Pontifex

“ He has his thousands of pounds a year, while his father had perhaps three thousand shillings a year towards the end of his life. He is a successful man; but his father, hobbling about Paleham Street in his grey worsted stockings, broad brimmed hat and brown swallow-tailed coat was worth a hundred of George Pontifexes, for all his carriages and horses and the airs he gives himself.”
“But yet,” he added, “George Pontifex is no fool either.” And this brings us to the second generation of the Pontifex family with whom we need concern ourselves. ”

“ He is indeed by some writers, chiefly French, called sovereign pontiff, but only in the sense of supreme pontiff, Pontifex maximus, or summus pontifex, to indicate that he is the highest but not the exclusive authority in the church. The council of Florence, on which we plant ourselves, defines him to be primate, not sovereign, and ascribes to him plenary authority to feed, direct, and govern the whole church, but does not exclude other and subordinate pontiffs, who, though they receive their sees from him, yet within them govern by a divine right no less immediate than his. ”

“ Well has the name of Pontifex been given Unto the Church's head, as the chief builder And architect of the invisible bridge That leads from earth to heaven. ”

“ But Pontifex's severe features had relaxed considerably ere he finished.
“Mr. Wade,” he said–“if that be your name—I am inclined to accept your narrative as substantially correct, and I applaud your design to prevent this marriage, though your methods of execution are open to criticism. But you will forgive me if I verify your statements by a direct reference to Mr. Windrum? I shall send a telegram—”
“I can save you the trouble,” replied Archibald.
“You seem to think of everything,” remarked Mr. Pontifex, with an indulgent smile. “Have you telegraphed yourself?” ”

“ Miss Pontifex was old enough and wise enough to know that this is the way in which even the greatest men as a general rule begin to develop, and was more pleased with his receptiveness and reproductiveness than alarmed at the things he caught and reproduced. ”

“ Next day the John Pontifexes had to come, and Eliza and Maria, as well as Alethea, who, by her own special request, was godmother to the boy, for Mr Pontifex had decided that they were to form a happy family party; so come they all must, and be happy they all must, or it would be the worse for them. Next day the author of all this hubbub was actually christened. Theobald had proposed to call him George after old Mr Pontifex, but strange to say, Mr Pontifex over-ruled him in favour of the name Ernest. ”

“ Mr Pontifex would say it was only right to give a boy his option, and was much too equitable to grudge his son whatever benefit he could derive from this. He had the greatest horror, he would exclaim, of driving any young man into a profession which he did not like. ”

“ Statesmen had long recognised the danger, and were obviously attempting to cope with the new forces. Antonine’s proposal was one for the extension of his jurisdiction (as Pontifex Maximus) to the new monotheisms, by the amalgamation of these with the older worships over which his authority as Pontifex Maximus was unchallenged. If he had succeeded he would have exerted his headship of religion in much the same fashion as Elizabeth Tudor—claiming a similar headship—exerted hers in the sixteenth century. ”

“ The Roman pontiffs formed the most illustrious among the great colleges of priests. Their institution, like that of all important matters of religion, was ascribed to Numa. The number of pontiffs appointed by this king was four, and at their head was the pontifex maximus, who is generally not included when the number of pontiffs is mentioned. It is probable that the original number of four pontiffs (not including the pontifex maximus) had reference to the two earliest tribes of the Romans, the Ramnes and Tities, so that each tribe was represented by two pontiffs. ”

“ It is one thing however to resolve that one’s son shall win some of life’s larger prizes, and another to square matters with fortune in this respect. George Pontifex might have been brought up as a carpenter and succeeded in no other way than as succeeding his father as one of the minor magnates of Paleham, and yet have been a more truly successful man than he actually was—for I take it there is not much more solid success in this world than what fell to the lot of old Mr and Mrs Pontifex ”

“ The pious Theodosius found himself literally compelled to become a Pagan pontiff. A bon mot [Footnote: "A bon mot."—This was built on the accident that a certain Maximus stood in notorious circumstances of rivalship to the emperor [Theodosius] : and the bitterness of the jest took this turn that if the emperor should persist in declining the office of _Pont. Maximus, in that case, "erit Pontifex Maximus;" that is, Maximus (the secret aspirant) shall be our Pontifex. ”

“ Both Emperors were away from Rome, Lucius Verus in Greece, on his way home from Antioch and the great victories of his three years’ campaign against the Parthians, Marcus Aurelius in Germany hastening from point to point along the headwaters of the Rhine and Danube, desperately resisting the pertinacious attacks of the Marcomanni. The Pontiffs were without their chief and acted under the leadership of Faltonius Bambilio, Pontifex of Vesta, the busiest and most anxious of them all. ”

“ It is obvious that a priesthood having such functions as these, and holding office for life, must have been a great power in the state, and for the first three centuries of the republic it is probable that the pontifex maximus was in fact its most powerful member. ”

“ At seven or eight years old he could read, write and sum better than any other boy of his age in the village. My father was not yet rector of Paleham, and did not remember George Pontifex’s childhood, but I have heard neighbours tell him that the boy was looked upon as unusually quick and forward. His father and mother were naturally proud of their offspring, and his mother was determined that he should one day become one of the kings and councillors of the earth. ”

“ In the first of them, the Pontifex begins, and is proceeding to contend, that in spite of Acts of the Senate, temples, statues, and other commemorations of miraculous circumstances, all such prodigies were nothing but mere fables, however solemnly attested, or generally believed. Now, the transcriber might fear, lest a similar inference should be drawn by the sceptic, to that which has in fact been deduced by the English translator of this work, in the following passage of a note:—“Hence we see what little credit ought to be paid to facts, said to be done out of the ordinary course of nature. ”

“ See AUGURS. PONTIFF, The Roman. The Pope is often alluded to as the Roman Pontiff, the term implying an analogy between his office and that of the Pontifex Maximus of the ancient Romans. PONTIFICAL INDICTIONS. See INDICTIONS. PONTUS. See MITHRIDATIC WARS. PONTUS EUXINUS, EUXINUS PONTUS. The Black Sea, as named by the Greeks. PONZA, Naval Battle of (1435) . See ITALY: A. D. 1412-1447. POOR LAWS, The English. "It has been often said and often denied that the monasteries supplied the want which the poor law, two generations after the dissolution of these bodies, enforced. ”

“ Thus we find the three dignities of pontifex maximus, augur, and decemvir sacrorum united in one individual. Bodily defects incapacitated a person at Rome, as among all ancient nations, from holding any priestly office. All priests were originally patricians, but from the year B.C. 367 the plebeians also began to take part in the sacerdotia [Plebes] ; and those priestly offices which down to the latest times remained in the hands of the patricians alone, such as that of the rex sacrorum, the flamines, salii, and others, had no influence upon the affairs of the state. ”

“ He was here the Sovereign Pontiff, the all-powerful Master whom Christendom adored. His slim waxen form seemed to have stiffened within his white vestments, heavy with golden broidery, as in a reliquary of precious metal; and he retained a rigid, haughty, hieratic attitude, like that of some idol, gilded, withered for centuries past by the smoke of sacrifices. ”

“ All the faith, all the love of those believers, overexcited by the regal spectacle they had just beheld, returned once more to the dream, to the rageful desire that the Pope should be both King and Pontiff, master of men’s bodies as he was of their souls—in one word, the absolute sovereign of the earth. Therein lay the only truth, the only happiness, the only salvation! Let all be given to him, both mankind and the world! ”

“ The Infallible gives forth the first oracle in his now acknowledged plenitude of power. Does it sound like "the word of God," at whose potent spell a disordered world will rise to new order and repose, or like that of an old man chiding the absent bishops who had not adorned the triumph of the day?
This exalted authority of the Roman Pontiff, venerable brethren, does not oppress, but assists; does not destroy, but builds up and often confirms in dignity, unites in affection, and strengthens and protects the rights of brethren—that is, of the bishops. ”

“ They could not be impelled by ambition or avarice, as the temporal and ecclesiastical powers were united in the same hands. The pontiffs were chosen among the most illustrious of the senators; and the office of Supreme Pontiff was constantly exercised by the emperors themselves. They knew and valued the advantages of religion, as it is connected with civil government. They encouraged the public festivals which humanize the manners of the people. They managed the arts of divination as a convenient instrument of policy ”

“ His words to his apostles were: “As the Father hath sent me, I send you”—the fulness of power I have I bestow upon you, that you may act in my name, in such a way that “he who hears you hears me; and he who will not hear you, let him be to you as the heathen and the publican.” He makes the distinction between those who are to hear and those who are outside his church; he constitutes in his kingdom, his church, those who are to command with his authority and those who are to obey: the apostles and their successors—the Sovereign Pontiff with the bishops—and the people or the laity. ”

“ Yet as far as that dramatic interest is concerned which springs from the play of individual character, and which has such attractions for the modern public, it is almost beyond doubt that the Papacy offers a wider and more varied field than either Republican or Imperial Rome. The long story of the Pontiffs is studded with examples of every form of public and private virtue, of public and private vice. The peculiar mode of papal election has raised to the pontifical chair men from all ranks of society, from almost every European nation, and of all conceivable types of character. ”

“ Francesco advanced at a signal from the Cardinal of Cosenza, who acted as master of ceremonies, knelt and kissed the Pontiff's feet. He felt somewhat dazed by the unwonted presence and awaited in silence the Pontiff's question. In a fleeting glance he had taken in his surroundings, but as, when [Pg 178] he rose from his kneeling position, his gaze encountered that of the Pontiff's minion, there swept over him such a wave of rage, horror and shame, that all the color left his face, and his hands were clenched, as if he would spring at the cowled form by the Pontiff's side and strangle him. ”

“ The Pope, or Supreme Pontiff, is the vicar of our Lord on earth, his representative—the representative not only of him who is our invisible High-Priest, but of him who is King of kings and Lord of lords, therefore of both the priestly and the kingly power. ”

“ Or precisely when the Roman Pontiff was speaking ex cathedrâ? Was the famous Syllabus Errorum, for example, issued ex cathedrâ or not? Grave theologians have never been able to make up their minds. Yet to admit doubts in such matters as these is surely dangerous. "In duty to our supreme pastoral office," proclaimed the Sovereign Pontiff, "by the bowels of Christ we earnestly entreat all Christ's faithful people, and we also command them by the authority of God and our Saviour, that they study and labour to expel and eliminate errors and display the light of the purest faith." ”

“ It is separate in no sense, nor can be, nor can so be called, without manifold heresy, unless the word be taken to mean distinct. In this sense, the Roman Pontiff is distinct from the Episcopate, and is a distinct subject of infallibility; and in the exercise of his supreme doctrinal authority, or magisterium, he does not depend for the infallibility of his definitions upon the consent or consultation of the Episcopate, but only on the Divine assistance of the Holy Ghost. ”

“ The reigning Pontiff, whosoever he may be, is always the Supreme Ruler, the Head of the Church, and the Vicar of Christ; but he is not, on all occasions, nor under all circumstances, the infallible ruler.
To guard against any mistake as to the meaning of our words, let us explain that infallibility is a gift, but not a gift that the Pope exercises every day, nor on every occasion, nor in addressing individuals, nor public audiences, nor is it a prerogative that can be invoked, except under special and indeed we may certainly add, very exceptional circumstances. ”

“ And when the Pontiff stretches forth his arms to bless it, together with the world which is inseparable from it, he can bear a witness to himself which no sovereign shall ever bear, that he has neither built nor conquered, nor received his city, but that he is its inmost and enduring life, that he is in it like the blood in the heart of man, and that right can go no further than this, a continuous generation which would make the parricide a suicide. ”