are found to be defective and incomplete, often on the very points on which we wish most for information and evidence. This could hardly be avoided. For to give on each subject the whole of the evidence available, say during five centuries, on all controverted questions of faith and practice, would involve a work of such extent, that few would venture to produce, and fewer still, perhaps, attempt to read it. Besides, what are called theological works are expected to comprise laboured essays on the existence and the attributes of God, the necessity and nature of revelation, the mysteries of grace, with a long list of other matters, which do not directly fall within the range of what are considered the controversies of the day; and so the space for these controversies is necessarily narrowed; and we find ourselves at a loss just when and where we need assistance most; though from no actual neglect or want of ability in the writers. Hence the felt need of shorter and more available Treatises on these special subjects; treatises which, whilst placing before the reader a complete Exegesis, and the whole of the Historical evidence, on any individual question that he may wish to examine, shall not go beyond the size of an ordinary Pamphlet, and yet contain all that can be

gathered from the writings of the Fathers, as proof of their views, and those of their age, in elucidation of the matter studied or debated.

The present small volume is intended as a specimen of a work of this nature. The subject, St. Peter and his successors, is selected for obvious reasons; and it is hoped that it may lead to other treatises on the same principle, as manuals for ready reference on subjects of equal importance in themselves, though they may not just now be of so paramount an interest. It is of the very essence of such a work that it be complete and exhaustive; that whatever evidence has been preserved shall be produced; so that there shall be an actual representation of each of the Fathers placed before the reader, without omission or extenuation, if possible; and the nearer complete accuracy and fulness are attained, the nearer will the work be to perfection.

Something of this kind, on this very question amongst others, has been already attempted in the second volume of the Faith of Catholics; but that work could not be rendered as complete as was wished, without increasing it to a size that would, in many ways, have defeated its object; many isolated passages are scattered, from the very nature of the work, throughout the three

volumes, and very many had to be omitted from sheer want of room. In fact, the cost and extent of that work, which is now out of print, put it quite out of the range of what is meant by a popular Book of Reference.

Other works of admitted value and learning, and of moderate size and cost, have also appeared on the same question; but able and satisfactory, in a sense, as they are, their evidence from the Fathers is not, as a rule, as far as my acquaintance with them goes, collected together, but is introduced here and there to elucidate or confirm statements; and it would, I feel sure, be a very laborious task to derive, from any of them, a clear and complete view of the opinions and testimony of any one of the Fathers.

Its

From what has been said it will at once be concluded that this Work professes to reproduce the views and teaching of the Fathers on the prerogatives of St. Peter, and of his successors. aim is, that, when the extracts from each Father have been read, nothing beyond what is contained in them shall be able, by friend or enemy, to be gathered from his writings, on these questions,nothing, that is, that can fairly be said to modify, add to, or in any way change, the impression left by the passages given. When words seemed not

to contain any fresh hint or evidence towards the meaning of an author, but merely to repeat what had been given already in other extracts, it has not been thought necessary to publish them; but it is believed that the writer will be found in this rather to err on the side of excess than defect; and be, perhaps, considered over minutely to adduce quotations which may, at first sight, seem only a repetition of what had already been said by the same Father. Possibly this may, in some instances, be the fact; but it may be that a careful study will end in convincing the reader, that there is something or other that distinguishes one extract from the other; that some, though slight, additional evidence or allusion is introduced in the one passage that is not found in the other, though they may seem at first but mere transcripts.

But should there be any error of judgment of this kind, it will possibly be thought a very venial one after all. A very grave error indeed would be the omission of any important evidence, extract, or fact; a charge which the writer hopes may not have to be made against him, with justice.

As, however, it is quite possible, that a work which covers so long a space as five centuries of

B

the Church, and has to deal with so many writers, may be defective by omitting some points of evidence; where this is found, or thought, to be the case, the writer would take it as a kindness to have the omission pointed out to him, or indeed any important inaccuracy, into which he may inadvertently have fallen, specified; and he will at once acknowledge the defect and correct it, in the Second Part, which will not appear for at least two months after the publication of this first treatise. This is one of the advantages which he had in view in publishing the Essays separately.

Newark, 1870.