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up, I also am a man?" Where would have been the immense revenues collected afterwards by those who St. Peter himself had prophesied should, through covetousness, with feigned words, make merchandise of men's souls? And should we ever have

'We would ask the Roman Catholic, whether he thinks that St. Peter, who, in the answer before us, repelled with such uncompromising christian humility the homage offered to him by Cornelius, would ever have consented to be installed Pope of Rome according to the ceremonies observed in these enlightened days? For it appears that the Pope is placed on the altar and adored three several times: "First, in the chapel, where the election is held, the Dean of the Cardinals, and after him the other Cardinals, adore his Holiness on their knees, kiss his foot, and then his right hand," &c.; and again, "the Pope is placed on the altar in the Chapel of Sixtus, where the Cardinals come and adore the second time," in the same manner. And again," the Pope is carried in his pontifical chair, under a grand canopy of red, fringed with gold, to the church of St. Peter, where he is placed upon the grand altar, and the Cardinals adore him for the third time, and after them, the ambassadors of princes, &c. &c."-Cérémonies et Coutumes Religieuses, par B. Picard, tom. i. p. 50, quoted by Bishop Hopkins, who observes, "The tone of this writer is so far from what it ought to be, that I should not cite him for any fact likely to be called in question."—p. 374.

In the primitive times of the church, during the days of the fathers, the Pope was unknown. It was a title given, without distinction, to all the Bishops. Thus, when the

heard of the sale of indulgences, the immense sums given to pray the souls of the dead out of the hands of retributive justice, had his words been repeated to those who offered their worldly substance in exchange for spiritual blessings, "Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money?" What would have become of the doctrine of exclusiveness, had this noble conviction been every where received-his candid declaration of it every where promulgated, "Of a truth I perceive that God is no respecter of persons; but in every nation he that feareth Him and worketh righteousness is accepted with Him?”

Emperor Constantine writes to Athanasius, the Bishop of Alexandria, he addresses him by the title of Pope; and in the liturgy bearing the name of Basil, that part where prayer is offered for the Bishop of Alexandria, is thus worded, "Remember, O Lord, our most holy and blessed Pontiff, Father N., Pope and Patriarch of the great City of Alexandria." Reminding his Roman Catholic brethren of this historical fact of the general use of the title of Pope, Bishop Hopkins adds, Why it has become restricted to the Bishop of Rome for so many centuries, instead of being, as it once was, the common title of all the metropolitans, is a question which your doctrine of supremacy must answer.' See Bishop Hopkins on the Church of Rome, p. 218.

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How strange it is that man should have founded the doctrine of infallibility on the basis of one who (considered not in his apostolical character) was prone to error from the beginning to the end! For it is in the Acts, after that (in common with the rest of the Apostles) he had received the Spirit-after that by divine assistance, as the commissioned servant of the Most High, he had bravely overcome the weakness of his nature, and boldly spoken forth the words of God, in defiance of imprisonment, stripes, and deaththat a thrice repeated vision is sent from above to eradicate that narrow-minded spirit of exclusiveness, the last evil that remained unsubdued within him-the last that Christianity had to fight against, and overcome.1 It is after he had received the Holy Spirit from on high that we again find this timidity of character, and the narrow-minded exclusiveness of his national prejudices influencing his con

In giving an account of this vision, and of the calling of the Gentiles, to his Jewish brethren, St. Peter thus concludes, in a beautiful spirit of christian toleration and christian humility. "Forasmuch, then, as God gave them the like gift as he did unto us who believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, what was I, that I could withstand God?", - Acts xi. 17.

duct so strongly as to call down upon him the severe but straightforward declaration of St. Paul-a declaration which evidently shews that if infallibility was given to St. Peter's successors, it certainly was not given to St. Peter himself, and that he had to bow before the correction of his fellow-labourer in the vineyard of his Master. Thus St. Paul writes,

When Peter came to Antioch I withstood him face to face, because he was to be blamed;" and why did he withstand him? because, having been taught by God to consider nothing as common or unclean, he had at first, in the true spirit of his Master, eaten with the Gentiles, and kept up a brotherly intercourse with those whom the prejudices of his nation had excluded from the promised blessings; "but when other Jews came, whom he feared," he separated himself from those Gentile converts, with whom he had before been living in christian charity and brotherly love; "and other Jews dissembled likewise with him (that is, with Peter) insomuch that Barnabas even was carried away by their dissimulation." "But when I saw," continues St. Paul, "that they walked not uprightly according to the truth of the Gospel," (mark that Peter and those who dissembled with him did not walk

according to the truth) "I said unto Peter, before them all, If thou, being a Jew, livest after the manner of the Gentiles, why compellest thou the Gentiles to live as do the Jews?" and then he adds, "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law (those outward observances to which Peter attached such undue importance) but by faith in Christ Jesus." 1

It may be remarked, that this is the only instance in the Gospel of one of the Apostles being publicly reprimanded by another; and it is curious that upon the infallible Apostle

1 Gal. ii.

2

2" I said before them all." "We should not (says St. Cyprian) admit the prescription of custom, but should rather be overcome by reason. For Peter, whom the Lord chose first, and upon whom he built his church, when Paul disputed with him on the subject of circumcision, claimed nothing insolently to himself, nor arrogantly assumed any thing. Nor did he say that he held the Primacy, and that it was fit that Paul should comply with him in his new and lately devised ways. Nor did he despise Paul because he had been a persecutor of the Church, but admitted the counsel of truth, and readily yielded to the lawful argument which Paul set forth; thus leaving to us an example of concord and patience, that we should not love our own notions too well, but should yield occasionally to those things which our brethren and colleagues usefully and wisely suggest; and if they are true and lawful, prefer their suggestions to our own."-See Bishop Hopkins on the Church of Rome, p. 119.

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