The-papacy-its-history-dogmas-genius-and-prospects-wylie

16 RISE OF ECCLESIASTICAL SUPREMACY.tious views which began, incourse of time, to actuate theirsuccessors, but from that pure zeal for the diffusion of Christianityfor which these early ages were distinguished. Itwas natural that churches founded in these circumstancesshould cherish a peculiar veneration for the men to whosepious labours they owed their existence ; and it was equallynatural that they should apply to them for advice in allcases of difficulty.That advice was at first purely paternal,and implied neither superiority on the part of the personwho gave it, nor dependence on the part of those to whom"^z it was given. But in process of time, when the Episcopateat Rome came to be held by men of worldly spirit,—loversof thepre-eminence,—the homage, at first voluntarily renderedby equals to their equal, was exacted as a right;andthe advice, at first simply fraternal, took the form of acommand, and was delivered in a tone of authority.* Thesebeginnings of assumption were small ; but they were beginnings,and power is cumulative. It is the law of itsnature to grow, at a continually accelerating rate, which,though slow at the outset, becomes fearfully rapid towardsthe end. And thus the pastors of Rome, at first by imperceptibledegrees, and at last by enormous strides, reachedtheir fatal pre-eminence.Such was the state of matters in the first century, duringwhich the authority of the presbyter or bishop—for thesetwo titles were employed in primitive times to distinguishthe same office and the same order of men-f-—did not extendbeyond the limits of the congregation to which they* Eusebius, Eccl. Hist, book V. chap, xxiii. p. 92. London: 1650. Wefind the monk Barlaani declaring that bishops and presbyters were originallythe same, and that the difference of rank aiiiongst bishops was o;"human, not divine institution. " Casterum ab institutione omnes paresesse debncrnnt, tarn potestate quam auctoritate. Ea institutio quaj episcoposfecit non divina sed huraana. Nam divino institute iidem cum presbyterisfacti."— Barlaami Tractatus, p. 297.t Gibbon, vol. ii. p. 331. Edin. 1832. Mosheim, cent. i. part ii. chap,ii. sec. 8.