Note N36 — St. PETER (continued 7)

Such a Letter, we may be sure, has not been tamely received by the Partisans of Rome. Some of them have rejected it as forged and surreptitious, for no other Reason, but because Syricius is there made to disclaim a Power which he undoubtedly had. But this is evidently begging the Question[1]. Others, finding it conveyed to us amongst Ambrose’s Letters, have ascribed it to him, by prefixing his Name to it. But Ambrose is unluckily named, and spoken of, in the Body of the Letter: whence Baronius himself allows it not to be his[2]. The Style afforded great Matter of Dispute, some thinking it like, and others unlike, to the Style of Syricius: but more than the Style, the Title; To Theophilus and Anysius. The former was Bishop of Alexandria: And how came he to be any-ways concerned in the Cause of Bonosus? If that Name was common to him with some Bishops of Macedon, how came that Bishop to be named before Anysius his Metropolitan[3]? In the Height of these Disputes, Holstenius published the above-mentioned Letter at Rome, under the Name of Syricius, from a very antient and authentic Manuscript, with the following Title, To Anysius and the other Bishops of Illyricum[4]. This turned the Controversy into another Chanel; for the Dispute was no more concerning the Authenticit, but the Sense, of the Letter, which the Sticklers for the See of Rome began to think very different from the Sense that the Words of Syricius had conveyed to them before; nay, those who had rejected the Letter as spurious, for no other Reason but because Syricius was there made to disown a Power which he undoubtedly had, were not ashamed now to maintain, that he disowned no such Power. Some of them have a particular Faculty or Talent at making Authors say what they never thought or dreamt of; nay, at making them affirm what they flatly deny, and deny what they positively affirm. But they have not been so successful on this as on several other Occasions. The Words of Syricius are too plain and precise to admit of any plausible, or even probable, Misinterpretation. To avoid therefore the tiresome and unnecessary Task of confuting the forced Interpretations they have put on the Words of Syricius, I refer the Reader to his Letter, which is the Fifth amongst Ambrose’s Letters; and leave him to judge, whether it was possible for him to disclaim, in Terms less liable to Misinterpretations, the Power of judging a Cause committed by a Council to the Judgment of others, which was disclaiming, in other Words, that universal Jurisdiction, which his Successors have usurped, and pretend to exercise by Divine Right.