the West Arian. At
length St. Remigius baptised the Frankish chief as first-born of the Teuton
race in the Catholic faith of the Holy Trinity, and the Pope at Rome gave
utterance as a father to his joy. The end was that the schism was
terminated on the part of the bishop, the heir of the seat and the
ambition of Acacius, by the prince, by his nobles, among them the
legislator who was to be Justinian, and by 2500 bishops throughout the
East, acknowledging in distinct terms that one unique authority on which
the Popes had rested throughout the contest. They declared solemnly, in
celebrating the holiest mystery of the Christian faith, that the word of
the Lord cannot be passed over, saying, "Thou art Peter, and upon this rock
I will build My Church". They added that the course of five hundred years
had exemplified the fact "that the solidity of the Christian religion rests
entire and perfect in the Apostolic See". The rebellion of Acacius in 483
drew forth this confession from his successor, John II., in 519.

The seven successors of St. Leo stood as one man. No variation in their
language or their conduct can be found. Not so the seven successors of
Anatolius at Constantinople. That bishop, who had seen himself foiled by
the vigour and sagacity of St. Leo at the Council of Chalcedon, lived
afterwards on good terms with him, and died in 458, in his lifetime. He was
succeeded by Gennadius, who, during the thirteen years of his episcopate,
was faithful both to the creed which St. Leo had preserved and to the
dignity of the Apostolic See. He was followed by Acacius, who occupied the
see from 471 to 489. There was some quality in Acacius which gained the
favour of princes. He had charmed at once the old emperor Leo I.; but Zeno,
whose influence first made him bishop, afterwards followed all his
teaching. He had also gained a renown for orthodoxy by refusing the
attempt of Basiliscus to make the imperial will a rule of Church doctrine.
It was when his stronger mind had mastered Zeno that he began the desperate
attempt against the doctrine and discipline of the Apostolic See which has
been our chief subject. But when he died in 489, his successor Fravita at
once renounced the position which he had taken up by asking the recognition
of Pope Felix and restoring his name in the diptychs. It is true that in
his conduct he was double-dealing, and, while he sought for the Pope's
recognition, parleyed with the heretical patriarch of Ale