The Purpose of the Papacy | Page 2

Bishop Vaughan applies
more than one touchstone, which, one would imagine, ought to be
sufficient to prove to any unprejudiced mind the falsity of that theory.
Among these, what I may call the "pallium touchstone,"--which still
bears its irrefragable testimony in the arms of the Archbishops of
Canterbury,[1]--has always appeared to me peculiarly conclusive.[2]

In the present small volume, Bishop Vaughan adds another to the series
of popular and instructive books which have made his name a
household word among Catholic writers. May its success and its utility
be as great as in the case of those which have preceded it.
[cross] LOUIS CHARLES, Bishop of Salford.
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 1: Not in those of York since 1544, see Woodward's
Ecclesiastical Heraldry, p. 191 and plate XX.]
[Footnote 2: See The Pallium, by Fr. Thurston, S.J., (C.T.S.) and the
striking list in Baxter's English Cardinals, pp. 93-98.]

AUTHOR'S PREFACE.
The following chapters were not intended originally for publication. If
they are now offered to the public in book form, it is only in response
to the expressed request of many, who listened to them when delivered
viva voce, and who now wish to possess a more permanent record of
what was said.
In the hope that they may help, in some slight measure at least, to
promote the sacred cause of truth, we wish them Godspeed.
[cross] JOHN S. VAUGHAN, Bishop of Sebastopolis.
XAVERIAN COLLEGE, MANCHESTER January, 1910.

CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
I. GENERAL NOTIONS 3

II. THE POPE'S GREAT PREROGATIVE 18
III. WATCHMAN! WHAT OF THE NIGHT? 35
IV. THE CHURCH AND THE SECTS 53
V. THE POPE'S INFALLIBLE AUTHORITY 69
VI. THE POPE'S ORDINARY AUTHORITY 87

PART II.
THE ANGLICAN THEORY OF CONTINUITY IN THE CHURCH
OF ENGLAND, OR THE AUTHORITY OF THE POPE IN
ENGLAND IN PRE-REFORMATION TIMES.
I. THE CHURCH IN ENGLAND BEFORE THE REFORMATION
107
II. THE OATH OF OBEDIENCE 117
III. THE AWKWARD DILEMMA 130
IV. KING EDWARD AND THE POPE 145

THE PURPOSE OF THE PAPACY.


CHAPTER I.
GENERAL NOTIONS.

No one who is given to serious reflection, can gaze over the face of the
earth at the present day without being struck by the religious confusion
that everywhere reigns. Who, indeed, can help being staggered as well
as saddened by the extraordinary differences, the irreconcilable views,
and the diversities of opinion, even upon fundamental points, that are
found dividing Christians in Protestant lands! The number of sects has
so multiplied, that an earnest enquirer scarcely knows which way to
turn, or where to look for the pure unadulterated truth. A spiritual
darkness hangs over the non-Catholic world; and chaos seems to have
come again.
Yet, amid this almost universal confusion, one bright and luminous
path may be easily descried. As a broad highroad runs straight through
some tangled forest, so this path runs through the ages, from the time of
Christ, even to the present day.
We can trace its course, from its earliest inception in apostolic times,
and then in its development age after age, down to our own day: from
Peter to Gregory, from Gregory to Leo, and from Leo to Pius X., now
gloriously reigning. We refer to the mystical (and one might almost say
the miraculous) path trodden by the Popes, each Pontiff carrying in turn,
and then handing on to his successor, the glorious torch of divine truth.
Though clouds may gather and thunders may roll, and tempests may
rage, and though the surrounding darkness may grow deeper and deeper,
that supernatural light has never failed, nor grown dim, nor refused to
shed its beams and to illuminate the way.[3]
The continual persistency of the Papacy, to whom this steadily burning
torch of truth has been entrusted, is unquestionably one of the most
certain, as it is one of the most startling facts in the whole of history. It
stares us full in the face. It arrests the attention of even the least
observant. It puzzles the historian. It taxes the explanatory powers of
the philosopher, and will remain to the end, a permanent difficulty to
the scoffer and to the sceptic, and to all those who have not faith. As a
fact in history, it is unique: forming an extraordinary exception to the
law of universal change: a portent, and a standing miracle. Its
persistence, century after century, in spite of fire and sword; of

persecution from without, and of treachery from within; in prosperity,
and in adversity; in honour and dishonour; while kingdoms rise and fall;
and while one civilisation yields to a higher, and the very conditions of
society shift and change, is deeply significative, and betokens an
inherent strength and vitality that is more than natural and that must be
referred to some source greater than itself, yea, to a power far mightier