From Against Heresies, written around 180 AD:
“It is within the power of all… in every Church, who may wish to see the Truth, to contemplate clearly the Tradition of the apostles manifested throughout the whole world; and we are in a position to reckon up those who were by the apostles instituted bishops in the Churches, and [to demonstrate] the succession of these men to our own times; those who neither taught nor knew of anything like what these [heretics] rave about. …
[It] is a matter of necessity that every Church should agree with this Church [the very great, the very ancient, and universally known Church founded and organized at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul] on account of its preeminent authority…”
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