PROPOSED SOLUTION OF THE DIFFICULTIES. 11 7 been given us, that Linus and Cletus were indeed bishops of Rome before Clement, but that they were so during the lifetime of Peter:. so that they undertook the episcopal charge while he fulfilled the office of the apostleship."' 6. This notion may be confirmedby divers observations. It is observable, that the most ancient writers,' living nearest the fountains of tradition, do not expressly style St Peter bishop of Rome, but only say that he founded that church, instituting and ordaining bishops there, as the other apostles did in the churches which they settled; so that the bishops there, in a large sense, succeeded him, as deriving their power from his ordination, and supplying his room in the instruction and governance of that great church. Yea, their words, if we well mark them, exclude the apostles from the episco- pacy : " Theblessed apostles, therefore, founding and instructing the church, delivered the episcopal power of ordering and governing the church to Linus. "3 Which words the later writers (who did not foresee the consequence, nor what an exorbitant superstructure would be raised on that slender bottom, and who were willing to comply with the Roman bishops, affecting by all means to reckon St Peter for their predecessor) easily caught, and, not well distin- guishing, called him bishop, and St Paul also, so making two heads of one church. 7. It is also observable, that in the recensions of the Roman bishops, sometimes the apostles arereckoned in, sometimes excluded. So Eusebius calls Clement " the third bishop of Rome," yet be- fore him he reckons Linus and Anacletus.4 And of Alexander he says, that " he deduced his succession in the fifth place from Peter and Paul,"8 - -that is, excluding the apostles. And Hyginus is thus accounted sometime the eighth, sometime the ninth bishop of Rome.' The same difference in reckoning may be observed in other churches: for instance, although St Peter is called no less bishop of Antioch than of Rome by the ancients, yet Eusebius says that " Euodius was first bishop of Antioch;" and another bids the Anti- ' Quidam enim requirunt quo modo, cum Linus et Cletus in urbe Roma ante Cle- mentem hunt fuerint episcopi, ipse Clemens ad Jacobum scribens, sibi dicat a Petro docendi cathedram traditam; cujus rei hanc accepimus esse rationem, quod Linus et Cletus fuerunt quidem ante Clementem episcopi in urbe Roma, sed superstite Petro; videlicet ut illi episcopatus curam gererent, ipse vero apostolatus impleret officium. Rafzn. in prcef. ad Clem. Recogn. [As we have shown above, p. 108, it cannot be proved that the apostle Peter ever was at Rome at all. Ancient writers differ much about the Erst bishopspf Rome, and whether there was one or more there at a time.ED.] 2 Const. Apost. vii. 46; Iren. iii. 3; Tertull. 3 Fundantes igitur, et instruentes beati apostoli ecclesiam Lino episcopatum admini- strandæ ecclesim tradiderunt. fren. iii. 3. 4 Euseb. iii. 4, 13, 15; Iren. iii. 3. ? n'suamnv áaó lli.rpau zal llaúxau zamáymv LoSaxr',v. E.neb. iv. 1. 3 Iren. i. 28, iii. 3, 4; Euseb. iv. 10.
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