Here is another declaration which confirms what the preceding and
many other passages establish in so convincing a manner. Not having
discovered a single text of the New Testament which told in favour
of purgatory; but, on the contrary, having observed and meditated on
those which I have quoted, and many other equally opposed to this
doctrine, I was fully persuaded that it never had been thought of by
the writers of the Gospel. You may easily believe, my dear children,
that this discovery in no way tended to strengthen the bonds which
held me to the Romish church, nor to confirm me in their faith.

Still, however, I was dissatisfied, and still longed to know
positively _from whence_ the priests had derived their vain system.
This desire filled my mind for some days, and at last it struck me
that _the Pope_ must have been the inventor of it. I then naturally
began to wish to discover _who_ the Pope was, and what right he had
to impose such a doctrine. I had often read and heard, both in
conversation and from the pulpit, that St. Peter was the chief and
head of the Apostles; that he had been the first pope at Rome; and
that all succeeding popes had inherited his rights and prerogatives.

I conceived a wish to know what the New Testament said upon this
subject, and I immediately undertook a second perusal of it; in the
same state of mind as before, that is to say, absorbed by one sole
object, and having nothing in view but to find out whether St. Peter
had really been set over all the other apostles, and placed at Rome as
head of all the churches.

This examination, which was pursued with a degree of attention of
which I should now be scarcely capable, ended in convincing me that
the supremacy of St. Peter was no better established by the New