of Christ into the unity of faith," and to preserve men from being "carried about by every wind of doctrine." But if this was the design of Christ as to the whole ministry, and as to each individual teacher, most of all was it in instituting one supreme and universal Pastor : in him most of all would be seen the perfect fitting in together of each individual member: he was set up especially for the compacting of each spiritual joint, the harmony and cohesion of the whole. Here, then, the office of the universal Pastor or Teacher is precisely equivalent to him, who, by another image confirms, strengthens, consolidates his brethren. Thus, in the second text Christ foretold the third. But the more we contemplate all the three in their mutual relations, the more a certain thought suggests itself to the mind. There is a special doctrine concerning the most Holy Trinity, the most distinctive of that great mystery, which expresses the reciprocal indwelling of the Three Persons. Now something analogous may be said of the way in which these three texts impermeate and include each other, of their exact equivalence, and distinct, but inseparable force: of whom one is said, of the same must all.

4. Fourthly, they all indicate a sovereign authority, independent itself, but on which all others depend; symbolizing power from above, but claiming obedience from below; immutable in itself, but by which all the rest are made proof against change; for it is not to the sheep that the shepherd is responsible, but to their owner. It has been said throughout that the one special mark of Peter's distinction was a peculiar asso

2 Ὁ καταρτισμὸς τῶν ἁγίων, Eph. iv. 12.

ciation with Christ. It is not therefore by any infringement of equal rights that this authority is set up, but as the representative, the vicegerent, of Him in whom all power dwells: who bore this authority in His own body, and who committed to another what was first His own, both by creation and by purchase— "Feed My sheep." In all these texts the immediate transference of authority from the Person of the Godman is most striking; in Peter He inaugurates His great theandric dispensation, and forms the Body which He was to leave on earth. Thus these texts most clearly express that important doctrine of antiquity, the keystone of the Church's liberty from the world, which is the reason why the world so hates it, "The first See is judged by no man." So entirely have political ideas and jealousies infected our mode of judging of spiritual things-to such a degree is our peculiar civil liberty made the standard of Church. government that it is necessary to insist again and again on what to Christians ought to be a first principle, viz. that "all power and jurisdiction in the Church, like the Church herself, ought to rest not upon natural and human authority, but on the divine authority of Christ. This is the reason why we may pronounce no otherwise concerning such jurisdiction, than we know has been handed down from Christ, its proper author and founder. Now it is certain that at the same moment at which Christ instituted the community called the Church, such a power was introduced, and entrusted as well to Peter singly as the head, as to the Apostles under him. Nay, that power was fixed and constituted, and its ministers and bishops marked out, before the Church, that is, the whole body and commonwealth,

had grown into coherence. And so ecclesiastical jurisdiction did not first dwell in the community itself, and was then translated by a sort of popular suffrage and consent to its magistrates; but from the very first origin Peter was destined to be single chief of the future body, and next to him the other Apostles.

5. Fifthly, it must be observed that there is a definiteness about these texts which belongs in a far less degree to those forms in which the co-ordinate and coequal authority of the Apostles, as such, is expressed. This last is left to be harmonized and brought into operation by the superior power of the chief. They are indeed sent into all the world, they are immediately instituted by our Lord, they have the promise that His power shall be with them, and that their sentence shall stand good in heaven and on earth; but this promise, which is the most distinct made to them, has been already gathered up into the hands of one, and in its practical issue is limited by the necessity of co-operating with that one; that is, the authority of Peter includes and embraces theirs, but theirs is ranged under his. Theirs is modified not only by being shared, but by having his set over them. Now observe how distinct and clear, how definite in their meaning, while universal in their range, are the things said of him alone; 1. That He should be the rock on which Christ would build His Church; 2. That permanence and victory should belong to that Church for ever through him : 3. That he should bear the keys in the kingdom of heaven: 4. That whatever singly he should bind and loose, should be bound and loosed in heaven as well as

3 Petavius, de Ecc. Hier. lib. iii., c. 14.

:

on earth 5. That he should confirm his brethren, the Apostles themselves being the very first so called: 6. That he should be the Shepherd of the fold. What can constitute inequality between two parties, if such a series of promises given to one, and not to the other, does not?

6. Sixthly, these promises cannot be contemplated without seeing that the ordinary and regular government of the Church springs from the person whom they designate, and in whom they are concentrated. To take the last, all spiritual care is summed up in the word Pastorship, the office of priest, bishop, metropolitan, patriarch, and pope, rising in degree, and extending in range, but in its nature the same. On the contrary Apostles (with this one exception, in virtue of the Primacy), Prophets, and Evangelists, are extraordinary officers, attending the opening of the dispensation, but afterwards dropping off. But the Church, as it was to endure for ever, and the orderly arrangement of the divine ministry, were summed up in the Primacy, and flowed forth from it as the full receptacle of the virtue of God the Word Incarnate. And so it is the head of the ministerial body. All which is set forth as in a picture to the mind, in that scene upon the shore of the lake of Galilee, when the Lord said to Peter, "Feed My sheep."

7. And, again, Peter was thus made the beginning and principle of spiritual power, as it left the Person of God the Word, not for once, but for ever. Long as the structure should endure, its principle of cohesion must bind it. As the law of gravitation binds all worlds together in the natural kingdom, and is a continuous source of strength and harmony, so should be in the

spiritual kingdom that force which the same Wisdom of God established; it goes on with power undiminished; it is the full fountain-head from which all streams emanate; it is the highest image of God's power as the centre and source of all things. This idea is dwelt upon by S. Cyprian and S. Augustine, as well as by Pope S. Innocent', the contemporary of the latter, and was afresh expressed in a synodical letter of the three provinces of Africa to Pope Theodore, in A. D. 646, "No one can doubt there is in the Apostolic See a great unfailing fountain, pouring forth waters for all Christians, whence rich streams proceed, bountifully irrigating the whole Christian world"."

8. And, lastly, in these great promises Peter is specially set forth as the type and the efficient cause of visible unity in the Church. Such was the very purpose of Christ, that His disciples might be one, as He and the Father are one. For this end, in the words of S. Augustine, "He entrusted His sheep to Peter, as to another self, He willed to make him one with Himself;" and in the words of S. Leo, "He assumed him into the participation of His indivisible unity"." But this is seen no less plainly in the words of Christ, than in the Fathers; for He made one Rock, one Bearer of the keys, one Confirmer of the brethren, and one Shepherd. The union of millions of naturally conflicting wills in the profession and belief of one doctrine is almost the very highest work of divine power; and as grace, that is, the Holy Spirit diffused in the heart, is the inward efficient of this, so the outward, both symbol and instrument, is the

4 S. Cyprian de Unitate, c. 3. S. Aug. to Pope Innocent, Ep. 177, n. 19. Pope Innocent to the Councils of Carthage and Numidia. 6 S. Aug. Serm. 46. S. Leo, Epistle 10.

Mansi, x. 919.