it should be in Italy, though he did not cease to wish that it should be there (Ep. xcv. 1). Meanwhile Anatolius had willingly signed the tome, as had "all the church of Constantinople, with a number of bishops"—it appears that it was sent for signature to all the metropolitans (Ep. lxxxviii. 3; Labbe, iv. 546 C)—the bishops banished for adherence to Flavian were recalled, and all honour shewn to Flavian's body (Ep. Pulcheria, lxxvii.). At the same time a large number of the bishops who had been induced by fear to assent to the decrees of the Ephesine synod (by July 451 almost all) had testified their sorrow, and, though by the decision of the papal legates not yet admitted to the communion of Rome, were allowed the privileges of their own churches; Eutyches was banished, though not far enough to satisfy Leo, and everywhere "the light of the Catholic faith was shining forth" (Epp. lxxx. 2; lxxxiv. 3; cxxxii. p. 1053). The legates, who returned at once, carried back a number of letters to their master, and in Apr. 451 we have a number of letters from him, expressing genuine satisfaction. He commends all that has been done, praises the "sacerdotal" zeal of Marcian, the diligent watchfulness of Pulcheria, and rejoices in Anatolius's adhesion to the truth (Epp. lxxviii. lxxix. lxxx.; cf. lxxxv. 3). He praises the conduct of his legates and confirms their wish that the names of those bishops, Dioscorus Juvenal, and Eustathius, who had taken a chief part in the crimes of the council of Ephesus should not be recited at the altar (lxxx. 3; lxxxv. 2). As for the council, he wishes it postponed, but has to yield to the emperor, and writes to him in June 451 (Ep. lxxxix.), nominating the legates to represent him. He makes it a point that his legates should preside, and that the question of the true faith should not be treated as an open one (Ep. xc.; cf. xciii.). If Leo, presiding in the person of his legates, secures the position of his see, and if the prohibition of maintaining heretical positions ("nec id liceat defendi, quod non liceat credi") gives security to the faith, there will be no cause of anxiety about the council, but a caution is still needed that the condemnation of Eutyches must not be an excuse for any rehabilitation of Nestorianism (Ep. xciii. end). When the synodal letter of the council of Chalcedon (Ep. xcviii.) reached Leo, it was couched in terms highly complimentary to himself, and brought the best news as regards the question of faith. Eutyches had been finally condemned and Dioscorus deposed. Leo expresses his satisfaction (Ep. to Marcian, civ.). The faith of the church was unmistakably asserted. In Mar. 453 he tells Maximus of Antioch (Ep. cxix.) that "the glory of the day is everywhere arisen." "The divine mystery of the Incarnation," he tells Theodoret,"has been restored to the age"; "it is the world's second festivity since the advent of the Lord" (Ep. cxx.).
While on this score Leo had every cause for joy, there was one decree of the council against which his legates had protested and which stirred his utmost indignation—viz. the 28th decree on the dignity of the see of Constantinople, which seemed to imperil the unique position of the see of Rome.
Before treating of this, we will take a general review of the position and influence of Leo as bp. of Rome up to this point of his pontificate. The age into which Leo was born was one which demanded, above all else, a firm consistency and therefore centralization in the church. It was an age of little intellectual energy, and was to be succeeded by ages of still less. The world wanted above all things unity and strength, and this was found in taking Rome for a centre and a guide both in faith and in discipline. Accordingly the papal supremacy made a great stride during Leo's life. He has been well called "the first pope," "the Cyprian of the papacy," for we associate with Leo's name the first clear assertion that metropolitans and patriarchs are subject in some way, still undefined, to Rome. What is Leo's own view of his position? In his sermons preached on his "birthday," i.e. the day of his consecration—an occasion on which a provincial council used annually to be assembled at Rome—he expresses his sense of his own insignificance but of the magnitude of his position and of the presence of St. Peter in his see, "ordinatissima totius ecclesiae charitas in Petri sede Petrum suscipit" (Serm. ii. 2; cf. iii. 3; v. 4). St. Peter is the rock; St. Peter alone has to "strengthen his brethren" (iii. 3; iv. 3). Not only has he the primacy (iii. 4) but is the channel through which is given whatever graces the other, apostles have, and so, though there are many bishops and pastors, yet Peter governs them all by his peculiar office ("proprie"), whom Christ governs by His supreme authority ("principaliter"); thus "great and wonderful is the share in its own power which the divine condescension assigned to this man" (Iv. 2). Just as the faith of Peter in Christ abides, so also does the commission of Christ to Peter, and "Peter's care rules still all parts of the church" (iii. 2; v. 4). Thus the see of Rome is the centre of sacerdotal grace and of church authority; it represents Peter, "from whom, as from a head, the Lord wills that His gifts should flow out into the whole body, so that he should know he has no share in the divine mystery who has dared to retire from the solid foundation of Peter" (Ep. x. 1, in re Hilary of Arles). The see of Rome again, occupies in the ecclesiastical world more than the position which the empire of Rome occupies in the secular "gens sancta, civitas sacerdotalis et regia, caput orbis effecta latius praesidet religione divina quam dominatione terrena"—because the Roman empire uniting the world was just the divine preparation for the spread of the universal Gospel (Serm. lxxxii. 1 and 2). This, then, is his theory: let us see how he put it in practice. We see him standing as in a watch-tower, with his eye on every part of the Christian world, zealous everywhere for the interests of the faith and of discipline, and, wherever he sees occasion, taking the opportunity of insinuating the authority of his see, not only in the West, but in the East. The "authority of the apostolic see" to regulate discipline and depose bishops is asserted very absolutely to the bishops of Aquileia and of the home provinces in the beginning of his pontificate ; as for the heretics, "obediendo nobis, probent se esse nostros" (Epp. i. v. iv.).
