silence as to its main design.  The Paschal question awakened little interest in the days of Polycarp, and among the topics which he discussed with Anicetus when at Rome, it confessedly occupied a subordinate position. [556:2] “When,” says Irenaeus, “the most blessed Polycarp came to Rome in the days of Anicetus, and when as to certain other matters they had a little controversy, they were immediately agreed on this point (of the Passover) without any disputation.” [557:1] What the “certain other matters” were which created the chief dissatisfaction, we are left obscurely to conjecture; but we may presume that they must have been of no ordinary consequence, when so eminent a minister as Polycarp, now verging on eighty years of age, felt it necessary to make a lengthened journey by sea and land with a view to their adjustment.  He obviously considered that Anicetus was at least influentially connected with arrangements which he deemed objectionable; and he plainly felt that he could hope to obtain their modification or abandonment only by a personal conference with the Roman pastor.  And intimations are not wanting that he was rather doubtful whether Anicetus would be disposed to treat with him as his ecclesiastical peer, for he seems to have been in some degree appeased when the bishop of the capital permitted him to preside in the Church at the celebration of the Eucharist. [557:2] This, certainly, was no extraordinary piece of condescension; as Polycarp, on various grounds, was entitled to take precedence of his Roman brother; [557:3] and the reception given to the “apostolic presbyter” was only what might have fairly been expected in the way of ministerial courtesy. [557:4] Why has it then been mentioned as an exhibition of the episcopal humility of Anicetus?  Apparently because he had been previously making some arrogant assumptions.  He had been, probably, presuming on his position as a pastor of the “new order,” and his bearing had perhaps been so offensive that Polycarp had been commissioned to visit him on an errand of expostulation.  But by prudently paying marked deference to the aged stranger; and, it may be, by giving a plausible account of some proceedings which had awakened anxiety; he appears to have succeeded in quieting his apprehensions.  That the presiding minister of the Church of Smyrna was engaged in some such delicate mission is all but certain, as the design of the journey would not otherwise have been involved in so profound secrecy.  The very fact of its occurrence is first noticed about forty years afterwards, when the haughty behaviour of another bishop of Rome provoked Irenaeus to call up certain unwelcome reminiscences which it must have suggested.