to take precedence of elders who only ruled, had always been permitted to act as moderator; but, on the ground of the new arrangement, the pastor probably began to assume an authority over his session which he had never hitherto ventured to exercise.  In the beginning of the reign of Antoninus Pius the number of towns with several Christian congregations must have been but small; and if five or six leading cities approved of the system now inaugurated at Rome, its general adoption was thus secured.  The statements of Jerome and Hilary attest that the matter was submitted to a synod; and the remarkable interregnum which followed the death of Hyginus can be best accounted for on the hypothesis that meanwhile the ministers of the great metropolis found it necessary to consult the rulers of other influential and distant Churches.  If the measure had the sanction of these foreign brethren, they were of course prepared to resort to it at home on the demise of their presiding presbyter.  Heretics were now disturbing the Church all over the Empire, so that the same arguments could be everywhere used in favour of the new polity.  We find, too, that there was a vacancy in the presidential chair at Antioch about the time of the death of Hyginus; and that, in the course of the next year, a similar vacancy occurred at Alexandria. [555:2] If the three most important Churches then in Christendom, with the sanction of a very few others of less note, almost simultaneously adopted the new arrangement, the question was practically settled.  There were probably not more than twenty cities to be found with more than one Christian congregation; and places of inferior consequence would speedily act upon the example of the large capitals.  But unquestionably the system now introduced gradually effected a complete revolution in the state of the Church.  The ablest man in the presbytery was commonly elevated to the chair, so that the weight of his talents, and of his general character, was added to his official consequence.  The bishop soon became the grand centre of influence and authority, and arrogated to himself the principal share in the administration of all divine ordinances.

When this change commenced, the venerable Polycarp was still alive, and there are some grounds for believing that, when far advanced in life, he was induced to undertake a journey to Rome on a mission of remonstrance.  This view is apparently corroborated by the fact that his own Church of Smyrna did not now adopt the new polity; for we have seen [556:1] that, upwards of a quarter of a century after his demise, it still continued under presbyterial government.  Irenaeus was obviously well acquainted with the circumstances which occasioned this extraordinary visit of Polycarp to Rome; but had he not come into collision with the pastor of the great city in the controversy relating to the Paschal Feast, we might never have heard of its occurrence.  Even when he mentions it, he observes a mysterious