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Against the first two of these Flavians nothing is to be said except that the rise of their house to the Principate was by caprice of the soldiery. Vespasian was an honest Sabine, fond of retiring to his native farm; he brought in much good provincial blood with him into Roman society.
The cataclysm which followed the deposition of Nero is in the strongest contrast to the ease and smoothness, only broken by a trifling mutiny of the praetorian guards, with which the principate passed into the hands of Nerva after the murder of Domitian. This century is what is properly known as the Silver Age.
The same logic of events which transformed the constitutional principate of Augustus into the sultanate of Diocletian and Valentinian, has brought about a parallel development in the Church which inherited the traditions, the policy, and the territorial sphere of the dead Empire. The second World-State which had its seat on the Seven Hills has followed closely in the footsteps of the first.
Herod Agrippa II, the son of Agrippa, who held the principate from 50-100 C.E., and was the faithful creature of Rome throughout the period of his people's stress, proclaiming himself on his coins "lover of Caesar and lover of Rome," deposed and created high priests with unparalleled frequency as a means of extorting money and rewarding the leading informers.
In this same letter the Pope uses the following words: "We are confident that no one truly a Christian is ignorant that the first see, above all others, is bound to execute the decree of every council which the assent of the universal Church has approved; for it confirms every council by its authority, and maintains it by its continued rule, in virtue of its own principate which the blessed Apostle Peter received by the voice of the Lord, but continues to hold and retain by the Church subsequently following it".
The Cæsar had nominated his successor to the imperium in the Circus the other day. If the Augusta would but make her choice, the people would perhaps be ready to accept her lord now as Consort Imperii, with the ultimate hope that a just and brave man would succeed to the principate in due course.
Let us attempt to gather the meaning of the various statements quoted from St. Gregory, and see whether they do not form a coherent whole. He claims, like all his predecessors, the three great texts concerning Peter, as conveying the charge of the whole Church, the Principate, to Peter and his heirs, that is, the Popes preceding him.
The consul-major had received the precious parchment at the hands of the special messenger sent by the Cæsar himself: that messenger was none other than Folces, and he had stated positively that the praefect of Rome was dead. It was useless to demand that a man be proclaimed to the principate if that man be dead.
This accident has happened to persons of unimpeachable morality to gentlemen. He may suffer from spells of imbecility like Clodius. He may . . . what might he not do! I tell you he is the Caesar of the dramatic world. There has been since the Roman Principate nothing in the way of irresponsible power to compare with the office of the Censor of Plays.
"I announce to you the beginning of my pontificate, and consider it a token of the divine favour that I bear the same as your own august name. This is an assurance that, like as your own name is pre-eminent among all the nations in the world, so by my humble ministry the See of St. Peter, as always, may hold the Principate assigned to it by the Lord God in the whole Church.
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