The grounds of such a decision were many and various; in the first place, St. Peter himself, on whose transmitted authority the popes pretended to found their own, was not at all superior to the other apostles:--“Thou art Peter,” said indeed our Lord to him, “and on this rock will I build my church;” but he only built it upon him as he built it upon James or John. Of the church of Ephesus, it was expressly declared that it was built “upon the foundation of the _apostles_ and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner-stone.”[238] In whatever sense, therefore, Peter might be called the rock, (if indeed to Peter the expression referred, and not to Christ,) James or John might be called so too. When an apostle was to be appointed in the room of Judas, it did not fall to Peter’s province especially to choose him; when deacons were instituted, it was not exclusively by Peter that it was done; the bishop of the first and principal church after our Lord’s ascension was not Peter but James; and by James the decree touching circumcision was issued. St. Paul had no scruple in rebuking Peter to his face when he dissembled, or in asserting of himself that “he was not a whit behind the very chiefest apostles.”[239] But further, even had St. Peter been all that the church of Rome pretended, his superiority would still have been of person, not of place, and could not attach to Rome more than to Antioch; nor so much, if Rome, as some even of the earliest interpreters of Scripture affirmed, was Babylon. Moreover, whilst the commission given by our Lord to Peter, “Feed my sheep,” (which was a text put in the fore-front of the controversy by the Romanists) could be interpreted to mean the whole world was to be the Pope’s diocese, there was nothing which Scripture might not be made to mean; besides, if the Pope was St. Peter’s successor, wherein, it was asked, did the succession consist? What one thing had St. Peter like the Pope, or the Pope like St. Peter? Did St. Peter take away the keys of the kingdom of heaven; hide the treasures of God’s word; consign souls to purgatory, or release them from it at his pleasure for silver or gold; pray in an unknown tongue; carry about the sacrament with lights and bells; sell jubilees, graces, palls, bulls, pardons, indulgences? Did he call himself the head of the church, the bishop of bishops, and usurp dominion over all God’s creatures? Did he exempt himself from the power of civil government; maintain wars; set princes at variance; or sit in a chair with a purple gown and regal sceptre and diadem of gold and precious stones, and set his feet on kings’ necks? Did St. Peter, it was asked in conclusion, leave these affairs and others like them in charge to his successors from hand to hand?