Barrow - BX1805 .B3 1852

XXII INTRODUCTORY ESSAY. their head. And as Christ, the king of the church, has undoubtedly received " all powerin heaven and in earth," the sameuniversaljuris- diction is presumed to belong to his delegate and representative.* That this extravagant claim has been made by the popes for many centuries is beyond all question. Our author has observed, in his Introduction, that Gregory II., who was ordained in 715 (several years before Pepin's dotation of temporal possessions to the pope), " may be reputed the father of that doctrine, which, being fostered by his successors, was by Pope Gregory VII. (Hildebrand) brought up to its robust pitch and stature," p. 17. The following may be selected frommany other decrees of the popes and councils, as a spe- cimen of the authority claimed, aild thegrounds on which it was made to rest; it is from the famous " Extravagant" of Boniface VIII.: "All the faithful of Christ, by necessity of salvation, are subject to the Roman pontiff, who has both swords, and judges all men, but is judged by no one. In the power of which successor we are taught by the evangelical sayings that there are two swords, the spiritual and the temporal; for when the apostles said, ' Behold, here,' that is, in the church, `are two swords,' the Lord did not answer that there were too many, but merely enough. Certainly he who denies that the temporal sword is in the hand of Peter attends little to that word of the Lord, `.Put up thy sward into its sheath.' Each, then, is in the power of the church, the spiritual and the material sword. But one is to beused for, the other by the church; one by the hand of the priest, the other by the hand of kings and soldiers, but at the nod and permission of the priest. Thus the prophecy of Jeremiah is verified in the church and the ecclesiastical power: `See, I have set thee this day over the nations and over the kingdoms.' There- fore, if the earthly power turn aside, it will be judged by the spiri- tual power; and if a spiritual inferior, by his superior. But if the high spiritual power turn aside, it can be judged by God alone, not by man; since the apostle bears witness, The spiritual man judgeth all things, but he himself is judged by no man.' And this authority is not human, though given to man and exercised by man; but ratherdivine, givenby the divine mouth to Peter himself and his successors, in himwhom he confirmed to be a firm rock, the Lord saying to Peter himself, 'Whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound inheaven.' Whosoever, therefore, resists this power, resists the ordinance of God; unless he pretend, as the Manichees, that there are two beginnings, which we judge false andheretical, because, as Moses testifies, not in the beginnings, but `in the beginning, God See this point ably argued and illustrated in " The Papacy," by the Rev. J. A. Wylie, chap. v.

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