BmBmtmmmmmtmmmmmamimmmm—mit mm.nm., i\ , i ,. >»i »i«m » nn n Kwmeatt>i« > A. D, i to A.D, 313 ^L . / . O ? 4* f ffc* ®bw%t«| * PRINCETON, N. J. ^ M BR 165 Rnril 5 f B ? 7 18 £4 Burns, Islay, i§l7-1872 The first three Christian centuries 3 cA^w- ^U/, &VI *ALr£&5U^ I ^ a n b o n : T. NELSON AND SONS, PATERNOSTER ROW. EDINBURGH; AND NEW YORK. 1884. PRE FA CE. Y aim in the following pages has been to present, prkface. within a comparatively moderate compass, the results of the most mature investigations into the history and life of the early Church, in a form at once solid and popular, and thus to produce a work suited alike to the purposes of closet study and of general Christian edification. With this view, I have adopted the following method : First, I have excluded from the main body of the work all such minute details of theological sects and contro- versies as are necessarily unintelligible and repulsive to general readers, referring the student to a full Ap- pendix at the close, chiefly from approved writers, for ampler information on special points ; and, secondly, I have sought to enrich and enliven the meagre detail of ecclesiastical events and names with such graphic notices of Christian faith and manners, and such glimpses into the inner life of that old time, as are usually presented in a separate form, but which constitute, in truth, the very soul of Christian history. As examples of what I mean, I may refer to the account of the " Church in the Catacombs," in the third iv PREFACE. preface, chapter of the second Period ; the blending of biographical incident with the history of doctrines, in the fourth ; and the picture of Christian life and manners during the Martyr Age, in the fifth. The authorities I have chiefly used throughout, besides such original sources as were open to me, are, for general Church history, Neander, Gieseler, Kurtz, Guerike, Hase, Schaff, Alexander (New York), Merle d'Aubigne, and the other writers of the " Seances Historiques," Milman, Burton ; for doctrine-history, Hagenbach and Neander ; for Christian antiquities, Riddle and Coleman ; and for information on special points connected with the life of the early Church, Conybeare and Howson's " Life and Epistles of St. Paul," Taylor's " Ancient Christianity,'' and Bunsen's " Hippolytus and his Times," and " Analecta Ante-Nicsena." Where I have only adopted the generally received results of the best writers, I have avoided the parade of needless references ; on special matters of doubt- ful controversy, I have either quoted my authority or pointed to the sources of fuller information. On the much agitated question of the primitive form of Church government I have avoided all discussion. The catholic design of the work excluded a controversy in regard to which the great body of orthodox Protestants are so much divided, and which, besides, is much better studied in works expressly devoted to its consideration, than in a general history of the Church. In looking along the whole course of the Church's earthly life, it has seemed to me that it might be PREFACE. v most fitly arranged under the following natural periods, preface. namely : — I. The Apostolic Church (from the Advent of Christ to the death of St. John). II. The Martyr Church (from the death of St. John to the edict of Milan in a.d. 313). III. The Imperial Church (from the edict of Milan to the fall of the Western Roman Empire). IV. The Mediaeval Church (from the fall of the Western Empire to the Reformation). V. The Modern Church (from the Reformation to the present time). The present volume, it will thus be seen, embraces only a part of a larger plan; at the same time, the period to which it refers, constituting the great formative age of the Church, is a subject in itself so complete and unique, that its history may well be considered as a separate and independent whole. The Chronological Tables of ecclesiastical and contem- porary history appended to each Period, the Synoptical Chart of ante-Nicene theology, on page 287, and the Examination Questions at the close of the volume, will be acceptable to those who wish to test their knowledge, and secure a thorough mastery of the whole course of events and opinions during the first Christian centuries. I. B. CONTENTS. INTRODUCTION. THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST— PREPARATION FOR THE ADVENT. 1. In Heathenism, 2. In Judaism, ... 3. In the General Circumstances of the World, Pajje 10 17 20 PERIOD FIRST. %\n g^asiolu dUjurdj. CHAPTER I. THE BIRTH AND BAPTISM OF THE CHURCH. Bethabara and the first Disciples, Ministry of Christ, Church at time of Ascension, The Miracle of Pentecost, The Pentecostal Church, ... Early Triumphs, Martyrdom of Stephen ; Dispersion and further Extension of the Church Baptism of Cornelius, 22 23 24 26 27 29 30 31 CHAPTER II. ANTIOCH AND THE FIRST MISSIONS Antioch and its History, ... 32 First Gentile Church, 34 The First Mission, 36 Labours of St. Paul, 37 Labours of St. Peter, 38 Labours of St. John, 40 Early Heresies — Nazarenes, Ebionites, &c. 41 Traditions of other Apostles 46 James the Just at Jerusalem 47 CONTEXT*. CHAPTER III. THE CHURCH AT THE CLOSE OF THE APOSTOLIC AOE. Extent of the Church, Numerical Strength and Social Position, Constitution and Organization, Form of Worship, Psalmody, and early Hymnology, ... Preaching, Literature — Apostolic Fathers, Chronological Table I. — Ecclesiastical and Contemporary History of the First Period, ... Chronological Table II. -The Life of St. Paul, The Apostles' Creed, Page 51 52 54 55 56 58 62 64 68 71 PERIOD SECOND. CHAPTER I. THE 'PROPAGATION OF THE FAITH. Church in a.d. 160, Church in a.d. 200, Advancing Social Importance, Causes of Success, Gibbon's Secondary Causes, Different Modes of Conversion, 73 74 75 76 79 81 CHAPTER II. MARTYR TIMES. Causes of Persecution, Normal State of the Martyr Church, The " Ten Persecutions," Persecution under Nero ; Account of Tacitus, Persecution under Dornitian, Persecution under Trajan, Correspondence of Pliny and Trajan, Martyrdom of Ignatius, ... Christians under Hadrian. . . 83 87 88 88 90 91 91 92 92 viii CONTENTS. Pago Rebellion of the Jews and Second Fall of Jerusalem, ... ... 92 Persecution under Marcus Aurelius, ... ... ... ... 93 Asia Minor — Martyrdom of Polycarp, ... ... ... ... 94 Vienne and Lyons — Pothinus, Blandiua, Ponticus, Syniphorinus, ... 94 Persecution under Septimius Severus, ... ... ... ... 96 Leonidas, Potamiaena, Basilides, ... ... ... ... ... 97 Perpetua, Felicitas, &c, ... ... ... ... ... ... 97 CHAPTER III. MARTYR TIMES CONTINUED — THE CHURCH IN THE CATACOMBS. The Church under Ground, ... ... ... ... ... 100 Roma Subterranea — its Streets, Chambers, Churches, Tombs, ... 101 Persecutions under Maximinus Thrax, ... ... ... ... 110 A Long Peace, ... ... ... ... ... ... ... Ill Persecution under Decius, ... ... ... ... ... 112 The Lapsed, Classes of, ... ... ... ... ... 112 Persecutions under Uallus and Valerian, ... ... ... ... 114 Persecution under Dioclesian, ... ... ... ... ... 115 Peculiar Feature of this Persecution — Attempted Destruction of the Sacred Writings, ... ... ... ... ... ... 117 The Death-struggle, ... ... ... ... ... ... 118 Rise of Constantine and final Peace of the Church, ... ... ... 120 CHAPTER IV. THE FATHERS OF THE MARTYR AGE — BIOGRAPHY ANI> THEOLOGY OF THE ANTI-NICENE CHURCH. 1. Justin Martyr and the Christian Apologists, .. ... ... 122 2. Irenoeus and the Gnostic Controversy, ... ... ... ... 128 3. Origen and the Alexandrian School, ... ... ... ... 136 Pantsenus, Clement, ... ... ... ... ... 137 Doctrine of the Logos — The Trinitarian Controversy, ... ... 145 4. Tertullian and the Montanists, ... ... ... ... ... 147 5. Cyprian and the Doctrine of the Church, ... ... ... 159 Schism of Novatus, ... ... ... ... ... 164 Schism of Novatian, ... ... ... ... ... 167 Contest with Rome — Catholicism versus Romanism, ... ... 169 The Church System, ... ... ... ... ... 173 Other Writers of this Age, ... ... ... ... ... 176 CHAPTER V. CHRISTIAN LIFE IN THE MARTYR AGE. Characteristic Virtues — Patience, Fortitude, Brotherly Love, ... 178 Idea of the Christian Calling — Militia Christiana — The Royal Priesthood 181 Ascetic Tendencies, ... ... ... ... ... ... 184 Marriage and Family Life, ... ... ... ... .. 187 Dress, ... ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 189 CONTENTS. i* Religious Worship, Prayer, ... ... ... ... ... 190 Symptoms of Corruption, ... ... ... ... ... 195 Sacraments, ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 195 Favourite Symbols, ... ... ... ... ... ... 196 Discipline and the Catechumenate, ... ... ... ... 197 Penitential System, ... ... ... ... ... ... 199 Practical Keligious Teaching— The Atonement, &c, ... ... 200 Relation to the World and Civil Society, ... ... ... ... 206 Views of Death and the Grave — Christian and Heathen Mourning, ... 211 The Natalitia Martyrum and their commemoration, ... ... 213 Their Abuse, ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 213 Conclusion, ... ... ... ... ... ... ... 214 Chronological Table III.— Ecclesiastical and Contemporary History of the Second Period, ... ... ... ... ... ... 218 Chronological Table IV.— Bishops of Jerusalem, Antioch, Rome, and Alexandria, to the year 325, ... ... ... ... ... 230 Chronological Table V.— Councils, ... ... ... 232 APPENDIX. I. St. Peter at Rome, ... ... ... ... ... 235 II. Heretics of the Apostolic Age, ... ... ... 236 Dositheus, .. ... ... ... ... 236 Simon Magus, ... ... ... ... .. 236 Menander, ... ... ... ... .. ... 237 III. Gnostic Sects and Teachers, ... ... ... ... 237 Ebionistu and Ebionite Gnosis, ... ... ... 240 Nazarenes, ... ... ... ... ... ... 240 Ebionites, ... ... ... ... ... ... 241 Elkesaites, ... ... ... ... ... ... 241 Pseudo-Clementine System, ... ... ... ... 241 Gentile Gnosticism, ... ... ... ... ... 243 Cerinthus, ... ... ... ... ... ... 244 Basilides, ... ... ... ... ... ... 245 Valentinus, ... ... ... ... ... 246 Ophites, ... ... ... ... ... ... 247 Carpocratians, ... ... ... ... ... 248 Antitactes, ... ... ... ... ... ... 249 Saturninus, ... ... ... ... ... 249 Tatian, Bardesanes, ... ... ... ... 250 Marcion, ... ... ... ... ... 250 Hermogenes, ... ... ... ... ... 251 Maniclneism, ... ... ... ... ... 252 IV. Primitive Form of CnuRon Government, ... ... 254 Episcopacy, Presbytery, and Congregationalism— Definition of the Question at issue, ... ... ... .. 254 x CONTENTS. Page V. The Love Feast, ... ... ... ... ... 255 Connection with the Eucharist, ... ... ... 255 Origin of the Name and Custom, ... ... ... 256 Mode of Celebration, ... ... ... ... 256 Time and Place of Celebration, ... ... ... 258 Abolition of the Custom, ... ... ... ... 259 VI. The Apostolic Fathers, ... ... ... ... 259 Clemens Romanus, ... ... ... ... 259 Barnabas, ... ... ... ... ... ... 260 Hermas, 260 Ignatius, ... ... ... ... ... ... 261 Polycarp, ... ... ... ... ... ... 261 Papias, . . ... ... ... ... ... 261 Diognetus, Epistle to, ... ... ... ... 262 VII. Ignatian Epistles, ... ... ... ... ... 262 VII. Christian Apocrypha, ... ... ... ... 265 IX. Correspondence between Pliny and Trajan, ... ... 269 Inferences from, ... ... ... ... ... 273 Illustrations from Lucian, ... ... ... ... 274 X. Doctrine op tee Logos and the Holy Trinity, ... ... 275 XI. Doctrine of the Trinity before the Council of Niczea, 285 Tabular Synopsis, 287 XII. Neo-Platonism, ... ... ... 288 Plutarch, 289 Ammonius Saccas, Plotinus, Jambliclius, Proclus, ... 289 Porphyry, 289, 290 XIII. The Easter Question, ... ... ... ... 292 XIV. The Rise of Monachism and Celibacy, ... ... 293 Celibacy of the Clergy, ... ... ... .. 300 XV. Doctrine of the Lord's Supper, ... ... ... 302 XVI. The Catechumenate and the Disciplina Arcani, ... 303 XVII. Venial and Mortal Sins, ... ... ... ... 305 XVIII. The Holy Scriptures and the Canon, ... ... ... 306 XIX. Literary Opponents of Christianity, ... ... ... 309 XX. Ecclesiastical Offices and Form of Worship in the Martyr Age, 310 A Sunday Morning in a. D. 250, ... ... ... 310 Missa Catecliuinenoruin, ... ... ... ... 311 Missa Fidelium, ... ... ... ... ... 312 XXI. Symisolum Nicenum, ... ... ... ... ... 315 Examination Questions, ... ... ... ... ... 317 Index, ... ... ••• ••• ••• ■•• ••• 327 THE FIRST THREE CHRISTIAN CENTURIES. CHURCH HISTORY FROM A.D. 1 TO A.D. 313. INTRODUCTION. THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. The central point of all time and of aU history is the The cen- manifestation of the Son of God in the flesh. With his ™*££ advent closed the old world and began the new. In it the course of the ages at once reached its first great landing-place, and started on another and grander career. For that event all the past had been preparing, and from it all the future was to spring. It was the ripened fruit of the one, the pregnant and ever-fruitful germ of the other. The mysterious birth in Bethlehem's manger im- parted at last to the world's life that divine leaven which had been from the first preparing, and from that moment began that process of living and life-giving fer- mentation which has ever since been making all things new, and which will continue on from age to age until the whole is leavened. The preparation thus made for the coming of the rrepara- Saviour was twofold, and came from quarters the most advent widely separated from one another. The one was the work of heathenism, the other of Judaism ; the one of 10 THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. Intro- unaided nature under the guidance only of a general uuction. sn p er i n tending Providence, the other of renewed nature under a special and supernatural economy of grace. Human culture and divine power each contributed their part in preparing the way for a religion which, like its Author, should be at once human and divine, — a graft of heavenly and uncreated life inserted in a stock of earth. While both, however, worked together toward the same end, they did so in widely different ways. It was the function of heathenism mainly to reveal man's need — of Judaism, God's mercy. In the one we behold the creature feebly groping after the Creator, — in the other the Creator, by grand successive stages, drawing near to the creature. The one raised ever more and more terribly the great problem, — the other prepared the solution of it. The one was the cry of nature, — the other the response, waxing clearer and clearer as ages passed, of divine grace. Thus, by a mysterious and wonderful arrangement of Providence, while all over the wide field of the world the soil is being prepared for the seed, in a little spot of chosen ground the divine seed is ripening for the soil. From the day of the fall to the day of the advent, God had been preparing the world for salvation, and preparing salvation for the world. Heathen- I. The preparatory influence of Heathenism was, as we have already remarked, chiefly negative. It was important, not so much for what it found, as for what it sought for in vain. Much as it contributed, at an after stage, by its high intellectual and scientific culture to give form and system to the divinely revealed message of grace, and to aid its establishment and propagation throughout the world, it contributed nothing whatever to its discovery. All along it had been at best but a seeker after truth, but never found it. Through long and weary ages it had been in a sense " crying after knowledge, and TEE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. 11 lifting up its voice for understanding," but the answer intro- never came. It wrestled with the great problem of man's PU0TION being and destiny, but could never solve it. It looked around it on every side, and wistfully peered after some light that might illumine, or at least break the darkness, but all in vain. It questioned nature, it questioned its own heart, it questioned the dim records and legends of the past, it questioned the schools of philosophy and the shrines of oracles, but found no satisfactory response. Instead of clearer light, there was only increasing doubt, perplexity, darkness. " The world by wisdom knew not God." Far from advancing nearer to the truth, or to any fixedness and certitude of religious belief, it only receded age after age further and further from it, — sank into a lower and lower depth of moral and spiritual degradation. Speedily forgetting the few and faint remains of a primi- tive revelation which they may at first have retained, and at the same time quenching that inner light of con- science and instinctive reason which "lighteth every man," the heathen nations of antiquity seem at a very early period to have lost all practical consciousness of a living personal God, and to have sunk down to a blind and idolatrous creature worship. The world became their Nature- god, instead of the God that made the world. Nature, with all her wondrous forms of beauty, and ceaseless and mysterious stirrings of creative life, ever present before their eyes in the clear, vivid light of those bright southern climes, enchained and fascinated them — filled up the whole field of view, and instead of a pathway to lead them up to God, served only as a gorgeously coloured screen to hide from their eyes his eternal majesty. They could not but be conscious of a divine power working all around them, and pervading and quickening all things in earth, sea, and sky. In the rush of the waves, in the bursting of buds and flowers, in the hum of insect life, and in the silent and solemn courses of the stars, not to 12 THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. Intro- speak of the still more wondrous workings of their own ' spirits within, they recognised the ceaseless energy of a mysterious Presence, which they felt though they could not see. But that Presence they conceived of rather as a presence in the world, than above and beyond it. Some thought of it as one great soul of the universe, others as a multitude of spiritual powers inhabiting the different elements, and manifesting their agency in the various forms and phenomena of the world's life. The one view gave birth to pantheism, the other to polytheism, — the former the religion of the select few, the latter of the common herd. Both, however, united in identifying the Creator with his own works, and thus practically denying or ignoring his eternal power and Godhead. Popular Hence the popular deities were for the most part either mere personifications of what were called the hidden powers of nature, or idealized and deified men and women whom they had come to identify with them. The crea- tures thus of their own imagination, they were in all essential respects like themselves. The highest idea man could form of God was but the enlarged reflection of his own image. Jupiter, Juno, Venus, Diana, Apollo, are to all intents and purposes men and women, only of a larger size. If greater in power and beauty, they were greater also in passion and in crime, — at once enshrining the noblest virtues and sanctifying the foulest vices of their worshippers. Such as they were, they were multiplied endlessly. The great void of the human soul was not to be satisfied with two or three, or a thousand such deities. So there were "gods many and lords many." Every National nation had its own peculiar deities 1 and its own peculiar and favourite rites. There were the gods of Greece and the gods of Rome ; the gods of Egypt, of Phoenicia, of Assyria, 1 " Summus utrinque Inde furor vulgo, quod numina vicinorum Odit uterque locus, quum solos credat habendos Esse decs, quos ipse colit." — Juv. Sat., xv. 35. THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. 13 of Persia, and of every other people and tribe throughout intro- the world. There were gods, too, of the hills and of the DPCTI0M plains ; gods of the sea and of the land ; gods of the Local forest and of the fountain ; gods celestial, terrestrial, and infernal ; till the whole sphere of conscious existence seemed to teem with unseen powers of beneficent or malignant agency, before which the enthralled spirit bowed in worship, or cowered in superstitious alarm. Such was the religion of the multitude, of the great bulk and body of the people, even in the most enlight- ened nations of antiquity. In the midst of these, how- Religion ever, there were ever found wiser and deeper spirits, of the few whose inward hungerings after truth could not be satisfied with such husks. Hence the long and illustrious line of those who all claimed, and some of them well deserved, the name of the " lovers of wisdom." Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, were only a few out of a great multitude of such seekers ; a bright and conspicuous constellation amid thousands of other lesser stars. It seemed at one time as if their weary search were about to be crowned with success ; as if the true wisdom, wooed so long, were to be won at last. Socrates, the wisest and the best of socrat.es, heathen sages, approached so near the gate of truth, that 399" ° he may be said almost to have stood on its threshold. By the lowly sense of his own ignorance, by .his striving after self-knowledge, by his dependence on a higher inspiration for all his deepest thoughts and truest impulses, by his sublime resignation and calm hope of a future life, he seemed almost to catch the spirit of the gospel, while remaining ignorant of its distinctive truths. Plato, his illustrious pupil and successor, took, intellectu- riato, ob ally at least, a still higher flight. With a genius at once B ' c 343- poetic and keenly speculative, he gathered together the scattered elements of thought inherited from his master, and combining them with the fruits of his own original meditation, formed them into a sublime system of uni- !4 THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. intbc- versal philosophy, which must ever be regarded as the cpotion. jjjgjjggf; effort of the unassisted human mind in the search after religious truth, and the nearest approach ever made by heathenism toward the ideas and the spirit of the coming salvation of God. He taught the soul of man to realize its own immortal nature and its essential rela- tionship with the divine, placed the highest good in union and communion with God, discoursed of another and higher world beyond the veil of time and sense, in which dwelt the perfect and eternal archetypes of all that is good and beautiful and true here below, and called the forlorn and sense-imprisoned spirit to aspire towards that bright region as its true, though forsaken home. There was something in all this, and generally in the lofty and ethereal tone of his whole philosophy, that was in unison with the spirit of Christianity, and which was at least fitted to prepare men's minds for the conception of that unseen kingdom of spiritual and immortal life, "which eye had not seen, nor ear heard, neither had entered into the heart of man." Such were the highest results of heathen speculation, the richest and ripest fruits of the long and toilsome search after wisdom. At best they were only "guesses at truth," and could never impart to the soul any certainty of knowledge, any assured conviction of unseen realities. They were bright and glorious dreams ; and, like dreams, very vivid and real, doubtless, for the moment, to the lofty spirits whom they visited ; but, like dreams too, thin and unsubstantial. To Plato succeeded Aristotle, Aristotle with keen logical faculty and metaphysical acumen, and while adding little to the substance of truth, contributed a method of investigation and study which has descended as an inheritance to all after time, and tended more to mould the entire form of human thought than any other influence whatsoever. But he was the last of the truly great heathen sages. With him expired the last bright gleam of ancient philosophy and wisdom. ob. 322. TEE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. 15 Henceforth the course of human thought was incessantly intro- downward. With the loss of their civil liberty and DD _!!1° N ' national life, which took place about this time, the Greeks seem rapidly to have lost also whatever was strong, ear- nest, and real in their intellectual and moral life. Philo- sophy, always hostile to the existing forms of religious faith, became more and more cold, sceptical, and godless, phiioso- and gradually divided the world of speculation into three phlc sect3 schools, each one of which seemed more removed from the truth than the other. There was first the frivolous and sensual Epicurean, 1 regarding pleasure as the highest Epicu- good, tracing the world and all human things to the reans ' blind play of chance, robbing the soul of its immortality, and God of all interest in or care for the world, and thus turning human life into a mere animal and sensuous existence but a degree removed above the beasts of the field. Then there was the cold and iron-hearted Stoic, 2 stoics wrapt up in the pride of his own independent and self- sufficing strength, resolving all things into a stern and unalterable fate, to which, when he can no longer resist, he calmly and grandly bends, despising pleasure, despising pain, despising life itself, except so long as it may be held with honour, and when no longer worth the keep- ing, throwing it away by a voluntary self-destruction, — the true religion of strong Roman hearts in an age of degradation and despair, and when nothing remained of their ancient glory but the proud spirit and the stern unbending will. And then, lastly, went forth the darkest and vilest spirit of all, a vain, frivolous, heartless scepti- sceptics. cism, 3 which had its rallying point in the new academy, but which more and more infected with its spirit the whole world of ancient speculation and thought. Scoff- ing at all truth, denying the possibility of any certainty of moral or religious knowledge, it placed the highest 1 School founded by Epicurus, ob. B.C. 271. " School founded by Zeno, ob. B.C. 260. * School founded by Arcesilaus, ob. B.C. 240; and ^arneades, ob. 128. 16 THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. Intro- wisdom in the studious avoidance of care, and in the ' tranquil enjoyment of the present moment, reckless of the future. Thus, amid the contests and vain janglings of the other schools, there was gradually opening up beneath their feet a great gulph of absolute unbelief, which, yawning wider and wider from age to age, threat- ened at last to swallow up utterly whatever was sound Moral cor- and true in the world's life in its black abyss. 1 Mean- ruptIon ' while with the decay of religious belief, the moral life of the people continued age after age to sink to a lower and still lower depth of degradation and corruption. The strong, though rude natural virtues of early times had expired and given place to a civilization which, to all the vices of savage life, united a refined licentiousness peculiarly its own. Family purity, female honour, mutual faith and truth, and all those other ties which bind society together, perished in one wide deluge of cruelty, licentiousness, and shameless abandonment, realizing at last, in all its darkest lines, the picture drawn from the life by an apostle's master-hand : " Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and four-footed beasts, and creeping things. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient : being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, in- ventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, without understanding, covenant -breakers, without natural affec- 1 " Esse aliquid manes et subterranea regna, Et contum, et Stygio ranas in gurgite nigras, Atque una transire vadum tot millia cymba Nee pueri credunt, nisi qui nonduro fere lavantur." Juv. Sat., ii 150. THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. 17 fcion, implacable, unmerciful : who, knowing the judg- intro- ment of God, that they which commit such things, are U J"L ' worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them" (Rom. i. 22, 23, 28-32). Thus by its very misery and utter hopelessness of self- deli- verance, no less than by its former yearnings and faint dreams of better days, did that old heathenism become, in a sad sense, as the "voice of one crying in the wilderness, Pre- pare ye the way of the Lord; make his paths straight." It was at the very moment when the world was ripe either for destruction or a divine redemption, that the Great Restorer appeared. II. In passing now from heathenism to Judaism, we Judaism enter at once into a new world. Dark and dim as that old covenant was, compared with that better dispensation that was to succeed it, it was as the noonday light itself compared with the deep gloom that covered the earth all around. " From the world of polytheistic religion, we pass into the sanctuary of monotheism; from the sunny halls where nature and men are deified, to the solemn temple of Jehovah, the only true God, of whose glory all nature is but a feeble ray, and who maketh the earth his footstool." It is in truth not so much a mere preparation for the coming salvation, as that salvation itself in an embryo and rudimentary form. Beneath the rough rind of the law was already hid that divine gospel seed which was to be the germ of new life to the world. Even the great spiritual ideas and new-creative truths which were proclaimed and, as it were, embodied in Christianity, and which constitute its chief strength and glory, existed in embryo, and were to a certain extent developed in Juda- ism. The unity of God ; his universal and eternal pro- vidence; the sanctity of law; the reality of sin; the necessity of expiation, repentance, pardon, redemption; above all, the hope burning on from age to age, and wax- 2 18 THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. Intro- ing brighter and brighter as darker night settled down on duotion. ^.| ie wor j ( j j f a divine Deliverer and King, who should arrest the powers of evil, and usher in a blessed reign of righteousness and peace; — all united to form a system, which was not so much superseded as consummated and crowned in the great mystery of the Cross. In the dark- Messianic est times, that religion never died wholly out from the heart of the chosen people. On the contrary, affliction, exile, oppression, massacre, and iron servitude, only served to burn that great hope of the nation into their very hearts, and render it more than ever an inseparable and indestructible element of their life. From the time of the captivity downwards, and especially during those last sad years which immediately preceded the birth of Christ, the Jewish people were more intensely Jewish, and more thoroughly pervaded with Messianic hopes and longings than ever. These hopes and longings, indeed, were in the minds of most sadly perverted and confused. The promised kingdom of righteousness had been degraded into a mere earthly dream of political supremacy and glory. Persecution, too, especially under the savage Epi- phanes and the iron yoke of Rome, had driven the nation mad, and communicated a peculiar bitterness to their na- tional feelings, and a dark exclusiveness and proud defiant bigotry to their religion till then unknown. Hated and scorned of all men, they hated and scorned in turn, and came more and more to anticipate the coming day of redemption rather as a day of vengeance to their enemies than of salvation to the world. Practical religion, too, had sunk into sad decrepitude. The living unity of the Church and nation had been broken up into a plurality of sects. Pharisaism, Sadduceeism, Esseneism, in their mutually repellent antagonism, had taken the place of Pharisa- the one holy nation and peculiar people. The Pharisee, — standing alone in his self-righteous and self-sufficient pride, the very impersonation of lifeless formalism and exclusive THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. 10 bigotry, muttering his prayers, multiplying his fastings, intro- flaunting his broad phylacteries, heaping up ordinances, DD ^ N ' rites, and ceremonies of empty bodily service, making clean the outside of the cup and the platter, while the inner part remained impure, — was the poor petrifaction of traditional religion of which the living soul was gone. Then there was the cold and sceptical Sadducee, the true sadciucee Jewish epicurean and rationalist, divorced in heart and 1S ' soul alike from the great traditions and glorious hopes of his nation, believing neither in angels, nor spirits, nor resurrection, nor in anything else great and earnest either in earth or heaven, bent on taking the world easy, wor- shipping the ruling powers, and leaving the future to take its course. Then, finally, there was the mystic and contemplative Essene, a sort of Jewish ascetic monk, Essene- morbidly groaning over the evils of the times, despairing lsm ' of remedy, and so fleeing to the desert waste to escape from a world which they could not hope to mend. Meanwhile here and there all over the land, and even perhaps among some of those who were more or less infected with the perverted tendencies to which we have referred, there were select souls, who, in a true sense, though with dim and imperfect views, were waiting for "the consolation of Israel;" men of humble faith, and prayer, and meditative study of the holy word, who, while bravely discharging present duty and improving present means, were looking and longing for better things to come. Such were the Simeons, the Zachariahs, the Annas, the Elizabeths, the Marys of the early gospel dawn, who first, though beneath a dark disguise, recognised the King of glory, and first welcomed him to their hearts. These were the true blossom and crown of the Old Tes- tament Church. In these it reached at once its consum- mation and its second birth, at the same moment expir- ing and awakening to newness of life, in spirit like that of him who cried, " Lord, now lettest thou thy servant 20 THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. Intro- depart in peace, for mine eyes have seen thy Salva- DUOTIOK. ti()n » Thus, alike in Heathenism and in Judaism, was the way prepared for the advent of the Prince of Peace. The one, by its forlorn misery and inarticulate yearnings, — the other, by its longing hopes and prayers, — were crying out together for the great Restorer, the Desire of all nations. The whole world was in expectation, as if intently listen- ing to catch his approaching footsteps, when the angelic song announced to the Jewish shepherds his birth, and the star shone forth in heaven to guide the distant sages to his feet. state cf Meanwhile, everything in the outward state of the the world. wor i^ an( j y ie nations marvellously conspired to further the great design. The whole world was then included within the limits of one universal empire. Everywhere, from the banks of the Euphrates to the shores of the Atlantic, from the German Rhine to the Egyptian Nile, there was nothing but Rome. There was one sceptre, one law, and more and more one form of civilization and of social life. The barriers of nations were broken down, and a freedom and facility of intercourse existed between the most distant regions and tribes, such as had not been known from the beginning of the world. The great trunk lines of Roman traffic were thus the ready- made channels of new ideas, and the veins and arteries destined to convey the fresh life-blood that was about to be infused into the world. In a great measure, too, there was but one language. By a remarkable arrangement of Providence, as the result of a train of circumstances beginning with the victories of Alexander the Great and reaching downward to this time, the language of Greece, the richest and most expressive form of speech that ever lived on human tongue, had become the spoken language of the educated classes throughout the whole Roman THE WORLD BEFORE CHRIST. 21 empire — thus, as it were, reversing in behalf of God's intro- great design that judgment of the confusion of tongues DD f^ K that had been sent to defeat the perverse designs of man. With this was combined another circumstance, perhaps even more remarkable. As the Greek language was everywhere, so also was the Jewish nation. By means of their frequent captivities and dispersions, they had become at last in great measure cosmopolitized, and were found domesticated in scattered colonies of greater or less extent over the entire. Roman world. In every consi- derable town and city of the empire there was thus a Jewish synagogue, Jewish worship, and a mixed con- gregation of native Jews and Gentile proselytes. Thus at once was the light of the old covenant more widely diffused, and a starting-point prepared for the introduc- tion of the new. Everywhere the synagogue was the cradle of the Church — the train already laid, along which the living fire might run. Thus, in this sense too, the Jaw and the prophets prepared the way and heralded the coming of the Lord. And, last of all, it was a time of universal peace. " The whole earth was quiet and at rest." The temple of Janus was shut. The political atmosphere was still and undisturbed, — fit prelude to His coming, whose gentle influence, like dew of summer night, descends most freely in the holy silence of the calm, ^xpectant heart. 22 THE BIRTH AND BAPTISM OF THE CHURCH. PERIOD FIRST. THE CHURCH OP THE APOSTLES. FROM A.D. 1 TO A.D. 100. CHAPTER I. THE BIRTH AND BAPTISM OF THE CHURCH. A.D. 1 TO A.D. 42. period j T was a fc Bethabara, beyond Jordan, amid the wild soli- FIRST. J — tudes of the J udean desert that the Church of Christ was ti S t. born. From amid the solemn and awe-struck crowds that thronged around the last prophet of the law, went forth the first disciples of the gospel. The Forerunner prepared the way for the Saviour; the bright day-star of the new and better covenant first heralded the dawn, and then vanished amid its glory. The voice of the messenger that went before to prepare His way was still sounding in the ears of the expectant people, when the Lord, whom he proclaimed and they sought, suddenly came to his temple — the living temple of those true hearts whom God's secret grace had made ready to wel- come him. The preaching of repentance thus fitly ushered in the preaching of peace — the sharp probing of legal conviction, the healing balm of grace. Already had the Baptist administered to his august Successor that signi- ficant rite which was to him the solemn investiture of his office; and then, having discharged that last grand act of his introductory ministry, prepared to quit the scene. Henceforth he must decrease, that his Master THE BIRTH AND BAPTISM OF THE CHURCH. 23 may increase. The friend of the Bridegroom must drop chapter into the shade, and hide behind his Lord. An oppor- I- tunity soon presents itself of thus gracefully surrendering A - D - 1_42 - his trust. One day, soon after the wondrous scene at the Jordan, he is standing with two of his disciples, doubtless conversing of the things of that eternal king- dom of which he testifies, and specially, perhaps, of that divine inward cleansing without which none can enter within its pale, when a mysterious stranger passes by. John looks suddenly up, and pointing with his hand., exclaims, " Behold the Lamb of God." It was a word spoken in season, and instantly produced its effect. " The two disciples heard John speak, and the}' followed Jesus," passing at once within the circle of that divine attraction from which they never afterwards escaped. The name of one of these disciples is one well known to us. It First