TESTIMONY OF THE CATACOMBS TO THE PRIMACY OF ST. PETER.
In our former article[139] the evidence which we adduced as to the testimony of the Catacombs on a disputed point of Catholic doctrine was drawn almost exclusively from their inscriptions; and that evidence was very abundant, because the doctrine in question was precisely that on which we should look to tombstones for information. It was only natural that, in writing the last earthly memorial of their departed friends, the survivors should spontaneously—one might almost say unconsciously—give utterance to the thoughts that were in their mind as to the present condition and future prospects of those to whom they had now paid the last offices. The subject now before us is of a very different kind. We are going to inquire of the Catacombs whether they can tell us anything as to the idea entertained in primitive times about the position held in the Christian hierarchy by St. Peter and his successors; and we think most persons would consider it very strange indeed if we should elicit any answer to this inquiry from the inscriptions upon gravestones. Mr. Withrow, however, is of a different opinion; he thinks that if in those early days the bishops of Rome enjoyed any superior dignity over other bishops, it ought to have been, and probably would have been, mentioned on their epitaphs; and, accordingly, he chronicles as items worthy of being noted in the
controversy such facts as these: that “the tomb of the first Roman bishop bore simply the name Linus” (p. 507), and that in the papal crypt, or chamber where the popes of the third century were buried, they are only honored with the title of bishop, and even that appears in a contracted form, ΕΠΙ or ΕΠΙΚ (p. 508). The Dean of Chichester seems to entertain a somewhat similar opinion; only, as he has formed a higher estimate of the episcopal dignity, this opinion shows itself in him in a different form. He thinks the extremely “curt and unceremonious” character of these papal epitaphs almost a conclusive argument against their authenticity.
Mr. Withrow further adds (p. 509), that the word Papa or pope does not occur in the Catacombs till at least the latter part of the fourth century, when it is found, applied to Pope Damasus, in the margin of an inscription by that bishop in honor of one of his predecessors, Eusebius. Even with reference to this, however, he insinuates that, as this inscription in its present condition is “admitted” by De Rossi to be a badly-executed reproduction, of the sixth or seventh century, of a previous inscription, “this title may very well belong to that late period.” Our first impression upon reading this was a grave doubt, which we cannot even now altogether suppress, whether Mr. Withrow had ever read either what De Rossi or his English epitomizers have written on the subject of this monument. Certainly, he cannot have
appreciated the curious and interesting story they have told of this stone; or, if we may not call in question his intelligence, we shall be obliged to accuse him of wilful misrepresentation. One of the most striking features in the story, now lippis et tonsoribus notum, is that the ignorant copyist, so far from being capable of forging a link in the chain of evidence for the papal supremacy, was only able to transcribe the letters actually before his eyes, and even left a vacant space occasionally where he saw that a letter was missing from the mutilated inscription before him, which, however, he was quite incompetent to supply. We are afraid, therefore, that Mr. Withrow must be content to acknowledge that this obnoxious title of pope was certainly given to a Bishop of Rome before the close of the fourth century. At the same time we offer him all the consolation we can by pointing out that it was given to him only by an artist, an employé of his, and one of his special admirers—he calls himself his cultor atque amator—and perhaps, therefore, Mr. Withrow may suggest that the title was here used in a sense in which he is aware that it was originally employed—viz., as an expression of familiar and affectionate respect rather than of dignity.
But we must go further, and, in obedience to the stern logic of facts, we must oblige Mr. Withrow to see that the title was used of the Bishop of Rome some seventy or eighty years before Damasus. If he had ever visited the cemetery of San Callisto, he might have seen the original inscription itself in which the title is given to Pope Marcellinus (296-308); and this time not by a layman, an artist, but
by an ecclesiastical official—in fact, the pope’s own deacon, the Deacon Severus, who had charge of that cemetery:
Cubiculum duplex cum arcisoliis et luminare
Jussu PP. sui Marcellini Diaconus iste
Severus fecit.…