official for personal infallibility, and of confounding infallibility itself with inspiration,*what must have been the state of the Orangeman's mind sixty years ago-taught, as he was, by his parson, that infallibility meant impeccability, and that Catholics believed that the pope never sinned in thought, word, or deed; that, in fact, he was the man of sin exalting himself even above God. himself? This is what Mr. Keenan meant by, Infallibility, a Protestant invention.”

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* "I am thoroughly convinced that there is no living man who would utter such a downright theological absurdity as to compare a papal utterance with the Gospel. The Gospel, and indeed the whole of the word of God, is inspired by him: that papal definitions de fide, infallible utterances ex cathedra as they are, are inspired by God, no one has ever taught either in the Vatican Council or in the Catholic Church." ("True and False Infallibility," by Bishop Fessler, Secretary General of the Vatican Council.)

CHAPTER II.

PAPAL SUPREMACY.

The Pope of the Bible.

WE will now pass on to take into consideration your grounds for refusing obedience to the Bishop of Rome. You admit that, in the ancient Church, "the Bishop of Rome held a universal primacy of honor conferred upon him by ecclesiastical regulation (p. 220), and not of divine appointment at all" (p. 196). This is your opinion; and you contrast with it the faith of Roman Catholics, "that the pope is supreme by divine right-meaning by this phrase Christ's personal appointment" (p. 195). You herein rightly explain the theological distinction between divine appointment and church or ecclesiastical appointment, i. e., between "de jure divino" and "de jure ecclesiastico." In your opinion, the Bishops of Rome became primates by mere ecclesiastical appointment. At least this is the opinion expressed in your fifth conference. You change your mind, however, in the course of seven days, and in your sixth conference show signs of development in the Catholic direction. The Bishop

of Rome is primate, not by church appointment merely, but by the appointment of our Lord: "Our Lord, acting through the combined episcopate, granted a primacy of honor to the Bishops of Rome" (p. 220). Popes are therefore primates by divine right, i. e., by the personal appointment of Christ.

It is on this very principle that you affirm on page 196: "Jesus Christ established a single ministry in three orders-bishops, priests, and deacons. And this is the only hierarchy that exists of divine right." Now, we know that our Lord ordained his twelve apostles; i. e., he gave them universal jurisdiction: " Go ye into all the world." The apostles added three to the original twelve. But we never read anywhere that our Lord personally ordained or appointed a bishop; far less that he ordained or appointed a deacon. In fact, if we did not know that there were "instructions and commandments which Christ gave to the apostles by the Holy Ghost" (Acts i, 2), during the time prior to his ascension, we could not have believed the orders of the episcopate and diaconate or the sacrament of confirmation to have been ordained by Christ at all; for there is not a word of direct proof that Christ instituted any of them. If, then, our Lord, acting through his apostles, established a hierarchy of bishops and deacons, which hierarchy for that very reason, becomes of divine

right, and may not be rejected without sin; so, on your own showing, you cannot refuse obedience to the Bishop of Rome without incurring divine censure, because he is primate of divine right, since "our Lord, acting through the combined episcopate, granted him the primacy of honor."

Further. There are, you say, three passages of Scripture on which Rome bases her claim that Peter is supreme. One is, "Feed my sheep and my lambs;" the second is, "Thou art Peter;" and the third is, "I will give unto thee the keys" (p. 217). You are of opinion that the first passage goes for nothing. You are led to this. conclusion by the reflection that our Lord was rebuking Peter for acting in a manner of which the other apostles were guiltless. There was a danger, you allege, of Peter being regarded by the other apostles as unworthy of even equality with them (p. 205). Our Lord, you think, was merely reinstating him and restoring him to the apostolate, which, on your own authority, you declare "he had forfeited three times over" (p. 205). What about article xxvi, " On the Unworthiness of Ministers"? Dr. Ewer, you seem to outvie in Protestantism the Thirty-nine Articles themselves! Our Lord was, in fact, telling him to be shepherd; but he meant that Peter should be a shepherd, merely in that sense in which the others were shepherds. Here, dear Doctor, you betray a tendency too well characteristic of

the Protestant Reformation. The translators of the Protestant Bible, conscious of the preëminence given to St. Peter in the Holy Scriptures, did not scruple to tamper with God's word; and just as you would say, Peter and the other shepherds, so they imported the word other into Acts v, 29, and the passage was made to run: "Peter and the other apostles answered and said." This minimizing word other is a Protestant interpolation. Thus, alas! my dear Doctor, you explain away the Holy Scriptures when they don't harmonize with your own "views."

You are so anxious to make out a case against St. Peter, that you entirely forget the portentous fact mentioned so particularly by St. Paul, that, after his resurrection, Christ appeared to Peter, first, alone: "That he was seen of Cephas, then of the twelve." (1 Cor. xv, 5.) So anxious are you to make out a case, that you entirely forget an important verse in the very Scripture narrative you are quoting: "This is now the third time that Jesus showed himself to his disciples." (John xxi, 14.) You entirely forget that our Lord had already breathed on them and said unto them: "Receive ye the Holy Ghost. As my Father hath sent me, even so do I send you." (John xx, 22.) It was therefore somewhat out of date, and out of harmony with accomplished facts, that our Lord should be but now reinstating St. Peter into the apostolate which he had forfeited three