anything. The ques- 
 tions which give occasion for them prove nothing ; even 
 if we had no answer to them, our failure to explain 
 the problem which they suggest could establish no solid 
 foundation for claims so extensive and universal as those 
 of the Roman Pontiff. But we believe we have thrown 
 light upon that problem ; we have shown some of the 
 steps by which the Bishop of Rome advanced from the 
 position conceded to him in early times of being first 
 among equals [primus inter pares) ^ to that which he now 
 claims of supreme pontiff, universal bishop, and sove- 
 reign ruler of the whole Christian Church. 
 
 While, however, we believe that any one who carefully 
 follows the indications which we have presented, will be 
 able to understand something of the growth of the Papal 
 power in the ages through which its history has extended, 
 we must again draw attention to the real point under 
 consideration. Did our Lord Jesus Christ give to St. 
 Peter the place of supreme teacher and governor among 
 the Apostles, and over the Church? Did St. Peter trans- 
 mit those powers to the Roman Pontiff? Did the Bishop 
 of Rome assert those powers, and were they conceded 
 to him in the first ages of the Christian Church? We 
 answer all these questions in the negative. We have 
 
 M 
 
178 POST-NICENE TESTIMONY, 
 
 examined with the utmost care and candour the testi- 
 monies of the sacred writers, and of the earliest Fathers 
 of the Christian Church, and they know nothing of these 
 pretensions. On the contrary, their words and their 
 acts are utterly incompatible with any acceptance, or 
 even any knowledge of such a theory. 
 
C 179 ) 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE CATHOLIC FAITH 
 
 Objection : no security for the Catholic faith in the English Church — 
 Rests upon the assumption that Roman teaching is true — This, the 
 very point to be proved — The objection used as a subsidiary argu- 
 ment in behalf of Roman claims — The Catholic Faith — What it 
 means— (i) All religious truth (even if truth) not of equal import- 
 ance—Opinion and faith illustrated — (2) The multiplication of 
 dogmas — Not desirable — Not scriptural or primitive — Necessity of 
 doctrinal definitions conceded — Creed of Nicaea — Contrasted with 
 recent Roman definitions — English formularies and ecclesiastical 
 courts— What do the formularies teach ? — Compared with primitive 
 doctrine— The demands of the Bishop of Rome make it impossible 
 to give him his old position in the Church — Decisions of ecclesias- 
 tical courts — The Gorham case — The Bennett case— Essays and 
 reviews — Conclusion. 
 
 We might leave the question respecting the Papal 
 claims to the consideration of the reader, and refuse 
 to be drawn aside to any secondary or subordinate 
 points in the discussion. But there is one argument 
 which is frequently urged, of a character so specious 
 and plausible that, however little value we may our- 
 selves attach to it, we cannot safely pass it by. We 
 refer to the objection often urged that there is no 
 security that the Catholic faith will be taught in the 
 Church of England ; nay, worse than this, that no one 
 
i8o THE CATHOLIC FAITH 
 
 can be sure that he will not be forced to listen to the 
 teaching of heresy from her pulpits. 
 
 We say the argument is a plausible one, and we are 
 aware that it has actually been the means of unsettling 
 the minds of unwary members of the English Church. 
 It is quite obvious, however, when we examine it closely, 
 that it rests upon an assumption, and not upon an ac- 
 knowledged or demonstrated truth. It rests upon the 
 assumption that the teaching of the Church of Rome is 
 the "Catholic Faith;" and this is the very thing which 
 has to be proved, and which we deny. 
 
 Let us make this quite clear. If the Roman claims 
 be well founded, then the English position is both schis- 
 matical and heretical. It is in that case of no use 
 whatever going into details, and saying that in such a 
 Church you may have a modified Catholicity, and in 
 such another almost undisguised heresy. If the Pope 
 be the Vicar of Christ — supreme teacher and ruler of 
 the Church — it is ridiculous for us to draw up a scheme 
 of what we call the Catholic faith, apart from his utter- 
 ances, and then ask how far that scheme is recognised 
 by the clergy of the English Church. Assuming the 
 truth of the Roman claims, we have no right whatever 
 to engage in any such examination; we have only to 
 submit to the authority of the Pope, and accept his 
 teaching. 
 
 On the other hand, if this be not proved concerning 
 the Bishop of Rome — if we say (as we do) that there is 
 no adequate and satisfactory proof that he is the Vicar 
 of Christ, then the imperfections of Enghsh teaching can 
 furnish no reason whatever for accepting another system 
 which we do not believe to be true. And yet this would 
 
THE CATHOLIC FAITH i8i 
 
 seem to be the tendency of the argument, if it has any 
 force at all. 
 
 Let us look at it again and mark the alternative with 
 which we confront it. "You cannot be sure/' says the 
 Roman, " that you will not have heresy instead of Catho- 
 lic truth in the Church of England." We reply — before 
 even looking at the evidences furnished for such a charge 
 against the English Church : '^ This argument is abso- 
 lutely worthless; for whatever the teaching of the English 
 Church may be, we have no right to reinain ifi it if the 
 Roman claims are valid ; and, on the other hand, 7ve 
 have no right to go to Rome if these claims are invalid ; 
 whatever the doctrinal condition of the English Church 
 and clergy may be." 
 
 Is this a fair alternative? The Roman controver- 
 sialist cannot and will not deny it. We might therefore 
 treat this particular argument as absolutely worthless, 
 and leave it. But we cannot be unaware that it is used 
 as a kind of subsidiary evidence in favour of the 
 Roman claims and against the English position; and 
 from this point of view it requires some further con- 
 sideration. It might be inferred, moreover, that we 
 admitted the truth of the accusation against the English 
 Church if we were to dismiss it without actually facing 
 its contents. 
 
 The meaning of the argument so employed, may be 
 thus stated : There is a body of doctrine which is gener- 
 ally accepted by Christians as forming what may be 
 called the '^ Catholic faith." Now this body of doctrine 
 (however much there may be besides) is actually held 
 by the Roman Church, enunciated in its authoritative 
 formularies, taught by its clergy, and cannot in any of 
 
1 82 THE CATHOLIC FAITH 
 
 its parts be contradicted by any of its teachers. There- 
 fore you are sure that you will be taught this Catholic 
 faith in the Church of Rome. On the other hand, you 
 are not sure of this in the Church of England. Some 
 of the clergy of that Church will deny portions of this 
 faith, and you will be forced to listen to what you con- 
 sider heresy. Is it not then — here is the point of the 
 argument — is it not more likely that the Church of Rome 
 is right, than that the Church of England is right? See- 
 ing that the Church of Rome teaches all that you regard 
 as Catholic truth, while the Church of England may not, 
 is it not more probable that the Church of Rome is the 
 true Church, and that her other doctrines are also true, 
 seeing that she is thus faithful to that which you regard 
 as Catholic truth ? 
 
 The argument in this form is ingenious and specious, 
 especially as addressed to the adherents of one particular 
 school in the Church of England. But we must again 
 observe that it rests upon a double assumption — first, that 
 all doctrines are of about equal importance; and secondl)^, 
 that it is desirable to multiply the number of articles of 
 faith, to define a great many points of Christian opinion 
 as being matters of faith, instead of leaving them open. 
 It is necessary that we should examine this double 
 assumption with some care. 
 
 I. With regard to the first, that all religious truths 
 (even if it be granted that they are truths) are of equal 
 importance, we can have no hesitation in negativing the 
 supposition at once. Let us illustrate this statement 
 from certain opinions which have, in some Christian 
 communities, been put forth as dogmas, and which at 
 one time seemed hkely to gain that position in the 
 
THE CATHOLIC FAITH 183 
 
 Roman Church. Take, for instance, the teaching of 
 St. Augustine in opposition to the Pelagians. There 
 can be no doubt among Christians now that, in that 
 controversy, St. Augustine was substantially in the right. 
 In asserting the necessity of Divine grace in order to the 
 fulfilling of the Divine law, he maintained a principle 
 which is accepted by all Christian Churches as vital. 
 But Augustine went far beyond this, and made asser- 
 tions respecting the operation of Divine grace which the 
 Church of Rome has refused to approve. Let us suppose 
 that the whole Western Church had accepted, as the 
 Calvinists have done, these opinions of Augustine as 
 dogmas, would any one pretend that they were of equal 
 importance with the fundamental principles of his system 
 which are now held almost universally } 
 
 Take an illustration from the present authoritative 
 teaching of the Church of Rome. Until a {^^n years 
 ago the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin 
 and the infallibility of the Pope were open questions ; 
 any Roman Catholic might deny them. At that time, 
 then, even those who believed them to be true regarded 
 them as of subordinate importance in the Christian 
 system. If they are raised to an equal importance with 
 the doctrine of the Godhead of Christ, for example, it 
 cannot be from their intrinsic value — for quite recently 
 they might be denied — but from the accident of their 
 being defined at a certain time. 
 
 2. This question is intimately connected with the 
 second mentioned, the desirableness of multiplying the 
 articles of faith in the Christian Church. This, indeed, 
 is a point of real importance in connection with the 
 controversy between England and Rome; and it is 
 
1 84 THE CATHOLIC FAITH. 
 
 perhaps the real point which is involved in the argu- 
 ment which we are now considering. 
 
 Mark the point. It is said that we have no security 
 that the whole Catholic faith shall be taught in the 
 English Church. Our answer is, that we have the same 
 security for the teaching of what we regard as the 
 Catholic faith that the Roman Church has for the 
 teaching of its view of the faith. But we maintain that 
 it is undesirable that the articles of the faith, which are 
 to be believed as necessary to salvation, should be 
 greatly multiplied. We believe that it is safer in the 
 interests of the faith itself, and more conducive to the 
 spiritual well-being of Christian men and women, that 
 many questions which Rome has decided as matters of 
 faith should be left open as matters of opinion. 
 
 One thing at least is clear, that the original require- 
 ments in order to Christian communion were few and 
 simple. When the Apostles preached to Jews and 
 Gentiles the glorious gospel of the Blessed God, they 
 demanded first a profession of faith in Christ ; secondly, 
 that the professing believer should be baptized with 
 water in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy 
 Ghost, and in this way become a member of the Chris- 
 tian Church ; and thirdly, that he should live as one 
 who had given himself to God through Jesus Christ 
 our Lord. This was all. It was quite clear that there 
 was no disposition on the part of the apostles to 
 multiply dogmas, or require exact conformity with 
 their own opinions from the members of the Church 
 of that age. 
 
 So far we are all agreed. But the Roman will remark 
 with perfect truth that it became necessary, in the course 
 
THE CATHOLIC FAITH, 185 
 
 of time, to define more exactly those doctrines which 
 were from the beginning essential portions of the Chris- 
 tian faith. This, we say, is perfectly true. When a man 
 said, ^* I beheve in Jesus Christ, '^ he was understood to 
 attach a certain meaning to the great Name which he 
 confessed ; and that meaning was so well understood 
 in the Church, that for a time there was no need to 
 define it closely. Even when Ebionitism arose, making 
 of Christ a mere man, and Gnosticism, which denied His 
 proper humanity, there was for a long time no formal 
 definition against these dangerous errors. But when 
 Arianism began to spread abroad in the Church, it 
 became necessary not to make a new doctrine — that 
 was not then thought of — but to say clearly what the 
 Church believed, and always had believed, concerning 
 the person of her Lord. Now, she had believed always 
 that he was very God and very man ; and that is what 
 she meant to say by drawing up the Creed of Nicaea, 
 aud subsequently, by universally accepting it. The 
 particular terms of that confession were valuable only as 
 setting forth clearly those truths. The reason for insist- 
 ing that the Arianizing party should accept them was 
 simply this : that, in rejecting that form of words, they 
 meant to reject the proper Godhead of Christ. If a 
 Catholic bishop had been told, after the Council of 
 Nicaea, that he had helped to make a new dogma, he 
 would have denied the truth of the accusation at once. 
 If he had been told that he had conclusively shut up 
 that which had previously been an open question, he 
 would have said that this was an entire misunderstanding 
 of their intention and their work. They had simply put 
 the faith of the Church into language which did not now 
 
1 86 THE CA THOLIC FA 1 TH, 
 
 admit of evasion. But in all its length and breadth it 
 was the old faith and nothing more. 
 
 A moment's reflection will show that this was a very 
 different procedure from the recent definitions of the 
 Church of Rome. The doctrine of the Immaculate Con- 
 ception, for example, is not the mere statement of a 
 dogma which was held in other forms before. The thing 
 had been stated centuries ago as clearly as it is stated 
 now; but formerly it might be negatived, now it must be 
 affirmed. And this, as we have said, not with reference to 
 any mere form of expression, but with regard to the very 
 question and the very foundation of the question which 
 is now supposed to be settled. It is then a new doctrine : 
 new as a doctrine in its essential meaning, as well as in 
 its formal expression. It was quite different with the 
 articles of the Nicene Creed. In their meaning they 
 were never open questions in the Church; and the new 
 form was only adopted in order effectually to preserve 
 the old meaning. These statements can be further 
 verified by taking the various articles of the Nicene 
 Creed in detail, and considering their relation to the 
 previous teaching of the Church, and then contrasting 
 them with the new dogmas of the Church of Rome in 
 their relation to the teaching of primitive Christianity. 
 
 But it is said that even in this narrower sense of the 
 Catholic faith there is no security for its being taught 
 in the English Church ; first, because of the indefiniteness 
 of our doctrinal formularies, and secondly, because of 
 the decisions of our ecclesiastical courts. It is important 
 to consider how far these allegations are true, and to 
 what extent they may be used against the English 
 Church and in support of the Roman position. 
 
THE CATHOLIC FAITH 187 
 
 With regard to the language of our doctrinal for- 
 mularies : while we consider the large amount of 
 liberty w4iich they allow to be almost an unmingled 
 benefit, we admit that we are bound to test their con- 
 tents by the primitive and Catholic teaching of the 
 Christian Church. And in doing so, we must ask such 
 questions as the following : — 
 
 1. Does the Church of England teach what was taught 
 by the early Church? This is the general question. 
 But we may put it a little more definitely. 
 
 2. Does the Church of England leave any doctrine as 
 an open question which was not so left by the Catholic 
 Church in the first ages ? Again, 
 
 3. Does the Church of England tolerate any teaching 
 which the early Church condemned? 
 
 4. Does the Church of England deny anything which 
 the early Church affirmed ? 
 
 We say the early Church, by which we mean here the 
 Church of the first four centuries. If we take the whole 
 doctrine of the Church of Rome, and call that the 
 Catholic faith, then of course there is an end to the 
 whole question. And this we believe to be the assump- 
 tion commonly involved in the argument now under 
 consideration. But this is begging the whole question, 
 this is assuming the point which has to be proved. The 
 supposition which we are now examining is that of the 
 existence of a body of truth which was known in the 
 first ages as the authoritative teaching of the Christian 
 Church. We have extended this primitive period to the 
 end of the fourth century, and we are asking whether 
 the Church of England teaches as those four centuries 
 taught ; bears the same witness against doctrinal errors 
 
1 88 THE CATHOLIC FAITH, 
 
 which was borne by those four centuries ; whether the 
 Church of England is more " Hberal," more " indefinite," 
 than the primitive Church was. 
 
 We have no hesitation in answering the questions thus 
 proposed. The Church of England holds and teaches 
 the Catholic doctrines of the three Creeds ; she affirms all 
 that they affirmed ; she condemns, as they condemned, 
 Arianism, Macedonianism, Nestorianism, Eutychianism. 
 What they taught concerning the Father, the Son, and 
 the Holy Ghost, concerning the Church, the forgiveness 
 of sins, and the life everlasting, she teaches. The 
 Church of England, in short, is no narrower and no 
 wider, no more liberal and no more exclusive, than the 
 Church of the first four centuries. We might say the 
 first five j but we have reasons for stopping at the fourth, 
 in order to prevent the necessity of extending the con- 
 troversy to greater length. 
 
 If it be said that we do not assign to the See of Rome 
 the place which it occupied in the early Church, we 
 reply that this is the very question under discussion ; 
 and we add that, in so far as this is true, it is inevitable. 
 We deny nothing to the Roman Bishop which he 
 received from Christ. If we cannot give him the place 
 which he held in the early Church, it is because he is 
 not contented with that place. Having regard to his 
 present demands, we cannot give him what he received 
 from the early Church without giving him much more, 
 which we consider it unlawful to give him; and so the 
 fault is not ours. If he asserts that he asks no more 
 than the privileges bestowed upon him by our Lord, we 
 answer that he cannot prove this, that we can prove and 
 
THE CATHOLIC FAITH, 189 
 
 have proved the reverse; and therefore it becomes a 
 most solemn duty to deny and resist his pretensions. 
 
 But we must return to the actual teaching of the 
 Church of England. It is constantly said that, however 
 orthodox our formularies may be, the practical action of 
 our ecclesiastical courts throws down the barriers which 
 they have raised, so that we have no safeguard against 
 heresy, no certainty that the truth which the creeds assert 
 will be taught in our pulpits. To put it more plainly 
 and more strongly, it is said that, in these days, no one 
 will be condemned for heresy, and a clergyman may 
 teach what he likes. 
 
 It is indeed but rarely that clergymen are convicted 
 of heresy, although it is by no means true that this never 
 takes place. The reason for this infrequency of convic- 
 tion is to be sought in the fact that, in a free country 
 like England, teachers who are not in accord with the 
 National Church leave it and teach their own opinions 
 elsewhere. Some few there may be who silently hold 
 heretical opinions ; and this is so in all Churches. There 
 are probably fewer in the Church of England than in 
 most other Communions, — among other reasons, on 
 account of her greater liberality ; but if English clergy- 
 men were to teach heresy, they could very easily be 
 convicted and condemned. 
 
 To this statement we are prepared to hear the re- 
 joinder that, as a matter of fact, judgments on doctrine 
 have been given which tend to leave open the most 
 momentous questions, and to allow clergymen of differ- 
 ent schools of thought to give the most contradictory 
 utterances on doctrines of vital importance. As illustra- 
 tions, we are asked to consider the Gorham case, the 
 
190 THE CATHOLIC FAITH. 
 
 Bennett case, and the cases arising out of the publica- 
 tion of " Essays and Reviews." It would be impossible, 
 within our limits, to consider these cases at length j but 
 we may briefly point out that not one of these decisions 
 affected the truth of the Catholic faith, and that not 
 one of them allowed in the Church of England a liberty 
 unknown to primitive Christianity, or hostile to the best 
 interests of the Gospel and the Church. 
 
 It would be absurd to say that these cases present no 
 difficulty; because men of real ability and of high 
 principle have been disquieted by them. But it may be 
 truly said that the alarm which was felt, when they were 
 first decided, has not only disappeared, but has been 
 seen to be in a great measure without foundation. 
 
 As regards the Gorham case, the point in dispute was 
 far more technical than real and substantial. No doubt, 
 if Mr. Gorham had been tried by men who considered 
 merely the technical language of the Church documents, 
 and the expressions of which he had made use, they 
 would in all probability have condemned him. And 
 yet most people who now calmly consider the case can 
 see that they would have been wrong. For it is now 
 agreed, on all hands, that the phraseology respecting the 
 grace of baptism is more or less ambiguous. To this 
 day the word " regeneration " is used by the teachers of 
 every Church in different senses. It is possible, there- 
 fore, that one person might affirm and another might 
 deny that the grace of regeneration is universally con- 
 veyed by means of the Sacrament of Baptism, and yet 
 that both might mean exactly the same thing. 
 
 Now, whatever might be the propriety of Mr. Gorham's 
 language, what he meant was to say that there is not 
 
THE CA T HO Lie FA ITH. 1 9 1 
 
 certainly a true beginning of the life of grace in holy 
 Baptism ; because, according to his view, such a life, 
 once begun, could not cease. In holding this view of 
 the nature of Divine grace, he believed what St. Augus- 
 tine beheved; and surely it could not have been the 
 wish of High Churchmen of that time to exclude St. 
 Augustine and those who believed as he did from the 
 ministry of the English Church. This has been most 
 clearly shown by the late Professor J. B. Mozley ; and 
 It is a complete answer to the assertion that, by the 
 decisions of our English courts, English clergymen may 
 teach opinions on baptism diametrically opposed to 
 each other. This is no more true of English than of 
 Roman clergymen. Lacordaire could apply the language 
 of our Lord, *^ Except a man be born again," to the 
 conscious beginning of the Christian life in a man^s 
 personal experience; and this is very much what Mr. 
 Gorham did. That judgment simply affirmed the liberty 
 which has always been enjoyed in the Christian Church 
 on the subject to which it referred. Formally it seemed 
 to do more than this : really it did no more. 
 
 The Bennett case is too recent to be examined, in all 
 its details, in this place. But what was the practical 
 effect of the judgment in that case? It was not to 
 sanction two different doctrines of the Holy Eucharist 
 in the Church of England ; but simply to decide that 
 certain opinions which Mr. Bennett held strongly and 
 taught earnestly w^ere outside the definitions of the 
 English formularies on this subject. If Mr. Bennett had 
 raised his own opinions into articles of faith ; if he had 
 declared that the holding of those opinions was necessary 
 to salvation, he would have been condemned. He did 
 
192 THE CATHOLIC FAITH. 
 
 not claim the authority of the English Church for the 
 statements which he published : he only asserted that 
 the English Church did not condemn them, and there- 
 fore left him at liberty to teach them. The decision of 
 our courts was to the effect that an English clergyman 
 had such liberty. 
 
 To some persons this decision seemed dangerous, 
 and at variance with Catholic truth. But this view can- 
 not be maintained. The early Church had uttered no 
 authoritative voice on the subject. It left its members 
 to employ language widely different as to the exact mode 
 of the presence of our Lord in the sacrament. The 
 English Church, in allowing the same liberty, proved 
 that she was a true representative of primitive Christi- 
 anity. Partisans on both sides were dissatisfied. Some 
 wished the EngUsh Church to affirm, and others wished 
 it to condemn, the opinions of the clergyman who was 
 under trial. What is certain is, that no such approval 
 or condemnation is to be found in the decrees of the 
 first four Qi^cumenical Councils ; no, nor in the writings 
 of the great fathers and teachers of the Church for the 
 first four or five centuries of her history. It was a strong 
 proof of the true Catholicity of the English Church that 
 no such approval or condemnation was found by her 
 judges in the wording of her formularies. 
 
 The case which sprang out of the publication of 
 ** Essays and Reviews " involved two doctrines, the 
 inspiration of the Scriptures, and the future punishment 
 of the wicked. It will be remembered that considerable 
 excitement was caused by the acquittal of the accused. 
 Yet to what did that acquittal amount? Simply to this; 
 that the Church of England had not so defined either of 
 
THE CATHOLIC FAITH. 193 
 
 those doctrines that the clergyman in question must be 
 condemned. 
 
 We can see more clearly now that the decision was 
 not only wise but just. There was considerable danger 
 lest these points should be so defined — practically de- 
 fined at least — as to check the lawful exercise of the 
 critical study of the Bible, and to tie down the teachers 
 of the Church to some narrow theory of future punish- 
 ment which further investigation might have shown to 
 be unscriptural and untenable. It is impossible to show 
 that men have studied the Bible with less reverence 
 since that judgment was pronounced, or that the teachers 
 of the Church have shown less deference to its authority. 
 Never has the study of the Scriptures been conducted 
 with more learning and zeal and devout earnestness 
 than during the last ten years; never have more valuable 
 contributions been made to our expository literature. 
 If, on the other hand, the subject of future punishment 
 has been discussed with greater freedom, it has not been 
 a freedom which has been used against the Gospel or 
 Divine revelation ; but almost universally with the 
 greatest respect for the testimony of the Sacred Scrip- 
 tures. 
 
 So much we may say as to the practical effects of the 
 decision ; but we must again recall the consideration so 
 often adduced that the early Church had no precise 
 theory with reference to the inspiration of the Canonical 
 books, and did not exclude those who held different 
 opinions on the subject of future punishment. 
 
 It would be easy to apply these remarks to many other 
 subjects which the Church of England has wisely left 
 open ; but these have been selected as the most pro- 
 
 N 
 
194 THE CATHOLIC FAITH. 
 
 minent, and as having been the subject of examination 
 in the ecclesiastical courts. In this matter, then, the 
 Church of England, so far from imperilling her claim to 
 Catholicity, has proved that she is truly Catholic, and 
 this in no vague sense of that expression. She affirms 
 no more and no less than was affirmed by the first ages 
 of the Catholic Church of Christ. 
 
 And thus we return to our first remark : the accusa- 
 tions against the English Church, as giving no certainty 
 for the teaching of the Catholic Church, rest on the 
 assumption that doctrines which are Roman are also 
 Catholic. And this is the very point which has to be 
 proved, and which cannot be proved. Taking the 
 Vincentian canon {Quod semper^ quod uhique^ quod ab 
 omnibus) in the most liberal sense, it cannot be applied 
 to the doctrines of the Church of Rome ; and it can be 
 applied to those of the Church of England. 
 
 We may sum up the conclusions at which we have 
 arrived, and put the nature of the argument in a very few 
 words. The advocates of the Roman claims may take 
 one or two starting points : (i.) They may attempt to 
 show that the actual teaching of the Church of Rome is 
 in perfect accordance with the doctrines held in the 
 Christian Church from the beginning of her history. 
 If they can succeed in doing this, they will have made 
 it probable that the Bishop of Rome is the Vicar of 
 Christ; or (2.) They may give evidence that our Lord 
 appointed St. Peter to be the supreme teacher and 
 ruler of the Church, and that the apostle transmitted 
 all his power and authority to successors who were to 
 occupy the Roman See ; and in that case we are bound 
 
THE CATHOLIC FAITH, 195 
 
 to submit to the Pope, and to accept his teaching without 
 question. 
 
 We can find no sufficient arguments in defence of 
 either position. It is to the latter that we have dedi- 
 cated the greater portion of these pages. Roman 
 Cathohcs will allow that it is, after all, the one vital 
 question. We have asserted, and we beheve we have 
 given complete proof of the assertion, that the Church 
 of the first four centuries knew absolutely nothing of the 
 Roman claims in their modern form. And therefore we 
 are bound to reject them as unfounded. Whatever, then, 
 our own difficulties may be — and they are much less 
 serious than they are often represented — we have no 
 right to accept an authority which we believe to be 
 usurped, or to submit to claims which we believe to be 
 false. 
 
 THE END. 
 
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