to the public ear; and it therefore required to be interpreted by the more ancient designation.  Could we tell when this work of Hermas was written, we could also perhaps name the very year when the president of the eldership was first called bishop. [551:3] It is now pretty generally admitted that the author was no other than the brother of Pius of Rome, [551:4] the immediate successor of Hyginus, so that he wrote exactly at the time when, as appears from other evidences, the transition from presbytery to prelacy actually occurred.  His words furnish a very strong, but an undesigned, attestation to the novelty of the episcopal regimen.

X. But, perhaps, the most pointed, and certainly the most remarkable testimony to the fact that a change took place in the constitution of the Roman Church in the time of Hyginus is furnished from a quarter where such a voucher might have been, least of all, anticipated.  We allude to the Pontifical Book.  This work has been ascribed to Damasus, the well-known bishop of the metropolis of the West, who flourished in the fourth century, but much of it is unquestionably of later origin; and though many of its statements are apocryphal, it is often quoted as a document of weight by the most distinguished writers of the Romish communion. [552:1] Its account of the early popes is little better than a mass of fables; but some of its details are evidently exaggerations, or rather caricatures, of an authentic tradition; and a few grains of truth may be discovered here and there in a heap of fictions and anachronisms.  This part of the production contains one brief sentence which has greatly puzzled the commentators, [552:2] as it is strangely out of keeping with the general spirit of the narrative, and as it contradicts, rather awkwardly, the pretensions of the popedom.  According to this testimony, Hyginus “ARRANGED THE CLERGY AND DISTRIBUTED THE GRADATIONS.” [552:3] Peter himself is described by Romanists as organizing the Church; but here, one of his alleged successors, upwards of seventy years after his death, is set forth as the real framer of the hierarchy. [553:1] The facts already adduced prove that this obscure announcement rests upon a sound historical foundation, and that it vaguely indicates the alterations now introduced into the ecclesiastical constitution.  If Hilary and Jerome be employed as its interpreters, the truth may be easily eliminated.  At a synod held in Rome, Hyginus brought under the notice of the meeting the confusion and scandal created by the movements of the errorists; and, with a view to correct these disorders, the council agreed to invest the moderator of each presbytery with increased authority, to give him a discretionary power as the general superintendent of the Church, and to require the other elders, as well as the deacons, to act under his advice and direction.  A new functionary was thus established, and, under the old name of bishop or overseer, a third order was virtually added to the ecclesiastical brotherhood.  Hence Hyginus, who, no doubt, took a prominent part in the deliberations of the convocation, is said to have “arranged the clergy and distributed the gradations.”