Peerage of the Apostles

In the preamble of the statutes instituting the Order of St. Michael, founded in 1469 by Louis XI., the archangel is styled “my lord,” and is created a knight. The apostles had been already ennobled and knighted. We read of “the Earl Peter,” “Count Paul,” “the Baron Stephen,” and so on. Thus, in the introduction of a sermon upon St. Stephen’s Day, we have these lines:—

“Contes vous vueille la patron

De St. Estieul le baron.”

“The Apostles were gentlemen of bloude … and Christ … might, if He had esteemed of the vayne glorye of this world, have borne coat armour.”—The Blazon of Gentric.

I myself was intimate with a rector who always laid especial stress on the word Lord, applied to Jesus Christ.

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.