true, because S. Polycarp assured the Roman pope, Anicetus, that he had always so kept the feast "with John, the disciple of our Lord, and the other apostles with whom he had lived." 1 However, the churches which kept Easter on Sunday also claimed that they had received their custom by tradition from the apostles. During the greater part of the second century the two customs went on side by side, and yet the Church was not disturbed by any serious dissension in connexion with this matter. On the contrary, when the Christians from Asia came to Rome, they were allowed to keep the feast on their own Asiatic day, although the Roman Church itself kept the feast always on the Sunday. This large-hearted tolerance was exhibited by the five Roman bishops, Xystus, Telesphorus, Hyginus, Pius, and Anicetus, whose pontificates lasted from about A.D. 118 to about A.D. 165. It seems probable that Pope Soter, the successor of Anicetus, forbade the Asian Christians, who came to Rome, to keep their Asiatic Easter in Rome itself. He appears to have required all Catholic Christians living in Rome to keep the feast together on the Sunday after the full moon; but he remained in peace and fellowship with the bishops of Asia, who in their own province of Asia went on celebrating the festival on the day of the full moon. Soter's successor, Eleutherus, followed on the same lines. But Victor, who succeeded Eleutherus, and who governed the Roman Church from about A.D. 188 to A.D. 198, determined to make an effort to establish uniformity and to suppress altogether the Asiatic custom. He appears

to have written letters in the name of his church to the several metropolitans, begging them to summon their provincial synods, and to discuss in them the question of the proper day for the celebration of the Easter festival. It is important to notice exactly what the pope's action was at this initial stage. He was the first bishop in the Church, and it was most fitting that he should take the initiative. There is no reason to suppose that by any authoritative act he commanded his brother-metropolitans to summon their synods. What he did was to ask them to do so. Polycrates, the Bishop of Ephesus, writing later on to Victor and the Roman Church, says: "I could also mention the bishops that were present [at the synod in Ephesus], whom you requested (noare) me to summon." ."8 Though the word aliów may be used in the sense of "to require," yet this is not its only meaning. It seems to be the right word to express requests made by one

1 Euseb., H. E., v. 24.

2 Tillemont, iii. 103.

› Euseb., H. E., v. 24. Tillemont (iii. 633) expresses Polycrates' meaning thus: "Polycrate dit que Victor 'lavait prié d'assembler les Evêques de l'Asie."

church to another church. Thus, after the death of S. Polycarp, the Church of Smyrna wrote a short account of his martyrdom to the little Church of Philomelium in Phrygia. Towards the conclusion of the letter the Smyrnaeans say, "Ye indeed requested (n{ɩwσate) that the things which happened should be shown unto you at greater length."1 S. Clement of Rome uses the word aów three times of entreating or beseeching God. So Pope Victor, who had no jurisdiction in the province of Asia, requested Polycrates the metropolitan to exercise the authority which he possessed, and to convoke (μɛTakaλtiv) the bishops of his province. In compliance with the request of the Roman Church, synods were held in many provinces, as, for example, in Palestine, in Asia, in Pontus, in Gaul,8 in Osrhoene, and elsewhere. There was a unanimous determination throughout the Church, except in Asia and the neighbouring region, that Easter should be celebrated on Sunday. Victor held his own local synod in Rome; and in communicating its decision to Polycrates he appears to have threatened that if the Asians persisted in their custom, they would be cut off from the communion of the Roman Church. Polycrates, with the consent of the Asian bishops, replied in a letter full of interesting details, addressed, not to Victor only, but to the whole Roman Church, in which he says, "I am not scared by those who intimidate us [with threats], for they, who are greater than I, have said, 'We ought to obey God rather than men.'"4 "Upon this," Eusebius says, "Victor, the Bishop of the Church of the Romans, forthwith endeavours to cut off the churches of all Asia, together with the neighbouring churches, as heterodox, from the common unity; and he denounces them by letters, and proclaims that all the brethren there are utterly (äpdnv) separated from communion.5 However, these measures did not please all the bishops. They exhort him, therefore, on the other side to pursue peace and unity and love towards his neighbours. Their writings too are extant, somewhat sharply upbraiding (πληκτικώτερον καθαπτομένων Victor. Among these also was Irenaeus, who, in the name of those brethren in Gaul over whom he presided, maintains indeed that the 1 Mart. Pol., xx.

2 S. Clem. Rom. ad Cor., li., liii. and lv.

3 Perhaps in Gaul the synod was diocesan rather than provincial. It seems probable that in the time of Victor there was only one bishopric in Gaul, the seat of which was at Lyons. See an article by Mgr. Duchesne, entitled L'origine des diocèses épiscopaux dans l'ancienne Gaule, which appeared in the Bulletin et Memoires de la Société Nationale des Antiquaires de France, tome 1. pp. 387-390 (Paris: 1889). See also Duchesne's Origines Chrétiennes, p. 450.

1 Euseb., H. E., v. 21. S. Jerome (De Illustribus Viris, cap. xlv., Migne's Patrol. Lat., xxiii. 659) translates Polycrates' words as follows: "Non formidabo eos qui nobis minantur."

See Additional Note 6, p. 436.

mystery of the Lord's resurrection should be celebrated only on the Lord's day; but he also becomingly exhorts Victor1 not to cut off whole churches of God, which preserve the tradition of an ancient custom. . . . And this same Irenaeus, bearing out his name, and a peacemaker in temper, exhorted and mediated in ways like these for the peace of the churches. He also wrote, not to Victor alone, but to very many other rulers of churches respecting the question which was agitated." One would certainly conclude from the account given by Eusebius that the Asian churches persevered in the practice which they inherited from S. John. Sixty years after their dispute with Victor we seem to be able to gather from S. Firmilian that the Churches of Rome and Caesarea differed in regard to the days on which Easter was to be celebrated.3 Cappadocia and Asia were neighbouring provinces, and, if in S. Firmilian's time the former was quartodeciman, it is probable that the latter was so also. Later on, before the time of the Council of Nicaea, quartodecimanism seems to have come to an end within the communion of the Catholic Church.

There are various points in this narrative to which it may be well to call your attention. Polycrates was a man whose orthodoxy, as Eusebius tells us, was notorious, and he is described in the Synodicon as a very holy person; 5 and yet when Pope Victor required him to alter his day for keeping Easter, and threatened him with excommunication if he refused, he replied that he was not scared by Victor's threats. He evidently had not been brought up in the teaching which was so clearly set forth by the Vatican Council. Polycrates, though he must have been educated among those who knew S. John, had not been taught that all the pastors and all the faithful are bound to the authority of the pope "by the obligation of true obedience, not only in things which pertain to faith and morals, but also in things pertaining to the discipline and government of the Church." Still less did he know that "none can deviate from this teaching without the loss of his faith and salvation." From the point of view of the Vatican Council, Polycrates' letter was a wicked act of rebellion, and all the bishops of Asia, by consenting to that act of rebellion, became partakers in their metropolitan's guilt. But the Fathers of the Church were wholly unconThe historian Socrates (H. E., v. 22, 16, ed. Hussey, 1853, ii. 626) says that S. Irenaeus "chivalrously inveighed against (yevvaiws Kaтédρaμev) Victor" on this Occasion.

2 Euseb., H. E., v. 24.

3 Ep. S. Firmil. inter Cyprianicas, lxxv. § 6, Opp., ii. 813. See Additional

Note 7, p. 438.

H. E., v. 22.

Tillemont, iii. 107.

C

scious of that view of the matter. When S. Jerome writes a short life of Polycrates, he says nothing about rebellion or any other wrong-doing, but quotes the most important part of Polycrates' letter, including his refusal to conform himself to Victor's decision, as a proof of the ability and weight of the man. Moreover, S. Irenaeus, and numbers of other Catholic bishops, took the same view. No doubt they thought that there had been wrong-doing; but in their view, not Polycrates, but Victor was the culprit. They "upbraided" Victor "somewhat sharply." As far as we know, they said nothing to Polycrates. But perhaps for our purpose the most important point to notice is that nobody seems to have supposed that communion with the Catholic Church depended on communion with the Roman see. Victor wrote letters, in which he announced that all the Asian brethren were "utterly separated from communion." It was, of course, in the Roman bishop's power to exclude them from the communion of the Roman Church. In those days it was in the power of every bishop to decide who was to be in the communion of his church, and who was to be excluded. But exclusion from the communion of the Roman Church, though it might lead to exclusion from the communion of the Catholic Church, did not necessarily involve such exclusion. Therefore Eusebius tells us that, while Victor (speaking, no doubt, for his own church) announced that the Asians were "utterly separated from communion," he at the same time "endeavoured to cut them off, as heterodox, from the common unity." He endeavoured, but he failed in his endeavour. The other bishops objected to Victor's proceeding. They refused to withdraw their communion from Polycrates. He therefore remained united to the common unity of the Catholic Church, although cut off from the communion of the Roman Church. A very important principle underlies this fact. Evidently, in the second century the Church was in no way the born handmaid of the Roman pontiff. The theory set forth in the Vatican decrees was unknown. The Roman Church was not held to be the necessary centre of unity. We may also gather from this whole history that it is a very dangerous thing to attempt to learn the rightful authority of the Roman popes from the claims which they make. The Roman popes, with very few exceptions, have been much too fond of putting forth baseless claims. But the right way of dealing with such claims, if we may judge by the example of S. Irenaeus and other holy bishops of his time, is to inveigh against the claimant fearlessly, and to upbraid him sharply, and to refuse to submit 1 S. Hieron., De Viris Illustribus, cap. xlv.

to his claims. That was how Catholic bishops dealt with Pope Victor in the closing decade of the second century. Evidently either he or his successor learnt a salutary lesson; the abortive excommunication was withdrawn, and after that everything went on as if nothing had happened.

The Witness of S. Irenaeus.

I now pass from the Paschal controversy, in which S. Irenaeus took such a prominent part by opposing the unchristian action of the Roman bishop; and I proceed to consider the famous passage in that same Father's treatise, Against all heretics, which Roman Catholics are very fond of quoting, whereas, as I hope to show, it is in reality wholly irreconcilable with the papal claims. S. Irenaeus is exposing the fallaciousness of the arguments used by the Gnostics. They said that their heretical doctrines were derived from the apostles, who delivered them "not in writing but in speech."1 S. Irenaeus, in reply, appealed "to that tradition which comes from the apostles, and which is guarded by the successions of the presbyters in the churches."2 "It is," he says, "within the power of all, who may wish to see the truth, to contemplate clearly the tradition of the apostles manifested throughout the world in every church (in omni ecclesia): and we are able to enumerate those whom the apostles appointed to be bishops in the churches, and their successors, quite down to our own time; who neither taught nor knew anything like what these [heretics] rave about. Yet surely, if the apostles had known any hidden mysteries, which they were in the habit of teaching to the perfect apart and privily from the rest, they would have taken special care to deliver them to those, to whom they were also committing the churches themselves; . . . but because it would be too long in such a volume as this to enumerate the successions of all the churches (omnium ecclesiarum), we point to the tradition of that very great and very ancient and universally known church which was founded and established at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul;-we point, I say, to the tradition which this church has from the apostles, and to her faith proclaimed to men, which comes down to our time through the succession of her bishops, and so we put to confusion all those who, in whatever sort, either on account of self-pleasing, or of vain glory, or of blindness and perverse opinion, assemble in unauthorized meetings. For to this church, on account of 1 S. Irenaeus, III. ii. 1. Ibid., III. ii. 2.