what do you say, if not these very words, I will ascend into heaven; I will exalt my throne above the stars of God? Are not all the bishops the clouds that pour forth the rain of instruction, and who are furrowed by the lightnings of their own good works? In despising them, my brother, and endeavouring to put them under your feet, what else do you say than that word of the ancient enemy, I will ascend above the heights of the clouds? For my part, when, through my tears, I see all this, I fear the secret judgments of God; my tears flow more abundantly; my heart overflows with lamentations, to think that my Lord John — a man so holy, of such great abstinence and humility, but now seduced by the flattery of his familiars — should have been raised to such a degree of pride that, through the lust of a wrongful title, he should endeavour to resemble him who, vaingloriously wishing to be like God, lost, because he was ambitious of a false glory, the grace of the divine resemblance that had been granted to him, and the true beatitude. Peter, the first of the Apostles, and a member of the holy and universal Church; Paul, Andrew, John — were they not the chiefs of certain nations? And yet all are members under one only head. In a word, the saints before the law, the saints under the law, the saints under grace — do they not all constitute the body of the Lord? Are they not members of the Church? Yet is there none among them who desired to be called universal. Let your Holiness consider, therefore, how much you are puffed up when you claim a title that none of them had the presumption to assume.
"You know it, my brother; hath not the venerable Council of Chalcedon conferred the honorary title of universal upon the bishops of this Apostolic See, whereof I am, by God's will, the servant? And yet none of us hath permitted this title to be given to him; none hath
