Page:The Church of England, its catholicity and continuity.djvu/42

 his successors were also dead, without having accomplished very much for the furtherance of the Gospel. A fearful pestilence, called the "yellow fever," had passed over the land and carried off many of the Christians and some of the most famous Bishops. Deusdedit, the Archbishop, died of this plague. After his death the See was vacant for a couple of years. There was no Bishop in England to consecrate a successor. Two of the kings chose a man named Wighard for the See, and sent him to Rome for consecration. But he died of the plague on the way. Then it was that the Pope's usurpation began to show itself. He himself proceeded to appoint a Bishop for Canterbury. His choice fell upon Theodore of Tarsus, an old man sixty-six years of age, who had great wisdom and wide learning. It was a happy choice. "A better or a more judicious appointment," said Mr. Hore, "could not have been made." After Theodore was duly ordained and consecrated for his office he came to England, accompanied by Benedict Biscop, in the year 669.

Let us see in what way his work was an advantage to the Church of England.

Up to this time the Church in England was only a collection of so many independent Missions, without any recognized head or any centre of unity. The Celtic Church had not the capacity of organization. It could not bind the Church together into one whole. Rome excelled in this matter of organization, and Theodore had learnt the way to do it. His object, then, on coming to England was, first of all, to unite the separate Christian Missions, and to place them under one central authority. In order to carry out this object, he spent