but act with us also for our spiritual resurrection, and we shall perhaps confess that we owe you thanks: but if the offence and commencement of the scandal has proceeded from old Rome, and from the successors of the apostle Peter, read the words of the apostle Paul addressed to the Galatians, who says, 'But when Peter came to Antioch, I withstood him to the face, because he was to be blamed,' and other things which Paul afterwards said concerning Peter. But as we ought piously to believe, a resistance of this kind was not the cause of any discord or bitter contention, but rather of examination and profound arguments arousing temporal condescension. For they were united in Christ by the bonds of affection, of similar faith and doctrines, and not distracted by any ambition or avarice; and would that in these respects we were like them. But it has given rise to offence in our minds, that you gape after earthly possessions whencesoever you can scrape them together, and collect gold and silver; and yet you say that you are disciples of him who says, 'I have neither gold nor silver with me;' you compel kingdoms to be tributary to you; you multiply money by traffic; you unteach by your acts what you preach with your mouth: let moderation restrain you, that you may be an example to us as well as to the whole world. You see how good a thing it is for a brother to be assisted by a brother: it is only God who does not need advice or assistance from any one, but men require to be assisted each by his neighbour. If I did not reverence the great apostle Peter, who is the head of the apostles of Christ, and the rock of the faith, I would bring to your memory how this rock was shaken to its foundation, and agitated by a low woman, with Christ's permission, according to the judgments by which he foresees all things, whose judgments are a great deep; who by the sound of the cock crowing, brought to Peter's memory the words of the prophecy, and aroused him from the sleep of despair. He, on being aroused, washed his face with tears, and confessed to God and to the whole world, and became an example of patience, carrying the keys of the heavenly kingdom, and running in the presence of all men, saying, 'Does not he who falls rise again? Arise, ye who have fallen, look on me, and obey me, as I am hurrying to the celestial paradise, the gates of which I have received power to open.' I write thus to

your holiness, and mention these things only to recall your recollection; for I know that you are endowed with all wisdom and knowledge, and agree with Solomon, whose words are these: 'Give occasion to a wise man, and he will be yet wiser; teach a just man, and he will be eager to receive.' This only I will add, and will then finish my discourse, namely, that there are many and great nations who think with us, and agree in all points with us Greeks. The first are the Ethiopians, who dwell in the first parts of the east; then the Syrians, and others who are more influential and virtuous, such as the Hyberians, the Lazi, the Alans, the Goths, the Chazars, and a countless host of the people of Russia, and the victorious kingdom of the Bulgarians: all these, as it were, are obedient to our mother, and still persevere immoveably in the old orthodoxy. But may the holy God, who, for our sake became man, and was placed at the head of the Church assembled out of the nations, again collect us in the unity of the faith, and suffer the Greek church in union with her sister old Rome, to glorify Christ, the prince of peace, by an unity of faith, for the restoration of the orthodoxy, in which they have agreed from times long past. May the hand of the Almighty God give to you, most holy cardinals, fraternal affection, and guide you all, until you arrive with joy at the tranquil port. The grace of God be with you all. Amen."

66

Letters from the pope.

Gregory, bishop, servant of the servants of God, to his venerable brother German, archbishop of Constantinople, Health and the apostolic benediction.-Your brotherly letters having been presented to us and our brethren by your messenger, and having been received with proper good feelings, and their purport being fully understood, we have made arrangements to send to you some religious men of tried knowledge, to carry to you the words of life, and to explain to you more fully our wishes. But inasmuch as 'Out of the eater came forth meat, and out of the strong came forth sweetness,' lest out of the mouth of the dead lion, with shame we write it, the honeycomb supplied by the father be despised, we have thought proper to send a few words in reply, lest, if we should not do so, it might seem that your letters were despised;

for when the wise man listens, he will become wiser, and if he understands, will obtain the government. Although, as the contents of your letter recalled to our recollection, Christ is the first and chief foundation of the faith, which we acknowledge, beyond which no other can be laid; yet in the second place, and as the secondary foundation, we will mention the apostles and prophets, and the foundations of Sion in the holy mountains; and the citizens of heavenly Jerusalem are said to have been established on the foundations of the apostles and prophets. Amongst these the first and chief is the blessed Peter, not without reason, and by a special prerogative he was allowed to hear from the Lord, 'Thou shalt be called Cephas, which is by interpretation a stone.' As the full force of bodily sense is concentred into the head, from which by some secret passages a portion flows into each of the limbs, like a rivulet from a fountain, so the three orders of those of the faith, Noah, Daniel, and Job, that is to say, prelates, both monks and married persons, whom Ezekiel is said to have seen in his vision as persons to be saved. By Peter is designated the rock on which the Lord has builtnot a house of the wood of Mount Lebanon, nor a gallery of pillars, nor a house of the daughter of Pharaoh, but his church for his faithful people, who are caught in its net, as it were from the whole body of fishes of all kinds. He is, as it were, the primate of primates, who drank streams from the fountains of our Lord's intelligence, whence the means of salvation must be derived, and with all patience and teaching, not contentiously nor by proud resistance, must the darkness of error be removed. And what you state does not oppose this, if you make a distinction of time and place, that Paul withstood Peter to his face; since we may read that this has been done by orthodox fathers; and Peter, by professing the Mosaic law, endeavoured to gain the Jews, and Paul, shunning circumcision by all the means in his power, strove to gain the Gentiles from this false doctrine. Otherwise it may be argued that Paul, when travelling through Syria and Cilicia, having arrived at Derbe and Lystra, circumcised Timothy, who was sprung from a Gentile father, and by a widow of the true faith. In the second and third place, the argument may be adduced that, when Paul sailed to Syria, accompanied by Priscilla and Aquila, and had shaved his head

at Cencreæ, for fear of the Jews, according to the law, he there shaved the hair which he had let grow owing to a vow, and which the Nazarenes, who had made a vow, usually did, according to the command of Moses. If, dear brother, you fully understand the secret of the dignity and the office of authority of Peter and Paul, and if you consider their zeal, who only craved after the souls of men, you will find that these two, whom the same faith and the same sufferings had rendered truly akin to each other, differed not in doctrine either during their lives, or at their deaths. For, although Peter and Paul carried on their labours in different languages and by different rites, supplying milk to the children and meat to those of more advanced age, the former amongst the stiffnecked people of Judæa, and the latter amongst the Gentiles, yet, when the full term was expired, each of the two with one and the same spirit, preached one Lord, one faith, one baptism, and the other articles of faith, according to the grace bestowed on him by God. For according to the words of the Lord, who spoke to Peter and the rest of the apostles in these words: Whose soever sins ye remit, they are remitted unto them; and whose soever sins ye retain, they are retained.' Paul was, in conjunction with Peter, performing the mysteries of his office, and according to these words of the same authority, expressed to Peter in particular, 'Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth, shall be bound in heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, shall be loosed in heaven!' he thus recognised Peter's dignity. He therefore came to him as the chief and the fountain of the Gospel of the Lord at Jerusalem, and afterwards, in conjunction with him and others, preached the Gospel according to the revelation, that he might not have run in vain ;' and this same circumstance is confirmed by the words of our Lord, spoken to Peter alone, in which he is enjoined, ‘If his brother sinned against him, to forgive him, not only seven times, but seventy times seven ;' to him alone, too, the Lord distinctly intrusted his sheep, and he possessed such a special virtue in performing miracles, that sick men were placed on their couches and beds in the streets, and were healed by his shadow. His authority, too, is also more expressly confirmed by the words of our Lord, when he says to him, 'Launch out into the deep,' and as is more fully sub

joined: Let down your nets for a draught.' Since, therefore, on account of the excellence of his faith, which with truth acknowledged two natures in one Christ, when he said, "Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God,' Peter alone has received on earth the keys of the heavenly kingdom. As there is one God, one faith, one baptism, one beginning, one body of the church militant, and a body with many heads is considered prodigious, and one without a head is without a beginning, it only remains for the government of the Church universal, which the said Peter, in conjunction with Paul, has assembled from amongst the Greeks, Latins, and barbarians, that the Lord should, by what has been before stated, appoint a chief of it, and show who is to succeed him. He, however, foreseeing that the Church would be trampled on by tyrants, lacerated by heretics, and separated by schisms, said to him: 'I have prayed for thee, Peter, that thy faith fail not; and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren: from which it is plainly to be inferred that all questions of faith ought to be referred to the see of Peter. But, to use the words of your own letter, and we say it with sorrow, the long and seamless vestment of the true Joseph has indeed been presumptuously torn, not by the hands of soldiers, but by the passions of ecclesiastical persons; and, therefore, let us see who has torn it. Inasmuch as the Greek church seceded from the unity of the Roman see, it immediately forfeited its privilege of ecclesiastical liberty; and she who had been formerly free, became a slave of the secular power, that by a just dispensation of God, she who would not recognise in Peter the divine primateship, might endure secular rule, however unwillingly; under which, despising things of no slight importance, backsliding by degrees, professing a meaningless faith, and waxing cold in its brotherly affection, rushed back through the field of licentiousness; so that, without rebuke from any one, it concealed what was lawful under what was unlawful; and, seceding from the temple of Peter, is, as it were, ejected by the Lord from his hall, which John, in accordance with the Lord's prohibition, does not measure out with his staff, since it is given to the Gentiles, as you see visibly brought to completion. And because Samaria, too, which seceded from the temple of God, from Judah, and from the confession of the true faith,