ange the mode of appointing the chairman of the
eldership, and that he was now promoted to the office by election, and
not by seniority. [541:5] Whilst his language indicates distinctly that
this alteration was made after the days of the apostles, it also implies
a date not later than the second century; for, though it was "after the
beginning," it was at a time when churches had been only _recently_
"erected in all places, and offices established." The period of the
spread of heresies at Rome, at the commencement of the reign of
Antoninus Pius, and when Hyginus closed his career, answers these
conditions.

IV. As Rome was the head-quarters of heathenism, it was also the place
where the divisions of the Church must have proved most disastrous.
There, the worship of the State was celebrated in all its magnificence;
there, the Emperor, the Pontifex Maximus of the gods, surrounded by a
splendid hierarchy of priests and augurs, presided at the great
festivals; and there, thousands and tens of thousands, prompted by
interest or by prejudice, were prepared to struggle for the maintenance
of the ancient superstition. Already, the Church of Rome had often
sustained the violence of persecution; but, notwithstanding the bloody
trials it had undergone, it had continued steadily to gain strength; and
a sagacious student of the signs of the times might even now have looked
forward to the day when Christianity and paganism, on nearly equal
terms, would be contending for mastery in the chief city of the Empire.
But the proceedings of the heretics were calculated to dissipate all the
visions of ecclesiastical ascendency. If the Roman Christians were split
up into fragments by sectarianism, the Church, in one of its great
centres of influence, would be incalculably injured. And yet, how could
the crisis be averted? How could heresy be most effectually
discountenanced? How could the unity of the Church be best maintained?
In times of peril the Romans had formerly been wont to set up a
Dictator, and to commit the whole power of the commonwealth to one
trusty and vigorous ruler. During the latter days of the Republic, the
State had been almost torn to pieces by contending factions; and now,
under the sway of the Emperors, it enjoyed comparative repose. It seems
to have occurred to the brethren at Rome that they should try the
effects of a similar change in the ecclesiastical constitution. By
committing the government of the Church, in this