We read in the Acts of the Apostles³²⁹ that the bishops are appointed by the Holy Ghost to rule the church of God: neither this verse of Scripture, nor any other sacred text, makes mention of the pope as a universal pastor by whom all the rest are to be ordained. We should vainly seek for the slightest vestige of a bull of ordination, granted by the sovereign pontiff to the bishops of the earlier ages: for example, to St. Cyprian, St. Chrysostom, St. Basil, St. Ambrose, or St. Augustine. St. Cyprian, on the contrary, having adopted an erroneous opinion, was scarcely in communion with the pope. The Council of Nice³³⁰ directs that each diocesan bishop may be confirmed by his metropolitan or archbishop; a regulation which leaves no pretext for supposing that the bishop of Rome had, in this respect, any function to perform. Three popes of the fifth century, Zosimus, Leo the Great, and Gelasius, have spoken of the installation of prelates, claiming for the metropolitan, and for him alone, the right of investiture. Zosimus³³¹ says, that the Apostolic See itself ought to respect this prerogative of the metropolitans. That a bishop should be required by the people, elected by the clergy, consecrated by the bishops of the province, under the presidency of the metropolitan, is all that is insisted on by Leo I.³³² and lastly, Gelasius³³³ decides, that when the metropolitan is dead, it belongs to the provincial bishops to confirm and consecrate his successors. A council of Toledo in 681,³³⁴ confers the same right on the bishop of the metropolis; and this doctrine was so well established in Spain, that before the thirteenth century, the bishops of this kingdom had never applied to the pope for bulls of investiture or confirmation. ³²⁹ C. xx. v. 28. ³³⁰ Can. 4. Council. Hord. vol. 1. Col. 783. ³³¹ Epist. 7. ³³² Epist. 8. ³³³ Epist. ad Episco. Dardan. ³³⁴ Canon 6. Many authors fix the origin of this pretension of the pope in the pontificate of Alexander III, 1159, 118-1. Potestas sane vel confirm&tio pertiaebit per singulas provincias ad metropolitanum episcopum. See a like regulation in the twelfth canon of the Council of Laodicea.