ever it was, passed to the Bishops of Rome. His letter to the Council of Chalcedon proves this, as we have seen, sufficiently; and this power of the first Apostle did not make him master of the others; it has passed to all bishops who exercise it lawfully; Peter was only distinguished by the priority of his ordination.
Romish theologians have misused the eulogiums that St. Leo and other Fathers have addressed to St. Peter, in an oratorical way, without choosing to see that even literally understood, they do not constitute privileges transmissible to the Bishops of Rome, since none of these Fathers have recognized any in them; but no one who is familiar with the Fathers could take these eulogies literally. We will prove this by the works of St. John Chrysostom, whose writings have been most abused by the Ultramontanes, and whom they most prefer to quote in support of their system. They have accumulated texts to prove that the great Bishop of Constantinople gave to St. Peter the titles of first, of great apostle, of Coryphæus, of prince, of chief, and of mouth of the Apostles.
But if he has given the same titles to the other Apostles, what can we conclude in favour of St. Peter?
Now, in several places in his writings he says of all the Apostles, that they were the foundations, the columns, the chiefs, the doctors, the pilots, and the pastors of the Church.
He calls Peter and John in the same sense, princes of the Apostles.[1] He says of Peter, James, and John collectively, that they were "first in dignity among the Apostles, the foundations of the Church, the first called, and princes of the disciples."[2]
If he says of St. Peter, "Peter so blotted out his denial, that he became the first of the Apostles, and that
