n his letter of that date to Epiphanius he speaks of its having been
already despatched, and repeats his decision, that all affairs touching
the church shall be referred to the Pope, 'head of all bishops, and the
true and effective corrector of heretics.'

"In the same month of the following year, 534, the Pope returned an answer
repeating the language of the emperor, applauding his homage to the See,
and adopting the titles of the imperial mandate. He observes that, among
the virtues of Justinian, 'one shines as a star, his reverence for the
Apostolic chair, to which he has subjected and united all the churches, it
being truly the head of all; and was testified by the rules of the
fathers, the laws of the princes, and the declarations of the emperor's
piety.'

"The authenticity of the title receives unanswerable proof from the edicts
in the 'Novellae' of the Justinian code.

"The preamble of the 9th states that 'as the elder Rome was the founder of
the laws, so was it not to be questioned that in her was the supremacy of
the pontificate.'

"The 131st, on the ecclesiastical titles and privileges, chapter II.
states: 'We therefore decree that the most holy Pope of the elder Rome is
the first of all the priesthood, and that the most blessed archbishop of
Constantinople, the new Rome, shall hold the second rank after the holy
Apostolic chair of the elder Rome.'

"The supremacy of the Pope had by those mandates and edicts received the
fullest sanction that could be given by the authority of the master of the
Roman world. However worthless the motives, the act was done, authentic
and unquestionable, sanctioned by all the forms of state, and never
abrogated,--the act of the first potentate in the world. If the supremacy
over the church of God had been for man to give, it might have been given
by the unrivalled sovereignty of Justinian.

"From this era the church of Rome dates the earthly acknowledgment of her
claim. Its heavenly authority is referred to the remoter source of the
apostles."--_Apoc._, pp. 14-16, 30, 31.

The war against the Vandals was vigorously prosecuted by Belisarius,
Justinian's general, and resulted in their conquest the same year. Thus
was the second of the first ten divisions of the empire subjugated: the
second horn was plucked up.

Rome was still in possession of an Arian monarch, who was the bitter enemy
of the Catholic church. Intelligence of the success of Belisarius in
Africa reached the