St. Peter, either alone, or jointly with St. Paul, as we read in Irenæus, and in the Apostolical Constitutions[[64]], appointed other Bishops of Rome. Now, when he appointed others, did he resign his Episcopacy, or retain it? If he resigned it, he did not die Bishop of Rome; which shakes the very Foundation of the Pope’s Claim to Supremacy: if he retained it, there were Two Bishops on the same See at one time; which Pope Innocent I. in his Epistle to the Clergy and People of Constantinople, condemned as an Irregularity never known till his Time[[65]]: he did not, it seems, recollect that it had been practised by his Predecessor Pope Peter. Theodoret tells us, in his Ecclesiastical History, that when the Emperor Constantius would have had Felix to sit in the See of Rome, together with Liberius, upon the Return of the latter from Banishment, the People of Rome would not content to it, crying out, One God, one Christ, one Bishop. Felix died soon after, and upon his Death Theodoret makes the following Remark: It was, says he, a special Providence, that Peter’s Throne might not suffer Infamy, being held by Two Prelates[[66]]. He did not consider, or rather did not believe, that it had been held by St. Peter and St. Paul, by St. Pater and by Linus.
St. Peter Bishop at
Rome, not of Rome.
To conclude, St. Peter was perhaps Bishop at Rome, not of Rome[[N2]]. He was Bishop at Rome, if he ever was there, being, in virtue of his Apostleship, impowered to discharge, at Rome, and every-where else, all Episcopal Functions; but was not specially Bishop of Rome, or any other Place; that is, he did not take upon him the Charge of any particular Bishop, the Administration of any particular Bishoprick, that being inconsistent both with the Dignity and Office of an Apostle, or universal Bishop.
[N2]. 'Tis a Distinction made by a Pope, King in Etruria, not of Etruria.
| Nero, Galba, Otho, | LINUS, First Bishop of Rome. | Vitellius, Vespasian, Titus. |
Year of Christ 66.
Linus, and not
Clemens, the Bishop
of Rome.